Chapter 14

Arthur was too shocked to resist the guards as they led him away. But before Arthur was taken out of the hall, a large number of guards were sent out of the room first. Ivan's planning had even extended to what would happen after the trial. The longer Arthur was before Bayard, the more anxious those who were waiting for him had become, but with no sign or either Arthur or Merlin, they had been without any knowledge of what was happening behind the closed doors. As soon as they heard the movement of the heavy doors, all of those who hadn't already been pacing around were on their feet. What they had not expected, however, was to find themselves immediately surrounded and penned in by guards, all of them with cross-bows trained on them. Ivan was taking no chances, and knew that however loyal Arthur's knights were to him, there was nothing that unarmed men could do when faced with arrows pointing straight at them.

Leon was the most senior of the knights and therefore the one with the greatest understanding of normal protocol, and spoke with a certain amount of indignation to the guards. "What is the meaning of this?" But the only one who spoke in response was Lancelot.

"Merlin was right – he suspected that something was going on."

But any further deliberation was silenced by the emergence of Arthur through the doors flanked by the same guards who had led him in, but this time instead of walking freely between them, two of them were holding him tight, whilst the other two walked with drawn swords. And this time his head was down.

Elyan called out to him, "Sire!" But when there was no response, Lancelot tried again.

"Arthur!"

This time Arthur turned his head towards them, but it was as if he didn't see them, as if his attention was a thousand leagues away, but before his head went down again, they had all seen the expression on his pale face, and it was one of shock and quiet desperation. And if any of them were still in any doubt that something was very seriously wrong, that doubt was dispelled completely when Gwen called out once more to him, "Arthur!" and even she got no response.

Even before the guards had started leading Arthur out, Merlin had been leaping down the stone stairs from the gallery two at a time. His immediate thought was to follow Arthur, but he knew that his first priority was a simple one – not to be found or caught. If anything was going to be done to help Arthur then he was going to have to be the one to do it, and that depended on him staying out of the clutches of the Mercian guards. However, by the time he managed to surreptitiously work his way around to near the main doors of the hall, Arthur was long gone, and the only thing he saw was the back of the knights as they and Gwen were being led down to the cells. Suddenly the corridors began to fill with those who had been witnessing the trial and who were now spilling out through the hall's doors, and Merlin dived under a small nearby wooden table that was draped with a heavily embroidered cloth bearing the Mercian crest. Merlin's size was somewhat larger than what could comfortably be accommodated under the table, and thankfully the attention of all those who walked by was too taken up with what had happened at the trial to notice the tip of a boot sticking out from under the cloth.

When the corridor was finally empty, Merlin re-emerged from beneath the table and despite the time he had had there to think, he found himself standing there without any clear plan of what he was going to do. What he did know, however, was that Ivan and his accomplices had seen him often enough to know what he looked like and how he dressed, so he had to disguise himself somehow if he was going to avoid capture. Whilst transforming into an eighty year old version of himself would be a good disguise, without Gaius' potion he would be left with no means of transforming himself back and besides, he didn't fancy attempting to somehow rescue Arthur in a body that left him unable to move quickly - or without aches. Thankfully, he did at least have one other idea for a disguise. The one blessing of the haphazard nature of the packing done by Arthur and Merlin was that a number of items had found their way into the chest that had no conceivable use at the tournament. So after Merlin had discarded his own recognisable boots he exchanged them for the surplus pair of Arthur's that had been packed, and again exchanged his jacket for another one of the princes that hadn't seen the light of day since they arrived in Mercia. But the item that was most useful was Arthur's large blue cloak. Merlin had been adamant that it would have no use whatsoever on the trip, but Arthur had still insisted on taking it anyway. And Merlin knew why. It was the cloak he always used in Camelot to disguise himself when he wanted to creep down to Gwen's in the evening to spend some time with her. Although Merlin had pointed out to him that since Gwen's room was likely to be along the same corridor as theirs in Bayard's castle, wearing the cloak inside with his hood up would probably draw far more attention to him than not wearing it, Arthur would not budge and so the cloak went in the trunk.

Merlin managed to find the same back set of steps that Ivan had used when Arthur was arrested, and was soon out into the main square. As he looked around he spotted Ivan in one corner talking to some of his knights. Behind him, however, there was a covered arcade, similar to the one that ran along one side of Camelot's square. Merlin crept along it to get closer to see if he could get any information. A quick word of magic knocked over some barrels near Ivan and the others, diverting their attention whilst Merlin moved himself to a pillar that was almost immediately behind them in the arcade and Merlin quickly realised that they were talking about the whereabouts of the older servant from Camelot who have driven the cart to Mercia. Merlin knew that he had family near the city whom he was taking the opportunity to visit whilst the tournament was on. Merlin recognised Ivan's voice immediately.

"No matter. He's old and weak and he'll probably return to the city tomorrow anyway when they would be due to be leaving anyway. Besides they'll need someone to drive the cart back to Camelot with Pendragon's body – both parts of it!"

Merlin was utterly sickened by the laughter that followed Ivan's comment, and it was all he could do to stop himself leaping out there and then and unleashing his anger upon them in a spell that would silence them forever. And as Merlin stood, breathing heavily and trying to control himself, he heard Ivan address one of his knights again.

"And has there been any sign of his manservant yet?"

"No, my lord. We've searched the castle as you instructed, but no one's seen him."

"He can do us no harm - he is too far from Camelot to get any help. But I will not have one of Pendragon's vermin loose in our city. Keep looking, and if you find him, bring him back - I want all those who are loyal to Arthur looking on when their prince is executed. But if the servant resists arrest, just kill him."

Merlin stood still where he was, not moving until he was sure that they were all well out of the way. The next hour was an utterly disheartening one for Merlin. He knew where the cells were, but found that the way down to them was so heavily guarded by armed soldiers that he couldn't get anywhere near them without using magic in a fairly dramatic way, which would immediately have raised the alarm before he'd even got anywhere near Arthur. He hadn't been able to find the dungeon and he knew that making enquiries about it around the castle would only raise suspicions. Eventually, he found a tavern in the lower town where there was no chance of him being recognised, and he found that if he pretended he was visitor who had come to watch the tournament, the locals were only too happy to tell him every little detail they knew on the only topic of conversation there that day. He learned that the dungeon was on completely the opposite side of the castle to the cells, and that there was only one entrance to it which was a heavy door behind which was a long flight of stone steps to the dungeon itself in the depths of the castle. The locals delighted in explaining that as the dungeon was used solely for those under sentence of death, the door to the steps that led down to it was actually in the main square, so that there was no possibility of the prisoner escaping between the dungeon and the square where all executions were carried out. One of them had had a cousin who had been in Bayard's army and who had been put on dungeon duty at times. They related to their rapt audience in the tavern how, in addition to the actual dungeon door at the bottom of the steps being securely locked, the door in the square was not only locked from the outside by the keeper of the keys but also bolted from the inside by the guards who were stationed there, thus ensuring it was nigh on impossible for the prisoner either to escape or to be rescued. They also explained how the number of guards stationed there depended on the crime, and as the visiting prince was guilty of attempting to murder the king's son, there would be six guards stationed behind the door in the square, the maximum there could be.

Merlin slipped out of the tavern as quietly as he had entered it, and made his way back to the square. He stared at the heavy door that he now knew barred the way to the dungeon. There were guards on either side of it, and it was in full public view. And Merlin felt his stomach suddenly tighten as he saw workmen walking across the square carrying wood, and he knew that they were there to build the platform on which the execution would be carried out. He left the square again, and walked out through the main gate, and when he'd found a deserted street just outside the castle, he found a quiet corner and leant against the wall so that he could think. And as he thought about the dungeon and the heavily guarded cells, the city that was full for the tournament and would stay full for the execution, and about the fact that he was one person – a person with magic, yes, but still just one person – against a city, he put his head back against the wall and felt hot tears of frustration pricking his eyes. But the tears began rolling down his cheeks as he thought again of Arthur alone in the dungeon, and all he could do was wipe the tears away with the blue cloak that belonged to his friend.