Hey!
Sure has been awhile!
I'm very very very sorry it's been so long, but it's not my fault! It's the school's fault! They're awful people! And senior year is ridiculously tough!
Anyway, on with the stoy... (Watch out for Author's Note at the bottom!)
Norane knew what was to happen.
She always knew what was to happen.
It was true that Seers were magical, but it was not the kind of magic Amaroa fought against. The cure did not affect her Sight. Nor did it affect her heritance.
She was the sister of a prince. The daughter of a king. The granddaughter of the greatest dragon lord the world has ever seen.
She was Norane.
And she didn't need Giaus's antidote.
She knew what was to happen.
She'd always known.
Norane stepped out of the old physician's lodgings, and saw the streets around her. It has been years since she could truly see with her eyes. She didn't remember the last image the blue orbs transmitted. For all her life, she's seen the world through her Sight. Through her magic.
Amaroa could not get rid of her Sight, even if he did get rid of her magic.
She had seen the dragon attacking Camelot in a dream, before she ever met the wizard Merlin, before she ever saw the sun.
She had seen herself stepping up to it as it was about to kill her father, had seen its nostrils flare with loathing, had heard his words and his anger. He had come because the magical force that was Merlin had been extinguished. The dragon assumed this meant that the wizard had died without having accomplished his destiny.
This was not true. The Wizard had lived, and he was accomplishing his destiny right at those moments. Now he should be at the Ork river, and the poisonous water should be splashing around him, again entering his body, again taking away the magic that made him who he was, while the prince and the knight remained oblivious as people without Sight often were.
But it did not matter. The Wizard's destiny was to prove to the prince that magic was not wicked, and he had done that already.
He was disposable.
She had seen it.
He would die.
But not yet. No. Before, he would be seen by the dragon, and the dragon would leave. She would be the one to show him, with her Sight, and with her powers as a dragon lord. The last dragon lord, for when the Wizard would be dead, she would be the only one left.
She has seen her brother grieve his friend.
She has seen him murdering their father as retribution, and taking the throne.
She has seen him becoming king: the most beloved, well loved king Camelot has ever known.
She has seen magic flourishing once more in the kingdom.
This was how things had to be.
She had no regrets.
Norane breathed in deeply, and then began her march up to the castle.
She had seen herself stopping the dragon.
How long did the Wizard have left, before her actions would kill him?
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
Atora stood at the arena, motionless.
Around her was silence. Before she has heard the screams of the frightened town folk, but the noise was no more. They had grown silent with fear, while in the castle the nobles sat in hiding and the dragon circled around the high towers, roaring his fury and his pain.
He had said that she was born out of magic.
She breathed in the cool winter air. Spring was just around the corner, but before it set the last of winter would be more terrible then the entire season before it. There was a great storm brewing in the heavens, and she didn't know if it was the dragon who caused it, or maybe it was the events that had recently occurred, or maybe it was just the way it was.
The latter did not seem very likely.
It had been spring when he had taken her to the cliff top with the grass and the dandelions and tied that beautiful rock over her neck.
Early evening. Those bandits came, and they did not know that it was so very worthless.
She had not been the same since that day. She tried to tell herself that she was, but it was a lie. She hardly remembered anything- all she could recall were them touching her, telling her to come with them, and him saying that they need leave her alone, that they have the stone they'd come for and that they should leave. She didn't know when they started running, her clutching the necklace in her arm, or when his magic erupted in the form of falling trees and stumbling horses, or when they caught them between heaven and earth at the edge of the cliff, the rocky ground far, far below, or when one of them grabbed him and fought to get him down while the other was grabbing for her, or when she fell, down, lower and lower to the rocks-
You can't make me love you and then die on me.
She woke up and the bandits were on top of her. She was alive. Perfectly fine. Her arm was held tightly in a fist, but when she opened it, the rock was gone, and instead her body was buzzing with a strange energy, and an unfamiliar mark appeared in her palm, jugged and uncertain, darker than the rest of the skin and in the shape of a heart.
You can't make me love you and then die on me.
She was different then. She knew it. The bandits recognized her- maybe he had told them who she was. They brought her to her father and there she stayed, waiting for him, wondering where he had gone.
You can't make me love you and then die on me.
Did she? Did she die?
Did he bring her back?
Was she reborn from his magic?
Atora glanced at the sky above her, covered with massing black clouds, and felt the heat of the spreading fire.
Her eyes flashed golden. The clouds parted, and she saw a scrap of blue sky.
Merlin was not alright.
He pretended to be, every time Lancelot or Arthur glanced back at him with concern, and made sure to say something to calm them, but the truth was, he was a loose stone away from sliding off the horse's back.
It was a fine horse. Normally Merlin loved riding horses. There had been two in Ealdor, usually used for long travel and to carry goods from the farming village to the larger town where their produce were sold. But now it seemed like the animal was trying to torture him. Every step brought waves of agony running through him, every whiney made his head spin. He didn't reveal to the other two how much magic he was using just to sit up. He knew that below his slowly drying cloths his body was covered with bruises, that he was bleeding heavily and that he certainly could not last much longer. He needed Gaius. He needed help.
Arthur glanced back at him again. Merlin smiled.
They had been riding for almost an hour, the three horses running through the well traveled road easily, hardly breaking a sweat. Merlin did though. He gritted his teeth and tried not to flinch too much. The towers of smoke still trailed higher and higher in the sky from the city, and they had no time for pain. They had to see what had happened. Dozens of royal courts all in one burning place was never a good thing, was it?
"Do you think it's just the feast?" Lancelot said hopefully, but Arthur didn't reply. His face was foreboding. Something sinister was occurring in Camelot, and he was not there to stop it.
They could see the end of their track. One more turn, and the gates of the city would rise above them, glistening in the late morning sun.
"Lancelot, take Merlin to Gaius," Arthur instructed, his expression intent. "I'll go straight to my father. Follow me when you're finished, it seems that we may need all the help we can-"
A deafening roar filled the calm forest.
"Was that a dragon?" Lancelot demanded, incredulous.
Arthur's face whitened, and he glanced back at Merlin.
"It's back," He whispered, and pushed his horse forward, until the gates were in sight.
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
"What is the situation?" The king asked, looking at his first knight with urgency.
"My lord, the beast is where it has been," Gor said, bowing low at Uther's feet. "Circling the castle. All the royal families are accounted for, apart from King Boon's niece, the lady Atora, and sir Ackles of the Roater Court, who has taken a team of his own men to battle the dragon and has not been seen since. Three of our knights are dead and seven more are gravely injured, but the rest stand by for instructions from my liege. The town people-"
"And Prince Arthur?" Uther demanded, cutting in.
"He does not seem to be in Camelot, my lord."
"Find him," The king commanded. "And find more men. We need to kill this thing once and for all."
"My lord, last time the prince had done something. Perhaps if my lord knows what it was-"
"Well if you find him, he'll tell you, won't he?"
Gor lowered his gaze. "Yes, of course, sire."
"Bring me Gaius," The king commanded. "He shall care for the injured. And then go. I don't care what you do; you need to destroy that beast!"
"Yes, my lord.
The knight stood, and turned to go. Uther stopped him at the door of the war room, where he stood before a table covered by maps of the city.
"Bring the captains here," He said, more calmly. "We need to form a plan. And get me an outline of what's been burnt down so far."
Gor bowed, and left. Uther sighed, turning back to the maps.
So much for the great celebrations.
"My lord!"
He looked up, angry to be bothered. A man stood at the doors, allowing light to stream into the dark room. Uther frowned at him. He was a commoner, dressed in old rugs and unshaven.
"My lord, I come from the village Toan, up the mountain-"
"How did you get in here?" The king demanded. "We are in the midst of a battle, you can't-"
"My lord, wizards!"
Uther froze.
"What?"
"Hundreds of them!" The man said excitedly. "All over the mountains! Ones who have been captured before-"
"How do you know this?"
"I saw them- they travel at great speed, my lord, far faster than men do-"
"Sire!" Uther turned his gaze to the new interruption. "The southern walls are being hit! We must evacuate the castle!"
"Wizards!" The commoner was saying. "Evil, despicable- we've started capturing them, of course, my king, how much is it per head nowadays?"
"The entire southern wall is destroyed. We must move the royal courts somewhere safe, perhaps the-"
Another man entered through the doors. "A girl is here to see you, my lord, says she must speak to the king, says she can stop the dragon, she does-"
"-Flying, I tell you! Flying on brooms, their hair alight-"
"My lord, we need instructions, we must-"
Just then, the well decorated windows of the wall behind the king exploded with a burst of flames.
Uther was thrown forward, into the now speechless trio. He turned around as sun rays filled the hall.
There stood the dragon, fangs out, nostrils flaring, gazing at him with unadulterated hate.
"Uther," It said, and the king's blood ran cold.
He gulped.
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
Norane knew the dragon would make its way to the king.
He would break through the southern walls, the ones nearest to the forest. Then he would make his way through the scrambling knights in the training fields, burn the gardens that led to the castle, boil the water in the pond. He would fly toward the place where he knew his target would be, cowering in fear from it. Her father. The king. Uther Pendragon.
She was almost sorry that she was to save him.
But she had to. She had seen it.
When she heard the walls crumbling down, when she felt the heat of the flames on her skin, she stepped forward, clasped the large handles of the ancient oak door, and entered.
It was there, just as she knew it would be. Giant. Furious. Hurt. For all his hate of Uther's court, the dragon loved the Wizard. He loved him for having spared him when he could have killed him with a flick of a wrist. He loved him for being so ready to accept his destiny. For doing what was right. For whining a lot.
It had hurt him to think the Wizard dead.
"Uther," it said with detestation. Norane looked on with interest. She heard the men in front of her yell and scramble away with terror. She heard people behind her- royals, recently escaped from the dungeons- running here and there, stopping in shock and awe to stare at this creature, whose kind was once so common in the sky, that none of them had seen in decades.
"Leave here," The king said. He must have thought himself very brave, but to her he looked like an old, grey man worth little to her or others. His time was over. It was almost a shame to let him live past this day.
The dragon laughed, and the sound was cold and bitter. The king stood up higher.
"What is it that you want?" He demanded.
"Your reign has been too long, old man," The dragon whispered, but everyone in the entire city must have heard. "You've killed all of my kind, all the humans who were friends to my kind, and those who possessed such as our abilities- of magic- you've captured and hanged. Your hands are dripping the blood of thousands, and yet you stand before me, in your rich garments and your golden crown."
"What do you want?" Uther repeated, louder, but his voice broke in the middle. Norane gazed forward detachedly. She's only once before seen her father, when Amaroa was at her side and the cure was still strong in her veins. He had seemed much more threatening then, much more dangerous.
"What do I want?" the dragon drawled, and his face contorted in what might have been either joy or fury. "I want you dead."
And he lowered his gallant head down toward the fibble, helpless king, teeth out, eyes yellow with a sadistic hunger-
"If only I could allow you to do that," She said, stepping forward elegantly.
The great beast froze, turning its enormous head to her with fascination.
"A dragon lord," He said in wonder. "You lot just keep popping up, don't you?"
"Indeed," She muttered, like she knew she would. "But you must not kill this man today."
"No?"
"No."
"And why is that?"
"Because," She said, remembering the words as she spoke them. "He is my father."
Silence grew behind her as her words filtered through the growing crowds.
"You are a sorceress," Uther said, disgusted. "No child of the Pendragon Court has ever been-"
"You have no love for your father," The dragon said, ignoring the muttering king. "Why would you have me spare him?"
"The wizard whom you seek is still alive," She said, the words as well rehearsed as her tall, gallant stance and the piercing look in her sky blue eyes. "He will breathe long enough to commence his destiny, and his nearing death will complete it. If the King dies, his son's fate would, also."
"I know the wizard of which you speak," The dragon boomed. "He is gone. I have sensed his magic dying. It is gone."
"Was gone," She corrected. "It has returned, now."
She watched, along with the royal courts frozen behind her turned back, as the enormous beast stretched his neck higher, towards the sky, listening.
When he lowered his head once again, she knew he had found the Wizard's magic again, as it rode quickly down the mountain.
"Your grandfather had been my master. My dragon lord. My best friend," He told her, and only she had heard. "And this man had killed him."
"He will be stopped. And Arthur would be the one to do it."
If I started submitting again, would anyone read this?
?
And regarding this chapter: I know we're all more interested in Arthur, Merlin, and Lancelot then Camelot at this very minute, but my stories are rarely from one point of view because I love making life complicated. Next chapter the two story lines would finally collide, and then we'll be Merlining all day long!
I'm going to be rewriting parts of the story, but no one needs to read it again from the top. It'll only be very minor changes. If you get alerts, make sure they're of the chapter you're looking for!
-AMS