A/N: I know I should be concentrating on "Bonds of Destiny" but this idea just came to me and refused to leave me alone! Please don't kill me! Just read this and enjoy! I'm already working on chapter 5 of "Bonds of Destiny" I just need to work on some kinks in the plot before I can write everything out. Be patient. Until I post the other chapter please have fun reading this story!

Pairings: None really...because there is no romance in this story.

Spoilers: Set after the end of Season 3.

Disclaimer: I do not own "Merlin"

Chapter 1: Enemy?

Arthur was riding along with his Knights in tow looking for the bandits' hideout. It was early morning; the sun was shining signalling a beautiful day. However, the Prince was not enjoying it one bit.

The group was abnormally silent, but that could be attributed to the fact that Merlin was missing from the group. Arthur felt this silence most of all, it was the cause of his abysmal mood.

No matter how much he denied it, the Prince enjoyed his manservant's company. Their typical style of banter was always a welcome relief during long journeys. Honestly, Arthur wasn't sure how he got on without Merlin before. Their friendship though odd was still a bright spot in Arthur's life.

Well that friendship and Gwen's love. Adding to that his four new Knights and the fact that Camelot was back to its former glory, Arthur was doing pretty good. His father and Morgana were his biggest problems now.

The King had never truly gotten over what Morgana had done. Although Uther was still King it was Arthur that was basically ruling Camelot. However, the Prince had not taken the title of Regeant or King. Arthur was still counting on his father getting back to normal even though it had been months since the incident with Morgana.

Arthur wasn't just naively hoping for it, the King was healing slowly but surely. For the past couple of months Arthur had been stuck in the castle managing matters and hadn't been able to go out on any excursions of any kind. With his father being unwell Arthur had been trying to get Camelot back on its feet.

Now with Camelot back on firmer standing, Arthur had heard about bandits in this area and had decided to investigate himself. He had the confidence that his father would be fine. He had also left his best Knights back in Camelot. They included Lancelot, Gwaine, Percival, Elyan, and Leon.

He wasn't that worried about the bandits. The reports stated that there were very few of them, about 6 to 7 only. They were petty thieves and were stealing from travellers that were crossing the forest. Arthur jumped at the chance of getting out of the castle.

He would have enjoyed it thoroughly had Merlin and his new Knights accompanied him as well but the castle needed to be guarded by people he trusted the most and Merlin was ill. Arthur had had to deal with a temporary servant for two days now and it hadn't been fun.

His temporary servant Evan was far too respectful and silent! This would have been appreciated before he had known Merlin as a servant. So he had been in a sulky mood for the last two to three days and was hoping for Merlin to get better.

This trip was also turning out to be boring. He sighed and continued scanning his surroundings. Then suddenly he heard a twig snap and raised his hand up to signal for the rest of his party to stop. He slowly got off his horse and his Knights followed the example.

They stood there waiting and alert for any danger. Then...all hell broke loose.

Merlin was lying in bed recovering from his excessive use of magic. A couple of days before he had been out trying to stop a sorcerer from assassinating Arthur and he had used far too much magic, thereby collapsing as soon as he had returned to Gaius's chambers.

He had been in bed since then. Arthur had been told that he had taken ill and caught a cold so Merlin had the days off. However, Merlin had been terribly bored. He may deny it vehemently but he missed hanging out with Arthur.

Sure his newly Knighted friends visited him each day but the Prince couldn't do so. Although Arthur did still come late in the evening once or twice for a few minutes to see how Merlin had been doing, which Merlin appreciated a lot. However, neither of them would still admit to being fond of each other.

Merlin was about to open up his spell book to pass the time reading, when he felt a jolt pass through his body. It was an awkward feeling of urgency and fear, but he had nothing to fear. He was in his room quite alone. So why did he have this feeling?

He concentrated on it longer and realized in panic that it was a sensation he had felt before. Arthur was in trouble. He had felt this curious sensation prior to this point but had never given it much thought until now. But he didn't have time to explore it; he had to get to Arthur.

He was about to throw his spell book under the bed and run out the door when he realized that he might not reach Arthur in time if he took a horse. But then how to get to Arthur?

He looked down to his spell book in thought when unbidden an image of Morgause disappearing into thin air came to him. He had never bothered to learn that spell even though it was in his spell book. The book mentioned that it was dangerous and that there were chances of getting lost in another realm for eternity if the spell isn't done right. Merlin though didn't have a choice.

However, he needed a disguise, some way to cover up so that Arthur didn't realize who he was. Knowing he was running out of time he settled for a worn down brown cloak that had a deep hood, which would cover up his features well enough. He was sure with the amount of magic he had a couple of bandits wouldn't be much trouble to him.

He knew the people Arthur took with him hadn't been enough for this mission. He should have taken the more seasoned Knights, but the Prince hadn't believed that the threat would be anything big. Arthur had also been too antsy to get out of the castle and had as per usual ignored all of Merlin's warnings.

As he put the cloak on and flipped through his book for the spell he heard the door to Gaius's chambers opening. Not knowing who it was he hid the book under his bed-covers and started thinking about an excuse for why he was out of bed and in a cloak.

Then Lancelot walked in and Merlin breathed a sigh of relief.

The warlock hurried to answer Lancelot's unanswered questions whilst taking out the spell book once again to look through the spell, "Arthur is in trouble! I have to go and help him. I have a feeling he might be injured I'll bring him back to the edge of the woods surrounding the castle. Get Gwaine to come along with you and wait there for me to come. He'll be able to help you."

Lancelot's eyes widened as he said, "Should Gwaine be told the truth?"

Merlin paused for a beat, then continued flipping pages and said, "Do whatever it takes to get Gwaine to come with you, but be careful not to alert anyone else."

Lancelot gave a determined nod and then Merlin finally finding the spell read over it quickly. He had it memorized in minutes. He turned to Lancelot and said, "Good luck!"

Lancelot gave him a smile and said, "You need it more than me. Be careful Merlin."

Merlin nodded and muttered the spell while concentrating on the bond between Arthur and himself. The bond would lead him directly to the Prince.

Arthur was beyond furious. He was tied up and sat in the middle of a crowd of jeering bandits. The reports had been false. There were well over fifty bandits surrounding him right now. They were in the bandits' camp in a thicket of trees a few miles away from where Arthur and his Knights had been ambushed.

The Prince cursed himself for not listening to Merlin, though he would never admit it out loud. He knew there had been many times before that Merlin had had uncannily accurate gut instincts. In this case Merlin had told him that he "had a bad feeling there was more to the story."

And the servant had been right! Now Arthur was bruised and had one or two broken ribs. He also suspected that the suspiciously wet feeling on his side was blood from a stab wound. He was in bad shape with no one to help.

The couple of Knights he had brought with him had been slaughtered. The only reason why he was alive was because the filthy brutes wanted gold. In the state that his father was in he suspected the gold would be handed over far too quickly, without thought to see if the Prince was alive or not. His father's mind was too delicate right now to take the loss of another child.

He dreaded the consequences. His other Knights and friends wouldn't suspect anything wrong until tomorrow, because he had said he would be back by then. Even at that time they would just assume that he had been held back and wouldn't come looking for him until the day after.

By then he was sure the bandits would have moved out of this area. They were at this very moment going over their plans of how to ask Uther for the gold. Arthur was sat in the middle like a prize trophy. It also meant that, unfortunately, the Prince couldn't work on any way out of his ties because he would be seen by the bandits since he was seated right in the middle.

As the bandits continued their laughter, merriment, and plans Arthur felt a weird sensation pass through his body. Confused Arthur focused on the feeling trying to figure out what it was. He felt a strange pull, a sort of connection and then all of a sudden in a whirlwind a figure stood in front of him.

Shocked, Arthur stared up at the figure. Whoever it was wore a worn down brown cloak with a hood that entirely covered up their face. But he could discern familiar blue eyes before the cloaked figure turned around abruptly to face the bandits.

The men around him were just rousing from their shocked stupor and picking up their swords. However, none of them moved, the leader courageously stepped forward and asked, "What do you want? Have you come here to save the Prince?"

The cloaked figure spoke in a low, controlled voice that had a cool intonation, "Leave at once and I will spare you."

The leader looked at him and then laughed before saying, "You can't do anything to us. We outnumber you. You may have some magic but it will do you no good. We've faced sorcerers before and come out the victor each time!"

The cloaked figure, who Arthur decided was male because of the voice, spoke, "I am not like other sorcerers. I'll give you one more chance to leave this place."

Arthur watched the scene ahead of him in shocked silence. His thoughts returned to the blue eyes he had spotted just before the sorcerer had turned away. For some reason Arthur couldn't get rid of those eyes, they reminded him of Merlin.

But that was ridiculous! Merlin couldn't be the sorcerer. However, the stranger's voice, though different, sounded familiar.

The Prince jolted out of his thoughts as the sorcerer muttered words and fireballs started shooting out of his hands. The fight had begun. It had been barely a minute of fighting and half of the bandits were already lying all over the forest floor.

However, this only angered the others who kept coming. There was one that suddenly tried to reach out and yank Arthur backwards as leverage but the sorcerer had caught him. The sorcerer turned and in the morning light the Prince saw blue eyes turn molten gold as the bandit was thrown off by an invisible force.

The Prince was shocked further. The man had uttered no words. Then once more an invisible force went out like a wave around the sorcerer and a couple of the men were thrown backwards. This it seemed had caught the attention of the leader and he called for his men to regroup and to not move.

He held his sword defensively against his body as he spoke, "Why are you protecting someone that would see you dead if he knew who you were?"

Arthur was curious about that as well. So he waited attentively for the answer, but it never came instead the sorcerer only said, "You can leave now. As you can see, you and your men are no match for me."

Arthur saw the leader tense in anger and madly charge at the sorcerer. Some part of his mind that wasn't shocked realized the stupidity of such a move.

He heard the sorcerer give a quiet and resigned sigh as once again an invisible force pushed the leader back. Before any of the other bandits could make a move, the sorcerer raised his hand to the sky and Arthur saw clouds starting to gather. A bolt of lightning guided by the sorcerer's hand landed right in front of the remaining bandits.

Arthur was surprised further. The sorcerer had used no words and could control the weather! He felt slight droplets of rain starting to fall around him. The bandits looked around in shock and then turned to the sorcerer in fear. They started to back away the leader doing the same.

Arthur expected the sorcerer to kill them where they stood but he did no such thing. The sorcerer stood protectively in front of Arthur and watched the remaining 10 or so bandits run for their lives. Around that same time the rain also abruptly stopped and the sun was shining across the area once more.

Once again his belief system had been shaken not only had a sorcerer saved the Prince, he had done so without utterly slaughtering all of the bandits. The bandits probably deserved to be killed so why hadn't the sorcerer, who could clearly have done it without even lifting a finger, killed them?

He then looked around at the damage and started slightly when the sorcerer spoke, "They are alive, badly injured but alive. I don't like killing unnecessarily. They would have died, however, had I been at full strength. Lucky for them I am a little unwell."

Arthur's eyes widened as he stared at the sorcerer, "This was you a little unwell...?"

The sorcerer turned around and again Arthur caught blue eyes before the hood covered up the sorcerer's features. The sorcerer only softly stated, "We need to get you back. You'll need Gaius to look you over."

Arthur was shocked again, "How do you know my physician? Who are you? Why did you help me? Do I know you?"

Arthur felt more than saw the sorcerer's surprise and expected silence as his answer but the sorcerer replied, "My name is Emrys. I helped you because I believe you to be different from your father. I know your physician because I'm from Camelot. I'm there to help keep you safe."

Arthur blinked confused, "Keep me safe? You're not making any sense. How come you've never been caught?"

The sorcerer simply replied, "I'm good at staying hidden. I apologize but I do not have time to answer all of your questions. Some day you will know all Arthur, but not now. Besides you're hurt."

With that the sorcerer moved forward to assist Arthur to his feet. The Prince was shocked to realize that he trusted the sorcerer not to harm him and even allowed the assistance. The ropes that were tied around him loosened and fell away at a few whispered words from Emrys.

The Prince was just about to ask how they were going to head back to the citadel when he felt the curious sensation of feeling himself fade. He blinked and looked around to see that they had arrived at the edge of the woods that surrounded the castle. The fortress itself loomed over them.

Arthur was also shocked to see Lancelot and Gwaine making their way towards them. Arthur had one arm on the shoulders of the sorcerer and one of the sorcerer's hands was wrapped around the Prince's waist while the other was clutching on to the Prince's hand that was across the sorcerer's shoulders.

Since Arthur was so heavily leaning on Emrys it gave the Prince a feeling that Emrys was quite bony and thin. Once again Merlin's name and image crossed the Prince's mind.

Arthur shook his head but stopped at the softly voiced question from Emrys, "Are you alright my Lord?"

"I'm fine. Do you know my Knights as well? How did they know we would be here?"

The sorcerer said nothing as both Lancelot and Gwaine came up to them. Both the Knights took Arthur by one arm and Lancelot nodded at the sorcerer who nodded back.

Then Emrys muttered some words and vanished into thin air. Leaving Arthur with unanswered questions and a terrible gut instinct that kept telling the Prince that Emrys and Merlin were the same people.

A/N: That's all folks! I know I ended it pretty badly, but I'll see if I want to continue it or not. I think it'll depend on the amount of reviews I get. I had been planning to leave it here from the start actually. I was going to leave it to you guys to imagine what happens next.

Anyways, if the response for the story is good then I might continue and add a chapter or two. But for now I'm going to concentrate on "Bonds of Destiny". Hope you enjoyed the story and I apologize for any errors in grammar etc. Please review with your feedback!