I don't own Merlin.


The messenger's heels clacked against stone floors. He jumped every time a shadow twitched, and with good reason. It was a castle, filled with the kind of darkness achieved by centuries without light, and it appeared to be deserted.

He knew better.

He wasn't a sorcerer himself, but he knew magic when he saw it, and magic clung to this place. It was slathered on the walls, slicking the floor, reaching out with thin fingers to tap him on the shoulder, and he wondered, not for the first time, why anyone would remain in such a place by choice. Just the feel of it was enough to make him want to run as fast as he possibly could in the opposite direction.

But he had a job to do, and he never backed out on a job, not when there was good money to be made.

"Who are you?"

It took the messenger a moment to realize the words hadn't been spoken aloud. It was inside his head. No one else was there.

Not sure if this meant insanity, danger, or both, he swallowed harshly and held his ground. "I come from the southern kingdoms, m-my lady. Lord Mordred sent me."

There was a long pause. "And?"

"H-he told me to tell you, my lady, that the package has been obtained."

Torches flickered to light, mounted all along the walls. The only sound was the soft swish of soft fabric on stone.

"Is that it?"

The messenger leapt halfway out of his skin as he turned around. Directly behind him stood the infamous Lady Morgana Pendragon, just a terribly beautiful as he'd been told. Her hair was matted with dirt from the months, possibly years, that it had been left unattended. The firelight glinted in her dark eyes; stark shadows accentuated the angles of her thin face, making her look even more deathly pale.

"Y-yes, lady. That is all."

"Good."

He didn't even catch a glimpse of her bejeweled dagger before she slipped it in between his ribs.

xXx

Morgana left the nameless man lying there on the floor, choking on his own blood. It would take a little while for his feet to stop twitching, and she wasn't in the mood to watch.

For the moment, she needed to speak with her associate, but without a quick way to get a message through, Morgana decided it could wait until he arrived with their prize. And what a prize it would be.

She'd sent Mordred off nearly two weeks ago; so all in all, he'd worked quickly and efficiently. Not that he would hear any such thing from her. Mordred had a high enough opinion of himself without her bolstering his ego.

Morgana sneered to herself and she slipped through the gargantuan wooden doors into the age-old throne room. Mordred was a problem that she couldn't afford to get rid of. If she was honest with herself, she wasn't very comfortable working with a sorcerer that was so much more powerful than her. She was a high priestess of the Triple Goddess; wasn't she supposed to be the best of the best? But alas, characters seemed to walk straight out of myth, like Mordred and the ever-elusive Emrys, and compared to them, her own prowess was laughable.

And Emrys, another thorn in her side. Well, admittedly, he was a rather large thorn, but still just a thorn. But not for much longer. If Mordred spoke the truth, and Emrys hid somewhere in Camelot, than he would be revealed when they attacked, and with any luck, they would do away with him without much difficulty.

Morgana did suspect that Mordred wasn't sharing all he knew on that topic, but she was in no position to interrogate him. It wasn't that she was scared of him; high priestesses do not get scared. She owed him, and he her, and such suspicions would wreck their tentative alliance just before their plight bore the fruit they so hoped for.

They were so close. All she had to do was tolerate Mordred, and soon she wouldn't be sitting on this cobweb-covered throne in an abandoned castle in the middle of nowhere. She would sit on the throne Arthur had stolen right out from under her, and the citizens of Camelot would be at her command.


Merlin was missing. Again.

Arthur wasn't worried. He refused to be worried, especially when Merlin had most likely gotten lost in a tavern once again. Or knowing him, perhaps he was lost in the castle.

Either way, Merlin was gone and Arthur wasn't worried.

On the first day that Merlin hadn't come to wake him up, Arthur had stormed into Merlin's bedroom to drag him out of bed the way Merlin so frequently did to Arthur, only to find it uninhabited. Gaius was nowhere to be found, so Arthur left and waited for the pesky manservant to turn up.

On the second day, Arthur mentioned it to Leon. He was very offhanded about it, naturally. It wasn't anything to make a big deal of. He prided himself on the level of casualty he'd displayed.

On the third day, he asked Gaius about it. Gaius avoided his eyes and said that Merlin was in town. "For two and a half days?" Arthur had asked. Apparently, yes, for two and a half days, but no, he wasn't in the tavern.

On the fourth day, he'd mentioned it to Guinevere. That wasn't his best idea. She began to panic, and for some silly reason, she seemed to think he was worried as well, which was an embarrassment to both of them. It was just Merlin. Why would he worry about Merlin? When he'd asked her this, all she'd said was, "Because it's Merlin." There really was no suitable reply to that, so he'd just scowled.

It was the fifth day that Merlin was absent, and there was a young boy whose name he couldn't be bothered to remember was fetching his bathwater. He didn't see how the child's name was important; he was only filling in for Merlin. Arthur was certain that Merlin would be back, so even if Merlin was worth worrying over, Arthur wouldn't be worried because obviously Merlin would return, probably within the day, if not within the hour.

On the sixth day, the morning passed without incident. The patrols had nothing to report. Merlin hadn't been found, they told him. He was just gone, without a trace. Not that he'd actually asked them to report specifically on whether or not Merlin had turned up; they just happened to do so, and Arthur really couldn't have imagined why.

On the afternoon of the sixth day, Merlin stumbled more than walked into Arthur's chambers, Arthur's lunch precariously balanced on his left hand.

"Well, it's about time. How long can it really take to carry one tray up from the kitchen? Feels like I've been waiting for…days…," he mused, voice slowly fading as he spoke. Something felt off. Was he missing something? It couldn't be anything very important; he was the king, after all, and kings don't forget important things.

Merlin did look a little tired, he noticed. Even thinner than usual, if that were possible.

And then he remembered.

Arthur shot out of his seat. "Merlin!"

The servant gave a shaky smirk. "Yes, sire. I even saved some of your lunch for you."

Striding over to stand in front of him, the king surveyed his subject. "Put the tray down, would you?"

He set it down on the table, and Arthur immediately preceded to slap him as hard was humanly possible on the back of the head.

"You idiot! Do you have any idea how worried," he paused a beat, "Guinevere was? I've half a mind to throw you in the stocks for a month. Explain yourself."

"Got lost."

"Where?"

"Well, that's kind of the problem, Arthur, I don't know where."

Arthur glared.

"Well, if that's it…" He took a step back in the general direction of the door, and his foot caught on the leg of the table. All Arthur really knew was that one second, Merlin stood in front of him, and the next, he was fully out of his line of vision and lying spread-eagled on the floor.

"Augh…"

Arthur looked towards the ceiling for a moment, running through all the things he could say at that particular moment. After careful consideration, he just shook his head.

"Moron…"

The king grabbed his lunch, which was half eaten by then (courtesy of Merlin), turned on his heel, and took a seat at this desk. By the time he looked back up, Merlin had disappeared.

Odd, Arthur thought rather disinterestedly, I didn't hear the door.

xXx

Merlin woke Arthur only half an hour late the following morning, which was basically a new record for him. Arthur had a busy enough day ahead of him that he didn't actively attempt to score his revenge on Merlin for his brief disappearance, but the manservant knew that he was by no means forgiven.

The emotion that Arthur hated, possibly the most of any, was worry, and although the king wouldn't admit it, Merlin wasn't deluded enough to believe that Arthur hadn't been worried.

Merlin hadn't wanted to leave for a week; it had been a necessary evil. And no, he had not gotten lost. Arthur may be oblivious at the best of times, but even he didn't believe that. What had started out as a perfectly innocent excursion to track down a patch of yarrow had quickly grown more complicated when he ran discovered a reeking, mutilated corpse hanging from a tree like a piñata at a child's birthday party.

He'd pinpointed a bloody trail of bodies, leading northwest and seeming unstoppable. He summoned Aithusa, and with the help of the young dragon, who was much more humble and willing to be treated a bit like a horse than the late Kilgarrah, he made good time.

By the time he realized he'd been led into Cenred's territory, it was too late. He never found the source of the dead (although he had his suspicions), but he did find a rather murderous pack of bandits, and they couldn't have been more pleased that he did.

Luckily, he only spent two days in their captivity, but he by no means made it out unscathed. Cuts and bruises peppered his entire abdomen, and Gaius had carefully taped at least two broken ribs.

Overall, he was exhausted, sore, and generally felt like death warmed over. Arthur's irritation did nothing to improve his mood, nor did the many, many perks that came with it.

Sword practice, for instance. Merlin was elected to be the target.

Gwaine's blade crashed down on the rather flimsy practice shield, jarring every bone in Merlin's body, and from the sympathy in the knight's eyes, Merlin had a feeling that this was him going easy.

All it took was one heavy blow to the side of the shield to unbalance him, and Merlin toppled over, landing face first in the dirt.

A low groan escaped his throat as he planted his hands in the ground on either side of him, attempting less-than-successfully to push himself up.

"Merlin?"

A hand on his shoulder jostled his injured ribs, and gritted his teeth as he allowed himself to be pulled into a sitting position.

"Merlin? Sorry, mate, that was a cheap shot, you alright?"

"Gwaine, move." A pause. "Merlin? Get to Gaius's chambers; you look a little…off. Merlin?"

Merlin brushed Arthur off, frowning with a touch of annoyance. "No, I'm fine, I just slipped."

Arthur rolled his eyes, disregarding him completely. "Percival, take him to Gaius's chambers and see to it that he stays there."

"What? That's ridiculous, I'm right as rain. Just give me the shield, I'm—" He stopped midsentence as the sparring yard pitched before his eyes when he tried to stand up. Percival grabbed his arm. "Alright, alright, I'll go…" he agreed petulantly.

Arthur looked after him slightly concernedly. Just what on earth had Merlin been getting up to? If whatever it was could get the manservant into such a state that he couldn't handle a routine training session, Arthur at least could be sure that he didn't like it. Not one bit.

Merlin didn't arrive to wake Arthur until lunch time the next day. Arthur smiled slightly to himself as he looked over at his curtained windows and listened to the doors to his chambers slam open as they usually did. Not only was Merlin late, but he was being rude about it.

All was well.

"Rise and shine, your lordship! I'm afraid you're going to have to rush; due to unforeseen circumstances, you were woken just a bit late and your council meeting starts in ten minutes. Come on, get up." Merlin tore one of Arthur's pillows out from under his head and struck him over the head with it. Next went the blanket, causing Arthur to mumble in protest as the cold air hit his body.

"Arthur!"

"Yes, yes, I know, I'm comi…" He gave up on speech halfway through the word.

"No, you're not, you prat. Get up." Again with the pillow.

When Arthur didn't respond, he heard footsteps drawing away from the bed, and for a moment, he actually thought Merlin may have given up, and he grabbed for his second pillow so he could get back to unconsciousness…only to find it was gone as well. A moment later, two cold hands latched onto his ankles, and one tug later, Arthur was on the floor.

"Merlin, what the hell?"

"No disrespect meant, sire," although if the derisive way he said 'sire' it was more of an insult than anything else, "but get the hell up. I…will go get your breakfast now. Try to get dressed, if you can."

"You forgot my breakfast"

"I didn't forget it, Arthur. I just left it behind for…theatricality."

"What?"

"Well, it wouldn't be all that dramatic if I just had it, would it? It's all about presentation. That's basically the first rule in the servant's handbook."

"Merlin, you wouldn't know the first thing about what a 'servant's handbook' is—assuming that that even exists."

"Well, that's a little unfair. Maybe I have one and I just didn't bother to read it. Maybe I skimmed it, you never know. I'm a busy man; I can't just read a whole book on something as useless as how to be a good servant."

Arthur shook his head, glaring at him even as his lips started to twitch into a grin. "Just fetch me my breakfast, Merlin. I'll dress myself; I'm not completely helpless."

Merlin turned towards the door, muttering exactly what he thought of that proclamation under his breath.

A silver goblet struck the wall just next to his head.

"I heard that, idiot. Now get out or the next time I won't miss."

Merlin gave a mocking salute and disappeared from view.

Arthur frowned as he looked at his trousers, for two reasons. Firstly, he had little to no idea as to how he was expected to put them on. He didn't understand why Guinevere and Merlin teased him so about that; they were very complicated things. One leg has to go in one side and the other in the other, and how exactly is a man supposed to know which is which? And then if he puts them on backwards, he's ridiculed unless he corrects it. How is he to know if it's wrong? Maybe they're just not comfortable trousers.

But that was most likely the more trivial problem.

He still had no idea where Merlin had been all week. Merlin seemed to like to think that Arthur had accepted that Merlin 'got lost' but Arthur realized that even Merlin wasn't that stupid. He'd have liked to put it out of his mind, but Merlin was just so…strange about it.

Something was wrong, and Arthur fully intended to find out what.


So, I'd like to think of this as my tribute to the series. The finale was perfection. It was painful, but it was perfect. It's terrible that it's over, but at least we still have our fanfiction, right?

I guess this is kind of an alternate ending to the series. I started writing it before 5x12 aired, and I have the general plotline mapped out, so hopefully updates will be relatively regular. Thanks for reading!