After his initial panic attack, Arthur calmed down enough to wrap his mind around the situation – which was clearly magic – to the point where he was able to hold a conversation with Gaius and Merlin. It was a short conversation, clipped and awkward, but it broke the tension.

"I see he's taking his time waking up," Arthur had said to Gaius whilst staring at Merlin's sleeping skull. Gaius glanced at him.

"Yes. I'm not quite sure why." He sounded worried.

"Hmm." Arthur had an idea, but he wasn't sure if he should share it just then. He stowed it away for later. Instead, he turned towards Young Merlin (which took far more courage than it should have, he felt) and asked, "Don't suppose you might know? Being… Well, him and all."

Merlin was good at a lot of things, but he was rubbish at hiding embarrassment. "Ehrm," he fumbled, blushing, "Well, I, er- no."

Arthur turned away before the boy could see his face, which he was sure was twisted in a strange grimace. He wasn't sure if it was his own presence, what with being fifteen years in the wrong time, or if he had simply forgotten how awkward and young Merlin had once been. He was painfully aware of how much growing he had gone through over the past decade, but he'd either never noticed or had forgotten how much Merlin had changed, as well. The king couldn't help it when he glanced at the boy sidelong. He was thin and lanky as ever, but he didn't seem quite comfortable in his skin yet. He was jittery, too. When Arthur looked at this younger Merlin, he knew that he should recognize him, know him, remember him. But he didn't. He'd forgotten what Merlin had been like back then. That Merlin was a vague memory, as if from a dream, and seeing him again in flesh and blood was a surreal experience for Arthur. Eventually, he shook himself and had to look back at his unconscious friend. This was Merlin. This man, knew. And he had a boatload of questions for him whenever he decided to wake from his beauty sleep.

Before long, Uther made it clear that he wanted to talk with Arthur – the older Arthur, that is. Gaius protested against such a meeting, but the king insisted. Begrudgingly, Gaius informed the Older Arthur, and after several hours cooped up alone preparing himself mentally, Arthur agreed to appear before the king. Gaius remained uneasy as he escorted the displaced king to the Great Hall.

They received some stares as they walked. They'd kept it all very hush since the occurrence, but inevitably, word of the lookalikes had spread through the ranks of the nights and guards – even some servants stared as they passed by. Arthur tried not to look at them. He couldn't occupy himself with small discomforts like stares when his family, a part of his family that should have been dead, were waiting for him just a few footsteps away.

"Are you ready, Sire?" Gaius asked.

Arthur clenched his jaw and sucked in a breath. He ran a hand over his beard, and braced himself.

"Yes." He said quietly.

The doors opened, and Arthur had to steel himself.

He'd been aware that Uther would be there. He wasn't entirely surprised when he saw his younger self there as well, but when Arthur stepped into the hall and caught sight of Morgana, he wasn't prepared for the sudden ache and the lump in his throat.

She looked just like he remembered, like he'd always wanted to remember. An intense face set on pale skin with waves of stark black hair as a backdrop. She was poised in her ornate dress like she'd been born in it, and looked every inch like a princess. Clean. Confident. Dignified. Her hair wasn't matted, her dress untorn. Her eyes didn't hold the poisonous, crazed look anymore, and despite himself, Arthur felt tears. He couldn't let them fall, and coughed around his throat's soreness as he was shown to a seat in front of his strange examiners.

The only sound in the room was the sound of their bootheels on stone as Gaius took a seat next to Uther and the Older Arthur sat down across from them all. A water clock dripped in its stand in the corner.

He wondered what they might think of him, and felt oddly sheepish, like an animal put on display. It was silent and awkward for a while the group studied him, and Arthur looked everywhere but at them. He couldn't help but to cough once in a while and shuffle his injured arm in its sling, and the noises accentuated the silence. He knew he shouldn't speak first, but he was tempted. Thankfully, Uther spoke before he could give in.

"Who are you?"

It was a simple question. "Arthur Pendragon," he said, leaving off his title intentionally. He saw them all stiffen, and quickly deduced that it was his voice; of course, he sounded just like the Arthur they knew. He may have looked different, but voices weren't prone to change much at his age. "I assure you," he said to Uther, "I am your son. And so is he," he nodded at his younger self. "Somehow. Gaius tells me that I've come back in time, though how, I'm not so sure."

"It's true, Sire," Gaius put in, "the subject of time travel has been studied little, but I see it as the only explanation."

Prince Arthur was pale as he stared at King Arthur, and the older man tried not to stare back. He fidgeted. Damnit, he knew that he'd been taught that it was rude to stare – hadn't he listened? He sniffed and tried to ignore himself.

"Well, why don't you try and explain it to us? What happened before you appeared here?" Uther asked.

Arthur sighed. He hadn't exactly been expecting an interrogation, but all things considered, he supposed he shouldn't have been surprised. "I was in Camelot, last I recall," he said, starting off with a shrug. "We were under attack. I'd been injured. Merlin was trying to help me reach the Keep."

"A retreat? In a siege?" Uther seemed alarmed. King Arthur set his lips in a line and wished he didn't have to explain it all to anyone, least of all, to his father, whom he knew would react strongly.

"The attack was a surprise. We were unprepared, and the… attacker," he couldn't help it when his eyes wandered over to Morgana, "was powerful. A sorcerer," He added, and regretted it. Uther sat up straighter and opened his mouth to speak, but Arthur cut him off. "This sorcerer took us by surprise. We were forced to take cover any way we could."

"How many years… How far into the future are you from?" Uther asked with some hesitation. Arthur glanced at him. He wasn't sure if it was a good idea to tell him. He glanced at Gaius, this question in his eyes. Though he didn't look happy about it, Gaius nodded.

"Fifteen," he said at length, and let it settle. The triad of royals glanced at each other, and each absorbed the revelation silently.

"And magic still plagues Camelot then?" Uther asked. Arthur squeezed his eyes shut and had to bend his head.

"…yes, if you say so." He sounded disappointed, but not for the reason that Uther summarized too quickly.

"I've always told my son that magic is a curse to the land, one that must be quashed."

And inexplicably, Arthur had to fight back a chuckle. "Yes, you always did always tell me that." Even he wasn't expecting the strange tone of fondness that escaped into his words.

Did. It was a past-tense reference that wouldn't register with the royals until later. For the time being, none of the younger Pendragons thought twice about it.

"What happened?" It was Morgana who asked the question. Arthur glanced at her and wanted to snap at her, blame her. From what Merlin had told him years ago, Arthur knew that Morgana was well on her way to becoming Camelot's enemy by now. And yet, even as he looked at her and knew what she was, he found he could only hurt for her. She didn't know how it would end. She didn't know how Arthur would hurt for her, how she was not alone. How could she? He sighed and closed his eyes, fighting to remember as his memories drew nearer to the present. Or past, as it were.

"We were going down the west corridor to the keep," He said, "Merlin was practically dragging me by then. We'd rounded into the North Wing, when… She… The sorcerer appeared. She attacked." He was frowning deeply, making every effort to not mention Morgana's name. "She said something to me… To Merlin. I was nearly unconscious, I think. I can't remember it all well. Merlin was talking with her. She started saying something, something magic, and then… Merlin… I don't…" He scrunched up his face, thinking, but after several minutes, nothing came. He sighed and opened his eyes. "I can't remember it all. There was something there… Something unusual. I woke up here."

It was a convoluted answer at best, and it raised far more questions than it answered.

"This sorcerer," Uther said, and Arthur wished he'd never mentioned the word 'sorcerer', "You said it was a woman. Was it Morgause?"

Arthur was the only one who could see Morgana stiffen. "No," He said, and his half-sister relaxed. "No, it was someone else."

Uther nodded thoughtfully. "And you remember nothing else? Was the sorceress the one who brought you here?"

"I don't know," Arthur admitted with the shake of his head. "As I say, I was barely awake when she showed up, much less for whatever she did afterwards. If anyone, Merlin would be able to tell you what happened next, but apparently, he's decided to not wake up very easily."

Uther looked at Gaius, and the physician nodded. "I believe there may be some secondary injury or calamity keeping Merlin comatose, Sire – the Older Merlin, that is. I'm working it out, but it may be a while before he wakes up." Uther nodded, and looked back at King Arthur.

"And if she – if the sorceress was the one to bring you here, would you have an idea why she would do such a thing?"

"No," Arthur said with a lost toss of his head. "I have absolutely no idea." He glanced at Morgana again, and almost wanted to ask. For clear reasons, he couldn't. "But I do know one thing," He said, voice grave, "If she did bring us here, then there is every possibility that she has come here to Camelot as well."

While Gaius and Arthur were away, young Merlin was bent over his older self with an intense expression on his face. He was careful to heed Gaius warnings, and made no move to physically touch his other self, his arms crossed solidly over his chest as he peered through the dim evening light down at his own older face. But it wasn't really the physical features that he was looking at. It was something deeper.

Merlin had always been able to sense magic. He could sense it in things, around enchantments, and around people with magic. When he'd bent over the Older Merlin for the first time and reached out to examine him with his magic, he'd had a rather frightening sensation of looking into a mirror. His own magic, usually so internal, was shining up at him from the external world. It had shaken him enough not to try again. But then, Gaius and Arthur had left for their meeting with Uther, leaving Merlin alone with his unconscious older self, and inevitably, Merlin's curiosity got the better of him.

When he'd reached out to the older man's magic, Merlin had expected a repeat of before: a reflection (or rather, duplication, he thought) of his own magic bounced up at him. And, as he expected, that was just what happened. But dimly.

So dimly, in fact, that for a moment, it felt as though this man, this Older Self of his, had hardly any magic to his name. It alarmed Merlin, and he'd spent the whole evening scanning over the tendrils of the unconscious man's magic, trying to find a reason for its absence. But for whatever reason, the magic was either gone or hiding, and Merlin couldn't sense it. The parts that remained, he recognized. This was his magic, he was sure. But where had the rest of it gone?

He jerked up when the latch on the door rose, and he knew that Arthur and Gaius were returning from their meeting. Not wanting to get in trouble with Gaius for getting too close to the Other Merlin and not wanting another awkward meeting with the Other Arthur, Merlin darted up to his room, doused the candles, and jumped in bed to feign sleep. In the other room, the door opened.

"Will I have to do that again, Gaius?" Arthur asked. He sounded tired.

"I'm not sure, Sire. I'll try and see to it that you don't. It must have been… hard." Merlin could hear liquid being poured into a glass.

"Mmm." Arthur didn't say anything else. There was a pause. "Where's Merlin?" he asked. Immediately, Merlin closed his eyes and evened out his breathing to a believable sleeping pace. After a moment, Gaius opened his door a crack and peaked in. He shut it.

"Asleep," Gaius said quietly as he stepped back down into the main room. Arthur grunted, and Merlin could hear him shuffling his shoes. It was one of Arthur's nervous habits.

"Giaus," He began uncertainly, "earlier… earlier, you told my father that you didn't know why Merlin hasn't woken up."

"Yes," Gaius said, and Merlin could tell that he was frowning. "He has no injuries, that I can see, and shows no signs of any illnesses. By all rights, he should be up by now. What are you getting at, Sire? Do you have an idea?"

"I might," Arthur said. He sighed, and there was a tense pause. Merlin didn't realize it then, but he'd begun to hold his breath.

"Is it…" Arthur paused again briefly, and if he pretended for a second that it was Prince Arthur who was talking, Merlin would have thought he was second-guessing himself. "Is it because of his magic?" Arthur asked eventually.

Merlin's eyes widened and he gasped. He heard clay shattering in the other room and knew that Gaius must've dropped his glass in surprise. Merlin didn't blame him.

Arthur knew.

Arthur knew about the magic.