Six days. It had been six days and still Merlin hadn't found anything on how to turn Arthur back. He was sitting on the floor next to the bathtub while Arthur played with his new toys in the water. He'd been in the bath for nearly five minutes and the floor, and Merlin, were surprisingly still dry. A new record.

Arthur loved his bath toys, he loved all his toy actually. He'd never had this many toys at home, and none of them were this much fun. Although he missed his nursemaid and Gaius and maybe his father, just a little bit, he really liked Merlin. Merlin dressed him in clothes that weren't itchy, he gave him lots of toys and let him play whenever he wanted to, he made really yummy food, and if Arthur had a bad dream he could climb into Merlin's bed and he wouldn't get mad and tell him to go back to his room like father did.

"Wook Mewin, i's a fish" Arthur called excitedly as he made the plastic fish swim around in circles.

"Wow how did a fish get in your bath?" Merlin asked with pretend shock.

"Magic" The toddler exclaimed happily. He had seen Merlin use magic a few days before and had been fascinated with it ever since. Merlin smiled sadly at the giggling toddler. If only he had been exposed to good magic as a child instead of taught to hate all magic. Both of their lives could have been so much simpler.

"Oh no, i's a scawy monstuw. Ahhh." Arthur screamed as he made a toy squid attack the toy fish. The thrashing of the toys continued until the fish finally surrendered and Merlin's shirt was thoroughly soaked.

"I done" The toddler announced as soon as he'd calmed down.

"Alright let me get a towel."

Ten minutes later Arthur was dried and in a pair of iron man pyjamas sitting in the middle of his bed and waiting for Merlin to come tell him a story. The warlock used a towel to quickly mop up the water on the bathroom floor and then changed out of his wet clothes before going back to Arthur's room. Arthur patted a spot next to him on the bed and Merlin quickly followed the child's unspoken command. As soon as he was settled Arthur cuddled into his side and all but demanded a story.

"Once upon a time there was a young prince who did a very foolish thing." Merlin began. Arthur loved stories about the prince and his man-servant and Merlin loved retelling their adventures to the young king. Of course he changed a few details to make some of the stories more child appropriate. He was currently telling the child of the time he'd killed the unicorn and had to save the kingdom. Arthur was fascinated, though he'd heard the story before he still reacted with small gasps when something bad happened and giggles when something good happened.

"Because of the prince's willingness to give his life to save his servant the curse was broken and the kingdom was saved." Merlin finished and noticed that Arthur didn't comment or ask for another like he normally did at the end of a story.

Glancing down he realized that the toddler had drifted off during the story. The warlock smiled slightly at the sight and gently ran his fingers through Arthur's fine, baby, hair. He just looked so innocent tucked into Merlin's side and clutching a fist full of his shirt. The thought of anyone ever wanting to hurt this sweet little boy was appalling to Merlin.

. . . . . . . .

"Remind me again why we had to turn him into a child."

"Because we need an innocent soul to complete the spell."

"Why did it have to be him though? We could have chosen any child. Why go through the trouble of turning Arthur Pendragon into a child?"

"Because if he's an adult he'll be able to stop us."

"We could have just killed him."

"We tried that remember. Emrys saved him. He killed Jeff!"

"Oh would you get over it already it was just a barghest."

"Jeff was not just a barghest. He was my barghest and he was special."

"Whatever. Your stupid beast cost us precious time and now we only have three days to get to Arthur and in case you haven't notice Emrys is even more protective now. They haven't left the flat in days, and we can't get in. Not with that barrier he's got up."

"Well if you had taken the boy right after he turned we wouldn't have this problem."

"How was I supposed to take him? He was standing right next to Emrys. If I'd tried anything the warlock would have killed me."

"Why do you even have magic if you don't know how to fend off one old sorcerer?"

"Don't you start. You know as well as I do that Emrys isn't just an old sorcerer."

"Well what are we going to do? We have to think of some way to lure them out of that blasted flat."