The Royal Scandal *Book One*

A Ticking Time Bomb S1 E7

💚 Edited--02.07.2020 💚

Since Sophia and Aulfric arrived, Arthur has been missing more and more of his duties. Just this morning, he had missed the bestowing of a Knighthood to one of Father's most loyal men. Clearly, Father was not happy about that and when Merlin tried to cover up for Arthur, he ended up in the stocks, again.

Luckily he was only in them for an hour before Father sent me down to get him released.

"You know, I think your Father likes me," Merlin said, as we walked back to Gaius'. Merlin was still covered in rotten veg so was smelling pretty bad.

"Do you really?" I asked smirking.

"Yeah, I mean, he could do a lot worse to me than the stocks, but he hasn't," Merlin said smiling.

"No, it's just it's a lot of paperwork to sign. And being the lazy man he is, he doesn't want to have to do that," I told him.

"Oh. Well, progress is being made," Merlin countered.

We arrived at Gaius' and walked straight in. As soon as he saw Merlin, he sighed.

"Not again, Merlin, surely," he said, looking up from his book.

"You would think that the appeal of pelting the same person with fruit would wear off after a while, but, oh, no," Merlin said, walking over to a bowl of water.

"It's probably the only exciting thing to do while waiting to hear about your Princes whereabouts," I sighed, helping Merlin get some tomato out of his hair.

"Yes, I heard that Arthur wasn't at the knighting ceremony," Gaius said.

"Yeah, he wanted to make the most of his time left with Sophia," Merlin said.

"So you helped him," Gaius predicted.

"I'm his servant. I had to," Merlin replied, washing down his face.

"That isn't exactly true. He gave you the option, although he did make Merlin feel guilty with how he phrased it. Anyway, if you ask me, I can't wait for Sophia and her Father to leave; there's something strange about them," I said, sitting on the table.

"Yeah, well, they'll be gone soon so you needn't have to worry," Merlin said, smiling up at me.

"I'm going to have to agree with you there, Chelsea. I fear that Sophia may not be all that she seems," Gaius told us, getting Merlin's full attention.

"Why?" He asked.

I noticed that he had a bit of food behind his ear so I got up and went to help him.

"What do you know about seers?" Gaius asked us, as I took the wet cloth from Merlin's hand.

"Not much. They're supposed to be able to see the future like prophets," Merlin tried to remember.

I grabbed his hand and pulled him to sit down so I could get better access to all of that manky food.

"It's said to be an innate ability. Those who have it are born that way. Some aren't even aware that what they see is the future. It comes to them in their dreams," Gaius explained, as I dabbed slightly at Merlin's face. Something about that scenario sounded so familiar.

"What's this got to do with Sophia?" Merlin asked.

"It's not Sophia, is it? It's Morgana?" I asked Gaius. When Merlin looked at me confused, I explained in more detail. "Morgana has these dreams, nightmares actually, and Gaius has been giving her sleeping draughts for as long as I can remember really."

"Exactly. The night before Sophia and Aulfric came to Camelot, Morgana had a dream. Sophia was in it," Gaius told us, causing me to pause what I was doing and look over at Gaius. Merlin's reaction was pretty similar as he stared at Gaius, wide eyed.