Work Text:
“You kill me, and you’ll have all of Camelot to answer to.”
In hindsight, Odin supposed he should have heeded the warning of the late King with more care than he initially gave. Bloodlust blinds one’s sight, as they say.
For reasons he would find out soon enough, he had survived the magically-induced earthquake when all his men lie in a heap of corpse and rubble all around him, the earsplitting roar of rage and agony so raw that shook the walls of the cave piercing through his very soul that he still felt even as he kept running and running- Like a game in a hunt he enjoys to take part of in his spare time, every snap of a twig had his eyes darting around in fear, threats crawling beneath his skin, clawing into him. Run, run, run—
Later, the news of Camelot’s King’s demise would soon reach the rest of Albion, the body nowhere to be found within the wreckage. Some say an ancient magic was involved, the blood of the last Pendragon a fuel to light up the path to restore the glory of the Old Religion. Others say it was simply swallowed by the Earth, taking back what was rightfully hers.
No one knew the truth.
“They will hunt you.”
Turns out the Knights of Camelot really was the least of his worries, as he had predicted.
Oh, they fought well. The Queen held her people and Knights with an iron grip that he had slightly miscalculated, but still it was a fight he could dance with his eyes closed, a battle song sung from the day he was born into the world, alive and bred to fight to the death. Even as his forces were pushed back and he was brought to the Queen, her cold eyes raking over him in silent disgust, evaluating his worth and all the political stance this could mean for her Kingdom, he had already accepted his fate.
But as soon as his eyes fell onto the man standing a little bit behind the Queen to her right, he knew the reason he had survived for this long was no luck. Not his skill or battle prowess.
Emrys, they called him. What Morgana called him. The most powerful sorcerer to ever walk the planet, with the Earth, the Sea and the Sky at his very commands—staring eerily back into him as if looking and prodding at his very soul with careless yet thorough inspection.
The frightening being with burning, golden eyes that now haunts his dreams every single night in his cell, taunting and coddling his very being day and night, whispers of promises of tearing him limb by limb, repeating the image of his own severed from his very body (“Just like Arthur,” it whispered fondly. Suffer-) as he was forced to watch how the very dull blade agonizingly cut through each vein in his neck, tearing right through his skin and muscles before his brain had managed to shut down completely, having him relieve the pain over and over and over-
“And they will find you.”
Morgana is no more, the rumors hushed under moonlight; all beings connected to magic buzzing with unease as the witch finally perished. Her magic snuffed out of the very earth with no traces of it left whatsoever, simply gone from existence. No legacy to call her own other than being the crazed half-sister to the late King of Camelot.
Odin could not help but envy her.
‘You’ve taken my King from me, from Camelot—from all of us,’ it- he hissed, darkness coiling around his heart with a grip that could easily crush mountains, rigid cold slamming into the small space he occupied like a raging blizzard whenever he paid a visit. Odin shuddered. It had barely begun. ‘You’ve upset the balance of the universe and for that you shall pay.’
Death sounded much, much sweeter than anything Emrys had given him thus far.
“And they will not rest until they’re done.”
The rotting carcass of the former King was starting to garner the attention of the resident rats and flies, which would not do. Camelot had to maintain its hygiene after all. It was a minor lapse on his part really, he already forgot that it still existed.
With a blink of gold eyes (Not blue. Never blue. Not anymore-) the putrid mesh of bones and meat crumbled into nothingness, not even something worthy to be offered back to the Earth or be blown into the Sky.
Emrys slunk back to the Throne Room, where his Queen and her trusted council (Only those he gave a seal of approval. No more betrayals. No more stabbing behind their backs. No more-) was busy reexamining the recent attacks from Odin’s borders, their people still refusing to answer to her demand- er, request to discuss a more peaceful route for the future of both kingdoms.
It was a shame, truly.
He had offered his help in...‘convincing’ them much quicker the previous night, to which Guinevere had finally looked at him properly, her many letters of state matters abandoned while she regarded him with a…strange, faraway look, as if noticing him for the very first time. But…that could not be, for he was the one who brought her to Arthur’s perfectly intact body resting peacefully on the Isle of the Blessed, her grief bursting out in unending streams of tears and wails, arms clutching painfully to his non-corporeal body.
(Except it wasn’t painful, because he no longer feels any pain, or any other sensation for that matter—only that his memory suggests that it should be and-)
“You would do it if I asked it of you, wouldn’t you, Merlin?” Her voice was soft, the dim candlelight casting a shadow over her distant eyes. She continued to gaze at him, waiting, head tilted inquisitively.
Bowing his head in deference. “Emrys, my Lady,” he corrected absently before pressing on, “I live to serve the King, and now his Queen. And no one else.”
Because no one else will ever deserve his loyalty. Or his love and devotion. No one will ever be as worthy as him, with the exception of the lady before him.
When he looked back up, her strained smile reflected the unbearable sorrow in her eyes, a single tear falling down her hollowed cheek- but he could not for the life of him figure out why, even as the familiar tugging in his chest prevailed.
Is this a glimpse of how it felt when he had a functioning heart once?
Easing away the phantom pain where his heart used to be, he decided that very moment that he liked this state much better.
(Yet somewhere deep within him, in a secluded, locked corner where Merlin still hurts and lives and breathes, he would instantly know that Gwen was mourning the loss of the dearest and oldest friend she had. Merlin did what he only could—he grieved along with her.)