Chapter Text
It didn’t take long to reach the Lake. As Kilgharrah began his descent, Merlin squirmed excitedly.
“Feels good,” he said as the dragon’s claws hit the ground. “Good magic.”
“The young warlock speaks the truth,” Kilgharrah rumbled beneath them. “For one so powerful as him, the magic at this site is like a physical sensation of wellbeing.”
Arthur slid off Kilgharrah’s back and helped Merlin to do the same. Together, they approached the water.
“Look!”
Arthur blinked. A pale woman with dark hair stood watching them, her face creased in a gentle smile. A second ago he could have sworn she hadn’t been there.
“It’s a pleasure to meet properly, Arthur Pendragon.” Her voice was soft and lilting. “And to see you again Merlin.”
Merlin blinked up at her from beneath his dark lashes. “‘S I know you?”
“You’ll remember when you’re bigger.” She looked back to Arthur. “I know what you have come here for. Are you ready?”
“Surely it’s Merlin you should ask?”
The Lady’s face softened as Merlin reached out, fingers tracing invisible patterns in the surface of the lake’s calm waters. “He’s ready in his own way. The transition may be harder for you.”
Merlin had mentioned the Lady of the Lake before, told Arthur she was instrumental in recapturing Camelot from Morgana. Arthur had not expected her to seem so human - she reminded him a little of Merlin himself. Most of the time Arthur forgot his friend was the mighty Emrys, the most powerful warlock to live, and talking now to the Lady of the Lake felt just like talking to Gwen or one of his knights.
“My Lady-”
“Please, call me Freya.”
“Freya.” The name felt familiar somehow. “Do you know- will Merlin- that is-”
“Will he remember?”
Arthur nodded.
“It will seem distant, in the way all childhood memories are, but yes. He will remember.”
Arthur released a breath he hadn’t realised he had been holding. Perhaps he couldn’t give Merlin a new childhood or a better life - but he could at least leave him with some happier memories.
“Alright,” he told her. “I’m ready.”
After one final hug - which Arthur held onto just a few moments longer than he would have wanted anyone else to see - Merlin went with Freya into the Lake. After that things got a bit fuzzy. One moment Arthur was watching them wade into the water and the next he was waking up on the shore. A familiar face loomed above him.
“Let’s have you lazy daisy.”
“Merlin!”
“The one and only.”
For a few moments all Arthur could do was stare. Merlin was back to his usual self, but flashes of his four-year-old self glared out from his goofy grin, open posture, and wide blue eyes.
“How do you feel?” Arthur finally managed to ask as he regained his feet.
“Honestly? Fantastic.” Merlin shook his head ruefully. “I’m just sorry I put you through so much trouble. I didn’t mean for the healing spell to take effect on me when I activated it in the cave.” His expression turned wistful. “Freya wanted me to thank you, by the way.”
“Thank me? For what?”
“For freeing her.”
“I don’t understand.”
Merlin hesitated. He glanced at Kilgharrah, curled up by the edge of the lake. The tops of the forest trees rustled in the gusts of the dragon’s deep, slumbering breaths. He would be asleep for a while yet.
“I think that it’s time I told you something...”
Merlin’s stillness as he looked out upon the lake felt strange to Arthur after so long in the company of an excitable four-year-old. They both leant against the enormous trunk of an ancient weeping willow, its trailing branches drifting in the gentle breeze.
“A few years ago, a man named Halig came to Camelot,” Merlin began his tale. “He was a bounty hunter, but one of his captives had escaped.”
“A druid girl,” Arthur recalled. “She was cursed, wasn’t she?”
“Yes.” Merlin shuddered a breath. “I didn’t know that when I freed her. Even if I did, I’m not sure it would have made a difference. When I saw her trapped in Halig’s cage... all I could think was that it could have been me. ”
Arthur’s blood boiled as mention of the cage brought to mind the merchant in Eldermoor who had named a price for a four-year-old boy. Trying to push his anger away he asked, lightly, “So that’s why you were stealing my sausages then?”
Merlin snorted. “I’d forgotten about that. You saved me from Halig too, remember?”
Arthur did remember, only too well. One of his knights had mentioned in passing they had seen the bounty hunter hauling Merlin to the dungeons when Arthur had bemoaned his servant’s absence. He had only just arrived in time to stop Halig from inflicting what would likely have been a severe beating.
“I took food to her whenever I could,” Merlin continued. “Kept her hidden in the crypts under the castle. The more we spoke and learnt about each other, the more I felt like I’d found someone who could really know and understand me. I fell in love with her.”
The quiet admission shamed Arthur. How could he not have noticed all of this going on right under his nose?
“We planned to run away. Leave Camelot and find somewhere we could be safe... but at night the curse took hold.”
With distressing clarity, an image burst across Arthur’s memory. A great winged beast rearing up above him, snarling ferociously with sharp fangs.
“You mean the creature I killed... that was her?”
“You were protecting your kingdom. You didn’t have a choice.”
“I’m...” Arthur wanted to apologise, but the word sorry felt so inadequate. “If I’d have known-”
“It’s alright,” Merlin cut across him softly. “Really. She was so tired of being trapped, hurting people... that’s why she wanted me to thank you.”
A sudden jolt as Arthur recalled how this conversation had begun. “Freya?”
“I brought her here before she died.”
Arthur pictured Merlin laying Freya upon the lake’s shore, comforting her in her final moments, and returning to Camelot - completely alone.
“If Guinevere...” Arthur trailed off, unable to finish the thought. “I don’t know what I’d do. I’m sorry you had to go through that by yourself.”
“It was a long time ago,” Merlin murmured, but Arthur didn’t miss the sheen of tears in the warlock’s eyes. “I’m not alone any more.”
“No,” Arthur agreed firmly. “You’re not.”
They sat in silence, watching as the sun dipped steadily lower in the sky, until at last Arthur worked up the courage to ask,
“Did I do the right thing? Bringing you back to this age?”
Merlin raised an incredulous eyebrow. “You think I’d rather be a four year old?”
“You’ve lost so much.” Arthur’s thoughts echoed with Hunith’s choked sobs as she finally revealed the depths to which Uther’s rule had pushed her. “What if this was an opportunity to start again?”
Merlin was silent and Arthur tried to stifle the dread curdling in the pit of his stomach. The cave and its magic were still out there - if this was truly what Merlin wanted...
“No,” Merlin said, and Arthur had to fight back a sigh of relief. “Starting over would mean forgetting it all - not just the bad, but the good as well. I wish Will hadn’t died, but I could never erase my memories of him. I wish I had known my father for longer, but I don’t regret the time we had. And I wish Freya were here with me now, but I treasure the love that we shared. There’s darkness in life, but that’s what makes the light shine so brightly.”
He smiled then, his wide beam reminiscent of the child he had been mere hours ago. “You did give me a second chance though. In all my childhood, I don’t think I ever felt as safe as I did for those few weeks in Camelot. The memories will stay with me forever. So thank you for that.”
Heat rose to Arthur’s cheeks and he averted his eyes with an awkward clearing of his throat. “Yes, well. It’s good to have you back. Back to normal, that is.”
“You missed me then?” Merlin teased, but amusement was swiftly overtaken by trepidation. “How embarrassing was I as a four year old?”
“Well, let’s see...” Arthur drawled, a slow smirk spreading across his face. “You smuggled gravy in your pockets, never took a bath - and you insisted on singing a ridiculous song about flowers over and over again.”
Merlin groaned and buried his head in his hands. “Surely it wasn’t all bad?”
Arthur thought back over the past few weeks - hugs, childish games, giggles, disgustingly cute displays of magic - and couldn’t help but smile.
“Well,” he conceded as they went to wake Kilgharrah and begin their journey home. “Perhaps not all of it.”