Archive of Our Own

“You feel all that?”

“Don’t you?”

—

Arthur returned to Camelot from Camlann alone, bloody, and miraculously alive.

Everyone insisted on treating him the way they had after his father died. They looked at him like they were a bit afraid for him and a bit afraid of him, like he was living half in the land of the dead and they weren’t sure who he was going to bring with him if he decided to go all in.

Arthur understood their caution, but he didn’t feel the way he’d felt after his father died. He was no stranger to grief. He was a warrior and an orphan, he had lost comrades and friends, and now even his sister. He knew what grief felt like, how it tended to choke him, make him curl into himself, carve him out and make him hollow.

This didn’t feel like that.

Gwen told him it was perfectly understandable, that it was going to take time for him to accept what had happened. She said that Arthur needed to process, to let himself feel the loss.

Gwaine took him out and got them both very drunk, and told him he couldn’t believe it either. He said that if Arthur wanted to talk about it, he was there.

Leon asked if he wanted to take time away from some of his duties, and offered to fill in. He silently took things off of Arthur’s hands. Leon had been with him the longest, watched him through all his grief, and had learned that it was generally a good idea to give him space and something to hit.

Arthur knew they were worried about him. He was growing quite worried about himself, honestly, but it didn’t change how he felt.

Everyone insisted that Arthur needed time to process, to accept that Merlin was gone. The only problem was that Merlin wasn’t.

He didn’t know how to explain it without sounding like his father when he’d seen his mother in the well, like he was losing his mind and looking for ghosts. He didn’t know how to look at his court and make them understand that Merlin had once told him about nature, about the sacred connectedness of the earth, and asked Arthur if he felt it. He didn’t know how to say that he hadn’t felt it back then, but that he did now.

Arthur had been ready to die at Camlann. It was odd, to avoid a fate that you knew somewhere deep in your bones should have been yours. It was odd to wake up from the icy grip of death and find yourself instead in the lifeless arms of your servant, your sorcerer, your best friend.

He had filled the boat with flowers, picked Merlin up and put him in. He had taken Merlin’s neckerchief—somehow spattered with Arthur’s blood, along with the rest of his clothes—and tucked it into his sword belt.

Arthur had sent Merlin’s body into the lake himself, checked again and again for a pulse with his own shaking fingers. He knew that Merlin had died. He knew that Merlin was dead.

He just wasn’t gone.

Arthur had cried over Merlin’s body, and called him an idiot. He’d closed Merlin’s eyes and asked his unmoving face why he would do that, why Merlin would pour all that he was into Arthur, giving him his life force, his power, himself, until the magic he was made up of reclaimed and scattered him, tearing him from his mortal shell and away from Arthur.

“It was supposed to be me,” Arthur said as he placed branches around Merlin’s body. “It would’ve been alright. Guinevere would take care of the kingdom, and of you.”

Eventually, knowing there was no point in lies of omission to a corpse, Arthur asked “why would you save me if it meant leaving me?”

He knew the answer. Merlin had told him a million times, in a million ways.

“I swear to protect you or die at your side.”

“I use it for you, Arthur. Only for you.”

He’d begun the trek back to Camelot with a heart heavier than he could ever remember holding before.

By the time he arrived, though, things had changed.

Arthur found shelter under the curved branches of the trees around Lake Avalon, and a surprisingly soft patch of ground on which to spend the night. He fumbled as he tried to remove his chainmail, and the wind whistled through the leaves as though it was teasing him.

He slept soundly, as if someone he trusted was taking watch. He shouldn’t have allowed himself to relax so much, not alone in the woods so close to a battleground, but he couldn’t help it. Arthur didn’t understand why he felt so safe.

He rested his hands on the wound in his side, now raised scar tissue. It felt warm, calm. It was what was left of Merlin, Arthur supposed. His final act had been to do what he’d been doing for the last decade, taking Arthur’s broken pieces and putting them back together.

No harm came to him as he slept, and when he woke with the sun he realized he hadn’t even felt the chill of the night.

As Arthur walked, he found the path he’d been planning to take blocked by very determined looking squirrels. They chattered at him incessantly when he tried to get around them, and he found himself fighting the urge to order them to shut up.

He then proceeded to feel deeply guilty that his grief-laden mind was trying to replace Merlin with a pack of squirrels.

Arthur was eventually forced to acknowledge that he really could not get through without either massacring squirrels, or suffering a squirrel attack. The first option was cruel and the second rather humiliating, so he took a parallel path instead.

He heard the sounds of shouting just east of him an hour or so later, and realized bandits or remnants of the Saxon army must be on the other path.

The path he’d been warned away from.

Arthur looked around, and saw one squirrel peering at him from a tree.

“Thanks,” the King of Camelot said. The squirrel, being a squirrel, did not respond.

He tripped over a root an hour later, and the wind whistled in a way that sounded amused. When he grew hungry, he found a blackberry bush. It had no business being where it was, under the dense shade of the forest’s canopy, and to find one singular bush with perfectly ripe fruit was too providential to be ignored.

Blackberries were his favourite. Arthur should have been suspicious, but he just felt cared for. He ate his fill and suffered no adverse effects.

His grief seemed to ease in strange ways as he traveled. In Arthur’s experience, grief felt like being alone in the world, like holes carved into your heart that could never heal. He couldn’t understand why he didn’t feel alone, why it didn’t feel like some crucial part of his soul was gone forever.

He’d felt alone without Merlin even just on the way to Camlann, had caught himself looking for him as they made camp, as the knights bickered. He’d sought Merlin’s eyes when he gave a speech to his troops, only to remember that Merlin hadn’t come with him. He’d felt alone then, alone and angry. It was hard not to feel alone in those moments, after ten years with Merlin by his side. Merlin should be by his side now, with all his treason and trouble. They should be walking back to Camelot together.

Arthur could feel that absence, but it didn’t feel the way it should.

After a few more hours, during which the natural world continued to be warm, accommodating, and protective, Arthur was forced to wonder if maybe he was losing his mind.

It wasn’t denial or shellshock. It just felt like Merlin was still there, still with him.

Arthur stopped moving, standing stock still in the conveniently cleared glade he had found. The wind ruffled his hair, as if urging him onwards.

“Merlin,” he said, and the wind stopped. The birds stopped too, the forest oddly silent.

“Merlin,” Arthur said again. “That’s you, isn’t it?”

The wind whispered over his skin, almost a caress. Arthur swallowed hard.

“Well, no need to hold the poor birds hostage,” Arthur said, and in the next second the normal sounds of the forest resumed.

Arthur closed his eyes. He must be hearing things. He’d never had hallucinations in grief before, but given Merlin’s determination to be the exception to every rule, it wouldn’t be hard to believe. It would certainly be easier to believe than whatever this was.

He didn’t want to believe it, though. He wanted to believe that whatever magic ran through Merlin’s veins ran through Albion too, that Merlin could never leave this land, could never truly leave him.

“It’s as if the world is vibrating,” Arthur remembered Merlin saying. “As if everything is much more than itself.”

“I’m going to need more than a little wind,” Arthur said, trying to keep his voice from shaking. He closed his eyes. “Prove it to me, then. I’m essentially ordering you to show off, you should love that.”

He kept his eyes closed for longer than he had to, unwilling to relinquish the hope that had wrapped its hands around his heart. He kept his eyes closed until the wind nudged him again, a clear request.

When Arthur opened his eyes, there was a tangle of flowers growing at his feet.

They were dark green, with thin yellow bulbs poking out. Arthur furrowed his brow, kneeling to examine them, and was suddenly hit with the memory of reaching through bars, his fingertips brushing crushed leaves. They were Mortaeus flowers, growing in a clearing near Camelot instead of spider-infested caves under the Forest of Balor.

Arthur drew off his gloves to cup the flowers in his hands. They felt alive. They felt like they were much more than themselves.

Arthur, absurdly, felt tears come to his eyes. It was the second time he’d cried over his manservant in as many days, bringing the grand total up to three.

(Arthur remembered a bad wound, a rockslide, a seemingly futile search, and the salt on his face in the dead of night. He remembered finding Merlin, covered in mud but miraculously alive. He remembered the desperation of it, the knowledge he could not unlearn, the feelings that he could not forget.)

“Are you a ghost?” He asked, and the wind whistled in a way that he interpreted as a protest. He had a million questions, but Merlin—for it was Merlin, it had to be—had no way to answer.

“Glad you’re here,” Arthur said, because it was true and he needed Merlin to know.

He plucked one of the flowers, wrapping it in Merlin’s neckerchief and tying it to his belt. Then he continued his journey back, because what else could he do?

Merlin continued to be helpful, and Arthur always found food, fresh water, and good places to rest. Despite travelling through a forest on foot and alone, Arthur had a feeling that he’d never been safer.

When he arrived at Camelot, there was of course an uproar.

After tearful reunions, meetings, long explanations, and two days spent in the castle, Arthur wondered again if maybe he’d been imagining things. He periodically unwrapped the flower, but as it dried out it grew less recognizable, less clear.

He told Leon he was going for a ride to clear his head, and Leon nodded.

The thing about grief, Arthur thought as he saddled his horse, was that it gave him reasons. It made him unquestionable. He’d have to be careful not to take advantage of that. He was quite sure Gwen and the knights wouldn’t let him, but his real check on such things had always been Merlin.

Arthur rode out to a small clearing near the Citadel and dismounted. He closed his eyes, trying to feel the natural world, trying to find Merlin in it.

He heard a twig snap, and opened his eyes to find a unicorn peering at him from the edge of the glade. Arthur stared at it, unblinking. Slowly, it lowered its head.

“Merlin?” He asked, and the oppressively hot day was suddenly disrupted by a cool breeze.

Arthur couldn’t help the smile that spread across his face. “I thought I was losing my mind.”

The wind picked up enough to flip his tunic into his face, and Arthur pulled it back down, grinning. No doubt if Merlin had been able to speak, he’d be saying something about how Arthur had lost his mind years ago.

“Why use the wind?” Arthur asked, looking back to the unicorn, which was now approaching Llamrei interestedly. “Can’t you just possess an animal, or something?”

The unicorn tossed its mane, and Arthur wondered if he’d offended it somehow. “Not- not you,” he said to it, and was answered by bird calls that sounded an awful lot like laughter.

Arthur laughed too, helpless to stop it. He’d missed Merlin.

“Right,” Arthur said. “Right. Well, good to know I can’t escape your mocking even now.”

The wind ruffled his hair, and Arthur wanted to grab it, hold it, feel it breathe, but it didn’t and he couldn’t.

Arthur passed the decree that legalized magic less than a week later, and not a raven cawed to interrupt him. It was the quietest he’d ever heard Camelot, with the air still and the animals silent, just his voice as it echoed over his people.

When they began to cheer, he felt the sounds of nature come back with them.

He went out into the woods every day, and perhaps that was why everyone treated him as if he was fragile. He was, admittedly, distracted. He missed Merlin, missed his easy smile and his constant chatter, missed his steady presence by Arthur’s side.

“I miss you,” he found himself saying to the air, despite the fact that Merlin had decided to scare him out of his wits by having a giant spider crawl up his leg only minutes before.

The grass he was sitting on bent towards him, as if trying to embrace him.

Arthur cleared his throat, and tried to keep his grief at bay.

Gaius thought he was struggling with survivor’s guilt. Arthur thought it was more likely he was struggling with survivor’s irritation.

Merlin was, of course, an even worse manservant now that he was disembodied. Arthur would call for Merlin to bring him something only to remember that Merlin had gone and turned himself into the wind, and thus didn’t have any hands with which to carry Arthur’s food. Arthur had taken to dressing himself, unable to stomach the thought of someone else doing it, of another servant’s touch where Merlin’s should be.

There were some benefits though. Arthur and Gwaine went on a patrol following reports of looting, and found three bandits dead in the woods, each bearing what Gaius later identified as the bite of the adder.

“It’s odd,” he said, furrowing his brows. “They’re not usually fatal.”

Arthur opened his window that night and said, “we could’ve handled some bandits.”

A large moth flew into his face, and then tumbled into his room. Arthur spluttered, and tried to chase it out, but it evaded his attempts.

After a few minutes he rolled his eyes and said, “but thank you for taking care of them, Merlin.”

The moth flew straight out the still open window. Arthur shook his head, smiling.

He’d have to talk to someone about it, he knew. For one, everyone thought he was going slightly insane. Even putting that aside, Arthur had realized that he didn’t want to live like this forever, not if there was another option.

It may have been wiser to go to Gaius, who knew about these things, but Arthur went to Guinevere first. Though it had been some time since they’d been in love, he loved her deeply and there was no one he trusted more. She was his wife, his Queen, and she deserved to know what was going on with him. Besides that, Merlin had been one of her closest friends.

Gwen listened patiently, and waited until Arthur was finished. She frowned, drumming her fingers against his desk.

“I know it sounds insane,” Arthur said. “I know it does.”

Gwen smiled. She ran a finger over the pressed remains of the Mortaeus flower, crumbling slightly in one of Arthur’s books.

“A bit,” she admitted, “but I’ve never known you to be. Will you show me?”

Arthur nodded, and took her outside. Gwen was quiet as they walked beyond the stones of the Citadel, nodding to the night guards at the gate as they passed. He recognized her silence as hope, and understood it completely. He took her hand and squeezed it.

“Merlin,” he said once they’d stepped onto the grass beyond the castle courtyard. “Say hello.”

Gwen gasped, and Arthur turned to see small purple flowers growing out of the ground in front of her.

“Oh, Merlin,” Gwen breathed, dropping to her knees. “I’m so glad.”

The wind whipped her hair joyfully, and Gwen’s laugh was teary.

It chased away the last of Arthur’s fears. Merlin was real, he wasn’t gone, and Gwen knew it too. He wasn’t seeing things, and it wasn’t wishful thinking. Merlin wasn’t alive, but he wasn’t dead either, and that meant there was hope.

Arthur found Gaius the next day and explained everything.

Gaius nearly wept. “I have been finding herbs I need where they shouldn’t be,” he admitted. “Can’t stop helping, can he?”

Arthur agreed, throat tight. Gaius pulled himself together and began pulling out books.

“The Druids call him Emrys,” he said. “It means immortal.”

“I suppose I’ll have to pay a visit to the Druids then,” Arthur said.

It wouldn’t be exactly easy. With the magic ban repealed, Arthur’s meetings with the Druids were very scheduled, and usually involved a lot of other people. He didn’t want to scare them by showing up unannounced, and he didn’t want to scare his court by asking about resurrection in the middle of peace talks.

Arthur’s patrol route with Gwaine went close enough to a camp that he decided that would be his best bet. He’d meant to tell Gwaine anyway.

When he explained, Gwaine looked like he was ready to run him through. Arthur understood that feeling, understood what hope could do to men used to running on anger.

When he took Gwaine out to the woods, a pheasant wandered up to them, and Gwaine’s knees buckled.

“Merlin,” he said hoarsely. “Don’t ever scare me like that again.”

The pheasant pecked at Gwaine’s leg, and he bowed his head, hair falling to cover his face.

Arthur stepped away slightly, to give him some time alone and the shield of being unseen.

“We’ve got to get him back,” Gwaine said as they returned to the castle.

They visited the Druids on their next patrol, leaving their swords by their horses.

“Arthur Pendragon,” an old woman said, greeting him with a low bow. “To what do we owe the pleasure?”

It was strange, his relationship with the Druids, who were his people and yet not. Sometimes they shouted at Arthur, sometimes they kissed his feet. When they yelled, the clouds tended to part in such a way that Arthur was singularly struck by the sun, and when they knelt, Arthur tended to trip over a root that hadn’t been there before.

He was far more comfortable with this middle ground, as it seemed Merlin was. Merlin had always been good at giving people the precise amount of respect they had earned.

“I’ve come to ask about a friend of mine,” he said. “I was told you know him as Emrys.”

The woman broke into a wide smile. “Yes. We felt his return to magic, to Albion. He has been everywhere lately.”

“His return to magic?” Gwaine asked.

“Come,” the woman said. “We have much to discuss.”

Hilda, as she introduced herself, gathered several other Druids and sat them all down on stones. Then she began to speak.

She spoke of prophecies, of destiny, of Arthur’s foretold death and Merlin’s foretold wait. She spoke of Merlin’s resistance to fate, how he had never been resigned, even when his actions had led to the things he sought to prevent. She spoke of dragons, death, and the lady of the lake.

Arthur listened to the weight that had been on Merlin’s shoulders and felt vaguely sick. He could tell there were gaps in this story, as the Druids could only know what had been prophesied and what had come to pass. He wanted nothing more than to talk to Merlin about it, to really talk to him, not speak to the air and try to interpret its answers.

Because he couldn’t, he asked, “if he’s immortal, what happened?”

Hilda sighed. “He went against fate, against his own destiny and yours. Prophecies are powerful things, and though Emrys proved stronger, that power demanded a price. Emrys is not merely a sorcerer, he is magic, the very embodiment of it. Magic cannot die, but bodies can. He paid that price in exchange for your life, destined to be cut short.”

“I had no idea you were so keen to die for me.”

Arthur gritted his teeth, angry now. He was familiar with this part of grief, with the rage, the knowledge that he had to live with the aftermath of death. His anger had no place here, he knew that.

Gwaine put a hand on his shoulder, and asked, “is there anything that can be done? To get him… re-embodied?”

Hilda shook her head. “If there is, that power lies only with him. Emrys’ very existence goes against the laws of magic, and he is the only one able to bend them. He harnessed the very power of life and death at a remarkably young age, killing the priestess Nimueh in order to save your life after you had been bitten by the questing beast.”

Arthur was momentarily shocked enough to be distracted from the matter at hand, but forced himself to refocus.

“The laws of magic demand a life for a life,” Arthur said hesitantly.

Hilda nodded.

“Which is why my mother died.”

Hilda nodded again.

“And why Merlin is… what he is now.”

“Yes.”

Arthur twisted his fingers together, thinking. “What if I died?” He asked.

He was just curious, really. He wanted Merlin to be back with him, he wasn’t about to do anything rash, he just wanted to know.

As soon as the words left his mouth, the wind began whipping harshly, swirling around the camp. Arthur felt the grass beneath his feet climbing up his legs, holding him in place.

“I was just asking!” He yelled over the roar of the air. “I wouldn’t disrespect your sacrifice Merlin, I swear.”

The wind dropped to nothing almost at once, and though the grass loosened, it remained lightly draped around Arthur. He bent down to pat it, trying to be comforting.

“I didn’t mean it like that,” he said. “I wouldn’t.”

The grass tightened, almost like an embrace, then fell limp. Arthur swallowed hard, and looked up.

Hilda and the other Druids were looking around almost reverently.

“His power is beyond measure,” one of the men murmured.

“He guards the Once and Future King,” another said.

Arthur was trying very hard to be a good king. He always had, but even more so now that he’d become aware of the many ways in which he’d failed in the past. He did his best to break out of the bubble he had been raised in, to hear different opinions, and accept different ways of life.

He did his best, but gods above, the Druids freaked him out sometimes.

He exchanged a look with Gwaine before coughing politely.

Hilda looked up, and blinked a few times. “Well,” she said, regaining focus. “Such a thing wouldn’t work anyway. Your death was not demanded in general, it was demanded at Camlaan. That fate has already been avoided, the price cannot be un-paid.”

“Thank you,” Arthur said, standing abruptly. “We should go.”

“He will return to you if he can, Arthur Pendragon,” Hilda said, too knowingly for his liking. “We can feel it, in the land and in the magic. He wishes only to be by your side.”

Arthur nodded. “So do I.”

The ride back was quiet, both the knights and the forest thinking in near-silence.

“He’ll find a way,” Gwaine said eventually. “Won’t you Merlin?”

The branches above them bent down, brushing the top of Gwaine’s head. Agreement, Arthur supposed.

When he returned, Gwen was waiting in his room.

“Well?” She asked.

Arthur shook his head. “They can’t do anything. They said if it’s possible, Merlin’s the only one who can make it happen.”

“Then he will,” Gwen said simply.

“If he could, he’d have done it already.”

“Things can change, Arthur. Don’t give up on him.”

Arthur sighed, sitting on his bed. Gwen looked at him like she was waiting for an answer.

“I’m not giving up on him,” Arthur said weakly.

Gwen rolled her eyes. “Merlin hid his magic while living in the heart of Camelot for ten years. He saved your life when you were fatally wounded, more than once. He struck down the Saxon army almost single-handedly.”

“Hey!” Arthur protested.

“You and your men fought bravely, but Merlin summoned lightning,” Gwen said sternly. Then she shook her head. “Arthur, I’ve lost everyone. My father, Elyan, Morgana, Lancelot. Merlin has been my best friend for years, and he has proven he can do the impossible. I will keep faith. I suggest you do the same.”

Arthur watched her go, and wondered what he had ever done to deserve her.

He pulled her aside the next morning, and suggested they go for a ride. Gwen agreed, smiling.

As they saddled their horses, Arthur said, “I’m sorry.”

“What for?”

It was something Gwen had taught him very early on, that apologies were only worth their intent, that one had to understand what they were sorry for.

“For acting like this has only been happening to me,” Arthur said.

Gwen smiled. “I forgive you. You also shouldn’t worry about that, Arthur. He had many friends, but the two of you were different. I would never ask you to pretend otherwise.”

Arthur kissed the top of her head, gratitude and respect.

The next few weeks passed in much the same way. Arthur told some of the other knights about Merlin when inexplicable things happened on patrols, then some of the councillors when they explained that their blighted crops had healed overnight, then the stable hands who kept having horses break out of the stables and return with people who needed help.

It was like having a Court Sorcerer, and proved to be very useful. Arthur began to resent useful. He wanted his friend back.

Everyone treated him with a deep sense of kindness that he understood to be appropriate to grief, that he understood to be necessary for his restlessness. Arthur still worked, and he still ruled, but he also spent an absurd amount of time in the woods alone. He wondered what he would be like if Merlin was really gone. He wondered, for the first time in a long time, what his mother’s death had truly felt like for his father.

Alone in the woods, of course, was a misnomer. He was with Merlin in the woods.

“Any luck getting back to normal?” Arthur asked, as he did every day. The daisy in front of him bent to the right, indicating that the answer was no.

Arthur hummed. He wanted to ask what Merlin had tried, what he was doing, how he was doing it, but they had discovered that trying to speak in complex questions was more trouble than it was worth.

“You’re trying to, though?”

The daisy bent all the way to the left. Yes.

Arthur nodded. It would have to be enough for now. A moment later, a fly started buzzing incessantly around his head.

“No idea why I even want you back,” Arthur said, swatting at it ineffectually. Merlin made it rain on him for that one.

The weather control was a bit of a shock every time. Arthur would set out on patrols, and fog cover would roll in. He would be doing reconnaissance, and the air would become cool and clear.

Gwen planned a festival celebrating the six month anniversary of the magic ban being lifted, and fretted about the possibility of rain when heavy clouds gathered the night before it was to start, but the day dawned bright and warm. The clouds that did remain were formed into shapes of unicorns, gryphons, and other magical beasts that Arthur had to ask Gaius to identify. It felt right, to have Merlin celebrating with them.

It was strange, the line Merlin managed to walk. Everything he did reminded Arthur that he was magic itself, and yet everything he did reminded Arthur of the teenager who’d come to Camelot so long ago and called him a prat.

Merlin had always contained multitudes. It wasn’t much of a surprise.

Still, when Arthur got involved in a skirmish with bandits and one of the men got slightly too close to him, he couldn’t help but jump when he was struck down by lightning from a clear sky.

Simultaneously, when Arthur was out on patrol and found bird droppings on the back of his tunic, he couldn’t help but glower ineffectually at the same clear sky.

Merlin was still himself, whatever else he was, and Arthur took comfort in that.

Unrest came as no surprise, what with the slow return of magic to Camelot and its surrounding kingdoms. Magical and non-magical threats alike were dealt with almost as soon as they arose, and Arthur hardly had to lift a finger.

Of course, Merlin couldn’t stop a threat he didn’t know existed.

Arthur’s time spent with the delegation that had come from Nemeth was some of happiest he’d had in recent months. Mithian had become a close friend and ally, and she and Gwen adored each other.

Mithian asked about Merlin on her first morning, and Arthur began to say he had died in the line of duty, but Gwen cut him off.

“Merlin is a sorcerer,” she said. “He saved Arthur’s life, and now he exists in nature.” Arthur stared at her. Gwen shrugged.

Mithian said, “sorry, what?”

They explained more thoroughly, and Mithian listened carefully. When they finished, she looked between them and said, “show me.”

Merlin carved an M into the ground under Mithian’s feet, and she raised an eyebrow, unfazed as ever. “That is very impressive,” she said.

She proceeded to send two riders back to Nemeth and asked them to retrieve the books on magic from the palace library.

“We never followed the laws as closely as some of the other kingdoms,” she admitted. “The knowledge was protected under the guise of fighting magic.”

“I am grateful for it,” Arthur said, and she smiled.

Gaius accepted the books, and asked Arthur’s permission to place some wards around the castle that might allow magic more freely within it.

“It’s been a site of so much death,” he explained. “Merlin might be able to reach inside more easily if I try to cleanse that.”

Arthur told him to knock himself out, unsure whether he believed it would have any effect, but more than willing to let Gaius try.

He continued to spend many late nights in his chambers with Mithian and Gwen. Between that, the way vines were creeping up around the edges of the castle, and the way Arthur’s baths began to seem a bit warmer than they could be without magic, warmer than they’d been in months, it softened the sting of Merlin’s absence just a bit.

Mithian hunted with Arthur, supplemented the histories Gwen was writing, and befriended half the castle within a week.

“She reminds me of Morgana,” Gwen admitted, very quietly on one very late night. “The way she was, once.”

“You miss her,” Arthur said.

Gwen nodded, though it was not a question. “So do you.”

He did. He did not miss the threat of her, the danger, the possibility of having to kill or be killed by someone he had loved so much, but he did miss her. Luckily, his other would-be assassins did not have anything approaching Morgana’s skillset.

Since lifting the ban on magic, Merlin had prevented six attempts on Arthur’s life. Arthur and his knights had dealt with an additional three, subtle and non-magical, within the Citadel’s walls and harder for Merlin to foresee and intervene in.

The first one that Merlin had stopped had come the day after the ban was removed. A man who had lost his family to Morgana jumped out at Arthur in the woods.

“She killed my mother and sister,” he hissed, circling Arthur with a poison knife. “You cause only death. Would that your father was still alive, he’d have already had your head for this. As he’s not, that honour falls to me.”

Arthur had his sword drawn, but did not even have time to swing it.

A sharpened tree branch pierced the man’s abdomen from behind, sticking straight through. Arthur cut his throat to put him out of his misery.

“Merlin,” he said. “You are not the executioner. It is not up to you to decide who lives. He should have been imprisoned, and given the chance to renege on his words.”

No answer came from the nature around him, and Arthur understood as he rode back through surprisingly rocky terrain that he was being given the silent treatment.

Still, the next attempt on his life (a young sorceress who screamed that lifting the ban was not enough, that nothing would bring her husband back, that Arthur deserved to die for what his father had done) ended with the woman being held still by vines, allowing Arthur to knock her out and take her back to the dungeons.

“Thank you,” he said as he cut the vines, and one of them moved to pat him on the head condescendingly. Arthur couldn’t help but smile, despite the circumstances.

The first attempt within the Citadel was a man who came to petition Arthur. He had opened his court to anyone twice a week, where villagers and nobles alike could bring their complaints.

The man got close to the throne, bowed, and then produced a scythe that he swung at Arthur.

Leon blocked the blow and had the man disarmed before Arthur even got to his feet.

“Dungeons?” He asked, tying the man’s hands behind his back.

Arthur sighed. “Dungeons. I’ll be down to speak with him tonight.”

Leon handed the man off to a pair of guards, and Arthur continued to hear from the other petitioners, who recovered from their shock quickly in favour of ensuring that the king would hear their complaints.

When he stepped outside that day, the wind and the grass and the animals crowded him, examining him.

“Hey, I’m fine,” Arthur said soothingly. “I didn’t even have to do anything. You should trust my knights more, Merlin.”

It was a very odd sensation, to know that the wind was rolling its eyes at you.

The point was, Arthur was growing used to assassination attempts. He had already grown used to betrayal, and was unsurprised when he had to imprison two of his councillors—formerly Uther’s councillors—who had been involved in one of the plots. He knew how to remain on high alert.

Being among friends made him relax slightly, but not much. On the final night of Mithian’s stay, Arthur noticed that he didn’t recognize one of the servants. This was not unusual, as palace staff were hired at a regular rate, but he would have to learn the girl’s name. He asked Gwen if she knew it, and she shook her head, frowning.

“I wasn’t told about any new appointments,” she said.

That made Arthur suspicious. As Queen, Gwen had taken on the role of seneschal, and in conjunction with the Steward she managed most of the palace staff.

He got Mithian’s attention, and she confirmed the servant was not one of hers.

Arthur watched her carefully through the banquet. Afterwards, he pulled a knight aside and instructed that he tail her, ensure that she went to the servant’s wing or with whoever she was serving, and report back to Arthur at curfew.

Half an hour after curfew, Arthur sighed, buckled his sword belt, and went to find the knight.

He found him dead in one of the lower corridors. He grabbed the knight’s wrist to ensure there was no hope, and bowed his head when he could not find a pulse.

“He didn’t put up much of a fight,” a voice said from behind him. “You should train them better.”

Arthur spun to find the servant, though he doubted that was what she was.

“You killed him using magic,” Arthur said calmly, having noticed the lack of any obvious wound. “It’s difficult to train against that.”

The woman smiled, and her teeth were sharp.

“Who are you?”

“My name is Aine,” she said, and as she said it Arthur saw her eyes flash red. “You are familiar with my kind.”

Arthur blinked, trying to place hazy memories that swam through his mind. There had been a girl. Merlin had knocked him out. He had a vague sense of water.

Arthur gritted his teeth, realizing that had likely been a magical threat Merlin hadn’t told him about.

“I wouldn’t mind a refresher,” he said conversationally. He could tell by her stance that if he reached for his sword, she would strike. He didn’t know how strong she was, but he knew she had killed his knight, and he wasn’t about to risk it.

“I am a Sidhe,” she said. “We are the fae of Lake Avalon. Your soul should have been ours twice now.”

“I’d rather keep my soul,” Arthur said, inching his hand back towards Excalibur.

“I wouldn’t do that,” Aine hissed, and as her eyes flashed again Arthur found himself immobilized.

His eyes darted around. If she would just take him outside…

“Are you going to take me to your lake then?”

Aine laughed. “No. You’ve proven far too slippery for that, and we’ve heard the very world itself offers you protection. No, I think I’ll kill you here.”

She pointed a staff at him, long and twisted with a crystal point, and Arthur felt himself freeze entirely. His heart stopped. His blood stopped. His lungs stopped.

Merlin, he thought desperately, a cry for help and a dying wish in one.

The moment Arthur stopped moving, everything else started to move. The walls of the castle began to shake. The stones around them cracked, shivering apart. The wall by Aine’s head shattered into dust.

A golden glow coalesced in front of Arthur, growing brighter and brighter before fading with a bang.

Arthur felt his heart start again. He blinked the afterimage of the light away, blind for several seconds before he could see again in the dark of the hall.

There was a man standing in front of him, arm outstretched. Aine was sprawled on the floor, dead or unconscious.

Merlin turned around, the same golden light fading from his eyes.

“Why do you keep getting nearly assassinated inside?” He asked.

Arthur had pins and needles across his whole body as his blood flowed back, had fallen to his knees as his organs began to move again, but he scrambled to his feet.

“Merlin,” he said, nearly falling back over. “Merlin.”

Merlin looked down at his own arms, wiggled his fingers. “In the flesh.”

Arthur surged forwards on shaky legs and wrapped his arms around him.

“How?” Arthur asked, voice muffled from where his face was pressed against Merlin’s shoulder.

“I don’t know,” Merlin said. “You needed me, so I came.”

Arthur held him tighter, scared that he would dissolve into wind or sunlight under his hands.

After a very long time he pulled back, and went to alert one of the night watchmen about the bodies. Sir Gareth’s funeral would be held the next day. Merlin curled his finger, eyes flashing, and informed them that Aine’s body had been sent back to the Sidhe.

He followed Arthur back to his chambers without either of them saying a word about it, and Arthur unbuckled his sword belt and crawled into bed, exhausted.

Merlin stood at the foot of the bed, looking at him.

“What are you doing?” Arthur asked, and Merlin started.

“Oh. I don’t know. I haven’t had to sleep in months, I’ve just been watching over you.”

Merlin turned to go, and Arthur said, “wait.”

He wasn’t willing to risk it, wasn’t willing to let Merlin out of his sight so soon.

Merlin stopped and turned back to him. Arthur lifted the right side of the blanket, an invitation. “You can hardly watch over me from Gaius’s chambers.”

Merlin’s answering smile was the sunrise. The bed shifting as he crawled into it was the waves, his eyes, fixed on Arthur in the dark, were the stars.

Arthur reached out and brushed his hair away from his forehead, feeling the rippling fields.

“You’re still everything, aren’t you?”

“I always was,” Merlin said.

Arthur thought of a hundred near misses, a thousand gentle words, a million laughs, innumerable moments. Yes, he thought, yes, you always were.

He slept with one hand on Merlin’s arm, listening to him breathe.

Merlin was still asleep when he woke the next morning, still embodied and breathing beside him. Arthur set a meeting of the core members of the round table for noon, and asked a passing servant if he could bring up two breakfasts.

Arthur took them at the door, and the sound of it closing seemed to wake Merlin up as he rolled over with a grunt.

“Rise and shine,” Arthur said cheerfully, and Merlin opened his eyes already smiling.

He proceeded to inhale the food as Arthur watched him with poorly concealed amusement.

“What?” Merlin asked, mouth full. “I haven’t eaten with my own mouth in months.”

“With your own mouth?” Arthur asked, curious.

Merlin shrugged, swallowing. “I’ve been part of cows as they grazed, part of wolves as they hunted. I’ve been butterflies drinking from flowers, buzzards as they circled carrion.”

His eyes shimmered as he spoke, not quite gold but not quite blue either. Arthur reached out and put his hand over Merlin’s where it lay on the table.

“Stay with me,” he said.

Merlin smiled up at him, all teeth and crinkled eyes. “Where else would I go?”

Arthur brought him down to the round table when they were done eating, with time to spare before the meeting started. He sat, and Merlin took up his position behind him.

“Come here,” Arthur said.

Merlin moved to stand closer behind him. Arthur rolled his eyes, and pulled out the chair to his left.

Merlin blinked at him. “I can’t do that.”

“Why not?”

“I’m a servant. Everyone knows me as a servant. If I start sitting in on your meetings, people will think I’ve manipulated you somehow. Or enchanted you.”

Arthur laughed. “Merlin, I’ve been treating you as an advisor for years. I should’ve given you a seat ages ago, you were already doing the job in all but name.”

“But not naming it makes it easier,” Merlin argued.

Arthur shook his head. “Did you forget who I married? My court has never operated based on the birth of its members, and it won’t start now. You deserve this place, and you will take it.”

Merlin’s face turned lightly pink, and Arthur watched. He’d missed being able to see Merlin’s reactions like this. It was a wonder he’d hid his magic for so long, what with the way every emotion painted itself across his face.

“Sit, Merlin,” Arthur said, and Merlin did.

He stood again a minute later, when Gwen came in, saw him, and gasped.

Merlin spun her around when she hugged him, beaming.

“I knew you’d be back,” Gwen said, squeezing Merlin’s arms, his face, his hands, as if testing his solidity. “I missed you, nice as the flowers were.”

“I missed you too,” Merlin said, pulling her in again.

“I don’t remember getting any flowers,” Arthur said airily.

Merlin rolled his eyes at him over Gwen’s shoulder. “No, you just got your enemies killed, your path cleared, and your life saved.”

Arthur touched the scar on his side absent-mindedly, and grinned. “Which means I don’t deserve flowers?”

Gwen pulled away, smiling as she took her seat on Arthur’s right.

“No, you don’t deserve flowers because you’re a spoiled prat,” Merlin said cheerfully. “And hey, I gave you Mortaeus flowers! That wasn’t easy, you know.”

Then he turned back to Gwen, and began to ask a hundred questions about seemingly every person the Citadel employed.

Gwen filled Merlin in on the castle gossip as he leaned against the table next to her. The others began to trickle in, and Arthur watched Merlin’s face light up again and again.

Leon embraced Merlin and patted him on the back, Percival practically lifted him off the ground with the force of his hug, and Gaius (with tears in his eyes) insisted on checking him for injuries and ensuring that he had rebuilt himself properly.

Gwaine was late, as he usually was, and he burst in with a halfhearted, “sorry, princess,” before falling abruptly silent when he saw Merlin.

“Good to see you,” Merlin said, and Gwaine barreled into him with such force they would’ve both fallen over if Leon hadn’t reached up and steadied them.

“When I said he was worth dying for, I didn’t mean you should,” Gwaine said, and Arthur saw Merlin run his hands soothingly up his back.

“I’m not dead.”

Gwaine pulled back, inspecting Merlin from head to toe, first in a clearly concerned manner, then in his more usual (mildly laviscious) way. “Even better,” Gwaine said, hand twitching on Merlin’s shoulder. “You’re alive.”

Arthur dismissed the meeting soon after, having just called it to show everyone that Merlin was back. An idea was taking shape in his mind, one he wasn’t sure how to ask about.

Merlin followed him back to his chambers, chattering about how soft Arthur’s bed was. It floored him how much he’d missed this, Merlin’s voice constantly at his back.

“Is this permanent?” Arthur asked when they were back in his room. “Are you going to dissolve into a cloud of magic on the weekends or something?”

“It’s permanent,” Merlin said.

“You sure?”

Merlin stepped forwards, looking at Arthur with an intensity he wasn’t sure how to take. “I’m not going anywhere. Or dissolving into anything.”

“And there wasn’t a price?”

Merlin shrugged helplessly. “The world is full of life. I probably took some of it. But nothing drastic.”

“Nothing drastic,” Arthur repeated, hand on his scar. “Right.”

Merlin frowned. “Are you angry with me?”

“I don’t know!” Arthur exclaimed. “Maybe!”

“For the magic?”

“No, you idiot, for the dying.”

“I didn’t die, Arthur,” Merlin said. “I can’t.”

“Then whose body did I send out over Avalon?”

Merlin reached forward and put a hand on his arm. “I’m sorry you had to do that. But I would do it again.”

“You can’t,” Arthur said. “I won’t let you, Merlin. Do you understand?”

“Yes,” Merlin said. “Of course I understand. I wish I didn’t, but yes.”

“Right then. Good.” Arthur looked up. “There’s a lot you haven’t been able to tell me, these past months.”

“These past years,” Merlin corrected.

“These past years,” Arthur agreed. “You’d better tell me now.”

“Are you sure?”

Arthur smiled. “I can’t very well appoint a Court Sorcerer if I don’t know what he’s done with his power, can I?”

It was a long conversation. It was days of conversation, occasionally interrupted by yelling, or crying, or a demonstration of a spell. It made raw every loss, every win, every death and every moment of joy they had experienced in their time together.

Arthur still had work to do, as did Merlin, and he was at every meeting as he always had been, but now he sat at Arthur’s side rather than standing at his back. No matter what they’d talked about, no matter how angry one or both of them were, they were a united front.

Merlin talked about Nimueh, about Gaius and his mother and the questing beast, about his attempt to give his own life for Arthur’s.

“The Druids said something about your power over life and death,” he said.

Merlin nodded. “I try to be careful with it. The laws of magic aren’t suggestions, not really. I think… I think I could break them properly, if I really wanted to, but I don’t know what might happen.”

“You are absolutely forbidden from breaking the laws of magic,” Arthur said, alarmed. Merlin looked relieved.

Merlin talked about poisoning Morgana with his voice shaking, and Arthur closed his eyes against the grief.

“Things could’ve been so different,” he said. “We could have saved her, couldn’t we?”

“Yes,” Merlin said, never one to soften the blow. “I certainly could have. I’m sorry.”

“So am I.”

Merlin had a million stories, everything he’d done for Camelot filling the air between them. Arthur listened. It was all he could do.

“You told me there was no place for magic in Camelot,” Arthur said when Merlin fell uncharacteristically silent after mentioning the Disir.

“Mordred was destined to kill you. I couldn’t let that happen.”

Arthur stared, thinking of all Merlin had given up. He’d lied to Arthur about Morgause, stopping him from killing his father, driving Arthur further towards hating magic, but that was different. Merlin had stopped Arthur from killing a man, a guilty man, yes, but still. Here he had tried to ensure that an innocent one would die.

“Merlin,” Arthur said, and his voice was shaking with anger. He still trusted Merlin, had forgiven him for the lies months ago, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t angry. “If you ever make a decision that big without telling me why ever again, I will sack you.”

Merlin glared at him, eyes fiery, and not for the first time Arthur looked at Merlin and saw Emrys.

“I’d do it again,” he snapped.

“I know you would,” Arthur said. “That’s what makes the threat necessary. If you want to serve me, if you are going to agree to serve me, if you are going to be a part of my court, you cannot make decisions that harm Camelot for the sake of saving me, certainly not without telling me everything first.”

Merlin’s hands twitched, and Arthur watched his internal struggle.

“Fine,” he said finally, and Arthur exhaled, relieved.

“Why didn’t you just tell me?” Arthur found himself saying more than once, with nearly every tale.

Merlin sometimes responded with anger, with sadness, or with a smile, but usually he responded by looking Arthur in the eye and saying, “you know why.”

And Arthur did, to some extent. He certainly understood why Merlin never said anything while his father was alive, and the danger he’d been in every day made Arthur sweat just to think about. Merlin hadn’t wanted to put him in the position of making such a difficult choice, but Arthur was fairly certain that the position of being constantly terrified for Merlin’s life would have been the worst part.

He then realized that was the position Merlin had been in for the entire time they’d known each other, constantly terrified for Arthur’s life, bearing the burden of it alone.

“When I became king,” Arthur said at one point, and Merlin shook his head.

“You hated magic more than ever. You blamed it for Uther’s death. You were grieving, and angry, and if I’d told you then I think you would have tried to kill me.”

Arthur felt sick at the thought, but couldn’t quite refute it.

“I’m sorry,” he said, so many times he lost count.

Every time, Merlin would shake his head and say, “I forgave you a long time ago.”

It took two weeks of evenings and mornings and in-between moments for Merlin to tell him everything. They reached the end just after sunset one day.

“I knew you were going to die, and I couldn’t let it happen. It wasn’t a spell, it wasn’t even a conscious choice. I just did it, and when it was done I was spread over all of Albion, feeling the entire land at once. I had no way to focus, no way to understand what I was.”

“Sounds overwhelming,” Arthur said.

Merlin smiled. “You have no idea.”

“How did you go from that to bending one daisy?”

“I held onto my humanity,” Merlin said.

“Sure, but how?”

Merlin smiled ruefully. “Even when I was everything that breathed, I knew your breaths. It took me less than a second to find you, and then I just stayed. I focused on the area around you, and if I got lost in the movement of it all, the way the land grows…” Merlin trailed off, his eyes shimmering, gold creeping in at the edges.

Arthur reached over and touched the back of his hand. Merlin’s eyes snapped back to blue, and he smiled at Arthur.

“Exactly. Just like that.”

Something in Arthur’s chest unfolded, and his breath caught. “Gods,” he whispered.

“Just me,” Merlin said cheekily.

“Never just,” Arthur said, and Merlin flipped his hand around so they were palm to palm, not quite holding. “You are Albion, magic, everything.”

“What are you getting at?”

Arthur couldn’t help his doubts. If anyone had earned the right to be free of them, Merlin had, but they were built into him. Arthur was born to be king, and he has questioned every day of his princehood whether he would be a good one. Arthur was crowned, and he constantly wondered if he deserved it.

It made him a better person, a better king. His father had never questioned himself, had let his rage and guilt lead him blindly through the world and listened to no one who might contradict them.

Arthur refused to be led by his birthright or his bloodline. Arthur refused to allow himself to believe he deserved what was given to him, terrified that if he let that entitlement return, he’d stop trying to earn his place, and his people would suffer for it.

Arthur was arrogant, and determined, and stubborn, but deep down he remained terrified. When he lost faith in himself, Merlin and Gwen had pulled him up. When his hesitance threatened to harm, his friends were there to push him to a decision.

All this to say, Arthur knew that questioning Merlin’s loyalty wasn’t fair. He was giving in to his own fears by doing so, he was being deliberately selfish because he wanted the reassurance. Arthur was confident he knew what Merlin’s answer would be, but he wanted to hear him say it.

“Arthur?”

“The Court Sorcerer position is yours, if you want it,” Arthur said. “But I want you to think about it first. All that power. Are you certain you want to limit yourself, bind yourself to this?”

Merlin shifted his hand, moving so that their fingers fell together. Monarchy and magic, more than the sum of their parts.

“I am all of those things,” Merlin said. “Flowers and birds of prey, quarries and clouds, this land and the sorcery that runs through it. But above all that, Arthur, I am yours.”

Arthur exhaled, a shuddering sort of breath that was as close as the lungs got to crying without getting the eyes involved.

He pulled Merlin to his feet by their joined hands, and looked at his lips.

Despite his reputation for recklessness, Arthur was trained to make decisions carefully, to think about them thoroughly, to consider every angle and possible person affected. His reputation came from the fact that once he had made the decision, he dove in so completely that it sometimes winded him.

Arthur brought his other hand up to Merlin’s face, a face he had missed for months on end.

“Arthur,” Merlin said, shaky, uncertain. All the power in the world was contained in one person, and his voice was trembling.

Arthur kissed him.

Merlin—six feet of insolence and fire, a thousand kilometres of nature and power, ten years of trust and devotion, and always Arthur’s—kissed him back.

Because of course he did. Because of course Merlin would give as good as he got, never pliant for a second, and never giving Arthur room to doubt.

“I missed your face,” Arthur said when they pulled back, still breathing the same air.

“Did you?” Merlin asked, inordinately pleased.

Arthur kissed the self-satisfied smile. “Don’t let it go to your head, it’s big enough as it is.”

“You’re one to talk,” Merlin said, plucking at the collar of Arthur’s tunic. “I’ve had to get these taken out so you could fit yours through.”

“You haven’t,” Arthur said.

Merlin smiled. “But you believed me for a second.”

“Missed your voice too,” Arthur said. It spilled out of him, the desire to show Merlin that while Arthur was only human, while he was born to be Camelot’s first and everything else second, he was also, in his heart of hearts, Merlin’s.

“You’ll never have to again,” Merlin said. “When you need me, I will be there. Always.”

“Yeah,” Arthur said, breathless with the magnitude of it, with the sincerity of Merlin’s words and Arthur’s own belief in them. “Yeah, okay.”

“I missed your hands,” Merlin said.

Arthur raised an eyebrow, at odds with the smile he knew he could not stop. “Did you now?”

“I did.”

“Care to prove it?”

Merlin snorted, and rested his forehead on Arthur’s shoulder, giggling. “Really? That’s your line?”

“I’ve been told I’m very smooth and charming.”

“You’ve been lied to,” Merlin said, grinning. “Luckily you don’t need to do anything to seduce me, seeing as I’ve been in love with you since I was nineteen.”

Arthur blinked at him. “Really?”

Merlin rolled his eyes. “As if I’d just lie about that for a laugh. As if it’s not deeply embarrassing.”

“It is not!”

“It is,” Merlin said. “Do you remember what you were like at that age?”

Arthur wrinkled his nose, thinking about it. “Point taken,” he admitted.

Merlin laughed and kissed him again, and Arthur felt that same sense of sacredness he’d felt from the Mortaeus flowers Merlin had grown, that humming connection.

“I love you,” Arthur said, helpless with it. Merlin’s eyes darkened, and Arthur smiled. “Better line?”

“Much,” Merlin said, then dragged Arthur over to the bed and proceeded to prove it.

As he lay with his arm around Merlin, Arthur noticed that it was just slightly too bright outside for this time of night. He slid away to look out the window, and Merlin mumbled a protest.

Arthur peered out. Over the fields, the fiefdoms, the farms and valleys of Albion, past the labyrinth of Gedref, Arthur could see the ocean. All along the coastline, as far as he could see, the waves crested and glowed.

Arthur opened the window, sticking his head out to get a better view, and his attention was caught by movement in the sky.

He looked up to see shimmering threads of light, ranging in colour from green to pink. They stretched around the stars in every direction, converging in the sky above Camelot.

It wasn’t as though Arthur hadn’t noticed Merlin’s eyes going gold. He had very much noticed, and in fact tried to make it happen, so he really should’ve expected something like this.

“Merlin,” he said.

Merlin came to stand behind him, hooking his chin over Arthur’s shoulder and following his gaze.

“Oh,” he said.

“What is it?” Arthur asked.

“The ocean, that’s just plankton,” Merlin said. “The sky is… a sort of interaction, between the sun and the air. I didn’t know I could do that.”

Arthur stared at Merlin’s love and power, painted along every edge of Albion.

“I can probably stop it?” Merlin said.

Arthur reached out, tangling their fingers together. “Don’t you dare.”