Oops. I actually forgot about this story -_-
My bad. Here's the update finally :)
~14~ Mercy Killing
He noticed three things when he opened his eyes: first, that he was naked. Second, that he was coated in gore that was not his own. And third, that he was going to be sick.
Merlin rolled over in his rough cradle of tree roots and vomited, stomach burning, tears streaming down his cheeks. He continued to retch even after his body was empty, noting with alarm that what burst from his mouth was red and black, like blood.
Once he regained control, he sat up, shuddering. Dried fluids cracked across his chest, neck, shoulders, and legs, and he brushed it away as though in a trance, confusion roiling in the forefront of his mind.
What happened? Where am I?
He was in a forest, an older one by the looks of the trees and their scraggly beards of moss, sitting in the embrace of ancient roots like a wood elf. It was early morning, and the air was chill. The angled sun shone between the branches from the east, casting shaped rays of light into puddles upon the ground. It was in one of these puddles that the mutilated corpse of a blonde-haired man lay, his chest and stomach torn out, his throat slashed, his eyes still open and frozen in the fear he had experienced before he was slaughtered.
Merlin blanched, looking at the remains of Captain Baldwin's lieutenant, Asmodius, then at the blood and organ pieces spattered across his own body, and realization hit him like a hammer on an anvil.
Gods, what have I done?
He nearly puked again, but as there was no more of Asmodius's flesh in his stomach, nothing came up. All he got was pain, but in his shoulder and legs, curiously enough. He curled up in a ball to wait until the torment subsided, but when it didn't, he glanced at the offending points, only to blink in surprise. There was a gash on his thigh and another, with a giant bruise, on his side, but a slice on his shoulder captured his attention. The flesh around that wound was raw-looking and hot to the touch, and oozed yellow pus. He touched it gingerly, only to hiss and withdraw his hand. Fortunately, the bleeding had hastily scabbed itself to a halt, and so he didn't die from blood loss while unconscious.
"Resąnęsco." His irises flashed like twin doubloons, and with a sigh of relief, he watched as the angry wound sealed over and the red skin faded away. He healed his other wounds the same way, glad that none of them were more deep. Anything worse than what he had would be beyond his skill to Heal.
While he was at it, he banished the remaining cuts and bruises left behind after he had tumbled from the smuggler waggon a week ago during the Blackhand raid. After all, why not?
Finally, he nearly stood. At the last moment, he noticed the absence of clothes on his person, and nearly blushed from embarrassment until he also realized that there was no one around to see him.
His knees shivered as though an earthquake was rattling the land, but he managed to stand and make his way to where Asmodius lay prone, his remains a feast for flies and ants. The stench was strong in the warlock's nostrils and he turned away, to see a gleam of ivory beneath the broken branches of a bush. Cautiously approaching, he saw that it was a white horse, equally dead, and equally rotting. It sickened him, but he crawled into the bush and rooted around in the horse's saddlebags. From them, he managed to acquire a clean set of clothes, made for long travels. He pulled them on, tightening the belt more than usual because the attire was too big for his slight frame. Then he took the time to inspect the site more closely.
There were definite signs of struggle, like a bear, or werewolf, had torn up the ground in a challenge. Dried blood speckled the leaves and rocks, condensed more in some places than others. There were large claw marks scored into the trunks of surrounding trees. There was also a dagger left discarded in the leaves, almost hidden.
Merlin bent to retrieve the silver blade, and touched its hilt, only to release a short scream and stagger back, holding his hand. Steam gently drifted free of his fingers where he had touched the weapon, and he hastily wiped them on his pants. He heard a snickering brook a bit into the trees and stumbled towards it frantically. At its edge, he jammed his hand into the water and scrubbed it with the other. The pain receded, and when he lifted it from the brook, the flesh looked red and felt slightly tender.
It didn't take much for Merlin to realize what had just happened. Silverbloods were werewolf hunters – they may not have a cure, but they have an extermination method. Asmodius had planned on killing him, and Merlin was sure that it was not a spontaneous decision, especially not on his own part. The warlock had no doubt that Captain Baldwin was deep in the murderous plot, but who could blame him? Merlin had practically killed his son, after all...At least, it was an accident. Baldwin wouldn't care less that it was in self-preservation.
Merlin considered taking the dagger with him to show to Arthur (Arthur, had he turned?), but was wary of touching it again. It must have been the source of the agony in his shoulder, and he had to prove that the Silverbloods were not what they seem, which wasn't very trustworthy in the first place. After careful consternation, he found a few rags in the saddlery and tensely wrapped up the silver blade in several layers, careful not to let the cold metal touch his skin.
When he stood and turned around, he was confronted by a wolf.
The beast was sniffing around the half-eaten corpse of Asmodius, at complete ease with Merlin not four paces away. The servant stared at it, forgetting that doing so was the worst thing one could do when facing a wild animal. The wolf prowled on, moving from the Silverblood to the horse and ignoring him. It snorted the scent from its nose, and only then did it finally look up and acknowledge Merlin's presence. Its emerald eyes inspected the warlock intelligently, as though it had never seen a human before and did not consider him a threat. It padded closer, making Merlin flinch. Pausing, concerned, the wolf's nose twitched as it sniffed, one paw in mid-step. Then it snorted and lowered its head again, following its muzzle away into the trees.
It hadn't been afraid. It was alone, and wolves generally avoided humans if they could, yet...this one hadn't been afraid. Why was that?
Merlin had a suspicion, but that didn't calm his agitation. Of course, it just added to the growing mound of reasons for his agitation, including that he was a werewolf, that his king was a werewolf, that that very same king was in the reaches of werewolf hunters, and that he had eaten human flesh!
His stomach roiled again at the latter thought, even though he had thrown it all up and knew that he hadn't been in his right mind when it happened. The monster that he had turned into had been threatened, and it did what its instincts told it to do. Merlin just wished that he had gained control back before the creature got hungry.
Shaking away the gruesome thoughts, he put the deadly dagger, wrapped in its many layers of cloth, in a leather satchel from the fallen horse's saddlery. Then Merlin took off through the trees, brisk in his cautious treading. Even if he knew the way, he wasn't going to go back to Camelot, not yet, not until he got the answers he needed.
Kilgharrah seemed to come even faster than usual—when summoned, he could appear from the clouds within moments, but even so, it was as though the urgency in Merlin's commanding voice had drawn the ancient dragon ever swifter.
"There is a problem, warlock," Kilgharrah thundered before he even had the chance to land in the vast clearing Merlin had chosen, "a problem bigger than you can handle. Why can't you ever find issues that are small enough for you to take for yourself?" He folded his massive wings and waited expectantly, regarding him with great golden eyes.
"I would be able to deal with it myself, but Arthur is caught up in it as well." Merlin dropped the satchel and sat down on a boulder, suddenly very tired. "I need your help."
"Of course you do. It seems that while your destiny is to keep the young Pendragon alive and in turn save Albion, my destiny is to help you do so." The great dragon lowered his scaly head until his gaze was level with Merlin's. He inspected the warlock just as the wolf had, and then Merlin was blasted back a step as Kilgharrah snorted. "It is good that you called me. This is indeed something you cannot overcome alone."
"You know?"
"I know. I Heard it in your voice, and I now can See it in your eyes. You have been infested by an ancient magic that rivals the age of even the dragons. I wasn't far from the place where the last werewolf fell, so I am shocked to See you now bearing the curse. How did this happen?"
Though weary, Merlin recounted the events from the past week, throwing in the ambush the king and his knights had set up for the Blackhand cult, which had been wrecking its way across the country with an unfamiliar beast.
"I don't know if Arthur turned last night," Merlin finished. He shrugged. "I hope not. I was nearly killed, and he certainly would have been if he changed. I wish I could remember what happened, how I escaped the Silverbloods..."
"It is well that you did," replied the dragon. "I remember the Silverbloods – they would have indeed killed the king if he had turned, as they would have you, had you not escaped. They are blind in their dedication, harnessed to the road in which they must slay every unfortunate to be cursed by the werewolf. You would have not outlasted the night."
"But they said they had a cure!" Merlin protested. "They said—"
"People will say anything in order to accomplish their goals, you know this," Kilgharrah interrupted, his tone grim. "The silver rock they claimed could hold your conscious before that of the werewolf's is just that: a silver rock, nothing more. I very much doubt it was even part of the blades they said it did, but even if they told that much of a truth, they were simply finding a cover for killing you." The dragon adopted a mocking tone. "They would still claim it to have been an attempt, only things got out of hand." The scaly ridges above his golden eyes furrowed in a frown, and his lip curled back to reveal ivory teeth within. A puff of smoke swirled from each of his nostrils and drifted away into the breeze. "It is difficult to say whether their intentions are good, for they aim to cleanse the land of a terrible and dangerous evil, yet their methods are dark and they care not of who the monster once was."
It was then that Merlin was hit with the full weight of the problem, and his previous feelings of overwhelming frustration, sorrow, and despair were nothing to how he felt now. He blinked away sudden tears, clearing his throat and refusing to meet the dragon's eye. His next words were carefully chosen, and slow in the coming.
"I...I'm lost. I don't know what to do. There seemed to be so much hope with every other obstacle, with the Dorocha, and the Questing Beast, even Morgause's immortal army! But this..." He bit his lip, shaking his head. "I've lost. I've failed. I've doomed Camelot, and with it, Albion." Finally, he looked up at Kilgharrah, and was shocked to notice something he had never before. The great dragon had seen over a thousand years of life, an incomprehensible feat to any mortal, but he had never really shown it before. Now, in this helpless state, facing a problem that he could not see over even with a millennium of experience, Kilgharrah looked...old.
"Oh, Merlin—"
"You should kill me," the warlock interrupted, throat closing, voice cracking. When the dragon didn't reply, he looked up, a fierce determination in his gaze. "Just do it. Kill me, before I kill someone else."
"Merlin—"
"Please, Kilgharrah. I would kill myself but I'm afraid of not doing it right and suffering. It won't take a moment, or cost you any effort. Look at me; I'm barely taller than your finger is long. I won't even feel a thing."
"Merlin—"
"If you don't, then I will. Either way, I will not live to see another sunset, nor experience the change ever again. I have this dagger here – it obviously is harmful to werewolves, and painful as it will be, at least I won't harm any more people..." Merlin stood, dry-eyed, expressionless. He nodded once at his old friend. "Goodbye, Kilgharrah. I thank you for all your help, and I—"
The roar that exploded from the ancient dragon startled the birds from the trees for a league around. Merlin recoiled as Kilgharrah tore up the earth with his claws, tail flailing, wings spread and buffeting the air into a tempest. So rare were the occasions that the warlock felt afraid of the dragon, but this bout of rage surpassed them all.
Kilgharrah swung a mighty paw, and Merlin was knocked onto his back. He somehow managed to scramble to his feet, and he bolted for the trees, only for the dragon to pounce. He landed just behind the warlock and then jumped again, crashing down between Merlin and the cover of the woods. Before the servant could change direction, Kilgharrah turned and swatted him to the ground, pinning him with one paw, and then thrust his face into his, teeth bared in a ferocious snarl.
All was silence. Merlin was sure Kilgharrah could feel his throbbing heartbeat beneath his great foot, and it took him nearly a minute to realize that he wasn't breathing. He sucked in a gulp of air and panted, trying to soothe his heart. The dragon continued to drill him with his ominous glare, a deep rumble like thunder sounding in his throat.
Finally, after what seemed an eternity, a wave of understanding overcame the warlock, and shame brought a dampness to his eyes that couldn't be blinked away.
"Thank you," he croaked, and when the dragon's nostrils flared, he said, "I realize now...I don't want to die."
"You either die a hero, or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain." ~ Harvey Dent (Batman)
We'll just see about that, Mr. Dent.
