Title: None Goes His Way Alone (1/?)
Rating: K+
Word Count: (this bit) 1410
Warnings: Spoilers for entire TV canon including S5 finale, bits and pieces of legend. (Archimedes belonged to Arthurian legend long before Disney's The Sword in the Stone)
Genre: Humor, fluff, AU, fix-it fic, animal fic, anything else I eventually decide to throw in due to my own lack of sanity
General Summary: Merlin has always thought that the sorcerer chooses the familiar; his new familiar begs to differ.
This Bit Summary: Merlin and Gwen's first conversation after his return, ending in a startling revelation for all concerned.
Disclaimer: Obviously I don't own Merlin, or there would still be a Series 6, and certain characters would have very different fates, etc.
A/N: Fix-it, of sorts, for certain S5 events. My readers can probably guess which in particular those events are. Despite the solemn tone of this prologue (had to get the angst out of the way right away), this will be a lighthearted fic, as I think that's probably what the fandom needs badly right now. Title comes from one of my favorite poems about fate and immortality: A Creed, by Edwin Markham.
There is a destiny that makes us brothers:
None goes his way alone:
All that we send into the lives of others
Comes back into our own.
I care not what his temples or his creeds,
One thing holds firm and fast
That into his fateful heap of days and deeds
The soul of man Is cast.
Chapter One
"Why did you hide from us – from me?"
The blunt question made him wince, tinged as it was with no reproach, only hurt. His eyes fell to the table, shame burning his ears.
"Merlin, I only wish to know," the Queen said softly, placing a gentle hand on his arm. Warm eyes, full of shared compassion over shared grief, slowly drained the tension which still kept him arrow-straight and uneasy in his chair.
Finally he relaxed slightly, head thumping dully against the wood of the seat-back. "I…I wasn't ready," he finally murmured. "To face any of you, but especially you, Gwen."
The Queen's eyes darkened with pain, and she removed her hand with a grimace. "After what I became under Morgana's control, how could I blame you for that, Merlin," she said bitterly.
He glanced up, incredulous. "That's got nothing to do with it," he protested, truly mystified. As the Queen began to protest, he held up a hand to cut off her arguments. "Gwen, I know better than anyone else how impossible it is to resist an enchantment of that scale," he continued pointedly. "It wasn't that."
Sighing, he closed his eyes for a moment, gathered his courage for a conversation he'd been dreading ever since he had made the decision to return to Camelot from his self-imposed exile. Finally he drew a long, deep breath, and reached for the nearest goblet of liquid fortification. It was time to properly face the memories he had been trying his hardest to avoid for nearly three months.
"What then? Merlin, you can tell me," Gwen entreated, and he sensed the mental transition from monarch to old friend. "Were you afraid I would blame you for being born with magic - or for not saving Arthur?"
The goblet fell with a clang to the table, wine sloshing over the side, and he immediately scrambled from his chair to snatch the nearest serving-towels, an instinct still ingrained even after three months of absence.
"I'm sorry," he muttered, stopping the flow before it reached the silken skirts of the Queen – apology also an ingrained instinct by now. "I'm really sorry –"
"Oh, Merlin." A single word, uttered with so much affection it stopped him in his tracks. Gwen rose from the table, gracefully avoiding the puddle on the floor, and bent to his eye level. "You are not my servant, Merlin, and you never have been," she said quietly, and he let her pull the soaked towel from his shaking hands. "That honor belonged to one man, and I will not have you tarnishing that memory. Come with me."
"Yes, my Lady," he whispered, and followed her from the room. He barely registered the guards' looks of polite disinterest when the Queen took the hand of a known sorcerer.
"I would never have blamed you, Merlin."
He quirked a lopsided grin and glanced sideways at the teary-eyed Queen, for after thirty minutes of relating the events following the battle of Camlann even his weary soul felt the need for respite. On his shoulder, a sleepy Archimedes protested the movement with a disgruntled meep, before settling back down in a ball of irritatedly-fluffed feathers. "Despite throwing me in the dungeons for poisoning the King?"
Rather than smiling back at him, however, Gwen's beautiful skin darkened further in embarrassment, and for a moment they both stared in painful awkwardness out over the castle courtyard in silence, only the stars and distant town fires for company.
"Did Arthur have no one he loved, who did not betray him in some way?" she finally asked lowly, eyes fastened on the empty courtyard below.
It was not an accusation, and Merlin did not take it as such; for they both had been victims of circumstance, both had begged forgiveness for their betrayals and received it from a noble King, both had wholeheartedly loved Arthur Pendragon with every fibre of their souls. They were neither of them from the same ilk as Morgana, Agravaine – even Uther, in his unleashed spirit form.
Arthur had known that; for he was a noble man, and a noble friend and husband.
"I did everything I could, Gwen, I promise you that," Merlin suddenly broke the silence, desperation fueling the rapid words that fell to punctuate the end of his interrupted story. "If there had been any alternative – if I'd been able to summon the Cup of Life, or if there were an injury-switching spell, or anything –"
"Merlin." A slim hand reached over and hesitantly patted his knee. The tawny owl cracked one eye, regarded her suspiciously, but then settled back with a chirrup of approval. "I know. I know now, what you have done for Arthur; and I know what you would have done had there been a chance. I would never dream of blaming you. So please, Merlin," Gwen added softly, giving his knee a squeeze, "please stop blaming yourself?"
Merlin bit his lip, inhaling a shaky breath, but said nothing. He did not trust his voice, not at that moment. They both rose as one, and walked the battlements in silence, only nodding to the occasional guard who pretended not to see them. After a few moments, Archimedes shook himself awake and suddenly dived off the side of the battlements with a war-cry, obviously going after a mouse or rabbit below. Merlin watched him go with a slight smile, letting out a weary sigh that drew the Queen's attention once more.
"What will you do now?" Gwen asked after a few moments of quiet.
"That is why I stayed away," he whispered painfully. "I didn't know, and I still don't. Arthur was everything, Gwen. I lived to protect him and his Kingdom – and now…"
The Queen inclined her head in understanding, compassion shining in her eyes. "I would never force you into anything, Merlin," she said slowly, "but I would be honored if you would at least remain Camelot's protector, in whatever capacity you believe you are able. In Arthur's memory, if you can."
Merlin smiled at her then, a tiny but genuine grin that lightened the dark lines around his eyes. "I'm here, aren't I? I came back for you, Gwen, and for Albion."
"And we must make a new beginning, Merlin," she said softly, eyes roaming the farthest reaches of the horizon – of her new United Kingdom, the land that her husband had dreamed of. "Everything has changed."
"It wasn't supposed to," Merlin whispered.
"But it has," she returned gently. "And we must go on. For Arthur, and for ourselves."
"He loved you more than anything," Merlin blurted suddenly, turning against the wind to face her, eyes slightly wild. "He – at the end, he wanted you to know that." He stumbled over the white lie, but hoped his sincerity would gild it sufficiently.
Gwen only smiled. "I know. And you are a terrible liar, Merlin."
He blushed. "I –"
"Merlin, we had our chance the night before Camlann, for a few hours in our tent there on the battlefield, to say what we wished to say." Her smile suddenly brightened the night, and he fidgeted awkwardly before its warmth. "I am pleased that his last words were for you; for you deserved that much, Merlin."
Shock showed clearly on her beautiful face as Merlin suddenly dropped to one knee before her, there on the castle battlements, and bowed his head, shoulders shaking with the relief of absolution.
"I have always believed that you were a worthy Queen, Gwen, even before you believed in yourself," he said, the words ringing with clear conviction, "and tonight I swear fealty to you and to Camelot in Arthur's memory; all that I am, all that I have, for as long as I am needed, and for as long I live."
Which is likely to be a very long time, he added mentally with a wry grimace. That was a whole different set of issues which he was not up to dealing with tonight. "And I promise that…" He trailed off, incredulous, as a flare of bright magic suddenly sang through his veins, responding to something…someone, in close proximity.
"Merlin?" If the Queen was wondering why he was staring at the waistline of her gown, she was too genteel (and too amused) to say so.
The young warlock sat back on his backside with a thump, staring up at her with a look of utmost incredulity, and…wonder.
"What is it, Merlin?"
"You must have done more than just talking the night before Camlann, I take it?" he asked, with an impertinent grin so wide it nearly split his head in half.
Below them, a young rabbit counted itself lucky that the owl hunting it had suddenly veered off-course with a loud screech of surprise.