Lady Knight Missione (Merlin fanfic)

Chapter Twenty One - Avalon, Part IV

Mordred pulls back his arm and uses his elbow to land a blow in my lower stomach. I'm wearing chainmail so I should hardly feel it but I do. I double over in pain, and cough twice. It feels like four sword hilts and four times Percival's strength that hits me, instead of just Mordred's elbow. He's strong, too strong, inhuman strength. Why is he doing this? How did he get here? And how is this possible?

Out of the corner of my eye I see him shift as he brings down his sword onto me. I have enough of a warning and time to bring my own sword up and block his, but just barely. He keeps attacking, harder, faster and more viciously. I do my best to block him and try to bring him down but I can't. It gets harder and harder, to the point where I can hardly hold my sword. Finally he gets the drop on me and hits me with his sword hilt over my head. I can feel a bump starting to rise on my forehead as I fall to the ground dazed and confused.

I look up as my vision becomes hazy and see Arthur leaning over me. I smile a little as he holds out his hand for me to take. I almost grab on when Mordred comes into view, standing behind King Arthur with his sword drawn back ready to strike. I try to warn Arthur but I am too late. Mordred plunges his sword into the King and I have failed. King Arthur is dead and Camelot will perish.

Arthur's body falls to my left but I can't look at him, so instead I look at Mordred. He looks like Mordred, but for some reason he doesn't feel like Mordred. He feels too evil, too sure of himself, and the more I look at him the more I see less of Mordred and more of something else. His grin is too unnatural, his hair too dark, his eyes not bright but instead dark soulless eyes, his skin too sickly and pale, and his smell, his smell is like decaying flesh. I scrunch up my nose and feel a deep pit form in my stomach as he says, "It will always end like this. Stop, trying."

I want to say yes, every fiber in me is ready too but I feels this to be wrong, and I know what I feel. This isn't Mordred. This thing killed Arthur for no reason, Mordred would never do that. If Mordred is to kill King Arthur it will be because he has a good reason, because he feels like this is the only solution, that this is the only option left, and that it is the right thing to do. I know Mordred like I know myself and he can be saved, he will be. I will never stop trying.

"No. Never." I say to the thing that moments ago I was sure was Mordred.

Everything changes around me, that thing is gone, Arthur is gone, and the room is gone. I am back where I was before, where it is only me and Pryoca. My mind feels drained of everything but surprisingly my body is as full of strength as ever. Although my mind is drained, one thought keeps bouncing around inside, and that one thought is one of the only things holding me together.

'I have to find that apple and I have to save Arthur. I have to save Arthur and Mordred both.'

...

Nearly two months is what we call the passage of time that passes before the Queen is saved. She is back to who she really is not five minutes before Mordred asks, "Is Missy really gone?" Gwen gives him a sad smile as tears glisten in her eyes and says, "I saw Morgana push her into a lake. I think it was the lake of Avalon, but, it was strange..." She trails off as a confused expression appears on her face.

"What was strange? What do you mean, My Lady?" Asks an impatient Mordred.

"Well, after Missy was pushed in, a blue and purple cloud surrounded her, but underwater and then I saw no more." The Queen quickly shifts her body, looking over at the King and says hurriedly, "She could still be alive Arthur."

He nods his head and says, "We'll make the journey back to Camelot where you will rest and then we will send out a search party. If she is still there we'll find her."

The King only says these words for Guinevere and Mordred's sake, when in truth it's been some time. If Missione did manage to survive Morgana's grasp, then where is she? She never returned to Camelot or even sent word of her survival. The truth is she's most likely gone, dead. Even if he is holding onto a small sliver of hope that she isn't.