1x05 – Morgana le Fay

It all started when Gwen came knocking at Gaius' door late one morning. Merlin hadn't been there at the time, but he could well imagine her distress, having seen it once before when her father took deathly ill. And so it was that Gwen ushered Gaius to the Lady Morgana, in the hope that he could wake her when all the maid's efforts had been of no avail.

By high noon that day, the court gossip was astir with rumours. Along every corridor there were whispers that the king's ward had taken gravely ill with a mysterious sleeping sickness, and that even the Royal Physician could not wake her.

The king and prince were fetched, Merlin tagging alongside Arthur. Morgana looked so peaceful asleep, a state she normally had such trouble reaching that it seemed irony of the cruellest sort that she would only find rest when rest was ailing her. Merlin looked on from his place near the door while the king and prince sat by her side. Gaius bustled about trying various remedies. Gwen stood near the foot of the bed, as if hoping her beloved mistress would rise to give her her orders for the day.

The next day, he came across Gwen crying on the top steps of an upper landing in an empty guest wing. It was only by chance Merlin had come that way, having ducked up the nearest staircase to avoid a bad-tempered old nobleman. He hesitated on the spiralling steps; since the only reason Gwen would be there would be to break down in private, he was undecided if he should leave to respect her wishes or try to comfort her in some way. The choice was taken out of his hands when Gwen turned her head towards him, wiping at her eyes like one trying to remove the evidence.

"Merlin," she said dully. Her watery smile was messily pinned in place and straining at the pins already.

Merlin continued up the steps to sit beside her. He racked his brain for reassurances, but all the ones that came to mind he couldn't bring himself to give, not being confident of them himself. They sat together without words for a while, the silence only broken by the soft sound of Gwen's crying. At length, her sobs slowed. She took a deep breath, and wiped her eyes with her sleeves.

"Thanks for staying with me," she said. Merlin offered a half-shrug, wishing he could do more. "It's just... it's so difficult to see her like this. I've known Morgana for so long and she's always been such a good friend to me - "

Gwen cut off as though choked, swallowing heavily. She closed her eyes and took deep breaths before continuing. "We were just ten when we met. We'd both recently lost a parent - she her father, and I my mother. I was a chambermaid at the time, just starting at the palace and very nervous. And Morgana - she was so good to me. The day I was chosen to attend to her was one of the happiest of my life."

Gwen wiped at her eyes with her sleeves. "I spend every day with her - I can't picture my life without her in it. I always thought we'd go through all the milestones together, if she dies... I can't picture them. I can see Morgana on my wedding day, clapping and smiling in the front pew, clearer than I can imagine the blissful face of my husband. And I can well imagine her a bride - we'd spend hours drawing out the perfect design for her dress, and then I'd spare no effort creating her vision for her. She'd be radiant with happiness when she wore it - the most beautiful woman in the world. Our children would play together every day, while we half-watch as we chat."

Gwen looked to Merlin wretchedly. "What'll I do, if she doesn't make it?"

"She will," Merlin reassured, willing it to be true. "Gaius is doing everything he can for her. She'll get better; you'll see."

Gwen nodded, trying to smile again. She stood, brushing the dust from the floor off her skirts, and excused herself, half-fleeing down the steps with her face cast downwards. Merlin stood with a sigh, and waited a few minutes for Gwen to pass before returning to the main part of the castle himself.

The next two days were torturously long. Merlin may not have had such a long history with Morgana as Gwen, nor was he as close to her, but it was painful to see the kind, spirited woman lying so lifeless.

Gaius tried various remedies to no effect, and Merlin delved into the healing section of his book against Gaius' advice. There, he found no easy answers. He tried every safe spell for head injuries or infections on Morgana, and none of them helped in the slightest. Three days after she'd taken ill, Gaius pronounced her to be hours away from death, saying that there was no more he could do for her.

And that was when Merlin first met Edwin, a young but learned man who had a remedy to cure all ills.

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Edwin's remedy was sorcery - though this was of course not what he let the general population believe. Merlin had mixed feelings about this.

On the one hand, Morgana would have died without Edwin's intervention. On the other, Edwin's lies about his cure put Gaius in a bad light. Merlin tried to dispel these thoughts; after all, Edwin had tried to speak up for Gaius, so surely it wasn't entirely his fault that at the moment Gaius' name was left in the mud with the king. It wasn't like Edwin could have told the king the truth; he'd had to lie, and any lie he'd told would make Gaius look less competent in comparison.

It was not merely one act of sorcery, however, that was making Merlin feel like he was being tugged in opposing directions. Edwin had offered to tutor him in magic. It was a thrilling opportunity - here was a man who could teach Merlin far more than a book could. He'd restored Morgana to her usual self when all of Merlin's efforts had failed; nowhere in his spellbook were Edwin's beetles so much as mentioned. There was so much he could learn from Edwin, and all he had to do was say yes.

Yet he felt that doing so would be a betrayal of Gaius, the man who'd taken him in despite the danger of harbouring a sorcerer and treated him like his own son. The casual, entitled way Edwin used his magic was practically sacrilege, it was so opposite to Gaius' beliefs about hard work and caution. As hard to swallow as Gaius' words were, they made a lot of sense to Merlin. Magic was powerful; for that reason alone it demanded more thought and deliberation than Edwin gave it.

Edwin's words, though, also had a ring of truth to them. Merlin should be using his magic to better the world; that was the entire point of coming to Camelot, it was the entire reason Gaius had given him his spellbook. Edwin's words about his right to use his abilities spoke to Merlin: why shouldn't he use the gift that came naturally to him? If the rest of the world had been born lame, should he feel guilty to walk and run and dance just because others couldn't?

Once, when Merlin first came to Camelot, Gaius said that there might be someone out there more knowledgeable on magic than him. In the half year since then, Edwin was the first person to appear before Merlin who matched that description. It was exhilarating to think of all the questions he could answer and all the things he could teach.

If only Gaius and Edwin got along, Merlin wouldn't be gnawed apart by indecision on whether or not to accept Edwin's offer.

He supposed the tension between them was inevitable, seeing their introduction occurred when Edwin one-upped Gaius. Yet he felt it stretched beyond that. There was an underlying competition between them, as Merlin had half-expected though he'd hoped otherwise. As the days went on it seemed to get worse instead of better, until it bared its ugly fangs; Gaius was dismissed from his position based on Edwin's claims.

That was Merlin's first test, where he had to definitely pick one over the other. When it came, there was no hesitation; he'd leave Camelot and Edwin behind to follow Gaius in a heartbeat, if Gaius had consented. He hadn't; he'd talked Merlin into staying. But it wasn't long afterwards when Merlin's loyalties were put to a more extreme, final testing.

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Arthur's panic was contagious, and so Merlin found himself rushing to Edwin's quarters at top speed. He flung open the door, a condensed explanation of the king's sudden illness on the tip of his tongue, and stopped short, feeling like he'd been punched in the gut by the sight within.

Heat poured out from the open door, a hitting him like a slap to the face. Edwin stood before a ring of fire encircling Gaius, who was squeezed against a pillar to avoid the leaping flames.

"What are you doing?" Merlin asked, horrified. Surely there was an explanation for this – surely it couldn't be what it looked like.

"He's trying to kill the king!" Gaius called, "I couldn't let him!"

Arthur's panicked voice flashed through Merlin's mind, saying my father has Morgana's illness. That was Edwin's fault? But if that was Edwin's fault, then when Morgana was dying, when they'd hovered uncertainly for days hoping for a miracle, Gwen crying in private and Arthur pacing in frustrated helplessness, was that too Edwin's fault? And then all that had followed – Gaius' fall in standing leading to his forced retirement – had that been intentional on Edwin's part?

"I can rule the kingdom now, with you at my side." Edwin said, like he was some other person than the man Merlin had gotten to know in the last few days. "We can be all-powerful."

The words felt disconnected to Merlin; they existed on a separate plane from his concerns. What did Edwin's ambitions have to do with Gaius' life? "Release him."

"It's your loss, Merlin."

Edwin looked over to an ornamental arrangement of battleaxes. With a slight hand movement, he sent one off the wall and towards Merlin. Leaning back to avoid it, too rushed to think up a proper spell, Merlin reverted to pure instinct. The axe slowed to a stop a mere foot from his face, by willpower alone.

Edwin cast another spell, his magic tugging against the axe to bring it back under his control. Merlin tightened his hold on it, but it began to slide away. His hold wouldn't last indefinitely. Moreover, the heat made it hard to think; already his focus was slipping.

He couldn't let Edwin win; he'd die in an instant, and Gaius would follow soon after. Merlin pushed the axe backwards, determined not to give Edwin the time to overpower him. He heard a sickening thud. Edwin crumpled to the floor like a puppet whose strings were cut.

The magic fighting against his vanished. In the periphery of his vision, the ring of flames fell. Gauis was saved. Merlin let out a breath he didn't remember taking in, panting in exertion.

Beneath Edwin, a pool of red began to seep. The back of Merlin's throat burned. He swallowed deeply, forcing the burning sensation down into the pit of his stomach, which rebelled against this. He looked away, to Gaius, who was safe, but even as he smiled in relief the afterimage of Edwin's crumpled corpse lingered, like it had been burned into his retinas.

Edwin hadn't been the man he'd thought he was, Merlin tried to tell himself, to ease the burning. He'd tried to kill Gaius. He'd probably been the cause of Morgana's illness, and all his friends' grief. He'd framed Gaius for incompetence. He was trying to kill the king.

Arthur's frantic face rose with this thought, and Merlin seized upon the distraction. Cramming his revolting emotions within a box, slamming down the lid to mitigate the overflow, Merlin sprang into action. Only once he and Gaius were in Uther's chambers, with Edwin's beetles, did Merlin stop to think of the next step. And when Gaius revealed what it was, Merlin balked.

"We can't use magic on Uther, he'd kill us!"

But Gaius was insistent, looking to Merlin with imploring eyes full of expectations. Merlin wavered; he couldn't bear to disappoint his mentor, not so soon after almost losing him. Gaius thought that healing Uther was the right thing to do, and his half-hearted loyalty to Gaius had nearly resulted in his mentor's fiery death, had Merlin's eyes not been opened in the nick of time. This time, Merlin would whole-heartedly trust Gaius' judgement, even if he wasn't sure he understood it.

When the deed was done and the king was saved, Gaius offered some of his rare praise, which was all the more sincere for its rarity. Merlin laughed a bit in exhilaration, feeling a warm glow despite everything. For that moment, it seemed the world was righted to how it should be.

Yet in the days following Edwin's death, Merlin was kept awake at night by his choices. What would he have done, if Gaius hadn't been in danger? Would he still have stood against Edwin and said no, you must not kill the king?

He was certain he wouldn't have used magic to save Uther, the murderer of his father, if Gaius hadn't been there, urging him on when he hesitated.

Now that it was all over, and he'd escaped with his head intact by sole virtue of Uther being in the dark about how he'd been saved, Merlin couldn't stop himself from thinking how much easier his life and many others would be if he'd let Uther die.

While he tortured himself with could-have-beens from that day when he'd held the lives of three people in his hands, Merlin couldn't help but mourn the could-have-been had Edwin truly been who he'd pretended to be, and Merlin had been able to learn from him. Gaius tried, but Gaius had lived through the Purge; he could not offer Merlin the unconditional encouragement Merlin craved. Gaius' brand of encouragement was like the potions he made; good for you, but bitter to swallow. He would not praise Merlin animating beetles; he'd be far more likely to smack him across the back of his head and chide, put that away - what if you get caught?

Edwin had provided something Merlin hadn't realised he'd been craving: a second person to talk to about his struggles. Gaius was his mentor, his confidant, and like a father to him, but he often knew what Gaius' advice would be without having to ask him: be careful, use your magic for good, and use it only when science cannot provide the solution. There were times when Gaius surprised him - asking him to cure Uther with magic, for one - but in general his guesses of what Gaius' advice would be were pretty accurate.

He was grateful to have someone to talk to as he would surely go mad without anyone seeing him for who he truly was, but he often craved a second opinion or less brusque listener. Edwin had offered him those things, and it seemed to Merlin they would not be so easy to come by again. Yet within a fortnight he was proven wrong, when for the second time in as many days Morgana le Fay and her sleeping problems caught his attention.

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Merlin hadn't ever given much thought to Morgana's nightmares. As the physician's once full-time and now part-time apprentice, he encountered a city's worth of health related problems that came in all shapes and sizes and degrees of gravity. Some noblewomen had corns on their feet, some had eczema brought on by too much make-up, and as for the Lady Morgana, she had problems sleeping - it had seemed that simple to him. His first indications otherwise came out of the blue.

He and Arthur had just rescued a girl in the woods – Sophia of Tír-Mòr, a noblewoman who'd recently lost her home to raiders. Arthur brought her before his father, and the king took her and her father Aulfric in as guests. Merlin had just finished showing her to her chambers when he was accosted by Morgana.

To say that Morgana was acting weird was an understatement. She looked at Sophia as if she was someone she knew and detested, yet she'd had to ask Merlin for her name. Morgana was blunt in her hostility towards the other lady, yet reticent on her reasons why. More than anything she seemed distracted, and Merlin was under the impression that her mind had only been half with him in that brief exchange of information - on her end, at least; Merlin walked away in utter bafflement.

It would take two days for Morgana's strange reaction to Uther's guests to be explained, and when it was, the explanation came from a most unexpected source.

In retrospect, Merlin felt he should have known that Gaius would have the answer. Gaius was like a great well of knowledge; not much went on in the court that he wasn't aware of. As so it was that Merlin got a lesson on the gift of seers, and how Morgana had shown all the signs of being one since she was very young.

Something stirred in Merlin's distant childhood recollections then. "Vivienne, Morgana's mother... is that where she gets it from?" Gaius looked astonished at Merlin's deduction which, given he'd supposedly never met Morgana's mother, must seem an unbelievable leap of logic. As Gaius didn't seem inclined to believe he'd understood Merlin correctly, Merlin clarified, "She was a seer, too, wasn't she?"

After confirming this, Gaius of course asked how Merlin knew. And that was how Merlin ended up telling Gaius about his childhood time-defying kidnapping that he generally tried not to think about too often, out of deep-rooted guilt at Aithusa's continued containment.

The old man looked as though he'd given him much food for thought, most of it hard to chew and harder still to swallow. "… What was it that Vortigern called you?"

Merlin shrugged. "I don't remember. It's been so long... Em-something."

It seemed to Merlin a small matter to get caught up on - out of everything in those events, Vortigern getting his name wrong was perhaps the least important. Gaius seemed to think otherwise. "You said you told him your name was Myrddin... Myrddin Emrys, was that what they called you?"

"Yeah, I think so." The name rang true to his distant recollections. Merlin remembered Gaius knew about the blood rain, and a weird feeling came over him as something occurred to him. "How do you know?"

It was difficult to tell what Gaius was feeling then, as even Gaius looked uncertain how he should take this confirmation. "When he was alive, Uther's older brother Aurelius often went on solo reconnaissance missions. One time he came back with tales of how Vortigern had offended the gods and the priestesses, and of a young boy named Myrddin Emrys who had a pet dragon and the favour of the gods resting upon him.

Gaius raised his eyebrows. "You should be honoured; you inspired him to change the name of his bloodline to Pendragon and use dragon emblems on all his banners. He even took on Ambrosius, the Latinized version of Emrys, as a title."

Perhaps this was Gaius' form of revenge, was all Merlin could think as he struggled to process this. Merlin had told him something unbelievable yet true, and Gaius had retaliated by forcing a strange truth onto him: he, Merlin, was responsible for all of Camelot's draconic imagery that he had always found ill-fitting to represent Uther's reign. It was a truth that was just plain bizarre, but he had a nagging suspicion that nine years ago (three decades ago?) Aurelius had indeed said something about dragons and banners before leaving.

There was an uncomfortable intensity in Gaius' gaze now, as though he'd seen something in Merlin that went beyond weird childhood anecdotes and accidentally naming dynasties. Gaius seemed to be piecing pieces of an enormous puzzle together, now that he had the guidance of a reference picture, and looked too stunned at what he was discovering to know how to deal with it.

At length, he shook his head as though to clear it and resumed the normal expression of fond exasperation he used towards his impossibly talented but reckless ward. "Merlin, you truly do puzzle the mind. Only you could be the center of such ridiculousness."

Merlin couldn't bring himself to disagree. Keen to move away from this strange side tangent of realisations they'd gotten onto and keep Gaius from looking at him as though he was a different person than his ward, he retraced the conversation back to its origin. "Sooo... If Morgana's a seer and she had a dream about Sophia, I assume that's going to tie in with what you said about Sophia being untrustworthy?"

Gaius jumped on the shift in topic, as though he too was not eager to discuss the strange significance behind Merlin's past mishaps, and started telling Merlin about potential plots to kill the prince and about Aulfric's eye's which turned red when he was angered.

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Gaius had seen many things over his long lifetime and those that he hadn't had the privilege to witness in person he could often find in a neglected musty recess of an old library. With time and a reference book he could read and write many obscure languages, though he could only converse in a few of them, and at one point in his early sixties he'd made it his goal to read through the entirety of the court record rooms, taking in more facts than his old brain could process.

He considered himself well-versed in all literature, scientific or otherwise, and he liked to think that - while no man could have the answers to every question life could throw at him - over the years he'd accumulated within his head and books more answers than the average man. And so it was that he could, with a level head and analytic mind, calmly face down plagues and scheming courtiers and magic-hating kings and most of the trials that life had thrown his way.

Then Merlin had arrived in his life, carrying a load of unanswerable questions on his shoulders as baggage that no boy his age should have to bear, and Gaius was confronted with questions he'd never thought to ask of the world.

It had been nearly half a year since that day, and Gaius had grown used to Merlin's unique brand of magic. He never had learned all that he wished to from the dragonlords, so he couldn't be sure that Merlin's uniqueness couldn't be put down to his blood, though he strongly suspected that Merlin wasn't typical even for the son of a dragonlord. Nevertheless, not counting Merlin's strange experiences when he was dying of poison, it had been a long time since the lad had caused Gaius to question his knowledge of the ways of the world.

Then Merlin had, with wide blue eyes and the innocence of a child repeating words beyond his comprehension, told him that he was Emrys. It explained so much that Gaius was astounded it hadn't occurred to him earlier.

Yet even that hadn't been as strange a realisation as when Merlin - again, with the innocence of a child who had no idea of the implications of his words - informed him that he'd followed Aulfric to Avalon. Merlin was nonchalant even when informed that no mortal could see Avalon except in the moments preceding death, merely shrugging and dismissing it with, "Well, I've seen it and I'm still here."

He'd had to let the matter go at the time; Arthur was in danger of being sacrificed to the Sidhe and they didn't have time to discuss the implications of Merlin returning from the Lake of Avalon. Nonetheless, late that night and well into the next day, Gaius ran through all he knew multiple times, examining the situation from every which angle.

Either the literature written about Avalon was wrong, or else the meaning behind the name Emrys was more literal than Gaius had hitherto suspected.

The next morning when Merlin slobbed jam down his shirt while he ate and ran to attend to Arthur at the same time, it was difficult to see him as Emrys, great immortal sorcerer who journeyed to and from the Land of Eternal Bliss without batting an eye. Perhaps that was Gaius' problem, he mused as he went about his daily tasks. He was trying to see Merlin as Emrys, in all the preconceived glory he associated with the name, when instead he should be trying to see Emrys as Merlin, a boy who existed outside of the words of long dead poets and seers. It was two things that were the same and yet weren't; it was looking at the same problem after tilting the parchment to read it better.

Still, Gaius was almost glad for the distraction Arthur's disastrous audience with his father provided. Even if it came in the form of Arthur narrowly escaping being engaged to a Sidhe, any diversion from the concerns that would continue to plague him long after this matter was dealt with was welcome.

He knew he'd have to tell Merlin about the significance of being Emrys sometime, but for now Gaius could lie to himself and say he was putting it off until after this mess was over. But Gaius suspected that even once they'd gotten rid of the Sidhe, he'd find another excuse to hold off on the conversation. It would be kindness, really, not to put such weight on the boy's shoulders - that was something Gaius could tell himself to ease the lie of omission.

Somewhere in the deep of his mind, there was another, deeper reason it was better for Merlin not to know. In his old age, Gaius had seen many good-hearted youngsters change with age, and not always for the better. Julius Borden and Edwin had both been sweet boys once upon a time, who'd eagerly tested out spells that were little more that party tricks, with the same delight Merlin always had alight on their faces. Then their powers grew, and they never learned where to draw the line.

Emrys, immortal, destined for greatness, said to be the most powerful sorcerer ever to walk the earth... he didn't dare tell that to any youth, even one so good as Merlin, for fear of warping a self-image still in development.

It wasn't Merlin Gaius didn't trust, it was himself; he was the one shared fixture in the lives of Uther, Julius, and Edwin. He knew it wasn't his fault how they'd turned out, but – though he never could pinpoint quite how he could have turned them off the paths they'd started down on themselves – a heavy mantle of regret lay on his shoulders that he could never be rid of. These had all been boys or young men who'd looked to him for guidance at one point in their lives, and he'd failed them all. It scared him more than he'd admit that he might do the same with Merlin; what if he again missed that pivotal moment, where the path to damnation opened up?

No, Gaius didn't dare to tell a bright-eyed young lad that he had infinite power lying untouched at his fingertips; even though he knew he'd have to, eventually.

Morgana broke him from his internal dilemma, striding into his chambers late in the day more upset than he'd seen her since Gwen's arrest. "He's gone! Arthur's gone with her! She's taken him! I know you don't believe me, but I'm so sure it's going to happen. My dream's going to come true."

It took much soothing, but he managed to calm Morgana. She had to be stopped from the rash actions she was prone to; going to Uther about her dream would only hurt her and not help Arthur any.

There was only one person in Camelot, in the world even, who could help Arthur now. It took tremendous power to defeat two Sidhe, but more than that, no mortal could follow them where they had gone. There was only one human alive who could, and Gaius feared for him when he discovered why that was.

It would seem that, despite Gaius' reluctance to burden his ward with the knowledge of his destiny, he could not be rid of the need for Merlin to play the role written out for him.

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The sun was high in the sky, streaming through Arthur's window, by the time Arthur stirred with a great groan. Merlin and Gaius, seated by his bedside waiting for such a noise, snapped to attention. Arthur opened his eyes, groggily asking what happened.

"Can you remember anything?" Merlin asked, to determine how much he'd have to explain and what he would be able to keep Arthur in the dark over. There were several things – surviving a magical blast to the chest, chief among them – that would be best if he could just conveniently forget to mention.

Arthur pulled his head off his pillows with a pained groan, clutching at it with one hand and squeezing his eye in a grimace. After a moment of thinking, he adopted a confused look, and started to remember slowly. "There was a girl… Sophia, she… I asked my father something about her, I asked him…"

Arthur suddenly stilled, and then bolted up in bed. "What was I thinking?!"

Merlin glanced at Gaius before responding, seeking a go-ahead to begin the yarn they'd spun while waiting for Arthur to regain consciousness. Gaius didn't stop him, apparently having concluded as well that Sophia's love spell had dulled Arthur's memory enough to proceed with their altered version of events. "Well, we did wonder. Especially when you eloped with her last night."

"I did what!?" Arthur apparently didn't even remember this much.

From there, Merlin and Gaius took it in turns to give Arthur their glossed over version of events: Arthur, in a fit of passion, had eloped with Sophia in the middle of the night, and had to be knocked out by Merlin and dragged back to Camelot.

The real story, of course, had been much more magical and dangerous. Merlin's nerves still felt frayed from those heart-stopping moments in the frigid lake water, trying to locate Arthur through the reeds and murky water concealing him. Even after he'd dragged him above the surface, he'd had to hit Arthur's back several times to get him breathing again, feeling like the cold had crept into his very heart as the terrible thought occurred to him that he'd been too late. It was an experience he would be glad to put behind him, and not one he wanted to have to try and convince Arthur of, even if there weren't things in it that he couldn't easily explain without telling Arthur about his magic.

From the look of things, even the fabricated story was a slight to Arthur's ego. Merlin had to admit, telling Arthur he'd whacked him over the head with a lump of wood had been extremely satisfying, even if he knew it was a lie.

"No one can know about this," Arthur threatened, unaware that this was exactly what physician and apprentice wanted. "Any of it. Is that understood?"

Merlin's smugness at having things go his way, however, only lasted until they had to give a secondary falsehood about the day's events to the king. He'd thought everything was going swimmingly, up until Uther made an ominous remark about food shortages.

And so it was that, for the third time in three days, Merlin found himself the object of entertainment for children with too much time and spoiled food on their hands. With the smelly goo of rotten pulp trickling down the contours of his face, Merlin questioned for the millionth time since he'd first pulled Arthur out of the path of a dagger why it was that he continually stuck out his neck for that boy. His rewards were sparse, and more often they were of the unwelcome ilk.

The sun felt like it was leisurely loafing around in the sky, meandering downwards at a pace that was tauntingly slow. At last it finally was spreading its colourful cast into the rest of the sky as it neared the horizon, and the time came for Merlin to be released from the stocks.

To his great surprise, there was someone still standing on the street that had long since emptied. The man was off to the side, where he hadn't been visible to Merlin from the limited view of the stocks, and he was staring directly at Merlin and looking as though he was waiting for him.

He was a stooped old man with sparse white frizz surrounding a shining bronze bald spot covering his entire upper scalp like a crown. Merlin couldn't place him for a moment, but when he saw a large barrel of tomatoes lying at the man's feet, it came to him in a flash where he'd seen him before. It was Tenoch, the tomato seller whose granddaughter he'd cured months before.

Tenoch soon saw he'd caught Merlin's attention. The old man waved Merlin over, looking a little uncomfortable to be doing so. "You can't go wandering the streets looking like that. You can clean up at my place, if you'd like."

Disconcerted by this unexpected invitation, Merlin was of half a mind to say no – the walk back to Gaius' chambers wasn't that long. Then Tenoch lifted up the half-full barrel, his old bones creaking and his face screwing up with the effort, and suddenly Merlin's worries looked laughably irrational; here was an old decrepit man, what was there to be wary of? He'd accepted the girl's cloth easily enough when they'd first met; he had no good reason to think her grandfather was any less sincere in his desire to be helpful.

"Here, let me carry it," Merlin said, taking the barrel from Tenoch.

Tenoch's home was a block away, which Merlin was very grateful of. He wasn't sure how the old man had gotten the barrel into the marketplace full, for even half-emptied it was very heavy. Glancing around the main room of Tenoch's house, it was difficult to find floor space to put it that wasn't already occupied with other, fuller barrels. Spotting a clearing, Merlin left it leaning against the wall, just under a giant crack.

"Ah!" Tenoch cried. When Merlin turned, he seemed to be wishing he could take back that one reflexive noise. From behind Merlin, he could hear a faint scuffling within the wall. "Just… I'd prefer it if it wasn't right against the wall…"

Merlin obediently pushed the barrel away from the wall, wondering absentmindedly if Tenoch had a mouse problem. Tenoch beckoned him towards a cluttered table, where a bowl of water lay beside a stack of dirty dishes. Merlin had to sidestep through a winding path of narrow spaces between one barrel and the next to get there.

Tenoch handed Merlin a cloth, and Merlin reflexively thanked him. He started to wash up, then paused as he registered something missing. "Where's Miya?"

"She went home, just after the autumn equinox." Tenoch seemed surprised Merlin hadn't known this. Merlin couldn't recall seeing her lately, but then he spent much less time in the lower town now that he was Arthur's servant. "Winter's slow for business, what with people rationing their funds until planting season comes around, so I sent her home to help out her parents on the farm."

"In the winter?"

Tenoch looked amused by Merlin's confusion. "It's much warmer where we come from than it is here. It takes more effort to grow crops through the winter, but with the right techniques it's doable."

Merlin hadn't ever heard of a land like that. He knew growing seasons varied in different lands – Camelot had a longer one than Ealdor, for one – but he couldn't picture a land where farms grew food without pause all through the year. Did that mean they had plants with very long growing seasons, or did they have two harvests a year? "What kingdom are you from?"

"It's very far away, you won't have heard of it," Tenoch evaded. He cut off Merlin's next questions before he could voice them. "Trade secret – sorry, but I can't risk my competitors discovering my sources and cutting into my business, now, can I?"

"I suppose not," Merlin muttered, disappointed, and went back to scrubbing the guck out of his skin and hair.

Something nagged at him while he washed; Tenoch had said that Miya had gone home a month ago, but the stack of dishes on the cluttered table was more than what a single man would get through. Upon further examination, there were other small things that indicated otherwise. Her stool was still taking up precious floor space; surely in the month she'd been gone Tenoch would have put it away to free up some room? Directly above it on a wall shelf was a large basket of assorted fresh fruits, arranged artistically and painstakingly decorated with brightly coloured ribbons laced into frills and tied into many delicate little bows – an aesthetic appealing to little girls, not old men.

The most glaring contradiction was two slender gloves that would not fit a man's hand. They were resting atop an open barrel of potatoes one moment, yet when Merlin closed his eyes to wash pulp juice off his face he heard shifting around in that direction. When he reopened his eyes, the gloves were gone and Tenoch's hands were behind his back. He looked like he was braced for a comment, but Merlin wasn't exactly sure what accusation he could give.

Why are you hiding gloves behind your back sounded weird even in his head. Instead, he asked, "Does Miya come back to visit you?"

"No," Tenoch shifted slightly, fiddling with what he was remarkably unsuccessfully trying to hide. "Like I said, we come from a land that is far away. There wouldn't be time for her to travel here and back. She won't return until the spring."

Merlin had cleaned himself as best he could, so he placed his dirtied towel between the bowl of water and stack of dishes that were too many for one man.

He debated over whether to call Tenoch out on the inconsistencies between his words and the realities of his home, but he couldn't think of anything to say. The excessive amount of dishes, Miya's stool being left out, the effeminate fruit basket, and even her gloves didn't exactly constitute irrevocable proof of her presence – though that Tenoch was hiding the gloves behind his back was rather suspicious.

In the end, whether Miya was or was not there, it wasn't really Merlin's business. If there was anything wrong then Tenoch wouldn't say she'd be coming back in the spring. He was beginning to wonder if the merchant of exotic goods just liked to be pointlessly mysterious, or if he was just that paranoid about his competitors discovering where exactly tomatoes and potatoes and the other things he sold came from that he'd lie about how far away his country was.

"Well, thanks again for your help." Merlin said, awkwardly edging towards the door, wondering how quickly he could leave without looking rude.

Tenoch backed out of Merlin's way, conspicuous in his efforts to keep his back out of Merlin's view. "It's no problem," he sounded like one who was trying to sound nonchalant, but he couldn't quite contain his relief at Merlin's move towards departure. "None at all. Miyahuatl wan-… I mean, Miya would want me to - if she knew about your recent punishments, that is. She's very taken with you; if she was here, she'd help herself."

It really was amazing, the way Tenoch was acting. Merlin wondered if this was what he looked like, when he'd almost let his secret slip and was so desperate to act unsuspicious that he came across as a babbling simpleton.

"Right, er, well I should go…"

"Of course, of course," Tenoch said a touch too quickly and enthusiastically. "The door's over there…"

Two sharp knocks sounded from the opposite wall, the one with the big crack on it. Merlin looked at it puzzled; there was nothing there, so he had no idea what could have made that sound. Tenoch looked startled by the noise as well, but more upset at it than confused. He glanced over at Merlin as though gauging his reaction.

"Don't mind that. It's probably just… mice," he finished unconvincingly. As he should; what kind of mice knock?

Tenoch looked back to the wall, tilting his head slightly. Then his eyes widened and he drew in his breath, like he'd just remembered something. "Ah, yes. Wait a moment."

Tenoch wove his way through the labyrinth of barrels and pulled the girlish basket from the upper shelf. Merlin couldn't help but notice that he didn't need the stool to reach it. Tenoch handed the basket to Merlin. "Here." Tenoch's eyes flickered to the numerous little bows and he gave a small grimace. "This is to apologize for supplying most of the food thrown at you – though to be fair," he defended, "it's not like it was personal; if people want to buy my wares, I'm not going to dictate how they use them."

He gave the scarcest of glances at the wall, again, and lowered his voice. "Also, I want to thank you for being so kind to Miya."

He started guiding Merlin towards the door as he spoke. "She was very nervous about coming here. When she first arrived it was hard on her, not knowing anyone. She had lots of difficulties making friends because she couldn't speak Common well. It was hard, for a young girl to be so alone, so she was very happy to meet you. I could always tell if she'd seen you on any given day by her smile – she really enjoyed having someone other than her doddery old grandfather to talk to."

"Well, at that time I was also a foreigner in a new city," Merlin hedged, made awkward by the praise. He stepped over the threshold, but didn't turn down the street.

He didn't tell Tenoch that his sympathies for the square peg who just couldn't fit into that coveted round hole, no matter how hard it tried, extended further back than his entrance to Camelot. He'd never lived anywhere where he couldn't speak the language, but he understood better than anyone the feeling of being surrounded by people who all had something in common that – no matter how you tried – you couldn't emulate without it being noticeably off.

Suddenly, Merlin was glad that he'd never given into his occasional urges to brush the little girl aside when she got too overexcited or irritating.

"Still," Tenoch hesitated, then stepped out the house and drew the door nearly shut behind him. He lowered his voice so much that Merlin had to crane forwards to hear him. "It can't be easy to have to humour a younger girl. For what it's worth, it's much appreciated."

Merlin made his way up the castle stairs in considerable higher spirits than he'd left them in earlier that day, when he'd covered for Arthur for the third time in as many days and been sentenced to the stocks again. The oddities of the merchant household were almost forgotten as he carried the girly gift and the old man's gratitude with him up to Gaius' chambers.

He'd defeated blue immortal creatures of magic, saved Arthur, and – though he'd been punished – he'd at least gotten free fruit and praise. Merlin was in a good mood all through supper, and when Morgana came into Gaius' chambers he gave her a very cheerful greeting.

Morgana gave a more subdued reply and came forwards without her usual brisk, confident pace. She asked Gaius for a sleeping draught, and once he'd turned away she said in an odd tone. "Arthur told me what actually happened."

She turned to Merlin then, with a forced smile.

Merlin's mind went blank; he remembered Morgana's look of disbelief in the throne room when Arthur gave his cover story about going on a hunting trip, and he cursed himself now for not guessing she'd confront Arthur about it afterwards.

Haltingly, Morgana continued, "You must have hit him round the head really hard."

His immediate gut reaction was relief that Arthur's memory of what "actually happened" had not returned. This was just as quickly replaced with unease at the deception; Morgana was just as responsible for saving Arthur's life as he was, didn't she deserve to know the truth? It seemed cold-hearted to let her walk away believing her dream had only been a dream.

Beside him, Gaius moved slightly, catching Merlin's eye. He was giving Merlin a look that said in no uncertain terms he was not to say anything foolish.

Merlin felt torn; Morgana had a right to know about her own abilities, but forging ahead disregarding Gaius' advice often had adverse consequences – Gwen's and Lancelot's arrests came to mind. He hesitated, but with Morgana looking expectantly at him his time for deliberations was short. The rhythm of her breathing was off; she was waiting like his reply would determine the course of her life. Hidden under her mask of normalcy, she was nervous, he realised with surprise. He didn't think he'd ever seen Morgana nervous before, which only highlighted how critical she considered his response.

He swallowed, hoping he wasn't about to make a drastic mistake. He carefully avoided looking at Gaius. "Actually, that's not quite what happened."

Morgana looked as though in the same moment he'd confirmed her greatest fears and greatest hopes. From his peripheral vision, he could see Gaius frantically shaking his head. Merlin made the mistake of glancing over to him, and the look on Gaius' face stopped him. His determination dimmed; he wasn't sure why Gaius wanted Morgana not to be told the truth, but what if he knew something Merlin didn't? Was he really prepared to face the consequences if something went horribly wrong from being truthful with Morgana?

It's not too late; you can still back out now, whispered a tempting voice in the recesses of his mind. Tell her that Arthur actually tripped, or hit his head on a tree branch. You can pass off lying as a manifestation of manly pride.

Merlin averted his eyes, looking down at the table to avoid the pleading looks Gaius and Morgana had fixed upon him. He could not get out of this without disappointing one of them.

The decorated fruit basket in the center of the table caught his attention. A great golden pine-cone like monstrosity topped with green tufts of slender leaves rose as the centerpiece, ringed by more normal looking brightly coloured fruits that he still had no names for. The girlish tastes decorating the basket stabbed at him; in them, he could hear an echo of Tenoch's thankfulness for the simple act of talking to a lonely girl.

The loss of the man he'd thought Edwin was, a secondary confidant and advisor, hit Merlin all over again. It had been difficult for him to have the people he could talk to cut down once again to just one person; how would he be able to cope with being completely alone in his secrets?

He forced his gaze back upwards, to where Morgana was still waiting for him to say outright what she suspected, and wondered how he would be able to cope if the veracity of his magic was denied. He'd think he was going insane, imagining things that weren't real.

"Actually," Merlin said, his decision made. "I pulled him out of a lake after Sophia nearly drowned him."

Morgana was so pale that Merlin worried she'd faint right there. Gaius hastily handed her sleeping draught to her and steered her towards the exit. Morgana moved along like a puppet jerked on strings with no thoughts of its own. After she'd been maneuvered outside the door she just stood there, dazed.

Gaius shut the door, blocking her from view, and Merlin braced himself for the berating that was sure to follow. Gaius gave a look to the door before stalking over to Merlin on the other side of the room. His voice was low, but simmering. "What have you done?"

"She deserves the truth - about her dreams coming true, at least. We owe her that much. It was her premonition that saved Arthur's life!"

"Yes, and by telling her you've endangered hers!" Dread stabbed at Merlin, and Gaius continued angrily. "What if she lets something slip to Uther?"

"She could have done that without knowing she was a seer. At least now she knows to be careful."

"Knowledge can be the greatest condemnation – you weren't here twenty years ago, you have no idea what it was like! When people know they have something to hide they act like they have something to hide. Sometimes, that's all that's needed for their condemnation."

"Morgana's Uther's ward; I think he'll need a bit more evidence than a guilty face to turn against her."

"Don't you remember the plague? Once Uther hears something's the result of witchcraft, he starts seeing foes everywhere. And the next time there's a witch hunt – yes, next time, Merlin, for there's certain to be one – Morgana will know that she's in peril. Uther is not a blind man; he will notice a change in her demeanor. When magic is concerned, I fear that even his ward is not safe from his paranoia."

"If that happens, then I'll take responsibility for it then." Merlin said to assuage the guilt writhing in his innards.

Even if Gaius was right and Merlin had just made things worse, he wasn't helpless. If somewhere down the line Morgana's fear tipped Uther off that he should arrest her, then Merlin would just have to rescue her. With his disguise he may or may not be able to get her out of Camelot without giving himself away. But even if he did and he could never return to Camelot in his normal appearance, he refused to regret it. Morgana had the right not to be lied to about her own abilities.

But there was no point assuming the worst was inevitable.

"In any case, it hardly matters whether it would be better for her not to know now."

"Yes, I suppose the damage is done," Gaius said wearily. "Let us just hope that this is the only personal discovery Morgana makes. Should she develop further magical gifts, then I fear for her."

/**

I've combined these episodes because Kilgharrah didn't affect them much and they're three-quarters filler anyways. I apologize if you wanted to see the actual episodes happening… but I changed very little from the main conflicts, so they hardly needed blow-by-blow descriptions.

I know technically Kilgharrah was the one who convinced Gaius to save Merlin in place of Uther, but then in this AU Merlin spent four months hanging out with Gaius all day every day, so I hardly think Gaius would need convincing. It's not like it took much to convince him in the canon version.

Poor Morgana's had a very rough two weeks!

**/