Royal Pain in the Posterior

[Arthur Pendragon]

Arthur was continuing to follow the trail of destruction! From fallen fruit and vegetables, to random trinkets, to . . . a sea of fabrics? Arthur did not stop once to help any of them, mostly because he was trying to calm his dogs down. And nothing seemed to be working. They were only getting more hyped up, and Merlin was only getting further and further. When he suddenly heard the loud barking in the distance though, Arthur knew something was not right. He quickened his pace to see one of his dogs behind the pile of wood that seemed to come out of no where, while the other continued to race ahead, clearly just missing the block by a couple of inches. The dog left behind was not very happy, and he just kept barking in frustration of course. Arthur crouched down next to him, patting his neck in attempt to calm him down.

He looked ahead, trying to determine how much distance was between the other canine and Merlin. This wasn't good at all! A patrolling knight came to see what the commotion was about, and Arthur quickly told him to restrain his dog. With at least one down, Arthur began to stumble over the pile of wood. It was not easy, but not impossible and when he was finally at the other side, began to ran ahead once again. Only this time, he had no idea what direction his dog and Merlin had run towards. Taking a completely wild guess, he just kept moving ahead, calling out his animal's name. This was just getting ridiculous. On the bright side, at least his pets were getting plenty of exercise. And Merlin was learning all about discipline. The thought of that alone brought a smile to the Prince's face as he continued to move ahead.

Maybe he should call out to the dog who could actually reply. "Merlin!" Arthur shouted, trying to get his attention. Alright, so calling Merlin a dog was a bit of an insult . . . to Arthur's pet dogs that is. "MERLIN!" He said, once again. The fun chase would have to come to an end soon, but the fun part of blaming his servant for the mess he made in the city was going to bring about a whole new element of fun!

[pie]

Merlin nearly breathed in relief when one dog was stopped by the barrier of wood -- ONE?! The second dog had got past just in time to avoid the falling wood! Cursing silently to himself, Merlin turned on his heels and began to run off once more, praying that his pause hadn't cause him too much precious time. Time that he could use to live instead!

He couldn't use magic again to attempt to stop the dog. Not with Arthur so close in witnessing-range. Besides, if he paused to try, and failed, he wouldn't have any more time to run, to escape. Therefore, that was out of the question. He'd have to hope he'd come across something that he could use to distract the dog, or that Arthur would be able to stop it.

He rounded a corner, and than another one shortly after, trying to lose the dog in a complicated patter of different paths. It failed, however, and the dog stayed quickly behind on his heels. It did seem, though, that he had lost the Prince... something he had not wanted! Arthur was the only one who could stop the dog. If he wasn't around, how could he do that?!

"Sirrrrre!" he cried, hoping that Arthur could hear him! He hadn't heard the Prince's calls, or he would have responded, even gone back towards him if he could. Oh, why did he have to let his big mouth get him into these sort of situations? Even if he didn't respect the man himself, he should have at least pretended he did! That way he wasn't punished by having dogs chase him!! Exercise... Well, they were getting plenty to last a week! A month even! And if something didn't happen soon, he was going to climb on a roof or a merchant stand or something!

[Arthur Pendragon]

Arthur did hear Merlin call out to him . . . in a rather pathetic voice. But at least he was using proper titles now. Yes. That was what Arthur was thinking about. Not the fact that he potentially terrified his new servant, but rather, despite everything, he should be -- and still was -- using the appropriate title to address him with. Arthur followed the sound of his voice, and as corny as that sounded . . . it was literally what he would have to do to find his servant and make him do something more useful. Because clearly, running for your life was a waste of time. Running for his life while polishing his armor would be better. Hmm. Arthur wondered if this Merlin person was any good at multitasking. He would find out soon enough with all the chores he was planning to dump on him.

Unfortunately, while Arthur heard Merlin's voice, so did his dog who was a highly trained hunting dog. The canine also followed the sound of Merlin's voice. Soon, the animal caught the servant in his sights, just as Arthur stepped forward to see both his dog and the lesser intelligent being. "Don't move!" Arthur warned Merlin, acting as if his very life depended on remaining completely still in this moment. As if his dog was going to rip him to shreds if he decided to run again -- when in reality, none of this was true. Arthur just did not want to keep chasing after Merlin, and it was always fun to see what sort of last minute fear he could instill into his servant. "Stay very still," he added his voice dead serious, holding his hand out as a cautionary gesture. He was behind his dog, who was in the middle and in front of the animal, was Merlin.

Arthur did not command his dog to do anything though, and the canine was far too excitable to just stand there. So, in one quick moment, it raced towards Merlin, leaping into him . . . . . . . and started licking his face. This action made Arthur smile, not because it was a sweet little scene. But because he was rather proud of himself for having made his dogs out to be vicious killers, when they knew better than to attack another human being without cause. They only reacted to threats, and hell . . . Merlin couldn't even look threatening to something as small as a fly. So all that running for nothing. How immensely amusing and hilarious that was.