Last run for Percival. Enjoy!
The ghost of the Fisher King laughed, shaking his transparent head. "I knew I'd have a lot of explaining to do, what with Camelot being right next door and everything. Yes, I know about the magic ban. I know about everything. Listen, child; I was old when I died, older than a good many castles and hills and any other thing you'd care to name. I had children, centuries ago. I outlived my wife and my children, and my grandchildren, and probably my great grandchildren as well. I don't know how many generations are between you and I, nor do I know from which of my children you are descended. But you are. You have to be, or your voice wouldn't call forth such things."
Percival glanced at the others, tense. "What do you mean, my voice calls things? I don't have magic."
"No, you don't," said the dead king, his eyes sharp and kind at once. "And neither did any of my children, come to think of it. Not that it matters. The land recognized you, and I have named you as my heir in kind. All the powers that entails are available to you now."
"You're not answering the question," Elyan growled, drawing his sword as well. Merlin almost laughed—he had no idea what Elyan and Arthur were going to do, pointing weapons at a dead man, but it seemed to make them feel better. At least Lancelot had the sense to keep his hands at his sides. "What do you mean when you say these things? What powers does your heir get? What's happened to Percival?"
The king sighed and turned around. A ghosty-looking throne appeared above the broken one, and the king sat down in it. Except for looking much younger and healthier, (and, well, dead) he now looked very much like he had the first (and last) time Merlin saw him. "I am not the first king of these lands, and I will not be the last," he said, "but I am the first who fully understood the power of the lands and took advantage of that power. I don't know who or what made the land the way it is, or why, and I won't question it. All I know is the power has been passed down through my bloodline since the beginnings of recorded history. The word king is inaccurate, and you're not a prince because this land has no princes. No true government, either. It's always been able to take care of itself. Master might be the better word, although the land itself prefers heir…"
"You're not making any sense, sir," Merlin said, noting the shake in Percival's hands again and wishing these ancients-types could make a point without going all the way around and sounding cryptic about the whole thing. "We understand that the country is slowly recovering, and we understand that it has something to do with Percival, and we understand it happens because Percival is your heir, but we don't understand how."
"Exactly," Lancelot said. "Percival doesn't have magic. Is he using yours?"
"Mine?" the king scoffed. "I could barely scramble eggs with magic in life. How good do you expect me to be in death?"
Arthur looked even more confused now. "But…you were a brilliant sorcerer. Your magic sustained the land, and corrupted it, and it died with your magic…"
The king laughed again. "Oh, no, young Prince Arthur. You've got it backwards. It's the land that's magic, not me." He ignored the five shocked faces around him and continued. "It's in the underground rivers. It gets into the soil, into the air. It stops at the borders, miraculously, but this place, this beautiful, amazing country…it is magic, made by magic. My predecessors never truly understood that, but I did. I asked it to keep me alive, so it did." He looked at the horrified Percival in front of him. "The heir, the king, is the conduit for the magic, what gives it direction. It is the land that is tied to the king, not the other way around. I grew old and weak, and the country grew old and weak with me."
"And when you died, so did the land," Lancelot said, comprehension dawning at last.
"But…that would mean…" Arthur's eyebrows were furrowed almost beyond recognition. "…If it's the land that's magic…your magic didn't corrupt it? And…maybe…it didn't corrupt you?"
The king raised an eyebrow and glanced at Merlin, who shrugged. "That's a big admission for him," the warlock said. "Give him time to catch up."