Memory Jar

Chapter 6

Being nervous wasn't something you were trained for as a knight. How to be brave, yes. How to murder people, sadly most definitely, yes. How to protect, how to serve, sure.
But to be nervous? That was a trait you were naturally required to have to become a knight.
A knight who wasn't nervous, wasn't careful.
A knight who wasn't nervous was rash instead.

Leon prided himself with his ability to cancel out most of his nervousness. That was how he had survived this long.
He had grown up in Camelot under Uther's reign. And he remembered – let's say most of it.
He barely remembered how times were before the purge. As he had been maybe five when it began.
But he remembered the wonder his parents had held for magic before things changed.
He remembered how his own views shifted, when Uther declared it evil. And how it changed again, when Merlin killed the king against his own will.

The memory was blurry, as it was for almost everyone. But Leon remembered it had been a council meeting. He remembered a goblet and Merlin speaking of poison.
And he saw someone being insistent that it wasn't. Something happened and then Merlin was forced to drink from it.
After that he lost control of his magic. It was so obvious that whatever the goblet contained was what had Merlin under his grasp. But to this day they didn't know exactly what had been in it.
It must have been enchanted.
Then again – that day – no sorcerer had been present. Apart from Merlin, of course.

Leon sighed. No really. Not even the one who called himself king today.
The man who was sitting on the throne now was the one who enchanted the goblet - that much was true. But he was hardly the man in control of the kingdom.
That man was another. The one who held the strings over the kingdom – the man who demanded wars and kept killing innocent people. Regardless of magic for once -
Was the royal advisor.
Not that it was a surprise, really. Often, kings were deluded in their actions. Manipulated by snakes and rats who invaded the Castle's like pests.

That was why Leon was still here. Mordred was king. And he was a sorcerer. He was young. He made many mistakes. Rash and uninformed ones. He used Merlin for decisions he made based on falsely placed advice from Agravaine. Because of course it was Agravaine. Who knew the kingdom and it's rulers better than Agravaine? Who was practically raised to usurp a king, since he was never meant to inherit a throne?

Leon had to keep as many people safe as possible. He needed to give the king reasonable advice to counter the toxic input Agravaine had to give.
It helped to have Merlin on his side. As the former court physician apprentice had a way to get to the king. Try and balance him out. Merlin knew things most people didn't. And Merlin did his best to help Mordred in any way he could. Mordred's trust in him was devided. Which is why he made Merlin unable to lie to him.

Merlin still helped him. Because they were kin. And Merlin understood his struggles. Merlin was too empathetic for his own good.
It was difficult to support him, especially on Merlin himself. As he tried to help the very man who took his freedom away. And who ordered him to kill against his nature.

Leon and Merlin had managed to evade some wars that Agravaine was trying to plant. But they had lost many other verbal battles.

Another factor that made Leon's life so much more difficult – was the only person Agravaine trusted. And that person was the most difficult of them all, because Mordred loved her.
Kara was the poison to Merlin's antidote. She was the dagger to his shield.

She was even more dangerous than Agravaine himself. Because she reached Mordred were no one else could. At his heart.
Agravaine had made the plans to overthrow Uther Pendragon. But it was Kara who convinced Mordred to do it.

Merlin and Leon both hardly slept anymore. Merlin kept having nightmares of people dying because of him. More than just him killing them. No – it was more than that.
Merlin kept thinking he had abandoned his people. Camelot. The king.
Though it was still a mystery to Leon how Merlin ever came to protect Uther in the first place.