Sorry about the long wait - I've been having trouble writing this. I know where I want to go with this story, just not sure how to write it. Not exactly happy with this chapter, I planned to make it longer but I felt like I owed it to you lovely readers to get it up. Hopefully I can get the next chapter up soon, since it was meant to be part of this one... ta again for reviews. question: would you like me to leave translations of the magicy language at the bottom of the chapter?

Sneak attacks and being stupidly annoying.

After they finished swimming they began to drudge back to the camp, chatting to each other. Suddenly Merlin stopped, turning her head to the side staring off into the bushes. She thought she had seen a flash of colour. Continuing on, she amplified all her senses, feeling like something was off. She heard a rustle in the above trees, too big for birds.

She stopped dead and hissed "Shhhhh!" Arthur barely glanched her way, so she illiterated her warning "Shut up you lot!" Holding out her hand in a halting signal.

Arthur thought, 'oh so he does know hand signals, he just chooses to ignore mine.'

"Merlin, you don't tell me to shut up, I tell you to shut up."

"Not when there's something wrong. Don't make this one of those moment where I tell you something's wrong, you ignore me, and something turns out wrong" the boy whispered kind of frantically.

"Merlin, I count my sense better than yours and there is nothing amiss."

Famous last words.

Bandits leaped down from the trees and from behind rocks, trunks and heavy foliage. The men yelled, alerting the knights of their presence as if there had been any doubt. The Knights were outnumbered five to one, odds that even may have perturbed Gwaine, maybe just a little. They moved into a tight defensive stance, Merlin being slightly on the outside.

"Well Sire, I think we have found the group of hostile bandits" Sir Leon stated obviously, and if Merlin didn't know better she might have thought his tone held a hint of irony.

The fight was on. The men clad only in light chainmail charged, the opposing force coming to meet them head on. Weapons clashed and banged. Merlin watched sharp and blunted blades swing, hands wielding knives and even a man hefting a heavy hammer, which brought painful recollections to mind for Merlin.

"Arthur, watch out!" Merlin yelled as a large man snuck up behind him whilst he fought off another. The King swung his sword around in a wide ark, hitting the other bandit to the ground.

"Merlin, move!" Arthur's attention temporarily focused on his manservant who had debatably saved his life, before he turned back to defeat another attacker.

Merlin ducked out of the way of the weapon coming towards her head. "Astice!" The man flew backwards into a tree, as the young Witches eyes glowed gold.

A man came at Gwaine knife in hand, the rugged Knight distracted not yet noticing the trouble. Merlin ran towards him and tackled the man spectacularly, yelling "Forþ fleoge!". The man fell down knocked out. In Gwaine's eyes, however the tackle looked more like a fast paced yet fortunate fall into the enemy, whilst yelling nonscence but none the less had prevented a potential stab wound. Gwaine winked at the clumsy village lad, before re-joining the battle with Percival, who clunking people on the head with sickening crunch sounds that made Merlin wince in pity for the receiver of such brutal methods.

"Feall hushefen." The girls eyes were glowing as tree branches fell randomly and men tripped over tree roots, that they could have sworn were not there before.

Merlin kept an eye on all of the Knights, who she had come to consider friends, some maybe even as brothers, but of course her soul attention was always Arthur.

"Ahatian!" A blade a man held grew absurbly hot, glowing red and he dropped it. Arthur stabbed the man, not noticing the magical assistance. Despite their current predicament, the raven haired girl couldn't help but roll her eyes. Being distracted, protecting others where she could, she forgot about herself. She felt a cold blade kiss against her throat.

"Stop…" the man who held the knife commanded, "or I will kill the boy." The five men of Camelot sourced the voice of command to rest their eyes on the slightly struggling body of their friend who hid his fear behind a mask of defiance. The fighting almost immediately halted.

"Merlin!" Arthur shouted, part way out of concern for his friend and the other out of expiration that his idiot manservant. Was it too much to ask that the useless boy at least keep himself out of trouble?

The middle aged man, who shared a likeness with of an old ragged wolf with his grisly grey beard, was what appeared to be the leader of the renegade group.

"Lay down your swords" he commanded. Arthur did not.

"Do it or I will slit the little pretty boys throat" he barked, pressing the blade harder against Merlins skin so a line of red blood seeped.

Arthur slowly began to lower his sword to the ground – thank goodness the sword wasn't Excalibur, he had chosen not to bring it on this 'hunting trip' – his Knights following suit.

"No, Athur don't!" Merlin exclaimed. 'Why did he have to be so damn noble? Always trying to save his royal backside and then he goes and makes himself venerable for the likes of me?'

"Shut it boy" wolf man said, kneeing Merlin in the lower back. Merlin sharply exhaled, eyes watering.

"Don't touch him!" The King shouted angrily. Merlin may be useless and the worst excuse for a manservant ever, but admittedly the boy did mean a great deal to him.

Merlin stared around desperately and wildly trying to think of a way to get them out of this situation with revealing her magic or causing any harm to come to her friends. It almost seemed like a hopeless case. She would have to see how it played out before pulling out the big cards.

"You have not right to do this. I am the King of Camelot."

"Oh, I know"

"Who are you and what do you want with us?"

"I am Terrowin, leader of this group. I can't well tell you that, it would ruin the surprise. First of all though I want you to comply to our wills."

"What if we refuse?"

"Well we might just find that my hand slips. Is your common little servant's life worth anything to you, because in the case I don't think you are in a position to refuse?"

Arthur slightly and grudgingly nodded, assuring the bandit the advantage he held.

"Right then, I want you on your knees, hands behind back. All of you."

Arthur and the Knights began to do so, thus proving that she did mean something to him after all, although he would never admit. Whilst she was gratified by the gesture she however could not stand the sight of her King kneeling in front of these filthy excuses for humans. So she impulsively and probably not very wisely kicked Terrowin as hard as she could in the shin. He yelped and in surprise dropped her to the ground, and she began to scramble over to Arthur. It was irrational thought but somehow been closer to him, she imagined she could protect him better. The leader quickly regained his composure though and strode over to the boy of the ground, where he repaid him in kind by kicking the insolent boy in the side, knocking him to the ground. The knights all yelled in protest. They hated seeing their friend – despite how stupidly brave his actions often were – being treated in such a brutal way. Merlin provoked an odd sense of both protectiveness and reliance in each of them like one would feel for a younger –albeit more vulnerable – sibling. With Merlin and the Knights at their mercy, wolf man gestured for other bandits to come in and take their weapons away and tie their hands tightly behind their backs with rope. Merlin was dragged up and felt the same thing happen to her.

"Good, now that's sorted let's get the prisoners back to base. I'm sure a certain person will be very happy to see them." The bandits made sounds of agreement and triumph whilst he shot the group a vile wolfish grin.

Arthur gritted his teeth at the use of the word prisoner and wondered who could this person was that would be 'happy' to see them. Maybe Terrowin wasn't the boss after all. They were forced to their feet and made to walk lead by men who held their arms tightly to prevent escape. Merlin was a bit sore and wobbly on her feet after such harsh treatment and her captor was a big smelly brute who had clearly never heard of a bath. Merlin stumbled slightly and she was yanked up, the man clearly not impressed with her clumsiness. Being attacked, tied up and lead around was degrading and she couldn't stand it, it was annoying and simply rude. Noting her captor's annoyance at her she smiled deviously. Her plan may not be the smartest, well actually quite stupid but oh well.

'What on earth could Merlin be smiling about?' Arthur pondered, as he saw the servant trip and fall once again, for about the sixth time. Without his hands he was even more clumsy than usual.

'Oh' Gwaine was the quickest to catch on to Merlins joke. Merlin wasn't being clumsy accidently, he was doing it purposely to irritate her guard. He was protesting in the only way he could. He had to admire Merlins audacity to be a smart arse even in the most dire of events.

Whilst is was kind of funny, Leon thought, the lad was playing a dangerous game.

'Stop tripping you clumsy oath! You can't get away.' The man scolded, growing very tired of the continuous tripping, falling, pulling, dragging, pushing and yanking routine.

Elyan observed the man was starting to get very shirty with Merlins deliberate antics now.

"I can't well help it you know. My hands are tied behind my back so it's hard to keep balance…. especially when your horrific stench is driving me to distraction!" Merlin said in a petulant voice, in a tone reserved for speaking to a simpleton.

Percival gapped. Merlin attitude at the wrong time to the wrong person strongly suggested he lacked any self-preservation skills.

"That's it boy!" Merlins captor thumped heron the head, knocking her clean out. He then proceeded to swing her light weight body of his shoulder to carry the prisoner the rest of the way.

Arthur quite simply thought 'ouch'.

Review Replies - Hey guys, haven't done this before but I felt a little rude leaving questions unanswered. If you read on (when there is something to read on to) all will be answered, but here are some hints to tide you over until I get my lazy backside into gear.

NamikazeMia - Thankyou for being my first reviewer! I feel for Merlin in the show, but hopefully he/she feels like shes made up for it in the end and arthur understands.

Little Karma - will work on making chapters longer, thanks for the advice.

question: would you guys like shorter, more regular updates or longer ones?

review, MegamiTenshiHime, IreneGypsy - Don't worry, Merlins true identity as a girl will be revealed sometime honestly, just hold tight, i will be updating as soon as possible :)

Saroura92- the boys definitely can't do anything else but that, if they didn't have merlin it would be utter chaos - more than it already is that is :P

Yami-Chan-123 - oh there will be some serious BAMF fem merlin, and some definite revelations and shocks for the boys.

nyxaurora - yay! you got the punny title. 10 points to gryffindor.

DemonVampireGoddess, Guest, femfan and everyone else - thanks for your kind words of support :D

Irene (Cara) - you review/message made me ridiculously happy. Always glad to find a fellow, DW, TW, Merlin, Sherlock fan (or in my case obsessive fanatic). I live in Qld. Sorry to hear about Irene the bird, but really it is ironic. I have a friend who name her fish sherlock, who jumped out of his tank, but although sad, we did have a little turn over the irony. I love molly hopper, i wish sherlock was nicer to her. For some reason I have this weird ship in my mind of molly and pc andy (from TW). crazy hey? all my animals are named after characters too :D anyways, just talking randomly here, so excited to have met some that feels the way i do - two sides of the same coin, tehe :) doctor who is back soon! fangirl squeee!