Merlin: The Depth of Secrets

7-Agree?

They all were sitting around Merlin not really knowing what else to say for the umpteenth time during the day. So Gwaine broke the silence. "Hey, Merlin....could you turn water into ale....????" he said in a sly voice. Merlin not looking up said," Ya. Well I haven't really tried it so I'm not sure." Percival being curious asked," Could you show us some?" Merlin responded with "Magic?" and Percival nodded. So they all looked in Arthur's direction. He stubbornly said," Absolutely not. Magic is illegal and corrupting."  Merlin's face fell and so did a few others. He then asked with despair lacing his voice," What are you going to do to me then?"

Arthur looked up at Merlin who was looking at the ground picking grass. He responded," You'll stop practicing it and there will be no problem. No one has to know."  Merlin sighed," I can't just stop practicing magic Arthur..." And Arthur said," Why not?" So Merlin continued in a small voice," Because I may just be uh you know uhm well it's kinda hard to understand but you know what I mean? Right?" Arthur trying to understand the words that just came out of Merlin's mouth said," I have absolutely no idea what you're talking about."  So Merlin took in a deep breath before quickly spurting out a long line of words," I.am.magic.Like.I.am.actually.the.human embodiment.of.magic.I.can't.not.practice.it.because.I.am.it.So.it.causes.a.lot.of.problems.and there.are.so.many.times.when.I.have.to.use.it.so.I.don't.know.Well.ya." He said that all so quickly that most of the knights couldn't even comprehend most of it. But they got the gist.  Arthur was stricken with differing opinions. Magic is terrible. Merlin is magic. Merlin has always appeared to be good. So he said," Well, then i don't know. I have no clue on how to fix this. Can you get rid of the magic?"  

Merlin was aghast at this proposition and angrily retorted," No! I can't get rid of it. Neither would I ever do something like that. Without magic I will die. Just poof. Oh where'd Merlin go? I don't know he just ceased to exist. And fix what? Me?! I'm here to help fix you! Literally my entire life had been dedicated for me that you'd return magic to the land. And the balance of the universe would restore. But here you are trying to fix magic!" 

Arthur's mouth was wide open after the outburst. So he resorted to the only idea he had left," I guess we can return to Camelot. Place a guard on you or put you in cell until I figure this out."

Merlin's eyes flashed gold and rose appeared in his upward palm. "Does that look harmful to you? For all I know you would burn a person alive for simply producing it to someone they loved. At least your father would. And the apple never falls far from the tree does it?"

Merlin's mention of him being alike to his father upset Arthur greatly. So much that Arthur's first instinct was to draw his sword. Yet when Merlin saw this he also saw flashes of the horrible images and tears started to spill from his eyes. Despite his tearfulness his eyes flashed gold and a shield was formed around him. Arthur saw Merlin's tears and dropped the sword. He looked at his manservant with regret and concern but mostly guilt. He had almost made one of Merlin's terrible scenes come true.  He then looked away from his hand and towards his men who were banging on the barrier trying to convince Merlin to let them in. And then he noticed that the tree trunk was expanding around Merlin's bubble. Yet Merlin's eyes were not gold from what Arthur could see. The very earth was protecting him. He then remembered something Gaisus had said about sorcerer shields and how to defeat them. 

He quickly told his men," Stop! You'll hurt Merlin with all that banging!" All of the sound ended almost instantly. Then Gwaine turned around with tears threatening to spill and angrily said to Arthur," You selfish prat!  The second he stops concentrating on that barrier, he is going to have another episode because you want to take him to Camelot so you can shove him into a cell until you figure out what to do. You don't have to do anything. Except maybe try and change the laws for him and others. AND you pulled that god forsaken sword on him so now he won't come back to Camelot because he'll already know that you'll run him through on sight." After saying that Gwaine stalked towards the farthest outreaches of the camp they had made and didn't look back. 

The other knights went and sat down around the unlit fire pit after a few of them shot him glares, that could probably kill most men, towards him. Arthur look back down toward the spot where Merlin used to be seen. He then walked around the tree and saw that it was completely closed off. 

Arthur went toward the others and sat down with them around the unlit fire pit. After a long while of silence Elyan broke it by saying," Lance was right you know?" Arthur turned towards him with a look of confusion on his face that urged Elyan to continue," You know? That if you do any of those things to Merlin we probably would all leave. At least I can speak for myself on that one. You may say that you won't do any of that but pulling your sword back there might have proved you wrong."  

Arthur replied to Elyan by saying and addressing it to everyone," We won't have to worry about it anymore. He sealed himself up in that tree and if he doesn't come back out before noon tomorrow we'll leave without him."

All the knights around him stared at Arthur in shock. Would Arthur really leave Merlin in the middle of the woods after frightening Merlin enough that he'd seal himself inside of a tree? After a moment of letting what Arthur said sink in Lancelot piped up," That counts as one of the scenes from Merlin's mind. It's abandonment. That is practically you saying that you don't care if he comes back or not." 

Arthur let out a deep sigh before giving in to his knights," What would you all have me do then?" Immediately at least half of them started talking over each other. So they agreed to go one at a time. They compiled a nice yet complexly understated list of what the knights think that Arthur should do. It went like this. Talk to Merlin. Gain back Merlin's trust. Trust in Merlin. And let Merlin convince him that he isn't a traitor.