[fic] The Ivy Crown, 6a/9

[da_ya_ri]

Part 6
Three Ravens


If anyone had asked him about it, Merlin wouldn't have been able to explain why—but somehow, his Dragonlord powers were different from his magic.

A chilly wind stirred the night air, and Merlin shivered, folding his arms across his chest to preserve some body heat. The day had been a mixture of sunny and overcast, and now the moon was barely visible through lazily drifting clouds, carrying the fresh scent of impending rain. He glanced up at the sky, and hoped that Kilgharrah would heed his call before the downpour started.

Even now it felt like his very bones were vibrating, thrumming with otherworldly power. It wasn't like his magic, which sometimes reminded him of a swift spring breeze, or the waters of a brook skipping over stones. His magic was everywhere, flowing through his veins in his blood and sown into every muscle and tendon; in this, at least, he could articulate how the ancient gift that his father had passed down to him was different.

An endless well of power seemed to open up in him whenever he called for Kilgharrah, like something sharp-toothed and primal awoke in his gut and directed his magic to where it would never think to go on its own. Even after more than a year, the sensation was still as foreign as it was unsettling, and if Merlin was honest with himself, he had to admit that it scared him sometimes.

It made him think back to the battle against the immortal army, and considering the fact that it had been forged in dragon fire, it seemed only logical that it reminded him of Arthur's sword. It was odd to think that Arthur, who didn't have a magical bone in his body, should be the one destined to wield it—but Merlin didn't doubt for a second that Arthur's controlled strength could temper the sizzling energy in the blade. When Merlin had used it, it felt like the sword had guided his hand.

Another gust of wind made him wrap his coat more tightly around himself, and he wandered a little deeper into the sprawling field when he heard the rustle of leaves in his back. They had ridden all day, and the closer they'd come to the forest, the more unsettled Merlin had felt. It was probably just an instinctive response to the story the innkeeper had told them, but it had gotten to the point that Merlin had to force himself to choke down some field rations when they'd made camp, his stomach roiling with discomfort.

The others were sleeping soundly about two furlongs from the treeline, and Merlin had offered to take the first watch to sneak away without anyone noticing. Now he was standing in an open field, watching the grass sway gently in the nightly breeze, and tried to ignore the itch at the back of his neck that came from having his back turned to the forest.

Leaves rustled behind him, the sound ominously loud despite the considerable distance he was keeping from the treeline, and Merlin almost missed the shadow that briefly obscured the moon. With a great rush of air and a thump that shook the earth beneath his feet, Kilgharrah landed in front of him, neatly folding his wings at his sides and not seeming all that surprised to see him.

Which made sense, all things considered, since Merlin was the only one who could call him. Merlin craned his neck to look up at him, awed once more despite himself. Moonlight glinted on the dragon's scales and made the leathery wings shimmer faintly. He looked just like he always did, the timeless depth of his eyes unchanged despite the months that had gone by since they'd last seen each other.

"Merlin," Kilgharrah greeted after a moment of silence, solemnly, although he seemed to take care to pitch his voice low so as not to wake the others—he'd probably seen their camp from above when he'd flown down to meet Merlin.

"Hello," Merlin said, oddly tongue-tied now that the dragon was here. It felt weird to talk to him without impending disaster nipping at his heels—well, he got the disaster bit down, but it still seemed quite far off.

Usually, he never got the time to wonder if whatever problem he had really warranted a dragon's advice; he just blurted it out as soon as Kilgharrah's claws touched the ground. They met so rarely that every time felt strangely like the first, which was disconcerting in itself. But at least Kilgharrah didn't hold Merlin's past failings against him, although Merlin sometimes suspected that he wanted to.

The dragon seemed to glance at the forest for a moment, although it was hard to tell with the moonlight reflecting in his eyes. He bent down a little further, cocking his head as if to study Merlin closely and check whether he had changed, at least, but Merlin couldn't tell if he was satisfied with what he saw.

He cleared his throat, uncomfortable despite himself. "I— I need your help."

"I'd guessed," Kilgharrah replied calmly, refolding his left wing with great care. Merlin got the distinct impression that if he'd been human, he would have started picking at his nails with a knife or something equally idle. He seemed to notice the lack of urgency in the air as well. "Do go on."

Merlin took a deep breath, tried to organize his thoughts, and told him everything.

He started with the Green Knight's arrival at the feast all those months ago, and watched in confusion when Kilgharrah started visibly, looking at Merlin in askance for a moment before leaning closer, something clearly having piqued his interest.

He went on telling him about the dead noblemen, their ensuing journey, and the ivy. While waiting for the dragon to arrive, Merlin had felt acutely aware of the sounds around him, the occasional cry of a bird from the nocturnal forest and the gentle rustling sway of the grass. But now the world around him seemed to dissolve into insignificance as he told his story, and he stopped listening for any sounds from the camp's general direction.

Kilgharrah listened in silence when Merlin described how they'd retraced the Green Knight's path through all those villages, and how they'd met him again at Beltane eve. He faltered a little at the memory, but carried on, determined not to omit anything of importance—he was fairly sure he could see a knowing gleam in the dragon's eyes despite the darkness. Although it didn't seem connected to the rest, Merlin made sure to inform him of his unsettling encounter with the strange magical dogs as well.

"And now we're going to head straight into Mercia," he finally concluded, "and Gwaine is going to get his head cut off." He spread his hands, helplessly; his palms felt clammy in the cool night air. "What am I going to do?"

Kilgharrah said nothing for a long moment, and Merlin paused for breath, oddly exhausted now that he'd told him the whole story in one go—but just talking about it was relieving in itself. He watched the dragon's pensive gaze drift to the forest again, and tried not to fidget when the amber eyes came to rest on him once more.

"You always think that you must do something," Kilgharrah said at last, his voice still pitched low. But at least he didn't sound accusing—if anything, he seemed deep in thought. "You assume everything falls to you."

"Well," Merlin floundered, a bit nonplussed, and shrugged as the full meaning of the words registered with him. "That's what you've been telling me all these years, isn't it?"

He cringed a little when the dragon narrowed his eyes at him and tossed his head as though in annoyance. "It is not," Kilgharrah said sharply, although he just seemed slightly cross at having been misinterpreted. "I have been telling you of your destiny. The reckless knight has no part in that."

It only took Merlin a moment to figure out that Kilgharrah was talking about Gwaine, and the surge of irritation that went through him wasn't entirely unexpected. "He's my friend," he snapped, and folded his arms across his chest defensively—it wasn't easy to glare daggers at a dragon, but he'd be damned if he didn't try. "Is it so wrong that I want to help him?"

"No," the dragon said simply, "but you cannot make his choices for him, nor protect him from his own taste for adventure."

Merlin swallowed hard, feeling his stomach drop. "So he will die?" he asked, not caring when his voice came out hoarse.

"That depends on whether he proves himself worthy. And that," Kilgharrah added, clearly seeing the unvoiced question in Merlin's expression, "is for the Green Knight to decide."

Blinking up at Kilgharrah in momentary confusion, Merlin remained silent as the words stirred something in his memory, a tiny detail that he had almost forgotten. His mind flashed back to the clearing, the firelight flickering across the Green Knight's features as he'd said that Gwaine's strength was worthy of being tested. He frowned, quickly pushing away the mental image of the blood that had spurted from the man's neck.

"The Green Knight," Merlin said slowly, searching for any sign of recognition on the dragon's features. "Why is he killing all those people anyway? I mean, where did he come from? Why target potential allies of Camelot?"

Kilgharrah's teeth showed in what Merlin had learned to recognize as a smile, and he thought he saw a flicker of appreciation hidden there as well, like he was asking the right questions at last. Still, the dragon simply shifted his weight a little, claws sifting through the grass.

"You do not need to know anything about him," he replied, his voice dismissive, but Merlin still caught the glint in his eyes. "Nothing I can tell you would help you interfere with your friend's choices."

"But I want to know more," Merlin countered firmly, unwilling to back down in this, spurred by the distinct feeling that yet again, there was something important that he was not being told. "I want to know why he's doing this, who he is, because I just don't think he's as evil as he seems to be."

A nightly breeze stirred the grass and brushed through Merlin's hair, and he felt himself tense when the forest behind him rustled once more as though in response to his words. This time he couldn't help but look over his shoulder, although the treeline was as dark and still as ever in the moonlight. No gleaming eyes watched him from the undergrowth, and no calls of dangerous beasts sounded through the night, but Merlin still felt a chill roll down his spine.

"Tell me, Merlin," Kilgharrah suddenly spoke up again, and Merlin hurriedly turned back to face him again, frowning at himself for getting distracted by the supposedly haunted forest again and again. "Do you know folk tales and songs? The kind sung by peasants at firesides when the winter comes, those that are not fit for the echoing halls of a great castle?"

Merlin just stared at the dragon for a moment, wondering whether he had indeed just made a poor attempt at a joke—it didn't seem particularly funny, though, at least not to him.

After a short, befuddled silence, Merlin began, "I don't see what that's got to do with—," but Kilgharrah gave him a distinctly impatient look, and so he just shrugged half-heartedly before continuing, "Well, I know some songs, I guess, from Ealdor. But trust me, you don't want me to sing—"

"There is a tale that has been remembered in song for centuries," the dragon explained, like he hadn't heard a word Merlin said, and Merlin gratefully trailed off and let him talk, still confused. "Though the song is well-known enough, not many people are aware that it tells the story of the last days of a battle for the Northern Plains."

Merlin sucked in a quick breath when two puzzle pieces suddenly clicked together in his head, and he took an instinctive step closer, although that meant he had to crane his neck even more to look Kilgharrah in the eye. "You mean the one against the immortal soldiers?" he pressed, excited that he'd managed to make at least that connection. "The innkeeper at Cogeltone told us about that just the other day!"

The dragon nodded, clearly pleased that Merlin was catching on quickly for once. "So you know that this forest," and he briefly inclined his head at the treeline, "was their last stronghold?"

"Yes," Merlin replied, but frowned when he thought back to what they'd been told yesterday—somehow, it felt like long ago. "Well, sort of. The innkeeper said that according to the legend, there was just one knight left to defend it in the end."

"But defend it he did," Kilgharrah said, quietly now, like their conversation was stirring up a long-forgotten memory. "And as the knight lay slain under his shield at last, the forest did not forget that he had died to protect it."

Silence descended on the field like a curtain, as though called forth by the dragon's words. Kilgharrah was watching him, his gaze somehow calculating, like he was trying to gauge whether Merlin's thoughts were going where he'd nudged them. Merlin let out a long, slow breath, and tried to think back to the long winters of his childhood before he'd come to Camelot, when his mother had told him stories and sung songs for him to pass the long nights when it had been too cold to sleep.

"Slain under his shield?" he finally repeated, dazedly, with the memory of flames crackling in the fireplace and scratchy sheets wrapped tight around him still hovering in front of his mind's eye. "That's—"

"From the song," Kilgharrah finished for him, and Merlin got the feeling that he was almost proud of him for having made that connection. It must be quite a change from his usual incomprehension, Merlin thought—but on the other hand, the dragon was unusually forthcoming with information today. "It tells the story of the forest's gratitude."

"But—," Merlin started uncertainly, and trailed off again as he struggled to remember more. He had the distinct feeling that he knew which song Kilgharrah was referring to, although it hadn't been one of Merlin's favorites back then—he'd thought it was rather boring, if he remembered correctly. There hadn't been any beasts to kill, no princesses to save, just a man dying alone.

Or not so alone, he thought as he remembered more of the different stanzas. There were definitely no words of a grateful forest in his memory, though—just a few repetitive, nonsensical lines to fill up the spaces between the story, as so many folk songs did, and a lot of animals.

"Are you sure we're talking about the same song?" he asked at last, when wracking his brains turned up no further results. "The one that's got those recurring phrases, something like 'with a down, derry, derry, derry down, down'?"

"You might know it as the song of three ravens," Kilgharrah confirmed, and ruffled his wings again, an oddly birdlike move in the moonlight, although the dragon didn't have feathers—Merlin thought it looked like a human shifting his weight from foot to foot. "And the valiant warrior from the song introduced himself to you as the Green Knight not too long ago."

There was a pause, and Merlin felt his jaw drop, although he couldn't have stopped it if he'd tried "What?" he blurted out, when he found his voice again. "You mean the song is actually about the Green Knight? He was the knight who defended the forest?"

"He is," Kilgharrah confirmed, lazily shuffling his claws through the swaying grass, like it wasn't quite as entertaining to watch Merlin grapple with the whole concept as he'd thought it would be. "Although his real name has long since been forgotten."

Merlin frowned, still lost in the memory of snow swirling past the window of Hunith's tiny hut, and thought again how odd it was to actually have the dragon talk to him in a more or less straightforward manner. But maybe this whole business with the Green Knight simply wasn't important to Kilgharrah, or at least not important enough to thoroughly confuse Merlin with riddles. He didn't seem to think that it had anything to do with Merlin's destiny, after all, which was usually the most riddle-laden topic of conversation he could think of.

"But that song...," Merlin began again, struggling to gather his thoughts and remember as much of it as he could. "There wasn't anything about a forest, was there? As far as I remember, it was about three ravens wanting to eat the dead knight, but the animals protected him—hounds," he added slowly, going through the stanzas he did remember, "and hawks, and the doe buried him."

"Precisely," Kilgharrah said, like that settled it. Merlin stared up at him in silence, trying to convey without words that it did not. "The forest thanked him in the only way it knew how—it granted him immortality."

The word went through him like a jolt, piercing the confused haze in his mind. His mouth went dry with the images that rushed to the front of his mind, of soldiers neither bleeding nor falling under the assault of blades. He couldn't reconcile that with his memory of the Green Knight, though, and so he finally just croaked, "Immortality?", as if repeating the word would make it easier to understand.

"Not the unclean kind that can be stolen with the help of the Cup of Life," Kilgharrah corrected sharply, clearly having followed Merlin's train of thought. "A primal, formless, real immortality that merged his soul with the forest's magic even as his body decayed into nothingness."

"Oh," Merlin breathed, relieved, and quickly discarded the thought that that kind of immortality could have been forced on the Green Knight. He shuddered to remember what it had felt like to obliterate Cenred's soldiers, to hear the unearthly ringing sound of steel tearing through immortal flesh.

Neither of them said anything for a long moment, but this time Merlin felt content to let the silence stretch. The load of new information that had been dumped on him was still foreign, and he knew he'd be turning it over in his head for days to come, like oddly shaped stones he'd found on a riverbank. Even in his wildest dreams, he never would have drawn a connection between the old song and the Green Knight.

"It all makes sense," he muttered absently, staring up at Kilgharrah in wonder; the dragon huffed a little, and Merlin got the distinct impression that he'd almost rolled his eyes, because of course everything that he told Merlin made sense.

"The night when the Green Knight came to Camelot, Gaius was looking at a book," Merlin said slowly, all but feeling everything coalesce into a full picture in his head. "When I came in he was looking for something in a fairytale book, and there was a picture—"

He broke off, taking his time to dredge up the memory again. Half obscured as it had been by Gaius' arm, Merlin had still caught sight of three ravens sitting on a tree, and of the head of a dog, guarding the edge of a knight's fallen shield. It must have been an illustration of the song, but that wasn't the only thing that struck him as odd.

"I saw three ravens," Merlin burst out, urgently staring up at the dragon. "There was a clearing—just outside of Torpelei we came across a clearing, and just before we left again I saw those three black birds."

Kilgharrah nodded, seeming satisfied with the conclusion that Merlin was beginning to reach. "And I saw the hounds, too," he added after a moment, the memory of their golden eyes coming more easily. "Just the other day I was riding through the fields, and they were suddenly just there—it was like they were watching me."

"Of course they were, Merlin," the dragon said when Merlin paused to look up at him expectantly. "The animals from the song became the Green Knight's friends and guardians in immortality—his eyes and ears, if you will."

"So he's been watching us all this time," Merlin muttered, and risked another glance over his shoulder at the forest. The treeline looked the same as it had when he'd last looked at it, but somehow it felt different from before, more threatening. Merlin imagined he could feel little beady eyes on him, calmly observing, shrouded in the undergrowth, and quickly turned back to Kilgharrah.

"But I just don't understand why he's doing this," he said, trying to cover up his feeling of unease. It was useless to think of all the animals that might be watching them right now, and he didn't know why he felt apprehensive at the thought of the Green Knight finding out that he was on to him anyway.

"I mean," he added, when Kilgharrah just blinked down at him calmly. "I've been telling people this all the time, and I don't know why I'm so sure about it, but he simply doesn't seem like an evil kind of person who'd just kill random noblemen for his own enjoyment."

He paused, hopefully glancing up at the dragon and trying not to look as in over his head as he felt. But Kilgharrah just sighed, blowing out a huge gust of air that stirred the hair atop Merlin's head, as if he'd been expecting Merlin to say that but wasn't quite sure how best to reply.

"He became a forest spirit," he answered at last, something old and weary in his tone, like that was the part of the tale that he didn't like sharing. "And spirits can be bound."

"Bound?" Merlin repeated when he fell silent, thoroughly confused now.

Kilgharrah gave him a disapproving look, clearly expecting Merlin to catch on more quickly, but at least the words came more smoothly when he asked, "Have you never wondered why Uther sent him away, or why Gaius knew where to look for him?"

Merlin opened his mouth, ready to reply that he had wondered about that, but the dragon cut him off before he could speak. "Spirits can be bound if you know their true name," he explained. "In his lifetime, the Green Knight was known as Sir Bercilak de Hautdesert, named after the forest he defended so valiantly, and the first one to use his name against him was Nimueh."

"I don't—," Merlin began, but paused when the full meaning of the words sunk in. Then he just gaped up at Kilgharrah for a good long while, listening to the rush of blood in his ears and wondered, somewhat hazily, whether he might have misheard. But the dragon had been speaking quite clearly, and the air was still and quiet around them, so he couldn't accredit what he'd heard to the wind.

"Nimueh?" he croaked at last, and Kilgharrah actually chuckled, like he was thoroughly enjoying Merlin's utter confusion.

"She sent him to Camelot a year into the Great Purge," he confirmed, and it could just have been Merlin's imagination, but he thought the dragon sounded almost amused. He must have caught wind of the whole thing somehow, chained under the castle as he'd been. "The Green Knight was under orders to challenge the court to a beheading game, but unfortunately for Nimueh, it was not Uther who responded. One of his knights died in his stead."

Merlin just shook his head, and raked his fingers through his hair in an effort to calm his whirling thoughts. "And Uther recognized him," he muttered, still remembering the stricken look on the king's face when the unusual visitor had announced why he had traveled all the way to the citadel.

Kilgharrah was silent, watching Merlin with his head cocked to the side in an oddly birdlike gesture. Merlin just stared up at him, and fought the urge to ask if he was absolutely sure about everything he'd just told him—Merlin had gone such a long time without even thinking of Nimueh that it felt thoroughly odd to learn about her involvement in this. But if he was honest with himself, he knew that the dragon wouldn't lie to him—he might present Merlin with analogues and riddles that tied his brain into knots, but he had nothing to gain from an outright lie this time.

He took a deep breath and slowly let it out again. "I can't do anything, then?" he asked, frustration bubbling up and lacing his words with an edge of bitterness. "I just have to wait until Gwaine either finds the Green Chapel, wherever that might be, or the Green Knight finds him? And then I'll have to watch as he chops his head off for no good reason except that he feels like it?"

Kilgharrah fixed him with an annoyed look. "One would think, young warlock," he said, almost snapping at Merlin all of a sudden, "that you insist on stumbling along through the dark even though I have provided more than enough torches to light your way. Did you not wonder who has summoned the Green Knight this time?"

"Um," Merlin muttered, slightly chastised, because it really hadn't occurred to him to think about that. He'd been so wrapped up in his astonishment about the mention of Nimueh's name that he'd forgotten that this time, there had to be a sorcerer behind the whole matter, too.

It was hard to give a nonchalant shrug when fixed by the dragon's glare, but Merlin tried anyway. "Who summoned him, then?"

Kilgharrah blew out a disgruntled breath, once more ruffling Merlin's hair with the gust of air, although this time it felt distinctly warmer than earlier, and Merlin barely resisted the urge to take a step back. "The witch, of course."

This time, it only took him a second to catch on, and when he did, the tight, sinking feeling in his gut told him that he'd come to the right conclusion. "Morgana?" he asked in a near-whisper, suddenly cold all over although the night air had just been mildly chilly before.

The last time he'd seen her, the ceiling of the throne room had cracked open under the surge of wild, untamed magic that had spilled out of her with her screams. He still remembered the sickening crack of Morgause's head against solid stone and his own astonishment when he'd caught sight of Gaius' outstretched hand.

But most of all he remembered Morgana's eyes, golden and wild with despair as she'd crouched over the fallen body of her sister. Merlin should have known that she would seek revenge, but right then, with grief wrenching scream after hoarse scream from her throat, he hadn't thought of that.

"Yes," Kilgharrah replied, more quietly this time, almost as though he was just a little chagrined to see the shock in Merlin's eyes. "She bound him to her will and sent him to Camelot, but with less finesse and practice than Nimueh." The reptilian face shifted in a way Merlin couldn't quite interpret, but he got the impression that Kilgharrah was scrunching up his nose in distaste. "She didn't tell him where to look if nobody in Camelot proved to be worthy of his challenge."

Merlin swallowed hard, but it didn't alleviate the slightly sick feeling that had been stirred up by Kilgharrah's words. "So he's forced to search for someone worthy, and just challenges random noblemen in the hopes that they will be?"

"Not quite," the dragon said, his eyes glittering in the moonlight, and although his expression was hard to read, Merlin thought he looked satisfied, like Merlin was finally asking the right questions. "You are right to assume that the larger part of his actions is not his own, but you must understand that he is using what leeway the witch's spell left him."

"Leeway?" Merlin repeated numbly, and squeezed his eyes shut for just a moment, his head beginning to spin under the continuous onslaught of new bits and pieces of the story that he hadn't known before.

"He cannot stop until the enchantment breaks," Kilgharrah stated, and shifted his weight, the rustle of leathery wings sounding loud in the nocturnal silence. "And personally, I can think of no better way to make that happen than to leave a trail of dead vassals for Emrys to follow."

Sucking in a sharp breath at the unexpected mention of that name, Merlin couldn't do anything but stare up at the dragon in befuddled silence for what felt like the umpteenth time that night. Either Kilgharrah secretly enjoyed baffling him, or he was just that easy to startle—either way, he was beginning to feel dizzy from the sheer number of astonishing things he'd been told until now.

"He's hoping I might free him?" Merlin asked, a bit dismayed to hear how dull his voice sounded, like a part of him had already shrugged and integrated that fact into his worldview without a hitch. "How did he even know about me?"

Kilgharrah gave him a long, silent look, but didn't reply, and Merlin nodded absently. "Right," he said, suddenly feeling dangerously close to bursting into hysterical laughter. "Prophecies, destiny, and all that. Got it."

The grass swayed in another gust of wind. Even from this distance, he heard ancient branches creak in the forest, and couldn't help shivering again. This time, he resisted the urge to look over his shoulder, though, and told himself firmly that he had nothing to fear from the forest. After what Kilgharrah had told him, he was coming to the hazy conclusion that he'd been right not to think of the Green Knight as evil all along.

The dragon rose slowly on his haunches, looking down at Merlin thoughtfully, like he was trying to assess whether all that new information had indeed sunk in. "I still don't know what to do," Merlin told him, a bit forlornly—he realized that Kilgharrah wanted to leave, probably having better things to do than sorting out Merlin's messes, but it still made him feel a bit let down.

"Perhaps you need not do anything for now," the dragon said after a pause. Merlin appreciated that he worded it as a suggestion, rather than a disgruntled command to just suck it up and deal with the fact that he might not be able to help this time around.

Merlin just sighed in reply, and watched as Kilgharrah unfolded his great wings, extending them to their full span to stretch his muscles after the long period of sitting down. Inaction didn't sit well with him, especially with impending doom hovering over Gwaine's head—and maybe over all of their heads, come to think of it, since they were about to cross the Mercian border after all.

Kilgharrah inclined his head at him, and Merlin nodded back automatically. He stepped back when the dragon crouched low, the scales on his belly brushing the grass, before he launched himself into the air. No matter how often Merlin saw it, it would always be an impressive sight—a gust of wind brushed his hair from his face as Kilgharrah soared up into the sky with a great flap of his wings, and he tilted his head back to watch. The dragon circled the field once, his course traceable only by the shine of his scales in the moonlight, and glided westwards, the rushing sound of his wings fading into the distance.

Sighing again, Merlin rubbed a hand across his face—his head felt so stuffed with information that his temples were beginning to twinge, and he hadn't noticed before how tired he was. Distantly, he wondered how much time had passed since he'd sneaked away; maybe Gwaine had already woken up for the second watch and was wondering where Merlin had gone.

He turned back in the direction he'd come from, his path of flattened grass barely visible in the moonlight. Maybe the fire hadn't gone out yet (or well, even if it had, he could always relight it with magic), which meant that his bedroll would be warm—he'd placed it close to the flames. And he'd sleep on the whole issue for a night, and maybe all the fresh knowledge that Kilgharrah had dumped on him wouldn't be quite as overwhelming the next morning.

A light breeze stirred the air as he walked towards the cluster of bushes that lined the field, and Merlin quickened his steps, shivering a little. It seemed to have gotten colder, or maybe it was just his tiredness chilling his bones—at any rate, Merlin found he was rather looking forward to getting a good night's sleep.

But there was an ominous rustle in front of him, accompanied by the snapping of twigs and a creak of bark, and Merlin stopped short, his gaze zeroing in on the bushes as his heart seemed to surge up into his throat. It was just his luck to get mauled by a wild boar this close to their camp, he thought frantically, and rifled through his memory for a useful spell as he took a slow step back—but then he froze completely when Arthur stumbled out from behind the thicket, the blade of his unsheathed dagger glinting.

Apprehensive guilt flashed through him, and Merlin opened his mouth, trying to quickly think of an excuse for being out in the field instead of keeping watch, but the words died in his throat when he caught sight of Arthur's expression. Even in the moonlight, he could tell that his face was pasty white, his eyes huge and blue and very, very incredulous as their gazes met, and Merlin swallowed hard.

"What—," Arthur started hoarsely, but any and all words seemed to desert him, and he just waved a frantic hand at the sky to indicate the direction into which the dragon had flown off, his hold on his dagger never loosening. "Merlin, what—"

"Hell," Merlin said with feeling, and pressed suddenly shaky fingers to his forehead to stave off his oncoming headache.






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