CHAPTER FOURTEEN
There was confusion first, and blatant shock. Then horrified understanding as all the pieces slotted into place. But fury overrode them all.
"Merlin!"
"Hello, Morgana," he replied calmly.
She stormed towards him, radiating malice with every step.
One opportunistic young knight thought to attack her while her attention was diverted. She didn't even look at him, just made a sharp gesture. He dropped dead on the spot.
"It was you," she seethed. "The thorn in my side, the obstacle in my path. My greatest enemy – and you are nothing but a servant. A peasant bastard, a scrawny weakling, a coward! You are no one!"
Her words could not hurt him. He had lived his whole life in the shadows, but no longer. "I am Emrys."
Morgana's shrill laughter was tinged with madness. "I cannot believe I feared you."
"You should."
"You cannot stop me! I have more powerful magicks at my command than you could even begin to imagine." She flung a hand towards the western ridge and detonated an explosion that threatened to crush a company of Camelot's troops.
A flash of gold in Merlin's eyes brought the tumbling stones to a standstill. Slowly, they rolled back up the slope and settled back where they belonged. "I am magic."
"What you are is a traitor," she spat. "By allying yourself with Camelot, you have made an enemy of your own kind. We could have fought together against Uther's tyranny, but instead you chose to betray me!"
Merlin knew that he had earned her wrath, but he would not have been forced to poison her if she had not joined Morgause in her plots against the kingdom. "You betrayed us first."
Her face twisted with hatred and disgust. "Do you think you will be hailed as some kind of hero? You have lied to Arthur from the very beginning, hiding your true nature behind this idiotic disguise, using forbidden magic right under his nose, making a fool out of him. He will not thank you, Merlin. He will never trust you again. You will be cast out, hunted, reviled, just as I have been."
Merlin did not know how Arthur would react to the truth, and now was not the time to think on it. He set both hope and fear aside in a small corner of his heart, and focused on the lost and damaged woman in front of him.
"You chose this, Morgana. If at any time you had turned from this path of death and destruction, Arthur would have welcomed you back with open arms. He loves you."
"Arthur is nothing to me. And you mean nothing to him." Her words were sharper than any dagger, striking to wound, aimed with precision. "You are all alone in the world. And you will die here, with no one to mourn you."
Her magic lashed out. Merlin swept it aside.
"This is not my end, Morgana, but yours," he said sadly. "You were my friend, once, and I don't want to hurt you. I give you one final chance. Put a stop to this, or I will."
She sneered. "You can try."
She raised her hands and began to chant. "Afol léodwita bannan becnyttan. Ābūge geþanc néadhæs. Ahebban dilegian laþgeteona."
Merlin could sense the power rising around her and knew that she was drawing strength from the Druid Elders. He closed his eyes, allowing his magic to See what he could not, and traced the spell back to its source.
'There.' Annessa and the others were bound in cold iron chains, guarded by a dozen heavily-armed soldiers and one grim-faced sorcerer. They looked drawn and pale, and the life seemed to drain from them further in the few seconds that he watched. He sent the image to Mordred. 'Do you see them?'
'I see them,' Mordred replied. 'Where are they?'
'At the far end of the mountain pass.'
'With an entire army between us and them. This will not be easy, Emrys.'
Nothing about this would be. 'Do what you can. I'll hold off Morgana for as long as I am able.'
Merlin sensed Morgana's power reach a crescendo. He mustered his own magic and opened his eyes, ready to face the greatest battle of his life.
For survival. For Camelot. For Arthur.
ooOOoo
"This is where I leave you, sire," Mordred shouted over the din.
Arthur yanked his sword free from another corpse, unable to recall how many had fallen beneath his blade, exhausted beyond belief. But his men still fought, and so would he, until death or triumph.
"You found the Elders?" he called back. His sword clashed against another and the impact reverberated up his arm. He gritted his teeth, deflected the next blow, stepped into the opening he left and shoved the blade up under his ribs.
Mordred drove his dagger through one man's eye, and his sword through the gut of a second. "At the end of the pass!" A blast of his magic took down four others.
Arthur took a moment to glance in the direction he pointed, and saw a seething mass of bristling steel. "You'll never make it!"
"I must, sire." With a roar of effort, he beheaded two Saxons in one blow, a slick spray of blood preceding the twin thuds against the floor. "Emrys fights Morgana as we speak."
Arthur dispatched another soldier. Down in the muck, fighting was a struggle between individuals. Mind given over to the instincts of the body, breath and movement, duck and parry. One well-aimed blow, and then the next, and the next. He was distantly aware of fireballs, explosions and earthquakes, but the scope of magical warfare was beyond him. He had to trust in Emrys.
But Emrys was relying on them, too.
"You'll need help!" Arthur yelled. "And I need a horse!"
Mordred didn't question him, just gave a shrill whistle enhanced by the flare of gold in his eyes.
Miraculously, Arthur's own warhorse came charging across the field. He had been unseated early on – his cloak seized from behind – but Llamrei had continued without him, trampling the enemy beneath heavy hooves. Her flank was damp with blood, her eyes were wild, her nostrils flaring, but she stopped and allowed him to swing up into her saddle. Arthur patted her neck, leaning low to murmur a quick thanks for her courage and loyalty, before he gave his call to arms. "ON ME!"
His men closed ranks behind him, forming a wedge with Arthur at the fore. "We'll break the line," Arthur told Mordred. "Take Gwaine and Percival, stop for nothing."
"Yes, sire!"
Arthur yelled a battle cry and urged Llamrei forward.
ooOOoo
"King Arthur has given us an opening," Mordred told his companions. "Now we go in with stealth, and speed. I am casting a glamour on us; we should pass unnoticed, so do not engage with the enemy unless you absolutely have to."
"Understood," Percival said, sheathing his sword but drawing two long knives instead.
Gwaine flicked the hair out of his face. "What are we waiting for?"
Mordred completed his spell and the three of them shimmered out of perception. They picked a path through the carnage, and Mordred might have stressed speed but he couldn't resist casting stasis charms and healing spells as he passed wounded men of Camelot. If Morgana could be stopped, some of these men may yet be saved.
All the attention was either on Arthur or the magical death match raging behind them. Mordred could taste the power in the air, sense the balance of the world shifting, but he dared not turn to watch. Emrys had assigned his mission; he would not fail.
They made good time across the field, until Arthur and his company became bogged down and they had to start cutting their own way through.
"Doesn't seem sporting," Gwaine said, driving his sword into the neck of a man who never saw him coming.
"They still outnumber us," Mordred countered. He slammed two heads together. "We're just evening the odds."
Percival grinned, slashing tendons and arteries with his twin blades or bowling men over with his sheer size.
Abruptly, they broke through the final rank of the Saxon army. Their goal was in sight.
"I have to drop the glamour," Mordred warned in a low voice. "Take out the guards; I'll deal with the sorcerer."
Gwaine twirled his sword in readiness, Percival held his blades out at his sides and bared his teeth.
Mordred set his stance, raised his palms, and released his magic. "NOW!"
He struck the sorcerer head-on, blasting him backwards. Gwaine and Percival split the guards between them, their weapons a blur of silver, moving perfectly in tandem.
"Wáce ierlic!" the sorcerer gasped.
Mordred staggered from the blow, but it only stunned him for a second. He stretched out a hand and clenched it into a fist, envisioning the man's neck within his grasp. "Forbrecan!" He made a sharp jerking motion. The sorcerer's spine snapped.
Only two guards remained, and his magic killed them both.
"That was easier than I thought it would be," Gwaine said, swiping at the sweat on his forehead and leaving a streak of crimson in its place.
Mordred thought so, too, but he didn't question their good fortune. "Help me get these chains off them." He went to Annessa first. She was barely conscious, her countenance ashen and her frail body seeming as fragile as glass. "Onlucan," he murmured, and the locks broke open. He cast the same spell towards the other Elders. Gwaine and Percival moved forward to free them.
The chains bit cruelly into Annessa's arms and he unwound them with care, only to find crudely scrawled runes in black ink marring her skin.
"These symbols are how Morgana is maintaining her connection with them," he explained, repulsed by the dark ritual she had been willing to invoke. If it continued much longer, their magic would drain them to lifeless husks. "Áfeorme!" It took a few attempts, but his cleansing spell managed to smudge one of the runes just enough to disrupt the flow of power.
Annessa let out a gasp and slumped in his arms.
Mordred hurriedly checked for a pulse and was relieved to find one, faint and thready but there. "Áfeorme!" he snarled, wiping away the remaining symbols.
He repeated the procedure with Cereus, who groaned but gradually blinked back to awareness, and Urik, whose magic slammed back into him with enough force to make the whole ground shake.
Trosdon bore no runes.
"Mordred," he greeted warmly, showing no sign of the weakness plaguing the others. "How nice of you to walk right into our trap."
"Trap?" Gwaine asked, looking around uneasily, his grip tight around the pommel of his sword. But the field around them was empty.
"Yes." A slow grin spread across Trosdon's face. "The Lady Morgana has a message for you, Sir Mordred. Beirnan."
The noise of the battle faded away. Mordred blinked. He felt curiously empty. Blank. Adrift. All sense of urgency had left him, but he rather felt that there was something he ought to be doing. He wondered what it was.
Gwaine's voice filtered through to him, as if from a great distance. "What does that mean? What did you do?"
"Oh, I just activated a little seed of magic that Morgana planted in his head. She would have preferred that he give his allegiance to her willingly, of course, but young Mordred here is too loyal for his own good. Never mind, he will still do as we require."
A growl from Percival. "And what is that?"
Mordred wanted to know, too. He swayed closer.
"Why, to kill Arthur Pendragon, of course."
Of course. Everything suddenly became crystal clear.
Gwaine gave a cry out outrage and charged at Trosdan. Mordred frowned a little at the antics of his friend. "Sleep," he chided. Percival looked ready to do something equally foolish, so Mordred nudged him into slumber as well.
He couldn't have them interfering.
"You understand your task, Mordred?" Trosdon asked.
Mordred nodded. "To kill the King."
It was his destiny, after all.
ooOOoo