fh_trips | Arrakis - Sietch Tabr - Wednesday Morning & Afternoon

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field trip 2009: arrakis

Arrakis - Sietch Tabr - Wednesday Morning & Afternoon

It was around dawn when the scent of food began wafting up from the kitchens. Fresh baked bread, coffee, and the lilting tones of Fremen chattering in a mixture of Galach and Chakobsa as they went about their lives.

If they were a bit more outgoing and less-wary of the visitors than they had been the day before, well, going out into the desert to meet with Shai-Hulud had shown a certain daring and respect, and those were two traits that the Fremen held very dear.

The portal would arrive to pick them all up around three, but until then, the visitors from Fandom had the run of Tabr.

Although it still didn't make you safe from the Aunties.

[OCD UP]

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Dinah's heart lurched. Because she was pretty sure he was lying, or he was keeping something back, and either way (this couldn't end well) - either way she couldn't quit now.

"So he was faking it? And the evil witch was lying? And you..." She bit her lip. "You didn't kill her?"

"Nimueh," Merlin corrected quietly. He shifted to find a more comfortable position. "What exactly did you see?"

"Nimueh." It was important to know the names of people who died. She was always sorry she didn't know the names of the two alien soldiers she'd had to kill. "I saw..." Dinah closed her eyes, partly to hide from Merlin (and why was she scared again? she didn't want to be, why was she?), partly to bring the memory into sharper focus.

"You got there, and Gaius was slumped against the altar, and she-- Nimueh-- had a chalice in her hand. She acted surprised you'd come back, but I don't think she was?" Dinah frowned, the dream's details sharper than her own memories. "And you asked her what she'd done, and she said, a life for a life." Dinah gulped. "No, first that your mom was safe. And wasn't that what you wanted?" And another detail came back, one she hadn't shared with Arthur. "You said you were trading your life for Arthur's, not anyone else's, and she, she..." Dinah hugged herself, shaking her head, face crumpling at Merlin's remembered emotions and how she would have felt if it had been her mom, her friend. "She cheated. She said Gaius was willing and that's the way the Old Magic worked."

"Gaius was willing," Merlin said, arms on his knees now. "And I did try to trade my life for Arthur's."

Because, clearly those were details that she needed.

"That sort of magic is--there is always a price for life."

Gaius deserved a huge hug, if she ever met him. Because that was... yeah. The same way Merlin deserved a hug now, and she wanted to, and then the rest of the dream caught up with Dinah, and she demanded, "Why didn't you run? She was going to kill you!" Anger throttling down fear for the moment, Dinah said, "I saw her throw the fire at you, and felt you collapse and you weren't breathing there for a minute Merlin and--" She flailed. "Back up! Getting help! Why didn't you do that? Why?"

Merlin stared at her for a long moment. "There was no back up, Dinah. There is me and them. And when it comes down to it, I'd rather it simply be me."

Dinah flinched back. She didn't mean to. She didn't think about it, she just pulled back, and-- "Yeah. I saw."

"If I had let her live, all she would have done is return to attack Camelot again," Merlin replied tightly. "Or put Arthur in danger again. I won't allow that."

"I don't--" Dinah hugged herself, rocking a little, and said, "She scared me. What I saw of her, in your dream. Badly. She reminded me of--" She cleared her throat. "Someone I met once." She shook her head, looking away, still wanting to cry. "I know you had to do something to her. Maybe you even had to kill her, I don't know, I don't know anything else about her, but she seemed-- really evil." Then she looked at Merlin, and finally blurted it out: "But you scared me too, Merlin. Not the power. You."

She was something like what Merlin felt he could have been in another place.

"Because I killed her?"

Dinah nodded, then shook her head, then put her head in her hands. "Partly. I think? But, it was more than that. You were so cold, Merlin. Not like you. Not like the person I know."

"I'm simply--me. It hasn't come up here like it does in Camelot."

Dinah stared at him, then said, "So this happens a lot? No questions? Someone threatens Arthur with magic, and you just-- kill them?"

And she'd called him the Secret Service guy, but she'd been thinking how he'd saved Arthur's life and gotten his job as a manservant and not-- "Wait. Is this what happened when you saved Arthur's life the first time?"

"She was going to kill him."

"I got that part," Dinah said, half-sharp, half-upset, because yeah, that wasn't a fun thought either. "I did, I mean, I understand it. That's not-- I'm not questioning that, okay?" Her breath hitched. "I don't know what I'm questioning!" she burst out. "Or why you-- why this scares me so much. It's not like it's really news, that sorcerors try to kill people in Camelot."

"They try, yes." And he stopped them. Every bloody time. "And people try to kill them as well. It's not like Fandom, Dinah. Things do not end neatly. If I was discovered, my head would be on a pike on the ramparts as a warning to anyone who wanted to practice even the most harmless of magics."

Dinah was noting that, and some part of her brain was thinking Hmmm and also wait and also you need to think about what this means exactly but another part was too upset to process the implications yet.

"If-- if I'd thrown something at Arthur? Or lost my temper and picked him up, and shook him sometime, way back when?" Dinah was watching him now, more carefully than she wanted to. "Would you have-- what would you have done to me?"

Merlin looked down for a moment. "I would have stopped you."

"Stopped-- stopped how? Called a teacher?" Dinah hated that her voice sounded like she was going to cry. "Gotten Arthur a sword? Talked to me?"

"It would depend on what you did," He said carefully. "But you're not a killer. It isn't that sort of worry."

Unless she made it one.

"Guess we're both lucky, then, hunh." She knew she was too upset to make sense of this, but there were too many things scaring her about Merlin right now. Even while she still wanted to hug him, how weird was that? "Or maybe just me?" Was that fair, or unfair? She couldn't even tell. "I'm sorry. This is all beyond me. And I did kill someone once, Merlin, so it's not just that."

It wasn't the same thing.

"I understand." Kinda.

Dinah nodded, then said, "You're still my friend. You are," she said fiercely, as much to herself as him. "I just have to think about this. Figure out how to be okay with it. Somehow."

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Arrakis - Sietch Tabr - Wednesday Morning & Afternoon

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