Disclaimer: I do not own Merlin (I wish I would!)
A/N: I did my best to avoid language mistakes but as my native tongue is German there may still be many to be found. Please accept my most humble apology in advance!
As to the plot of this story: After I wrote 'Abandoned' – my first fanfiction ever – as a mostly "Arthur-centred" piece, I wanted to write a story that focuses more on Merlin and on magic. The result is, as I fear, less tragic and dramatic than "Abandoned", but then it is also more "canon" than my first story. The story is therefore rated "K", although I want to have some real combat action in the second half. I hope you'll enjoy it. Please review!
The legacy of Cornelius Sigan
3. The warlock's tale
When Merlin felt the hard slap hit his face he jerked to attention. Uther had taken his face in both hands. Obviously the King had been trying to speak to him for some time now, while he had been overwhelmed by the sudden flood of memories. "STOP IT! Nobody's going to hurt you, you're safe now!" Seeing understanding coming back into the young man's face and eyes, Uther let go of his face. "You're safe now" he repeated much more calmly than before. "I am not going to hurt you in any way and most certainly I won't have you brought back to the dungeons. Believe me, my son running away and being abducted from Leon's hands by God knows whom and where to has taught me a lesson. But you must tell me where he is and how I am to bring him back. Will you do this? As his friend?"
Merlin wiped his face. He hadn't realized that he had been sobbing. Still shaken he stammered "You really believe that now? I mean, that I am his friend? That I would never harm him or you or anyone in Camelot? You know that now? Really?" Uther, at his wit's ends, confirmed it once again. Gaius, hearing the overly indulgent, overly patient tone of voice, laid a warning hand on his King's shoulder. "Sire, I think he's just going to tell you everything, please hear him out."
Merlin felt a sudden rush of energy come to him at the thought that there might be a possibility that Uther would actually listen to him. He sat up on the bed and straightened his back. "Arthur is with the Druids. They want to ……!" But that was as far as he came before Uther sprang to his feet. "I knew it. God damn them all, I knew they would take their petty revenge on Arthur at the first opportunity!" "I wouldn't call their revenge 'petty'. You kill them on sight at every opportunity" Gaius muttered to himself.
Fortunately the King couldn't hear this as Merlin, exasperated by the new misunderstanding drowned both of them out. "They want to protect him. In fact, they are the only ones who might be able to protect us all from the Dark Forces but so far Arthur couldn't convince them, neither to help us, nor to let him go. The Druids think it's wrong to fight violence with violence. They say that using their magic against the Dark Force Cornelius Sigan conjured up centuries ago would infect them with the same evil which finally overwhelmed Cornelius' soul." While this silenced the King no understanding dawned on his face. Gaius looked equally lost.
The Pendragon shook his head despairingly. "This is useless. Obviously the boy is still raving. The fever is speaking out of him. You can call me as soon as you have brought him back to his senses, Gaius. Until then nobody is allowed to know that he is back here!" and he turned towards the door.
Merlin all but jumped on him. "But Sire, I am talking sense. It's all true. Please you must listen to me or we all are going to die." Surprisingly, Uther turned back to him. "Merlin, Cornelius Sigan is dead, or as good as, and from what your uncle told me it was you, not Arthur, who defeated him." Merlin swallowed and felt his face blush. "Yes…., Yes Sire, that's right, it was me!" "Then what impending doom could a defeated magician bring to us now? And what has this to do with my son being in the Druids' hands?"
Merlin swallowed hard. "Please you'll need some patience, but you must hear me out." And then he told them the whole story, as he had learned it from Morgana and the Druids. How the combined forces of Camelot and Mercia once, many centuries ago, had had to face a superior enemy force. How the Kings of that time had beseeched the then Court Magician, Cornelius Sigan, to conjure up magical support for their army. He had done so but in the end they had all gotten much more than they had bargained for.
Sigan had created an army of shadows from the ghosts of dark feelings, dark secrets and dark deeds which had completely destroyed the enemy's army. But once let loose it couldn't be stopped anymore. Feeding on destruction and murder the shadow army had laid the enemy's lands to waste, killing all inhabitants, men, women, children, even the animals. Firestorms had raged across the landscapes and the soil had been poisoned for many years to come. Stronger and stronger the Dark Army had become until it threatened the very realms it had been created to protect. When both realms had faced total annihilation, Sigan had gained the help of the then strong and numerous Druid tribes and their magicians. Together they had been able to paralyze the Dark Forces.
It had needed all their magic abilities to cut the Dark Power that conjured up the shadow soldiers in half and to seal it off in two separate leaden coffins. One had been buried in the vaults deep under Mercia's ancient Royal Castle Arengarde. The other had been buried in the vaults that formed the foundations of Camelot Castle. Both Kings had sworn a solemn oath that neither they nor their descendants should ever reopen the magical sanctuaries that held the horrible force prisoner, because should only one of the coffins ever be reopened the consequences would be monstrous. But should both halves of the Dark Force be ever reunited the world of man as we know it would cease to exist. Only in the most sacred temple districts of the old religion, or so legend had it, the last King of Camelot and his magician might survive to one day rebuild what the greed for power and wealth had once destroyed.
After the coffins had been buried the Druids had once again distanced themselves from the world of ordinary humans. Sigan had resumed his life as Camelot's Court Magician. But there had been a price to pay for what they had done. In order to defeat it they had come to touch the Dark Force and it hadn't let go anymore. First secretly, unnoticed, than stronger and stronger it had eaten away at everyone who had touched it until it had consumed them. First Sigan had had to pay for being the 'human vessel' the Dark Force needed to conjure up its shadow army. To save Camelot, Sigan had been killed by the very King who had ordered him to conjure up the Dark Forces in the first place.
However, the most horrible fate had befallen the Druids. For the first time in their existence they had turned against each other. Temple districts and sacred forests had been destroyed, forest castles and villages burned down with all their eerie beauty lost forever before the dark sorcerers had been subdued. For centuries the Druids and the priests of the old religion had mourned the losses they had had to suffer from an evil which had been brought into the world by belligerent, power greedy human beings. Only then the old religion had made the island of the blessed its most sacred sanctuary until it had been destroyed by a human King named Uther Pendragon. Afterwards most of the old cult's remaining followers and the Druid magicians had retreated to Vayatanu. Only those who, like Nimue, didn't want to surrender their life in the world of humans without a fight had stayed behind.
At this point of his narration, Merlin gazed furtively at Uther's enigmatic face. The King seemed to be lost in thought. Not once he or Gaius had interrupted the warlock's tale so far. Merlin cleared his throat and went on.
Six months ago a young man named Marcus had succeeded to the throne of Mercia after his uncle, the former King, and his two sons had died under dubious circumstances in the space of three months. Not everybody had believed in them dying of natural causes and so Marcus had faced much opposition, open and hidden, at the beginning of his rule. He had feared to be confronted with a war at two fronts when Camelot, Mercia's most powerful neighbour, had refused to acknowledge his rightful succession to the crown. At the news of the Pendragons contacting the other neighbouring realms on the matter, Marcus' fear had become stronger. It had been then that he had remembered the ancient tale of how a former King of Mercia had once conjured up magical support for his army. Knowing perfectly well that Camelot would never take his refuge to magical means – and again Merlin looked at Uther's still unmoving face – he must have thought this to be a perfect last resort. The Pendragon studied his feet. He knew all too well that, at the first news of instability in the country, he had dug out the plans his military commanders had made for an attack on Mercia.
"From this moment on", Merlin continued, "Marcus has been under constant surveillance of the Druid's intelligence network." He ignored Uther's frown at the mentioning of the Druids being able to spy on a King. "They don't know how he did it but he certainly has found the Mercian coffin and he has succeeded in opening it a few weeks ago. Nobody knows with what – or whom – Marcus has fed it, but the Dark Force is awakening. Most probably Marcus is already turning into its 'human vessel' right now. The Druids have felt its Searchers scanning their retreats and the whole of Albion. The magical barriers which protect their retreats are holding up only barely, but they have ways to strengthen them. When the Dark Force has gathered enough strength it will surely turn against Camelot for a reunification with its other half."
Fearing the King's reaction to what he had to say now, Merlin once again cleared his throat, and shifted uncomfortably on the bed until the King gazed at him with barely concealed anger.
"The Druids are not willing to fight against the Dark Force again. They are adamant that it is their task to keep Arthur safe and to endure what they call the 'time of punishment' in Vayatanu, which they can shield not only from the world but also from time. They think they can endure ten or more years in their retreat which would count for centuries in our world." Merlin lowered his head and murmured "When Arthur realized that they wouldn't let us go he pleaded with them to help you fight the Dark Army but not even Morgana listened to him."
Oblivious of the others exchanging disbelieving looks at the mentioning of King Uther's former ward whom the King had thought to have been kidnapped by her half-sister Morgause, the young warlock brought his narration to an end. "Arthur persuaded me to help him escape. I got away but they caught him and forced him back into the village." With a look able to break a heart made of stone he gazed into Uther's still unreadable face. "Please, you must believe me. The magical barrier was too strong for me. I tried so hard to bring him back with me……" His voice trailed off.
Slowly, deliberately Uther looked up, directly into the young man's desperately pleading face. "So you think that I am going to be mad at you for not being able to bring my son back to a certain death?"