Merlin and the Dragon Slayer
By Emma Maund
April 2019
Fanfiction based on Merlin TV series
Prologue
"The problem with dragons is that we believe we are always right," the Great Dragon Kilgharrah had told Merlin. "This deeply held belief is rooted in our power to see the past, present and the future at the same time. The source of this power is a black stone heart beating within the middle horn of a dragon's crown. Pierce the heart in the horn and you steal our ability to see all things."
"The problem with believing that you are always right is that sometimes you are wrong." Merlin had replied.
"That is indeed true, young warlock. For all that I have seen and heard, I have made many mistakes in my long life." Kilgharrah sighed. "Take the lessons I have given you and use them wisely, for my greatest mistake is not yet done." The Great Dragon had then laid his head upon the ground and closed his eyes for the last time.
Centuries had passed and Kilgharrah's final words remained clear in Merlin's mind. The year was now 2045. The earth was a scorched wasteland, the seas had turned to dust, and the white dragons ruled the skies.
After the Great Purge of 2031, when people without magic were persecuted by the resurrected demon-witch, Morgana Pendragon, the remaining human resistance had sought refuge underground. Those humans with magic had helped their fellow survivors to tunnel through the rocks, find deep wells of water beneath the earth, and to build subterranean cities illuminated by spells for science and technology were lost to the world.
The Druids and many magical creatures had helped the humans - wizards, witches, Sidhe, pixies, Vilia, unicorns, goblins, dwarfs - for they did not wish to live under Morgana's rule. Their reward was to be hunted to extinction by Morgana's armies of dreadful wraiths and shades.
By the late 21st century, the dragon slayers were the only ones left to fight against the witch and her armies, but the slayers grew fewer in number each year. These brave men and women fought the white dragons with bows and arrows, swords, spears and axes. Their primitive weapons were often no match for a dragon's fire, but their spirit and determination shone like a beacon of hope in the night.
The dragon slayers were the new knights of this second Dark Age of mankind, and the greatest slayer of them all was Merlin's apprentice.
Chapter 1
Everything slowed down before a kill. The beat of the dragon's wings against the hot, dry air. The tendrils of smoke uncoiling from its flared nostrils. The sound of claws unsheathing as it descended from the sky.
The dragon slayer was crouched on a large rock overhanging a cliff. She took a moment to admire her prey. Its pearlescent white scales, its piercing blue eyes, and its translucent wings through which shone the light of the sun.
Then, she lept. Her sword raised high. She landed lightly behind the dragon's crown and pierced the middle horn. Her hand reached inside and pulled out the still beating black stone heart. The dragon writhed in pain in the sky. Next she slit its throat and arterial blood spewed forth like a red fountain. Without hesitation, the slayer turned and ran down its long neck, driving her sword between its shoulders and severing the spinal cord.
The slayer was powerfully quick despite her diminutive size. The dragon barely roared before it lost consciousness from loss of blood. The severed spinal cord killed the beast instantly as it plummeted to the ground.
Leaping off the crippled white dragon as it fell, the petite young woman landed beside Merlin who had been watching nearby. She wiped the blood off her sword, tossed her long blonde hair, and smiled at him brilliantly, her blue eyes sparkling, as she handed him the black stone heart: "Another one bites the dust?"
Merlin said nothing as he took the dragon heart and turned away. "Oh, come on!" laughed the dragon slayer, her name was Jess. "It's funny. I know you like that song." She followed the wizard as he walked into the mouth of a cave and began the long descent down roughly hewn stone steps to the tunnels below. "AC/DC, right?"
"No," said Merlin. "Queen."
"Oh," Jess shrugged. "It's so old, your rock music, why do you like it so much anyway?" Jess knew Merlin was old, but he looked as young as she was. He was an immortal.
"It's the music of hell," Merlin's eyes glowed and the torches along the tunnel walls burst into flame one after another. "It's what you play when the world has gone to hell." Jess smiled. She was used to the wizard's dark moods. He had raised her from a baby. Her parents, also dragon slayers, were killed not long after she had been born. Jess could hear the lyrics of AC/DC's Back in Black echoing through the tunnels as they walked towards Merlin's chambers.
'Back in black
I hit the sack
I've been too long I'm glad to be back.'
A group of children were sitting on the floor, playing with model toys in the dirt. Knights, horses, maidens and dragons all skilfully carved from rock. Jess recognised Merlin's handiwork. A boy ran in front of the wizard and waved his toy dragon, growling "Roooaaaraaargh!". Merlin's eyes flickered again and the toy came to life. The model dragon wriggled out of the boy's hands and flew off down the tunnels. The children screamed excitedly as they chased after it.
"Great. All we need is another dragon in the world," said Jess wryly.
"No new dragons will be called into the world after today," Merlin replied. He stopped outside his chamber and held up his hand to wave aside the large stone boulder that blocked the entrance. Once inside, he casually waved his hand again and the boulder rolled back into place. The candlelit chamber was cluttered full of books, bottles, jars, and various strange objects all gathering dust. A rabbit mask sat on one of the shelves. Merlin hunched over a bench and poured two cups of tea.
"The white dragon that I sent you to kill today was the last true dragon to be summoned from its egg by a dragon lord, and thus the only dragon able to lay dragon eggs for Morgana's army. His name was Aithusa."
Jess sat down at the bench. "That was Aithusa? And you knew him, right?"
"Yes. I knew Aithusa well. It was I who called him from his egg, and I named him after the light of the sun. I believed that Aithusa's birth bode well for Albion. I was wrong." Merlin sighed. "Aithusa was one of my many mistakes. It was his fire that forged the sword that killed Arthur. It was his breath that resurrected Morgana after I had killed the witch. It was also Aithusa's magic that helped Morgana to destroy Camelot after the Battle of Cammlan."
"I know, I know." Jess had heard the story many times. "Everyone dies."
But Merlin didn't hear her. "By the time I got there it was too late..." he murmured lost in his memories.
-0-0-
The wizard's mind flashed back to the shores of Lake Avalon where he had sat for days after Arthur died. He did not eat, drink, or sleep. He was lost in grief.
Freya, the Lady of the Lake, sent the Vilia, benevolent spirits of the brooks and streams, to sustain him. She called out to Merlin when the thunder of a thousand dragons taking flight shook the sky. She urged him to wake when the smoke from Camelot's fires blotted out the sun. He saw and heard nothing.
It was Kilgharrah who finally woke the young warlock from his stupor. The Great Dragon flew down and landed beside him on the shore, reviving Merlin with his breath. It was with regret that Kilgharrah told Merlin of Camelot's fate.
"I underestimated Aithusa's love for his mistress. The white dragon used his breath to call Morgana back from the dead, but she returned more terrible than before. A demonic revenant consumed by hatred and rage. She desires only death and destruction." Kilgharrah sighed. "Then Aithusa broke our highest law. He laid eggs at his mistress's request and allowed her to summon dragons from the eggs even though she is not a dragon lord. One thousand white dragons she called into the world to wreak her revenge on Camelot. And that was not all." Kilgharrah paused. He was in pain. "Those people who practise magic have allied themselves with the witch. They grew tired of waiting for King Arthur to change the laws against the Old Religion." Kilgharrah looked sad. "I am sorry young warlock, but your friends are dead. Queen Guinevere, Gaius, and the last Knights of the Round Table, Sir Leon and Sir Percival. I saw them fight bravely. I saw them all fall." The dragon took a painful breath. "I, myself, along with a small clan of Druids tried to protect Camelot and its people, but we were no match for Morgana's army. Aithusa's children and I met in battle in the skies above the castle. I am an old dragon and no match for a thousand younglings. I have been dealt a mortal blow."
Kilgharrah's breathing was heavy and slow. "Listen to me carefully, Merlin, for I have very little time left. Morgana will not be satisfied by Camelot's destruction. She will ravage the world unless you can stop her and her dragon army. You are more powerful than you know. You must unleash that power to bring her to an end."
Then Kilgharrah revealed to Merlin the secret of how dragons can see through the mists of time. "Take the lesson I have given you and use it wisely, for I fear my greatest mistake is not yet done." The Great Dragon had laid his head on the ground and closed his eyes for the last time.
Merlin felt the magic in his blood surge more powerfully than ever before. The world around him began to spin, faster and faster, until the lake disappeared and he was standing on a battlefield. Witches and warlocks fought against knights and warriors as Morgana and her white dragons flew overhead.
Merlin's eyes glowed and he released a dreadful roar filled with the pain of his loss. It was a terrible sound like none had ever heard before. The force of it threw everyone on the battlefield to the ground, where their bodies immediately turned to dust. Witches, warlocks, knights, warriors on both sides - Merlin did not discriminate - there was nothing left of them but dust and bones. His primal roar echoed throughout the kingdom, flattening forests, shaking castles into rubble, and opening fissures in the earth that swallowed villages whole. And when it was done, Merlin sank to his knees in horror at the darkness of the power that was within him.
In the sky above, Morgana screamed and her white dragons spiralled in fear and confusion. Sickened with himself, Merlin could bear no more death on that day. He raised his hands to the sky and a deep utterance came from his mouth. A spell so powerful it dragged Morgana and her dragons out of the sky and into the deepest bowels of the earth. There they would stay imprisoned till the world's end.
The weight of his actions laid heavily on his shoulders as Merlin returned to Lake Avalon. He despised the magic that he had unleashed upon the kingdom. Even the gentle Vilia shrunk away from him in despair. Merlin stretched out his arms and let the wind carry him across the lake to the Isle of Avalon.
Thousands of years passed as Merlin slept beneath the Isle in self-imposed exile. He shut himself away from a world he feared he might destroy. Freya tried desperately to reach him. "See the wonders that people are creating, my love. Art, poetry, music, science. There is more to experience, more to learn, do not let yourself fade away, my love." But Merlin refused to hear her.
In his dreams, he could only hear the screams of Morgana and the howling of her dragons trapped in their eternal prison in the deepest, darkest chasm of the earth.
At the turn of the 20th century, the world was a noisy place. Electricity, radio, telephone, television, automobiles, aeroplanes, and new terrible weapons and machines of war caused Merlin to occasionally stir in his sleep.
In 1939, a signal broke into the warlock's dreams. It carried a message on a specific frequency, hitchhiking on the air-raid sirens of London's blitz during the Second World War. The message repeated over and over again: "Do you have magic? Your country needs you." Merlin woke up.
For the first time in history, he was curious about the outside world. The wizard had sensed the withdrawal of magic as the Old Religion faded and was replaced by science and technology. Those who still practised magic no longer lived in fear of persecution for the world no longer believed in them.
But now the world was calling to Merlin, and to others like him, for help: "Do you have magic? Your country needs you." The wizard wondered for a moment whether or not to answer the call. Then, without hesitation, Merlin decided what he would do. He focused on the source of the signal. His eyes glowed as his surroundings changed. He was standing next to the desk of a stout, stern-looking man. Winston Churchill, prime minister of Britain. Churchill had shouted at him: "Who the devil are you?" To which Merlin had curtly replied: "I am Merlin, the last Dragon Lord."
That was how Merlin returned to the world. During the Second World War, the Nazis had acquired a menagerie of magical creatures and artifacts that tipped the balance of power in their favour. Though he was careful never to unleash the full might of his magic again, Merlin supported the Allies in their war efforts and thwarted Hitler's supernatural schemes.
After the Allies won the war in 1945, Merlin retired to a cottage in Glastonbury near the Isle of Avalon, which was known to the modern world as the Glastonbury Tor. The cottage was a gift from MI5, at Churchill's request, to thank the Dragon Lord for helping the Allies in their victory.
"Go see that girl of yours, Merlin. Freya, isn't it? Spend some time together," Churchill had said to him.
"Thank you, Winston," Merlin had accepted the gift graciously, but he knew the real reason for the prime minister's generosity. The government felt safer knowing where the Dragon Lord was and what he was doing.
Merlin lived a reclusive lifestyle in Glastonbury. MI5 occasionally called upon him for a favour (a rogue troll causing the disappearance of tourists in the Lake District, or a sighting of a man-eating manticore in Manchester) but mostly they left the Dragon Lord alone.
Merlin had discovered since he had awoken in the 20th century that he was an immortal. His body never aged. But, for the purpose of keeping his immortality hidden from his most curious neighbours, and to allow him to enjoy his solitary life, he took on the appearance of a wizened-looking hermit. He kept up this appearance long into the 21st century until he grew tired of being old.
He kept a radio and a television in every room of the cottage. The warlock often watched reruns of Sabrina the Teenage Witch, which he rather related to, or listened to stations playing 80s rock music, while making mixed tapes for Freya.
He never visited Freya. His magic was powerful enough to enter the realm in which she dwelt at the bottom of Lake Avalon, but he was too afraid. Merlin guarded his emotions tightly: grief and guilt had closed his heart to love. He still cared for Freya deeply. Whenever he walked past the lake, or stepped in a puddle, or stared at the rain streaming down his windows he would look for her eyes and see her smile.
In the early decades of the 21st century, an exploratory mission to investigate seismic activity at the bottom of the Mariana Trench revealed some interesting findings. Unaware that human curiosity would soon release a terrible force, Merlin had stopped hearing Morgana's screams in his dreams. He had almost allowed himself to forget that she was still alive and trapped with her dragons thousands of miles beneath the ocean floor.
In 2025, a private expedition funded by a well-meaning billionaire to uncover the secrets of the Mariana Trench caused an explosion in a fault line along the ocean bed. Merlin awoke in his cottage in Glastonbury as the chasm opened, and the witch and her white dragons erupted from the sea. Morgana and Aithusa were once again unleashed upon the world.
By 2029, the Third World War was over. The Axis Powers led by Morgana Pendragon had won and the Allies had fled underground. In 2031, the second Great Purge began as Morgana mercilessly persecuted people who did not have magic. Merlin often asked himself why he did not stop the witch himself, but he already knew the answer. Morgana's raw hatred and demonic rage had made her almost unstoppable. The Dragon Lord realised what he would have to do to stop her, and he had not made his peace with that.
-0-0-
The candles in the chamber were burning low by the time Merlin finished telling his story. Jess was asleep in her chair. Merlin didn't blame her. She had heard it often enough. He got up and put a blanket around her. The Dragon Lord stroked a strand of blonde hair from her face as he looked fondly at his favourite dragon slayer. The only orphan he had chosen to raise and train himself. "It won't be long now, Jess," he whispered. "Soon you will understand why I have told you the stories about Camelot all your life."