8. Part 1: Don't Say Goodbye/Abandoned/Isolation
(from "To Carry the Fire")
I cannot feel the fire.
That surprises me, as I sit in the dark in our temporary camp not far enough from Camlann, and try to think past Merlin's words of confession. And the blood-soaked bandage wrapped around his middle. I cannot believe the betrayal my mind tells me, just happened.
I cannot believe the loss my mind tells me, will happen soon.
I cannot feel the magic my mind tells me, exists right there in the palm of his hand, cupped in mine, in the form of an impossible tongue of fire. Dancing. Not burning.
Impossible. Yet right there, all of it, and I feel nothing.
I think, maybe it's a dream. Because Merlin cannot be a traitor. Cannot be dying. Cannot have magic.
What is true? I wait to wake, and it doesn't happen.
Then I realize, I can feel the cold.
Something draws my attention upward, and I see that it's – snowing. The sky overhead is faintly gray in the late afternoon, the only patch of blue showing far toward the western horizon where a crescent moon rocks.
I watch the sky for a while without really intending to – I believe I'm dreaming now, snow is just as improbable as anything else. Snow and the moon. Cool and remote and calm.
Then, something draws me to look at Merlin.
His face is white – mostly, except for that damnably persistent dark trickle from the corner of his mouth that I can do nothing about except try to hide and deny – and serene, as he looks up and watches the snow also.
There's something about you, I can't quite put my finger on it… Someone knew I was in trouble and sent a light to guide the way…
On your long journey to become king, you'll need a guardian angel…
Then, abruptly, inadvertently, everything makes sense.
All the impossible becomes possible, and not for the first time. I feel a bit like I am waking, healed from those wounds I remembered, informed of a victory I cannot recall having a hand in. Accepting that it is my hopes that have come true, instead of my fears.
Because of Merlin. And with magic, peaceful and beautiful and poignant.
Treachery inverted is loyalty.
I can't feel that either, yet, can't understand it any more than I did its converse, just a moment ago, but my mind has accepted it as true.
His smile is small, whimsical and strangely sweet – for an instant I wish that he is looking at me, when it happens – for another instant I realize why he has smiled.
This is it, his last smile his last look his last…
I cannot get his name out – Merlin! - fast enough to capture his attention, cannot move –
Before his eyes drop shut. His body shudders, and goes completely, gently slack.
This is it. This is it.
"No. Please, no." I want to grab him and shake him, but I can't so much as touch him, for fear of pain I'll cause, either of us, for fear of what I'll find… and what I won't.
This is impossible – I am so childishly scared – don't leave me, Merlin.
Alone.
The fire has gone out. The candle surrenders to a gust of wind too sudden and harsh.
So long we have been together – through frustration and anger and triumph and peace and teasing and serving and irritation and danger and learning and satisfaction and rest and reward – I cannot believe this either.
Cannot allow it. Cannot command it to be otherwise, but that doesn't stop me from pleading, as I break. A little.
This cannot be the end, of whatever this was and whatever we had that I never understood, and barely glimpsed.
Please.
This, this is the betrayal. Not the magic – a whole kin of people condemned blindly to the pyre and that is not the golden torch I wish to light my way my reign my legacy my kingdom – but this loss.
"Please, don't go," I whisper.
Why not. Because I can't lose him, after all I've lost, after everything we've been through? Because he's a servant and never should have been on the battlefield, a sorcerer and never should have used his body to shield me from Mordred's blade? Because he's too damn young to die, too pure and generous, regardless of other considerations?
No, because it's not about me. And it's not about him. It's about what we all need.
So I whisper, "Please don't take him."
Who do I expect to hear me, to take notice? On what basis do I beg? The authority of a king and the representation of an entire kingdom? A flawed and humbled and desperate friend?
I remember backing into the water of the Cauldron, drenched and helpless, pleading, persuading… waiting. Have mercy. Give back.
Come take my hand. Come with me and change destiny, thwart evil. Remain mine. Oh, please won't you…
And…
I feel as though something lingers.
Like a single curl of smoke dancing in the air when the light of its cousin is extinguished to invisibility.
But for a moment, a mote of deep orange remains at the tip of the wick.
Gone, but still…
Maybe his spirit? maybe his magic?
I shiver at the thought, and I can't tell if it's the dread I was taught or the hope I've just discovered. Maybe it's only because it's still snowing and my fingers are chilled and my side is numb and my blood is cold…
"Merlin," I say, quiet and urgent and swift, making my own confession.
Something I need to do, whether he hears or not. Whether it changes anything for him or not… it might change me. For the better. As he often had…
"I thought I knew. I was sure I was right. I had a vision of the king I wanted to be and the kingdom I wanted to rule." A glorious blazing golden ideal of peace and prosperity… light in the darkness…
All I know is that, for your many faults, you are honest and brave and truehearted, and one day you will be the greatest king this land has ever known…
We end this war, against tyranny, greed, and spite – we fight for our lives, the future – Camelot, Albion, the united kingdoms.
For the love of Camelot.
"I was wrong. Merlin, I was wrong. Magic. I don't know – I don't understand… I need you, though. Someone I trust, to show me, to explain – for fairness and for freedom. All peoples, all laws. Merlin, you have to help me build this kingdom. We're not done yet, and it won't be the same without you."
I can't help believing he's listening. Like someone – or something - is listening.
One spark… must be breathed gently to life and flame, nurtured, fostered, coddled, coaxed… I don't know what to do. Touch him or not?
I don't know what else to say.
The moon rocks over us, a sliver of light, and it suddenly feels important to know whether it's waxing or waning, coming or going. Whether it's going to be full, or dark.
I don't remember. For the life of me, I can't remember.
8. Part 2: Don't Say Goodbye/Abandoned/Isolation
("Last Light" from Kingdom Games: Albion Games)
The pain had faded. In its place was a hot-water-bottle sensation that was not unpleasant, except that it left Merlin's hands and feet cold. He couldn't move much, but he was comfortable, and didn't want to. They'd tied the wad of bandages in place over his ribs awkwardly and with difficulty, and he didn't want to put any of them through the hassle of repositioning it.
He had the recovered dragon's egg where he could touch it. He had Gwaine, sitting where he could see him, reclined against one of the saddles, his head bowed and the poultice held in place on the back of his skull where the knight had struck the tree. He had Arthur here, too – tired, discouraged, in need of a hot bath, a warm meal, and a soft bed. He'd have those soon enough. A few more days.
But, by all the gods, his king was uninjured. That was Merlin's triumph. He wore that wound, the macabre red smile of a wound in his chest drooling blood in Arthur's place, gladly and proudly. The choice was his, the sacrifice, the fall. He'd kept his word.
"Young dragons are… called into the… world, by the dragonlord," Merlin said, and his friends looked up. The sun was setting, and it gave their skin, their faces, a burnished golden glow. Another radiance called to him inside, faintly but insistently. Just a moment, he thought. Give me just a moment. "One word to command… familiar stranger. I give… the dragon… a name."
"You're not going to–" Arthur started.
Gwaine said at the same time, "Do you think it's a good idea to–"
Merlin uttered, "Aithusa."
He'd known her name since he first saw the egg, on the pedestal in the tower. The one word, the perfect name, soothed a raw desire he hadn't known he could possess so strongly until the moment he'd cupped the egg in his palms.
The tiny consciousness focused swiftly, awareness increasing, sharpening, followed by an immediate and undeniable demand for freedom. The top of the egg, the rounded point of the teardrop, cracked, split. For an instant a fragment of shell balanced on her head, the size of Merlin's fist, ridged, eyes blinking intelligently, inquiringly.
Then the shell burst, Arthur and Gwaine both instinctively ducking and shielding their faces. Merlin kept his eyes on the dragonet, crouching on the one remaining section of shell to spread her wings for the first time. If he'd been standing, she'd have come comfortably around knee height, and able to stretch a little higher.
She was beautiful. She was glorious. She was white. The edges of her wings were so fine they were transparent.
"A white dragon," Merlin breathed. "Arthur, that's so rare. The white dragon bodes well for Albion. For you. For the land you will build."
"The land we will build together," Arthur reminded him in a low voice, his eyes on the dragonet.
"Her name is Aithusa?" Gwaine said, quietly, as if he feared he might frighten her away.
"I've named her after," Merlin stopped to breathe, "the light of the sun. The morning."
Aithusa accepted his presence as an anticipated fact, but chittered curiously, stretching out her wings and turning her head from the king to the knight and back again.
"These are my friends. Sir Gwaine of Camelot. And High King Arthur," Merlin told her. She eyed the other two men, cocking her head and creeping forward a few feet to examine them.
Arthur, absolutely enthralled for the moment, reached his hand out to her, and she retreated to Merlin's knee. "It's okay," Merlin told them both. "It'll take some time."
Aithusa flipped about to examine him, her lord. Love. Concern. Smell of blood?
"Yes, I'm hurt, Aithusa," Merlin explained to the hatchling. "But it's nothing for you to worry about. How are your wings? Strong? I need you to–"
Worry. Stubborn. Blood. Father lord wrong. Help.
Dainty eyelids clicked shut, and the little white body expanded as a deep breath was drawn in. Then Aithusa opened eyes and mouth – tiny razor-sharp teeth already in place – and breathed on him.
He sighed. It was a joy somehow different to any other he'd ever felt. He thought Hunith might understand best.
Frustration. Pout. Blood smell wrong.
"Don't worry," he told her. "You're not meant to heal me. I have another duty for you."
If she were a human girl, Aithusa might have crossed her arms over her chest and scowled, sticking out her lower lip.
Merlin whispered, "O drakon, e male so ftengometta tesd'hup anankes." The hatchling froze, fascinated, the harsh words whispered caressingly. "Nun de ge dei s'eikein kai emois epe'essin hepesthai d'e Kilgarrah."
Aithusa shook herself, unfurled her wings, cocked her head once more at Merlin as if to ask, are you sure I can't stay? Then she hopped from his knee to the top of his left boot, flapped in an upward angle, steering around trunks and branches like a natural, heading for the open sky. He could feel the tears sliding down his temples.
He wondered how long her journey would take.
Arthur moved next to him, his back to the tree trunk. "What did you tell her?" he asked, positioning the water-skin where Merlin could take a swallow easily, and he did so, to satisfy his friend.
This close, the golden connection he'd forged with Arthur hummed so strongly it was vibrating, distracting him from a deeper golden call within.
"I sent her… to Kilgarrah," he said.
Arthur set down the water-skin, curled his fingers around the back of Merlin's neck, and adjusted the padded saddlebag under his head. "Is that better?" he asked.
"Much," Merlin said. He couldn't tell a difference, but it didn't matter. "Arthur…"
When his king had touched him, the golden call inside had aligned somehow with their connection – it was the same now, there was no choice left to make, he was relieved about that – delving through heart into soul, and further.
"I'm proud of you," he said.
Arthur gave him his familiar half-smile pulled self-consciously sideways – but then he understood, and the smile was gone. "Merlin, no. Do you hear me? I forbid you–"
"I don't… do what I'm told." He could vaguely feel his body breathing, chest rising, ribs expanding, but the air seemed to do no good once inside his lungs. Because of this, his body worked harder to accomplish a failing respiration, and it made talking more difficult. Arthur lifted him in his arms, propped him against his knee. "You – the once and future – unite…" he gasped. Just wait! "I have… stood beside you… protected you…"
"Yes," Arthur said. "You have. My Emrys." His sea-blue eyes were wet, and his voice shook. Merlin wanted to tell him, don't cry. But he had more important things to say.
"My life… I gave my life… blood, breath, magic… at your side." He managed a smile. "The sacrifice… my choice. I'm not… sorry."
"Merlin – no, you can't," Arthur ordered.
He felt Gwaine pick up his other hand, and squeezed slightly. I'm sorry, my friend, but … Arthur. "You have to… let me go to…" He gasped and panted and for a moment pain swirled madly in his side. Arthur held him more tightly, and it subsided. "When Kilgarrah – he'll know, but you… must… let me go. I have to…"
"You stay," Arthur begged. "No. I'm not letting you go. Merlin? Do you hear me? Merlin!"
The last thing he saw was a tear sliding down the face of his friend, his king, glittering in the last light of the setting sun like a tiny drop of crystal.
It was dark, but he was not afraid. He knew where to go. He followed that golden lifeline that told him now of Arthur's pain and Arthur's grief, that heard his friend saying his name, screaming his name – he longed to reassure him. But he had to retreat, backing away slowly, til he sensed he was on an edge of sorts. And far below, a faint stir of liquid gold.
Merlin put out the arms of his self, his soul. His wings, spread to fly, to drop, to drift, to soar and glide ever towards the hidden golden depths buried.
Eagerly, confidently, he launched himself into the void.
8. Part 3: Don't Say Goodbye/Abandoned/Isolation
("The Faelg of Time" from Past Faults and Future Perils)
The links of the chain around Merlin's wrists clinked as he lifted both hands, to be able to feel behind his neck. No puncture wounds or smashed bones penetrating the dull ache of sore muscles in his shoulder.
Morgana crouched panting several paces away, one hand up on the edge of the table next to her for balance, itself knocked over and broken some time ago. She gave him a baleful glare under tangled graying hair – no more arch looks or snide comments anymore. She wasn't deliberately toying with him now; if he wasn't mistaken, she'd already made the determination to truly kill him, to finish this – and couldn't.
The subterranean room of the ruins shuddered, and dust sifted. All around them the ordinary objects had been reduced to unrecognizable pieces, flung back and forth and battered with their opposing magic. The rest of the furniture, save for the ruined table, had been twisted or dismembered, between attack and defense.
The only problem was…
He shifted, edging toward the stair leading upward to freedom, to Arthur and his friends. She snarled a gesture and he countered with his shield, but the force of their colliding magic sent him staggering back to the corner, where he was hard-pressed to keep himself from sliding down to the floor, while she gasped for air.
"Morgana," he choked. "Just let me go. You'll have some time to escape, we'll let you go this time. But, stop. You have to know you can't win anymore."
"I've already won!" she snapped, her voice broken and whisper-hoarse. "Emrys is not my destiny or my doom, I will not accept that!"
He almost sympathized. More often than not he agreed with Arthur's determination to forge his own destiny and not merely wait for fate to overtake him. But this – no one had chosen this but her. She was forging her own destiny, trying to kill Merlin before he killed her – driving him to defend himself, just as Arthur had necessarily defended his own life, his men and his kingdom, from one magical threat after another.
Arthur had chosen a different destiny, though, than to be nothing more than Uther's heir.
Why could she not choose something else? Was this destruction really part of her character as much as protection of the innocent was part of Arthur's – to take them down the path of destiny even as they consciously meant to resist?
And what was he? Where was he? Somewhere in the middle – accepting the path while making it his own… He readied himself to attempt to ascend the stairs again, expecting confrontation-
Both of them flinched as the door at the top of the stair slammed open, the space filled immediately by Mordred and another man – middle-aged and hawk-nosed and unshaven, with blood on his face and slick down the side of his sleeve. Between them they dragged the body of a knight down the stairs, and Mordred smiled as he came.
Merlin knew it was a corpse from the first step, and despaired. Who, then, of Arthur's men.
The blond head swung lifelessly from the neck, fingers empty and motionless, knees and boots thudding into each step behind them without resistance.
Who would be so important that Mordred would bring him to…
"My lady." Mordred pronounced the words with separate sarcasm. "Why am I not surprised to find Emrys still alive? The two of you are supposed to possess legendary power and yet you both have failed to kill your enemy. I, however, am the victor today."
The stranger released his hold as Mordred flung their burden the last two steps down. The knight's body tumbled, rocked to absolute stillness without a single sign of sensation or awareness, in the broken detritus of the floor. Not a who anymore, but only a what. The stranger labored his way back up the stairs and out.
Mordred put his hands on his hips and included them both in his enigmatic smile. "Maybe our people ought to follow me instead of you. Morgana."
The ancient prophecies speak of an alliance of Mordred and Morgana united in evil…
She pushed upright, next to the table. "Is that who I think it is? You had no right, Mordred! He was mine to kill, as soon as this one was done!"
If this boy lives, you cannot fulfill your destiny…
Merlin moved out from the corner. His knees threatened to buckle, and he caught his balance on the wall. The chain binding his hands had vanished.
"As soon as this one was done," Mordred repeated mockingly. Merlin took another step. "When was that going to be – tomorrow, next week? After the rest of us were killed defending your play-time?"
Merlin took another step.
The dead man's limbs were crumpled – one leg under the other, one arm behind the back, chin tipped to the ceiling. Eyes half-opened and dull-blank. The chainmail collapsed and shrunken over the chest.
There was a smear of blood down the stone stairs, in some places still dripping; blood saturated one trouser-leg beneath the chainmail all the way past the knee. Silver tainted with red – so much red, too much red. More than he'd ever seen at once, save for corpses slaughtered on a battlefield.
I've seen worse.
On a dead man… If I do die, will you call me a hero?
Merlin took another step, empty and sick but the draw was irresistible. Blood showed on the face also, a very slight stain beneath his nose, red-gold in the short beard.
Another step, and his knees failed him and it was what he deserved for his own failure.
Arthur. My lord. Wake up, please… wake up. Look at me… This – this can't be happening. Another dream, right? Another vision she's twisted and cursed me with?
He sensed magic lighting behind him, a spark growing into a spell, into an attack. That was intolerable. With only a thought, he pushed the threat away from him, hard and immediate and as far as it and its creator would go.
Arthur's skin was cooling, and slack. Merlin's fingertips searched helplessly for the pulse of life - deep in his neck, anywhere in either wrist – the chainmail was broken, and blood smeared his hands as he searched trembling, but there was no breath in the lungs. Not for some time, now.
The king had been dead before they'd even begun to drag his body here to this room.
Dead, because Merlin had lied, had hidden and gone on his own to face their enemy and it was the worst decision he'd ever made because this time Arthur had followed, and encountered Morgana's people.
I'm sorry. Arthur, I'm so sorry. I'll never… I'll never do it again… He wouldn't have the chance. Arthur was dead.
Someone's voice broke into his turbulent thoughts. "…With his own sword, too. An honorable end for an honorable man, at least, wouldn't you say, Emrys? All of us should hope for so much."
Merlin looked up at Mordred, who'd drawn the sword from his belt. A familiar sword, with a runic message on the burnished gold core of the steel blade. Cast Me Away… Rage rose inside him like boiling steam, filling his ears and dulling the shriek that erupted from somewhere behind them.
"Now, now, my lady – don't be jealous. I'm sure you can still find those who will follow you instead of me. And I – I've hurt my enemy as much as I possibly could. How does it feel, Emrys? And I have an immortal weapon to defend myself with, if you're ever in a position to attempt revenge."
Mordred smiled down on Merlin deliberately, then pointed the king's sword at him theatrically. A sword with a fresh stain of blood almost reaching that gold core.
As swift as thought, Merlin's magic plucked the blade out of the druid's hands. Mordred snatched after it, faint consternation just beginning to mar the smooth superiority of his expression.
The blade slid through the air next to Merlin's neck, just over his shoulder – a knighting position. He didn't rise from his knees, reaching up to grip the hilt and spin the blade as he'd seen Arthur do a thousand times, pivoting past his elbow, the point clearing the stone of the floor by barely an inch-
Mordred couldn't have stopped the momentum of his lunge if he tried, and Merlin thrust into it, as far as he could reach. Below the rib cage, no resistance of blade-on-bone. Horror showed in Mordred's ice-blue eyes – realization, despair.
Merlin grated out, "You should not have killed my friend."
He kept hold of the sword as Mordred sank to his knees, then toppled over, freeing himself. Lifeblood poured from the wound following the retreating blade, soaking his tunic. So much blood; too much blood. Mordred stilled – no movement, no breath – blue eyes dull and sightless in death.
Merlin gagged on bile, regained control, and lowered the sword to lay on the ground by Arthur's hip.
"You should not have killed my friend," he whispered, and it didn't matter who he addressed.
Lightning was impossible indoors anyway… But it had not been the lightning that chose Nimueh's death to balance Arthur's life that night long ago – so long ago.
It was Merlin himself who'd done that. Somehow.
Legendary, impossible magic. Like Sigan who could shift the tides and turn day to night or night to day-
Call back a lost day, rather than skipping ahead to a new one?
Merlin gulped, reaching for the stream of time he'd felt but rarely, able to cup the moments temporarily in his hands before they poured out again at their usual rate.
Time slowed.
Not good enough. Desperation lent him strength – he was the most powerful – but what he wanted, what he needed, was right. Love, not hate; light, not darkness; life, not death.
Time stopped.
It was silence. It was darkness all about, inky and impenetrable – no walls, no floor or ceiling, nobody but himself and Arthur, lying before him in the emptiness.
Not good enough.
Night to day. Not skipping forward in time, but going back. Turn it back. Breathe out, then take it back in… It hurt. His skin crawled, absorbing perspiration. Tears he hadn't noticed rolled up his cheeks and blurred his eyes.
Not just him, but Arthur too. Take him back – bring him back. Disregard the rest of the world and the people on it; elsewhere drops falling down to splash unnoticed instead of separating from puddles, reforming and rising and returning to the clouds. Wax melted as candles burned, and the sky wheeled imperceptibly above, forward ever forward and too heavy and too enormous to interrupt, but Merlin… Merlin could… Merlin could back up, and he could take Arthur with him.
Second before second before second – how many must he pluck from the past and fling before them into the future before-
Arthur's chest rose. His eyelids fell – then lifted, puzzled and groggy and pained. Merlin swooped into his line of vision, delighted, terrified, and Arthur focused on him.
Merlin released time, and it gushed forward again, darkness fading to the gray stone of the Isle chamber. Arthur dragged in a moment's shallow breath, coughed a terrible little sound that flecked lips and beards with droplets of blood – and his heart would begin pumping more of the same through his wounds.
"Arthur!" Merlin cried out.
The king tried to smile. Twitched like he'd tried to raise his hand. His gaze fell away from Merlin and began to dull with exhausted agony.
Fading. Dying again. Still mortally wounded and Merlin could not heal him. Could not find the reserves of magic to turn time back far enough to prevent the wound initially inflicted.
Just like before, and the Questing Beast. Arthur was dying and no magic or medicine could save him.
That reminded him, though - not a cure, but a balance. A trade.
You should not have killed my friend… Did he know what he was doing, this time? Had Nimueh deliberately chosen his mother instead of him, or was it necessarily random – some rule of this particular magic, granted not performed, that he was ignorant of?
Take me. Take me. I willingly give my life for Arthur's…
Something in Arthur's essence reached out, spiraling lazily for Merlin's chest – it was blue-white and glowed like moon-lit mist – he prepared himself for his own last breath, the last thud of his heart.
I'm sorry. Arthur – I'm so sorry. I'll never… do it again… happy to be your servant til the day-
As the mist extended, finding Merlin's corporeal body no obstacle, Arthur's eyes widened – focused beyond Merlin – and he read his king's thought instantly.
Danger. Enemy. Behind you.
Morgana.
He'd knocked her into the wall some moments ago – how many, passed and returned? – but she'd spoken to Mordred, hadn't she?
Merlin whirled in his crouch, unbalancing down to a hard seat on the ground, instinctively evading the dagger she stabbed toward him, eager to plunge it into his back, into his chest, slicing edge if not pointed tip-
Thud-thud-thud
His pulse beat steady and even, and the mist spiraled outward, still seeking its mark.
Not you. Not now. Not yet.
Morgana couldn't have stopped the momentum of her lunge if she'd tried. Horror flooded her face as the dagger disintegrated into sparkling motes – white showed around the green of her eyes and her lips cracked as she tried to scream.
Her body shuddered briefly as though Merlin was shifting his gaze between her and her reflection in a mirror. Heat sparked and built in an instant, roaring out of her as she exploded into a thousand thousand sparks of light that shimmered and were gone without a trace.
Shaking uncontrollably, Merlin unwound the twist in his body to face Arthur again. Just did… that magic… right in front of… his king. His friend. Just did…
"You've brought peace at last," Arthur whispered, tension draining from his body.
Merlin's fingers jerked clumsily at the hole torn in the king's chainmail - each movement too swift, carrying too far, having to be halted and drawn back. "Does this hurt?" he blurted. "Are you still-"
"I'm fine." Arthur didn't move to a more comfortable position, didn't even attempt to lift his head from the floor. His eyes were blue coals in ashy pits, and his lips were white and cracked and he looked exactly like-
He'd lost too much blood. Even with the wound healed by that-
"Merlin, there's – something I want to say to you," the king murmured, then panted shallowly, fumbling to grasp Merlin's hand. "Thank you. And-"
The spell of exchange roared to life around Merlin without warning. Magic squeezed and reshaped him like dough, punching the breath from his lungs and relocating the bile in his stomach to the back of his throat, yanking him inexorably away from that moment in time.
I didn't get to say goodbye - I meant to say goodbye. I meant to say…