Arthur

I couldn't believe it. Focusing on his magic, his betrayal, hurt more than I could possibly have imagined.

But losing him was so much worse.

I just sat there. Guinevere was rushing around, making tinctures and binding wounds. I think she was avoiding... it... as well, in what was certainly a better way than mine; she could at least be useful. Better than sitting beside the body of your best friend contemplating all the things you'd say to him, all the hurting, yelling, teasing, if only...

Gaius was there too, I remember that much. Mostly they just left me to my own devices. I thought of all the times we'd been out on our adventures, all the laughs, the jokes, the never-ending name calling that I always pretended to hate so much. I realised then that much as I loved my Queen, as much as Gaius cared for me, as much as my Knights of the Round Table were loyal, he had been my rock. He was the one who saw me at my worst, who made me my best. He was the one who carried me through. Suddenly every joke anyone had ever made about him being weak, being useless, surged back in full force, and I dearly wished that I could take back each one of them. Jokes they may have been, but looking back now they were sometimes too meaningful than they ought. After that little display of power on the field for me today I knew also that they were entirely untrue.

Naturally I'd wrangled the prophecy out of Gaius right before the battle; I'd wanted to know why he'd paled so when I told him we were to make our stand at Camlann. He then explained to me that I was the Once and Future King, that I would be aided by the most powerful sorcerer to ever walk the Earth, and that I was destined to die by Mordred's blade on the fields of Camlann.

Clearly he was wrong.

Either that or Emrys also knew of the prophecy and was determined to give his life for me, as always. Knowing him, he'd been planning to from the start. When he just appeared in front of me like that it gave me the biggest shock I'd ever had in my life: not only was the all-powerful Warlock Emrys in fact my trusted friend and manservant, but he was also able to bend the very fabric of the Earth in order to transport himself from the cliff to the canyon. That sort of magic had never been done before; now that he's gone, it will never be performed again. Still his power awed me, made me understand at least why my half-sister wanted both of them dead so very badly.

And yet I would give all of that up, my throne, my destiny, my life, just to see him live, to see him smile. The prophecy said that we were two sides of the same coin. I don't know if my life is worth living without him now.

"Goodbye... old friend. Farewell...

Merlin."