It started back when Harry was once again at the Dursleys, waiting for his birthday to roll around so that he could get free of them for the rest of the summer before school started again.

Well, if Harry was going to be meticulous about the details and scrupulously honest, it started nearly fifteen hundred years ago, but at the time, he didn't know that. So for convenience's sake, when asked about it later in life, Harry always began the story near the start of the summer after his fourth year at Hogwarts, as it saved time and let him skip over quite a bit of history.

Fourth year was over, thank all that was magic, Harry's relatives were leaving him well enough alone (though his friends were leaving him a little too alone), and he had two months with the Dursleys to work through the piles of summer assignments given to him by teachers eager to get their students stressed about their upcoming OWLs year before it even began, and then he'd have a few weeks with the Weasleys and Hermione before heading off to school once more. Dudley was on his diet once again, although – much to Harry's relief – it was far less restrictive than it had been the summer before. On the bright side, Dudley was rarely seen around the house, as he was always "off for tea" with his mates during the day, and home only minutes before supper was served. Harry thought he'd seen his uncle roll his eyes once at Aunt Petunia's obliviously cheerful announcement of where her precious Duddykins was headed before hiding behind the financial section of the newspaper, but he realized after a few seconds that he had to be imagining things. Clearly, the dreams were getting to him.

It was bad enough that he was still dreaming of the graveyard, Cedric, the ritual, the duel, Voldemort, almost every night. They took that knot of complicated emotions lodged behind Harry's ribs – guilt, grief, fear, fury – and tied it tighter every night. But it didn't stop with that. No, of course not. Now he was having other dreams – dreams that felt just as real, just as much like true memories, that didn't make the tiniest bit of sense.

Dreams of wearing chain mail and riding a horse through the woods with a sword at his hip and a small company of men dressed just like him, hunting something dangerous. Dreams of sitting on a throne with a heavy gold crown on his head, listening to a petitioner ask for his kingdom's help in some matter. Dreams of a grand wedding full of pomp and ceremony as he tied his life to a beautiful woman with warm eyes and a sweet smile. Dreams of a profound sense of loss as another equally lovely woman drifted further and further away, until one day she looked upon him and called him her enemy. Dreams of being impaled upon a sword on a battlefield by a youth with cold, pale eyes and snow-white skin. Dreams of long, half-insulting conversations with a man he could never publically admit was his best friend and most trusted advisor. Dreams of dying in that man's arms, oddly secure in the knowledge that he'd see his friend once again.

The oddest part, as far as Harry was concerned, was that those dreams were occurring in an entirely different language – and he could understand every word. A quick browse through the early chapters of "A History of Magic" made it clear that he was dreaming about Britain during the sub-Roman era. It didn't explain why he was suddenly fluent in both Brythonic and Old English while he slept. Nor did it explain why everyone else seemed to be having sleep troubles, too.

Thanks to Harry's keen hearing and tendency to wake up at inconveniently early hours, he was more than aware that none of the Dursleys were sleeping soundly this summer. In the bedroom next door, Dudley regularly woke up around three and paced back and forth for several minutes before settling heavily in his desk chair to play computer games until breakfast. Down the hall, Harry could flip a coin to predict whether it would be Uncle Vernon or Aunt Petunia who'd get up and go downstairs in the pre-dawn hours, Uncle Vernon for a finger of scotch and a dry biography of Ambrosius Aurelianus, Aunt Petunia for strong, sweet tea and a very thick, but much more interesting book on the myths and legends of Camelot.

The lack of undisturbed sleep wasn't restricted to Number 4 Privet Drive, either. Harry's friends were being infuriatingly reticent about their summer and what they were doing, but Ron, Hermione, and Ginny had all mentioned in separate letters that they were having disturbing dreams that they couldn't make heads or tails of (and not to mention it to the others, please, as they'd never hear the end of it). Ron mentioned armor, a red cloak, a sword, and "funny languages". Ginny wrote of contradictory dreams, of being both a serving girl and wearing a crown, of a blacksmith father and a hall full of people crying "Long live the queen!" as she sat on a throne. Hermione's letters were unusually lacking in detail, though she wrote that she too was dreaming in both Brythonic and Old English, and that in her dreams she was performing magic far beyond anything she'd ever heard of while at Hogwarts. Then they all said something that worried Harry, as he'd been hoping he'd just been hallucinating: they were starting to recognize some friends and acquaintances as people other than who they actually were.

Oh, how he wished he'd been hallucinating. God help him, how he wished he'd been hallucinating. But no. He was, of course, in exactly the same boat as his friends. He sat down to breakfast every morning with Dudley, Uncle Vernon, and Aunt Petunia, and he had the strangest feeling that he was eating with three entirely different people. He clung to his denial as hard as he could; it could be a curse, or a potion, or a hex, or any number of things that was affecting them all so oddly. Then one morning, about three weeks into his summer holiday, his denial was shattered into dozens of pieces.

It seemed like a normal Saturday morning. Breakfast was brought out to the table by Aunt Petunia, who then served everyone portions she thought were appropriately sized. Harry's portions had grown over the past few weeks for some reason, but they were still significantly smaller than Dudley's and Uncle Vernon's. Uncle Vernon set the paper aside, looked at Harry's less than well-appointed plate, grunted disapprovingly, and reached across the table to heap another large spoonful of eggs and two breakfast sausages onto Harry's plate.

"You need to eat more, Arthur," he said gruffly, forking another piece of buttered toast onto Harry's plate as well before settling back and turning his attention to his own plate. "You're as scrawny as that servant of yours."

Time stopped. Everyone froze and just stared at each other, scarcely breathing.

Arthur.

Yes. Arthur. It felt right. It felt like…him. As his acceptance of that settled about his shoulders like a cloak, around his brow like a crown, all his dreams fell into place and developed clarity unlike any he'd ever experienced before in his life. He was Arthur Pendragon, king of Camelot. He was back.

No wonder Merlin had called him the Once and Future King.

He looked around the table at his family and this time he was almost one hundred percent certain he recognized the people he'd seen overlaying them like barely-there spectral images. But just to be certain… "Fæder?" he asked hesitantly in Old English.

Aunt Petunia inhaled sharply. Dudley gaped.

Uncle Vernon's jaw clenched and he closed his eyes for what felt like an interminable age. Then he exhaled slowly, opened them again to reveal a suspicious sheen across his eyes, and said, "Arthur. Oh, dear God."

"I'd hoped I was just going crazy," Harry admitted. He wasn't quite ready to start referring to himself as Arthur just yet. Accepting that he'd been reincarnated was a big enough step in his opinion.

"You aren't the only one, Wart," Dudley muttered.

"I think it was a collective wish," Harry said. He raised his eyebrow at Dudley and asked, "Kay?"

Dudley buried his face in his hands and nodded, groaning.

"We had an agreement that you'd never call me that again," Harry said, giving into the temptation to flick a blueberry at his cousin's forehead.

"That was well over a thousand years ago. Agreement's expired," Dudley said firmly, flicking a blueberry back.

Harry caught it deftly and looked to his aunt. Unaccountably, her ears turned red and she looked away with an expression of extreme mortification on her face.

"I'd really rather not say," she said, determinedly avoiding any eye contact. Her hand crept up to rub the shell of one of her tomato-red ears and Harry, Dudley, and Uncle Vernon all choked at the familiar gesture.

"Ector?" Uncle Vernon exclaimed in a strangled voice as Dudley yelped, "Dad?"

"And I thought this family couldn't possibly get any weirder," Harry told his eggs gloomily, suddenly quite put off his breakfast.

"My dad's your dad and my mum's my dad," Dudley said, matching his gloom. "I don't think it can get weirder."

"Maybe not weirder, but it could've been worse," Harry offered. "Aunt Petunia could've come back as Morgana."

Uncle Vernon turned a delicate shade of green. "Incest is not a proper mealtime conversation topic, Harry."

"Would you prefer it if we talked about magical reincarnation and the druids' prophecy of the Once and Future King returning in Britain's hour of greatest need?" Harry asked innocently. To his great surprise, no one flinched at the dreaded 'm' word.

Rather, Uncle Vernon looked at Harry with a growing wonder in his eyes and said, "My nephew, my son, is the Arthur of legend. Of all the unbelievable things I've seen and heard in this life and the last…my God, the Once and Future King is Harry Potter."

"Now, I'm just checking, but you don't have any desperate or deep seated desire to burn me at the stake, do you?" Harry asked. "Because you were…. Well. You were rabidly anti-magic the last time around, to be blunt. And you're not all that keen on it now, either. But I'm magic this time, and Guinevere came back, and she's magic, and one of my knights came back, and he's magic, and Morgana came back as well, and she's still magic, but she's loads better, as far as I can tell, and you can't just make someone's magic go away, and –"

"Ar-Harry," Aunt Petunia interrupted. "If this is Britain's greatest hour of need, and you were brought back as a – a wizard, then clearly, you're meant to use magic to defend our nation from whatever threat it's facing. Right, V-Vernon?"

"Right," Uncle Vernon said with a strong note of conviction in his voice that almost completely disguised his unease. "But that doesn't mean you should be neglecting your physical training. We need to get you back into fighting form. You're just a shadow of your former self! You'll be going to the gym with Dudley for the remainder of your time with us – and don't think you'll be getting away with eating like a bird anymore. The more you eat, the more you grow; the more you eat, the more you can exercise; and the more you eat, the stronger you'll become."

Harry contemplated a snarky reply, but thought better of it and simply nodded and dug into his cooling breakfast. He was used to Uncle Vernon's revisionist history, and now that the memories of his past life were so clear and orderly, he realized he was quite used to Uther's revisionist history as well. 'Eat like a bird', his arse. He ate what was put on his plate, and he polished off every last crumb. He'd do the same if he were served bigger meals.

When breakfast was finally over and Harry, at his relatives' urging, was heading upstairs to change into exercise clothes so he could spend a couple hours at the local gym with Dudley, Uncle Vernon stopped him with a big hand on his arm and asked quietly, "Morgana…does your friend know who she is?"

"I don't know," Harry said truthfully. "I can send her a message with Hedwig if you're willing to wait a few extra minutes for me. There might be a reply by the time we return."

Uncle Vernon nodded shortly, letting go of Harry. He hesitated, then clapped Harry on the shoulder. "Harry – Arthur – the dead are obsessive and single-minded. What I told you when we last spoke wasn't true at all. I am proud, damn proud, of what you did with Camelot. Even if you did marry a serving girl and allow commoners to become knights."

Harry flashed his uncle (his father? No, his uncle) a grin and ran up the stairs to throw on gym shorts and an older, smaller shirt before tying his oversized trainers on securely and scrambling for a piece of parchment and his favorite self-inking quill. Right, best to address the whole issue to Hermione, but he ought to throw something in there for Ron and Ginny (Ginny! His Gwen!) as well. How to go about it, though?

Ah! He had it.

Sweostor, Cwén, and Cniht, (He wrote carefully, knowing that the recipient of his short letter would understand the language of the Saxon invaders perfectly)

Have you figured out what the dreams mean? I have. You wouldn't be able to guess in a million years who my fellow disturbed sleepers at 4 Privet Drive turned out to be.

I'll see you soon. Take care of each other.

Harry.

He ended it with a little doodle of a dragon holding an enormous fountain pen and rolled up the parchment tightly, tying it to Hedwig's leg. "Take this to Hermione, girl," he said softly. "Thanks."

She hooted at him affectionately and shot out the window, soaring high into the sky in the direction of London, and Harry turned away and headed back downstairs. He had a lot of work, painful, physical work, ahead of him before he could look in the mirror and even begin to see a hint of the Arthur Pendragon of old reflected back.

At least Merlin can't call me fat this time around, Harry thought with a mental shrug. He laughed under his breath and ran down the stairs to join his waiting uncle and cousin, looking forward to the long, grueling workout that awaited him.

When he dragged himself back up the stairs a few hours later, limp as an overcooked noodle and aching all over, Hedwig greeted him with a friendly clack of her beak and held out her leg. Harry untied the response from his friends with shaky fingers and slumped over his desk, smoothing it flat and reading it with an anticipation he didn't know he still had the energy for.

Broðor, Ceorl, Cyning,

We have woken up. Ginny would like me to tell you that you are about 1500 years late in coming home and kissing her. Ron would like to convey his relief that he remains Ginny's brother in this life just as he was in the last. As for me, I'm – I'm better. Conflicted, but better. I don't know how to start to apologize. But then, I'm not certain how to forgive myself, either. And this is just where you and Ginny and our conspicuously absent friend are concerned. As a matter of fact, I am aware of who you're living with. (Apparently the magic of the Old Religion is too, well, old to fall under the purview of the Ministry of Magic's Trace, so I did a bit of scrying while you were off at the gym and listened in on some of the conversations. I apologize for the invasion of privacy, but you know me; I've never been able to leave well enough alone.) Honestly, Harry, I have no idea how to handle your uncle. How can I apologize when there's so much that he has to apologize for himself, and probably never will? How can I forgive him for what he did to my kind – our kind, now – in that lifetime, when thinking of what he's done to you in this one makes the blood boil in my veins?

On a different, but semi-related topic, when I look back now from a position of logic and sanity, I can see where I went astray. You recall the sleeping spell that the castle fell under, and the Knights of Medhir, don't you? Well, unbeknownst to me, the spell animating them was anchored to me, and the only way to destroy it was to kill me. I've no idea how our mutual friend discovered this, but he did, and he did what he needed to in order to break the spell and ensure your victory. Do not blame him for this; I expect he blames himself enough for any ten of us combined. But my theory, based on how, after that, I so quickly slid into embracing morality-free manipulation, then outright villainy and finally insanity, I believe firmly that when my sister brought me back from Annwn, she brought me back…wrong. It is a true relief to be put to rights once more.

We all miss you terribly, and we can't wait to see you again. Soon, broðor. Soon.

With love,

Hermione (and Ginny and Ron)

Beneath their signatures were three tiny sketches, one of the 'pen-dragon' Harry had created sitting on the pen and reading an enormous spellbook, one of a delicate tiara encircling a single forget-me-not, and finally, one of a rather excellently rendered broadsword leaning against a blacksmith's anvil.

So, his returned knight was Elyan. Ginny had to be thrilled about that. But it made him wonder – how many more of them had, as Hermione put it, "woken up"? And who were they?

And for that matter, where the hell was Merlin?

** ** ** Hour of Greatest Need ** ** **

Late on August 3rd, a party of two appeared out of nowhere on a quiet neighborhood street in London. Knowing that they were being watched from whichever house they would soon enter, the younger of the two pulled away casually and asked offhandedly, as if he had no more than a passing interest in the answer, "So how many of us are there, that you know of for sure?"

In just as casual a manner, Remus Lupin, once known as Geoffrey of Monmouth, court genealogist and librarian of Camelot, said, "Besides the two of us? You're aware of Hermione, Ron, and Ginny, and the Dursleys." He paused for Harry's nod and continued. "There's also Sirius and Severus. Sirius's identity I know. Poor man's been having an identity crisis ever since he, ah, 'woke up'. Severus I'm unsure of. He absolutely refuses to hear anything about Camelot. If you bring it up he'll walk away, and if you follow, he'll threaten to hex you."

"Hmm." Harry stroked his jaw with his thumb thoughtfully and wished, not for the first time, that he didn't look so much like he could pass as Merlin's younger brother in this life. Still, the past month and a half hadn't been awful. He'd hit a growth spurt near the end of the school year that had seen him shoot up five inches by the time he woke up, and his uncle and cousin's 'stuff him full of protein, complex carbohydrates, and vitamins, then throw him to the mercy of the weight machines and the treadmills' plan had been, strangely, eagerly accepted by his magic, bringing on an extra couple inches of height and a broadening of his shoulders that everyone back at Privet Drive looked upon with approval.

"Harry?"

"I'll talk to him," Harry said decisively. At Lupin's dubious look, he added, "Come on, Remus. What's the point of being the much-heralded Once and Future King if I can't talk one grumpy former subject of Camelot into giving up his identity to his former liege lord?"

"You've really embraced this double identity business, haven't you?" Lupin said dryly.

"Of course," Harry said. "For the love of magic, can you imagine what it would have been like if 'Britain's hour of need' came about and nobody but me returned? Horrible! Obviously, I'd do what needed to be done, but finding myself returned to life in a world without Gw-my wife, my sister, my knights – it would be so incredibly lonely. Luckily, that's not what happened. I woke up, Ginny woke up, my sister woke up, my father woke up – bit of a mixed bag at first, that one, but things are much improved now – three knights woke up, one of my court advisors woke up…." He trailed off and gave Lupin a smile that felt almost too big for his face. "I'm willing to bet that the entire Round Table, no, even more people than that, will be awake and known to us by the time school starts again."

"I, for one, won't bet against it," Lupin said. "Shall we go inside?"

"Wait," Harry said, throwing out a hand to stop him. "You said you know who Sirius is. You specifically mentioned it."

Lupin gave him a mischievous look. "And?"

"And then you didn't say who," Harry said. He crossed his arms and raised an expectant eyebrow, pleased to find that once again, thanks to the miracle of teenage growth spurts, he was able to look down at people rather than up when waiting for answers.

Lupin laughed. "Oh, that look on your face takes me back," he said. "You may look like a Potter, but you're still every inch a Pendragon where it counts."

Harry grinned at him in delight. "Thank you!" he said. "I'm glad I haven't lost my touch. Now stop waffling and tell me who Sirius is."

"You won't believe me," Lupin warned him.

"Life is already unbelievable," Harry said flippantly. "Go on. Tell me. Please."

"If you insist," Lupin said. He cleared his throat and said, laughter lurking behind every word, "He's your mother."

Harry sat down hard on his school trunk. "Oh, my God." He let that percolate for a few seconds before looking up at Lupin, beaming widely, and bouncing to his feet. "Fantastic! Let's go see him!"

"That was fast," Lupin commented, grabbing Harry's trunk and following behind him. "Here. Read this."

Harry looked down at the scrap of paper that had been thrust into his hands. "Well, I've spent the last month and a half getting past the fact that my father, who's my uncle, is married to Sir Ector of the Forest Savage, who's also my aunt, and their biological son in this life is Kay. Compared to that, Sirius being my reincarnated mother is a breeze." He squinted at the spidery script that crossed the little paper and read under his breath, "The Headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix can be found at Number Twelve, Grimmauld Place." He looked back up. "What does that…."

Across the street, something seemed to be growing between Number Eleven and Number Thirteen, something growing upward and outward, pushing the two houses apart with a loud grinding noise of brick and mortar scraping against brick and mortar. Finally, with one last lurch and a final, ominous crunch, a dark and imposing townhouse loomed over them.

"Welcome to headquarters," Lupin said cheerfully, dragging Harry's trunk behind him as he set off for the house. "Come on."

"Creepy," Harry commented as he followed along in Lupin's wake, across the street and up the steps to the door. He surreptitiously pulled his wand out of his jacket sleeve and held it at the ready – just in case. Even the exterior of this house was giving him a case of the creeping horrors.

Lupin drew his wand as well, tapping it against the door silently. The door opened and swung inward just as silently, and Lupin waved Harry forward into the lit hall.

He hardly had enough time for a single, disturbed observation – Was that a troll's leg? – when he heard a soft voice say, "Hello, Harry," and he looked up from the hideous umbrella stand to see three people waiting at the other end of the entry hall looking back at him. And for the life of him, he couldn't tear his gaze away.

Ron, standing strong and proud and even taller than him, damn it, his eyes shining and his hand resting at his hip where his sword once hung so long ago. Hermione, still and watchful, seeming torn between running to him and shrinking into Ginny, whose arm she was holding fast to as she plucked at her sleeve absently. And Ginny, practically vibrating in place and smiling at him so beautifully with damp eyes and glowing cheeks.

"If –" Harry broke off, his mouth dry, and tried again. "If you lot don't get over here right now and greet your king properly, I'm going to recruit Remus and Sirius into helping me prank you three to hell and back for the rest of the summer."

A heartbeat later Ginny collided with him, throwing her arms around his neck. He wrapped his arms around her waist reflexively. "Next time you leave a battlefield to die at the shores of a mystical lake and cement your place in British legends forever," she told him breathlessly, "Remember to kiss your wife goodbye." And with that, she demonstrated exactly the sort of kiss she meant.

Without breaking the kiss, he picked her up and whirled her around until she couldn't help laughing giddily. "I'll remember that," he said, joy bubbling up in his chest. "Lots of kisses, just like that. But believe me, Ginny, I have absolutely no intention of getting run through with a sword on the fields of Camlann again, so I suppose you'll just have to settle for those kisses being regular kisses and not goodbye kisses."

Ginny slipped from his arms and back to her feet and molded herself to his left side, smiling up at him as he tucked her more firmly under his arm. "You have yourself a deal, my love."

Ron was the next to welcome him, striding over and offering his hand. They gripped forearms in a warrior's greeting, grinning at each other. "You've grown a bit," Ron observed. "You're, what, an even six feet now? They finally feeding you?"

"Excellent deductive reasoning. Yeah, they were heaping my plate and tossing me in the gym for hours every day. I'm still not taller than you, though, curse your Weasley genes," Harry sighed. "And you look a bit different."

"It's the freckles, isn't it?" Ron said, holding up his arm for inspection and looking it over mournfully. "Of course it's the freckles. I never freckled back in Camelot."

"Yes, Ron," Harry agreed, hiding his laugh behind his fist. "It's definitely your freckles."

Ron laughed and smacked him companionably on the back. "It's good to have you back."

When he pulled back a bit, falling in to Harry's right and just a half-step behind, Harry looked to the one person left who had yet to come over, let alone say anything. "Hermione?"

She fidgeted with the hem of her blouse, looking at her feet and then back up at him, conflict written all over her face. Apparently, despite bi-weekly owl post exchanges over the past month and a half, being presented with a flesh and blood Harry was enough to bring back all the troubles and insecurities they'd worked their way through together in their letters. "Harry…."

"Sweostor," Harry said gently, spreading his right arm wide and beckoning her with his fingers. "Come give your annoying, foolhardy, headstrong, stubborn prat of a brother a hug."

Tears welled up in her eyes, and she gave a hiccoughing laugh and stumbled across the space separating them to fall into his chest, flinging one arm around Harry and the other around Ginny as she buried her face in the collar of his shirt and mumbled brokenly, "Broðor…Arthur…Harry…I thought I'd never…so sorry…love you so much…."

He hugged her back with his free arm, and Ginny held her tight with one of her arms as well. "Shh," Harry murmured. "We love you, too. All is well."

And though he knew that things were just beginning, while he was there, holding his long lost wife and sister while one of his most trusted knights stood beside him and an old court advisor watched from the doorway with a quietly approving smile, he couldn't help but feel that his words were true. For the moment, all was indeed well.

After watching the finale of Merlin (yes, this is a crossover/fusion story), I was mauled by a rabid plot bunny and had to get out this chapter. It's odd, it's got distinctly cracky elements to it, and I can guarantee that continuing it will only bring more oddness. But I guarantee only the highest quality of oddness for you, readers! Thanks for venturing in, and please let me know what you think before you go!