2.14 How They Won Their Freedom
How far could Arthur push it? How long could he run the Wrapter on fumes and bloody-mindedness before the engine coughed its death and left them all stranded and vulnerable?
He let their course drift closer to the passing shore, searching for the perfect place – twice rejecting good options… Too soon was too far from Camelot, and on foot they couldn't get far before the Interceptor caught up. Too late and… literally dead in the water, rather than slaughtered on land.
"Two minutes, and they'll be in sight," Merlin reported. Still leaning on the instrument panel beside Arthur as if relaxed – maybe for the benefit of the women in their care. Would Alice know the truth? What was her range, if the space was not defined by the four walls of a room?
But the psychic was keyed with tension.
Arthur made his choice and swerved to the shore, spinning the helm and easing back on the throttle at the last minute so that the craft continued to drift landward with its momentum while the prow pointed back out to sea.
"Here we are," he said, and it wasn't hard to summon a genuine grin for his passengers at the repetition of the directions. "Last stop – everyone out. Hurry please, and sorry I couldn't get you closer to Britesea…"
Alice at least didn't argue. Whether she responded to his sense of urgency or the confidence in what he knew he must do, she was on her feet in a moment, swinging over the side of the boat to drop with a splash into sandy thigh-high shallows.
"Pass me our rucksacks," she said up to Hunith, leaning over the side with a look of bemusement. "Then over you come."
"Is this Camelot?" Hunith said, obeying but slowly, as if she half-expected to be informed of a joke. "Are we walking again?"
"Should be less than a league to Camelot's side of the border," Arthur said to them.
Hunith dropped her shoulder-bag over to Alice, but paused on the rail to watch her son uncertainly as he pushed upright, windblow and suddenly furious.
"What are you doing?" Merlin demanded.
"Out," Arthur told him. "No time for discussion."
Or last-minute declarations of feelings. He saw the assumption on Merlin's face that he was going to pull the same trick with the Wrapter as they'd done with the delivery truck – drive on further, make it look like we abandoned it because it ran out of gas, they'll search in the wrong place just long enough to let us slip past again…
"You can't," Merlin said bluntly. "They'll be on you in seconds, not hours, and you can't disappear in the water like you can into the woods off the road."
"Merlin," Arthur said, softly but uncompromisingly. "Off. Please. Look at the plan once you're on shore – that's where I need you." He gestured, pointing to his temple.
The psychic didn't have time to study the half-assed, hope-it-works idea, but he did have time to decide. To choose to trust Arthur's decision and leadership. He gave a curt nod, then bent to snag his ruck, hoisting it to his shoulder as he hoisted himself over the rail, landing beside the women with a splash.
Arthur gunned the motor, churning the shallow water to gain speed again, heading out to open water. Get as close to Britesea as possible – as far away from the psychic and his mother and the middle-aged long-cover scout as possible-
Before the engine gasped at the last of the fuel, and sputtered up its ghost.
The silence wasn't absolute – the waves still slapped against the hull, restraining the impetus of the Wrapter, pulling it back to float like storm flotsam, constantly in rise-and-fall motion but lifeless. Seabirds floated on air currents far overhead, voicing their incoherent commentary.
Arthur's rucksack had been left on the floor next to the pilot's seat, and he bent to pull his handgun from a zipped pocket. Was there anything in there he'd be sorry to lose? Clothing he could replace, food he wasn't going to need anymore…
Twenty seconds left from Merlin's two-minute warning. Three shots left in the gun.
The air was chill – closer to dinnertime than lunch, and the deck rocked petulantly beneath his boots. Sorry about that deposit. Maybe Camelot's military would cover replacement costs. Your country thanks you.
Breezes plucked at his clothes, and brine prickled in his nostrils.
There – a point of black interrupting the gray-meets-gray of the horizon. It would grow, and loom… They would spot him with their binocs – they would identify him as their quarry…
They would shoot back.
Arthur glanced to the coast, and could see one tiny lone figure between the tree-line and the water. That would be Merlin – Alice would have persuaded Hunith to hike to safety and cover, then. Up and in.
It was all in the timing, as usual. Arthur left the helm, balancing his way to the right rear of the craft as it drifted – starboard-stern or stern-starboard? – and braced his body between the back of the bench seat and the hull. Muscles and joints absorbed the motion of the water to steady his aim…
Two hundred yards and closing.
When he lifted the handgun and took aim, they'd see it. Maybe take evasive maneuvers, but the Interceptor was equipped with weaponry, and they'd use it, likely choosing to fill his hull with holes as they bore down faster.
That was what he was counting on.
Ready, Merlin? Three shots, then I'll dive over – but at that moment…
One object on the table, a cicala lighter before a gaunt boy barely of age, desperation alight in his eyes even as the flame jumped up on the lighter that no one was touching… Whatever Gaius anticipated from the psychic, Arthur had envisioned-
Boom.
Ready, Merlin? Here we go.
Arthur lifted the gun, and calmly squeezed the trigger.
…..*….. …..*….. …..*….. …..*….. …..*…..
Merlin watched Arthur at the helm, wind tousling his hair with increasing ferocity as he accelerated, as he'd watched for hours, buffeted and half-deaf in the back of the boat.
And now the scout was driving away. Again.
"Merlin?" his mother said behind him. "Aren't you coming? They'll be here soon, you said, they'll see us…"
"He's got to stay," Alice guessed. "Don't you?"
Every nerve was attentive to the last drop of fuel, the last moment of motion driven – Merlin closed his eyes and the distant buzz-rumble of the motor cut out.
Dead in the water…
"It's the plan," Merlin said aloud. Because Arthur was confident in his ability to swim – he could abandon the boat and join them eventually – as long as no one was following. As long as no one realized they'd been distracted…
Truck on the rail-tracks, leading the pursuit out of Ealdor. Truck in an Essetirian ditch this morning, pointing them in the wrong direction. But the boat…
Arthur's memory was loud and clear, and Merlin trembled to see himself on the screen in a briefing room – the observer and the unrealized recorder catching the uncertainty and wariness he still felt for The Man, pinning him down, locking him up, pursuing him to own what he could do.
Fire. That's what Pendragon thought, fire and fuel, and it wouldn't be a small simple tongue of flame.
He meant to discharge his last three shots-
The first of which echoed clearly across the water, unmistakable but too far to feel real, or cause alarm.
"There they are!" Hunith gasped fearfully. "Merlin! Come-"
Arthur didn't expect to hit anything effectively. Second shot ricocheted off the front window of the wheelhouse; the angle was wrong and the distance too great to expect penetration or a satisfactory shattering effect. If he had a grande-calibre rifle…
After the third shot, he'd jump. And when his foot hit the rail, he wanted Merlin to ignite the two-hundred-gallon fuel tank of the Wrapter like he'd ignited the tiny five-gram cicala lighter. Explosion sending Arthur flying still further, but landing in the water like he intended, obliterating everything else – no survivors, nothing to save or scavenge, and Arthur could swim clear of the wreckage, back to shore eventually, leaving the Interceptor to return to Essetir believing them all dead.
A bit disorienting, to open his eyes and see the two vessels from a distance, one churning recklessly toward the other – and simultaneously, to see it approaching, through Arthur's eyes… The Interceptor was closer to the Wrapter than Merlin was.
They weren't deviating, weren't swerving. They were going to ram the Wrapter with their stronger, better-designed military craft.
Third shot. Just past the edge of the wheelhouse, winging one of the Essetirian soldiers. Red on black.
Arthur dropped the weapon, whirling to mount the gunwale-
Merlin acted on instinct without hesitation, igniting the greater store of fuel… inside the Interceptor's tank.
The resulting explosion was a concussion of sound and flame, energy ripping through the air, disintegrating all solid objects in its expanding path – detonated whatever stores of ammunition they had on board like multiple fireworks lit nearly simultaneously – and careened forward, momentum carrying it into a death-throes collision with the Wrapter. Which crumpled under the fiery onslaught – then combusted violently in reaction.
"What? was that?"
Merlin snapped back to himself, disconcerted and unsteady. Silt shifted beneath his boots, cold water plucking and tugging at his legs and balance, unbearable against skin that felt singed.
Just in time to feel the extra-gentle warm puff of air that had traveled the distance-
Fireball still mushrooming with violent speed on the water – he couldn't breathe. The world rocked and he floated, tipping one way and then the other. Maybe he'd blown out an eardrum – or ratcheted his temperature so high equilibrium was affected. He couldn't tell where Arthur was. Couldn't tell if Arthur was still alive.
Bits of burning wreckage rained down upon the distant water. No identifiable part of either boat remained – had he waited too long? had the Interceptor been going too fast?
Bloody hells, either way Arthur was going to surface in the middle of that, disoriented or injured maybe-
Merlin took two slogging steps forward, forgetting that he was in the water himself, and nearly tripped into a full-body splash.
"Did he hit their fuel tank?" Hunith's voice, uncertain.
"That would have been one shot in a thousand…" Alice's voice, incredulous.
They flanked him, unseen on either side, further up the bank of the shore. He flinched, trembling with reaction, caught between their presence and the absence of Arthur. Was he breathing? Scraps of dark ash fluttered in his vision as it lurched and sloshed about like he was still at sea.
"Did you do that?"
The question pulled his attention down and to the side. Alice had waded to him, close enough to take hold of his arm; there was alarm on her face and dread in her eyes.
"How could that possibly have been him?"
She heard and he heard, but neither of them responded to Hunith's question. Merlin watched Alice realize the truth; excuses glued his tongue to the roof of his mouth. Briefly he considered flinging himself forward into the sea – he couldn't swim well at all – to drown himself as an abomination. And something about her, or him, or them both, gave the truth away to their companion.
"It was him?" Hunith blurted, sounding shocked.
Instead of turning to face her – wariness and disgust like his dream, like the observer in the room – he turned his head to look across the water.
Some few embers still fluttered visibly airborne. Even more unidentifiable bits and pieces burned on the treacherous surface, fire and water and he could taste ash on his tongue, smell the burnt fuel coating his throat. No air even to cough-
There was a third vessel, suddenly, nosing tentatively around the edges of the widening circle of floating debris, the spilled fuel rising above the water to ignite. Wheelhouse painted white, hull a midnight blue with white lettering and he could see an A and a T.
Camelot. Navy. Britesea.
The comm-block connection from the grocery in Drysell.
Gwen.
Looked like they were fishing around in the water with long poles. For survivors.
Merlin couldn't sense The Man at all. At all. He was dark like a black hole, like a spot in space that didn't exist because it was empty, a vacuum, no oxygen…
He leaned over as his body vomited, turning itself inside out, his guts wringing themselves like a dirty dishrag. He heaved again and again, tears stinging his eyes, shaking and spitting misdirected bits and excess saliva. He might have been moaning, and maybe only someone else's grip on his arm kept him from collapsing into the floating mess.
The third boat wasn't clear anymore, blurry in the smoke and heat. His ears were ringing, and when Alice said his name, he was surprised to see her; it didn't feel like she was there.
Merlin…
Hunith had gone, he was sure, escaping into the trees of the border as quickly as-
Alice turned him and he saw his mother still waiting up on the dry part of the shore. A dream maybe – his body moved and reacted and responded without conscious intent, just like a dream. He was alone in the world – both women were nothing more than a flat image, an empty shell, a poorly painted memory, a recording on a screen.
His limbs were heavily soaked, and his boots made furrows in sandy mud up to the grass. Alice pressed, and he folded himself down to tiny yellow-green blades-
Death by a thousand cuts-
And he closed his eyes, hearing their voices murmur over him like the sea.
All neighborhoods everywhere had been scoured to bedrock, and the white stone castle walls had vanished.
…..*….. …..*….. …..*….. …..*….. …..*…..
The explosion was so sudden they all flinched as one – reactive questioning, demanding explanation from those behind them in the body of the ship.
"What happened-"
"Get closer!" Gwen ordered Elyan, blinking furiously to dispel the afterimage.
"Was that him?" Percival said, sounding uncharacteristically uncertain. "Was that Arthur's boat?"
"The other, I think?" Leon responded. "Looked like an Essetirian Interceptor?"
"Get closer!" Elyan bellowed to the junior officer piloting their Protector-class patrol ship.
That's what it had looked like to Gwen, too. Larger, faster, sleeker ship bearing down like a shark – maybe they'd been firing on the smaller civilian craft, too…
"He couldn't possibly have set that off with a shot from a handgun," Elyan said beside her.
Flaming, burning, inanimate wreckage seeking to return to an inert state after the forces enacted – all things tend to disorder-
She wasn't breathing. He was in the water if he wasn't dead, and if he was unconscious… Darkness laced by the flickering fire of an inferno, hard to breathe in the heat, the stench of things burning that weren't meant to burn, acrid with chemical taint and metal.
The deck trembled beneath them with the determination of the engine and they surged forward, flame-tipped waves and floating detritus and fiery airborne scraps expanding just like her memories of Urhavi receding behind them – no change, no difference, looks the same – til it didn't.
Thick smoke-fumes stung soft tissue, and the movement of the water was deceptive, drawing the eye in a dozen directions-
The rail pressed into her belly, holding her back on deck, as she leaned forward, straining – dashing away moisture that escaped her eyes. The pilot angled them to the seaward size of the wreck – No, that's wrong, he would swim for shore – how far could he get, we better not go over the top of him…
"There!" someone said, pointing.
The back of someone's shoulders bobbing just above the surface. Curve of spine, drift of light hair. Facedown in the water.
"Get the reaching poles! And the body-hooks!" someone shouted.
She wasn't breathing, and her fingers were going numb around the rail. The hooked end of the pole splashed into the water, bumped beneath an armpit. The body rolled sluggishly – obviously corpse, half the face charred right off – uniform collar of Essetirian military.
Wasn't him.
"We can't just drive right into the middle of that," Percival was saying, tightly exasperated.
"Launch the rescue boat!" Elyan shouted.
"And you can't dive in and swim out there either," Leon responded. "Keep looking."
Gwen didn't want to take her eyes from the rubble-strewn water to watch the rest of her team launch the bright-orange four-man rescue boat from the stern of the patrol ship, but she was aware when they started their motor and began to cruise slowly around the site in the opposite direction.
"Can we get closer?" she said to Elyan. He wielded the reaching-pole; Leon grabbed another and extended it to the water, prodding hull-scraps, deck-planks, burning foam from seat-padding and bumpers.
Arthur could be on the opposite side, struggling for air, injured and losing consciousness. He would've dived deep but underneath, all the heavy parts would be careening to the bottom – engine components, instrument panels, twisted metal scything through the water.
"Give me a minute to get this one on board," Elyan answered, short of breath to maneuver the pole with its burden. "Can't leave anyone behind…"
Casualties. Survivors?
Bloody hells, if they had Merlin here, he could point them right to-
"Just because we only saw one person doesn't mean it was Arthur alone in the boat," she said aloud to Percival, as Leon leaned his reaching-pole out to the water, the rail at the bend of his hips.
"We'll get everyone we can," Elyan said at her other side, levering the corpse over the rail; she chose to study every inch of the surface intently, rather than pay any attention to what he was doing. "Trust us – we've done this before. Part of our job."
McKenzie on the little orange rescue boat half-stood to cup her hands around her mouth and shout back to them, "Is that splashing? Is someone splashing over there?" She pointed exaggeratedly.
"I see someone!" Percival responded. And then – "A… piece of someone," he added, subdued.
Gwen was going to be sick.
Elyan's body jerked with some signaled order to the pilot of the patrol ship, and the Protector pivoted slowly to enter the spreading area of the wreck, prow dividing floating remnants and greasy water. Gwen shoved Leon down the rail, closer to the prow – they passed Percival, who was occupied with retrieval of the corpse he'd discovered, and took up positions at the pointed front of the ship, gazing intently about.
"He'd have headed for shore, if he could," Leon said to her, lifting his head to scrutinize the activity of those manning the rescue boat momentarily.
If he could.
McKenzie and Fletcher were dragging another body into the little orange boat as Cartwright piloted the trolling motor; it was dressed in black uniform also and Gwen was relieved to spare only a glance.
The acrid stench of burned fuel and something not unlike gunpowder stung her eyes and nostrils and she blinked tears again, wishing she was psychic. Arthur, where are you? Were you alone in the boat? Were you in the boat at all?
Elyan called something to his second officer, further down the rail on the opposite side of the boat. Across the water, the voices of Gwen's troops were audible also, giving each other direction or encouragement.
No one shouted, We got a live one!
Was it awful that she absolutely did not care whether the Essetirians recovered were alive or not? Come on, Arthur, you charming bastard – don't do this to me. Don't leave me like this!
"We've got first aid, standing by," Elyan called to the three of them.
The more seconds that ticked past, the less likely it seemed that any survivors could be found, the further her heart dropped. Wind buffeted her hair, finding the curls she'd let hang from a civilian-messy bun. Dread clutched her heart in her chest, squeezing slowly but mercilessly. The motor churned softly, and the subtle wake pushed sections of unrecognizably blackened pieces out of their path.
How long? Til dark, and then give up? Turn on searchlights? Report back to the naval base, see if any information was waiting, leave a message for Gaius and then head back out?
It wasn't impossible that-
"There!" Leon said urgently, pointing with his entire upper body, streaked now with ashy sweat. "There, there – do you see? Right there, Leon – no, below that-"
It was a corner of something mangled, rising up and floating – she couldn't see past it, but Leon silently maneuvered the reaching-pole, every muscle in his body taut. Slowly the piece shifted – he leaned, twisting the pole to utilize the curved edges designed to snag bodies, whether living or dead.
"Pull him in, pull him in," Leon said.
"I got it," Percival gritted.
The body rolled as he drew the pole in, and Leon moved behind Percival to help steady it. Sodden blond hair, white t-shirt rippling slightly in the water.
"It's him," Gwen heard herself say, leaning hard over the rail. It's him, it's him – it's him, isn't it…
"Careful," Leon said. They leaned the pole on the gunwale like a lever, lifting Arthur from the water and drawing him close enough that Leon could let go to reach and grip Arthur's belt, dragging him over.
Both sleeves ended in hands – both legs ended in boots, and Gwen breathed just a little bit easier as Leon lowered Arthur to the deck, untangling him from the pole. Percival let it clatter down.
Elyan said, "That's your guy?"
And Gwen was on her bare knees on the rough deck, cradling Arthur's head and shoulders as Leon turned him – water ran from his mouth and his skin was gray-pale. He was absolutely limp – his head lolled, his feet tangled together. Blood bloomed on torn sleeves, on one tattered leg of his jeans, now that it wasn't being actively washed away in the water.
Not gushing, though.
"He's not breathing," Leon reported, digging for a pulse beneath Arthur's jaw, pressing his palm down over Arthur's heart.
She didn't hesitate. Tip his chin, pinch his nose – exhale steadily into his lungs.
Take a breath of her own, and do it again.
And again.
Muscles firmed, tightened, shifted against her knee, and his body convulsed, bringing up water he'd swallowed, squeezing out water he'd breathed-
Thank heaven, alive-
He coughed and gagged, curling toward her and she pillowed his head on her hand, searching with the fingers of the other to find the source of trickling blood rusting the hair plastered to his head and the side of his face. He braced himself with a hand flat on the deck, and more crimson swirled in the water sluicing off him.
"Give me that first aid!" Leon bellowed.
Arthur's eyes blinked open, gray-blue like sky showing through clouds, and focused on her.
"Di'n't cou'," he slurred.
"Don't try to move, Arthur," she told him. "What do you remember? Where are the others, were they with you?" In a minute, if he could answer coherently, she would ask the questions specific to the possibility of concussion.
"Didn't count," he said, more clearly. "That didn't count." He coughed again, curling tighter.
"Scissors in there?" Leon demanded of Elyan, who dashed up with the first aid kit, a red bag just smaller than a rucksack that unzipped to show instruments and materials in velcro slots and clear plastic pouches. "Give me those…" More blood spilled to the puddles on the deck as Leon began cutting up Arthur's pantleg; the jean material was soaking through and darker than water.
"What didn't count?" she said to him, to distract both of them from what Leon was doing. Her fingers found the contusion on his scalp – just inside his hairline above his right temple. The skin had split over a worrying lump, and it bled like a head wound, but it was nothing to horrify.
"Visible bone there," Percival commented shortly.
"Yeah, but not much bleeding," Leon returned. "And I don't think there's a break…"
Below the knee, so she decided not to be horrified by that yet, either – blood was seeping through the tears in the sleeves of his shirt, and she could focus on that, trying to rip the material to see. The cuffs were too thick, but it seemed like shallow cuts at first impression. She hadn't forgotten the damage done by the bomb in Urhavi – a lot of small nicks and spreading bruises that added up, but didn't truly threaten.
"That didn't count," Arthur repeated hazily, finding her eyes with his again, "as our first kiss."
Leon snorted even as he wrapped bandaging swiftly and confidently. Percival sounded amused as he predicted, "He'll be all right."
Arthur slumped, closing his eyes and coughing weakly – shocky, she thought.
"Hand me those scissors," she decided, ignoring the comment and any emotion that prompted or resulted. "I'll wrap his arms – Elyan, we need to get back to base hospital a-sap."
"We've spotted another patroller," Elyan said, "coming out of Britesea. We can leave the rest of the salvage to them and our rescue boat and your three scouts…"
"Merlin," Arthur managed, face pressed to the wet deck like he was trying to listen to someone whispering in the engine room. "I put them off… on shore…"
"All right," she soothed, stripping the pieces of his sleeves back from torn flesh leaking water-diluted blood – again, nothing life-threatening, thank goodness.
Percival thrust an opened gauze-roll into her hand. "We'll get them. Someone will get them, Arthur, don't worry."
He shuddered, and his body went limp again by degrees. Elyan retreated to give indistinct orders, and beneath them, the engine increased revolutions exponentially.
Back to Britesea.
…..*….. …..*….. …..*….. …..*….. …..*…..
Arthur's whole body buzzed with engine-tremors, and breezes rippled across his clothing, tugging at his hair. He floated on the foam of sound and wasn't it strange, so much noise and powerful movement while he just lay there?
Two eyes thrust themselves sideways into his vision – broad vertical forehead, shorn hair-bristle. "You're fine, Arthur. We've got you."
"Can't feel my legs," he said pleasantly.
"That's the meramine."
Oh – floating on that as well. Pass me another round – painkiller patches on the house.
"We're in Camelot?" he tried.
Another pair of eyes on his other side, dark and lovely and if he wanted to see the rest of her face he'd have to marry her – damn this sister business.
"Almost," she said, with an effort to be cheerful rather than anxious. "Technically. Camelot's waters, our side of the border…"
His eyelids dragged down, and sound mumbled away to steady engine reassurance. Camelot's patrol boat, Camelot's navy. Britesea – can't avoid the paperwork this time. Can't switch clothes and steal a delivery truck driver, flag down a trauma ward.
That's some good shi…
"What happened out there?"
"Essetirian vessel in neutral waters, looks like. Collided with a civilian craft, significant speed, resulting explosion… We're en route to the post trauma ward with a civilian survivor… didn't see others… left three in the rescue boat still searching."
"We've got salvage, then. Rescue if we find any live ones…"
"Roger that."
Lawrence, he thought. Leclair. Not Roger.
"Mm," he managed.
Leon loomed, the top half of his mop of hair tied behind his head. Psych Ops concession from military regs to better hide their identity, though Leon wasn't a field agent, exactly. "Want water, Arthur?"
A laugh fluttered in his throat, stuck, and he couldn't cough it free. No more water. Not for a while. I've had enough.
"Merlin," he made his mouth say. "On the… shore."
Gwen's black curls haloed her head as she bent and pressed her mouth on his – highly agreeable. Didn't count.
"Stop trying to talk now, please," she told him. "We'll handle it – we'll find him, and bring him in."
Under arrest? In handcuffs? He can tell you're coming – unless he's sleeping…
"Please just rest," her lips said.
He wanted very much to make those lips pleased with him, and then they'd smile. He mumbled something that was meant to be cheerful and obedient – his whole body was submerged under the desert sand, but… he trusted her. She took good care of him.
I might love you…
…..*….. …..*….. …..*….. …..*….. …..*…..
"It's going to be dark soon."
"Well, we're really not in any danger here. There's food in my pack and it might be chilly and uncomfortable to sleep out, but when he's ready – it's only half a league to Britesea."
"When he's ready? What – what-"
"He's just your son. Still just your son. Still that brilliant, eager, innocent boy."
"No, but - he's not. He's really, really... not. They took him, they… they made him something else. They made him this."
"He's awake, Hunith. He can hear you."
Merlin struggled back to control – fingers, eyelids, inhalation. For a long moment everything was blurry – he blinked, and recognized dim twilight. His skin was heavy, all over, but nerves were firing, firing like a tank of fuel and fumes.
"Slow down, Merlin, take it easy," Alice said, and he could see her outline bending over him, the pale shape of her face.
He could hear the water, rhythmic and unending and serene.
Every inch of him was shaking, but he pushed her hands away and forced his muscles to contract, to pull him toward sitting, to pull his heels toward him. It felt like he might shake apart, every pin from every hinge joint and he would be undone.
"I can't see you," he blurted to Alice. Both of his hands jittered up the opposite arm, and his knees knocked and sprawled out his lap. "The houses are gone-"
Desert wasteland. The sandbox. No quaint cottage with lace-edged curtains and green-painted shutters.
No white-stone castle walls.
"What do you mean you can't see?" Hunith moved into view on his opposite side, arms hugged to her chest, not much more than a vague silhouette.
His head tipped – he couldn't see her any better – he searched the gathering darkness out to sea, but the fires had all been put out, and there were no other boats with any lights at all.
"All the people," he said, turning back to Alice. She met his eyes – she knew he didn't mean he couldn't see. "I can't-"
"I know," she said, soothing, interrupting so he didn't have to say it aloud. "Don't worry about it right now."
"But I can't-" His jeans and boots were still thick-heavy-damp, and he shivered like it was mid-winter. Over a mountain in a skid-cart, out on cracking thin ice. "I can't Arthur."
"Oh," she said, an extended sound of thorough sympathy. "Merlin – I'm certain they pulled him from the water alive, if that helps."
"Why does he care?" Hunith asked Alice. "I thought they were-"
"Who?" Merlin asked. "Who pulled him from the water?"
"Camelot naval patrol."
"When?" he said, already seeking the ground, to push away from it, unfold his legs to hold his body upright like they were supposed to, that was their job. Half a league, and it wasn't even dark yet. Maybe she had a torch in her pack.
"Couple hours," Alice said. "Take it easy, Merlin, take it slow."
"We can," he said. "We can walk. The rest of the way." His knees were sinking slowly into the ground. "We can walk the rest of the way?"
"Just to turn yourself in?" Hunith said. "What about me?"
"They'll give you asylum," Alice told her soothingly. "Nothing for you to worry about. Merlin told you that already?"
A little house, with a square of linoleum in the back hall, a worn gray rug, hooks on the walls for raincoats or umbrellas, tripping over the boots… No guards to keep her from walking to the corner grocery for milk.
His toes dragged when he tried to flatten his soles on the ground. Sooner rather than later. Make sure of safety. Then surrender and not worry about heavy skin and nerves on fire. Maybe they could give him something for that. Maybe they could-
"The houses are gone, Alice?" he said. When he lifted his head to look at her, his whole body levitated – or else the ground dropped away. Neither of them seemed to notice.
"If you're speaking of your psychic ability," she said. "I think you've temporarily run out of gas, as it were. Used it up in a rare way. But it'll come back."
"Okay," he said, nodding fit to disjoint his neck bones. "Okay, okay."
"Your emotions are all over the place," she said softly. "That will settle too, I think. For now, don't worry about what you're giving me."
"S-sorry," he managed. There, now his boots were on the ground.
"Don't worry about it, I said," she chided. "Merlin, do you honestly think you can make it to Britesea and the naval base with just the two of us? Just be patient."
"I still think-" Hunith started.
"Never mind," Alice said comfortingly, as he cast about for his rucksack. "Give it one more minute, and they'll be here."
Hunith startled. "They?"
Torch beams flung themselves across the ground, caught the trees, leaped into his eyes – Lawrence Leclair, caught by his enemy's henchmen in the darkened conservatory, let himself be surrounded til they were all in place. Then he sprang into action, knocking each of them out with brutal, brilliantly-placed blows.
Merlin lifted his hands, palms out to shield his eyes.
"CPO," someone said. "We're CPO-"
"So am I," Alice said tartly. "Care-Green-Speaker-Haunt. It's about time you showed up." She bent to retrieve her rucksack – and Merlin's, by the look.
"Merlin," said one of the torch-beams. "I'm glad to see you. We've got a lot to talk about."
"Yeah," he said, stumbling two steps and reaching out to find Leon's shoulder. I feel odd. I'm sorry. How's Arthur. Dunno if I can make it…
"What's wrong with him?" someone asked.
"Psychic exhaustion," Alice said, tucked behind the brightness somewhere. "Treat him like he's drunk."
"In that case, maybe we should ask our questions now," Leon said. His torch sprouted an arm that curled beneath Merlin's, right around his shoulder-blades and his nerves approved.
"You got him?" That torch had Percival's voice.
"Steady as she goes, Merlin," Leon said. The light flickered round in an impossibly swift about-face, and the older man was a solid shadow under Merlin's arm.
"How's Arthur?" he asked the shadow, shuffling his boots at a cooperative pace. Did not want to trip over any rocks or fallen branches, getting from the woods to… maybe troop transport? "If I'm lucky..."
"Still in surgery when we left," Leon answered.
Surgery. For… hell's sake.
"Just his leg, though," Percival said. "Gashed it open. Thousands of stitches, maybe, but they said the bone was solid, and the bleeding wasn't terrible."
He wanted me to blow up the boat. And I did. Just… the other one. "The other one exploded, not his. I didn't follow the plan."
"All right, Merlin," Leon said patiently.
"…Other survivors?" Alice asked, sounding further away. It was hard to focus past recalcitrant boots and Leon's movement and breathing.
"None. At least, that we know of right now."
From further away, he heard Hunith say something, but he couldn't tell what it was. Maybe asking where they would be taken? Nice hotel room, for her. "For her and Alice, of course," he said.
The brig, for him.
"D'they still call it a brig?" he asked Leon.
Who snorted breathlessly and said, "On second thoughts, let's talk after you sleep this off."
"Come now," Percival suggested, with humor in his voice. And how did he manage that, after what Merlin had done to them, too? "Step lively."
He tried to pick up his feet, pick up the pace.
"Shut up," Leon said to Percival.
Beyond the lights and the sounds of boots on the forest floor, someone snickered. Someone whistled – Alice said something that made more than one of them laugh…
As soon as they reached the truck, Merlin was going to stretch out on the gritty-grimy floor and sleep as long as they let him. "You can cuff me to the bench seat, if you want."
Leon huffed and shifted closer, fingers clamped around Merlin's wrist to stretch his arm over the broad shoulders of Arthur's best friend. "Come on - don't stop now. We're almost there…"
A/N: Should be one more chapter to resolve things – at least for now. Part 3 will have to wait til my NaNoWriMo story is finished, but I plan to start posting chapters for "Revenger" again as I'm composing the rest of the NaNo original… (gosh, by then it'll be November again and… no, don't even think about it.)