Something Shiny
Title: Something Shiny
Rating: pg
Pairing: Merlin/Arthur
Words: 6,000
Summary: Written for a KMM prompt wherein Arthur has had a thing for Merlin in armor ever since that day in Ealdor.
Disc: not mine.
master fic post
i
"You're just coming in that?" came a voice from the stall adjacent. Merlin looked down at his shirt, then up again. What? A few horses whinnied and stamped, and Merlin dropped a curry comb into the tack box.
"Why is it," Sir Bedevere asked, coming out from behind his dappled mare, "that you never wear any armor?"
Merlin buckled a halter and yanked a few leather strappings to test the saddle. He always checked Arthur's horse twice, now. The straps of this specific saddle were in fine condition, only slightly worn. There was no way this could come loose.
"Is it because you're not to enter the fray?" the knight pressed on.
"Arthur never told me to," Merlin said simply. He took the horse's blanket, and folded it over a bar.
"Seems strange, is all," Bedevere said. Merlin nodded quietly, and then led Arthur's steed from the stables. Five minutes later, he'd readied the second horse, the one that had been good as designated as his own seeing as it was always there in the stables, available even when Arthur ferried them away from the castle at but a moment's notice. He overheard Bedevere now, outside, speaking to Arthur. "Are you certain it's wise to bring him out like this, with only a small sword for protection? No offense meant, of course sire."
Merlin heard the reply: "He's done well enough till now. But now that you've mentioned it..."
One mile out, their party was attacked by bandits. That is what Arthur told his knights as they piled the bodies one over the other and set the fire. They all knew that the words were but a story, that no bandit would attack a host of knights bearing the crest of Camelot, not these days, when they were at the brink of war.
Arthur met Merlin's gaze over the saddle, wiping a dagger against the leg of his trousers.
"Have to clean that later," Merlin muttered. Arthur sheathed his blade and pulled his sword from a tree stump.
"We ride onward," Arthur told them all. Merlin saddled up, once again. "Merlin, you've got..." He motioned towards his head region, and Merlin pursed his lips at him, trying to suss out what exactly he was trying to communicate.
"Leaves, twigs and stuff," Arthur finally said. His eyes widened. "And your arm..."
The men were all mounted and ready to set off again, eager to avoid the stench of burning flesh. Merlin moved his arm back, out of sight, and rode on ahead, further down the forest path. Arthur followed at a trot, catching him up. It had all been for naught, anyways; Arthur always noticed when he had been injured. He bade the knights continue on without them, and Merlin sighed.
"Perhaps we should suit you up with some armor," Arthur muttered. He rolled the sleeve and prodded at the offending wound, disregarding the intake of breath.
"There was a falling branch," Merlin told him, and handed over his skin of water. "That's all it was."
"Fell a bit too close for comfort, I'd say," Arthur said. He met Merlin's gaze for a moment, but never halted in his ministrations.
"I really don't need it."
"Never been a problem before, but what will my men think?" Arthur raised his eyebrows.
"A bit too late for that, wouldn't you say?"
"Give me one good reason why I shouldn't have you suited for your own set of mail." Arthur kicked his horse into a trot, and Merlin called from behind, "Well, I'd have to clean it for one."
ii
Merlin was creeping down the halls.
It couldn't be called anything else, really, and ah well, he'd always been rather shameless about it. His boots, softest of leather and parchment thin at spots, made not a sound and thus were perfect for midnight sneaking. The moon cast the hallways in blues and the torches cast the rest in golds, and every time he reached an alclove he ducked into it, waiting for guards to walk past or to make sure that he was out of sight as much as possible.
Back when Merlin had first arrived at Camelot, just over the two and a half year mark now, the guards had made the rounds like clockwork, switching out every three hours at night on sentry duty, with moving agents walking the halls at eight minute intervals. Now, their movements were inconstant, whether to throw off intruders or just a reflection of the growing anarchy underpinning the whole of Camelot Merlin was not certain, but it royally frakked up his sneaking.
Arthur was locked in his room - again - and this morning, when two embarrassed members of his own guard escorted him away from the throne room and to his tower, he had made that one hand signal at Merlin which probably meant "Come break me out or I'll spend the entire imprisonment thinking up new and disgusting chores for you." Besides, they had prepared for this, Merlin stowing a real rope up top, above the four-poster bed, for just this occasion, this next time when Uther grew too worried that his son might try to take matters into his own hands.
"Ah, Merlin," was the first thing Arthur said to him when Merlin ducked into the room. "I didn't think you'd get through this time. Double the guards and all that."
To be honest, the idea of Arthur trapped in a room, even his own room, felt like a challenge. There was no way Merlin could back down from that. In fact, life at Camelot was like on big dare altogether, and it was probably best not to consider just how it had possibly warped his personality. Anyways, outside the door Merlin made L-fingers at both the guards and then the lock, and was now feeling kind of jumped up, like possibly they should get going and defenestrate already, before the guards decided that the sound down the hall had probably just been the wind or something.
The next thing Arthur said was: "What. Is that."
Merlin turned his head, but continued reaching up to grab the rope coiled up over the canopy. He rolled his eyes and then looked back - GOLD! - at the bundle, which yanked the six inches of distance into his open hand. "It's my armor, sire. Garlain's page gave it to me, he's outgrown it."
"That's Sir Garlain, Merlin." Arthur's voice was despairing, almost hoarse.
Merlin tied one end of the rope to the bedpost in a knot that looked complicated enough, and looked back to Arthur. "Why are you looking so upset? I thought you told me to get some mail next time we went on a quest thing." Arthur twisted his mouth in consideration, and continued to look Merlin up and down, shaking his head.
Merlin returned his attention to the knot at hand, tugging it a bit, wondering how one really could tell whether a twisted mass of rope-around-pole would manage to hold.
"God have mercy," he heard from behind. And then, after a thunking sound, "Why. My life."
Merlin rubbed his hands up and down the chain-links and grinned over at Arthur, who looked at a loss.
"Know what I just realized?" Merlin said. He tossed the whole snake of rope out the window, into the yawning night, tugging it one last time to make sure. "People are going to think I'm a knight. Good thing you taught me how to block and parry. Do I get a shield with a dragon on it now?"
"Merlin."
"Or a bigger sword?"
"Merlin, get out the window."
"After you, sire."
"Merlin."
When they had picked themselves up from the courtyard flagstones, and tried to look cool while secretly checking for twisted ankles, Arthur cast Merlin one last despairing look. To Merlin's "Ready sire?" Arthur tugged Merlin's coat of mail down a bit at the side, yanking on the overly-large hauberk. He shook his head. Merlin waited until Arthur turned to stalk across the moonlit expanse to the drawbridge to hoist his pants from where they were wedged uncomfortably under ill-fitting armor, then scurried along after him.
iii
"Can you just-"
"-no I really don't think I ca-"
"Merlin, just, for once let me-"
Later on he would probably be punished in some indirect way for stepping on Arthur's face. It was only very briefly, really, and completely by accident, and it was so dark that he couldn't be blamed. It was Arthur who had ordered him to climb up on his shoulders, after all, Arthur who had made him put on the blasted chain mail for a simple information-gathering mission.
"Just- Arthur- hold still, come on."
The lowest tree limb was still about a hand away, and this had better be worth the trouble.
"This isn't exactly comfortable," Arthur told him. Merlin shifted his weight on Arthur's shoulders and considered the smooth tree trunk that his face was pressed against, and then how much easier it would be to hoist himself up if he weren't lugging the extra stone in metal. He heard Arthur's heavy breathing below him, and figured he was probably thinking along the same lines.
In a fit of ingenuity, Merlin untucked his neckerchief and managed to flop one end over the branch, rather pathetically. His shoulders burn-stretched and his arm muscles quaked. He held his breath a bit, and reached up with the other hand so that he had his hands wrapped in each end of the cloth, made all the more difficult because he couldn't really see anything.
"This is ridiculous," he muttered, and, pulling down as hard as he could, walked his way up the trunk, until he very inelegantly was able to swing a leg over and seat himself astride the branch.
"Ha!" Arthur said. Merlin looked down to where Arthur stood below, looking up. "Wahoo!"
"Right, ha," Merlin said. He lay flat over the branch, pretty certain he would fall at any moment.
"Merlin," Arthur called up. "Much as we love that armor...unfortunately it's got to come off."
"Pardon, sire?"
"You're all...shiny...in the moonlight that is. People will be able to see you from over the wall."
"Shiny, sire?" he ground out, clutching the limb for something akin to real life. He knew it was a valid point, however, so after a moment he sat up as well as he could, back against the tree trunk, and kind of shimmied the mail up and over his torso, holding the branch with one hand and delicately trying to pull one arm free. A manly sob was uttered, but eventually he had managed this feat, while simultaneously not falling to the hard earth below.
He allowed the armor to fall wherever, watching as it slithered from his clenched fist and heard as it crunched against the ground below in the shadows. Arthur made an incomprehensible noise, but no matter, because he absolutely was, without a doubt, completely through with that ridiculous wardrobe blunder. For one, the belt didn't fit right, always falling down around his hips instead of staying tight just under his ribs to support the weight of the metal.
The entire thing didn't fit well, in fact - not the first shirt and not even this one, which Arthur had had fitted for him in secret and left next to his own for Merlin to find. Also, Merlin's wearing it seemed to bring out the more violent side of the prince's personality, as Merlin had this extra layer of protection that would allow more manhandling. Since the retrospectively unfortunate day the mail had come into his life, Arthur had been whapping him with swords and tugging him around, and generally wrestling him, and it was sometimes rather frightening.
For the above stated reasons, along with reasons of gravity and general inability to safely move from his perch, Merlin decided that he was never coming down from this tree.
He resumed his climb.
iv
Skirmishes at the borders were getting rather thick, rendering it near impossible to maintain anything resembling consistent communication with Mercia or North Umbria. Nothing was clear as of yet, however, and the sweaty stupor of each summer fell this year like a dropcloth over the land. The heat was so oppressive that the dogs of the lower town straggled uptown, where they lay about near the pump, waiting restlessly for any spillover.
Nothing else changed. Arthur didn't let it. He remained consistent in his training, always had, the practice which was year-round, and extreme weather be damned.
The knights didn't grumble, not a bit. Yes they drank more, slept earlier, and woke at dawn to train when the sun was not yet at its zenith. Also, inexplicably and to his chagrin, they started beating up on Merlin a bit as well, in addition to Arthur, enough that Merlin was forced a bit down to Earth, became less oblivious, maybe, started swiveling his head around before entering any open spaces, lest a rogue knight come at him from the side, mace in hand.
"Your men," Merlin said some week in July, bursting into Arthur's chambers and slamming the door. "Have been testing my shield work."
He leaned back against the door, sweating and in a huff. His chain mail scrinched. He hated the sweat that gathered at his lower back, and that glittery, clinking noise when he walked down the corridors and outside, where there was already enough noise that might obscure the thunder of a charging knight.
"They're interested in your training," Arthur smirked. He gestured for Merlin to sit at the picnic table. "They volunteered to help toughen you up."
Merlin believed it - Arthur never lied, after all - but it had probably gone down more like this: Arthur, their prince and liege, stalking the grass of the training grounds, all wind-whipped hair and crazy-eyes as his men looked on with welling respect. It would be familiar, the epic rhetoric Arthur employed with all his heart, and the cries of his men as they were stirred into patriotism.
"We shall protect every man, woman, and child in Camelot!" "Yae." "The sick, and the weak." "YAR." "The poor and the rich!" "Graar!" "It is our duty- nay, our creed - to give these good citizens the protection they deserve. To give them the tools they require, to survive the coming war." "Graaar!" "It will be hard, but we must prepare." "Yeah." "For this reason please catch Merlin unawares as you see fit, especially when he is porting water jugs and other breakable containers, that he might learn to defend himself. Don't worry, I got him some armor. Try only to hit him where it's shiny, of course, and if he runs, it's all part of the training. That will be all." "Wahoo!"
Merlin screwed up his mouth, and plucked at his vambrace. "I just don't see how fearing for my life helps anyone. Please don't make me wear this, Arthur."
"What! You've got to be quicker, Merlin. I remember it like it was yesterday, that fine day in Ealdor when you so valiantly donned the stuff, and stood with me to save your village. I was proud with you at my side. And besides, the color suits you. Brings out the-" he waved a hand, an indistinct gesture at Merlin's person. "Steel of your eyes, or some rubbish."
Merlin felt sick, only thinking now how Will's armor hadn't been enough. Arthur selected a broadsword from the tabletop and examined it.
"The steel of my-" Merlin said. Arthur sharpened the sword with a dainty whetstone. "I'm sorry, but I promise I'll do just fine without this."
The sharpening stopped. "Really."
"Not to whine-"
"Go right ahead. Whine all you like, not that I'd stop you...just don't blame me when you're run through by an enemy blade, or struck by a flaming arrow."
"This battle will be a magical one, Arthur, don't pretend you don't know it."
Merlin made as if to remove the shirt of mail, which felt a part of him more than he'd like, but Arthur stopped him with a look. He laid the sword back on the picnic table, and said: "Please, Merlin."
v
After a bit of wheedling and argument - because really, what had started out as something of a joke had lasted quite long enough, thank you very much - Arthur only required Merlin to wear his metal on scouting missions and hunting trips. He crept around in the bushes as usual, which meant only long-range kills with the crossbow were possible. The ruckus Merlin now made just trying to breathe...it cleared the immediate forest instantly.
This armor was like the damn feathered cap. He only realized in August, when Arthur lured him into his chambers to dust but then foisted a new, nicer set of mail on him to wear that evening at the feast. Arthur's smile was mischievous, and Merlin hid his own grin behind a laugh. Why was Arthur always so earnest?
"No, please don't," he laughed, and Arthur looked pointedly at the bundle, daring him to put it on.
"Come, Merlin, it's now the official outfit for...servants of the crown. Besides, it's a gift."
Merlin busied himself organizing the closets, turning away from the sunlight and that specific challenge. Back in Ealdor a gift meant a new chair or a berry pie. Life was different from where he stood now, in the Prince's chambers in Camelot, the exchange rate bewildering.
"It's bad enough that you've had me wear it in front of your men," he said, giving Arthur a reason he could understand. "If I start wearing it at social events I'll be made fun of forever. Your father will make me juggle or eat fire. Besides, I heard him telling Gaius that there's been no sign of Morgause for the past month, so really this isn't necessary; I'll stay out of harm's way, I promise."
After babbling for quite some time and checking a rack of red tunics for signs of moths, the silence from behind grew suspicious. Et voilà: when he turned, it was to find Arthur rather close behind him, holding up the new shirt of mail in Merlin's direction and eying it with some speculation.
"Your arms just refuse to bulk up, don't they," Arthur wondered. He stepped forward and encircled a bicep with thumb and forefinger. "It's rather impressive. You'd think all the work in the stables, the arsenal- that is unless you've been bribing those lower than you to work in your place these last three years..."
"Lower than me?" Merlin asked. Arthur managed to get Merlin's head through the neckhole of the mail. "Hey!"
"Yeah, you know," Arthur hummed. He gripped Merlin's arm through an armhole, then the next, and then smoothed down Merlin's hair. "Other servants."
"Which other servants?" Merlin asked, and Arthur stilled. He received a shrewd look for that, and then Arthur patted the mail down and made Merlin turn in a few circles. He refused to continue that line of questioning. Instead, after tossing Merlin a new leather belt, he flopped on his well-made bed sheets, and surveyed Merlin's cleaning of the fireplace mantle, et al.
An hour later, Merlin went to procure some herbs at the market - lavender, for headaches, and a great bushel of mustard flower - and he espied Guinevere through a rack of vegetables. She was in pink, like some summer wildflower, holding a basket of fresh bread swaddled in cloth.
"Gwen!" he called. She kept on ahead, pushing through an oozing crowd. Merlin trod on a few feet, and only just avoided a pyramid of barrels, in his haste to reach her. She finally turned.
"Merlin," she said. "You're dressed like normal!"
"What?" he floundered. A cool breeze blew through his thin tunic. "Oh, this, yeah."
"I mean," she said. "Not that you didn't look normal in armor, just, you know, it seemed unlike you."
"Gwen, what servants are under me? I mean, hierarchically speaking."
"Well, all of them really," she said. "Everyone knows that!"
"Every..one?" Merlin looked around the market. The air felt suddenly close. Who was this everyone?
Gwen adjusted the weight of her basket, and smiled at him curiously. "Well, I mean, they're not all of lower status, not the king's advisers, not Gaius, but he's not a servant, is he? But most of them."
"Ah," Merlin said. He thought of how pages made room for him in the hallways, how few of the maids spoke to him.
That night Merlin didn't wear the mail but he did wear the hat, and the red cape, because well, what did it matter what other people thought?
vi
"How on EARTH?" Gaius dabbed at the wound with a somewhat-sterilized rag. Merlin snorted, but otherwise remained terse. Late afternoon light filtered through their dusty windows. He had been taking the reprieve as a chance to daydream a bit.
"It seems to be an animal bite of some sort." Merlin was shocked back into the present, as he received a sudden full-right-eyeball look from the physician, real suspicious-like. Merlin averted his gaze, examined his hands."Is it...? Merlin! Is this a dog's bite?"
He looked wildly into Merlin's face, and Merlin looked away again. Gaius felt the brow and took the pulse, and after a moment the panic seemed to subside. "You're lucky I gave you that rabies injection. Otherwise we'd all be frothing at the mouth in no time at all. I cannot count the times you have nearly been mauled by some horrific species of beast. I shouldn't let you out of this basement without protection of some sort!"
"Yeah, that's what Arthur says."
"Does he?" Gaius asked. "What ever happened to that shirt of- Are you listening to me?"
"I'm sorry, I-" Merlin stood. "I have to go."
It was imperative that he find Arthur. Of COURSE it had been Arthur's fault. Merlin was due on the practice pitch anyhow. As he rushed down the walk to the stables, bursting in the double doors to gather the equipment, he thought calmly of the many and varied things he could leave in Arthur's bed. He slung a belt over his arm, and gathered three hilted-swords and a helmet in his arms.
The room stank of sweat and the oil that was used to wipe down the weaponry, and also Merlin had a slight dust allergy which he would never tell Gaius about for fear of any and all stoppered-bottle concoctions. The man was a genius, perhaps, and a true scholar, receiving priceless ingredients paid for by his stipend he received from the King, and an impressive array of glassware (beakers, the like) from Northern Africa.
"Looking thin, Merlin," Sir Gonrad said. Merlin pursed his lips and grabbed another sword. "Need a bit more 'padding' around your middle, maybe."
"Is this some new form of greeting?" Merlin asked. A few of the men looked up, but quickly lost interest.
"Oh, not so shiny," Sir Barnaby winced. Merlin frowned.
"I'm looking for Arthur, where is he?"
"My lord is on the field," Sir Barnaby said. "A field which I would not dare step foot upon were I not wearing at least a full coat of armo-"
"No," Merlin said. He gave everyone in the room a look. Frowns all around, frowns for everyone!
Most continued examining swords or whatever else knights did while their pages did all the work. Sir Barnaby shrugged, and said, "Just trying to protect you."
Sir Crugs popped in with, "Oh look! I happen to have found an extra-"
"No."
Merlin slumped out onto the field. His feet squelched into the grass, and his vision speckled in the bright and sudden clarity of the sun. Arthur stood like some sort of princess's dream, mace swinging idly by his side and a red pennant flapping and flagging just behind him.
The first thing Arthur did to show his displeasure was to pull each sword from it's sheath and examine its fine steel in direct sunlight.
"How's your reflection?" Merlin asked, just as Sir Cullen went by. Arthur looked to him sharply and then to the blade in hand.
"You call these sharp?" he asked. He retrieved the omnipresent whetstone and made as if to fix whatever impurity or warble he pretneded to have found. "We're off on a scouting mission in the morning. You're not coming."
He stroked the edge of the blade against the block, calmly, grinding away at the quiet with the sounds of metal-on-stone. Merlin looked on dispassionately.
"That's what you say, but we both know that I'll go wherever I damn well please."
Arthur swung the blade in an easy arc to Merlin's neck. Merlin stood his ground. Stood his ground because he was still holding most of the weaponry, but stood it nonetheless.
"You going where you damn well please, meaning you'll put on some-"
"No," Merlin repeated. The men began filing onto the field, taking up spots along the wall and near the shield rack. Arthur looked past Merlin, and then back again. Merlin put the equipment down at their feet, and then folded his arms across his chest. The men stirred, the conversation low and respectful.
"You might find it safer if you-"
"Arthur," Merlin said. Arthur shifted from one foot to the next, actually shifted under Merlin's gaze.
"Did you," Merlin said. "Did you set your dogs on me?"
"Merlin," Arthur said.
"Was that to teach me some sort of lesson in safety?"
"Well, never mind that." He held out a gauntleted hand, and Merlin reached on instinct to adjust it. Arthur leaned in close. "I thought I saw something in the well."
"Pardon?" Merlin adjusted the other wrist strap, looking at Arthur askance.
"You heard me," he said. "I thought I saw something. In the well. Go...go and check."
Merlin drew back to look him full in the face. He glanced around, to where the knights were watching and then comprehension lit like a second dawn.
"You want me to go back to the courtyard, and look in the well...Arthur. Is there you-know-what in there?"
"Why don't you peek your head in and find out." Arthur gestured with a sword, and smiled as Merlin flinched back a bit.
"No. No, Arthur. I don't even know how you'd manage it, but you would."
"Fine, go...go do all those things you manage to avoid."
"Fine."
"Even the darning."
"Fine."
"Fine, then."
Arthur looked away, smiling sarcastically at his men, and Merlin studied him for a moment, his slightly bratty prince, and despaired of the future that would probably be far more iron-clad than he had managed thus far. He responded to a little wave sent his way by one Sir Leon, lion cub of the court, and then tramped off to do the laundry.
And that was how Merlin missed supper.
vii
Enough about armor.
Things started to go bad, and so on one morning that promised only fresh light, the final four set off towards North Umbria, because if there ever was a time to keep things from the king, it was now, with skirmishes at the border running to full-fledged battles and summer's sweat giving way to leaf drifts as September came to a close.
It was nearing lunch and Arthur was riding on up ahead in hunting browns with Gwen at his side. They were positively sun-dappled, and they blended into the brush and maples from time to time, often enough that Merlin was on edge, just that much more than usual, squinting to make them out when they rode on too far down the path. Alongside him Morgana was walking her mare at what could be considered a leisurely pace, but which to Merlin felt rather calculating. The roll of the saddle tried to lull him into a stupor, but he knew well enough not to let it.
He felt it in the wind, first, a sort of prophecy. Gravel crunched and rolled beneath horse hooves, but that was the only sound. He turned and looked sharply at Morgana, whose eyes were light against their dark moon of under-eyeliner. She was staring up the path, where Arthur and Gwen had now stopped to allow their horses to rip at some mustard flower that grew wild in the forest. Merlin had often come to gather herbs for Gaius, although rarely this far. There should have been bird song.
Yes, the world felt still. He looked back to Morgana, but she just kept on staring on ahead, stroking her horse's mane. Merlin rode on, a bit faster, so that he left her dawdling behind. Abruptly there came a twittering and a kind of rushing of tree branches. He fell back again. Silence.
"Nice day," Merlin said to her. Morgana hummed under her breath, irises an off-color and so Merlin waited.
Presently, the wind began to pick up, and Merlin couldn't wait any longer.
A green serpent wove out from beneath a bush and made to cross the path just before them in a darting motion.
The reaction was nearly instantaneous. The horse beside Merlin's reared, and Morgana yelled in surprise. Merlin had not, unfortunately, thought of the surprise of his own horse, who was an unnaturally finicky beast in the first place, even sans reptile, so it stood to reason that Merlin would be thrown into the underbrush and showered with the dirt and some pebbles that were kicked up in the fray. He was.
This was not the first time Merlin had conjured a snake, but the ability was a pretty recent development. At first it had been butterflies. Twizzler or whosit had inspired him, only a court jester and even he had managed to issue forth a whole flock of the things. It hadn't worked. Then, operating on a hunch one morning last month, he looked up a different sort of spell in one of Gaius' hefty tomes. It had been easy enough to find, as the book itself was labeled "Slight of Hand and Illusions to Impress Your Friends and Enemies," and on only the fourth try vaporous insects had appeared like magic.
A snake wasn't much harder. It was incorporeal, even this one because he hadn't practiced too much. He could see the ground through it's scales as it slid quickly to the rocks at the foot of the hill. (Only later would Merlin find that he had the power, like boy wizards to come after, to actually call and speak with snakes. This would not surprise him in the slightest as he had already spoken to far larger reptiles and snakes would seem a mere party trick. Arthur, however, would find this entertaining until the moment his body set sail towards Avalon.)
"Merlin!" Morgana yelled, which brought Merlin out of the dazed reverie. She was off her horse in a moment, and Merlin heard a far off shouting as Arthur turned and galloped back.
Hands were jerking him up into a sitting position, as if that would help a possible concussion, and Arthur was admonishing him with "can't take you anywhere, Merlin, you're always getting hurt" and other things to this effect, while Merlin tried to watch Morgana, tried to suss out what exactly she had been about to do, but her face was a mask of the friend he had known for three years now, and he had never really been one to read people.
viii
At a relatively new, relatively decent inn, that's where it leaves off.
Merlin had walked on ahead of the knights who were loitering outside by the stables. He knew he was easily identifiable as a servant by his hurried stride and the sack of coin that had been tossed his way by Arthur. He'd caught it on the way to the stable doors, without even looking really - all in line, they'd done this before. The jangling of a bell as he swung the inn door open was familiar as well, and the request for as many rooms as were available for the night. My master will press on in the early morning, and He requests a cask of your finest ale.
The innkeeper was unusually attentive. Perhaps she knew who her guests really were, Merlin thought distantly as she took in his gangly appearance and he glanced out the window at the sky. He wondered if it would rain, and, if so, whether it would be natural rain or some sort of magical omen. He accepted a large ring of keys, impatient to perhaps wash his face and then spend a good hour devoting himself to food. The usual.
He lugged a few bags up to a dark room on the second floor. After flinging open four window shutters, exposing the room to blue evening light, he began arranging he and Arthur's few belongings on the bedside tables, and only sat on one of the mattresses after he had checked the beds for insects and looked under them for same. The clouds outside were steeped like heavy whipping cream, and ominous.
This past month had been taking its toll. Word from the far reaches of Camelot seemed to bring nothing but ill-news, missives like harbingers, and resources were stretching thin. Sometimes Merlin suspected that all this training had been for nothing. Magical. Non-magical. That maybe nothing much would be within his control.
He walked the hallways and peered into rooms, on the watch for suspicious characters. So many people were staying at the inn tonight, though, it was hard to tell. Finally, he ambled down the creaking stairway into the warm front room once again. He met Arthur's gaze across the room with a nod. Arthur was, of course, already encircled by his men. They all looked to be feeling the effects of a week's patrol and were now stretching themselves out and sinking down into their wooden chairs in the hot firelight.
Merlin said something to the innkeeper about their meal, and she said: "Yes, mi'lord." and went to the back.
Um.
The ceiling felt low and it was near impossible to think in the loud conversation. He made his way across the room, pushing past rowdy groups of men to their equally rowdy table at the back. As he passed a neighboring table, he was jostled by a thick man in blue, not one of Camelot's. Merlin stepped around him, but the man also stepped away, hands held before him as if to appease: "Pardon!"
The knights moved their chairs aside when he reached them. It was subtle, but by now their whole group worked with a sort of precision, everything in its place, a strong sense of routine.
When Merlin reached his seat to Arthur's left, he took a moment to collect his thoughts. He watched the men swigging their drinks and doing other manly things like punching each other in the metal shoulder plates and picking their teeth with things they'd found in their pockets, and then he looked to the laughing face beside him. When Merlin said his name, Arthur turned at once, eyes crystally in the firelight. Merlin had to lean in to make himself heard.
"You told them I was a knight," he accused. He leaned back to take a look at Arthur's face.
"I think it's highly unlikely any one would believe it, Merlin," Arthur said. "Despite what I say-"
So he had told them, then. Merlin smiled back. "Ah, but your word is law."
"-no one would believe it, because, as you've only just demonstrated, you interrupt me when I speak, and address me directly," Arthur said. He motioned for Sir Leon to pass down another goblet. "Really, Merlin. None of my knights would dare to do that."
Merlin just kind of stared at him, and after a moment of consideration Arthur flicked him in the armor and called for another round.
end.
Rating: pg
Pairing: Merlin/Arthur
Words: 6,000
Summary: Written for a KMM prompt wherein Arthur has had a thing for Merlin in armor ever since that day in Ealdor.
Disc: not mine.
master fic post
i
"You're just coming in that?" came a voice from the stall adjacent. Merlin looked down at his shirt, then up again. What? A few horses whinnied and stamped, and Merlin dropped a curry comb into the tack box.
"Why is it," Sir Bedevere asked, coming out from behind his dappled mare, "that you never wear any armor?"
Merlin buckled a halter and yanked a few leather strappings to test the saddle. He always checked Arthur's horse twice, now. The straps of this specific saddle were in fine condition, only slightly worn. There was no way this could come loose.
"Is it because you're not to enter the fray?" the knight pressed on.
"Arthur never told me to," Merlin said simply. He took the horse's blanket, and folded it over a bar.
"Seems strange, is all," Bedevere said. Merlin nodded quietly, and then led Arthur's steed from the stables. Five minutes later, he'd readied the second horse, the one that had been good as designated as his own seeing as it was always there in the stables, available even when Arthur ferried them away from the castle at but a moment's notice. He overheard Bedevere now, outside, speaking to Arthur. "Are you certain it's wise to bring him out like this, with only a small sword for protection? No offense meant, of course sire."
Merlin heard the reply: "He's done well enough till now. But now that you've mentioned it..."
One mile out, their party was attacked by bandits. That is what Arthur told his knights as they piled the bodies one over the other and set the fire. They all knew that the words were but a story, that no bandit would attack a host of knights bearing the crest of Camelot, not these days, when they were at the brink of war.
Arthur met Merlin's gaze over the saddle, wiping a dagger against the leg of his trousers.
"Have to clean that later," Merlin muttered. Arthur sheathed his blade and pulled his sword from a tree stump.
"We ride onward," Arthur told them all. Merlin saddled up, once again. "Merlin, you've got..." He motioned towards his head region, and Merlin pursed his lips at him, trying to suss out what exactly he was trying to communicate.
"Leaves, twigs and stuff," Arthur finally said. His eyes widened. "And your arm..."
The men were all mounted and ready to set off again, eager to avoid the stench of burning flesh. Merlin moved his arm back, out of sight, and rode on ahead, further down the forest path. Arthur followed at a trot, catching him up. It had all been for naught, anyways; Arthur always noticed when he had been injured. He bade the knights continue on without them, and Merlin sighed.
"Perhaps we should suit you up with some armor," Arthur muttered. He rolled the sleeve and prodded at the offending wound, disregarding the intake of breath.
"There was a falling branch," Merlin told him, and handed over his skin of water. "That's all it was."
"Fell a bit too close for comfort, I'd say," Arthur said. He met Merlin's gaze for a moment, but never halted in his ministrations.
"I really don't need it."
"Never been a problem before, but what will my men think?" Arthur raised his eyebrows.
"A bit too late for that, wouldn't you say?"
"Give me one good reason why I shouldn't have you suited for your own set of mail." Arthur kicked his horse into a trot, and Merlin called from behind, "Well, I'd have to clean it for one."
ii
Merlin was creeping down the halls.
It couldn't be called anything else, really, and ah well, he'd always been rather shameless about it. His boots, softest of leather and parchment thin at spots, made not a sound and thus were perfect for midnight sneaking. The moon cast the hallways in blues and the torches cast the rest in golds, and every time he reached an alclove he ducked into it, waiting for guards to walk past or to make sure that he was out of sight as much as possible.
Back when Merlin had first arrived at Camelot, just over the two and a half year mark now, the guards had made the rounds like clockwork, switching out every three hours at night on sentry duty, with moving agents walking the halls at eight minute intervals. Now, their movements were inconstant, whether to throw off intruders or just a reflection of the growing anarchy underpinning the whole of Camelot Merlin was not certain, but it royally frakked up his sneaking.
Arthur was locked in his room - again - and this morning, when two embarrassed members of his own guard escorted him away from the throne room and to his tower, he had made that one hand signal at Merlin which probably meant "Come break me out or I'll spend the entire imprisonment thinking up new and disgusting chores for you." Besides, they had prepared for this, Merlin stowing a real rope up top, above the four-poster bed, for just this occasion, this next time when Uther grew too worried that his son might try to take matters into his own hands.
"Ah, Merlin," was the first thing Arthur said to him when Merlin ducked into the room. "I didn't think you'd get through this time. Double the guards and all that."
To be honest, the idea of Arthur trapped in a room, even his own room, felt like a challenge. There was no way Merlin could back down from that. In fact, life at Camelot was like on big dare altogether, and it was probably best not to consider just how it had possibly warped his personality. Anyways, outside the door Merlin made L-fingers at both the guards and then the lock, and was now feeling kind of jumped up, like possibly they should get going and defenestrate already, before the guards decided that the sound down the hall had probably just been the wind or something.
The next thing Arthur said was: "What. Is that."
Merlin turned his head, but continued reaching up to grab the rope coiled up over the canopy. He rolled his eyes and then looked back - GOLD! - at the bundle, which yanked the six inches of distance into his open hand. "It's my armor, sire. Garlain's page gave it to me, he's outgrown it."
"That's Sir Garlain, Merlin." Arthur's voice was despairing, almost hoarse.
Merlin tied one end of the rope to the bedpost in a knot that looked complicated enough, and looked back to Arthur. "Why are you looking so upset? I thought you told me to get some mail next time we went on a quest thing." Arthur twisted his mouth in consideration, and continued to look Merlin up and down, shaking his head.
Merlin returned his attention to the knot at hand, tugging it a bit, wondering how one really could tell whether a twisted mass of rope-around-pole would manage to hold.
"God have mercy," he heard from behind. And then, after a thunking sound, "Why. My life."
Merlin rubbed his hands up and down the chain-links and grinned over at Arthur, who looked at a loss.
"Know what I just realized?" Merlin said. He tossed the whole snake of rope out the window, into the yawning night, tugging it one last time to make sure. "People are going to think I'm a knight. Good thing you taught me how to block and parry. Do I get a shield with a dragon on it now?"
"Merlin."
"Or a bigger sword?"
"Merlin, get out the window."
"After you, sire."
"Merlin."
When they had picked themselves up from the courtyard flagstones, and tried to look cool while secretly checking for twisted ankles, Arthur cast Merlin one last despairing look. To Merlin's "Ready sire?" Arthur tugged Merlin's coat of mail down a bit at the side, yanking on the overly-large hauberk. He shook his head. Merlin waited until Arthur turned to stalk across the moonlit expanse to the drawbridge to hoist his pants from where they were wedged uncomfortably under ill-fitting armor, then scurried along after him.
iii
"Can you just-"
"-no I really don't think I ca-"
"Merlin, just, for once let me-"
Later on he would probably be punished in some indirect way for stepping on Arthur's face. It was only very briefly, really, and completely by accident, and it was so dark that he couldn't be blamed. It was Arthur who had ordered him to climb up on his shoulders, after all, Arthur who had made him put on the blasted chain mail for a simple information-gathering mission.
"Just- Arthur- hold still, come on."
The lowest tree limb was still about a hand away, and this had better be worth the trouble.
"This isn't exactly comfortable," Arthur told him. Merlin shifted his weight on Arthur's shoulders and considered the smooth tree trunk that his face was pressed against, and then how much easier it would be to hoist himself up if he weren't lugging the extra stone in metal. He heard Arthur's heavy breathing below him, and figured he was probably thinking along the same lines.
In a fit of ingenuity, Merlin untucked his neckerchief and managed to flop one end over the branch, rather pathetically. His shoulders burn-stretched and his arm muscles quaked. He held his breath a bit, and reached up with the other hand so that he had his hands wrapped in each end of the cloth, made all the more difficult because he couldn't really see anything.
"This is ridiculous," he muttered, and, pulling down as hard as he could, walked his way up the trunk, until he very inelegantly was able to swing a leg over and seat himself astride the branch.
"Ha!" Arthur said. Merlin looked down to where Arthur stood below, looking up. "Wahoo!"
"Right, ha," Merlin said. He lay flat over the branch, pretty certain he would fall at any moment.
"Merlin," Arthur called up. "Much as we love that armor...unfortunately it's got to come off."
"Pardon, sire?"
"You're all...shiny...in the moonlight that is. People will be able to see you from over the wall."
"Shiny, sire?" he ground out, clutching the limb for something akin to real life. He knew it was a valid point, however, so after a moment he sat up as well as he could, back against the tree trunk, and kind of shimmied the mail up and over his torso, holding the branch with one hand and delicately trying to pull one arm free. A manly sob was uttered, but eventually he had managed this feat, while simultaneously not falling to the hard earth below.
He allowed the armor to fall wherever, watching as it slithered from his clenched fist and heard as it crunched against the ground below in the shadows. Arthur made an incomprehensible noise, but no matter, because he absolutely was, without a doubt, completely through with that ridiculous wardrobe blunder. For one, the belt didn't fit right, always falling down around his hips instead of staying tight just under his ribs to support the weight of the metal.
The entire thing didn't fit well, in fact - not the first shirt and not even this one, which Arthur had had fitted for him in secret and left next to his own for Merlin to find. Also, Merlin's wearing it seemed to bring out the more violent side of the prince's personality, as Merlin had this extra layer of protection that would allow more manhandling. Since the retrospectively unfortunate day the mail had come into his life, Arthur had been whapping him with swords and tugging him around, and generally wrestling him, and it was sometimes rather frightening.
For the above stated reasons, along with reasons of gravity and general inability to safely move from his perch, Merlin decided that he was never coming down from this tree.
He resumed his climb.
iv
Skirmishes at the borders were getting rather thick, rendering it near impossible to maintain anything resembling consistent communication with Mercia or North Umbria. Nothing was clear as of yet, however, and the sweaty stupor of each summer fell this year like a dropcloth over the land. The heat was so oppressive that the dogs of the lower town straggled uptown, where they lay about near the pump, waiting restlessly for any spillover.
Nothing else changed. Arthur didn't let it. He remained consistent in his training, always had, the practice which was year-round, and extreme weather be damned.
The knights didn't grumble, not a bit. Yes they drank more, slept earlier, and woke at dawn to train when the sun was not yet at its zenith. Also, inexplicably and to his chagrin, they started beating up on Merlin a bit as well, in addition to Arthur, enough that Merlin was forced a bit down to Earth, became less oblivious, maybe, started swiveling his head around before entering any open spaces, lest a rogue knight come at him from the side, mace in hand.
"Your men," Merlin said some week in July, bursting into Arthur's chambers and slamming the door. "Have been testing my shield work."
He leaned back against the door, sweating and in a huff. His chain mail scrinched. He hated the sweat that gathered at his lower back, and that glittery, clinking noise when he walked down the corridors and outside, where there was already enough noise that might obscure the thunder of a charging knight.
"They're interested in your training," Arthur smirked. He gestured for Merlin to sit at the picnic table. "They volunteered to help toughen you up."
Merlin believed it - Arthur never lied, after all - but it had probably gone down more like this: Arthur, their prince and liege, stalking the grass of the training grounds, all wind-whipped hair and crazy-eyes as his men looked on with welling respect. It would be familiar, the epic rhetoric Arthur employed with all his heart, and the cries of his men as they were stirred into patriotism.
"We shall protect every man, woman, and child in Camelot!" "Yae." "The sick, and the weak." "YAR." "The poor and the rich!" "Graar!" "It is our duty- nay, our creed - to give these good citizens the protection they deserve. To give them the tools they require, to survive the coming war." "Graaar!" "It will be hard, but we must prepare." "Yeah." "For this reason please catch Merlin unawares as you see fit, especially when he is porting water jugs and other breakable containers, that he might learn to defend himself. Don't worry, I got him some armor. Try only to hit him where it's shiny, of course, and if he runs, it's all part of the training. That will be all." "Wahoo!"
Merlin screwed up his mouth, and plucked at his vambrace. "I just don't see how fearing for my life helps anyone. Please don't make me wear this, Arthur."
"What! You've got to be quicker, Merlin. I remember it like it was yesterday, that fine day in Ealdor when you so valiantly donned the stuff, and stood with me to save your village. I was proud with you at my side. And besides, the color suits you. Brings out the-" he waved a hand, an indistinct gesture at Merlin's person. "Steel of your eyes, or some rubbish."
Merlin felt sick, only thinking now how Will's armor hadn't been enough. Arthur selected a broadsword from the tabletop and examined it.
"The steel of my-" Merlin said. Arthur sharpened the sword with a dainty whetstone. "I'm sorry, but I promise I'll do just fine without this."
The sharpening stopped. "Really."
"Not to whine-"
"Go right ahead. Whine all you like, not that I'd stop you...just don't blame me when you're run through by an enemy blade, or struck by a flaming arrow."
"This battle will be a magical one, Arthur, don't pretend you don't know it."
Merlin made as if to remove the shirt of mail, which felt a part of him more than he'd like, but Arthur stopped him with a look. He laid the sword back on the picnic table, and said: "Please, Merlin."
v
After a bit of wheedling and argument - because really, what had started out as something of a joke had lasted quite long enough, thank you very much - Arthur only required Merlin to wear his metal on scouting missions and hunting trips. He crept around in the bushes as usual, which meant only long-range kills with the crossbow were possible. The ruckus Merlin now made just trying to breathe...it cleared the immediate forest instantly.
This armor was like the damn feathered cap. He only realized in August, when Arthur lured him into his chambers to dust but then foisted a new, nicer set of mail on him to wear that evening at the feast. Arthur's smile was mischievous, and Merlin hid his own grin behind a laugh. Why was Arthur always so earnest?
"No, please don't," he laughed, and Arthur looked pointedly at the bundle, daring him to put it on.
"Come, Merlin, it's now the official outfit for...servants of the crown. Besides, it's a gift."
Merlin busied himself organizing the closets, turning away from the sunlight and that specific challenge. Back in Ealdor a gift meant a new chair or a berry pie. Life was different from where he stood now, in the Prince's chambers in Camelot, the exchange rate bewildering.
"It's bad enough that you've had me wear it in front of your men," he said, giving Arthur a reason he could understand. "If I start wearing it at social events I'll be made fun of forever. Your father will make me juggle or eat fire. Besides, I heard him telling Gaius that there's been no sign of Morgause for the past month, so really this isn't necessary; I'll stay out of harm's way, I promise."
After babbling for quite some time and checking a rack of red tunics for signs of moths, the silence from behind grew suspicious. Et voilà: when he turned, it was to find Arthur rather close behind him, holding up the new shirt of mail in Merlin's direction and eying it with some speculation.
"Your arms just refuse to bulk up, don't they," Arthur wondered. He stepped forward and encircled a bicep with thumb and forefinger. "It's rather impressive. You'd think all the work in the stables, the arsenal- that is unless you've been bribing those lower than you to work in your place these last three years..."
"Lower than me?" Merlin asked. Arthur managed to get Merlin's head through the neckhole of the mail. "Hey!"
"Yeah, you know," Arthur hummed. He gripped Merlin's arm through an armhole, then the next, and then smoothed down Merlin's hair. "Other servants."
"Which other servants?" Merlin asked, and Arthur stilled. He received a shrewd look for that, and then Arthur patted the mail down and made Merlin turn in a few circles. He refused to continue that line of questioning. Instead, after tossing Merlin a new leather belt, he flopped on his well-made bed sheets, and surveyed Merlin's cleaning of the fireplace mantle, et al.
An hour later, Merlin went to procure some herbs at the market - lavender, for headaches, and a great bushel of mustard flower - and he espied Guinevere through a rack of vegetables. She was in pink, like some summer wildflower, holding a basket of fresh bread swaddled in cloth.
"Gwen!" he called. She kept on ahead, pushing through an oozing crowd. Merlin trod on a few feet, and only just avoided a pyramid of barrels, in his haste to reach her. She finally turned.
"Merlin," she said. "You're dressed like normal!"
"What?" he floundered. A cool breeze blew through his thin tunic. "Oh, this, yeah."
"I mean," she said. "Not that you didn't look normal in armor, just, you know, it seemed unlike you."
"Gwen, what servants are under me? I mean, hierarchically speaking."
"Well, all of them really," she said. "Everyone knows that!"
"Every..one?" Merlin looked around the market. The air felt suddenly close. Who was this everyone?
Gwen adjusted the weight of her basket, and smiled at him curiously. "Well, I mean, they're not all of lower status, not the king's advisers, not Gaius, but he's not a servant, is he? But most of them."
"Ah," Merlin said. He thought of how pages made room for him in the hallways, how few of the maids spoke to him.
That night Merlin didn't wear the mail but he did wear the hat, and the red cape, because well, what did it matter what other people thought?
vi
"How on EARTH?" Gaius dabbed at the wound with a somewhat-sterilized rag. Merlin snorted, but otherwise remained terse. Late afternoon light filtered through their dusty windows. He had been taking the reprieve as a chance to daydream a bit.
"It seems to be an animal bite of some sort." Merlin was shocked back into the present, as he received a sudden full-right-eyeball look from the physician, real suspicious-like. Merlin averted his gaze, examined his hands."Is it...? Merlin! Is this a dog's bite?"
He looked wildly into Merlin's face, and Merlin looked away again. Gaius felt the brow and took the pulse, and after a moment the panic seemed to subside. "You're lucky I gave you that rabies injection. Otherwise we'd all be frothing at the mouth in no time at all. I cannot count the times you have nearly been mauled by some horrific species of beast. I shouldn't let you out of this basement without protection of some sort!"
"Yeah, that's what Arthur says."
"Does he?" Gaius asked. "What ever happened to that shirt of- Are you listening to me?"
"I'm sorry, I-" Merlin stood. "I have to go."
It was imperative that he find Arthur. Of COURSE it had been Arthur's fault. Merlin was due on the practice pitch anyhow. As he rushed down the walk to the stables, bursting in the double doors to gather the equipment, he thought calmly of the many and varied things he could leave in Arthur's bed. He slung a belt over his arm, and gathered three hilted-swords and a helmet in his arms.
The room stank of sweat and the oil that was used to wipe down the weaponry, and also Merlin had a slight dust allergy which he would never tell Gaius about for fear of any and all stoppered-bottle concoctions. The man was a genius, perhaps, and a true scholar, receiving priceless ingredients paid for by his stipend he received from the King, and an impressive array of glassware (beakers, the like) from Northern Africa.
"Looking thin, Merlin," Sir Gonrad said. Merlin pursed his lips and grabbed another sword. "Need a bit more 'padding' around your middle, maybe."
"Is this some new form of greeting?" Merlin asked. A few of the men looked up, but quickly lost interest.
"Oh, not so shiny," Sir Barnaby winced. Merlin frowned.
"I'm looking for Arthur, where is he?"
"My lord is on the field," Sir Barnaby said. "A field which I would not dare step foot upon were I not wearing at least a full coat of armo-"
"No," Merlin said. He gave everyone in the room a look. Frowns all around, frowns for everyone!
Most continued examining swords or whatever else knights did while their pages did all the work. Sir Barnaby shrugged, and said, "Just trying to protect you."
Sir Crugs popped in with, "Oh look! I happen to have found an extra-"
"No."
Merlin slumped out onto the field. His feet squelched into the grass, and his vision speckled in the bright and sudden clarity of the sun. Arthur stood like some sort of princess's dream, mace swinging idly by his side and a red pennant flapping and flagging just behind him.
The first thing Arthur did to show his displeasure was to pull each sword from it's sheath and examine its fine steel in direct sunlight.
"How's your reflection?" Merlin asked, just as Sir Cullen went by. Arthur looked to him sharply and then to the blade in hand.
"You call these sharp?" he asked. He retrieved the omnipresent whetstone and made as if to fix whatever impurity or warble he pretneded to have found. "We're off on a scouting mission in the morning. You're not coming."
He stroked the edge of the blade against the block, calmly, grinding away at the quiet with the sounds of metal-on-stone. Merlin looked on dispassionately.
"That's what you say, but we both know that I'll go wherever I damn well please."
Arthur swung the blade in an easy arc to Merlin's neck. Merlin stood his ground. Stood his ground because he was still holding most of the weaponry, but stood it nonetheless.
"You going where you damn well please, meaning you'll put on some-"
"No," Merlin repeated. The men began filing onto the field, taking up spots along the wall and near the shield rack. Arthur looked past Merlin, and then back again. Merlin put the equipment down at their feet, and then folded his arms across his chest. The men stirred, the conversation low and respectful.
"You might find it safer if you-"
"Arthur," Merlin said. Arthur shifted from one foot to the next, actually shifted under Merlin's gaze.
"Did you," Merlin said. "Did you set your dogs on me?"
"Merlin," Arthur said.
"Was that to teach me some sort of lesson in safety?"
"Well, never mind that." He held out a gauntleted hand, and Merlin reached on instinct to adjust it. Arthur leaned in close. "I thought I saw something in the well."
"Pardon?" Merlin adjusted the other wrist strap, looking at Arthur askance.
"You heard me," he said. "I thought I saw something. In the well. Go...go and check."
Merlin drew back to look him full in the face. He glanced around, to where the knights were watching and then comprehension lit like a second dawn.
"You want me to go back to the courtyard, and look in the well...Arthur. Is there you-know-what in there?"
"Why don't you peek your head in and find out." Arthur gestured with a sword, and smiled as Merlin flinched back a bit.
"No. No, Arthur. I don't even know how you'd manage it, but you would."
"Fine, go...go do all those things you manage to avoid."
"Fine."
"Even the darning."
"Fine."
"Fine, then."
Arthur looked away, smiling sarcastically at his men, and Merlin studied him for a moment, his slightly bratty prince, and despaired of the future that would probably be far more iron-clad than he had managed thus far. He responded to a little wave sent his way by one Sir Leon, lion cub of the court, and then tramped off to do the laundry.
And that was how Merlin missed supper.
vii
Enough about armor.
Things started to go bad, and so on one morning that promised only fresh light, the final four set off towards North Umbria, because if there ever was a time to keep things from the king, it was now, with skirmishes at the border running to full-fledged battles and summer's sweat giving way to leaf drifts as September came to a close.
It was nearing lunch and Arthur was riding on up ahead in hunting browns with Gwen at his side. They were positively sun-dappled, and they blended into the brush and maples from time to time, often enough that Merlin was on edge, just that much more than usual, squinting to make them out when they rode on too far down the path. Alongside him Morgana was walking her mare at what could be considered a leisurely pace, but which to Merlin felt rather calculating. The roll of the saddle tried to lull him into a stupor, but he knew well enough not to let it.
He felt it in the wind, first, a sort of prophecy. Gravel crunched and rolled beneath horse hooves, but that was the only sound. He turned and looked sharply at Morgana, whose eyes were light against their dark moon of under-eyeliner. She was staring up the path, where Arthur and Gwen had now stopped to allow their horses to rip at some mustard flower that grew wild in the forest. Merlin had often come to gather herbs for Gaius, although rarely this far. There should have been bird song.
Yes, the world felt still. He looked back to Morgana, but she just kept on staring on ahead, stroking her horse's mane. Merlin rode on, a bit faster, so that he left her dawdling behind. Abruptly there came a twittering and a kind of rushing of tree branches. He fell back again. Silence.
"Nice day," Merlin said to her. Morgana hummed under her breath, irises an off-color and so Merlin waited.
Presently, the wind began to pick up, and Merlin couldn't wait any longer.
A green serpent wove out from beneath a bush and made to cross the path just before them in a darting motion.
The reaction was nearly instantaneous. The horse beside Merlin's reared, and Morgana yelled in surprise. Merlin had not, unfortunately, thought of the surprise of his own horse, who was an unnaturally finicky beast in the first place, even sans reptile, so it stood to reason that Merlin would be thrown into the underbrush and showered with the dirt and some pebbles that were kicked up in the fray. He was.
This was not the first time Merlin had conjured a snake, but the ability was a pretty recent development. At first it had been butterflies. Twizzler or whosit had inspired him, only a court jester and even he had managed to issue forth a whole flock of the things. It hadn't worked. Then, operating on a hunch one morning last month, he looked up a different sort of spell in one of Gaius' hefty tomes. It had been easy enough to find, as the book itself was labeled "Slight of Hand and Illusions to Impress Your Friends and Enemies," and on only the fourth try vaporous insects had appeared like magic.
A snake wasn't much harder. It was incorporeal, even this one because he hadn't practiced too much. He could see the ground through it's scales as it slid quickly to the rocks at the foot of the hill. (Only later would Merlin find that he had the power, like boy wizards to come after, to actually call and speak with snakes. This would not surprise him in the slightest as he had already spoken to far larger reptiles and snakes would seem a mere party trick. Arthur, however, would find this entertaining until the moment his body set sail towards Avalon.)
"Merlin!" Morgana yelled, which brought Merlin out of the dazed reverie. She was off her horse in a moment, and Merlin heard a far off shouting as Arthur turned and galloped back.
Hands were jerking him up into a sitting position, as if that would help a possible concussion, and Arthur was admonishing him with "can't take you anywhere, Merlin, you're always getting hurt" and other things to this effect, while Merlin tried to watch Morgana, tried to suss out what exactly she had been about to do, but her face was a mask of the friend he had known for three years now, and he had never really been one to read people.
viii
At a relatively new, relatively decent inn, that's where it leaves off.
Merlin had walked on ahead of the knights who were loitering outside by the stables. He knew he was easily identifiable as a servant by his hurried stride and the sack of coin that had been tossed his way by Arthur. He'd caught it on the way to the stable doors, without even looking really - all in line, they'd done this before. The jangling of a bell as he swung the inn door open was familiar as well, and the request for as many rooms as were available for the night. My master will press on in the early morning, and He requests a cask of your finest ale.
The innkeeper was unusually attentive. Perhaps she knew who her guests really were, Merlin thought distantly as she took in his gangly appearance and he glanced out the window at the sky. He wondered if it would rain, and, if so, whether it would be natural rain or some sort of magical omen. He accepted a large ring of keys, impatient to perhaps wash his face and then spend a good hour devoting himself to food. The usual.
He lugged a few bags up to a dark room on the second floor. After flinging open four window shutters, exposing the room to blue evening light, he began arranging he and Arthur's few belongings on the bedside tables, and only sat on one of the mattresses after he had checked the beds for insects and looked under them for same. The clouds outside were steeped like heavy whipping cream, and ominous.
This past month had been taking its toll. Word from the far reaches of Camelot seemed to bring nothing but ill-news, missives like harbingers, and resources were stretching thin. Sometimes Merlin suspected that all this training had been for nothing. Magical. Non-magical. That maybe nothing much would be within his control.
He walked the hallways and peered into rooms, on the watch for suspicious characters. So many people were staying at the inn tonight, though, it was hard to tell. Finally, he ambled down the creaking stairway into the warm front room once again. He met Arthur's gaze across the room with a nod. Arthur was, of course, already encircled by his men. They all looked to be feeling the effects of a week's patrol and were now stretching themselves out and sinking down into their wooden chairs in the hot firelight.
Merlin said something to the innkeeper about their meal, and she said: "Yes, mi'lord." and went to the back.
Um.
The ceiling felt low and it was near impossible to think in the loud conversation. He made his way across the room, pushing past rowdy groups of men to their equally rowdy table at the back. As he passed a neighboring table, he was jostled by a thick man in blue, not one of Camelot's. Merlin stepped around him, but the man also stepped away, hands held before him as if to appease: "Pardon!"
The knights moved their chairs aside when he reached them. It was subtle, but by now their whole group worked with a sort of precision, everything in its place, a strong sense of routine.
When Merlin reached his seat to Arthur's left, he took a moment to collect his thoughts. He watched the men swigging their drinks and doing other manly things like punching each other in the metal shoulder plates and picking their teeth with things they'd found in their pockets, and then he looked to the laughing face beside him. When Merlin said his name, Arthur turned at once, eyes crystally in the firelight. Merlin had to lean in to make himself heard.
"You told them I was a knight," he accused. He leaned back to take a look at Arthur's face.
"I think it's highly unlikely any one would believe it, Merlin," Arthur said. "Despite what I say-"
So he had told them, then. Merlin smiled back. "Ah, but your word is law."
"-no one would believe it, because, as you've only just demonstrated, you interrupt me when I speak, and address me directly," Arthur said. He motioned for Sir Leon to pass down another goblet. "Really, Merlin. None of my knights would dare to do that."
Merlin just kind of stared at him, and after a moment of consideration Arthur flicked him in the armor and called for another round.
end.