The Royal Scandal *Book Two*

Damage Control S2 E5

The morning after the whole mirror, window, T-R-O-L-L incident, I was wandering around the castle, humming quietly to myself, not really knowing what to do with myself. It was just one of those days where I was a bit in my own little world. But it seemed like someone was about to present me with a very important task, drawing me away from my dreamworld.

"You need to talk to Gaius," Merlin said, as he started walking alongside me in an empty corridor.

I turned and looked at him in confusion, having not heard him coming up behind me. Once most of the confusion had passed, my mind registered what he had just said.

"Why? What's wrong?" I asked.

"Well, I told Gaius about the whole t-r-o-l-l thing and he's going to tell Uther about everything he knows," Merlin explained, causing me to stop in my tracks and turn my whole body to face him.

"You mean to say that Gaius is about to tell my father that his new lady friend's a troll?" I asked.

"That's exactly what he's gonna do," Merlin nodded.

Oh, God. This was not going to go well.

Luckily, I already knew where my father was as I had passed him on my little stroll, luckily managing to sneak around him so he wouldn't see me and try to talk to me. So with this knowledge, we would hopefully be able to get to him before Gaius did. Also I would probably need to come up with a way to distract my father. About a million different things ran through my mind. But in my head I fixated on one.

I would just say or do something that would cause my father to give me one of his lengthy lectures and then I could attempt to walk away from him, making him follow me and then Merlin would distract Gaius. It was a fault proof plan. Well, it would have been if we could've actually put it into action.

When we arrived at the place my father was when I last saw him, Gaius was already a couple feet away from him and there would have been no time to stop him. So we decided to listen in on this tragedy that was inevitably about to happen.

Merlin and I subtly poked our heads around the corner, staying out of their view as we were pretty close to them now. My father was looking at something or someone out the window so I glanced out of it and saw 'Lady Catrina' walking down the stairs outside, making me roll my eyes.

"My Lord," Gaius began, giving father a short bow.

"Yes, Gaius," he replied, barely acknowledging that Gaius was there. He truly was captivated by this woman, well, troll.

"I have served you for many years now. I like to think that in my humble capacity I have advised you to the best of my ability, and that my advice has proven to be of value to you," Gaius said.

"Yes, this is true," father agreed, still looking out the window.

"And so I must advise you that Lady Catrina is not all she seems to be," Gaius said.

I started to nibble nervously on my bottom lip as I watched the scene slowly unfold.

"Oh, then tell me, Gaius. Who is she?" father asked, slowly turning to face Gaius.

"I believe her to be..." Gaius trailed off, struggling to find the words. "She's... she's..."

"Oh, come on. Out with it," father encouraged, frowning impatient.

"She is a troll, sire," Gaius said bluntly.

Beside me Merlin sniggered quietly, making Gaius glance over at us but not before we hid behind the wall. Merlin was leaning up against the wall and seemed to be unable to control his laughter as he covered his mouth with his hand.