Destinies Intertwined (Mordred/OC Merlin BBC Series) - IN PROGRESS

Chapter 9

Mordred's life was leaving him, and my sanity was leaving me at a similar rate. My hair was turning white, and my heart was going crazy, my fingers were bleeding from picking at them, and I caught myself scratching deep crevices into my own skin with the fingernails that had turned into something akin to claws. My eyes were losing their forest green color and slowly turning red. The eyes that once held happiness and love held an underlying insanity. I felt like something much darker was at work. Something I couldn't fight.

I longed to watch as glass shattered and I wished to see flames burst to life, destroying everything in its path.

I felt my compassion for all things living leaving me, and I felt nothing but anguish and fear. And power. A power I had never felt before. And a bloodlust I could not understand.

Every bit of life that left Mordred created a demon inside me that took over bit by bit until I couldn't breathe.

Terrible thoughts would plague me wherever I went--thoughts I knew were not mine.

Whispers, like beings in the back of my mind, began telling me to do things. Terrible things.

I took to wearing a black dress, keeping a black cloak on, the hood up, and speaking to no one. Even my voice was changing to one more of a hiss.

I no longer felt the caress of the moonlight in the evenings, nor the warmth of the sun, nor the cool of the water or the pull of nature's gifts. I was somehow empty, yet I was completely filled with something I could not understand, and it frightened me.

And yet, the voices kept telling me to stay hidden. To show nothing. To speak of nothing. To keep it secret.

This wasn't just about Mordred anymore.

I knew something happened when Arthur and Merlin went to the soothsayers, and I knew it was not good. I knew it had something to do with our destinies. Something to do with my destiny. Something I had forgotten, but all I could picture were the things that I wanted. Things shattering, fire overtaking the lands, death... Darkness.

Arthur and Merlin had caught me off guard when they came home, and suddenly the part of me that was still good, the little light inside my heart, the little me that was still living, burst through for that moment. Just long enough for me to make my way out to the two men.

"Merlin," I called, and my heart skipped a beat once more at the hissing sound. He whirled around to look at me, and I saw Arthur stop as well. "Arthur..." I felt scared. I felt tears well up in my eyes, and I began shaking, uncertain of what to do when the voices began screaming at me, telling me not to do it, not to tell them, that I was better than this.

"Who are you?" Arthur asked, getting off his horse, unable to see my face, and Merlin followed.

"Ariella," I told them, and they looked surprised as I lifted my hood. Shocked and filled with fear. That was when the darkness took over, and I was lost. "You should've listened to the dragon, Merlin," the being hissed before, with a swipe of her hand, the men were thrown backward.

I woke with a start, my heart racing, and I looked around. I was still in Gaius' chambers, sitting beside Mordred, exactly where I had been when I fell asleep. I gathered a bit of my hair and pulled it forward in the hopes of comfort, but what I saw only made my heart sink.

My hair was turning white.

I felt fear build up inside me, and after a moment of thought, I grabbed my cloak, running out of the chambers and into the night, tying it around my neck as I ran.

"Halt!" I heard someone call, and I whirled around to see a knight running toward me.

"Percival?" I asked, my heart racing. I had to get away.