Merlin, to Gaius's great surprise, did not suffer from insomnia, despite what he had been through. Indeed, it seemed that his troubles had exhausted him to the point of making him into a very deep sleeper. He was early to bed and early to rise, full of energy as he was in the mornings, and wearied as he was in the evenings by running around Camelot all day – his favourite occupation at the moment.
It surprised Gaius, therefore, when Merlin came down to breakfast one morning pensive, and a little ruffled, as if he had not got quite enough sleep. He might have asked the boy about it, had his expression and aloof manner not entirely forbidden him; he guessed that he had been grieving, or at the least thinking about his mother or the people of his village, and so did not disturb him.
He was wrong, however. The events of the night had led Merlin to forget entirely those matters that had troubled him before.
It must have been around midnight. Gaius had stayed up late working on some new potion, but even he had gone to bed by that point. The sky had been dark and cloudy, and the city deathly silent, save for the occasional footstep of a guard. Merlin might have missed all of this, had he not been drawn out of sleep by a voice calling his name.
He started, and bolted upright; the voice had already faded with the light breeze that rattled his window-pane. He almost replied, for a moment thinking that it was Gaius: but no, it had been deeper and more throaty, yet somehow not quite like a man's voice at all.
It must have been a dream, he decided, clutching at the fragments of a fading vision from which he had been so rudely awoken. He could not recall dreaming, but he supposed he must have been. Therefore he lay back down, and was about to go back to sleep, when –
Merlin!
He sat up again, and rubbed his eyes. That was no dream: yet it had seemed a little like a voice in his head, and it certainly hadn't awoken anyone else. It was strange, then, that he should be able to pinpoint the direction from which a voice in his head came. It seemed to have come from somewhere beneath his room.
His curiosity was as great as any child's, perhaps greater, and he did not have that fear of the dark that was common in so many others: therefore he slipped out of bed, and paced across the room before bending down and seeing if he could hear the voice through the floorboards. He had just put his ear to the wood when the voice resonated again, calling his name once more, echoing in his head rather unpleasantly.
He was fully awake now, and so, unless he was imagining it, there had most definitely been a voice. It would not however be prudent to reply to it by shouting: therefore he padded to the door, opened it quietly, threw a glance towards Gaius's sleeping form, and crept out of the quarters. He was lucky that he was still a child, for anyone with feet any bigger than his would not have been able to navigate those obstacles that littered the floor; he got into the corridor without any trouble, and, swinging the door ajar, he took stock of his situation.
Even if the voice did not call again, he would surely be able to locate it. It had been so clear in his mind. Therefore he followed what he thought to be its trail, pattering down the corridors, and listening out for the guards, lest he be arrested for wandering round after curfew. A strange thrill coursed through him. Breaking the law was surprisingly exciting.
He did not know quite where he was going, nor did he know if he would ever be able to find his way back: all that mattered, it seemed to him then, was that he found the source of the voice. It had most definitely called his name. All that remained to him was to answer that call. He still wondered, at the back of his mind, why it had not awoken anyone else: but that did not bother him for the moment.
At length he came to what looked like a corridor he shouldn't take, but which was the only route he could follow, if he was to continue in the right direction. A thin light flickered on the walls, coming from somewhere around the corner. Merlin was just about to enter the corridor when he heard a noise from further down, and froze.
It had been a muffled curse, a word that no man would have spoken in front of a child had he known of his presence. It was followed by a quiet noise that seemed to signify victory, and a slight clattering. The noises weren't coming closer, and nor were there footsteps. Merlin ventured nervously into the corridor, and followed it to where it wound round a corner, before stopping and holding his breath.
The smell of burning tar came to him, and he guessed from this that the light was provided by a torch. There were no more voices, but the ensuing sounds made Merlin think of board-games.
Cautiously he glanced round the corner. His little face was not, thankfully, perceived by the two guards who were beyond. Having seen the situation, he retreated hurriedly, and pressed himself against the wall whilst he considered his next move.
There had been two soldiers in a wide part of the corridor – more of a doorless room. They were guarding something, that much was evident. They had been sitting at a table playing what had looked to Merlin like a game of Nine Men's Morris, and they had, of course, been entirely in the way of the rest of the corridor.
It was at that exact point that the voice returned to Merlin, louder and clearer than ever before:
Merlin!
He jumped, and had to stifle a cry, for the voice had been almost painfully loud. He was certain now that it was coming from beyond those guards. He had only to get past them.
He sneaked a look again. They were still engrossed in their game.
At that very moment, he felt a rush of energy leave him. The air around him seemed to tingle a bit, and he drew a breath, knowing exactly what was happening but unable to control it. The magic left him in a great wave that was almost visible: and to his utter astonishment the two guards froze mid-move.
Doing magic by accident was a little annoying, and quite often highly inconvenient, but he had to admit that it came in useful sometimes. He shrugged, and went nonchalantly down the corridor, straight past the men, whose faces were frozen in grimaces that made him laugh aloud.
He fled then down the remainder of the corridor, round a corner and out of sight of the men; the air took on an entirely different texture all of a sudden, and the light began to fade; and then – he was in a cave.
He stumbled to his knees, entirely surprised by the sight before him. The corridor had ended unexpectedly in a wide cavern that fell deeply below the ledge on which he stood, and rose to a vaulted ceiling almost like that of a cathedral. To the left and right it didn't seem to have an end. The whole place was surreal: he had seen nothing like it.
All the same, he was a little disappointed to find nothing here that possessed a loud and booming voice. He was far below Camelot now, he estimated – far below where there should have been beings. He hadn't even realised that Camelot was built upon this cave system.
How small you are...
Merlin bolted upright. There was that voice again! And yet it still seemed as if it was in his head – it –
He didn't have time to try to make sense of it. He had scarcely staggered to his feet when there was a clanking and a flapping and a dragon appeared before him.
Naturally, he could do nothing but stare.
It was a magnificent creature, proportioned just like the ones in story-books, but with a kind and yet enigmatic smile that Merlin had never seen on anything but a human being. It had the most remarkable eyes, furthermore, blazing gold ones that seemed to pierce his very being and stare deep into his soul.
Not for the first time that night, he wondered if he was dreaming. No – he was convinced that he was. Dragons didn't exist. He mustn't be so stupid as to believe that this was real.
How small you are, said the dragon, for such a great destiny.
It was bizarre. The voice was almost certainly the dragon's, and yet it did not move its mouth. At last Merlin realised why the voice had sounded as if it was inside his head – because it was.
'I... I don't understand,' he stammered out, entirely overwhelmed now by whatever this meeting was, and rather hoping it was a dream, because one can escape from dreams.
You do not need to understand, said the dragon, only to know.
'What do I need to know?' asked Merlin. 'And what did you mean by great destiny? I don't have a great destiny.'
On the contrary, said the dragon with something akin to a laugh. Yours is the greatest that was and will be... Your destiny is to protect Arthur, and to help him to become a great king.
'I don't understand,' said Merlin again, perplexed.
Now the dragon regarded him with a critical eye. You will.
'But Arthur... you don't mean Arthur the nasty prince?'
The dragon did not respond to this, but Merlin knew that he was right.
'He's horrible,' Merlin commented, with all the honesty of a child his age.
Maybe you can change that.
'I don't want to talk to him again,' said Merlin, folding his arms.
The path of destiny cannot be altered.
Merlin merely raised one eyebrow, in an expression that would in an adult have looked disparaging, but in a child was merely amusing. The dragon chuckled again.
I shall give you the advice you need, but the path is yours to forge.
Then the dragon unfurled its wings, and made to take off again; Merlin caught a glimpse of a chain around its feet, and knew then why there had been a clanking. 'You are a prisoner!'
That is a small matter.
Merlin might perhaps have pursued this train of thought, but that he was utterly bewildered. He rubbed his brow, suddenly feeling greatly tired, and decided that this was enough excitement for one night. 'I have to go,' he declared, and the dragon, smiling enigmatically, took off and disappeared from sight.
Merlin stared at the empty cave. Only the chain gave any evidence that the dragon was here. He could not believe a second of what had just happened, and so, without any further ado, went back to bed, in the hope that on the way he would wake up.
He had not woken up until the sun was streaming through the window, and Gaius had been about to come and tell him it was time for breakfast. All the events of the night came back to him in an irregular flood, like snippets of a dream; he was about to dismiss it as such, when he noticed that his jacket had been moved slightly to one side on the floor. He had moved it like that when he had knelt to listen through the floorboards. He put a hand to his temple to steady himself, and began to consider that it had all in fact happened.
The first thing that came to his mind on realising this was a fervent hope that his spell on the guards had been released.
The second was a mad rush of thoughts, such thoughts that Gaius was immensely concerned about his silence at breakfast. But he wouldn't tell him about what had happened. Not just yet. Somehow, in just a few words, the dragon had conveyed a good deal to him, and he would need time to think over what exactly it was that had happened in the cavern that night.