The first time, Sal awoke, the pain claimed him instantly again and he lost conscious before becoming aware of anything.
The next time he awoke, he had time to recognize, that he was hurting badly before he fell in darkness again. The time after that he was able to curse that he was a time-traveller and that his father had been right with his theory about Sal being unable to die until he returned to his own time.
The third time he lay on the ground for hours until darkness claimed him again. The fourth time he woke, he still was unable to move, but he was able to wish. And wishing he did.
The pain he felt while he was lying on the ground was horrible. After some hours lying there he wished for someone to end his misery. After some days he prayed for death wholeheartedly. After a week he would have seen his dead body in the Mirror of Erised when he would have looked in it.
His whole body arched and his depleted magic tried to heal him. He did not know how often he nearly visited the realms of the death - just to be pulled back to his body and his agony again.
When he finally was able to move again, the battlefield was long since deserted. The Romans had simply let the dead lying on the floor and had travelled on.
The first thing Sal did, when he was able to move again, was to look at his hand. The Roman had gifted him a silver coin. It took one or two seconds until Sal understood that it was meant as a fee for crossing over to death. A gesture for respect.
Sal tucked the coin away in his girdle and felt for the rest of his stuff - mainly his staff, his weapons and potions.
No one had robbed him. His things were still all there - but Sal guessed that he had not been robbed out of the same respect that had earned him the coin to cross over. He felt grateful to that one Roman who had respected him enough for stopping his comrades - not that anyone of them could have taken his weapons. His weapons were goblin made. If he really needed them or if he wished it, they would return to him instantly.
It still took Sal some days until he was able to stand up again. So as soon as Sal was able to stand again he gathered the bodies of the dead and buried them.
It was hart.
The first dead he recognized was Gawain, his old teacher. The man had been pierced with a dozen of arrows. One of his feet had been cut off and his eyes were glassily staring in the sky. The Roman he had fought with had succumbed his own wounds and lay on Gawain's chest like a lover at night would do.
The next he found was Lancelot. The blade of the sword that had killed him was still sticking in his chest - broken like Lancelot himself. Sal had to fight tears while his mind played over and over the times when Lancelot had been with him. It replayed Lancelot's laughter, his jokes, his rashness, his friendly tone…
Sal fought the feelings with his Occlumency and buried the man at the far end of Hogwarts', no, Camelot's lake, next to Gawain. Then he continued.
Sal wasn't sure how many days it took until he found the next he knew. The magic in the air had stopped the dead from rotting, so when he found Arthur and Medrawd they still looked like they had in life.
This time Sal cried while his hands caressed the locks of his brother and father and the fury send shivers through his body. He took away the sword he had given to his father and bound it again to his girdle, unable to look at the wound that had killed Medrawd - a wound that had been made by Sal's sword. The wound Arthur had received was as hard to look at as Medrawd's. This wound Arthur had received because Sal had trained his brother in fighting…
And Sal felt fury - a fury directed at both of them for using Sal's gifts to destroy a person Sal had loved. A fury that was directed at both of them because they had decided not to bother and talk about it. Instead they had fought and killed each other - for nothing more than power. Oh, how Sal loathed them for it!
Still, he buried them next to each other. Next to Lancelot and Gawain. Then he broke down and cried again while anger filled his heart. Anger at fate, anger at the Romans, anger at his fathers and brother…
Finally, after hours he stood up and stumbled back to his task. He buried the dead. Hundredth of men in hundredth of graves. And then he found the last one. This one person he had known, that he had lost since the day he had become aware again - and at the same time had hoped to find unharmed even now.
He was lying there as if he was sleeping. His eyes were closed and his staff in his hands. There was no wound on his body, that would have killed him but magic needed no wound to kill someone.
Sal just could stand there and stare at him. Then he finally fell down on his knees next to him and reached for him with trembling hands.
The white hair still was as soft as it had been when he was still alive…
"Atr" Sal whispered. "Atr… !"
And then the loneliness came crashing down on him. The loneliness and the feeling of loss. Sal wept.
Of course he had known that Myrddin was an old man. Of course he had known that he would lose him. But losing him from old age or losing him in a battle was different - and Sal had never thought that he would not see Myrddin again when the battle finally ended…
A soft arm sneaked around his waist and cradled him against a warm, nearly hot and comforting body.
"Weep, fledgling. You have the right to do so. You have lost far too many to take it calmly" a warm voice said.
"I… I have to bury…"
"I will bury him. You have buried far too many, fledgling."
Sal just shook his head and tried to free himself from the stranger.
"He is my father. I have to bury him" he answered while he tried to get free.
"And he was my egg. I have the right to do so, too, my fledgling" the stranger said softly. "I will let you aid me - but I will be the one to bury him. I am his father. I should do it."
Sal looked up at this and stared at the stranger. The stranger's face looked a lot like Myrddin's but the eyes where golden, burning with red flames - and definitely not human at all…
"What… what are you?!"
The stranger smiled.
"I am a phoenix" he answered softly.
"But…"
"This form is temporary" the man said. "I will lose it in some hours. The most time it is strenuous to take on a human body - and the one time it wasn't was a lot of years ago. It was the time I raised your father."
"Don't frighten the egg, Fawarx" another voice said, the voice of a woman. Sal turned and stared at the woman behind the man. Her hair was greying and her eyes yellow like the basilisk's Sal had killed in second year. Her eyes had the same shape and colouring like Myrddin's.
"So you felt his death also, Aleahkys" the phoenix said softly.
"Of course I did. I am his mother after all" the woman said and bowed down to Sal. Sal did not know what happened but as soon as her hands met him, he felt himself shrink until he was a little child. The woman picked him up and then turned to Fawarx.
"Will you take our egg?" she asked softly. The phoenix nodded.
This time the funeral was different. While Sal had just buried the death, Myrddin's parents decided to burn their son.
Sal watched the burning and after Myrddin's body had been burned, his ash was taken to the walls of Camelot.
"You have died protecting these walls and all that they stand for. One day you will be needed again to protect them. Rest in peace, my egg. Will you continue to protect what you wanted to protect all along" Fawarx said and the ash was taken by the wind.
And suddenly a warm feeling enveloped the air around them - a feeling that Sal knew from his time in the future. It was this feeling that had told him from the first day he had entered the castle that he was home.
"What…?" he asked astonished when a soft wind caressed his cheek.
"Your father, fledgling" the phoenix answered softly. "Or did you think he would leave you for good? Whenever you return - he will always welcome you home."
And with that the woman carried Sal out of the grounds that later would become Hogwarts.
As soon as they left, a heavy and at the same time comforting feeling settled down on Sal's shoulders.
"The wards" he recognized. But not just the wards. Also the essence of his father - a father that he had lost but that had not left him.
Sal smiled while again tears started to mare his cheeks.
"Don't cry, my egg" the woman said. "Grandma and Grandpa are still here. From now on we will raise you as our own."
"I am a grown-up" Sal answered while trying to hide his tears.
"No, you aren't" the woman answered. "You are a little, adorable egg and I will raise you as mine."
The man snorted.
"You do not even know the name of Myrddin's egg, Aleahkys - and you already started the plan to raise him? Have you even asked him before you shrunk him to an egg again?!"
"Hush you, dear" Aleahkys said. "Or you will not be allowed to aid me in raising him."
Fawarx just snorted.
"Well, at least I finally know I lost it fully" he said. "I started to doubt my sanity when I decided to hatch my egg with a basilisk. Just an insane phoenix does the same again with his egg's egg."
The woman snorted.
"You should be grateful for every day we have. One day I will not recognize you anymore, so don't complain" she answered and cradled Sal as if he really was a little child. "And I am sure the little one will appreciate to have a family again - even if this family will more often be a snake and a bird then human."
The man snorted, but then sighed.
"I am sure, he will" he finally said. "Where to next?"
"The goblins" Sal said quietly. "They have to take Exccaliebor. I cannot…" Again tears threatened to fall. "… I cannot use it again. Not now - maybe later but not now…"
The woman - Sal's grandma - just caressed his cheek.
"All right, my egg" She said softly. "We will go to the goblins and after that we will go on. I will not raise my egg's egg in this cold and unfriendly country. It was hard enough to raise my egg here - I will not do so again with my egg's egg."
The man just snorted.
"Then let's leave the country. How about somewhere warm like Egypt or Rome?"
"Egypt" Aleahkys decided. "I am sure our little egg does not want to come anywhere near Rome for the next years."
"Egypt it is" the phoenix said and held out a hand. The woman took it and in the next moment flames licked on their bodies. A moment later they were standing in the middle of the goblin village Sal had left some years ago.
The goblins stared at them, then Gringooed came running and Aleahkys took the sword from Sal and gave it the stunned goblin.
"We will take the egg and you will guard its sword" she said to the stunned goblin.
"What… what happened?" another stunned voice said - Vayland.
"Our egg lost its father" Aleahkys said. "Fawarx and I decided to raise it again. It's too little for the sword, so we will leave it in your hands. You can hold on it until a family member needs it or until the egg comes back to claim it."
Gringooed stared at her, then he looked at Sal and understanding lit his eyes.
"We will guard it well, Lady Basilisk" he said warmly. "Until a member of Morganaadth's family needs it or Morganaadth returns to claim it."
Aleahkys just nodded.
"So mot it be" she said and held out her hand to Fawarx.
"Egypt now, dear" she ordered. The phoenix snorted but took her hand. A second burning later and they really were in Egypt - and in the middle of the desert.
"Definitely better, my dear" the female basilisk decided. "And now, my egg, let us return to you…"
The next two hundred something years Sal spent in the company of a phoenix and a basilisk. And while he lived with them, Medrawds own child who he had left behind with his mother Morgana, grew up and married. It had children and they married again. Hundredth of years later, the name LeFay would be lost but the line continued until there would be born a young girl to one of the descendants. The girls name would be Lily, Lily Evans. Meanwhile, a thousand years before Lily's birth Sal was learning to be the child of a basilisk and a phoenix - both of them insisted on teaching him while they changed locations every week because the female basilisk insisted on it.
Like that Sal saw a lot of places he had never dreamed about - and all of them were on the warmer parts of the earth.
Sal also started to grow again but it took him nearly all two hundred years to even reach his normal fifteen years of age again.
When he asked his grandmother about that, she just shrugged.
"Don't worry" she said. "It just takes so long because it wasn't you yourself who shrunk your body but me. But it really does not matter - you are after all somehow still fifteen, my egg."
After this explanation Sal had just sighed and decided not to ask again. He was not interested in hearing another explanation he did not understand fully. All he knew was, that he had for over two hundred years no control about how old he looked. When he finally had it again, his grandmother just sighed.
"So you really are a grown-up again, fledgling" she said sighing. "Well - I will not be able to hold on you forever. Just remember: I am here for you as long as I can. Your Grandpa and I will come to your aid. You just have to call us." And with that, she let him go again.
And Sal left.
It was hard at first, to be alone again - but he needed to leave. He could not be followed by his Grandparents the rest of his life!
So he left and returned to Britain and the goblin village he had left all those years ago. Gringooed was still alive but very old. His son Vayland was now the chieftain of the goblins. When Sal walked in their village, they recognized him instantly.
"So you are home again, Morganaadth" Vayland greeted him.
"I am" Sal answered.
And Vayland flicked his hand to summon Sal's sword.
"Take it. You are a clan-leader, you have to wear your sword."
Sal just hesitated a second.
"I will give it in your care when I leave again" he finally said. "When one of Medrawd's children asks for a sword - will you give it to them? I will not take it with me when I leave again."
"I will - as long as you just lend it to them and don't give it up. A goblin might after all give his sword to another one, but he will not gift it to him when the sword was made for him."
Sal just smiled.
"I would never give away a gift I received" he answered sincerely. "I merely will not need it when I travel the world and I do not want it to be unused until I need it again."
"This I can accept and understand" Vayland said and welcomed Sal home - where Sal would stay for the next sixty odd years until he finally decided to travel again…