A/N: I really liked the idea of Aithusa being Freya's dragon and Morgana sort of taking Sarrum's role. Part of this turned out to be a bit more Agravaine-centric than I expected, but that could just be because this is the first thing I've ever written with him in it and didn't realize how much scenery the man can chew... LOL. Worry not, though, if you're big on Morgana/Aithusa; there's still hints of it in this story, even though she allies with Freya instead. Anyway, this takes place in season four, when Aithusa was still small; I would say somewhere after A Servant of Two Masters but before Lancelot Du Lac.

Pairings: Merlin/Freya (of course!), and Agravaine/Morgana.

~Chapter One: The Arm in the Water~

THE LITTLE WHITE dragon was young -a baby still, really, only recently hatched- when she flew along the strip of shoreline above the lake of Avalon.

Below her, the lake shone like silver against a golden-mud pavement dotted with wildflowers, light pouring in from all sides, though the sun was above. The dragon's small shadow cast only minimal shade, dimming the smallest of silver sparkles glinting up from the water.

Letting out a little noise of pleasure, of amusement perhaps, the dragon swooped down, meaning to dip her claw or the tip of one wing into the sweet, cold water.

A beautiful shimmering white hand, followed by its extending arm, glowing with scattered water droplets that were like pure samite, reached out from under the waves and caressed the white dragon gently with its long, smooth, lacy fingers.

Grunting, the white dragon leaned into the touch, enjoying it, then pressed her pale snout against the lake-lady's palm.

Flying just out of the fingers' reach, the white dragon let out another -almost shrieking- sound and breathed over the arm. A marking, of a Druid symbol, appeared on the inner part of the arm, materializing in a series of unsteady ripples until it settled, darkening -becoming more real somehow- and shone permanent black; ink that would never fade against the whiteness of the skin.

And, as soon as that happened, the dragon's magical breath shaking the lake's muddy bed ever so slightly, more than just an arm started to emerge from the lake's waters.

A beautiful dark-haired young woman stepped out and, breathless with amazement, waded over to the shore. The dragon stayed with her, landing on a nearby rock.

"Aithusa," breathed Freya. She glanced from the Druid mark on her arm to the baby dragon.

The Lady of the Lake knew of this dragon. She had seen her hatching, whilst scrying in Avalon, hoping to catch a glimpse of Merlin in Camelot. Most of the time, the water had been dark, blank nothingness, in her search for the warlock she so dearly missed; the last friend she'd ever had. Often enough to be discouraging, when it showed her anything at all, it had been nothing at all to do with the person she most wanted to see. (Although, she had to admit, seeing Morgause toying with the stolen Cup of Life, and learning what was going on by those means, had come in handy in the long run.)

But, three times, out of the hundreds she had tried to, she'd seen him. Merlin.

The first was long before he knew part of her was still alive in Avalon. She wanted so badly to tell him she was not all dead and gone, that he need not mourn for her. But she couldn't, so telling him that he'd made her feel loved and swearing to one day repay him with her last mortal breath had had to be enough. She saw him forgive Arthur, smiling -even laughing a little- when the prince gave him a noggie, and she'd nodded approvingly at this. Good boy. She had known he would; his forgiving nature and loyalty was part of what made Merlin, well, Merlin.

The second was a miracle. The Fisher King gave Merlin a vial of water from Avalon, and her lover accidentally broke it, spilling out the water. That time, not only could she see him, but he could see her too, and they'd been able to speak. They hadn't had long, but that was all right. It had given her the chance to see him again. And the chance to keep her word. He had come to her, at the lake, and she had reached out, holding aloft the sword forged in the breath of the Great Dragon.

Last, but certainly not least, had come the third time Freya saw Merlin via scrying. He was walking through a forest -evidently in the dead of night- bringing a dragon's egg he'd rescued from a tomb to Kilgharrah the Great Dragon whose breath had made a weapon that could kill what was already dead. She could hear them speaking, though the water created a kind of wet static that made some of their words less than clear and she had to pay close attention to catch the majority of the conversation. By that means, she learned his father was dead; that Merlin was the last Dragonlord, only Kilgharrah would no longer be the last dragon. And she saw, with her own eyes, the shell of the egg crack and the white dragon enter the world at Merlin's behest. Heard her old lover naming the beautiful creature -which Kilgharrah, poor thing, did not realize was female- Aithusa, after the light of the sun.

A Sidhe flew past her line of vision and Freya had whipped her head around suddenly. When she looked back down again, the pool was blank once more and Merlin and both dragons were gone.

There was a reason only Freya's arm had given Merlin that sword. She had lost, at death, after her mortal body was burned in the viking-like funeral Merlin gave her after she expired in his arms, the ability to appear as herself in the mortal world. In Avalon, she looked, of course, like Freya. The Sidhe didn't know her by that name, of course, calling her The Lady of the Lake the same way many of the Druids knew Merlin only as Emrys, but she still bore, on that side of the lake's portal, the face of the Druid girl who had once been Halig's prey and prisoner.

But on the other side...?

There was no telling what her face would be. No telling if it would be burned, scarred, or even just an ordinary face simply unrecognizable as Freya to any who had known her in her previous life.

Her arm, though Merlin seemed not to have noticed, in all his excitement, hadn't kept its lifetime Druid mark, either.

That is, not until Aithusa came and, in her curiosity about the pretty arm that touched her, breathed upon it. She had restored Freya, given the Lady of the Lake the ability to walk on as herself on both sides of the portal.

Crouching on her knees before Aithusa on the rock, Freya looked into the creature's striking blue eyes. "Thank you."

Aithusa made a cooing sound and rubbed her small head against Freya's brow, similar to how a kitten might love up on its owner's forehead.

Looking back at the lake of Avalon over her shoulder, Freya felt a thrill of excitement. This was her home now -her place she was sworn to be guardian of- but there was no reason, since Aithusa had restored her mortal half, she couldn't go away for a bit, as long as she remembered to return eventually. It would probably have to be sooner rather than later, even so, but it was better than nothing. Far, far better. She was almost shaking with excitement at the prospect.

And the Lady of the Lake knew exactly where -or more precisely who- she wanted to use her new-found freedom to visit.

Camelot.

Merlin.

MORGANA STOOD OUTSIDE of her hovel, looking cross. Agravaine was late. Again.

She sometimes wondered, when as exasperated as she felt at that moment, why she even bothered to put up with him. He was not her uncle; Ygraine had been Arthur's mother. There was no reason for her to care much about his fate. But, despite this, when he so frequently had to leave her to go back to Camelot -to Arthur, to keep up the pretense that he was, as always, his loving uncle, nothing more and nothing less- she kind of missed him. He loved her, at least, if that was worth anything. Morgana did not particularly return his feelings, and certainly she felt none of the blind devotion he seemed almost to worship her with at times, but she could still use it and didn't hate it. She might not have anyone left to be loyal to -there was nobody else in the world she loved after her sister Morgause's sacrifice- yet there was something -a dull ember's worth of a glow of warmth- in knowing that somebody could still love her. What she did or did not feel for them, in exchange, mattered not at all.

"Morgana!" There he was, tethering his horse to a tree and fast-walking down the hill towards her hovel.

She frowned, folding her arms across her chest. "You had better have a good excuse."

He didn't, really, he was just late. But... "I have some news," he told her, his eyes flickering with an almost puppy-dog expression, craving her approval.

Arching an eyebrow, Morgana glowered coldly. "Is Arthur dead?"

"No, my lady."

"Is Gaius?"

"Well...no..." Agravaine willed himself not to stammer. Why did he always think Morgana would be so overjoyed, with every piece of news he carried to her, at great peril to himself, only to be bitterly disappointed each time by her embittered, irritated reaction?

"Do any of the knights of Camelot have so much as a lingering cough?" Her glower intensified, as though she already knew the answer.

"No."

"Then how could you possibly have news that would please me?" demanded Morgana.

"It's about Emrys."

The effect of that name on the high priestess was instantaneous; she blanched and her arms fell down to her sides stiffly as she stared, expectant and a little nervous, at Agravaine. "What about Emrys?"

"Myself and some men happened to catch a lost Druid boy who was coming a little too near the direction of this hovel and we had to...apprehend...him."

"And?" Both eyebrows were lifted now, the expression of annoyance returning to her face along with a dash of spreading colour.

"And while he claimed he didn't know who Emrys was, he said a girl who was once a Druid, some years previous, but is now a sorceress of some sort known to the Druids as The Lady of the Lake, is looking for him."

"Looking for him?"

"She is rumoured to be headed towards Camelot."

Morgana smirked hopefully, though she hardly dared believe her luck. "She's looking for him in Camelot?"

"Possibly."

"The boy babbled something about a Druid prophecy."

"What kind of prophecy?"

"It is said that the sorcerer they call Emrys is destined to fall in love with their lake-lady." Agravaine shrugged, then snorted. "Nonsense, of course, but-"

"No more nonsense," Morgana said slowly, "than Emrys being my doom."

"My lady-"

She held up a hand. "Silence." Her mind was formulating a plan. "If she is his destiny, would he come for her if something were to detain her from reaching him in Camelot safely?"

"He might," said Agravaine, stating the obvious rather unhelpfully.

"And then we would have him at our mercy." Morgana liked that.

"The sorceress-"

"She cannot be more powerful than a high priestess," Morgana decided. Morgause taught me well. "And I'm sure a clever man like you can come up with some clever way of bringing her to me."

He noted the condescension in her tone, and knew better than to take her words for a compliment, no matter how badly he might have wanted to. "Yes, I'm sure I could."

"Yes." Morgana's smirk deepened. "After all, everybody has a weakness."

Not everybody, Agravaine mulled inwardly, not you. Morgause's death had made Morgana strong, without a weakness to be used against her, but it also made her cold; her heart was not warm and open to him.

As if reading his thoughts, choosing to ignore the underlying longing attached to them, Morgana conceded, "Well, nearly everybody."

"Of course."

"If Emrys' weakness is this woman," she went on, "we just need to find out what hers is, and they will both be in our hands."

"My lady-"

"I expect you to find out what it is." She gave him a stern look and started to turn around, preparing to go back inside her hovel. Looking over her shoulder, she added, "When you come to me with that, Agravaine, I will believe you do indeed have good news."

IT WAS THE dragon; the creature that accompanied the traveling lake-woman. That was the only noticeable weakness. She really seemed to care for the pale-coloured little reptile. She didn't eat much herself, but she always stopped to let the dragon eat, and stroked it absently when she rested, kind of dozing, her eyes half-closed, with her back against a tree truck, allowing that thing to curl up in her lap like a pet dog.

In spite of the fact that he had hated Uther, from the moment Ygraine died giving birth to that foolish boy who now sat upon Camelot's throne as though he -and not the beautiful, exiled Lady Morgana- was Uther's eldest child and thus his rightful heir, right down to the minute when he was able to lend a helping hand in the king's untimely death so that he might get everything that was coming to him, Agravaine had to admit that maybe -just maybe- Uther had been onto something with his getting rid of the dragons.

Sorceresses and priestesses were beautiful souls, and Druids -the powerful ones, anyway- could sometimes prove useful allies, willing or otherwise, but dragons, even only in theory, were just overgrown lizards that blew their nasty fire-breath at anything that stood in their way, burning down homes and camps. No good there. Of course, if there was some magical property Morgana could discover in a dragon... But, then again, this particular slip of a dragon was not yet much of one. A white rat with scales, more like.

"Capture the dragon," Agravaine ordered his men under his breath, gesturing over at the resting sorceress and her little friend. "If I'm right," he added, "she will do as you ask so he will not be harmed. She will not dare use magic against us if it means her beloved creature will be in peril."

A twig snapped somewhere deep in the forest, and Aithusa lifted her head.

Freya was sleepy and content. They were not far from Camelot now, and soon she would be very near Merlin. The thought was cheering, to say the least of it.

She was not sure, exactly, how she imagined she -her being a lake spirit and a sorceress to boot, and once, though he mightn't remember, a dangerous, blood thirsty Bastet the now King Arthur had fought and ultimately killed some years ago- would get in, but she decided she would cross that bridge when she reached it. Surely a hooded garment of some sort -a cloak, perhaps- mightn't be too difficult to acquire, and she could slip in the gates, in the daylight so as not to look suspicious under the cloak of night, maybe under the pretense of getting water or something... Then she could just ask someone which quarters were Merlin's. She'd tell them she was an old friend, and that, yes, he would want to see her. That wouldn't be a lie, she didn't think. Or, if because of her Druid mark, which could be discovered, now that it was back, if things went poorly, she really did have to sneak in at night, surely finding him without directions wouldn't be too difficult. How many personal menservants to the king, who were also physician's assistants could there possibly be in all of Camelot, let alone the citadel itself? It wouldn't be hard to narrow down relatively quickly.

But, of course, she mustn't rely too much on his hospitality... No good putting him in danger of a conspiracy to harbor a sorceress...

Well, if after she was there and sized up the situation, such appeared to be the case, Freya could always find someone who didn't care either way to deliver a message to Merlin asking him to come to her.

Aithusa was off her lap and flying low, close to the ground, turning her head around. The first twig had been too far away for Freya to hear (the dragon's keen ears alone had picked up on it) but another snapped, closer to them, and this time her head whipped around, too.

Something was wrong. Freya knew what it was to be hunted; she had spent a large portion of her cursed life running away from hunters, always looking over her shoulder. And someone was definitely tracking her every move now. The hairs on the back of her neck prickled with fear. She wished desperately for a dagger. She had some new powers as the Lady of the Lake, but she wasn't sure how many of them worked outside of Avalon. And this was no time to test them out uncertainly.

Aithusa shouldn't be flying so far from here, however close to the ground she'd remained, when someone was following them like this. "Aithusa, come-"

Suddenly someone jumped out and snatched Aithusa, crushing her little white wings against her body scales, holding her fast however much she snarled and squirmed, even tried biting, to get away from him -for it was a him, a great burly man dressed all in leather and silver- and back to Freya.

"Please, let her go," Freya tried. She knew it was in vain, though. This was not the first time she had seen unbreakable coldness in a hunter's eyes.

Agravaine stepped out, along with the rest of his men (only the biggest, and now the second biggest, who was helping him put her in a cage, were needed to catch such a small dragon, and he and the others could surround the sorceress).

Freya pushed back her hair, which till then had been hanging down in her face.

Agravine paused for a moment, genuinely surprised. He had been expecting a lady a bit more, well, on in age. Even with her small, willowy form and long dark hair, he'd simply thought an at least middle-aged face would have been hidden. This girl couldn't be much older than Morgana. She might even be younger, if his guess was correct. Unless it was magic, showcasing her great power, that made her appear youthful. Spells dealing with age, Agravaine knew were difficult, simply because he had heard Morgana angrily bemoaning the difficultly once or twice when it would have been beneficial for her to have appeared older or younger than her real self. Personally, he thought she might one day master, if she kept at it, making herself appear as an old woman (he'd even thought of a name for an old Morgana: Hilda, which she'd said was stupid though she'd been smiling when she said it), but never as a young maid of eight or nine, last high priestess or no. Easier to add years than take away from them was the general rule, so far as Agravaine could tell.

Still, somehow, he thought that this lake-sorceress really was as young as she appeared.

And Emrys, her supposed destined love, was a doddering, ugly old man with a long white beard!

Such beauty -and spunk, he saw, as she was struggling against his men as they tried to clasp her pretty little wrists in irons- to be wasted on that old, nasty sorcerer who'd attacked Morgana outside of her own hovel only a few weeks previous! Fate was very cruel to this one. He almost felt sorry for her. At any rate, at least she was excellent bait. If Emrys had ever seen her before, and if there was even the slightest hint of a man's desire in his being, he wouldn't be able to resist coming to her rescue. And then, once he'd fallen into their trap, Morgana would be safe from his meddling forevermore.

"Stop struggling," grunted one of the men. "Stop at once, or we'll break the dragon's neck." Another man, at his signal, got his great big meaty hands ready, as if to reach into the cage poor frightened Aithusa was imprisoned within and snap her throat like a chicken's.

Freya froze. She didn't doubt they could -and would- do it. This noble, infant creature -creature of magic, no less- had restored her to life, brought her forth from the lake... She could not watch her be murdered right before her very eyes. Not when she could save her.

"Good girl." Her wrists were tied with cords as well as locked in irons by the time they were finished; and her feet were bound, too. Agravaine crouched next to her and stared into her sad brown eyes. "Well, Emrys sure likes them young."

He had nothing else to say to, or about, her. That pretty much covered all of what he'd been thinking.