Chapter 6

Arthur, Merlin and Gaius stood around a chair where they had placed an unconscious Agravaine. Gaius held a container of smelling salts that he assured them would wake Agravaine instantly. Merlin stood behind him with a look of concentration, ready to use magic.

Having located the amulet, they spent the next half-hour coming up with a plan for what to do next. They had all agreed that killing Guinevere was out of the question, hence the much more elaborate measures they were about to go through.

Gaius waved the smelling salts under Agravaine's nose and his eyes flew open. He jumped to his feet, but Merlin was already incanting his spell.

"Mod wes craeftles."

It was difficult to tell if the spell had worked as it was supposed to. Arthur's plan hinged on Agravaine being enchanted and under their control, but it had to be done inconspicuously so that Morgana would not suspect anything. However Agravaine swayed on the spot as though the spell had simply made him dizzy and confused.

"How do you feel?" Arthur asked him.

"Never better!" he replied with a childish smile, sounding nothing like himself.

It was not very encouraging.

"Pick up that mug," Arthur said to Agravaine, to see if he would obey.

Agravaine picked up a mug that was sitting on Gaius' table, not paying the least attention to keeping it upright. All of the water that had been in the half-filled mug splashed onto the floor. Agravaine looked surprised and held the mug upside down above his head, looking back and forth between the empty inside of the cup and the puddle of water on the floor as if wondering how that had happened.

"You think that is inconspicuous?!" Arthur asked in frustration, rounding on Merlin.

Arthur had been under the impression that Merlin's magic was pretty much infallible. As glad as he was that Merlin was still Merlin, he had hoped that Merlin's tendency to massively screw up his instructions would not extend to his ability to perform the magic that Arthur ordered him to.

"Sorry but I don't use this kind of magic very often!" Merlin protested, "I've never tried controlling someone before!"

Arthur supposed he should be glad to have absolute assurance that Merlin really had never enchanted him before. He had been worried that, despite trusting Merlin, he would always have occasional doubts about whether everything that he knew had been tempered by Merlin changing his mind about things. He would inevitably have quashed the thoughts but there would never be a way to be sure, since he certainly would never know if Merlin had enchanted him. So he should be glad to have proof that that had never been the case, but at the moment he was too busy being annoyed by Merlin's uselessness when he was supposed to be an all-powerful sorcerer. Had Arthur been so impressed and intimidated by Emrys only because of the air of mystery generated by his cloak?

Agravaine tried sticking his hand into the mug, only to get it stuck.

"You've turned him into a simpleton!" Arthur said in exasperation, and Agravaine nodded in agreement.

"Umm, I'll find something better," said Merlin, dashing into his room and knocking a pile of papers off of Gaius' table on the way.

Arthur rolled his eyes, as Agravaine tried unsuccessfully to pull the mug off of his fist, feeling like he was surrounded by children.

A moment later, Merlin emerged from his room with a large, ancient and very illegal looking book clutched in his hands. Arthur wondered where he had been hiding it, considering the number of times he had personally conducted searches for evidence of sorcery that had included looking through Merlin's room.

Merlin rifled through several pages of the book before stopping to read a page full of words that looked like nonsense to Arthur. After a moment he looked up from the book and held a hand out towards Agravaine, who was now banging his hand on the table in an effort to remove the mug.

"Eadmóde ond hiersumian eac niedaes," Merlin said, with a flash of gold in his eyes.

Agravaine straightened up and removed the mug from his hand, simply by unclenching the fist that he had shoved into it.

He then sank to one knee before Merlin and said, "My Liege, your word is my command."

Arthur failed to stifle his snort.

Merlin himself looked taken aback by the result of his spell.

"Umm, just act normally," he said.

Agravaine stood up.

Arthur glanced at Merlin, who simultaneously glanced back at him.

So far so good, Arthur supposed.

"Will you be able to convince Morgana that you are still working for her?" he asked Agravaine.

"I believe that I can handle that, Sire," Agravaine replied.

He certainly sounded like himself now. Perhaps their plan was not doomed to failure after all.

It did not take long for Merlin to give Agravaine his instructions and the three of them headed off to take their positions.

Arthur hid himself around a corner where he couldn't be seen, as Merlin knocked on Morgana's door. It was late enough that Morgana should be in there, with Guinevere getting her ready for bed.

"Merlin!" said Guinevere, answering the door, "Do you need something?"

"Have you seen a rat?" Merlin asked.

"A rat?" said Guinevere, raising an eyebrow.

"I chased it down the corridor but then it disappeared. It must have crawled under the door."

"I haven't seen any rats in here."

"There," shouted Merlin suddenly and ran past Guinevere into the room.

Arthur inched along the corridor wall and peered into the room. Morgana and Guinevere were both looking startled at Merlin, who was crouched down and searching underneath Morgana's bed. Arthur used their distraction to slip into the room and hide himself behind the changing screen. He pulled out the enchanted cloak Merlin had given and put it on.

Merlin straightened up.

"Strange," he said, "I could have sworn I saw it under there. I must have imagined it."

"Maybe it went into another room," said Guinevere helpfully.

Merlin walked up to her and put a comforting hand on her shoulder.

"Don't worry," he said reassuringly, "I'll find it."

Guinevere looked a little surprised by Merlin's behaviour. She glanced at Morgana briefly and in the moment when her eyes were averted, Arthur saw Merlin's eyes glow golden and the amulet around Guinevere's neck vanished.

The amulet was still there of course, just invisible. The illusion that Merlin cast over it only held while he had physical contact with Gwen, which was why Arthur was currently playing the part of Emrys. Morgana would have heard the description of how Emrys had appeared in Camelot from Agravaine and she should recognize the figure in the shadowy cloak as her enemy. Arthur readied himself to make his appearance.

"Didn't you have a necklace on earlier today?" Merlin asked casually.

Gwen looked down and Morgana looked up sharply, both of them noticing the distinct absence of the amulet around Gwen's neck.

"What have you done with it?!" Morgana screamed, leaping up from her chair and suddenly looking quite deranged.

Her shock was understandable since she would know full well that the amulet should be impossible for anyone but herself to remove.

"My… my Lady," Guinevere stuttered out, "it was there earlier. I never took it off."

Arthur took his cue and broke cover. He made sure that as he ran out the room he made it clear for Morgana to see that he was holding a fake amulet that Merlin had magically conjured earlier.

He heard Morgana's voice from within the room say in horrified disbelief, "It's him – Emrys!"

Arthur quickly ducked into a nearby storage room, removed the cloak and stowed it out of sight. He emerged from the room in time to see Morgana charge by. She completely ignored him.

Arthur jogged down to the end of the hall, where Agravaine was waiting, and handed the fake amulet to him. The first part of their plan had gone brilliantly.

By the time Arthur got back to Morgana's chambers, the warning bell was sounding and he could hear the heavy footfalls of guards storming about the castle.

When Arthur re-entered the room, he found Gwen looking very upset and Merlin sitting beside her on Morgana's bed with his arm comfortingly around her shoulder.

"I promised Morgana I wouldn't let anything happen to that amulet," she was saying.

Arthur had suggested that perhaps they should let Gwen in on the plan but Merlin had insisted that it would be far too difficult to explain and that only a genuine reaction was certain to work. Arthur had relented and agreed that she would be safer not knowing what was going on, but it was still difficult to see her so clearly upset.

It was not long before Morgana returned, looking angry and frightened.

"How did Emrys get the amulet?" she demanded sharply of Guinevere.

"I don't know," she said sadly, "It was like it just suddenly vanished."

"You must have noticed something!" Morgana said accusingly.

Before Guinevere could reply, the door opened and Agravaine walked in.

He walked directly up to the group of people and said smoothly to Morgana, "I managed to recover a certain precious artifact."

He pulled the fake amulet out from a pocket and quickly slipped it around Guinevere's neck.

Morgana stared at it for a second in sheer relief.

Agravaine distracted her by placing his hand on her arm and saying, "I live only to serve you my Lady."

Morgana glared at Agravaine and he removed his hand from where he was touching her.

Arthur saw Merlin use the moment when Morgana and Guinevere were both looking at Agravaine to surreptitiously touch the fake amulet, which vanished. Then he took his hand off of Gwen's shoulder, causing the real amulet to reappear.

Everyone looked back to the amulet around Guinevere's neck.

"My Lady, I swear I will not let it out of my possession again," Guinevere said.

"No," said Morgana sharply, "you are clearly not suited for the job."

She grabbed the amulet and pulled it, none too gently, off of Gwen's neck. She clutched the amulet tightly and looked rather at loss for what to do with it.

Guinevere looked incredibly hurt by Morgana's lack of trust in her.

"My Lady, might I suggest myself as the protector of your treasured amulet?" said Agravaine, stepping forward, "No one could be more devoted to you than I, and I would rather die than fail in a task you had appointed me to."

Morgana had rolled her eyes during the last part of Agravaine's speech, but she considered his words and after a moment she handed the amulet to him and said, "Put this on and if you fail to protect it I will…"

But her words broke off as she realized that Agravaine had not put the amulet on. The moment that it entered his possession he had turned and run for the door.

Morgana's reaction was too late and Agravaine was long gone by the time her spell bounced off the doorframe.

Arthur stopped himself from cheering out loud. Everything had worked out perfectly. Their main difficulty had been in the fact that while Guinevere wore the amulet, it could only be destroyed by killing her and that only Morgana herself could remove it from her. They had therefore endeavored to create a scenario in which they could trick her into doing just that.

Morgana chased after Agravaine, but the delay in her response meant that she shouldn't have had time to see which direction he had headed after leaving the room.

"Agravaine, he… what?" said Guinevere, stunned.

Arthur ran out of the room, he needed to get to Agravaine before Morgana. But he soon found that it was not just Merlin following him as expected, but Guinevere too.

"Guinevere, go wait in Morgana's chambers, I'll take care of this."

"No, I'm coming with you! It was my task to protect that amulet."

"It could be dangerous!"

"I'm not afraid of Agravaine," she said stubbornly.

Arthur gave up and kept running. He knew there would be no convincing her to stay behind.

They met Agravaine in Arthur's chambers as arranged. Guinevere looked shocked when she saw him and even more so when he handed the amulet to Merlin.

"Arthur, what is going on?" she asked.

How could he possibly explain?

Their plan to get the amulet had gone perfectly. Now that it was not around anyone's neck it would be easy for Merlin to destroy it with magic, but how was he supposed to do that with Guinevere watching?

Arthur looked at Merlin, who looked like he had no intention of performing magic in front of Guinevere.

"Guinevere…" said Arthur, and they both looked to her. Guinevere stared back at him with her eyebrows raised as though waiting for him to explain everything. However, Arthur had started speaking without actually knowing what he was going to say to her.

But they were distracted from their conversation as Merlin suddenly slumped forward, unconscious. As he fell, a hand reached from behind him and grabbed the amulet.

Arthur spun round to see Morgana standing behind Merlin, who was now lying unconscious at her feet.

"I see you are no longer under my spell," she said, "It is better this way actually. I want you to know the truth when I kill you."

"You will never be Queen, Morgana," Arthur said defiantly. He needed to delay Morgana; distract her. With Merlin unconscious they had no way to fight her. He needed Merlin to wake up. Now.

"But I am Queen," she said in a falsely sweet voice, "and there is only one way you can stop me."

Morgana bent down and slipped the amulet around Merlin's neck.

"Go on then," she said, kicking Merlin so he rolled slightly closer to Arthur, "kill him."

Arthur felt like she had just stabbed him in the heart. After everything they had done to trick Morgana into removing the amulet from Guinevere, how on earth were they going to get her to take it off of Merlin? Especially since she was now aware of the fact that they knew about her. She had made it so that even if they managed to escape from her, the only way to break her curse was to kill Merlin. And so long as Merlin was alive, Morgana could not be killed.

Morgana laughed, "You are weak Arthur. Just as I thought."

"Morgana," said a teary-eyed Guinevere, "why are you doing this?"

Arthur grabbed Guinevere by the hand and pulled her away from Morgana, stepping in front of her. At the moment she didn't remember how dangerous Morgana was and he wanted to avoid a confrontation between the two of them at all costs.

"What happened to you, Morgana," he said, playing for time, "You were my friend, my sister."

"Who was never acknowledged as such!" she replied angrily.

"You can't blame me for the sins of my father."

"You are no different to him!" Morgana screamed, "You have always persecuted those with magic! Do you know what it is like to have to pretend – to hide who and what you are, knowing that the ones closest to you would have you killed simply for being yourself?!"

"My father was wrong about magic. I would have understood."

"You are a liar! You are only saying that to save your own skin! In all the years I knew you, you never once gave any indication of being sympathetic to magic users! You have made it perfectly clear how you feel about me and my kind!"

"I was wrong about magic before. But since I met Emrys…"

"Of course," Morgana cut him off, "you would use magic yourself when it benefits you but condemn anyone else who uses it! You are a hypocrite and you do not deserve to live another day!"

Morgana was visibly shaking with uncontrolled anger. She took a deep breath and then said in a voice that was only slightly calmer than her previous shouting, "I will enjoy killing you, Arthur Pendragon!"

She raised her hand towards him and shouted, "Adiedede!"

Arthur had no time to dodge as the spell flew towards him. He simply saw a bright light and knew that his death had come. He flinched instinctively and closed his eyes against the blinding light, but he felt no pain or any other indication that the spell had made contact. Then he opened his eyes and saw why.

Agravaine stood between Morgana and Arthur. He swayed on the spot for a moment, and then crumpled to the ground, dead. He had thrown himself in the way of the spell.

Arthur felt a strange detachment as he looked at his uncle's body. It had surely been Merlin's spell, as opposed to Agravaine's own will, that had caused him to sacrifice himself for Arthur, but Arthur couldn't help feeling an irrational sense of gratitude nonetheless. Agravaine had thoroughly betrayed him and Arthur would almost certainly have condemned him to execution if they ever got through this, but as he saw him dead now, he could feel nothing but pity for the broken man his uncle had become and the way that he had died at the hands of a friend.

However, Arthur did not have long to ponder these things. Agravaine had bought him only a moment. Morgana was temporarily stunned; even after Agravaine had betrayed her before, she seemed shocked by what he had just done.

Arthur drew his sword and pointed it at Morgana. He had purposely not done so before because he didn't want to provoke her. But if she was attacking him anyways he would rather die with a sword in his hand trying to defend himself than accept defeat.

"Your sword cannot stop me," said Morgana condescendingly.

"But I can," said a voice to the side.

Arthur whipped around to see that Merlin had gotten to his feet and was looking at Morgana with a grim intensity.

Merlin pulled a dagger out of his pocket, which Arthur recognized as his own. He must have dropped it in the woods in the shock of finding out the true identity of Emrys and Merlin must have picked it up.

Morgana snorted as though amused at the idea that Merlin intended to take her on with nothing but a dagger.

"You have lost Morgana," said Merlin darkly, and he slit his own throat.

"NO!" Arthur and Morgana both screamed at the same time.

Arthur ran towards where Merlin had fallen but Morgana pushed him out of the way and got there first.

She leaned over Merlin and chanted some kind of spell. At first Arthur thought that she was trying to heal Merlin, but he was lying completely still in an ever increasing pool of his own blood and was surely beyond the help even of magic. But then Arthur realized that Morgana had her hands not on Merlin, but on the amulet.

She finished her spell and her eyes glowed golden. Then she sat back, as if in relief.

Guinevere, who had burst into tears after Merlin fell, suddenly gasped, "I remember."

So the enchantment had been broken. But at such a cost. Morgana must have somehow undone the bond between herself and the amulet. After all, she was still alive even though she should have been killed when the curse was broken by Merlin's… by Merlin's…

Arthur grabbed Guinevere's hand and pulled her out of the room. It broke his heart to leave Merlin back there but he was beyond their help now, just as they were beyond his help. He needed to get Guinevere away from Morgana.

They had hardly left the room when they ran into a group of knights.

"Where is Morgana, my Lord?" one of them asked.

"In my chambers," Arthur replied shortly, trying to ignore the despair in his mind and take command of the situation, "Men, with me. Guinevere, keep going and find somewhere safe."

Arthur charged back into the room surrounded by knights, leaving Guinevere out in the hallway.

Morgana had gotten to her feet while Arthur had been in the corridor and she now looked condescendingly at the group of people who had just burst into the room.

"Your spell has been broken Morgana," said Arthur firmly, "Surrender. You cannot fight off all of Camelot!"

The knights moved to surround Morgana, and she glanced around keeping track of all their positions. She raised her hand in front of her.

"Emrys will be here any moment," Arthur added, hoping to unnerve Morgana and trying not to let his voice break at the thought of his friend, "You can't get away."

Morgana certainly did look unnerved by that statement. She grabbed something around her neck and shouted, "Bedyrene us! Astyre us thanonweard."

And she disappeared in a whirlwind.

Arthur breathed a sigh of relief. At least she was gone.

He turned to his men, "Inform the others of the situation and conduct a search of the castle in case Morgana is still around."

The knights left.

Arthur walked to where his fallen best friend lay.

He sunk to his knees beside Merlin's body.

Now that the crisis was over, the grief struck in full force. Merlin had been the bravest, kindest and most selfless man that Arthur had even known. And he was gone forever. He had stayed at Arthur's side to protect him and used his great powers to help others with no thought of recognition for his actions. And his only reward was to lay broken in a pool of his own blood. No one would even know the great loss that, not just Arthur personally, but all of Camelot had suffered with Merlin's death. Those he died to save had no idea of all that he had done for them.

What was he going to do without Merlin? It was as though the brightest light in Arthur's life had been snuffed out.

Arthur found he had tears running down his face. He lifted Merlin's body and cradled it in his arms.

And then he heard a quiet voice ask, "Is everyone gone?"

Arthur whipped his head around to see who had spoken only to find that he was alone in the room.

He turned back to Merlin, only to see him staring up at him.

He actually dropped Merlin in shock.

"Ouch," said Merlin, sitting up and rubbing the back of his head where it had hit the floor.

"What… But," said Arthur incoherently.

He looked down at himself and Merlin. They were both covered in what was unmistakably blood.

"I wasn't actually dead," Merlin explained, "It was all an act. I just moved the knife close to my neck and did a blood conjuring spell."

"But the enchantment broke," said Arthur blankly. He was feeling rather lightheaded. Merlin was alive. He was speaking. He was alive.

"It broke because Morgana severed the link between the amulet and her soul."

The truth was really starting to sink in now that Arthur was recovering from the shock. Merlin was alive.

"You're alive!" he said in wonder, and gave an involuntary laugh of relief.

Merlin grinned at him.

Suddenly Arthur felt like strangling Merlin. What had possessed him to think it was acceptable to fake his own death and cause Arthur to needlessly grieve for the stupid idiot?

"I can't believe you did that!" he shouted.

Merlin simply continued grinning, only increasing Arthur's irritation. What kind of maniac comes up with a plan like that anyways?

"Why do you even know a spell that makes blood?!" he asked in frustration. Did Merlin frequently practice spells for the purpose of pretending to kill himself?

Merlin shrugged.

"It was in my book," he said, as though he thought that was a satisfactory explanation.

Arthur whacked Merlin over the head.

"If you ever do anything like that again…" he said warningly, leaving the rest of that sentence up to Merlin's imagination.

"Well, it worked!" Merlin protested and when Arthur continued to glare at him he added, "Besides, you gave me the idea."

Arthur found he could think of no argument to that so he simply got to his feet and wiped the blood that was on his hands onto his shirt. Merlin could wash it out later. It would serve him right.

Merlin chanted a spell and all of the blood that was splattered across both of them and a good portion of Arthur's chambers vanished. It seemed incredibly unfair to Arthur, who had been picturing Merlin's deep regret of his actions as he sat for hours scrubbing magically-conjured-blood off on the floor, Arthur's clothes, the bed…

"Merlin!" said a sudden voice in shock and amazement.

Arthur turned to see Guinevere standing in the doorway, staring at Merlin as though she was seeing a ghost.

Had she seen him do magic just now?

Guinevere ran across the room and hugged Merlin, sobbing into his shoulder, "I thought… I thought you were dead."

It seemed that she hadn't entered in time to see his magic after all. However, Arthur had no idea how they were going to explain this.

Merlin patted Guinevere awkwardly on the back and said, "Umm, yeah, sorry about that."

Guinevere pulled back and looked at both of them, "What happened?"

"Morgana used a magic amulet to enchant everyone in the castle," Merlin explained, "It made everyone believe that she had inherited the throne. Arthur and I remembered though, so we stole the amulet. Fortunately the curse is broken now."

Arthur couldn't help but feel Merlin had left out a few key points in his explanation.

"But I saw you kill yourself!" Guinevere protested.

"I don't remember that," said Merlin, "But the amulet messes with your mind. It makes you remember things that never happened and see things that aren't real. It was probably just the amulet playing tricks on you."

Guinevere didn't look like she really believed that explanation but she nodded and accepted it anyways. Arthur was reminded of the times that he had done the exact same thing while Merlin had been spouting some nonsense story. It had never seemed worth bothering to try to dig deeper and figure out what had really happened because it was Merlin and probably nothing to worry about anyways. Guinevere similarly also seemed to dismiss this as just "one of those Merlin things" as though she was also used to this kind of situation. Did Merlin have these moments with everyone in Camelot? Or was it just his close friends?

Arthur had been under the impression that Merlin must be a master of falsehoods in order to have deceived them all so thoroughly for so long, but he was now starting to think that the only reason Merlin hadn't been found out yet was because nobody actually took him seriously.

"Anyways, we should probably go and explain to people what has been going on now that everyone remembers," said Merlin.

Arthur suddenly felt very tired and he remembered that he had not slept the night before. And the past two days had been anything but restful. He looked longingly at his bed, but knew that before he turned in he should go and speak to the knights and councillors about what had happened. It must be quite unnerving for them all to have been enchanted and suddenly regain their memories without knowing what was going on.

"Let's go summon the council then," said Arthur gloomily.