He watched, as a golden haired boy grow up under a firm tutelage of his father, as years of propriety got drilled into his mind, letting him believe that no peasant was better than him. He watched, as the young man's father, his tutors, warp his mind on his thoughts of magic, teaching him to hate it, to fear it. He watched as the young prince grew up, acting on his father's behest, the sole purpose of his life being a son his father was proud of. He watched as the young prince led raids against innocent men, women and children. He watched as the boy became a man, as he found friends within commoners and peasants, fell in love, and got betrayed. He watched as the young prince became a King, -a King who was loved by his people- with his friends by his side, his heart extending to those that are very dear to him. He watched as the young King's heart prioritized his brothers in arms, he watched as the golden haired King claimed his best friend -a peasant- as the brother he never had. He watched as the prince won tournaments, as the King won battles and wars. He watched as the King gave away his trust, and most of the time ended up being betrayed. He watched as the King finally fell from the sharp end of a sword by one of his former trusted knights. He watched as he realised that his brother had been lying to him, but all the while as his heart ached that the King was not trusted enough by his brother to be enclosed in the secret. He watched as the King closed his eyes, his last breath leaving his lips, making one last wish to the Goddess for his friend.

Blue eyes flew open to catch a glimpse of sunlight filtering down to the ground from the canopy of trees above him. Arthur groaned as he stirred from his slumber, trying to grasp the feeling of not having a crippling agony from the wound at his side. A moment passed as he stayed still to gather his bearings.

There was no pain at his side. Come to think of it, Arthur felt perfectly fine given the fact that he had just died. Curiously, he poked his finger on his side, the place where he had been mortally wounded. But no. The pain had receded to a feeling of an annoying bruise.

Where was he? Blue eyes trailed around the place that he rested, but the golden haired King still had no idea where he was.

He had died, Arthur was sure of it. He remembered Merlin's boney arms holding him, he remembered the agonizing pain, and how his life flashed before his eyes. Now, he had somehow ended up here. Where was here anyway? Why was he alone? Shouldn't there be someone to greet from the Otherside when one crossed over? Some sort of a Guide? Or should he find his way to whatever the place he was needed? If Merlin was here Arthur would have received a cheeky smile and a 'No special treats in the afterlife you prat!'

Thinking about Merlin brought the young King to move himself up from his place on the ground and sit up, and groaned again when he felt a familiar pain of a bruise on his back. Huh, that was something. So the mortal wound had receded to a bruise, but also added a back pain as well? Granted, he was very glad he was alive, er- well dead, but Arthur would like to know what was happening thank you very much.

He glanced at himself, the familiar weight of his armour comforting him for a moment. Except, this was not the armour that he wore to his last battle. Arthur was sure of it. His eyes travelled to his surroundings, drinking in the calmness, his skin pickling as a feeling of liveliness etched into his skin. He was sitting in a narrow valley between the roots of trees, dimmed sunlight dripping through the canopy of leaves above him. As he looked around, his vision settled on a small dying fire to his right, still cracking and popping and smoke emitting from the burning kindling.

Was someone here waiting for him? There was something familiar about this place, as if he had been here before. Beside him, there was something that resembled a poultice, wrapped in leaves and tied together with a string. On his other side, there was a familiar piece of clothing that Arthur had been using as a pillow before he woke up. Blinking rapidly, and scrambling to gather the worn brown jacket in his hand, Arthur realized it for what it was. It was Merlin's jacket. He was certain of it. It smelled of herbs and polish and there was something- something very Merlinesqe feeling in the jacket made him certain of his discovery. But what was Merlin's jacket doing in the Afterlife? With Arthur?

No. No. There was something he was missing here. What was he missing this time? Despite what Merlin used to say, Arthur was neither stupid, nor a fool. He had ruled Camelot for five glorious years, had been regent on his fathers behalf for another year and was known to keep his head about at the stress of battle. Now he just had to figure out what was exactly wrong with everything around him. Really, he shouldn't have expected to have a little good time even now that he was dead.

A snap of a twig and a crunch of dry leaves made his head turn away from the jacket on his hands towards the sound, instincts of a battle hardened King taking over his mind. Somewhere at the back of his consciousness there was a voice that said there would be no harm to him since he was already dead, but another different voice, which might have been strikingly familiar to Merlin, told him that he was about to discover something that would change his life. Or death in his case.

Arthur sat up from his place on the rock, hoping silently to wait for the intruder to walk through. But suddenly, he felt disoriented, as if he felt like a stranger in his own body. So instead of standing up, Arthur toppled back to the hard ground beneath him, his back hitting the wet soil and earning a groan through his lips.

Another snap of a twig and a second of anticipation later, a figure appeared out of the entrance of the path, and Arthur felt his breath leave his body.

As the sun's rays glimmered down on the figure standing on the footpath, Arthur's eyes met with the familiar striking blue eyes of his best friend. The tall gangly fellow stood there for a second, seemingly taken aback either by seeing him or being spooked by something else. Arthur's heart thundered in his chest, wanting to do nothing more than to hug the boy and never let go, but if Merlin was here that meant either the sorcerer had somehow cured him, or the idiot himself had died and wherever this place was the afterlife. Arthur didn't really want to believe the latter, because he was certain that the former didn't happen, as the golden haired King knew that he had died. But if the latter of the options were true, which meant that his friend either had given up all hope or someone had hurt him.

Tears picked to his eyes as Arthur stood up from his place on the floor, waiting a moment to get his bearings and stumbled towards the raven haired man standing, hovering - at the entrance as if in a trance, -without a hint of a smile on his face- who looked paler than Arthur had ever seen, but younger than he could remember.

A grin broke from his lips, because dead or not, Merlin was familiar so and god help him, if Arthur could rely on one man, it would always be Merlin.

"Merlin!"

The King exhaled a laugh with relief, not knowing if he should be happy to see him or to reprimand him for following him even to his death, as his muscled arms wrapped around the younger man's torso. Arthur felt the man go rigid and stiff as he touched him, as his chin rested on the black mop of hair. It took him five seconds to get a response from his companion, and boney arms wrapped around his own torso rather stiffly for Arthur's liking.

Was something wrong? He thought that Merlin would be happy to see him. Arthur was happy to see him, his heart swelled with so much happiness that he felt as if he could take over the world if he had Merlin by his side. Probably could, but he's not going to think about that.

"Arthur, you're hugging me."

His rambling thoughts came to a halt as he heard the response, the familiar voice of his friend came as a muffled croak, as if he was trying to stop from crying. But that was okay, Arthur could look past that, if Merlin wanted to, Arthur could be the shoulder for him to cry on, no matter how bad he was at feelings. That was the least he could do for the man who had done so much for him. If he needed to ignore his vulnerability, Arthur could work with that too.

"So?" The King asked, shrugging, but keeping his hold on the scrawny man.

"You never do that! Did you hit your head when that arrow knocked you out?"

Arrow knocked me out? What?

Arthur released his hold on him, stumbling back, and meeting the younger man's eyes with confusion. Surely Merlin knew that Arthur had died didn't he? What was this about the arrow knocking him out? The younger man himself looked concerned, his eyes speaking a whole other story than what his face showed.

"Arrow knocked me out? Merlin, stop lying to me. I died! You were there! Is this the Afterlife? Are you dead too?"

"You didn't die!" said Merlin firmly. If Arthur wasn't looking, he wouldn't have seen the dark shadow pass across Merlin's face. It had gone the next moment, but it was there. If possible, the man looked paler than he had been before. "I won't let you!"

Arthur had a sudden urge to laugh. Not because he doubted Merlin's words -never that- but because he knew that he had died. He knew that Merlin was there holding him as he took his last breath. He saw his life flashing before him. There was no doubt that he had died. So why was Merlin so hell bent on denying it?

Merlin, now that Arthur took an actual look at his friend, who looked as if there was a world on his shoulders. He looked very pale, with a haunted look in his eyes. Now that Arthur really looked, the Merlin standing in front of him looked different. Younger. Still scrawny, still boney, but he hadn't yet lost the boyish looks that Arthur had seen in Merlin's youth.

What happened?

"Well, you tell me then, what happened?"

The other man sighed, walking past Arthur as if he hadn't heard him, and picked up the jacket from the floor that Arthur had been clutching like a lifeline before he met its owner. Arthur was not going to tell his friend that he had smelled the thing to be certain of what it was. He waited patiently for his answer, all the while watching Merlin with sharp eyes to detect a lie in his words.

"The arrow didn't pierce your armour. You knocked yourself out" said Merlin, halfway through pulling his jacket on him. There was a moment of silence, where Arthur tried to remember a time he got knocked himself out with an arrow, only to come up with nothing. Merlin seemed to have noticed his confusion, because when Arthur met his eyes again, there was concern in his eyes with a sheen of fear in his furrowed brow.

"Don't be ridiculous Merlin," the golden haired man said, trying so hard to ignore the dread pooling in his stomach and to bring about some amount of normalcy between them. "What even is this place?"

"Woah, you really don't remember do you? We were chased by bandits. We're somewhere in the Valley of the Fallen Kings. 'Trust me,' you said, 'they'll never follow us in there' you said, now look what we have, you knocked yourself out, and you don't even remember what happened!" There was a hard edge along with an undercurrent of concern in the dark haired man's voice, and Arthur was almost taken aback by the ferocity of it.

Arthur staggered back, closing his eyes, taking a moment for himself and not willing to look at his companion. He did not know what was going on, and this wasn't simply him dying and waking up in the afterlife with Merlin by his side. There was more to this, but Arthur had no idea what to do about this.

"Arthur?"

His voice was closer to him than before, and Arthur opened his eyes to meet concerned blue eyes peering at him from above. What was he doing on the ground?

"So, I'm not dead yet?" he managed to croak out, trying a vain attempt at humor, just to bring him back to the present.

"No." The other man said firmly as if there could be no other argument. "I don't want to lose my job" there was a ghost of a smile there which Arthur could see, although it didn't reach his eyes.

"Huh. Could have fooled me, I thought you hated being my servant."

"Someone needs to keep your head from getting bigger."

There was a quirk of his lips, and although Arthur didn't know what exactly happened to him and why his friend who was standing in front of him looked so young, he thought maybe things might be a little okay.

"Come on then," said Merlin, walking back and dosing the smoking kindling with water. "We're leaving this place."

"I'm the one who gives orders here, remember?" Arthur raised his brow, falling back to his usual persona which Merlin happily named the prat. It's easier to be there in the moment than to think about how he certainly died and ended up in the Valley of the Fallen Kings seemingly alive.

"Yeah. Are you ready? Let's go"

Arthur slowly nodded, unusually silent, because usually he would reprimand Merlin for that, and usually Arthur would have his wits about him in the situation. But this was not usual, Merlin was strangely on edge, and he now knew better than to doubt his instincts. Besides, Arthur could feel something deeply unsettling on his skin which made him want to leave the place sooner rather than later.

As Arthur began to walk beside his servant, he decided, while he should think more of the fact that they were nowhere near the Valley of the Fallen Kings the last time he checked before he died, he would rather pay more attention to the fact that he as alive with his his much younger friend by his side.

His eyes fell on the man next to him, whose shoulders were tense, fingers digging painfully into his palms. There were slight tremors wracking his body, although it would have been unnoticeable if Arthur didn't know of the man walking beside him. Merlin was silent, his pace was fast, even Arthur had trouble keeping up with him with the slight disorientation he felt with his own body. Why or how is a matter that Arthur should look to sooner rather than later, but now he couldn't bear the tense silence between them.

"Anything in your mind Merlin?" he asked casually, his eyes fixed on the back of the head of the man now walking at the front.

"Nothing"

Did Merlin know what happened to Arthur? Did he have anything to do with coming back to life? Arthur had every right to believe that this was not the Otherside of the Veil, and that he was alive. He just needed more evidence.

"Is it because I told you that I died?"

"For the last time, you didn't die! Stop talking about dying and think of what you want to report to the King!"

Arthur ran his hand through his hair. He could feel a headache building from the back of his head. Wait- He stopped in his tracks.

"T-The King?"

Because Arthur had been the King the last time he checked. Because he had been so for the last four years. Because his father had been dead for the last five years. Why did Merlin speak of another King?

"Sire, are you alright?" Concerned eyes fell on him, and Arthur did his best to ignore them. The ache at the back of his head didn't get any better either.

"Yes," Arthur said instead. "No need to keep him waiting anymore do we?"

His friend nodded without another word, but decided to slow his pace for Arthur to catch up with. Normally, the silence would have been filled with banter between them, or Merlin's usual prattle about the latest castle gossip, but it seemed neither of them had any mind for a talk. For Arthur, it was the never ending questions that his mind provided, and the headache that seemed to worsen with his every step.

They somehow managed to reach the Citadel, the castle of Camelot stood proudly before them. Arthur had no time to admire his beloved castle, his home that he ever thought he would see again, as he felt as if someone was pounding his head with a mace- repeatedly. Everything felt as if it was too bright, and he wanted nothing more than go to sleep and never wake up. If it wasn't for Merlin's shoulder that he managed to hold at the top of the castle steps, Arthur would have collapsed right there without a care.

"Let's get you to your chambers. I'll make someone inform the king that you're back" Merlin's voice was soft against his ear, and Arthur could only nod, and concentrate on trying to keep one foot in front of the other, until he reached his chambers. He had closed his eyes somewhere between the stairs and his chamber, and the next thing he knew was laying on the soft familiar mattress of his bed and promptly passing out.

I don't really like how I ended this chapter tbh. But it was already getting too long, and there was a lot of info dump in here for someone who was supposed to be dead. Thank you for reading this so far. Leave a Review letting me know what you think. Anyone who as any idea which episode this fic takes place would get a hug and a cookie from me.

Until next time :)

-Popcornbay