A/N: One-shot. I wrote this for a contest on the Merlin Wiki. It's just an idea of how the series (overall) could maybe end. Some of the text format didn't come out 100% right when I posted it to the comment for the contest, so I thought it couldn't hurt to post a "proper" version on my FF account too.

"Help me, Emrys, please..." Morgana croaked out weakly, staring up at the old, white-bearded sorcerer standing before her as she was sprawled out on the ground, lying on her side.

"Is this really what you wanted Morgana?" he boomed out angrily, hurt and rage echoing in his deep, aged voice.

"Please..." Morgana stretched out and arm, reaching for him.

Before she could see, or use her magic to try and sense, Emrys' reply, Morgana's world went black.

She found that she was in complete and utter darkness, another prison, but not the sort that brought on madness. At least, not immediately. It was calm, behind her eyelids, safe from the bloody remains of the great battlefield.

Later, she woke, with one thought on her mind: that she truly did regret everything she had done. There was one memory that replayed itself in her head, over and over again: of herself and Arthur as small children, playing together, some mixed form of hide-and-seek or tag, running through the main square, Uther calling after them to get back inside castle walls...laughing... It had been so long since she'd allowed herself to remember anything positive about her father or brother. Always she had said 'Dear brother' with an air of scorn, hating him, making herself hate him more every day, and easily.

Now she wondered how she had managed. He was her friend. Yes, she had grown up. Yes, she had truly felt she no longer owed him, the son of the magic-hating tyrant king, any loyalty. In her eyes, Arthur was the mad usurper, not the other way around. But knowing that, somewhere in the battlefield, he had lain, fatally struck by Mordred, dying, she kept seeing, not the brother she hated, not the king she despised and longed to see killed, his head rotting on a spike, but her friend... From all those years ago. She felt what she never expected to again: empathy. Had her treatment of him, her unending attacks on Camelot, felt to him as Mordred's stabbing her in the back had felt to her? In his eyes, was she the traitor? Was he...after all...despite all she'd believed...innocent...? Was Emrys in the right to protect him?

Where was Emrys now? Would she ever know who he really was? Did it matter? He was not there; he had left her.

No, not left her, not on the battlefield, for her vision cleared and she saw she was in a woodland clearing somewhere. He had not carried her far, but Emrys had not left her to rot amongst the other bodies upon the field.

Arthur, she thought, wondering if she was mad or if she had simply been mad all this time without knowing it, though everyone else had... I must get to him. I must know where they've taken him... I must help him... Must atone for what I've done to him...

Her eyes landed on an inscription on a rock behind her. Here Lies Morgana Pendragon, sister to the Once and Future King.

Had Emrys put that there using magic? Or somebody else?

There came a voice. "Morgana..."

"You...!" Her breath caught in her throat.

It was the Cailleach, and she was beckoning to her. "Morgana Pendragon. Come here. We have much to speak of and to decide, and very little time."

Meanwhile, Merlin had taken the injured Arthur into an abandoned knights' tent to try and tend to him.

"Mordred...?" murmured Arthur weakly, uncertain.

"He's gone," Merlin told him, setting him down. "He's dead, Arthur. You dealt him a mortal counter-blow."

Arthur grimaced. "Where's the old sorcerer?"

Merlin shook his head. "You shouldn't try to talk now, Sire."

"I saw him, Merlin," croaked Arthur. He had seen Dragoon... What was more, he knew he'd seen him. It was just after Mordred wounded him and he dealt that counter-blow. He had seen the old white-bearded sorcerer walking across the devastated battlefield. "He took Morgana..." Had he been on her side all along? Gaius had seemed to think he was a friend, and that he had done all he could to save Uther, not being at fault for his slipping away in death, but what he had seen -the old man staring down at Morgana, then mere taking her away, lifting her up and carrying her off someplace else- still seemed odd.

It's a fever, Arthur, Merlin felt the urge to say, lying about his magic by default. None of what you saw was real... He was never there... Morgana must have spirited herself away... I saw nothing, only the wind swaying the blood-stained grass... But, no, the time for all that was in the past. It should have been over long before now; there were still so many things Merlin felt they were meant to do, him and Arthur, that he had prevented by fearfully keeping his secret too long.

Besides, Arthur was fading fast now, but he was not yet slipping into full unconsciousness; if Merlin used magic on him, to try and fight, even against fate and destiny themselves, the king would see.

So let him, thought Merlin, rebelliously. He's my friend, and he's dying. He won't hate me. And even if he does, it's too late for that to hurt me now. The warlock could not quite admit to himself that still he was desperate for Arthur to accept him for what he truly was.

"Arthur," he said softly, easing him down onto one of the cushions on the floor of the tent, "don't be afraid. This is going to make you feel a whole lot better."

"What are you talking about?" the king mumbled.

"This." Merlin closed his eyes and concentrated, placing the palm of his hand over Arthur's wound. "Licsar ge staðol nu." His eyes, opening again, were golden-coloured, and glowing.

For the first time, in spite of his grave injury, Arthur was not so dead to the world that he did not see. He saw. He saw everything. His servant, his friend, trusted over so many years, using magic...

If Merlin felt guilt, or fear, he did not allow it to show; he couldn't, not now.

"Merlin," Arthur gasped out. "You're...you're a sorcerer... You use magic."

"No, Arthur," Merlin said, "I have magic." Really, he felt he almost might as well have said, 'I am magic'.

"How long...?" He needed to know. His head was swimming, he wasn't entirely sure any of this was even real, for there was no way Merlin was a sorcerer... Still, he needed to know. If it was true, how long had his servant been keeping this from him?

"I was born with it."

Arthur set his jaw and stared daggers. Whether it was from pain or from anger directed at him, Merlin was never certain, but, on the side of caution, he guessed the latter, and did not seem to be completely wrong.

"You shouldn't have kept this from me, Merlin." His eyes darkened, clouded considerably. "There can be no place for magic in Camelot..." Arthur mumbled the latter to himself, in voice that if it were stronger might have been filled with mild disgust, recalling, echoing, (possibly even mocking), Merlin's own words from not so very long ago. "Damn it, Merlin!"

"I didn't have a choice. Think, Arthur. You must know that is true. That I wouldn't lie to you. Your father would have had me killed years ago, if I hadn't kept it hidden. All I ever wanted was to help you become the once and future king. To restore magic to the land, yes, because I believed it was what you -what we- were meant to do. I didn't know I would fail. But most everything, Sire, has been for you. I did what I did, said what I said, wronged whom I wronged, only to save you."

Arthur's face softened, but only a little. He croaked out something inaudible.

"What was that?" Merlin whispered.

"I said," he groaned, "your magic doesn't work."

The wound, Merlin realized, crestfallen, it's not healing. It's closed up a little bit, and the spell, if nothing else, may keep him alive a little longer, but it's not healing. "Not this time."

"Do you mean to say," he whispered through quivering lips, "you've used magic on me before?"

"Yes."

"How could you?"

"It was only to save your life."

"I thought you were my friend."

"When I have ever been anything else?"

"You know how dangerous magic is."

"Better than anyone," he assured him. "That's why I had to keep it secret."

"Merlin, for God's sake, don't be such a girl," Arthur managed to blurt out. "I can see you're crying. No man is worth your tears, Merlin. Not even me."

"I can't help it," he choked.

"I don't hate you," Arthur said. "I don't. I feel...betrayed...but I can't hate you. You may very well be the only friend I have left. Your actions were...misguided... You meant no harm. I forgive you."

"It's not that," wept Merlin, the tears streaming down his cheeks now, their flow unwilling to be slowed down, no matter how many times he bit onto his lower lip and tried to hold it in. "It wasn't supposed to be like this."

"Merlin..."

"This wasn't our fate," whimpered the warlock. "We were to unite the land of Albion. You were meant to make peace between those who follow the way of the Old Religion and those who do not, so we can all live in peace. And you weren't supposed to go, not like this."

"The old man...his eyes..." Arthur realized. "Oh, Merlin, that was you, wasn't it?"

"Arthur," he snapped, a bit more harshly than he meant to. "Are you listening to me? We've failed...everything, everybody's suffering, all those pretty promises of a brighter future for Camelot, it has all been for nothing... It's been in vain."

"I am still your king, Merlin, and I order you stop crying and answer me."

"Yes."

Of all things, the corners of Arthur's mouth turned up, as if in a smile. "That explains a lot."

"You never really believed I was in the tavern every time I disappeared, did you?" Merlin asked, forcing a chuckle.

"Actually, I did." He rolled his eyes and winced. "That's what's so sad. I should have known better; you never could hold your drink. Two tankards of good mead and you were usually out cold."

Merlin inhaled, sniffling, forcing further laughter.

"Merlin," said Arthur, "whatever magic you've given me, it won't hold forever. I want you to promise to do three things for me."

"I promise."

"First, however hopeless it is, send for Guinevere. I...I want to see my wife once more, before I pass on into the next life without her..."

"She will never..." She would never reach them in time.

"Merlin, you promised."

He nodded. "I know. And I will. At once, Sire."

"Good." He took a shaky breath. "Second, when you have finished that, you owe me a story."

"A story?" His forehead crinkled. "What story?"

"You can't tell me you kept your secret all these years without something interesting happening. Your secret must have tentacles, branches. You tell me about it. I deserve that much."

Merlin swallowed.

"And so do you."

"Arthur..."

"It's all I have left to give you, Merlin. Do you understand? It's all I have left. It's the only thanks I can offer. For all you've done. Your chance to speak, to avouch yourself."

"What's the third thing?"

"I'll tell you when it's time," Arthur said, rather mysteriously. "I can't explain it. I only know it won't be long; not now. You will know soon enough. And so will I. Until then, first Guinevere, then your story."

And so Merlin the great warlock, secret sorcerer, granted the king's requests. He sent messengers (they were alive because they were not knights and fate had chosen, for that reason, it seemed, to spare them), short and to the point letters on their persons, in each direction, banking on whichever could reach Camelot and the queen first. It mattered not, as long as one of them got through and made it to Gwen in time. Then, sitting at Arthur's side, he told him. He told him everything. Not once did Arthur interrupt, though his eyes widened and his brow lifted once or twice, with great effort. When it was over and all was said, he reached out unexpectedly and touched Merlin's hand. His fingers curled around the cold-sweat drenched palm of his manservant and he squeezed, lightly; he was both giving forgiveness and asking for it in turn. He was so sorry. He couldn't imagine what it must have been like to go through all Merlin had alone.

"But I wasn't alone," Merlin reminded him, when Arthur mentioned it.

"What...? But who...?"

"Gaius." Merlin smiled, his facial expression bittersweet. "That's who I had, who I cried with. Who kept me sane and tough me everything that was good and right about magic."

"Ah." Well, yes, that was right, he would have had Gaius, who was once a magic-user himself before the great purge, for comfort; that made sense.

"So, about that last request..."

Arthur smiled. "Not yet, Merlin." Not just yet...

And somewhere in the darkness of coldest, dimmest hours before the following the dawn, the queen of Camelot received a message and ordered her servants to ready her horse at once.

In the chilly air, horse going full speed at a might gallop, Guinevere was on her way.

Back in the tent, all silent, Arthur was beginning to close his eyes all the way, his breathing slowly changing.

"No." Merlin shook him. "Don't sleep. Rest now, Arthur, but don't go to sleep." He was afraid that if Arthur slept now, he would never wake. Perhaps there was a forthcoming moment when Arthur would have a long, long sleep, one well-earned if nothing else, but that moment was not just yet...

There was something...something more...that had to happen first. Yes, there was so much they missed, so much Merlin blamed himself for, but there was one thing, one thing, they were not too late for. The poor warlock only wished he knew what that something was.

"Gwen," murmured Arthur, unexpectedly. "Guinevere." He seemed to be blinking, staring blearily over Merlin's shoulder.

Merlin looked, but there wasn't anybody there.

Yet, Arthur saw her. Felt her. She had not arrived, still on her way, but in spite of this, he saw her clear as day. The king saw his wife standing there as clearly as he saw Merlin. Whether this was madness, or else Gwen had, though she later possessed no memory of it, by some magic she had never known she had and never would, been able to send the essence of her spirit ahead of her traveling body to Arthur's side, will forever remain a mystery. Even Merlin never learned the whole truth of this unexplained event.

Merlin, said a voice inside the warlock's head. Merlin I am outside. Listen to me. It was the voice of the great dragon, Kilgharrah. Being a Dragonlord and having heard this voice many times over the years, Merlin knew him at once.

While Arthur was busy goggling helplessly, a desperate yet relieved smile on his face, at what he believed to be his dear queen standing behind his manservant, Merlin ducked his head out of the tent. He decided it was safe enough to risk. If Arthur thought he was with Gwen, he wouldn't want to go to sleep in front of her, to waste his last few moments with her; it meant he would fight to keep awake, to keep alive, just a little longer. With Merlin's magic helping his willpower, maybe it would last long enough.

Outside, Kilgharrah wouldn't land. In the air, he battled with the white dragon, Aithusa, and part of the bargain between them, at the end of the battle below was that, till the end of Arthur's time, neither of them would set claw on human-trod earth again, keeping to the sky, save one exception: if one of them died and fell from the sky. Kilgharrah was weak, but he was not yet defeated. And Aithusa fought boldly, almost stupidly, as if she didn't know why she fought, only that she must, for Morgana was her mistress and Kilgharrah was on the side of Emrys, showing no signs of dying anytime soon, either.

Still, the great dragon could communicate with the Dragonlord on the ground telepathically, through their connection and through their shared magic.

There is not much time, Merlin. You are to take King Arthur to the lake of Avalon. See to it that he arrives at sunset. There, you will find a little boat, coming for, then waiting for, him. No matter the cost, no matter the pain, the once and future king must be on that boat, Merlin. No matter the cost... He must be aboard when it sails away. It is the last hope. No matter what... See to it... And, farewell, young warlock; farewell, my truest friend. Farewell... Farewell, my last kin.

Tears in his eyes, a painful lump in the middle of his throat, Merlin nodded and ducked back into the tent, just as Arthur had finished talking to 'Gwen'. Farewell, Kilgharrah.

"Your Majesty," said Merlin determinedly, when the king's now somewhat glazed eyes focused on him again.

"Merlin," mumbled Arthur.

"We have a journey to make." He swallowed. "A long one."

"I don't..." For a moment, Merlin was worried Arthur would refuse to come, saying that Gwen would not to know where to find him, but then he remembered: Arthur thought, poor man, that he had already been visited by his wife. He would have no qualms, believing they had said their goodbyes and there was no longer any need to wait for her.

All the same, it couldn't hurt to leave some kind of magical trail behind, so that Gwen might follow, if she arrived. The chances of her making it to the boat by sunset were even more dismal than theirs, but Merlin chose, as he always did, hope. He would, he decided, leave a way for her, a magic path, to arrive at the shoreline of the lake of Avalon, the old gods willing.

It was a long hard day of riding. Merlin and Arthur took only one horse, for Arthur was too hurt to ride properly and Merlin needed to hold him up. No matter how many times Merlin chanced a stop along to way and tried to keep on using magic to heal Arthur, the wound only got worse. At a slower rate, it was true, than one untouched by magic, but that was hardly an improvement at this point. Kilgharrah was right; the boat, and whomever was in charge of it, was their last hope.

By some miracle, the sun was indeed just dipping into the sky when they came breathless to the shores and Merlin dismounted, lifting Arthur off with him.

Where was the boat?

There it was, sailing along the waters, a curved dark spot on the not so distant blue-and-gold horizon, coming ever nearer.

Merlin breathed a sigh of relief.

That is, until he saw who came out of the boat and walked towards Arthur. "Morgana," he hissed, eyes flashing, not with magic, but rather with cold, hard anger.

"Give the king to me," Morgana ordered, after a moment of awkward hesitation. "I'm to take him to the Isle of the Blessed." She took a deep breath, then looked Merlin straight in the eyes. "I can heal him there, do you understand?"

Morgana might be powerful, but Merlin was fairly certain she was still not as powerful as he himself was. If he could not heal the king, how could she? More importantly, why would she want to?

"After all you've done..." he growled. "You expect me to trust you with the life of a man you have been trying to kill all this time?"

"He is my brother, Merlin."

"I find it interesting that you say that now," he retorted. "I'm the one who's been protecting him. You have no idea-"

"I know," snapped Morgana.

Merlin stared at her. "Know what?"

"I know who you are." Merlin had not realized how tired and browbeaten Morgana truly appeared until, for just that one moment, the old her -powerful and headstrong and not willing to take no for an answer- shone through with one small lift of her brow. "Emrys," she added. There was a ring of coldness in her voice.

"Who told you?"

"It was the Cailleach," Morgana informed him. "Who you so heartlessly left me to."

"Left you?" Merlin cried. "I did you a kindness. You were staring up at me, begging me for help... And I took you away from the battlefield. I put you someplace where you could rest in peace. I could have ended your life right there." I could have been your doom... "But I gave you a chance, however small. Arthur needed me. I couldn't have stayed. For all your claims to want to restore magic, Morgana, you only brought about ruin and cruelty. You gave me no reason to rescue you, and I could not put your life before Arthur's; especially not after all you've done to him."

"I have made a bargain with the Cailleach," Morgana cut in tersely.

She was not so forgiving of Merlin, him keeping his magic secret when he might have revealed it to her, might have been on her side, long ago when she needed him most, but, strangely, whether it was that she was growing too tired to care, or her remorse was truly genuine, thinking only of Arthur -her little brother, her friend- and grateful, after all, that Merlin had protected him, she did not hate him for it. Still, with all the history that was between them, things were ever tense, full of bubbling sparks bursting up and out at the surface.

"What sort of bargain?"

Arthur, quite out of commission at the moment and mostly dead to the world though he still lived and breathed deep inside himself, groaned and muttered something unintelligible.

Merlin continued to support his weight and cling to him protectively, but he did not bother trying to figure out what the king said and manage an answer. He needed to hear what Morgana had to say. Just then, it was more important. An answer to everything that she had done, to him, to her own half-brother, to all of Camelot, trumped over the mad ramblings of a hurt and feverish man who did not even know the lake nor his own half-sister when he stood so near them.

"My life extended, a claim to rule, as a queen, not over Camelot, but over the fairy beings, including the Sidhe people of Avalon, and to live on as High Priestess and bring magic where I might, in exchange for repentance, for saving Arthur and letting him sleep until he will be needed in the world again.

"My own magic alone won't heal him, but the magic that is all around the Isle of the Blessed, the power I can now command from Avalon, can restore his life. But you must give him over to me at once. For a thousand years I will be bound to the Isle and only the under-realms of the lake. I will not be able to come with a boat again. Arthur would be dead by then, even if I could return."

"No." Merlin shook his head and swallowed tears. "No. I won't let you take him."

He'd trusted her, believed she had a good heart, even stood up, years before, to Kilgharrah on her behalf when he kept referring to her as 'the witch', and she had gone and betrayed them all. He would not trust her with his own life, let alone Arthur's.

Still, Kilgharrah had said, no mincing of words, flat out, no muss, no fuss, that Merlin must put Arthur on that boat no matter what the cost.

Merlin might still have refused, if he hadn't chanced to look into Morgana's face and see someone he had not seen for a long, long time: the king's old ward. The angry High Priestess, for but that one fleeting moment, had the eyes, the very expression and essence of, the Morgana who had once come with him to Ealdor, to help his little village fight against their oppressor.

That Morgana, a Morgana he had not realized even still existed to begin with, all these years later, he still had a thin-spread, breakable thread of trust with. It was frayed and thinned, almost to the snapping -the breaking- point. But that sliver of trust, however feeble, still remained, even after everything she had done.

"Arthur," Merlin whispered to the king, giving in. "Arthur, you have to go with her now. She's going to help you. I promise."

As Arthur was being lowered into the boat, there came the thundering of hooves and Gwen was running towards them, the back of her dress and her cloak trailing out behind her. "What's happening? Morgana? Merlin, what's she doing? Where are you taking my husband?"

"You need to trust me, Gwen," Morgana said. "I'm not going to hurt him."

"Like I would would ever trust you again-" she began.

Merlin put a hand on her shoulder. "Gwen, stop. As unbelievable as it may be, she's on our side right now." Or, at least, she was on Arthur's, and that was what really mattered...

Gwen ran to the side of the boat and took his hand in hers, kissing his knuckles. "Goodbye, Arthur."

His lips moved, though his eyes never opened, but Gwen (and Merlin) both swore they heard him say, "Guinevere," and he knew his queen was there, for real, one last time, bidding him a tearful farewell.

"Merlin," he managed next, eyes still closed. "The third request." Arthur, with great effort, handed him his sword, which Merlin hadn't even realized he'd still had on him. "Throw it into the lake." Then he could say no more.

As the boat with Arthur and Morgana on board sailed off into the sunset, Merlin watched numbly. It was over. The end. He did not even notice when Gwen left his side. And where she went, he never learned. The persisting belief was that she went to a convent of a faith that those of the old ways called the New Religion, but Merlin never put much weight into such speculation. Nor did he think anything much, years later, when rumours abounded that someone had found the bones of Arthur and his queen buried together on an island near where the Isle of the Blessed was; he knew Arthur was still alive, with his sister someplace, resting and healing, till he could return and finish the work he was meant to do.

Merlin was alone on the shore, not certain what to do with himself now. He couldn't go back to Camelot, and he had long out-grown his place in Ealdor. Kilgharrah was probably, by this point... No, he didn't want to think of that. Not just then.

Ever so sadly, he threw Arthur's sword, forged in the dragon's breath, back into the lake of Avalon.

A white arm rose from the water and caught it in mid-air. Then, after it sank back down, a woman, who some have called, in retelling the story, the Lady of the Lake, appeared, rising from the water like an ancient spirit emerging from a lifted veil, and all his pain and fear and uncertainty was instantly forgotten. An unexpected happiness and weariness together began to swell in his heart.

"Freya," he breathed.

She smiled. "I've missed you."

"Arthur..."

"Will return," she promised. "You did what you must."

"I feel so...empty...and cold..."

"You need to come with us now," Freya told him, reaching out her hand.

Merlin noticed the water was swirling and he was seeing, not the lake itself anymore, but straight into Avalon. Lancelot and Elyan stood there, some ways behind, waiting for him and Freya.

Merlin smiled shakily and wiped the last of his tears away with the back of his sleeve. "All right."

He took her hand and, stepping forward, their fingers intertwined, they disappeared together, into Avalon.