Merlin Headcanons

What Tomorrow Brings

A/N: I feel like I should credit the many writers before me who have graced us with glorious depictions of Merlin whapping people with a staff/cane.

. . . . .

Arthur doesn't spend too much time around his father's manservant. The man's nice enough, he's sure - an older man who knows the value of keeping his mouth shut but has the glint of unspoken words in his eyes - but there's never been much call for him to much more than glimpse the servant, and until recently servants weren't something he thought much about.

Now, with a kiss from Guinevere still lingering on his lips, and Merlin's odd words of wisdom echoing in his head, he probably spends more time thinking about servants than he does anyone else, but he's a better man for it, so he doesn't let it bother him much.

To his original thought though - He doesn't really know his father's manservant at all. He has, however, thought he would at least recognize the man. Which is why he frowns as a younger, red headed man brings his father another glass of water at the banquet.

His father catches the direction of his glance and explains the matter with a wave of his hand. "I had to let William go. He was getting too old."

"Too old?" The words sound a bit strange to his own ears, but his father doesn't seem to notice.

"His eyesight was going, he was getting unpardonably clumsy, and his mind had started wandering. I should have let him go sooner, really."

The conversation has already gone on too long for this topic, but he can't stop himself. "Go where?"

His father frowns, confused. "What?"

Arthur shrugs, making it casual. "What will he do? He won't get another job, surely."

The king just waves his hand again. "I gave him some money, of course. He'll be fine."

Will he? Arthur wonders. Does he have any family? How long will the money last? What if he gets sick? What if it's stolen?

Why does it matter?

He has a sudden vision of an elderly Merlin - he pictures him with a long white beard for some reason, he can't imagine why - fumbling more than usual with a breakfast tray, spilling food across his papers and struggling to clean it up. Struggling and squinting as he writes a speech for Arthur and one day forgetting to write it at all.

He shook the image off. He was older than Merlin. Far more likely was that Merlin, even at eighty, would be as cheerfully annoying as ever, refusing to shave off the beard no matter who told him to and whacking people with a cane he only pretended to need, and innocently saying, "What? I thought they were an assassin!" whenever Arthur tried to get him to stop. (And then Merlin would turn out to be right, and Arthur would refuse to outright say so, and Merlin would be singing "I told you so" at the top of his eighty year old lungs.) He can picture it now - Merlin using his age as an excuse to hide his clumsiness, feigning forgetfulness to get out of chores, and then making up for it all by reminding some poor sorcerer why "harmless old servants" were anything but.

If anything, he'll be the one to cause trouble. Madness runs in his family, he knows, and a small part of him even acknowledges that it might be beginning to take his father. He shoves the thought aside quickly, but he considers it for himself.

He can see other futures too, sadder ones, where Merlin makes excuses for the king and coaxes and tricks him into doing what needs to be done. Merlin gently reminding him that Guinevere is gone, married to some blacksmith in an outer village, and that his wife, some political necessity, is waiting for him in the dining hall. Merlin hiding from the world that the king is no longer fit to rule and bitterly cursing them when they find out and pass the crown to his son because in Merlin's eyes, he will always be fit, always be worthy, even if Arthur isn't sure why. Merlin, calling him "sire" regularly for the first time in his life, in a stubborn show of defiance and loyalty.

That's assuming they make it that far, of course. The world is not a safe place, not for knights and princes, and not for servants who insist on coming along . . . and insist on drinking poison and making deals with sorceresses trying to bargain their lives away. (Yes, Arthur knew about that. He'd overheard Merlin and Gaius talking about it once, shortly after. He'd confront Merlin about it someday when he thought he could do it without shouting. Not that Merlin didn't deserve to be shouted at, but knowing their luck, someone would overhear him, and Merlin would end up getting himself burned at the stake, and he had enough nightmares about Guinevere burning without adding Merlin to them too, thank you very much.)

Death wasn't the only fate that could await on a battlefield. One of them might be injured severely enough that they never fully recovered. Arthur honestly feared that for himself more than he feared death.

So. Lots of depressing futures possible.

But, despite his constant threats, there was one thing that was constant in all of them: Merlin was there.

Not fired. (Arthur is, contrary to popular belief, not actually that much of an idiot.)

Not somewhere quieter with a nice business and a family of his own. (Arthur is aware that this one is an actual possibility, and he has nothing against the idea of Merlin settling down with some nice girl or other. It's the idea of Merlin deciding that he has better things to do with his life than fight beside Arthur that bothers him, and, no, he will never, under any circumstances, say that out loud.)

Not executed. (Arthur has forgiven his father many things. If the king ever goes through on executing Guinevere, Merlin, or Gaius, though, that's going to change very, very fast. And although the son in him wants his father to live forever, the rest of him is very much looking forward to a day when someone will cry "Sorcery!" and point a finger at one of the few people he trusts, and he will get to raise an eyebrow and order the guards to arrest the accuser instead of the accused. A day when maybe he can finally stop jumping every time a trial is called to session and dreaming about a father that refuses to listen and a courtyard died with one more victim's blood.)

And in no future, no matter how clumsy or forgetful or nearsighted or flat out insane Merlin might become, can he imagine handing him a bag of coins and telling him to go.

That night, when Merlin's helping him change for bed, he asks him what he knows about William. Quite a lot, it turns out. Apparently the man has very decided political opinions and a dry wit that he'd stored up all day and unleashed on anyone willing to listen. Merlin is always willing to listen to anyone and had apparently struck up a friendship with the man.

"He's gone to live with his daughter," and Merlin happily chats on about the man's family although there is a sadness in his eyes. He seems to weigh Arthur for a moment before saying, "He used to have a son too, and two grandchildren, but they all died a few years back. At least, that's what most people say."

"And what really happened?" Arthur asks with a raised eyebrow.

Merlin glances at him sidelong. "Nothing. They probably are dead by now."

"Merlin."

" . . . There's a rumor that the youngest grandchild had magic. They might have gone to the druids." There is a challenge in Merlin's eyes, daring him to make something of this.

Arthur just nods. "Just a rumor, of course."

"Of course."

Arthur should be afraid, he knows. Afraid because Merlin lives with a former sorcerer who remembers too much about magic, and was friends with one back home, and has no qualms with dealing with the enemy to save Arthur's life. Afraid because Merlin sensed the power of the unicorn, and afraid because he was so quick to help the druid boy.

Instead he is afraid that his father might find out.

He hates magic. Of course he does.

It's just a lot easier to hate when Merlin's not around for some strange reason that Arthur has spent years not thinking about.

"Do you ever think about the future?" he asks instead.

Merlin's eyes shine with that odd light he sees whenever Merlin imparts his little scraps of wisdom. "Oh, yes. All the time."

. . . . . .

A/N: The plot feels a little rambley in this one, but I like it anyway. I leave it to you to decide if this is a "missing scene" type thing from season three and that Arthur's thoughts on the future are bitterly ironic, or if it's an AU where the prophecy was actually fulfilled.