Cottia wandered down to the stables after he had gone. Their horses were looked after by the men there, but she liked to see Goldberry herself. After all, once you got used to them, horses were rather nice. And the stables were always warm.
She was leaning on the closed gate of the stall and feeding her horse when a voice behind her made her jump.
"Hello, Miss Cottia." It was Sir Percival. A string of teenage boys were behind him. They looked sweaty and eager, and all of them were wearing light armor and carrying weapons - although when she looked more closely she saw that they were old weapons with very blunt edges.
She nodded to Percival. The boys were staring at her. Some of them were giggling furtively. She stared back at them. They looked away.
"What are you?" said one of the boys, who was bigger than the rest. "Some kind of freak?"
Percival gave him a look. The boy grinned back.
"What are you? Some kind of bully?" Cottia had seen his kind before. Oh, so many times before. They were always the same.
He reached as the line filed past her and grabbed a handful of her hair, yanking hard. It had grown out a little, but it was still only shoulder-length. She twisted like a snake and sank her teeth into his hand hard enough to draw blood. The metallic tang of it filled her mouth and some instinct made her thrust up her hand and rake his face with her fingernails as he tried to back away. He yelped. Percival turned and grabbed him by the collar, effortlessly lifting the boy several inches off the floor.
"Cottia is a personal servant of the King. You will treat her with respect." He looked at the red furrows on the boy's face and the blood dripping from his hand, and then at Cottia, who was calmly wiping her mouth on her sleeve. Percival looked impressed as he hauled the boy away.
She was half expecting him to tell on her to the King or to Merlin (and she was not sure which she dreaded more), but instead he accosted her just as she was leaving the stables about ten minutes later.
"I'm sorry about Nicholas, Cottia. He is a bully."
She shrugged. "I know. I was a delinquent. I've seen his kind before."
Percival was slightly taken aback at her calm, but he continued. "I spoke to Sir Leon, and he agreed with me - this is just an idea between the two of us - that we should teach you a little about how to fight."
"What for? Will I need to?"
"It will make you safer. For one thing, you'll be able to hold your own in an attack like the one when we were on patrol, and for another -" He seemed embarrassed.
"What?" she demanded as he seemed unwilling to continue.
"You are a singular person. You dress like a boy all the time, and you have a boy's job. You ride with us as a servant to do the work of a boy, not as a maid or a messenger for a lady. Uh - well, in fact, there has never been a girl quite like you in Camelot, at least so openly. You are attractive and also unusual, and because of that, you will be bullied by your peers."
She looked up at Percival. It made her neck ache. He was very tall. "So? That's no different from all the rest of my life. There have always been people who hated me. I don't spend much time out alone, anyway."
"You still need to learn how to fight. Even Merlin knows the basics of combat. How do you suppose he has survived for so long when he accompanies Arthur on the most perilous of quests?"
"Well, all right. What do I have to do?"
Percival beamed. He held out a long dagger in a plain black sheath. "We agreed that this would be the most suitable for you to start with. You're not strong enough to use a sword, and you probably won't want to carry one. But a good dagger can go anywhere with you, and it can be very effective. The techniques you learn with it can be easily adapted to a sword if you ever find yourself with one. Are you doing anything important in the next hour?"
She shook her head.
"Then come with me and I'll start your training."
He didn't let her use the dagger at first. They used wooden practice weapons from the school the King had set up to train young men. After the battle in which he died, the casualties of his knights had been so high that one of his first decisions when he returned was to open a school to teach all suitable young men the skills to be good soldiers. Traditionally, the boys would have trained with real weapons from day one, but Arthur wanted quantity over quality. He had not promised to knight every graduate of the school, only the ones who showed him they were worthy. The others would still be highly trained regular soldiers.
Cottia rather enjoyed the training, to her surprise. It was a bit like dancing, which she had always been good at, with the bonus that if you did it correctly, you could save your life. She had a very good sense of space and balance, but she was not fast.
After an hour, Percival stopped the lesson. "That's enough for today. You're picking the basic positions and footwork up very nicely."
"When can I use this?" she asked, picking up the dagger again.
"When you're skilled enough to not kill yourself with it."
"Oh."
"You'll train in armor then. I know that when you fight, you probably won't be wearing any, but it's better to be safe than dead by accident." Percival patted her shoulder. "Come find me tomorrow when you have an hour to spare. If I can't teach you, Sir Leon will. We're both overlooking the school for the boys right now, so we're down here and ready to teach most days."
'Down here' was in a large field outside the arena that the tournaments were held in. There were lots of little tents set up, and boys and knights were swarming over it as the battle school practiced. The clash of metal on metal and the drum of horse hooves rang around the space. Percival had been teaching her in a long narrow space back between the tents of the teachers, where no one had been watching them. He waved as she hurried back to the castle.
Cottia was very tired and rather sore that evening. Merlin had been surprised when she told him that Percival was training her, but he agreed that she needed to learn the basics. When she showed him her dagger and told him what Percival had said about armor, he looked thoughtful and then went and rummaged around in a chest in his room. He came out with an armful of metal.
"This is a lightweight set of chain mail made for a woman," he said. "It has all the padded underneath clothes too. It's not as much protection as you'd get from one of the standard sets, but it'll fit you better and it won't restrict your movement as much. It was made for flexibility."
She looked at it dubiously and then yawned. Merlin reached over and ruffled her hair. "Go to sleep. I have to help Arthur tonight. He has a lot of paperwork."
Cottia took a bath and went to bed, unaware of the storm clouds building up on the horizon.
0000
"She bit through the boy's hand?" Merlin repeated incredulously.
"Percival saw it. The boy tried to pull her hair, she bit his hand and put some deep scratches on his face with her fingernails." Arthur looked up from his reports. "The boy doesn't have a good reputation. I'm glad she stood up to him. He won't be good for much for a few weeks. Alice says the bite is deep."
Merlin was remembering the day that Cottia had been biting his fingers when she was angry with him. It had hurt, but it hadn't drawn blood or even left much of a mark. He shivered. She really was like a feral animal. "Are you sure you want her to know how to fight?"
"It's better than having her bite people. The unexpected is more dangerous. Anyway, she'll only be taught the basics. If she wants to make a career out of it, she'll have to teach herself."
"Maybe she'll become a knight," Merlin said only half-jokingly.
"Shut up, Merlin. Women aren't knights."
"Morgause beat you in fair trial."
Arthur scowled. "I was holding back. I didn't want to hurt her. Anyway, she was a sorceress."
"She didn't use magic in that fight."
"And how do you know that?" Arthur kept his tone casual, but he watched his servant's face intently from beneath his eyelashes. He thought he saw Merlin stiffen for an instant, but it was over before he could be sure.
"Look, I'd seen enough sorcery before that to know the difference between coincidence and magic."
And that was perfectly true, damn it anyway. Arthur internally groaned. Aloud, he said, "Well, if she turns out to be good enough, I'll knight her. After all, I promised to knight anyone who qualifies regardless of their birth. Perhaps it's time that that meant gender as well as social status."
"I think it should," said Merlin. There was a gust of wind that set papers rattling on the table and made the candles flicker. He went over and shut the window. Arthur got up and joined him. They looked out into the darkness together.
"I wonder if a storm - " Merlin started to say, but he was interrupted by a long flash that lit up the sky and showed the the seething pall of cloud that was sweeping towards them.
"I'm glad I got the lightning rods in order," said Arthur. "This looks like a big one."
There was a painfully loud roll of thunder, as if to emphasize his words. They could dimly hear the rain pounding the stones outside after it was over. The glass was already rippling with water. Merlin relit the candles that had gone out. He set down the match and froze. "Cottia," he said. Arthur looked up.
"She doesn't like storms, does she?"
"She's terrified of them. I have to go make sure - "
"Yeah, of course. Bring her back here if you like. There's no reason why you can't."
Merlin nodded distractedly and bolted out of the room.
0000
Cottia sat up as the echoes of the thunder died away, praying that she had dreamed it. But a light tore across the sky outside, making the darkness in her room even darker, and then another suffocating wave of sound came. She shook her blanket off and desperately put her hands over her ears. She couldn't breathe, the noise was so loud.
Light. She needed light, real light, not the flickering kind from the sky outside that only brought more darkness. Her fingers, fumbling across the surface of the table, found the candle and the box of matches, but she could not get one to light. Then there was thunder without the warning of lightning and she dropped the box, matches spilling everywhere. She panicked, and the candle blazed into life, sending a spout of flame taller than her up into the air. She stared at the column of fire. She hated fire almost as much as she hated storms. The door to her room flew open, and one of the panes of glass in a window shattered as another flash came.
She leapt out of bed and ran out of the room. She stumbled into someone just outside her door and struggled wildly as they held her. "Cottia, it's all right! It's just me."
It was Merlin. He held her by the elbows and shook her. "It's all right," he repeated. She grabbed the front of his jacket. "Go put your regular clothes on and come with me." He looked into her room. "Oh dear. We'll fix the window in the morning. Some always break from the thunder."
She clung to him as he he led her down the stairs and along endless corridors until they reached the King's apartments. It was a little quieter there, since they were no longer in a tower. The sound of the rain beating on the windows was oddly soothing, and so was the soft light of the candles. Cottia sat curled up in a corner beside the fire. Merlin and Arthur were close, and they were talking quietly. She had brought her music player with her, and that helped to drown out the sounds of the storm.
Gwen came in quietly, taking off a wet cloak. "It's awful out there."
Merlin took the cloak from her and hung it over the back of a chair to dry. Gwen went over to stand in front of the fire, and noticed Cottia asleep on the hearthrug. "Is she all right?"
"Oh good, she's asleep," said Merlin, looking over. "She's afraid of storms. I couldn't leave her on her own."
Arthur had gotten up and come to stand by Gwen. Now he knelt down and picked Cottia up. She stirred but did not wake up. He laid her gently across the foot of their bed.
"Good idea," said Gwen. She rummaged around in a cupboard and pulled out a blanket, which she placed over the girl. Then she sat in a chair by the fire. Arthur went back to his desk. Merlin leaned against the table and watched, occasionally handing Arthur more pieces of paper.
"I've been thinking," said Gwen after a long time. Arthur looked up and grinned.
"Oh, no," he said.
"I don't have a maid anymore," Gwen went on, ignoring him. "I haven't noticed it that much, to be honest, but it does get awkward sometimes. Do you think she'd be good at it, Merlin?"
"I don't know. She's neat and precise. You'd always be able to find your socks. They'd probably be cross-referenced."
"I wouldn't need her to actually attend me every day. But I was thinking, it would be more fair for you to have a helper. You take care of both of us, and you do a very good job." Merlin waved his hands, embarrassed. "No, it's true," Gwen protested. "You're more like a member of the family than a servant. Tell him, Arthur."
"Yes, Merlin, your laziness and incompetence do make you more like an annoying little brother than an actual, trained, servant. I don't know why I've put up with you for so long." Their eyes met, and there was no mistaking the teasing note in Arthur's voice.
"I don't know why I've stayed," Merlin replied in the same tone. "After all, there are lots of arrogant dollopheads to work for."
"Anyway," Gwen said firmly, "Cottia could help me with some of my more formal dresses, and it would look better if I had a maid with me when we sit in the throne room."
Arthur looked thoughtful. "That's a good point. We can't afford to look casual right now. We need all the ceremony and formality we can muster. People like a show. She'd basically just have to hang around with you a lot more, Merlin. Would you both be comfortable with that?"
Merlin shrugged. "I don't mind her company. Once you get past the suspicion and the biting, she's actually quite a pleasant companion."
"Has she bitten you?" asked Gwen. "I heard about the boy who tried to tease her."
"She was angry. But she didn't break the skin."
"Sometimes I wonder if I am right about her," said Arthur. "She has great potential, but -"
"We don't know if it is for good or for evil," said Merlin somberly. "I think she could destroy this kingdom single-handedly if she really wanted to. She just doesn't know it yet."
"Or she could save us all," said Gwen. "She reminds me so much of Morgana."
"I know," said Arthur. "It sort of gives me the creeps. But it's just a coincidence. We can't judge her on that."