This is one episode in the continuous storyline of my Merlin season 6, so you have to read the other episodes before this one. I know it seems like a lot but I promise it's not that bad. Start with my alternate S5E13 ending, then it'll link you to my season 6 episode 1. Here's the link to 5:13 alternate:
www,fanfiction,net/s/10568694/1/The-Diamond-of-the-Day-Part-2-Alternate-ending
replace the commas with periods to make it work. :)
To my frequent flyers, you may note that this is a revised version of part one of this episode. I've never reposted a first chapter before, so we'll see how well it works. I may have to mess around with it for a whole, so please be patient with me. :)
PLEASE DON'T READ THIS UNTIL YOU'VE READ THE EPISODES I WROTE TO PRECEDE IT. Thanks!
Kay was having an unusual day.
He couldn't decide whether it was a bad day or a good day; it felt like a good day, but it had put him in a bad mood. A lot of great things were going on today. Merlin had visited him that morning and presented him with a professionally-made quarterstaff he'd found in the armory, and Katera was at the stable helping him feed the horses because the queen had let her off work early.
Given those facts, one would expect him to be having a good day, but a lot of unfortunate things had occurred, as well. On the way to work he had slipped in a heap of manure some heifer had left in the street, so one of the boots he'd bought hardly a month ago, which he'd been hoping would last him a couple of years, was already in bad condition. One of the feed bins in the royal wing of the stable had been empty, so he'd had to run down to the marketplace, but the treasury worker he was supposed to be able to ask for money for stable needs had given him a hard time about it. Then that extra trip had put him behind and he'd been late for his lunch break. The list went on; it really hadn't been a good day.
Now that Terra was here, he was trying to put all that behind him and get in a good mood, but it wasn't working because a group of knights were loitering by their horses' stalls; one of them – Kay was pretty sure he'd heard King Arthur refer to him as Sir Gwaine – was obviously drunk, and he kept making eyes at Terra.
Kay had nothing against that group of knights; they were Arthur's inner circle of friends, he knew, and enviably good swordsmen. They usually seemed like a decent crowd, too, and he'd gotten to know Sir Mordred in person on the journey back to Camelot after Arthur and Mordred had rescued Kay, Terra and Merlin from the slavers. He'd spoken with Sir Leon a few times regarding stabling arrangements, since Leon was the Captain of the Guard. Even Gwaine had exchanged friendly words with him in passing once or twice. But right now the bearded knight was managing to get on all Kay's most sensitive nerves, and the stablehand was itching to put him in his place.
The knights were sharing a dish of cherries fresh from the orchard; every now and then one of them would toss a cherry in the air and one of the others would take a swing at it with his sword. Their accuracy was impressive; three times out of four they at least tipped the cherry, if not split neatly through it. Gwaine's tipsy grin every time he sent two cherry halves spinning apart in midair was serving to aggravate Kay even more.
They'd been at it for a few minutes when Kay finished mucking the stalls and headed down the aisle with a wheelbarrow full of manure to dispose of. Courtesy of Gwaine, a fragment of cherry landed in his wheelbarrow as he passed the knights; he scowled, muttering, "At least you can do something with a sword, pretty boy."
"Why thank you." Gwaine flashed an oversized smile.
"My pleasure." Kay returned the smile icily. "Even you're good for something, I guess, even if it's only looking pretty."
"There are worse things to be good for." Gwaine's smile was unfazed. "For instance, hauling dung."
"Gwaine," Mordred murmured, but the other knights made no move to intercede as the tension built. They all knew Kay was out of his place; a stablehand who insulted a knight deserved to be disciplined one way or another.
Kay felt both his feet on firm ground, though; this being Camelot, he knew he wasn't in danger of being executed, jailed, or even fired. The dung jab had stung him; he came back with a cold smirk, commenting, "At least I can work like an actual man. Pretty boys like you haven't ever even gotten your hands dirty."
Gwaine's smile faded into a deep scowl. "Don't pretend you know anything about me."
"Please." Kay snorted. "I know your type. Your father was a knight and he never did a day of real hard labor in his life, and he raised you just like him."
Mordred cleared his throat loudly, but the damage was done. That had been a barb in the wrong place for Gwaine, who was already off from his usual laidback temperament thanks to the amount of mead he'd had. He took a step toward Kay, growling, "If you mention my father one more time, I'll have satisfaction from you – stableboy or not. Got that, one-eye?"
References to his eyepatch usually didn't bother Kay, but that one did by virtue of the person it was coming from. Kay stepped closer; now the two of them were nose to nose, glowering into each other's eyes from inches away as he questioned with a hard smile, "Are you challenging me to a duel, pretty boy?"
"I'm not going to duel a servant." Gwaine snorted. "What are you going to do, throw dung at me?"
"Maybe." Kay grinned. "I bet your daddy bought you that sword, though. It would be a shame to get manure all over it."
Gwaine stepped back, his face set; clearly he was resolved not to let the stablehand's taunts get under his skin.
Just then Terra arrived on the scene, frowning. "Is everything alright over here?"
Gwaine treated her to his best dazzling smile. "Everything's fine. You just stand there and look beautiful, sweetheart."
That was exactly the wrong move to make, unless he was trying to escalate Kay's temper. Gwaine's smile darkened when Kay snapped, "You probably can't do anything with that sword except chop up cherries."
"I wouldn't bet on that if I were you." Gwaine gritted.
"Yeah? What are you, daddy's little swordsman?" Kay put the finishing touch on his efforts to infuriate the knight. "Prove it, then. Make daddy proud!"
"Kay . . ." Terra began.
Gwaine glanced appealingly at Leon. "Give him your sword."
"What, you're going to duel Arthur's servant?" The Captain of the Guard demanded.
"Arthur's servant has a name." Terra informed him.
Leon raised an eyebrow at her. "You and your brother are a touchy pair, aren't you?"
Gwaine tipped his head as if considering the question that had been put to him, then answered brusquely, "Yes, I'm going to duel Arthur's servant."
"He's got it coming," Percival pointed out. "Technically he could go in the stocks for this, so Gwaine's letting him off easy."
"I'm not going to injure him." Gwaine rolled his eyes. "I'll disarm him, alright?"
Leon didn't put up much of an argument; with a sigh, he drew his sword and presented it to Kay.
The redheaded stablehand lifted his palms in front of him. "That's not my style." He jerked his head over his shoulder to where he had left the quarterstaff Merlin had given him leaning against the wall. "Mine's back there. Do you mind?"
"Make it quick." Gwaine's tone clearly stated that he thought Kay was making excuses to avoid the duel. His eyebrows rose when the stablehand returned a moment later with his quarterstaff. "You're going to fight me with a broomstick?"
"It's a quarterstaff." Kay shrugged. "Like I said, we're all good at something."
"Have it your way." Gwaine mirrored the shrug, then added with a grin, "May the best man win."
"I will." Kay assured him coldly.
Gwaine shot an indignant look at Katera as she and the other knights backed away to give the combatants space. "He just stole my line!"
Without warning, the quarterstaff flicked up, ramming into Gwaine's stomach. The knight doubled over, wheezing; Kay spun the staff and brought it cracking down across the back of his opponent's neck. He drew back, watching Gwaine keenly.
The knight sprang into action suddenly; startled by the ferocity of the attack, Kay fell back, parrying a shower of blows with his staff. It took him a second to recover – then he got in an extra blow between blocks, slamming the staff into the knight's ribcage. Gwaine recoiled with a grunt, but as Kay brought his staff around for another blow the knight turned it aside with his sword and went for a stab at the younger man's chest.
Kay leaped back, sweeping the broomstick across and hitting the back of Gwaine's sword hand and arm. He followed up swiftly, stabbing the end of the staff at the side of the knight's knee. Given full power, a blow like that could knock bones out of alignment or break the leg, but Kay was wiser than to seriously injure the knight; as it was, the knee merely buckled.
Gwaine shouted in angry pain and moved in, his swordpoint everywhere. Kay gave ground, getting in a blow of his own here and there but still being forced back. His weapon could strike without causing serious injury; should Gwaine's sword strike him, though, he could be critically wounded.
The thing to do was to disarm his opponent, Kay realized. He acted on the thought instantly; lunging in, he slammed the end of his staff through Gwaine's guard and brought it across the knight's face, fracturing his nose, then across his upper arm, sending stabs of pain down to Gwaine's sword hand. He brought the staff down hard on Gwaine's forearm as it stretched out to land a backhanded slash across his ribs. The blow was knocked sideways, laying open the knuckles of Kay's leading hand.
After an instant of maneuvering, Kay brought the knight's sword down toward the floor. He stamped on Gwaine's sword blade, pinning it down, but was taken by surprise when, instead of trying to pull his weapon away, the knight let go of it and tackled Kay, slamming both of them back into the wall.
At this proximity, Kay's staff was useless. Hand to hand combat wasn't exactly his forte; Gwaine had a definite advantage now.
As the knight's fist snapped his head back, Kay pushed off from the wall, sending the pair of them reeling across the hall, gripping each other furiously. They crashed to the ground; Gwaine was on top, blood streaming from his nose. He managed to plant a knee on Kay's left arm, growling, "Don't ever talk about my father like you know anything about him!"
Before he could take advantage of his position, huge hands were hauling him upright. Kay leaped to his feet to continue the attack, but Terra was there, jumping in front of him and pushing him back. At the same time, another pair of hands caught him by the arms, immobilizing him.
Percival had been the one to seize Gwaine. He shook the smaller man, speaking to him angrily, but Kay wasn't listening. He stopped struggling, startled that things had gotten out of hand so quickly. The whole fight had taken less than fifteen seconds.
As the two opponents relaxed, the other knights let go of them. Percival steered Gwaine toward the door, handing him something to staunch the blood flowing from his nose. Mordred turned toward Kay and Terra, telling them apologetically, "He's not usually that touchy. He's just had too much to drink."
"Kay's not usually that touchy, either." Terra told him, shooting a fierce scowl at her brother. "I really don't know what's wrong with him."
Kay retrieved his quarterstaff from where he'd dropped it. "He was asking for it."
Mordred glanced over his shoulder toward the other knights, who were following Gwaine and Percival toward the courtyard, before telling Kay quietly, "You're the one that picked that fight, not Gwaine. You shouldn't have taken advantage of his being drunk like that – of course he's not himself. Gwaine normally would never act the way he just did. But he was drunk; what's your excuse?"
A/N: I rewrote this part because Gwaine was really OOC in my original version, but I think he's still OOC in this segment. What do you guys think? If you think he was kind of OOC, any suggestions on how to improve that would be welcome. My other concern is that Kay comes off as kind of a jerk, even though he's really just a kind of hot-headed guy (literally and figuratively, since he's a redhead :) ). Let me know if he seems jerk-ish. And of course if he was, I'm open to suggestions on how to fix that, too.
Also, PLEASE REVIEW! Seriously, giving feedback, even if it's just a sentence, is the most rewarding thing you can do for a writer. Additionally, the reviews are what give me steam to keep working on this; I've had my whole Merlin project on a back burner for a few months, but someone discovered my S5:E13 alternate ending and left me several reviews, and that got me motivated to get back to work on it (thanks, Denise! :D). So seriously, please review - it might just be what makes me post the next part, and that's what you want, right? :)
It's summer now and school's out, so I'm really hoping I'll be able to power through some stuff and make up for lost time (I know I haven't updated in too long...).
