CHAPTER 16: Chase and Track
Arthur, Merlin, and Gwaine
Arthur and Gwaine ranged to either side of Merlin, checking for any sign that their quarry had passed that way, though it was unlikely they'd find anything. A patrol had seen a figure from a distance, carrying something, mount a horse just outside of Camelot and head east. It had been gone by the time they arrived and they hadn't pursued, since the warning bell had not yet rung. East was the direction that the fort of Allamar lay, where Morgana was holed up.
Merlin had a horrid feeling that they wouldn't find them in time, that Mina was in terrible danger. He glanced at his companions again. Both were slightly ahead of him and a ways out to the sides. Focusing, he played a hunch and sent out a mental call. Initiating contact was not his forte, but it couldn't hurt to try. "Mina? It's Merlin."
Mina and Sealgaire
I was having a very uncomfortable ride behind a smelly bandit with my nightdress hiked up almost to my knees, when there was suddenly a voice talking in my brain. I looked around so wildly I nearly fell off the horse, causing Sealgaire to growl at me. "Shut it," I growled right back. "I'm not exactly wearing appropriate riding clothes here. It's not very comfortable."
"You can ride on my lap," he offered with a dark chuckle. He'd made the offer before, and I'd told him in no uncertain terms that I'd ride on a man's lap right around the time I'd eat my own eyeballs, so I just ignored him.
"Mina? Can you hear me?" Came again.
I had no idea what I could do with that. With a mental shrug, I thought, "Ye-es? Merlin? How in the hairy hills of Nantucket can I hear you when you aren't here?"
"It's hard to explain. Are you safe? Can you tell me where you are?""I'm … sort of safe. Sealgaire took me but I've convinced him that I'm an ally. Are we really doing some freaky Miss Cleo telepathy thing?"
"I don't know what that means." I could hear the very Merlin combination of amusement and frustration in his mental voice. "We're trying to find you. Is there anything you can tell me about where you are?"
I focused as hard as I could and looked around, trying to project images of what I saw. A headache immediately blossomed but I didn't stop.
Arthur, Merlin, and Gwaine
Merlin swayed on his horse. Mina was sending images of everything she could see around her, and they were overlapping with reality, making him dizzy. He quickly straightened, checking to see if either Gwaine or Arthur were looking his way, but they were distracted by an argument over...garlic? Merlin smiled to himself and sent to Mina, "Stop! Stop with the images. It's too much, and I can't see anything that will help me find you, anyway."
Mina and Sealgaire
I was relieved to get his message, as the pain getting out of hand. "I did try to leave a message," I thought. "By a stream that had a dead tree that made kind of a 'u' shape. I drew an arrow."
"I'll try to find it," Merlin replied. "There is – " his mental voice cut out as the pain became too much of a distraction for me to hear him.
"Stop now. Stop the horse!" I shouted out loud. I didn't really wait for the horse to stop before tumbling off, probably flashing him in the process. I fell to my hands and knees and threw up everything I'd eaten. I threw up so hard I might have thrown up stuff I'd eaten weeks before. It finally stopped, and I registered feet a little ways away.
"What's the matter with you?" demanded my captor.
"Head trauma," I ground out. Despite my misery, I dredged up my best genie impression from the original Aladdin. "One to many hits from the snake." I stood and held out my hand. "Water." He handed over the skin with visible reluctance, and I made sure to pour it into my mouth without touching it to my lips. I rinsed, spit, and did it all again, and handed it back.
"You done?" he asked with distaste.
"You're a real gentleman, huh?" I wiped my mouth on my shoulder, not having to feign dizziness. "I can't go farther right now." This could be good, slowing us down, so Merlin and his posse could catch up.
Sealgaire looked around us. He wanted to argue, I knew, but he probably didn't want me puking on his back either. "We're almost there. You can rest once we get there."
Swallowing my nausea, I tried to send a quick message to Merlin, but all I got out was "sick" before I felt like I was going to pass out. I couldn't risk that while I was hanging out with Sir Psycho. Not finding any way to slow us further, I very reluctantly turned to get back on the horse. That's when I saw the eyes in the forest, and every single one was trained on me. Sealgaire froze, then practically threw me on the horse and jumped up in front of me.
"We can get to Morgana's men," he said. He kicked the horse, lifted two fingers to his lips and blew a piercing whistle. We rode at a run that was probably unsafe through the trees, and certainly not safe for me hanging off the back of the horse. In just a moment, though, we burst out of the trees into a cleared area. Ahead of us was a crumbling keep with armed men that I assumed were Morgana's pouring from it, presumably called by Sealgaire's whistle. I looked back and saw hundreds of what I would call Slenderman's rabid dogs running at us from the trees. And I thought the day had started poorly.
Arthur, Merlin, and Gwaine
Merlin veered to his left. "Hey, guys," he called, "I hear running water. Let's find it so we can refill."
"That's not a bad idea," said Arthur. "If they crossed the stream, we may find some tracks."
"Even if we do find tracks, how do we know if it's theirs?" argued Gwaine, though he was already turning his horse to follow.
"Do you ever simply do as I tell you without arguing or complaining?"
"You'd get pretty bored if I did that."
Merlin cut in, "Is this going to devolve into another useless argument? Because four is my limit for one trip and we're at … eight I think."
"We're not arguing," argued Gwaine. "We're bettering ourselves through intellectual discussion."
"Merlin wouldn't understand," said Arthur loftily. "His idea of bettering himself is finding the bottom of a tankard."
"I learned that from Gwaine," sniped Merlin instantly.
"That's harsh, mate," complained Gwaine, "but probably true." Instead of replying, Arthur held up his hand for them to stop. He dismounted and studied something on the ground.
"Someone crossed here, very recently," said the king. "And look at this." Someone had arranged a bunch of twigs into a big arrow, pointed across the stream in the direction the tracks were headed. "And this, here." A light-colored rock had been used to mark words on to a larger rock. It read: LM merleacha fheistiú.
"LM is equipping bandits," translated Gwaine. "It's in a language only used in Annis' land." He shrugged at Merlin's questioning look. "I grew up there, remember?"
"LM might be Lady Morgana," guessed Merlin.
"And it might be a trick from Sealgaire," cautioned Arthur. "His name comes from the same language. It actually means 'hunter.'" He smirked at Merlin's surprise. "A prince learns at least a little of each language of the five kingdoms. Like we said, Merlin, we're learned men."
"Glad there's something useful under your crown," grumbled Merlin under his breath, making the corner of Gwaine's mouth to quirk up.
"Shall we follow the tracks, o learned one?" asked the knight, dodging the half-hearted punch Arthur threw at him.
"Come along, you disrespectful cretins."
They mounted up and rode for just a minute longer when Gwaine asked, "Do you smell that? Someone was sick here." Before anyone could respond, a piercing whistle split the air. As one, the three men kicked their horses to a run.
Everyone
Despite our horse's speed, the demon dogs were catching up fast. As creepy as they were, I wasn't sure that being in the midst of all of Morgana's men would be better. The first of the dogs swarmed around our legs and the horse reared up. Two of the men had reached us and began to hack at the dogs. The horse danced sideways and the new vantage point put me in perfect position to see Arthur, Gwaine, and Merlin emerge from the woods. "Stay back, Merlin," called Arthur as he and Gwaine drew their swords. I decided that the chaos could be my opportunity. I took a deep breath, pulled Sealgaire's dagger from his belt, and clocked him in the head with the hilt. While he was unbalanced, I pushed him off the horse without hesitation or regret. In fact, I may have smiled, just a little.
I wheeled the horse and did my best to head toward the guys from Camelot, but the dogs were laser focused on me.
Arthur leaned low off the side of his horse, skewered two of the dogs with one strike, and allowed them to slide off his sword. Gwaine stabbed straight down into the spines of three in a row and spun his horse to the right to cut down a foot soldier that was threatening Merlin. A dog-hand grabbed my right calf – why the hell did the creepy dogs have hands? – and another got a handful of the hem of my nightdress. Then all of the dogs right near me blew back as if I were at the epicenter of an explosion. Shocked, I locked eyes with Merlin, who gave a tiny shrug. I noticed in passing that none of the dogs approached Merlin at all, seeming afraid of him.
Arthur was in the midst of a circle of men, but he moved in a deadly dance. He and his sword and his horse were one, spinning, stabbing, mowing down anyone who came too close with strength and grace. His moves were classic, the forms he'd been taught, executed to perfection. Gwaine was just as dangerous, his motions less fluid and predictable, but he changed his motions and the directions of his strikes faster than he should have been able to. He adapted to each opponent effortlessly, impossible to catch or disarm. I could have watched them all day if I hadn't been fighting my own way through a writhing, grasping swarm. I could tell that Merlin was flicking the dogs away from me whenever he could, but he had to watch Arthur's and Gwaine's backs too, and he couldn't be seen by anyone. He made a blow aimed for Arthur's back deflect off his pauldron instead and sent a thrown lance off course so it hit one of the men on the ground instead of Gwaine's horse.
If I could just get to my rescuers we'd have a good chance to flee, since we were the only ones on horses. But then Arthur saw Sealgaire, and he yelled across the melee: "Sealgaire? You should be called Cladhaire. Face me, you coward!"
Sealgaire, who'd been retreating toward the keep, whirled with an inarticulate shout, running toward the king. Arthur leaped off his horse, and Gwaine and Merlin exchanged identical looks of frustration. "I've got his back," called Gwaine. "Get Mina!" He too jumped off his horse to cover Arthur's blind spot.
Sealgaire reached Arthur and the two exchanged furious blows. The bandit was used to quickly overwhelming opponents with his speed, but Arthur parried every blow and returned them with strikes that were just as fast but stronger. The sunlight catching his blond hair and glinting off his chainmail, Arthur looked like an avenging angel as he steadily beat Sealgaire back, sword spinning and unrelenting. Gwaine was his dark counterpoint, at his left shoulder, keeping three and four men at once from getting close enough to Arthur to interfere. Gwaine struck like a snake, deflecting and inflicting small wounds before his opponents knew he was there, doing just enough to give Arthur space. Nobody could touch either of them.
Then, suddenly, Arthur's fight was over as Sealgaire, fearful realization on his face, missed a deflection and the king's sword slid into his gut. Pausing just a split second to pull his sword free and think about Geraint, Arthur noticed how the fight had changed. He and Gwaine were separated from their horses by at least 10 men, and more surrounded them. But the kobold dog-things were no longer a factor. They were all heading in one direction.
Meanwhile, I slashed at the dogs with the dagger, kicked them off my legs, and did everything I could, but they got heavier and heavier. They were singularly focused on me.
The weather had radically changed too. The sun was obscured by ominous, rolling black clouds that sparked with lightning. A bolt illuminated the battlefield and 15 men went flying in every direction.
Morgana's spell is actually helping us instead of her of her own men, thought Arthur. He didn't see the fierce concentration on Merlin's face as the warlock tried to even the odds for the outnumbered band. He also didn't see the lone warrior sneaky up behind his servant. Merlin didn't see the danger either.
In my own frantic struggle, though, I noticed. I didn't think, just threw my dagger. It flew true, sinking into the men's neck and felling him.
It was my only weapon, but I didn't regret my actions. Merlin looked at me in surprise, and watched in horror as the weight of all the dog things pulled me from the horse.
Struggling futilely, I watched the sky disappear as I was buried in the mass of bodies.
Arthur and Gwaine reached their horses as lightning struck again and the wind rose so sharply some men were literally blown off their feet.
"I lost Mina! The kobolds took her," cried Merlin as his friends reached his side. "She saved my life and I couldn't help her."
To his credit, Arthur never hesitated. "Let's get her back."
The three spun their horses to follow the horde, their flight covered by one final lightning strike.
What was one more seemingly impossible quest?