Chapter Text
“I had no idea you were so keen to die for me.”
“Trust me, I can hardly believe it myself.”
“I’m glad you’re here, Merlin.”
**
“Emrys.”
The woman calls his name again, but this time the words are accompanied by fingers pulling his chin up to meet her gaze. For a moment, they are both silent, but then Merlin remembers why he is here and pulls his head away from her hand.
“Who are you?” The woman’s smile returns, and Merlin is disarmed enough to stand on the defensive.
“I am the keeper of Avalon. Kairon.”
Shit.
Shit .
This is really happening.
Merlin can’t think of anything to say, his throat tightening around his voice until he’s so lightheaded he might fall again.
It’s been—it’s been so long .
Apparently he says that out loud, because the woman says, “And you have waited well, Emrys.”
Merlin’s magic screams at him to focus because Arthur is going to be by his side again and it won’t do to be hyperventilating like an idiot when he returns.
Before he can ask where Arthur is, the woman looks out on the lake again. When he’s so close, Merlin can see the moonlight burning away her skin and leaving only a skull in its place. He swallows back nausea as she turns back to him, her face once again vaguely human.
“Where is he?” Merlin manages to say to the not-quite-woman in front of him.
“Albion’s greatest time of need looms on the horizon,” she says, his question apparently nothing to her. “It is time for Arthur Pendragon to rise again and fulfil his destiny. It is time for the Once and Future King to return.”
“But where is he?” Merlin presses, his age-old impatience with magic and gods and whatever-the-hell-she-is being so damn indirect with him making his voice carry across the empty shore.
“It is time,” she continues, leveling a glare that leaves his lungs empty, “for Emrys to walk the road to Avalon and retrieve Arthur from the place he has rested.”
Anger surges in Merlin’s chest. “No one told me I must retrieve Arthur from Avalon!” He really is sick of being kept so in the dark. Frankly, after so many years as the sole keeper of magic in the world, he thinks he should feel like he understands at least a little about what he is keeping. But no, because minor goddesses keep thinking it’s absolutely fine to just spring things like this on him, completely unprepared.
But he doesn’t say that. Instead, he takes a solidifying breath and meets her eyes with a renewed strength.
“What must I do?”
The woman beckons him forward. She walks until the soft tide of the lake washes over her feet, almost hypnotizing in its rhythm. She kneels and rests her hands on the water for a long, silent moment.
Then the water under her hands pushes away in small, delicate waves. Instead of crashing back into the lake, however, they climb higher and higher until the damp mud of the lake floor is exposed and the waves twist upwards towards the sky. The layer of water is so thin it almost looks like glass, and Merlin has the urge to reach out and run his hands through it.
Once the water stills, the muddy earth descends past the newly-formed gateway and forms a dark passage beneath the lake.
“Only those who are not mortal may cross the path between the world of the living and Avalon. There are few such creatures left on this earth, Emrys, and if Albion’s doom is to be thwarted, you must succeed in bringing back Arthur.”
“If you cannot be mortal, how will Arthur make the return with me?” Merlin asks, but he knows the answer already.
“His time in Avalon has stripped away his mortality, Emrys. You were never meant to be alone in your immortality.” Before Merlin can ask what the hell that means, she is standing again. Her eyes have become pained, like the air is burning her lungs. “I cannot stay long in this realm, Emrys. You must make the journey now.” She raises her palm in front of her, and a small blue light emerges.
Merlin sucks in a breath at the display of magic. For so long, he has been alone and seeing the magic of another brings tears to his eyes. The little light hovers by his hand, and he has to resist the urge to reach out and stroke it.
The woman drops her hand, and she is no longer a terror to behold. Instead, ancient sadness writes its story on her face. Merlin feels as though he understands her.
“This light will guide your way. I’m afraid it’s all I can give you, Emrys. While you are on the road, you must keep your eyes fixed ahead. Do not look to those who will call to you from the waters, or you will not be able to resist them. You cannot be lost to the lake.” She gives him one last look. “I will meet you in Avalon.”
Then she is gone, beckoned back into the loving arms of the earth, and Merlin is left alone at the entryway.
The blue light drifts through the air until it’s resting at the entrance. It hovers in place, bouncing slightly as Merlin takes a moment to process what just happened. He allows himself twenty seconds to stand uselessly gaping at the gateway, and then he steels himself. He is nothing if not willing to throw himself into danger under hardly optimal circumstances, so he follows the little light past the water crowning the passage and into the darkness below.
As soon as his feet touch the mucky lake floor, he is swallowed into it, dragged down into the earth with far less grace than the woman before him. For a moment, water crashes around his ears, and he feels like he’s drowning, but then his feet reach solid ground again.
Even in the darkness, he can tell he’s in a narrow passage.
“Hardly a road,” he mutters to no one, “more like a bike lane.”
The light calls him forward again, and Merlin feels trapped by an entire lake’s worth of water. He knows he’s probably imagining the thinness of the air, so he takes a deep, fortifying breath and sets off after the light.
It’s difficult to tell how far he’s gone in the darkness, but his legs soon begin to ache.
He walks, and walks, and walks, with nothing but the sound of his footsteps on the muddy stone and his own thoughts occupying his mind.
He will see Arthur soon. He can feel in his heart that he will, no matter what he faces on this road. He could spend days, weeks, months walking, but he is going to see Arthur again. He has to.
There is a faint buzz in the air of the passage, but not in a way that makes it feel vibrant. It feels overbearing, like Merlin is not supposed to be here.
Passage is hardly an adequate name for whatever this road is. Everything around him feels sentient, like the water carries more memories than even Merlin does. He’s spent centuries pouring his own memories into water; the memory in the waters of Avalon is foreign, unpleasant. Not unfamiliar, but still suffocating.
As he continues walking, he distracts himself from the ache in his legs by humming. At first, it’s nothing in particular, just notes arranged in a pleasing pattern, but then it turns into the song Merlin had remembered so vividly in the shop.
He can’t quite remember the lyrics.
“Marianne of Mercia, she ran to the war front,” he murmurs, the words sounding breathless as he squints, trying to see if there’s any sign of how much further the path stretches on. “The lads were gone, so she went on, to see if she could join ‘em. Marianne, she—”
Earl.
The water changes, suddenly.
Merlin is no longer surrounded by unfamiliar memory, but his own. He’s stopped walking without realizing it, and the damp air around him pulses with longing to remember.
Earl .
His magic feels different here. Not suppressed, exactly, but pressurized, like it’s being squeezed into a small container. Some leaks out and the water becomes alight with his memory.
Merlin remembers very little about the night he met Jon, because he had been very, very drunk. The only time he really ever got drunk was around the anniversary of Arthur’s death, because he’d always begin thinking about Arthur and how Arthur had spent years believing Merlin spent every night in the tavern and was a raging alcoholic, and then he’d think, why not honor his obliviousness by getting royally smashed instead of thinking about him anymore?
Hence, sitting on the shores of Avalon, pretending he wasn’t sitting where Arthur had literally died a fuck-ton of years before.
He remembers thinking that his trousers were getting wet because it had rained that afternoon and sand was rather absorbent, but the alcohol kept him warm enough that he wasn’t bothered by it.
He shouted at the lake and the gods and anything that would listen, really, because then he can remember feeling his throat hurt and being thrown back into the first few weeks after Arthur’s death.
He remembers jumping a little when a voice behind him asked if he was alright, thinking somewhere in his drunken mind that maybe Arthur had the courtesy to return at last.
“You aren’t Arthur,” he said when faced with a man who was clearly not Arthur, and said man shook his head.
“No. Jonathan. You alright, mate?”
“My friend is being stubborn and not returning from the dead,” Merlin recalls saying, and he can see the man’s face crumple in sympathy before sitting next to him on the beach and staying until Merlin was ready to leave.
Merlin finally gets control of his magic and pulls it back in, gasping for air. He doesn’t have time to get his bearings before a quiet voice curls around his mind.
Hey, Earl .
His magic tugs again, but Merlin yanks it back. Instead of getting lost in memory, he decides he should probably just say something.
“Hey, Jon.” It seems like a neutral enough response, but the voice hums in displeasure.
It’s been a long time, Earl . Didn’t you miss me?
Merlin’s stomach churns. “Of course. Of course I’ve missed you.”
Something almost like laughter echoes in his head.
I’m glad to hear that. You know, since you never think about me .
“You know when I think about you?”
The laugh sounds again. I’m dead, Merlin. Does it sound like I have much else to do?
Merlin shrugs. “I guess not.” Even though he feels like Jon (or whatever form of Jon is here) is moving, his voice remains firmly rooted inside his head.
The little blue light circles Merlin’s waist and bumps against his fingers before darting forward again. Merlin licks his lips nervously. “Look, Jon, I gotta keep going, alright? I’m sorry.” As soon as he takes a step forward, there’s an awful scream that leaves him clutching at his ears.
No, no, don’t go, you can’t go! Jon’s voice begs him, and Merlin knows no matter how badly he wants to stay, he can’t.
“I’m sorry,” he says quickly as he keeps walking and Jon keeps screaming, “I have to keep going. I have to get Arthur.”
You didn’t make it in time , Jon screams, you were supposed to make it in time. You never make it in time .
“I’m sorry,” Merlin apologizes again, but he keeps moving forward.
You were supposed to save me! I wasn’t supposed to die in a car wreck. You should’ve gotten to me sooner!
“Please, I’m sorry,” Merlin begs, and when he starts running, the yelling crescendos until he can’t even hear his own thoughts over the voice screaming in his head. Tears start streaming down his face at some point, but he makes himself keep running. His vision starts going white at the volume of Jon’s yells, brighter and brighter until Merlin is sure the voice will crack open his skull and stream into the passage, but then Jon’s voice disappears and Merlin is left only with shaking hands and ringing ears.
For a long moment, he stands totally still, his fingers pressing against the wet skin of his cheeks.
“Okay,” he says quietly, nodding to himself, “okay.”
The little light returns to him. It ghosts over his hands and arms, leaving the hair there standing on edge.
Merlin nods again. “Okay.”
He knows logically that continuing to walk will probably mean more people from his past yelling at him. He knows logically that there is not going to be a way around this, that to get to Arthur he must face the voices of those who left him behind.
But illogically, he is filled with the sudden and awful hope that maybe all of this has been a silly nightmare, and now it’s time for him to see everyone he’s loved again, even if they are pissed at him for being alive while they’re off being dead.
Before he can let himself dwell in the hope, though, the air tightens around him, and his magic pushes out of his fingertips as he hears another voice call out to him.
Mercer .
He doesn’t have time to be dragged into his memories, but it happens before he can stop it.
He remembers seeing her for the first time across the crowded ballroom floor, her smile reminding him so much of Morgana’s that he nearly dropped his glass.
“Don’t you go after my sister,” Ben had said, laughing, and Merlin remembers a solid clap on the shoulder like they were old friends and hadn’t just met that morning.
Merlin isn’t sure why he’d agreed to come to this stranger’s party, but then again, why did he do most things?
He remembers Ben leaving, and his eyes meeting the woman’s eyes across the room, the way they had looked hollow and aching. Merlin knew he had to speak with her, from that look. The look Morgana had given him so often, before he knew it would be his fault that she began to look for solace in darkness.
He doesn’t remember how he got there, but he can clearly see the grimace masked as a polite smile that had graced her face when he approached.
He remembers fumbling with his words. There was so much of Morgana in her eyes, so much of the warmth before the darkness took over.
“I’m Mercer,” he said finally, and she gave him a polite nod.
“Rosalie.” She began to turn away.
Merlin can’t remember how, but they ended up sitting in the garden with a bottle of wine between them and laughing like old friends. He hadn’t laughed in a long time, and the sound of their joined laughter, muffled so the rest of the party guests didn’t discover them, echoes in his ears as he hears Rosalie’s voice in his mind once again.
You’re here .
She sounds surprised, and Merlin feels a wave of guilt for what happened between them.
“Why would I want to be anywhere else?” he says pleasantly, like there isn’t sticky lake mud coating his shoes from when he stands too long in one place and the air isn’t threatening to suffocate him with memories of his dead loved ones.
You were pretty quick to get rid of me last time I saw you .
Merlin pinches his fingers together.
“I couldn’t stop you from being married, Rose,” he says quietly, and when he hears her laughter, it’s like a metal rod being jabbed through his brain.
You could’ve proposed. You could’ve taken me far away from him .
Merlin’s feet have sunk far enough into the wet sand that when he pulls his foot up to take a step, the resulting squelch is enough to distract him from her voice.
“You know I couldn’t have,” he insists gently, more convincing himself than her, but when he takes a step forward, his gentle tone does nothing to placate her scream.
You let him take me away! Away from everything I cared about! she cries, and Merlin feels his eyes burn.
“I didn’t know your ship would go down. I couldn’t have known.” As he steps forward, her words turn bitter.
But if you had been there, you would’ve been able to keep us safe! You could’ve repaired the mast and stopped the storm and put all that water back in the sea where it belonged!
Merlin lets logic take over and attaches himself to her statement.
“You’re not real,” he says simply.
Of course I’m real , the not-Rose’s voice replies in a yell, and Merlin stops walking, if only to have a moment to himself to think.
“Rosie had no idea about my magic. She never would have said that to me.” And for a moment, he feels better. It’s like he’s cracked the code on a safe and the door has swung open in a satisfying arc after he’d spent hours banging on it uselessly.
The feeling starts to fade as soon as not-Rose speaks again.
Doesn’t mean what I’m saying isn’t true , she says in a sing-song voice. She’s mocking him, whatever she is, and Merlin starts to realize he has no idea what he’s gotten himself into.
He begins to run, and with every step, his head aches with the sound of Rose’s screams. With Jon, the screaming had stopped after Merlin went far enough, so he just keeps running and running and running in hopes that maybe, just maybe he can outrun her.
And when her voice breaks off in the middle of a word, he keeps running. He locks his magic down tight inside himself and runs until he can’t breathe or think or understand anything the voices are saying.
They come faster now, one voice after another, blending together as flickers of memory color the dark water surrounding him. His name, so many of his names, are screamed around him as he keeps running, keeps pushing, until his heart is begging him to stop but he won’t stop because if he stops he will never start again.
The voices get jumbled and confusing and he can’t tell what’s happening. Snippets of memories, guilt pulling him in a million directions. Names, names, so many names, faces blurring in his mind, and the memories are not a comfort anymore they’re a burden and they’re suffocating him and he’s going to collapse under the weight of them and they’re calling him so many names he’s gone by so many names he can hardly remember who he is or what these faces are and all he wants to do is turn back or better yet just join them in the water so they can see, so they can see he’s just Merlin and he’s suffering so much, too.
And then a soft Merlin cuts through all the noise, and Merlin finally stops running.
The air changes, and everything is different.
“Gwen,” he whispers back, his breath coming in great, heaving gasps as his exhausted muscles shake. And he knows it isn’t her, that none of this has been anyone, not really, but his magic hears his name in Gwen’s voice and bursts out of him joyfully.
He falls to his knees as he can’t help but remember.
He can remember burning. Aching, cracking, burning all the way down his throat. He’d just spent two weeks screaming and crying and yelling at the gods, and he knew if he tried to speak, his voice would crack and wane and give way to a river of blood.
He remembers thinking this because Gwen’s dress was red where she stood by the window of the chambers she and Arthur shared.
Arthur, who was gone. Arthur, who had left him.
There was an unsheathed sword on the table, and the sight made Merlin’s eyes burn the same way his throat did, so he covered his mouth with his forearm to choke back a sob.
Gwen must have heard him and turned around, because somehow she came to his side and he must have said something or else he didn’t have to because he sunk to the ground and Gwen began crying and fell into his arms.
The only words he can remember are I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry. He was apologizing, over and over, for crying and for not saving Arthur and for never telling her before. Gwen must have told him to be quiet because he stopped talking and she pulled away to look into his eyes.
Soft brown. Warm. Red rimmed already, like she’d been crying for weeks. Because she probably knew in her heart the moment Arthur died the same way Merlin did.
Her hands were soft on his face. Nothing like they were when she was a servant. She was a good queen. Merlin pushed her and Arthur together and then he’d cleaved them apart.
Gwen was saying how she’s proud of him and so glad he’s her friend and is alright, and that they’ll see Arthur again, but all Merlin can remember thinking is that Arthur was not at peace and not resting and because they were tied together he will never be at rest. For a moment Merlin thought she knew about the prophecy as she wiped his tears away.
But no, she meant they’ll see each other in the afterlife, and Merlin didn’t have the heart to tell her he’d kept Arthur from finding peace . I always was a headache to him when he was alive, guess I still am now that he’s dead , he could have joked, but trying to speak would have only made his vocal chords burn.
And so he and Gwen sat in a tearful embrace on the floor of the chambers Arthur would never come back to, the unearthly silence echoing in his mind.
Merlin .
It’s so warm, the way she says it, and Merlin has to fight every instinct to not turn to the water and jump into her arms.
“Hello, Gwen.” He tastes salt on his lips when he says it, and her presence feels comforting instead of haunting as he wipes away tears.
Back in Camelot. That’s what the change in the air is. The scent feels familiar, like it’s from a dream Merlin can’t quite remember. He can hear Gwen’s smile when she replies, and the urge to turn to her is even stronger.
It’s time, isn’t it?
He lets out a wet laugh. “Yes. It’s time.”
The little light sweeps over his body before hovering in front of his nose. This isn’t Gwen, it seems to chide, this isn’t really her.
But it feels like her, and Merlin isn’t ready to get off the ground just yet.
You could just stay with me , Gwen says sweetly, and Merlin shakes his head resolutely.
“I’ve failed before. I will not fail this, not after so much time.”
If Gwen really were there, Merlin knows disappointment would be dulling her eyes.
The thought is enough for him to pull himself off the ground. He takes a breath, then a small step.
You’ve forced me to be alone for so long. The least you could do is keep me company for awhile .
The change in tone is so sharp that even though he expects it, Merlin winces.
“No. You never resented me for that. You told me it was alright. You found another to love.”
The laugh in his mind is cruel.
That was before I languished here a thousand years.
And even if he knows it can’t be the truth, it makes Merlin feel sick.
“You were happy with Leon.” He’s lost his rhythm, and he’s afraid if he tries to run again, he’ll collapse.
I was never happy after you let Arthur die , she yells, and the shrill fury in her voice is enough to catalyze Merlin’s running because he knows Gwen would never yell at him like that and whatever is yelling does not have good intentions.
The little light seems pleased with him as it whizzes on ahead, and Merlin pretends it’s the only thing in the entire world that matters.
His magic feels more alive than it has in centuries, and Merlin thinks that if he tries to contain it, it will burn him from the inside out.
Merlin .
Gwen’s cries are replaced with another deceivingly soft voice, and Merlin’s magic swells.
He remembers warm metal in his hand, the engraving well known to his dexterous fingers. He held it tightly against his chest, pretending the heartbeat thumping against it was Arthur’s and not his.
There are tiny dents in the wall next to his bed, Merlin remembers thinking numbly, wondering briefly how they got there, his eyes tracing the light upturns of wood over and over until the wood is blurry in his memory.
He hadn’t changed his clothes for far too long. He’d stayed there in bed, lying atop his blankets like a useless child for far too long. He remembers the way food hardly seemed worth the effort anymore, especially since it wasn’t like he could die of starvation.
He can remember the sound of his door creaking well, from the decade he spent pulling it open and closed and trying to sneak out. He remembers hoping it was an assassin, armed with a blade forged in dragon’s breath, and feeling oddly disappointed when it was Leon that called his name.
Leon had begged him to get out of bed, saying something angry about self-pity and wasting away. Something about how badly Gwen needed him.
Merlin said something about Leon only being there because Gwen was sad, and Leon said something about friends grieving together.
He can’t remember much else in the conversation, except for the end of it.
“It would break his heart to see you like this,” Leon had said quietly, and the numbness that had enslaved Merlin for the six months since Arthur’s death had cracked for an instant.
“Then he should have held on a little longer. We were—we were so close and he gave up.” The tears spilled out. “He left me. He—he knew and he abandoned me.”
He remembers the stewing of anger and grief and bitterness boil over inside him.
“Arthur loved you more than he was ever able to tell you. I can promise you he held on as long as he could.”
“If he loved me, he would’ve held on longer.”
Merlin .
“Leon.”
And he keeps moving no matter how badly he wants to stay and speak to his friend.
You’re going to get Arthur, aren’t you? To take Gwen away from me?
Merlin knows that the voices just want to make him angry, make him hurt, so he stays with them, but it still makes his heart ache to hear such a thing from such a kind man. “Nobody could ever make Gwen do anything she didn’t want to, Leon.”
She never truly loved me because you gave her hope that Arthur would return .
“Gwen loved you,” Merlin says sharply, because she did.
And yet you let her lose me like she lost Arthur .
“Gwen told me not to try anything I’d regret,” he hisses back,
We spent so many years together. Did our friendship mean so little to you that you wouldn’t go behind our backs? But we weren’t like Arthur, nobody was good enough for you after Arthur, the voice screams, but Merlin grits his teeth and continues forward.
“The real Leon would never say this,” Merlin says more to himself than the voice, and the Leon in his head is laughing when he disappears.
Merlin .
“Mum,” he whispers, half-reverently, and half in fear of what weapons she will pull on him.
For some reason, he thinks less of a memory than a scene. Sitting outside, watching his mother balance on the roof as she rewove the pieces he’d caused to fly out during a nightmare. It’s hardly a happy scene, his mother concentrating and guilt creeping through him for causing the trouble, but there’s also a sense of pride in it. That his mother was always so strong.
My darling boy , she murmurs when he stops, but as soon as he starts again, her voice turns sharp. How could you abandon me, for all those years ?
Conversing with the voices has made them more bearable so far, but Merlin knows if he tries to talk, he’ll break down into tears.
You were always so busy with your destiny that you forgot about your mother. Do you know what it was like for me? To have a child out of wedlock, and raise him alone? Do you understand how difficult that was? And you repaid me by forgetting about me once something better came along .
Each jab hits harder than the last, and Merlin feels like he’s gotten lost inside himself, stumbling through the darkness until he can catch a glimpse of what is worth going on for.
You won’t even look at me now, you useless fool ! Look at me , she screams, look at me!
His magic wants to sing in apology, to beg for her forgiveness, and just before he gives in to the urge to stop, she fades away.
Merlin .
Crunch-thump, crunch-thump, crunch-thump.
He can remember the rhythmic motion of chopping through stems on Gaius’ workbench. The movement is still engrained in Merlin today, the gentle press of the knife, back to front, back to front. He can still smell the lavender masking the odor of whatever he had been working on at the time.
He remembers Gaius on his bed, gazing out into the distance with glassy eyes, and for an awful moment, Arthur’s eyes replaced Gaius’ and a wave of grief crashed through Merlin.
It had been two years, and somehow, everything still felt raw, like he had a nerve exposed and no one had bothered to help it heal.
It’s unfair to phrase it like that, he knew, since everyone else had been grieving. But with Gwaine gone and Arthur missing and Merlin half-losing his mind and then Merlin being appointed Court Sorcerer, no one quite understood how to treat him.
And it was okay, of course, he was doing okay. Sure, he woke up every morning with a gaping wound where the other half of him was meant to be, and he may or may not have imagined Arthur’s voice in his head far too often for it to be normal, and he may have thought about retrieving Excalibur from the lake of Avalon and joining Arthur so he doesn’t have to wait anymore a little too often for it to be healthy.
But he was fine. He’s fine.
He remembers the knife suddenly biting down on his finger and pulling it back with a wince and small curse. Gaius didn’t move on his bed, and as Merlin wrapped his finger in a cloth and watched him, he knew the end was soon.
The bed creaked as he sat, old and sad and not used to the additional weight Merlin provided. Gaius’ hand was cold in his own, he remembers, old and calloused like only a physician’s could be. It hurt him that Gaius started slipping away so quickly. There was only so much he can do, even with magic, but he felt at peace with it.
Or maybe he just couldn’t process the idea that Gaius was going to die, he thinks in retrospect. That Gaius was going to die, that everyone he’d ever known is going to die as well. Maybe he had shut himself off from feeling anything after Arthur.
He remembers panicked breaths, tears rushing to his eyes, more out of instinct than anything since he couldn’t quite feel sad. He remembers the thought taking hold of his throat and gripping him tightly, squeezing and squeezing and squeezing until he knew he was going to die before he had a chance to lose anyone else.
He feels the same way now, the pain of the voices building up around him, a chorus for the back of his mind, until they’re trickling down the back of his throat along with the tears and drowning him as he stands, frozen, on the path.
His magic surges protectively, looking for the threat, looking for a problem to fix, but instead it finds the aching emptiness inside of him.
Don’t think I don’t know what you did, Gaius says firmly, more like he’s reprimanding Merlin for stealing a piece of chicken than what he actually did, so Merlin decides he can stand for a moment and catch his breath.
Leaving Camelot to fend for herself , he tuts. The little light flashes in warning, and Merlin pulls his hands off his thighs and straightens his back.
“I did what I thought was best,” he says calmly, then takes a quick breath and breaks into a steady jog.
You abandoned Camelot! You broke your word to me!
Merlin keeps running.
Gwen needed you! Her children needed you! And you left them behind for years in order to make yourself feel better!
Merlin keeps running.
As Gaius prattles on in his half-mad roar, Merlin begins humming Arthur’s song again. It’s funny, that he calls it Arthur’s song even though he’d only heard Arthur sing it once. All the other knights had probably sung it a hundred times, but it was only ever the once with Arthur.
Arthur.
Arthur, who he is going to be with soon.
The thought isn’t quite enough to drown out Gaius in his mind, but it makes everything a little bit easier.
Somewhere among the names and faces and angry accusations, Merlin realizes that there can’t be more than a handful of people left. The thought that Arthur might be close makes his magic sing with anticipation.
He is at once so weary that he might fall to the ground and sleep forever and the most awake he’s been in 1500 years.
1500 years.
He allows himself to stop for a moment as the thought latches onto the part of his brain not being yelled at in Gaius’ voice.
He’s spent years telling himself he hasn’t been counting. It’s a lie. He’s counted every damn day he was left to wait. Every day a little more magic faded from the world and flocked to him, like he could protect it from disappearing. Every day the world turned more foreign, more unrecognizable, Merlin has counted.
Merlin .
Gaius’ voice is replaced by Gwaine’s, and Merlin begins to cry as his magic leaps out of him, searching for the friend he has missed so desperately.
Like with his mother, there’s no specific moment he remembers. It’s all loud laughs and goofy smiles and arms thrown around his shoulder like there’s nowhere else they belongs. Merlin remembers quiet evenings when Gwaine joined him at Gaius’, watching him cook up salves and potions with his head resting on his arms, laughing as he tried to copy Merlin’s movements.
He can remember the moment he learned Gwaine was dead. His throat was raw from weeks of yelling at the sky, and he could barely stand with the weight of his grief. He was sitting in Gauis’ chambers, eyes fixed on a leaky patch of roof, when Percival had knocked softly.
Merlin remembers Percival telling him, saying Morgana got to him, they were trying to make it right, and the worst of it is that he didn’t really care. Not in the shadow of Arthur, not when everything he understood had been torn away on the whim of a twisted version of destiny.
He didn’t even cry when Percival handed him one of Gwaine’s gloves. Merlin had tossed it onto the table and slipped back into his numb daze.
Before you ask, there aren’t any taverns ‘round when you’re dead .
It sounds so much like Gwaine that Merlin can perfectly imagine turning back to find Gwaine grinning at him and tackling his foolish friend in a giant hug.
“That must be terrible for you,” Merlin says, even though he knows responding will only make it more difficult to leave.
1500 years sober, gotta be some kind of record .
Merlin laughs against his will, tasting tears on his lips.
“I bet it is.” He lingers for a moment before taking a shaky breath. “I know you’re not really Gwaine—”
You always were clever, weren’t you?
“—but I damn well wish you were.” The continuance makes the voice quiet for a moment, like it’s entering uncertain terrain.
Wouldn’t have thought you cared, considering you didn’t give me half a thought when I died.
And even if this isn’t really Gwaine, an awful sense of guilt washes over Merlin.
Your precious Arthur died, so you didn’t have time to care that I was gone .
Merlin wants to protest, but he knows it’s true. The Gwaine in his head starts to feel real. Merlin can’t get himself to move on.
You always chose him over me. Even when he treated you like dirt. He always came first.
Merlin’s feet feel stuck to the muddy ground.
Even now, you’re going to leave me to find Arthur. As if he’s thought about you once since he died.
Arthur. Right. Arthur. Merlin has to move.
“I’m sorry,” he winces as he takes a small step forward, and it pains him when Gwaine begs him not to go.
He repeats the apology on every step like a prayer. It feels like an age passes before Gwaine’s shouting stops. His lungs feel ragged, like someone has taken an axe to them and left his flesh in mangled pieces.
Merlin .
Merlin doesn’t have time for this. “If I promise to walk slowly, will you not shout at me?” he snaps, and the Lancelot in his head laughs warmly.
Alright. If you wish .
He takes a step forward, and for the first time, the voice sharing his head doesn’t scream at him to stop.
If all he’s had to do is ask nicely this whole time, he is going to demand a refund.
Besides Arthur, his magic has always liked Lance best. Maybe it’s because Lance knew from practically the beginning, maybe it’s because of their shared conspiratorial smiles, or because Lancelot was the first person in Camelot that understood him. Regardless of the reason, it begs to be set free so Merlin might bask in the memory of his friend.
“Why aren’t you yelling, like the others?” Merlin finally asks when he’s walked awhile in silence.
You were the one who asked me to be quiet .
“Would the rest of them been quiet if I’d asked?”
No , the voice says, but it doesn’t elaborate.
He walks on for a few minutes in silence, but with every step, the desire to stop and talk gnaws at him with such fierce intensity that Merlin has to assume the silence is its own specialized kind of hell. After all the yelling and screaming and crying pounding in his head, he would have expected the silence to be a nice reprieve. Instead, the air feels suffocating as the little light bounces gently a few feet ahead of him.
It should have been you , the voice of Lancelot suddenly says into the quiet of Merlin’s mind, the words sounding forced and a little breathless, like it’s the only chance he’ll have to say them.
“What should have been me?” Merlin asks, but it’s silly of him. He knows the answer.
At the veil , the voice replies anyway, you should have been the one to go through.
And out of everything he expects himself to say—that it wasn’t his time, that he would’ve done anything in his power to stop Lancelot from going through—he instead whispers, “I sometimes wish it had been.”
Lancelot’s voice gives a little sigh, but it’s gone before Merlin can hear its reply.
Merlin .
Chills run down his spine as the soft lull of Lancelot’s voice drifts out of his mind and is replaced with the bright lilt of Morgana’s.
She doesn’t sound like a woman who spent the last desperate years of her life trying to get revenge for all the ways she was wronged by her family and her kingdom. No, this sounds like the Morgana from before. Before her magic left her terrified, before Uther’s harshness toward her turned cruel, before Morgause offered her the acceptance she had so badly needed.
“I’m sorry,” Merlin chokes out, and he stops again.
And whether it’s on the defensive or recognizing a kindred soul, his magic pushes out of him before there’s any way for him to stop it.
He can remember the way Morgana had grinned at him when she thought he liked Gwen, the way her eyes sparkled when she argued with Arthur over silly things. The way she’d told him she was going to Ealdor to help his mother, how she’d asked quiet questions about magic over the body of the sleeping Druid boy that would one day destroy their lives.
How she’d been so helpless and scared and alone and how Merlin had handed her over to destiny so thoughtlessly.
How he’d poisoned her instead of helping her, how the light in her eyes faded when he cried holding her instead of just explaining what was going on.
How it was his fault, everything she became.
“I’m sorry,” he says again through tears, and he hates that this isn’t her, that she’s dead and he’ll never be able to take back everything that happened between them.
You think I could forgive you for everything you’ve done ? Morgana asks him, and Merlin knows that he can’t.
“It was all my fault,” Merlin whispers, and he forgets everything about why he’s here.
You never thought things through far enough. Every time you tried to outrun destiny, you just played right into its hand. You’re a fool, Merlin .
Merlin laughs emptily. “I know that, Morgana. Gods, I know.”
You did everything wrong then.
“I know,” he repeats. Before she can reply, he remembers why he is here and begins walking again.
Do you think you won’t do everything wrong this time?
“I hope not.” It’s an honest answer, and he can hear her laugh in his head. It isn’t the cold, manic laugh from the later Morgana. This laugh is soft, like flowing water. Merlin hasn’t heard it in so long that it feels like he’s been punched in the gut.
By talking to me, you’re doing this wrong .
Merlin is just glad she isn’t yelling yet. “I’m still walking, aren’t I?”
You’ve barely moved three steps since I came .
For an instant, panic flares in Merlin’s gut when he realizes he stopped moving. Then he shoves it down and keeps walking.
This time, the voice returns angry.
You really think, after all this time, you even remember how to be Emrys? You failed at it then; what’s to stop you from failing now?
The words are plucking at every exposed nerve Merlin has, so he presses his groaning legs into the ground and starts to run again.
“Keep going, keep going, keep going,” he mutters on his exhales, even if he can’t hear himself over the sound of Morgana’s yells.
And even when the voice changes and it’s Balinor and every inch of him screams to stop, to stay, that they had so little time together and now they can have all the time in the damn world, he keeps going. He lets the burn of his muscles obliterate any voice in his head and keeps pressing on, and on, and on.
You let me die , he screams, you could’ve saved me, I’m your father!
He ignores him until the words blur together and they’re just noises.
Then it’s Will, but not his Will. There’s no warm laughter or snappy comebacks, just screaming and wailing and how could you choose him over me?
Then it’s every voice at once, and his head is no longer his own.
Look at us , they beg him, just once. Just one last memory .
He promises himself it’s just for an instant, but then he turns his head and his eyes are stuck looking. The figures beyond the wall are so far away that he can barely see them. He takes a step closer, like he’s being pulled in on a fishing line.
They get clearer, and he sees Will and Lancelot and Gwaine and Morgana and Balinor and Lancelot is extending a hand to him. All he has to do is reach past the wall an inch, and he will be able to grasp Lancelot’s hand. The little light returns, waving in front of his nose desperately, half-blinding him.
Come on, Merlin, you deserve to rest .
But the voices in his head waver for an instant when the light bumps against his temple, and Merlin remembers that this isn’t Lancelot. This isn’t really Lancelot, or Gwaine, or Balinor, or Will, or Morgana, and he has to get out of here.
Why is he here? For some reason he’s still reaching, and the faces in the wall flicker. The five shadows are slowly joined by more and more and more until it looks like an army has amassed, just behind the wall. An army of people he has lost and he needs to make things right with so they don’t hate him in death.
These are not his friends. These are not his friends. These are not his friends.
His head becomes a little less fuzzy, and the faces of his friends transform into something gruesome, something half-decayed.
With a burst of energy, Merlin pulls his hand away and stumbles backwards. Pulling his eyes away has made him feel like his lungs are filling with sand and everything hurts and now the voices are back, all at once, at full force, and he runs with everything left in him to the light peeking out ahead.
The blue light urges him on, and he pretends it’s just the light he’s running towards and the future of Albion isn’t riding on the next few moments.
And then he’s stumbling, stumbling past the voices and the cries and the hands reaching for what they can never touch as the ground turns pliant beneath his feet. He’s falling before he can stop himself.
And then he’s on the ground.
At first, he thinks it’s the same sand shifting through his fingers that makes his eyes burn like he’s set them aflame, but when he looks up, he realizes it’s the orange twilight pouring over him like rainfall.
He has made it.