Chapter 38 A/N I do not own Merlin. Let's say that two months have passed since the Valiant incident. THIRD EPISODE, THE MARK OF NIMUEH. The Pied Piper story is still not mine. I don't know if I said before, but Alex is around five years old.
"Good morning my love." Owaine said from behind her in bed.
"Good morning, my knight." Cassie replied, stretching out her arms before snuggling back into him.
"I'd ask how your evening was, but I think we both know the answer to that." he said, smirking.
"Just two more months before we are finally wed! Then, we'll see what you can really do!" Cassie said conspiratorially, turning around and kissing him on the nose.
"How about I show you right now?" Owaine asked, leaning over her in bed and kissing her deeply.
"Hmm, as tempting as that sounds, you have training and I have work I need to do. Come on." Cassie said, pushing him off her and sitting up.
"You should really do something about that." Owaine said.
"About what?"
"Always following the rules. It gets annoying sometimes, especially when there's other things on mind." Owaine said grinning cheekily
"Yes, well. We all have our duties, my knight. It's just a matter of whether we follow them or not." Cassie said, dressing in the corner. "Now, I have patients to see. Love you." she said, kissing him once more before turning to leave. "And, in case you forgot, I don't follow all the rules." she said from the doorway, using her magic to playfully push him out of bed.
"Not funny!" Owaine called after her as she walked out the main door.
"Good morning, Gaius, Merlin. I was just going to the Lower Town to check on some patients, is there anything you would need?" Cassie greeted as she entered the room.
"Ah, Cassie. We were just on our way there ourselves. It seems one of the villagers died suddenly this morning, we're just going to examine."
"I'll walk with you down then. Good morning Merlin." Cassie said as he finally emerged from his room, muttering grumpily
"Cassie." he greeted, his voice thick with sleep as he put on his jacket.
"Come on, then, you two. We don't have time to waste with your jabbering." Gaius said, billowing out the door and missing Cassie and Merlin's looks of amusement.
"We barely said 'Hello' Gaius!" Merlin and Cassie called after him, laughing as he waved at them and started muttering to himself.
The three wound their way into the lower town and spotted the man lying on the dirt facedown. Gaius knelt beside the man to examine him better while Cassie and Merlin just looked on.
"Aren't you scared?" Merlin asked
"Of what?" Gaius responded from the floor.
"That you might catch whatever it is." Merlin said as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.
"I'm the Court Physician, Merlin. This is part of my job." Gaius said exasperatedly. "Most of the time there's nothing really to be scared of," he added, turning the body around.
He exchanged quick glances with Merlin, his brain turning over possibilities of what this may be.
"You were saying?" Merlin said, noticing Cassie looking for something to cover him up with.
"People mustn't see this, they'll panic." Gaius said, looking around furtively. Cassie draped the sheet she found over the man.
"I'll go speak with his family. Try and find out what might have happened, Gaius." she said, walking towards the other end of town quickly. She arrived at the cottage and knocked.
"Yes?" came the man's wife's voice.
"Hi, Lenore, is it okay for me to come in?"
"Of course, Cassie." she said, moving to the side and allowing her entrance.
"May I sit?"
"Of course." Lenore said, sitting opposite her at the table.
"I'm afraid there's no easy way for me to tell you," Cassie started nervously. "Y-your husband, he-he's passed away." she said softly, reaching out to take the older woman's hand.
"What?" Lenore asked, the color draining from her face.
"I'm really sorry for your loss, but I'm afraid I must ask you some questions."
"How did he die?" she asked tearfully.
"Gaius is examining him now. It's why I must ask you these questions. Lenore, was he feeling ill last night at all?" Cassie continued softly.
"No." she said, trying hard not to break down in front of Cassie.
"Did he have anything to eat?"
"We had porridge, same as we do every morning." she answered, getting up weakly to find a handkerchief.
"Okay, what about to drink?"
"Only water. I fetched it from the pump this morning." she answered looking dully out the window.
"Has he done anything differently recently? Gone someplace?"
"No!" she cried, finally breaking down. Cassie slowly got up and gently led her to the bed and sat her down. She rifled through her medicine bag and took out the sleeping draught.
"I'm going to leave some of this for you, Lenore. It's a sleeping draught. Just in case you need to sleep. It's best if you take it all at once, and then lie down as it acts quickly. Would you like me to send someone to look after you today? I'm sure they would do so gladly." Cassie said as gently as she could, kneeling in front of the woman so they could be eye level.
"I think I'll just take some now." Lenore said shakily, reaching out with trembling fingers for the vial.
"Here, let me pour some out in a cup." Cassie said, quickly grabbing a clean one from the cupboard and pouring a glug out.
She handed it to Lenore who downed it and laid down in her bed. Cassie gently brought the blanket up and turned to leave, stopping by her neighbor's house to make sure that she was looked after.
"Gaius, he's had a breakfast of porridge, same as everyday, some water just before he left for work, and Lenore says that everything they do is routine, he hasn't done anything different lately. Perhaps it's from a bug bite?" Cassie said after she quickly made her rounds for the morning.
"Thank you Cassie, I'll be sure to look for one once I begin my examination."
"I've just been to Morgana's, she's given me the day so I can help you, just tell me what to do Gaius." Cassie said, not moving after he had clearly dismissed her.
"Very well, get me the tools on the table over there, I must begin an autopsy. Can you do my rounds for me today?"
"Right away Gaius." she said, moving around Merlin to get the tools, when she turned back around she smiled at the flower he still had tucked into his neckerchief.
"What?" He asked, confused, to which Cassie answered with a sly look at this neck.
"Merlin!" came Arthur's echoing voice from the corridor, he moved to open before being able to answer her look.
"Erm,...I'm on my way. Sorry I'm late." he said, obstructing Arthur's view of the body.
"Don't worry. I'm getting used to it." he said, furrowing his brow at the flower.
"Oh...er. Gwen, she gave it to me." he said, by way of explanation to both royals.
"Tell Gaius my father wants to see him now." Arthur ordered, disinterested.
"Okay." Merlin said, looking out the door before closing it. "Gaius..."
"I heard."
"Wait, why couldn't he just tell you himself?" he asked, looking annoyed at Cassie's silent laughter.
"Because that's the way it is. You're a servant" Gaius answered.
"Wha... if he knew who I was, what I've done…" Merlin started, forgetting that Cassie was still in the room.
"You'd be a dead servant. Right, get this covered up." Gaius said gravely, forgetting about Cassie's presence as well
"Hey, I'm not your servant." Merlin said indignantly
"No, you're my dogsbody. Come on, hurry up." Gaius said, reaching for the sheet to cover him up. Cassie just stood silently in the corner, waiting for either of them to acknowledge her presence. Or leave, whichever came first. She really had to talk to them about forgetting she was there, it was rather rude.
While Cassie went about doing Gaius' rounds, he and Merlin made their way to the council chambers. There was a servant who had fallen dead, the goblet of wine and platter on the floor next to him, Gaius bent down to examine him while Uther asked him what had happened.
"I don't know, Sire. It's the second case I've seen today.." Gaius answered truthfully from the floor.
"Why didn't you report it to me?" Uther asked tentatively.
"I was attempting to find the cause." Gaius answered straightening up, the various Lords and Ladies looking on in fright.
"What did you conclude?"
"I don't think it's time to hurry to conclusions. The scientific process is a long one." Gaius evaded expertly.
"What are you concealing from me?" Uther asked with narrowed eyes.
"Sire, I have seen nothing like it. The victims are dying in 24 hours, and it's spreading fast." Gaius told him gravely.
"But what is the cause?" Uther insisted.
"O think you should say the cause, the most likely cause, is sorcery." Gaius admitted reluctantly, Uther reeling in shock and fear at the news.
He pulled Prince Arthur aside while the ladies and lords of the Court were looking on in fear.
"We must find who did this."
"I will, Father."
"Conduct door to door searches. Increase your presence in the town. Double the guards on all the gates. And lend the physician your servant." he ordered.
"Merlin? But…"
"We need Gaius to find a cure. He needs all the help we can give him. If Gaius is right, believe me, this city will be wiped out. This is the kind of magic that undermines our authority, challenges all we've done. If we cannot control this plague, people will turn to magic for a cure. We have to find this sorcerer, and quickly." Uther said frantically, not allowing any disagreement.
"Yes, Father."
Cassie found Gaius and Merlin somewhere in the lower town a half hour later. She'd checked up on most of her patients and finished Gaius' rounds before she spotted them..
"There's a few more people who've been infected. I don't think it's from a bug bite, Gaius. Some of these people don't even go to the same places." Cassie told them gravely as they were walking down the street. "What are they doing?"
"Searching for the possible sorcerer." Gaius told her, noting how she paled, but putting it to the back of his mind. There were more pressing matters at hand now.
"Gaius? Gaius. He's still alive." Merlin called to his guardian who was still speaking with Cassie.
"I'm afraid there's nothing we can do for him.
"Robert!" Cassie breathed in horror, running towards his cottage to check on Mary and the children.
"But we haven't tried." she heard him say, but she was too far away to hear what Gaius responded.
"Mary! Alex!" Cassie called through the door, banging on it. When she didn't get a reply she barged in, finding Mary laying on the bed with Alex curled up next to her, crying and the baby fast asleep in his crib.
"Cassie!" Alex sobbed when he saw her, running over to her and wrapping his arms around her waist tightly. "Is she sick? Why won't she wake up?"
"Oh, Alex." Cassie said softly, her heart breaking at his voice. "Come on, let's get your brother and go to my chambers." she said, gently prying his arms from around her and gathering the baby in her arms. "Come, Alex."
"But-"
"I'll tell you when we go up, come on." she said, offering her hand for him to take and hurrying to her chambers.
"I need you to tell me exactly what they did this morning. Do you think you can do that?" she asked him once she sat him down in her chambers and gave him a glass of milk.
"Mum and dad got up and made breakfast, some porridge with milk, and then mum fed Taran. Dad had some water before he left and mum said I could go play outside for a bit. She had a glass of water, and when I went back inside, she was already asleep. So was he." Alex said pointing to his brother.
"It's either the porridge or the water!" Cassie realized, jumping slightly when the door banged open and Arthur and a few knights barged in.
"Over there." Arhur ordered the guards who began searching through everything immediately. "Sorry Cassie, we're searching every room in town."
"I-I get it." Cassie stammered out, cradling the baby who had been woken up by the sound of the door banging open.
"What's with the kids?"
"They're friends. Parents just…" Cassie said, looking at Arthur pointedly to convey she hadn't told Alex yet.
"Oh." he said, his eyes betraying the impassive mask he wore. "What's all these books and papers?"
"Gaius was teaching me to become his apprentice," Cassie said pointing to the ones on the shelves, "Those are my for delivering babies." she said to the one he was holding.
"Why are they in three languages?"
"Sometimes I think in one, and sometimes in the other. And Latin when Gaius is teaching." Cassie answered.
"You're a good… artist." he said turning his head and the book to see if he could figure out what she had been drawing.
"That's a baby at four months. One of the villagers miscarried and I had to deliver the baby or else she would have been infected." Cassie explained sadly.
"They look so strange." he told her, nodding to the knights who left when they found nothing. "Good luck, with that." Arthur told her vaguely, looking at the baby in her arms and the child sitting next to her, scared.
"You too." Cassie said, going over to close the door and soothing the baby.
"Alex, do you want me to finish that story? The one I started telling you before your mum's belly got big?" Cassie asked, trying not to let her tears fall. She needed Gaius' help to tell him, she couldn't do it herself.
"Yes, please!" he said excitedly, moving closer to her and laying his head on her arm.
"How about we get more comfortable? Your brother is falling asleep and I unfortunately don't have somewhere other than my bed to put him,"
"Okay." Alex said, getting up and walking through the open door to her room to sit on her bed.
"Get comfortable, Alex. I have to make sure your brother doesn't fall off the bed." Cassie told him, going about and making sure there was a small space on her bed enclosed on four sides for the baby. "Now. Where were we? Oh, yes." Cassie said, beginning her story, her voice changing with the mood of the story. " 'You will bitterly regret not keeping your word, Mayor.' the pied piper promised. He turned around and vanished, leaving the men shivering in fear. That night all the townspeople slept more soundly than they had in a while, having been freed from the nightmare of the rats. In the morning, before any adult had woken, the man in the feathered hat returned to the small village, his flute in hand. And when the strange sound of piping wafted through the streets at dawn, only the children heard it. Drawn as by magic, they hurried out of their homes. Again, the pied piper paced through the town, this time, it was children of all sizes that flocked at his heels to the sound of his strange piping. The long procession of over a hundred children soon left the town and made its way through the wood and across the forest till it reached the foot of a huge mountain. When the piper came to the dark rock, he played his pipe even louder still and a great door creaked open. Beyond lay a cave. In trooped the children behind the pied piper, and when the last child had gone into the darkness, the door reaked shut. A great landslide came down the mountain blocking the entrance to the cave forever. Only one little lame boy and one small blind boy escaped this fate. It was them who told the anxious citizens, searching for their children, what had happened. And no matter what people did, the mountain never gave up its victims. Many years were to pass before the merry voices of other children would ring through the streets of Hamelin but the memory of the harsh lesson lingered in everyone's heart and was passed down from father to son through the centuries."
"I don't like the ending of that story." Alex said sleepily from the bed.
"I know, but do you understand what happened at the end?"
"I think so. Does it mean that magic is evil?" Alex asked with wide eyes.
"No, sweetheart, the story has many teachings, but that's not one of them. At the end, after the mayor broke his promise, his word, the man in the feathered hat returned to seek revenge. Revenge is not something you should seek. Ever. My mother always used to say 'la venganza nunca es buena, mata el alma y la envenena.' Revenge only works to poison your heart. Alex. But that's not my real point. Those children, at the end. Do you know what happened to them?"
"They were trapped in a cave." Alex told her.
"Yes, they were. They died, sweetie. Do you know what that means?"
"My mum said that our dog died, she said he left and is at a better place now."
"Do you understand what happened to him?"
"Not really." he said in a long drawl.
"Well, you feel your heartbeat," Cassie said, holding his hand against her chest so he could feel her heartbeat, "And you can feel people's breath. Without either of those things, you cannot live."
"So those children didn't have a heartbeat or breathe?" he asked timidly.
"They did for a while, but the air eventually ran out and their hearts stopped. They died."
"Did they go to a better place?"
"Yes, honey. The children were welcomed into heaven with open arms."
"That's nice. What's heaven?"
"My family always taught me that heaven is the place where the good souls go. That it's eternal life, and full of love and light and hope."
"But then why can't you live without the heartbeat or breathing?"
"Heaven isn't really on earth, Alex. It's a place where people and animals go when they die; their soul goes to live forever in heaven. Alex, do you know why I'm telling you this?" Cassie asked tearfully.
"No. I don't know." Alex told her, reaching up and wiping away the tears with his fingers.
"You know the sickness that has been going around?"
"That's why Prince Arthur was looking in the Lower Village? For sick people? Why was he looking here, then? You're not sick." Alex said.
"No, darling. I'm not sick. But your mum and dad were." Cassie said in a whisper, not trusting her voice.
"But they're better now, right? You said they were sick, so they're better now?" he asked her hopefully.
"No, darling. They didn't get better. They're at the better place now, they're in heaven," Cassie told him, her heart breaking when he didn't say anything.
"B-but I can see them, right? Mum's going to make me breakfast tomorrow morning and dad's coming home tonight to tuck me into bed? Right?" Alex said frightfully.
"I'm so sorry, Alex. Your mum and dad have died." Cassie told him softly, holding him close as he cried.
"Cassie? Where are you?" Owaine called from the main chamber. "Cassie?"
"His parents just…" Cassie said, tears still falling down her face as she trailed off, sparking some recognition in his eyes.
"Oh." he said, walking into the room and kneeling beside the bed. "It's Alex, right?"
"Yes." he mumbled from Cassie's side.
"Alex, you want to come see the knights training? It's really cool." Owaine said, holding out his hand.
"Okay." he sniffled, taking his hand and allowing himself to be led out.
"Thanks." Cassie whispered to him with a smile, wiping the tears from her face, Owaine nodded once at her, glancing at the baby that was beginning to stir.