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In the years to come, whenever Merlin could be persuaded to recount his version of this night he would always open with the phrase coined by a Victorian author, voice a rasping whisper as he spoke: “It was a dark and stormy night…” His master and constant companion would look at him, then, inhuman eyes glinting dark as flint—and the creature would offer a fond smile edged with wicked intent. Everyone would know why, though no one would ever dare speak the words aloud. Many of their own stories were much the same.
Lies, small ones—sometimes they helped. There was no comfort to be had elsewhere.
The truth, of course, was that the night had been neither dark nor stormy, though Merlin had been frustrated to find the fuse to the downstairs electric circuit had blown again. However, the moon was full and the stars already out in abundance when he’d returned home shortly after nine on an unusually balmy autumn evening. He’d had plenty of light to guide his steps safely through the little house he shared with the latest incarnation of Gwen, all the while wondering with some humour why she had not seen to the matter already.
This Gwen, a young pre-med student who called herself Wendy (and didn’t remember anything about Before, which Merlin sometimes regretted, if only because she seemed to be just a little bit in love with him), had proclaimed herself the “Ms. Fix-It” of the house after he’d nearly blown up the kitchen trying to put up a new cabinet (apparently magic and automatic tools didn’t go together well), and she generally tried to avoid giving him opportunity to be what she termed “dangerously helpful.” Usually she was already in the back storeroom adjacent to the kitchen and rifling through the fuse box before he even had a chance to notice the problem. But didn’t she have some sort of anatomy test scheduled for the morrow? Vaguely he recalled a few heartfelt complaints and a lot of scowling over the breakfast table that morning. He’d been too preoccupied with his own worries to listen.
Well, if Wendy needed to study, he wasn’t going to go tripping up the stairs to interrupt her. Fuses weren’t such a new technology that he hadn’t had to change them before. Admittedly, Merlin had been a bit of a backwater hermit before Wendy had made it her personal mission to drag him into the twenty-first century (he’d been perhaps a bit self-indulgently reclusive and depressed since the last incarnation of Arthur had perished behind enemy lines during the Great War), but even he’d embraced the joys of modern electricity. Just as he’d managed such inanities alone for the greater part of the twentieth century, so too would he manage now.
And, besides, today was his lucky day! Nothing could possibly go wrong, not when he was so close to victory that he could almost taste its sweet and heady flavour.
Arthur.
He’d found him again, Merlin was sure of it. How could he not be, when the young man—one Aaron Stone—looked just as he did when they’d first met all those endless centuries past? That wasn’t always the case. (Last time Arthur’s outward appearance been as far from the original as ever: short, compact, and terribly Irish in the most stereotypically ginger-topped and freckle-faced manner imaginable. Arthur had sulked so adorably about his impugned upon vanity when he’d remembered Before that Merlin hadn’t had the heart to tease him about it. Much.) Merlin took it as a promising sign.
The only problem was that the young man had been orphaned at a young age and seemed to have fallen off the grid after completing a bachelor’s degree in business and economics two years back. A curious dilemma, but the Old Magic would have alerted Merlin to Arthur’s premature demise, so the lack of paper trail was not the result of death, but something else. Arthur was alive and waiting. And if his sources were correct, Merlin may soon have all the clues he needed to reunite with his lost love once more. His heart sped at the very thought of it.
Humming light-heartedly, Merlin dug around in the “junk drawer” under the kitchen counter just inside the doorway and pulled out an emergency torch with a pleased grin. The beam of light flickered a bit when he pressed in the button, but shaking the finicky bit of tech set it to rights, as always. After that it was just a matter of ducking his head into the storeroom, locating the spare box of fuses, and screwing in the replacement. They would need another box of fuses by the end of the month if they kept going through them at the rate they had been lately. Really, they should probably give in and call an electrician to see what the problem was, but Wendy was already buried neck-deep in student loans and Merlin’s job as an assistant librarian didn’t pay quite that much. It was a lot cheaper to just keep buying fuses. If anything went really wrong, Merlin could always cheat and hope Wendy didn’t notice (and that the house didn’t inadvertently blow up).
Light flooded the narrow room. Mission accomplished.
There was no time for celebration, however, because that was the precise moment a terrible high-pitched scream rent the air. “Gwen,” Merlin said, a terrified breath catching in his throat, because he knew that scream. For centuries it had played back in his memories and in his nightmares both, the relentless phantom of another era and another failure long past. Something had happened. Something had gone very, very wrong. “Wendy!” he said again, louder this time. His voice cracked, hysterical even to his own ears.
Another cry rang out in sonorous reply, weaker than the first, and then Merlin was fleeing the storeroom with all the speed he could muster.
The torch rolled on the floor, discarded and forgotten.
Merlin scrambled up the stairs, heart thumping erratically in his chest, and prayed to all the gods that had ever been and ever would be that his friend was alright. She’d been such a godsend to him that he didn’t know that he’d be able to cope if anything happened to her. Not on his watch. Not again.
“Hold on,” he called out as he ascended the stairs, “I’m coming!”
He sprinted past the upstairs bath, past his own messy bedroom, and threw open Wendy’s closed door with a slam that rattled the windows. And there she was. On the floor. Face buried in the vintage carpet he’d bought her last Christmas, because she’d been complaining about the chill of her bedroom’s hardwood floor. Her petite form was twisted so strangely that for a moment he thought she had merely done herself injury while practicing those silly yoga exercises she seemed so fond of. But.
She wasn’t moving. Or crying. Or showing any sign of life at all.
“Wendy?” he said, dropping to his knees beside her. Trembling, he reached out to touch her, to roll her onto her side. There was no resistance. Brushing her curls back from her face, he found himself staring into wide, unblinking brown eyes. And at the bloody mess where her throat had been mercilessly savaged. “Oh, Wendy.”
Numb, broken, unsure of what to do, he gathered his friend’s empty corpse into his arms and buried his face into her hair. She still smelled as sweet as always, of lavender shampoo and vanilla body lotion. His throat grew tight, his mouth dry. How could this have happened? How could he have not sensed the danger? It was so obvious now. The magic thrummed in his veins, singing a cacophonous tune of wrong wrong wrong and all he had to do was turn around—
“Who are you? How did you convince her to invite you in?” How did you know to hide yourself from me?
There had only ever been one person privy to the trick of shielding his presence from Merlin.
The creature shifted behind him, clothes rustling (intentionally, Merlin realized, so as not to startle him) as it drew near. It’s fingers were gentle—and cold, so shockingly cold, like the first frost of winter—as they brushed easily over the curve of Merlin’s neck from behind to curl proprietarily along the base of his jaw. Merlin didn’t shiver, didn’t turn to face the monster that had taken the life of his friend, but it was a close thing.
Magic sizzled wildly in his veins, waiting. Not yet. Not yet.
“Oh, my dear Matthew,” the creature chuckled, the carefree lilt of its voice more suited to the scene of an afternoon out with friends or the aftermath of a good football match than the horror film this night has become. Hackles raising, Merlin was suddenly quite certain that he didn’t want to know the creatures face, not ever, because... Because that voice was familiar. Too familiar. No. Tears trickled down his cheeks with renewed force. Wendy’s locks were already damp. “Or would you rather I call you Merlin? I’m hurt that you don’t recognize me. Except you do recognize me, don’t you?” The hand at Merlin’s throat tightened. Merlin gasped, choked, and the creature loosened its grip again, stray hand coming to comb contritely through Merlin’s own dishevelled locks. “Sorry, darling,” the creature cooed, “I forget my strength. Please, won’t you look at me? I’ve missed you. Come away from the girl.”
“No.” He wasn’t ready. He’d never be ready.
Another chuckle, low and syrupy, met his declaration. “Still as stubborn and insubordinate as ever, I see. How delightful. Still, there’s no need to carry on like this.”
“You killed her,” Merlin whispered. “You killed Gwen. And you act like it’s nothing. I don’t know you. Not anymore.”
“Don’t be so melodramatic. She’ll come back. She always does.” The creature paused, considering, and continued in a softer tone—almost human: “I regret the necessity of killing her, but she was being stubborn and—and her stench is all over you. She wanted you. I’m in no mood for sharing. You’re mine.”
And that, it seemed, was enough to pull Merlin out of his numb stupor, for he jerked his head around to glare accusingly at the creature—careful (so careful) not to jar poor Wendy. Cheeks flushed with rage, he met the red-tinged gaze of the one who was once Aaron Stone. The creature smiled tentatively and despite the uncannily pale skin, the unholy eyes, and the blood-stained mouth (Gwen—Wendy—sorry, so sorry!), Arthur’s latest incarnation was still the most beautiful sight he’d seen in many, many years. So like the first. The pictures hadn’t done him justice. Merlin’s heart broke.
“I belong to no one!” A lie, of course. But for the first time he wished it was true.
“Merlin,” the Arthur-creature complained, making an exasperated sound, “must you raise such a fuss? This is hardly the reunion I expected. You’ve been looking for me, haven’t you? My minions tell me you’ve been quite intent on your search. I must apologize for keeping you waiting, but surely you understand why I couldn’t come to you at once. Obviously I needed to be sure that you’d be safe amongst my new family, and conquering over centuries-old vampires takes some doing.”
“Aaron—”
“Arthur.”
Merlin inhaled deeply, sucking back his tears. “Arthur, you can’t really have expected me to be pleased to meet you again after you’ve done away with your humanity. For Christ’s sake, you’ve just murdered our friend! Yes, she loved me. Yes, she wanted me. But you must have known she was no threat to you. It’s always been you, only you, every time. How am I supposed to forgive you after this? You are not the man I love!”
“I’m sorry,” the creature lied, expression utterly without remorse. “I did this for you—I’ve made myself immortal. All these centuries you’ve been alone, and you’ve suffered for it. But you don’t have to suffer any longer. I’m not going to die again. I’m free to stay with you, just as you wished. We’ll see eternity together, you and I. The sacrifices of a few insignificant lives are hardly a high price to pay for such a blessing.”
Just as you wished. The words struck deep—a dagger to his soul.
Merlin laid Wendy on the ground and vomited, hunched over and grasping at the carpet in hopeless sorrow. The creature’s arms wrapped around him from behind in a cruel parody of comfort, cool lips brushing kisses at the base of his throat with just a hint of fang. “Shh, darling,” it pleaded, “I’ll take care not to kill so carelessly in the future. I didn’t mean to upset you. Hush, now, hush. The next time she’s reborn, you can keep her, if it pleases you—and the others too. I promise.”
The magic swelled—and poured out of him at last in a torrent of uncontrollable power so immense that the stinking bile under his panting face began to boil and the carpet beneath him charred and smoked. He willed the magic backward, directed it toward the monster that had once been (should have been again) his love, and the sheer unchecked strength of it should have reduced the thing to ash. It would have done, had it been anyone else. But it was—had been—Arthur.
“Stop,” the creature demanded, and the power swelled and dissipated in an instant. Merlin had never been able to deny Arthur anything. “I’ve had enough of this foolishness. Let us away.” Then, without so much as a by-your-leave, it lifted Merlin into a bridal carry, cradling him like precious cargo, and what was the use in fighting? The battle was already lost.
So, years later, whenever a particularly brave human servant or a timid minion gathered the courage to ask how such a sweet man could have found himself the consort of the now reigning Lord of Shadows, no one was ever much surprised to hear a tale filled with drama and adventure and nothing even remotely resembling the truth. Merlin hid behind words—found them a convenient outlet for the pain and guilt he’d never show. With each new twilight—with each innocent fallen and each country brought to its knees by a foe humanity didn’t understand—he came apart just a little bit more. It was his fault, really. His curse.
He should have known. He should have known Arthur’s love for him would not have permitted him to allow Merlin to remain trapped outside of time alone forever. He should have—
But.
The worst part of it all was was that most of the time...
Merlin was happy.
Even when the bodies of those they should have protected lay strewn on the ground around them.
Even when Arthur’s kiss carried the metallic tang of freshly spilt blood.
It was sick and selfish and wrong, and he hated himself for it, but Merlin was happier than he had been since he’d lost Arthur the first time. Arthur was with him, would never leave him, and that was worth the world to him (worth any number of Gwens).
When Destiny had twisted Merlin into the perfect companion for her Chosen Hero, he bet She hadn’t intended this.