11. With the best of intentions

"Under no circumstances I am to be disturbed" Arthur said authoritatively whilst the guard soldier outside Gwen's chambers snapped to attention with a jerk.

Blast it, he was as loyal to his King as the next bloke but the man's concept of waking hours was – weird. Why couldn't he visit his wife at a reasonable hour? But no, it had to be in the middle of the night, or in the small hours or when the sun was grilling the castle or whenever a seasoned soldier would want to rest his eyes for a minute or two.

"Aye, My Lord, nobody but the Queen or the Head of the Council is to be presented to you whilst you're here, Sire" the guard droned out the usual protocol, but it wasn't such a good idea.

"Gods almighty, are you deaf man? I said, nobody and I meant nobody. Is that understood?"

"It's four o'clock in the morning Arthur, and your voice is ringing from the walls. Just a teensy bit louder and the Court will assemble, all by themselves."

Arthur glared at Merlin who returned his angry stare with a patient, enduring smile. The kind he'd once seen on the face of a Christian saint carved in wood. The smile that told his King that he was his loyal friend, his always willing servant and that he would endure his beloved sovereign's every whim, however childish, prat-ish, idiotic and utterly stupid that sovereign might chose to behave. Merlin had developed a great talent for that smile. It was meant to chastise his King and they both knew it.

"Carry on" Arthur harrumphed at the unfortunate soldier and the man saluted his King for a farewell, not without a grateful wink at the young sorcerer who with a very Merlin-like attitude of ironic obedience sauntered inside after his master.

"You know, 'carry on' is such an awfully useful phrase, don't you think so, Sire? Whenever a knight, or a prince or any other fountain of tact and wisdom is out of his depth he just growls 'carry on' and…"

"Shut up, Merlin!"

His Majesty's angry order was the last thing the guard heard before the door was slammed shut behind his back.

For a second the soldier marvelled at the warlock's ability to survive such jibes, time and again, without being tied to a whipping pole or thrown in the stocks or at least sent packing for good. Heaven knew that the young King had a kind heart but he also had his father's temper and at times it was best not to tangle with him.

A hot feeling of dismay shot through the soldier all of a sudden. Speaking of the King's temper when visiting his wife at four o'clock in the morning and her Ladyship wasn't alone. Another man had entered her chambers some hours ago and only now the guard remembered that he had yet to come out again.

"Oh hell" the soldier thought miserably. "Why on my watch? Why is it always me?"

He shouldn't have bothered.

Arthur greeted Gwen's visitor the second he had finished greeting her. "My Lord Duke, thank you for agreeing to meet me here at this ungodly hour."

"No hour is ungodly if it is spent on HIS behalf" Marke of Cornwall replied, dead seriously, and as always it took a considerable effort on Arthur's – and Merlin's – side not to roll their eyes, as gravity a bit overdone was the Duke's signature attitude.

"It is me who has to be grateful for this opportunity to talk things through and my special thanks go to Her Ladyship for the use of her rooms" Marke continued and Arthur suppressed an impatient sigh "If we go on bowing to and complimenting each other, we can spend the night here without getting any work done."

Therefore his next words were a bit blunter than he had planned them to be. "Let's get to business then, shall we? Guinivere, if you'll excuse us…."

"I won't" she said, gently but firmly. "This concerns me and my son as much as anyone else."

Arthur was the only one present who noticed the almost inaudible emphasis on the word 'my' son. The blood rushed to his cheeks and made them burn; a sign Marke misunderstood as being related to him.

"Merlin here informed me that you might wish to discuss Lord Erec's fate with me" the Duke said hastily. "It has been six weeks now since his arrest and he…."

"His well being is not my concern" Arthur interrupted the other rudely while he plonked himself down on the nearest chair and signalled the others to do the same.

Lately his wife had this effect on him.

His desperate love for Gwen when he'd thought she'd die had made room for a sullen, sulking feeling that could be called by many a name. Bereaved. Ridiculed. Humiliated. The feeling grew stronger any time he held his little son in his arms.

Black eyes, black hair, light-honey skin.

Nothing like Margaly.

Lancelot's eyes. Lancelot's hair. Lancelot's skin.

Oddly enough, Arthur loved Galahad madly.

Or maybe there was nothing odd about it.

Lancelot could do nothing, nothing at all to take the little boy away from him. So perhaps Arthur Pendragon had been incapable of keeping his wife, but he would keep this child, no matter what.

To hell with Lancelot du Lac and all the precious hopes a youthfully naïve Prince of Camelot once had had for a future full of love and tenderness!

The vengeful thought determined Arthur's reaction even now and from this moment on the perspectives of the people present fell grossly apart.

From Arthur's point of view, if Gwen insisted on being part of what could only be a nasty mess of a conversation, by all means, let her. He'd hardly any opportunity to see a wife and companion in her these days; maybe she'd at least look the part today.

For Guinivere, Arthur's face told her all she had to know about his feelings, as well as some things she only imagined and together they made her bite back tears that could have been made of blood. They sure hurt enough. Why, oh why couldn't he see that she was only trying to find a way out of the mess they'd brought themselves and their marriage to?

But of course, His Highness had more important things on his mind than their marriage!

There had been a time in which Merlin would have noticed the personal undercurrent in a seemingly purely political situation but, after being forced out of his depths long ago by Council matters, Algernon's demands and the King's constant manoeuvring, the warlock had lost some of his natural empathy.

In short, he had learned to focus on one point of view and on one set of moods exclusively and naturally this standpoint was, who else's should it have been, Arthur's. As a consequence, if Merlin wasn't caught up in Morgana's plans and view on life, he was caught up in her brother's, and he lacked the resources to much consider anybody else's.

In this very moment, the warlock didn't much like the frown on his King's face when Arthur leaned towards Marke. "You and your Christian friends have thought it wise to utter some threats against the realm, the Crown and me, should Lord Erec be executed as he deserves. I came mainly to tell you that that was not as clever as you might have thought."

"Sire, I'd never….." The old noble was crestfallen under the sudden attack but Arthur puffed himself up even more.

"Duke Marke, last time I checked I was your King and you will at least have the courtesy of hearing me out, or I swear I'll make you, grey hair or no!"

Now Merlin was truly horrified. This was not at all what they had agreed on in advance. Arthur had been a paragon of peace half an hour ago, now he was a demon of wrath. What was it these days that the prat couldn't live through five minutes without getting mad with rage at anything and anyone around him?

"Letters have reached the Council that the Christian Lords think it better to spare Lord Erec's life, 'or the peace of the realm might be lost' " the warlock said reasonably, trying to calm the stormy waves ere they all drowned uselessly. "It was an ambiguously phrased message at best."

Before Arthur could bite his faithful companion's head off for speaking out of line, as he clearly wanted to do, Marke grabbed the offered life-line. "I agree that these letters were ill phrased, My Lord. But I give you my solemn word that my friends intended no threat by them. It was, correct me from wrong, our impression that Your Majesty yourself wanted to spare Lord Erec's life, if possible."

"So you and your friends undertook it to lecture my sister and me, to most solemnly berate us, in public, as the imbecilic children we are in your superior eyes and judgement!"

"We meant no disrespect …."

"Didn't you indeed. Pray tell me then, was it your wish to see Erec die under the sword, so that you may have an excuse for stabbing me and Morgana in the back? If I ever intended to moderate Erec's punishment, against the expressive wish of almost all my Council, and against the law of the land, how could I do so now? Anyone would think I chickened out of the situation as soon as the Christians bared their teeth at me."

"Duke Marke has a suggestion how to solve that problem" Merlin said and Arthur darted around in his seat, glaring murderously. "One word, just one more word, and you'll regret it" that glare said, unmistakably.

"Then why did you take me? Why am I here?" Merlin's stare replied, equally silent, equally decisive. They had had this conversation before, verbally and silently, many times.

Surprisingly, it was always Arthur who backed down. Other than his father he not only knew when he was in the wrong but he also acted on it. At least sometimes. And with some people.

"And what would that suggestion be?" the King pressed out, calmer now. Obviously much more in the mood for listening than he had been before.

Arthur Pendragon would've rather suffered death and hell fire before he admitted to his servant and friend that that was why he liked to take Merlin with him. Because he didn't trust his own temper. But then, he had no need to say it because Merlin already knew.

Gwen, for one, knew it very well, too. And every time the special magic between those two worked its miracle in front of her very eyes, something rotted away inside her.

As she saw it, her husband had gone to bed with her. But as to his heart, that had not been his to give when he married her as it had already been taken for good.

She didn't have another woman for a rival. She had a male warlock. And in her worst and darkest moments, when she was all alone with her jealousy, her guilt, her despair and the knowledge that all she'd ever longed for had gone awry – in these moments she was sure that she hadn't been the only person in Arthur's bed in the past. It helped to think that, to conjure it up. Because if he had betrayed her first, her betrayal wasn't that bad any more.

Sometimes she ached so much inside that she treated herself to these fantasies, as if it was a medicine, a pain killer. Especially since that day two weeks ago when Gaius and Alice told her that another pregnancy would be her death.

As the two healers had made it abundantly clear that further sexual contact between husband and wife was out of the question, she had waited for a sign of regret, of loss in her husband's face, but she'd seen only relief.

So that was that, then. Out Guinivere, in Merlin.

A daughter. A son, at least officially. A Crown. And the best friend of all.

Who needed a wife if he had all this?

Unbeknownst to Guinivere, the chosen solace came at a high price. Slowly but surely all the warmth in her, all that had once been the living, glowing centre of many people's life was throttled and died. Every time she indulged in these base thoughts, some of her heart blood turned to poison.

As it did now.

She panted slightly and Marke looked at her, worriedly. Marke, not Arthur. The way her father would've looked at her, had he not been murdered by her husband's most august papá.

"I think we could kill several birds with one stone, so to speak" Marke now said hesitatingly. "If Your Majesty would allow me to talk openly…."

"Please do!"

The Duke cleared his throat and, in his usual somewhat circumstantial habit, he began to elaborate his thoughts. The essence of it was that Erec should be banished from the Kingdom for life due to an incurable mental illness Gaius would – miraculously - diagnose him with. This way his pardon wouldn't look like an act of cowardice on the King's side (naturally Marke wasn't fool enough to actually use the word 'cowardice'. He circumvented it, which prolonged the narrative of his ideas considerably.) Erec's fiefdoms and his other fortune should go to – and there the problems began.

"Surely they can only go to your nephew Tristan" Arthur smiled, already more than half won for the idea. "You're a sly old dog My Lord Duke, if you forgive me for saying so."

The Duke bowed slightly but he didn't look too happy. "I see how this would seem the only apt solution, Sire. Alas, it is not possible. I cannot accept my nephew being heir to Lord Erec's estates and fortune if I'm going to disinherit him!"

Arthur just gawked at him for a second, stunned. "First of all" he finally said "you can hardly decide both issues on your own because the fiefdoms are mine to give or withhold. Second, why on earth should you do a foolish thing like this? No dried leaf could ever be pressed between Tristan and you, ever since his parents died. He's a fine young knight, he will make a great Duke and he adores you."

"Unfortunately this is no longer so" Marke said. "You have worked hard, My Lord, you and your sister, very hard, for a balance of believes in the realm. The Branguards, their high rank and vast estates are a power base for the Old Religion, my family and friends and our entitlements are the stronghold of Christendom. If you bestow the Bodmin estate and the rest of Erec's estates on Tristan, this balance no longer holds."

"Says who?" Merlin chimed in, his head swimming. Surely the endless hours he and Geoffrey had spent over the maps, boundary plans, different sets of legal frames and countless other things that defined the fiefdoms which together formed Camelot could not have been for nothing?

"Says Tristan himself" Gwen said calmly. "Morgana told me. She wasn't too happy about it although it was the first letter she had from Morgause in a very long time. A few weeks ago, Sir Tristan arrived on the Isle of the Blessed and by the whole assembly of High Masters and Priestesses of the Isle, under the benevolent auspices of Morgause herself, he gave up his Christian faith and became an acolyte of the Old Religion, on his own request."

Marke sighed. "You see the problem, My Lord. If Tristan were to inherit first Lord Erec's estates and mine later on – "

"More than 70 % of Camelot would be in the hands of followers of the Old Religion, the rest would be neutral as it belongs to the Crown directly" Merlin droned out the figures he had taken many a torturous, boring day to learn by heart. "And the Queen herself a sorceress and sister to the High Priestess" he added in his mind. "Three cheers for the end of peaceful coexistence in the realm."

"I still don't get it" Arthur said doubtfully. "Why should Tristan do this to you?"

"Because he loves the Lady Iseult. He's always loved her. He thinks he can't live without her." Marke's face was peculiarly flushed now.

Arthur shook his head in confusion. "That's why her father promised to give her hand to your nephew in marriage as soon as they're both of age. They're to be wed come summer."

"Things have changed, Sire. We, that is my Christian friends and I… I mean, father Severinus and our bishop were convinced that….. and Erec thought too….."

"Oh heaven, spit it out man. Who thought what?"

"Erec found out that magic runs in Iseult's family. It hasn't surfaced in some generations, but it is there. Perhaps you know that the family line of Tristan's mother is not free of the abomi….." Marke's gaze flickered to Merlin and his wrinkled face reddened even more. "I mean, Tristan's own family has been known to produce sorcerers. So we – the Christian community, that is – thought that the marriage should not take place."

The old man looked very embarrassed. "As I am the last male member of the only family line which has never had any magic, I… I was persuaded… I married Iseult myself three months ago." He grinned sheepishly. "I think her to be carrying my child."

"I do beg your pardon" the King said after a while, when he'd found his voice again. "You did what?"

"I know, technically I'd needed Your Majesty's permission, but…."

"Technically" Arthur repeated while he tensed his muscles. "Technically?"

"It was a marriage of convenience and I thought…. as it doesn't really concern Camelot's interests…."

"The hell it doesn't" Arthur roared at the top of his lungs. "What were you thinking you old fool? Your nephew and heir, your brother's only son, one of my best knights, and you steal his bride, a girl hardly old enough to be your great-grandchild, you meddle with my plans without so much as asking my leave, you turn my whole realm upside down and you dare speak of convenience?"

In an instant he was up and came for the much older noble. "You're supposed to be the first aristocrat of Camelot, the highest ranking noble at my Court, even before the Branguards, and you behave like a brain-amputated, senile old peacock that's spotted a young hen?"

Just this once it was Guinivere who stopped her husband, as Merlin was too surprised by the turn of events. "You can hardly blame people for behaving like you treat them, Arthur! And what's done is done. We cannot whine over the past, we have to find a way out of this mess."

All of a sudden, Arthur's eyes narrowed dangerously. Abruptly, he grabbed Gwen's hands and pushed her away from him, forcibly. "So that's what this nightly meeting is about" he hissed. "Naturally there's somebody else to taker over from Tristan, isn't there. Dear Lance has married Alaine and her claim on Erec's estate, why not make him heir to Cornwall, too? Is that it, hmh? Feathering your nest for later on My Lady, are you?"

Gwen turned ghostly pale. "What do you…."

"Tristan has proved his loyalty to me and Morgana many a time. What better plan than to oust him and bring in a man of your own trust, eh? As he's become such a devout Christian since his mock marriage. He's perfect, isn't he. He always has been. He's got no nightmares. He's not a cripple. And now that I…. I, My Lady, have made him a very rich man with a foolishly naïve girl for a wife…."

"Arthur, we aren't alone!" Gwen was trembling with horror. He would regret this, horribly regret this the second he regained his senses.

But right now, he'd clearly lost it. "Listen to me, Madam, this won't wash. You will not trade me for that sanctimonious decal of a knight, you will not make a fool of me in front of everyone, I won't let you."

"Presently you're the only one who's making a fool of you!"

Only now it occurred to Arthur that besides his best friend somebody else was witnessing events. He felt bile rising in his throat when he looked around – and saw an empty room. Somehow, somewhen Merlin had thought it wiser to take himself and the old, profoundly perplexed Duke out of the immediate danger-zone.

Violently Arthur wiped his brow and eyes with his hands before he searched Guinivere's gaze. With his wrath spent, the only thing he knew for sure was that he had overstepped a mark tonight. And for better or for worse, this couldn't be undone. "We can't go on like that, Guinivere. We just can't. Heaven knows I still love you, more than my life, but I cannot go on like this. I thought I could forget, or ignore or whatever it takes – but I can't. I'm sorry."

Gwen felt her face burn as if he'd slapped it. "It'll always be with us, it'll never give us some peace, Arthur, will it? The past, I mean. And only it's darker sides. The pleasant moments, our love, our happiness – they're fading from our memories already, aren't they."

"Yes!"

"So we can't stay together."

"No. We cannot."

The first few heartbeats were the hardest. Gwen thought the pain would suffocate her. Or at least make her faint. Or something equally dramatic. Instead she was reintroduced to a side of her character she had quite forgotten.

She nodded. She even smiled. "Then, if you would want to hear me out, I could tell you the rest of Marke's suggestion and I think it might be the perfect solution for all of us."

Outside, in a quite corner of the castle, until the sun had risen and the servants began their busy day, an unlikely couple made of a peasant warlock and a peer of the realm did the very same.

Afterwards Duke Marke shook his head. He was sure he'd never understand what drove Uther's son, not in his great moments, not in his failures. What kind of passion, what demon possessed this handsome young man – Marke would never know. Especially not when it came to Arthur's weird marriage. Apparently he couldn't live without that former handmaiden but he could not live with her, either.

However, there was one indispensable royal talent Arthur had that made up for many a weakness – the talent to win and keep valuable friends. Like this madman Gwaine, like this blacksmith's son. Like Leon. Or like Malcolm Branguard, damned heathen but one of the finest heads in the Kingdom.

Or like this young warlock. Imagine the son of Uther Pendragon risking everything to bring magic back to Camelot because a peasant boy from Ealdor had taught him, whilst serving his breakfast and washing his socks, that his father was wrong about the evils of magic.

Remarkable. Yes, that was a fitting word for both of them. Incomprehensible, weird, even crazy one moment, brilliant the other, but altogether: Remarkable. Even though thou shall not suffer a witch to live.

"Oh Lord, to think that you should choose heathens and sorcerers to do your work on earth" Marke thought before he went to his chambers.

It was an extremely tired warlock who informed – and convinced – Morgana to give the whole scheme her blessing. He left out the bit about Marke calling all magicians abominations unworthy of being born. Let them all think he hadn't noticed the Duke's slip of the tongue, it was better that way.

Reluctantly, Morgana agreed to the plan that had been made. But not before she had declared that they would have a little daylight nap – as Merlin clearly needed one – and later on they'd practice magic and no mistake. And as to this little nap…..

"Morgause surely thought she might finally get Cornwall out of Tristan's conversion" the Queen said as Merlin curled up beside her later on, still glowing from her body's heat and his.

"I thought, as a 'daughter of the Goddess' or whatever she's called since she was officially made High Priestess, she cannot hold worldly office."

"But if she were to be declared Duchess she could name a proxy of her own choosing and he wouldn't be a Christian!"

"And that's exactly why she can forget about that. Arthur would never allow it. He can't, even if he wanted to." Merlin chuckled softly. "I think, right now he'd like to. The Christians are in his bad book I shouldn't wonder." He robbed even closer and hugged her when he closed his eyes. Gods, he was tired.

"Morgause will be furious" Morgana said stubbornly.

"Isn't she always" he muttered sleepily.

"No good will come from this" the Queen whispered. "Not from Marke's wedding. And not from Erec staying alive."

"There's nothing we can do against Marke's wedding" Merlin replied, already mumbling as he was half asleep. "And for Erec – if he died we might well have another civil war on our hands. So we better kick him out and good riddance."

"I hope you're right. But it's so sad. Arthur and Gwen. I thought that would last forever and a day."

Merlin didn't answer. He was fast asleep.

He didn't know it, but his own love had made him a bit more egoistic than he had been before. And then – it had taken him embarrassingly long but in the end even he had understood that it had been Gwen's adultery which had spoiled things for Arthur. That Gwen was responsible for Arthur feeling low when he should be on the very peak of his life.

And for Camelot's Court Sorcerer one thing was as plain as a pike staff, not because he had given it much thought but, honestly, because he had never really thought about it at all: If he had to make a choice, the royal siblings would come first. Always. And in anything.

So, to him, it was Guinivere's fault. As it had been Uther's fault before. Not that he didn't pity Gwen. Had it been in his power, he'd done anything to make things better for her. He did pity her, a lot. But he pitied Arthur more and he always would.

Therefore, troubled and worried as he was, Merlin still lay in Morgana's arms at peace with himself and with his life.

On the next morning the Court was assembled and everybody played his – or her – part.

The trial against Erec proceeded in due course; Gaius had a great entry and speech. There was a lot of restlessness and murmuring when the King's wife, only recently recovered from an almost lethal child-bed, formally pleaded for Lord Erec's life, as her – obviously also recently found – Christian conscience did not allow her to keep silent.

Arthur and Morgana graciously granted her request, everybody was touched. Even those who had relished in the thought of seeing Erec die became sentimental and the Lord's banishment was actually cheered. Well, not by him, but who gave a damn. He would be escorted to the nearest harbour, put on a ship to wherever the wind would blow and – farewell My Lord and please stay away from Albion's merry shores."

"Shipping out inconvenient fellows might yet become a Camelot tradition" a self-styled jokester told his companions, hinting at Uther's banishment.

He got a few laughs but not many as the next announcements were much more interesting. Erec's estates would go to Cornwall – half of it, and the other half would go – to the Branguards, by special permit of the Crown Council.

A beaming Angus pocketed once more the title and claims of Bodmin, although it was a bit reduced in size and value.

Arthur, Morgana and Geoffrey had trouble smiling whilst they bent one of Camelot's most ancient and wisest precautionary laws but – it's always better to smile than to weep when you have got no choice.

For a long while the two Branguards were the most sought after people in all of Camelot.

Marke got permission to finish the church Erec had founded and somewhat later Galahad was christened in this very church, with Marke as his only godfather and potential guardian.

People murmured and shuffled their feet when after the first ceremony a second christening was announced. Her Ladyship the King's wife looked very pretty when she was officially made a Christian and her pronouncement that she would withdraw to a Christian order for a time of meditation and better lessoning in the new faith was very touching, too.

Doubtlessly she would come back later on and all the gossiping and talking about her had been just that – gossip and talk. My, she had looked so very lovely in that church, had she not. And two healthy royal heirs, in such a short time. A fine woman their King had taken for a wife, a fine woman indeed.

That was what people thought and in their enthusiasm about the lavish feast, the food, the drink and everything else that accompanied the little Prince's arrival in this world they just forgot that no date had been fixed for Guinivere's return.

The King's wife left in great style a few days later, her brother and Sir Leon as the leaders of her escort at her side in full knightly splendour, and the people who cheered her heartedly did not know that she had had to say good bye to her children all alone, that her husband had been invisible and had left it to his sister and friends to see her off.

The people were kept equally ignorant of Morgause's tactical reaction to the spoiling of her plan for driving a wedge between Christians and the Old Religion in Camelot.

Arthur was absent from the castle when first Alined's, then Marke's messengers arrived. The King of Camelot was out hunting, together with most of his remaining knights and although Merlin could not for the life of him understand why the poor innocent animals should suffer the brunt of Arthur's unhappiness, he was at his friend's side, as always.

So Morgana received the message, only Geoffrey, Gaius and Malcolm Branguard at her side.

She read the pompously sealed and decorated letters, swallowed once and gave them to the others.

"Well. That was quick work on your sister's side. There's no doubt that she's behind this" Gaius said, much calmer than he felt. Malcolm nodded. "Aye. Both of it. Well timed, well planned. I grant her that."

"Would you leave me alone, please" Morgana said, out of the blue. She clearly had an idea, one she did not want to share with them.

"But Your Majesty, the King must be informed this instant. This could easily grow into a full scale crisis" Geoffrey remonstrated heatedly.

"Whoever informs my brother about these two letters before he comes back from his hunt will lose his head by my own hand. Is that clear? Leave Arthur in peace for a day or two, for heaven's sake!"

There was more to the Queen's fury than a distorted face and shining eyes. The air around her crackled and it wasn't a pleasant feeling on the skin. It was rumoured that it could leave blisters. Or worse.

As a result, Morgana rarely needed to give an order twice. In the blink of an eye everyone had vanished.

Everyone but Gaius, the only one except Arthur and Merlin who wasn't in awe of Morgana's instinctive reactions. "What are you going to do, child?" Somehow he had come back to calling her that, as if the time in which they had been bitter enemies had never existed.

"What I have to. I promised my brother to stand by him and Camelot when we took over and whatever choices my sister has made; I've made mine for good."

Briefly he thought that she had murdered her father without her brother's knowledge and against his express wishes. But Gaius knew better than to mention that. She would say that she acted in Arthur's and Camelot's best interest and although his heart ached terribly any time he thought of Uther, how could he contradict her? Most probably she was right.

"There is something you should know, Morgana. Something you must consider before you make any choices."

"Do not lecture me on morals again, old man. I wear a Crown, I can't afford them!"

"That's a hard thing to say."

"It's even harder to ignore. Look at my brother. He's always tried to reconcile the two and look what it has brought him to. Do you still recognize the golden child in the wretched man?"

"It's not Arthur I'm concerned about, it's you."

"I'm sorry?"

"You're with child, Morgana. Merlin's child, no doubt. I found out yesterday, when I examined you."

Gaius kept his worries to himself. The greatest warlock ever, a dragonlord, had fathered the child of a destroyer. Many, many people would want to get hold of such a child. Gaius felt sick when he thought of it. And the secret, Morgana's secret, which could be Morgause's undoing, it would surely be revealed. The Isle would want the child to be destroyed, as a mistake nature should never have made. Khilgarrah himself would want to... but Merlin would never….. Don't think about that now, old man. It's all in the future. For now there's a young woman who's your only concern. "You should be careful, child. The pregnancy might be – exceptional in a way."

She was still staring at him, dumbfounded. "But I thought... I mean, I was sure... the books say I cannot have a child, because you once said I'm a...people like me cannot have children."

"You haven't born it yet, have you" Gaius thought "and maybe you never should", but he wasn't the kind of man to say such a thing to a woman's face, especially not if this woman had begun radiating a warm, almost palpable joy and happiness from somewhere deep within. "Obviously the books were wrong then" he said instead. "Female magicians with your kind of powers are extremely rare, maybe that's why."

The Queen smiled at him, radiantly, the way she had done when she had been a child herself, before all the misery, the betrayals, the misunderstandings and it felt as if his heart should break.

Gaius chastised himself inwardly. She had been so very trusting when he had examined her yesterday, he could have given her a potion, she'd been sick and bleeding for a few days and she'd never known….. but Alice would have found out. And it was Merlin's child, too. Anyway, he hadn't done it and now it was too late. There was only one thing left to say. "Morgana, magic ran strong in your mother's family, for many a generation. Merlin is – unique, you might say. Keep the pregnancy secret for as long as you can. Will you?"

"When?" Morgana asked excitedly and he knew she hadn't been listening. "When will it come?"

"Barely six months from now. In august."

The next instant Gaius was hugged ferociously, a kiss was pecked on his cheek and then he saw a multi-coloured, silk-clad creature buzzing off with a "sorry, I must dash" flowing in the air behind her.

Only now he remembered the two sinister letters he had read earlier. "Morgana, what are you going to do?" he shouted.

But he was already alone with his feeling of impending doom.

Meanwhile the Queen ran through the castle corridors at top speed until she reached the nursery where Margaly greeted her enthusiastically. "No, sweetie you must be patient for once, I've not come for you. I've come for your little brother. You know, your auntie Morgause is a bit angry with us because we've let him have a Christian name giving and I'm going to do something about that."

15 minutes later the Queen left the castle for the lakeside forest, a sleepy little Galahad in her arms and a very disappointed Margaly left behind in the nursery.

Morgana took all necessary care to avoid the royal hunting party and she reached the lakeside unseen and unheard. "Come on Your Royal Highness, we'll see to it that you get a proper name and when the time is right we'll tell Morgause all about you being a true son of the Old Religion. That'll make her happy and then we can talk her out of these stupid schemes she's plotting against your father."

A bit clumsy but undauntedly she ploughed through the preparations for the ceremony as best she could while Galahad enjoyed the sunny day and the exclusive attention he got. All went well until she reached the point where the name of the child must be spoken aloud for the very first time. She shied away from using 'Galahad', as this was the name given to him in a Christian baptizing. She ransacked her brain for a proper name from the Old Faith, but couldn't think of one.

Until she remembered the first magician she'd ever come to know more closely, the one with whom the exploration of her own magic had begun. The first magician whose life her brother had saved, in defiance of every single order and every lesson Uther had ever given him.

Morgana raised the sacred chalice she had brought until it sparkled phenomenally in the sunlight. "The four elements welcome you to this world, Mordred, son of Arthur and Guinivere.

A gust of ice-cold wind shook the trees and the sun vanished behind a cloud when she proceeded, but Morgana didn't see it.