Nothing like the sun
The sun is setting, making the sky glow pink and gold; people hurry home, anxious for the day to be over so they can sink into their soft, warm beds and sleep, ready for yet another endless day of work and drudgery.
The crisp autumn winds whistle down the street, biting and snapping at exposed skin. A woman pulls her coat closer about her, and a man catches his scarf before it blows away. Leaves rush past, often landing on people and brushed off with impatient hands.
He walks slowly, will very little purpose. Head down against the wind, hands shoved deep into coat pockets, he plods along. His much more sedated pace to those around him sets him off as different, in another world. Others take no notice of him; and he very little of them. He carries nothing, and yet has the whole world on his shoulders. He stoops like an old man, but is barely 30, if not 20. He looks up and the last dying rays light up his face; the well-defined cheekbones, unlined face and mouth that used to be set in a permanent smile. But those days are long gone, and after such a time, he is doubtful they will ever return.
He reaches the top of the hill, and sits on a bench nearby, almost buried under dead leaves. Small children are running past him, some dressed up as vampires, witches, and wizards. One exceedingly small girl drops her pumpkin lantern and it cracks on impact with the soggy, leaf-strewn floor, before rolling along and coming to rest at his feet. He bends over, picking it up with long, white fingers. He turns it over in his hands, and soon locates the break. A few words are whispered under his breath, quickly caught by the wind and whipped away, and maybe the sun catches his eye and lights up their clear blue for a split second, or maybe the little girl imagined it, but she thought she saw his eyes flash gold. She walks up to him cautiously- her mother told her to be careful near strangers.
He smiles, a kind, soft smile, and she grins back, flashing her gap where her two front teeth should be, but they came out last week on her apple. She loves apples, but now they are not worth the bother to eat, as it is exceptionally hard to take a bit without her two front teeth. But she received two shiny pounds in their place from the tooth fairy, and she thinks this is a good exchange for no apples for a few months. And the teeth are already starting to poke through her gum, as she pointed out proudly to her parents that morning, and her teacher, her friends (who were all very impressed), her Nan and her two big brothers.
The man hands her her lantern, and she takes it eagerly, barely remembering to shout a quick 'Thank you' before she speeds off after the others, her eyes alight with excitement at the prospect of sweets.
He watches her go, smiling still. He remembers why he must do what he has been doing for the past millennium, and it has momentarily strengthened him. As the sun sinks lower, he gets up and starts off towards the woods, where it is already dusk and the trees are alive with the sound of animals and birds in that moment of movement before everything stills and the night begins. As he treks through the forest, at first following the path and then, later on, leaving it, the sun falls further, stretching the shadows to breaking point before, finally, sinking below the horizon and plunging him into darkness.
He has come prepared, however; the bright light of a torch shines through the trunks as he continues his journey, his yearly pilgrimage on all hallows eve, the time when spirits are most connected with earth. He, however, is only interested in three particular ones.
Only when he is deep in the woods does he stop. He moves the torch around until he comes across a sturdy hazel tree. He smiles at the tree, and rubs his hand along a well-worn trunk, as he has done for year after year after year. Than he mutters something under his breath, and his eyes, once again, flash gold, only this time there is no sun to take the blame. The earth rumbles, and a small passage at the foot of the tree appears.
He walks slowly down it, ducking under the huge bronze bell that hangs just by the entrance. He knows, despite the great temptation, that he should not ring it yet. Not yet. But soon. He carries on, gripping the torch tighter in his hand, a small smile growing on his face. And then he reaches the chamber.
He holds out a hand, and old fashioned torches flare up, illuminating the cavern and rendering the torch useless. As the light flickers and dances across the dark walls, he looks around. A huge, round table sits in the middle, surrounded by piles of coins and jewels. Slumped on the table are a group of knights, asleep, and a man wearing a golden crown. The only two women are either side of him; one with a circlet on her head, sleeping close to the king, and one with long, midnight tresses, with her head on her pale arms.
Merlin smiles at his friends. He walks over to them, and sits in the empty chair between Morgana and Arthur.
'Hello, old friends,' he says, happily, though he knows they cannot hear r answer. It makes him feel better, being able to talk to them every year, when the passage opens. He tells them about the modern day, about how different life is now.
'You should see the cars, Arthur, you'd never be able to believe the speeds they can reach. And Gwen, they have special machines now, which wash your clothes for you. I know how much you'd like that.'
When he grows tired of speaking, he gets up and arranges them. He tries to make Morgana more comfortable, but somehow makes it worse, and so he leave her be and moves on. He straightens Arthur's crown, strokes Gwen's hair and smoothes out the creases from their clothes. Then he sighs into the quiet and reflects.
Mordred killed Arthur when he was 37 years old. His rule had barely just begun. The dragon had told Merlin what needed to be done, and he sealed them all in the underground chamber, ready for the future when they would be needed again. And he was left on the outside, alone.
He lived out the rest of his natural life in his home town, Ealdor, occasionally visited by Lancelot. He had disapproved over Gwen's infatuation with the Knight, and had only just been able to save her from Arthur's anger, but he knew Lancelot was, overall, a good man. Merlin had wished he could have sealed him down here as well; he had been pushing it a bit on Gwen and Morgana, but he couldn't bear to leave them behind. He also had a few selfish reasons.
One was that he wanted Gwen and Arthur to be untroubled in the future; second was that he didn't want to be entirely alone. So he grew old and died quietly in the night, only to wake up the next morning as himself at 20. Ten years later, when he still looked 20 and was stoned from the village he had moved to after Ealdor, he realized he wasn't aging.
This wasn't a very good thing; it made it almost impossible for him to stay in one place for any length of time. People believed he had sold his soul to the devil to remain young. Merlin had to admit they weren't far off the mark. More like a dragon that a devil, though.
So he used his magic to age himself. He grew old, died and became 20 yet again, never younger, as it had been then that he had met Arthur for the first time. So he continued through this cycle, watching the world grow and develop, as it left magic behind in the favor of science. And he was proud of them. They had come so far.
Every year, when the passage opened during all hallows eve, he made his pilgrimage down, to see how they were. They always remained unchanged. Sometimes he took some money, to keep himself going.
Then, seven years ago, he had woken up as 20 for what felt like the thousandth time, and started to age naturally. And so he knew the time was coming of the Once and Future King, and he was excited his long wait was finally nearing its end. A thousand years is a long time to be lonely.
This year, however, as he gazes at the bell, which would wake Arthur and the others, the temptation grew. Would ten years really matter, in the grand scheme of things? Just as it became almost too great, he hears movement at the end of the tunnel. He freezes; who has discovered the passage, and Arthur's resting place? He waits, as a torch light shines into the cavern, and the person grows closer to the discovery of his or her lifetime. But as the shadow steps into the flickering light of the cavern, Merlin relaxes in relief.
The heavily pregnant woman walks over to him, and he gets up and offers her his seat. She smiles at him.
'I thought you might want some company tonight,' she says, her light welsh accent echoing in the cavern.
'It is getting harder,' he admits, and she attempts to hug him, her bump hindering her slightly. Merlin smiles and rests his hands on her swollen belly, feeling pride flood his body.
'You should be resting,' he says, mock-crossly.
'I was worried about you,' she says. 'It's so close now; I didn't want you moping down here for another year.'
Merlin remembers how it had been before he'd met Nesta, before she'd been there to help ease the sense of loneliness.
'I love you,' he says, leaning his head against hers, in an awkward half-hug. He'd met Nesta six years ago, at a mutual acquaintance's party. She'd been beautiful, smart, and Merlin was starved of human company. He'd fallen in love for the second time in his life, and he was lucky enough that she felt the same. When Merlin had explained his life and everything that had happened, Nesta had remained silent. He'd even shown her some magic, but still she had stayed utterly still. Then she broke into a relieved smile.
'I knew you were hiding something from me. I thought you were going to say you were gay!' They'd married three years ago, and Merlin had used the treasure from the cavern to buy them a house, a proper house, rather than the flat they shared, which certainly scored him points with his in-laws. For the first time in a thousand years, he had a family again. He loved it. And now, in a few weeks time, his daughter would be born. His heart swelled with pride once more, and he put both hands on Nesta's bump, feeling the movement of the baby inside. She would have his gift of magic. He could sense it.
'Are you done?' she asks after a moment of silence, gently and carefully. He nods, and she leads him gently from the passage, up past the hazel tree. He takes one last glance back at his slumbering friends, and knows that soon, they will be together again. This makes him smile.
It takes a while to get back to their small house, as Nesta is quite near her time and cannot move particularly fast. Merlin has much longer strides, and is anxious to get home, but never lets go of her hand. When they are standing on their porch, while Nesta fumbles for her keys, Merlin watches her slender hands pick out the right one, her dark eyebrows furrowed in concentration, her dark brown eyes shining in the small light that triggered as they walked up the drive. She gets the door open with a triumphant sound and Merlin half-carries her to the sofa, before getting a movie out of the cupboard to watch before they retire for the night. As he searches through the cabinet for a suitable film, he glances at his wife on the sofa, feet propped up on the other side as she peruses the magazine she'd abandoned to go and fetch him, and he hopes Morgana will understand. He did love her, but a thousand years is a long time, and she was not the one to save him from himself.