Radagast as the instigator made me laugh.

Down in the towns, there's always work guarding the trade wagons for a second son and swordsman from Woodbridge. When the merchants hiring men ask where I'm from, I say, "Oh, it's one of the tiny hamlets up in the hills. We've got a wooden bridge we're very proud of."

And they laugh, and ask where I came by the sword I carry. It's not a peasant's weapon and no minor lord's second son in this province has the funds for a gold-bound hilt and a jeweled pommel.

"It's under the Amnesty," I assure them. "But I don't show it off where the dragon might see, if you know what I mean."

They chuckle, and we all bless the wisdom of the current king's great-great-grandmother who brokered an agreement with the dragon who lives under the hills that nobody would bother his hoard and he'd forgive all the thieves who had dragon-cursed bits and baubles. He's slept peacefully ever since.

Their only remaining question is whether or not I can use the fancy sword. By the end of the trade route, I've more than earned every bonus they offer.

I've had variations on that sort of hiring conversation over the last hundred years.

This time, the man passing me an ale in a town tavern is from Woodbridge.

Reggie is twenty years older than when I saw him last. His straw blond hair has gray in it and he's finally grown that patchy beard out into something worthy of a hamlet's headman. He looks like a rube next to the more brightly dyed townsfolk, but he'd seen me and known me for who I was immediately.

He said, "We've been expecting your lordship any season now."

"I'm told it's something of a family tradition," I said.

He favored me with a grim look. "Afraid not, your lordship. I knew your father. You're the spitting image of him, for all that you favor southern clothes and beads in your hair instead of his northern furs. You'll rule fairly and justly for ten years. You'll reap in the good harvests and lighten our burden in the hard ones. All we can ask for."

"There are worse family traditions..."

"And in ten years, just like your father, you'll wander to the towns again to find a bride and never come back. And in twenty years, your son will come back to Woodbridge. The spitting image of you and your father before you."

We both looked at the sword belted to my side. Sure, the Amnesty says that all is forgiven...

"Lad, your family's cursed."

"Maybe," I suggested hesitantly, "I shouldn't go up to Woodbridge at all."

"And disappoint all the folk waiting for you?" He asked. "I knew your father. I liked him. He was the sort of lord who'd throw a proper party in his hall and then turn out on a cold spring night to help with the calving. Come to Woodbridge, your lordship. The challenge is keeping you there."

..............

We had ten years to come up with something clever, but it didn't take nearly that long. The cure for the curse was pretty obvious: take the sword back to the dragon, fall on my knees, and beg forgiveness for my forefathers' thieving ways.

If only it were that easy.

I tossed the fancy sword back in the pile with the rest of them, shed my human form like a snake's skin, and curled up on my hoard to think.

It had been a rather clever plan to stave off boredom as long as it lasted. I'd be Woodbridge's good lord for ten years, then wander off on the trade routes long enough for the next generation to grow up. Far to the south, there was another tiny hamlet who hadn't yet figured out the connection to the dragon's hoard. Far to the north, my isolated tribe of wanderers would probably blame the local enchantress for my curse (but she'd seen through my disguise immediately and would call on me if something went wrong.)

Unfortunately, I was now stuck in a morass of my own making. If I lifted the curse, then Woodbridge was going to ask some very suspicious questions in twenty years when I didn't age at all. If I refused to lift the curse, I was going to create a diplomatic incident, and the last thing I wanted to do was explain myself to the king. And if I told the truth, nobody was going to trust the dragon they'd thought was safely asleep.

I chewed it over. Literally. Gem-encrusted scepters make excellent chew sticks and I picked out the emeralds between my teeth with my fancy sword afterward.

.................

I walked out of the dragon's lair wide-eyed, dazed, and stumbling like I was drunk. Reggie lent me his shoulder all the way over the wooden bridge back into the hamlet and to my small hall. The hall easily held everyone who lived here, and they all waited to find out if we were throwing a party or singing a dirge. "I take it you saw the dragon," he said as his wife plied me with ale.

I drank deeply. "He's gone back to sleep. Thank the gods. I never want to do that again."

"Did he lift the curse on your family?"

"Maybe?"

I looked around the hall. They were good, simple folk. I couldn't stay here decade after decade. But I could be their good lord for ten years of every thirty, and trust their own headmen to look after them for the rest. "The dragon lifted the curse. And for my honesty, he gave me eternal youth."

I looked around at those good, simple folk living in the shadow of a dragon who slept under the hills and said, "You know we can't ever tell anyone, right?"

Slowly the realization spread. If we told anyone the secret to my youth, we'd have amnestied thieves rolling up to beg for forgiveness (and Eternal Youth). Idiots would be dumb enough to steal from the hoard in order to beg forgiveness. The king would be furious we'd poked the sleeping dragon.

And, well, I was a dragon. I really hoped I wouldn't have to prove again why we all blessed the king's great-great-grandmother's wisdom.

Reggie sighed his acceptance. I said, "Hey, looks like I'm upholding the family tradition after all," and he chuckled.

................

Ten years later when I left Woodbridge and followed the trade routes north, the enchantress fixed me with a gimlet stare. "How many lies are you going to tangle yourself in before you tell the truth?"

"I haven't the faintest idea," I admitted. "But nobody trusts a bored dragon."

Just lots and lots of practice, I'm afraid. I'm glad you enjoyed it.

Merlin appeared with a clap of thunder, an impressive entrance bound to impress even a swaggering bunch like the knights currently gathered for the tourney on the Pendragon's courtyard, no doubt peppering poor young Arthur with questions and his guardian Sir Hector with ill-disguised demands.

Instead, he found young Morgana Le Fay admiring the sword once in the stone, supervising three men with pickaxes, and eyeing him with a decidedly less than impressed expression.

"Give it here, girl," he said, gruffly. "I'll reform the stone and no harm done."

Her eyes and hair were raven dark. She'd grow into the sort of beauty that could enchant a king and the magic to keep him at her side even after she grew old. Unfortunately for her, she was the daughter of Queen Igraine and her first husband Gorlois, not Igraine and Uther Pendragon who Merlin served.

"I think not," she said, dark eyes flashing. "What sort of test to determine the rightful ruler is this? My half-brother is what - fifteen this year, if I recollect - and does he have the wit to solve this riddle as I have done?"

Arthur was not particularly clever, no. But he was kind and humble, unlike his father who cast covetous eyes on another king's queen. Morgana's bitterness over the matter, made plain by her deeds here, must not harm the boy. He said, "It was no riddle, but a sign to mark the true king. No one will mistake you for the Pendragon's legitimate heir and thus you have accomplished nothing."

Shouts from the tourney announced another contest at arms. A worried looking squire darted from the stands towards them and passed into the row of knights' tents.

She cried, "Haven't I? I've shown your 'true king' to be nothing more than a magician's tool. This sign was not of legitimacy but rather of he who would make Merlin his master!"

"You are a fallen witch indeed to hate your brother so and endanger his kingdom," he said, drawing himself up so darkly that the workmen dropped their pickaxes and fled. "He was entirely innocent of the wrongs done your mother."

The squire, not finding whatever he was looking for in the tents, came rushing back out. He saw the shattered rock and the sword in her hands. "Lady, good lady, have you a use for that sword?"

Merlin froze. For the boy was Arthur. In a few more years, there'd be no hiding that he was the Pendragon's son.

Morgana looked from him to the squire, and said haughtily. "I have magic beyond your reckoning and thus no need of a sword. But what need have you?"

He bowed, clearly in imitation of the knightly manners he'd learned alongside his older (adopted, though he knew it not) brother Sir Kay. "My brother, Sir Kay, broke his sword in the fray. Without another one, he cannot compete. I would not see him disappointed. And so I dare ask you: would you grant my brother your favor and your sword so he may compete to your honor and glory?"

Much to Merlin's surprise, she softened her stance, tore a black ribbon from her gown, and tied it to the sword before handing it over. "That was nobly asked, squire. If your brother asks after the ribbon's color, tell him you and I both mourn our fathers."

He blinked, his face a mask of confusion and growing alarm. "Sir Hector was fine when I left him..."

Merlin cut in harshly, "He's fine now, squire. Run along." Where he saw the Pendragon's hard features in his youthful mien, it was natural that Morgana saw her mother's just as clearly.

Arthur left as he was bid, swiftly carrying the sword to Sir Kay, with no idea that he was about to be thrust headlong into his destiny more by his witch-sister's contrivance than Merlin's magic. The wizard glared at her.

She more than matched him, glower for glower. "Of course he's an innocent, you meddling old man! You stole my infant brother from my mother's bedside as your patron lay dying. No, you never thought about how she would feel, to lose husband and son at one stroke-"

"The rival kings would have killed him-" he protested.

"My arts could've protected him better than yours - you haven't even disguised him." She accused. "And he would have known he had a mother and a sister who loved him, not a false family who are about to be ripped away from him in exchange for a dead man's crown."

The crowd noise grew dead silent. She glanced back towards the stands and, again to his surprise, her bitterness softened. "He is not what I expected."

Stiffly, he said, "I served his father and his father's father faithfully. I had a very long time to consider what sort of son I wanted to serve."

For the first time, as she studied him under lowered brows and he examined her not as an opponent but as a potential colleague, they understood each other.

She said, "No more loss and falsehoods. He will gain a mother and a sister. I will gain two brothers and an adopted father besides, even if the youngest of us wears the crown."

If she could let go of her anger, he could surrender to the inevitable. "I will remain long enough to make explanations to the court and then leave your new family alone so long as he is in no danger."

She held out her hand. As he kissed it, a vision of foretelling rose before his eyes: Arthur, old and gray with wisdom, would have no heir of his own flesh to pass on the crown. The young man kneeling before him was raven-dark of hair and eye, and he ruled as justly as his uncle was humble and kind.