There was nothing left but this in the end. Nimue had turned her back on me, Frik had left me alone in remembered fear of the days of old when Mab had been his mistress, Mordred was dead, Arthur was dead, The Lady of the Lake vanished and gone, and so there was nothing left but to succumb to emptiness and as I at last saw Mab broken, for in her own way she had loved Mordred.

His death rendered her once ebony tresses grey, her face more pale than usual, sickly and wan, and somehow it was this picture of Mab that at last made me pity her, her humiliation touching me to the heart, but then I remembered the people she had hurt and destroyed and knew that this was my last chance to rid myself of her.

Our powers were matched in battle, and besides neither of us had any strength left to put much power into our spells. But I had one strength she could never match. I was part human and thus I did not fear death, did not fear to fade away and be forgotten.

"What are you going to do now Merlin," she said her voice soft and brittle, "You cannot win."

It was hard to condemn my mother, hate her though I thought I did, but condemn her I did, for the sake of peace in Britain and for the sake of those lying barely cold on the ground outside Camelot, for the dead soul that was my son with Mab, for still I believed her to be guilty of that murder.

'I turn my back on you, Mab. You can't fight us or frighten us. You're just not important enough any more. We forget you, Queen Mab. Go join your sister in the lake, and be forgotten."

Her mouth gaped frantically as she realised that she had fallen into a trap that she could not get out of. "No Merlin, you can't. I love you ... as... as a son.," but the endearment held no warmth and I stayed facing the surviving the surviving soldiers, thei back turned as Mab screamed "LOOK AT ME! LOOK AT ME!"

"Frik," she cried, "Frik," but he heard her not, for she had been the end of the one being who could ever love a gnome, she had taken away his magic and callously and cruelly loved in his face as he cradled his dead love in his arms.

But it was very hard to ignore her faint pleading, and as I felt her grow weaker, i knew that my last hope of true happiness was drifting away into empty air.

I did not feel victorious and I did not feel triumphant, I felt only the triviality and the waste of it all. Everyone that I had ever loved, everyone who had ever loved me all gone, all gone down, gone somewhere far away where I could no longer bring peace into their lives, and so snatching my own happiness away.

Mab's voice in my mind grew fainter and fainter, yet still I heard her dying words to me, before they too became nothing as she vanished with a last scream of despair...

So is this how it all ends?

Our worthless battle

Our trials

Trampled into the dust

The chain of hate

Snapping too late for the both of us

I will fade

Snuffed out like a candle

And you must live with what you have done

Into the long years

Endless desolation of the heart

My final legacy.

All the coldness, all the ice

Trickles away and my heart

Breathes once more

But you do what you must, my son

My whimpers, my screams

No longer can bind you to me

My eyes bore into your back

You ignore

But your pain is a palpable thing

Heavy in the air.

I go to join my sister

You to endlessly wonder alone.

All those wasted lives

Given us in exchange, our pain their prizes at last

I at least will know surcease

You must endure

Your human emotions scarring forever.

Here there are no winners

Only an empty void

To us is dealt death

Or perhaps worst of all, memory

For those who stay behind.

The Gods are not always kind

To us they give Endless Night

And remembrance for all eternity.

So this is how it all ends

In empty air and tears and

Worst of all...

Silence.

And Mab with her dying breath was right. The empty air, the tears of heartache her legacy to me. My hate and my love for her so deeply intertwined that even now I cry out in the night, dreaming of her face.

Every day I am reminded of the love we might have shared, the love that I forced myself to destroy because I believed that love is not enough.

I catch my breath when I see a woman working in the fields with deep green eyes; I turn and wait when I hear footsteps behind me. On the beach I hope the tide will carry with it her voice. Sometimes I almost think I hear her words float to me upon the wind.

'Mab," I say, "I remember you now, when it is too late. Come back, you are not forgotten." But the words are empty and futile.

Where she has gone, none but the dead can follow and I am left with only memories to drive me through my weary days; memories and daydreams of what might have been had I been brave enough, strong enough.

But soon even memories fade, distorted by the old man's vices and failings and the inevitable passing of time. In my brighter days I pray that Mab will have another chance at life, a chance not dictated by fading spirits and titles of Goddess, but a chance of simplicity and peace. But always deep down, I know we do not get a second chance and that where she has gone, there is no escape from the snares of death.

So instead, I pick up my pen and write, and this time, as with Nimue in Avalon, I write to tell the truth, so that Mab will be remembered by the people not as an evil spirit, but as a restless soul, who's actions were shaped by others long before I was born. I write so that she will be remembered with respect, and with who knows? Even love...