[Fic] The Burden of Your Blues (pt. 4) - for yelloerainboe

[solstice_mods]

[ Part One] | [ Part Two] | [ Part Three]



So then they had about twenty such hours, Arthur obviously unsure how to comport himself in their tenuous situation, but not in the uncomfortable way Merlin had thought was a possibility. Instead, he was giving Merlin long, somewhat indecipherable looks, smiling unexpectedly at comments he previously might have scoffed at. Merlin would smile back, and he meant it, more than he wanted to admit, but every time he did he felt guiltier. If Arthur had exceeded his expectations in so many ways -- not that he wasn't still an ass in so many ways -- who was to say he couldn't do the same for the most important issue of all?

He was fortunate, in a cop-out sort of way, that the issue got decided for him.

On Friday afternoon he was handed a note by some lower student he'd never seen before.

"Merlin," he read, "I would be pleased if you would join me for tea today, Gaius."

Arthur shouldered his tennis bag. "Won't get a better chance. I'd tell you to use your subtle skills of espionage, but I don't actually think you have any. So you'll just have to do whatever it takes."

"Thanks, Arthur," Merlin said dryly.

"I do mean whatever, Merlin," Arthur said, looking at him suggestively.

"That's disgusting!" he protested.

"We all have to make sacrifices for the greater good," Arthur said archly, and loped off to practice. Merlin made a mental note to tell him later how stupid he looked running with the bag.

Gaius had tea set up on a plain but expensive-looking set, much better fare than the school put out for the break between classes.

The small talk was a little strained, especially since Merlin kept trying to figure out how to segue a question about his Maths teacher into about that cult book you had that I stole... and forgetting an actual response for the original query. He didn't know why Gaius himself kept pausing awkwardly as well, but figured it out when Gaius took a long, crooked-browed look at him and said, "I don't mean for this to come out wrong, but I noticed yesterday that some of my books had been moved, and now I can't find one. I know it's a little haphazard in there, so I wouldn't be surprised if you'd knocked them over and simply put one back in the wrong place. It's very valuable to me personally, and I wouldn't want to lose it."

Merlin panicked. Only internally, he hoped, but he wasn't sure how long his playing it cool act could last when all he wanted was information about the book.

"I... Did knock some over," he admitted, standing up and walking to the shelf to stall a bit. "I thought I put them all back where they were, which one was it?"

"It was smaller than most of these, unmarked except for a depiction of a heart on the cover. It should have been with the rest of these."

Merlin pretended to look for the book, kneeling down for a better effect. "You knew my mother, right?"

"I did."

"For how long? It's just, I don't really ever remember you, so it must have been a while?"

"That it has. I actually have met you before, but you were so small I'm not surprised you've forgotten."

"And you... Basically got me into this school, right?"

"No. I did suggest you apply, but you were accepted in your own right."

"So Mum must trust you a lot."

"Merlin," Gaius said, and waited until Merlin looked up at him. "What is this about?"

"Why does she trust you?" Merlin asked again. He couldn't think of a way around just admitting the whole story, so he knew he had to take a risk of trusting Gaius, but he wasn't going to do it without at least some confirmation from the man on why he should.

"Your mother and I used to work together at a hospital. I helped her, when I could. She's a very strong woman, but in those days, there were some things that were difficult for a single woman to do."

"So she must not think you're the type to stand by and let an innocent boy die."

"What on earth? Stand up, Merlin, and look at me."

He did. "Cornelius Sigan."

Gaius frowned. "So you have the book?" He sounded surprised, which wasn't what Merlin had expected; he'd assumed Gaius had known he'd taken it all along.

"Cornelius Sigan killed a lot of people," he said. He probably sounded like a total idiot, but it was important to get just one bit of confirmation that Gaius didn't condone all Sigan's actions.

"He was a very evil man," Gaius set, and Merlin sighed enormously in relief.

"I took the book," he explained. Gaius opened his mouth, but Merlin raised a hand to stop his words. "I took it because, well, because I'd seen that heart before."

"Hearts aren't exactly uncommon, Merlin."

"What about blue heart-shaped diamonds? What about blue heart-shaped diamonds that a woman tries to use to force Arthur's soul out of him?"

Gaius sucked in a breath, and suddenly looked very, very old. "You'd better tell me everything," he said, voice strained and harsh.

He gave the most detailed explanation he could, rushed but thorough, because Gaius still looked sceptical and Merlin knew how insane it all sounded. He didn't leave anything out, from the police station to the revelations about the henges and the moon. He didn't explain about his magic, though, because that was an even deeper secret, one he wouldn't reveal if Gaius didn't believe the foundation.

"If this is true," Gaius said when he was done, sitting limp and resigned in one of the chairs they'd been to take tea on. "They must have found the watcher, and we may be unable to stop them. I knew they were trying, but I didn't predict they'd even convince the watcher to help them resurrect Sigan."

"Do you know who the watcher is?" Merlin asked excitedly, grasping hard at the back of the chair. He'd probably missed his last class, he realised, but even if he still had time, he wasn't going.

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you, boy," Gaius said. "But it will suffice to say he is very, very old, and unless they are somehow stopped, they'll succeed with his help."

"Do you know how?" Merlin felt like his heart would leap through his throat, this was so much more than he'd hoped for.

"I could probably figure it out, but it wouldn't matter. Magic like that can only be stopped with more magic, and there hasn't been anyone powerful enough to fight Cornelius Sigan in nearly a millennium. I'm not sure there's anyone alive who could do more than cheap parlour tricks with the greatest of training and concentration."

"How... How powerful would you have to be?"

"Merlin," Gaius said, looking at him with a hopeful cant to his eyes for the first time since they'd begun the conversation. "Why are you asking me?"

He'd thought about this moment his entire life, wondered what the look in their eyes would be before he said it, and after. He'd thought about it so much, in fact, that now the moment had come he couldn't even say it. It meant too much. "I think you know," was all he could say, biting his lip.

"My God, boy. Does anyone else know? You haven't told anyone here, have you?"

He shook his head. "No one ever, just my mum. But -- if Gwen and Arthur and Morgana are going to help me, I'm going to tell them. I won't lie to them about it, not to their faces."

"Arthur didn't tell Uther any of this?"

"He tried, but Uther didn't believe it."

"That's just as well, he wouldn't have reacted well if he had," Gaius said, gaze far away for a moment.

"So you'll help?" Merlin asked. "Please, we can't do it without you."

"I don't like it, not one whit, but we've so little time, I don't think there's another option."

"There's not," Merlin declared. "And I can do it, if you just tell me what to do."

----

He'd stayed so late that he actually missed dinner, too, but as he closed the door to Gaius' quarters behind him, the man bent deep over another book full of writing he'd never seen before -- spells, he'd said, actual spells -- it occurred to him what he had to do.

He had to sprint to catch them all in time, hoping none of them had left early. He saw them right before they would split to head to their rooms, in a small knot, heads together and talking so low he couldn't even hear them when he skidded to a halt right behind Morgana's dark head.

"Merlin," Gwen said, catching him first from her vantage point across the triangle. Morgana and Arthur looked up at him with such similar expressions that he was abruptly reminded that they'd truly grown up together.

"I have -- I have to tell you something," he said, feeling antsy and a bit mad and not sure whether it would help him more to look serious or give a mad, relieved grin he like wanted.

"Okay," Arthur said, looking at him. They all three waited.

"No, no, not here."

He led them down the same path he'd walked alone before, hurrying them along when they kept stopping, confused, to ask where he was taking them. It was long dark, and the half-moon in the sky did little to light the forest after the last lamp post faded into the night.

"If you're trying to lead us into the woods to kill us where no one's around," Morgana said after she stumbled on a tree root and had grabbed Gwen's hand to steady herself, "You should know I don't need a foil to fight."

"It's not that," he promised, spinning back to smile at her. "We're almost there."

It wasn't as far as he typically went, but it was far enough in the darkness, and he didn't want one of them to get hurt wandering the unfamiliar path.

"Okay, okay," he said, turning to stop them and gathering in close. Arthur was looking at him a little like he thought Merlin was a crazy person, a little like he was about to leave, and very impatiently. "I just talked to Gaius and... He knows who the watcher is. He wouldn't tell me--"

"Then why are we here," Arthur said. Gwen shushed him, and he looked at her so surprised Merlin wondered if anyone had ever shushed him before in his entire life. He giggled at the thought, high on adrenaline and hope and relief to finally be saying it.

"That's not the important part. The important part is that he thinks he knows what I can do to stop them -- or at least, he'll figure it out."

"What you can do?" Arthur asked, and then, "I still don't know why we're here." Gwen looked like she was about to ask a question, too, but Morgana was just watching him, that same probing, intimidating look in her that he imagined from her matches.

"It has to be me because," he began.

And he stopped. He looked at them all again, Arthur's mouth still open to demand something else, Gwen waiting silently and Morgana still looking like she knew something more than he did. As he watched her, her whole face changed.

"Merlin, are you--?" she said, tone like a question but either not quite sure what she was asking or as unable to actually say it as he was. He nodded.

"Is he what?" Arthur asked, annoyed.

"Oh my God." Gwen's eyes were wide, but she didn't look angry at all, what he most dreaded.

"What," Arthur said again, pitched higher.

"Magic, you idiot!" Morgana exclaimed. "He's magic!" Merlin looked at her. "Sorry," she said, expression sheepish.

"That's ridiculous," Arthur said. "Merlin, what did you--" He met Arthur's eyes, sure his guilty expression said everything he himself had been unable to.

Arthur must have thought so, too, because he stared back, mouth pursed but blank eyed, for a long moment of silence all around. Then he turned around and stalked back the way they'd come. Sort of, at least.

"Arthur!" Merlin called, but he didn't stop, not that Merlin had really been expecting him to. Merlin looked at Gwen and Morgana, to his right. They were surprised, but fine, of course, and Arthur was angry, or hurt, or whatever it was he didn't want Merlin to know, because of course he didn't know how to actually deal with anything.

Of course Merlin took off after him.

"You're not even going the right way!" he said when he was close enough to to grab Arthur's sleeve. Arthur's face was shadowed in the dark.

"I think I am," he said flatly.

"Well, you're not." He realised with a pang he'd left Gwen and Morgana in the dark with only the hope of an excellent sense of direction to get back. He'd go back for them, if they needed, after he fixed this.

Arthur kept walking, though, and nearly took his eye out on a low branch he barely saw in time. Still kept walking.

"Can't you make some light with your special secret powers," he said, stomping through the crackling layer of dead leaves over the soil.

"Yes," Merlin said. Arthur didn't actually turn around, but he looked over his shoulder at the pale, glowing ball cupped in Merlin's palm, reflecting in his eyes, and waited at least for Merlin to get abreast of him. They walked in silence until they reached the edge of the woods, considerably further from the school than where they'd started. Arthur frowned, then started trudging back up the path. Merlin sighed; apparently he'd have to do it while they went.

"If you were me," Merlin began, glad his legs were actually longer than Arthur's, "what would you have said? If you were me, and I was you and my father didn't even let the teachers at his school talk about magic, and the the only magic I'd seen was someone trying to kill me, and first I said it was magic and then I said I didn't even believe in magic when you tried to ask, and then I was so -- you were so... And you'd never told anyone and your mother had made you swear not to, not ever, but you thought that maybe something was more important than your secret, but you still didn't even know how, and--"

"I think you lost me after your forty-third switched pronoun," Arthur told him, but he stopped and looked at him. "How long?"

"I -- my whole life. Always."

"Why'd you come here?"

Merlin laughed, one short, mirthless chuckle of agreement. "It's not like there's a magic school or anything," he said.

"Guess not," Arthur said, actually smiling, just a little. "Just... Leave me alone, for a bit." Merlin nodded; it wasn't what he wanted to do, but if Arthur needed it, then he'd comply, of course. There was still more to be said, like that even if there were a magic school Merlin probably wouldn't go -- he liked doing magic, loved it sometimes, but it wasn't all he wanted to do, to be. Those would have to wait.

He was still standing where Arthur had left him when the girls emerged from the woods, leaves in their hair but in pretty much the exact spot they'd gone in.

----

He gave Arthur until the next morning, sleeping in Gwen's bed while she squeezed in with Morgana. He'd intended to just use the floor, but she'd smiled and insisted it was hardly a big deal. They'd also very graciously not commented on his abandoning them in the dark and offered to let him sleep at theirs, so in return he'd answered all the questions they'd asked, first hesitantly and then with more confidence. It felt good -- wonderful, even -- to finally discuss it, made it more real and made him feel less set apart. Even if he was still different in some manner, it helped in ways he'd never imagined to know that he had friends who knew and didn't really think any differently of him for it. Arthur aside at the moment, but Merlin hadn't expected any better at first.

He woke up once from one of the dreams, but didn't feel as heavy with dread as usual and was able even alone to fall back to sleep easily. Sometime after dawn he got up to take a piss and decided to just go back. It was strange seeing the campus so empty in daylight, even the timid pale light of early morning, like he was the only one left.

Once he got to the door, he paused, trying to gather quickly an array of responses to whatever Arthur might say. He'd said most of what he could last night -- except, he realised, I'm sorry -- but he'd still try.

Then it occurred to him that Arthur was probably asleep, anyway, so he told himself to stop being so silly and opened the door.

Arthur was asleep, though at first Merlin had thought he hadn't come back, either, because his bed was empty and he was buried face-down under his blankets and Merlin's own, his blond head barely visible on Merlin's old, lumpy pillow.

Merlin toed off his shoes, not quite sure Arthur would appreciate what was he doing, but if he hadn't wanted to share he should've used his own damn bed. The clock said it was barely past five, which left him with plenty of time for a nap before actual morning.

Arthur was sleeping precariously close to falling backwards off the edge, leaving Merlin just enough room to squirm in next to the wall and under Arthur's outstretched right arm. Arthur didn't wake, just murmured something that was more a voiced sigh than actual words and pulled Merlin in with one strong flex.

The conversation came later, when Merlin's alarm went off like every other morning and Arthur slapped it off. If he was surprised to find Merlin there, he didn't show it. Nor did he say anything, or react much at all save turning back towards him, away from the alarm and everything else, to look at him.

Merlin looked back, half-wishing this could be the sort of thing they could just be manly, manly men about: brood for a while then hit each other or something and be fine, like the time he'd accidentally broken the arm off one of Will's transformers when they were too old for it to really matter but it still had. But he and Arthur didn't have the time for that luxury, and he actually wanted to say what he needed to.

"I am sorry," he said. Arthur blinked and looked evenly at him from under his eyebrows, obviously expecting more, so Merlin stumbled on. "I just... I really haven't ever told anyone before. It's been a secret for so long I don't even have to think about keeping it. I just... Do."

"Morgana?"

"She's just cleverer than the rest of us," Merlin admitted, rueful. "Probably wasn't a conclusion anyone should have drawn from what I actually said."

"No, you weren't making any sense at all," Arthur chastised, but his eyes were lighter. "So... Magic. It's real." He still didn't exactly look right, which Merlin could understand because Arthur's skills at dealing with internal conflict seemed to be approximately zilch, but also because it was contrary to everythingUther Pendragon had taught him. But he was still here, still looking at Merlin from across the bed, and that was a better start than Merlin had ever let himself hope for.

"I think so, at least." Merlin grinned, sighed and let some of the tension out of his shoulders. "But I've never met anyone else, or heard of them, even."

"Looks like it's up to us to make sure you don't have the wrong sort of company," Arthur said. He rolled Merlin onto his back, crawled over his thighs and straightened, pulling off his shirt. Merlin watched it go appreciatively, at least until Arthur dropped it onto his face. The cotton smelled like Arthur, strong and clean. "School first, though. Education for the masses, and all."

He felt that day like everything really was going to be alright, like they were invincible and Cornelius Sigan's crazy, berobed followers would rue the day they ambushed Merlin in the woods, like his friends knew -- Arthur knew -- and no one had called the police or headmasters or counsellors.

Every time Gwen met his eyes at lunch, he smiled so wide he felt his whole face change, until she started laughing nervously and asking if she had something on her face.

"No, no!" he protested. "It's just... I think this is all going to work, Gwen."

"Of course it is, Merlin," and when he looked at her expecting patronisation, falsity, he saw only his own happiness and hope.

-----

Morgana cornered him later, standing under a tree outside his building after he'd been let free for the weekend. He'd been planning on dropping off his books and heading toGaius' until dinner, but it was clear from her tight jaw that something important was on her mind.

"You should ask him," she said when he joined her, hunching slightly under the low-hanging branches, "how to destroy the stone."

"The stone?" He honestly hadn't thought that much about what specifically he would be called upon to do; he'd figured Gaius would tell him.

"I think... I think it's the key to stopping them."

"Alright," he agreed. "Did you see something in the book?"

She paused, open-mouthed. "No, I just think it's what we should do. Call it instinct."

"Instinct?" he repeated, half-wondering whether he considered that adequate to base their whole plan of action around.

Her eyes focused over his left shoulder, avoiding his gaze. It was the only display of reluctance he'd ever seen from her. "Well, I--"

"Are we actively trying to be mysterious now?"

Arthur peered at them both, head cocked and one hand keeping a particularly pointy shoot from taking out his eye.

"I've got to see Gaius," Merlin said, so abruptly that it immediately seemed like they were hiding something. He didn't think they were, exactly, but he didn't know what was going on, or why Morgana's talk of instincts made her so evasive.

Arthur must have thought so, too, because his brows drew down and his lips in.

"I'll tell you about it later," Merlin promised, thrusting his bag into Arthur's free arm. "Don't think Gaius likes waiting."

Gaius greeted Morgana's suggestion with a thoughtful pause.

"It might be a good idea," he said finally. "Only the watcher knows for certain how to defeat Sigan, so we'll be operating essentially on instinct ourselves. Unfortunately the best method I can imagine is lightning. There are methods to call it, with spells to control it, of course, but I don't know any of them. And if you tried without the proper focus and training, you'd be just as likely to destroy the person next to you, or yourself."

But he shortly came to another suggestion, some sort of synthesis of spells intended to banish the soul from its vessel and then destroy it before it occupied another body. He put Merlin through a short series of tests, just to ensure he had the discipline to master them.

He replicated some of them later, sitting next to Morgana and a wide-eyed Gwen on the floor of his room. Arthur was still a little standoffish, quiet, but he'd stolen dinner for Merlin from the dining hall so hemust've been at least sort of fine. Between bites, Merlin juggled a stack of books, sent them back to their shelf and then lifted the whole thing. This was the hardest part, trying to keep it steady enough that none of the haphazard piles toppled -- it had been epically worse inGaius' cluttered study. When he'd put the laden shelves down, practically unchanged, Gaius had simply stared, for so long that Merlin started to fidget.

Morgana watched much the same, intent eyes and hand clenched on Gwen's wrist. Merlin turned to Arthur, perched alone on Merlin's bed. He was staring at the now resettled desk, face blank.

He sent a puff of air to ruffle Arthur's hair; Arthur visibly started, turned to look at him. Merlin was surprised by his expression -- what had seemed void from the side seemed straight on to be surprisingly vulnerable, and he found himself immediately smiling back, trying to show that he wanted Arthur to accept it but also that it didn't matter too much -- this didn't change that Arthur had once pelted him with tennis balls until Merlin collapsed to the grass court in surrender; had chased him down a ravine and ripped the band from Merlin's wrist, then left his hand there, unnecessarily; had caught the beaded sweat on Merlin's neck with his open mouth.

Arthur didn't exactly smile back, but he quirked his mouth playfully, the cousin of the face he made when he caught Merlin watching him in class. It was enough to flood Merlin with relief, and enough to make him blush with the memory, duck his head down. When he darted a glance back at Arthur, he was actually smiling -- a little bit of a "hah, made you do it" grin, but a smile all the same.

Apparently all it took was for him to humiliate himself with his own train of thought.

----

Gaius taught him streams of complicated words, harsh and sibilant and unfamiliar in his mouth. They twisted his tongue, felt like he was chewing something he disliked, butGaius seemed pleased with his pronunciation. Arthur laughed when he repeated them later and said he looked like there was something stuck in his throat. Merlin was glad for the relief this brought from the tensest weekend he'd ever lived: two full days without the distraction of lessons to draw their thoughts from what they'd be doing the next Friday.

Gaius also pronounced Stonehenge the best candidate, the biggest and most powerful spot ever erected in England, and still one of the most intact. If they were leaning so heavily on the book's ritual,Gaius supposed, it implied they had little or no magic of their own, and were relying on the magic bound up in Sigan's system, so the more they could use their surroundings to focus and amplify the power, the greater their chance of success.

This meant they'd have to leave early on Friday, skip classes and drive most of the day. Arthur had wanted to leave Thursday, but Morgana pointed out that the longer they were missing, the greater the alarm and thus a wider search and a greater likelihood they would be found. If they skipped Friday's lessons, it could be all day before anyone thought something was amiss.

So Merlin sat and watched Monday and Tuesday pass in a blur, only half-aware of school and only half-aware of his fingers twitching under the table, running silently through the spellGaius had invented, a complicated mash of unrelated sounds he kept messing up, repeating out of order or squashed together. Gaius said he had to get them all just right, or instead of banishing he might magnify, instead of dissolving he might discolour.

Clouds hung ominously all Wednesday and finally broke while he spent lunch in in Gaius' study.  He watched the rain between repetitions, as it grew from a steady patter to an unseasonal downpour and cacophonous thunder. Afternoon Physics was cancelled, something about a tree in the road between their teacher and the school, so he stayed later than he'd intended, working the convoluted mess untilGaius beamed proudly and proclaimed he'd never thought he'd see the day. Merlin smiled back, even the growing knot of cold tension in his stomach no match for the rush of fondness. Somehow in a week,Gaius had become more of a father figure than he'd ever had before in his life.

He braced himself for his dash through the pelting drops, as he had watched other students do through the window all afternoon. He was about to take his first step when he heard someone call his name. Gwen and Morgana were rushing past, holding hands and laughing, completely soaked. He was glad they're happy, even just for a moment; Arthur had spent the past few days growing increasingly silent, drawing into himself with tense shoulders.

The rain wasn't half as much fun without someone else to slosh through the puddles with, and he was still thoroughly drenched when he slams the door of their room. Lightning strikes in time, like magic.

It was dark -- he hadn't switched the lights on yet and the storm blocked the sun from the window. He peeled off his wet clothes, dropping them in a sodden, squelching heap on the floor and climbed into his bed without putting anything else on. His skin was still clammy, hair dripping. His mother would have told him to take a hot shower.

Arthur came in with his tennis whites streaked muddy. Merlin was shocked, thinking he'd somehow spent hours daydreaming and cold, or perhaps been at Gaius' far longer than he thought, but the clock revealed that no, tennis practise had barely started.

"The weather," Arthur explained, pulling his shirt over his head and plopping it down on top of Merlin's clothes. "Courts are too wet to play so Coach had us running, but everyone kept slipping. Think he was worried we'd hurt ourselves."

Probably a valid fear, Merlin thought, turning to watch the rain outside flood over the sidewalks. When he looked back, Arthur was wearing dry pants and standing in the middle of the room. He couldn't have been warm, not in the slightest, but he wasn't making any move to do something about it.

"Come here," Merlin said, unexpectedly fond.

He hadn't even really noticed warming up, but realised it when Arthur burrowed under the blankets and curled around him, absolutely frigid after his cocoon of warmth. Even freezing, though, he was welcome, and Merlin was glad of the solid invasion of Arthur into his thoughts as well as the growing warmth of his limbs, the way his fingertips dipped into the individual grooves of Merlin's spine.

"Are you nervous?" he asked suddenly. He didn't even know which he wanted: for Arthur to be concerned in contemplation of the task they'd set for themselves, or for him to be confident, reassuring.

"Don't be ridiculous," Arthur replied, brash tone belying everything Merlin remembered about what he'd said under the influence of sleepless nights past.

"I am," he admitted.

"About the -- the spell?" Arthur still stumbled a little, danced verbal circles around magic or anything related, but Merlin could understand that -- it was strange even for him to be discussing it like this, and Arthur was trying, at least.

"A bit. We're making a lot of assumptions, you know? What if we're wrong? And we don't really know what we're actually walking into. But there's still not anyone else to rely on."

"No," Arthur agreed. Even if they hadn't made the effort already, Merlin didn't think Arthur would truly consider turning the responsibility over to others. Not when he was already so involved, not when he felt partially responsible for it to begin with.

"We need a plan," Arthur said.

"Tomorrow," Merlin said. "We'll make one." With everyone.

The sky darkened save the flashes of far-off lightning, and Arthur's skin grew more temperate until it was neither cooler nor hotter than his own, until Merlin so was used to the press of him that he couldn't even tell where he ended and Arthur began.

----

But in the end, no plans at all would have mattered.

----

Merlin hoped, curled tense in the backseat of Morgana’s car as she sped south, that Gaius would forgive him their obvious manoeuvre to keep him on the grounds. The reasons to leave him behind: his absence would be more suspicious and more indicative of a serious problem than that of four students, if their combined vanishing act were even discovered and connected; his self-professed inability to be of any help; their unwillingness to endanger anyone else, all far outweighed any potential benefits.

Even if he had double-checked their information and noticed before tonight that they’d given him the wrong date of the full moon, the mass food-poisoning attack they’d arranged would keep him occupied.

It was the only part of their “plan” of loosely connected series of eventualities and contingencies that they could really depend on. So far it seemed to be working; no panicked, angry calls had come yet.

He ate something greasy and tasteless, right off the highway, and couldn’t even remember when they pulled away where they had eaten. The roads weren’t crowded, but they were busy, lots of people going about their ordinary business. He stared absently into the cars they passed, wondering what the drivers, the children in the back, would think of a cult trying to resurrect one of the most dangerous magical figures in Britain’s history.

Laugh, most likely.

----

He’d never given much thought to the part in books where someone says, “If you’d told me a year ago I would be shearing black sheep in the Scottish highlands with my cousin’s mailman,” or something of the sort. But now he understood. If you’d ever at any point before one month ago told Merlin he’d be running once more through everyone’s assigned tasks in all their anticipated possibilities with Arthur Pendragon, he’d - well, he’d probably have done a lot of things. But believing would not have been among them.

Seemed he’d learnt his lesson.

But that really wasn’t what he should dwell on. Not when Arthur was detailing, under fading light, entry points based on a satellite photo he’d printed from the internet and Morgana was thumbing the guard of her sword. Another thing he’d never really anticipated - seeing an actual swordfight, even so one-sided as this would probably be. Gaius hadn’t mentioned anything about his Sigan-worshipping pseudo-Druids practising sword arts.

Arthur had looked on rather covetously when Morgana and Gwen had tested the blades Merlin had clumsily sharpened.

Morgana had smirked. “You had your chance, you know, and you quit for football.”

“I think this is the exception that proves the point fencing is a showy, antiquated display from those who can’t master real sports,” Arthur had replied archly.

Then they'd had to fake interest in the tour group from Amesbury they'd assimilated into, early enough to scope the site out and get a better idea of their surroundings. The car was pulled off the road, far enough that it would be ignored during the day and invisible after dark.

For now, though, they were to take two positions, a pair at each of the main highways leading in, and wait until they saw something. Fortunately, both had small forested areas protruding from the manicured fields that made up most of the surrounding terrain, enough to hide in. Text messages would provide regular check-ins and the go signal.

He squashed into some shadowy underbrush with Morgana to wait, passed the time by working the spell silently through his mouth. He didn’t really like the splitting up part, but he knew it was the best possible way to cover the major entrances and not leave anyone alone.

Nothing, read their first several exchanges. Back and forth, nothing. The wind blew eerily across the fields and then into the trees, and it was far too silent after the last tourist groups cleared out.

He'd half-expected them, based fancifully off a joke Gwen had made, to come in on broomsticks, or even horses, but all the happened was that Arthur and Gwen, from the side closest to the parking lot, sent They're coming.

And they were, parking cars blatantly on the side of the highway, the occupants slamming doors and walking in a long, robed line.

"My god, they look utterly cracked," Morgana observed.

Next was crossing the field on the other side of the road, low and silent, to meet near the middle. Then came the only part of the plan Merlin honestly felt ridiculous about -- not the spell, not the swords, just the part where they found some stragglers and pulled an every movie and TV show ever on them by attempting to yank them subtly off the road and steal their kitschy robes, leaving them somehow incapacitated and out of view. Arthur gleefully practised some sort of head-bashing move he'd probably been working on for ages.

And there they were: four people stepping into the roadway and following the dwindling line. They were to be late, it seemed.

Indeed, they were among the last to join the mass of cloaked figures, all of whom fortunately had the cowls pulled low to obscure much of their faces. They were in greater numbers than before, and had formed a loose circle around the ruined stones, but as a herd backed up and parted around the opening in the monument where the stones had collapsed, because someone was approaching, or perhaps something, a huge, hulking shape in the drained light.

It was --

Gwen made a strangled noise of shock, somewhere to his left. He was concerned for a moment she'd given them away, but similar noises were echoing all around them, because --

Because next to the same woman who'd led the ceremony before was the biggest bloody creature Merlin had ever seen. But it wasn't only gigantic.

It was a dragon.

The mismatched pair was followed by others, lugging the same ancient wooden chest Merlin remembered. Several more supported a blond teenager who must have been Allen Jones, watching the silent animal with stark terror. Merlin couldn't exactly blame him -- it had the biggest mouth he'd ever seen, two enormous wings and long claws at the end of each limb. Even its tail looked like a weapon.

The woman apparently couldn't resist a bit of gloating and grand-standing, giving a condescending speech about how no one had believed they'd found the stone and communicated with the watcher. But here was proof, it seemed, that they'd done both, and now they could perform the ceremony. Merlin only half-listened, running first through Arthur's carefully constructed plans for one labelled In Case of Bloody Effing Dragons, and then trying to ascertain in his own mind how this would change anything. They couldn't speak, everyone around them was listening to the woman like she directly channelled the words of a god. To them, perhaps she did.

None of the preparations of before appeared, neither the jumping nor the peel. Either Jones had already undergone them or they'd done away with the rituals altogether.

Jones was forced to his knees, held as Arthur had been. The stone heart was brandished, strange words chanted, and this time Merlin waited until the blue swirling light coalesced and began to flow out like a wandering air current.

As soon as the stone was dull and empty, he began the spell. He felt it swell and crystallise in his mind, focused it and raised one arm. From this point, he was no longer an invisible facet in their mass -- he was a target, and now it was the task of his friends to protect him until it was done.

He didn't see, but was told later how every single one of them held back, afraid to confront the swords wielded by Gwen and Morgana until the woman's shrieked command. But by then Merlin was finished, and Arthur would say later that the dragon's head swung immediately to focus on their group, big, unfamiliar eyes unmoving.

Allen Jones, forgotten on the ground, broke from his terrified daze and screamed, scrambled backwards. Merlin thought for a dreadful second he'd failed, but Jones was clearly just a terrified child, not the possessed body of an evil sorcerer.

They'd done it.

He laughed, almost manic with relief, grabbed Arthur's hand and never wanted to let go. Morgana dropped the sword and pumped one fist victoriously in the air. He knew how she felt, there wasn't any single movement or emotion or word that could capture the swell of triumph in his head, his heart. The not-Druids were milling, yelling, confused, looking enmasse to their leader, the woman from the hemp demonstration and the field.

She stepped forward, laughing, and then looked up. Her eyes were a deep, uniform black.

"I felt you, you know, but I thought it was the dragon. They have such powerful magical signatures," she said, voice at once her own and not, tone amused and condescending but not at all defeated. "Very interesting bit of magic. It worked, I suppose, to protect that boy, but he was a replacement anyway, completely unnecessary." She stepped forward, face cruel and mocking. "It can't actually stop me." She laughed, and the whole gathering circle around them joined in.

"Get them," she said, an absent, throwaway order. They surged forward with renewed purpose, and Merlin saw Morgana go for her sword, but it was in the grass, she'd stepped away from it, and they were on her before she could do anything.

Arthur yelled as the first reached him, knocked the figure to the ground and swept the feet out from the second. He was trying to reach the woman. Merlin tried, too, reached out and repeated the spell. He didn't know what else to do.

She watched him do it, even flicked a finger and stopped two men who tried to grab him. She stopped Arthur, too, waved a hand and he was on the ground.

"Arthur!" he cried, mind thick with worry.

"I'm fine," he said, face red. "Just... Can't move."

"I was curious if it could do anything once I was already in possession," she said. "Seems not." She let the next group get Merlin, pull him closer to face her.

"Merlin," he heard, a voice deep and grave and urgent. He looked around desperately, wondering if perhaps more help was here despite all their efforts, his and Arthur's and Gwen's and Morgana's, to keep their activities and destination secret. But he recognised no one in the sea of eager cloaked faces. Noone's hood was drawn down any longer, so he could see the unmasked expressions of rabid glee.

"Merlin," it came again. The woman didn't react. Arthur on the ground beside him didn't react. No one else could hear it, and he wondered if he was going crazy before he looked up and saw the dragon looking directly at him.

"Do it, young warlock." The voice, he realised, was inside his head.

"Do what?" he cried. He didn't know how to communicate telepathically.

The woman cocked her head at him. "I was going to ask you to join me, and just take that body down there." She gestured dismissively to Arthur. "Seems pleasing enough."

He heard a crack and a scream behind him. The woman focused over his left shoulder, and he turned as well.

Morgana was looking around wildly, one of the robed figures who'd been holding her -- a woman with dark hair, now singed -- rolling on the ground. She rose to her knees and threw off the dark robe, which smoked in the grass.

"Do it again, Merlin!" Morgana said. "Now!"

Merlin hadn't done anything.

"Interesting," said Sigan-woman. Perhaps just Sigan, now. "Perhaps that one can join me. She seems powerful, as well."

"Time, boy! Time!." The dragon's mind-voice sounded even more urgent now, or perhaps Merlin was projecting.

He'd stopped time once, or slowed it to a point where its passing was unnoticeable. He could have done anything he wanted, he supposed, but it had terrified him more than anything he'd ever done before, and he'd vowed to never do it again.

"So your body will do," Sigan said with a smile. "I'll enjoy bending all that power to my own will. Perhaps you'll even put up a fight."

"Now, or your chance is gone!"."

So he did.

He hadn't meant to leave the dragon out of the spell. Perhaps it was impervious to his magic. Perhaps it was impervious to all magic. Either way, it watched him intently, while everyone else,Sigan and Morgana and Arthur and the swarm of cult followers, were frozen. He bent to check Arthur, who seemed unhurt.

"What are you?"

The dragon snorted. "Don't ask stupid questions, boy. Even you can't maintain this for long."

"What do you mean, even me?"

"There's a longer tale to this than we can manage now. It seems we may have longer, though. I... Didn't think that would ever happen. You know, I hope, that magic once held a prominent place in the this land?"

"Of course."

"Very good. So few do. Those times were the golden age of Albion, cooperation between sorcerers and magical creatures and humans. But the humans grew jealous of magic, scared of it, and undertook a campaign to extinguish it. They were, as you know, successful."

"Some are even campaigning to remove it from history," Merlin interrupted.

"I feared as much. In those times, there were many dragons, powerful seers all. But we were hunted and slain, and I retreated to protect my knowledge. I expected to foresee the triumphant return of magic, but all I saw was a further retreat from those golden times. I am not proud of my reaction, which was to withdraw completely from my self-appointed task as protector of magic. As I left magic, it left me, as well. I lost my power of sight, and had only my knowledge of spells and the prophecies of the past to remember. You are in them, I believe, though I didn't understand them at the time. But I had lost hope with the sight, so when I was approached to assist in this venture I could see no other way to bring magic back to its rightful place."

"So if you're here to help them, why are you talking to me now?"

"I have no stake in good or evil, young warlock, but a magical revival led by Cornelius Sigan can only lead to its downfall once again. Your spell, clever though it is, and your power, though if I am correct as to your identity is very significant, will not be enough to defeat him in this form. I am going to tell you something few men have ever known. I believe you will be the only one living. You must use it at the last possible moment, once Sigan thinks he has already won."

The words were even more alien than Gaius' spells, but they felt powerful, weighty, even in his mind.

"Now, young warlock," the dragon said.

Merlin let go of time.

It all rushed back: Sigan's delicate female hand raised, evil grin and mocking laugh, Arthur silent and constrained on the ground, Morgana screaming.

"Quiet, girl," Sigan ordered.

She was.

Merlin waited, tense with anticipation and worry for his friends, as Sigan raised the hand again. The hemp woman's black eyes rolled back in her head and she collapsed as the blue fog seeped from her mouth like a gentle exhalation.

He closed his eyes, let it invade him. It was cold and felt somehow slimy, absolutely evil. He dropped to his knees, wanting to choke, but he had to concentrate on the spell. The ancient words slipped through his mind.

"Merlin!" he heard Arthur yell, and then everything went black.

----

He didn't wake up suddenly. It was more like the gradual draw from sleep on a late morning, especially since he felt warm, supported, andsomeone's hand was cupped around his cheek.

But then he remembered.

He sat up before he'd opened his eyes all the way, and was relieved when he did that he hadn't whacked Arthur straight in the chin. It was nearing dawn, but his eyes still took a moment to adjust.

"Did it--" he gasped urgently.

But Arthur just said, "Merlin," a little cautious. Merlin realised they all had no idea what had happened, they'd probably just seen him go down.

"The stone?" he asked. He didn't really know what he wanted to see to confirm it was all over. He knew Sigan wasn't in him, but what had happened?

"It's--" Arthur began, but then his gaze dropped to the ground, searching.

"Here," said Gwen. She was standing a few meters away, looking at the well-trodden grass with an expression both careful and disgusted.

It was lying forgotten amongst the crushed blades, innocuous and swirling with blue essence once again.

The relief this time was less all-encompassing than before, perhaps because it had been so swiftly tempered then, but at the same time he knew this time it was real. He reached for it.

"Merlin, should you--" said Arthur.

"It's alright," Merlin said. "It can't hurt me." He hoped they could find something to destroy it totally, but for now he could keep it safe. He wrapped it insomeone's forgotten robe.

It seemed all the fake druids were gone, leaving only a slightly-scorched wreck of the field around Britain's most well-known heritage site. Even the possessed woman was gone, and he wondered whether she'd been alright to leave herself or if she'd been carted away by her former followers. He didn't much care either way.

"How long?" he asked.

"Not too long," said Arthur, but his face obviously said quite long enough. "That lot cleared out pretty quickly. I think they were scared of you." He smirked, added, "Idiots."

"Allen Jones?"

"Asleep, actually, in the car. Wanted to call his mum but we didn't think it was a good idea to get directly involved. We'll drive him home, I guess, or to a police station. I don't even remember where he lives any longer.

"Me either. What about the dragon?"

"It flew away," Morgana told him, like that was exactly what he should have expected if he'd just thought about it. She was swinging the sword absently, face drawn. Had she known before? It seemed they had more to discuss than he'd thought previously. But it would be nice -- great, even -- to not be alone anymore.

"It said it would be in touch," said Arthur, derisive twist to his mouth conveying exactly what he thought about communing with dragons, of all things.

"He was quite excited," Merlin said. "He didn't even hide it very well."

"How do you know it was a he?"

"His voice, of course," Merlin said, failing in his attempt to not smirk like a prat.

"He didn't speak, though." Arthur was looking more put out by the second, and Merlin couldn't resist just a little more messing with him.

"Well, first he did telepathically," he explained, tapping the side of his head. "Then I, ah..." He coughed, not sure how to discuss it without sounding like he was bragging. "Kindofstoppedtimeforabit."

"Stopped time?" Gwen repeated. "That's... Pretty awesome."

"Thanks," Merlin said, hoping he wasn't blushing like a little kid. Judging by Arthur's face, which seemed too light and, well, fond for their previous discussion, he wasn't succeeding.

"Can Morgana do it, too, now?" he asked, looking at her. She'd been staring pointedly at the sun arching from the horizon, spilling pink and orange through the clouds. "Can you?" Arthur repeated. She shrugged.

"We'll find out," Merlin said.

She finally looked up and met his eyes, surprisingly cautious. He smiled, because he knew it all, the relief of knowing finally the source of all the weird unexplainable circumstances in your life, the fear of your own abilities, the sudden barrier keeping you and your secret from everyone else. But he hadn't truly felt that barrier since they'd all found out, and Morgana, well, she didn't need to feel it all.

She smiled back, enough that he knew she understood.

"Back to school?" Gwen suggested. She was idly scratching their first initials into the grass with the absolutely overkill tip of her sword. GM up top, MA below, so they made a square. He thought for in instant that it needed to be destroyed, they couldn't leave a trace, but at the same time, who on earth would connect those? Who would even want to?

"Unless we want to take off the rest of the weekend," said Arthur.

"Get a hotel in London," Morgana suggested.

"Or the beach!" Merlin said. He wouldn't mind running straight into the ocean, clothes and all, ducking under and just flowing with the waves. He laughed, imagining for a second never returning to school. Maybe they could be magic-enabled private detectives. Or they could open a cafe, he'd never tried to cook with magic. Maybe he could predict stock tips.

But maybe they should just go back to school, try to act like nothing had happened and they'd been joyriding for a day. They could finish their education and he could practise magic, maybe teach Morgana. They could go public, set up a school like older times, like the golden days of Albion...

So he said as much, or at least the beginning part. Arthur grinned ruefully at him, then bent to pick up another of the discarded robes.

Those got stuffed in the back of Morgana's car and dumped along the side of a completely random road.

Later he sat though the most epic lecture of his life from an extremely irate Uther Pendragon, who he suddenly did not mind so much. In fact, he had something of an urge to talk back at one particular part where Uther had ignored the rest of them and targeted Arthur directly, but Arthur had apparently, somehow, known, and slid the toes of one shoe right over Merlin's to stop him. It was totally unnoticeable to anyone else, but Merlin took the hint.

The reunion between Allen Jones and his parents was broadcast everywhere and on the cover of every paper. Unsurprisingly, there was no mention of crazy cults or dragons. Even if Jones had lied to them when he'd promised to keep the secret and tried to tell the whole story, Merlin doubted he'd be believed by anyone but conspiracy theorists and the more extreme magic revivalists. They would have their day, he promised, but not when he was still a schoolboy.

They weren't ready yet. But they would be.