*Note: It begins! I've not written any Merlin fic before, so I hope this goes well. And don't worry, Merlin may be old in this chapter, but he won't appear so very soon!

Chapter 1

Merlin paused. He adjusted the satchel strewn over his shoulders. His head inclined towards the lake to his left, but his eyes did not lift. The sight of the grassy knoll and the misted lake that encompassed it was engrained into his memory, and to look would only confirm what—who—he knew was not there. He sensed no ripples in the water, no rising figure, no sputtering breath. Arthur was not there. Merlin berated himself for it, but still he could not help stopping at Avalon's lookout, where the king had been buried so many centuries ago. Gripping the strap of his satchel and feeling the weight of its contents lay heavy on his shoulder, Merlin looked ahead down the concrete road and continued walking.

The wind was not unkind, but there was a definite chill in the air, as one expects when summer settles and the warm season teeters into autumn. Merlin could feel his beanie hat slipping, as the wind pushed its claws under and slowly lifted it from his white hair. With one hand on his head and the other stuffed into the pocket of his wool coat, Merlin trudged the distance to his cottage. Whereas many of the homes in the surrounding village all bore a resemblance to one another on their fronts, Merlin's home was decidedly dissimilar. Its antiqueness lent to the legends, or "rumors" as the parents of children who spread them said. Though Merlin did spend much time abroad (several weeks at a time), he unfailingly returned back to his cottage. And as he kept himself up to speed with the world's affairs, he was also privy to a certain local legend that told of the odd and lonely man who lived in a cottage on a hill, who could never die, who brewed potions and made lightening strike, and who survived by living off the youth of missing children.

Merlin, of course, knew the latter bit was nonsense but he did nothing to refute it. In fact, it amused him greatly when, every few years or so, an especially brave child would knock on his door or hide in his garden to catch a glimpse of the old man's gold eyes or his white, wispy hair. And if such a child were a lucky one, they would even see a form of a dragon, glittering in fire ash and sparks, as they ran home. It was a safe gesture as the children who witnessed such magic were always alone and were never believed by their mates, no matter how they tried.

These legends, however, provided Merlin with a greater gift than cheap amusement. They granted him solitude, either out of fear from his distant neighbors or perhaps dislike of the strange aura Merlin surely gave. He preferred to be alone but he was also keen on not moving his permanent home, and the rumors enforced by children in the village were simply an aid to the old warlock.

Merlin, aching slightly from the dampness in the air that surrounded his cottage, walked up a small incline, on the dirt path that emerged from the paved road. The land around the cottage was simple and wild, but not in a way that suggested laziness or indifference. It was simply that Merlin liked the way his garden resembled a miniature forest. There were delightful wildflowers in the summer and snow-covered pines in the winter, just as nature, Merlin thought, should be. There was a little but sturdy horse stable that kept two mares that he fed and groomed and sometimes took for a ride. The cottage itself, however, was made of stone and decaying wood, and moss that blanketed much of it. On the roof, there was a stubby chimney that puffed when the hearth was in use. The front door squeaked when opened or closed. In short, Merlin's cottage was all that a home should be, no more and no less.

Naturally, its inside was more telltale of a wizard inhabitant than a dreary old man. But no one ever saw the inside, except for Merlin, and he liked to keep it that way.

Merlin kicked off his brown boots, removed his cap, and began to unbutton his coat as he moved through the door. His tabby cat slinked by, curling itself around Merlin's leg. He bent down to pet it gently under its chin but the squeak of the door closing frightened it and caused it to leap into another small room of the cottage. Taking off his coat and hanging it over the back of a wooden chair, Merlin raised his hand to the radio perched atop a table and his eyes flashed gold. Immediately, it turned on and a man giving the news was speaking, "…third bombing this week in a major British city. That makes the total dead nearly thirty and over fifty more injured. It is not certain who was behind the Cardiff attack, but it is certain those involved are members of the same organization responsible for the attacks in Leeds and York. Precautions are being set in London, among other cities, and, once again, government officials urge any witnesses of unusual or suspicious activity to inform the police—"

The rest of the newscast was interrupted by a rather harsh shake of Merlin's hand an abrupt shutdown of the radio that left several sparks flying and a brief hum of static. Merlin sighed and rubbed the sides of his head with his fist, frustrated. When it came to terrorist attacks, when it came to war and turmoil, and all the bad things he had seen men do over the centuries of his life, he was now at a point where he did not understand what horror Albion—now called Great Britain—had to be in for Arthur to return. Falling into the chair at the table, Merlin kneaded his wrinkled forehead, thinking.

He had expected Arthur's return so many times in the past, it felt futile to hope for it now. Perhaps, he thought, the Great Dragon had been wrong. Perhaps Arthur would not return. Perhaps it had been a lie to ease the passing of his king.

But had not Merlin seen Arthur's arm grasp Excalibur and pull it below the surface? Had he not heard Arthur be called Albion's "Once and Future King" upon multiple occasions? Surely those were signs of things to come. But still, where had Arthur been when the land had nearly succumbed to air raids fifty years ago? When riots shook the land? When civil wars threatened to ruin the kingdom they had built together? Where had Arthur been when the Empire was falling? Hope, Merlin had learned the hard way, was a poisonous thing.

There were so many instances in which a hopeful Merlin had waded out into the waters of Avalon, trousers rolled up to his calves, his eyes searching for a sign of Arthur and had left, dejected and bleak. At the table, Merlin threw his fist down. He wanted to scream. In the cottage, bottles vibrated and threatened to fall off their counters. A brisk breeze whipped through his room and rustled the herbs hanging from the ceiling.

Lately, he had been lax on what he had considered his duties after Arthur's death: to protect the land and its people, within Camelot's borders and beyond. Merlin felt aged. He was so old. He felt despondent in the face of Arthur's unfulfilled return. What was the point? he wondered. Running a hand through his hair, Merlin felt his surroundings calm down.

The people he passed now felt like a different people to him and Arthur had simply become a ghost, and Merlin had become Albion's shadow but not its keeper. Kings he had outlived were corrupt and so were the people. Over hundreds of years, Merlin had witnessed too much. He was slowly losing faith, losing the desire to hold together the fabric of these united kingdoms.

Tomorrow, Merlin decided, he would stay at home and advance his own studies. He would stay indoors and worry only about himself. People, he thought, can take care of themselves.

Merlin stood and clutched his satchel, holding against his navy sweater-clad chest. He walked to his bedroom and unloaded the contents of his bag. It was another book and an illustration slid within a think plastic bag. Looking at his collection, Merlin set the newest addition atop piles of some of the others. Most of these books bore similar titles: King Arthur: Behind the History and the Myth, Guinevere and Lancelot, Le Morte d'Arthur, Camelot and the Arthurian Legend. Many books were in French, some in Welsh, a few in more eastern languages, but most in English. Merlin had no problem translating the texts, as he had picked up his fair share of fluency over the years. There were novels, histories, dramas, drawings, and fragments of texts. He had his favorites and he had others he disregarded entirely, being aware of how ridiculous they were. On good days, he laughed at how much of the credit had been given to Arthur for miraculous battle victories and how his own character had reached such an astute level.

But there were bad days as well, when he pored over the accounts of Arthur's supposed immortality, wishing for some fact or myth he had overlooked but no book proved to be anything more but merely a confirmation of what Merlin already was told. And yet, Merlin couldn't help but progress his collection. It was comforting, in a way, to know how his and Arthur's story had become so legendary. Though, he found, it was never told in quite the manner that Merlin remembered it happening. Most of accounts of the warlock depicted him as a much older (even grouchy, Merlin was displeased to read) advisor to King Arthur.

But their names lived on, and as a pair, he noted, and that was enough.

Merlin ran his thumb over the spine of his newest book, entitled The Tragedy of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. The title was in gold against a grey cover. He had attempted to barter with an Irish bookkeeper until the man had given in and simply gave Merlin the book, seeing he wanted it so desperately. Within the book was a loose page equipped with a beautiful, gothic illustration of a robust blonde man wielding a sword, surrounded by rocks. The caption read Arthur pulls Excalibur from the stone.

Merlin sighed once more and looked out his bedroom window. It was dusk. He was tired from the journey home and so he would soon retire to bed. Merlin looked out his window, at the lake of Avalon that bordered his cottage on its lonesome hill. His eyes scanned the water briefly. He then shut its panel blinds and said, almost inaudibly, "Goodnight, Arthur."

Later, in the night, Merlin was asleep. He did not witness the first ring of ripples forming on the lake.