Merlin waited.
He waited as the boat floated to the middle of the lake, the flames he had used to set fire to Arthur's corpse sending smoke up into the sky and he knew that were he closer he'd have smelt the sickly sweet scent of the once and future king burning.
He waited throughout the chaos that was Camelot scrambling to recover without the best king that had ever ruled.
He waited as Gwen's heart, twice broken now, mended and she somehow moved on. Within a year she'd married again, the kingdom needing a king, and Leon made an excellent, just and wise king and a supportive, and in the end loving, husband, although of course he couldn't measure up to Arthur in anyone's hearts.
He waited as the rest of his friends aged, altering his appearance with magic as they did, as since the day Arthur had died the old religion had frozen his body, keeping him at the age Arthur knew him to be so that things could continue where they carried off when he returned.
He waited as his friends all married and had children of their own.
He waited as they died. Gaius first, the others following after a gap of, thankfully, many years. Each death struck him hard, but none quite as hard as Arthur or the loss of his mentor and father figure.
He waited as Gwen's children had children who had children who had children and he watched the throne of Camelot be handed over many times to a new heir, always keeping things running smoothly in the background even if his King was no longer there.
He waited as things began to change, times progressing as new technologies were invented. He didn't ever see the great dragon again after that fateful day when Albion's greatest chance died but he knew that things were meant to be this way. So he let them. But then, something changed. People began to forget. They began to forget about Arthur, and his knights of the round table. They forgot about Uther who killed many innocents during the great purge and they began to doubt even in the existence of magic.
Merlin couldn't have that, now could he?
So he fed the people of the world stories. Telling them of the great King Arthur of Camelot, who had the best knights in all of the kingdoms. King Arthur of Camelot who held his knights, friends and people all in the highest regard and who was the fairest ruler the world would ever know. He told them about Gwen and Lancelot, about Morgana and even about himself, the loyal and loving servant who, with his magic, saved the great king over and over again without taking credit.
He told the people of the world about the great adventures they had had.
Of course, over time, the stories changed and were warped, just like all stories are. Merlin, the faithful servant with magic, friend of the King and only a few months younger than him, turned into Merlin, still a warlock, but instead Arthur's mentor, an old man who advised the great king. The story of the sword the great dragon had bathed in his fire and then later was used to increase the moral of King Arthur, became something else enitrely.
But one legend did not change, and stayed the same even as times changed and people died and were born.
The legend of the old man – for Merlin had decided to keep his appearance the same as it was when the last of his true friends died (Percival, in his sleep with all his children and grand children surrounding him)– who told stories of magic and dragons and great Kings, spread across all the plains of the world – which was larger than anyone in Camelot, anyone in the world at that glorious golden age of time, could dare imagine.
But still, Merlin waited.
He waited for thousands of years.
Over those years, he saw his friends again. Reincarnated by magic time and time again, in the same bodies but with different names and different lives.
He never told them who he really was, but he rejoiced in the fact that they walked the earth and got the chance to see the way things had changed and evolved.
When the twentieth century came about, Merlin settled down by the lake. The lake where he had sent Arthur out on a boat and the lake where the lady of the lake, whose story was now so twisted that Merlin had completely given up on correcting people about it, had caught it when he cast it out.
Motorways, roads forged of hard rock and that inventions named cars were permitted to use, were built next to the lake, but after time they too wore away and the lake became what it once was all those years ago, in the middle of nowhere. However the forest that surrounded it had been cut down years and years ago. How Merlin had sobbed that day, sobbed for all the things he had witnessed and had had to lose.
But still, he waited.
And the twenty first century came about and Merlin had come to a decision.
He would wait, of course he would – it was what he did. But he would also live. So, he bought a house, a few hours walk away from the lake where Arthur would one day emerge from, and he allowed his magic to once again turn him from old to young. The first decade he had spent time just staring at his reflection, unable to believe that he was him again.
He made friends and, to his great pleasure, the reincarnations of all his friends turned up in the village he now lived in. And their names were the same as in the old days. And with that sign,Merlin knew. He knew that it was time. Arthur would soon return. The time he would be needed most would be approaching soon.
Gwen worked in the village clothes shop, a small shop that wasn't one of a chain because of how small the village was. It was the closest to one of her old jobs, she'd had many, of seamstress that Merlin had seen her in and that made his throat close up with fresh tears when he discovered it.
Gwaine had hardly changed, as the position of Knight was no longer so highly regarded – why, all it involved now was a plot of land, there was no requirement of fighting for your king and kingdom and to become one all you needed to do was be 'knighted' by the current ruler (a miss Elizabeth who was approaching the age that Gaius had been when he died and Merlin knew it would be her time soon) – so instead, he was the owner of the local tavern, which was called a pub now.
The other knights all had different jobs, but each fit the skills they had in the old days. Percival was a manual worker, he worked on a... construction site... which fitted him since he used to be the strongest physically of all the knights.
When Merlin had seen Gaius, the same age he was when Merlin had arrived at Camelot all those years ago, the villages physician, doctor, it was all he could do to stop himself from calling out his name and hugging him with all the strength in his body.
The old religion brought back all of the people who earnt it, Morgana hadn't returned and neither had Mordred which Merlin was glad for. If they had been alive when Arthur was killed it was likely he would have killed them instantly, in as painful of a way he could come up with, and he didn't want the temptation coming up now, as it surely would.
For another 2 years he waited and it was in the winter of the year 2012 that things began to stir.
It started with the dreams, much like it had when he first arrived in Camelot. The great dragons voice called him once again and night after night he'd run to the lake thinking this is it, this is Arthur's foretold return and nothing would happen.
But he knew it would. He was patient and he had waited for so long, a little more waiting wouldn't do any harm.
Winter turned to spring and it was a new year. At least, the new calendar said it was spring, and to be honest Merlin never used the stupid thing, it was as foreign a thing to him as all that internet stuff was.
It was a day in spring, in the month of April, and Merlin could barely keep himself from grinning at his students. He was a lecturer in the university in the village. It was a fairly new university, and it was small, but he liked it, for he taught myths and legends. Specifically, the myths and legends of King Arthur. His first lesson he had sat the students down and told them, instantly, that what they already knew was completely wrong.
Over the years he'd been subtly trying to change the records and myths in history back to the truth, to no avail. So he'd decided to write a book. His book, written in such detail and with such a personal first hand account and with all the evidence needed to tell the scholars that it was all completely true, Merlin's magic had of course been a great help with that, his book had become the textbook for the course he was now teaching.
His students had of course at first been sceptical. But day after day of Merlin's story telling, right from the very beginning, with all the accounts of how he'd saved Arthur and Camelot included, of his being Emrys and everything else (of course leaving out the fact that he was Emrys and Merlin from the stories, he used the name Colin now), and the students could hardly deny it.
With the detail in which Merlin taught, the students learnt everything far quicker than normal and hadn't even needed to look at their revision notes, although some did, in order to pass their exam.
So, it was when Merlin was finishing up his life long tale to his first class of students, grinning at their shock and dismay at Arthur's death and Mordred's betrayal and awe at the last message from the great dragon, that it happened.
A tremor shook the earth and his students had clutched at each other. Until they noticed the look on their professors face.
"Professor?" they'd asked, never been given a last name, always been told to address him as just professor.
Merlin ignored them, his eyes shining as his magic scanned the lake and could detect movement from the deep. Even without that, the scent and feel of magic in the air would be more than enough.
The students could see the change in him instantly, he looked less like a professor with every minute, as his eyes started turning golden with the magic, and more like the mythical warlock whose life they'd been being told about for the last three years.
And what Merlin breathed out next confirmed it.
"Arthur,"
And he ran.
He ran and ran and ran, his students following in disbelief and hope as he did so, all gasping as others joined them.
Gwen, Lancelot, Gaius, Gwaine... and more. All of them appeared at Merlin's side, exactly as they had been described, their memories newly awoken and as they ran the students could hear the reunion of the friends.
"Merlin" said by all in one breath and he greeted them all by name.
"Gaius! Gwen! Gwaine! Lancelot! Leon!" and on and on, even as his breath ran out he greeted them all warmly.
Then, they got to the lake. After a few minutes the lakes surface began rippling as an armoured hand broke free from the water, clutched in it a singing sword that Merlin's students instantly placed as the sword of King Arthur, known as Excalibur.
Followed by the hand came an arm, and then a torso, then a head, bursting forth with a deep gasp for air as the students watched breathlessly, his blond hair wet but he still looked majestic. Like a king.
When he got the edge of the lake, drenched and just awoken, he was met with a crowd of fifty people, at the front of it those he loved most and then others total strangers, down on one knee, their heads bent in acknowledgement and respect.
The king had returned and Albion would flourish under his rule.