Title: A calm before the storm
Summary: Post 5x13. Destiny doesn't bind us, our choice is everything.
-oo-
It didn't do him well to think about it. Not at all.
Think how it all ended. His life, the one he built and cherished above everything else, with his friends at his back call. All lost and to be forgotten soon after history has written its part.
And he has to live with it. Forever.
Well the fate is cruel one would say, but after it all, he has done more than enough to deserve such fate. Indeed the road to hell is paved with good intentions. He has paid that price over and over again, probably would do it all over if he had to, if he was true to himself.
Albion is behind him, everyone concerning it is to be left behind too or he will never move, never be able to even take the next step that would surely continue the wretched path of destiny that has befallen on him and never seems to let him out of its claws.
He has to prepare for another war, in another time. Even now he sees that there won't be enough time to be prepared for it all. Again he feels like he's fighting a losing battle, one that has him two steps behind and ready to decide the fate of others one more time. To be the "hand of God". Decide who lives and who dies and mess with peoples fates.
The view is beautiful from the hill that overlooks the majority of Camelot. Place of peace now. For how long no one knows. Him, he will look for more knowledge, more skills to acquire so that the past doesn't repeat itself.
So that death doesn't repeat itself, yet he knows he will lose.
The wind seems to pick up and the clouds gather before the storm. He can feel it coming.
For now, all that he can do is observe, no more interfering in the name of destiny, not yet. For now it is time to sharpen his skill and craft and strengthen his magic.
He looks down to the object in his hand. A small blade with a red and gold embellished hilt. It feels heavy. He has put Arthur to rest, the Excalibur resting with him, waiting for the day it will unleash its power on the world once more. Despite all the commotion in the last few hours of their time spent together he doesn't regret what he has done to preserve Arthur and his path toward the greater good. Even his friends along the way have fallen for such cause. Yet, he doesn't regret. He mourns, feels their loss as if a part of him was missing.
In the end, he felt alone in spite of their companionship. It lessened the burden for sure, but he was always different and lost in his own world of misery and hardship. Lost in his magic.
The hide and seek game, that has certainly grown old and tiresome for everyone.
Yet as he continues to look at the fine edges of the blade in his hand he almost feels her magic lingering in the object. Still feels her sorrow and pain over things he had wronged and pulled against her.
He can't seem to let her go.
Among all the advices and peoples wills that have been projected onto him, he feels he can finally admit it. He needed her, even craved the closeness to her more than anyone else because she was his kin.
She had magic, power over others and a life force bigger than life.
As he grips the blade tighter in is hands and feels his magic wrap around it, feels the need to possess something of hers. To possess her. Despite the darkness and anger, the need to destroy everything in her path, use every trick in the book to best him. Go to enormous lengths to protect herself from the infamous Emrys, the powerful and vile magician who always seemed to stand in her path, before he became Merlin and pushed her to strike from her end and bring to conclusion their never ending battle of mind, will and magic. Good and evil, yet in spite of it all, sacrifice and bloodshed, the evil that is hers to bear and his overbearing destiny - she was his.
So for now he will wait for the rise of another time, another evil to cross path with. Wait for destiny to start waving its thread across the world and wake those long forgotten. Wait for his friends to rise again and join him in battle.
Wait for her. Wait for her eyes to meet his once again.
With the final thought in his mind he turns and walks away from what was left of his old life, where he would have probably been celebrated as more than he actually deserved. Away from it all, he wants nothing of it. As he blends with shadows a resolution burning behind the fierce gaze that penetrates the time itself.
This time he will do it right. This time it will be with her by his side.