Merlin: You're A Mile Away And You Have Their Shoes 1/3 (PG-13)
Title: You're a Mile Away and You Have Their Shoes 1/3
Author: mad_maudlin
Fandom: Merlin
Pairing: Merlin/Arthur, and also Merlin/Arthur
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: All episodes
Warnings: Crack, shovels, massive rupture of the fourth wall.
Summary: Arthur wanted to know what was going on in Merlin's head. He just didn't mean it so literally.
Disclaimer: No frogs were harmed in the production of this fanfic.
A/N: This is for Kinkme_merlin, this prompt, and I swear it started out as a comment fic. It is now a 22k comment fic. I don't know how these things happen to me sometimes.
Arthur went to bed in a prince's suite, in a bed of satin and velvet and goosedown, idly fondling one of the ugly little rings Lady Rowena had given him over dinner that night. Rowena had come from somewhere in the east with a simpering smile, a variety of low-cut gowns and a total lack of tact that bordered on the astonishing. Arthur's mind, however, was not on Rowena; instead he was mainly thinking un-princely thoughts about his manservant.
There were times when he thought that Merlin was nothing more than a manservant--perhaps, in some ways, a friend, though Arthur had had so few of those he couldn't really tell for sure. (And no, that wasn't grounds for unbearable angst and drama in his life--he viewed it as an inevitable consequence of his station, like the green rash the crown sometimes gave him on his forehead.) But then there were other times--times like tonight, when that feather-brained doxy Rowena had been flirting all too obviously and Merlin had been clutching the wine bottles a little too tightly, so tense the feather in his hat had been quivering--Arthur thought that maybe, just maybe...
...but it was so hard to tell, so hard to guess what, if anything, was going on in that head of his from one minute to the next, if Merlin thought of him in anything like the same way, and Arthur didn't dare act unless he knew for certain...
Arthur fell asleep to such thoughts and woke up to scratchy wool blankets and a straw mattress and a draft through the window and Gaius pounding on the door screaming "Arthur! Arthur, wake up, Prince Merlin wants to see you!"
He sat upright, taking in the room--Merlin's room, dammit--and Merlin's clothes, or something very much like them, hanging out of the cupboard--and the ring still in his hand. He did the reasonable thing then, which was to shout, "Oh, bloody fuck."
X
It took, in hindsight, far too long and far too many stupid questions for Gaius to assure Arthur that he was really, really not joking. Logic, as tutors had long ago tried to teach Arthur, favored the least complicated solution to any problem. An elaborate hoax implicating Merlin, Gaius, and a tailor (as the clothes were so much like Merlin's, but cut to a size that made Arthur feel awkward and skinny) that involved drugging him, moving him to another room, changing his clothes and then pretending he was his own manservant, with no obvious punchline in sight--that was illogical.
Sorcery, on the other hand, was always a possibility.
He dressed in the scratchy and ill-fitting clothes, pulled on the well-worn boots and went to see "Prince" Merlin in full confidence that he would be equally discomfitted by the sudden role reversal and they could immediately work on getting this sorted--Arthur had a few theories about that bitch Rowena already and was prepared to test them at the point of a sword. But when he arrived, he found a familiar room and Merlin in familiar clothes, as they were Arthur's, though cut to create the illusion that Merlin was fit and muscular. Merlin looked up from where he was fastening his belt and gave an oddly avuncular sigh with no sign that he found anything out of the ordinary. "There you are," he said. "I was beginning to think I'd have to tidy up myself."
"Sorry...sire," Arthur said, and even managed not to throw up afterward. He'd really been hoping Merlin would be aware of the problem, so at the very least he'd have somebody to complain to. But after having Gaius check the index of every book on mental aberrations in his considerable library, Arthur wasn't about to let anyone else in on this predicament unless he had to, which mean Merlin had to stay in the dark for now. Though that didn't mean he couldn't do a spot of subtle reconnoitering in the process. "Did you, ah, need me for anything special, this morning? Something really unusual, maybe?" he asked hopefully.
Merlin looked at him with one eyebrow raised in an eerie imitation of Gaius. "No," he said. "Not really."
"No? So it's just a," Arthur gestured vaguely. "Normal morning?"
"I..." And there Merlin paused, just a bit, and fiddled with something on his finger. Rowena's ring, and Arthur remembered he'd given the mate to Merlin before sending him off for the night--Merlin had asked for it, just to see it, and Arthur had said here, keep it, one is quite ugly enough for me. So since they each had one when they went to bed...oh, so going to kill her. "That's strange," Merlin continued. "It's like there's something I've forgotten to do."
"Hate that feeling," Arthur agreed firmly, hoping to elicit a little something more.
But Merlin just said "Mmm," sort of absently, then shook his head and grabbed a pair of gloves from the table. "Anyway, I'm to go riding with Lady Rowena this morning, and I'd like you to muck out my stables while I'm gone. I've got some clothes that need mending in that pile over there--" Which, to Arthur, was indistinguishable from any other pile all over the bloody room-- "if you could take those down to the maids, and I'm drilling with the knights this afternoon, so please also have my armor cleaned. If you can manage all that before I get back?"
Arthur realized he couldn't answer if he kept grinding his teeth. "Sure," he managed to squeak. "No problem."
"Good man, Arthur," Merlin said with a little grin, and clapped him on the shoulder before sweeping out in a flutter of long red coat. Arthur felt something like indigestion or outrage beginning in his chest; he liked that coat.
"Fuck this," he muttered as soon as the door was closed, and glared at the pile of laundry, which burst into flames.
X
The armor was not cleaned, nor the stables mucked, by the time Merlin and Rowena returned--Rowena laughing cheerily, Merlin looking faintly ill--but Arthur had succeeded in setting fire to most of Merlin's laundry with his mind. Putting it out again was turning out to be more of a problem, but as the capper to the most bizarre morning of his life, it was really pretty amazing and probably not at terrifying as it should've been. It felt strangely natural, even if no reasonable definition of the word "natural" could possibly apply; it was easy as breathing, almost too easy, and kind of fun.
What this had to do with swapping places with was anyone's guess, but Arthur supposed it made about as much sense as any sort of magic, really. Why snakes in the shield? How can flowers grow in caves? Whose idea was it to combine a lion and a bird? Et cetera. He wondered if Merlin had suddenly gained the ability to fly or something.
Arthur wasn't stupid enough to linger and get caught in the bedroom with a heap of charred linen, so as soon as he saw Merlin's return from the window he gathered up an armful of scorched laundry and made a run for it. He at least knew where the castle laundry was, on account of having spent most of his early adolescence sneaking down there in hopes of getting a glimpse of Morgana's underclothes or perhaps the damp and heaving bosom of Twyla, the laundress, whose bosom was quite substantial. (There was also Bert, the boy who tended the fires in the laundry and generally went without a shirt; Arthur had seen his fill of his bosom and more than a few regions southward, but Twyla had sent him away when she caught him "corrupting" the little prince. Her bosom had been doing the most enchanting bounce during that rant. It was a deeply confusing memory for Arthur.)
On the stairs, he collided--almost literally--with Gwen. "Careful there," she said, catching the pile of shirts before they were strewn over three floors. Then she noticed the burns. "What on earth happened to these?"
"Fireplace," Arthur blurted. "They jumped in. Awful scene, really. I don't know how I'm going to tell Merlin his clothes are suicidal." That got him a giggle, but not much of one, and even if it wasn't a good joke Arthur expected a bit more than that. But Gwen looked pale, with puffy dark spots under her eyes, and Arthur found himself asking, "Are you, er, all right?"
Gwen bit her lip and looked around a bit before leaning in. "It's...it's Morgana," she said.
"What about her?" Arthur thought, actually meaning, please tell me she's switched lives with some one so I can have a peer group.
But Gwen said, "The nightmares. I've never seen them so bad. Half the night she was talking in her sleep, saying...well, terrible things, and she's forbidden me to talk to Gaius." Gwen's eyes lit up. "She didn't say anything about talking to you, though, did she?"
"Of course not," Arthur said, and he wanted to ask a million questions, starting with since when has Morgana got nightmares? but instead he assured Gwen, "I promise you that I will violate your deepest confidence and go running to Gaius immediately with the secret you made me swear to keep."
Gwen grinned at him. "You're a good friend, Arthur," she said warmly, and climbed a step to give him a kiss on the cheek before bouncing off with a bit more spring in her step.
Arthur may have stared after her with his mouth hanging open, but only for a moment. It wasn't that casual affection bothered him, per se--just because he never got any didn't mean others should do without--but for some reason it suddenly occurred to him that maybe Merlin got that kiss on the cheek from Gwen, in some real world that made sense. Maybe he got it a lot, even.
Not that he was envious or anything. He just had to stop halfway to the laundry to extinguish another shirt.
X
Merlin seemed surprisingly magnanimous about Arthur's failure at being working-class when he found out about it--more generous than Arthur ever was to him. "Honestly, I don't care," he said as Arthur helped him into his armor--which was somehow subtly different from the armor Arthur wore in his real life, had to be, because it was so damn tricky to get on. "Anything to get me away from that woman."
"Rowena's a raging bitch," Arthur agreed firmly. "I think you should have her arrested."
Merlin made a face. "God, no. I think I'm meant to be marrying her or something." Arthur spluttered incoherently and dropped the helmet, which Merlin seemed to find a normal conversational turn. "I mean, nobody's said anything, but the way Father's been acting...I think maybe Sophia gave him ideas."
"The one you tried to elope with?" Arthur asked. (It was small consolation that, in this world, he'd obviously been the one to beat Merlin about the head with a stick and drag him home. Very, very small.)
Merlin nodded. "Rowena, though...there's something about her that bothers me and I can't put my finger on it." He frowned up at Arthur. "Are you all right?"
"Peachy," Arthur assured him. "Never been better."
"You grind your teeth whenever I talk about Rowena," Merlin said. "And you were acting funny at dinner last night."
No, you were acting funny, Arthur thought, and oh, wasn't this rich--he'd been thinking about getting inside Merlin's head, hadn't he, and instead he got every other part of Merlin's life. "I just get a bad feeling around her," Arthur said breezily. "Very bad feeling. Bribing you with those rings, that's not exactly queenly behavior, is it?"
"I wouldn't call it bribery, but you're right," and Merlin got that look again, like something was on the tip of his tongue. And once again, he shook it off. "Thanks for the help, Arthur. You don't have to hang around if you don't want--we won't be done until dinnertime."
"No, no," Arthur said, and earned him another incredulous look. "I wouldn't miss this for the world."
Because Arthur had seen Merlin with a sword, in the real world, and he was hysterically funny as long as you didn't stop to think that maybe some day he'd actually have to defend himself with it. Arthur found himself a good perch on the edge of the field, and settled in for a bit of entertainment to make up for the trauma of the morning. He watched Merlin give some quiet instructions to the knights--quiet, god, they'll barely hear him in the middle of a battle, yelling is one of the things you've got to practice-- and then take up a guard position, facing into the group.
Sir Cador came at him, using a two-handed broadsword, the kind that could cave in a helmet or crush a wrist as easily as slicing an apple. Arthur gripped the stone of the ledge he sat as Merlin held his ground--
--and then twisted out of the way of Cador's swing at the last possible second. "What, is this dancing class?" Arthur blurted, because there was nobody around to hear him. "Stand and fight, that's how--oh," because Merlin had turned his twist into an elegant stroke at Cador's exposed flank, tagging him hard above the kidney. "Beginner's luck," Arthur muttered.
Cador recovered easily enough and they squared up again, only this time Merlin was letting his shield arm droop, creating a perfect opening over his left shoulder. Cador would've been an idiot not to go for it, except once again Merlin seemed to perfectly anticipate the stroke; he used the edge of the shield to deflect it wide, and when Cador let one hand go from the broadsword Merlin took the opening for a savage thrust at Cador's exposed belly. It was hard enough to wind him; in a battle, it would've been the perfect chance to break some ribs, maybe even punch through the ringmail. Cador had the good sense to retreat out of Merlin's reach while he caught his breath, but Merlin didn't press the advantage; just resumed his guard and waited.
"You're about a foot taller than him," Arthur advised Cador from afar. "Choke up on him. He can't dance forever."
Cador was apparently thinking he same thing, because he adjusted his grip and then feinted, drawing Merlin's shield arm out and forcing him to parry with his sword. But Merlin, the little shit, dove down and ducked under the swing and bashed Cador's leading knee with his shield; Cador howled and staggered, losing his grip on the broadsword again, and then Merlin was up and swinging viciously at his neck--only at the last minute did he pull the blow and twist to use the flat of the blade, or Cador would've been picking rings of mail out of his skin for the rest of the day. As it was, it rang hard on Cador's helmet, and now Merlin was inside his guard, punching him in the face with his greaved right fist--"You're going to break the joints!" Arthur protested, even before he remembered he'd have to mend them--before wheeling his sword down, under Cador's, to sweep his feet out from under him. Cador landed gracelessly on his back and swiped his helmet off to pinch off the flow of blood from his nose.
Merlin didn't even seem to be breathing heavy as he beckoned to the next knight in the line.
Arthur watched with mounting incredulity as Merlin danced his way around every knight on the field. He rarely took the offense unless he had a perfect opening; he lured opponents in and then turned their own stroke around on them, using speed and an unexpected amount of grace. Arthur wasn't sure which outraged him more: that this Merlin was so bloody good at what he did, or that the knights were falling so easily for what were (to Arthur, eventually) very obvious and cheap tricks. If it wouldn't land him in Gaius's tender care--or worse, the stocks--Arthur would've gone out there and started lecturing them personally on everything they were doing wrong, and then demonstrated by knocking Merlin down one or twice or maybe five times.
Unless...
"Fuck this," Arthur thought, suddenly suspicious. He snuck back to the armory and located his second-favorite practice sword (Merlin had, of course, taken the first.)
He had been training to be a warrior for as long as he could remember; his first toys were model knights, hard-edged creations with tiny movable joints so he could re-enact the best battles of the tournaments. He'd held his first sword, a wooden model, as soon as he was old enough to stand; weapons had always felt like extensions of his body. The motions of the drills were as natural as breathing.
Until now, because suddenly the grip and balance were just gone, he couldn't make a swing that went anywhere near where he wanted it, and within two attempts his wrist was starting to twinge in a troubling way. What he could do, however, was throw his sword in frustration, and somehow this caused all the other swords in the armory to sail through the air in a rain of steely death; he ducked and covered his head with his arms as they piled up against the far wall. Fuck.
"Think, Arthur," he muttered to himself while he sorted out the mess before anyone saw it. "You've switched everything but bodies with Merlin. Different families, different work, different skills..." And perhaps--perhaps--they even looked a bit different, but Arthur was not going to admit to ogling Merlin's newly-muscled chest and arms (so much better than Bert the laundry boy) if it meant he had to admit his own physique may have slightly...diminished itself. Besides, the weather was unseasonably cold.
They hadn't switched personalities, or at least Arthur didn't think so--he still felt basically Arthurian, though of course if he did change his personality he wasn't sure he'd notice. Merlin, more to the point, still seemed basically like Merlin the servant, friendly and a bit hopeless--though weirdly polite, to boot, and also surprisingly sneaky. Arthur remembered that he'd stacked up his plates after breakfast and left clothes on the floor; Arthur generally kept his own clothes off the floor (well, more often than not) but he couldn't ever recall bothering to stack the plates for Merlin no matter how much Merlin bitched about it. Even his swordplay seemed to suit him, like his wordplay, all unexpected thrusts and trick openings.
So Merlin had acquired a skill at combat that was equivalent to Arthur's, but not exactly the same. And Arthur...could set fires with his mind.
Now it was him with something on the tip of his tongue, and he couldn't quite figure out what it was.
X
He still had to muck the stables that day, and no, it turned out fire was not a useful shortcut for that; and there was attending Merlin at another big dinner, which was downright disconcerting, what with Uther right there, saying all the cutting and awkward things he normally said to Arthur, only now to a different target. Merlin was crap at hiding how much it bothered him, and really, Arthur had managed that trick a long time ago...but then again, Merlin never could hide anything.
Morgana was there, looking half-dead, and so Arthur had to avoid Gwen's death glare rather than admit he'd forgotten to talk to Gaius all day. (What with being in the wrong life, he thought he had some excuses.) So was Rowena, and she was fawning over Merlin just as blatantly as she'd fawned over Arthur the night before, which really made Arthur want to set her on fire a little bit. (He was careful to check that thought he moment he saw smoke curling off the edge of her sleeve, though. Getting beheaded as a sorcerer would greatly impinge on his plans to sort out the universe.) The bitch had passed off wicked magic rings on him, and now was carrying on like nothing had happened. Was this all some kind of elaborate plot to get into Merlin's pants? Hell, she could've just asked, and Arthur would've shoved the ungrateful prat into the line of fire, since he was so obviously enjoying it...except he wasn't...and this was really about Rowena and her evil plots, as opposed to Rowena grabbing Merlin's hands and smiling at him.
The wine bottle in Arthur's hand exploded slightly, but unfortunately, Rowena wasn't brained by flying glass.
X
"All right, spill it," Merlin said. "What's your problem with Rowena?"
"What problem with Rowena?" Arthur asked. He didn't ask, Can we discuss this when you've got trousers on? He honestly had no idea why Merlin should decided to have deep conversations while he was in the bath and Arthur was folding laundry to hide the scorch marks (and to avoid looking at Merlin in the bath). Maybe water made him thoughtful? Some people said it did. Arthur never felt thoughtful in the bath, and he couldn't specifically recall if Merlin had ever had a bath before, though of course he was not thinking about Merlin in baths, he was folding laundry and plotting to kill Rowena.
"You look like you're plotting to kill her half the time," Merlin said, and Arthur nearly started another small fire out of alarm. "And don't lie, because nobody just accidentally squeezes a wine bottle hard enough to shatter it. You've been giving her the evil eye practically since she got here, Arthur. What's up?"
He wanted to bluster something about bad omens, but Merlin and his nakedness were right there, looking at him, expecting something of material worth. And Merlin did seem to know, on some level, that something was amiss here, and maybe that Rowena was to blame--at least, he showed more awareness than anyone else in the castle, including Uther, which hurt in more ways than Arthur wanted to admit. "Do you ever wonder," he asked slowly, "if, maybe...if we were different people...if things would be, y'know, different?"
"Um...yes?" Merlin said, with a little laugh.
"So that came out wrong," Arthur grumbled. "What I meant is...I mean, if I wasn't...or if you weren't prince," because it was easier than having to refer to himself as a servant, even in the hypothetical. "What would that be like?"
"What, to see how the other half lives?" Merlin shrugged. "No boring council meetings."
"No tax policy," Arthur suggested.
Merlin smiled, and started feeling around for his towel down at the foot of the bath. "No overnight border patrols."
"No Rowenas." Arthur steeled himself and crossed the room to put the towel in Merlin's hand (and then wrap him up in it. Possibly he'd secure it with nails.)
But Merlin grabbed Arthur's hand, holding on tight despite his slippery fingers. "And no manservants," he said quietly, in a husky voice, and god, how had Arthur never noticed Merlin's eyes were so damn blue before? Was this new? Arthur swallowed hard, because this was so not where he'd hoped the conversation would go, and yet he couldn't actually complain about it. "If we were...different people," Merlin added, before pulling his hand back.
"Yeah," Arthur croaked. "Different."
Merlin frowned slightly, watching Arthur's face. "I wouldn't--that is, I'd never want you to feel...obligated," he said haltingly, and oh god, was he actually--did he--
"Oblig--" Arthur almost laughed, and reached for Merlin's hand this time. "Merlin, mucking the stable is an obligation. This--this is--" If there was a this, if this was really what Arthur thought it was--
Merlin leaned in and kissed him then, shutting down any other thoughts. It was soft and chaste and weirdly sort of sweet, until Merlin parted his lips and cupped one hand around Arthur's jaw. Arthur pawed at Merlin's shoulders, not caring that he was slopping water down his shirt--it was the blue one, anyway, he never liked the blue one--nor that he still smelled of the stables, nor that this was all happening in an incredibly problematic context that he was supposed to be trying to undo instead of enjoying the hell out of--
Merlin sucked in Arthur's lower lip, pulling a little gasp out of him. At the same moment, the windows rattled, the fire popped loudly, and every candle in the room suddenly burst into flame.
Arthur pulled back immediately, lest he start Merlin on fire as well, and he could tell by the devestated and bewildered look on Merlin's face that he hadn't noticed the fire and explosions and was drawing all the wrong conclusions. "Sorry," he blurted, "I'm so sorry, I just, Gaius--" Arthur scrambled out of the room and ran for it, flat-out, as if he could outrun the fire burning inside him, threatening to escape.
He barely slowed through Gaius's work room, pausing just enough to shout, "Morgana's going mad, you didn't hear it from me!" before locking himself in the little bedroom. There were candles here--he lit them all, great towering flames that ate them down to stubs within minutes, and that seemed to release some of the pent-up energy. He still felt like he'd swallowed a hot coal, but it didn't seem ready to burn its way out of his chest any time soon.
Gaius knocked on the door. "Arthur? Is everything all right?"
"Yeah," Arthur said. "Fantastic."
"What's this about Morgana?"
"Gwen said she's having hideous nightmares or something." Arthur curled up on his side, clothes and all. "Gaius, I...I'm really tired. Think I'm going to get some sleep."
Gaius didn't answer for a minute, but suddenly there was a very audible sigh from the other side of the door. "Fine," Gaius said. "I'm sure to find out all the details sooner or later anyway, and probably in the least convenient possible way. Good night, Arthur."
What the hell was all that supposed to mean? "Night, Gaius," Arthur said weakly, and pressed his face into the pillow.
X
It was a long time before Arthur got to sleep that night, between the burning inside him and all the aches and pains of a day spent playing servant. He'd felt less sore after certain tournaments in his life. But still, eventually, he slept, and when he finally did he was overtaken by dreams far more vivid than he'd ever experienced before.
He dreamed about Ealdor, for some reason, and Hunith, and working in fields and sleeping on floors and messing about with Will in the forest, blowing things up just to see awe and pleasure in his eyes. He dreamed of coming to Camelot, of picking a fight with what turned out to be Prince Merlin Pendragon, of daring to use magic to save the whingy little git's life and getting service as his reward. He dreamed of snakes in shields and griffins in forests, of drinking poison for Merlin and watching Merlin drink poison for him, of burning that fairy bitch Sophia to ashes and then dragging Merlin out of the water, lips on cold lips, willing him to breath even if Arthur had to do it for him. He dreamed of fire and water and secrets, of calling down lightening, of holding life and death in his hands, and of an enormous voice somewhere below him calling out Arthur...Arthur..."ARTHUR!"
That woke him with a start, ripping him out of the dreams; the candles made a feeble effort to light themselves again, fragments of wick flaring in their puddles of wax, but the room was otherwise dark and still and empty.
Well, except for the booming voice in his ear that said, "ARTHUR, YOU IDIOT, GET DOWN HERE THIS INSTANT!"
Very few people had ever dared to call Arthur an idiot, and none of them had ever been invisible before...except, no, this wasn't an invisible voice, it was just coming from somewhere very far below. The dungeons, maybe? Or was there something below the dungeons? Frankly, he'd never had much reason to look, even though he knew the stories about his father capturing the last of the dragons--he sometimes suspected those were all made up anyway.
But there was a...feeling, a presence, like the mental equivalent of someone tugging on his sleeve, and that voice hadn't sounded particularly happy, so Arthur dragged himself out of bed and started a systematic search of the castle. It had started raining at some point in the night, so he had no moonlight to help him out, but he discovered with a bit of concentration he could conjure a flame about the size of his thumbnail out of thin air to light his way--which was pretty bloody cool, and also slightly terrifying after the near-firestorm in the prince's room (because he still couldn't think of it as Merlin's, not at the moment). Moreover, it was likely to get him beheaded if anyone saw it, and since Arthur had no desire to die a peasant he tried not to conjure the light unless he really, really needed it.
The levels above-ground were quiet, unless you counted the king's snoring and Morgana talking in her sleep; the latter didn't sound particularly happy, but Arthur chalked it up to those nightmares and moved on. It was too late for even the rowdiest of the knights to be slinking up from the lower town and too early for even the most devoted servants to be up, so no one interrupted him as he made his way lower and lower, eventually coming to the mouth of the dungeons, where the guards slept in shifts to deter any late-night jailbreaks. They were playing dice, and it turned out it was just as easy to put out fires as it was to conjure them; Arthur simply extinguished the torches, and while the guards fumbled to protect their winnings or steal someone else's, he slipped past them entirely and felt his way down the tunnel in the dark. He planned to conjure up the flame again, but it turned out to be unnecessary--he found a stack of torches further down the passageway (by stepping in them and nearly falling on his arse).
The upper cells were empty, and so were the lower cells, and so were the lower lower cells, the ones without any windows at all; they hadn't been used in Arthur's memory, and they didn't even have the moldy-straw smell of the others to show that someone had ever been down there. And then there were steps, and passages, and more steps, and a broken gate. And beyond that--
"Finally. Took you long enough."
Arthur found himself standing on a small ledge, overlooking a vast cavern--one big enough to swallow all of the castle, it seemed. And perched on a crag opposite him was an actual, honest, totally-not-made-up dragon. For some reason, his first, blank-brained thought was, It doesn't look a thing like the drawings. Then he realized it was also talking. And that it was talking to him.
"I...you...you're...huh," was about the most intelligent thing Arthur could say for a few minutes. Also, "You're a dragon."
The dragon sighed, narrowing its eyes. "Oh, god, you really are as stupid as they tell me."
"Look, this has not been the best day of my life," Arthur said defensively.
"Nor mine," the dragon snapped. "And things are about to get much worse."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Arthur paused. "Wait a minute, do you know who I am?"
"You are meant to be Prince Arthur Pendragon, the heir to Camelot," the dragon said, and somehow hearing someone else--or, well, something, maybe he wasn't exactly in a frame of mind to debate pronouns--hearing another voice tell him what he already knew let something relax in the back of Arthur's mind that he didn't even know was knotted. "However, a powerful and ancient magic has been put to work that is tearing apart the very fabric of the world."
"You mean how I switched placed with Merlin?" Arthur asked dubiously. He certainly considered that a crisis, but not exactly one of world-tearing proportions.
The dragon nodded. "You must undo this spell and restore the natural order of things, or the consequences will be severe."
"Right," Arthur said. "Got to kill Rowena. Won't be too much of a problem if I wait for her to lean over a candle--"
The dragon made a growly noise, and Arthur was abruptly reminded that it was big enough to swallow him in one bite and he didn't have a sword. "The girl had no idea what she was doing," it declared. "She's as caught up in the effects of the spell as everyone else. It is the rings you need, and Merlin, though the gods only know how you'll manage it."
Arthur put his fist on his hip and tried to look very kingly and severe, in case that would actually work on the dragon. "Just what sort of spell is this, anyway? And why are you and I the only ones unaffected?"
"The ring in your left pocket," the dragon said. "Look at it."
Arthur juggled the torch around--but, yes, he'd been carrying the damn ring around all day. It was an unremarkable ring, silver with a dark red stone that sat on the band like a bead of blood. Its mate--the one Merlin was wearing right now--looked basically the same, though Arthur didn't remember either of them looking so creepy before. "All right, what about it?"
"That ring and its equal are known as Rings of Hermes," the dragon explained. "The inscription on the inside of the band reads, 'A gift from heart to well-match'd heart.'"
"That's lovely," Arthur said, even though it looks like a load of squiggles to him. "What's it mean?"
"The girl believed it was a simple love spell, and that it could be combined with an incantation to steal your heart away. Apparently it's gotten out that that's the only way you'll notice a girl," it added in an undertone.
"What's that supposed to mean?" Arthur demanded.
"Nothing," the dragon said; it may have even coughed, if dragons did that. "The point is, she was hopelessly wrong and yet still had enough power and will to enact the incantation that activated the rings. It just so happened that you and Merlin were both holding them when she did so--ironically, if you're still had both in your posession, nothing would've happened."
"Yes, right, irony is a bitch, let's all have a laugh. So what did happen?"
It paused, either for dramatic effect or to continue irritation the hell out of Arthur. "The Rings of Hermes were not created for love, boy. Originally they were made to allow two people to temporarily experience each other's life--the sort of exchange that you and Merlin have unfortunately undergone--for the purpose of gaining perspective and wisdom. Later, they were sometimes used by the unscrupulous and unworthy for a more permanent change of lifestyle. They proved so dangerous that all were destroyed, or hidden away--at least, as long as there were wizards of sufficient power and moral character to keep an eye out for them."
Arthur mostly ignored the second half of that speech. Experience each other's life...the dreams...the fire..."Are you," he asked. "Are you say Merlin is--that this is--that he--"
"Yessss?" the dragon asked languidly.
Arthur shook his head. He may have even stamped his foot. "Merlin is not a sorcerer."
The dragon stared at him through half-closed eyes. "You've dreamed his life, Arthur--that's the Old Religion trying its best to mend the damage the rings have wrought. You can feel his magic even as we speak."
"He's Merlin, though!" Arthur said. "I mean, he's hopeless! At everything! He couldn't tell a convincing lie to save his life!" He thought suddenly of the afanc's plague and Merlin storming into the council chambers to die in Gwen's place--and remembered, unbidden, as if it had been himself, guilt-wracked and terrified, and Merlin apologizing for him in an embarrassed way--"My god, he can't even tell the truth properly!"
The doubled memories made Arthur's head hurt; so did the laughter of the dragon, but that faded quickly. "Even when the rings were used on common people, with common lives, they caused great damage to the natural order of the world; that's why they were meant to be used temporarily, and why they were later banned. But you have a destiny, Arthur, and not even the Old Religion can alter the stars. Until you and Merlin are back where you belong, the world will continue to fray, and the damage will not be confined to Camelot, or even Albion."
"Wait, destiny?" Arthur asked. "What destiny? And what kind of damage? I mean, I want to put things right as much as you do, but I need a little more information here."
"The damage has already begun," the dragon said, and then it spread out its wings. Arthur would not have called himself any kind of dragon expert, as this was his first, but he was reasonably well-versed in various other animals and he was pretty certain that things with wings ought to be able to, you know, fly. These wings did not look aerodynamic; they were torn and tattered, pocked with holes big enough for a man to crawl through, crusted with at least two different colors of disgustingness--one might be blood, but Arthur had no idea about the other. "I am too old and much too clever to be affected by the magic of the rings, and so the Old Religion must heal the wound in other ways."
"That...does not look good," Arthur said. Then he realized: "Wait a minute, what about me? Why do I still still remember things how they were? I'm not going to get some kind of skin disease, am I?"
The dragon snorted. "No, young Arthur, you will not. Merlin's magic is what protects you--and puts you in gravest danger. The rings can interchange families and histories, but they cannot alter his soul; the best they could do was displace parts of it, in an attempt to preserve things as they were."
"So I've got a bit a Merlin's soul flopping about inside me?" Arthur asked. It wasn't exactly a comfortable thought; for some reason he pictured it in the form of one of those neck scarves, as if it were stuck to the bottom of his boot.
"You have a power you are well-nigh incapable of controlling," the dragon said. "And you'll need to control it; only another warlock can break the spell, Arthur, and for the time being, that warlock is you." It paused. "May all the gods be merciful for that."
"I think I understand now why Father locked you up down here," Arthur grumbled.
The dragon snorted, and flapped its ruined wings in vain for a few minutes; then it looked slightly embarrassed. "If you could just turn around for a moment..."
"Why?" Arthur demanded.
"Turn around," the dragon snapped.
Arthur folded his arms, mindful of the torch. "What are you planning to do behind my back?"
"Turn around!" the dragon roared, spewing a fireball in Arthur's direction--and it said he couldn't control himself? Arthur dove for the floor, but he still didn't miss the dragon toddling weakly off its rock, a tremendous chain clattering behind it, down into the depths of the cave.
"Fine!" he bellowed after it. "Have your dramatic exit scene! See if I care! I hope it's your balls that rot off next!" He continued in this vein for some time, until he was headsore and raw in the throat; the dragon didn't come back, and it was only after Arthur started to trudge back up the stairs that he realized the evil beast hadn't told him how to reverse the spell on the rings.
"Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck," he chanted, all the way up the stairs, pausing only long enough to harass the dungeon guards some more (he may have moved some coins about on the table in the dark, but they deserved it for dicing on duty). At least he knew what was going on now, sort of, but as for what to do about it...and anyway, what did a dragon with moldy wings mean in the long run? How much "damage" could actually--
A clap of thunder, a flash of lightening, and a blood-curdling scream hit in rapid succession, and Arthur didn't have to think twice about following the scream to its source: Morgana's room. "Morgana!" he shouted, pounding on the door while she screamed. "Morgana, let me in!"
He heard glass shatter, and another scream briefly joined the first one; then the door flew open and he was faced with Gwen in only a bed gown, wild-eyed and seemingly strung out on her very last nerve. Morgana was sitting upright in bed, eyes wide open, screaming her fool head off. Through the shattered window behind the screen, Arthur could hear the wind and rain and a succession of small wet thuds that were too dull to be hail and too heavy to be raindrops.
Gwen just stood there, breathing too fast, numb with shock; Arthur tried shaking Morgana, but her body was rigid as wood, and slapping her had no effect. (Though he supposed that he would have the memory of it for future reference, when she tempted him to violence in other, less terrifying circumstances.) "Water," he called to Gwen over the noise. "Throw water on her!"
"The pitcher is empty!" she shouted back. A few curious onlookers were starting to gather in the hallway, though so far nobody was asking what Arthur was doing in a lady's room in the middle of the night. Arthur seized the pitcher from Gwen and went to the broken window, since it sounded loud enough for the pitcher to fill with rainwater in a moment or two.
He went round to the window and froze in place. Half of a frog was twitching on the floor, in a puddle of rain mixed with blood; another frog, mostly intact, was impaled on a splinter of glass. Out in the courtyard, frogs were falling from the sky to splatter dramatically on the paving stones and steps and bannisters.
Morgana suddenly stopped screaming. "Fire," she said in a strange voice that barely sounded like her own. "Fire, and iron, and blood. The stars will go out on Albion."
So that's the kind of damage it means, Arthur thought numbly.
Part Two
Author: mad_maudlin
Fandom: Merlin
Pairing: Merlin/Arthur, and also Merlin/Arthur
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: All episodes
Warnings: Crack, shovels, massive rupture of the fourth wall.
Summary: Arthur wanted to know what was going on in Merlin's head. He just didn't mean it so literally.
Disclaimer: No frogs were harmed in the production of this fanfic.
A/N: This is for Kinkme_merlin, this prompt, and I swear it started out as a comment fic. It is now a 22k comment fic. I don't know how these things happen to me sometimes.
Arthur went to bed in a prince's suite, in a bed of satin and velvet and goosedown, idly fondling one of the ugly little rings Lady Rowena had given him over dinner that night. Rowena had come from somewhere in the east with a simpering smile, a variety of low-cut gowns and a total lack of tact that bordered on the astonishing. Arthur's mind, however, was not on Rowena; instead he was mainly thinking un-princely thoughts about his manservant.
There were times when he thought that Merlin was nothing more than a manservant--perhaps, in some ways, a friend, though Arthur had had so few of those he couldn't really tell for sure. (And no, that wasn't grounds for unbearable angst and drama in his life--he viewed it as an inevitable consequence of his station, like the green rash the crown sometimes gave him on his forehead.) But then there were other times--times like tonight, when that feather-brained doxy Rowena had been flirting all too obviously and Merlin had been clutching the wine bottles a little too tightly, so tense the feather in his hat had been quivering--Arthur thought that maybe, just maybe...
...but it was so hard to tell, so hard to guess what, if anything, was going on in that head of his from one minute to the next, if Merlin thought of him in anything like the same way, and Arthur didn't dare act unless he knew for certain...
Arthur fell asleep to such thoughts and woke up to scratchy wool blankets and a straw mattress and a draft through the window and Gaius pounding on the door screaming "Arthur! Arthur, wake up, Prince Merlin wants to see you!"
He sat upright, taking in the room--Merlin's room, dammit--and Merlin's clothes, or something very much like them, hanging out of the cupboard--and the ring still in his hand. He did the reasonable thing then, which was to shout, "Oh, bloody fuck."
X
It took, in hindsight, far too long and far too many stupid questions for Gaius to assure Arthur that he was really, really not joking. Logic, as tutors had long ago tried to teach Arthur, favored the least complicated solution to any problem. An elaborate hoax implicating Merlin, Gaius, and a tailor (as the clothes were so much like Merlin's, but cut to a size that made Arthur feel awkward and skinny) that involved drugging him, moving him to another room, changing his clothes and then pretending he was his own manservant, with no obvious punchline in sight--that was illogical.
Sorcery, on the other hand, was always a possibility.
He dressed in the scratchy and ill-fitting clothes, pulled on the well-worn boots and went to see "Prince" Merlin in full confidence that he would be equally discomfitted by the sudden role reversal and they could immediately work on getting this sorted--Arthur had a few theories about that bitch Rowena already and was prepared to test them at the point of a sword. But when he arrived, he found a familiar room and Merlin in familiar clothes, as they were Arthur's, though cut to create the illusion that Merlin was fit and muscular. Merlin looked up from where he was fastening his belt and gave an oddly avuncular sigh with no sign that he found anything out of the ordinary. "There you are," he said. "I was beginning to think I'd have to tidy up myself."
"Sorry...sire," Arthur said, and even managed not to throw up afterward. He'd really been hoping Merlin would be aware of the problem, so at the very least he'd have somebody to complain to. But after having Gaius check the index of every book on mental aberrations in his considerable library, Arthur wasn't about to let anyone else in on this predicament unless he had to, which mean Merlin had to stay in the dark for now. Though that didn't mean he couldn't do a spot of subtle reconnoitering in the process. "Did you, ah, need me for anything special, this morning? Something really unusual, maybe?" he asked hopefully.
Merlin looked at him with one eyebrow raised in an eerie imitation of Gaius. "No," he said. "Not really."
"No? So it's just a," Arthur gestured vaguely. "Normal morning?"
"I..." And there Merlin paused, just a bit, and fiddled with something on his finger. Rowena's ring, and Arthur remembered he'd given the mate to Merlin before sending him off for the night--Merlin had asked for it, just to see it, and Arthur had said here, keep it, one is quite ugly enough for me. So since they each had one when they went to bed...oh, so going to kill her. "That's strange," Merlin continued. "It's like there's something I've forgotten to do."
"Hate that feeling," Arthur agreed firmly, hoping to elicit a little something more.
But Merlin just said "Mmm," sort of absently, then shook his head and grabbed a pair of gloves from the table. "Anyway, I'm to go riding with Lady Rowena this morning, and I'd like you to muck out my stables while I'm gone. I've got some clothes that need mending in that pile over there--" Which, to Arthur, was indistinguishable from any other pile all over the bloody room-- "if you could take those down to the maids, and I'm drilling with the knights this afternoon, so please also have my armor cleaned. If you can manage all that before I get back?"
Arthur realized he couldn't answer if he kept grinding his teeth. "Sure," he managed to squeak. "No problem."
"Good man, Arthur," Merlin said with a little grin, and clapped him on the shoulder before sweeping out in a flutter of long red coat. Arthur felt something like indigestion or outrage beginning in his chest; he liked that coat.
"Fuck this," he muttered as soon as the door was closed, and glared at the pile of laundry, which burst into flames.
X
The armor was not cleaned, nor the stables mucked, by the time Merlin and Rowena returned--Rowena laughing cheerily, Merlin looking faintly ill--but Arthur had succeeded in setting fire to most of Merlin's laundry with his mind. Putting it out again was turning out to be more of a problem, but as the capper to the most bizarre morning of his life, it was really pretty amazing and probably not at terrifying as it should've been. It felt strangely natural, even if no reasonable definition of the word "natural" could possibly apply; it was easy as breathing, almost too easy, and kind of fun.
What this had to do with swapping places with was anyone's guess, but Arthur supposed it made about as much sense as any sort of magic, really. Why snakes in the shield? How can flowers grow in caves? Whose idea was it to combine a lion and a bird? Et cetera. He wondered if Merlin had suddenly gained the ability to fly or something.
Arthur wasn't stupid enough to linger and get caught in the bedroom with a heap of charred linen, so as soon as he saw Merlin's return from the window he gathered up an armful of scorched laundry and made a run for it. He at least knew where the castle laundry was, on account of having spent most of his early adolescence sneaking down there in hopes of getting a glimpse of Morgana's underclothes or perhaps the damp and heaving bosom of Twyla, the laundress, whose bosom was quite substantial. (There was also Bert, the boy who tended the fires in the laundry and generally went without a shirt; Arthur had seen his fill of his bosom and more than a few regions southward, but Twyla had sent him away when she caught him "corrupting" the little prince. Her bosom had been doing the most enchanting bounce during that rant. It was a deeply confusing memory for Arthur.)
On the stairs, he collided--almost literally--with Gwen. "Careful there," she said, catching the pile of shirts before they were strewn over three floors. Then she noticed the burns. "What on earth happened to these?"
"Fireplace," Arthur blurted. "They jumped in. Awful scene, really. I don't know how I'm going to tell Merlin his clothes are suicidal." That got him a giggle, but not much of one, and even if it wasn't a good joke Arthur expected a bit more than that. But Gwen looked pale, with puffy dark spots under her eyes, and Arthur found himself asking, "Are you, er, all right?"
Gwen bit her lip and looked around a bit before leaning in. "It's...it's Morgana," she said.
"What about her?" Arthur thought, actually meaning, please tell me she's switched lives with some one so I can have a peer group.
But Gwen said, "The nightmares. I've never seen them so bad. Half the night she was talking in her sleep, saying...well, terrible things, and she's forbidden me to talk to Gaius." Gwen's eyes lit up. "She didn't say anything about talking to you, though, did she?"
"Of course not," Arthur said, and he wanted to ask a million questions, starting with since when has Morgana got nightmares? but instead he assured Gwen, "I promise you that I will violate your deepest confidence and go running to Gaius immediately with the secret you made me swear to keep."
Gwen grinned at him. "You're a good friend, Arthur," she said warmly, and climbed a step to give him a kiss on the cheek before bouncing off with a bit more spring in her step.
Arthur may have stared after her with his mouth hanging open, but only for a moment. It wasn't that casual affection bothered him, per se--just because he never got any didn't mean others should do without--but for some reason it suddenly occurred to him that maybe Merlin got that kiss on the cheek from Gwen, in some real world that made sense. Maybe he got it a lot, even.
Not that he was envious or anything. He just had to stop halfway to the laundry to extinguish another shirt.
X
Merlin seemed surprisingly magnanimous about Arthur's failure at being working-class when he found out about it--more generous than Arthur ever was to him. "Honestly, I don't care," he said as Arthur helped him into his armor--which was somehow subtly different from the armor Arthur wore in his real life, had to be, because it was so damn tricky to get on. "Anything to get me away from that woman."
"Rowena's a raging bitch," Arthur agreed firmly. "I think you should have her arrested."
Merlin made a face. "God, no. I think I'm meant to be marrying her or something." Arthur spluttered incoherently and dropped the helmet, which Merlin seemed to find a normal conversational turn. "I mean, nobody's said anything, but the way Father's been acting...I think maybe Sophia gave him ideas."
"The one you tried to elope with?" Arthur asked. (It was small consolation that, in this world, he'd obviously been the one to beat Merlin about the head with a stick and drag him home. Very, very small.)
Merlin nodded. "Rowena, though...there's something about her that bothers me and I can't put my finger on it." He frowned up at Arthur. "Are you all right?"
"Peachy," Arthur assured him. "Never been better."
"You grind your teeth whenever I talk about Rowena," Merlin said. "And you were acting funny at dinner last night."
No, you were acting funny, Arthur thought, and oh, wasn't this rich--he'd been thinking about getting inside Merlin's head, hadn't he, and instead he got every other part of Merlin's life. "I just get a bad feeling around her," Arthur said breezily. "Very bad feeling. Bribing you with those rings, that's not exactly queenly behavior, is it?"
"I wouldn't call it bribery, but you're right," and Merlin got that look again, like something was on the tip of his tongue. And once again, he shook it off. "Thanks for the help, Arthur. You don't have to hang around if you don't want--we won't be done until dinnertime."
"No, no," Arthur said, and earned him another incredulous look. "I wouldn't miss this for the world."
Because Arthur had seen Merlin with a sword, in the real world, and he was hysterically funny as long as you didn't stop to think that maybe some day he'd actually have to defend himself with it. Arthur found himself a good perch on the edge of the field, and settled in for a bit of entertainment to make up for the trauma of the morning. He watched Merlin give some quiet instructions to the knights--quiet, god, they'll barely hear him in the middle of a battle, yelling is one of the things you've got to practice-- and then take up a guard position, facing into the group.
Sir Cador came at him, using a two-handed broadsword, the kind that could cave in a helmet or crush a wrist as easily as slicing an apple. Arthur gripped the stone of the ledge he sat as Merlin held his ground--
--and then twisted out of the way of Cador's swing at the last possible second. "What, is this dancing class?" Arthur blurted, because there was nobody around to hear him. "Stand and fight, that's how--oh," because Merlin had turned his twist into an elegant stroke at Cador's exposed flank, tagging him hard above the kidney. "Beginner's luck," Arthur muttered.
Cador recovered easily enough and they squared up again, only this time Merlin was letting his shield arm droop, creating a perfect opening over his left shoulder. Cador would've been an idiot not to go for it, except once again Merlin seemed to perfectly anticipate the stroke; he used the edge of the shield to deflect it wide, and when Cador let one hand go from the broadsword Merlin took the opening for a savage thrust at Cador's exposed belly. It was hard enough to wind him; in a battle, it would've been the perfect chance to break some ribs, maybe even punch through the ringmail. Cador had the good sense to retreat out of Merlin's reach while he caught his breath, but Merlin didn't press the advantage; just resumed his guard and waited.
"You're about a foot taller than him," Arthur advised Cador from afar. "Choke up on him. He can't dance forever."
Cador was apparently thinking he same thing, because he adjusted his grip and then feinted, drawing Merlin's shield arm out and forcing him to parry with his sword. But Merlin, the little shit, dove down and ducked under the swing and bashed Cador's leading knee with his shield; Cador howled and staggered, losing his grip on the broadsword again, and then Merlin was up and swinging viciously at his neck--only at the last minute did he pull the blow and twist to use the flat of the blade, or Cador would've been picking rings of mail out of his skin for the rest of the day. As it was, it rang hard on Cador's helmet, and now Merlin was inside his guard, punching him in the face with his greaved right fist--"You're going to break the joints!" Arthur protested, even before he remembered he'd have to mend them--before wheeling his sword down, under Cador's, to sweep his feet out from under him. Cador landed gracelessly on his back and swiped his helmet off to pinch off the flow of blood from his nose.
Merlin didn't even seem to be breathing heavy as he beckoned to the next knight in the line.
Arthur watched with mounting incredulity as Merlin danced his way around every knight on the field. He rarely took the offense unless he had a perfect opening; he lured opponents in and then turned their own stroke around on them, using speed and an unexpected amount of grace. Arthur wasn't sure which outraged him more: that this Merlin was so bloody good at what he did, or that the knights were falling so easily for what were (to Arthur, eventually) very obvious and cheap tricks. If it wouldn't land him in Gaius's tender care--or worse, the stocks--Arthur would've gone out there and started lecturing them personally on everything they were doing wrong, and then demonstrated by knocking Merlin down one or twice or maybe five times.
Unless...
"Fuck this," Arthur thought, suddenly suspicious. He snuck back to the armory and located his second-favorite practice sword (Merlin had, of course, taken the first.)
He had been training to be a warrior for as long as he could remember; his first toys were model knights, hard-edged creations with tiny movable joints so he could re-enact the best battles of the tournaments. He'd held his first sword, a wooden model, as soon as he was old enough to stand; weapons had always felt like extensions of his body. The motions of the drills were as natural as breathing.
Until now, because suddenly the grip and balance were just gone, he couldn't make a swing that went anywhere near where he wanted it, and within two attempts his wrist was starting to twinge in a troubling way. What he could do, however, was throw his sword in frustration, and somehow this caused all the other swords in the armory to sail through the air in a rain of steely death; he ducked and covered his head with his arms as they piled up against the far wall. Fuck.
"Think, Arthur," he muttered to himself while he sorted out the mess before anyone saw it. "You've switched everything but bodies with Merlin. Different families, different work, different skills..." And perhaps--perhaps--they even looked a bit different, but Arthur was not going to admit to ogling Merlin's newly-muscled chest and arms (so much better than Bert the laundry boy) if it meant he had to admit his own physique may have slightly...diminished itself. Besides, the weather was unseasonably cold.
They hadn't switched personalities, or at least Arthur didn't think so--he still felt basically Arthurian, though of course if he did change his personality he wasn't sure he'd notice. Merlin, more to the point, still seemed basically like Merlin the servant, friendly and a bit hopeless--though weirdly polite, to boot, and also surprisingly sneaky. Arthur remembered that he'd stacked up his plates after breakfast and left clothes on the floor; Arthur generally kept his own clothes off the floor (well, more often than not) but he couldn't ever recall bothering to stack the plates for Merlin no matter how much Merlin bitched about it. Even his swordplay seemed to suit him, like his wordplay, all unexpected thrusts and trick openings.
So Merlin had acquired a skill at combat that was equivalent to Arthur's, but not exactly the same. And Arthur...could set fires with his mind.
Now it was him with something on the tip of his tongue, and he couldn't quite figure out what it was.
X
He still had to muck the stables that day, and no, it turned out fire was not a useful shortcut for that; and there was attending Merlin at another big dinner, which was downright disconcerting, what with Uther right there, saying all the cutting and awkward things he normally said to Arthur, only now to a different target. Merlin was crap at hiding how much it bothered him, and really, Arthur had managed that trick a long time ago...but then again, Merlin never could hide anything.
Morgana was there, looking half-dead, and so Arthur had to avoid Gwen's death glare rather than admit he'd forgotten to talk to Gaius all day. (What with being in the wrong life, he thought he had some excuses.) So was Rowena, and she was fawning over Merlin just as blatantly as she'd fawned over Arthur the night before, which really made Arthur want to set her on fire a little bit. (He was careful to check that thought he moment he saw smoke curling off the edge of her sleeve, though. Getting beheaded as a sorcerer would greatly impinge on his plans to sort out the universe.) The bitch had passed off wicked magic rings on him, and now was carrying on like nothing had happened. Was this all some kind of elaborate plot to get into Merlin's pants? Hell, she could've just asked, and Arthur would've shoved the ungrateful prat into the line of fire, since he was so obviously enjoying it...except he wasn't...and this was really about Rowena and her evil plots, as opposed to Rowena grabbing Merlin's hands and smiling at him.
The wine bottle in Arthur's hand exploded slightly, but unfortunately, Rowena wasn't brained by flying glass.
X
"All right, spill it," Merlin said. "What's your problem with Rowena?"
"What problem with Rowena?" Arthur asked. He didn't ask, Can we discuss this when you've got trousers on? He honestly had no idea why Merlin should decided to have deep conversations while he was in the bath and Arthur was folding laundry to hide the scorch marks (and to avoid looking at Merlin in the bath). Maybe water made him thoughtful? Some people said it did. Arthur never felt thoughtful in the bath, and he couldn't specifically recall if Merlin had ever had a bath before, though of course he was not thinking about Merlin in baths, he was folding laundry and plotting to kill Rowena.
"You look like you're plotting to kill her half the time," Merlin said, and Arthur nearly started another small fire out of alarm. "And don't lie, because nobody just accidentally squeezes a wine bottle hard enough to shatter it. You've been giving her the evil eye practically since she got here, Arthur. What's up?"
He wanted to bluster something about bad omens, but Merlin and his nakedness were right there, looking at him, expecting something of material worth. And Merlin did seem to know, on some level, that something was amiss here, and maybe that Rowena was to blame--at least, he showed more awareness than anyone else in the castle, including Uther, which hurt in more ways than Arthur wanted to admit. "Do you ever wonder," he asked slowly, "if, maybe...if we were different people...if things would be, y'know, different?"
"Um...yes?" Merlin said, with a little laugh.
"So that came out wrong," Arthur grumbled. "What I meant is...I mean, if I wasn't...or if you weren't prince," because it was easier than having to refer to himself as a servant, even in the hypothetical. "What would that be like?"
"What, to see how the other half lives?" Merlin shrugged. "No boring council meetings."
"No tax policy," Arthur suggested.
Merlin smiled, and started feeling around for his towel down at the foot of the bath. "No overnight border patrols."
"No Rowenas." Arthur steeled himself and crossed the room to put the towel in Merlin's hand (and then wrap him up in it. Possibly he'd secure it with nails.)
But Merlin grabbed Arthur's hand, holding on tight despite his slippery fingers. "And no manservants," he said quietly, in a husky voice, and god, how had Arthur never noticed Merlin's eyes were so damn blue before? Was this new? Arthur swallowed hard, because this was so not where he'd hoped the conversation would go, and yet he couldn't actually complain about it. "If we were...different people," Merlin added, before pulling his hand back.
"Yeah," Arthur croaked. "Different."
Merlin frowned slightly, watching Arthur's face. "I wouldn't--that is, I'd never want you to feel...obligated," he said haltingly, and oh god, was he actually--did he--
"Oblig--" Arthur almost laughed, and reached for Merlin's hand this time. "Merlin, mucking the stable is an obligation. This--this is--" If there was a this, if this was really what Arthur thought it was--
Merlin leaned in and kissed him then, shutting down any other thoughts. It was soft and chaste and weirdly sort of sweet, until Merlin parted his lips and cupped one hand around Arthur's jaw. Arthur pawed at Merlin's shoulders, not caring that he was slopping water down his shirt--it was the blue one, anyway, he never liked the blue one--nor that he still smelled of the stables, nor that this was all happening in an incredibly problematic context that he was supposed to be trying to undo instead of enjoying the hell out of--
Merlin sucked in Arthur's lower lip, pulling a little gasp out of him. At the same moment, the windows rattled, the fire popped loudly, and every candle in the room suddenly burst into flame.
Arthur pulled back immediately, lest he start Merlin on fire as well, and he could tell by the devestated and bewildered look on Merlin's face that he hadn't noticed the fire and explosions and was drawing all the wrong conclusions. "Sorry," he blurted, "I'm so sorry, I just, Gaius--" Arthur scrambled out of the room and ran for it, flat-out, as if he could outrun the fire burning inside him, threatening to escape.
He barely slowed through Gaius's work room, pausing just enough to shout, "Morgana's going mad, you didn't hear it from me!" before locking himself in the little bedroom. There were candles here--he lit them all, great towering flames that ate them down to stubs within minutes, and that seemed to release some of the pent-up energy. He still felt like he'd swallowed a hot coal, but it didn't seem ready to burn its way out of his chest any time soon.
Gaius knocked on the door. "Arthur? Is everything all right?"
"Yeah," Arthur said. "Fantastic."
"What's this about Morgana?"
"Gwen said she's having hideous nightmares or something." Arthur curled up on his side, clothes and all. "Gaius, I...I'm really tired. Think I'm going to get some sleep."
Gaius didn't answer for a minute, but suddenly there was a very audible sigh from the other side of the door. "Fine," Gaius said. "I'm sure to find out all the details sooner or later anyway, and probably in the least convenient possible way. Good night, Arthur."
What the hell was all that supposed to mean? "Night, Gaius," Arthur said weakly, and pressed his face into the pillow.
X
It was a long time before Arthur got to sleep that night, between the burning inside him and all the aches and pains of a day spent playing servant. He'd felt less sore after certain tournaments in his life. But still, eventually, he slept, and when he finally did he was overtaken by dreams far more vivid than he'd ever experienced before.
He dreamed about Ealdor, for some reason, and Hunith, and working in fields and sleeping on floors and messing about with Will in the forest, blowing things up just to see awe and pleasure in his eyes. He dreamed of coming to Camelot, of picking a fight with what turned out to be Prince Merlin Pendragon, of daring to use magic to save the whingy little git's life and getting service as his reward. He dreamed of snakes in shields and griffins in forests, of drinking poison for Merlin and watching Merlin drink poison for him, of burning that fairy bitch Sophia to ashes and then dragging Merlin out of the water, lips on cold lips, willing him to breath even if Arthur had to do it for him. He dreamed of fire and water and secrets, of calling down lightening, of holding life and death in his hands, and of an enormous voice somewhere below him calling out Arthur...Arthur..."ARTHUR!"
That woke him with a start, ripping him out of the dreams; the candles made a feeble effort to light themselves again, fragments of wick flaring in their puddles of wax, but the room was otherwise dark and still and empty.
Well, except for the booming voice in his ear that said, "ARTHUR, YOU IDIOT, GET DOWN HERE THIS INSTANT!"
Very few people had ever dared to call Arthur an idiot, and none of them had ever been invisible before...except, no, this wasn't an invisible voice, it was just coming from somewhere very far below. The dungeons, maybe? Or was there something below the dungeons? Frankly, he'd never had much reason to look, even though he knew the stories about his father capturing the last of the dragons--he sometimes suspected those were all made up anyway.
But there was a...feeling, a presence, like the mental equivalent of someone tugging on his sleeve, and that voice hadn't sounded particularly happy, so Arthur dragged himself out of bed and started a systematic search of the castle. It had started raining at some point in the night, so he had no moonlight to help him out, but he discovered with a bit of concentration he could conjure a flame about the size of his thumbnail out of thin air to light his way--which was pretty bloody cool, and also slightly terrifying after the near-firestorm in the prince's room (because he still couldn't think of it as Merlin's, not at the moment). Moreover, it was likely to get him beheaded if anyone saw it, and since Arthur had no desire to die a peasant he tried not to conjure the light unless he really, really needed it.
The levels above-ground were quiet, unless you counted the king's snoring and Morgana talking in her sleep; the latter didn't sound particularly happy, but Arthur chalked it up to those nightmares and moved on. It was too late for even the rowdiest of the knights to be slinking up from the lower town and too early for even the most devoted servants to be up, so no one interrupted him as he made his way lower and lower, eventually coming to the mouth of the dungeons, where the guards slept in shifts to deter any late-night jailbreaks. They were playing dice, and it turned out it was just as easy to put out fires as it was to conjure them; Arthur simply extinguished the torches, and while the guards fumbled to protect their winnings or steal someone else's, he slipped past them entirely and felt his way down the tunnel in the dark. He planned to conjure up the flame again, but it turned out to be unnecessary--he found a stack of torches further down the passageway (by stepping in them and nearly falling on his arse).
The upper cells were empty, and so were the lower cells, and so were the lower lower cells, the ones without any windows at all; they hadn't been used in Arthur's memory, and they didn't even have the moldy-straw smell of the others to show that someone had ever been down there. And then there were steps, and passages, and more steps, and a broken gate. And beyond that--
"Finally. Took you long enough."
Arthur found himself standing on a small ledge, overlooking a vast cavern--one big enough to swallow all of the castle, it seemed. And perched on a crag opposite him was an actual, honest, totally-not-made-up dragon. For some reason, his first, blank-brained thought was, It doesn't look a thing like the drawings. Then he realized it was also talking. And that it was talking to him.
"I...you...you're...huh," was about the most intelligent thing Arthur could say for a few minutes. Also, "You're a dragon."
The dragon sighed, narrowing its eyes. "Oh, god, you really are as stupid as they tell me."
"Look, this has not been the best day of my life," Arthur said defensively.
"Nor mine," the dragon snapped. "And things are about to get much worse."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Arthur paused. "Wait a minute, do you know who I am?"
"You are meant to be Prince Arthur Pendragon, the heir to Camelot," the dragon said, and somehow hearing someone else--or, well, something, maybe he wasn't exactly in a frame of mind to debate pronouns--hearing another voice tell him what he already knew let something relax in the back of Arthur's mind that he didn't even know was knotted. "However, a powerful and ancient magic has been put to work that is tearing apart the very fabric of the world."
"You mean how I switched placed with Merlin?" Arthur asked dubiously. He certainly considered that a crisis, but not exactly one of world-tearing proportions.
The dragon nodded. "You must undo this spell and restore the natural order of things, or the consequences will be severe."
"Right," Arthur said. "Got to kill Rowena. Won't be too much of a problem if I wait for her to lean over a candle--"
The dragon made a growly noise, and Arthur was abruptly reminded that it was big enough to swallow him in one bite and he didn't have a sword. "The girl had no idea what she was doing," it declared. "She's as caught up in the effects of the spell as everyone else. It is the rings you need, and Merlin, though the gods only know how you'll manage it."
Arthur put his fist on his hip and tried to look very kingly and severe, in case that would actually work on the dragon. "Just what sort of spell is this, anyway? And why are you and I the only ones unaffected?"
"The ring in your left pocket," the dragon said. "Look at it."
Arthur juggled the torch around--but, yes, he'd been carrying the damn ring around all day. It was an unremarkable ring, silver with a dark red stone that sat on the band like a bead of blood. Its mate--the one Merlin was wearing right now--looked basically the same, though Arthur didn't remember either of them looking so creepy before. "All right, what about it?"
"That ring and its equal are known as Rings of Hermes," the dragon explained. "The inscription on the inside of the band reads, 'A gift from heart to well-match'd heart.'"
"That's lovely," Arthur said, even though it looks like a load of squiggles to him. "What's it mean?"
"The girl believed it was a simple love spell, and that it could be combined with an incantation to steal your heart away. Apparently it's gotten out that that's the only way you'll notice a girl," it added in an undertone.
"What's that supposed to mean?" Arthur demanded.
"Nothing," the dragon said; it may have even coughed, if dragons did that. "The point is, she was hopelessly wrong and yet still had enough power and will to enact the incantation that activated the rings. It just so happened that you and Merlin were both holding them when she did so--ironically, if you're still had both in your posession, nothing would've happened."
"Yes, right, irony is a bitch, let's all have a laugh. So what did happen?"
It paused, either for dramatic effect or to continue irritation the hell out of Arthur. "The Rings of Hermes were not created for love, boy. Originally they were made to allow two people to temporarily experience each other's life--the sort of exchange that you and Merlin have unfortunately undergone--for the purpose of gaining perspective and wisdom. Later, they were sometimes used by the unscrupulous and unworthy for a more permanent change of lifestyle. They proved so dangerous that all were destroyed, or hidden away--at least, as long as there were wizards of sufficient power and moral character to keep an eye out for them."
Arthur mostly ignored the second half of that speech. Experience each other's life...the dreams...the fire..."Are you," he asked. "Are you say Merlin is--that this is--that he--"
"Yessss?" the dragon asked languidly.
Arthur shook his head. He may have even stamped his foot. "Merlin is not a sorcerer."
The dragon stared at him through half-closed eyes. "You've dreamed his life, Arthur--that's the Old Religion trying its best to mend the damage the rings have wrought. You can feel his magic even as we speak."
"He's Merlin, though!" Arthur said. "I mean, he's hopeless! At everything! He couldn't tell a convincing lie to save his life!" He thought suddenly of the afanc's plague and Merlin storming into the council chambers to die in Gwen's place--and remembered, unbidden, as if it had been himself, guilt-wracked and terrified, and Merlin apologizing for him in an embarrassed way--"My god, he can't even tell the truth properly!"
The doubled memories made Arthur's head hurt; so did the laughter of the dragon, but that faded quickly. "Even when the rings were used on common people, with common lives, they caused great damage to the natural order of the world; that's why they were meant to be used temporarily, and why they were later banned. But you have a destiny, Arthur, and not even the Old Religion can alter the stars. Until you and Merlin are back where you belong, the world will continue to fray, and the damage will not be confined to Camelot, or even Albion."
"Wait, destiny?" Arthur asked. "What destiny? And what kind of damage? I mean, I want to put things right as much as you do, but I need a little more information here."
"The damage has already begun," the dragon said, and then it spread out its wings. Arthur would not have called himself any kind of dragon expert, as this was his first, but he was reasonably well-versed in various other animals and he was pretty certain that things with wings ought to be able to, you know, fly. These wings did not look aerodynamic; they were torn and tattered, pocked with holes big enough for a man to crawl through, crusted with at least two different colors of disgustingness--one might be blood, but Arthur had no idea about the other. "I am too old and much too clever to be affected by the magic of the rings, and so the Old Religion must heal the wound in other ways."
"That...does not look good," Arthur said. Then he realized: "Wait a minute, what about me? Why do I still still remember things how they were? I'm not going to get some kind of skin disease, am I?"
The dragon snorted. "No, young Arthur, you will not. Merlin's magic is what protects you--and puts you in gravest danger. The rings can interchange families and histories, but they cannot alter his soul; the best they could do was displace parts of it, in an attempt to preserve things as they were."
"So I've got a bit a Merlin's soul flopping about inside me?" Arthur asked. It wasn't exactly a comfortable thought; for some reason he pictured it in the form of one of those neck scarves, as if it were stuck to the bottom of his boot.
"You have a power you are well-nigh incapable of controlling," the dragon said. "And you'll need to control it; only another warlock can break the spell, Arthur, and for the time being, that warlock is you." It paused. "May all the gods be merciful for that."
"I think I understand now why Father locked you up down here," Arthur grumbled.
The dragon snorted, and flapped its ruined wings in vain for a few minutes; then it looked slightly embarrassed. "If you could just turn around for a moment..."
"Why?" Arthur demanded.
"Turn around," the dragon snapped.
Arthur folded his arms, mindful of the torch. "What are you planning to do behind my back?"
"Turn around!" the dragon roared, spewing a fireball in Arthur's direction--and it said he couldn't control himself? Arthur dove for the floor, but he still didn't miss the dragon toddling weakly off its rock, a tremendous chain clattering behind it, down into the depths of the cave.
"Fine!" he bellowed after it. "Have your dramatic exit scene! See if I care! I hope it's your balls that rot off next!" He continued in this vein for some time, until he was headsore and raw in the throat; the dragon didn't come back, and it was only after Arthur started to trudge back up the stairs that he realized the evil beast hadn't told him how to reverse the spell on the rings.
"Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck," he chanted, all the way up the stairs, pausing only long enough to harass the dungeon guards some more (he may have moved some coins about on the table in the dark, but they deserved it for dicing on duty). At least he knew what was going on now, sort of, but as for what to do about it...and anyway, what did a dragon with moldy wings mean in the long run? How much "damage" could actually--
A clap of thunder, a flash of lightening, and a blood-curdling scream hit in rapid succession, and Arthur didn't have to think twice about following the scream to its source: Morgana's room. "Morgana!" he shouted, pounding on the door while she screamed. "Morgana, let me in!"
He heard glass shatter, and another scream briefly joined the first one; then the door flew open and he was faced with Gwen in only a bed gown, wild-eyed and seemingly strung out on her very last nerve. Morgana was sitting upright in bed, eyes wide open, screaming her fool head off. Through the shattered window behind the screen, Arthur could hear the wind and rain and a succession of small wet thuds that were too dull to be hail and too heavy to be raindrops.
Gwen just stood there, breathing too fast, numb with shock; Arthur tried shaking Morgana, but her body was rigid as wood, and slapping her had no effect. (Though he supposed that he would have the memory of it for future reference, when she tempted him to violence in other, less terrifying circumstances.) "Water," he called to Gwen over the noise. "Throw water on her!"
"The pitcher is empty!" she shouted back. A few curious onlookers were starting to gather in the hallway, though so far nobody was asking what Arthur was doing in a lady's room in the middle of the night. Arthur seized the pitcher from Gwen and went to the broken window, since it sounded loud enough for the pitcher to fill with rainwater in a moment or two.
He went round to the window and froze in place. Half of a frog was twitching on the floor, in a puddle of rain mixed with blood; another frog, mostly intact, was impaled on a splinter of glass. Out in the courtyard, frogs were falling from the sky to splatter dramatically on the paving stones and steps and bannisters.
Morgana suddenly stopped screaming. "Fire," she said in a strange voice that barely sounded like her own. "Fire, and iron, and blood. The stars will go out on Albion."
So that's the kind of damage it means, Arthur thought numbly.
Part Two