Chapter Text
“Don’t go,” Merlin insisted, to which Arthur responded how he always did, by way of rolling his eyes.
“These will hardly be the first magical beasts I have faced, Merlin,” Arthur childed, somewhere between amused by Merlin’s worry, and insulted that Merlin thought Arthur couldn’t match a few ghost dogs in battle.
“Sure, alright,” Merlin flung one hand in a shug, hurrying behind his king as Arthur strode down the corridor. “But you don’t know; maybe you just cannot defeat them with a sword, no matter how great a warrior you are.”
“I’ll make do,” Arthur said, dismissive.
“We know hardly anything about these beasts! How can you hope to ride into battle against them?”
“You told me Gaius had managed to translate the scroll that was found?” Arthur raised one brow, looking back at him without breaking his pace towards the Hall of Ceremonies.
Merlin sighed, frustrated. “He has. That doesn’t mean you can just-”
Reaching the Hall, Arthur passed the guards with a nod and flung the heavy timber doors open. Conversation within the room ceased at his arrival, the collection of knights and noblemen turning to acknowledge his entry with short bows.
“Right.” Arthur got straight to the point. This was a briefing, not an hours-long council session, he could be as curt as he liked. “As I am sure you are all aware, last sennight one of our patrols was flagged down by men from Prennwich, a town two days’ ride south of the Citadel. They have been under attack by magical beasts, which have been described as great hounds made of smoke. Livestock is mauled nightly, and it seems the situation has escalated. Lord Agravaine?”
Arthur gestured to his uncle, who brightened at the moment of attention from the room. “I have just returned from a reconnaissance of Prennwich.” It was a very noble motion, that Agravaine himself had gone. There was no great calling for a nobleman of his station to make such a journey. “The King is correct that the situation has grown graver- there have been four attacks by these hounds on the people of Prennwich, one of which did not survive his injuries. The others we brought back to the Citadel for the advanced healing that the Court Physician can provide.”
Gaius, standing to the back of the group, dipped his head in curt thanks. Held low in both his hands was an ancient-looking scroll, made of some kind of decaying vellum wrapped around an ornate post. Out of the corner of his eye, Arthur could see where Merlin was standing behind him, half in the shadows. Arthur was fairly certain he was watching the scroll carefully, too.
“I saw the hounds myself, your majesty.” Agravaine continued. “They were aggressive, but not incredibly dangerous. The townspeople who were injured were merely unfortunate and unprepared to protect themselves. I have no doubt that a small company of knights would have no trouble felling the beasts.”
Arthur nodded, considering. “And what of the scroll?”
A flicker of emotion across Agravaine’s face, something Arthur couldn’t put name to. “Of course.” He gestured to Gaius, who stepped forward.
“Agravaine and his men found this at the outskirts of the town,” Gaius began, addressing the whole room and the King alike. “From what I could translate, it appears to be instructions for the ritual used to summon the hounds- they are known as the Hounds of Annwn, beholden to a god of the Old Religion. Based on the information written, they are not meant to be aggressive creatures. They hunt wrong-doers or criminals, or escort souls to the world beyond this one. I can only imagine that whoever summoned them altered their behaviour in some way to make them so vicious.”
“Morgana, undoubtedly,” Arthur said, repressing a sigh. He held out a hand and Gaius passed him the scroll, almost reluctantly. “It seems she will commit any attack on Camelot as she can, even just senseless violence such as this.”
The scroll was heavy in his hand, and slightly gritty as if it was threatening to disintegrate under his fingers. Arthur tugged it open, taking in the intricate, archaic ink that decorated the animal skin parchment. At the top of the scroll was a swirling, artistic representation of a dog, the red ink on its ears and eyes startlingly vibrant for such an old artifact.
“This is the spell to summon them,” Gaius pointed at the thick swathe of script at the centre of the scroll. “And this is the spell that dismisses them from this plane.”
The second piece of text under Gaius’ crooked finger was comically short compared to the first- just two words. They were hard to make out in the faded, elaborate timeworn font, but Arthur read it anyway, somewhat involuntarily: Kil ad-arawn.
It meant nothing to Arthur. The language of the Old Religion was entirely foreign to him, and unreachable for an entirely different reason. Even just holding such a relic of magic made Arthur’s skin crawl, his hands feel dirty.
Perhaps it was the injustice of it all that made the words stick with him. Kil ad-arawn… Arthur was about to risk life and limb of both himself and his men fighting these hounds, when all a sorcerer would need to do to defeat the dogs would be speak two words. Kil ad-arawn. It didn’t feel fair.
“Yes,” Gaius agreed. “Morgana made a great error, allowing this scroll to fall into our hands.” The old physician glanced incisively at Agravaine. Whether there was any hidden intention behind such a deliberate look, Gaius’ impassible expression revealed nothing to Arthur.
“Fortune is in our favour,” Agraviane smiled brightly.
Arthur nodded gravely. “Indeed.” He took a breath, and addressed the room as a whole. “Morning of the morrow, I will ride to Prennwich with four knights, and fell these beasts before they can cause any more harm. Sir Brunor, I ask that you would accompany me.” He addressed one young knight towards the back of the room, whose face lit up. “Ready Sirs Feirfiz, Griflet and Howel; tell them we leave at dawn.”
“If I may, Sire, is this wise?” Gaius folded his hands. “Morgana’s schemes are rarely ever so elementary. It may be a trap.”
Arthur re-rolled the scroll, somewhat roughly. “In truth, it doesn’t matter. Lord Agravaine’s reconnaissance has told us that if Morgana means to lay a trap, it is lackluster. And even if it is, I cannot stand by while my people are harmed by the attacks she wishes to make against me. Magic is cruel and malign and Morgana wields it against us without mercy. I will not let her make attacks on this kingdom without retaliation. If this council has no more to add on the matter, then our meeting is adjourned.”
The room was silent, every eye on him. Arthur stood tall, unyielding. He turned to Leon, standing at his right, and passed him the scroll. “See that this is burned.”
“Arthur.” Merlin stood, arms crossed next to where Arthur sat at his desk, doing a very good job of ignoring Merlin in favour of studying a map of his kingdom. “You’re being a fool.”
“That’s treason, you know,” Arthur said mildly.
“So is putting the life of the King in danger! Why do you get away with it and the rest of us can’t?”
“Do you really think some ghost dogs are such a threat to my life? We’ve fought Dorocha, I don’t think any ghosts could be worse than that. These ones have nothing more than big teeth.”
“Yeah, and what did fighting the Dorocha cost us?” Merlin spat, genuine anger colouring his words.
Now, Arthur did glance up at Merlin, eyes narrowed. That was too far.
Merlin’s temper faded at Arthur’s glance. His jaw worked for a moment, before he spoke again. “I’m sorry. I know you miss Lancelot too. But I can’t- I just think there’s something… off about all of this.”
Arthur glanced back at his map, tracing the route to Prennwich with one finger, studying the forests that surrounded it to the south. “Not one of your funny feelings, again?”
“And when am I wrong?”
Arthur thought for a moment. Opened his mouth to speak, then closed it again, considering. “Well, I’m sure this time will be fine.”
Merlin made a small noise of frustration, throwing his hands in the air. “You are incorrigible!"
“And you are a pest.” Arthur didn’t have to look at him to feel the glare directed his way.
Unperturbed by how Arthur continued to ignore him, Merlin spoke again. “Why do you have to go?”
“Oh, so you think we should let Morgana’s sorcerous beasts continue to terrorise the innocent?”
“No, you prat, I’m asking why you have to go? You have dozens of knights trained for exactly this purpose of protecting Camelot!”
“Quite right, and I’m taking a company of them with me.”
“None of the knights, though,” Merlin frowned.
Arthur needed no explanation to who he was referring to. He had his knights, his dozens upon dozens of men-at-arms, trained by him to protect Camelot with their blades and their lives both. But then there were his knights, the men who had sat beside him at the Round Table of the ancient Kings of Camelot. Leon, Gwaine, Percival, Elyan, and Lancelot, when he was with them still. Arthur considered Merlin and Gwen in that number too, in a roundabout way. There was no-one beyond them that Arthur trusted more. It did truly feel odd not to be taking any of them with him- it happened more often than not.
“Not this time,” Arthur shook his head. “It was only last week that you all fought the Lamia creature. I’m not taking any of you back into the field so soon before you have had the chance to rest. Besides, the knights I have selected to take all need experience in the field. If my uncle is correct and the hounds are not too great of a threat, then I see nothing to be concerned about.”
Merlin was frowning again, for some reason. “I still don’t think you should need to go.”
Arthur sighed lightly. “Morgana’s fight is with me.”
“Exactly! So surely you shouldn’t-”
“I will not send my men to fight my battles for me, Merlin!” Arthur insisted. “That is not the way I will rule this kingdom.”
Merlin deflated, looking somewhere between fond and terribly, wearily resigned. “...I know.” He sighed. “I’ll go pack.”
“You’re not coming, either.” Arthur said, just as softly.
Merlin’s eyebrows jumped upwards. “What?”
“You were attacked by the Lamia too, if I remember correctly. And doesn’t Gaius need your help with the people wounded by the hounds?”
Merlin’s expression pinched, seeming just a little distressed. “Well maybe… but-”
“Merlin, if you neglect your responsibilities to the health and healing of my subjects just to aimlessly ride after me to Prennwich, I will not be pleased.”
“Well I’m surprised you even remember I’m Gaius’ apprentice! Besides- what about your health?”
“Again, that’s what the knights are for! There isn’t much you can do against a few smoke hounds, Merlin. I’ll be back before you know it. And do not follow after me, I know you’re already planning on it.”
Merlin scoffed. “Me? Follow you? Why would I do that?”
Arthur shook his head, exasperated. “If you ride two days to Prennwich only to find I’ve slain the beasts and so then you complain about riding two days back to Camelot again, I will spare one of the hounds just to feed you to it.”
Merlin didn’t rise to the banter this time. His eyes were pinched in the way that meant he had a headache, or was worried over something. Arthur saw that look on him far too often these days. “I just don’t like all this, Arthur. You can’t know what will happen.”
“I’ll be fine, Merlin, what could go wrong?”
“Don’t say things like that!” Merlin pressed, agitated.
Arthur stood, meeting Merlin at eye-level and taking hold of his shoulder in a grip he hoped was comforting. “I know you fear magic, Merlin, but that is exactly why I must see these beasts eradicated. Sorcery is a blight on our lives and I know you want it gone from these lands as much as I do. I will gladly protect my people from magic however I can, and right now, that means riding out to face whatever Morgana threatens us with. I will not let my people live in fear.”
Merlin sighed again, looking back at him with something sincere, and somewhat sad. “You’re a good man, Arthur.”
x+x+x
The fields outside Prennwich were chillingly still.
The only movement was the shifting of the men at Arthur’s back, their breath curling as steam in the air, catching the moonlight.
They had heard the howls, little more than a few minutes ago, but they had seemed to fade into the distance. The beasts’ hunting calls were louder the further away the pack was, the townspeople had told them. And now, the night was silent.
Arthur’s knights were tight in formation, their eyes sweeping the empty fields and the void-dark treeline. The other dozen men with them- shifting, skittish- were volunteers from Prennwich itself. It was a large town, and all these men had families they were intent on saving from these ghostly beasts. They had taken up their simple swords and stave torches, desperate for the chance to fight beside the Knights of Camelot.
They were not trained for this. Part of Arthur felt that not even his knights were, or himself. All of them could feel it- a crawling sense of dread, of otherworldly fear encroaching upon them all. How could Agravaine’s intel be so wrong? Arthur could not even see the enemy, and yet he already knew that what they faced was no beast easily felled.
Behind him, on the grazed-short grass, there was a carcass of what was once a cow. The flies on it were dormant, unstirred by the mens’ presence, but the same could not be said for the smell. Arthur was glad for the little light of nighttime if only that he could not closely see the bloated mass smeared across the ground. The stench of death hung heavy in the air.
Something made a noise in the trees, an animal’s yelp breaking the silence. The sound did not come again, but Arthur could feel the way terror struck through the circle of villagers. “Hold steady, men,” Arthur called, putting all of his authority and unwavering confidence into his voice. For the sake of these young, inexperienced soldiers, Arthur could pretend to be brave.
When they could finally hear the sound of growling hounds, it was like nothing Arthur had ever heard. It was not the bone-shaking terror of a dragon’s roar, or the paralysing scream of a Dorocha. This felt older, somehow. Less tangible. It brought on the chill of being alone in the vastness of midnight, when the wilderness itself was watching.
“Sire?” One of the townsmen to Arthur’s left was trembling. He could see it in the way the moonlight shimmered off the man’s sword, shaking with his hand. “What do we do?”
A moment of silence, still- as if even the wind was holding its breath.
Then the first hound burst snarling from the treeline.
Arthur heard some of the men at his back cry out as they all turned to face the largest dog he had ever seen.
It was pale and not quite solid, its fur trailing and wisping through the air. He couldn’t tell whether or not its great clawed paws even met the ground. Its eyes glowed a smoldering red, the same with its ears, like the crackling of a fire. When it snarled, canines as long as a knife glinted with saliva.
And it was not alone. Arthur could see in the edges of his vision- at least three more hounds watching from the shadows from the forest, ready to strike.
A pack, then. Really, Arthur should have known.
He drew in a breath, gripping his sword until the leather of his glove creaked. Then he gathered every ounce of his courage, and yelled- “With me!”
When he charged, his men were at his back.
Arthur had fought beasts before. Even creatures like the Griffin, whose hide steel could not cut, still had attacks that could be parried, weak spots to be exploited. But fighting suddenly became a hell of a lot harder when his sword rushed through the hounds as if they truly were made of smoke.
Around him, his knights and the townsmen were screaming in terror as they fell, pounced upon and meeting their fates against claws that were very very corporeal. Arthur could see them swinging their swords wildly, all their into a blow that would not find purchase. It was like trying to slay the wind, if the wind had teeth.
The world took on a different quality, in the throes of a battle. Time was meaningless. Reality narrowed to the sword in his hand. His eyes on the enemy. His breath echoing harshly within his helmet. Arthur could not land hits of his own, but he could dodge. For what felt like the hundredth time as the battle stretched he dove to the side to avoid a set of gnashing teeth, rolling on his knees to slash at an underbelly, trying- trying again and again that his sword may meet flesh.
“Hold together!” Arthur hollered, reality flooding back to him all at once when nobody answered.
His stomach dropping away in horror, Arthur glanced at the ground behind him. All he saw were bodies- the men that had stood with him minutes ago. Blood soaked chainmail, plate armour pierced right through. Flesh hung in chunks off bone, limbs mangled by teeth. They were all dead. All of them.
All but him.
The hounds seemed to know it too, sniffing at the corpses they had felled. One circled towards him, its mouth dripping with something rotten.
Arthur gripped his sword with both hands, facing the beast that would be his end. Of course it would be Morgana’s doings that would kill him, in the end. And not even to a warrior in a noble fight to the death, but to some dog that didn’t even have the decency to feel the cut of his sword.
The hound just stared him down. What was it waiting for?
Oh- it was waiting for its friend, Arthur realised absently, hearing the cold sweep of magical smoke behind him. He was half-way through turning his head to look when something caught him in the side of the neck and tore.
He didn’t know if he cried out- the world dissolving into white-noise as he was thrown to the ground. Something was very, very wrong- bright, hot liquid gushing down the front of his armour even as his gloved hand met his neck on instinct, fighting against the flow. Buckled over, on his knees, he was sure there was pain but his mind was too removed from it to even feel it.
The hounds didn’t even seem to have the decency to want to finish the job. They had no interest in feasting on corpses, only creating them. They could see the blood spilling from Arthur and knew he was a dead man.
Arthur supposed that he was. There would be no surviving this. Too much blood was flowing from him, in pulse with his desperately throbbing heart.
His hand didn’t seem to be able to grip his sword, no matter how hard he tried. It fell from numb fingers, landing soft on the grass.
Something else had caught the hound’s attention, in the distance, sniffing the air. Even as the world began to spin, Arthur knew where they were looking- back towards the township with its warm hearths and livestock and the people- the families hiding in their homes, trusting Arthur, their King, to save them.
He had seen men bleed to death. He had seen their hot blood spill unstoppable from a great wound, as their skin grew pale and their life left them. More than once he had seen a dying man call for his mam, his mind and senses spilling away with the blood that poured out.
Arthur never knew his mother. It wasn’t fear that he felt, as the ground traded places with the sky and he helplessly fell to meet the earth.
No, it was something else. Some detached sense of righteous anger- that his people were relying on him to save them, and here he was, dying in a pasture as their own death; smokey and fanged, closed in.
Arthur’s own death was inevitable, and he didn’t care. But those people down there- he would not let them die. He refused.
Those two words came back to him, a mantra in his fading mind. Kil ad-arawn. Kil ad-arawn. Kil ad-arawn.
There was no rational thought left in him, no decision to his actions. It was purely with instinct, the last of his strength, that Arthur reached.
His blood was soaking into the earth, becoming one with whatever great power waited there. When he called to it, in a way he didn’t truly know how, it surged to answer him.
The words crossed his lips, but he was past hearing them above the ringing in his ears. As the grey in his vision closed in, he caught sight of a great blue flare of light- the hounds dissolving into sky-coloured fire.
Oh, was Arthur’s last thought as darkness claimed him at last. It really was that simple.
Then he was gone.