A/N: I still don't own this.
Percival had been admittedly distracted with talking with Lancelot when it had started. And because of that, he cursed, he'd been slow to react.
They're been a yell and thud from behind and Gwaine had yelled, "Merlin!" and Lancelot, reacting faster than him, had yelled "Ambush!" and while he was trained to react quickly, he had to admit his confusion had caused him to pause for a second. Perhaps a second to long.
An arrow had sailed into the tree next to him and he'd been shocked into action.
"Take cover!" Arthur had yelled, and then their attackers had revealed themselves, most of them having swords not crossbows.
Unlike the rest of them though, he didn't draw his own. Merlin had been hurt, apparently, and he had to make sure his friend was well.
Merlin looked awful.
Oh gods, he'd wanted to yell, oh gods please don't be dead.
Merlin was crumpled under his horse, and there was so much blood. The horse was dead. Merlin, he'd prayed, was not.
With Lancelot covering them, he had reached under Merlin's arms and pulled him from under the horse, thankful the mud was soft enough for him to do so.
Hidden behind an oak, one he happily leant Merlin against, he could finally check on the smaller man.
Eyes met his, unfocused and half-lidded, but aware none the less.
His shoulders dropped with a smile flitting onto his lips before the sounds of battle echoes out again. He saw more and more bandits emerging. They'd soon be over run.
"Are you alright?"
They weren't winning the fight; he'd need to be ready to escape.
"I... I think so."
It wasn't good and he wasn't sure Merlin was telling the truth, but they had no time.
Eventually, they had been overwhelmed. He wondered whether he should've been fighting instead, but it was too late for that now.
He and the other knights were stripped of their weapons and bags, meaning they were completely at their enemies' mercy. Merlin was torn from his grasp and shoved to the ground, where he failed to rise again.
"Merlin!"
There was far too much blood.
Percival wasn't too focused on Merlin to notice Gwaine being knocked out by the bandits after fighting a little too hard for their tastes, or perhaps it was the obscenities he was yelling.
Did he really think they were being discrete?
He knew that there was more than a friendship between Merlin and Gwaine. He wasn't going to mention it before they did, but he wasn't blind. But now it meant two of his friends were unconscious and that made any escape that much more difficult.
They were led for hours through the forest before they stopped in a clearing. Merlin and Gwaine were dumped by the brutes that had been carrying them.
The trees rustled and maybe 60 men emerged to surround them, led by a man wearing far finer clothes than his companions, red formalwear with silver embroidery and embellishments.
"Swefe." (Sleep).
He didn't feel the earth as he hit it.
.
.
.
Gwaine woke with a pounding headache.
He remembered the heart-wrenching panic when Merlin had vanished from beside him in the ambush. Remembered the bandits winning, blades at the necks of each of the knights as their bags and weapons were apprehended.
He remembered them wrench a blood covered, half conscious Merlin from Percival's grasp, tossing him to the ground not at all gently. Merlin didn't get up.
He'd been enraged, wrestling his way out of his captors' grasps, desperate to get to Merlin.
Something had made contact with the side of his head.
He raised a hand and found his head was sticky with blood.
"You with us Gwaine?"
"Wha? Oh yeah? I'm awake."
Hands helped him into a sitting position and he cracked his eyes open. Well, tried too. Only one actually opened, the other was swollen shut.
"Whoa. I mean... uhhh..."
"Really, El? I doubt it looks that bad."
"Sorry," the knight in question sounded sheepish, "but that's one hell of a bruise."
"Yeah," he agreed, "it feels like it."
He screwed his eyes shut before opening them again, squinting in the light.
Elyan, Gwen, Percival, Arthur, Leon, Lancelot, Mer... no.
"Where's Merlin?"
"We don't know. He's not in here."
"Ok... ok..." he took a deep breath, "What's the plan, Princess?"
Please R+R and Arwen vs Gwenlot if you have a preference.