A/N Hello! This little ficlit is a direct result of Teenmuggle and her wonderful portrayal of Merlin and the Founders in her story "A New Purpose". I strongly advise you read her story first as it contains both better writing and a whole lot of prerequisite knowledge which is needed to grasp my little epitaph.
Disclaimer! If it's not already obvious, I do not own Harry Potter, BBC Merlin, A New Purpose or any of the details, worlds, characters, characterizations, names etc. etc. - do I really need to go on? - associate with them. They belong to Rowling, BBC, and Teenmuggle respectively. The title belongs to Tolkien.
That said, I dearly hope you enjoy it. TM, I hope it lives up to your standards! Thank you for letting me add to your fandom!
The young man, mid-twenties at best, sports a shock of black hair and eyes that twinkle, though with either tears or laughter, none could say. Cresting the last ridge, he freezes at his first sight of the valley that will be his home for the next year. One year, and after that... he decide when the time comes.
Hogwarts.
The name alone haunts him with memories of her stubbornness and her eventual acceptance of what she had called foolishness and the rest had called well deserved silliness.
Seeing the castle now for the first time in years is a blow to the heart. In some ways the lakeside castle has hardly changed from the day he left it, its three towers still rising high and firm into the airy light, the lake ruffled by the ever-present cool breeze and the forest swelling out on all sides to fill the wild valley. But the decades still show. New additions, most prominent among them a long bridge across the gorge opposite the lake, remind him of the severity of the years parting them now.
Those eight years had been among the happiest he'd ever known; certainly the happiest since he'd left Camelot in ruins, his friend in destiny killed by his own foolishness. But he'd returned. He'd promised her, after all, that Hogwarts would outlast the ages and that her legacy would never fade. How could he do that if he never entered their school again?
His pack hits the dirt beside his small trunk. Soon enough he follows it, folding in on himself until he can no longer see aught but the inside of his robes, black of course, that no noble would feel offended by a uniform of a different family's colours. The thick cloth hides the view but not the tears that soak through the fabric and make his eyes ache in sympathy with his heart.
I can't do this Rowena. You were supposed to teach Ancient Runes. Not me. It is too soon. Tomin has only just died. Surely there are still those who would remember me. Surely Hogwarts can wait another decade, or several.
But just as he can hardly bear to think of walking the same halls he had helped construct, or teaching again from the same books that she had pursued so eagerly and with, at first, so little success in her refusal to ask his help, he can bear even less the thought that he should never return until it was too late. If he never returned until the battle that threatened to rip their dreams apart stone by stone, spell by spell leaving nothing but another tale of faded glory.
No.
He will not let that happen here. Hogwarts will outlast the ages if he has to rebuild it himself from the foundation up.
Voices and the rumble of cart wheels catch his attention. Drawing to the edge of the road his eyes flash gold and invisibility falls over him like a cloak.
Soon the cart comes into view. It is drawn by a tired grey gelding urged on by an even wearier greying man but what catches his mind is the contents. Books. At least a hundred in all and each obviously taken great care of.
"Coom on laddie. Keep up new. We've got ta' git these t' tha castle b'fore tha weather breaks."
"Aye Da!"
Dashing up and around the cart a lively young boy with a familiar shock of red hair whirls around to face his elder. "But Ah'll be able ta read thim whin Ah please right?"
The man grabs his boy's hand with his own. "That'll be for thim up at tha castle ta decide. But ye'll attend when yore auld 'nough sah ye cin read them again then, Ah'll wager."
"Why are we givin' up Granda Tomin's books ta thim anyway?"
Tomin's books. He watches as the cart moves slowly out of sight and still has not moved by the time it reappears in the distance. So Tomin had never stopped reading after all. That at least one of his children had lived up to the promise of their youth gladdens him and grants him the courage to stand. He'd sworn to himself and to her that he would return. And the headmaster is already counting on him. Ancient ruins would not be a subject abounding in wizards and witches both able and willing to teach it. One year. One year to assess the state of the school, the board of governors, the students. Then he could leave again with a clear mind.
Picking up his pack and the small wooden truck with its startling engraving of a rearing lion, he allows the invisibility spell to dissolve. An hour later he is shaking hands with the headmaster himself.
"Mansell Emrys is it? So pleased to have found you. I was afraid the position would die out. Would have if it weren't for you. No one has taught it in over a year since the last professor died... a lifelong condition so I remember. But the older students have kept up their studies and mentored the beginners to boot so you won't have too much catching them up to do, eh?"
Merlin nods attentively not really paying attention as his gaze roams over the vaulted timbers of the hall, merely the entrance, yet larger by far than possessed by most of the ancestral homes. And the Great Hall.
"I have heard wonders of the Great Hall's enchantment." He interrupts the other man with a start. In that moment, the feeling that had been coming on him all day opens itself to him and he feels a great need to see it all again. Absorb everything. Most of all he wants to remember it all, just as it is now, alongside how it was then. "I would very much like to see it for myself."
The suggestion is taken to with gusto and within moments he is walking through the great doors. The four tables are longer, and of studier construction. Tapestries depicting the four house crests and a larger one of the combined school crest decorate the walls. He allows his eyes to glide upward. The enchantment is exactly the same. Ghosts of sturdy timbers and arching supports float behind the strong sunlight and brilliant blue sky in imitation of the same outside. He remembers its creation, the first act of old magic that had truly united the founders as his pupils. How proud Helga had been of her 'roof of clouds'!
Suddenly he is chuckling as those early memories come pouring forward to the front of his mind. Gordric's impatience with his magic and how Merlin himself had been the first victim of the man's rushed spellwork. Helga's kindness as she introduced him to the rescued house elves, all one-hundred-four of them, by name. Salazar's grim acceptance of him and their joint work in fending off the Wizarding Council. And Rowena. Cold, intelligent, frightened Rowena, who had yet to open her heart but who had been so eager to learn his lessons and so quick to implement them without fail.
That night he quietly slips down the corridors away from his new quarters, past the caretaker, and up the stairs of the tallest tower. Her tower. Tonight there are no students, no fellow teacher preparing their lessons, no presence at all save for him and the stars.
The night fades to grey as the moon rises over the mountains and still Emrys of Hogwarts makes no move to leave. The stars turn in their ancient dance, the wind moves in the trees of the forest, and one man, older than the trees and older than the stones beneath his feet, remains awake to absorb the patterns and recall the steps to the dance of the stars. As dawn spills over the peaks, dimming and finally obscuring the objects of his gaze, he rises stiffly.
A promise had been made and his promise he has kept. He is here. But unlike the first time he had ascended these steps, he now views the stars as something infinitely precious. No longer are they merely a cruel reminder of the eternity he must pass alongside them. This time the stars remind him of a smile, quickly hidden, and a laughter rarely given. This time the stars are her raiment and reminder of a promise.
A promise to love.
As always comments, complements and especially critiques are all welcome!