THE FOREST OF ESITIA
His face changed when he saw that it was her.
His hands fell from his hips and he looked almost sheepish.
The tips of his ears coloured.
Ava stared at him. Her breath like his was like steam in front of her face. The night was not especially cold. But there was a rising chill in the air, like a warning.
He was wearing simple clothes. The Uncle Merlin she knew wore purple or light blue robes with gold thread. These were like servants clothes…
"Your mother is in the first part of her term carrying Llacheu."
Ava tried to think on what Eveline had said and count back to exactly when she was, from what she knew of the time before her eldest brother was born.
Merlin shifted and held his hands up.
He must have thought that her stunned silence was because he had demanded to know why she was there.
Partly it was.
"Sorry! Sorry for a moment there you looked like someone I know." He apologised.
"Who?... the queen of Camelot?" She asked too quickly.
"Yes… why?" Merlin chuckled before he saw the intenseness of her blue eyes, "do you know her?"
"Yes…" Again Ava failed to get a handle on herself before she answered truthfully instantly. She took a breath to slow herself, "well… I know her better than I know the king… I have never seen or met him… but my brothers and my uncle, my father's friend, say that I look a lot like queen Guinevere. Although I have my father's eyes…. Although I never knew him either…"
Her voice trailed away and she looked down.
Merlin smiled sadly, stepping closer again, "I never knew my father either… well not well… I only met him briefly before he died."
She let out a breath and rubbed at her eyes, "I'm sorry Merlin."
"You know my name?"
Her eyes snapped open at his question and she looked up.
Before she let out a long mumble at his enquiring gaze she shifted and shrugged, shrugging was good…
"Don't many people know the name of Camelot's court sorcerer?"
Merlin laughed easily, "not many, considering I have only been it for a day."
She stammered, "I am sorry to hear that my lord."
He laughed harder, "My lord? Now I know you have never met the king…"
Ava didn't laugh.
Her eyes narrowed as he spoke of her father for the first time, "he has not made you noble yet?"
"Yet?" Merlin ceased laughing and lifted his eyebrows, staring at her hard.
"I mean…" She shifted.
Merlin waved it away and walked closer, his hands on his hips, "Nahh… he is doing it his own way, one step at a time… he will knight farmers into soldiers in a heartbeat but with magic… he has to be careful… I think if I ever become a noble it will be by Gwen, not by him."
Ava couldn't help but stare, "You think that Queen Guinevere will… not the king?"
Merlin scoffed and blew out through his lips, "He is a royal prat…"
Her eys widened impossibly.
Merlin walked around her, having too much energy to stand still, "I don't care how long he lives, I think there is a part of him that won't have it in him… I joke… he is a good man."
"He is."
Ava's voice was small and unsure, and when Merlin looked at her again she was looking at the floor, although not really seeing it.
"I thought you said you haven't met him, or seen him…" He enquired gently, eyes searching…
"I haven't." She sniffed and looked up at him, holding his gaze with a regal determination, and there was a set on her jaw that Merlin was sure he had seen somewhere before, "But I like to think that everyone's praise and stories are true. It is all I have."
"Indeed…" His voice trailed away.
There was something about her….
Ava could see his mind was whirring as he stared at her, and she knew she was not doing a particularly fantastic job of being inconspicuous and normal.
"So erm… what are you doing?" She asked.
Merlin tapped his temple firmly, "The druids have called me mentally, saying that they have a message…"
"And you are going by yourself… in the dark?" Ava folded her arms and lifted oen eyebrow in doubt.
It made Merlin pause.
There was something about that expression… as though he was completely useless with three heads…
He pushed it away, "You are one to talk! I can protect myself… who is going to protect you?"
"I was with someone…" She defended hotly, "they got me this far, but it seems I have to go the rest of the way myself."
"Isn't it always the way?" Merlin chuckled and shrugged.
Ava found she was smiling, "Yes."
There was a noise in the woods and her head snapped around.
Her heart beat grew loud and Merlin held his hand out for her silence sharply.
She swallowed and watched the woods and him as he walked closer, hand still raised.
He scanned the woods with his eyes and was still.
She didn't breathe for a moment.
Suddenly there was a whoosh as someone ran fast away from close by them.
A moment more past before Merlin moved to her side.
"On second thoughts. The druids are bound to be nearer than wherever you are going…"
"Camelot." She answered instantly.
"Exactly. Come with me. You will be safe…" He put a hand on her shoulder.
"I know."
"And I have the feeling that if I let you get hurt your late father may haunt me. Come on, we will be back in Camelot before long."
He strode past her in the direction opposite to where Eveline had pointed.
Ava watched her Uncle Merlin walk away for a moment before she followed and muttered to herself.
"So you have always been this strange… wonderful."
CAMELOT – THE VAULTS
A long white crystal gleamed in the hands of a large stone statue, which dominated the back of one of the cells in the vaults.
The statue had been carved from pale granite, and depicted a young woman with flawless kin and flowing hair holding the crystal in the palms of both her hands.
A dark figure loomed over the statue, which gloomed undisturbed in the moonlight.
The short man's heavy boots scuffed the thick dust on the floor at the statues feet as his hand reached to hover over it.
As his hand wrapped around the Crystal it glowed red hot and turned crimson and let out a high pitched shriek in the man's brain.
CAMELOT – THE ROYAL CHAMBERS
In the moment that the man deep in the vaults disturbed the crystal and heard the high noise, Gwen felt it shatter through her sleeping brain.
The queen had been laying curled on her side facing away from her husband, who was laying on his back sleeping deeply.
She rolled further onto her sighed and scrunched her eyes together in discomfort, fisting her hand as a white burning circle appeared on her palm.
She rolled further away from Arthur and unfolded her hand as the necklace Merlin had given her, handing around her neck always to protect her from magical enchantment and curse, glowed fiercely for a moment, before it disappeared, like the mark on Gwen's palm.
She opened her eyes and rubbed them tiredly, looking down at her palm.
There was not a mark to be seen.
THE FOREST OF ESITIA
As the mark disappeared on Gwen's palm, miles away Ava felt a sharp sting on the back of her neck and a noise in her head. Her hand flew to the back of her neck and rubbed at the spot.
Merlin glanced at her, "Are you alright?"
"Mmm?"
She lowered her hand and smiled at him reassuringly, "I think I just got bitten by an insect… come on, let's keep going…"
"I can look at it for you…"
"It is fine." She pushed him forwards gently, "go!"
Merlin stared at her and didn't move.
She shrugged, "What?"
"Nothing!" He helped up his hands defensively and strode forwards muttering, "it is just you are giving me orders now…"
Ava rubbed at the back of her neck again before she moved her hair back over it.
Her hair blocked from sight a silver bruise-like mark that did not leave as Gwen's had done.
It remained.