Pinterest Inspired.
Sorry its been so long since I last updated. I've been busy.
Anyway, enjoy!
"The important thing to remember, is that this could have gone much worse."
Arthur snorted before saying, "how could this possibly be worse? We're stuck in Morgana's maze, which has a dragon guarding it, and practically waiting to be found because one of the sky high maze hedges grabbed us. Now we're stuck, without our weapons while the stupid, magical hedge holds us prisoners. Now please tell me what in the five kingdoms could possibly be worse than that?"
Not made by me. Made by ~999Anaida
What Merlin looks like right now in the maze. They are currently in a hedge circle, able to look at eachother. (The knights are there.)
"A lot actually," Merlin mutters to himself while looking down. Starting to remember all the times Arthur, himself, or his friends had nearly died. Some had died. There were times that he'd been tortured, and times Arthur almost found out about Merlin's magic.
Those were only the first thoughts that came to Merlin's mind before Percival decided to speak up, "Arthur, don't start. He obviously doesn't want to talk about it. We should focus on getting out."
"Actually Percival, I would like to know why Merlin is here. We told him to stay behind, and here he is."
"How about you give him A break Arthur? He warned you about the trap, but you didn't listen," Elyan seemed rather annoyed at Arthur. Probably because they could have avoided this situation if Arthur had just listened to Merlin for once in his life.
"Oh? Why are you taking his side? You're supposed to be loyal to me!" Turns out Arthur was in one of his moods.
"All due respect sire, but I'm taking Merlin's side with this one too!" There was Leon deciding to join in too.
"What about you Gwaine? Are you going to choose Merlin too?"
"Nah I choose beer. Merlin is my next choice though."
"I thought I could trust you guys! Now I'm just an annoying Prince!" Arthur was sobbing in a very unprince like manner.
While the others were arguing, Merlin had used a spell to get himself down. "Glad you at least recognize that you're annoying," Merlin muttered from the ground.
Seeing Merlin was down, Arthur quit his fake sobbing, and called dramatically, "Merlin save meeee!"
"Are you drunk?" That was the only reasonable explanation to how Arthur was acting at the moment.
"Maybe? How many drinks does it take to get drunk again?"
Merlin groaned loudly before grabbing one of the swords.
"You're drunk? Without me? Ummm excuse me, but that's just wrong!" Apparently Gwaine was sober this mission. What a miracle!
Now Merlin was holding a sword and grinning like a mad man at Arthur.
"Merlin?"
The raven haired boy took another step towards Arthur.
"Merlin?"
Another step.
"MERLIN?"
With a swish Merlin brought the sword down. Arthur's eyes were closed. When he reopened them, he was on the ground, and his butt hurt. Merlin had just scared him a bit before he let Arthur down.
Merlin then gently let the others down.
"I vote we don't listen to intoxicated Arthur and let Merlin lead," Gwaine called out.
Then the rest of the knights simultaneously replied, "agreed."
Merlin gaped at them for a few seconds before he walked out of that hedge trap. The knights in tow, he cautiously continued.
If it was only him and an intoxicated Arthur, then he certainly would have called Kilgarrah to bring them home. He didn't ask much of Kilgarrah, so hopefully he'd be okay with doing one favor. Unfortunately, that was not the case. That left him with one option. Explore.
They found multiple dead ends, while there was an occasional battle which Merlin usually ended with a bit of hidden magic. It seemed Merlin was going to save their sorry hind ends multiple times again this trip.
When they finally decided to settle for the night, they had a small supper of leftovers, and guess who had watch duty. That's right, Merlin.
Soon the knights had fallen asleep, which left Merlin to his thoughts, and to watch the surroundings. It was a rather gloomy night. With the wind rustling the hedges, and the mist rolling in, Merlin was getting a bad feeling. That feeling could also be the night chill considering Merlin didn't have his jacket. That was lost somewhere within the magical hedges.
Merlin waited a while. Nothing happened, and that was rather strange. It was like the calm before the storm. The soft snores (and loud ones from Arthur) were comforting compared to the thunder in the distance. It wasn't raining yet, but the air was moist, which was a sign of rain coming.
"Eh mate, it's my turn to keep watch. Go get some beauty rest. You need it!"
"Thanks Gwaine," he replied sarcastically before heading to the empty bed roll as instructed.
Despite Merlin's worries, sleep came easy due to the many restless nights of chores.
...........
Of course, Merlin was right. When he awoke, he found a hedge right between the knights and himself. He was alone.
"ZZZZZzzz hajzhjs ZZZZzzz," well not all alone. A soon to be hungover Arthur was on his side.
Somehow the hedge had grown overnight... Well it looked like the knights were going to have to choose a new leader.
Looking around he realized there was a sleeping Griffin on too of another hedge. Somehow the griffin hadn't noticed them when it chose its place to sleep. So far this week was just turning out great.
"Arthur, wake up!" Merlin whispered urgently.
Arthur started groaning, "leave me alone Merlin! Can't you tell I have a hangover?"
"Well you can't have a hangover if you're dead, so wake up, and shut your pie hole."
This was Merlin's new favourite way to wake Arthur. The usual hassle Merlin encountered was not there. Instead, there was an awake, and cautious prince.
So they attempted to sneak away, which they were actually successful at for the first time in forever.
"Where are we?" Arthur asked when in a safer location.
"You were that drunk huh?"
Looking down, Arthur nodded.
"Well your dad sent us on a mission to capture Morgana, and we followed her into a maze. We got seperated from the knights and I've saved your life twice so far."
"Sure you have Merlin," Arthur muttered under his breath.
"Sorry, what was that?"
"Nothing."
After that, they were silent, and explored the maze for a while.
It seemed the maze had gotten more eerie over night. The mist seemed to be permanently hanging over them. The wind had picked up causing random rustling noises. Besides the rustling, there were no sounds. This simply put Merlin on edge. Usually there was a river flowing by, an animal, or the occasional passersby. Not here. Merlin could feel the strong magic coming off of the maze, and couldn't tell if someone had placed spells on it after it grew, or if it had been grown with magic. The place reeked of wet dirt like after a rain fall.
"Merlin, have we tried climbing the hedges?"
Merlin's mouth went wide open, as did his eyes. He hadn't thought of that. So he shook his head no.
"Idiot," he heard Arthur mutter before walking towards a hedge.
Merlin looked at the ground for a second, and when he looked back up, Arthur was gone.
Searching frantically, Merlin called out, "Arthur?"
"Still here you idiot," came Arthur's annoyed reply from inside the hedge. "I think it's some kind of hallucination spell." Arthur's head suddenly popped out of the hedge. "Get in here," Arthur demanded while dragging Merlin in.
From inside the hedge, everything that was conjured by magic became see through. Without the magical hedges, it was simply a plain field. Although, there were a few magical traps setup, which you could clearly see when inside the hedge. You know what else the two could clearly see? The knights.
Arthur began walking towards them almost immediately. Going through illusion after illusion, they got closer to the knights.
Walking through the last hedge, they found rather shocked knights. Their prince, and his servant walking through a hedge was rather startling.
"That's it! I need either an ale or an apple!" It seemed Gwaine was fed up with this maze just like Merlin was.
So they headed in the direction they knew Camelot to be.
............
When they had chased Morgana Into the maze, she had seemed powerless. Maybe the maze had been a way for her to escape. That was the conclusion that the knights came to on their way back to Camelot.
Actually, their travel back was rather quiet. Not as busy as usual. Maybe it had previously rained causing people to find shelter. There was that earthy smell that comes after rain, and the ground was damp, so it was very likely.
They'd passed an apple tree, which made Gwaine shut up, and no one else really had the audacity to speak to Arthur when he had a hangover. Well except Merlin, who at the moment seemed deep in thought. So let's just say the trip was very quiet.
Getting back to Camelot, they had noticed something rather startling. There were no people in Camelot. None whatsoever.
The sound of kids playing, the smell of fresh bread from the bakery, and the warmth that usually sprung forth when entering Camelot were gone. In place was a cold eerie feeling accompanied by silence.
The buildings were all there and unharmed. They were just uninhabited at the moment. It was as if all the people in Camelot had fled from something.
Walking into the castle, it had never been so quiet. There was literally no one to be seen.
Gwaine had finished his Apple stash and decided to speak up, "you know what would be fun? Playing hide and seek right now."
"Like the people?" That was Elyan sassily telling Gwaine that now was not a good time for jokes.
"Shut up, you guys are giving me a worse headache then I already have. Our main priority is to get the people back, not... Hide and seek!" It seemed the hangover was affecting Arthur quite a bit and making him brash.
After searching the castle for any signs, the group (well more Arthur) decided they were going to search the houses for people or signs.
For a while, they found nothing, but in one house, Gwaine found a six year old. Another they found a nine year old. Them a toddler. It continued for a while, before they had what looked like a tiny kid army. There were also a few elderly that were somehow crippled.
It had been rather awkward due to the majority of the guys not knowing how to take care of kids. Percival and Leon were the only ones able to calm the kids and get them to stop crying. Once they'd done that they asked what the kids knew. What they learned was that a dark haired lady had come in with some kind of flute, and all the adults and teenagers that heard it started following her. "It was like magic!" One kid had shouted.
They had supposedly gone east. Which made sense due to the many footprints left behind.
Due to how good Leon and Percival were with the kids, they got baby sitting duty. Gwaine had offered to stay behind, because he wanted to play hide and seek with the older kids in the castle, but Arthur had declined. Leaving Camelot, Arthur then began muttering about how Gwaine should've never became a knight.
"So lets say this is Morgana, how will we stop her if she has the whole of Camelot as her army because of a magical flute?" Merlin asked, before shifting on his saddle.
"We'll cross that bridge when we get there."
Merlin snorted.
"What?" Arthur questioned trying to defend himself for whatever Merlin had snorted about.
"Oh I don't know, maybe there's two things. Like the fact that we're about to cross a bridge. Also the fact that if we burst into another situation without a plan, we're probably going to die this time."
"Merlin what are you babbling on about?"
"Guys, shut up! Elyan spotted a large group of people!" Gwaine shouted, still sounding annoyed that he couldn't play hide and seek with kids in the castle.
They started creeping towards the large group of people. At the moment, they were all dancing in circles. The person in the center was only slightly visible. The person quite obviously had long dark hair, but her face was blocked by the dancers. There was an echo of a soft melody playing in the distance. The music was rather... calling. It made them want to go dance with the others.
"Okay guys, here's the plan. We make so much noise that they can't hear her flute, and then we get that flute when she's distracted."
"Wouldn't it just be easier to plug our ears, sneak through, and then take the flute Arthur?"
Arthur looked rather angered that Merlin would attempt to change his plans. "Merlin, arguing with me when I have a hangover I not the best idea." This was more of a threat then a statement.
"Alright then, let's try it." Merlin replied rather sassily. Somehow, Arthur didn't notice.
And that's how an entire kingdom of people ended up dancing around their worst enemy.
As usual, Merlin used magic and got the situation under control.
I got lazy and lost the inspiration to finish it.
.