Fic: Indistinguishable From Magic
Mar. 2nd, 2010 02:35 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
netgirl_y2kTitle: Indistinguishable From Magic
Fandom: Merlin/Doctor Who
Characters: Morgana, Morgause, Merlin, Arthur, Gwen
Rating G
Word Count: 5423
Summary: Morgana is a Time Lord in a fob watch. No, really, she is.
There was a voice coming from Morgana's jewellery box.
Time Lords, Daleks, Time War, Gallifrey, Time Lords, Daleks, Time, Time, Time...
Depressingly enough, this was actually the least of her problems. Firstly, she was concerned that Uther or Arthur would realise that her daring escape from the clutches of Morgause had actually been part of an elaborate plot to place a spy within Camelot. Secondly, there was Morgause herself, who kept popping up in mirrors and things to ask how the aforementioned spying was going. And finally, mealtimes had gotten rather stressful, what with the constant worry that Merlin might have been making merry with the toxic substances again.
Still, there was a voice coming from Morgana's jewellery box. It was annoying.
Time Lords, Time Lords, Time Lords, Time Lords...”
Morgana sighed and stood up. It was becoming impossible to get any sort of morally dubious plotting done. She crossed the room and crouched down next to her dressing table, she pressed her ear to the box.
TARDIS, Gallifrey, Daleks, the fall of Gallifrey...
“Er,” Gwen cleared her throat as soon as she entered Morgana's chambers. Morgana stood up sharply and smiled, trying to look as though she hadn't been listening to the nonsensical ramblings of a wooden box.
Luckily Morgana's recent, ahem, kidnapping had made Gwen more inclined than ever to indulge her various eccentricities, and she said nothing about it.
“Can I get you anything?”
“No, Gwen. Thank you.”
“Very well, my lady.”
“Gwen?”
Gwen looked surprised but pleased to be called back; things hadn't been comfortable between them for a long time. “Yes, Morgana?”
“Do you know where Gallifrey is?”
“It's somewhere near Cumbria, isn't it?”
*
“Arthur!”
Morgana intercepted him on his way to train with the knights. Normally he'd have told her that he didn't have time for her, but he was still feeling a little guilty for not defying his father's orders and going to save her from Morgause.
Indeed, the reason Morgana eventually had to fake her own escape was that she'd gotten bored of hanging around Idirsholas waiting for a non-existent rescue party.
“What?”
“Have you heard of somewhere called Gallifrey?”
“Gallifrey? It sounds Scottish. You don't want to go there, Morgana, it's nothing but rain and the Scots.”
Morgana waved her hand dismissively. “Thanks anyway.”
“Oh, and Morgana? My father is sending a group of knights to that castle where you were held to capture Morgause.” Arthur reached out and gripped her hand briefly. “There's nothing to be afraid of anymore.”
“Oh. Right. Er, good. Would you excuse me?”
She turned away from Arthur and rushed around a corner. In one of the high, stained-glass windows she could just make out a flicker of blonde hair and red fabric. “I assume you heard that?”
She heard Morgause's laughter and hoped Uther hadn't sent any of the knights she was particularly fond of.
Not for the first time she wondered why, what with the magic crystal and ability to appear in reflective surfaces, Morgause didn't just do her own spying?
“Who are you talking to?” asked Merlin, who was always popping up from round corners and behind furniture these days.
“No one,” lied Morgana, turning to face him.
There had been an awkward few days when Morgana had first arrived back in Camelot. She'd wondered if Merlin was going to tell Arthur about her being a witch, and Merlin had wondered how severe the punishment for attempting to murder the King's ward was.
Eventually self preservation won out for both of them, and now they settled for glaring at each other across the banquet hall.
“Yeah, right.” said Merlin. He attempted to stride masterfully past Morgana, while at no point turning his back on her.
*
Morgana was dreaming. She'd had to leave her biodampener... No, she meant healing bracelet, didn't she? Whatever it was, she'd had to leave it behind, and now her nightmares were back as bad as ever.
She dreamt of monsters made of metal cutting a swathe through Camelot. They couldn't be hurt by swords or arrows. They fired weapons of magic and screeched “Exterminate! Exterminate!” as they cut down knights and peasants alike.
One of the magical weapons struck Arthur and he fell, dead before he hit the ground.
The same thing happened to Merlin. Which wasn't entirely unpleasant, actually.
Then Gwen fell, and Morgana woke with a scream. She didn't need a talking box to tell her that this was Not Good.
The box was determined to have its say anyway.
Daleks, Daleks, Daleks, Daleks, Daleks, Daleks, Daleks...
“Oh, shut up,” said Morgana.
She looked speculatively at the full length mirror across the room. Before Morgana had returned to Camelot she and Morgause had a long talk, and they'd agreed that Morgause wouldn't do anything (using Morgana as an ingredient in a sleeping spell, for example, or conjuring an army of metal monsters) without first getting Morgana's express agreement. But it was probably worth double checking.
She waved a hand at the mirror and muttered the words Morgause had taught her. The glass rippled as though made of water, and after a few moments resolved into the image of Morgause, looking every inch the dangerous enchantress, except for the bit where she was rubbing sleep from her eyes.
“Morgana, is everything well?”
“Yes. Sort of. Listen, you aren't by any chance about to conjure an army of Daleks to destroy Camelot?”
“What are Daleks?”
“Never mind.”
“Morgana, are you getting enough sleep?” asked Morgause.
“Yes. I'm fine. Just, bad dreams. I'm sorry to have woken you, goodnight.”
“Should I come to Camelot and get you?”
“No,” Morgana insisted. Being rescued by a dashing knight in armour once was lovely, twice and it began to look like you were incapable of looking after yourself. “Honestly, it's nothing.”
“Take care of yourself, my dear.” Morgana nodded and with another word the glass was back to normal.
Just before she drifted off to sleep, Morgana found herself looking at the mirror and thinking, “I'm surprised a thousand year old Carrionite telephone still works...”
*
The next day it occurred to Morgana that the voice might not be coming from the box itself, but from something inside it. This cheered her up immensely; a talking box was just odd, talking jewellery was somehow less so.
She spent the morning wrapped in a dressing gown, sitting in front of her vanity mirror, lifting every piece of jewellery she owned to her ear as though they were seashells and she was trying to hear crashing waves.
Gwen was bustling around the room clearing things away. Luckily she didn't find Morgana's behaviour all that odd, Morgana had always found pretty things soothing in times of stress.
Morgana threw down an irritatingly silent earring in disgust and picked up a necklace. It wasn't one of her regular pieces. It was a heavy silver locket with a catch on one side. It was decorated with etched swirls and circles, in style it reminded her a little of her biodampener... healing bracelet.
Perhaps it was another gift from Morgause?
Generally, Morgana was very much in favour of receiving pretty gifts from beautiful women - she didn't feel as though there was enough of it in her life, but this wasn't really the time. She lifted the locket to her ear.
Time Lord, Time Lord, Time Lord, Time Lord, Time Lord, Time Lord, Time Lord, Time Lord...
The necklace slipped though Morgana's fingers and hit the stone floor. Gwen hurried over and picked it up, it obviously wasn't talking to her because she calmly offered it back to Morgana.
“Here you are, my lady.”
“Thank you, Gwen.”
As she took the locket Morgana's fingernail caught on the catch and she had the almost overwhelming urge to flick it open. But then, sometimes she had the almost overwhelming urge to march into Uther's chambers and tell him she was a witch and damn the consequences, or throw her arms around Gwen and tell her that she loves her and is sorry they've grown apart. And she doesn't do those things either.
“Gwen,” Morgana began hesitantly, “have you seen this necklace before today?”
“Of course, it's always been in there. But you've never mentioned wanting to wear it before and, well, it doesn't really go with anything else you own.”
“I don't think I've ever noticed it before... Well, I think I'll wear it today.”
Morgana nodded and turned to her wardrobe, to deal with the serious business of which of her dresses would best complement a talking silver locket.
*
Other than the necklace babbling nonsense at her - which was slightly more interesting than anything the courtiers might have to say, and slightly less depressing than psychically eavesdropping on Merlin and the dragon discussing her potential evilness - life continued on much as it had before.
None of the men who had been sent to capture Morgause returned, Arthur complained about how he was expected to defend Camelot with an elite fighting force of two knights and Merlin continued to stare at Morgana as though she was going to start setting things on fire the moment his back was turned.
The necklace had very little to say on the subject of arson, but quite a lot to say about Daleks.
Morgana's nightmares continue to feature the metal monsters, sometimes terrorising Camelot, sometimes a landscape she didn't recognise: burnt orange with two suns low in the sky.
In fact, she spent so many of her nights dreaming about Daleks that she had no advanced warning about the Mercian lord who tried to assassinate Arthur, and as a result she ended up being grazed by an arrow as she tried to drag Arthur out of harms way.
After Merlin had bodily tackled her away from the prince, Uther ordered her to the court physician's chambers to be taken care of. Gaius bandaged her arm while Merlin looked at her, keenly.
“I did just save Arthur's life, you know. You don't have to look at me as though I'm a bomb that's about to go off.”
“A bomb, my lady?” asked Gaius, as though he didn't recognise the word. This had been happening to Morgana a lot lately; either everyone was getting stupider or she really was talking nonsense.
“Yes. A clockwork device that... I can't remember, do we have clockwork yet?”
Merlin and Gaius regarded her with a look of deep suspicion that Morgana felt was uncalled for. Gaius finished bandaging her arm and said, “I'll get you a salve to prevent the wound scarring, my lady.”
Morgana nodded vaguely and focused on Merlin. She remembered the colour of Merlin's eyes just before the candelabra had oh-so-fortuitously fallen and crushed the would-be assassin.
“Merlin, are you a Time Lord?”
The question prompted another deeply suspicious look. “What's a Time Lord?”
“I think it's a bit like being a dragonlord, only with fewer dragons.”
“How do you know about the dragonlords?”
“Magic, all-seeing crystal,” said Morgana, when what she meant was cheap Carrionite phone-tap.
*
It was a familiar sensation, really.
Deep down Morgana had known her dreams told the future since she was fifteen. She'd avoided admitting it, even to herself, knowing that as soon as she did everything would change. Likewise, she knew the locket wasn't just a magical curiosity, but she also had a feeling that as soon as she opened it nothing would ever be the same again.
So she wore the necklace every day and avoided using words like “Dalek” or “Gallifrey” in conversation. Unless it was with Merlin, in which case she went out of her way to repeat as many of the things the necklace said as possible just to watch him get increasingly confused.
Morgana imagined that if she ever did open the locket it would be at sword-point, or when she was about to be burned at the stake or something equally dramatic.
In fact, what actually happened was she was sitting in a court session about the distribution of grain, or the rounding up of sorcerers, or something else that she should probably have been paying attention to so that she could report it to Morgause. She was bored and fidgeting with her necklace, which had become something of a habit. Her thumbnail accidentally caught on the clasp, the locket snapped open and Morgana remembered.
Time Lord, Time Lord, Time Lord, you are a Time Lord, you are a Time Lord, you are a Time Lord, I am a Time Lord...
One thing she now knew for certain: being a Time Lord was absolutely nothing like being a dragonlord.
One good thing that came from having spent several months in Uther's court being by turn in fear of her life and extremely hungover was no one batted an eyelash when Morgana turned a nasty shade of green, lurched from her seat and rushed from the room as though she was about to be sick.
She pushed her way into the hallway and leaned against the wall before she could fall down, she pressed her palms and forehead against the cool stone. The trick was to breath, just breath deeply and evenly. It was at times like this, she thought, that a respiratory bypass system was going to be very useful. Of course, that thought set her off on another round of hyperventilating.
It was, when she thought about it, a little annoying.
You spend months and years coming to terms with the fact that you're a witch and becoming a revolutionary accordingly; only for it turn out that you are not a sorceress after all, but a Time Lord from the planet Gallifrey. Which doesn't come with sparkly magic powers, but does come with a brain full of stuff - including the brand new concept of planets.
It was almost enough to drive a girl to drink - again.
“Morgana, are you alright?” Gwen had followed Morgana out into the hallway.
Before Morgana could say that she was not alright, nor was she entirely sure she was really Morgana, Merlin burst through the doors with a shout of, “Gwen, be careful!” He stopped in his tracks, looking surprised that he wasn't having to pry Morgana's fingers from around Gwen's throat. Honestly, the ideas that boy got into his head.
Gwen frowned. “Be careful of what, Merlin?”
“Yes, Merlin,” Morgana echoed. “What should Gwen be careful of?”
*
Gwen took Morgana to her chambers, helped her into her nightgown and put her to bed. Which was sweet, but basically unhelpful. But it did get Morgana away from Merlin, and from Uther and the rest of the Court and allow her to sit quietly and sift through all the new things in her head: supernovas and TARDISes and untempered schisms.
There were new memories in there too; memories of a childhood on Gallifrey, of the academy and a hateful uniform with an improbable collar, of worried adults, of war and Daleks and whispers of “we must save the children.”
And then a TARDIS and a Chameleon Arch...
Which begged the question, “Gwen, if you had a magic time machine that could look like anything, where would you park it?”
*
That night Morgana spent a long time staring into her mirror, the words that would enable her to speak to Morgause lay heavy on her tongue.
Maybe she could write her a letter instead?
“Please allow Morgana to be excused from the revolution on the grounds that she's an alien.”
Maybe not.
*
The next morning Arthur came to visit her. “Gaius told my father that you had some sort of episode.”
Morgana was suddenly very grateful for Gaius's inability to speak plainly to the king, because it meant that a desire to overthrow the monarchy became “an episode.”
“I'm fine now,” Morgana said. For a certain definition of fine, obviously.
“If it's about Morgause--” Arthur started awkwardly.
“It's not about Morgause,” Morgana cut Arthur off. She and Arthur had been communicating perfectly adequately by name calling and pulling each other's hair for over ten years, this was no time for them to start talking about their feelings. “You know, she's really very nice. I think you'd like her if you gave her a chance.”
“We're still talking about Morgause?”
“Yes. She gave me jewellery, and taught me some new sword-fighting moves She showed me the one she beat you with. I can show you how to counter it later, if you like?”
“I do not need combat lessons from a girl.” Arthur cleared his throat and said, “But, uh, maybe when you're up I can show you how much I don't need combat lessons from you?”
“I'd like that. Oh, and Arthur, if you ever meet something called a Dalek, aim for the eyepiece.”
“Is it just me, or have you gotten stranger recently?”
“You have no idea.”
*
Morgana continued to have nightmares about Daleks.
They weren't precognitive dreams about Daleks swooping above Camelot, instead they were the nightmares of someone who'd grown up in war zone.
She remembered seeing one of the Dalek ships over the capitol just before she was herded into a TARDIS with a group of other frightened eight year old Time Lords. She remembered crying as the chameleon arch descended towards her skull, and one of the custodians smiling at her and saying, “Don't worry, we're going to make you a princess.”
Morgana woke with a start.
Well, she supposed, there hadn't been a monarchy on Gallifrey for millennium, she couldn't really blame them for not knowing the difference between a princess and the king's ward.
*
The strangest thing about recovering her memories was that nothing else really changed.
Uther continued to rule in a manner that made most Time Lord presidents seem reasonable and well balanced, and Morgana continued to stay out of his way as much as possible. Granted, she didn't know exactly how Uther would react if he discovered she was an alien (assuming he understood what aliens were and didn't cry “sorcery”) but she doubted it would be with understanding and restraint. And although she hadn't been taught much about regeneration before she was taken from Gallifrey, she didn't imagine that decapitation would help the process along.
Arthur continued to have near death experiences with all manner of weird and wonderful creatures – Morgana was beginning to suspect that Camelot was built on a rift that led straight to the planet of the biologically improbable mythical creatures – and Merlin continued to save him with magic.
That was another thing, a lot of the supposedly magical artefacts in and around Camelot were quite obviously of Time Lord, or Carrionite or some other alien origin. But the things that some people could do--
You could see quite a lot of sorcery in Camelot, well, you could as long as you weren't following Uther's direct line of sight, and maybe it was a coincidence that people's eyes flashed the exact colour of Artron energy when they were using magic, but Morgana doubted it.
Low level psychic ability being exacerbated by some kind of rift or tear in the space-time continuum?
And even without the magic, there were things about Camelot that were just wrong. That copy of “Gray's Anatomy” she'd spotted on Gaius's shelf was definitely anachronistic.
The worst part of it was that there was absolutely nothing that she could do about any of it. A Time Lord without a TARDIS, she was about as useful as a seer no-one would listen to.
The more things change the more they stay the same.
*
There was a tournament in Camelot. Well, nothing had tried to kill the prince all week and it was something to do. Morgana watched the clashing swords with casual interest. She wondered about the Time Lords - hiding a child from a war in a time and place where the main form of communication was hitting the other person around the head with a broadsword.
She was trying to think sensibly about TARDISes. There must be one in Camelot somewhere. The Time Lords wouldn't strand her here, would they? And if their intention had been for her to live out a normal human life, why would they have left her that locket with her memories locked inside it?
The thing to do was assume that there was a TARDIS somewhere and all she had to do was find it. And if she couldn't, then she'd do something else – panic, probably.
She slipped out of her seat and away from the stands. Arthur was smashing Sir Kai's helmet with the hilt of his sword, and the part of Morgana that had attended the academy on Gallifrey thought it was barbaric, while the part of her that was Morgana and enjoyed elbowing kidnappers in the face was cheering him on. It was making her head ache.
“Morgana,” Gwen called, following her, “aren't you staying to watch?”
“No, but I thought you would. Arthur's fighting.” Morgana emphasised the prince's name. Gwen fidgeted and looked away. “You could have told me, you know. God, Gwen, what did you think I was going to do, pitch a jealous fit?”
“I don't know, Morgana. I don't know what you're going to do from one day to the next. I'm... I'm afraid for you. And I didn't want you to think I was trying to take your place or anything.”
“Gwen, unless you've got a talking necklace and a time machine hidden in your cottage you couldn't possibly take my place. You haven't, have you?”
Morgana tried not to get her hopes up, but Gwen would make an excellent Time Lord. Gwen just frowned, years of working for Morgana had taught her to bypass Morgana's more logic challenged statements without really hearing them. She said, “Anyway, it's never going to happen, Uther--”
“Won't be around forever,” Morgana interrupted.
“Because of you,” Gwen remarked sadly.
Morgana opened her mouth to deny it, but she couldn't. She had come back to Camelot to kill Uther. He was a tyrant, and a menace to society and a threat to Morgana herself.
“I hate this,” she said instead, “us not getting along. It makes my eyeballs itch.”
Gwen smiled a little at that. “I know. Me too.”
“You should get back to the tournament, if you miss Arthur's victory he'll sulk for a week.”
*
Morgana had sensible, well thought out reasons for why Uther wasn't dead yet: he hasn't done anything too tyranty this week, Arthur's not ready to be king, Gwen would be disappointed, if they hold off for a little while longer Morgana might be able to find her time machine and run away from all this.
Somehow she suspected that none of those reasons would come close to convincing Morgause.
*
Morgana had an idea, and this one didn't even involve stripping down to her underwear.
The mystical creatures that terrorised the countryside surrounding Camelot had to come from somewhere, Morgana suspected some sort of time-space rift. And that rift had to have been opened by something, possibly a TARDIS.
She asked Arthur, who was oddly reluctant to direct Morgana towards a concentration of terrible monsters.
She asked Merlin, who offered to draw her a map.
*
It was halfway to Camelot's border that she came across the ruined castle, a central keep surrounded by piles of rubble. At least, to anyone else it would look like a ruin, if they noticed it at all. But Morgana's stomach flip-flopped and every cell in her body stood to attention and screamed TARDIS.
She smiled widely and dismounted from her horse, you couldn't keep a horse in a TARDIS.
“Merlin,” she called over her shoulder, “could you take my horse back to Camelot?”
Merlin had spent most of the journey to the ruins hiding behind one tree or another. And while he was very thin, the trees in this part of the countryside were few and far between, and he was on horseback. He dismounted and walked over to her, looking equal parts sheepish and defiant.
“Shouldn't you be back in Camelot?” Morgana asked. “Arthur might cut himself shaving in your absence.”
“Is that a threat?”
“Oh, for-- Yes, Merlin, it's a threat. You've uncovered my villainous scheme.”
“That would be funnier if you hadn't already tried to kill the king. Do you know what his father's death would do to Arthur?”
“Arthur's a big boy now, I'm sure he realises that Uther has to die for him to become king. Or are you planning to tell him that Uther's just gone away to live on a farm?”
“Morgana--”
“Since when are a fan of Uther Pendragon's? He'd have you killed in heartbeat if he knew what you are. Arthur wouldn't be able to stop him.”
“Is this the part of the conversation where you try to convince me that we should be on the same side, that we don't have to be enemies.”
“Merlin, you put hemlock in my drinking water, we definitely have to be enemies.”
“Yeah,” said Merlin, sounding sadly resigned.
“It's just, don't you ever wish you could tell destiny to go to hell?”
“No. I'm going to help Arthur be a great king. It's a good destiny.”
“You only say that because you haven't got to the bit where you get locked in a tree yet.”
“What are you going to do now, go back to Morgause?”
“I am going to step inside this keep and make it disappear.”
Merlin grinned. “Really, Morgana, even I couldn't do that.”
“You just watch me.”
*
The door of the keep swung open easily and she stepped inside. The last occupants of the TARDIS had left the desktop theme on “castle” so it didn't immediately look much bigger on the inside. But the thing that gave away its true nature was the console – made of some sort of organic stone – rising from the floor.
The thing about having been taken from her home planet at the age of eight and hidden from an apocalyptic war in an essentially medieval culture, was that Morgana had never had any proper, official piloting lessons.
But she was damned if she was going to step back outside and admit to Merlin that she couldn't do it, so she reached for a promising looking button, hoped for the best and pressed...
*
Morgana looked at the empty space where Gallifrey had once been and tried to feel angry. She should feel angry, she should feel devastated, she should want to rain fiery revenge down on the Daleks heads.
But she felt more indignant. Like she used to when Uther executed suspected sorcerers in the courtyard, that it was terribly sad but it didn't really affect her.
Because her life on Gallifrey, it was like a dream, and not even one of her true ones. That was why she didn't think of her herself by her old, Gallifreyan name, that and she probably couldn't pronounce it any longer.
She didn't feel like a Time Lord, she felt like... like the Lady Morgana, a noblewoman of Camelot with a time machine.
She guided the TARDIS away from the ruin of Gallifrey, after all it was terribly sad.
*
She found Earth – second home to all orphaned Time Lords, of course Morgana didn't know that, yet – and travelled through its history. She tried not to think about Camelot; about Morgause, who was probably worried sick; about Arthur, who was undoubtedly pretending not to be; about Gwen, who was afraid for her; and even stupid, murdering Merlin.
In 1975 Morgana walked out of a cinema in London, halfway through an excessively silly film and thought, “Why not?”
*
It took her a little while to find Camelot again. This was partly because of Morgana's driving, she hadn't exactly been in 1975 through choice, and partly because Camelot was hidden. The entire planet of Albion was hidden in the time vortex, in a pocket of time that caused the same fifty years to loop over and over again.
Morgana took back all the unkind things she'd thought about the Time Lords; this was clearly a wonderful place to hide a young Time Lord, the Daleks would never find it, Morgana had almost missed it and she knew where it was.
The time loop explained everyone's obsession with destiny, and why people kept calling Arthur the once and future king.
From an entirely practical point of view it also minimised the chances of Morgana arriving in completely the wrong century. But not, apparently, in the wrong part of the country. As soon as she stepped out of the TARDIS Morgana realised that instead of landing the TARDIS back where she'd originally found it, she'd landed right outside Uther's castle.
Which was what she got for trying to parallel park. That, and guards with pikes running towards her shouting, “Sorcery!”
*
Camelot's dungeons had not markedly improved since her last stay. The only silver lining was that this time she wasn't manacled to the wall. Which, actually, didn't make a lot of sense; surely if you're going to chain someone up for talking back to the king, you should also do it when they ostensibly use magic to move a castle across half the kingdom.
Morgana wished that she actually was the powerful sorceress that Uther accused her of being, or at the very least that she'd remembered to lift the sonic screwdriver on her way out of the TARDIS.
She supposed there was nothing to do but sit tight and wait for Morgause to rescue her, which would hopefully be before Uther decided on the means of her execution. It was then that she heard whispered voices from beyond her cell.
“I don't know about this, Arthur. The king seems sure she's an enchantress.”
“Of course she's an enchantress, Merlin. Or did you miss the magic castle that appeared out of thin air just outside my window?”
“But--”
“That's enough. I cannot allow my father to execute Morgana, he would never forgive himself.”
“I'm just saying, I don't want your father to execute us.”
“Oh, hello, Arthur. I mean, sire. I mean, Merlin. I mean--”
“Good evening, Guinevere.”
“Hi, Gwen!”
“I was just taking a stroll.”
“So were we. And it's a complete coincidence that we were strolling in the direction of Morgana's cell.”
“Merlin, you utter-- Gwen, is that a spanner you're hiding behind your back?”
“Er, no?”
At that Morgana pressed her face as close as she could to the bars of her cell and whispered, “This is a lovely reunion, but could at least one of you open this door?”
Armed with a spanner, a complete set of keys and Merlin, it only took ten minutes to get Morgana out of the dungeon.
*
“So,” began Arthur, “I imagine what with the disappearing castle and all, you won't need to borrow a horse?”
“I... Arthur... Uther's going to be furious, you know.”
“He'll calm down eventually.”
Morgana had another idea. “It might be an idea to be elsewhere until he does.” She smiled slyly. “At least for Gwen's sake.”
“For Gwen's sake. And Merlin's, obviously.”
“Oh, if you insist.”
The prince clapped his hands together and cheerfully announced, “Right, everybody into the weird magic castle, at once.”
Nobody noticed that it was bigger on the inside, it was definitely time to change the desktop theme.
*
It was just a quick stop on their way. Morgana felt butterflies doing cartwheels in her stomach when she stepped out of the TARDIS and Morgause hurried over and pulled her into an embrace. “Thank God, you're alright.”
It was the same feeling of bone deep recognition she'd had when Morgause had first come to Camelot, and when she'd found the TARDIS.
“Morgause,” she asked, “has any of your jewellery ever spoken to you?”
Even Morgause, who was in the habit of treating everything Morgana said and did as though it was perfectly wonderful, looked askew at that.
“Never mind. Could you just walk this way with me for a moment?”
*
“Absolutely not!” said Arthur, when Morgana returned to the TARDIS with Morgause.
“It's my time machine! And I let you keep Merlin.”
“That's not the same thing,” chorused Arthur, Merlin and Morgause.
“Is it just me,” mused Gwen, “or is this castle a little bigger on the inside?”
Fandom: Merlin/Doctor Who
Characters: Morgana, Morgause, Merlin, Arthur, Gwen
Rating G
Word Count: 5423
Summary: Morgana is a Time Lord in a fob watch. No, really, she is.
There was a voice coming from Morgana's jewellery box.
Time Lords, Daleks, Time War, Gallifrey, Time Lords, Daleks, Time, Time, Time...
Depressingly enough, this was actually the least of her problems. Firstly, she was concerned that Uther or Arthur would realise that her daring escape from the clutches of Morgause had actually been part of an elaborate plot to place a spy within Camelot. Secondly, there was Morgause herself, who kept popping up in mirrors and things to ask how the aforementioned spying was going. And finally, mealtimes had gotten rather stressful, what with the constant worry that Merlin might have been making merry with the toxic substances again.
Still, there was a voice coming from Morgana's jewellery box. It was annoying.
Time Lords, Time Lords, Time Lords, Time Lords...”
Morgana sighed and stood up. It was becoming impossible to get any sort of morally dubious plotting done. She crossed the room and crouched down next to her dressing table, she pressed her ear to the box.
TARDIS, Gallifrey, Daleks, the fall of Gallifrey...
“Er,” Gwen cleared her throat as soon as she entered Morgana's chambers. Morgana stood up sharply and smiled, trying to look as though she hadn't been listening to the nonsensical ramblings of a wooden box.
Luckily Morgana's recent, ahem, kidnapping had made Gwen more inclined than ever to indulge her various eccentricities, and she said nothing about it.
“Can I get you anything?”
“No, Gwen. Thank you.”
“Very well, my lady.”
“Gwen?”
Gwen looked surprised but pleased to be called back; things hadn't been comfortable between them for a long time. “Yes, Morgana?”
“Do you know where Gallifrey is?”
“It's somewhere near Cumbria, isn't it?”
*
“Arthur!”
Morgana intercepted him on his way to train with the knights. Normally he'd have told her that he didn't have time for her, but he was still feeling a little guilty for not defying his father's orders and going to save her from Morgause.
Indeed, the reason Morgana eventually had to fake her own escape was that she'd gotten bored of hanging around Idirsholas waiting for a non-existent rescue party.
“What?”
“Have you heard of somewhere called Gallifrey?”
“Gallifrey? It sounds Scottish. You don't want to go there, Morgana, it's nothing but rain and the Scots.”
Morgana waved her hand dismissively. “Thanks anyway.”
“Oh, and Morgana? My father is sending a group of knights to that castle where you were held to capture Morgause.” Arthur reached out and gripped her hand briefly. “There's nothing to be afraid of anymore.”
“Oh. Right. Er, good. Would you excuse me?”
She turned away from Arthur and rushed around a corner. In one of the high, stained-glass windows she could just make out a flicker of blonde hair and red fabric. “I assume you heard that?”
She heard Morgause's laughter and hoped Uther hadn't sent any of the knights she was particularly fond of.
Not for the first time she wondered why, what with the magic crystal and ability to appear in reflective surfaces, Morgause didn't just do her own spying?
“Who are you talking to?” asked Merlin, who was always popping up from round corners and behind furniture these days.
“No one,” lied Morgana, turning to face him.
There had been an awkward few days when Morgana had first arrived back in Camelot. She'd wondered if Merlin was going to tell Arthur about her being a witch, and Merlin had wondered how severe the punishment for attempting to murder the King's ward was.
Eventually self preservation won out for both of them, and now they settled for glaring at each other across the banquet hall.
“Yeah, right.” said Merlin. He attempted to stride masterfully past Morgana, while at no point turning his back on her.
*
Morgana was dreaming. She'd had to leave her biodampener... No, she meant healing bracelet, didn't she? Whatever it was, she'd had to leave it behind, and now her nightmares were back as bad as ever.
She dreamt of monsters made of metal cutting a swathe through Camelot. They couldn't be hurt by swords or arrows. They fired weapons of magic and screeched “Exterminate! Exterminate!” as they cut down knights and peasants alike.
One of the magical weapons struck Arthur and he fell, dead before he hit the ground.
The same thing happened to Merlin. Which wasn't entirely unpleasant, actually.
Then Gwen fell, and Morgana woke with a scream. She didn't need a talking box to tell her that this was Not Good.
The box was determined to have its say anyway.
Daleks, Daleks, Daleks, Daleks, Daleks, Daleks, Daleks...
“Oh, shut up,” said Morgana.
She looked speculatively at the full length mirror across the room. Before Morgana had returned to Camelot she and Morgause had a long talk, and they'd agreed that Morgause wouldn't do anything (using Morgana as an ingredient in a sleeping spell, for example, or conjuring an army of metal monsters) without first getting Morgana's express agreement. But it was probably worth double checking.
She waved a hand at the mirror and muttered the words Morgause had taught her. The glass rippled as though made of water, and after a few moments resolved into the image of Morgause, looking every inch the dangerous enchantress, except for the bit where she was rubbing sleep from her eyes.
“Morgana, is everything well?”
“Yes. Sort of. Listen, you aren't by any chance about to conjure an army of Daleks to destroy Camelot?”
“What are Daleks?”
“Never mind.”
“Morgana, are you getting enough sleep?” asked Morgause.
“Yes. I'm fine. Just, bad dreams. I'm sorry to have woken you, goodnight.”
“Should I come to Camelot and get you?”
“No,” Morgana insisted. Being rescued by a dashing knight in armour once was lovely, twice and it began to look like you were incapable of looking after yourself. “Honestly, it's nothing.”
“Take care of yourself, my dear.” Morgana nodded and with another word the glass was back to normal.
Just before she drifted off to sleep, Morgana found herself looking at the mirror and thinking, “I'm surprised a thousand year old Carrionite telephone still works...”
*
The next day it occurred to Morgana that the voice might not be coming from the box itself, but from something inside it. This cheered her up immensely; a talking box was just odd, talking jewellery was somehow less so.
She spent the morning wrapped in a dressing gown, sitting in front of her vanity mirror, lifting every piece of jewellery she owned to her ear as though they were seashells and she was trying to hear crashing waves.
Gwen was bustling around the room clearing things away. Luckily she didn't find Morgana's behaviour all that odd, Morgana had always found pretty things soothing in times of stress.
Morgana threw down an irritatingly silent earring in disgust and picked up a necklace. It wasn't one of her regular pieces. It was a heavy silver locket with a catch on one side. It was decorated with etched swirls and circles, in style it reminded her a little of her biodampener... healing bracelet.
Perhaps it was another gift from Morgause?
Generally, Morgana was very much in favour of receiving pretty gifts from beautiful women - she didn't feel as though there was enough of it in her life, but this wasn't really the time. She lifted the locket to her ear.
Time Lord, Time Lord, Time Lord, Time Lord, Time Lord, Time Lord, Time Lord, Time Lord...
The necklace slipped though Morgana's fingers and hit the stone floor. Gwen hurried over and picked it up, it obviously wasn't talking to her because she calmly offered it back to Morgana.
“Here you are, my lady.”
“Thank you, Gwen.”
As she took the locket Morgana's fingernail caught on the catch and she had the almost overwhelming urge to flick it open. But then, sometimes she had the almost overwhelming urge to march into Uther's chambers and tell him she was a witch and damn the consequences, or throw her arms around Gwen and tell her that she loves her and is sorry they've grown apart. And she doesn't do those things either.
“Gwen,” Morgana began hesitantly, “have you seen this necklace before today?”
“Of course, it's always been in there. But you've never mentioned wanting to wear it before and, well, it doesn't really go with anything else you own.”
“I don't think I've ever noticed it before... Well, I think I'll wear it today.”
Morgana nodded and turned to her wardrobe, to deal with the serious business of which of her dresses would best complement a talking silver locket.
*
Other than the necklace babbling nonsense at her - which was slightly more interesting than anything the courtiers might have to say, and slightly less depressing than psychically eavesdropping on Merlin and the dragon discussing her potential evilness - life continued on much as it had before.
None of the men who had been sent to capture Morgause returned, Arthur complained about how he was expected to defend Camelot with an elite fighting force of two knights and Merlin continued to stare at Morgana as though she was going to start setting things on fire the moment his back was turned.
The necklace had very little to say on the subject of arson, but quite a lot to say about Daleks.
Morgana's nightmares continue to feature the metal monsters, sometimes terrorising Camelot, sometimes a landscape she didn't recognise: burnt orange with two suns low in the sky.
In fact, she spent so many of her nights dreaming about Daleks that she had no advanced warning about the Mercian lord who tried to assassinate Arthur, and as a result she ended up being grazed by an arrow as she tried to drag Arthur out of harms way.
After Merlin had bodily tackled her away from the prince, Uther ordered her to the court physician's chambers to be taken care of. Gaius bandaged her arm while Merlin looked at her, keenly.
“I did just save Arthur's life, you know. You don't have to look at me as though I'm a bomb that's about to go off.”
“A bomb, my lady?” asked Gaius, as though he didn't recognise the word. This had been happening to Morgana a lot lately; either everyone was getting stupider or she really was talking nonsense.
“Yes. A clockwork device that... I can't remember, do we have clockwork yet?”
Merlin and Gaius regarded her with a look of deep suspicion that Morgana felt was uncalled for. Gaius finished bandaging her arm and said, “I'll get you a salve to prevent the wound scarring, my lady.”
Morgana nodded vaguely and focused on Merlin. She remembered the colour of Merlin's eyes just before the candelabra had oh-so-fortuitously fallen and crushed the would-be assassin.
“Merlin, are you a Time Lord?”
The question prompted another deeply suspicious look. “What's a Time Lord?”
“I think it's a bit like being a dragonlord, only with fewer dragons.”
“How do you know about the dragonlords?”
“Magic, all-seeing crystal,” said Morgana, when what she meant was cheap Carrionite phone-tap.
*
It was a familiar sensation, really.
Deep down Morgana had known her dreams told the future since she was fifteen. She'd avoided admitting it, even to herself, knowing that as soon as she did everything would change. Likewise, she knew the locket wasn't just a magical curiosity, but she also had a feeling that as soon as she opened it nothing would ever be the same again.
So she wore the necklace every day and avoided using words like “Dalek” or “Gallifrey” in conversation. Unless it was with Merlin, in which case she went out of her way to repeat as many of the things the necklace said as possible just to watch him get increasingly confused.
Morgana imagined that if she ever did open the locket it would be at sword-point, or when she was about to be burned at the stake or something equally dramatic.
In fact, what actually happened was she was sitting in a court session about the distribution of grain, or the rounding up of sorcerers, or something else that she should probably have been paying attention to so that she could report it to Morgause. She was bored and fidgeting with her necklace, which had become something of a habit. Her thumbnail accidentally caught on the clasp, the locket snapped open and Morgana remembered.
Time Lord, Time Lord, Time Lord, you are a Time Lord, you are a Time Lord, you are a Time Lord, I am a Time Lord...
One thing she now knew for certain: being a Time Lord was absolutely nothing like being a dragonlord.
One good thing that came from having spent several months in Uther's court being by turn in fear of her life and extremely hungover was no one batted an eyelash when Morgana turned a nasty shade of green, lurched from her seat and rushed from the room as though she was about to be sick.
She pushed her way into the hallway and leaned against the wall before she could fall down, she pressed her palms and forehead against the cool stone. The trick was to breath, just breath deeply and evenly. It was at times like this, she thought, that a respiratory bypass system was going to be very useful. Of course, that thought set her off on another round of hyperventilating.
It was, when she thought about it, a little annoying.
You spend months and years coming to terms with the fact that you're a witch and becoming a revolutionary accordingly; only for it turn out that you are not a sorceress after all, but a Time Lord from the planet Gallifrey. Which doesn't come with sparkly magic powers, but does come with a brain full of stuff - including the brand new concept of planets.
It was almost enough to drive a girl to drink - again.
“Morgana, are you alright?” Gwen had followed Morgana out into the hallway.
Before Morgana could say that she was not alright, nor was she entirely sure she was really Morgana, Merlin burst through the doors with a shout of, “Gwen, be careful!” He stopped in his tracks, looking surprised that he wasn't having to pry Morgana's fingers from around Gwen's throat. Honestly, the ideas that boy got into his head.
Gwen frowned. “Be careful of what, Merlin?”
“Yes, Merlin,” Morgana echoed. “What should Gwen be careful of?”
*
Gwen took Morgana to her chambers, helped her into her nightgown and put her to bed. Which was sweet, but basically unhelpful. But it did get Morgana away from Merlin, and from Uther and the rest of the Court and allow her to sit quietly and sift through all the new things in her head: supernovas and TARDISes and untempered schisms.
There were new memories in there too; memories of a childhood on Gallifrey, of the academy and a hateful uniform with an improbable collar, of worried adults, of war and Daleks and whispers of “we must save the children.”
And then a TARDIS and a Chameleon Arch...
Which begged the question, “Gwen, if you had a magic time machine that could look like anything, where would you park it?”
*
That night Morgana spent a long time staring into her mirror, the words that would enable her to speak to Morgause lay heavy on her tongue.
Maybe she could write her a letter instead?
“Please allow Morgana to be excused from the revolution on the grounds that she's an alien.”
Maybe not.
*
The next morning Arthur came to visit her. “Gaius told my father that you had some sort of episode.”
Morgana was suddenly very grateful for Gaius's inability to speak plainly to the king, because it meant that a desire to overthrow the monarchy became “an episode.”
“I'm fine now,” Morgana said. For a certain definition of fine, obviously.
“If it's about Morgause--” Arthur started awkwardly.
“It's not about Morgause,” Morgana cut Arthur off. She and Arthur had been communicating perfectly adequately by name calling and pulling each other's hair for over ten years, this was no time for them to start talking about their feelings. “You know, she's really very nice. I think you'd like her if you gave her a chance.”
“We're still talking about Morgause?”
“Yes. She gave me jewellery, and taught me some new sword-fighting moves She showed me the one she beat you with. I can show you how to counter it later, if you like?”
“I do not need combat lessons from a girl.” Arthur cleared his throat and said, “But, uh, maybe when you're up I can show you how much I don't need combat lessons from you?”
“I'd like that. Oh, and Arthur, if you ever meet something called a Dalek, aim for the eyepiece.”
“Is it just me, or have you gotten stranger recently?”
“You have no idea.”
*
Morgana continued to have nightmares about Daleks.
They weren't precognitive dreams about Daleks swooping above Camelot, instead they were the nightmares of someone who'd grown up in war zone.
She remembered seeing one of the Dalek ships over the capitol just before she was herded into a TARDIS with a group of other frightened eight year old Time Lords. She remembered crying as the chameleon arch descended towards her skull, and one of the custodians smiling at her and saying, “Don't worry, we're going to make you a princess.”
Morgana woke with a start.
Well, she supposed, there hadn't been a monarchy on Gallifrey for millennium, she couldn't really blame them for not knowing the difference between a princess and the king's ward.
*
The strangest thing about recovering her memories was that nothing else really changed.
Uther continued to rule in a manner that made most Time Lord presidents seem reasonable and well balanced, and Morgana continued to stay out of his way as much as possible. Granted, she didn't know exactly how Uther would react if he discovered she was an alien (assuming he understood what aliens were and didn't cry “sorcery”) but she doubted it would be with understanding and restraint. And although she hadn't been taught much about regeneration before she was taken from Gallifrey, she didn't imagine that decapitation would help the process along.
Arthur continued to have near death experiences with all manner of weird and wonderful creatures – Morgana was beginning to suspect that Camelot was built on a rift that led straight to the planet of the biologically improbable mythical creatures – and Merlin continued to save him with magic.
That was another thing, a lot of the supposedly magical artefacts in and around Camelot were quite obviously of Time Lord, or Carrionite or some other alien origin. But the things that some people could do--
You could see quite a lot of sorcery in Camelot, well, you could as long as you weren't following Uther's direct line of sight, and maybe it was a coincidence that people's eyes flashed the exact colour of Artron energy when they were using magic, but Morgana doubted it.
Low level psychic ability being exacerbated by some kind of rift or tear in the space-time continuum?
And even without the magic, there were things about Camelot that were just wrong. That copy of “Gray's Anatomy” she'd spotted on Gaius's shelf was definitely anachronistic.
The worst part of it was that there was absolutely nothing that she could do about any of it. A Time Lord without a TARDIS, she was about as useful as a seer no-one would listen to.
The more things change the more they stay the same.
*
There was a tournament in Camelot. Well, nothing had tried to kill the prince all week and it was something to do. Morgana watched the clashing swords with casual interest. She wondered about the Time Lords - hiding a child from a war in a time and place where the main form of communication was hitting the other person around the head with a broadsword.
She was trying to think sensibly about TARDISes. There must be one in Camelot somewhere. The Time Lords wouldn't strand her here, would they? And if their intention had been for her to live out a normal human life, why would they have left her that locket with her memories locked inside it?
The thing to do was assume that there was a TARDIS somewhere and all she had to do was find it. And if she couldn't, then she'd do something else – panic, probably.
She slipped out of her seat and away from the stands. Arthur was smashing Sir Kai's helmet with the hilt of his sword, and the part of Morgana that had attended the academy on Gallifrey thought it was barbaric, while the part of her that was Morgana and enjoyed elbowing kidnappers in the face was cheering him on. It was making her head ache.
“Morgana,” Gwen called, following her, “aren't you staying to watch?”
“No, but I thought you would. Arthur's fighting.” Morgana emphasised the prince's name. Gwen fidgeted and looked away. “You could have told me, you know. God, Gwen, what did you think I was going to do, pitch a jealous fit?”
“I don't know, Morgana. I don't know what you're going to do from one day to the next. I'm... I'm afraid for you. And I didn't want you to think I was trying to take your place or anything.”
“Gwen, unless you've got a talking necklace and a time machine hidden in your cottage you couldn't possibly take my place. You haven't, have you?”
Morgana tried not to get her hopes up, but Gwen would make an excellent Time Lord. Gwen just frowned, years of working for Morgana had taught her to bypass Morgana's more logic challenged statements without really hearing them. She said, “Anyway, it's never going to happen, Uther--”
“Won't be around forever,” Morgana interrupted.
“Because of you,” Gwen remarked sadly.
Morgana opened her mouth to deny it, but she couldn't. She had come back to Camelot to kill Uther. He was a tyrant, and a menace to society and a threat to Morgana herself.
“I hate this,” she said instead, “us not getting along. It makes my eyeballs itch.”
Gwen smiled a little at that. “I know. Me too.”
“You should get back to the tournament, if you miss Arthur's victory he'll sulk for a week.”
*
Morgana had sensible, well thought out reasons for why Uther wasn't dead yet: he hasn't done anything too tyranty this week, Arthur's not ready to be king, Gwen would be disappointed, if they hold off for a little while longer Morgana might be able to find her time machine and run away from all this.
Somehow she suspected that none of those reasons would come close to convincing Morgause.
*
Morgana had an idea, and this one didn't even involve stripping down to her underwear.
The mystical creatures that terrorised the countryside surrounding Camelot had to come from somewhere, Morgana suspected some sort of time-space rift. And that rift had to have been opened by something, possibly a TARDIS.
She asked Arthur, who was oddly reluctant to direct Morgana towards a concentration of terrible monsters.
She asked Merlin, who offered to draw her a map.
*
It was halfway to Camelot's border that she came across the ruined castle, a central keep surrounded by piles of rubble. At least, to anyone else it would look like a ruin, if they noticed it at all. But Morgana's stomach flip-flopped and every cell in her body stood to attention and screamed TARDIS.
She smiled widely and dismounted from her horse, you couldn't keep a horse in a TARDIS.
“Merlin,” she called over her shoulder, “could you take my horse back to Camelot?”
Merlin had spent most of the journey to the ruins hiding behind one tree or another. And while he was very thin, the trees in this part of the countryside were few and far between, and he was on horseback. He dismounted and walked over to her, looking equal parts sheepish and defiant.
“Shouldn't you be back in Camelot?” Morgana asked. “Arthur might cut himself shaving in your absence.”
“Is that a threat?”
“Oh, for-- Yes, Merlin, it's a threat. You've uncovered my villainous scheme.”
“That would be funnier if you hadn't already tried to kill the king. Do you know what his father's death would do to Arthur?”
“Arthur's a big boy now, I'm sure he realises that Uther has to die for him to become king. Or are you planning to tell him that Uther's just gone away to live on a farm?”
“Morgana--”
“Since when are a fan of Uther Pendragon's? He'd have you killed in heartbeat if he knew what you are. Arthur wouldn't be able to stop him.”
“Is this the part of the conversation where you try to convince me that we should be on the same side, that we don't have to be enemies.”
“Merlin, you put hemlock in my drinking water, we definitely have to be enemies.”
“Yeah,” said Merlin, sounding sadly resigned.
“It's just, don't you ever wish you could tell destiny to go to hell?”
“No. I'm going to help Arthur be a great king. It's a good destiny.”
“You only say that because you haven't got to the bit where you get locked in a tree yet.”
“What are you going to do now, go back to Morgause?”
“I am going to step inside this keep and make it disappear.”
Merlin grinned. “Really, Morgana, even I couldn't do that.”
“You just watch me.”
*
The door of the keep swung open easily and she stepped inside. The last occupants of the TARDIS had left the desktop theme on “castle” so it didn't immediately look much bigger on the inside. But the thing that gave away its true nature was the console – made of some sort of organic stone – rising from the floor.
The thing about having been taken from her home planet at the age of eight and hidden from an apocalyptic war in an essentially medieval culture, was that Morgana had never had any proper, official piloting lessons.
But she was damned if she was going to step back outside and admit to Merlin that she couldn't do it, so she reached for a promising looking button, hoped for the best and pressed...
*
Morgana looked at the empty space where Gallifrey had once been and tried to feel angry. She should feel angry, she should feel devastated, she should want to rain fiery revenge down on the Daleks heads.
But she felt more indignant. Like she used to when Uther executed suspected sorcerers in the courtyard, that it was terribly sad but it didn't really affect her.
Because her life on Gallifrey, it was like a dream, and not even one of her true ones. That was why she didn't think of her herself by her old, Gallifreyan name, that and she probably couldn't pronounce it any longer.
She didn't feel like a Time Lord, she felt like... like the Lady Morgana, a noblewoman of Camelot with a time machine.
She guided the TARDIS away from the ruin of Gallifrey, after all it was terribly sad.
*
She found Earth – second home to all orphaned Time Lords, of course Morgana didn't know that, yet – and travelled through its history. She tried not to think about Camelot; about Morgause, who was probably worried sick; about Arthur, who was undoubtedly pretending not to be; about Gwen, who was afraid for her; and even stupid, murdering Merlin.
In 1975 Morgana walked out of a cinema in London, halfway through an excessively silly film and thought, “Why not?”
*
It took her a little while to find Camelot again. This was partly because of Morgana's driving, she hadn't exactly been in 1975 through choice, and partly because Camelot was hidden. The entire planet of Albion was hidden in the time vortex, in a pocket of time that caused the same fifty years to loop over and over again.
Morgana took back all the unkind things she'd thought about the Time Lords; this was clearly a wonderful place to hide a young Time Lord, the Daleks would never find it, Morgana had almost missed it and she knew where it was.
The time loop explained everyone's obsession with destiny, and why people kept calling Arthur the once and future king.
From an entirely practical point of view it also minimised the chances of Morgana arriving in completely the wrong century. But not, apparently, in the wrong part of the country. As soon as she stepped out of the TARDIS Morgana realised that instead of landing the TARDIS back where she'd originally found it, she'd landed right outside Uther's castle.
Which was what she got for trying to parallel park. That, and guards with pikes running towards her shouting, “Sorcery!”
*
Camelot's dungeons had not markedly improved since her last stay. The only silver lining was that this time she wasn't manacled to the wall. Which, actually, didn't make a lot of sense; surely if you're going to chain someone up for talking back to the king, you should also do it when they ostensibly use magic to move a castle across half the kingdom.
Morgana wished that she actually was the powerful sorceress that Uther accused her of being, or at the very least that she'd remembered to lift the sonic screwdriver on her way out of the TARDIS.
She supposed there was nothing to do but sit tight and wait for Morgause to rescue her, which would hopefully be before Uther decided on the means of her execution. It was then that she heard whispered voices from beyond her cell.
“I don't know about this, Arthur. The king seems sure she's an enchantress.”
“Of course she's an enchantress, Merlin. Or did you miss the magic castle that appeared out of thin air just outside my window?”
“But--”
“That's enough. I cannot allow my father to execute Morgana, he would never forgive himself.”
“I'm just saying, I don't want your father to execute us.”
“Oh, hello, Arthur. I mean, sire. I mean, Merlin. I mean--”
“Good evening, Guinevere.”
“Hi, Gwen!”
“I was just taking a stroll.”
“So were we. And it's a complete coincidence that we were strolling in the direction of Morgana's cell.”
“Merlin, you utter-- Gwen, is that a spanner you're hiding behind your back?”
“Er, no?”
At that Morgana pressed her face as close as she could to the bars of her cell and whispered, “This is a lovely reunion, but could at least one of you open this door?”
Armed with a spanner, a complete set of keys and Merlin, it only took ten minutes to get Morgana out of the dungeon.
*
“So,” began Arthur, “I imagine what with the disappearing castle and all, you won't need to borrow a horse?”
“I... Arthur... Uther's going to be furious, you know.”
“He'll calm down eventually.”
Morgana had another idea. “It might be an idea to be elsewhere until he does.” She smiled slyly. “At least for Gwen's sake.”
“For Gwen's sake. And Merlin's, obviously.”
“Oh, if you insist.”
The prince clapped his hands together and cheerfully announced, “Right, everybody into the weird magic castle, at once.”
Nobody noticed that it was bigger on the inside, it was definitely time to change the desktop theme.
*
It was just a quick stop on their way. Morgana felt butterflies doing cartwheels in her stomach when she stepped out of the TARDIS and Morgause hurried over and pulled her into an embrace. “Thank God, you're alright.”
It was the same feeling of bone deep recognition she'd had when Morgause had first come to Camelot, and when she'd found the TARDIS.
“Morgause,” she asked, “has any of your jewellery ever spoken to you?”
Even Morgause, who was in the habit of treating everything Morgana said and did as though it was perfectly wonderful, looked askew at that.
“Never mind. Could you just walk this way with me for a moment?”
*
“Absolutely not!” said Arthur, when Morgana returned to the TARDIS with Morgause.
“It's my time machine! And I let you keep Merlin.”
“That's not the same thing,” chorused Arthur, Merlin and Morgause.
“Is it just me,” mused Gwen, “or is this castle a little bigger on the inside?”
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2010-03-02 03:32 am (UTC)“Merlin, you put hemlock in my drinking water, we definitely have to be enemies.”
Hee! I love Merlin and Morgana in this. It manages to be funny despite also being painful. (Or maybe it manages to be painful despite also being funny.)
Also, I love how "frequently drunk throughout season two" Morgana has become accepted fanon.
And Gwen said the line! As is proper.
In conclusion: this is awesome.
no subject
Date: 2010-03-02 05:09 pm (UTC)Hee! I love Merlin and Morgana in this. It manages to be funny despite also being painful. (Or maybe it manages to be painful despite also being funny.)
I have this personal fanon that Merlin and Morgana are going to end up immortal, and are going to spent centuries snarking and making half hearted attempts to kill each other while they wait for Arthur and Gwen to be reincarnated.
Also, I love how "frequently drunk throughout season two" Morgana has become accepted fanon.
I swear to God, Morgana's characterisation makes so much more sense if you assume that she started drinking after To Kill a King and didn't stop till Morgause kidnapped her off to do the twelve-step program.
Again, cheers!
no subject
Date: 2010-03-02 03:49 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-03-02 05:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-03-02 05:26 am (UTC)“It's my time machine! And I let you keep Merlin.”
“That's not the same thing,” chorused Arthur, Merlin and Morgause.
I laughed SO hard I choked!
no subject
Date: 2010-03-02 05:17 pm (UTC)Thank you!
no subject
Date: 2010-03-03 04:42 am (UTC)Perfect mix of hilarity and DW-esque cookiness. And explaining the whole destiny thing by a 50-year time loop? AWESOME!
Morgana would make a heck of a Time...lady?
And hee, the last line! :D
no subject
Date: 2010-03-03 01:26 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-03-03 06:33 am (UTC)The prince clapped his hands together and cheerfully announced, “Right, everybody into the weird magic castle, at once.”
BAHAHAHAHA PERFECT!
bookmarking this!
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Date: 2010-03-03 01:25 pm (UTC)I'm a little in love with the idea of Merlin as Morgana's well-meaning but slightly rubbish stalker trying to keep her from further mischief.
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Date: 2010-03-15 09:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-03-15 10:59 pm (UTC)Yes. I. er, perhaps over-thought how to make Merlin work in the DW universe, so, yays, it worked for you!
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Date: 2010-05-03 03:19 pm (UTC)This fic is very funny but "Please allow Morgana to be excused from the revolution on the grounds that she's an alien" just takes the title of best line.
I completely adore your Morgana and this fic in general.
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Date: 2010-05-04 01:06 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-12-15 06:03 pm (UTC)Bravo! Very well done, indeed! ^^
(^ that was me, btw...)
Date: 2010-12-16 02:21 am (UTC)I love how Morgana's not so concerned about a voice coming from her jewelry box as she is annoyed - and that it was less concerning that said voice was coming from a necklace rather than the box, itself!
Egads, I could go on for ages and never mention everything I love about this fic. If you haven't written a sequel for this, yet, you definitely should - I'll certainly be looking for it!!
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Date: 2010-12-20 10:04 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-12-20 08:22 pm (UTC)Thank you!
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Date: 2011-05-26 09:33 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-05-27 05:20 pm (UTC)Thank you!
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Date: 2011-12-12 04:30 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-12-12 04:36 pm (UTC)