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Heavy is the Crown (Harry Potter) Chapter 49: Merlin's Point of View
🕑 Added 2025-05-29 18:35:59 +0000 UTC[Merlin's POV]
Six years…
It’s been six long, surreal years since that brat arrived in my life… again.
Lying here in the quiet solitude of the Ravenclaw dormitory, my thoughts drift—always circling back to him, to Arthur, and the events of the past six years that have led me to this very moment. So much has changed, and yet the past feels closer than ever. Time folds in strange ways when destiny is involved.
I still remember the day he appeared before me—small, disheveled, wild-eyed. It was unexpected, and yet... not at all. I had prophesied this. Long before that moment, I foresaw that the boy who once was King would return. That Arthur would stand before me once more, and I would guide him again, just as I did all those centuries ago when he was destined to wear a crown and carry the weight of a kingdom.
The moment was uncanny. When I heard the snap of a branch and turned my head, it was like reliving a memory, one that had grown dusty with time but never faded. That was how he appeared to me the first time too—through the trees, with quiet steps and storm-filled eyes.
But this time… he was smaller. Younger. And heartbreakingly fragile.
He wasn’t alone either. He had a companion with him in the form of a cat, as if they'd clawed their way out of hell. Which, in truth, they had. When Arthur recounted his story to me, in my great wisdom, I looked into the chaos of emotions he was trying so hard to suppress. What I saw shook even someone like me. That pain... it was unfathomable. The raw emotional anguish of watching his mother and sister be murdered in front of him—By his father no less, is unlike anything else.
And yet, despite it all, he remains so heartbreakingly pure.
Even with the knowledge that he is a reincarnator—even with that soul older than it should be—Arthur has retained a naivety, a gentleness that seems impossible. He is light in its most delicate form. It’s rare to witness someone maintain their innocence after life has tried so hard to shatter it, but he does.
He truly does.
And it's beautiful.
Of course, I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised. He was like that before too—an idealist with a heart too large for the body it beat within. He wasn't this naive in the past, no, not after years of kingship and bloodshed. That maturity is gone now, reset completely with this second life. He is Arthur, yes—but a version unweathered by war, untouched by the burdens of a throne.
I pull the covers tighter around me, eyes fixed on the ceiling above, but my mind far, far away. I keep thinking about the day he finds out the truth—about everything. About his past life. About his destiny. About the multitudes of lies I told him, the truths I've kept close to me… and the role I played in shaping this path.
He will forgive me. I know he will.
But that forgiveness might hurt more than his anger ever could. Because once he knows—truly knows—everything will change. He’ll still love me, perhaps, still trust me in some fractured way… but not like before. Not with that wide-eyed reverence I never deserved to begin with.
There will always be a fracture, a silent space between us that used to be filled with pure trust.
I bite the corner of my lip, trying to chase away the ache that thought brings. No, not now. That’s a problem for future me. Tonight, I choose not to dwell on what is yet to come.
So instead, I think about Arthur’s progress. His incredible, sometimes frightening growth over these past six years. He’s evolving far faster than he ever did in his first life. Whether it’s swordplay, theory, or magic—he learns like it’s second nature. Perhaps it is. Perhaps remnants of the once-King Arthur bleed into this younger form, giving him an edge. But I suspect there's more to it than that.
No… I know there is.
It’s that thing inside him.
Just the thought of it makes me shiver, my stomach knotting with dread. I felt its presence most clearly during the Magic Circle ritual. When it rose—just for a moment—it was as if the very air turned to ice. And I have no doubt that it had a hand in what happened in the past… in what made Arthur murder his father with his bare hands. Why he can't even look at them without them being drenched in blood.
I dare not name it. Even thinking too long about it feels dangerous, as though it might awaken, sensing itself being acknowledged. It’s ancient. Beyond reason. It’s not something meant to be inside a child—or anyone, for that matter. But it is there, watching through his eyes, breathing through his soul.
And it's all my fault.
That’s why Arthur can do the impossible—why the magic circles he designs shouldn’t work, and yet they do. Why the circuits he carves into himself aren’t just theoretical genius, but actual conduits of magic. He bends the laws of magic, and reality itself bends with him.
Because it is making it so.
One of the wisest choices I made was teaching him Occlumency early on. If his emotions spiral out of control, if he loses grip on himself… he becomes vulnerable. Not just vulnerable to enemies, but to it.
To being consumed.
I can only pray that day never comes.
But prayer alone is never enough.
"Hm? He’s on the move," I thought, the corner of my lips curling into a faint, knowing smile. Pushing aside the blanket, I slipped my feet into the worn slippers resting at my bedside and rose from the bed without a sound. The dormitory was cloaked in silence, the soft breaths of sleeping students the only noise in the room as I quietly made my way out into the stillness of the castle.
Wandering through the moonlit corridors of Hogwarts, a place that—once upon a time—existed only in fiction, I found myself lost in thought. It’s strange, isn’t it? How something born from the imagination of a single person could exist so vividly within the fabric of this reality. But that’s the multiverse for you. A tangled web of realities—some birthed by divine forces, others by authors with vivid dreams and lucky pens. Hogwarts, as improbable as it seems, is just another thread in that vast tapestry.
Yet what the story never accounted for… were the variables.
Lance and Gwyneth.
That boy—he's nearly a mirror image of Lancelot. The resemblance is uncanny, from the way he carries himself to the sharpness of his gaze. But whether he's a direct reincarnation or merely a descendant, I can't say for certain. What’s worse… is that she found him again. Took him in, nurtured him, just like last time. That insufferable woman.
That bitch.
Gods, I sincerely hope I don’t have to see her again. But I know better. Of course I’m going to see her. How could I not? I can already feel the inevitable confrontation looming on the horizon, and it makes my stomach turn.
As for Guinevere—or Gwyneth, as she’s called now—I’m just as uncertain. Is she a descendant or a reincarnation? Regardless of the truth, I can only hope that this time… she doesn't repeat the same mistakes. That she doesn’t shatter Arthur’s heart all over again. I wasn’t there when the truth of their betrayal came to light, when the flames of civil war consumed Camelot. But the echoes of it remain with me. And I’ll be damned if I allow it to happen again.
Arthur… he doesn’t deserve that. Not again.
The poor boy never gets a break. Life continues to test him, pushing him toward a destiny he never asked for. And if Morgana has anything to say about it, the path ahead will only grow darker. Her hatred for the Pendragon line is as old and deep as any curse—carried across lifetimes, unbroken and festering. Whether she remembers or not, her soul hasn’t forgotten. It rarely does.
And so it falls to Arthur, once more, to bear the weight of legacy, war, and betrayal. To decide whether the cycle continues or if it finally ends with him.
The boy has no idea how much work lies ahead of him.
But he will.
Soon enough.
Comments
Green223
Love it and it sets up some mystery and makes us look back at what Merlin has been telling Arthur with a new more critical eye
