Dec 09: Merlin, Arthur and Uther do Christmas.
Fandom: Merlin
Prompt: Merlin can't get home to Ealdor for Christmas due to the abnormally heavey snow fall so Arthur asks Merlin to Christmas dinner with him AND his father.
Prompter: owensheart
Author Note: I have included (pre-evil)Morgana because I love her as a character and her dynamics with Arthur and Uther were lovely.
Author Note 2: Sorry, it's late.
The custom in Camelot was to give all household staff a coupe of days off to visit family. Uther had preserved meats and cheeses left in his quarters and Arthur and Morgana spent a couple of days without personal servants.
Except that year snow started to fall in November, and by December the nineteenth the ground outside the city of Camelot’s walls was covered in two inches of snow. The mud was frozen solid and awkward to walk on. And Merlin had spent one day searching out winter herbs for Gaius and returned covered in mud and bruises and shivering.
Gaius and Arthur had forbidden him from leaving the castle gates again for the winter. And the Gaius had gone and spent Christmas day with an old friend in the outer town, and Gwen had gone to find some of the girls she’d grown up with and the castle was eerily quiet.
Merlin had woken to an empty house, and then meandered down to the kitchens for some breakfast.
He’d had two cups of mead and a slice of bread with cheese for breakfast, then a cup of ale.
At this point Arthur had appeared, apparently to find another bottle of wine. He stopped with shock.
“Merlin.”
“Hello Arthur. Merry Christmas.” Merlin raised his glass to toast Arthur.
“Merlin, what are you doing here?”
Merlin paused, hearing Arthur’s need for the ‘correct’ answer, and not knowing (as usual) what it was. “Drinking ale?”
“Yes, but why?”
“I . . . don’t know.”
“Why aren’t you doing something else?”
“You let us off duties for Christmas,” Merlin pointed reasonably.
“No . . . where’s Gaius?”
“Geoffrey’s house.”
“Where’s . . . Gwen?” the pause made Merlin wonder fleetingly if Gwen was maybe the only person of Merlin’s status Arthur knew the name of.
“Some other person’s house.”
“Oh . . . ”
“Yup. Oh.”
“Well, come on then,” said Arthur decisively, grabbing a bottle of wine and heading back out of the kitchen.
Merlin looked after him, mildly confused, before rising and scurrying to catch up.
They arrived outside the king’s quarters and Merlin dropped behind Arthur again, as he’d spent most of the journey walking alongside him, which Uther wouldn’t approve of. Shockingly, Arthur leaned back and grabbed the fabric of Merlin’s shirt behind his neck, and pushed Merlin into the room before him.
“Merlin was alone, so I brought him along,” Arthur said, as though it were the most normal thing in the world to force your servant to walk ahead of you, or imply he was to spend the day as though he were equal to the royal family.
“Oh, dear,” said Morgana, apparently with real dismay, “Well, come and sit down.”
Morgana indicated to a space near where she herself was half sitting half lying; an array of pillows and blankets in front of the fire, as though she were one of those princesses from the Arab lands, and not one who spent her days sitting up straight and generally not looking so . . . promiscuous. Her feet were bared and her skirts were hitched halfway up her shins by the blanket below her.
Merlin stood in the doorway and blushed.
“Well, sit down, you’re letting all the warmth out,” Uther almost commanded.
Merlin blushed again and quickly shut the door behind him and moved slightly further into the room. He then stood there a little longer.
“Sit down Merlin,” Arthur said in the tone he gave orders that he thought he shouldn’t have to give, because it was so obvious and how could Merlin be so dim?
Merlin sat down a respectable distance from Morgana.
Arthur handed him a goblet of wine and threw himself down next to Merlin, somehow not spilling his own drink.
And Morgana made some quip about Arthur’s choice in wine that Merlin didn’t get, but Uther apparently found hilarious. And watching Uther laugh was quite disorienting.
Morgana smiled freely, in a way that didn’t say she was privately entertained by everyone else’s inferiority, and wiggled her toes in front of the fire.
Arthur looked on her fondly, and Merlin got a small view of how Arthur hadn’t complained at all about servants leaving for Christmas, something he’d been confused by before. All of Camelot respected the royal family for their Christmas generosity, their lack of inequality in choosing who gets to go home for Christmas. It was less about being a brilliant ruler - as so much in Arthur’s life was - and a little more about, well, selfishness. But lying in a pile of pillows and watching Uther laugh (the man still made his skin crawl a little, but, gods the man could laugh) and Morgana smile and Arthur show affection that wasn’t spliced with aggressiveness or sarcasm, Merlin couldn’t bring himself to fault this selfishness.
Prompt: Merlin can't get home to Ealdor for Christmas due to the abnormally heavey snow fall so Arthur asks Merlin to Christmas dinner with him AND his father.
Prompter: owensheart
Author Note: I have included (pre-evil)Morgana because I love her as a character and her dynamics with Arthur and Uther were lovely.
Author Note 2: Sorry, it's late.
The custom in Camelot was to give all household staff a coupe of days off to visit family. Uther had preserved meats and cheeses left in his quarters and Arthur and Morgana spent a couple of days without personal servants.
Except that year snow started to fall in November, and by December the nineteenth the ground outside the city of Camelot’s walls was covered in two inches of snow. The mud was frozen solid and awkward to walk on. And Merlin had spent one day searching out winter herbs for Gaius and returned covered in mud and bruises and shivering.
Gaius and Arthur had forbidden him from leaving the castle gates again for the winter. And the Gaius had gone and spent Christmas day with an old friend in the outer town, and Gwen had gone to find some of the girls she’d grown up with and the castle was eerily quiet.
Merlin had woken to an empty house, and then meandered down to the kitchens for some breakfast.
He’d had two cups of mead and a slice of bread with cheese for breakfast, then a cup of ale.
At this point Arthur had appeared, apparently to find another bottle of wine. He stopped with shock.
“Merlin.”
“Hello Arthur. Merry Christmas.” Merlin raised his glass to toast Arthur.
“Merlin, what are you doing here?”
Merlin paused, hearing Arthur’s need for the ‘correct’ answer, and not knowing (as usual) what it was. “Drinking ale?”
“Yes, but why?”
“I . . . don’t know.”
“Why aren’t you doing something else?”
“You let us off duties for Christmas,” Merlin pointed reasonably.
“No . . . where’s Gaius?”
“Geoffrey’s house.”
“Where’s . . . Gwen?” the pause made Merlin wonder fleetingly if Gwen was maybe the only person of Merlin’s status Arthur knew the name of.
“Some other person’s house.”
“Oh . . . ”
“Yup. Oh.”
“Well, come on then,” said Arthur decisively, grabbing a bottle of wine and heading back out of the kitchen.
Merlin looked after him, mildly confused, before rising and scurrying to catch up.
They arrived outside the king’s quarters and Merlin dropped behind Arthur again, as he’d spent most of the journey walking alongside him, which Uther wouldn’t approve of. Shockingly, Arthur leaned back and grabbed the fabric of Merlin’s shirt behind his neck, and pushed Merlin into the room before him.
“Merlin was alone, so I brought him along,” Arthur said, as though it were the most normal thing in the world to force your servant to walk ahead of you, or imply he was to spend the day as though he were equal to the royal family.
“Oh, dear,” said Morgana, apparently with real dismay, “Well, come and sit down.”
Morgana indicated to a space near where she herself was half sitting half lying; an array of pillows and blankets in front of the fire, as though she were one of those princesses from the Arab lands, and not one who spent her days sitting up straight and generally not looking so . . . promiscuous. Her feet were bared and her skirts were hitched halfway up her shins by the blanket below her.
Merlin stood in the doorway and blushed.
“Well, sit down, you’re letting all the warmth out,” Uther almost commanded.
Merlin blushed again and quickly shut the door behind him and moved slightly further into the room. He then stood there a little longer.
“Sit down Merlin,” Arthur said in the tone he gave orders that he thought he shouldn’t have to give, because it was so obvious and how could Merlin be so dim?
Merlin sat down a respectable distance from Morgana.
Arthur handed him a goblet of wine and threw himself down next to Merlin, somehow not spilling his own drink.
And Morgana made some quip about Arthur’s choice in wine that Merlin didn’t get, but Uther apparently found hilarious. And watching Uther laugh was quite disorienting.
Morgana smiled freely, in a way that didn’t say she was privately entertained by everyone else’s inferiority, and wiggled her toes in front of the fire.
Arthur looked on her fondly, and Merlin got a small view of how Arthur hadn’t complained at all about servants leaving for Christmas, something he’d been confused by before. All of Camelot respected the royal family for their Christmas generosity, their lack of inequality in choosing who gets to go home for Christmas. It was less about being a brilliant ruler - as so much in Arthur’s life was - and a little more about, well, selfishness. But lying in a pile of pillows and watching Uther laugh (the man still made his skin crawl a little, but, gods the man could laugh) and Morgana smile and Arthur show affection that wasn’t spliced with aggressiveness or sarcasm, Merlin couldn’t bring himself to fault this selfishness.