fic: LARP...a lot
Title: LARP...a lot
Words: 14k
Rating: PG-13
Summary: They LARP. College AU. Crack.
Disc: these people own themselves, and also I don't know much about LARPing.
A/N: creepy-secret sends me text fic and I try to repay her.
master fic post
"Merlin."
"Only my guild-members call me that," he told the pile of blankets that represented his roommate.
"Sis did predict I'd be stuck with the nerdy sort."
Merlin laughed, eyes squinting up. "What'd you expect? We're doing physics."
"-And one who stereotypes endlessly. Great," the roommate said. "Which, now that I think about it, I suppose explains the LARPing. Bunch of excitable folk stereotyping people from other time periods."
"I'll bring you back a staff, how does that sound? Maybe a nice oak one with a fat gem at one end."
"You can go away now."
Merlin's roommate burrowed deeper and Merlin looked out the window with a wistfulness that was near useless, he'd be out there so soon. He set about leaving.
"Lovely day out. I'll let you get back to sleep," Merlin told him, but before he slammed the door to his dormroom he thought he maybe caught a glimpse of one dark eye, as the roommate warned him: "I'll have a crossbow or nothing."
Merlin burst out of the dorms, into the finest day he'd seen in months. He had high hopes, the kind that were impossible to quash. He had plans to make Saturdays his reprieve from real life.
He met up with that one girl with hair extensions where she had been waiting for him at the bottom of the walk, past groups of students who remained civilians over the weekend rather than heading off towards a field just south of Warwick. She wore heavy under-liner and was rather smirky.
They met the van, with three other passengers, only one of whom Merlin had met, a girl called Gwen who'd been tabling for the event. She had big brown eyes and freckles, and a slight sarcasm about her, and he had been in an impressionable mood when he had signed on for this, charming girls like Gwen always seemed to get the better of him.
The van ride was only thirty minutes, and Merlin had decided against packing his ipod because this wasn't the proper time for it. Instead, he spent his first car ride in ages in a reflective state, earholes unplugged, thinking about LARPing. He considered the members he'd met so far on campus, privately thought of them as a shifty bunch that didn't seem to so much like people from other kingdoms as respect one another for their stick-with-it-ness and attention to details of long-since-deceased trades like basket-making and metallurgy. He was distantly excited about joining on, had his plasticy membership card in his trouser pocket with a big ole grin to prove it, but really just felt like an interloper, a spy for some outside party.
"How's dorms?" that girl, Morgana, asked him just as their ride was ending, the van pulling down a dirt road and through a copse of trees. She was a fourth year and thus able to ask these things like she thought maybe conditions had changed since her time there, for better or for worse.
"It's not as bad as all that," Merlin said. "The showers are a bit rank, but I've met some good people, I've kept my door firmly open and played music all day long, and now my room's being used as something of a sitting area."
"So you don't try, is that it?" she said. "What else do you get up to in there?"
"Sometimes we've even got a bit of a LAN party going on," Merlin told her. He wiggled his fingers for no reason he could specify, and said: "Play it and they will come."
"And what might this be?" she gave the kerchief that sprouted from his jacket pocket a gentle tug.
"Tis the main element of my faux medieval garb," he told her. He yanked it out and began to tie it around his neck.
The van crunched into park at a dirt patch near some other old vehicles. They all tumbled out, and he didn't hit his head on the door frame, his day was that good. He grabbed a cooler of fruit and drinks, and then stumbled alongside the girls and out onto the field.
The field.
"So many tents, so many people!"
"At least five hundred, I think that was the last count," Gwen told him.
After flashing their membership badges, which had been thirty quid that Merlin could have spent on something far more useful (/educational/hallucinogenic/socially-acceptable) they headed towards the tents, walked down a row, past flapping pennants and rough-looking folk, and five minutes later, Merlin was dropping the cooler under an awning of canvas, next to a red and gold stripey tent.
This was going to be ridiculous.
After they'd set things up, and Merlin had been introduced to some men who were muttering seriously over some maps, Merlin stood by the table and asked the most important question of them all:
"Well then, who am I?"
He'd been waiting on this question, didn't want to push it, but also felt ungrounded without an identity to apply over his trouser/loose-shirt combo like a second jacket.
Instead of an answer, however, the conversation veered.
"Hey aren't you-" A voice came just then, loudly from behind.
When Merlin looked over, he had to slap a hand over his eyes.
"Augh!"
"Oh yes, armor," the guy said. "Quite reflective."
Merlin blinked a bit, and squinted.
"You were tabling," he said, recognizing the blue of the guy's eyes, the confidence in his gait, and the douchiness of his hair. He was dressed in brown, like some sort of hunter, maybe.
"Tabling," the I-go-to-your-uni-but-am-probably-a-business-major student repeated.
"Nevermind," Merlin said. Gwen had fallen back, and was pulling a chair out of the direct sunlight to sit. Morgana was somewhere to his left, assessing. Merlin half turned back to her.
The guy picked up a stick off of the table, and snapped it in half.
"So, what am I? Knight? Master of the guard?" Merlin asked them. He searched for another occupation, anything, only minorly better at this here than he was in real life. "Cousin of the crown prince?"
"Nope. No way in hell, sorry mate," said the blond, revealing a set of heartbreaking teeth. "Definitely a peasant."
"Peasant!"
"And one who doesn't grow much to eat, by the look of things."
"I am a bit hungry," Merlin conceded.
"No one starves in our kingdom," said the definitely-business-student, almost angrily. "And our soil is excellent."
A tall man dipped his head to stage-mutter: "Arthur, perhaps we could trade him to Cenred's kingdom. I hear he'll take anyone."
"Now hang on a minute!" Merlin said. His identity was being harangued, and so soon after arrival! "I'm at least merchant class!"
This felt, in itself, a concession of the highest order. After all, he didn't want to end up a poor fool over cross the way, melting tallow over an open flame, and certainly couldn't be trusted to work with food. He had secretly been angling for court scholar, if he were to be honest, one who would, due to the hopefully unrealistic elements of the game, eventually be elevated to Dark Prince.
But he knew he'd probably best start humbly.
"I'm going to a career counselor in a few weeks," Merlin told him. "How about I let you know what she tells me?"
"Yeah, you do that," Arthur laughed. He looked Merlin up and down. "You know, there's-"
"Something about me, yeah," Merlin cut him off. "Heard that one before. 'S the ears. It'll take you awhile to notice, but that's what gets people."
Arthur seemed nonplussed.
"I was going to say you sounded Irish," Arthur told him.
"Hm."
"And that piece of cloth you've got snagged around your neck," Arthur pointed.
"Yeah, it's supposed to be there."
"Oh. Well. What's it for?"
"It's for cleaning things, of course," Merlin told him, and shrugged over at Morgana. "To be honest, I thought this place was going to be truly medieval, real dirty."
For some reason this Arthur was giving him a 'don't think i didn't just catch you' sort of look, to which Merlin had to frown, mouth flattening, and Arthur just pursed his lips in turn, and raised an eyebrow. Merlin thought about taking his neckerchief off, to dust something to prove its utility, but then he'd have to fold it again.
Arthur shook his head, and entered the tent.
"Who's he to choose, anyway?" Merlin muttered to himself. The noise of hundreds of medieval-enthusiasts faded back in, that Gwen girl weaving a length of ribbon into Morgana's hair and a few weedy fellows dressed as sentries stood straight and tall at attention all round the vicinity of the tent.
"Well, he's whoever he wants to be."
Merlin turned in place for a look at the tent across the row.
"This is a land where your efforts define you," a dark-haired man explained, coming forward. "One succeeds only by merit. It is the dream that forms the reality."
"What is there to succeed at?" asked Merlin, who really just liked to play make believe and had hoped they wouldn't have to do anything here.
"I'm Lancelot," the man said. "Follow me."
Merlin didn't tell anyone he was leaving. Perhaps people noticed, perhaps not. As peasant he suddenly felt invisible, a free agent with a mistakable face.
He followed this winsome fellow down a few rows of tents, swimming under his calm, if idealistic, speech patterns. He was introduced to some old women with pails of water, who fawned over Lancelot while the man stood, stoic and accepting of the praise, and also two people who were playing on a chalked board with giant chess pieces.
"What kingdom are you from, then?" Merlin asked.
"I belong to no kingdom," Lancelot was examining a bouquet of wild flowers at a booth.
"Oh, I didn't know you could do that," Merlin said. "Huh."
"You can't," Lancelot said.
BAMF, Merlin thought appreciatively. Lancelot continued:
"Every week I plant my tent closer to those of Camelot, in hopes that the others will begin to associate me with the people of Camelot. From there it should be a simple move. I shall arrive early on one day soon, and seat myself at the refreshments table and when all else arrive they will recognize me and be thus happily mistaken in thinking that I am a part of the kingdom. I will be as one of them."
"A mental blindspot," said a shirtless man. "Sublating yourself, as it were, assimilating a smaller part into a whole. Made invisible, hidden within."
"Is this-" Merlin said. He looked between the newcomer and Lancelot. "Brothers?"
"I am Gwaine," the man said. He looked at Lancelot. "Brothers in arms, no doubt. Are you a noble?"
"Unfortunately no," Lancelot replied.
"Quite fortunate, I'd say," Gwaine said. "For I abhor the lot of them."
Lancelot accepted Gwaine's serious arm-clasp.
"Right," Merlin said, and trailed along behind.
Merlin felt a niggling doubt that possibly he should be getting back, should find Gwen and Morgana and should ask for further instructions. Maybe he was supposed to be doing some peasantly chore, like pretending to clean out stables, or make soup, rather than spending an hour wandering around a field of nerds of all ages who were selling their wares and sometimes beating each other with wooden swords.
"I like the man who did the whittling," Merlin told Gwaine, once they were rounding back towards the area flagged off by Camelot.
"I also enjoyed the whittling," Gwaine told him. His smile was catching. "You know, we've a lot in common, you and I. I feel like I know you from somewhere."
"What do you study, by the by?" Merlin asked. He felt the weird warmth of commonality uncurling in his chest, like maybe he'd met a friend he could spend time with in real life. "Perhaps we've got a course together? It's just my first month at uni."
"What is a...yoo-nee?" Gwaine squinted at him.
Ah, Gwaine was one of those sort of roleplayers. Merlin rethought this potential friendship a bit sadly.
"Come, to table!" Gwaine slung an arm round Merlin's shoulders, and Lancelot trooped along beside them, and it was nice.
They had a drink, then a few more, and suddenly it was eleven o'clock, Merlin read this off the sundial pedestal, tilting his head to make it out.
"Hang on," he said loudly, to anyone and everyone. "It was eleven a few hours ago. Does this thing work?"
"It's four," Gwen told him, because he had arrived back at their station somehow. She sat, red and gold of their camp behind her, beating out some dents in what was maybe a chest plate, pretty in pink.
"We usually use bells, nowadays," Gwen said.
"Huh."
"To tell the time," she said. "You've met Gwaine, then?"
"Yeah, he asked me to get drinks!" Merlin was proud of his ability to make friends, even if they were a bit too invested in reenactment so as to pretend not to know anything about the real world.
"I knew it!" Gwen said. "I knew he asked everyone."
Despite the smug expression on her face, she seemed so sweet, so real, like Merlin was being shown polaroids of flowers.
"And Lancelot?"
"D'you know everyone?" Merlin asked. Gwen was something of a role model, something to aspire to, Merlin thought out loud.
"I have become familiar with much of the community," she said. "After all, I've been a part of the community since I was a child. My father..."
At this she stilled. Merlin had sat beside her at some point, and was in the position to put a comforting hand on her arm.
"Tell me if it's none of my business, but-"
"He died," she said. Merlin sobered.
"Oh, I'm sorry," he said.
Gwen went back to hammering at the armor, the steady clink clink of the mallet ringing out clear despite the constant bustle up and down the row, the swishing of tent flaps and sounds of a small buttery down the way, the relentless clack of churner to barrel. A group of children flocked past.
Merlin's thoughts turned inward, shocked from the sunny buzz of the field, so present and withdrawn from the tethers of real life.
"My father's gone as well," he said. Gwen glanced to him, smiling inappropriately.
"But this is wonderful!" she cried.
"E- Excuse me?"
He considered reality in this situation, and how in any way "wonderful" could describe it.
"I had no idea that your father was a LARPer!" she continued.
It took a moment, but at the end of that moment of thorough mental exercise, he still didn't understand. He said: "But, my father wasn't."
Then Gwen's face really fell.
"Oh!" She put a hand to her mouth.
"Wha?"
"I'm so sorry, I didn't-" she said. "I meant that my father had died in the LARPing reality. Struck down by the king for aiding a sorcerer. But he's still alive in real life, of course he is. Oh, Merlin, he's living in Sussex...I see him nearly once a month."
"Right," Merlin said, feeling uncomfortably embarrassed. "Well, then."
There was nothing that could save a situation such as the one they had found themselves in save a mutual esteem.
"Look," Merlin said, maneuvering the conversation towards a different subject. "I'm not saying I'm bored here, but I'm not quite sure if I'm supposed to be doing something specific, or if I'm meant as a stock character, which is fine by me. Just, is there a to-do list perhaps? What am I meant to be doing?"
Gwen looked relieved, but contrite, like she might just end up trying to buy his love to make up for the gaffe for quite some time.
"Well," she said. "How's your work ethic?"
"S'alright," Merlin lied. He picked up someone's skein of water and drank it down.
"Come along, then," Gwen said.
He was led by an arm down three stops, to a group of peasants by a particolored tent.
"Brought us another one, Gwen?" a woman called.
"Merlin," Gwen said. "May I introduce the EFAT?"
"Environmentalists For Appropriate Technology," a man in short trousers elaborated.
"Ah," Merlin said.
The people milled about, holding pieces of things in their hands and placing them in some logical pattern that Merlin was not yet able to decipher. The man was watching him, Merlin could feel it.
"I heated a teaspoon of water with a magnifying glass once," Merlin offered, citing his only brush with appropriate technology. "Took bloody hours."
"He'll do," the man told Gwen.
After that first day, Merlin could claim to have helped craft the left corner of some wood frame that would eventually hold some sort of medieval sewage-to-clean-water filtration system.
"A bit anachronistic-" he had said.
"Just keep propping that up," the man had replied. "And besides, the Romans brought the waste removal system to England."
"I don't think they created a-"
"Could you hold these nails?" a woman stuck a few nail heads carefully between Merlin's teeth. "Bite down. And, good."
When they were dropped at the dorms at nightfall, Merlin was too tired to tell his roommate anything.
*
They'd taken the van together this time. Arthur spent the entire ride with an arm slung sarcastically along the seat.
Trouble came when they parked.
"Oh, I seem to have-"
Merlin pushed his hands around in his backpack, and then in his pockets again, a useless gesture, but demonstrative, like maybe it would invoke some sort of empathy.
"You can't come in without your membership card," the gatesman said from his fold out chair, not bothering to look the least bit apologetic.
"Look," Merlin said. "I'm wearing trousers with a hole in the pocket. It must have fallen out on the way here. It won't happen again."
"Come along, Merlin." Arthur called back, still walking, the girls even further on ahead. But Merlin was held back by the invisible law of the LARPing grounds.
At a few paces, Arthur turned and said, "What now?" with a look on his face that went more like: "God help me."
"He's not to pass this line without a member's ID," the man shrugged. "And as he seems to have lost it-"
"Why don't you go talk to your supervisor about your attitude problem, then," Arthur told him, stalking back. "While my manservant helps unload my things."
"Manservant," Merlin scoffed, while the man said: "Who d'ya think you are?"
"I'm Prince Arthur, and you're wasting my time," Arthur said. Merlin laughed aloud, but stopped when he saw that Arthur's jaw was set in a hard line and his eyes were flashing, like he wasn't some maybe-marketing student from south London, in on a football scholarship.
Merlin stood his ground, but averted his eyes. This was a land of chivalry and the knight's code, and it was entirely possible he had just incited some sort of duel.
Instead of growing angry, however, the man bowed swiftly from the hip and said, "Really, my most esteemed apologies."
"Don't let it happen again," Arthur told him, in the tone of a nobleman reprimanding a misguided guard, rather than a twenty-one year old upstart taking his role-playing game too far.
Arthur steered Merlin away by the elbow, saying in a tone that brooked no argument, "Never leave me again."
"What the hell was that all about?" Merlin wanted to ask, although normally he wouldn't mind either way, would just accept it because, seriously, he was high like half of the time anyways.
What he ended up saying was: "what makes you so entitled?"
"The way of the land," Arthur told him, and stalked on ahead like he had forgotten Merlin's very existence.
As soon as he could, Merlin dragged Morgana into one of Camelot's many supply tents.
"I certainly didn't join the LARPing community to spend all day indoors," Morgana told him, watching as Merlin shifted around in his Vivian Westwood boots trying to find his words.
"Who is he?" he finally asked. "Why is he so entitled, and why do people listen to him?"
"Arthur?" Morgana asked.
Merlin nodded, and Morgana said, "There's someone you should meet."
Merlin hadn't thought to enter the main tent. It was surrounded by guards, for one, who managed to look serious and like this wasn't some boring way to spend their Saturday, stock still for hours and holding fake spears.
Entry was apparently easy, though, the guards pretty much useless, because Morgana just breezed on past with Merlin in tow, ducking in between the tent flaps and into a space lit only by candles and disparate sunlight.
Below the vaulted tent ceiling sat a middle-aged man.
He was a man who looked as though he had the sort of income that would allow for more luxurious costuming than the rest, outfitted as he was in velvets and silks. Merlin himself had struggled his britches and pair of loose shirts (patriotic in coloring) from a rack at the 99p shop just down the way from that fish and chips shop under the bridge.
He shivered. It was about ten degrees cooler inside, and quiet.
Upon the man's head sat a plastic crown, and all at once Merlin knew the man's identity.
"May I present His Royal Highness," Morgana told Merlin, and shoved him slightly between the shoulder blades into something of a bow.
"Hello there," Merlin said. "I'm Merlin."
The man glowered up at him and said, "Right."
"I'm pleased to be a part of your kingdom. I'm a sciences major at the University of-"
"I am a doctor of the sciences," the man told him. "Don't think for a moment that your mask of social normalcy can fool me. Dismissed."
Merlin's mouth screwed up at this, wondering what the man saw, decided it would be best to back away, and out of the close atmosphere of the tent.
"Ah, father." Arthur ducked in at that very moment.
"Arthur," the man said with a warmth that had seemed hitherto impossible.
Merlin ducked out as Arthur stepped in.
"And there's your answer," Morgana said. She took him by the arm once more and led him down a grassy slope, to where a group of people his age were leading a dance class.
Merlin felt the chill of the tent for long after. If that was what that tent hid, he was never going inside again.
*
Merlin ran into Arthur on campus, again and again, and the final time was when Merlin was entering a classroom, and Arthur came in through the other door and came up beside Merlin, even though the other students were all walking in to be seated.
Merlin looked up, noting that Arthur's features were sharper from this vantage point, below.
"Plebe," Arthur's expression seemed to convey, but instead he said, "I'll be promoting you to royal servant of my household. Come pick up my armor at the field. I keep it in the football sports shed."
Merlin was left feeling both pleased because a prince had come to his class and talked loudly to Merlin for anyone to hear, and annoyed because, well, Arthur wasn't really a prince, so, rude!
*
Merlin went home the next weekend.
"What is this tomfoolery!" Uncle G said when he found Merlin up at dawn trying to shine some sort of arm brace.
He had no intention of saying, "You know, there's this one guy in my Live Action Role Playing group who I can't really figure out, and I maybe kind of stayed in it 85% for him, even though it's only been three weeks and I'm already behind in schoolwork."
He couldn't just quit. Call him hopeless, but every time they accidentally met on campus it felt like destiny or something equally antiquated, how he'd been blinded from the first, when he'd seen Arthur initially, a pretty boy seated at a recruiting table by the bookshop, looking impatient. His was a shallow lust.
Instead of admitting all this, Merlin told Uncle G that perhaps his job at the chemists could be useful, and scratched Camelot club office's number onto a paper with a nubby pencil.
Just like that, Uncle G was in for the long haul, somehow consulting chemist as well as adviser to the king, easy as pie.
Merlin's mother was both impressed and amused that Merlin had come home for the hols with a sack of era-non-specific chain and plate mail, and Merlin had overheard her telling Old Tom by the gate, "Armor rather than a sack of unwashed clothing to launder like the other first years."
"We've already met some Saturdays," Merlin told her excitedly over toast that had been beaned, and Hunith hummed at the coffee pot as Merlin paid some serious attention to his veggie sausage patties, forgoing the oatmeal gruel because he ate enough of that as it was at the dining hall and also while LARPing.
"I'm pleased you're making friends," Hunith said.
"And some enemies," Merlin told her. "Some of the blokes over in Mercia literally get in fist fights with our guys."
"That's nice, dear," she said. "I'm so proud of you for being a knight, so honorable. That explains the armor, then."
"Oh, no no. Most of the others are knights," Merlin told her. "Like, this one boy. I'm, er, helping him out a little with his costume. He doesn't seem to have the know-how to take care of it, and I thought it might be helpful if I-" he thought of Arthur chucking the bag of equipment at him and saying 'I expect it spotless by next week.' "-if I polished it up for him."
"Always so helpful," Hunith said. "And what are you then, dear?"
"A scholar of sorts," Merlin said, now recalling how he had perused four of their resident librarian's books to prove to Arthur that forcing someone into unpaid employment wasn't allowed by LARPing rules. He screwed up his face. "There's a lot of studying involved actually."
"Don't you have O-chem to focus on?" Merlin's mother asked, which was the closest she ever got to asking him to quit, because Merlin was the first person in their family to attend uni, and they both didn't want him to mess this up.
"I'm trying to integrate the two," Merlin told her, uncertain. He became unsure as to why he had signed on in the first place, why he hadn't chosen a nice club instead, one that didn't involve getting ordered around.
But by the end of the week, he felt fresh and ready to return to his studies and, most importantly, his kingdom.
On the train back Friday night, he received a text that read: Meet me at the field at 8am with my armor. and Merlin found himself smiling and wrote back: Miss me? to which Arthur didn't respond.
The sun rose bright and Merlin was up with it, and when he went down to the track it was to see a bunch of players in uniform jogging about the field, dedicated. Merlin went to the sidelines, passing near the players who weren't currently in. When Merlin muttered something about jocks, a burly fellow threatened, good-naturedly because he was just that dangerous, to feed him mud, and Merlin went to take a seat a ways back from the chalked lines.
"C'mon, c'mon," some fan was saying beside him.
"How long's left, then?" Merlin asked her.
"It only just started, 8 o'clock," the girl told him, and smiled at Merlin's frowny face. "Don't worry, you haven't missed much."
Merlin had never been a fan of sports, although he'd been to the pub loads of times with friends back home. He picked out Arthur easily in the distance, because, although there were a bunch of people on the field, none of the rest had a giant arrow with the word "Prat" blinking above them.
"That's my boyfriend," the girl said. "The blond one, with the, you know, the face."
Merlin's stomach bottomed out, and he looked back at the field, all panic.
Phew, there were a lot of blonds with faces.
"Which-" he began. The girl was eager to supply this information.
"The goalkeeper. He's called Sean, a senior. Who're you here to see?"
"Oh," Merlin said, not aware he was here to see anyone, really. "I've just stopped by to return something to a friend." He patted the bag beside him, and it jangled. "He's one up front on the right. The one who just headbutted the ball across the field."
"The captain, you mean?" she said. "You're friends with-"
Merlin became aware that he could use this situation to his advantage, and filed away the name she gave him for future jokes if the relationship with Arthur was indeed going to be a snarky one. The girl was impressed that he knew "Arthur," resident golden boy and not-at-all-business-student, and he was impressed that she knew everything about football and could speak coherently at this early hour of the day. They were fast friends.
"Did you just want me to watch you play?" he asked when Arthur came to stand over him an hour later. His friend had left him, and he was one of the last ones on the field, having drawn the line at waiting around outside the locker rooms. He was nobody's bitch.
"Don't be ridiculous," Arthur said. "I needed my things back, didn't I?"
"But you told me to come at 8. Why didn't you just say to come at-"
"Come on, we've got to meet the van."
Merlin didn't stand, just remained lying on the grass, head pillowed by the bag of armor, an orange rind on the grass beside him from the half-time refreshments.
"You're rather good," he said. "And I'm tired, I had to get up really early."
"Of course I'm good, I'm always good," Arthur said. "Now come on, we've got thirty minutes."
"You never told me you were a history major."
"Merlin," Arthur said. "I've an important practice with my men today, don't muddle my head with your prattle."
Merlin sighed and got to his feet, feeling fatigued. Seven glorious days of lazing about at home had weakened him considerably. LARPers didn't seem to do hitpoints, but if they had, his would be low.
When Arthur didn't take the armor from him immediately, Merlin sighed again, and shouldered it, and jogged to catch up.
"So is your name really-" Merlin hedged.
"Merlin!"
"Right, I just think it's funny, is all."
"I'm sure you do," Arthur said, and stormed on ahead.
That afternoon, Merlin helped the EFAT folk draft plans for a medieval swimming pool which Merlin had very little faith in, and then lay in the sun for three hours watching Arthur train a group of twenty men in preparation for the joust. He waved at Lancelot, who was fitting in quite well, as was Gwaine, who grumbled just last week about getting on well with Arthur, and Merlin had told him, "Can't help yourself, can you?"
He picked at a few blades of grass. He wondered if Arthur was one of those boys who'd grown up in wealthy families, who'd worn jackets when visiting their relatives and had been forced into fencing lessons.
After he'd dozed and gotten bored, he went and played medieval frisbee with Gwen. Then they went to get medieval-style ice cream, and when Merlin returned to the practice field, they were just packing up their equipment, and Arthur's army looked almost like the real thing.
*
One day, Arthur was standing behind him in line at the Caffe Nero near the university. Merlin had never had that full-body reaction before, but he did now, shoulders tensing, and face heating and the barista frowned over the till as Merlin fumbled in his pocket for his wallet.
"Aren't you the type to get coffee at independent coffee shops?" Arthur said, like it was a crime. He shouldered past Merlin to the register, ordered a coffee with extra shots.
"Hey, I was-"
Arthur paid for his coffee.
*
It was interesting how quickly Merlin's focus shifted from "making friends" to "making Arthur his friend." Gwen and Morgana were sweet, and probably more interesting by miles, but this interest in Arthur made sense; it was always gratifying to spend time working out a puzzle, especially one that practically begged for his attention.
*
Merlin was surprised to find his uncle had taken up residence in a small tent near the latrines.
Merlin had always been close with his two family members, and from that week on, Merlin spent some time helping him mix dubious concoctions.
"Be careful with that," Uncle G would often say. And then follow it up with: "That's a concoction I brewed up according to the ancient lore of Galardahulk (making up the name on the spot and tapping his very modern pharmacology text) It prevents rashes." or "That's a potion that can burn one's enemy's face right off."
Uncle G's chemist table became quite popular with the folk of Camelot as well as those passing through from other kingdoms. Merlin went off one Saturday, stepping between the rows of tents back towards Mercia, to say, "Um, announcement, everyone. My uncle, the chemist, says he has a new line of hangover cures."
The revenue the business brought in went to supplies and to buying ale, which Merlin could get behind, even if he only ever had three drinks at most, and in any given month he probably spent more money on supplies like crackers and paracetemol than he did the drinks themselves.
"Are we legally allowed to do this sort of thing?" Merlin asked Arthur. Arthur who was sharpening a broadsword in a menacing fashion, but humming some 90s pop tune. "Wait, you haven't got a permit for that either, have you? Good grief."
"I'm a prince," Arthur said. He swung the broadsword in a manner that suggested beheading. "Prince's don't require-"
"Yeah, yeah," Merlin said. "Hand it over, then, and let me sharpen it. You'll have more time to train for the joust."
"We're having a mock-up," Arthur said. "A fake sword-fight with some guys from Mercia."
"I thought you all don't really get on."
"Not really," Arthur said. "But this is just good sportsmanship. Will you come?"
"To watch you beat on each other with metal sticks?" Merlin asked.
Arthur shrugged and tried not to look hopeful.
"Yeah, fine," Merlin said. "But don't think I actually care about this sort of thing. Give me a good book any day. And don't smile like that, it's frightening."
He followed Arthur to an open stretch of grass, to where the two opposing groups of knights were waiting.
The day nearly ended in disaster, but Merlin wasn't going to think about that.
He got in the van just after, 3pm, time for a nap, lulled by the yelling of peasants and laughter of those who were carefree, jobs in firms and offices forgotten for their twelve hours a week. He just wanted to be indoors.
When he woke, it was to find the van already in motion, his face was smooshed against the cushion. The sky was a dusk-blue out the window lending a dusk-calm to the inside of the van as well, the quiet cut only by the occasional muttering of Gwen and Arthur on either side of him, and the zipping of a few cars passing by on the motorway.
*
"I just wanted to call to say," the voice was sharp through the earpiece, just as Merlin had expected it to be.
"Hm?" Merlin lifted his head blearily to look at the clock, but couldn't find it. It must have been the following day, he couldn't have slept for as long as it felt (a year).
"Oh, you know what I'm trying to say."
"Wha?" Merlin asked.
There was a silence. He pressed his face back into the pillow.
"Just, thank you," Arthur said. "For pushing me out of the way. Accidents happen, and I don't know how you did it, I thought you were pretty far away on the sidelines, but you managed to get there in time."
Merlin rolled onto his back, and flung an arm over his eyes. He listened to Arthur breathing. He imagined him somewhere across campus, up at dawn, maybe at a desk.
"That guy was trying to kill you, that guy from the other kingdom."
"Nonsense."
Merlin felt like he was talking about some other life. Or like he was living two, or something, one with swords and one with pens.
"Are you in shock?" Arthur was asking him.
"No," Merlin said. "M'asleep."
There was a laugh of disbelief, quiet now.
"That wasn't so hard, was it?" Merlin mumbled, just in case he actually fell back asleep soon. "Admitting you need my help."
The line went dead after a moment, but he held his cell in the palm of his hand for a while longer.
part 2
Words: 14k
Rating: PG-13
Summary: They LARP. College AU. Crack.
Disc: these people own themselves, and also I don't know much about LARPing.
A/N: creepy-secret sends me text fic and I try to repay her.
master fic post
"Merlin."
"Only my guild-members call me that," he told the pile of blankets that represented his roommate.
"Sis did predict I'd be stuck with the nerdy sort."
Merlin laughed, eyes squinting up. "What'd you expect? We're doing physics."
"-And one who stereotypes endlessly. Great," the roommate said. "Which, now that I think about it, I suppose explains the LARPing. Bunch of excitable folk stereotyping people from other time periods."
"I'll bring you back a staff, how does that sound? Maybe a nice oak one with a fat gem at one end."
"You can go away now."
Merlin's roommate burrowed deeper and Merlin looked out the window with a wistfulness that was near useless, he'd be out there so soon. He set about leaving.
"Lovely day out. I'll let you get back to sleep," Merlin told him, but before he slammed the door to his dormroom he thought he maybe caught a glimpse of one dark eye, as the roommate warned him: "I'll have a crossbow or nothing."
Merlin burst out of the dorms, into the finest day he'd seen in months. He had high hopes, the kind that were impossible to quash. He had plans to make Saturdays his reprieve from real life.
He met up with that one girl with hair extensions where she had been waiting for him at the bottom of the walk, past groups of students who remained civilians over the weekend rather than heading off towards a field just south of Warwick. She wore heavy under-liner and was rather smirky.
They met the van, with three other passengers, only one of whom Merlin had met, a girl called Gwen who'd been tabling for the event. She had big brown eyes and freckles, and a slight sarcasm about her, and he had been in an impressionable mood when he had signed on for this, charming girls like Gwen always seemed to get the better of him.
The van ride was only thirty minutes, and Merlin had decided against packing his ipod because this wasn't the proper time for it. Instead, he spent his first car ride in ages in a reflective state, earholes unplugged, thinking about LARPing. He considered the members he'd met so far on campus, privately thought of them as a shifty bunch that didn't seem to so much like people from other kingdoms as respect one another for their stick-with-it-ness and attention to details of long-since-deceased trades like basket-making and metallurgy. He was distantly excited about joining on, had his plasticy membership card in his trouser pocket with a big ole grin to prove it, but really just felt like an interloper, a spy for some outside party.
"How's dorms?" that girl, Morgana, asked him just as their ride was ending, the van pulling down a dirt road and through a copse of trees. She was a fourth year and thus able to ask these things like she thought maybe conditions had changed since her time there, for better or for worse.
"It's not as bad as all that," Merlin said. "The showers are a bit rank, but I've met some good people, I've kept my door firmly open and played music all day long, and now my room's being used as something of a sitting area."
"So you don't try, is that it?" she said. "What else do you get up to in there?"
"Sometimes we've even got a bit of a LAN party going on," Merlin told her. He wiggled his fingers for no reason he could specify, and said: "Play it and they will come."
"And what might this be?" she gave the kerchief that sprouted from his jacket pocket a gentle tug.
"Tis the main element of my faux medieval garb," he told her. He yanked it out and began to tie it around his neck.
The van crunched into park at a dirt patch near some other old vehicles. They all tumbled out, and he didn't hit his head on the door frame, his day was that good. He grabbed a cooler of fruit and drinks, and then stumbled alongside the girls and out onto the field.
The field.
"So many tents, so many people!"
"At least five hundred, I think that was the last count," Gwen told him.
After flashing their membership badges, which had been thirty quid that Merlin could have spent on something far more useful (/educational/hallucinogenic/socially-acceptable) they headed towards the tents, walked down a row, past flapping pennants and rough-looking folk, and five minutes later, Merlin was dropping the cooler under an awning of canvas, next to a red and gold stripey tent.
This was going to be ridiculous.
After they'd set things up, and Merlin had been introduced to some men who were muttering seriously over some maps, Merlin stood by the table and asked the most important question of them all:
"Well then, who am I?"
He'd been waiting on this question, didn't want to push it, but also felt ungrounded without an identity to apply over his trouser/loose-shirt combo like a second jacket.
Instead of an answer, however, the conversation veered.
"Hey aren't you-" A voice came just then, loudly from behind.
When Merlin looked over, he had to slap a hand over his eyes.
"Augh!"
"Oh yes, armor," the guy said. "Quite reflective."
Merlin blinked a bit, and squinted.
"You were tabling," he said, recognizing the blue of the guy's eyes, the confidence in his gait, and the douchiness of his hair. He was dressed in brown, like some sort of hunter, maybe.
"Tabling," the I-go-to-your-uni-but-am-probably-a-business-major student repeated.
"Nevermind," Merlin said. Gwen had fallen back, and was pulling a chair out of the direct sunlight to sit. Morgana was somewhere to his left, assessing. Merlin half turned back to her.
The guy picked up a stick off of the table, and snapped it in half.
"So, what am I? Knight? Master of the guard?" Merlin asked them. He searched for another occupation, anything, only minorly better at this here than he was in real life. "Cousin of the crown prince?"
"Nope. No way in hell, sorry mate," said the blond, revealing a set of heartbreaking teeth. "Definitely a peasant."
"Peasant!"
"And one who doesn't grow much to eat, by the look of things."
"I am a bit hungry," Merlin conceded.
"No one starves in our kingdom," said the definitely-business-student, almost angrily. "And our soil is excellent."
A tall man dipped his head to stage-mutter: "Arthur, perhaps we could trade him to Cenred's kingdom. I hear he'll take anyone."
"Now hang on a minute!" Merlin said. His identity was being harangued, and so soon after arrival! "I'm at least merchant class!"
This felt, in itself, a concession of the highest order. After all, he didn't want to end up a poor fool over cross the way, melting tallow over an open flame, and certainly couldn't be trusted to work with food. He had secretly been angling for court scholar, if he were to be honest, one who would, due to the hopefully unrealistic elements of the game, eventually be elevated to Dark Prince.
But he knew he'd probably best start humbly.
"I'm going to a career counselor in a few weeks," Merlin told him. "How about I let you know what she tells me?"
"Yeah, you do that," Arthur laughed. He looked Merlin up and down. "You know, there's-"
"Something about me, yeah," Merlin cut him off. "Heard that one before. 'S the ears. It'll take you awhile to notice, but that's what gets people."
Arthur seemed nonplussed.
"I was going to say you sounded Irish," Arthur told him.
"Hm."
"And that piece of cloth you've got snagged around your neck," Arthur pointed.
"Yeah, it's supposed to be there."
"Oh. Well. What's it for?"
"It's for cleaning things, of course," Merlin told him, and shrugged over at Morgana. "To be honest, I thought this place was going to be truly medieval, real dirty."
For some reason this Arthur was giving him a 'don't think i didn't just catch you' sort of look, to which Merlin had to frown, mouth flattening, and Arthur just pursed his lips in turn, and raised an eyebrow. Merlin thought about taking his neckerchief off, to dust something to prove its utility, but then he'd have to fold it again.
Arthur shook his head, and entered the tent.
"Who's he to choose, anyway?" Merlin muttered to himself. The noise of hundreds of medieval-enthusiasts faded back in, that Gwen girl weaving a length of ribbon into Morgana's hair and a few weedy fellows dressed as sentries stood straight and tall at attention all round the vicinity of the tent.
"Well, he's whoever he wants to be."
Merlin turned in place for a look at the tent across the row.
"This is a land where your efforts define you," a dark-haired man explained, coming forward. "One succeeds only by merit. It is the dream that forms the reality."
"What is there to succeed at?" asked Merlin, who really just liked to play make believe and had hoped they wouldn't have to do anything here.
"I'm Lancelot," the man said. "Follow me."
Merlin didn't tell anyone he was leaving. Perhaps people noticed, perhaps not. As peasant he suddenly felt invisible, a free agent with a mistakable face.
He followed this winsome fellow down a few rows of tents, swimming under his calm, if idealistic, speech patterns. He was introduced to some old women with pails of water, who fawned over Lancelot while the man stood, stoic and accepting of the praise, and also two people who were playing on a chalked board with giant chess pieces.
"What kingdom are you from, then?" Merlin asked.
"I belong to no kingdom," Lancelot was examining a bouquet of wild flowers at a booth.
"Oh, I didn't know you could do that," Merlin said. "Huh."
"You can't," Lancelot said.
BAMF, Merlin thought appreciatively. Lancelot continued:
"Every week I plant my tent closer to those of Camelot, in hopes that the others will begin to associate me with the people of Camelot. From there it should be a simple move. I shall arrive early on one day soon, and seat myself at the refreshments table and when all else arrive they will recognize me and be thus happily mistaken in thinking that I am a part of the kingdom. I will be as one of them."
"A mental blindspot," said a shirtless man. "Sublating yourself, as it were, assimilating a smaller part into a whole. Made invisible, hidden within."
"Is this-" Merlin said. He looked between the newcomer and Lancelot. "Brothers?"
"I am Gwaine," the man said. He looked at Lancelot. "Brothers in arms, no doubt. Are you a noble?"
"Unfortunately no," Lancelot replied.
"Quite fortunate, I'd say," Gwaine said. "For I abhor the lot of them."
Lancelot accepted Gwaine's serious arm-clasp.
"Right," Merlin said, and trailed along behind.
Merlin felt a niggling doubt that possibly he should be getting back, should find Gwen and Morgana and should ask for further instructions. Maybe he was supposed to be doing some peasantly chore, like pretending to clean out stables, or make soup, rather than spending an hour wandering around a field of nerds of all ages who were selling their wares and sometimes beating each other with wooden swords.
"I like the man who did the whittling," Merlin told Gwaine, once they were rounding back towards the area flagged off by Camelot.
"I also enjoyed the whittling," Gwaine told him. His smile was catching. "You know, we've a lot in common, you and I. I feel like I know you from somewhere."
"What do you study, by the by?" Merlin asked. He felt the weird warmth of commonality uncurling in his chest, like maybe he'd met a friend he could spend time with in real life. "Perhaps we've got a course together? It's just my first month at uni."
"What is a...yoo-nee?" Gwaine squinted at him.
Ah, Gwaine was one of those sort of roleplayers. Merlin rethought this potential friendship a bit sadly.
"Come, to table!" Gwaine slung an arm round Merlin's shoulders, and Lancelot trooped along beside them, and it was nice.
They had a drink, then a few more, and suddenly it was eleven o'clock, Merlin read this off the sundial pedestal, tilting his head to make it out.
"Hang on," he said loudly, to anyone and everyone. "It was eleven a few hours ago. Does this thing work?"
"It's four," Gwen told him, because he had arrived back at their station somehow. She sat, red and gold of their camp behind her, beating out some dents in what was maybe a chest plate, pretty in pink.
"We usually use bells, nowadays," Gwen said.
"Huh."
"To tell the time," she said. "You've met Gwaine, then?"
"Yeah, he asked me to get drinks!" Merlin was proud of his ability to make friends, even if they were a bit too invested in reenactment so as to pretend not to know anything about the real world.
"I knew it!" Gwen said. "I knew he asked everyone."
Despite the smug expression on her face, she seemed so sweet, so real, like Merlin was being shown polaroids of flowers.
"And Lancelot?"
"D'you know everyone?" Merlin asked. Gwen was something of a role model, something to aspire to, Merlin thought out loud.
"I have become familiar with much of the community," she said. "After all, I've been a part of the community since I was a child. My father..."
At this she stilled. Merlin had sat beside her at some point, and was in the position to put a comforting hand on her arm.
"Tell me if it's none of my business, but-"
"He died," she said. Merlin sobered.
"Oh, I'm sorry," he said.
Gwen went back to hammering at the armor, the steady clink clink of the mallet ringing out clear despite the constant bustle up and down the row, the swishing of tent flaps and sounds of a small buttery down the way, the relentless clack of churner to barrel. A group of children flocked past.
Merlin's thoughts turned inward, shocked from the sunny buzz of the field, so present and withdrawn from the tethers of real life.
"My father's gone as well," he said. Gwen glanced to him, smiling inappropriately.
"But this is wonderful!" she cried.
"E- Excuse me?"
He considered reality in this situation, and how in any way "wonderful" could describe it.
"I had no idea that your father was a LARPer!" she continued.
It took a moment, but at the end of that moment of thorough mental exercise, he still didn't understand. He said: "But, my father wasn't."
Then Gwen's face really fell.
"Oh!" She put a hand to her mouth.
"Wha?"
"I'm so sorry, I didn't-" she said. "I meant that my father had died in the LARPing reality. Struck down by the king for aiding a sorcerer. But he's still alive in real life, of course he is. Oh, Merlin, he's living in Sussex...I see him nearly once a month."
"Right," Merlin said, feeling uncomfortably embarrassed. "Well, then."
There was nothing that could save a situation such as the one they had found themselves in save a mutual esteem.
"Look," Merlin said, maneuvering the conversation towards a different subject. "I'm not saying I'm bored here, but I'm not quite sure if I'm supposed to be doing something specific, or if I'm meant as a stock character, which is fine by me. Just, is there a to-do list perhaps? What am I meant to be doing?"
Gwen looked relieved, but contrite, like she might just end up trying to buy his love to make up for the gaffe for quite some time.
"Well," she said. "How's your work ethic?"
"S'alright," Merlin lied. He picked up someone's skein of water and drank it down.
"Come along, then," Gwen said.
He was led by an arm down three stops, to a group of peasants by a particolored tent.
"Brought us another one, Gwen?" a woman called.
"Merlin," Gwen said. "May I introduce the EFAT?"
"Environmentalists For Appropriate Technology," a man in short trousers elaborated.
"Ah," Merlin said.
The people milled about, holding pieces of things in their hands and placing them in some logical pattern that Merlin was not yet able to decipher. The man was watching him, Merlin could feel it.
"I heated a teaspoon of water with a magnifying glass once," Merlin offered, citing his only brush with appropriate technology. "Took bloody hours."
"He'll do," the man told Gwen.
After that first day, Merlin could claim to have helped craft the left corner of some wood frame that would eventually hold some sort of medieval sewage-to-clean-water filtration system.
"A bit anachronistic-" he had said.
"Just keep propping that up," the man had replied. "And besides, the Romans brought the waste removal system to England."
"I don't think they created a-"
"Could you hold these nails?" a woman stuck a few nail heads carefully between Merlin's teeth. "Bite down. And, good."
When they were dropped at the dorms at nightfall, Merlin was too tired to tell his roommate anything.
*
They'd taken the van together this time. Arthur spent the entire ride with an arm slung sarcastically along the seat.
Trouble came when they parked.
"Oh, I seem to have-"
Merlin pushed his hands around in his backpack, and then in his pockets again, a useless gesture, but demonstrative, like maybe it would invoke some sort of empathy.
"You can't come in without your membership card," the gatesman said from his fold out chair, not bothering to look the least bit apologetic.
"Look," Merlin said. "I'm wearing trousers with a hole in the pocket. It must have fallen out on the way here. It won't happen again."
"Come along, Merlin." Arthur called back, still walking, the girls even further on ahead. But Merlin was held back by the invisible law of the LARPing grounds.
At a few paces, Arthur turned and said, "What now?" with a look on his face that went more like: "God help me."
"He's not to pass this line without a member's ID," the man shrugged. "And as he seems to have lost it-"
"Why don't you go talk to your supervisor about your attitude problem, then," Arthur told him, stalking back. "While my manservant helps unload my things."
"Manservant," Merlin scoffed, while the man said: "Who d'ya think you are?"
"I'm Prince Arthur, and you're wasting my time," Arthur said. Merlin laughed aloud, but stopped when he saw that Arthur's jaw was set in a hard line and his eyes were flashing, like he wasn't some maybe-marketing student from south London, in on a football scholarship.
Merlin stood his ground, but averted his eyes. This was a land of chivalry and the knight's code, and it was entirely possible he had just incited some sort of duel.
Instead of growing angry, however, the man bowed swiftly from the hip and said, "Really, my most esteemed apologies."
"Don't let it happen again," Arthur told him, in the tone of a nobleman reprimanding a misguided guard, rather than a twenty-one year old upstart taking his role-playing game too far.
Arthur steered Merlin away by the elbow, saying in a tone that brooked no argument, "Never leave me again."
"What the hell was that all about?" Merlin wanted to ask, although normally he wouldn't mind either way, would just accept it because, seriously, he was high like half of the time anyways.
What he ended up saying was: "what makes you so entitled?"
"The way of the land," Arthur told him, and stalked on ahead like he had forgotten Merlin's very existence.
As soon as he could, Merlin dragged Morgana into one of Camelot's many supply tents.
"I certainly didn't join the LARPing community to spend all day indoors," Morgana told him, watching as Merlin shifted around in his Vivian Westwood boots trying to find his words.
"Who is he?" he finally asked. "Why is he so entitled, and why do people listen to him?"
"Arthur?" Morgana asked.
Merlin nodded, and Morgana said, "There's someone you should meet."
Merlin hadn't thought to enter the main tent. It was surrounded by guards, for one, who managed to look serious and like this wasn't some boring way to spend their Saturday, stock still for hours and holding fake spears.
Entry was apparently easy, though, the guards pretty much useless, because Morgana just breezed on past with Merlin in tow, ducking in between the tent flaps and into a space lit only by candles and disparate sunlight.
Below the vaulted tent ceiling sat a middle-aged man.
He was a man who looked as though he had the sort of income that would allow for more luxurious costuming than the rest, outfitted as he was in velvets and silks. Merlin himself had struggled his britches and pair of loose shirts (patriotic in coloring) from a rack at the 99p shop just down the way from that fish and chips shop under the bridge.
He shivered. It was about ten degrees cooler inside, and quiet.
Upon the man's head sat a plastic crown, and all at once Merlin knew the man's identity.
"May I present His Royal Highness," Morgana told Merlin, and shoved him slightly between the shoulder blades into something of a bow.
"Hello there," Merlin said. "I'm Merlin."
The man glowered up at him and said, "Right."
"I'm pleased to be a part of your kingdom. I'm a sciences major at the University of-"
"I am a doctor of the sciences," the man told him. "Don't think for a moment that your mask of social normalcy can fool me. Dismissed."
Merlin's mouth screwed up at this, wondering what the man saw, decided it would be best to back away, and out of the close atmosphere of the tent.
"Ah, father." Arthur ducked in at that very moment.
"Arthur," the man said with a warmth that had seemed hitherto impossible.
Merlin ducked out as Arthur stepped in.
"And there's your answer," Morgana said. She took him by the arm once more and led him down a grassy slope, to where a group of people his age were leading a dance class.
Merlin felt the chill of the tent for long after. If that was what that tent hid, he was never going inside again.
*
Merlin ran into Arthur on campus, again and again, and the final time was when Merlin was entering a classroom, and Arthur came in through the other door and came up beside Merlin, even though the other students were all walking in to be seated.
Merlin looked up, noting that Arthur's features were sharper from this vantage point, below.
"Plebe," Arthur's expression seemed to convey, but instead he said, "I'll be promoting you to royal servant of my household. Come pick up my armor at the field. I keep it in the football sports shed."
Merlin was left feeling both pleased because a prince had come to his class and talked loudly to Merlin for anyone to hear, and annoyed because, well, Arthur wasn't really a prince, so, rude!
*
Merlin went home the next weekend.
"What is this tomfoolery!" Uncle G said when he found Merlin up at dawn trying to shine some sort of arm brace.
He had no intention of saying, "You know, there's this one guy in my Live Action Role Playing group who I can't really figure out, and I maybe kind of stayed in it 85% for him, even though it's only been three weeks and I'm already behind in schoolwork."
He couldn't just quit. Call him hopeless, but every time they accidentally met on campus it felt like destiny or something equally antiquated, how he'd been blinded from the first, when he'd seen Arthur initially, a pretty boy seated at a recruiting table by the bookshop, looking impatient. His was a shallow lust.
Instead of admitting all this, Merlin told Uncle G that perhaps his job at the chemists could be useful, and scratched Camelot club office's number onto a paper with a nubby pencil.
Just like that, Uncle G was in for the long haul, somehow consulting chemist as well as adviser to the king, easy as pie.
Merlin's mother was both impressed and amused that Merlin had come home for the hols with a sack of era-non-specific chain and plate mail, and Merlin had overheard her telling Old Tom by the gate, "Armor rather than a sack of unwashed clothing to launder like the other first years."
"We've already met some Saturdays," Merlin told her excitedly over toast that had been beaned, and Hunith hummed at the coffee pot as Merlin paid some serious attention to his veggie sausage patties, forgoing the oatmeal gruel because he ate enough of that as it was at the dining hall and also while LARPing.
"I'm pleased you're making friends," Hunith said.
"And some enemies," Merlin told her. "Some of the blokes over in Mercia literally get in fist fights with our guys."
"That's nice, dear," she said. "I'm so proud of you for being a knight, so honorable. That explains the armor, then."
"Oh, no no. Most of the others are knights," Merlin told her. "Like, this one boy. I'm, er, helping him out a little with his costume. He doesn't seem to have the know-how to take care of it, and I thought it might be helpful if I-" he thought of Arthur chucking the bag of equipment at him and saying 'I expect it spotless by next week.' "-if I polished it up for him."
"Always so helpful," Hunith said. "And what are you then, dear?"
"A scholar of sorts," Merlin said, now recalling how he had perused four of their resident librarian's books to prove to Arthur that forcing someone into unpaid employment wasn't allowed by LARPing rules. He screwed up his face. "There's a lot of studying involved actually."
"Don't you have O-chem to focus on?" Merlin's mother asked, which was the closest she ever got to asking him to quit, because Merlin was the first person in their family to attend uni, and they both didn't want him to mess this up.
"I'm trying to integrate the two," Merlin told her, uncertain. He became unsure as to why he had signed on in the first place, why he hadn't chosen a nice club instead, one that didn't involve getting ordered around.
But by the end of the week, he felt fresh and ready to return to his studies and, most importantly, his kingdom.
On the train back Friday night, he received a text that read: Meet me at the field at 8am with my armor. and Merlin found himself smiling and wrote back: Miss me? to which Arthur didn't respond.
The sun rose bright and Merlin was up with it, and when he went down to the track it was to see a bunch of players in uniform jogging about the field, dedicated. Merlin went to the sidelines, passing near the players who weren't currently in. When Merlin muttered something about jocks, a burly fellow threatened, good-naturedly because he was just that dangerous, to feed him mud, and Merlin went to take a seat a ways back from the chalked lines.
"C'mon, c'mon," some fan was saying beside him.
"How long's left, then?" Merlin asked her.
"It only just started, 8 o'clock," the girl told him, and smiled at Merlin's frowny face. "Don't worry, you haven't missed much."
Merlin had never been a fan of sports, although he'd been to the pub loads of times with friends back home. He picked out Arthur easily in the distance, because, although there were a bunch of people on the field, none of the rest had a giant arrow with the word "Prat" blinking above them.
"That's my boyfriend," the girl said. "The blond one, with the, you know, the face."
Merlin's stomach bottomed out, and he looked back at the field, all panic.
Phew, there were a lot of blonds with faces.
"Which-" he began. The girl was eager to supply this information.
"The goalkeeper. He's called Sean, a senior. Who're you here to see?"
"Oh," Merlin said, not aware he was here to see anyone, really. "I've just stopped by to return something to a friend." He patted the bag beside him, and it jangled. "He's one up front on the right. The one who just headbutted the ball across the field."
"The captain, you mean?" she said. "You're friends with-"
Merlin became aware that he could use this situation to his advantage, and filed away the name she gave him for future jokes if the relationship with Arthur was indeed going to be a snarky one. The girl was impressed that he knew "Arthur," resident golden boy and not-at-all-business-student, and he was impressed that she knew everything about football and could speak coherently at this early hour of the day. They were fast friends.
"Did you just want me to watch you play?" he asked when Arthur came to stand over him an hour later. His friend had left him, and he was one of the last ones on the field, having drawn the line at waiting around outside the locker rooms. He was nobody's bitch.
"Don't be ridiculous," Arthur said. "I needed my things back, didn't I?"
"But you told me to come at 8. Why didn't you just say to come at-"
"Come on, we've got to meet the van."
Merlin didn't stand, just remained lying on the grass, head pillowed by the bag of armor, an orange rind on the grass beside him from the half-time refreshments.
"You're rather good," he said. "And I'm tired, I had to get up really early."
"Of course I'm good, I'm always good," Arthur said. "Now come on, we've got thirty minutes."
"You never told me you were a history major."
"Merlin," Arthur said. "I've an important practice with my men today, don't muddle my head with your prattle."
Merlin sighed and got to his feet, feeling fatigued. Seven glorious days of lazing about at home had weakened him considerably. LARPers didn't seem to do hitpoints, but if they had, his would be low.
When Arthur didn't take the armor from him immediately, Merlin sighed again, and shouldered it, and jogged to catch up.
"So is your name really-" Merlin hedged.
"Merlin!"
"Right, I just think it's funny, is all."
"I'm sure you do," Arthur said, and stormed on ahead.
That afternoon, Merlin helped the EFAT folk draft plans for a medieval swimming pool which Merlin had very little faith in, and then lay in the sun for three hours watching Arthur train a group of twenty men in preparation for the joust. He waved at Lancelot, who was fitting in quite well, as was Gwaine, who grumbled just last week about getting on well with Arthur, and Merlin had told him, "Can't help yourself, can you?"
He picked at a few blades of grass. He wondered if Arthur was one of those boys who'd grown up in wealthy families, who'd worn jackets when visiting their relatives and had been forced into fencing lessons.
After he'd dozed and gotten bored, he went and played medieval frisbee with Gwen. Then they went to get medieval-style ice cream, and when Merlin returned to the practice field, they were just packing up their equipment, and Arthur's army looked almost like the real thing.
*
One day, Arthur was standing behind him in line at the Caffe Nero near the university. Merlin had never had that full-body reaction before, but he did now, shoulders tensing, and face heating and the barista frowned over the till as Merlin fumbled in his pocket for his wallet.
"Aren't you the type to get coffee at independent coffee shops?" Arthur said, like it was a crime. He shouldered past Merlin to the register, ordered a coffee with extra shots.
"Hey, I was-"
Arthur paid for his coffee.
*
It was interesting how quickly Merlin's focus shifted from "making friends" to "making Arthur his friend." Gwen and Morgana were sweet, and probably more interesting by miles, but this interest in Arthur made sense; it was always gratifying to spend time working out a puzzle, especially one that practically begged for his attention.
*
Merlin was surprised to find his uncle had taken up residence in a small tent near the latrines.
Merlin had always been close with his two family members, and from that week on, Merlin spent some time helping him mix dubious concoctions.
"Be careful with that," Uncle G would often say. And then follow it up with: "That's a concoction I brewed up according to the ancient lore of Galardahulk (making up the name on the spot and tapping his very modern pharmacology text) It prevents rashes." or "That's a potion that can burn one's enemy's face right off."
Uncle G's chemist table became quite popular with the folk of Camelot as well as those passing through from other kingdoms. Merlin went off one Saturday, stepping between the rows of tents back towards Mercia, to say, "Um, announcement, everyone. My uncle, the chemist, says he has a new line of hangover cures."
The revenue the business brought in went to supplies and to buying ale, which Merlin could get behind, even if he only ever had three drinks at most, and in any given month he probably spent more money on supplies like crackers and paracetemol than he did the drinks themselves.
"Are we legally allowed to do this sort of thing?" Merlin asked Arthur. Arthur who was sharpening a broadsword in a menacing fashion, but humming some 90s pop tune. "Wait, you haven't got a permit for that either, have you? Good grief."
"I'm a prince," Arthur said. He swung the broadsword in a manner that suggested beheading. "Prince's don't require-"
"Yeah, yeah," Merlin said. "Hand it over, then, and let me sharpen it. You'll have more time to train for the joust."
"We're having a mock-up," Arthur said. "A fake sword-fight with some guys from Mercia."
"I thought you all don't really get on."
"Not really," Arthur said. "But this is just good sportsmanship. Will you come?"
"To watch you beat on each other with metal sticks?" Merlin asked.
Arthur shrugged and tried not to look hopeful.
"Yeah, fine," Merlin said. "But don't think I actually care about this sort of thing. Give me a good book any day. And don't smile like that, it's frightening."
He followed Arthur to an open stretch of grass, to where the two opposing groups of knights were waiting.
The day nearly ended in disaster, but Merlin wasn't going to think about that.
He got in the van just after, 3pm, time for a nap, lulled by the yelling of peasants and laughter of those who were carefree, jobs in firms and offices forgotten for their twelve hours a week. He just wanted to be indoors.
When he woke, it was to find the van already in motion, his face was smooshed against the cushion. The sky was a dusk-blue out the window lending a dusk-calm to the inside of the van as well, the quiet cut only by the occasional muttering of Gwen and Arthur on either side of him, and the zipping of a few cars passing by on the motorway.
*
"I just wanted to call to say," the voice was sharp through the earpiece, just as Merlin had expected it to be.
"Hm?" Merlin lifted his head blearily to look at the clock, but couldn't find it. It must have been the following day, he couldn't have slept for as long as it felt (a year).
"Oh, you know what I'm trying to say."
"Wha?" Merlin asked.
There was a silence. He pressed his face back into the pillow.
"Just, thank you," Arthur said. "For pushing me out of the way. Accidents happen, and I don't know how you did it, I thought you were pretty far away on the sidelines, but you managed to get there in time."
Merlin rolled onto his back, and flung an arm over his eyes. He listened to Arthur breathing. He imagined him somewhere across campus, up at dawn, maybe at a desk.
"That guy was trying to kill you, that guy from the other kingdom."
"Nonsense."
Merlin felt like he was talking about some other life. Or like he was living two, or something, one with swords and one with pens.
"Are you in shock?" Arthur was asking him.
"No," Merlin said. "M'asleep."
There was a laugh of disbelief, quiet now.
"That wasn't so hard, was it?" Merlin mumbled, just in case he actually fell back asleep soon. "Admitting you need my help."
The line went dead after a moment, but he held his cell in the palm of his hand for a while longer.
part 2