Chapter 11: The Holding Cells
Freya had spent the morning in her cousins' vegetable plot in Key Park.
She had felt somehow refreshed and energized when she woke that morning, as though a new life had truly begun, and all things were possible. As she weeded and watered she thought about Merlin, about his and Arthur's task in the city. About those who had suffered in this city – and those who were sworn to end that.
As she rounded the chest-high stone wall that surrounded the park, basket on her arm, trying to clean the dirt from her hands on her apron, she saw Agent Arthur pass the great sycamore and stride furiously up the street to Number Five.
"Arthur!" she hailed him, and had to repeat herself – "Arthur!" - before he looked up.
At his expression she hurried to cross the street. It was evident that he was in a black mood, and impatient. As she came up to him, out of breath, she saw he carried a charcoal-gray jacket. His own suit was a blue so deep it was almost black, but that gray could be –
"Is that Merlin's?" she said.
He glanced down as if he'd forgotten what he held. "Oh - yes."
"What happened?"
When he looked at her, his blue eyes were distant and thoughtful. "That is a very good question," he said softly.
"You met with the council this morning?" Freya asked, remembering the plans he'd outlined with Randall that morning as the family finished breakfast.
"He spoke to them, to the council," Arthur said, still distantly, as if still processing the events in his mind as he spoke.
"Merlin did?"
"Yes." He frowned, his eyes drifting away from her. "He grew quite… passionate. The judge was offended, and Merlin tried to leave but… but how could they know he'd react that way?"
"What way?" Freya said, her heart sinking. Did she really have to ask that question? How did Merlin ever react? "Was anyone hurt?"
"They arrested him," Arthur said, turning to unlatch the gate. He held it for her to enter, but took the front steps two at a time ahead of her.
She hurried after him, through the front door he left swinging open. She shut it quietly, then stepped to the doorway of the sitting room. Arthur was scratching hastily across a sheet of paper without taking the time to sit at the writing desk. Emma and Vivian had planned to use the morning to decide on changes to Vivian's wardrobe for the summer; Freya assumed they were still upstairs.
"Do me a favor," Arthur said. "Find a post rider who'll go to Camelot and back as fast as humanly possible. I'm going to see Merlin at the reeve's holding cells. There's something wrong here, something else going on."
"May I come with you?" Freya said, daring as calmly as she could. "We could find a rider on our way to the holding cells. Merlin isn't going anywhere, after all."
"Are you sure?" he said skeptically, inking his quill and continuing to scribble swiftly.
She thought of Merlin's first night in Emmett's Creek, his few hours spent in Whatley's cell, and didn't answer. He had seemed so much more in control since they'd left Ealdor, if not happy and content, then at least stable. He'd walked with her and talked with her, listened to her and offered advice with no glaring, no stalking away. She didn't want to lose any of what he'd gained. She didn't want him to return to the gaunt lone wolf he'd been last spring. Could her presence there prevent that? She didn't know, but something drew her to him all the same. She wanted to see for herself if he was all right.
"I'm sure," she said.
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"What they bring you in for?"
The speaker was a middle-aged man, iron-gray hair and deep lines creasing his face. He sat on the cell's only cot and leaned against the bars dividing their cell from the second, arms and ankles crossed.
"Assault, I suppose." Merlin paced the tiny cell, eyeing every inch of the reeve's holding.
The two cells were separated from the rest of the room by bars on three sides, and the brick back wall on the fourth. It was a large square room, a row of windows high on the south wall, only two doors – one through which they'd pushed Merlin, through the front hall and past the reeve's office, the other in the back wall, just beyond the bars of the cell they were in. Where did that lead? Was it more than a back door to the narrow alley behind the holding?
Why did they want him here?
"You s'pose?" the man challenged, with humor. "Who'd you s'pose you assaulted?"
Merlin didn't answer. He kept pacing, but slowly. He needed movement, but he couldn't allow panic at the small space, the confinement. Turn and walk again.
"Well, I wasn't staying," the man said. "Was just almost out, when I heard 'em opening the door to bring you in." He uncrossed his arms, producing a pair of slender steel picks. "You're welcome to come with, if you don't get in my way."
Merlin snorted. By the looks of the locks on the cells, he could've been out in five minutes with that set of picks, himself, and he was by no means a professional. This one was not what he appeared… but why? Why would they arrest him, only to assist him in breaking out? No one who truly wished him free could have known about the arrest in time to have this man waiting for him here.
The man didn't seem offended, didn't ask for an explanation, just knelt at the lock with a grunt and a cracking of his knees. "Out in a jiffy," he muttered.
Arthur had mentioned the over-crowding of the prison due to increased crime. Why was the reeve's holding so silent and empty?
"All by yourself this morning?" Merlin remarked. He'd have expected a guard or two in the cell room, at least.
The man looked at him and grinned without pausing in his work. "All by my lonesome."
Merlin pressed, "Is that your luck or mine?"
"You catch on fast, don't you?" A quicker glance, and keener, as the door sprang open with a creak. Well – he was good, just the sort of professional he claimed to be. "Come on," the lockpick added, without waiting to see if someone was alerted by the sound.
Merlin moved more slowly. Every sense seemed to tingle with wrongness. The charade continued, it seemed, but to what purpose? They'd taken his boot knife when they brought him here, but hadn't searched the other well enough to confiscate the picks?
"Out the back," the older man suggested, rounding their cell to the left. He paused when Merlin didn't follow.
"Good luck to you," Merlin said, nodding whatever thanks the man was due. He exited the cell and instead went to the door leading to the front hall and the reeve's office.
"Back is better," the lockpick insisted. "No one to see."
Merlin didn't answer. He listened at the heavy iron-bound door, then eased it open. No one was in evidence in the front hall or the reeve's office, and the windows here were too high to see anything but sky. Where had Reeve Agravaine and his deputy gone after locking Merlin in?
"You're on your own, then," the other man called as he let the door swing shut behind him.
Strictly speaking, Merlin considered, he hadn't broken out of the cell. Hadn't even left the reeve's holding. If he intended to stay in Turad as an agent, he couldn't become a fugitive today; it would make it ten times harder for Arthur to smooth things over, with the council here and with his superiors in Camelot, if it went that far.
Perhaps that was why it had been so convenient for that lockpick to free them both, and with no other witnesses or obstacles like attendant deputies. And although it had to discredit the two of them and their authority considerably for him to be walked from the Palais and through the streets a bound prisoner, was that really a strong enough reason to risk discovery? The shock on the council members' faces had been genuine, he thought, but he hadn't had the time to study them individually. Be interesting to see what Arthur thought.
Meanwhile, here he was, with a general sort of freedom, and an unoccupied reeve's office. He didn't suppose he could keep his boot knife if he found it, but they couldn't search him for or divest him of information he gathered.
There was no door to the reeve's office, so he stepped in and began to scan the paperwork left loose on the desk. He didn't expect a signed confession, nor yet anything especially incriminating, but to get a feel for the man, his ambitions and his fears, maybe, would be helpful.
There seemed to be a double handful of personal correspondence, of little value except for two names he recognized as leading citizens of the city, though not council members. Each was written in similarly vague terms, but seemed to promise political support. He seated himself to open a desk drawer, found four copies of the same letter, lacking addresses and signature, asking for a pledge of confidence, soliciting a promise of support in future endeavors.
What was the reeve campaigning for? In Merlin's experience, a reeve, once elected, kept his office til a rival petitioned for another election, or he himself chose to resign. And there had not been a whisper of either circumstance.
As he closed the drawer, a piece of folded paper half-under the desk caught his attention, and he bent to pick it up. Unfolding it, he discovered that it was part of a larger sheet that had evidently been ripped up, this piece perhaps dropped and overlooked.
He read, volatile and easily provoke-… -ake care in arrestin-… -ed will assist you. After… while trying to esca-… Not much obvious information, but the implications could be suspicious. Arthur would –
His thoughts were interrupted by a distant shouting from the street outside. He took a chance, tucking the paper into an inner pocket in his vest, as he heard the street door, out of sight down the front hall, fly open.
"- All escaping prisoners!" someone was shouting.
Merlin leaned back in the reeve's chair, hands behind his head, waiting. Booted feet rushed down the hall; one deputy passed the reeve's office door, intent on reaching the cells. The second one glanced in and stopped.
"Here he is, Bud!" he bawled.
Merlin barely had time to notice that they were carrying clubs like those wielded by the cadet corps in Sage Springs. With no preamble whatsoever, the second deputy rushed him, club raised.
Why they had chosen to attack instead of demanding answers or his peaceful return to the cell, didn't concern him at the moment. If he made no move at all, he would be bludgeoned, and hard.
He kicked the deputy just below the kneecap with the heel of his boot, catching the club in his hands as it descended. He used the man's grip on the weapon against him, pulling himself upright from the chair and yanking the deputy down at the same time.
Bud had returned, was close on his fellow's heels, club also raised with intent clear in his eyes. Merlin vaulted the reeve's desk as the third entered.
In such close quarters, they were no match for him. No blows landed on his body, being blocked by the club he'd appropriated, or by them getting in each other's way. He kicked, punched with his left hand, head-butted like a fighting ram, and even bit someone's elbow once when one man tried to break his nose with it. But when the shuffle of the scuffle left him with his back to the doorway, he took his chance to run.
The fight had lasted moments only, his quick search of the reeve's office not much longer. The middle-aged lockpick with the creased face might be three or four blocks away only, or back in the custody of other deputies already. Merlin had no clear plan of finding him to force a confession, nor yet of escaping out the back door – that might be good strategy for a bar-fight in a town he cared nothing for, but wouldn't serve here.
If he remained in the holding and allowed them to corner him, he could let them demand he lay down his club and return to the cell…
Bursting through the door to the cell area, he met two more deputies coming through the back entrance, each with club raised and looking eager to use it.
He made no attempt to block either door, though five-to-one wasn't odds he'd bet on in a fight. Blows began to land on his arms, shoulders, back, since he was mostly defending, but none hard enough to break bone or numb nerves in an incapacitating way. He backed to a corner, kept blocking the flurry of blows as best he could.
But none of them called for his surrender.
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The post rider Arthur had finally found was only one street over from the reeve's holding cells, and seemed glad to take a commission from an agent.
Maybe his pay was more certain from an agent, Freya thought. At least he promised to change horses whenever it was expedient, to reach Camelot and return with a reply as soon as he possibly could. Arthur promised a bonus for each day he could come before expected. Sixteen days could be done.
"Now, if Reeve Agravaine will let me speak to Merlin privately," Arthur was saying, as he opened the street door of the reeve's holding, and held it for her to enter first.
The front hall wasn't wide, and no one was in sight. Freya preceded Arthur to the open door of what appeared to be the reeve's office.
"Hello?" she called politely, though the room appeared deserted – the room appeared…
Papers from the desk had been swept to the floor, the chair knocked over. Even the heavy wooden desk was askew.
"Dammit," Arthur said, grim and succinct. Then his head came up, listening.
She listened too, heard muffled noises from the interior of the building that raised no alarm in her but had definitely alerted Arthur. He swung himself out of the office and was yanking open the door at the end of the hall when Freya emerged. She joined him quickly, but stopped in the doorway, holding the door open against the wall with one hand, aghast.
Four – no, five men in brown deputy's uniforms, armed with smooth truncheons, were circling a lone man like a flock of vultures, trading flurries of blows like beating wings keeping them aloft. They fought so quickly and furiously, Freya would not have recognized Merlin if she hadn't already seen him wearing those gray trousers and deep red vest.
She gasped in terror for him, before she saw he was armed himself with one of those clubs, swinging so viciously and skillfully it seemed none of them dared get close enough to land a damaging blow. His shirt was torn; though she saw no blood, she was aware that such weapons would bruise deeply, break bones, might even kill.
Freya saw this in the space of breath Arthur drew in, then he bellowed a string of profanity that caused the deputies to pause, look up, retreat half a step.
"Merlin!" Arthur shouted then, sounding angry with him as well.
The younger agent had been facing away from them when Arthur first spoke, and kept pivoting til he was sure the attack had halted, then lowered his own club and faced them, straightening. Freya found her breath catching again. His blue eyes were bright and stormy, fierce and exultant in his flushed face, his chest heaving with panting breaths. He was a fighter, in that instant, proud and glad of it. And something deep within her responded to his breath-taking masculinity.
It might have been a nervous reaction, an inexperienced deputy scared and unsure, acting without thinking before Arthur had a chance to issue orders. It might have been.
Without warning, the skinny, unshaven deputy at Merlin's back – frozen for a moment with club upraised at Arthur's cursing – brought his weapon down in a curving arc that caught Merlin unaware, across the back and side of his head and neck.
His face went blank, wiped emotionless, and he dropped like a felled tree. He didn't make a sound. And he didn't move.
Freya thought her heart had stopped.
"Back!" Arthur roared, voice shaking with rage. He faced five deputies, all armed and he empty-handed, but they shuffled their feet, lowered their clubs, backed away from Merlin's body. "You dare to touch an agent?"
Freya didn't wait for Arthur's permission. Letting the door slam shut, she went around him and knelt on the bare stone floor, eyes only for Merlin. The deputies' boots shuffled back another step. She felt for the pulse in his neck first, reassuringly steady, though quick. There was blood oozing through his hair, down his neck onto his collar; she didn't want to touch the wound, fearful she would hurt him further. She tried to roll him over – he was so heavy! His breath, one moment ago coming hard and fast from the exertion of the fight, was too light and too slow, now, for her liking.
"Drop those, and back up against the wall," Arthur ordered.
The truncheons clattered to the stone-slab floor, the boots retreated to the wall. Someone muttered, "An attempted escape–"
"Do not even suggest that, to me!" Arthur thundered. "It looked like you all could have dragged my agent from the cell and attempted to bludgeon him to death, and he fought back in defense of his life. I want all of your names, and you–" he snapped his fingers.
"Bud, sir," one of them mumbled behind Freya.
She scooted around so she could lift Merlin's head to her lap, trying to arrange his body that he might be more comfortable, knowing how ridiculous that was and not caring.
"Get out and find a doctor for him. Now."
One pair of boots moved past them to the door. Arthur knelt to feel for Merlin's wrist, keeping his eyes on the row of deputies, and the club Merlin had been using slipped from his limp hand to the floor. Arthur released him without comment, and glanced down only for a moment as his fingers brushed aside the bloodied hair.
"Is it bad?" Freya whispered. Her throat felt tight, but she refused to let tears fall in front of these strangers who had beaten Merlin so unfairly.
"It's that last one I'm worried about," Arthur replied in a low voice.
Merlin's legs moved. And she felt the rest of his body tense and tighten, and life was back in him. She felt such a rush of relief, she almost sobbed. But he disliked emotion shown over him… His face still rested against the top of her knee, his eyes were still closed. His hand moved waveringly up toward the back of his head, but Arthur, still crouched over them, caught it.
"Easy now, easy," he cautioned.
Merlin pushed the hand away, but weakly.
Freya slid her hands under his head, her fingertips brushing his collarbone through his shirt, helping him as he tried to push himself up off the floor.
As his head came up, he swore softly, then lifted his face to look straight into her eyes from only inches away. He fell silent, his eyes dark as midnight, his face pale but giving away no emotion – no anger, no pain, no embarrassment, no relief. He said nothing, just held her gaze several long moments as if Arthur and the four deputies were not there.
He could see her soul, she thought, when he looked at her like that.
The back door opened again, and she used the commotion as an excuse to look away, glance back over her shoulder. The doctor was a large man with a square jaw and a florid complexion, sandy-red hair fading to white.
"Prison doc," he explained shortly, meeting Arthur's sharp glance. "What've we got?"
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Even before agony began pounding through Merlin's skull – which it did, fierce and merciless and somehow red – he was aware of her scent. Sweet, faint, warm, feminine. He was vaguely aware that he was lying in her lap, and he was content with that.
Then of course, the pain in his head crashed down, through his neck, through his entire body, til his fingers ached and the sudden and overwhelming nausea warned him he might want to push himself away from her, for her own good.
His ears were ringing. He heard someone speaking far away, but couldn't concentrate on the words. There were men present, several, but who they were or why they were there escaped his memory. And he couldn't seem to care.
Her eyes were so dark, deep with worry for him and beautiful, he could look into their depths forever.
But it came to him that he should stand – so he tried. Didn't find it easy, with the floor tilting so unexpectedly. Or was it him tilting?
He should help her up? Why was she on the cold stone floor? Why was he? Didn't matter – he put out his hand to her but stumbled sideways.
Someone crashed into him, held him up.
Take it slow, someone said with Arthur's voice. But – it should be snowing, the posse just took Padlow…
"Hurry," he tried to tell them, but his tongue felt thick. If the two of them hurried they could catch them before they hung – but how could he know there would be a hanging before it happened? He was having no success at speaking or seeing or thinking clearly… but why was that important?
Someone leaned his head forward, stabbed him at the base of his skull with thick blunt fingers.
Merlin, can you hear me? Freya said. Why was she here? Where was here?
"I'm sorry – didn't get there sooner," he mumbled. "Stop him – hurting you."
That wasn't right. She was standing now, not crumpled bleeding in a cellar corner. She was wearing widow's black, fully recovered from her injuries.
A face swerved into his range of vision and he blinked. Which one of them was swaying? A stranger, featureless except for the kindness… Merlin wished he would quit speaking, quit touching his head.
Then, for an instant Arthur's blue eyes were sharply clear, and Merlin winced at their expression. The agent's lips moved, though Merlin didn't hear his voice, Do you understand me?
"Yes," he answered, slow and deliberate.
Sit still. Arthur's hand on his shoulders, pressing him down.
Soft seat, harder bar of a frame under the back of his knees. He noticed vertical bars behind Arthur. Prison cot, then. Prison?
"You should not – have brought – her here," he told the agent.
Rest, Arthur said, still not making any sound that Merlin could hear. But don't sleep. I'll come back later when you can talk. The agent turned away.
Hearing returned with a head-splitting clang, the tearing screech of a lock that he could feel scraping the nerves beneath his skin. He closed his eyes, wishing to rest his throbbing head in her soft, sweet-smelling lap.
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"What did he say?" Freya said anxiously as they left the reeve's holding cells.
"You can't stay," Arthur told her quietly, holding her hand firmly at his elbow and pulling her along. "They don't allow it, and even if they did, it wouldn't be proper."
"He's in no condition–" she tried.
"All he needs is rest, like the doctor said," Arthur said, leading her unwilling down the street toward Key Park. "You can't help him rest."
"But what if they–" Freya stopped at his sharp, warning look. She waited til they'd gone a few streets from the holding cells, almost skipping to keep up with him. "Do you really believe they caught him trying to escape?"
Arthur's lips twisted wryly. "Not one minute. I believe if he'd wanted to escape, he'd have been gone before they knew it. Not in broad daylight, though."
"What did they arrest him for?" she asked. He didn't answer immediately, so she prompted, "You said the judge was offended and Merlin tried to leave."
"You must have heard him say, don't touch me, at least once since you've known him." Freya smiled to herself involuntarily, and nodded, though Arthur was in too much of a hurry to notice. "He – pushed the judge. Then tossed the reeve onto the floor. It wasn't much at all if you're talking about assault, bruised their pride, mostly. For Merlin it was an extremely restrained response. There's – nothing I can put my finger on, but it's – very suspicious."
"You mean they provoked him so they'd have an excuse to arrest him?" she said. She was trotting to keep up, now. "And maybe they provoked him to fight just now?"
"It certainly seemed so," he murmured. "But why?"
"Could you talk to the judge?" she asked. "Maybe if Merlin agreed to offer an apology–"
"No," Arthur responded, almost absently.
She wished he'd slow down; she was beginning to feel a stitch in her side, and they were passing the twin-domed Daved Cathedral. It seemed a sacrilege, somehow, to race past it without half-noticing.
"If there is something going on, the judge is involved, or at least aware," Arthur explained. "If there's not, or he's not a part of it, then he reacted out of injured pride, and will be just as unlikely to rescind the arrest."
"What about a trial?" she asked.
Again Arthur shook his head. "Since the judge witnessed the offense and ordered the arrest, he can hold Merlin indefinitely."
"But do you think it's safe to leave Merlin alone in the holding?" she persisted. "If it was arranged for him to be arrested, maybe it was arranged for him to attempt escape… do you think someone wants to – kill him?" He shook his head once, not to deny the possibility, but to convey his own uncertainty.
"I don't have the authority to order his release," he said. "I've written to Agency headquarters, to obtain a full pardon from Uther, but that'll be a while in coming. I think, with my orders that he remains alone in the cell, and with the doctor checking on him every couple of hours, he'll be all right until tonight."
"And tonight?" she said, catching her breath as he paused to pay their toll before entering the Key Park district.
Arthur waited until they were out of earshot of the collectors. "Won't be the first time I broke someone out of a jail cell. Probably won't be the last, either. I'll take him to Morgana; I don't think anyone knows he's staying there instead of with me. Then they won't find him at Randall and Emma's."
"It can't have looked very good for you, to have Merlin arrested," Freya ventured. "Don't you think you're the first person they'll think of if he turns up missing from the holding cells?"
"I'll go late, after we're all in bed," he said, holding open the gate of Number Five for her for the second time that day. "You and your cousins can testify I retired at the same time as the family, and you never heard me stir."
Freya opened her mouth to ask to go with him, as she had earlier, then thought better of it. Surely he'd say no, anyway. And wouldn't he be right? She'd be in the way, more likely than not, might even inadvertently cause discovery or capture.
"Maybe you should have a coach waiting," she offered, pausing as he opened the front door for her. He gave her a quizzical look that had her face warming, but she went on anyway, "In case he finds it – difficult to get away on foot." His eyes narrowed on her face, and the hot feeling spread down her collar.
Then he nodded, and advised, "Better if you mention none of this to your cousins."
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Hours later, when they brought Merlin's dinner on a tray, he found he felt a little better.
A little clearer, mentally, though his head still pounded and at times his eyes didn't focus immediately. He sat very still on the end of the cot at the back of the cell, watching the deputies' every move as warily as they watched him. They'd only brought him down, he remembered – they were sure to remember also – when Arthur's arrival had distracted him. He was in no condition to fight again – vertigo whirled through him at the slightest attempt to move even now – but they didn't know that, and his safety might depend on them believing him capable of picking up where he'd left off.
And a little worse, as bruising began to spread across the rest of him. No broken bones, though, that was something.
Did they want him dead? Was the beating meant only as a warning? Evidently this had been planned before this morning, so did not come as a result of his tirade before the council. What had he done, or seen, that had someone so spooked? It hurt to try to puzzle through it.
Earlier he had decided to remain in the holding cells because of the position he'd put Arthur in if he escaped. But he wasn't willing to risk his life in support of Arthur's authority. He'd have to sort Merlin's escape out with the judge, and Merlin could still go on Arthur's side errands in secret.
But later. He could leave tonight or tomorrow night, but it wouldn't do for him to go stumbling and staggering about the streets, maybe even get picked up by a watchman. A schoolgirl could arrest him, the way he felt now. And he couldn't hire a coach to drive him to Morgana's – she'd likely turn him right back over to the reeve and his deputies for such stupidity.
No other criminals had been brought in since Merlin. If there were deputies on duty, they stayed in the front hall or the reeve's office; he had the cell area to himself.
His eyes closed against the nauseating sight of the food on the tray, and he leaned his head sideways against the brick wall, cushioned slightly by the bandage the prison doc had wrapped around his head.
If he slept, he wasn't aware of it, nor did it help his condition.
He was brought back to alertness, in any case, by the steely scratch of a key or lock-pick in the back door. Disoriented, he fully expected that the middle-aged man with the deeply grooved face was breaking back in. So when Arthur's golden hair and blue eyes and crooked grin appeared around the half-opened back door, Merlin stared at him blankly. Dreaming of course. Dreaming.
The dream slipped into the room and knelt to work on the lock of Merlin's cell. He watched, having nothing else to do, but didn't move.
"How's the head?" Arthur whispered as he worked.
"Been better," Merlin answered slowly.
"How's the rest of you?"
"Been worse."
Arthur chuckled, and the lock squeaked open. He paused and glanced over his shoulder at the door to the front office even as he beckoned to Merlin, hissing, "Let's go!"
Merlin pushed himself to his feet. His head still thundered agonizingly with every heartbeat, muscles and bones protested with a sore throbbing, but he managed to gain the door of the cell without passing out or throwing up. He leaned momentarily against the bars to rest, but Arthur was in a hurry.
He grabbed a handful of Merlin's shirt at the shoulder, and pulled him along, keeping him more or less upright against his tendency to lean too far one way or the other.
His eyes chose that moment to blur again into darkness, but he followed Arthur without question, and soon found himself shoved through the door of a covered carriage. Arthur must have hired a driver, for he climbed in behind Merlin, and the carriage started off.
"You feel up to talking?" Arthur said.
The rustling the agent made settling on the seat seemed deafening to Merlin. He himself didn't try to get comfortable, just rested on his left hip and let his cheek fall against the back of the padded seat.
"Don't expect… much sense," he warned. His lips felt numb. He found he could think the words, but forming them was difficult.
"What happened after the reeve brought you to the holding cells?" One thing came to mind with urgent clarity, and Merlin fumbled in his vest pocket, turning the folded bit of paper over to Arthur. "What's this?" Arthur asked.
It was dark then – that wasn't just his eyes. He closed them again anyway, and spoke haltingly. "The cells were empty, except for… one lockpick. We were out again… in five minutes. He wanted to go… out the back. I… found that… reeve's office."
A minute or an hour later, Arthur said, "Did it seem planned to you?"
"Didn't try to leave," Merlin said. It felt like he was mumbling, so he made an effort to speak more clearly. "Waited for 'em in the reeve's office. They said nothing, just… started in with th' bully-clubs. They're… the worst deputies… I ever see… or they meant to… work me over… with an excuse."
"Or kill you," Arthur mused. "I've been trying to decide all day if any of the councilmen could be responsible, but their shock this morning at the Palais seemed genuine. I don't know… it seems too elaborate and too risky a move just to undermine my – our – authority."
"Volatile and easily provoked," Merlin enunciated with care.
"That sounds like you," Arthur said, his voice wryly amused in the darkness of the coach.
"You told… the reeve and the judge… yesterday," Merlin said. His body was trying to fall asleep; his thoughts seemed clear, but increasingly harder to convey. "The threat of… death-contracts. They were ready today. They knew I was… your witness to… Mordred. Jordan."
"But their names were also presented to the revengers, along with the eight council members," Arthur reminded him.
"Easy enough to… guard against… what you know is coming," Merlin said. "Or a… smoke screen."
"And your average lone assassin will pursue lower-risk subjects like the eight, before going after a target like the judge or the reeve," Arthur added. "You do realize we're accusing them of conspiracy to murder?"
"Jordan's still at Morgana's," Merlin said. He had to keep talking so he could ignore the motion and jostling of the carriage. Though why would he care if Arthur had to pay extra to have the interior cleaned? "Arrest him… question him."
"Not unless I want to openly confront Judge Alined," Arthur murmured. "At this point, it's your word against theirs, and because of today, we're even less likely to be believed. I can't help but assume that was the reason for the arrest and the beating. Which means until we get to the bottom of this, we don't know who to trust."
"That why you came yourself, tonight? Could've had some of… Morgana's apprentices."
Arthur grunted. "You trust her? She could easily have passed information on to Jordan for Mordred. Jordan's paying her, isn't he?"
"She won't do… assassinations," Merlin protested. "Mordred would know… things about me... just from being there. Wasn't her… arranged this morning."
"Will she be willing to help you – us?" Arthur said. "If we're right about this, someone wants you dead because you can identify Mordred and Jordan, which might lead back to them. At the very least they want you in a condition where it'll be easy to throw doubt on your memory, or discount your testimony. Will it be safe for you to stay at the chalet, if Jordan and Mordred know that's where you've been living?"
"Where else can we go?" Merlin mumbled. "No choice… go to Morgana's."