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'Wait in the Fire' - Merlin - Mordred(/Morgana) - PG - 2800 words
So yeah, self-appointed guardians who are overinvested in their stubborn-as-mules charge, disquieting blue eyes optional. Apparently I have a type? That is, when the type isn't busy being blond, macho, and manpaining over ~duty~ and daddy issues.
My thanks to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
allothi, who fielded the first draft and helped me "know its spinal cord from its limbs", as she so succinctly put it. This would have been a poorer fic without her.
Wait in the Fire
Merlin. Mordred, Morgana, ensemble. PG. Spoilers for everything.
Mordred, through his own eyes and other people's trepidations. ~2800 words
Mordred had a tendency to vanish into the woods for hours on end.
No one ever asked him what he did or what he was looking for there. Although they knew Mordred was just a child, and instrumental in the times to come, they gave him wide berth. Let him do what he must, for he has his ways. The druids fed him and clothed him and cared for him, and pretended they weren’t afraid of him. Mordred was powerful, and his youthful impetuousness only exacerbated his burgeoning strength and nurtured grudges.
Aglain tried to mitigate the darkness in the boy, telling him of sorcerers past that had come to a bad end because of their desire to possess that which cannot be possessed and avenge that which should be left to lie.
“This anger will be the downfall of you if you aren’t careful,” Aglain warned him.
Mordred had replied, “Anger is what sharpens the blade.”
+
Mordred saw Morgana in his dreams long before he met her.
Even through the fever, even as he fluttered between life and death hidden in her room, her presence was familiar to him, and he reached out for her, wrapping his relief around her mind as he called her name. She gasped, and Mordred wanted to tell her that he had been waiting all this time, and everything was going to be all right now, can’t she see? They've found each other now just like the spirits said, can't she see? But the pain overwhelmed him and the world faded to black. The last thing he remembered was the feel of Morgana’s hand on his forehead, cool against his skin.
Or perhaps this too was a dream.
+
Arthur and Mordred stopped to rest just once on their way back to the druids, during which the prince gave him water and - when Mordred didn’t stop shaking - his cloak. When Mordred continued to tremble, Arthur sighed and sat next to him, pulling the boy into his arms.
“Morgana owes me,” Arthur muttered.
Dizzy and weak, Mordred leaned into him, hearing Arthur's heart beat against his ear. Mordred put his palm flat against Arthur's chest, and it was like holding the prince's heart in his hand.
+
“Is he safe?” Morgana demanded when Arthur returned. “Did anyone see you?”
“No one follows me unless I let them,” he replied.
To Arthur's surprise, Morgana threw her arms around him. “Thank you,” she murmured into his neck. “Thank you.”
She had not hugged Arthur in years. The immediacy of it was strange but familiar, like something he didn't know he missed. He recalled suddenly the nights when they were children, when she used to crawl into his bed after her nightmares and refused to be kicked out. It was easier to reach out then, easier to let yourself be soft with youth before pride got in the way.
Arthur tentatively put his arms around her and hugged her back.
+
The night after the prince returned him to his people, Mordred saw Morgana in his dreams, unless perhaps he was in hers. It was hard to tell. Mordred ran to her, but just as he was about to reach her, he woke up.
+
She will come to you, the spirits promised him, and so Mordred was for the most part content to wait. Dormant, but alert. Still, when he met Alvarr and saw the bitterness in him, the cogs in his head began to turn.
“There is a powerful crystal in Uther Pendragon’s vault that would give us a great advantage,” Mordred explained, and Alvarr listened with a skeptical expression on his face.
“How do we get to it?” he asked.
“Through his ward,” Mordred answered, because there was nothing wrong with giving destiny a little nudge sometimes.
+
When Morgana hovered on the edge of hemlock-induced death, Mordred said to Morgause, “I want to see her.”
“No,” she said firmly. “She's still too weak.”
“I can help.”
“You don't need to.”
“Let me see her!” he demanded, and let magic roil off him in threatening waves, let it spark at Morgause's skin and cut across the back of her neck, making her shiver. But unlike Alvarr, Morgause was implacable. She grew up with the priestesses of the old religion and had sat at Nimueh's right hand. She did not give in to childish tantrums.
“You can see her when she's recovered,” she said with an air of finality.
“She's my destiny!” Mordred roared.
“She's my sister,” Morgause hissed, the barest hints of red glowing in her eyes.
+
“What will we do with Morgana once we have the crystal?” Alvarr had asked.
Mordred replied, “She'll stay with us, of course.”
“Are you sure about that?”
“Yes.”
“She's the apple of the king's eye, you know,” Alvarr said. “Even if she’s let go of him, there's no guarantee that he’s let go of her. If he comes after her--”
“He mustn't,” Mordred cut in.
“I know what happened to the druids you stayed with the last time,” Alvarr snapped, “and I'll be damned if I let that happen to my men.”
“Morgana will stay with us!” Mordred exclaimed, and the air prickled with the flashes of magic unleashed, the echo of which hung in the air as a soft metallic hum. The hustle and bustle outside had stopped, and Mordred knew that everyone must be looking at Alvarr's tent right then, wondering what was happening, wondering whether the druid boy was to be trusted after all.
“I hope you know what you're doing,” Alvarr finally said.
Mordred knew what he was doing, and it was no fault of his if Alvarr did not.
+
After Morgana's so-called rescue from the druids, she avoided everyone and barely left her room.
“You must eat something, milady,” Gwen said when she found the tray of food untouched yet again.
“There are many things I should do,” Morgana muttered.
Not entirely to her surprise, Gwen knelt before her chair and took Morgana's hands in hers. “Morgana,” she said softly. “Are you all right?”
Gwen had always been the best at reading her silences. Uther may claim to love his ward, and Arthur to be able to outsmart her (or so he said), but it was Gwen who knew how to break through Morgana’s walls. It was Gwen who noticed that there were walls at all.
In the face of genuine concern, something constricted inside Morgana and suddenly she wanted to tell Gwen everything. If there was anyone in Camelot who would listen, it was Gwen. If there was anyone Morgana could talk to about this boy to whom she felt an inexplicable connection, whose bright eyes and promises she couldn’t get out of her head, it was Gwen.
The high stone walls of Camelot suffocated Morgana now that she had tasted freedom. She squeezed Gwen's hands and thought, I can't involve you in this. I can't make you keep secrets for me when Uther only descends further into madness.
“I'm just tired,” Morgana replied, but she could tell Gwen didn’t believe her.
+
For weeks after the knights' attack on Aglain's camp, Mordred had wandered the woods alone. It would not have been too difficult to track the other druids down, but Mordred found he liked the solitude, the space it gave him to think.
He wondered if perhaps he should heed his instincts and return to Camelot to seek out Emrys and his prince. If he should heed his heart and seek out Morgana. Mordred had been prepared for the first separation from her, but not for the second.
Mordred mourned the fallen, and hated Uther, and missed Aglain. Aglain used to tell him stories about the sorcerers and warriors of old, the heroes of the druids, and Mordred would listen with rapt attention, always asking questions, always criticizing the judgment of the protagonists and the strategies of the villains.
Aglain had been a good storyteller, but no one told Mordred stories now. Each night before Mordred fell asleep, he would listen to the forest and its stillness full of sound instead. The stars would peek through the leaves and he would count them until he was too tired keep his eyes open, and too empty to ache for what he had lost, again.
+
“Stop that!” Morgana hissed, flinching away from Mordred’s hand on her shoulder. “Stop that! Mordred! Get out of my head!”
Startled, he snapped back into himself, reeling with the suddenness of reentry. “Sorry,” Mordred sputtered. “I didn't mean to—I only—”
“I can feel you in my head!” she cried out.
“I'm only trying to help,” he said. “I saw you were troubled, and I--”
“My troubles are my own. You have no right!”
“Morgana--”
“Leave me be, Mordred.”
“Please--”
“Leave me alone!”
It was the first time she became truly angry with him, and it left him bewildered and hurt. Mordred left her to her misery, to her mourning for a king whose purpose in life had been to kill them and people like them. Camelot had a new king now, and the last thing Mordred expected to see in the aftermath was her tears. It was stupid. It was so stupid and, once outside, Mordred kicked a stump and stubbed his toe, punched a tree and hurt his hand.
“Give her time,” said a familiar voice.
Mordred turned around: Morgause. She was still in her armor, her hair pulled back in a knot at the nape of her neck. She carried her helmet under one arm, and he found himself resenting the calm with which she carried herself.
“I was only trying to help,” Mordred said bitterly.
“You can't.”
She smoothed away the fringe that fell across his forehead, and stroked his cheek. It was strange to see flashes of Morgana in Morgause: they shared the same unearthly beauty, the same sharp features and fire in their eyes.
“So what should I do?” he asked.
“Mordred,” Morgause said, and he could hear the ache in her voice, “you cannot always fix her.”
+
The hundredth time (or so it felt) that Morgana had resurfaced from hemlock-induced stupor, Mordred was there. She knew this not from sight – all she could see were shades of gray – but from intuition: the assurance that some bright and brilliant flame kept vigil by her side.
“Mordred…” she murmured, and had felt a small hand cover hers before she faded back into the dark.
+
Morgana didn't count the years that passed because she had already counted them in her dreams.
On the morning of Mordred’s birthday, she followed his footprints in the snow and found him walking along the edge of the woods, a gaunt figure wrapped in a cloud of silence. He had surpassed her in height this year, and when she hugged him, her head fit comfortably in the crook of his neck.
Morgana held his face in her hands and smiled, and wondered at how they both had changed over the years, how they became older and worn. Most of all she wondered if they had at all become wiser, or if that was just a bedtime story they told themselves to help them sleep at night.
+
The druid elders preferred to talk with Mordred when Morgana was present. Although Mordred was the one who grew up among the druids, it was Morgana who dared to rest a calming hand on his shoulder or to interrupt his tirade with a soberer suggestion. Mordred – much to the elders' apprehensive fascination – would reluctantly bend to her will.
+
“Of course I would destroy him,” Mordred was shouting. “I would destroy Merlin a thousand times over for you!”
“No, that would not be for me,” Morgana said sharply. “It would be for yourself.”
“He tried to kill you!”
“Yes.”
“You would abide that?”
“He has come here in good faith, Mordred.”
“He has come here trying to make us submit to Camelot and his precious king,” he snarled. “We kneel for no one!”
“You are too sensitive to displays of weaknesses,” she frowned, “from yourself and from others.”
“We will be weak if we say yes to him.”
“To want to be strong all the time is a weakness,” Morgana snapped.
Mordred flinched, as if slapped, and he hated how she looked at him then, like he was a child. Like he deserved only pity, not trust. Not trust at all, because there were parts of her she still kept to herself, no matter how many times Mordred had proved himself, no matter that he would bleed himself a thousand times over before ever betraying her heart.
+
For all that they said that Camelot's court magician was a powerful man, he was also a heavy sleeper. Mordred sneaked into Merlin's rooms with ease.
This was probably not the best way to wake up.
“I'm not fooled, Emrys,” Mordred was whispering, his knife at Merlin's throat. “You care nothing for us.”
“That's not true,” Merlin said hoarsely.
“You would sacrifice us all if your prince's life was on the line!”
“Actually he's a king now.”
Mordred pressed the blade into his skin.
“Mordred!” Merlin yelped. “Mordred, all I'm trying to do is forge an alliance with you and your people.”
“You should be counting yourself among 'my people', should you not? But to you, my people are just things to protect Arthur from.”
“Pot, kettle,” Merlin quipped. “You and Morgana—”
“If you lay one hand on her,” Mordred threatened.
“I won't, we won't, I swear,” Merlin insisted, his voice cracking. “All those years ago, I only wanted... That was – it was the dragon, Mordred, he... Please. Mordred. Please.”
One flick of the wrist, and Merlin would be done for. One quick jab, one quick spell, and the light in Emrys's eyes would go out. They could have been friends, once, and they could have been powerful allies, but when Mordred remembered Morgana on the verge of death, he could find no forgiveness in him.
He removed the knife from Merlin’s throat only for her sake.
+
As agreed, Gwen and Morgana met on Badon Hill at noon. Gwen went alone, despite Merlin and Lancelot’s protests. Only Arthur said, “Let the queen do as she pleases. She knows Morgana better than the both of you, after all.”
When Gwen arrived, Morgana was waiting for her, dressed in the drab and simple clothes of druids. Gwen herself wore the clothes she would wear in the forge. No queenly regalia today; she didn't want to further remind Morgana of how much things had changed.
Gwen’s first instinct was to run to her, but there was a distance in Morgana’s eyes that made her hesitate. When Gwen drew closer, she saw the tattoos that marked Morgana’s neck, trailing along her wrists and up her arms. She didn’t have those tattoos the last time Gwen saw her. How had it been this long since they last spoke?
“Hail, Guinevere, queen of Camelot,” said Morgana.
“Hail, Morgana,” Gwen replied. “A flibbertigibbet who used to drink too much at feasts and take an hour to choose which dress to wear to supper.”
The silence lingered, and Gwen held her breath, hoped against hope.
Finally, Morgana grinned. “I never took an hour to choose a dress.”
“Yes, it was more like two hours,” Gwen said, and embraced her old friend.
+
From the bottom of the hill, Mordred watched Morgana embrace the queen of Camelot and felt a twinge in his heart. That his and Morgana’s destinies were entwined was but truth, but there was no substitute for years of friendship and familiarity, for being there first, being loved first.
There are times when even fate is helpless against the sturdiness of the past.
+
Morgana said little on the return journey. Far be it from Mordred to be intolerant of silence, but he could feel the weight of her thoughts, could sense the content of them, and it made him uneasy. He asked, “Do you ever wish you could go back to them?” then wished he hadn’t.
She replied, “What use is wishing?”
+
“Tomorrow,” Morgana began.
“We ride for Camlann,” Mordred finished.
He caught her gaze across the room and held it for a few seconds before looking away. They knew Camlann was inevitable, and they had known this for some time now. There was nothing more that needed to be said. As for what Mordred wanted to say, on the other hand, he was sure Morgana already knew.
+
In Avalon, the apples are beautiful: deep red and succulent, and just the right amount of tartness. Everything in Avalon is beautiful, but quiet. In Avalon, Arthur will sleep, and across the water his world will change.
Mordred taught her that nothing stays, but Morgause taught her that everything will return. In time there will be time enough for everything, but for now, Morgana waits, and dreams.
My thanks to
allothi, who fielded the first draft and helped me "know its spinal cord from its limbs", as she so succinctly put it. This would have been a poorer fic without her.Wait in the Fire
Merlin. Mordred, Morgana, ensemble. PG. Spoilers for everything.
Mordred, through his own eyes and other people's trepidations. ~2800 words
Mordred had a tendency to vanish into the woods for hours on end.
No one ever asked him what he did or what he was looking for there. Although they knew Mordred was just a child, and instrumental in the times to come, they gave him wide berth. Let him do what he must, for he has his ways. The druids fed him and clothed him and cared for him, and pretended they weren’t afraid of him. Mordred was powerful, and his youthful impetuousness only exacerbated his burgeoning strength and nurtured grudges.
Aglain tried to mitigate the darkness in the boy, telling him of sorcerers past that had come to a bad end because of their desire to possess that which cannot be possessed and avenge that which should be left to lie.
“This anger will be the downfall of you if you aren’t careful,” Aglain warned him.
Mordred had replied, “Anger is what sharpens the blade.”
+
Mordred saw Morgana in his dreams long before he met her.
Even through the fever, even as he fluttered between life and death hidden in her room, her presence was familiar to him, and he reached out for her, wrapping his relief around her mind as he called her name. She gasped, and Mordred wanted to tell her that he had been waiting all this time, and everything was going to be all right now, can’t she see? They've found each other now just like the spirits said, can't she see? But the pain overwhelmed him and the world faded to black. The last thing he remembered was the feel of Morgana’s hand on his forehead, cool against his skin.
Or perhaps this too was a dream.
+
Arthur and Mordred stopped to rest just once on their way back to the druids, during which the prince gave him water and - when Mordred didn’t stop shaking - his cloak. When Mordred continued to tremble, Arthur sighed and sat next to him, pulling the boy into his arms.
“Morgana owes me,” Arthur muttered.
Dizzy and weak, Mordred leaned into him, hearing Arthur's heart beat against his ear. Mordred put his palm flat against Arthur's chest, and it was like holding the prince's heart in his hand.
+
“Is he safe?” Morgana demanded when Arthur returned. “Did anyone see you?”
“No one follows me unless I let them,” he replied.
To Arthur's surprise, Morgana threw her arms around him. “Thank you,” she murmured into his neck. “Thank you.”
She had not hugged Arthur in years. The immediacy of it was strange but familiar, like something he didn't know he missed. He recalled suddenly the nights when they were children, when she used to crawl into his bed after her nightmares and refused to be kicked out. It was easier to reach out then, easier to let yourself be soft with youth before pride got in the way.
Arthur tentatively put his arms around her and hugged her back.
+
The night after the prince returned him to his people, Mordred saw Morgana in his dreams, unless perhaps he was in hers. It was hard to tell. Mordred ran to her, but just as he was about to reach her, he woke up.
+
She will come to you, the spirits promised him, and so Mordred was for the most part content to wait. Dormant, but alert. Still, when he met Alvarr and saw the bitterness in him, the cogs in his head began to turn.
“There is a powerful crystal in Uther Pendragon’s vault that would give us a great advantage,” Mordred explained, and Alvarr listened with a skeptical expression on his face.
“How do we get to it?” he asked.
“Through his ward,” Mordred answered, because there was nothing wrong with giving destiny a little nudge sometimes.
+
When Morgana hovered on the edge of hemlock-induced death, Mordred said to Morgause, “I want to see her.”
“No,” she said firmly. “She's still too weak.”
“I can help.”
“You don't need to.”
“Let me see her!” he demanded, and let magic roil off him in threatening waves, let it spark at Morgause's skin and cut across the back of her neck, making her shiver. But unlike Alvarr, Morgause was implacable. She grew up with the priestesses of the old religion and had sat at Nimueh's right hand. She did not give in to childish tantrums.
“You can see her when she's recovered,” she said with an air of finality.
“She's my destiny!” Mordred roared.
“She's my sister,” Morgause hissed, the barest hints of red glowing in her eyes.
+
“What will we do with Morgana once we have the crystal?” Alvarr had asked.
Mordred replied, “She'll stay with us, of course.”
“Are you sure about that?”
“Yes.”
“She's the apple of the king's eye, you know,” Alvarr said. “Even if she’s let go of him, there's no guarantee that he’s let go of her. If he comes after her--”
“He mustn't,” Mordred cut in.
“I know what happened to the druids you stayed with the last time,” Alvarr snapped, “and I'll be damned if I let that happen to my men.”
“Morgana will stay with us!” Mordred exclaimed, and the air prickled with the flashes of magic unleashed, the echo of which hung in the air as a soft metallic hum. The hustle and bustle outside had stopped, and Mordred knew that everyone must be looking at Alvarr's tent right then, wondering what was happening, wondering whether the druid boy was to be trusted after all.
“I hope you know what you're doing,” Alvarr finally said.
Mordred knew what he was doing, and it was no fault of his if Alvarr did not.
+
After Morgana's so-called rescue from the druids, she avoided everyone and barely left her room.
“You must eat something, milady,” Gwen said when she found the tray of food untouched yet again.
“There are many things I should do,” Morgana muttered.
Not entirely to her surprise, Gwen knelt before her chair and took Morgana's hands in hers. “Morgana,” she said softly. “Are you all right?”
Gwen had always been the best at reading her silences. Uther may claim to love his ward, and Arthur to be able to outsmart her (or so he said), but it was Gwen who knew how to break through Morgana’s walls. It was Gwen who noticed that there were walls at all.
In the face of genuine concern, something constricted inside Morgana and suddenly she wanted to tell Gwen everything. If there was anyone in Camelot who would listen, it was Gwen. If there was anyone Morgana could talk to about this boy to whom she felt an inexplicable connection, whose bright eyes and promises she couldn’t get out of her head, it was Gwen.
The high stone walls of Camelot suffocated Morgana now that she had tasted freedom. She squeezed Gwen's hands and thought, I can't involve you in this. I can't make you keep secrets for me when Uther only descends further into madness.
“I'm just tired,” Morgana replied, but she could tell Gwen didn’t believe her.
+
For weeks after the knights' attack on Aglain's camp, Mordred had wandered the woods alone. It would not have been too difficult to track the other druids down, but Mordred found he liked the solitude, the space it gave him to think.
He wondered if perhaps he should heed his instincts and return to Camelot to seek out Emrys and his prince. If he should heed his heart and seek out Morgana. Mordred had been prepared for the first separation from her, but not for the second.
Mordred mourned the fallen, and hated Uther, and missed Aglain. Aglain used to tell him stories about the sorcerers and warriors of old, the heroes of the druids, and Mordred would listen with rapt attention, always asking questions, always criticizing the judgment of the protagonists and the strategies of the villains.
Aglain had been a good storyteller, but no one told Mordred stories now. Each night before Mordred fell asleep, he would listen to the forest and its stillness full of sound instead. The stars would peek through the leaves and he would count them until he was too tired keep his eyes open, and too empty to ache for what he had lost, again.
+
“Stop that!” Morgana hissed, flinching away from Mordred’s hand on her shoulder. “Stop that! Mordred! Get out of my head!”
Startled, he snapped back into himself, reeling with the suddenness of reentry. “Sorry,” Mordred sputtered. “I didn't mean to—I only—”
“I can feel you in my head!” she cried out.
“I'm only trying to help,” he said. “I saw you were troubled, and I--”
“My troubles are my own. You have no right!”
“Morgana--”
“Leave me be, Mordred.”
“Please--”
“Leave me alone!”
It was the first time she became truly angry with him, and it left him bewildered and hurt. Mordred left her to her misery, to her mourning for a king whose purpose in life had been to kill them and people like them. Camelot had a new king now, and the last thing Mordred expected to see in the aftermath was her tears. It was stupid. It was so stupid and, once outside, Mordred kicked a stump and stubbed his toe, punched a tree and hurt his hand.
“Give her time,” said a familiar voice.
Mordred turned around: Morgause. She was still in her armor, her hair pulled back in a knot at the nape of her neck. She carried her helmet under one arm, and he found himself resenting the calm with which she carried herself.
“I was only trying to help,” Mordred said bitterly.
“You can't.”
She smoothed away the fringe that fell across his forehead, and stroked his cheek. It was strange to see flashes of Morgana in Morgause: they shared the same unearthly beauty, the same sharp features and fire in their eyes.
“So what should I do?” he asked.
“Mordred,” Morgause said, and he could hear the ache in her voice, “you cannot always fix her.”
+
The hundredth time (or so it felt) that Morgana had resurfaced from hemlock-induced stupor, Mordred was there. She knew this not from sight – all she could see were shades of gray – but from intuition: the assurance that some bright and brilliant flame kept vigil by her side.
“Mordred…” she murmured, and had felt a small hand cover hers before she faded back into the dark.
+
Morgana didn't count the years that passed because she had already counted them in her dreams.
On the morning of Mordred’s birthday, she followed his footprints in the snow and found him walking along the edge of the woods, a gaunt figure wrapped in a cloud of silence. He had surpassed her in height this year, and when she hugged him, her head fit comfortably in the crook of his neck.
Morgana held his face in her hands and smiled, and wondered at how they both had changed over the years, how they became older and worn. Most of all she wondered if they had at all become wiser, or if that was just a bedtime story they told themselves to help them sleep at night.
+
The druid elders preferred to talk with Mordred when Morgana was present. Although Mordred was the one who grew up among the druids, it was Morgana who dared to rest a calming hand on his shoulder or to interrupt his tirade with a soberer suggestion. Mordred – much to the elders' apprehensive fascination – would reluctantly bend to her will.
+
“Of course I would destroy him,” Mordred was shouting. “I would destroy Merlin a thousand times over for you!”
“No, that would not be for me,” Morgana said sharply. “It would be for yourself.”
“He tried to kill you!”
“Yes.”
“You would abide that?”
“He has come here in good faith, Mordred.”
“He has come here trying to make us submit to Camelot and his precious king,” he snarled. “We kneel for no one!”
“You are too sensitive to displays of weaknesses,” she frowned, “from yourself and from others.”
“We will be weak if we say yes to him.”
“To want to be strong all the time is a weakness,” Morgana snapped.
Mordred flinched, as if slapped, and he hated how she looked at him then, like he was a child. Like he deserved only pity, not trust. Not trust at all, because there were parts of her she still kept to herself, no matter how many times Mordred had proved himself, no matter that he would bleed himself a thousand times over before ever betraying her heart.
+
For all that they said that Camelot's court magician was a powerful man, he was also a heavy sleeper. Mordred sneaked into Merlin's rooms with ease.
This was probably not the best way to wake up.
“I'm not fooled, Emrys,” Mordred was whispering, his knife at Merlin's throat. “You care nothing for us.”
“That's not true,” Merlin said hoarsely.
“You would sacrifice us all if your prince's life was on the line!”
“Actually he's a king now.”
Mordred pressed the blade into his skin.
“Mordred!” Merlin yelped. “Mordred, all I'm trying to do is forge an alliance with you and your people.”
“You should be counting yourself among 'my people', should you not? But to you, my people are just things to protect Arthur from.”
“Pot, kettle,” Merlin quipped. “You and Morgana—”
“If you lay one hand on her,” Mordred threatened.
“I won't, we won't, I swear,” Merlin insisted, his voice cracking. “All those years ago, I only wanted... That was – it was the dragon, Mordred, he... Please. Mordred. Please.”
One flick of the wrist, and Merlin would be done for. One quick jab, one quick spell, and the light in Emrys's eyes would go out. They could have been friends, once, and they could have been powerful allies, but when Mordred remembered Morgana on the verge of death, he could find no forgiveness in him.
He removed the knife from Merlin’s throat only for her sake.
+
As agreed, Gwen and Morgana met on Badon Hill at noon. Gwen went alone, despite Merlin and Lancelot’s protests. Only Arthur said, “Let the queen do as she pleases. She knows Morgana better than the both of you, after all.”
When Gwen arrived, Morgana was waiting for her, dressed in the drab and simple clothes of druids. Gwen herself wore the clothes she would wear in the forge. No queenly regalia today; she didn't want to further remind Morgana of how much things had changed.
Gwen’s first instinct was to run to her, but there was a distance in Morgana’s eyes that made her hesitate. When Gwen drew closer, she saw the tattoos that marked Morgana’s neck, trailing along her wrists and up her arms. She didn’t have those tattoos the last time Gwen saw her. How had it been this long since they last spoke?
“Hail, Guinevere, queen of Camelot,” said Morgana.
“Hail, Morgana,” Gwen replied. “A flibbertigibbet who used to drink too much at feasts and take an hour to choose which dress to wear to supper.”
The silence lingered, and Gwen held her breath, hoped against hope.
Finally, Morgana grinned. “I never took an hour to choose a dress.”
“Yes, it was more like two hours,” Gwen said, and embraced her old friend.
+
From the bottom of the hill, Mordred watched Morgana embrace the queen of Camelot and felt a twinge in his heart. That his and Morgana’s destinies were entwined was but truth, but there was no substitute for years of friendship and familiarity, for being there first, being loved first.
There are times when even fate is helpless against the sturdiness of the past.
+
Morgana said little on the return journey. Far be it from Mordred to be intolerant of silence, but he could feel the weight of her thoughts, could sense the content of them, and it made him uneasy. He asked, “Do you ever wish you could go back to them?” then wished he hadn’t.
She replied, “What use is wishing?”
+
“Tomorrow,” Morgana began.
“We ride for Camlann,” Mordred finished.
He caught her gaze across the room and held it for a few seconds before looking away. They knew Camlann was inevitable, and they had known this for some time now. There was nothing more that needed to be said. As for what Mordred wanted to say, on the other hand, he was sure Morgana already knew.
+
In Avalon, the apples are beautiful: deep red and succulent, and just the right amount of tartness. Everything in Avalon is beautiful, but quiet. In Avalon, Arthur will sleep, and across the water his world will change.
Mordred taught her that nothing stays, but Morgause taught her that everything will return. In time there will be time enough for everything, but for now, Morgana waits, and dreams.