So I know I only posted chapter one last night guys, but what can I say - I quite like this one. Thanks for the positive feedback I've recieved already, it's only been up like twenty four hours! Sorry, I'll stop waffling. Here's chapter two.

My my, cold hearted child, tell me how you feel

Just a blade in the grass, spoke unto the wheel

My, my, cold hearted child, tell me where it's all gone

The lustre of your bones, those arms that held you strong

- Ben Howard, The Fear

Mordred is already awake when Merlin stirs the next morning, eyes red but face set. The walls that shattered so easily last night have been rebuilt, and his hands are steady as he smothers the embers with leaves. He does not acknowledge Merlin with more than a glance, and they are on their way before the birds have stopped singing. Merlin looks around at the landscape, noticing how beautifully the hills have remained green and welcoming. However, it seems as though the loss of the snow has sapped Mordred of his composure. His icy façade has completely vanished, he stumbles over rocks and more than once he stops as though completely lost, running a hand through dishevelled hair and circling markers of wood or stone. Merlin never comments when this happens, but instead stands to the side and marvels at the change in the man he thought he understood.

No. That's not right. He could never understand such ruthless cruelty, or such heartless selfishness.

The road grows less trodden as they continue. Merlin has stopped wondering where they are headed, for he knows Mordred will not tell him and is honestly past caring. Besides, the walking gives him a purpose, stops his mind from wandering too far into the past. He knows cannot afford to lose his head again, to expose himself to Mordred's madness. Because he is fairly sure, now, that that is what it is. The obsessive need to cover exact distance, the anger at sudden and small obstructions, the constant circling – all of it reveals to Merlin how unhinged his companion has become.

That, and the screaming which accompanies each evening.

Every night, Merlin is awakened by the same mad cries he had witnessed for the first time only days ago. It happens so often now, he has formed a sort of routine. He sits when he wakes, draws his knees up, and locks his eyes at the writhing form across the dying flames. Mordred shrieks as though he is a child, and perhaps inside his head he still is. Merlin recalls the words he spoke to him years ago, and shivers.

'I shall never forgive this, Emrys. And I shall never forget.'

This boy committed harsh murder in childhood. He witnessed despicable things, true, but the number of lives – bright, beautiful, half lived lives – that he has brought to an end merit no mercy. And yet Merlin has grown accustomed to the ache of pity in his stomach as he watches the unconscious boy twisting wildly, face contorted in pain. He himself is no stranger to nightmares, especially since the day of the dragon. But his paralyse him, hold him still, and affect no one but himself. Mordred's pain is tangible, and it frightens him.

And then it happens.

On one particularly restless night, he is sat in his usual position, body having long grown used to the lack of sleep. He waits for the screams to die down, focusing more on the embers of the fire than the noise. But his eyes fly upwards at a jolt of sound, and he sees Mordred shoot upright. He turns to Merlin, and his eyes are glowing – not with magic, but with something far darker. His face is feral, agonised, and Merlin is repelled. He backs away, hands scrabbling in the dirty ground, but then Mordred's eyes hollow out and he lies still again. Merlin exhales, for a moment thinking it was nothing more than a result of his fatigue, and then –

His eyes feel as though they are burning. He leaps to his feet and tries blindly to run, but trips at the first tree root he comes across. He lies there, tears leaking from his eyes as he watches, helplessly, the images rolling across his vision.

Mordred's nightmares, it seems, are not unwarranted. Not if these cruel, vicious images are anything to go by.

Merlin watches Mordred grow up inside his head, horrified. He sees everything, as the pale druid child he had known grows to become the knight of Camelot. Sees the cold, dark cavern, sees the long glinting knives, hears the hiss of hot metal on flesh. And he cries, the torture of a small boy unravelling before his eyes.

He has never seen evil like this. And he watched the unnecessary slaughter of a peace dragon.

The hooded, shapeless men bring the druid boy pain every time they come. And then they instruct him, teach him unspeakable things and force him to recite them while the sweat and blood still leaks out of his skin. After a while, he doesn't cry anymore. And then the men stop the torture. Instead, what they begin to do is lie.

And Mordred, sick, injured Mordred, listens to every word they say, and believes them.

They present him with false scrolls, tell him they are ancient spells. Tell him that they have foreseen the birth of a pure white dragon (which Merlin can only suppose is true), and that the death of it at the hand of a king will bring endless power to those who would wield it for the benefit of all magical creatures. They train his body first and then his magic, fine tune it until he reaches a point where he is no longer a boy, but a machine. A dangerously intelligent killing machine, but the worst kind - one who does not know it.

Mordred understands that Morgana must die, and embraces it, for it will mean freedom for his people.

And then Merlin sees the throne room again, through the satisfied eyes of one who knows his task is nearly complete. He watches as the sword is raised, as it falls – and then nothing but mind numbing horror envelopes him as he is blasted back and realises he was never more than a chess piece to be used, and then disposed of.

Merlin forces his eyes to open, raising shaking eyes to his cheeks and finding them wet. He stumbles to his feet, arms splaying out to steady his balance, and leans against a tree, breathing heavily. He is so disgusted, with the world and with himself, the former because he cannot believe that there are creatures so vile crawling this earth that they are able to relish the torture of a little boy, and the latter because he has judged – with the best of intentions, to be fair, but judged all the same. Staggering back to their campsite, he wonders how he had never seen this in Mordred's thoughts before, but then he remembers that he has made it his business not to poke around in the brain he believed to have conceived the plan which had destroyed his life. He had wanted no part of it, and now he hates himself for it.

He has not forgiven Mordred. Nothing close to it. But he thinks he understands, finally, and it's an odd relief to know why his old enemy had found it in himself to do something so terrible. He was programmed. Merlin has seen this kind of manipulation before. As he heads down the slope that leads to their camp, he tells himself to confront Mordred about this, because he needs to know who these men are. He has to know, because then he can find them, and then he can kill them.

Of course, his life is one giant mess, he's known that for years and should really be used to it y now, but the sight of the empty campsite still manages to sink his stomach to the soles of his feet. At first, he merely thinks Mordred has deserted him, and sighs in frustration, but then his eyes flicker to a telltale notch in a tree and the odd dispersal of leaves across the ground, and he knows that Mordred has been taken. His heart rate quickens – the key to avenging the deaths of so many he's loved has been taken from him, and he cannot let it slip away so easily.

'Mordred!' he shouts, and the anger is tangible in his voice.

He is surprised by the speed of the response. A weak mumbling sound comes from a copse to his right, and he hurries to it, pushing aside leaves until he finds the barely conscious boy. His face is half soaked in blood, and a slit has been cut under his lip, weeping and swollen where the gag presses into it. The confident, secretive knight Merlin had known is gone, replaced by a trembling, paralysed shadow of a man.

'Tell me who they are. Tell me why they did this to you.'

Mordred only shuts his eyes in agony.

'Mordred, tell me. I know they've hurt you before, I know they'll do it again. You don't have to protect them. Where are they?'

The eyes that stare back at him are wild, and they register no understanding.

Merlin feels an overwhelming urge to shake him, hard, but knowing how fragile the boy is already and not wishing to cause further damage, he resists. The pale skin seems so much like paper, easy to tear and shred, and the harsh metal armour he still wears looks as though it could pierce the translucent flesh in an instant. Merlin knows he must get up and locate the men, for they must be close, but as he starts to rise he feels a flash of regret. He doesn't want to hunt them down, not right now. Because Mordred looks so weak and ill and the life is draining from him, rapidly, and maybe it's sentimental nonsense but after what the boy has been through, Merlin cannot bring himself to allow him one single moment more of pain. But he shakes this off as irrational, and forces himself to his feet.

They are there, stood waiting for him. Clearly, they do not know of his powers, had wanted to catch him not off guard, but feeling like he has a fighting chance. They walk towards him, smirks on their faces, and Merlin knows from the borrowed memories that these are mere henchmen, not the torturers he seeks. He has tried to abstain from magic since the dragon, but he does not think twice before his eyes light up and they are thrown back against the clump of trees.

He hears all three necks crack, and does not flinch.

Merlin swivels, steps back to the copse, and pushes back the leaves. Mordred's eyes are barely open, and the gag that binds his mouth is turning brown as the blood dries. His face is a deathly white, and his fingers twitch in their rope bonds.

Merlin feels sick.

He clears the area around the boy, afraid of moving him for fear of what it would do to him. Although the memories of Gaius are painful, he digs around inside his brain for remedies, and eventually rudimentary bandages replace the ropes around Mordred's wrists.

The slit beneath his lip stays. Merlin cannot bear to touch it, and the material fibres still sit within it from the frayed gag.

And this time, when Mordred opens his eyes, it is Merlin that says 'Eat.'

They stay at this campsite for several days. Mordred is weak, and cold, and Merlin tries to remain patient, knows he cannot confront the boy about his past when he is already so ill. They do not talk at all, if they can help it. But now, Merlin allows himself to slowly, gently begin to examine Mordred's mind.

He finds it is composed of many layers. Confusion, betrayal, pain – they are the most recent, the most immediate, but beneath them there is loyalty and belief in his mission. There is also anger, much of that, and hatred – not for those who tortured him, but for those who he was programmed to hate. Merlin digs through all this, finds it hued in dark greys and browns, but then one day, he breaks through the final barrier and that's it. Here is the real Mordred. Simplicity can sometimes be the way forwards, he notices, and manages to smile at the knowledge Arthur would probably have said something along those lines about him.

Mordred's true self does not have the same dark taste of grey about it. It is instead an intelligent, gentle blue, and it pulses with life. There is the innocence of the child he used to be locked up in there still, and a thirst for knowledge that Merlin would never have guessed existed. It is so much the opposite of what he expected, and yet so perfectly apt for the boy who lies healing in front of him, and he feels refreshed in an unusual way when he withdraws from the mind. But the next time he takes the opportunity to look, he does not have to fight to reach this layer.

Almost as though Mordred is letting him in.

After a week, the druid opens his eyes and focuses on Merlin in a way that makes him sure he is most definitely back in this world for good.

'Thank you,' he whispers, and Merlin – Merlin smiles.

The next day, he sits up. The day after that, he helps Merlin kindle the fire, and offers to fetch more firewood.

Merlin knows they should leave, now Mordred is strong enough to walk they must hunt down the manipulators, but he is too wrapped up in learning about this other man he knew nothing about to want to leave. He's just starting to let the forgiveness settle in. He sees Mordred stumble with the wood, and finds himself on his feet to help him before he knows what he's doing.

He holds the branches while Mordred picks up the ones scattered across the leaves. When Mordred holds out his arms for the branches, Merlin does nothing.

'You saw.'

He can only nod.

'You understand.'

He does not even have to move his head.

It's funny, how being so close to someone makes you so aware of their breathing.

They fall into each other without a word.

The fact that nothing has to change is what motivates them. For they are a team now, the pair that so despised each other in the beginning, and they can change things because they want to. Merlin has his life, Mordred his childhood – they will never get these things back, and they can choose to do nothing about that, if they wish. But they do not.

The next day, Merlin puts out the fire, and Mordred collects their scarce possessions.

Today, they both breathe.

Thanks for reading! Just a note (I kind of forgot to explain) the songs at the beginning are just what I've been listening to whilst writing, because I love the songs and I felt they fit the story well. Check them out if you want, they're pretty awesome :) The third (and final) chapter should be up soon - thanks!