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Merlin was content.Which is a complete and utter lie.Merlin wants to be content. Complacent of a life utterly alone until humanity itself dies. Because his fate, his destiny, was also a complete lie. His family, his friends died for nothing while he was punished with living on after them, clinging to the hope that he would ever see them again, in life or in death.Oceans rose and empires fell. Plagues ravaged. People grew ignorant. World wars passed.Arthur never came.Albion was bombed to near oblivion and Arthur never came.  People were dying and suffering and crying for the promise that had long gone broken, and Merlin waited, but there was nothing from Avalon. Nothing from the lake.His entire existence was a joke and Merlin wished that he could throttle that stupid dragon for ever telling him he was important. But he is entirely alone with no one to hate but himself for falling for pipe dreams.His heart hurt for his mother. For Gaius and Lancelot and Guinevere. For Arthur.He could barely leave his flat even on the days that didn’t plagued him with taunting memories, other than to travel mindlessly to Avalon, a three-day trip by train from the town that had once been Ealdor, slowly becoming part of the city to the north, sucking all the love that Merlin remembered from it away forever.Most times, Merlin didn’t understand why he made himself travel to the shores. He just felt numb and stupid when he came back, unrequited, and still nothing changed. Other times, he thinks that his loneliness overcomes him enough that he wants to go back to his friends, the only people he loved.He most often felt his loneliness on the anniversary of Gwen’s death. Many, many years after Arthur’s, but the anniversary dates only days apart.Merlin hated the time of year.Summer finally releasing its grip as fall slides into its place, the leaves turning burnt orange and red, and the sun always golden in the sky. How dare the world forget to mourn, Merlin thought. How dare it become beautiful and bright when the last true light died in his arms.“I hate you.” He said toward the island, the only thing left for him to shout at once even the Sidhe had died, finally, in the 18th century. “You promised me everything and I have nothing.”He stood at the shore, looking out at the island in utter agony as the beautiful sun shone on, mocking and ignorant. “You give me a gift and tell me to protect him and then let him die!”Still, Avalon gives him no answer, and he grows angrier at it, and himself, because nothing has changed for centuries and centuries and he hates that he still hopes that it will. That the promise he had been given might be fulfilled. It fills him with rage.“Take it back,” he seethes through clenched teeth, hot tears racing down his face and hatred consuming his soul. He digs his nails into the palms of his hands so deeply, blood drips from the curves onto the cursed ground. “If you won’t honor your promise, take it back and let me die.”The waters lap at the land peacefully, and still nothing responds.“Take the magic back!”Never had the air around him roared so loudly or intensely as when the last remnants of Avalon’s power struck out at him with full force and seeped into his skin, through every nerve and muscle fiber, until he was in its clutch completely. At first it felt like the warmth of an infant’s first blanket, then Avalon pressed in on every one of Merlin’s bones and organs until he felt he might collapse and be crushed in its grip.He thought he might finally die.His throat burned as he found himself unable to breath and his pulse thundered in his ears until it could no longer keep up the pace and began to slow. Avalon was drowning him in its power, and Merlin was helpless to its whims, merely a pawn waiting to be sacrificed.His magic flared in a final defense, against his own wishes, and Avalon clutched at it as well until it submitted to the greater power. Merlin sagged in relief as his magic relented and he waited for Avalon to finish its work and end the charade of him.Instead, as quickly as it could have finally killed him, Avalon ripped itself from Merlin, taking his magic with it instead of his life, stripping every piece of his powers and immortality from him. He could feel his soul tear in half, and he screamed until his voice gave out, even though the raw pain of it still burned through every part of him.He did not see where Avalon took his magic, having collapsed onto the ground, nerves in shock from the inordinate amount of pain that they felt. It was almost too much that they might not have been able to feel anything at all if Avalon had been merciful. But Avalon had no mercy for Merlin, he knew that much.Merlin lay on the shores of Avalon in agonizing pain until the sun had already begun to set, painting the water with the fading colors of the sky, beautifully torturous. Merlin watched the waters, gasping and curling in on himself.A breeze fluttered from the island across his face, and he flinched away, whimpering.We are sorry, Emrys. The voices of a long-silent religion whispered.“You should have killed me.” He gasped, despair filling his lungs instead of air. “If I can’t have anything else, just kill me, please.”He sobbed as the breeze blew over him again, gentle as his mother’s calming caresses, and he cried to the skies for it to stop.
We have not forgotten you, Emrys.
“You lie!” He sobbed, voice breaking in his throat and heart breaking in his chest. “You are still lying!”Avalon went silent, and Merlin cried, pressing his hands to his eyes as ugly sounds escaped from his raw throat. He lay on his back, crying, until he was too weak to even do that, cupping a hand over his mouth and curling onto his side.He cried until he couldn’t breathe because of the hiccupping sobs and fell asleep before he could stop himself, giving in to the blissfulness of a dark, black sleep on the shores of Avalon.~~~~He woke up grumpily to the breezes of Avalon brushing a chill across his skin. His tears had barely dried on his cheeks, and either Avalon had not let him sleep long, or he had cried even in his sleep. He rolled over only enough to peer out at the waters and glare.“Unless you’re ready to finish what I asked you, leave me alone.”
We cannot, Emrys.
“I am not Emrys.” He snarled, and rolled onto his back, arms laid over his eyes, stubborn as a young child. If I was, I would have Arthur, he thought solemnly, sniffling in the following silence.Avalon said nothing to him, only blowing over him in a continuous breeze like a train of thought searching for the right words. Merlin waited, impatiently tapping his foot, for Avalon to make good of its promises and either kill him or give back his friends.You must be patient, Avalon whispered.Fueled by a sudden burst of angry energy, Merlin whipped up and faced the island, poison dripping from his lips. “I have been patient for centuries while you tortured me with the lives of the people I loved.”Albion had no need –“Fuck Albion!” Merlin shouted, “Albion is gone.”The breeze faltered.“It doesn’t need him,” Merlin whispered, voice ragged, dropping his head shamefully as tears raced again down his stained cheeks. “I do.”~~~~Avalon didn’t kill him.Merlin didn’t ask it to again.He sat in silence, staring at the ground while Avalon made sure he knew it was still there with a constant breeze blowing across his face. He supposed it could be pleasant, if he cared enough to enjoy it. Instead, he sat at the shores for hours, stripping grass from around him with sharp tugs.“Am I mortal?” he finally asked, so quietly he could barely hear himself, twisting several strands of grass around his fingers and letting them go, watching the breeze take them away to settle on the water.
Yes, Merlin, you will age.
He chuckled bitterly at the absence of his immortal name, and yanked up more blades of grass.“No more magic?” he taunted, head cocked presumptuously.The breeze paused, as if taking a breath to think, and Merlin glanced up.“I felt you rip it from me.” He said accusingly.The breeze blew more powerfully at him, a sharp reminder of the power he spoke to.We did not take all of it. You still have a destiny, no matter how much you may disagree. The voices chastised sharply in his ear, causing him to flinch into his shoulder.“Fine.” Merlin sighed, looking back down to his hands, the cuts from his nails open and red. He couldn’t heal them with a thought anymore, he realized.“I’m going home.” He sniffled as he stood, breathing out harshly as his throat tightened while he tried to fight tears. “And I’m not coming back here. Ever.”
You will return, Merlin. You cannot fight your destiny.
“Don’t count on it.”

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

Late November, and Merlin was at last in a place that he could look out the windows of his shop without grimacing. He didn’t stare at the ground just to avoid the sight of the leaves slowly changing colors and falling from the trees as he walked the streets.He could breathe.The trees were completely bare now. The clouds had come in, grey and heavy with the coming winter’s snow. The slight chill of autumn had become solid cold, and even if Merlin couldn’t be completely happy, he was more than blindly numb to his surroundings.He finally opened the curtains in the bookshop, basking the shelves in crisp graying light. He even opened a window, taking a moment with his arms raised on the frame to close his eyes and breathe in the cold air. Winter was nice. Winter he could deal with.Merlin loved his shop as much as he could love anything after centuries of losing things, and people, that he had loved. He’d built the frame with his bare hands, and stocked the shelves with their first books, until he’d had to go away to keep up appearances. But the shop would always be there, waiting for him to return after the people he’d left behind were only memories. He could try to keep from getting attached, but the haunting memories of other sorcerers gone mad in loneliness kept him from cutting himself off from others. To stay sane. To stay human.It helped that he was like everyone else now. Mortal.He could stay and run his shop, never having to duck out and leave it to the person he hoped he could trust to keep it going without him. He could make those lasting relationships with those who came into his shop, never saying in the back of his head that one day he would have to leave them, so don’t get too close.The bell to the shop door rang, and Merlin turned to greet the customer, a young boy bundled in a ginormous winter coat and blue ball cap, eagerly bouncing on his toes by the comic counter. Donning a genuine smile at the boy’s enthusiasm, Merlin slid behind the counter.Before Merlin could even ask, the boy was pointing directly at the brand-new Batman. “Can I have this one?”“Of course.” Merlin nodded, crouching down to slide open the glass case of the counter and place the comic in front of the boy, who eyed it urgently. Merlin rang up the comic and watched the boy run out of the shop gleefully, already flipping through the pages as he met up with, presumably, his mother outside.Merlin appreciated the show of pure joy, a lasting smile staying on his lips, but the experience had left him uncomfortably and unexplainably saddened. He refused to delve further into the emotion, already knowing what was waiting for him behind that door.~~~~~Merlin absentmindedly grabbed a nearby pen as he rounded the counter, tapping the end on his palm while strolling around the store. The quiet helped him to clear his mind, his saddened mood slowly leaving him. He righted the occasional stray book, and set aside a few to read for himself.Passing by the nonfiction section, something caught Merlin’s eye in the window.The sound of his pen hitting his palm slowed as he turned to watch the next window, waiting to catch another glimpse, but more hoping that he wouldn’t.Two seconds. Two pen taps.A blonde head sauntered past the window, and Merlin’s breath caught. He knew that cut, that color. He wanted to run to the window and check, but he couldn’t move. He couldn’t believe. He could gaze at the blonde figure until it went out of sight and then he was holding his breath, staring at the next window.It took longer for the man to come by this time, or Merlin was too anxious to be patient. His heart thundered the longer he didn’t breathe.Finally, the blonde figure appeared again in the window. The man had turned more to face in now, and Merlin could see him properly. The line of his jaw, the curve of his lips, the shape of his nose compared to his eyes.The man looked into the shop for a moment through the window.Brown eyes. Not blue.Merlin swore under his breath, throwing his pen across the room. He began pacing, breathing harshly with panic, hands clutched in his hair. Stupid, he chastised himself. Stupid, stupid.He was past this. He was supposed to be past mistaking complete strangers for Arthur.Hot tears ran down his cheeks and Merlin sobbed as he collapsed onto a counter. He couldn’t breathe because it hurt; because there was no hope. The spark that had kindled inside of Merlin for over a thousand years had been doused on the shores of Avalon.Wiping at his eyes, skin hurt and raw, Merlin strode to the shop door, waving his hand over the lock habitually.Nothing happened.Cursing again, Merlin dug the key from his front pocket, fresh tears spilling down the bridge of his nose. There had never been a need for a key before, Merlin tried to reason with himself. Easy mistake.Except it wasn’t.Because he’d asked for this. This kind of life. Magic-less.Merlin turned the key to lock the door with a hard jerk and then threw the key across the counter. It slid until it fell over the edge and clattered onto the floor. Merlin scoffed, but otherwise ignored it as he set the second lock that bolted to the floor, sniffling and wiping at his nose.Finally, after flipping the door sign to closed, Merlin thumped onto the wall and slid down to the floor, hiding his face in his knees with his arms boxed over his head. He breathed harshly, eyes tightly shut, unable to keep from the occasional hiccup or stray whimper and moan.God, this was hard alone, Merlin thought.~~~~~It was stupid, but he didn’t care. He hadn’t thought it through, not even a little.Large calloused hands ran up Merlin’s sides under his shirt, bunching up the fabric at his chest, exposing his skin to the cold. He shivered and his partner laughed, biting sharply at Merlin’s earlobe. Merlin gasped and turned his head to meet lips with the other man, biting softly at his lower lip in retaliation.If Gaius, or Hunith, or, god, Gwen, could see him now, he might have been able to gather up enough self-respect to extract himself from the grasp of the man who was rubbing off against his thigh, but he’d gotten too drunk to care.Too drunk to care that when he ducked down to lick and kiss at Merlin’s stomach, the man could pass for the sturdily-built, blonde-haired nuisance of a person that Merlin wished he really was. Merlin could grip his fingers in that blonde hair and imagine that it was someone else, and that the cold wall of his flat was actually stone and the light from the lamp was a flickering fire burning in a hearth.But then the man stood back up to his full height and the illusion was broken. He was too tall, basically towering over Merlin and his eyes were dark green instead of beautiful blue.His vision blurred for a moment, whether from too much drink or burning tears Merlin would never find out, as his partner ducked his head into Merlin’s neck to start tonguing a mark near his pulse. Merlin arched his hips into the other man’s, moaning encouragingly while baring his neck.“Bedroom, yeah?” His partner whispered in Merlin’s ear.Merlin nodded, biting at the other man’s lips while he led them down the hall of his flat and through the open doorway of his room. He startled when the back of his knees hit the edge of his mattress, but his partner didn’t falter, leading Merlin down to lie on his back.Merlin lay under the gaze of his partner. He watched as the man’s eyes flicked over him, fixing specifically on the area of exposed skin where Merlin’s shirt had ridden up.It felt wrong. The gaze was wrong, and Merlin has to look away and hide his disappointment with a, hopefully, arousing stretch of his limbs and breathy gasp. His partner, as drunk as Merlin and probably ignorant of any dissatisfaction of Merlin’s, stepped between Merlin’s legs and slid a hand from his waistline up to his sternum.Pleasure returned to Merlin in a hot flash and rumbled positively in his chest for his partner to feel with his exploring hand. Grinning, his partner removed his hand and worked on unbuttoning Merlin’s jeans and dragging them down and off his long legs.Throwing the jeans across the room, his partner immediately hooked his hands under Merlin’s thighs, pulling Merlin forward to fit his erection between Merlin’s cheeks, still clad in underwear. His green eyes bore into Merlin’s, and the sight was unsettling Merlin’s poor, alcohol-raddled mind again. He hauled himself up, tightening his legs around his partner and cupped a hand at the back of his neck to pull him into the kiss. His nerves settled a bit and he and his partner rutted against each other, trading sloppy kisses.His partner was strong, muscles built up more for show than from daily use of swords and horseback riding, able to hold Merlin up at his awkward angle with out complaint, and his moans rumbled in his chest like Merlin could remember seeing and hearing from Arthur while he had been sleeping fifteen hundred years ago.It felt good, this deception. No, Merlin . Merlin shook his head, dismissing the words as the remnants of his common sense trying to knock him back into reality. He rid his partner of his shirt, scratching his nails down the man’s back as they rocked harder against one another.Merlin, stop this now . He bristled.Avalon.“Shut up.” He hissed through a particularly hard kiss, trying to hide his words from his partner, but not from that damned island.“What?” His partner breathed, pulling back slightly to give Merlin a curious stare.“Nothing,” he assured, using one hand to undo the button on his partner’s trousers. “Keep going.”His partner opened his mouth to argue, but Merlin reached far enough down his pants to wrap a hand around his arousal, and any dispute died on the man’s lips. Merlin chuckled lightly and stroked his hand slowly, easing them both back into their earlier frantic state.As their lips met again, a raucous clap of thunder and flash of lighting filled Merlin’s bedroom along with the booming, furious voice of Avalon shouting, Merlin!While oblivious to Avalon itself, his partner still felt the effects of the sudden thunder and lightning, as well as Merlin shouting and jumping away from him onto the bed. Merlin lay sprawled on his bedspread, disheveled and panting as Avalon accosted him, not with words, but with waves of pure fury, which only intensified as his partner reached forward and cradled his ankle.Fine!, Merlin assented, yanking his ankle away. Avalon stopped its effects immediately, and relief punched Merlin in the chest.Send him away, Merlin. Avalon ordered.Merlin huffed, but sat up and turned to his partner. “You need to leave.” He said quietly.Anger curled his partner’s features. “What, because of a little thunder and lightning?”“No,” Merlin snarled. “because I said s—” he cut himself short, clenching his fists and breathing in and out deeply. He met the disappointing green eyes of his partner.“I’m sorry,” he apologized, curling his legs under him. “I thought I was ready…for this. But I’m not.” The words came easily to Merlin, and his heart panged with guilt as he found that he wasn’t completely lying.“Hard breakup, huh?” His partner said bitterly. Merlin nodded, throat suddenly dry. “Fine. Figure yourself out, I’ll be at the Dandelyan.” His partner buttoned his trousers and collected his shirt in frustrated silence, stomping out of Merlin’s flat in under five minutes.“Satisfied?” Merlin asked the empty air in his bedroom, bracing his head against the heel of his hand with a groan, a sharp ache beginning to emerge. He needed more alcohol.
There are greater things coming that you will need a sound mind for.
Merlin scoffed. “Greater things?Greater things passed centuries ago, while you were busy ignoring me.” Merlin could hear the breezes of Avalon blowing past his window.
We have not forgotten you.
“Yeah, you said that.” His headache flared and Merlin winced, slowly lying down and burrowing under a blanket, hand still pressed to his forehead. Avalon had no response for his snarky comment, and Merlin slowly fell into a deep sleep, preparing for his first hangover since the sixth century.He was unaware of the dark clouds rolling in from the east, emerging from the storming waters of Avalon.
Be ready, Emrys.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

The world was falling apart.All the blue of the sky had been blacked out by giant, ominous clouds, which had been raining down a steady stream of hailstones since Merlin had opened the shop. The shop in turn had become a safe haven for those stranded outside, Merlin and his under-used tea kettle struggling to keep everyone warm and calm as the hailstones increased slightly in size and claps of thunder started to rumble through the atmosphere.Merlin had begun to notice flashes of lightning in the distance, his nerves filling with its electricity at the sight.It was coming from Avalon.He bit at his thumbnail as he made another round through the crowd with a fresh kettle of hot water and the packets of tea bags and hot chocolate. If anyone noticed his nervousness, they refrained from mentioning it, returning his small smiles as they took their drinks. He strode back to the front counter in a daze, setting down the kettle and packets to absentmindedly chew on his nail and stare at the floor, tapping his foot anxiously. There was no reason for him to feel so jittery because the storm seemed to be coming from Avalon. There was a lot of other landmarks and cities between him and Avalon. And he wasn’t Emrys anymore.His responsibility had been stripped from him months ago.A loud clatter brought Merlin out of his thoughts, startling the crowd and caused a haunted hush to fall across the shop. Merlin’s gaze flitted around, searching for the source of the loud smack! smack! smack!.He exhaled shakily.It was just a window blown open by the strong wind.Slightly more relaxed, Merlin gave the nervous crowd a soothing smile, weaving through them quickly to close and latch the window. He ran a hand down the wooden frame, patting it comfortingly before turning back to the crowd watching him earnestly.“Nothing to worry about, guys.” He assured, ignoring the instinct deep in his gut telling him otherwise. He grinned, and teased, “Maybe just stay away from that window.”A few chuckled, easing some of the tension, and the crowd went back to themselves, chatting softly.As Merlin neared the center of the crowd, moving slowly through them so as to keep from disturbing them as much as possible, he noticed another flash of lightning as a sharp crack of thunder sounded. Everyone jumped at the thunder, but, again, no one but him seemed to notice the lightning.His nerves thrummed frantically with his heartbeat, and Merlin flexed his fingers, feeling overwhelmed with energy that had no place to go inside him and was fighting to get out. He felt on edge, like his body was prepared for a great battle or arduous spell.He felt strangely alive.Strangely magical.Merlin.The voices flooded his ears along with another crack of thunder. His hard flinch was hidden among the crowd’s, but his shaking would be sure to get their attention. The energy overfilling him no longer felt so invigorating, and instead filled him with immense dread.Merlin, the voices called again, this time without thunder or lightning, which meant Merlin’s flinch was noticed by the woman next to him, who placed a hand gently on his arm.“Are you alright?” she asked quietly, careful not to draw the attention of anyone else around them. Her eyes glittered with genuine compassion, and Merlin wished he could spill out his heart, but another flash of lightning in the corner of his eyes had him biting his tongue.“Yeah, yeah, just fine. Don’t really like storms.” He lied, while Avalon called again, insistent as the wind outside picked up dramatically. This time, Merlin was careful not to flinch.The woman nodded, rubbing a soothing touch into Merlin’s arm before releasing him and turning back to her friends. Merlin decided that she had earned an extra tea or hot chocolate, once he had dealt with the aggravating voices, still insisting he notice them.Merlin, do not act as a child.“I’m not.” Merlin growled under his breath, apologizing quickly to a man who thought Merlin’s anger was directed at him. Moving forward, he continued in a whisper, “I’ve moved on, you stupid island. Maybe you can do the same.”The window he had just righted clanged open again, and Merlin, as well as many members of the crowd, jumped and spun to face it. Merlin’s throat went dry and he was shaking violently, but he still managed a quiet, “You can’t frighten me into submission.”Another clap of thunder.Merlin still stood stubbornly where he was.The hailstones rained down harder, having grown larger again, and smacked dangerously against the windows.“That your best shot?” Merlin taunted under his breath, wary of those standing around him, but feeling his adrenaline pump made him wild and daring enough to push Avalon further.Suddenly, the wind quieted and the hailstones slowed to a small patter. There was no flash of lightning or rumble of thunder.Merlin eyed the surroundings outside.All at once, the wrath of a power older than civilization crashed into the little shop with a tremendous and deafening roar, shattering the windows and tearing through the shelves with merciless fury. The crowd screamed and dove to the floor, covering their heads.Except for Merlin, who remained standing as glass rained around him, cutting into his exposed face and hands.But what flowed across his wounds was not the frigid air of a storm, but the familiar warmth of a friend that’s come home. Merlin watched as golden tendrils drifted across his skin and then seeped through into his veins. Like falling into an addiction, Merlin embraced that feeling of the energy that filled him, raising and upturning his hands and focusing his intents on everything around him.The air slowed, raining glass and hailstones stopping in midair at Merlin’s command. He breathed deeply as he curled his hands faced down and focused first on sending the hail out of his shop. They floated easily out of the gaping holes that had once been his windows, and Merlin smiled.This was his magic. It listened to him with eagerness.He could feel his eyes burning a molten gold.As he began to form the pieces of sharp glass back into their places as his windows, Merlin could see the golden essence of his magic bleeding back out of his skin, leaving him as it was no longer needed.He had no true control of it. It existed outside of him now, and Avalon was merely allowing him to use it for a time.As the last piece of glass was put back in its place, the last of Merlin’s magic left him in a rush. He gasped, the harshness of his magic being ripped from him a fresh wound in his heart. Around him, the crowd was slowly standing, checking each for injuries, which Merlin had saved them from, and questioning what had just occurred. They turned to their host for answers, only to find the space where he had been standing empty, but the front door to the shop wide open.~~~~~~When Merlin ran out the door of his shop, he stumbled right onto the shores of Avalon. He spun quickly to look back, but the store, the street, the entire city had disappeared and been replaced with trees thrashing in the wind.The storm raged around him with immense ferocity, whipping hail and rain at Merlin, but he was able to stand his ground against it, facing the waters of Avalon that were frothing and whipping as wildly as the wind, drenched to the bone and cut up from glass.“You want me for some greater purpose?” He shouted. “Well, I’m here! You’ve won!” The storm continued in a frenzy around him, but the winds carried no voices from the island.Merlin’s anger bubbled inside him. “Is this some kind of punishment? Taunting me with promises, with my magic, only to take it away and abandon me!” His voice tore from his throat, harsh and ragged, hot tears mixing with the freezing rain on his face.There was a blinding crack of lightning and boom of thunder, and the wind swirled madly around Merlin. He flinched as stray branches and other debris hit his body and cut his hands and face, but he shouted out into the downpour. Damn if he was going to lay down and be abused by a forgotten island.“The once great Avalon reduced to tormenting that last magical being in existence!” Merlin threw his hands down from covering his face, braver now with his words. “I bet you couldn’t bring back a mouse, much less the true King of Britain!”A great gust of wind hit Merlin square in the chest, sending him flying back onto the flooded grass. He landed square on his shoulder, but refused to stay down, rolling onto his side to clamber to his feet, holding his shoulder gingerly.“You need me?” He shouted. “Then take whatever’s left and leave. Go back to your reclusive existence and leave everything else to suffer. Just ike you did to Albion. Like you did to me,” The whipping winds raised in ferocity, but still Avalon was stubbornly silent.  Anger rushed through Merlin like a torrent, and through gritted teeth he spat out, “Like you did to him.Your beloved Once and Future King, dead in a lake.”The earth shook with the immense force of the thunder that Avalon released in retaliation, and the sky turned a bright white with a matching crack of lightning. Merlin’s heart lodged in his throat, beating wildly, but he refused to bend to Avalon’s will, standing amongst the assault.He said nothing now, but raised his chin at the island, narrowing his eyes in challenge.The wind whistled passed Merlin’s ears, carrying the voices of Avalon.
You are acting as a child, Merlin.
Merlin scoffed aloud, gesturing out to the city. “Me? You’re flooding all of England to get my attention!”
If you wish to help the mortals, you need a sound mind. Not anger and bitterness.
“Oh, my God!” Merlin laughed sarcastically, pacing back and forth in utter amazement. His shoulder twinged with the poor care he was taking to keep it still. “You’ve already taken my magic and are trying at my sanity. What do you want from me?”Faith, the voices whispered, and Merlin froze, wind snapping across his face. He flinched and turned away, the cuts on his face stinging in the cold. Avalon continued, Faith, and you will receive what you have asked for.For a cruel moment, Merlin thought of Arthur, lying dead at the bottom of the lake.“Don’t make false promises to me again.” He hissed. “Just stop. This, everything. There’s no point.”Amidst the fierce winds of the storm, a gentle gust blew across Merlin’s nose with the whisper, It is not a lie. You will be given back what you have lost.Traitorous hope filled up his chest, and he let out a pitiful half-sob, too hurt with centuries of longing to know whether or not to believe the words true.Faith, Merlin, Avalon whispered again, its quiet tone contrasted by the sudden, sharp cut of a branch along his cheek. Merlin hissed and brought a hand up to the stinging skin, bright red blood coming away on his fingers.“Faith?” He murmured, half dazed.And blood. Avalon whispered.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

Merlin could only stare at his hand, at the red stain of his blood on his fingers. Somehow it had become synonymous with proof. Bright red proof that he

wanted

Arthur and that Avalon would give him back.

He watched, dazed, as a drop of blood slipped down his finger to fall onto the grass by his feet. The ground shuddered, and the drop glowed a blinding gold before absorbing into the ground.

The storm’s intensity increased as if charged by Merlin’s blood, the force of it making Merlin waver on his feet. His mind was as unsteady as his legs, and a strong gust at his back sent him toppling forward.

He fell, barely managing to brace himself with his hands before he could smash his face in the dirt. Immediately his hand began to sting, the blood on his fingers glowing gold and sliding off his skin and into the grass.

As his blood disappeared into the ground, the storm and winds grew stronger and more violent. Merlin bowed his head to escape the debris of branches and stones now flying around him, but still he could feel sharp cuts and impacts as Avalon continued its onslaught.

A wounded cry escaped his throat as Merlin felt something large and jagged cut across his forearm and he stared at the deep gash marring him. Along his arms and hands – even on his face, Merlin could feel – were smaller bruises and cuts, but the gash was something different. Something made with intent.

Avalon wanted him to

bleed

.

Merlin stared at his arm as his blood started to slide down the curve of his arm, a bright scarlet against his pale skin, and turn gold as it reached the ground and Avalon drank its power up greedily.

You

are

magic, Merlin

, Avalon said, voices now stronger than a whisper and pounding in Merlin’s head.

He could feel the sharpness of more cuts being made along his arms and his hands, feel the heavy drip of his blood seeping into the ground, each becoming a golden tendril that slowly tightened and bound Merlin in place.

He couldn’t move if he tried, if the blood loss hadn’t already started to made his head spin. He groaned pitifully and stared dazedly out at the roaring waters of Avalon.

It is in your blood.

Merlin heard Avalon say, barely registering another wound being cut into his side by a jagged rock.

He was so tired. He just wanted to close his eyes and escape the torture of his reality. He couldn’t feel the cuts anymore, or his blood being slowly leached from him. There was just Merlin, lying on the ground, thinking of…

Of Arthur.

Of cold.

Of pain.

And our power

.

Avalon’s voices roared through Merlin’s head, surging up through its tethers connected to Merlin and

taking

everything it could in a surge that left Merlin boneless and half-alive.

Merlin could feel the ground, even the sky, quaking as Merlin’s blood fed Avalon enough power to rip the universe apart, with Merlin powerless to do anything but watch.

Blearily, Merlin thought he could see something emerging from the water, being thrown to the shore over and over while the waves crashed into it over and over.

He dismissed it, his mind too far gone, and submitted to the longing to close his eyes. He was still tethered to Avalon by his blood, and still it was sucking away everything inside him, slowly,

so slowly

, ending him.

Merlin lay on the grass in the pouring rain, amidst flying stone and branches, cracking lightning and booming thunder, feeling less and less of it as he drifted off into the darkness.

After a moment, he could feel nothing,

sense

nothing but the rasping in and out of his own breath.

It was getting harder to breathe in, he realized.

Something thumped on the ground by his head, a quick

one-two-three

. He didn’t know how to rationalize the sound enough to wonder what it was.

Distantly, somewhere in the back of his muddled mind, he could feel something pulling his body away, against the binding that Avalon had trapped him with, struggling to free him. Again, in that faint part of his brain, Merlin could hear shouting…or was it pleading?

With a final and desperate pull, Merlin was yanked painfully from his bindings.

He screamed.

~~~~~~

He came to in random bursts.

At first, it was only a split second. Just a sudden flash of white light and then back into darkness.

The next, there was a feeling. A sensation of someone’s hand cradling his head, stroking his jaw. Before he went back under, Merlin thought fleetingly of his mother tending to him while he was sick.

Finally, there was a voice. And Merlin nearly bristled thinking it was Avalon invading his head again.

Instead, it was something heavenly. Soothing.

“I know you’re still here. Still fighting.” Merlin preened and tried to make his eyes open. Tried to come back from the darkness to that voice.

“You’re too stubborn to let this beat you.” Merlin’s heart beat stronger, faster, and life filled his veins.

“Aren’t you,

Mer

lin?”

~~~~~

Merlin woke on his side, head pillowed on his arm. It ached horribly, like some bug had decided to burrow its home in his skull. But he was breathing, fully and strongly, not the weak rasps he last remembered.

Gently, he stretched out his arms and legs, brushing the rough texture of tree bark with his fingers and solid ground at his feet. His muscles were sore, but nothing flared too badly with pain as he slowly sat up.

He was still at Avalon. The area was disastrous, riddled with broken branches and torn up ground, but the waters had calmed to a normal, gentle rise and fall against the shore and Avalon had yet to say a word.

He hadn’t realized that the cuts Avalon had made in him were still there until they throbbed, his mind slowly coming back into focus so he could feel the dull pain of Avalon’s onslaught. His bare arms were streaked with dried blood, and he could feel more on his back and legs...but the cuts themselves had already begun to heal, the ones on his arms at least not as deep as they had been.

He knew he hadn’t healed them himself, not without his magic.

Avalon

had healed him.

His skin crawled and a chill went up his spine. It had nearly bled him dry,

demanded

it, and then stitched him up just enough to keep him alive as some kind of feeble apology.

Merlin looked pointedly away, hugging his knees to his chest and leveling his breathing as his rage spiked his heart rate. It pulled on his cuts, but he preferred the discomfort, finding something tangible to ground himself to.

No good losing his head now, especially when it felt near to breaking to pieces.

He wondered if it already had as he noticed a black leather boot off to his side.

His breath caught as Merlin followed the line of the boot up, until his gaze stopped at the sight of blue eyes. The blue eyes that had last been dimmed with death, but were now full of light. And caught on him.

“Hello, Merlin.”

Merlin gaped at him, at

Arthur

, sitting in front of him, speaking in the same voice Merlin had wished for for fifteen hundred years.

“

No

.”

It was a trick. A horrible, torturous deceit to finally finish him off.

Merlin scrambled to his feet, panic rising up in his throat and choking him, but he had barely taken a step before his head swam, the effect of his blood loss rushing through him in a torrent. He started to tip over, the ground coming up to him very quickly, but then Arthur was

there

, catching him mid-fall and guiding him gently back into a sitting position.

Merlin clutched at Arthur’s wrists, staring at him like he’d never seen another human being in his life, but he didn’t dare stop.

It had

worked

.

Merlin swallowed, his throat dry and scratchy, making his voice sound weak and quiet.

“Arthur?”

“Yeah,” Arthur smiled, and Merlin nearly sobbed at the sight, cupping a hand at the side of Merlin’s head. “It’s me.”

Merlin leaned into the touch, so grateful just to have it in something other than a dream and raised his hand to his mouth, beginning to laugh. He couldn’t do anything else, so overwhelmed with joy, and something strong stamping down his grief. Like love. Like pure, unfiltered wonder.

Arthur gave him a strange look, eyebrow raised.

“You have

not

changed, Merlin,” He stated, removing his hand and standing to his full height. “Still strange as ever.”

Merlin stopped laughing and stared at Arthur incredulously, mouth open and stunned.

Then Arthur gave Merlin another smile, bright and wide and beautifully familiar, and Merlin didn’t care.

Arthur had returned. Nothing else mattered but that.

~~~~~~

“Where’s your armor?”

“Hm?” Arthur looked over at Merlin, blue eyes trained on him, and Merlin almost forgot his question.

He took a steadying breath, and asked again, “Your armor. You were wearing it when you…” Merlin faltered, breaking Arthur’s gaze. Another breath. “

Before

. But you’re not wearing it now.”

Instead, Arthur was wearing the red shirt that had lost its ties, leaving nearly half of Arthur’s chest exposed, and been restricted to only being worn under Arthur’s armor. Merlin intentionally refused to stare, but his resolve had always been a bit loose when it came to Arthur.

Arthur made an affirming noise, and turned his head back to look at the grass he was digging up with his fingers. “I came back with it on, but it was getting heavy and cumbersome. I stashed it over there.” He pointed somewhere off to their left.

“You took off your own armor?” Merlin snickered.

“Yes, you

prat

.” Arthur chucked a handful of grass and dirt at Merlin, who ducked, pulling sorely at his cuts, but continued to laugh as Arthur tried to give him a sour look around his urge to smile.

For a moment, it was like nothing had happened.

They were still in Camelot, on a hunting expedition, and Merlin was being insolent, as usual, and Arthur was pretending like he didn’t enjoy someone not jumping over themselves to please him.

The pleasant moment slowly faded, and at its end, Arthur was back to picking at the grass while Merlin watched him, waiting for the trick to end or lighting to come down from the sky and kill them both. He wasn’t sure he would ever get past the small pit of unease he felt in his stomach underneath his happiness at having Arthur back.

“Was there something else you wanted to ask me, Merlin?” Arthur questioned, not looking up from his hands.

Merlin fidgeted nervously until Arthur looked at him again, not in irritation, but to give Merlin something to focus on amid his anxiousness.

“Do you remember,” Merlin stopped, needing to swallow and get a grip, even though his throat felt ready to close up. “Remember, um…being…” He fiddled with his hands, unable to get out the words.

“That I was dead?” Arthur supplied, a little too quickly to not have been as anxious about the topic as Merlin. Merlin noticed his hands shaking as Arthur wiped them on his trousers, blue eyes looking around everywhere except for Merlin.

He recognized the shield going up. Of Arthur becoming the King of Camelot and hiding away the man behind the responsibilities. The shield he put up when a wrong look in his eye could mean starting a war.

“Yeah.” He said quietly, nodding while Merlin’s heart caught in his chest. He hadn’t really expected that, instead having spent hours on what to say…how to break it to Arthur that he’d

died

, that the world had gone on without him - before he’d given up on Arthur coming back.

They sat in silence, neither looking at the other.

Arthur cleared his throat, taking deep, slow breaths in the way Merlin remembered him doing when something weighed on his mind and his shoulders.

“Merlin.”

“Yeah?”

“How long?”

“Since?”

Arthur gave him an annoyed glare, and Merlin felt a pang of guilt low in his stomach. He should just say it, he knows. Merlin was Arthur’s only connection between the life Arthur had known and the one he’d been thrown into. But still, Merlin wanted to keep the truth a secret, although he wondered why.

Merlin can see the tears brimming in Arthur’s eyes, and knows ‘why’ immediately. He wanted to give Arthur an out. An excuse to ask a different question to spare him the heartache.

“Fifteen hundred years.”

Arthur stared at him for a moment as Merlin’s words swirled in his mind. Then, in the second that Arthur looked away, Merlin saw his shield shatter, and the man under the crown come into full view.

Arthur curled into himself, head between his knees and arms wrapped around his legs. Merlin could hear the dry, dismal sob Arthur let out and began to feel his eyes burn with his own tears as centuries of deaths came back to him. Of a grief that had washed over an entire kingdom and taken hold in Merlin’s heart.

Arthur raised his head and cupped a hand to his mouth, muffling his short, hiccupping breaths. His shoulders shook with each ragged breath, and tears flowed freely down his face, collecting around his fingers.

Merlin saw Arthur’s wedding ring, glinting in the sun, and looked down at the grass, the guilt sitting heavily in his stomach expanding.

Suddenly, everything felt wrong.

Arthur stood abruptly, wiping harshly at his eyes as he strode to a clearer area nearby, less razed by the devastation of his return.. He paced miserably back and forth, pulling his hands through his hair, face twisted in anguish, visibly fighting every urge to simply break down.

Merlin watched him, leaning forward to rest his chin on his knees pulled up to his chest. His chest ached, as though a hole was being dug through the middle of his heart, pushing the pain of his cuts to the recesses of his mind. The pang of his own grief tugged at him, but he knew his pain was not the same as Arthur’s.

For Merlin, they had gone one by one.

He mourned with the others, burying his friends until there had been no one left. He’d grieved for the knights lost in battle, and those that had managed to grow old with partners and children. He’d cried over their graves and hurt when he kept waking up year after year with fewer familiar faces around him.

But that had been

years.

For Arthur, they were gone in an instant.

Merlin couldn’t watch Arthur any longer, shifting so his head lay on its side and he was watching a patch of beat up trees, the remaining limbs swaying in a lulling rhythm. He watched them, letting his mind wander listlessly in the back of his thoughts, only focused on the back and forth of the tree branches, barely hanging on to their tree, but still refusing to let go.

He felt the slow run of tears down his cheeks, and he let them fall.

Merlin heard soft footfalls as Arthur made his way back to Merlin, lifting his head to watch the man carefully, making no move toward him or to restart their conversation.

Arthur stopped in front of him, eyes red-rimmed and cheeks pink from rubbing, his hands settled on his hips. He stared at the ground, biting his lips, breaths still shaky even though he tried to keep them quiet. Arthur’s grief was so raw, so

present

that Merlin was surprised he had even come back over.

Merlin watched him patiently, tapping his fingers against his leg to quell the urge to stand and comfort Arthur. To wrap his arms around his shoulders and let him cry.

Arthur looked up from the ground suddenly, and in a ragged whisper said, “What.

Happened

.” His gaze had locked intently on Merlin, and his hands shook in fists at his side. Merlin met Arthur’s forceful gaze, wary of the tattered remains of Arthur’s shield barely holding together in his eyes.

“I

saw

you.” Arthur’s jaw clenched, hardening into a defined line as his gaze bore into Merlin. “I came back and I saw you, and you weren’t any different. Not

that

much. Not…” Arthur’s face fell in anguish, and he turned away, raising a hand to rub harshly at his eyes.

“

Arthur

…” Merlin moved to stand and go to Arthur, but Arthur stepped back, holding out his other hand.

“

No

. I can…just give me…” Arthur’s haggard voice broke, and he nearly tripped over his own feet trying to make distance between himself and Merlin. He sniffled and wiped his hand across his face, steadying himself and shivering as the wind picked up.

Merlin bristled when the breeze hit his face, and almost looked over his shoulder to see if the dark clouds had started to form in the sky or if the water of the lake would begin to pick up. Anything that would mean Avalon had changed its mind and was going to rip Arthur from him like it had ripped out his magic.

Merlin’s attention was diverted back to Arthur as he began to speak again, staring blankly off into the broken trees, hands down at his sides, shaking.

“I thought it had only been a few years, not…

not centuries

.” His shaking hands clenched into fists and his head bowed forward so that his gaze was fixed firmly on the ground, tears slipping down his nose.

“I saw you and I thought everything was going to be okay.” Arthur whispered.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

They didn’t stay by the lake.Neither said it to one another, but when Merlin stood and began walking to the path leading away from Avalon, Arthur followed him.Arthur let Merlin lead, the occasional crunch of a leaf or scuff of his foot against a rock the only reminder to Merlin that Arthur was still trudging through the early winter’s chill with him. They were both shivering, arms crossed tightly over their chests, but neither voiced a complaint.Arthur was silent as he followed behind Merlin, leaving Merlin’s mind to wander dangerously in the silence. His muscles were tensed from bracing headfirst into the cold, but the intense tightening in his shoulders remained simply because of the aching feeling low in Merlin’s gut.Arthur was back. Alive. Healthy. Seemingly un-cursed or enchanted. It still didn’t even seem real.But Avalon had nearly killed Merlin in the process of bringing Arthur back, a fact he was reminded of in every dull tug of the cuts still healing all over his body.Merlin was wary of Avalon’s true motives, memories of its unmerciful actions over the centuries pushing at the front of his mind. He knew better than to believe that even his life, his blood and magic, were enough of a price for Avalon in exchange for Arthur.At any moment Avalon could decide to rip Arthur from his grasp. If Merlin angered it again, or even if he didn’t, Avalon held Merlin’s heart in its hands.
If he relaxed, even for a moment, would Avalon take Arthur back?
His heart pounded, the sound growing louder and his hands began to shake. He blinked furiously as he walked into the trees and wondered whether that strange sound was the wind or him struggling to breathe. With every step, Merlin’s doubts grew, and the belief that Arthur had truly returned was fading. Was Arthur really behind him, or had Merlin finally descended into madness, and was walking alone toward the lonely city?Merlin stumbled, barely catching himself on a tree, his heart pounding in his ears and his muscles tightening up. His shoulder shook violently as Merlin clutched a hand to his throat, struggling to control his short, gasping breaths.
What if it wasn’t real at all? What if he was still lying in a storm, slowly being bled dry?
Merlin’s throat closed up and his body clenched tightly, like a rubber band stretched too far.  He reached out and gripped the nearest tree branch, leaning on it for support when his vision blurred. His lungs burned as he fought to breathe, and couldn’t pick apart the thoughts of – He was there. Youtouched him. You talked to him. – from – You’ve been alone for fifteen hundred years, why would he be here now? Everything was banging around in his head, fighting to be the focus. He dug his nails into the tree branch, trying to find something tangible to focus on, but everything hurtso much he could barely tell the difference between the pain in his fingers and the pain in his head.Something heavy and solid settled on his shoulder, and Merlin turned to it, barely able to make out Arthur’s worried gaze right in front of him.Suddenly, Arthur’s voice broke through the mangled voices of the tormenting thoughts in Merlin’s head.“Merlin!”He winced away from Arthur, who dropped his hand and stepped back, mouthing his apologies. But he wasn’t mouthing, Merlin realized, his thoughts had just taken over again and blocked out Arthur.Merlin stared at Arthur, forcing his blurry vision to settle something – anything. There was a hole in Arthur’s sleeve, and Merlin wondered if that had been there before. His mind quieted a bit and Merlin tried for something else – an old scar peeking out from Arthur’s collar – and finally his head was silent, and though his breath was still stuttering out of his lungs, Merlin was able to unclench his hands and slide to the ground, back resting against the tree.“Merlin?” Arthur said quietly, drawing Merlin’s gaze. His breathing had settled, but everything was sore and heavy, Merlin knew he looked half asleep as Arthur’s eyes scanned him for injury.Arthur opened his mouth to speak, but Merlin interrupted him before he could start, pointing at a spot beside him. “Sit. Just sit, Arthur.” His voice was raspy and sand in his throat, but Arthur nodded and settled down at Merlin’s side.Arthur sat with his knees up, arms braced around them, watching Merlin as laid against the tree, eyes closed and breathing slowly. Merlin was beginning to enjoy the silence until Arthur moved beside him, rustling leaves for a moment and then sitting in silence that was unlike what Merlin remembered.Curious, Merlin peeked over at Arthur and found him staring. He raised his eyebrows and Arthur spoke immediately.“What just happened?” His face was lined with worry, and Merlin noticed Arthur’s hand twitching, wanting to take Merlin by the shoulder and comfort him. Merlin wondered if his reaction when Arthur had put his hand there before was stopping him.He sighed, leaning fully back against the tree again and looking out at the forest in front of them.“I don’t know.” He answered. He hadn’t felt so helpless, so vulnerable, like that for a very long time. Every bone felt rattled, and thinking about the experience made his heart pick up again.“What do you mean ‘you don’t know’?” Arthur asked incredulously, his words surprisingly biting. Merlin scoffed, and pressed the heel of his hand into his temple, frustration bubbling in his chest. “Merlin, it just happened to you, how do you not–”“Arthur.”Merlin snapped, whipping his head to glower at the man, although it made him dizzy again. He tried to hold the look, but a wave of exhaustion made him waver and he looked away, shaking his head.Arthur turned away as well, shifting around looking for a comfortable spot, or to annoy Merlin, for a few moments until he slumped against the tree, arms crossed over his chest. He sighed heavily, unable to sit in silence for even a moment.Merlin tried to wait him out, tapping his fingers on his leg to keep from looking over at Arthur, resolute to not give in to his childish behavior. He grit his teeth as Arthur let out another long, heavy sigh. And then another.Merlin couldn’t help it.“Stop it.”Arthur froze, shoulders tensed, and Merlin waited, anticipating the inevitable outburst.“Excuse me?”“You heard me.”Arthur clenched his jaw and turned further away from Merlin, glaring at the forest in front of him. He kept silent, foot tapping on the ground.For a few moments, Merlin’s anger stewed in his gut and he was determined to avoid giving in to Arthur. He’d waited for him for fifteen hundred years, he could outlast the man’s stubbornness.But the longer they sat in anger, each refusing to apologize, the more the pit in his stomach turned to stone and Merlin antsily wished for one of them to just end the pitiful argument – preferably Arthur.But Merlin must have gotten soft in his old age and he shifted, laying out his legs in front of him and taking a deep breath, resting his head back against the tree. He heard Arthur’s foot pause, and Merlin felt the tips of his ears go hot. He’d gotten up the nerve, but what could he say?Merlin glanced around, gnawing on his bottom lip, until he looked down the path they had taken to where they were. The path to Avalon. The path to…“I didn’t get your armor.”Arthur snorted and Merlin banged his head back, groaning, and grimaced at the slight sting from the bark. A vague memory of embarrassment surfaced and Merlin could not believe the patterns they were already falling back into.Arthur was laughing now, though. Hard. Hunched over laughing that no amount of begging or hitting would make him stop.Merlin resigned to sit in his misery, rolling his eyes as Arthur dramatically took great, big inhales to get himself under control and wiped a finger under his eyes. He looked back over his shoulder at Merlin, a wide grin stretched across his face and eyes bright with mirth.Merlin raised his brows, “Quite finished?”Arthur let out his last chuckles, and reached up to massage his jaw, shaking his head. Merlin furrowed his brows and cocked his head in question.“Fifteen hundred years, Merlin,” Arthur side-eyes, breaking out into an even wider grin and Merlin braced himself, fighting his own smile “you’d think you could’ve learned how to be a proper servant.”Merlin stared at Arthur pointedly and said, “You’re a prat.”Arthur preened at the insult, as always, greatly unaffected and taking it as an ego boost. He wiggled in his seat, settling happily into his spot and teased, “You missed me.”Merlin rolled his eyes, but didn’t dismiss the remark, smiling softly.“Are you going to be okay?” Arthur asked kindly, still feeding off the pleasant atmosphere of their old habits.“I don’t know.” Merlin said softly, staring at a low tree branch. Arthur nodded and said nothing more.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

They needed to go to Ealdor, Merlin decided.Sitting on the side of the road, nails digging into Arthur's arm, afraid to let go in case of another car, Merlin decided.Ealdor was safe.God, it's been so long since Merlin had felt this...fear. For Arthur's life, but not his own. The speeding car roaring up the road was seared into his head, the image replaying over and over, Arthur standing in its path.Merlin had just gotten him back, and he'd almost just died."Merlin..." Arthur's faint voice broke through.He'd tried. Tried reaching out with his magic.But nothing had happened. He didn't even feel the rush of it in his bones. He'd been helpless."Why didn't you get out of the way?"Merlin had screamed at him to move. Move out of the road in case he couldn't get to Arthur in time because his stupid magic had decided to abandon him and he didn't believe he could save Arthur as just a man."I thought-" Arthur tried to catch his breath, gasping and swallowing hard, his eyes trained in the direction the car had driven away. "I thought they saw me."Arthur turned to look at Merlin, then, and asked, "Why didn't they stop?"And the look in Arthur's eyes was one that Merlin had been glad to forget. The fear. It chilled Merlin to his core.Because Arthur always was the one running headfirst into unfamiliar territory, sword at the ready, even if had no one with him. Arthur braved his challenges, because he had to. Because he wanted to, sometimes.But this. This new world frightened Arthur. The man who had faced his death countless times, a dragon even, but this was what was truly frightened him.Fire and terror came when fear went into Arthur's eyes.Merlin dropped his head and let out a shaky breath. He noticed the smears of blood that had dried on his jeans, and the new ones that had come from their tumble away from the road. He shuddered.They needed somewhere quiet to adjust. Somewhere Arthur wouldn't get run over if Merlin wasn't paying attention.So, Ealdor it was.Merlin still hadn't let go of Arthur's arm, so he was pulled along as Merlin stood and started walking back into the forest, away from the road.~~~~"Well," Arthur said, standing with his arms crossed in front of the cottage. "It definitely looks better."Merlin rolled his eyes and scoffed."It's a bit bigger than I remember." Arthur squinted at the little building, ignoring Merlin's unimpressed look, and even leaned forward a bit to be more of an ass.Merlin smacked his shoulder. "Well, it was a hovel."Arthur straightened, gave a short nod, then walked forward on the stone path to the front door. Merlin followed close behind, nearly tripping on an overgrown root that Arthur had avoided with ease, the prat.Arthur reached the door, and confidently went for the door handle, nearly bumping his nose straight into the wood when it didn’t budge."I placed a ward over it a long time ago," Merlin remarked.Arthur looked back over his shoulder, giving Merlin a pointed glare. “Open it?”Merlin’s lips pulled into a line and he traipsed to Arthur’s side. He looked at Arthur with narrowed eyes, and crossed his arms over his chest. Arthur, hand still on the doorknob, tilted his head to the door.“Well?” he said.“I have to get the key.” Merlin explained. He tapped one finger on his arm as Arthur continued to stare at him.“You’re standing on it.”Arthur quickly glanced down at his feet, lifting one to look under it, brows pulled together. Finding nothing, he looked back at Merlin and tilted his head.Merlin rolled his eyes, and put a hand on Arthur’s chest, pushing gently. With a soft noise, Arthur stepped back and watched with his furrowed brows as Merlin kneeled in front of him and dug at the edge of the stone that Arthur had been standing on.He pried up the stone, reaching under and pulling something small out. He lifted it up for Arthur, smirking with his brows raised.“See? Key.”“Well that’s not very magical.”Ignoring the remark, Merlin stood, brushed away a vine covering the lock, and swiftly unlocked the door. He stepped inside, checking the cottage. A fine layer of dust covered most of the surfaces, but everything else seemed just fine.He walked farther inside, hearing Arthur’s steps as he followed. He called out behind him as he reached the kitchen, checking a cabinet.“Things have changed a little bit, so just wait until –”   Merlin paused as Arthur’s steps paused in the doorway, turning to find him frozen, mouth agape. Merlin watched him carefully, holding back all his questions about what Arthur was thinking, and didn’t move from where he was standing.Arthur moved slowly further into the cottage, looking exactly what he was; dressed from one time and standing in another. He came to the edge of the kitchen island and reached out to touch the dark wood.Merlin kept watching him, quietly closing the cabinet and turning to face Arthur. He’d laid his hand flat along the surface of the counter, narrowing his eyes at the sensation. After a moment, he lifted his hand and backed away a step from the island. He took a long breath, running his hand down his face.Merlin wasn’t an expert on how to ease an unwilling time traveler into the present day, but he moved toward Arthur and spoke, “You alright?”For a moment, Arthur did nothing. He remained silent, staring resolutely at the floor, barely blinking. Merlin bit nervously at his lip to keep from pushing Arthur further into a possibly dangerous situation.Then, Arthur turned on his heel and walked out of the cottage.~~~~~~~Merlin really should have followed him. It’s not like the world outside the cottage was any more familiar, and now Arthur could be wandering around on a dirt road, confused out of his mind. What if someone tried to help him, asking him for things he had no idea about? ID? An address? ‘Camelot’ might give them a laugh.It was already dark out, had been for about an hour, and Merlin hadn’t moved from the couch. He’d only gotten up to light the fireplace and had spent the rest of the time staring at the fire, staring at the door, and staring back at the fire.It started to rain not much later, pounding on the roof and lulling an already exhausted Merlin to sleep, laid out on the couch. He fought the urge, pacing back and forth from the kitchen, but eventually he succumbed to sleep.~~~~~~~There was a scraping noise that woke Merlin up.It was the next morning, and a cursory search of the immediate area inside the cottage showed that Arthur still hadn’t returned. Merlin sat up from his laid-out position on the couch, wincing at the tight feeling in his back and rubbing his eyes.He heard the scraping sound again, and checked the room again. Still alone. After the third time, Merlin stood and strode to the door, opening it to search outside. He followed the sound as it was made a fourth time, to the side of the cottage.And there was Arthur.With his sword.“What…” Merlin murmured.Arthur hadn’t noticed Merlin come upon him, and swiped his hand, holding a whetstone, along the edge of the blade, creating the scraping sound that had roused Merlin. He did it once more before Merlin spoke loud enough for him to hear.“Arthur.”He looked up, hand resting on his sword’s hilt.“Where did you go?” Merlin asked.Arthur lifted his sword, the blade raised up straight, sunlight glinting off its edge. “Went to find my sword.” He answered shortly.Merlin crossed his arms, annoyance growing. “All the way back to the lake…for that?”Arthur went silent, laying his sword back across his legs to begin again with his whetstone. Merlin sighed, shifting to stand closer to Arthur, and lowered his voice.“Why are you still outside?”Arthur swiped his whetstone with a loud scrape.“Arthur, answer me.”Arthur huffed and swiped again, scowling down at the weapon. He went to do it again, but stopped, hand raised just above the sword. Merlin watched him, eyes fliting over him, trying to see what Arthur might do next.Arthur dropped his hand and bent his head, swallowing hard.“It’s…strange in there. I don’t like it.”Merlin uncrossed his arms and sat down on the grass. “I’m sorry,” he said, as he began picking at the blades. “I should have told you…”Merlin startled as Arthur suddenly thrust his arm forward, throwing his sword into the grass in front of him. He screwed up his face and growled, tossing aside the whetstone as well.“It’s not your fault, Merlin. Neither of us…this is ridiculous. That stupid lake…” Merlin snorted, and Arthur leaned back against the cottage wall, crushing some of the climbing ivy. He looked up at the sky, while Merlin looked down at the grass. Both were silent.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

Though Arthur would not admit the fact out loud, he obviously did not want to return inside. Not only would he avoid the subject if Merlin tried to bring it up, but he would purposefully rip up the grass in front of him and then tear up the blades in his hands until the silence made Merlin move on to something else.He didn’t like it – the cottage – and that was that for the time being. Sitting outside, in the grass with no other sounds other than the dry leaves in the breeze and the bugs beginning to emerge, Merlin could image that just beyond the trees were the knights, preparing camp and causing raucous that they could not in front of the king.The last time Merlin had been in this kind of quiet had been over fifty years ago, the last time he’d needed to disappear when his immortality began to cause problems with his friends, who were getting older without him.Otherwise, there was always sound. Cars, radio and tv…even when the people were asleep, some machine was running.Merlin left Arthur by himself outside only once to go back inside the cottage. He returned with a loaf of bread, cheese and meat. The few things closest to what they used to pack as rations.Arthur frowned at the packaged loaf, already sliced neatly. Merlin had taken the cheese and meat out of their packages and placed them on a tea towel, so Arthur paid them little heed.Merlin was quite hungry and made it through two sandwiches before pausing to watch Arthur. Being resurrected must have been a more arduous ordeal than Arthur was admitting, as he engulfed his meal, barely putting the ingredients together before shoving them into his mouth.Merlin wiped at the corner of his mouth. Arthur continued to eat like an animal.He finally slowed when there was only the end slice of the bread,  and panted as if he hadn’t taken a breath in between bites of food. Merlin didn’t say anything about the sight, and gathered the few scraps onto the towel and set it aside.“All we need is a fire.” Arthur remarked, waving a hand over the space between them.Merlin smiled a bit. He couldn’t help thinking of how it would still feel fake, without Gwaine’s taunts at the others, at least.“Don’t know that you want to sleep outside your first night back.” Arthur grimaced, and Merlin quickly added. “Gets cold up here, this time of year.”Arthur picked at the grass again, and was quiet.“You could sleep on the floor if you like. Probably as hard as the ground.” Merlin murmured, and laughed suddenly when Arthur chucked his handful of grass at him.“Offering the king of Camelot your floor, Merlin? You really have gone too long without me.” Arthur scoffed and leaned back on his hands, looking away as though he was truly disappointed and rolling his eyes. But he could not stop the smirk on his lips, even though his face twitched as he tried to keep it hidden.“You’re not king anymore. In fact, there’s a queen now.” Merlin popped a piece of the remaining bread in his mouth, chuckling when Arthur glared at him.You would never be able to tell that though – Arthur had remained unchanged, in both demeanor and appearance. Wearing his crown would just be overkill, even sitting in the grass in front of Merlin’s childhood home.Arthur looked at peace, mouthing off to Merlin and sitting in the setting sun, dressed as if he had never left. His eyes, still so blue, danced over everything and a breeze had made his blonde hair fall into his face. But he didn’t brush it away. Unbothered. Unworried.As if there wasn’t something that frightened him – possibly even terrified him – just a door away.Stubborn man.“It really…” Merlin started. “Really does get cold out here.”Arthur trained that unnervingly calm gaze on him and said nothing.“I could fix you a bath.”Arthur raised his chin a bit.“Like…old times?”Arthur cleared his throat and finally broke his gaze. Merlin’s chest hurt. Apparently he hadn’t been breathing while waiting for Arthur to answer.“Alright,” Arthur nodded. “old times.”~~~~~~~Merlin entered the cottage first, again, this time with Arthur close behind and peering over his shoulder as they walked in. Everything was in shadow, since the sun was far away from the side of the cottage with the big window.Merlin moved slowly when he went to flick on the lights, and while Arthur didn’t jump, Merlin felt a light touch of Arthur’s hand on his back when the artificial light filled the room.“This is it.” Merlin said, wincing at the tightness in his voice. Whether it was from waiting for Arthur’s response, or the continued pressure of his hand on Merlin’s back, Merlin didn’t want to think too hard about.And in pure Arthurian fashion, there was only a moment between Arthur being confronted by the new, and sometimes dangerous, thing and then headed directly toward the new thing, even if he had very little knowledge about it.For once, Merlin let him go without tensing up and readying a defense.He even felt fine letting something relatively harmful happen to him when Arthur kicked at his kitchen island.Arthur placed his hands on his hips and turned to Merlin.“Where is everything?”“What?”“Your kitchens are right next to your chambers.” Arthur gestured at Merlin’s living room, which Merlin had to restrain himself from laughing at, and then strode toward the hallway. “And I can’t find a room for council anywhere.”Merlin did laugh at that, a little snort.“Merlin.”He rolled his eyes.“I don’t hold council, Arthur. I doubt I could have more than few people here.”Arthur ignored him, striding off down the hallway without further comment. When he didn’t return after a few seconds, Merlin went into the kitchen, depositing the remains of their dinner on the counter and searching for his kettle.It’s been months, at least, since he’d last come to the cottage. He wondered if he even had tea left.“Is everything like this?”Merlin spun to face Arthur, the cabinet he was looking in slamming shut as he let go of it. Arthur had returned from searching the rest of the cottage, and was frowning at Merlin from beside the fridge.“Like what?”“You have five rooms!” Merlin raised his brows at Arthur, but Arthur only gestured wildly behind him and widened his eyes at Merlin.“Well, some places are bigger…” Merlin trailed off, shrugging his shoulders.“But?”Merlin was at a loss for words, having evolved alongside the world as it transitioned from straw huts and fire to insulation and electricity. How was he supposed to explain what he took for granted?“Not everyone has a castle, Arthur.”Arthur’s face scrunched up at Merlin, and he took another distrustful glance around the cottage.“So everything is just, small?”“Yes, Arthur.” Merlin rolled his eyes and sighed. His empathy for Arthur’s man-out-of-time routine was grating on his nerves, and he needed to busy himself from smacking Arthur upside the head. In Camelot, usually that meant chores. Now, he searched for his tea.“Well, are you going to keep your promise for a bath, at least?”Merlin closed his eyes and hung his head.Only Arthur’s pigheaded attitude could make Merlin want to throw him back in the lake.“Fine.” Merlin said. He abandoned his tea search and strode out his kitchen, past Arthur and down the hallway to his bedroom, which also had the only bathroom connected to it. He trusted – if that was the right word to use – that Arthur would follow him, if only to further complain about the utilities.If the rest of the cottage was furnished with things that Merlin had collected over his most recent years, the bathroom was perfectly up to-date. The floor heated up and everything.     Arthur would probably appreciate that, and then subsequently camp out in the bathroom for the rest of his life.Maybe Merlin wouldn’t tell him.Still without speaking to Arthur, Merlin went to and from the towel closet, placing it on the rack beside the clawfoot tub and then turning on the water. As it filed, Arthur watched the stream from the faucet intently, not afraid as he had been before, but still slow to approach.Merlin ran his hand under the water and Arthur was quick to do the same, standing right beside Merlin to do so. Merlin half-expected him to inspect the water on his hand, but he quickly wiped it on his trousers and then leveled his gaze at Merlin.“Not very warm.”Right.“The heater has to warm it up first. Only takes a minute.”Arthur reached down again, the water high enough that his fingertips trailed across the top. He frowned at the water and the taps, then reached out to one to turn it, shutting the water off. He smiled to himself, then flicked the water on his fingers in Merlin’s face, smiling wider when Merlin’s mouth pulled into a line.  “I never did get to see you use your magic.” Arthur commented, cocking his head toward the bath. “Non-secretly.”And Merlin didn’t think about - hadn’t thought about it for centuries - when he stepped forward and met Arthur’s gaze, waving hand over the water, letting his magic flow out to heat it until steam rose in steady waves.Arthur’s attention was focused solely on the golden hue of Merlin’s eyes, completely unaware of the fully-heated bath ready for him.How long had Merlin waited for Arthur to see this? See him?He was tensed up, waiting for Arthur to respond to Merlin’s open use of magic, and one of the cuts on his back started to ache. He hadn’t thought about his magic before he’d acted, or that Avalon had pulled so much of it out of him to bring Arthur back.We did not take all of it, Avalon had said. So, Merlin could still do something.If he could only heat up baths for the rest of his life, maybe that would be okay.“I must actually be a clotpole.”Merlin’s mouth dropped a little bit.“’Your eyes literally glow.”Merlin barked out a laugh in Arthur’s face, and then covered his mouth to catch the snort that was close to follow. He rolled his eyes and stepped away from Arthur, before he could surprise him again with uncharacteristic behaviors.“Aren’t you going to undress me, Merlin?” And, fuck, Merlin was not thinking about his old duties when Arthur said that. Even if he did indulge Arthur, for the sake of keeping some of the normalcy that he remembered, Merlin would never recover from being so close again.So Merlin didn’t stop, calling out as he closed the door behind him, “Not your manservant anymore!”“Since when?”

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

While Arthur bathed in the other room, Merlin finally changed out of his clothes, bloody and torn from Avalon’s brutality. It seemed a lifetime ago already that Avalon had nearly killed him to bring Arthur back, but the deepest of his cuts and abused muscles sternly reminded him that only a day had passed.His jeans and his shirt were ruined completely, stained with his own blood. Merlin was surprised, even, that Arthur hadn’t brought up the long tear down the side.He threw them in the trash, glad to be rid of them, and changed into a t-shirt and sweats, on edge every second he spent half-naked in his own bedroom with Arthur just behind the bathroom door. He practically sprinted back to the kitchen.He was waiting in anxious silence for Arthur, and was instead startled by his cell phone.He muttered a hello into it, still eyeing the hallway. His fingers started to cramp with how tightly he was holding it up to his ear, and the panicked voice of his employee, Peter, was a vague sound at the back of his brain until –“Merlin! Are you coming back?”“What?”“The store.” Peter repeated. “Where you work?”Merlin turned away from the hall and leaned onto the counter, sighing.“Things are…” he started. He glanced back, hallway still Arthur-less. “Do you need me?”“Well, after you…disappeared? I kept everything closed, but we have to open soon. Are you going to be back?”Merlin opened his mouth, but there was nothing behind it. He couldn’t force Arthur to figure out a brand-new time in the span of a few minutes, much less explain him to anyone else.And like he’d been summoned, Arthur walked into the room, naked as the damn day he was born and announcing, “Merlin, you haven’t set out any clothes – ”Merlin slapped his hand over his phone and hissed, “Arthur!”Peter’s voice came through faintly, “Who are you – ”“You know what, Peter,” Merlin spoke frantically into the phone, shutting his eyes as Arthur continued about his business, unaware. He pointedly turned away, and finished, “If you can hold down the fort for the day, I’ll be back tomorrow.”“Okay…” Peter said. “But, really, what is –”“Goodbye, Peter.” Merlin hung up abruptly, and dropped his phone on the counter and his head into his hands. That man deserved a raise when Merlin got back. Deserved a break, too.What was he thinking, he has a shop to run, people to make sure have money for rent and bills and – the world didn’t stop because Merlin’s focus changed. Arthur, Avalon, his magic…versus other people’s lives.“Merlin?”He groaned, a half-response to Arthur’s call.“Merlin, really.”“What?” Merlin’s head shot up, and he glared at Arthur for a second, before realizing that his hands were sparking, throwing bright magic bursts randomly. “Jesus.”He jumped and shook his hands, sending the sparks of his magic flying, but settled it overall, the thrum he hadn’t realized was there dissipating suddenly.That hadn’t happened since he was a teenager.He held up his hands in his eyeline, watching for further unwarranted sparking, Arthur visible just over his fingertips, and said, “Um…”He slowly lowered them flat on the counter, and met Arthur’s gaze.“We’re going to go into the city.”He glanced at Arthur’s bare…everything, and rubbed the back of his neck as he flushed with embarrassment as he added, “After I get you some clothes.”~~~~~~Merlin managed some pants that fit snugly without a belt, but his shirts and jackets wouldn’t fit Arthur’s ridiculous shoulders and all his torso. Eventually, he realized that going up to the cramped, little cottage attic was probably his only option left, and Arthur followed him, stretching out an old t-shirt.While Merlin looked through the cardboard boxes labeled helpfully “Clothes”, Arthur perused the others, opening what wasn’t taped down or buried.He thought he had found something suitable, and warm, and was finding doubles in case, when Arthur piped up behind him.“What are these?”Merlin turned, clothes in hand.  Hanging from Arthur’s fingers on an old leather bootlace was two thick, fabric discs, one green and octagonal and other a red circle, connected by another cord. They were a bit awkwardly shaped from the pressed letters, but definitely did not look as old as they really were.“Service tags. Identification.” Merlin replied, stepping forward to grab them. “Nothing important. I’ll just put them away.”Arthur backed away, holding the green disc up to read and before Merlin could snatch it away, he managed to make out the pressed lettering.“Pendragon?”Fuck his life, honestly.“I said, they’re nothing.” Merlin grabbed onto the red disc and yanked them from Arthur’s grip, thrusting the clothes at his chest. “Try these on.”Instead, Arthur tucked the clothes under his arm and went back to searching in the old jewelry box Merlin had tossed the tags into long ago.“You have metal ones in here too.” He remarked.Merlin sighed and stomped over to Arthur, leaning forward to look into the box. He plucked the metal tags out, closing his fist around them.“From an American buddy.” He explained shortly, pointing with his other hand at the clothes. “Try those on.”Arthur huffed, but turned away to set the clothes on a box and strip off his shirt. To focus on something else, Merlin examined his service tags, tracing over the depressed letters of the metal set with his thumb.
Of course you deserve them, Merl.
“What’s American?”“Arthur.” He closed his hand around his tags again, and tipped his head back as he groaned. He sighed and rolled his neck before looking at Arthur, prepared to scold him once again.But Arthur was fully dressed, in a dark blue Henley sweater that actually fit…really well. He naturally pushed his sleeves up to his elbows and was fiddling with the piece, feeling the fabric and tugging on it to see it stretch.“I like this fabric.” He said, nodding to himself and then smirking at Merlin.“Okay.” Merlin murmured, shoving the tags into his pocket. “I’ll get you more later.”~~~~~~“You cannot bring the sword.”“But –”“No.”Arthur rolled his eyes, but tossed the scabbarded weapon onto Merlin’s bed and shouldered the backpack Merlin had dug up for him.“Guess I’m ready to go then.” He grumbled, and frowned at the ground as he lagged behind Merlin for their first part of their ten-mile trek from Merlin’s hidden cottage to the nearest town.It was barer than the way from Avalon, and when Arthur stopped mourning his weapon, he kept his attention everywhere he could, watching the tree line and where birds would swarm out of the leaves.Merlin didn’t say anything about it, or that Arthur only relaxed when roofs were visible in the distance. He’d walked the way for years, and maybe that meant that he was compliant in the safety of it, that there weren’t lurking creatures, magical or otherwise.With Arthur relaxed, however, he was back to needling Merlin about the time between when he’d gone and now.And he was never one for mincing subjects he knew would be uncomfortable."You look good for someone who's been alive this long, Merlin." He sidled up to Merlin’s side, and readjusted the strap of his bag.Merlin ignored the statement and gave Arthur a side-eye. Arthur huffed, and fell back a step for a moment, until the view of more buildings seemed to push him to continue.“Merlin, I just gave you a compliment.”He sighed and looked ahead of them. A road was starting, with the sign for Hexham just beside it, and the station was close enough now, he supposed…he could bear this conversation."Thought you were calling me old." He replied, turning back towards Arthur as he walked. Arthur smirked with his small victory, and caught back up.“But not a day of it shows.” Arthur waved hand towards Merlin’s face and only smiled wider when Merlin frowned. He dropped his hand and continued, “Most people would be jealous.”Merlin scoffed, looking away to watch the road. They didn’t need a repeat of Arthur’s last interaction with vehicles. When they’d crossed, he said sourly, “Wasn’t exactly fun and games the whole time.”Arthur looked to the ground; his brows pulled together as he contemplated Merlin’s words for a moment. Merlin wasn’t sure what could come out of his mouth next, and he lengthened his stride to create some space between them and get to the town.But Arthur matched him easily, asking in a soft voice, "How old are you?"Merlin ground his teeth and stomped forward stubbornly as he bit out, “Find a calendar, Arthur.”He looked confused for a moment, then jumped forward and pulled Merlin back by the shoulder with a sharp jerk. Merlin went with it, rolling his eyes and dropping his head so Arthur wouldn’t see.“Merlin.”He exhaled slowly and as he lifted his head, he said plainly, “I was twenty-three when you died.” Arthur’s eyes flitted over his face, really looking at every inch now that he really knew that, like himself, Merlin had remained physically unchanged. Merlin smiled painfully at him. “Still twenty-three.”Arthur went silent, his hand on Merlin’s shoulder tightening and then falling to his side.Merlin swallowed, fiddling with his own bag strap and through his dry throat pitifully said, “But if you were really counting, it’s near fifteen hundred and forty…something.”Arthur’s face remained unchanged, solemnly and silently staring at him.Merlin broke the eye contact and a flush crawled up his neck. “Well,” he mumbled, starting to turn, but slowly, in case Arthur was going to grab him again. “we should probably get our train tickets.”When Arthur let him go unimpeded, he cleared his throat and added under his breath, “And I need to explain what a train is without making an arse of myself.”

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

Arthur, in fact, did not want much explanation.As they entered the station, Arthur fell in behind Merlin and stayed right at his shoulder. He was quiet. Silent, really.Merlin wanted to tell him to ease up and quit breathing down his neck, but as he turned to do so, a distracted man in a heavy coat on the phone smacked into Arthur’s shoulder in his haste.Arthur wasn’t pushed very far back, a solidly-built man himself, but Merlin felt his fingers skate over the inside of his wrist, almost curling around his hand.The second it was there, however, the next it was gone.The man had continued on as though it had never happened; Arthur cleared his throat and ran the hand that had reached out to Merlin’s through his hair, eyes skittering over the crowd – in case someone had seen.Merlin looked down at the gritty floor as Arthur collected himself, and only started walking again when he saw Arthur’s feet turn to him, saying nothing and ignoring the warm lines where Arthur’s fingers had grazed.Arthur more easily avoided other patrons after the first encounter, but he was visibly more relaxed once they found their seats. It was isolated, since Merlin paid extra to buy out the car, avoiding the spatially-unaware. Arthur instead watched them from safely behind the window.With Arthur distracted, Merlin pulled out his phone and settled forward on his knees, emailing Peter an ETA. He spent a few extra minutes checking the news in case they were coming back to government agents or overzealous scientists.From what he could see, the storm itself had been enough chaos that his own had gone unnoticed.Hopefully, his neighbors weren’t going to notice how much more damaged their places were than his own. After the fleeting moment reunited with his magic, his windows might’ve been left bulletproof.He was already the weirdo who never talked to anybody besides his own employees, what was a little extra strange?“So everyone just takes this…train?”Merlin looked up, his thoughts scattering as Arthur interrupted them. He was still people-watching out the window, fogging up a little of the glass with his breath. Merlin wasn’t sure if Arthur had even noticed what he was doing.“Uh,” Merlin blinked, shaking his head once. He focused on the station sign outside the window before he spoke. “Not just this train. There’s cars, bikes, the Tube – ” Merlin trailed off as Arthur gave him a blank look.“Lot more options than horses.” Merlin revised. Arthur rolled his eyes and peered back out the window as the train started to pull away from the station.  “Convenient.” He murmured.Merlin didn’t respond, slipping his phone into his pocket. He leaned back into his seat and tilted his head up to watch the ceiling, listening to the repetitive sounds of the older train sailing through quiet country and Arthur’s soft breathing as he watched it go by.Merlin closed his eyes as he listened, until the position started to wear on his neck.With a soft groan, he lowered his chin and checked the seat across from him.Arthur had fallen asleep, temple pressed against the glass and hands on his lap, mouth slightly dropped open. Merlin must have been paying even less attention than he thought, as Arthur was letting out soft snores of deep sleep.When had Arthur last slept? He realized that, if Arthur had, Merlin had not been around to see it.And Arthur…he was stubborn, to say the least. Even on simple hunts, he was first to keep watch, the last to rest. As King, he was more likely to pass out in the middle of his writings or spend nights pacing and planning before retiring to bed.It was the only time Merlin really saw Arthur, especially once he’d been crowned. There was always the knight, the Crown Prince, the King. The closest he ever was to relaxed was with Gwen, or only in complete privacy…until someone walked in and he donned the required mask.The man under it all rarely saw the surface; only when it was safe, when it was okay.And, possibly, for the first time since his death, “okay” was in the private train car with a man separated from him by fifteen hundred years.Or maybe it was just being far enough away from that damn lake.
Was anywhere far enough from Avalon?
Or would Merlin fall asleep one night, Arthur at his side, alive and making his heart actually feel like it was beating…just to wake up and find an even bigger hole where he’d been because Avalon decided to take him back?Merlin looked over the softened lines of Arthur’s face, only missing the sight of upturned lips and the blue of his eyes, wishing that the course of their lives had gone differently.If Arthur really had been a farmer outside of the kingdom, and Merlin just a traveler, stumbling upon him. If their scars were only physical – just accidents and fond stories – or at least less. Rather than the jagged psychological shambles they had now, where even sleep might be invaded.
Was anywhere safe?
~~~~~~            Arthur must have been avoiding sleep, since he remained conked out for the rest of the trip – a good few hours, snuffling only when Merlin stepped out to find the food cart.Merlin expected him to at least wake up and take some of his sandwich when he returned, but the deep smell of warm ham and melted cheese was ineffective. Merlin was secretly pleased as he curled up in the corner of the seat.But, like a skilled warrior, once the train began to slow and the sounds of a busier city than Hexham grew louder, Arthur twitched and awoke. His gaze first examined the car, checking Merlin’s position and whether anyone had joined them, and the flicked to the view out of the window, though any surprise about his new surroundings didn’t show.Merlin only noticed that his hand had gone to his side for an absent weapon when Arthur was shifting it back to his lap, rubbing his thigh to cover the action.“My shop is close by.” Merlin said.Arthur nodded, then stood. Merlin followed, but Arthur let him step in front, positioning close to Merlin’s shoulder again and shadowing him as they traversed the London station. It was late afternoon now, but the last of the end-day rush still packed the area with people.There were a few more bumps as they traveled through the crowd, and the all-around noise was constant and didn’t ebb to quiet until they stepped outside. Nothing was too much to startle Arthur again.Though every time someone walked too close or seemed just a little rude, Merlin focused on his hands – in case Arthur’s touch grazed.It didn’t happen.Merlin ploughed ahead until they were clear of the doors and onto the pavement, where Arthur stepped to Merlin’s side. He had stopped them in a calmer area, just off of the station. He took a long inhale and slipped his thumbs into his pockets.Arthur raised a brow when they had stood without moving for a few minutes, and Merlin raised one hand, gesturing to the buildings around them.“Take a second.” Arthur looked where Merlin’s hand pointed, scrunching his nose and brows in confusion. He shrugged.“Just look.” Merlin nudged Arthur’s elbow with his hand. He tried a little smile. “A whole new Camelot.”Arthur sighed, adjusted the strap of his bag and examined the area, squinting a bit with the setting sun. He looked up and down the buildings, all reaching heights only castles and defensive walls had before. He licked at his lips as he discovered a bakery across the street (a favorite of Merlin’s, in fact), then followed the path of a green motor scooter as it drove past. People walked around them, some giving strange looks, but most choosing to ignore a grown man gawking at normal surroundings.Merlin watched with a small smile, focused on the quick movements of Arthur’s eyes, back and forth, here and there. Trying to take in everything, even if he didn’t know what it was.“This was Camelot?” Arthur breathed, still looking at the city.Merlin swallowed, and said, “No, farther north.”Arthur’s mouth pulled into a frown, but as he turned it on Merlin, he continued, looking around at the setting himself. “But this…this is what Camelot could’ve been. Would’ve been.”Arthur’s face softened, and he now looked at Merlin as Merlin had been looking at him.“You’ve always been so hopeful.” He said.Merlin huffed and shook his head. “Not for a long time.”“Merlin…”He met Arthur’s eyes. “It’s fine.”Arthur’s jaw tensed, but his eyes were not narrowed or dark. Merlin expected him to push the subject.“Are we walking?” he asked instead.~~~~~~ Peter is overly relieved when Merlin walks through the door, nearly tripping over his own feet to greet him. Guilt sunk in Merlin’s stomach as he noticed Peter’s ragged appearance, his brown hair disheveled and clothes improperly buttoned and obviously worn for over a day. His brown eyes were red-rimmed and dark underneath. There were coffee cups littered across the comic counter.“Have you been here by yourself?” Merlin asked, placing his hands on Peter’s shoulders to steady him.He nodded and began rattling off the play by play of the last few days since the storm had come through, only half of which Merlin kept up with. The boy was practically vibrating from caffeine.He interrupted, raising a hand. Peter clamped his mouth shut. “Why didn’t you call anyone else in?”Peter was just a grad student, barely older than Merlin appeared to be. But he’d taken on work that could have only piled onto whatever he was already assigned at school. They had at least three other employees…“Everyone’s been dealing with the storm! Abby’s apartment was flooded, Si doesn’t have any power – ” Peter was rambling again, hands flying wild in front of his face until Merlin grabbed onto his shoulders again and squeezed once.Peter inhaled sharply and focused on Merlin’s face as he spoke gently to him. “Peter, you’ve done more than enough. You need to go home. And sleep.” Peter pulled a face and sighed as Merlin raised a brow at him.“I’ve been using the couch in your office!” He argued, throwing Merlin’s hands off his shoulders. He smoothed down his rumpled shirt and muttered, “It’s not like you were here.”Merlin pinched the bridge of his nose and nodded. “I know, I know.”This boy deserved a raise if anyone ever did. Did he even know if his own home was still standing? Or had he taken it upon himself to defend Merlin’s bookshop; which he kept simply because it was a little piece of nothing; inconspicuous among everything else.“Is that who I heard on the phone?”Merlin startled, and his first thought was that he was developing a focus problem.“What?”Peter pointed behind Merlin. “The guy going into your office?”Merlin spun to catch sight of Arthur’s arm heading through the doorway at the back of the store.“Utter prat.” He grumbled, and made after Arthur, throwing his bag on the counter as he passed. Peter tried to call after him, and then even to follow him, but Merlin paused and turned back to say, “You stay, I’ll make you babysit him.”Peter cocked his head with a puzzled expression.But if Merlin could count on one thing; it was that Arthur would act like Arthur.“Merlin!”He pointed over his shoulder and mouthed, “Nightmare.”Something crashed in his office – the sound of ceramic and solid thumps – and though Merlin inwardly cringed at the thought of which antique was now in pieces at Arthur’s hand, it put enough fear into Peter of having to deal with it that he nodded and strode quickly to the counter for his things.Merlin didn’t wait to make sure Peter followed through before dashing into his office more ruffling and falling objects calling to him.He tripped over a book thrown onto his rug in his hurry, but still hissed as he found his footing.Merlin leaned on the edge of a bookcase, massaging his toe with one hand and took in the small disaster Arthur had created. He was in front of another bookcase, the shelf parallel to his shoulders now rested on angle, with everything that had been place upon it now sprawled on the floor or held precariously in Arthur’s arms.“You couldn’t wait five minutes?”“Just help me.” Arthur muttered, grimacing when a small trinket tumbled from his arms. Merlin groaned and quickly stepped, his foot still throbbing, over to Arthur. He picked out the largest pieces and placed them on his desk. The disarray of the items didn’t make the desk look any different, its surface already covered with things Merlin had already put there.The rest of the smaller items, Merlin gathered in his own arms and found temporary homes for on the other shelves.Arthur barely glanced at Merlin once his arms were free, navigating the bit of a mess he’d made on the floor without making a move to clean them up. Instead, he picked up and examined a silver-engraved music box with working gears, but no working soundbox. When he opened the lid, the tiny, metal dancer spun slowly on its stand.Merlin gawked at him and made a small sound, the scolding caught in his throat as he struggled to put back what Arthur had just disturbed.Before Merlin could truly get after him, Arthur snapped the box closed and then placed it randomly back on a shelf, a few feet from where he’d found it, moving on to what next caught his eye.“I didn’t want to interrupt,” He said to Merlin’s earlier question, pausing to pick up one of few more recent items of the hodgepodge collection – a blue-handled pocketknife. “whatever you had going on.”Merlin’s brows pulled together at Arthur’s bitter tone, one that had before been saved for when Merlin disappeared without telling Arthur – often because he was secretly undoing plots against him. When using his magic would have ended with him tied and burned, but Arthur could never know and only thought him a terrible manservant.Merlin studied Arthur a bit more. He held the pocketknife close to his sternum, turning it over in his hands and watching it blankly. The hard clench in his jaw and low timbre of his voice when he spoke, turned mostly away to create a barrier while in an open room with another person.No, Merlin remembered, Arthur would not and had not cared about a servant until he needed them.He was only sullen when he felt he’d been barred from what involved him. That Merlin’s absences, and even those of his knights and Gwen, were within his grasp, but they could not trust him. The only people he could call friends did not trust him.And he’d only begun to discover the real truth when he’d died.Merlin sighed and walked slowly over to Arthur, sliding into in the small space Arthur had left unintentionally between himself and the shelves. He could only fit his head and right shoulder, but it was enough to reach over and pull the pocketknife from Arthur’s hands.Arthur gave no protest and stepped back to allow Merlin to lean against his desk, crossing his arms over his chest now that he had nothing to fiddle with. He stared at both their feet, jaw still clenched.There were no windows in the office, built only as a second thought when Merlin needed somewhere to put things away that he couldn’t – or didn’t want to – sell. The dim light from the ceiling fixture was feeble, giving both of them an yellow pallor.“Whatever I have going on?” Merlin murmured, raising a brow.Arthur shrugged, scuffing the toe of his shoe on the carpet. “He seems friendly.”“He’s my employee.”Arthur uncrossed his arms and scoffed. He looked at Merlin with a weary smile, playing with his wedding ring. Merlin fought his own smile, rubbing at his nose to attempt to hide it when he couldn’t.“He really is.” Merlin asserted, though the laugh in his voice seemed to defeat the intent.“He’s apparently the only one who cares about this place as much you.” Arthur mocked, finally letting go of the tenseness in his face. “And you weren’t that surprised.”“He’s twenty-two, and he’s got a little…infatuation.” Merlin waved his hand as he searched for the right way to explain, but Arthur was quick to comment.“He barely cared about me when I walked in.”“This isn’t about you.” Merlin reminded, tone light though his face had lost its jovial smile.“I just asked a question.” Arthur came forward , tilting his head as he spoke with the same tone. It made Merlin lean back against the desk, though there was little more space to go, holding on to the edge with his fingers. A habit developed over years of being the highest ranked in the room; to get his point across in the most pointed way. He never did more than that, and even Merlin used to brush it off and walk across the room to continue the conversation.Merlin reached up to push his hand against the center of Arthur’s chest, since the office was so small.Arthur just gave him a laugh and a cocky smile, pressing against Merlin’s hand. Merlin pushed harder, sending Arthur back a step. He huffed out a short laugh as he righted himself.“Don’t start messing with me, Arthur.” Merlin said.Arthur grinned wider and replied, confident and tease, “When do I ever?” as he stepped purposefully back into Merlin’s space.“I said, don’t.” Merlin raised his hand in front of him once more.“Fifteen hundred years, you’ve gotten a bit obstinate.” Arthur was still joking, riling Merlin up in the bantering game they had been used to a long time ago.“Arthur.”Merlin shoved him that time, which really knocked Arthur off balance. Merlin barely realized he’d done it, just blinked hard and swallowed the sudden lump in his throat.Arthur shook off the stupor first.“What the hell, Merlin?”Merlin’s hand was still raised in front of him, but as Arthur turned on him, he threw it down to his side, curling it into a fist. A flood of anger coursed through his nerves, his next words pouring out of him in a harsh exhale.“You don’t get to be in my face anymore, Arthur.” Merlin jutted out his chin, but Arthur narrowed his eyes and squared his shoulders. Merlin met his stubborn gaze, to which Arthur pointed accusingly at him.“I’ll do what I like.” His voice rumbled in his chest, his posturing adding to the ichor of his words. Merlin smacked his hand away, but he still continued. “You’re not in charge of me, Merlin.”“Don’t act like a jealous child.” He returned, stepping forward from the desk and using his height to match Arthur’s overgrown physical display.“You need to back off.” Arthur warned.“Whingeing about sharing your things.” Merlin drawled, pushing the issue to see Arthur’s mouth curl in anger and his eyes flare.Arthur threw out his hands. “What do I have to share?”“Your ego’s still plenty big enough.” Merlin almost gnashed his teeth, like a wolf protecting its share of the kill.The two of them paused, shoulders heaving and muscles tightened as if they’d progress farther than spiteful words. In this second, the office door creaked open. Neither reacted to it, and the doorway was empty for a full second until Peter popped in his head, eyes wide.“What.” Arthur growled, keeping eye contact with Merlin.Peter faltered at being addressed by a complete stranger, mouth frozen mid-sentence. Merlin’s anger was quickly replaced by a cold shame that shot down his spine. His glare sombered.He’d been fighting in his own shop, his space that had been safe and simple. What was he doing?Merlin winced and rubbed the back of his neck, clearing his throat. “I’ll be right out, Peter.”Arthur rolled his eyes and turned his back to Merlin, facing a wall of framed art pieces. He was less cooled from being walking in upon, setting his hands on his hips and grumbling about nothing to himself.Peter glanced at Arthur, mouth still ajar. Merlin cleared his throat again, more directly this time and Peter’s mouth snapped shut. He nodded to Merlin and ducked out, his footsteps quick on the old wooden floors.On Peter’s leave, Arthur turned his head to speak over his shoulder.“Can we go somewhere else?”His posture was still on guard, but Arthur’s voice had gone softer. Merlin couldn’t tell whether it was because the door had been left conspicuously open or Arthur was hiding under two layers – one of stone and one of quiet.It was probably the first instance since their reunion that Arthur had decided their course of action.Merlin peered at his feet, silent.Arthur didn’t ask him again or push for a reply. Merlin never ended up really answering, choosing instead to walk from the room.As Merlin passed him, Arthur’s hand moved, more than a twitch, toward him.His fingers just missed Merlin’s elbow and Arthur sighed, letting his hand fall to his side.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

Arthur sequestered himself in Merlin’s office without another word, leaving the door ajar slightly as Merlin had after their…spat. He made very little sound, as though he might have been left standing, frozen, in the middle of the room after Merlin had gone.Arthur had come back into life for a week and…and he hadn’t changed. Plucked from one time to another, like stepping through a door with not a scratch of time following him. Merlin had lived those years, all of them, a luxury of timeless body while cursed with solitary.Fifteen thousand years out of his element, but Arthur could wield his own clout like there was still a crown atop his head to back it up. Accosting Merlin at the mere sight of his attention straying elsewhere; that stupid raised chin and pleased glint in Arthur’s eyes when Merlin could barely explain himself.Peter was a child (even more than he realized), but if Arthur even suspected that Merlin had a personal life, he could never leave it alone.I’ll do what I like.He’d been alive so long, how did he not realize? The change that could not be escaped, even if he only thought every day about the one life he should have lived, instead of the hundreds that he’d been required to create.He sent Peter home, promising a well-deserved bonus, even though he was curled half over the counter, speaking down toward the floor rather than his employee. The thick walls kept out the sounds of the street, so that Merlin stood in utter silence. There was no hum of the heater, or the soft sound of pages turning while someone perused among the shelves. His own breathing almost startled him when his chest started to hurt from lack of doing so.While he was the only one around to work the store, he no longer cared about keeping it open. He doubted there had been any customers in the aftermath, and when he could bear to gaze across the little expanse of his shop, he decided he didn’t want anyone there anyway.Still in silence, Merlin rounded the store counter and padded to the door. He laid his hands against it, one on the doorknob and one on a window pane. Both were cold under his touch, and it was only that which made him continue forward and flip the little sign hanging from it to ‘closed’.He stood there for another moment, fingertips growing numb under the cold pane. He watched his skin grow a faint shade of red, drawing in his focus until he’d zoned out everything else.Arthur wasn’t stewing in his own anger, waiting, just in the other room.He wasn’t in charge of Arthur, acting like a teacher and protector after he’d failed at the job so long ago.He wasn’t out of control of the magic he’d had since birth.A soft thrum began to bubble up and spread through his veins, zipping to the ends of his fingers and into the glass.It cracked sharply, spiderwebbing out from the points of contacts with his fingertips to the wooden frame. Merlin didn’t flinch, observing the lines of gold that followed along the cracks. As it suffused into the wood at the end of the cracks, he peered up at his own reflection and was enraptured by the golden glow of his eyes.It was small, and considerably tame compared to what he was once capable of, but magic nonetheless.He began to press his fingers harder against the glass, purposefully pulling on the earlier thrum to bring it to surface. It was his, a part of him just as much as his heart in his chest and it would come when he called it.But he could feel it slipping away, out of his reach and fading. He’d only used it to barely crack a pane of glass, and it hadn’t even been on purpose. Only for it to wither back where he couldn’t reach it.He dug his fingers in harder, even trying to force his nails through the cold glass, but it was fruitless. The spark of his magic had come for a brief moment and then fallen from his grasp.He collapsed forward onto the door; his forehead pressed to an unbroken pane of glass. The cold barely registered as he tightly shut his eyes, fighting to keep from shedding the tears building up.He shared Arthur’s wish to be somewhere, anywhere, else.~~~~~~In a strange turn of luck, no one came into the shop after Peter had gone. Merlin kept it open, to keep up appearances, though he didn’t move from the front counter for anything. Arthur had yet to extricate himself from Merlin’s office, but he also wasn’t complaining about being left there. And Merlin was quite happy to keep it that way until he was ready to close.He laid forward on his arms, blankly watching the shelves in front of him and sinking into the silence of the room. He let his thoughts flit through his head, never settling on one or the other, even if one was the distant-feeling memory of waking up on the bank to Arthur come back from the dead or how he was going to go on as he never had: without magic, but with Arthur.The sunlight had started to set, turning a burnt orange and yellow through the windows behind Merlin. He’d need to officially close up shop soon, and take Arthur home. Not Ealdor, but the little flat that had the twenty-first century Merlin’s things – his books, his clothes, his life.A life Arthur hadn’t touched until now.But where else could he go? He’d never last, hidden away in the old cottage and the new world order would not accommodate someone so outside of it as Arthur Pendragon, king of another age.A lot of things would change. Irrevocably.~~~~~~He ended up falling asleep. Shop unlocked, completely open for anyone to walk in and rob him blind. If someone were so inclined to swipe a bunch of books.He wasn’t woken by anything, just the bleary awareness that he had fallen asleep when he didn’t mean to. That one moment he’d gone to blink and the next, the only light left was a couple of lamps giving off a soft glow.He blinked heavily, groaning in the back of his throat as the rest of his body caught up with his head. His neck ached from lying atop his own arms, which had also fallen asleep, buzzing pins and needles as the blood returned to them.He nearly started right off his chair when he realized Arthur was standing in the doorway to his office, staring at him.A chill ran down his back and a flush across his cheeks, now aware of Arthur’s observant gaze. He was leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed lazily in front of him and feet crossed as well.As Merlin sat, staring back at him with caught-wide eyes, he tilted his head and peered at Merlin in a way he couldn’t read. It was relaxed, neutral almost, the traces of anger that had come hours earlier now smoothed away. There was no secrecy, no tension in Arthur’s jaw, but Merlin had no clue what to think of it.
When had that happened?
Out of practice and unsettled, Merlin cleared his throat and slid off his chair. His path from behind the counter led him directly toward Arthur, but he ducked his head so his hair fell across his face as he passed. He could still feel the focused attention of that gaze on the back of his neck. He instinctively raised his hand to rub the heat of it away as he spoke quickly.“You’re ready to go then?” He didn’t pause for Arthur’s response, collecting his bag and fishing his keys out of the pocket.He strode across the room to the door, wrenching it open and leaving the obvious issue of the broken glass pane for the next day. Or possibly the next week. He stood with the door open, cold air infiltrating inside and blowing harshly across his cheeks.Arthur had moved just a step. Like he’d started to follow Merlin, but stopped, his hand braced on the doorframe. His face, however, had remained the same, studying and intent.Merlin pushed hard at the urge to buckle and tell Arthur what he was trying to figure out, forcing a scowl in its place and stubbornly meeting Arthur’s eyes. They flitted over his face, a final attempt at answers, before Arthur finally broke the connection with a sharp turn of his head, bringing his thump up to swipe at his nose.“Yeah.” He mumbled, as if he hadn’t been staring at all.And that Merlin remembered.He finally recognized where he’d seen the look in Arthur’s eyes before. Long, long ago, during his first days in Camelot before he learned how to juggle protecting Arthur’s destiny and masquerading as just his manservant.When his snark would slip past his slipshod barrier, brought down by exhaustion, and all of the sudden Arthur would stare at him – stare at him like there had suddenly appeared a person. Not someone behind-the-scenes, but someone who existed.He’d starting seeing Merlin. On equal ground, in sunlight instead of shadows, he saw Merlin enough to trust him about serpents on a shield and with his final moments. In return, Merlin had never pretended to be that first mask, very obviously sticking his nose in every facet of Arthur’s life.And Arthur was seeing him again. As someone different, who carried the weight of every day since their parting. As someone now a stranger.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

Somehow, Merlin ended up waiting on Arthur once again.It was wordless, like returning to the old habit after lighting a cigarette. Even if it was cheap and stale, even the first time was just that once…Arthur had collapsed on his sofa, clutching a pillow so close to his chest and Merlin grabbed a blanket to throw it over him.He’d done something similar when Arthur’s late nights had left him passed out over his desk in Camelot, or even when he’d separated himself from the knights after a poorly wrought plan, replaying the entire thing over and over to find what went wrong.Arthur had just come back, and Merlin dragged him across half the country within a week with little warning. Of course, he was going to shut down.And since it was “one time”, Merlin didn’t give much thought to how easily he took in the sight of Arthur in his little living room. The wrinkled furrow of his brow as he curled closer to the comfort of one of the throw pillows, and went immediately for a blanket.He hadn’t been anything of the servant sort – to Arthur or anyone else – in centuries. Surely the habit, the instinct, would have been long worn away.Of course, the moment he felt like it was gone from his head, the addiction came back to lure him in.Arthur didn’t fold the blanket Merlin had given him after waking up, or set the pillow back in its place.So, Merlin did it.Arthur went through the clothes Merlin had brought for him in a few days.So, Merlin washed them and didn’t teach Arthur how to do so himself.He cooked Arthur’s meals, under the guise of keeping Arthur away from anything that could set his flat ablaze. Although, cook was a loose definition when most of his food involved the freezer and the microwave.But…Arthur was happy. Taken care of, at least.He slept on the couch, often with the fireplace burning low in front of him. The first nights, Merlin hovered around the kitchen until the early morning, watching tiredly as he downed mug after mug of instant coffee in case Arthur woke up. In case he needed him. When he finally did retire to his own room, he left the door open.Arthur was quiet and placated, and after four days they had settled into their patchwork routine.He didn’t speak until he was about to head out the door, sidling up behind the couch and murmuring to Arthur’s sleeping form that he was going to work for a few hours.One of Merlin’s DVDs was playing on the TV in front of him, but Arthur nodded silently in response and tucked his arm under his pillow. When Merlin returned, it was to the same sight.Arthur had moved, apparently.Empty popcorn bags littered the cushion beside him, and he’d sat up to tuck his knees up against his chest rather than be stretched along the couch. His gaze flicked over when Merlin set down his keys, but otherwise he remained as he was.Merlin hung back at the counter, listening to the soft volume of the TV. He recognized it after a moment, the soft music in the somber beginning of The Princess Bride. Arthur had already watched it twice. And somehow, he felt that, of course Arthur would enjoy it.He dared to cross the flat and sit on the other side of the couch, the popcorn bag between them. Arthur kept his eyes on the movie, quiet and somber as he watched. Merlin dragged the other throw pillow into his lap, and fiddled absentmindedly with the corner as he started watching too.“It’s almost six.” he said.Arthur made a soft sound, without tearing his gaze from the movie. Merlin copied him, speaking low under the volume of the movie.“Need anything?”Arthur sniffed, resting his head on top of his knees and murmured, “Kind of hungry.”“Alright.” Merlin nodded, but Arthur had yet to look at him. He slid off the couch and went off into the kitchen, listening to the continuing sounds of the movie in case Arthur…called for him. Cleared his throat. Something.He watched Arthur out of the corner of his eye while the water boiled, but Arthur might as well have been a statue between Merlin’s leaving and his return, a Cup Noodle in each hand.Arthur blinked when Merlin held out his food, staring at the rising steam for a moment before reaching out for it. His fingers first brushed the styrofoam, unsure of the texture until Merlin pushed it closer and Arthur had to curl his hand around it or otherwise drop it.Merlin quickly handed him a fork as well, and sat back onto the couch, curling his feet underneath him before tucking into his food. He took a page from Arthur’s playbook, watching only the TV screen even though Arthur was finally looking at him, tired eyes watching.His eyes had been like that for a few days now, a darker shade of exhaustion. Merlin didn’t comment on it. Or that several days’ stubble growth had formed a blond shadow along his jaw.“Eat your food.” he muttered through his next bite.It was enough to make Arthur look down at his cup, and slowly bring his fork to the food. The movie played on in front of them, though most of it was drowned out under their chewing.It was uncomfortable silence, not that different from the uncomfortable one-sided conversation, but Merlin had decided it had been enough of Arthur wallowing in the damn living room. Or else Merlin might come back one day and find him buried under empty popcorn bags.“What d’you think?” he tried, twirling his fork among his noodles. Arthur peeked over the top of his cup, mouth full and brows raised. Merlin pointed at the half-gone food with his fork. “Acceptable?”Arthur chewed for a moment, nodding deeply. When he spoke, it was with his mouth full – still an actual child hiding in a grown adult’s body.“It’s good.”He kept his head down, close enough to not have to carry the noodles on the fork far to his mouth, practically inhaling it all at once. Merlin stopped eating to watch, poking his own utensil into his food. Arthur finished and set his empty cup aside on the coffee table, settling back into the couch without another word.The movie still played on, but Arthur didn’t turn his attention back to it. He faced Merlin, tucked into the corner of the couch, but his eyes were low, staring tired at nothing.“I can make you something else.” he offered.Arthur blinked, and then shook his head. “Maybe later.”“Okay.” Merlin stuck his fork into the cup, food half-eaten, and picked up Arthur’s empty one. The only sounds in the flat were the movie’s dialogue and Merlin’s footsteps across the space into the kitchen as he threw away their dinner.He’d become a servant again, now watching the man who’d been his king, his friend becoming…nothing. His life was on Merlin’s couch. Days of the same thing, broken up only by Merlin’s intrusion to make sure he was fed and showered – except now he wasn’t interrupting strategy meetings and sword practice.From a kingdom to a flat…a crown to nothing.Merlin pulled a beer out of the fridge, took a long drink. He set it down on the counter, and tapped the glass sides, glancing at the oven. Not even seven yet; they could still go out somewhere. Nothing like a club – too loud, too much – but something.“There’s a café around the corner.” he called out.He paused, but Arthur didn’t give an answer. Only a shift of fabric as he readjusted on the couch. Merlin lifted his beer up for another drink, but decided against it as the cool, amber glass brushed his lip. He set it aside, farther than necessary, before speaking again.“Small, not too busy. I think you’d like coffee.”Still no response.“…Or tea.” Merlin sighed, rubbing his fingertips against his forehead.He’d tried offering some of the green tea in the back of cabinet to Arthur – old bags from who knew when – but that was when Arthur was still grumbling about the bookstore. From the ten minutes it took him to remember how to use the kettle without his magic to help it along to the silent debate on whether or not to put sugar in the drink, it stressed him out more than necessary.Merlin hadn’t tried it again.“Arthur?”The silence was truly upsetting at this point, and Merlin strode back over to the couch, swiping the remoted off the coffee table. He turned the TV off with an emphasized press of the button, and then stepped directly in Arthur’s line of sight.His eyes, dark blue and tired, shifted over to Merlin.Merlin cast the remote aside, and crossed his arms over his chest. “Arthur, you can’t stay like this.”Arthur sat up, bringing a hand to rest against his temple. Other than where his fingers were pressed, his face as blank, staring at Merlin without disappointment, without annoyance. Without anything.Merlin clenched his teeth, and breathed a long sigh. Dug his nails into his arm and stared back at Arthur. Everyone word spoken had been by him, for days Arthur had barely done anything but exist and now…Merlin wouldn’t do it.He’d stand there, in silence. Like Arthur had sat on his couch, and started languishing right in front of him without a word for days. If there was anything left of Arthur now, perhaps Merlin could pull it out from him with sheer will.Arthur had always been stubborn, right from the beginning.And no one aggravated him quite like Merlin.The corner of Arthur’s mouth curled and with a long roll of his eyes, he finally spoke.“What am I supposed to do?”Voice sharp and biting, Arthur sat forward, brows pulling together in a furious scowl. Hoarse from little use, but his voice still startled Merlin, how starkly Arthur could still speak when Merlin had thought his attention had devolved to basically nothing.It was a shadow of Arthur’s previous self.“Well?” he asked again, voice colored with even more annoyance, now louder and directed.Enough so to call forward the fire in Merlin’s chest that could never stand to let Arthur’s tone go unchecked. The same that had overpowered any common sense and let words like “my lord” fall from his lips with mockery.“Go outside.”Every pent-up, bitter feeling and repressed annoyance spit out from Merlin’s mouth, no longer able to be gentle and lenient of Arthur. And the words, once they were finally let free of the levy, tumbled out of Merlin’s control. “I’ve been doing everything for you right now. Washing your clothes, making your food. But you’re not a Crown Prince anymore, and if you stay in here any longer –”Arthur stood, rising to meet Merlin’s gaze straight on and interrupt him with a bold, “I can’t go anywhere without you, if you didn’t notice.”He remained where he was, digging in his heels against Arthur’s close proximity. He’d already told Arthur once of their changed positions, that a crown which no longer existed didn’t justify his behavior.Merlin’s unflinching glare and refusal to move back seemed to remind Arthur of the fact and he pulled away with a resigned sigh, running a hand through his messy hair. Merlin hadn’t allowed him to go without bathing, but it seemed Arthur would need a reminder to do it again, the strands near-matted and greasy.“What does it matter to you?” Arthur dropped his hand to his side, and turned back to Merlin. “Really? What does it matter that I go out into a world I don’t understand?”He had no answer.Arthur’s face tightened and he swiped quickly at his eyes, ducking his head to hide, pointless as it was. It seemed that his throat had tightened up on him too, voice strained as he continued.“I almost get hit by a giant, metal machine or complete strangers know you better than I do. People speak, and it’s like I’ve been left out of the fucking joke, but no one’s waiting to reveal it to me.” He laughed, a frightening sound to Merlin’s ears – lifeless and pained. “If I go anywhere, I am at a disadvantage.”It was the most like himself Arthur had been in days, even to the point of tactical thinking about the entire situation. But like a poison, his view was hopeless and had spread throughout him.“Arthur, I –”“I know, Merlin.” He set his hands onto his hips, and for a moment Merlin thought he was dreaming again. Seeing Arthur standing as he had in the old walls of Camelot, but dressed so strangely different in soft, patterned clothes. “I know you’re here.”“No.” Merlin stepped forward, touching his fingers to Arthur’s elbow and then laying his hand on his forearm when Arthur didn’t storm off. “I know how frightened you are. How unfair this entire situation is to you because you have to be frightened.”Arthur looked at him, one brow raised, watching so intently Merlin felt a shiver run through him. He was out of practice brushing off those looks, but he couldn’t let it overcome him.“This isn’t a battle you can win with strategy. No planning, no armor. It’s a blind leap.” He said, tightening his hand around Arthur’s forearm once and then letting it fall away. “I forgot that.”Merlin moved back, just a step, his lungs straining for air while Arthur’s still staring at him the same way for so long. Merlin swallowed hard, forcing himself to hold that gaze and finish what Arthur needed to hear and what he needed to say.“But I am here.”Arthur’s lips parted to speak, but Merlin ducked his head and finally let himself flee from the ever-intense blue eyes of Arthur Pendragon. He shoved his hands into pockets, pausing at the border of hardwood and carpet that separated his kitchen and bedroom hallway.“Get some rest. And we’ll try in the morning.” He paused, biting the inside of his cheek. “Alright?”Arthur was still standing where Merlin had left him, only shifting to follow Merlin’s path away from him. The darkness that had hovered over him was no longer so prevalent, and Arthur glanced toward his makeshift bed, almost hesitant to return to it.“Yeah.” He finally replied, a bit of a smile crooking the corner of his mouth. "In the morning.”

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

He could hear Merlin sleep in the other room. The bouts of restlessness throughout the night where Merlin shifted among his blankets until he settled with soft snores that drifted past the door he always left open to where Arthur slept in the living room.Or tried to sleep.The couch, as Merlin had introduced it, was comfy with use, the cushions welcoming him easily. He was sure Merlin had spent a night or two on it before Arthur.He was used to darkness.While the years he’d known had slipped further and further away, he hadn’t known it. He remembered…glimpses, in a way. Like his sprit had come up for air, only moments at a time, and brought back the memory that life still existed. The strongest one had been that day, when Merlin’s voice had come through so clearly and Avalon had finally given him up.Settling into the cushions, Arthur hoped morning would come quickly.Because there was no darkness anymore.As he closed his eyes, the same plaguing image filled his mind: a lake, bordered on all but one side by heavy trees, that had once homed strange, mystical creatures. Waters that had enveloped him from time and decay and then flung him onto the shore to claw his way back out. He’d returned in the midst of raging storm, confused but alive.Now, the water was calm, moving in ripples from the breezes across them. But with the breezes came a voice – one voice composed of many that spoke all at once – and an ethereal chill that brushed across his skin.
Arthur Pendragon…
He could never respond, only a watcher of the shore and an audience for the voices. He had no idea of a name to call them, gone too long to recall if he ever knew…but it knew his. Like other beings of power, friendly or harmful, they often knew exactly who he was.
It is almost time.
It was here he always wanted to wake up, to end the unsettling space between dream and nightmare that this being with many voices had put him in.But not matter what he wanted, he was not in control. His eyes remained shut, and his consciousness forced to listen. It infuriated him like nothing else, and the voice seemed to know, blanketing him with cold winds until he settled again.
You will be needed.
Merlin would know what to do. This seemed more in his domain, but unlike the countless times in their past when Merlin risked his life to save Arthur’s, Merlin was not with him.Arthur didn’t know what the voices could want with him. As much as it had pained him before, Merlin was truly the one that people should want; should fight over. The power alone…his father could have only dreamed of controlling it. These voices would have much more use for Merlin, but they’d rather haunt the revived king of a bygone age.When the voices finally released him, there was no falling back to sleep. Arthur’s heart pounded too fast and too loud, and fear that it would only happen again when he closed his eyes clutched too tightly at him.More time always passed than he thought. The world outside Merlin’s windows was dark, though some lights were always on, speckling into the distance as far as he could see.At least someone else wasn’t asleep either.He thought forlornly of the window in his old chambers and staring out it onto the whole of the kingdom when he couldn’t sleep. The gentle torchlight that lit the castle walls slowly turning to sleeping night in the town and then the endless dark of the land farther away. Now, he never had any idea what he was looking at.Arthur turned onto his side and stared at the unlit fireplace. Without sleep, his mind wandered to what it usually did:Merlin.He’d called Arthur frightened…a word that would have thrown his ego-driven self at twenty-one into a defensive rage. Nearing thirty as king, he’d become better at brushing such things off, but would never have admitted it to be true. Not even to Gwen.Merlin spoke too much for his own good, but he was rarely wrong.Why did he have to come back at all, if it was going to be like this? Sheltered away and watching the new world he didn’t know pass him by through a pane of glass. Scared of the world and scared of sleep.And scared that Merlin had changed. A living relic, passing through and never belonging. Arthur stuck out like a sore thumb – forced to adapt fifteen hundred years later – but Merlin fit in too well. Could dip in and out of life without anyone paying attention.Something dark had grown in him. Arthur could see it when Merlin had nothing to occupy him, when he stared down at his own hands, thinking that Arthur wasn’t looking. He’d even started seeing it happen as soon as Merlin turned away, a light in his eyes while they fell into old habits and then dimming when they stopped.It would be wrong to say he’d missed Merlin – he’d barely been aware of anything until a week ago, but there was still a tug in his chest when he thought of his time in the lake and Merlin not being there.A tug that had helped pull him out and drive him onto the shore when Merlin had called.Merlin started getting restless again, groaning softly as he rolled in his blankets, the fabric shifting enough for Arthur to hear. He glanced back toward the bedroom, listening until the soft snores started up again.If Arthur was happy about anything that night…at least Merlin could sleep.