Paths, Plans, and a Good Man

They were running. They were running so fast and Merlin knew he should be afraid, he should be terrified because they were probably being chased by knights on horseback who would kill them and he couldn't see where he was going and was stumbling and scrambling and had fallen over twice, and for all he knew he could be about to go off a cliff but god, he was sprinting and could feel the wind on his face! The wind! And he could feel the massive open space around him and the warmth of the rising sun on his skin and his pulse pounding wildly throughout his whole body, and he could smell the air, and it smelled like biting sweet grass and morning dew and rich earth and clean, cold sweat and outside. And he could hear! The wind rustling in the grasses and susurrating across what he somehow knew was a vast, vast meadow, and the sound of his feet pounding on the ground so fast, as if he was borne by the wind sweeping across the plain and nothing could stop him; he could just soar above it all, and he could hear his heartbeat synced with his feet and so loud and strong and free. He was free! And god, he would do anything to stay out here with the wind on his face. He would run forever, just keep going until his legs gave out and his ragged breath came to an end and he could just lie flat on his back in the cool grass and laugh breathlessly and feel the sky watching over him until the birds and the worms spread him to the horizons and made him part of this untamed place. If there was nothing beyond this wild dash, he would still be filled with this furious, rapturous, unquenchable joy rising up to the heavens' infinite blue that he had just now remembered. He couldn't stop smiling, so wide his cheeks hurt, and a wild, half-delirious cackle launched itself out of his chest between shallow breaths only to be snatched by the winds, but he couldn't stop smiling and even the burning in his legs and his abs and in that beautifully painful hopeful pit in his throat was something to be thankful for, something to love, another reason to never stop smiling like the world had never fallen apart.

~o8o~

Arthur was not smiling. This was it, this was life and death; everything depended on this dash. He risked a glance over his shoulder; since they were not yet being pursued, apparently the plan had worked out, after all. He had worried Maggie had not been able to bribe a groomsman into slowly poisoning the guard horses before her exposure, but apparently she had managed. The sentries at the gate had rushed for horses that would by now be sickly and frail; by the time they realized they would have to chase on foot, Arthur and the sorcerer would have easily finished the mile and a half run to Hunter's Wood and his father's men. He had also been concerned about whether the blind boy could keep up, but the other, albeit with far less grace (the first word that came to mind was "flailing"), was keeping up with Arthur's tight, controlled sprint. Arthur caught a glimpse of the other boy's face: he looked positively giddy and a little mad, with an exuberant grin as wide as the open sky stretching across his face and breathless laughter leaking out around his panting. Huh. Well, Arthur didn't have time to deal with some sort of breakdown; a few more minutes and they would be in the wood, and his job would be complete. Arthur turned to check on him again and almost had a heart attack, racing sideways to intercept him and steer him back from where he'd drifted from their straight path before he horizontally face-planted on a protruding boulder.

The minute he touched the sorcerer's arm wild, savage, tooth-clenching joy wrenched at his back teeth, then coursed like superheated liquid lava down the back of his throat to do a centrifugal force loop-the-loop in the pit of his chest. Arthur immediately wrenched his hand away, inadvertently unbalancing the other boy and sending him stumbling to the ground with a cry of surprise. He ignored the indignant mutterings and did not offer a hand to help the sorcerer up, letting him push unsteadily to his feet on his own. "God damn it, stop doing that!"

The sorcerer balked. "Doing what? All I did was fall when you pushed me over!"

Arthur started jogging again, a little slower. "I don't know, the–the creepy emotion thing! Stop getting into my head!"

The sorcerer looked a little red, although whether it was from embarrassment or the breathless dash Arthur couldn't tell. "Oh, that. I can't–" (pant) "–bloody well help that! I have a lot of magic–" (wheeze) "–and I think it might be leaking? Or something?"

Arthur ground his teeth. "Well, don't you know how to stop leaking?!"

"I don't know, do you know how to stop being stupid?!"

Great. Not only was the sorcerer Arthur was stuck with out of shape, he was also apparently leaky. A few more minutes. A few more minutes and none of this would be Arthur's problem anymore. He shoved down the leftover bubbles of (literally) infectious joy and ran faster.

~o8o~

Merlin felt the change when they stepped into the forest. Not only was it cooler under the shade and sheltered from the wind, but he got a feeling all around him, the same feeling he'd gotten from the people in the town and had misinterpreted as just the warm sunlight. The same glowing feeling he was getting from the taller boy to his...left? Maybe? It wasn't all that reliable and didn't really help him get around, but it was something. Surrounded by darkness in both the metaphorical and literal senses, Merlin would take whatever somethings he could get.

Arthur eyed the surrounding brush with distrust. Due to the warmer climate this was a more light, sparse, and scrubby forest than the thick evergreen woods around Camelot, but it would still provide adequate cover should they be targeted by archers or horsemen. He scanned the trunk of each beech tree they passed until he finally saw the first of the Lionguard's markings: a simple X like any trailblazer's mark but distinguished by the red stain within. He followed them from tree to tree, grateful for the sorcerer's being silent for once to let him concentrate on search patterns. They followed a burbling stream for a while before leaving its left bank for a more convenient barely-trodden deer trail, then trudged along that until, after about 25 minutes, they hit a fork in the trail. Sure enough, he found another marked beech on the left-hand side.

Wait. He doubled back to the last X. Was it...deeper than the last ones had been? And the red dye within looked like a slightly different shade. Ignoring his companion's inquiry, he jogged back to the fork and searched the area again in a spiral pattern: no markings. The Guard could have just made another man do the scoring and had to dilute the dwindling ink supply. That was totally plausible and even likely. However, something about the situation put an uneasy twist in Arthur's gut. Was his father's men's path the right way, or should he take the other route and strike off into the unknown? He could hear the stream that way.

His decision was made for him by the sound of (staggering?) footsteps in the brush. Arthur slowly lowered his center of gravity and raised his sword. Out of the corner of his eye he saw the other boy grow very still, and he noticed suddenly that all the small bird and animal sounds around them were gone, as if the forest were holding its breath. (And what caused that, Arthur would have liked to know. Or would not have liked to know, since he really wanted to be wrong in his suspicions of just how powerful the being next to him was.)

A man crashed out of the ferns about fifteen meters down the trail behind them. Arthur recognized the red cape of the Lionguard but not the face, a broad young mug, not handsome but not ugly and grizzled with many-hours-past-five-o'clock shadow. The soldier was limping heavily, and looking closer Arthur could see the fletching of an arrow standing out from the meat of his thigh. The look in his eyes was that of a man dangling by his fingertips off the edge of a cliff and knowing that no one could hear him. About to let go.

The guardsman pressed a finger to his lips and attempted to hobble closer as silently as possible before stopping. A strange look crossed his face, and after a second Arthur realized the man was caught as the focal point in the sorcerer's fear-projection. Grabbing the other boy by the shoulder while being careful not to touch the bare skin exposed by the rips in his sleeves, Arthur breathed, "He's a friend." This close, he felt the fear diminish, but only barely. The soldier struggled forward, and Arthur went to meet him.

The guardsman was breathing raggedly. "We were ambushed, Your Lordship," he whispered hoarsely in Arthur's ear. "They knew what our markers looked like, and they followed them to the campsite almost immediately after we arrived. No time to plan escapes, overwhelming numbers. I might be the only one left. You need to run."

Arthur kept his face calm and stern. Of course, internally he was screaming CRAP! CRAP! CRAP! at unholy volumes, but this man needed to see a commanding officer. Arthur was trained for this. He was used to plans going south. He was not used to plans booking it to take a vacation on a tropical archipelago. "His Highness must have had a backup plan in place. Were you privy to your orders in the worst case scenario?" Leaning in closer, he breathed, "Am I to..." He drew a line across his neck and inclined his head in the sorcerer's direction. Cut our losses was implied.

The soldier gave a brief shake of his head, scanning the surrounding trees in the process. "His Highness wants the weapon at all costs. Your duties are clear: eliminate variables only in the event of unavoidable capture."

"And what is your condition, knight?"

The knight looked a little caught off-guard by the question. "Um, I can't run." His eyes went wide, as if it were just sinking in. Then they hardened. "I'll hold them off while you take the weapon."

Arthur nodded solemnly. "What's your name?"

Utred would disapprove of this. It served no tactical purpose whatsoever. It wasted moments when they could be running, and they would need as many of those as they could get. But he and his father occasionally had different definitions of the words "duty" and "honor."

"Uh, Sir Íobairt. Gregory. Or, um, Greg."

Arthur raised his head to look him full in those wide eyes. "You're a great man, Greg. Your family will be taken care of. However, if at all possible, your standing orders are to make it out the other side. I want to see you there."

The soldier blinked. "Yes, sir."

Arthur gave him a smile, and Gregory gave a watery one back. Then Arthur turned, grabbed the sorcerer, and whispered, "Quietly. Run." He caught one last glimpse of Gregory over his shoulder standing in the middle of the path, rigid as a boulder. Then they were off again.

Arthur tried to be cold, analytical. If the kingdom was going to survive, he had to be in that headspace. He had to complete his mission; to do that, he had to make all the right decisions and get really lucky.

No, he couldn't think like that. He had his orders. He needed to chart a path.

The forest, which had previously seemed so light and airy, was making Arthur claustrophobic.