World Made Anew (Merlin, Arthur/Merlin)

Arthur stared up at the sky through dense foliage that hadn’t been above him moments ago. Aftershocks from the explosion made the ground tremble. The forest, or wherever he was, was far too quiet. All Arthur could hear was a faint ringing that slowly fell away until he could make out his own breathing, hard and heavy as if he’d just run a mile.

Arthur sat up and realized he was alone. Trees stretched around him in every direction, with no discernable markings to tell him exactly which forest he’d ended up in though he knew he wasn’t in the forest surrounding Camelot. Carefully, Arthur picked himself up off of the ground. His muscles ached. His back had obviously taken the brunt of the impact when he’d landed in the forest, and he could already feel a deep bruise forming over his spine from the thick root he’d been laying on. On the bright side, he at least still had his sword, and little else save for the few coins that had been in his pocket and the small knife concealed in his boot.

The sun was still mostly overhead, which told him two things. One, not much time had passed since he’d last been in Merlin’s cell in Camelot. Two, he’d have to find moss or wait until the sun went down a little to have any clue which direction he was going.

“Not going to get anywhere standing here,” Arthur muttered to himself. Even that small noise sounded too loud in the quiet forest. The explosion had likely startled most of the animals into hiding.

Arthur started through the woods, heading towards where he vaguely thought the aftershocks had been coming from. He was only slightly glad that there was no one around to see how unsteady he was on his feet.