Board Thread:What If?/@comment-5674726-20141111204657/@comment-5674726-20141112213628

Merlin was in a truly awful position in The Poisoned Chalice.

If he was right about Arthur's goblet being poisoned, he would die but if there was no poison, he'd have to face Bayard's wrath for accusing him of trying to kill Arthur. It was a bad move on Uther's part to put him in that position as it would serve as quite a deterrent for other servants if they had cause to suspect that somebody was trying to poison Uther, Arthur or Morgana. Why speak up if it's a lose-lose situation for them?

In the short term, Merlin's fate would depend on how angry Bayard was with him and how far he was prepared to go in terms of punishing him. Uther gave him a free hand. It may have meant a spell in the stocks for Merlin, he might have been executed, flogged, had his tongue cut out for making a false accusation against a lord, etc. Arthur would probably have tried to intervene if he felt that the punishment was overly harsh but there would be a limit to what he could do without jeopardizing the fragile peace between Camelot and Mercia, and a war between the two kingdoms would cost many more lives than just Merlin's. If Merlin was very lucky, Bayard might decide to let him off the hook as a diplomatic gesture.

If Bayard was prepared to be lenient with Merlin, there would still be a longterm impact. Arthur wouldn't have taken the huge step of defying his father in order to save the life of a servant and he also wouldn't have seen Merlin be proved right about the threat to his life. Uther could also have decided that Merlin was unfit to be Arthur's manservant after the way he jeopardized the peace treaty, which would have had a major impact.