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The carriage screeches into the courtyard. Under the greying, darkening sky, it rolls to a stop, and out comes a gruff man clad in Lot’s colors. He opens the door to show them the cage with a person inside who he brands a monster, and waits for his money.
"It’s a bounty hunter," Leon later explains to the new knights in a private chamber, while a pyre is being built outside. "King Uther pays handsomely for some creatures and sorcerers to be brought in for execution. Less work for us that way."
Bounty hunters came with Freya, once, Merlin thinks in the fog of his mind. She was paid handsomely for, and she died. She still made them work for it.
Elyan nods in understanding, and Percival stares off somewhere, deep in memory of Morgause’s wicked soldiers murdering his family. Gwaine frowns as he uncaps his wineskin to take a swig. Merlin frets with the silverware, his face hidden, and Lancelot stills.
"What I never understood," Leon muses aloud. "Is why Cenred, and Lot now, send them to us. Magic is legal in their kingdom."
Merlin laughs bitterly at that. "It’s really not."
All heads turn to him, and Merlin is quick to hide any traces of anguish in the depths of his eyes, to still his shaking fingers. His face is serious and solemn, not betraying an ounce of his sympathy.
"Merlin," Leon smiles at him, light-heartedly.
They’ve always had a strange relationship, feeling kinship in their protectiveness of Arthur, but standing a chasm apart with their difference in rank, with Arthur only recently throwing a frail bridge over it, with his support of commoner knights.
"You’re from Lot’s kingdom, are you not? Could you enlighten us?"
Merlin’s gaze sweeps over them. Lancelot is trying to show his support with his eyes alone, but Merlin’s eyes can't stay on him, or he would crumble mid-sentence. Instead, they stay on Sir Leon, the loyal red knight of Camelot, and, a few years back, responsible for a list of suspected druids and magic sympathizers, to be killed by Uther if Morgana were not found. Merlin’s voice stays strong, but he hides the shaking of his fingers behind his back.
"As I said, magic isn’t quite legal there. If you’re found out… The best, the promising ones, are sent to the King’s army. They’re branded, enslaved for life, and get punished or killed for any misbehavior."
No one disturbs the resulting quiet. Merlin can’t see the others’ faces, his gaze staying still on Leon while he gathers strength to resume. Leon looks back, just as serious, nothing betraying any hint at compassion he might or might not feel. Merlin squeezes his own fingers behind his back.
"The unfitting, the unwilling get sent to Camelot for a few bags of gold. It feeds an entire village for a month."
"So it’s a choice between slavery and a quick death," Lancelot croaks out, and Merlin finally looks at him. His vision turns blurry at once, and he tries to force the emotions back.
"It’s a simple choice," Merlin agrees. One he had thought long about and decided— "Many choose death and come to Camelot."
"A much better choice would be not studying magic at all," Leon scoffs. "Why do it, if these are their only prospects?" Merlin turns back to him, still unsettled, and it must show in his eyes, for Leon’s voice turns gentle and imploring, as if he’s trying to break a simple truth to him. "And it corrupts the soul, Merlin. You saw what happened to Morgana."
He’s been hearing this lie for his entire stay in Camelot. He had even believed it before coming here and finding something good in his magic, finding purpose for it. Still, it hurts. It hurts because a pyre is being built outside for an innocent girl. It hurts to hide, to live a lie. It hurts to hear such words coming from a friend. Merlin finds his voice, and it shakes.
"Some pick it up to heal, to yield a harvest, to make a fire. And some," he croaks, the truth flaying him alive, "don’t have a choice at all. They are born with magic. Do you believe they should die at birth?"
"It doesn’t matter what I believe," Leon evades, clearly troubled. "Because it’s impossible. And be careful speaking such travesty out loud. One could think you a sympathizer, and you would find yourself on the second pyre."
Leon stands up from the table they’ve gathered at and strides away towards the door.
"Magic healed you, Sir Leon," Merlin speaks to his retreating back. "Should the druids burn for it as well?"
Leon stills. No reply follows, and the moment passes. Leon flees.
*
Shortly after, Merlin flees the chamber as well.
Back there, the weight of the truth almost crushed him.
His heart thumped wildly, breath wheezing in short, irregular bursts, and it all threatened to overflow him and come out in a violent outburst — of tears or of magic, he does not know.
He couldn’t hear, couldn’t see anything, his throat gripped by fear at the casual threat, at the possibility of his other friends voicing agreement with Sir Leon. He fled. He took his fear, his turmoil outside in hopes of finding some refuge for it, some quiet corner to calm down and not destroy the life he had built here on lies with a few more words of truth.
Someone’s steps beat hurried and heavy on the floor nearby, but Merlin doesn’t pay much attention to it, until Lancelot finds him and wraps his arms around him, crushing him into a tight embrace. Merlin still struggles with breathing, but, being so closely held, he can’t feel his body shaking anymore, and it helps. He tries to catch his breath again and again, and it only runs away from him into Lancelot’s warm neck. Lancelot’s hand runs gently over his back, back and forth, the knight murmuring something into his ear.
He doesn’t know how long they stand there, time stretching into an infinite thread, or tangling into a short mess.
"Are you," Lancelot’s voice finally clears the fog in his mind, even as the knight searches for a word and has to settle for an inadequate, "alright?"
"I’m—"
"Don’t lie, Merlin. Please." Lancelot implores him.
Couldn’t he see, couldn’t he hear that truth would unmake him? He built his life on lies, and truth would only make it crumble, make it hurt, leave him alone. Still, for Lancelot, he tries.
"I don’t know," his voice shakes. "Arthur is king, — or regent, as good as, — and they’re building a pyre for a sorcerer outside. It could be me. It will be me, one day."
"No, Merlin." Lancelot pulls away a bit to look into his eyes, to promise him. "He wouldn’t do it. Not with you. We have to believe it."
He wants to look into these warm eyes and believe it. He had, in the past. He had, until now. He can’t anymore.
"Belief doesn’t help anyone," Merlin’s voice breaks at the realization. "It won’t help that girl, and it didn’t help Freya, and— was the prophecy, the druids— was I wrong to believe?"
Lancelot doesn’t have an answer for him. He presses him back into the tight embrace. And he swears that he would make it right.
*
When Lancelot sat at the ancient round table, he believed. He believed in Merlin’s destiny, in the world that Arthur would build, and he promised to fight for justice, freedom, and all that’s good.
The world he lives in now, Arthur’s world, doesn’t have a place for Merlin at the table anymore. It has a pedestal for a pyre, instead.
This has to change, and a change can’t happen if they don’t fight for it.
Lancelot knocks on the prince’s door.
Has he pledged his life to the wrong person? Is Arthur truly a man who would watch an innocent being burned alive, just for a few bags of gold? Merlin’s shaking voice plagues his mind, and it brings a horrible image of Merlin burning instead, and of Arthur just watching it. Bile rises to his throat.
If so, he wants nothing to do with such a kingdom. He would free the girl himself, gather their supplies, and take Merlin with him on the way out the gates. They would find a place to belong, carve it out if need be. He would not leave him to a pyre.
If Arthur doesn’t change his mind—
"Enter," calls a gruff voice from the chamber.
He opens the door.
This is a moment of truth.