A/N: With thanks to my roommate, without whom this story would almost certainly not exist.
And also to Buffy the Vampire Slayer for soon to be obvious reasons.
. . .
Merlin has a large wheelbarrow covered in a sheet that he has thrown himself in front of. Since Merlin is approximately the width of a large bundle of sticks, this doesn't do much for concealment purposes.
Gwen stares at him, frozen, for a long moment.
"I have - sheets," Merlin blurts out. "From the laundry."
He does, admittedly, have a sheet. Gwen is just pretty sure, from the shape of it, that said sheet is currently hiding a body.
However, if she questions this, Merlin might question her wheelbarrow, which is currently filled with a monster who hadn't had the courtesy to disappear when she staked it and is barely covered by a quilt.
A quilt that is starting to slip.
"I also have - sheets," she says hastily. "And a quilt."
"Right," Merlin says.
"Right," she agrees.
They push their wheelbarrows in their separate directions down the corridor. Neither of them mentions that they are on the other side of the castle from the laundry or that it is midnight and far too late for such a chore.
Merlin is probably just carrying out a former patient of Gaius's, Gwen tells herself determinedly. If she thinks otherwise, she'll have to bring it up to Geoffrey, and - No. Not Merlin. Surely not Merlin.
It's fine.
Even though he carries out an awful lot of bodies for Gaius, and often at the most inconvenient times.
It's all fine.
(She does wonder, a little, what explanation he's come up with for her.)
. . .
It starts like this:
A strange man follows her home on a night when her father is late coming back from the forge. When she realizes he is not entirely human, she is not entirely surprised because this is Camelot, after all, and Camelot is all but under siege from the enraged remnants of magic.
It does not change her response, which is to shriek and try to hit him with the first thing that comes to hand, which happens to be a wooden ladle.
No one is more surprised than her when it goes straight through his chest, and the strange man falls into dust.
She should probably have reported this, but her trick with the ladle is a little too unnatural for her to feel entirely comfortable with admitting to it, and besides, it's not like she has any proof.
She sweeps up the monster and goes to bed, pressing her fist against her mouth to stifle her sobs.
. . .
By the third time she runs into one of the creatures, she has to admit that they seem to be drawn to her. She also has to admit that she needs to know more.
She's . . . changing. She's stronger now, faster, and the creatures keep saying such terrible things -
She can't be magic. She can't be. She would know.
But she can't take the risk of asking Gaius or confiding in Lady Morgana in case she's wrong, so she'll just have to figure it out for herself.
When Geoffrey finds her dozing on the floor of his library surrounded by dusty books that she is very sure he was supposed to have burned, she grasps desperately for an explanation that will get her out of this.
