A/N: Hello and welcome to my first Merlin Fanfic! I used to follow the show on TV when it was still broadcast and it was definetely my favourite TV show (actually, it is still to this day the only TV show I have followed out of interest). After reading over a few fics here on FF, I figured that I might as well take a shot at writing one myself. Maybe it will help me get back into writing properly again...

The story will be told mainly from Merlin's and Morgana's perspective, and it will feature a more independant Merlin than how he was in canon. If it was anything that really annoyed me in the show it was just how stupid and dependant Merlin was on others' opinions. So I'm going to remedy that in his fic. I hope you like it.

Summary: When Hunith begins to fear for her young son's life, should anyone find out about his magic, she takes him to the Isle of the Blessed, where she meets Nimueh. Seeing the young boy's potential, the High Priestess takes him on as her apprentice. Six years later, Merlin arrives in Camelot. But what are his reasons for being there?

Disclaimer: I do not own Merlin. Or Morgana for that matter either.

Chapter One: The Threat

Merlin couldn't help but allow a smile to grace his lips as the Village of Ealdor came into view. It had been too long since he last visited his home. Being apprenticed to Nimueh was quite a challenge. She was an excellent teacher, but she was also very demanding and left little to no time to spare and just relax. If she wasn't having him practice control of his instinctual magic, she had him reading about something from the Old Religion or desciphering an old script or something equally annoying. He had also noticed, to his annoyance, that she was somewhat of a perfectionist, not accepting anything less than complete mastery of a skill she taught him before teaching him something new. Merlin was half-suspecting that she took a sadistic pleasure in seeing him struggle to completely master specific skills, which she knew were hard to even get the hang of. At times, he had been stuck practicing the same skill for over a month.

Leaving his horse atop the hill that overlooked Ealdor, Merlin hurriedly made his way down towards the small village, towards his home. He only had the time to make a short visit, so he didn't want to cause a ruckus about it. The only reason he was here was to see his mother and tell her about his mission. He had resolved to not even seek out his childhood friend, Will, whom he otherwise always took the time out to sit down with and have a chat when he visited. Right now, he just didn't have the time. It was bad enough that he had went of course like this to visit Ealdor in the first place.

As he neared the village, he reached back and pulled up his hood over his head, hoping to appear like just the stray passerby. Doing his best to appear indifferent to his surroundings, Merlin set course for his mother's hut. As his childhood home came into view though, Merlin couldn't help but feel excitement build in his chest. A goofy grin spread over his face, showing no sign of the otherwise stoic apprentice of the Last High Priestess. The mental image of Nimueh's scowl if she had seen him showing such childish excitement didn't exactly help him keep it under wraps.

Knocking on the door three times, Merlin couldn't help but feel a slight sting of estrangeness. He felt like a stranger, knocking on the door to his own home. Having once been a close friend of Uther Pendragon himself, Nimueh had taught him a lot about "common courtesy", as she called it. In that regard, she had been almost like a second mother, or a very protective aunt, to him when he was away from home. Hunith, his mother, hadn't complained at all when he had told her about it. On the contrary, Nimueh's determination that Merlin received some lectures in proper behavior seemed to have improved Hunith's view of the High Priestess.

"Come in." a voice sounded from the other side of the door.

Shaking his head to clear it of his thoughts, Merlin smiled at the familiar sound of his mother's voice. Not wasting another second, he opened the door and entered the hut. It looked just like he remembered (not that there was a lot that could change. His mother didn't own a lot of furniture). As his eyes looked around the small hut, he found Hunith sitting by the table in the kitchen-area.

When Merlin pulled his hood down again to show who had entered her home, her eyes widened and she was on her feet in a heartbeat, quickly closing the distance between them. Just as she was about to crash into him, Merlin held out his arms and engulfed his mother in a hug.

"Merlin!" she whispered in his ear, as if she was afraid someone would overhear them. "Welcome home."

MxM

Morgana sighed as she listened to her guardian's speech about The Great Purge and how magic was a crime against nature itself. She had heard it before and had no real interest to hear it again. Her grey-green eyes narrowed as she looked down from the window where she was sitting, to the crowd that had gathered in the courtyard. In the middle of the crowd, a man was currently being forced down into an excecutioner's block while the excecutioner casually stood at the side, sharpening his large axe.

The King's Ward closed her eyes and turned away, trying to steel herself for what she was about to witness. It wasn't the first time she saw someone be excecuted, but she never enjoyed seeing people having their heads cut off. It just seemed so wrong to her in so many ways. In some cases, where the criminal in question had commited serious crimes on multiple occassions, she could accept that they had to be taken out of commission in order to protect the people, but that didn't mean she had to like it. And in her mind, Uther was too hasty in letting the axe fall, especially in cases like this one. When it came to magic, Uther Pendragon was unreasonable.

"... therefore, I hereby sentence this man, Thomas James Collins, to death for the crime of using magic!" Uther finished his speech, earning storming applauds from his audience.

Hearing the drums start to beat forebodingly, Morgana swallowed and forced herself to look down towards the Excecutioner's Block. The sorcerer, Collins, had stopped struggling against the chains and shackles that held him in place. He had resigned himself to his fate, as he bowed his head low and waited for the axe to fall. Even from up where she was sitting, Morgana could see that the Excecutioner smirked at the broken man in front of him. She felt how her insides twisted at the obvious glee the excecutioner was displaying as he raised his axe. How could anyone be so cruel, as to take pleasure in killing someone who had already been broken?

The drums picked up their pace as the Excecutioner's axe reached its peak, and then fell. It was over in a split second. Seeing the poor man's head separate from his body and fall to the ground, Morgana had to resist a sudden urge to throw up. For once, she was grateful that she was watching from way up here, instead of standing right next to the block. Her mind just vaguely registered when her guardian announced that they would be holding a great feast in a few days time to celebrate the anniversarie of the start of the Great Purge, and this "victory over magic".

Having heard and seen enough, Morgana got up from her spot by the window, feeling her legs protest wildly at the sudden activity. She had been sitting there in that window in a very uncomfortable position for over 40 minutes now, just to see someone's head get cut off. Had it been worth it? No. If she had known that Uther would take half an hour to hold a speech before he let the poor man out of his misery, Morgana would've stayed in her chambers.

Just as she was about to close the window and retire for the day, someone in the crowd began screaming in horror. Morgana stopped what she was doing and looked back out the window. People had began backing away from a point in the courtyard, in which an old woman stood. Her eyes were glued to the Excecutioner's Block and her mouth was wide open as she screamed at the top of her lungs.

"You are a foul man, Uther Pendragon!" she screeched, her wide eyes lifting to look at the King. "In your ignorance and lust for blood, you have killed my son!"

Morgana chanced a glance at her guardian. He had frozen in place, his eyes narrowed as they stared down at the woman. She couldn't see his face very well from where she was sitting, but she knew what he was thinking. If this really was the mother of the man he had just excecuted, then she was guilty in his eyes. If not for practice of magic herself, she was guilty for harbouring a sorcerer. In his mind, her "crime" was bad enough to varant her an excecution of her own.

"Your son," Uther spoke up with a challenging voice. "was caught practicing magic, which is acknowledged as a crime in this kingdom. He knew this, and he still commited the crime."

Even from where she was sitting, Morgana could easily make out how Uther's face hardened, which she knew was a sign that he was trying to reel in his emotions. Though she would never admit it out loud because of the sheer horridity of the statement, she was surprised that the King had even bothered to restrain himself from throwing the woman in the dungeon the moment she spoke out against him.

"My son never hurt a fly!" the woman screamed back. "You will pay, Uther Pendragon! An eye for an eye. A tooth for a tooth! A son for a son!"

Hearing the threat against Uther's son, Morgana felt a lump start to form at the back of her throat. 'Arthur!' she thought in alarm. While she wasn't particularly fond of Uther, his son was another matter. Morgana and Arthur had known each other for a long time, even since before she became Uther's ward. Since her mother, Vivienne, died when Morgana was very young, her father had always opted to drop her off in Uther's care whenever he was heading out into battle. She and Arthur didn't always get along, but he had been her only real playmate when they were younger. To hear someone threaten Arthur's life unsettled her greatly.

And apparently, Uther also recognized the threat for what it was. His face contorted with rage as he grabbed ahold of the railing, almost as if he was tempted to jump down into the plaza and grab the woman by himself.

"Seize that woman!" he roared, obviously enraged at the threat against his son's life and for once, Morgana couldn't help but agree with Uther's actions.

Before the guards could grab ahold of the woman however, she shouted something incoherrable that Morgana couldn't quite make out, but she realized with a sense of dread that the woman had spoken in the Ancient Tongue, the language of the Old Religion. She was proven correct a few seconds later when an unnatural gust of wind sweaped through the courtyard, before the cloud of dust that the wind had created wrapped itself around the woman and disappeared, along with the newly revealed witch.

Morgana stared at the spot where the witch had been standing just a few moments ago. If she had magic, then no doubt did she have the power to make good on her threat on Arthur's life. Again, Morgana found herself agreeing with Uther's next action.

"Find her!" he roared to no one in particular, though his direct command got all guards stationed within earshot to move. "I want her captured and brought to justice!"

Despite her dislike of excecutions, Morgana found herself agreeing with Uther. She swallowed to try and force the lump in her throat back. Feeling alarmed at the woman's threat, Morgana hastily closed the window and stood up, quickly walking away from it. But she didn't go in the direction of her chambers as she had first planned, instead heading towards the Training Fields, the last place where she had seen Arthur. The witch certainly had the power to extract her revenge on Uther by killing Arthur, and something told Morgana that it hadn't been an empty threat. She had to make sure that he was okay!

MxM

Merlin yawned and rubbed at his eyes as he sat in the saddle of his horse, making his way towards the City of Camelot. He had spent the night in Ealdor in his childhood home, but had been up before the sun rose in the sky, to make sure he got away in time. The ride from Ealdor to Camelot was a long one, even by horseback, so he couldn't waste any time. He was already behind schedule as it was because of his visit to his home.

He had explained to his mother over dinner last night that Nimueh had told him to seek out a man named Gaius, a former asociate of her's. According to Nimueh, they had studied magic together for the short time they both lived at the Castle in Camelot, before the practice of it became outlawed. He had been her mentor when she first came into her magic, and even though she stubbornly claimed to have surpassed him a long time ago, she admitted that Gaius had a wider knowledge of the more theoretical parts of the Old Religion than she did, having more experience in the matter. When it came to the practical part of the Old Religion, Nimueh was unmatched, as she was a High Priestess, but she admited that she did not know everything about its history.

His mother had thought that it just sounded like an excuse to get him inside Camelot's walls and Merlin couldn't help but agree. There had been something in Nimueh's eye when she told him to seek out Gaius that wasn't usually present when she gave Merlin his instructions. She had sent him on "missions" before to let him test the limits of his abilities, but she had promptly avoided sending him anywhere near Camelot before, and now she was sending him to the very heart of the kingdom. To him, that didn't make any sense.

As it would turn out, his mother had known Gaius when they were younger. She didn't give any details, but she said that he was a very kind and caring person, hence the reason why he had worked so hard to become the Court Physician. To help as many people in need as he could. She told him that she knew he had studied magic at one point, but was surprised to learn that he had been Nimueh's mentor.

Scratching his chin in thought, Merlin reached down to take a drink from the bottle he had brought along. Something about this whole thing unsettled him. If what Nimueh said was true and she no longer considered Gaius her asociate, then why would she send Merlin to meet him? He had come to learn over the years that Nimueh also had a goose unplucked with Uther Pendragon, the King of Camelot. The fact that she was now sending him to Gaius, a man she knew would be in close proximity to the man she claimed to hate, made him wonder if maybe she had an ulterior motive.

Merlin sighed as he heard his stomach rumble. It was about mid day and he hadn't really had anything for breakfast, other than a piece of bread his mother had forced into his hand before he left. Hearing his stomach rumble again, louder this time, he shook his head and pulled the bridles on his horse, causing it to stop dead in its tracks.

"I guess now is as good a time as any to grab a bite, wouldn't you say?" he asked the horse, as if it could actually understand him.

It didn't take Merlin long to set up a fire and start to cook something. Being way out in the forest and still far away from Camelot, he could use his magic as long as he made sure no one saw him, and on top of that he was a rather decent cook. Having lived the last 6 years in the care of Nimueh had taught him a lot of practical skills as well, as they didn't exactly make a legal living. Cooking was one of those practical skills, though he had never cooked anything in an actual kitchen. As he stirred the stew, he idly wondered how he would fare cooking in a kitchen. Smiling to himself, he put the lid on the small pot he had over the fire.

And then he froze.

Something was hanging in the air in the area. Looking around, he couldn't see anything strange about the place, but he was certain that something had happened here recently, something foreboding. Something that involved magic.

He had come to learn the hard way that someone who was very in tune with their magic and the nature around them could sense when or where magic had been performed. The more inexperienced the one who had performed the magic had been, the easier it was to detect. That was why, when Merlin had sneaked away at night to practice in secret during the beginning of his training, Nimueh had always caught him afterwards.

Taking a deep breath, he tried to calm his racing heart. This was the first time he had been able to detect anything without knowing beforehand that he would be asked to find whatever magic had been performed. He also noted, in the back of his head, that he hadn't felt anything when he was still on the horseback or when he had been stumbling around looking for firewood. It wasn't until he had sat down and relaxed completely that he had noticed that magic was hanging in the air and even then, it was faint.

Breathing slowly, Merlin opened his eyes again. He had to stay calm, or he risked losing what little sense of magic he had. Nimueh had told him that having this power at his age was a privilege, as it was a power that usually only the High Priestesses held. It was not a common practice of magic and it required hours on end of meditation for one to sharpen their senses enough to be able to sense magic around them.

Shutting out everything else, Merlin slowly rose to his feet. He moved slowly as to not cause his heartbeat to rise again from the activity. Trying to locate where the magic was coming from, Merlin closed his eyes and let his senses guide him, his stew completely forgotten. Eventually, after what had to have been at least 10 minutes of wandering around almost blindly, he finally felt the magic growing stronger. Confident that he had found what he was looking for, Merlin looked around himself one last time to make sure that he was alone before he held out his hand.

"Abethecian!" he commanded as he reached out with his magic.

At first, nothing happened in front of him. Merlin couldn't help but frown at this. Had the magic not worked? Or was this some kind of advanced enchantement that would require stronger magic to break? He honestly doubted that, since anyone who could use such magic would hardly leave enough trace of it for someone as unexperienced as him to notice it. Or had he just imagined feeling the magic in the air?

Not quite sure what to make of it, Merlin turned back around to walk back to his stew, but something he saw made him stop in his tracks. Behind where he had been standing, about 2 feet to his right, now lay the body of a young woman, spawlred on the ground like a puppet that had its strings cut off. Taking a moment to process the sudden appearence of the corpse, Merlin sighed. Okay, so he hadn't been spot on. He still needed more training.

Pushing his disappointment at his sensory abilities aside for the time being, he walked over to the body and bent down beside it. The woman couldn't have been older than 30 years of age, at most. She was wearing a long, beautiful red dress with golden lining, suggesting that she either belonged to a noble family, or made a very good living for herself. Judging by the fresh state her body was in, he would guess that she must've died not less than a day ago, which would also explain why he had been able to sense the magic despite his poor sensory abilities. There was no bodily harm done to her, so he guessed that magic had also been the cause of her death.

Turning her around, Merlin couldn't help but wrinkle his nose in disgust. Whoever had killed her hadn't even had the decency to close her eyes! Sighing to himself, he bent down and pushed her eyelids closed. Whoever she had been, he doubted that she had deserved such a horrible fate, being left out here all by herself to rotten. While Merlin had learned to not let his sympathy for others hold him back in a fight by now, that didn't mean he didn't have a certain respect for the dead.

Sighing, he stood up and made a descision. He couldn't be seen in the forest, kneeling over a corpse. Just wearing something with a hood made him look suspicious as it was, but finding a hooded man kneeling over the corpse of a dead woman? Na-ah, that wouldn't work out in his favour, and he didn't want to attract any more attention than was nescesary.

Having made up his mind, he went back to where his horse was watching him with a curious look.

"We need to get going again." he said as he patted the horse on the nose. "Don't give me that look, we'll stop to eat something later."

Quickly gathering the little stuff he had taken out of his bag, Merlin emptied the pot he had placed in the fire and used magic to cool it down enough to place it back in his bag. Then they were off again, at a much faster pace than they had rode in previously. Something about that corpse made him feel... uneasy, aside from the fact that it was a dead body. He didn't know why, but he felt like he needed to get to Camelot faster!

MxM

Morgana watched Arthur train from the window in her Chambers, which by a stroke of luck overlooked the Training Fields. Ever since the witch had openly threatened his life, Morgana had made it her mission to make sure Arthur was alright. Not that she would be able to do much from up here, but it put her at ease to know that he was okay for the moment. When she had found him the day before, after the Witch had made her threat, he had laughed at her when she explained what had happened and had told him that she was worried.

Narrowing her eyes at her childhood friend, Morgana sighed. Why was Arthur acting like this? Over the last year, Arthur had grown more and more arrogant of himself and his own abilities. He had began to wear his armor on an almost daily basis, just to show off who he was and whenever someone spoke back to him, he would throw down his gauntlet and challenge them to a fight. Naturally, being a very gifted warrior and knight, Arthur would easily outclass whoever he had challenged and then taunt them about their loss, as if to show off how great a warrior he was.

He still tended to act more softly when it was just the two of them, so Morgana hadn't immediately caught on to the change that had befallen him. The first time she had seen him beat up one of the villagers, she had barely been able to recognize him and had told him as much. The scolding she had received from Uther for "humiliating his son in public" had been one of the worst as of yet.

Since that day, she had avoided the topic of his bullying of the villagers when they spoke and had tried to stay out of it as much as she could, but at times it still made her sad. She knew of course why he was doing it. He wanted to prove to the people of the Kingdom that he was strong, that they would be receiving a strong king once Uther either retired or passed away. He didn't seem to realize that rather than impress the people, he was alienating himself from them. If she didn't know that it would probably never happen, Morgana almost wished that someone (other than herself) would beat him in a fight and take him down a notch or two.

"Milady?" a soft voice spoke up from somewhere behind Morgana. "Is there something I can do for you? You have been staring out the window for almost an hour now."

Turning around, Morgana found her maidservant, Guinevere, walking up to her. Seeing her one and only real friend, Morgana tried to put on a smile. Being a Lady of the Court, as well as the King's Ward, Morgana had trouble getting close to other people, especially other people around her age. Arthur was an exception to this of course, even though he was 2 years older than her. When Gwen had first been hired as her maidservant, Morgana had felt guilty. Gwen was only a year older than her, and yet she had to look after her, clean her chambers, wash her clothes, help her get dressed and respond to practically her every demand.

Morgana wasn't a very demanding person. For a Lady of the Court, she was unusually unselfish and undemanding. She had tried to help Gwen do her chores, but her presence when her maidservant washed her clothes and seeing the Lady she was supposed to look after help her clean the table had unsettled Gwen greatly, as she knew Uther would have her fired if he knew that Morgana was trying to do her chores by herself. So Morgana had instead tried to find other ways of showing her appreciation of Gwen, such as buying her some new clothes and give her a little extra money when she had done something she didn't normally do.

From there, their friendship had quickly blossomed as the years passed. Gwen, while a little reluctant at first, had been much more accepting of this new way of showing how grateful Morgana was that Gwen was there to help her. By now, Morgana would even dare to say that Gwen knew her almost as good as Arthur did.

"No thank you, I'm fine for now." she smiled at her friend, but when she turned back to look out the window again her expression turned worried again.

Gwen, having known Morgana as long as she had, noticed that her mistress and friend was troubled by something and walked up to put a comforting hand on her shoulder. When Morgana didn't react, Gwen sighed, as she had a pretty good idea of what was weighing Morgana down.

"Is this about the threat against Arthur's life?" she asked, studying her friend's face for any reaction. When Morgana swallowed, she knew she had been right in her assumption. "You shouldn't allow that worry you so much, Milady. At least not while he is on the Training Field. He will have the knights watching his every move, there's not need for you to eye him from up here like a hawk."

Deep down, Morgana knew that Gwen was right. Nothing had happened in 24 hours time so she would have to hope that nothing would happen. Taking a deep breath to try and calm herself, Morgana turned around to face Gwen again.

"I can't help but worrying, Gwen. Arthur is like a brother to me." she said, noting with dismay that her friend raised an eyebrow when she talked about Arthur like a brother.

"Right..." she said, obviously not believing for a second that Arthur was just a brother to Morgana.

Seeing the doubt on her friend's face, Morgana sighed. They had been over this so many times already and truth was, she was getting tired of it. Just because she was the King's Ward it didn't mean that she had to marry his son. And worse was, Gwen wasn't the only one who seemed to think that Morgana and Arthur would marry each other. She had heard people whispering about it during feasts and whenever the two of them were seen together.

Not wanting to get into another discussion about it with Gwen though, Morgana quickly tried to think of something else to talk about. She was usually very quick-witted, something that she prided herself in, but for once she found that she couldn't come up with anything to say. She was saved from trying though, as someone knocked on her door.

"Enter." she called, as she turned to look at the door.

As soon as the person who had knocked did as he was told, Morgana almost regretted her descision to let him in (not that she could've really refused him even if she wanted. Standing by the door to her chambers was no other than Uther Pendragon himself, King of Camelot and Morgana's guardian. Seeing who had entered the chambers, Gwen immediately bowed in respect of her king, but Morgana opted to look away from her guardian instead, which she knew he would take as a sign of disrespect.

"Leave us." Uther said sternly.

Gwen wasted no time in obeying her king and quickly hurried out of the room, closing the door behind her. For a moment, Uther looked at Morgana expectantly as if he wanted her to say something, but when his ward didn't speak up, he sighed and began to walk over towards her.

"Morgana," he spoke in a slightly softer tone. "What is this? Why are you not out there enjoying the festivities?"

Morgana had to resist the urge to roll her eyes. Was that all? Uther was here just to try and convince her to get out of here and celebrate while his own son had a death threat hanging over his head?

"I'm sorry, I just don't think that cutting someone's head off is a cause for celebration." she replied, trying to keep her face as neutral as possible.

Uther narrowed his eyes and glared at her for a moment. Had it been anyone other than Morgana, or maybe Arthur, on the receiving end of that glare, they would've flinched and taken a few steps back for safety meassure. As it was though, Morgana refused to back down from her guardian's stern gaze. She had never backed down from him before and she wasn't going to start now.

"You don't understand." Uther tried to reason with her, keeping his voice as calm as he could. "You're not old enough to remember how things were 20 years ago."

"Uther," Morgana interrupted him. "How long are you going to keep punishing people for something that happened 20 years ago, something that these individuals had nothing to do with?"

Seeing the look in her guardian's eyes at being interrupted so rudely, Morgana felt a shiver run down her spine. She knew that she was playing with fire right now and had she been anyone else, she would've been in the stock or in the dungeons a long time ago. Despite this, she held her ground and returned the King's glare, showing no sign of discomfort or fear.

"These individuals," he spat the word as if it left a bad taste in his mouth. "are practicing magic! And magic corrupts! You heard what that woman said, she threatened Arthur's life!"

"Only because you actually took her son's life!" Morgana shot back. "Think about it! If someone killed Arthur, wouldn't you want revenge on that person as well?"

For a moment, Morgana thought she might've overstepped even her boundaries with Uther when she saw the King's gloved hand twitch threateningly, as if he didn't want anything more than to hit her. He didn't do anything worse than grit his teeth and throw her a glare that told her just how angry he was with her thought, before he stormed off towards the door. Just before he left however, he came to a stop and turned to face her.

"I at least expect you to be at the feast in two days time. If not for me, at least show up in respect of the best singer in all the lands."

And with that, he left as quick as he had come. Hearing the door close behind him, Morgana let out a sigh of relief. She never enjoyed her arguments with Uther, regardless of how she felt about him. Even though he was a cruel and ignorant man in her eyes, he had really went out of his way to take care of her ever since her father died. She still disagreed with him on many things, but at the same time she found that she couldn't really hate him either.

What was worse, she knew that she would do as he wanted and show up at the feast in two days time. Perhaps he actually did have a point? If nothing else, it would help take her mind off the threat on Arthur's life. The heaven's knew she needed something to occupy her thoughts, or she would become paranoid! With that thought in mind, Morgana left the window to search for Gwen. Discussing what she should wear for the feast sounded like a good way to take her mind off of things.

MxM

Having crossed the boarder from Essetir to Camelot and made his way through the forests in record time, Merlin could finally see the Castle of Camelot tower in the distance from the top of a hill. Had it been any other time, he would've probably stopped and watched the scenery for a moment, because it really was a magnificent sight to behold in the last rays of afternoon sun, but as it was he just noted in which direction the castle was before he took off again.

He didn't know why he was in such a hurry, but there had been something that unsettled him greatly about that corpse he had found. The magic that had been used to kill at woman and hide her was crude and sloppy, suggesting that whoever had done it had been very amateurish and not very well versed and refined in the ways of the Old Religion. And amateur warlocks or witches were the most unpredicatable of them all, and the most dangerous, because they more often than not didn't follow the ways of the Old Religion and instead used their magic for their own selfish gains. Even Nimueh, who was a High Priestess and a supporter of anything magical, had expressed her disgust with people like that.

Being caught up in his own thoughts, Merlin failed to hear the unmistakeable sound of an arrow leaving a longbow and the swisching sound as it travelled through the air. Straight into the right front leg of Merlin's horse.

The next few moments, all hell seemed to break loose. With a screech of pain, the horse fell to the ground, tossing Merlin out of the saddle and through the air. Having not been prepared to get thrown off, Merlin landed hard on the ground a few feet away. Less than a second later, the air was filled with excited shouts and battlecries that seemed to surround Merlin on all sides.

Groaning, Merlin casually sat up and looked around himself as a group of rough-looking men closed in on him. His instincts, which had been refined over the last 6 years he spent he had spent as Nimueh's apprentice, kicked in as he felt adrenaline rush through him at the obvious threat. One. Two. Three. Four. Five... Six. There were six men in total, and by the looks of them, they were bandits.

Jumping to his feet as the bandits surrounded him, Merlin cursed loudly under his breath. He had been careless when he approached Camelot, and now he would have to clean up his mistake. He could almost hear Nimueh's reprimanding voice echo in his head as she scolded him.

"If someone knows your final destination, they are more likely to set up an ambush or trap close to your destination, rather than set it up randomly on the route there and risk missing their chance to trap you. Simple logic."

She had told him this more than once. Having been part of Uther Pendragon's Court, Nimueh had a decent knowledge of strategy and warfare. Despite her belief in the power of the Old Religion, she had made sure that Merlin understood the importance of using his power to their full extent, and not waste any energy on reckless assaults or by using more magic than what was absolutely nescesary.

However, that also meant that others might and most likely would possess the same knowledge. In this case, it would seem that these bandits had come to realize that staying close to Camelot, which was a city many people visited or at least stayed in during their travels, would make it more likely that they ran into someone they could ambush than if they randomly roamed the lands. Merlin grit his teeth.

"I'm in a hurry, and not in a particularly good mood right now." Merlin growled as he began to build up his magic. "I suggest that you let me through."

Silence rang through the area as the bandits processed Merlin's words, obviously not having expected such cheek from a young boy who had been cornered by six, rough-looking bandits. Then, they broke out into laughter.

"Did you hear that?" one of them said. "He's in a hurry and wants us to let him through."

As the bandits kept on laughing at him, Merlin quickly tried to figure out which one of them would attack him first. The one right in front of him were closest to him, having taken a step towards him when he spoke. Silently focusing his power in his right hand, Merlin could hear the air around his palm give off a slight crack. The bandits however were too caught up in their laughter to notice it. Smirking to himself, Merlin held up his hand.

"Well, it's your demise then." he said coldly. "Forbearne!"

As soon as the word left his mouth, the hand that had been pulsing with magical energy caught fire. The unexepcted sign of magic caused the bandits to stop laughing and, after a few seconds, their faces contorted with uncertainty. They had not expected this boy to possess magical abilities. Keep a close eye on all six bandits to make sure none of them ran away, Merlin couldn't help but feel a little sad. He would have to kill them all.

"Akwele!" he called as he thrust his palm forward, sending the concentrated ball of fire flying straight into the chest of the Bandit in front of him.

The power of the spell sent the bandit flying backwards with a cry of pain as the fire engulfed his body. Seeing their comrade being taken down with such ease, the other bandits took a hesistant step backwards. Merlin's eyes quickly scanned the area for any other possible interruptions but when he found none, he held out his hand again.

"Cume hay forbearnar!" he commanded, causing the fire from the dead bandit to start spreading around himself and his opponents in a circle to keep them from fleeing.

Seeing their only escape route being cut off by a ring of fire, the bandits turned back towards Merlin with a whole new look of respect and fear on their faces. The one who had been downed still had not moved, his sword lay fallen on the ground where he had first been hit by Merlin's attack. Looking at the five frigthened bandits, Merlin wordlessly summoned the sword to his hand and prepared himself. He was not going to enjoy this.

A/N: So there it is. I hope you enjoyed reading it. Yes, I know that lines and stuff like that aren't completely in line with what they say in the actual first episode. And no, this will NOT be one of those stories where the main character is instantly powerful and skips through the original trials. I don't like fics like that and I don't write fics like that.

Aside from Merlin, I hope I managed to keep the characters almost in line with their canon selves. I know Morgana is a little bit different from what she was in canon as well (if you compare her behavior in the first episode that is), but I think I managed pretty well otherwise. Please tell me what you think in a review!