Chapter Text
“Call for Gaius!”
The sun was rising so beautifully above the horizon, casting a golden glow over the mighty castle of Camelot. A slight breeze meandered through the stone hallways, chasing away the last shadows of the night and staving off the heat of the rising sun.
No, the young Knight stuck in one of the worst time slots to guard the castle entrance was having a delightful morning after all. In fact, he was wondering why some of the older knights had laughed at him when he was assigned this shift.
Key word: was.
His delightful morning, almost finished, with visions of a warm pastry and perhaps his welcoming bed dancing at the forefront of his mind, was quickly ruined by the King returning from his most recent adventure.
One that had not ended well, if the calls for the Court Physician were any indication.
The young knight quickly sidestepped the king’s horse as it came galloping into the square. A second more daydreaming about that pastry would have him trampled, a fact the King did not seem to care about in the slightest.
“Get Gaius!” the King hollered again, brandishing his sword wildly. “Before I send you to the stocks for three days!”
The young knight scampered off, disappearing into the winding halls of the castle as fast as the last shreds of Camelot’s peaceful morning.
But not before he caught glimpses of the matching grim faces on the Knights of the Round Table.
And not before he saw Sir Leon’s limp body propped up on his horse and cradled in the arms of the King’s servant.
~~~
“Arthur, what are we doing out here?” Merlin asked for the hundredth time since they left Camelot.
“We’re hunting a sorceress, Merlin. Stop asking.” Arthur’s voice was weary as he cut away tree branches with his sword.
Leon had to agree. Three days in the forests were tiring enough. But, they had been unlucky enough to be attacked at almost every turn by bandits or Cendric’s men. Leon had been wounded early on, taking a blow to the side. Merlin had found some herbs and bandaged it well, but it still slowed his movements more than he would have liked. In a later battle, Elyan had suffered a blow to the arm and Gwaine had broken his sword, now brandishing the jagged stump with a laugh, but all had insisted they press on.
And press on they did. Through the forest surrounding Camelot, over a raging river, and back out of the forest onto a cliff. Large rocks were scattered across the cliffside, strange symbols scratched into their surface.
Now, Leon was a fine and loyal law-abiding citizen of Camelot. But he still had experience with magic. He remembered seeing sorcerers practice in the village surrounding his home. And he had fought plenty of magic serving as a knight under Uther.
Leon knew magic symbols when he saw them. And judging by the way Merlin tensed as his eyes caught on the strange rocks, Merlin knew this as well.
“Well, I don’t think we should be here,” Merlin announced. Leon was not sure to whom he was talking. Arthur surely would not listen, and the Knights of the Round Table were sworn to follow their King anywhere.
Leon would follow Arthur anywhere without the slightest hesitation.
And Arthur would never abandon a quest that had magic involved, even if both Merlin and Leon really thought they should at least abandon this one.
“We have to find this sorceress, Merlin,” Arthur reprimanded. “She has been terrorizing my citizens for weeks. Casting strange spells that change their behaviors.” And that was why Leon had kept his traitorous mouth shut. Camelot’s First Knight, her First Protector could not turn away from a threat just because some rock carvings gave him the heebie jeebies.
But, oh, did his skin crawl looking at those rocks.
“But this place,” Merlin fumbled to find the words. Arthur always claimed that Merlin was just a coward terrified of anything remotely magic, but Leon did not feel that was the case.
But what exactly it was that tripped Merlin up so, Leon had yet to understand.
“Oh stop being such a coward, Merlin!” Arthur complained. “Let’s get on with it and return home.”
How long they searched, Leon couldn’t tell. Each rock could have hidden the sorceress, every bush could have concealed him.
So, Leon stuck close to his King’s side. Not obviously so, that would only serve to upset Arthur – much like how Leon withdrawing from the jousting tourney all those years ago had upset Arthur enough for him to do something stupid and rash.
But it was this cautious distance that endangered the King. Leon would never allow it to happen again. Though perhaps, he should have also kept a careful watch over the King’s clumsy servant.
Leon glanced away from Arthur when he heard Merlin trip and swear. Every day that boy was falling over something.
But it was this moment of distraction that allowed the sorceress to surprise them.
The knights were barely able to draw their swords before vines from those evil, evil pushes were twisting around their ankles. Gwaine spluttered out his surprise and Percival strained against the vines. Merlin appeared to be unaffected from his perch on one of the rocks. While the rest were preoccupied freeing themselves from the vines, which regrew as soon as they were cut, Merlin yelled out in surprise. “The sorceress! I see her!”
Leon saw her, too. Climbing out from whatever hole she had been hiding under, face obscured in a brown cloak with only the golden glow of magic in her eyes visible. Her dress, which might have once been a dark blue, was ripped and dirtied. Not the image of a woman who had been parading around a village bending everyone to her whim.
Moving as fast as he could, Leon cut at the vines around his feet and lunged for Arthur as the sorceress spread her arms. The vines raced after Leon, restraining his arms now in addition to his legs. They began to wind around his body, and from the strangled sounds of surprise from Elyan, they had begun to do the same to him as well. Gwaine still had the energy to be cursing under his breath as he was pulled to the ground, and Percival seemed to have forgotten his sword in favor of breaking his restraints solely with the might of his own arms.
What a pitiful group they must look like now. Leon struggled against his confines. He had to get to Arthur before the sorceress or her vines did.
“Arthur Pendragon, why do you pursue me?” The woman’s voice was shrill, despair and anguish lacing her tone. Leon spared her only a glance to see that her arms were trembling.
“You know why!” Arthur paused cutting at the vines to point his sword at her. “You are terrorizing the people of Camelot. My people!”
“Camelot terrorized us first!” she cried. “You and your wretched father have torn daughter from father, sister from brother, husband from wife for the crime of existing! Magic has aided Camelot in ways you will never know.” The sorceress whipped her head around to glare at Merlin before looking back to Arthur. With a wave of her hand the vines fell limp around Arthur as if he was exactly where she wanted him.
“Stay away from Merlin!” Arthur roared, and Leon simply did not have the time to waste letting his eyes roll out of his head. This was not the time, Arthur. “He’s a useless lump.”
“Magic loves Camelot. And King Arthur, you are said to be Camelot.” The sorceress seemed to listen to Arthur and ignored the servant boy, who ducked behind a rock and out of sight. The first smart decision to be made in this wretched place.
Leon cut desperately at the vines once more as they tried to climb up his neck. This was the beginning of a stupid monologue. And Leon had been around long enough to know that every time Arthur would hear out the magical threat and then be surprised at the magical attack that followed. Every time.
“But King Arthur, are you really Camelot? How much does Magic truly love you?” The sound the sorceress made was really more of a wail than a cry of rage and it was quickly followed by the chanting of magic, a lilting language. “Does Magic love you enough to sacrifice its people for you? I think it is time we found out.”
They never did find out. The sorceress leveled her arms at Arthur and Leon cut away the last of the vines. He lunged for his king, managing to push him out of the way as a burst of light exploded from one of the runic rocks.
The light struck Leon and it was like all of his exhaustion from the past decade or so of serving the Pendragons came crashing down on him all at once, and Leon was too weary to fight the battle against magic anymore. Too tired to even think of keeping his eyes open, and before he realized what happened everything faded to black.