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Emrys
As he watches the boat drift away across the water, he sinks to his knees in the soft mud of the lake shore.
The mist slowly begins to obscure the boat and he angrily blinks away the tears in his eyes, not wanting to lose sight of the last thing that still connects him to Arthur.
Kilgharrah
With a last beat of his powerful wings, the dragon alights once more on the shores of Avalon. The pain of the young Dragon Lord had been pulling at his old bones, calling him back to his side.
"Come, young warlock. It is time you left this place," he tells him gently.
Emrys makes no move to acknowledge his presence. He sits with his legs drawn up to his chin, rocking slightly. His knees are mud-caked, he is wet, and his eyes are red but dry.
‘There is nowhere left to go,’ Emrys thinks. The words are barely a whispers in his mind but the dragon has no trouble hearing them.
Kilgharrah nudges the young man's back with his snout, making no other move to acknowledge the words. There is nothing he can say. No wisdom in all his years that can ease such pain.
He breathes hot breath over Emrys, drying his clothes and hardening the mud that surrounds him.
"Name any place on this earth you wish to go, young warlock, and I will take you there. Any place but here," the dragon says. His tone is gentle but firm.
Emrys tilts his head slightly but still does not take his eyes off the isle at the centre of the lake.
"There is nowhere left to go," he repeats, this time out loud.
"There are always places to go for the living," Kilgharrah returns.
The young man next to him begins to shake and the dragon gently nudges him once more. A slightly hysterical hiccup escapes Emrys and he blinks rapidly as the tears begin to fall again.
"We are leaving, and you will give me a destination, young warlock."
Emrys nods slightly and finally turns his eyes to the dragon.
"The Isle of the Blessed," he says and his voice is rough with all the weight of his pain.
The old dragon is startled but lowers himself to be mounted. Slowly the man before him rises but instead of coming closer, he walks a few steps away from the dragon who growls lightly in response.
Paying the sound no mind, Emrys dips his hands into the water and murmurs, "Ábíed."
Lines of golden fire flare briefly in the lake water, forming the Pendragon crest. Emrys turns away and climbs on the dragon's back.
Morgana
At the warlock's behest, the dragon flies back over the forest and retrieves the body of the witch, the lady Morgana.
When they find her, Emrys casts a small spell to alleviate the stench and decay that has set in. He never leaves the dragon's back and they travel silently, with her clutched in the dragon's talons, to the Isle of the Blessed.
Once there, Emrys thanks the dragon and sends him away. It is not in the language of the Dragon Lords, but Kilgharrah obeys. He is old, tired and has done all that he can.
It is the last time the two will meet. In only a few years, Emrys will feel a connection in his mind sever. He never truly knew its presence until he felt the loss of it so keenly.
For now, however, he turns to the land before him and stretches out his senses. Behind his mind’s eye he flies swiftly through the crumbling corridors of the castle – down hallways and staircases into the crypt. He levitates the body of his former nemesis - his friend, his king's sister - and makes his way down into the catacombs under the land.
He sets her gently on one of the many marble sarcophagi in this cavernous room. It reminds him greatly of Camelot’s crypt and it seems a fitting place for her to rest.
He calls his magic up around him, stretching his arm out and drawing the long slumbering seeds out from the ground beneath his feet. They weave and intertwine to form a resting place for the last priestess of the Old Religion.
Finished, Emrys walks over to the body.
He holds his hands steadily over her form. Slowly her hollowed cheeks begin to fill, and the lines of strain and hatred disappear from around her eyes and mouth.
He wistfully smiles down at the woman he learned to love and call his friend, learned to hate and call his enemy. He has no tears left for her but he is sorry in far more ways that his words could ever express.
He lifts her bodily and places her carefully into the sarcophagus of vines and flowers. Stepping back, he stretches out his arms once more and slowly the plants knit closed above her.
When he leaves, it is hundreds of years before another living soul steps into these halls. The memories and ghosts that linger here are well and truly left to rest. With Morgana the Old Religion is at its end and slowly the last of its followers forget and are in turn forgotten.
Forgotten by all but one man and he does not care to speak of them.
Gaius
It is almost a month after the king's death when Merlin finally returns to Camelot. That night they eat his favourite meal and attempt to talk of inconsequential things. The conversation is awkward and stilted and soon they fall into a slightly more comfortable silence.
It is two days later that Gaius finally stops pretending that his Merlin has returned and begins to address him as Emrys. Merlin died along with Arthur on the shores of Avalon. It is a story he was only told after much questioning and a night, for once, actually spent at the tavern. Gaius suspects that it is the news of Gwaine's death that finally drives him there. The tears that Percival shed at the funeral were enough to make any man long for a bottle.
It is four days later that Emrys leaves Camelot, not returning for many, many years. Gaius does not see him again after their goodbyes at the city walls, but they do keep in contact for the remaining years of his life.
For the last four years before death claims him, he receives letters delivered to his door by a falcon. Its arrival always fills him with a bittersweet longing for the young man he only got to raise so briefly.
Guinevere
In the week that Merlin is in Camelot, she does not see him.
The council is assembled at the round table. The late afternoon sunlight filters through the large windows and the room his quiet, no one willing to speak the words that seem inevitable. As Leon begins to rise from the table, preparing to speak, the doors at the far end of the hall burst open.
"The King is dead!" a breathless page boy screams and everything erupts into noise and confusion.
She had known it, she thinks. She had known it for weeks.
It is only many hours later that she finally hears who has brought the news of the king's death. She then also understands why the message was not questioned by the knights.
She had informed them all that Merlin was with the king and that he was to be trusted. Arthur's most loyal knights - those who still remained - had needed no convincing. In their own way, much like her, they had all loved Merlin for many years.
In later years, she often regrets that she did not seek Merlin out when he first returned. There were so many words that needed to spill out of her but he was never there to hear them. So many things were left unsaid and she never does get a chance to tell him any of them.
In those early years of her reign, her thoughts often turn to Arthur and behind him, in the shadows, there are all the memories of Merlin. They are fond and warm, slowly fading into comforts rather than actual memories of the man he had been.
The last time they meet is many years later and they are both old then. Her reign had been prosperous and the people had loved her. There had been wars and famines but Albion was finally united, just as Arthur had always dreamed.
When she lay dying, Emrys came to her, held her hand briefly and was no help at all. She told him that she had no heir, that the powers in Camelot were divided, and he told her that it was no longer any concern of theirs.
She spoke no further words to him and passed quietly in the night.
Leon
The last time he sees Emrys is at the ripe old age of ninety-something in a tavern of all places.
He is already quite a few drinks into his evening when he spots a familiar looking face at the bar. It has been years but those ears are unmistakable.
He walks over to the unchanged man unsteadily, sloshing the liquid in his tankard over the rim. Coming to rest at the bar, one hand tightly gripping the counter, he looks at him unsteadily. Gathering himself, the first thing he blurts out is, "Shit, you haven't changed a bit."
"I have," Emrys murmurs quietly, giving his old friend a weary half smile.
Leon ignores his words and says, "Camelot has fallen, did you know?" His words are slurred and slightly accusatory.
Before the other man can respond, he speaks again. "She told me you know? The queen... 'bout you." He makes a wayward motion in Emrys' direction. "Couldn't believe it at first but... look at you," Leon says, flopping his arm once more haphazardly.
Then his demeanour suddenly sobers and he becomes slightly less bleary eyed, "How could you let it happen Merlin? How could you let it fall?"
The tired warlock flinches a little at the name but makes no mention of it.
"I am sorry my friend," is all he says.
He doesn't answer the question, doesn't think the older man would want him to.
But he thinks about his answer. He thinks and takes deep drinks from his ale. Drinks again and signals for another.
He thinks, ‘I had hoped that it would be enough. I thought that if Camelot needed him, he would return. Because I can't bear to be without him anymore. Because I can't die, Leon. I know because I've tried. Because I hoped seeing it happen would kill me or bring him back.’
He says none of this aloud. Instead, he takes another long swallow of his drink and places a hand on the other man's back. His eyes glow gold for a moment and he is slightly comforted by the knowledge that the last surviving friend he has will at least not suffer from a hangover come morning.
Merlin
It has been over a thousand years and he has well and truly kicked the drinking habit he'd developed and nurtured for a few hundred years after even Leon took his final breath.
Six hundred years sober and counting, he thinks grimly as he stalks past the busy street. It is on this day, every year, that he finds it hardest to resist. And it is on this day, every year, that he returns to this place.
A truck rushes past him and he looks at it briefly, before returning his gaze to the lake.
He is wearing the disguise of an old man today, though he has long found that age is irrelevant to his body. The magic that runs through this land and through him is far more complex than what the Old Religion taught, and he has learned much. He can be any age he likes; wear any face he chooses. Time does not touch him.
And yet, while this disguise had been well and truly exhausted after the first time he had used it, Dragoon the Great still connects him to his past. It is a link to Arthur and thus most precious.
Arthur
"In a pub!" Arthur says, mumbling into the long white hair of the old man in his arms, "Figures I'd find you in a bloody tavern!" His voice is rough, a bit too high and a bit too loud but he doesn't care.
The man in his arms is shaking and Arthur rubs his hands comfortingly down his back.
In the back of his mind, he is dimly aware of how insane he must seem to his friends. The part of him that is still having trouble coping with the onslaught of past memories is slowly curling into a ball and dying of mortification.
He doesn't care.
This is Merlin. His Merlin!
He pushes the other man away slightly, attempting to hold him at arm's length, and smiling when Merlin's arms tighten around him instinctively.
Within the lined old face, he meets those familiar blue eyes. He grins broadly before he throws his head back and laughs, unable to help himself.
He is quickly pulled back into the hug after that.
"I thought I'd lost you," Merlin whispers into his neck, tightening the embrace even further. Arthur squeezes back instinctively.
"God, I missed you," Arthur replies.
When they pull back this time, they both have tears in their eyes.
Merlin quickly grabs his hand and pulls him outside.
As soon as the doors of the pub close and they are alone on the street, Merlin shifts his features back to the boyish young man Arthur had last seen over a thousand years ago, when he was dying in his arms.
Arthur's breath catches and he knows that there is so much that needs to be said but all that is important now are his next words.
"I love you," Arthur whispers quietly, like a secret to the wind.
"I know," Merlin says with a grin before he captures Arthur's lips with his own.