Unseeing Eyes
Chapter 14: Unseeing Eyes
"Gwen – Your Highness, really. I'm fine. You don't have to do this." Merlin tugged ineffectually at Gwen's hand as she walked up the steps to the castle, holding her skirt up as she went. The Knight that had escorted them to the gate now hurried ahead to inform those who needed to know about the Queen's arrival and the immediate things that she would need. Merlin glanced at Godric behind him, whose eyes were as wide as saucers, taking the looming castle in. Rowena and Salazar on the other hand, were eyeing each other with a sort of apprehension, as if expecting guards to pop out from the castle waving their pitchforks and yelling "SORCERERS!" at them.
Which brought him back to the fear inducing realization that Gwen was unwittingly dragging him right back into the lion's den. It had been rattling enough just going to Camelot's lower town, but into the castle? Merlin thought he was going to pass out from anxiety.
Arthur knew who he was – kind of – and that knowledge alone was enough evidence for Arthur to sentence them all to burn. How was he going to get himself out of this one? Merlin was so deep into his own mind, searching for an out, that he failed to observe the last step and tripped.
With a fairly unwomanly yell, Merlin went down in a tangle of skirts and bags, banging his elbow on the edge of the steps as he caught himself.
"Are you alright?!" Merlin blinked his eyes open and found himself looking into the concerned faces of his children and Gwen. He clutched his twinging elbow and smiled up at them, self deprecatingly.
"I'm fine, I'm fine. Nothing I haven't done before." He shook his arm out, holding the trailing end of his sleeve in the other hand so it didn't flap about.
"Gwenivere? What's going on?" Merlin noticed all the children start at the voice and instinctively reach out to grab the sleeve of his dress. There was no mistaking the voice, as deep as it was cultured. No one was about to forget the sound of this man's voice, yelling in their cabin.
Gwenivere stood up from her bent position over Merlin, and looked at the approaching King who strode quickly to her, the Knight they'd sent in earlier trotting obediently behind him bringing with him the head of Household Affairs. Merlin saw with some satisfaction that Arthur's first priority was Gwen, brushing the twigs and leaves out of her hair, and checking her for injuries.
"He said you were attacked. By who?" Arthur held her by the shoulders, searching her eyes. She patted his hand comfortingly.
"It's alright. It was my fault anyway, I got too used to thinking that you'll always come running in to rescue me. But in any case, I was rescued, by this lovely woman." Gwen gestured to Merlin who was being hauled up in a joint effort by Godric and Helga. Merlin watched as Arthur squinted at him, the backlight of the torches mounted all along the castle doors making it hard to make out initially who was standing at the castle steps.
Merlin tried to subtly push the kids behind him, to protect them from Arthur's view but this time, he found that they wouldn't allow it. They held either his hand or his sleeve, standing resolutely with him. Arthur's eyes widened as they took in the wild, unruly black hair, and the big blue eyes.
"Arthur, she saved me from those drunk brutes that tried to rob me of this." She held out the necklace, clutched in her hand and a little dirty from its tumble in the mud. Arthur barely glanced at it, his gaze fixated on Merlin.
"This is -" Gwen paused and looked at Merlin quizzically. "Oh I'm sorry. I don't believe I ever asked for your name. How unbelievably rude of me. You know me as Queen Gwenivere, you are -?" Merlin hesitated before answering.
"Elladora." He stopped before he started, as Arthur answered the question for him, his expression incredulous. "Her name is Elladora of Carhaix."
Merlin raised a sheepish hand in hello.
"Hi?" His wave was tentative, since he wasn't quite sure how Arthur was going to take his reappearance.
Gwenivere looked between them confused, as a hand slowly crept up to place her arm in the crook of Arthur's elbow.
"Arthur, do you know her?" She asked, a little unnerved by the expression her King was wearing. Like he had never expected to see this woman standing before him. Before Arthur could respond, there was a slight sound of a sword scraping stone from behind Merlin and the entirety of the company turned to look behind them.
And what they saw were two men, drunkenly stumbling towards the steps and the closer they got, the more evident it was that the men were in fact, Gwaine and Percival, inebriated to the point that standing on their own was difficult. This was of course, proven by the fact that they were walking purely by the arms they had thrown over each other's shoulders, providing enough support to enable them to slowly make their way to the castle. Their swords were in their scabbards, scratching the ground whenever they dipped too low.
The King sighed. He motioned the Knight behind him forward.
"Go get Sir Lancelot and Sir Elyan. You are going to need a lot of help getting these two oafs back to their quarters." His lips unwillingly curved in a grimace that equal parts affection and exasperation. Behind it though, there was a different emotion, coloring his expressions in a unique hue.
Gwenivere patted his arm sympathetically, sending Merlin a look that told him she wanted him to understand and pardon the condition of the two men.
"Can't say I blame them. It's 7 years today." Arthur said, sighing quietly before focusing on Merlin again. Merlin tried not to show any visible signs of recognition at the sentence. Truthfully, he hadn't even been aware that today was the day, 7 years ago, when he had been run out Camelot. He usually tried not to dwell on the thought, seeing as it made him rather annoyed. But he'd long since come to terms with the fact that in the relationship between himself and Arthur, it was Arthur who held the grudge, the prejudice's and the frankly alarming high body count of sorcerers. And there wasn't anything he could do about it.
The hatred that Uther had started, Merlin had only cemented. The one chance he'd had at quelling all of Arthur's doubts had vanished when Merlin had inadvertently caused Uther's death. Granted that hadn't been his intention, but he should have not been so boneheaded and gone poking about the King's body so cavalierly. If he hadn't, perhaps Uther would still be alive. Though whether that would have been good or bad, Merlin wasn't sure.
Arthur cleared his throat, pinning Elladora with a look that had Merlin slightly on edge. What if the last 7 years had only turned him more prejudiced against sorcerers? What if the reasonable Arthur that he had hoped would prevail had been smothered under paranoia?
"So. Elladora. What brings you to Camelot?" His eyebrow raised, and Gwenivere rolled her eyes.
"Arthur, I just told you, she saved my life. I don't appreciate the interrogation!" Merlin saw Arthur bite his lip as he grabbed her upper and kind of jerked his head in Merlin's direction and whispered to Gwenivere in an aggravated tone.
"GWENivere. That's the woman I told you about, remember? The witch?" Merlin scowled. 'Witch' always sounded so insulting. As if they were calling him something hideous. He squeezed Rowena's trembling hand to reassure her and then spoke.
"Uh, hello? I was just dropping the Queen off to the Castle, since she was wandering around outside in the woods. Seeing as she's got you now, I'll be leaving thanks." Merlin made to turn and leave and barely got a footstep away before Gwenivere grabbed his arm, while simultaneously pinning Arthur with a pointed look, angling her head toward Merlin. When he looked at her confused, Merlin saw her narrow her eyes and jerk her head more demandingly in her direction.
Arthur sighed, and put his hand on his hips, hanging his head. He let out a huff and then looked up at Merlin, a tight smile on his face.
"Elladora. Ahem, Mistress Elladora, it is quite late. Why don't you – uh – why don't you stay here for the night? I agree with the Queen, we must show you our gratefulness. So, allow us to host you tonight."
It took everything Merlin had in him to keep a straight face with the pained look of forced gratefulness that Arthur was giving him. It was a unique cross between a smile and a grimace. Merlin realized belatedly that now it was his turn to respond to Arthur's invitation. The problem was here, he couldn't behave the way he had in Carhaix, if he refused to acknowledge Arthur for the King that he was, he would be sowing the seeds for rebellion. So he grit his teeth and grabbed his skirt and did a semi curtsey, hearing the rustling of fabric as Rowena and Helga curtsied and the boys followed suit with a clumsy bow.
Arthur made an odd coughing noise and turned around, motioning to the Head of Housekeeping to get their rooms prepared.
. . . . . . .
"What the devil do you think you're doing?" Merlin barely refrained from jumping at the sound of Arthur's aggravated voice in his ears. Gwenivere was walking ahead of him and the King, making an enthusiastic attempt and engaging the kids in conversation. So far only Helga and Salazar had taken the bait. The other two were staring stonily at the walls, ignoring her.
"I don't have the slightest idea as to what you're talking about your Highness." Arthur threw him an exasperated look that bordered on threatening.
"I'm being serious here Elladora. I don't have time for your mind games. What are you doing here?" It took Merlin all of two seconds to decide his course of action for his current interlude with the King. It appeared that in his absence, the King had managed to revert back into his previous personality.
"You know. Before I never could understand why exactly women would get so frustrated with men but," he looked Arthur up and down and took satisfaction in his offended look. "now, I'm starting to understand."
"You -!"
"We're here!" Gwenivere's cheery voice interrupted Arthur and she looked back at them, smiling and motioning Merlin to come forward. Merlin winked at the King and left him behind, speeding up his walk to reach the door to the room where they would be staying. It was in the west wing of the castle, which told him a lot about how thankful the Queen truly was. The west wing was where the King would house his most important guests. It was on the first floor of course, seeing as Merlin was nowhere near royalty and yet if Merlin were to remember the layout of the castle properly, he was directly underneath the King's chambers.
"I hope they're too your liking Mistress." Merlin gave Gwenivere a strange look and she nudged Helga affectionately.
"She told me you prefer being called that." Helga beamed at her, delighted to be talking to the Queen, seeming to momentarily forget the fact that the Queen and King were probably their biggest problems at the moment.
Rowena, Godric, Salazar and Helga ran in, inspecting the room while Merlin stood in the doorway, watching them and surveying the room. Arthur grabbed Gwenivere by the elbow and yanked her backwards, she gave Merlin an apologetic look and backed up a couple steps to talk quietly with her husband.
"That happens to bea sorcerer that you've invited to stay in our castle Gwenivere!" Arthur jabbed a finger irately in his direction.
"She happens to be the woman who saved my – your Queen's – life! She must be treated the same way we would treat anyone who helped us. If this was anyone else, you'd be giving them a medal of honor!" She stamped her foot lightly, a small movement.
"But she's not anyone else is she? For all you know she could be conspiring to kill us in our sleep!"
"If she had wanted us dead, she would have left you to die in Carhaix seven years ago and killed me in the woods."
When Merlin turned around Arthur and Gwenivere straightened up, flashing him identical strained smiles. Merlin returned it, leaning on the doorway with one hand on the door itself.
"Well, thank you for this. It wasn't necessary at all but thank you anyways."
"It's the least I could do for you. If you hadn't appeared when you did, I would be in a lot of trouble right now. Please, rest, both you and your children." Gwenivere grabbed Arthur's hand, tugging him down the hallway, sending Merlin a bright smile as she rounded the corner.
Merlin closed the door softly, bracing his forehead against it. He had all of two seconds to calm his panicky mind over being forced to stay in the castle before a loud crash startled him, followed by loud hissed
"Salazar!"
"What?! You pushed it!"
"Did not!"
Ah, the joys of parenthood, he thought ruefully.
"Oi! What did you trouble makers break back there?!"
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
It was clear after he had fixed the rooms appropriately to house all four children that he wasn't getting any sleep tonight. The moon was high in the sky, a pale milky orb that cast a white glow over the kingdom that lay asleep outside his window.
Merlin stood in the center of the room, a long oblong, oval shaped chamber with one large bed on the right side of the room and two beds on the left side of the room that were large enough for two people. Salazar and Godric on the bed next to wall closest to the wash basin and a screen that hid a tub for baths behind it. It was a room that was garbed entirely in muted golds and blues but it made Merlin feel claustrophobic for his old room at Gaius's and his other room in Carhaix, small, unassuming and uncomplicated.
That's what he'd always wanted after all. A straight and uncomplicated life with no prophecies and no dunce Kings to constantly watch over. Merlin raised both hands over his head, stretching them as much as he could, feeling the exhaustion from the day's exertion. He ran both hands through his full hair, rubbing at his skull to relieve the pressure building from the stress. Then he reached behind him to undo the corset lacing on his gown. Luckily the gowns that Eliana had given him sported a new kind of corset lacings, ones that allowed for a person to easily remove the garment, whereas before undressing had become a family affair for him, having to get both Rowena and Helga to help him.
The gown slipped off of his narrow shoulders and pooled at his feet, where Merlin stepped out of it and kicked it unceremoniously to the corner of the room, forgotten almost instantly. He stood now in his cloth slip and starting to feel the tiredness creeping into his body, he crawled into the bed, only to sit on top of the blankets, back against the pillows, his knees drawn up to his chest. The bed was half covered in moonlight, streaming through the windows, only partially in the darkness As a result of the canopy over the head of the bed. He wrapped his arms around his knees as he thought.
7 years since he had last even seen the castle. Walking through its hallways had been dizzying, he'd never thought seeing George as he was lead towards his rooms would fill him with such a rush of familiarity. That brought him to thinking about his rooms, he knew he was directly below Arthur's chambers and if Arthur was as he was before then it was quite possible that Arthur was only now getting into his chambers to sleep. He couldn't help but wonder if they were talking about him. After all, to his knowledge, this was the first time that a known sorcerer was being allowed to stay in the castle. He wondered what this meant for Arthur's state of mind.
He knew very well that he shouldn’t but he couldn't help it. He thought back to a book of spells he'd seen in Grindle's spell book. He closed his eyes and thought to himself. Auscultatio.
"Arthur, enough. I said she was staying the night. That's it." There was the sound of loud stomping, which Merlin assumed were Arthur's ridiculously large feet, throwing a temper tantrum.
"I don't think you understand the gravity of what you've done Gwenivere. That's a known sorcerer down there. IN MY CASTLE."
"Oh thank you, Arthur. I don't think I quite understood you the other twenty times you've said that tonight in the span of the last," there was a pause, "10 minutes. Honestly. Why is it so hard for you to believe that she could genuinely not mean us any harm?"
"Oh I don't know. Maybe because she practices Magic and magic is evil?"
"You yourself told me that she struck you as odd when you met her! That she seemed unlike anyone you'd ever met. That she was intelligent and knowledgeable, if a little eccentric."
"That was before I found out she had a whole brood of sorcerers with her and she was their leader."
"Arthur, she's a young mother of 4 children. That's hardly a brood of anything." Here there was such a large silence that Merlin half thought they'd fallen asleep in the middle of the conversation before he heard Gwenivere speak quietly, her voice muffled, as if pressed to Arthur's chest.
"Have you ever thought, that maybe she reminds you a little of Merlin?" Merlin strained his ears, listening for Arthur's response.
"Sometimes. She said she knew him. Maybe they're relatives."
"I thought his mother was his only family."
"Who knows. He spent 6 years of his life with me Gwen. He never told me he was a sorcerer. I don’t know how much of what he's told me about himself was even true."
"Why can't you just give him the benefit of the doubt. I'm sure he had his reasons of hiding it. The first being that he didn't want to end up a roast pig."
"I wouldn't have done that to him!"
"How could he be sure? You never said a word against it when your father burned hundreds at the stake."
"I was a child, not to mention a prince. I didn’t have a choice."
"Did you not have your own mind either?"
"Gwenivere!"
"Look, I'm just saying, that maybe it's time that you buried the past and just tried to look for him. Just talk. Hear his side of the story."
"Even if I wanted to, I wouldn't know the first place to look. And whose to say he'd even see me."
Merlin had heard enough. He held his face in his hands, trying to hold back the emotions that he hadn't brought up in years. They were like tidal waves, crashing against the walls of sanity that he'd built over time. He just wasn’t ready for this. All he wanted to do was go home. They wanted to find him. To talk to him. What for? To humiliate him again? To accuse him of more horrendous crimes? Because Arthur would rather fight a Griffin barehanded than apologize to a sorcerer, that much he was aware. He scoffed, knowing that the Arthur he knew would never apologize unless there was sufficient cause to. So unless Merlin could get his view on Magic to change. There was not even the slightest chance that an apology was coming his way anytime soon. And that was assuming Arthur even knew or wanted to know how to find him to deliver said apology.
Merlin looked up, wiping the moisture on his cheeks away, refusing to acknowledge them as tears and got under the blankets. He wasn't in any mood to think about the foolish King. He pulled the fabric up to his chin and closed his eyes, determined to get some kind of blasted sleep.
. . . . . . . . . .
Madalen carried two empty buckets out to the well behind the Terry Tavern. It was the dead of night and her last customers had finally left. She had sent her children to bed already with the help of her younger sister Lianora. Those three children of hers exhausted everyone today, after meeting the children of Lianora's friend. She chuckled to herself while rearranging her grip on the bucket handles. Rowley had been beside himself to find a friend in Godric. Her chuckle turned into a huff of annoyance when she nearly fell on the slippery ground.
It was muddy in the back, the ground uneven with the footprints of stable boys and horses that had been tethered there. She made her way to the well at the corner of the property. All she needed to do before going to bed was to fill the two buckets with well water for the chamber pots, then she could go and lie down and just sleep. She felt like she could sleep like the dead for all the work she had done.
Her foot squelched in the muck and as she pulled out she heard a rustling in the woods behind the well. She froze, her eyes searching the woods for the movement she heard. After a moment, she released the breath she was holding, chalking the noise up to the wind. She walked to the well, setting the buckets down on the ground, she heaved the lid off with a grunt, the slab of stone and wood falling wetly to the ground. As it slid off, the stones screeched against each other, the sound was augmented by another shrill sound.
This time, Madalen heard it loud and clear. The shrill squeal was loud in her ears, coming from all around her. A sudden flapping startled her as a big black crow flew out of the brush over her head, coming dangerously close to tipping her off balance. She flailed her arms but managed to regain her equilibrium, holding her arms out parallel to the ground, and straightened, breathing a sigh of relief.
Just a crow. Pull yourself together Madalen!
She brushed the hair out of her face, sweaty from her momentary scare, leaning on the lip of the well. Madalen could see the reflection of the moon in the still water's surface, a beautiful painting in the night. As she admired it, Madalen became aware that all around her, everything had gone silent.
The kind of silence that was devoid of even the smallest peep. The trees didn’t rustle in the wind, the crickets didn't cricket, and the sound of the horses snoring was gone. The atmosphere was so stifling that Madalen didn't dare move, even a mere tavern owner like herself could tell that this was abnormal. Her palms were sweaty and her breathing loud and labored, even to herself. She tried to calm herself, telling herself that it was nothing.
Then she heard it. It was a small, barely even discernible sound. But something was coming.
A shadow fell over her, blocking the moon and Madalen had no choice but to move. She gulped, and clenched her eyes shut. It was behind her. She quickly prayed, a small part of her telling her that it was useless, that no one was listening. She ignored it and turned fast, ready to face what it was that had come for her. Madalen was many things, a mother who birthed bastard children, an irresponsible woman, a sinner. But she was not a coward. She steadied her trembling breath, seeing the way it escaped her mouth in a cloud of cold air.
She looked up and saw for the first time in her life, the face of evil.
Madalen screamed and elsewhere in Camelot, Merlin woke up, eyes unseeing.