A/N: Long. But maybe I finally got the climactic action rolling, here… And it's all thematically relevant under the chapter title, too.
3.15 How They Found Camelot
Glare and shadow. Midnight and flare. High space bounded by fragile glass and fabric scaffold, layered with balconies and potent energy.
Two figures at the very top, locked in deadly struggle at the very edge. Strike and block, elbows and fists and feet, til one seized the other and over they went, two together.
One was Arthur.
The look on his face as he fell – as he realized his fall – was sheer horror. Impending and inexorable death.
And no one could save him.
"Where do you go?" Gwen asked him.
Merlin blinked at an unusual room – bright windows, sleek couches, tabletop stretching away under his forearms - and all of it was moving with a strong, subtle, relentless surge like a heartbeat.
Gwaine turned from one of the windows, the glass in his hand half-full. JT leaned back from a seat at the table, laughing; Charlie protested, Hector showed Martine the face side of a playing card and she shook her head, lips pursed to keep from laughing at the revelation of the Girl of Rivers card.
And Freya curled under another window on a padded bench, pen in hand and paper tablet propped on one thigh.
Barefoot, the lot of them. No one in proper uniform, showing plenty of relaxed skin to the weather.
"Merlin," Gwen said, wrapping her fingers around his wrist. Frazzled tendrils of hair wreathed her face but she slouched contentedly next to him. "Where do you go? When you do that, when that happens?"
"I don't know," he said honestly.
Her eyes crinkled, worried-thoughtful. "You're drifting."
That felt accurate. He looked around again and remembered, Ten-Via. Cartwright. Untethered.
"We're worried about you," Gwen told him. "You're okay, you're not hurt really, but in the middle of talking to you, Freya and Gwaine both have said, you just… disconnect."
Huh.
"Do you remember getting on the boat?" she added.
Unsteady heave from puddled concrete to short industrial carpet, innocuous gray, squishy-damp beneath the soles of his boots… he wiggled his toes and they were free, the friction of the carpet in the room pleasantly rough.
"Do you remember why we got on the boat?"
"Alexandria to Camelot," he said.
Her expression remained the same, but her emotion leaned forward, jaw set like she was going to tell him something he wasn't going to be happy to hear. "Do you remember why we left Alexandria?"
Isyadi in Janada. So many dead, screaming silently and begging incoherently beneath the rubble of the hospital and he was burned out, too.
"Why Camelot?" she prompted.
"Camp George gave up and went home?" he tried.
"Essentially." One of her dimples showed briefly. "Arthur has Cartwright aiming for Newmarch, okay? And Gwaine said he'd check in with chain of command at Fort Fuller, but if they want to come collect your squad, it'll give you some time to go home for a little while. You think?"
Home. Was that a sandy tent thick with heat and the sweat-stench of three other men? Or a barracks room with white cinder-block walls and a spy novel where his hand would land on it when he reached out. Or a square of linoleum and a worn gray rug under wall-hooks for rain-coats and umbrellas where he tripped over rubber boots as tall as his thigh.
Arthur. Has Cartwright aiming.
Her dark gaze flicked over his shoulder briefly, and that was all, but that was enough. The doors on a boat like this were always latched, open or shut again because a door ajar on the water would swing and slam. But someone's body was blocking the doorway and he knew it was Arthur's.
Scout Pendragon had caught up to him. His flight had been too slow, and the scout had been too clever, and he could taste the ham-and-cheese sandwich with pickles he'd stolen from the editor and his wife on the Newsy Queue. Arthur had twice chosen between the option of killing Merlin as his enemy, and letting him stay. Had twice risked his life to protect and keep and had-
Stood in the doorway of a hotel security office to make the decision for a third time. And instead of keeping, he'd sacrificed Merlin's life…
To prove that the murder-ambush had been aimed at him. At them. To get ahead of what was coming next by surrendering the field now, and relaxing the enemy with the belief that they'd won.
There's more at stake here than your feelings.
Gwen's emotion leaned forward again, pleading and hopeful, but if he looked at Arthur, what would he see? That same evaluation of Merlin's life and worth… and maybe this time the judgment would be unbearable. Maybe this time Merlin would see that Arthur's life and worth… weren't what he thought.
He turned his head.
Arthur was barefoot also, tourist shirt half-unbuttoned, hair ruffled, shoulder lounging on the doorframe. Face half in shadow, watching the whole room, maybe.
"They had pickles," Merlin told him. On the houseboat – in the mess tent – at the Institute – fried in batter at the Sunrise. "And bananas. It was a good sandwich, and they never missed it."
Freya looked up, but didn't say anything.
Something shifted in Arthur's bearing – something tense released, while something else tightened. "I thought you said he was improving."
"He was," Gwen responded tiredly. "I thought he was."
After a moment in which nothing significant seemed to happen, Arthur turned away again and disappeared down the side of the boat toward the back, where there weren't any windows.
"Where is he going?" Merlin wondered aloud. Camelot, certainly. Fort Fuller, Psych Ops, Director Gaius? Reporting in.
"The wheelhouse," Gwen said. "One level up. He and Cartwright are taking it in turns to pilot. They think less than twenty-four hours til we're home."
Home.
Exclamations rose from the card game – "Oh, you cheater!" Charlie exclaimed. Gwaine turned round to watch forward out the window again and the Ten-Via surged rhythmically over the waves, Gwen's hand on Merlin's wrist. Freya watched them and didn't say anything.
"I've temporarily run out of psychic gas," he told her, remembering as he repeated Alice's words to him on a sandy, grassy bank in the almost-dark. "Used it up, in a rare way. But it'll come back."
Freya almost smiled, and Gwen sounded relieved when she said, "Do you think so?"
Eventually. Maybe.
Merlin dreamed of a thick, deep forest, silent and motionless. His feet made no sound as he prowled forward and ahead of him Arthur turned without pausing to mark Merlin's presence over his shoulder. Their clothing was vague, indistinguishable, but Arthur's crooked, satisfied grin was familiar as home; he was content, he was satisfied, he was right in his element because they were following something. Hunting something… or someone.
There was no path. Arthur faced forward, body bowed slightly, moving-ready, and Merlin's feet halted.
In that instant, something flashed between them – fur-dark and growl, swift muscle and violent fury. An overgrown dog, a wolf? too fast for a bear, panther maybe but that wasn't quite right-
Arthur's body spun helplessly, blood spurting between frantic fingers, and he went down. Stumbling back to an enormous crevice in the earth hitherto unseen, losing balance, floating over the edge in obscenely slow motion and Merlin was still frozen in place, watching it happen…
The light in the corridor was dim, one bulb against the dark and silence of night, and the splash and surge of the great deep beneath them was distantly, insistently subtle.
Merlin ambled down the hall, palms outstretched helpfully toward the walls, joints loosened with the slow rhythm of floating.
"What are you doing?"
He paused and turned to see Freya in one of the doorways behind him, though he didn't remember passing it. Sleepy-eyed, tousle-haired. Oversize t-shirt slipping from one shoulder, shorts like men's boxers barely visible under the hem, long bare legs.
"Sleepwalking?" he answered. Maybe he'd needed the bathroom?
She looked confused. "Here?"
He tried to remember if he was supposed to be sleeping somewhere else. How many cabins, how many bunks, how divided between the men and women of their company, but it didn't seem to him like it mattered much, in the quiet of night. Instead he pivoted and ambled back to her.
"Are you all right?" he asked.
"I'm… not sure." She watched him with a hint of wariness beginning to wake the sleepiness, and backed two steps into the cabin.
It was empty. The blanket kicked to the bottom of one of the bunks marked it hers just as certainly as the head-hollow crushed in the pillow. Where were the others? He opened his mouth to ask if she wanted him to stay, if she didn't want to be alone-
"Do you want to stay?" she blurted. "For a minute?" Without glancing back, she sank to the edge of her bunk, bracing herself with both hands for a moment before angling her posture in an invitation for him to seat himself next to her.
Well, the door was latched in the open position, so it should be all right. He had to duck his head to fit under the bunk above hers, and when she drew her legs up and nestled further into the space, he slouched so his spine could rest against the curve of the inner hull.
Hesitantly she moved against him, curling her legs against his thigh, leaning into his upper arm, slipping her hand into his. He held very still so as not to startle her into breaking the contact, but each heartbeat and each breath spoke to him of smooth skin and soft curves and sweet scent and he'd never thought – he'd never allowed himself to think – of how delicate and feminine she was. How desirable.
She wasn't relaxing against him to return to her own thoughts in the silence. She was actively watching him to absorb the details of his body, just as he was doing – could she tell, then, like he could?
The jut of his knees, the wrinkles of his trousers around his joints, the soft fabric of the t-shirt over his ribs… She caressed the roughness of his palm, the inside bend of his fingers; he swallowed and she shifted. He felt her eyes travel up to his heart thundering in the hollowness of his throat, the line of unshaven jaw and the angle of nose and brow…
He closed his eyes and saw the shape of her mouth – when she smiled, when she breathed - flushed in the certainty that she was studying his lips.
Blood rushed oxygen through his body, choosing its destination apart from his will and he held very still because it was pleasurable and maybe she wouldn't notice.
This wasn't simple companionship, friendly comfort. Something was shifting, deep as the ocean-plates beneath them and as irresistible. He didn't breathe, hoping hoping hoping she wouldn't reject him in spite of what she found… hoping that she would still want-
"Merlin?" she whispered, close and slow and he wasn't sure if he was gazing into the starlit depths of her dark eyes or just remembering doing so. "What do you want?"
He couldn't articulate a single sensible word, but sound emerged anyway – questioning, half-steady at best. Yes. What? um…
"Do you want to touch me?" she asked, achingly vulnerable and pliant. "Do you want to kiss me?"
Each word was its own sentence, each sentence its own world, requiring hours and hours of contemplation to discover hidden nuance.
"Do you want to see me take off my-" Leaning forward fractionally, the collar of her shirt slipped lower off her bare shoulder and she wasn't wearing anything beneath it. Oh, if he could only catch her close, press himself to her, test to see if she would finally allow his hands their freedom to discover how smooth and warm her skin might be…
"I want to be with you," he managed. "I want to… love you. But it could be… only friends. Only that. If that's all you want, if that's what you need. I don't want to… take you and then lose you."
Now he was certainly connecting to her gaze, surprised and shy and deep as the sea.
"I want to make you happy," he finished hoarsely. "You tell me how."
Her chin came up and her expression resolved, even as her gaze went a little vague as she retreated to find words. "I want… someone who knows me and understands me and want to be with me anyway. Someone I can trust never to hurt me. Someone I can give… everything to. Someday."
Yeah.
He'd treasure whatever she gave him; he knew he didn't deserve it. And he'd give anything she asked for.
Her attention returned to him, brushed his face and lips, linked them – and she lifted, inhaling… It felt like the most natural and inevitable thing in the world when he met her lips lightly, softly. Willingly.
She didn't pull back, only waited and he kissed her again and again before she caught his jaw with her fingertips and kissed him back, fingers sliding to thread into his hair and raising a reactive gasp with a mild electric shock. She swirled her touch against his scalp and all the nerves in his body whirled. Her body was warm, and soft, and it was intoxicating how she responded, how she sought and allowed. She wanted closer and more and him and he was going to come apart but all his bony joints were in the way. If he could only figure out how to fit his body next to hers comfortably in the damn bunk – he couldn't trap or pin her at all, he knew that instinctively.
Freya broke away gasping, arching so the dusky line of her throat was well within reach of his lips and his mouth wasn't satisfied with kissing and tasting her skin, he had to find everywhere, and then return.
"Merlin," she managed, trembling but pressing close. "We – can't. We shouldn't. Not here, not now…"
He was so entwined with her, heart and soul, it took him a minute to seek his own clarity, not diving further into her. "Yeah. Okay." He wasn't breathing, he wasn't getting any air but he was nearly panting and his pulse pounded like drums around all the curves of their matched bodies. "You… I'm sorry?"
"Mm." She tightened her grip on him fiercely for another moment, then pressed him back. "You don't even know…"
Hells. So true.
"Merlin." She caught his face between her hands as he braced himself on the edge of the bunk and the wall-curve of the inner hull. Open door and corridor light and… bloody hells, if anyone… But she lifted her lips to his forehead in a last reassuringly fervent kiss. "I think I'm falling for you…"
In a terrifyingly permanent way. When I fall in love, it will be forever. Yeah, that.
She released him in a motion that pushed him playfully away. "Wake up, Merlin."
He flung out his arms and tensed, expecting an ignominious tumble to the floor below her bunk-
And lurched upright in a different room entirely. Moonlight on the water, reflecting through the windows of the main room, and his body half-sprawled off one of the bench-seats, and he was alone.
Cursing himself with every expletive he knew, he scrubbed his hands vigorously over his face, and pushed himself to his feet.
Mind your dreams.
The deck rose and fell, subtly resolute, and the engines throbbed low determination to continue toward destination, even at night.
Well, he was wide awake now, and vastly unsettled. Maybe he'd go check in with the pilot.
…..*…..…..*…..…..*…..
The pilothouse was the top level of the Ten-Via, above the main deck, which was above the cabins. It was only about the size of a military barracks room, wheel and captains' chair, panels of instruments and equipment, a pair of anchored backless stool-chairs for guests, and the walls were all windows, hip-height and up.
For all the good it did at night. Low, angled lighting and illuminated displays meant Arthur piloted according to gauges and dials, following Cartwright's navigational directions, rather than by sight.
You could reach the pilothouse from the outside or the inside, steep stair-ladder to a small wraparound observation deck, or a similar one coming up through a rail-guarded section of the floor at the forward end of the room. Might be possible for someone to enter the space surreptitiously, but scout's instincts doubted it – and heard someone coming up the stair-ladder.
Cartwright, he guessed, maybe Gwaine. Or one of the other soldiers, curious about-
But it was Merlin. Hands on the floor, on the rail, to guide himself. Not really turning to take in the room or check for company – except, psychic – but moving almost as slow and vague as he had since they'd reached Alexandria. Elsewhere, Arthur was inclined to believe, which was different than just merely absent, and unsettling.
His heart thudded in an uncomfortable rhythm, nerves prickling like they wanted to perspire. All his scout's pretense and charming social manipulation would do him no good with Merlin. In their last moment together, he hadn't thought about Merlin's reaction or the potential damage to their relationship as situations unfolded exponentially, he'd only chosen and acted. And he'd been faintly dreading this moment ever since he walked out of the Hotel Essential, in spite of what he'd told Merlin about not second-guessing oneself.
You lived, and I lived, and here we are – but it's not over, yet.
"Hey," he said inanely, when it seemed Merlin might be content to linger on the top step staring toward the starboard windows indefinitely.
What was he looking at? What did he see? Was he aware he wasn't alone, and did he know who he was with?
Merlin turned, indifferent and unruffled and unreadable, and didn't quite focus on Arthur. He didn't seem angry, anyway – but if he wasn't fully present, Arthur's instinct was to postpone any serious conversation.
"How do you feel?" he continued casually. "Halfway human? Clean and well-fed, again?"
"Halfway," Merlin echoed mildly, and made a thoughtful humming noise. "Now I know what the sandbox was like for you and Gwen."
Arthur winced. He'd never wanted those experiences for Merlin – being shot at, having to shoot back, the thousand and one doubts and fears and shocks both circumstances entailed. But if Merlin was going to be Psych Ops… if.
He'd also, subconsciously, figured on being present to share Merlin's experiences, to filter and handle and counsel.
"You've got a good squad, though," he continued, trying to sound out Merlin's state of mind a little better. "They still consider you a choker?"
Merlin didn't respond. Like he hadn't heard, or couldn't be bothered to find words for an answer. Gaze drifting.
Arthur added leadingly, "After what happened?"
The glow of moonlight through the windows mingled with the dim pilothouse running-lights and Merlin watched it a moment, or listened to something in the low engines – or far away – or just rode the motion of the waves they rumbled over. Then he moved to one of the stools and settled, empty hands on his thighs and shoulders slouched.
"Gwaine told me," Arthur offered, a quiet confession. The sniper in the village, the rescue at the hospital, the ignition of the tank of the truck to help them escape, and the truck-bomb. And would the prompted recollection remind Merlin to feel betrayed and angry, cold and closed? "Everything you did. Everything you've been through."
Merlin's eyes dropped shut, and he swallowed noticeably. "It was my fault."
And that was a conclusion Gwaine hadn't been certain that Merlin had or would reach, but it hurt Arthur to hear.
"No," he said. "It wasn't. The Isyadi are ruthless enemies, and you didn't exactly volunteer for this mission-"
"How often do you volunteer for yours?" Merlin murmured.
Not the point. "That was Gaius' decision, after I told him-"
Merlin's head tilted, and intensity linked them like a dart finding the bulls-eye across the small room, like the moment Freya Douglas had looked through him, evaluating and disappointed.
"Gaius did that to protect me," Merlin stated, his voice deep and sad and old, somehow. "He sent me to Gwaine. So I would be out of your way, and you could go on holiday-"
Arthur's heart dropped, and didn't find bottom. "Merlin, that wasn't – I wasn't-"
"To solve the case by yourself," Merlin continued – understanding that didn't dull the edge of the Arthur's regret. "You like to work alone."
That was true. Also true that he'd valued time spent with Merlin as partner – with Gwen as partner – only just beginning to see how another person added to efficiency and clarity, and the worries he'd had about a partner being hurt or killed, the pain and loss anticipated, the effort and attention expended to prevent that, never really materialized.
Also true that the process would have been complicated if Merlin had slipped custody and evaded arrest and legal proceedings to go with him.
Though maybe it would have been faster, if he'd been along…
And all evidence uncovered summarily dismissed by the authorities because of Merlin's fugitive status…
He hadn't looked away, and Merlin's intensity – involuntary, unintentional, almost – hadn't diminished. Arthur said, "I'm sorry for the way I treated you in the hotel security office. At least I could have told you my plan. You would have known that I believed you were innocent. That I believed in you."
Comprehension burned in Merlin's eyes and his expression didn't change and Arthur felt his life's worth hung in the balance. Because it wasn't his choice, this time, to forgive and try again.
"I could have hoped," Merlin said softly.
It felt like condemnation Arthur would endure because it was just, and he looked away. The tension of the moment deflated toward exhaustion, and the movement of the boat held more power over the strength of his body than his own will.
"Where are we going?" Merlin said in a different voice, staring blankly toward – through – the starboard windows. Roughly, north.
"Home," Arthur said automatically, feeling the weight of every hour descend upon him since… he didn't know when. Since Paris, and the pieces came together. Since the hour of exercise in the hotel, since Merlin had waited on the jogging-path to say Gaius wanted them for a briefing…
Bloody hells, it felt like a long life, suddenly.
"I mean, Camelot," he said lamely, thinking that Merlin might not feel the same way about that word. "Gwaine said-" surely they had told him this? several times? – "you're all officially missing in action, til you report in. They can send someone to collect you from Fort Fuller when we make landing. Cartwright figures we can make it by midmorning, make port with the other vessels coming in at noon and no one will take any special notice of us, if anyone's watching."
Merlin hummed like he heard Arthur, but wasn't really listening, and let the silence spread…
Arthur didn't know what else to say, after I'm sorry. Merlin wasn't… what he had been. If that meant he'd changed, or if he'd recover, maybe no one could say. Asking after Merlin's experiences was awkward; that wasn't really done from soldier to soldier or scout to scout if the story wasn't volunteered, except in the vaguest terms. How'd it go. And he wouldn't volunteer the complications he'd learned unless Merlin asked; that was sharing a burden willy-nilly.
Then. Merlin said, "You remember how I told you psychic worked for me? The houses, the neighborhood? And sometimes windows were open, and sometimes I could walk up the lawn and glance inside?"
Arthur couldn't help noticing Merlin had used the past tense. Worked, not how it works… "Yeah?"
Merlin cocked his head slightly. "I never opened up the doors, or crawled through windows? I never went inside anywhere? That feels… felt… invasive. You know?"
Totally out of his depth, Arthur repeated, "Yeah?"
"People shout things out their open windows, sometimes," Merlin mused. "The strongest feelings and reactions. And Geoffrey… it felt like he was always in a different room, if I glanced in a window?"
Sir Geoffrey Monmouth, one of Gaius' friends and sometimes advisor. Of the Monmouth Museum, biggest and best that Camelot could boast.
"I've never seen a person, inside their psychic-house." Merlin wet his lips absently. "What do you think it means, if I do? If I go inside, and… interact?"
Chills slid over Arthur's bare arms, and he held very still. Because his first thought was, interact. Attack? Could you kill someone without even touching them, if you were psychic? He'd never heard of it, but… yeah, he could imagine that damage was definitely possible.
Merlin didn't dart him a glance and hiss, It doesn't work like that!
But if he'd changed that much…
"If, say," Merlin murmured. "I… kissed. Someone. A girl."
Freya Douglas, and oh. So much different than Arthur's reactive thought.
Merlin gave him a shy glance, and something settled into place between them, solid and deep. After all and everything, he was coming to Arthur for advice on girls.
"Probably be careful," Arthur said, lightly grave. "That's your instinct anyway, yeah?"
"Yeah." Merlin gave Arthur his profile again. "It was just a dream, anyway. But I think… I think she might… like me."
By the sound of his voice, in the colorless dim of the pilothouse, Merlin was blushing.
Another time, in another place, Arthur might have teased him mercilessly. But for the memory of why Merlin was so inexperienced with girls – and not because he was awkward or ugly – and how he had no one else to come to, but someone like Arthur. Their relationship was a mixed bag at best. And maybe it would've been Gwaine Merlin asked, save for some detail Arthur wasn't privy to between the second-sergeant and Freya Douglas, causing hesitation.
"Congratulations," Arthur told him, meaning it. "I haven't got any romantic success stories worth telling, but… my instinct is also, go slow."
Even facing away from Arthur, Merlin's grin was visible and wide. "Sounds like good advice."
The engine grumbled away beneath them, and the wash of seawater against the hull rose gently into the quiet. And Merlin didn't push himself up and excuse a retreat.
He shifted for comfort, and stayed. And even if they spoke of no more than the Ten-Via and the navigation, the geography of the seafloor and the consequences of weather, it was… well, it was honestly more than Arthur had hoped for.
After this was all over, if he was still alive, he could find Merlin again and maybe start over. Again.
At the very least, he could show up at Merlin's place demanding the return of the book he'd borrowed. And then… well, he didn't know what he'd do. But he was good at improvising.
…..*…..…..*…..…..*…..
Merlin dreamed he slouched astride the quiet grumble of a turf-bike at a crossroads. Left into the village… or straight on to the Essetirian border… east was right, and to the coast.
The knowledge of a Pendragon presence at his back didn't disquiet. Imminent or distant, enormous or irrelevant, unclear. He knew Arthur, he understood him. Temper, reaction, decision, judgment – he was a good man.
And Merlin had a choice to make. Left or right. Mountains or valley. Woods or sea-coast. Gravel or pavement… he barely glimpsed the meaning behind the dream-decision, gripping handle-rubber but not turning for acceleration. One way or the other, and he felt no instinct either way, just the abstract knowledge that choice was necessary.
Purpose-plus-danger, on the one hand. Part of a team – though marginal and temporary – on the other. Complicated and simple, difficult and easy. He could gun the motor up a treacherous snowy slope and explode over the pass into the absolute unknown, or slide gently down to an eventual stand-still.
But he'd have to choose. Soon.
And the engine rumbled beneath him, and he squinted both directions, and-
"Merlin."
Woke again in the great-room of the Ten-Via, morning fresh and light blue at the windows all around. The voices of his unit were quiet and subtle, relaxed and inarticulate teasing.
And Freya stood above him, braced against the movement of the boat, telling him ten different things with the smile on her lips and the expression in her dark eyes. She was wearing the slender-strap tank-top with the fluffy skirt, and he hauled himself up, swinging bare feet down to short scratchy carpet.
"Breakfast?" she suggested, without losing the look of sly amusement that was so… happy, on her face. "Hector's doing something with eggs and vegetables in the kitchen…"
"Galley," he told her, finding his legs a bit unsteady with the roll of underlying waves. "Freya…"
She met his gaze, full saucy lips and unfathomable eyes.
"Did we-" he began awkwardly. "I mean, did I… were you, um…"
Instead of answering, she laid one hand soft along his ribs, leaning close and rising on her toes. It wasn't really an embrace and his arms didn't have time to decide how to respond, and she brushed nose and lips against his neck above his collar, prompting a full-body shiver. She made a noise in the back of her throat like purring, as if she was pleased with the way he smelled, and his knees buckled – just a little, not very long, but…
"Morning, Arthur!" said several people in the galley, and a cool salty breeze swept past Merlin.
He meant to turn, and find a smile, and voice a greeting – even though Arthur lingered behind him in the doorway, and didn't enter the room. Freya's attention slid past him, and remained open, if not exactly welcoming, but he knew how she felt about strangers and men, if not exactly why.
And they'd talked, in the night – if that hadn't been a dream too, or all in his head. Arthur had apologized, and Merlin understood… even if he didn't agree. With the decision, or its necessity, and the consequences – maybe unintended, but undeniably real. And Merlin knew, maybe better than anyone, how an I'm-sorry only began the repair. It didn't complete it.
And logically, it was a fact that he'd done worse to Arthur. More than once. But this still hurt.
"Breakfast?" JT suggested. "Even scouts eat breakfast, right, Thompson?"
Merlin's head turned of its own accord, just enough to see Gwen perched on a barstool at the galley island, bolted to the floor and pivoted to allow her to look at him.
Please, her expression begged him. Please.
I don't know what you want me to…
"Thanks, but no," Arthur answered smoothly. He sounded arrogant, aloof, in control. "I've got to get some sleep before we reach Newmarch. Cartwright says half past eleven, if we're lucky."
"Just in time for lunch, then!" JT answered.
"All you ever think about is food," Gwaine observed with mild derision, giving the other soldier a little shove.
"And you two are still on-mission, innit?" Martine said to Gwen.
Gwen's cheeks bunched in a friendly grin, as she made a light joke, "That's confidential…"
And Merlin could have looked. Even if he couldn't see her mental house right now, he remembered what it looked like and felt sure the door would be propped ajar, windows open, curtains waving in the breeze…
"Newmarch isn't very big, is it," Charlie mused, holding her plate out for Hector to scoop something with eggs and vegetables from the pan.
"Industry, more than tourism," Gwen answered.
"Your mother lives there," Freya said – to Merlin, but loudly enough that the others heard.
"Oh, yeah?"
"No kidding – nice!"
Her dark eyes were wide and uncertain. Sorry… didn't mean to. She'd said psychic made her blurt secrets, but both of them thought that somehow proximity to him meant that was suppressed, for her.
But maybe he wasn't, anymore. Or at least…
"Fort Fuller's not going to be able to send anyone to pick us up and take us in til tomorrow morning, anyway," Gwaine said to him, leaning over his elbows on the high galley island. "You have time for a visit."
Yeah… "You should come," Merlin said. He was looking at Gwaine when it came out, but he glanced down at Freya to reaffirm his desire to include her in such a visit, before taking in the rest of the room, the rest of the squad.
"Oh, yeah, maybe…"
Probably their connection wasn't tight enough for things like visiting each other's mothers; he wouldn't have felt comfortable with anyone's family except for Freya and Gwaine. And Gwen – he vaguely remembered meeting her brother in Britesea – was looking away, toward the-
Empty doorway. At some point Arthur had slipped away. Maybe he hadn't heard, or maybe he purposefully withdrew himself from Merlin's invitation.
…..*…..…..*…..…..*…..
Arthur contrived to be the pilot at the wheel, guiding the Ten-Via into the harbor at Newmarch, into a dock at the marina sized to accommodate them.
Which meant that Cartwright occupied himself tying them off and making them fast, and the soldiers took their collective leave – Arthur saluted the group through the window of the wheelhouse, and watched them make their way to shore feeling the Ten-Via rise and fall and thump against the bumpers of the dock, engines quiet.
Merlin didn't go with them. Nor Freya Douglas, nor Gwaine – and though they hadn't discussed it, he expected that Gwen would remain part of his mission until such time as she told him in no uncertain terms, she was out.
They'd talked. Sort of. Arthur didn't think Merlin was angry – maybe he was still too absent to be angry – but he wasn't in any condition to bear the burden of requested assistance.
Their partnership wasn't in any condition to bear the burden of requested assistance against orders, either.
"Arthur?" Gwen called up the interior ladder-stair without climbing to show herself. "Are you coming? Cartwright is going to square matters with the harbor-master and then take care of some routine maintenance, so we're going to…" She continued speaking, but probably turned away, so he couldn't tell if she'd interrupted herself to address someone else.
His rucksack leaned against one of the instrument panels, and Arthur crouched to lower it down the ladder before jumping down himself. The main room was deserted – he didn't figure it was his responsibility to check the state of the galley – and the door to the deck was latched open.
And when he approached the dock, he saw that all three remaining soldiers – Merlin, Gwaine, Freya – waited with Gwen. Waited for him.
Well, hell. Whatever he got, he deserved, right? Swinging his ruck over one shoulder, he vaulted over the boat-rail to the dock, steadying himself for semi-solid footing after equilibrium had adjusted to the motion of the sea.
"Hey," Gwen said to him, shading her eyes. Even though the noon sun was bright like the Middle East, it was crisp and clear and distant, not yellow-brown close like the sandbox. One could shiver in the sea-breeze, here.
And suddenly it occurred to him that she'd somehow influenced Merlin to include him in an invitation to visit Hunith, in spite of how small he knew her cottage to be.
"Gaius is in Newmarch," he said brusquely to all of them at once. Sidestepping past Gwen – she could easily shove him into the water of the harbor, greasy green-brown, and didn't. "He's with Alice. I'm going to head straight there…"
He didn't actually wait for them, but he didn't stride purposefully away, either. All of them followed him, and someone mumbled something that sounded like it could be a question.
"No, she's still at work," Merlin answered, clear enough for Arthur to hear, though he didn't turn. "Til dinnertime. Around dinnertime."
"So we could go with, pay the Old Man a visit, too," Gwaine said – to Arthur's back or to Gwen or to the others. "I've got a few things I'd like to say to him…"
Something tightened in the muscles between Arthur's shoulder-blades, and he concentrated on the darkly sodden wood-planking of the docks, before they turned into stationary concrete closer to shore. Gwaine was going to call Director Gaius on his choice to send Merlin to the sandbox. Of course.
Tucking his thumb behind the shoulder-strap of his rucksack, he led the group – I'm not a leader, why are they following me – up from the marina, to the nearest trolley-stop.
Water-sprinklers sprouted on tiny business-lawns, and somewhere out of a sight a dog was barking. Voices and foot-traffic and he could mostly ignore the awkwardness of conversation with his group. Gwen was better at that anyway – she and Freya chatted about hometowns and families and seaside vacations. Gwaine interjected a comment or two about the charms of holiday bars compared to clubs compared to cafes. Merlin didn't say much, and when Arthur swept a glance over him, he was nearly always gazing away into midair.
Arthur was the first onto the trolley, and grabbed a hanging balance-strap rather than seating himself. The driver, and the few passengers, eyed the elements of military uniform in their attire – Gwaine and Merlin both in camouflage trousers, Freya pairing a soft tan t-shirt with Gwen's flouncy skirt - but said nothing. He was the first off the trolley, too.
And then it was a quarter-league hike down a winding lane to Alice's house, where Gaius was staying. Patient stone walls and tidy gardens with oversize stone mushrooms and painted gnomes winking impishly beneath rose-trellises.
And though Arthur had never been there before, somehow he knew the house on the corner was Alice's, before he saw the number.
Up the crumbling step to a door painted wine-red, flanked by two pots of orange marigolds, and knock. And the porch was only big enough for one person to stand waiting, without having to back down a step when the door opened.
Gaius answered the door like he'd been waiting for them, his only concession to retirement a cardigan rather than suit coat. He raised his eyebrow to take in the extras between Arthur at the door and Gwen just closing the front-garden gate.
"Oh, good," the Director said, more stern than relieved. "What took you so long?"
…..*…..…..*…..…..*…..
Gaius, I'm in Aravia. I know… I sent you. Why? Reasons.
Something occurred to Merlin gradually, over the course of the walk from the marina to Alice's house in Newmarch, a walk that wasn't leisurely and might almost have been double-time.
They weren't done. Arthur – and Gwen along somehow after her extended mission. Into Asia somewhere, wasn't it? He saw the Tower and the Arc and the river separating around the church only to meet again – Paris, and he didn't need Percival's research folders to tell him that. They hadn't just traveled to Aravia to find him. Or to deal with those putting other lives at risk to target him. They hadn't come because anyone had changed their minds – or found evidence – about exonerating him after what happened with Morgana Pendragon.
We're not done. Neither of them was wearing the tourist-vacation costumes he vaguely remembered from the rail-station in Janada, anymore, but the hardy innocuous clothing that must have been more usual for scouts. Blend in, do what you gotta, then get away.
The whole thing. The Isyadi at Urhavi and the strings of Tosoldat's network Merlin had identified in the bomb-making pieces on the interrogation table between him and Arthur.
Do they need me? Surely they need me…
You could cut days off our time, and tell us a sure thing, Arthur had said, in that little room in headquarters. He'd also said, You can say no, and nothing changes, between you and me. If you're up for it – only if you're up for it.
Why hadn't he asked, this time. He said he trusted Merlin… maybe he doubted what Merlin was capable of.
What am I capable of?
Arthur and Gwaine followed Gaius through the front sitting room. Merlin paused on the threshold - Freya and Gwen still patient on the step behind him – and turned the other way, down a short corridor to a day-lit kitchen, where Alice was wiping her hands on a red-and-white checked towel.
She came to him immediately, forgetting whatever chore they'd interrupted. "Oh, no," she said, dismayed, searching his eyes. "Oh, dear, not again."
"The neighborhood's a bit bare," he said lightly, expecting her to understand. Her actual house smelled like apples and cinnamon, but there was no psychic neighborhood. "Everyone has moved away…"
"Everyone?" she said skeptically, tucking her chin for a moment – before wrapping a hug around him. "Never mind, they'll come back eventually."
Would they? Well, she'd been right before.
"This is Freya Douglas," he began, shifting so she could join him on the navy rug just inside the door, protecting silver-old floorboards. "She's-"
"Yes, I see," Alice said – and hugged Freya as well.
Freya's eyes went momentarily wide over Alice's shoulder, before she relaxed. "So you're-"
"Yep." Alice beamed, welcoming Gwen with a warm glance.
"But not-" Freya continued, a bit anxious.
"Not usually," Alice assured her.
Gwen turned from shutting the door, and said cheerfully to Merlin, "I suppose you caught all that?"
"Does it really matter if I didn't?" he returned light-heartedly, just glad to know that Alice and Freya connected, and she was comfortable here. Probably he ought to have warned her about Gaius, and Alice, and what they could do.
As for later, when they went to his mother's house… he felt a little guilty for wishing they could all be accommodated here and it wouldn't be necessary.
"If the rest of you will join us?" Gaius called peremptorily from another room, further into the house.
Alice grimaced, tossing her towel over the shoulder of a heather-gray button-up, and ushered them inward. Merlin had a brief moment of wondering if he should've unlaced and removed his boots, and then they all shuffled into a formal dining room.
Polished wood chair-rail, painted paneling below and textured ivory wall-paper above. Two great windows looking out at green hills, and space for eight at an antique dining set that might've been overlaid with mahogany. Gaius settled at the head, where papers and files and documents lay in messy piles, and Arthur lowered his rucksack in the far corner.
Merlin diverted behind the foot of the table, choosing to lean against a window-frame rather than assuming a place at the table. Gwen took the middle chair and Freya eased into the seat right next to her; Gwaine circled to come up to Gaius' right hand and Alice perched with her back to Merlin.
What could she sense about whatever was between him and Arthur, now? Good things, bad things, complicated things…
Gwaine started in accusingly, "I have questions for you, Sir, about-"
"We all have questions," Gaius cut him off testily. "If you're going to remain, Second-sergeant, if Scout Pendragon trusts you to remain-" he gave Freya a glance over his glasses, and she leaned a few inches back from the table- "you might observe silence til you're addressed."
The set of Gwaine's shoulders said, You haven't changed much, Old Man… Arthur straightened, crossing his arms over his chest and focusing on Gaius.
"What do you need me to do?" he said quietly. Without inflection, but somehow it served to stop them all in their emotional tracks. Maybe it was the enormity of the offer; Merlin could feel that across the room. Because, anything.
Gaius folded his hands over the papers on the table. "I have no authority to give orders-"
Arthur made an impatient noise. "What do I need to do?"
"Morgause Renard," Gaius said.
The dining room vanished abruptly behind a wall of waving jungle-grass and he could have drawn her face if he was an artist. Descending the stairs at the Pendragon family home, as he was ascending, and she'd looked at him.
"What about her," Gwen asked, bringing him back to the dining room. She rested one forearm on the table, but her body language included Freya beside her.
"Surprise candidate for the emergency elections," Gaius informed them. "Our agents in the capital aren't completely certain how that was managed, but-"
Arthur's arms swung down and he gripped the chair-back in front of him, face granite. "Gaius, there's no way that she-"
The Old Man lifted one finger from his clasped hands. "Not for First Minister, no. But she's a given now to replace Liam McEwan, who's likeliest by far to receive the necessary votes to replace your father."
Gwaine looked at Arthur.
Arthur's knuckles were white on the fancy scrollwork of the chair-back.
"Your father remains at your family estate," Gaius continued, shifting slightly to consult one of the sheets in front of him. "He has bodyguards and nurses and at least two specialists in residence. Hired by your sister, who has taken up indefinite permanent residence there also."
"Hired by my sister," Arthur repeated softly.
"On paper, at least," Gaius warned.
Merlin observed his last memory of Morgana Pendragon with more objectivity than he'd been capable of at the time. Screaming and flailing wildly enough to injure herself with bruises and scratches and throwing things… Was she taking medication, though? And for what? If the new staff at the estate weren't actually chosen by her, who would've… oh.
"Tomorrow night," Gaius continued, glancing around at all of them, "there is to be a gala at the Monmouth Museum, celebrating the nominees and providing one last opportunity to campaign before the vote is called on the day following."
He paused, but no one said anything. Merlin looked at the museum he'd never seen himself, but that was Sir Geoffrey's pride and joy. Polished granite floors, five stories and two wings, the lobby all glass up to the roof, hung with strings of lights, great banners and tapestries finely embroidered with advertisements for the grandest exhibits. It seemed familiar, somehow…
"I'm told… no one matching the description of Tosoldat given by Scout Thompson has been apprehended at the border crossings, or the harbors."
Gwaine looked at Gwen, surprised maybe by the caliber of her work; Merlin studied the calm concentration of her expression as if it would help him scrutinize that encounter in her memory. To know what the leader of a terrorist organization looked like – how close would she have been, and for how long.
"So he remains at large," Gwen said, setting her jaw in unhappy determination.
"I'm told that Tristan was successful in Paris," Gaius went on. "Several arrests, the appropriation of all relevant accounts. Conclusively successful. The Isyadi are financially finished."
"What about Janada, then?" Gwaine demanded, and pointed at Merlin without looking away from the Director. "What about all of them aiming for him?"
"The last ineffective gasps of a dying organization," Gaius said. "No more rebuilding, no more recruiting-"
Merlin almost snorted.
"Ineffective, my ass," Gwaine snapped. "We lost a lot of good people there."
Arthur adjusted his grip on the chair-back. "If Tosoldat hasn't been arrested, then he's here," he said quietly. "Plans still moving forward for some devastating, close-to-home campaign? Morgause Renard celebrating her imminent election to even a minor post in our government – and if she's Essetirian and psychic-"
In the moment of silence, Merlin realized that he'd forgotten that he was Essetirian and psychic too. Mild surprise suggested that he felt his chosen loyalty to Camelot was more natural, more intrinsic than his former nationality had ever been.
"She sent you an invitation," Gaius said, his mild tone at odds with the sharp glance he gave the scout.
Arthur inhaled, nostrils furling, and let go of the chair.
"It was addressed to our headquarters at Fort Fuller. Acting Director Gregory contacted me to ask after your temporary address, wherever you were vacationing."
Merlin did snort, then. As if Arthur Pendragon would vacation, at a time like this. He'd had only an inkling of how bad things were, himself, but regretted even a momentary uncertainty over Arthur's intentions and destinations after he'd been arrested, and then deployed.
"She invited me to this gala celebrating the election of someone else to my father's title?" Arthur repeated, dangerously calm.
"And a plus one," Alice added sarcastically.
Merlin felt Freya's eyes on his face, as if he could convey unspoken answers to her questions, but nothing blurted from her mouth.
Gwaine looked from Arthur to Gwen, Gaius to Alice, and back to Arthur. "So what are you going to do?"
"I'm going to accept the invitation, and go to the gala," Arthur responded, addressing Gaius. His eyes flashed blue fire and the white castle stone glimmered transparent for a moment, as he smiled a lion's smile. "It would be rude not to."