Merlin fic: Neither fish nor fowl [2/2]
Title: Neither fish nor fowl
Summary: Trusses of flowers, personalised letters and whole roast chicken had always been sure-fire ways to win a person's heart, at least in Arthur's experience. Merlin's heart, however, was an entirely different story.
Pairing: Merlin/Arthur
Rating: PG-13
Warnings/Spoilers: General references to episodes through S2
Word count: ~11,400
Notes: Many, many thanks to the_muppet and accordingtomel for inspiring the fic and betaing, respectively, and for laughing in all the right places. ♥
[Part 1]
A few days passed without Arthur being able to cultivate any extended interaction with Merlin, as a butchers' brawl in the market had devolved quite badly into a number of civilians sporting new noses and waggly tails, and it took some time for Merlin to get them back to normal.
"Are you sure you don't want me to put just a tiny, little ban on magic?" Arthur asked, when he found Merlin sitting on the steps in the courtyard, looking utterly exhausted as he waved goodbye to the last of the victims.
Merlin smiled up at him. "Yes," he said. "It'll only lead to more problems, I'm sure."
Arthur plopped down on the stair, giving Merlin a light push with his shoulder. "You need a rest."
"I'll turn in early tonight," Merlin said, scrubbing his face with one hand.
"No, I mean a proper rest. When was the last time you visited Ealdor?"
Merlin's eyebrows rose a fraction before drawing together, the corners of his mouth downturned as he tried to remember. He gestured vaguely after a while. "A year, maybe?"
"Well, there you are," said Arthur. "As your king, I order you to take at least a week off to go and see your mother."
"Arthur --"
"I said 'As your king,' Merlin. That makes it an official decree. I will put it down in writing and get one of the knights to proclaim it to you if I have to. There will be trumpets."
"Fine," Merlin groused, though the smile on his face told a much different story.
Arthur pushed himself to a standing position and stretched. "Good. Day after next, then, at first light. See you then; it'll be an excellent outing for the both of us," he said, and scarpered before Merlin could adequately register the fact that Arthur had appointed himself Merlin's travelling companion and houseguest.
In some societies it might have been considered rude, but Hunith had repeatedly told him, from the very first time he'd set foot there, that he was always welcome in her home at any time, and now he was going to hold her to that offer. Besides, the chance to spend some quality alone time with Merlin was too good to pass up; maybe he'd finally be able to hurdle Merlin's walls and get the man to talk to him again, properly.
He spent the next day avoiding Merlin so nobody had a chance to rescind Arthur's invitation to himself, though his feet, rebellious things, tried to lead him up Merlin's tower first thing after lunch; following this, he locked himself up in the throne room with his nice round table and a healthy supply of mead, and set himself to solving all of Camelot's problems at one go. Sir Leon looked in on him from time to time, just to make sure he wasn't accidentally creating more problems instead in the stupor of his self-imposed exile from the rest of the castle -- and once was obliged to come in and listen to him go on at length about a nameless sorcerer who he greatly admired, but otherwise Arthur remained undisturbed.
Night fell, going black and blue all over, and Arthur, having finished restructuring the entire political and economic system, gloated quietly to himself that there had been no sign all day of Merlin trying to get at him to make him stay in Camelot. Perhaps it meant that Merlin was looking forward to having Arthur ride alongside him, although it was similarly possible that, in his newfound regard for minding his manners, Merlin might have just chosen to keep his gob shut about being imposed upon. That didn't seem very like Merlin, though, Arthur decided. He could sire and my lord Arthur all he liked, but in his heart of hearts, Merlin was an impudent, insolent little whelp who didn't like following anyone's orders, and if he truly had a problem with Arthur coming home with him, he'd have engineered a way to make Arthur squirrel out of it by now.
With that happy thought in mind, Arthur's steps were extra sprightly as he made his way back to his chambers. He stripped off his clothing and tucked himself under the blankets, with hope and anticipation his bedfellows.
Just before sunrise, Arthur bounced out of bed again. Lighting a candle, he pattered over to his wardrobe and picked through his vast collection of red tops before eyeing with satisfaction a cornflower blue at the bottom of the pile (Gwen had once told him it was nice because it brought out the colour of his eyes and he'd said, Why in the world would anyone care about that, and that was why Gwen was really the cleverer between them). He dressed quickly and did a mental inventory of all the things he'd ordered to be packed and saddled onto his mount, and whisked out of his chambers, whistling loudly and making a heinous nuisance of himself all down the way to the stables.
Anyone else might have ended up in the stocks for delivering such a blow to music's good name, especially at this ungodly hour, but Arthur, besides being the king, thought it was well within his rights to feel excited for once. He didn't have much to get all aflutter over; most of his life had involved bowing to royal duties, whether it was receiving with a wide smile guests he loathed at his own birthday celebrations, or marrying people to appease other people, or going off to die for Camelot all the time. This trip would be purely for himself -- admittedly, a little selfish, considering he had a whole population to look after, but he'd only be away for a few days, and if his knights didn't know by now how to deal with surprise attacks by miffy dragons and things, then it would make no difference if he was in residence or not.
He had to prod a stablehand awake, and his horse seemed about as eager to ride out as Rowan when set on an errand, but Arthur felt no damper to his spirits. He stroked his mount's nose, and it gave him a sidelong glare, as if already exhausted with him. Merlin had borrowed it recently, to attend to a bit of magic gone awry in one of the south-lying villages, and Arthur clucked his tongue at how swiftly it had switched loyalties and picked up Merlin's demeanour.
The horses were saddled and ready to go in short order, and brought to the courtyard, where servants laded them with the week's worth of clothing and gifts, and various supplies for the journey.
To Arthur's surprise, Rowan had arrived early, looking slack-jawed as usual, to help Merlin with packing his horse. Merlin hovered nearby, a nervous look cast over his face, which Arthur could only ascribe to being anxious about his apprentice dropping half the things and having to reload them repeatedly. Or possibly because Merlin kept having to run back up his tower to fetch things he'd forgotten.
Arthur stood to one side for a while, watching with increased interest as Rowan piled and strapped and hung things on Merlin's chestnut, until it became apparent that the horse would soon buckle. As Merlin was up in his quarters no doubt rooting around for something else he didn't need to carry, Arthur had no choice but to address the apprentice himself.
"Oi, you," he said, in his sternest tones, and strode forward to survey the detritus accumulating atop the poor animal. "What is all this? Are you sure this is all necessary?"
"Dunno," Rowan said, helpful as ever.
Arthur poked around, pulling bundles off as he went; it seemed like the entire contents of Merlin's room, tired of a sedentary lifestyle, had made a great escape en masse downstairs. A bag of loud clinking caught his attention as he pulled at it, and he peered inside; several bottles of sloshy red liquid stared back at him, each labelled in Merlin's hurried scrawl: Vitamyne A.
"What are these for?"
"Dunno," Rowan said again. But being the veritable font of knowledge that he was, he deigned to add, "Master Merlin drinks 'em every night. Some kind of supplemental nutriment." The polysyllabic words were forced out with some great effort, which meant that he'd only heard Merlin saying them and had no idea what he was really talking about.
"Not necessary, then," Arthur deduced. He removed the bag, to the horse's immense relief, and handed it to Rowan, who managed not to fumble it. Before long, the foot of the courtyard steps were littered with a large selection of Merlin's possessions unsuited for the trip, which, incidentally, happened to be most of them.
"Why --" said Merlin, when he returned to find half his luggage discarded.
"Fifteen books, Merlin, really. You won't even have time to read any of them," Arthur said, ushering him forward. "Now, let's get a move on; we're losing daylight as it is."
Amid a flurry of But those are my things and We'll be away for a week, Merlin, not three years, they managed to get themselves astride their horses and on the road eventually, with both of them having given Rowan strict instructions to bring all the leftovers back up to the tower and not to let it all just sit and rot outside (and Arthur had provided extra incentives for good work with mention of a vacancy in the stocks). The start of the journey was silent, due to Merlin challenging himself to pout as long and hard as he could, but the day was bright and lovely, and the trill of songbirds so pretty that Merlin was forced to give up his sulk within ten minutes.
"This is nice," Arthur said, and frowned at himself for having unwittingly turned into a paragon of banality.
"Mm," said Merlin in agreement, his neck craning all over the place to trace the flitter of little birds overhead.
Still yet to surrender his monopoly on insipid conversation, Arthur added, "Bit like old times."
Merlin smiled at the sky, and it shone back at him. "Well, sort of. I mean, when we used to ride out together it was usually because we had to fight something, or find something, or kill something. Couldn't really just amble along and enjoy the scenery," he said, and plucked a leaf off a low twig, twirling its tiny stalk between his fingers.
"Yeah," said Arthur, watching the leaf spin, and felt his heart dance a similar pirouette.
Whether it was destiny or just luck, there was something truly remarkable about how his and Merlin's lives had twined together; there had been countless -- countless -- battles they'd had to endure, within Camelot and without, and death had reached for them at every turn -- that they were even both still alive and well and still by each other's side was almost beyond belief. How could he not love Merlin? The man had been through everything with him and for him. Even if he was fated never to win Merlin's heart, he knew he'd already received more than his fair share of fortune by earning Merlin's loyalty.
"No fights, no quarries; nothing to look forward to but peace and quiet and your mother's cooking," Arthur said, smiling widely to squash down the tragic prospect of never having his affections returned. "This is just -- for us."
Merlin gave him a brilliant smile in return, and it stayed for a second; then, like someone had just come along with a snuffer and capped a candle, the light behind his eyes went out. He looked down his shirtfront, as though expecting to find something there, but only ended up rubbing absently at his chest, a curious look on his face. When he met Arthur's gaze again, a polite smile slotted into place. "Er, what were we just talking about?"
Arthur opened his mouth, but unable to decide whether to berate him for not paying attention or for being the most frustrating man to ever walk the earth, only said, "Nothing important."
He spurred his horse forward so that he rode in front instead, and felt Merlin's eyes burning on him, but did not turn to look back.
By the time they stopped to set up camp for the evening, however, Arthur had regained his good humour; after all, it wasn't Merlin's fault that Arthur was in love with him -- well, actually it was, but Arthur couldn't very well order him to stop being so appealing; besides, with Merlin being such a contrarian, he'd probably just unearth some new way to be extra attractive, and where would Arthur be then? In any case, ignoring him the whole trip was the exact opposite of what he'd set out to accomplish, and Arthur hated not being able to tick things off his to-do lists.
There was a large stream nearby, its icy flow refreshing after a long day in the sun and a bit of a temper. Standing at the edge of the bank while Merlin tied up the horses, Arthur's repeated attempts to snare a fish for their supper proved futile, and Merlin sauntered by, looking amused as he watched. Arthur considered drenching himself in the stream so as to have an excuse to wear less clothing, but decided it wasn't worth being squelchy for the rest of the evening.
"You could help," said Arthur.
"But you're doing so well, my lord," Merlin said, with a hint of laughter in his voice.
"Stop it with the my lords and make yourself useful, sorcerer."
A brown trout flew out of the water at Merlin's command, barely a flick of his wrist -- Merlin rarely had to use spoken words anymore, so potent were his powers now, and Arthur took a brief moment to wonder whether it was a total waste of talent to have Merlin use them to catch dinner, but he was getting sick of standing at the stream looking a fool, and the fish swimming past were starting to look like they were having a bit of a laugh at his expense. He trudged his way back to their camp, shaking his hands of excess water, and gathered up a handful of dry sticks from the ground to add to their firewood pile.
Another slight movement sheared the fish clean of its scales, and Merlin padded over with their catch, a long stick threaded through it, and burst a merry fire to life.
"Lazy," said Arthur, sticking his hands close to its warmth.
Merlin chuckled, turning the fish over the flames. "You wouldn't have dinner if it wasn't for me."
Arthur smiled wanly to himself, and looked straight at Merlin, holding his gaze. "I'd really be lost without you, Merlin," he said, trying to keep his tone light, but he could feel the edge of emotion elbowing its way through.
The fish swayed dangerously; Arthur hadn't imagined the serious sincerity in his own voice after all. Merlin stared with wide, vulnerable eyes, seemingly at a loss, before hastening to his feet. "Here, hold this a minute, will you?" he said tightly, handing the stick to Arthur, and strode over to where he'd stationed the horses.
A deep sigh rumbled out of Arthur's throat at having been stonewalled again. He prodded the fish carelessly and then sucked at a charred finger. There was still a little light in the sky, and he could make out Merlin's silhouette, not far away, riffling through their bags.
"Arthur?" said Merlin, after a few minutes of increasingly frantic searching.
"Yes?" Arthur called back.
Merlin came back into view, approaching the fire. "Er, you wouldn't have happened to see a bag with a lot of little bottles in it, would you?"
"Of red stuff?"
"Yes," Merlin said, with hope.
"Right, your nutritious supplement things?" Arthur picked at the fish, jabbed it in Merlin's direction. "Fish is ready."
"The bag, Arthur?"
"Left it," said Arthur, and at Merlin's horrified expression, thought it better to carry on until the expression went away. He stood, so there'd be less height from which Merlin could lour at him. "Well, look, Merlin, we're only out for a week; we really didn't need to carry all those extra things. Plus, all those bottles -- on top of everything else you'd wanted to bring, you were this close to laming the horse where it stood. And what do you need all that surplus nutrition for, anyway? Don't the cooks feed you well enough? I know your mother certainly will. You're not ill, are you?" he finished, slightly out of breath. With any luck, he'd have laid down enough misdirectional threads for Merlin to get tangled up among them and forget to be angry.
As hoped, Merlin looked a little stunned. "Well," he began slowly, "I'm not ill, not really."
"Not really?" Arthur picked up.
"Not ill," Merlin amended. "I'm fine."
"You're not," Arthur insisted, in the same sort of tones one might shout 'Aha!' upon espying a comrade's feet under a tapestry during hide-and-seek. As this was probably as good an opening as he was going to get to address what had been bothering him, he forged ahead with the relentlessness of a battering ram. There would be time for regrets and offering to pay for the damage later. "You haven't been fine for a while."
Merlin shook his head. "What are you talking about?"
Arthur gestured widely; now that he had an audience, he had no idea where to begin without sounding like an overly sensitive tit, what with the horrendous amount of feelings involved. "You're -- different," he said, which he thought was rather a stupid way to start off. "We never finish half our conversations now because you just -- you go blank and then have to ask me what we were just talking about."
"Oh..." said Merlin, his eyebrows rising a fraction. His mouth twisted downwards as some realisation dawned upon him. "Oh dear."
"Yes, exactly," said Arthur, though he wasn't entirely sure they were oh dearing about the same thing.
"I'm sorry -- about the forgetfulness. I'll be better about it, I promise. Look, the fish is getting cold."
When they'd got themselves all sorted out, Arthur thought, he'd really have to teach Merlin some better diversionary tactics. He waved the stick away; perhaps such jejune distractions worked on amateurs like Rowan, but Arthur was too well-versed in the art to fall for it. There was no time for fish when he was finally making some kind of headway. It would only give Merlin a reason to stop talking, and then they'd end up right back where they'd started, with Merlin closing himself off and Arthur whining and scratching to be let in. "The fish, Merlin," he said, "is immaterial. What do you need that red stuff for, anyway?"
"Erm," said Merlin, toppled off-guard. He glanced at Arthur quickly, a sheen of guilt in his eyes. "It's for my mother. Health tonic, you know."
Arthur screwed his mouth into a frown. Whatever Rowan's myriad faults, there was no reason for the boy to lie to him. "Your apprentice said they were yours."
"He must have been mistaken."
"He said you drink it every day."
Merlin's lips pressed together, probably to stem his regret at having taken Rowan on, useless in every way except when it came to helping Arthur dissolve his lies. Arthur likely wouldn't have even bothered about the bottles had Merlin not made it so plain that there was something significant about them he was trying to keep out of scrutiny.
"Don't worry about it; it's fine, really," he said lightly, like their conversation hadn't just been veering out of his control and Arthur could be put off the scent so easily.
"Merlin."
"Really."
"Merlin."
"Just leave it, Arthur," Merlin said, stalking across the clearing and clearly piqued at having nowhere to hide, though even if he had, it wouldn't have lasted for long, as Arthur had always been very skilled at detecting lumps behind tapestries.
"There," Arthur said, following right behind him, frustration bubbling in his gut and threatening to spill everywhere. "That's what's different. You used to trust me. You used to talk to me. Even when I had no inkling about your sorcery, we had a better friendship than this; I can barely get two sentences out of you now without coming up against a wall. Every time I think I'm getting somewhere, every time you bloody insult me, I think, 'Oh, good, there's Merlin again,' and then you go and smile some vacant smile and call me sire, and it's like we've never met before."
Merlin said nothing, only stared at him, and Arthur wondered if he'd have to repeat the whole thing.
"Look," Arthur said quietly. "Is it something I've done? Have I offended you in some way?"
"Arthur, no."
"Then for god's sake, Merlin, what is it?" he asked, shouting like Merlin was at the other end of his father's council table. He could see why Uther had liked doing this; it was rather cathartic. He shouted some more. "Just bloody tell me what's wrong, and I will fix it."
Merlin opened his mouth, exhaling loudly through it as though pained. He shut his eyes. "I'm in love, Arthur," he said evenly, though a bitter aftertaste tinged the air. "With someone I can't ever have. That's what's wrong."
In his many years of physical training, Arthur had learned the most efficient ways to block blows and parry punches, but he'd never had the distinguished experience of deflecting words that hit so hard it hurt, and what they dislodged from his throat was surprising, even to him. "It's not that lady from the lake, is it?"
That earned him more staring, which was all well and good, as it gave him time to shore up the indifference he'd surely have to display while Merlin talked about being in love with someone else; served him right for prying. His concentration on assembling his features into perfect nonchalance was broken, however, when Merlin barked out a loud, incredulous laugh.
"No," he said, shaking his head like it was ridiculous for the thought to have even occurred to Arthur and worse still for him to have voiced it. "No, that was a lifetime ago, and it never was -- Well, anyway, it's -- mm, never mind."
"Anyway it's what?" Arthur ground out, feeling up for a little bout of self-torture. He'd got himself this far, might as well see it all the way through.
"Anyway," said Merlin, smiling sadly. "Anyway, it's you I've been in love with for years." He laughed again, soundlessly this time, at his shoes, as though he couldn't quite believe he'd found the gall to say such a thing out loud. He pulled at a supple branch, setting it to spring up and down. "Sorry. I really shouldn't have said anything. But you did ask."
Arthur nodded slowly, reeling. "I did."
Merlin turned back towards the fire, and added quietly, over his shoulder, "Don't worry, though, that's what the potion's for. Helps me forget."
Arthur said nothing.
"Reckon I should get another fish? That one's probably gone off a bit by now. Also, you dropped it on the ground."
The sudden about-turn of Merlin's tone, a didactic cheerfulness apropos of some other conversation that didn't exist, snapped Arthur out of his mental freefall, and he came over to stand next to Merlin. The ground beneath his feet felt a lot more solid now; boiled down, what he was dealing with wasn't Merlin being inexplicably distant or untrusting, it was that Merlin was simply being an idiot of the highest order, and that was something Arthur had no trouble with. He had what felt like eons of experience taking Merlin to task for being an idiot; he could fill volumes with it. Everything was going to be all right. Everything was going to be fantastic.
"You could have saved yourself a lot of trouble, you know, if you'd just come to me with this years ago."
Merlin's face twitched, but he busied himself with poking at the fire.
"What would I have done then, you wonder," Arthur went on, feeling obnoxiously happy and also just plain obnoxious. "For starters, I probably could have avoided having all those grubby courtiers falling on top of me. It's not very comfortable breaking other people's falls all the time. Hurt my wrist once, you remember? When Lady Cecily took me down with her?"
"Mm," said Merlin, his face now a mixture of confusion, resignation and relief. The fire received a very enthused stoking.
"Probably still would've had to marry Gwen," Arthur conceded airily, "to shut all the advisors up. But she would've understood. She knows, you know, that I've had my heart set on you long before I was even king."
Merlin froze, a dry branch halfway to the flames. His gaze slowly arced round, disbelief etched all across his features. "Say again?"
Arthur eyed him with mild suspicion. "You had better stop drinking that stuff if you expect to carry on any sort of meaningful conversation with me, Merlin. Whether you prefer the right or left side of the bed, for example. I'm not fussed either way, so long as you don't steal all the blankets."
Merlin matched his look, but his eyes shone. "You're just being a prat now."
"So I am. I suppose you expect me to make it up to you," said Arthur with a wide smile, and pulled Merlin to him.
He had dreamed, once or twice, or maybe one or two hundred times, of kissing Merlin like this, of that sweet effervescence simmering underneath his skin from having Merlin's arms wrapped around him, and it came as something of a surprise that his imagination, which normally served him so well, had been complete rubbish when it came to this. The heat of Merlin's lips searing his, the way his fingers dug into his skin, the warmth and affection that enveloped him -- it was more than he'd ever dared to hope for, and now it was all his. And he hadn't even had to end a chicken for it.
Arthur laughed into the curve of Merlin's smile, and let delirious happiness in.
Summary: Trusses of flowers, personalised letters and whole roast chicken had always been sure-fire ways to win a person's heart, at least in Arthur's experience. Merlin's heart, however, was an entirely different story.
Pairing: Merlin/Arthur
Rating: PG-13
Warnings/Spoilers: General references to episodes through S2
Word count: ~11,400
Notes: Many, many thanks to the_muppet and accordingtomel for inspiring the fic and betaing, respectively, and for laughing in all the right places. ♥
[Part 1]
A few days passed without Arthur being able to cultivate any extended interaction with Merlin, as a butchers' brawl in the market had devolved quite badly into a number of civilians sporting new noses and waggly tails, and it took some time for Merlin to get them back to normal.
"Are you sure you don't want me to put just a tiny, little ban on magic?" Arthur asked, when he found Merlin sitting on the steps in the courtyard, looking utterly exhausted as he waved goodbye to the last of the victims.
Merlin smiled up at him. "Yes," he said. "It'll only lead to more problems, I'm sure."
Arthur plopped down on the stair, giving Merlin a light push with his shoulder. "You need a rest."
"I'll turn in early tonight," Merlin said, scrubbing his face with one hand.
"No, I mean a proper rest. When was the last time you visited Ealdor?"
Merlin's eyebrows rose a fraction before drawing together, the corners of his mouth downturned as he tried to remember. He gestured vaguely after a while. "A year, maybe?"
"Well, there you are," said Arthur. "As your king, I order you to take at least a week off to go and see your mother."
"Arthur --"
"I said 'As your king,' Merlin. That makes it an official decree. I will put it down in writing and get one of the knights to proclaim it to you if I have to. There will be trumpets."
"Fine," Merlin groused, though the smile on his face told a much different story.
Arthur pushed himself to a standing position and stretched. "Good. Day after next, then, at first light. See you then; it'll be an excellent outing for the both of us," he said, and scarpered before Merlin could adequately register the fact that Arthur had appointed himself Merlin's travelling companion and houseguest.
In some societies it might have been considered rude, but Hunith had repeatedly told him, from the very first time he'd set foot there, that he was always welcome in her home at any time, and now he was going to hold her to that offer. Besides, the chance to spend some quality alone time with Merlin was too good to pass up; maybe he'd finally be able to hurdle Merlin's walls and get the man to talk to him again, properly.
He spent the next day avoiding Merlin so nobody had a chance to rescind Arthur's invitation to himself, though his feet, rebellious things, tried to lead him up Merlin's tower first thing after lunch; following this, he locked himself up in the throne room with his nice round table and a healthy supply of mead, and set himself to solving all of Camelot's problems at one go. Sir Leon looked in on him from time to time, just to make sure he wasn't accidentally creating more problems instead in the stupor of his self-imposed exile from the rest of the castle -- and once was obliged to come in and listen to him go on at length about a nameless sorcerer who he greatly admired, but otherwise Arthur remained undisturbed.
Night fell, going black and blue all over, and Arthur, having finished restructuring the entire political and economic system, gloated quietly to himself that there had been no sign all day of Merlin trying to get at him to make him stay in Camelot. Perhaps it meant that Merlin was looking forward to having Arthur ride alongside him, although it was similarly possible that, in his newfound regard for minding his manners, Merlin might have just chosen to keep his gob shut about being imposed upon. That didn't seem very like Merlin, though, Arthur decided. He could sire and my lord Arthur all he liked, but in his heart of hearts, Merlin was an impudent, insolent little whelp who didn't like following anyone's orders, and if he truly had a problem with Arthur coming home with him, he'd have engineered a way to make Arthur squirrel out of it by now.
With that happy thought in mind, Arthur's steps were extra sprightly as he made his way back to his chambers. He stripped off his clothing and tucked himself under the blankets, with hope and anticipation his bedfellows.
Just before sunrise, Arthur bounced out of bed again. Lighting a candle, he pattered over to his wardrobe and picked through his vast collection of red tops before eyeing with satisfaction a cornflower blue at the bottom of the pile (Gwen had once told him it was nice because it brought out the colour of his eyes and he'd said, Why in the world would anyone care about that, and that was why Gwen was really the cleverer between them). He dressed quickly and did a mental inventory of all the things he'd ordered to be packed and saddled onto his mount, and whisked out of his chambers, whistling loudly and making a heinous nuisance of himself all down the way to the stables.
Anyone else might have ended up in the stocks for delivering such a blow to music's good name, especially at this ungodly hour, but Arthur, besides being the king, thought it was well within his rights to feel excited for once. He didn't have much to get all aflutter over; most of his life had involved bowing to royal duties, whether it was receiving with a wide smile guests he loathed at his own birthday celebrations, or marrying people to appease other people, or going off to die for Camelot all the time. This trip would be purely for himself -- admittedly, a little selfish, considering he had a whole population to look after, but he'd only be away for a few days, and if his knights didn't know by now how to deal with surprise attacks by miffy dragons and things, then it would make no difference if he was in residence or not.
He had to prod a stablehand awake, and his horse seemed about as eager to ride out as Rowan when set on an errand, but Arthur felt no damper to his spirits. He stroked his mount's nose, and it gave him a sidelong glare, as if already exhausted with him. Merlin had borrowed it recently, to attend to a bit of magic gone awry in one of the south-lying villages, and Arthur clucked his tongue at how swiftly it had switched loyalties and picked up Merlin's demeanour.
The horses were saddled and ready to go in short order, and brought to the courtyard, where servants laded them with the week's worth of clothing and gifts, and various supplies for the journey.
To Arthur's surprise, Rowan had arrived early, looking slack-jawed as usual, to help Merlin with packing his horse. Merlin hovered nearby, a nervous look cast over his face, which Arthur could only ascribe to being anxious about his apprentice dropping half the things and having to reload them repeatedly. Or possibly because Merlin kept having to run back up his tower to fetch things he'd forgotten.
Arthur stood to one side for a while, watching with increased interest as Rowan piled and strapped and hung things on Merlin's chestnut, until it became apparent that the horse would soon buckle. As Merlin was up in his quarters no doubt rooting around for something else he didn't need to carry, Arthur had no choice but to address the apprentice himself.
"Oi, you," he said, in his sternest tones, and strode forward to survey the detritus accumulating atop the poor animal. "What is all this? Are you sure this is all necessary?"
"Dunno," Rowan said, helpful as ever.
Arthur poked around, pulling bundles off as he went; it seemed like the entire contents of Merlin's room, tired of a sedentary lifestyle, had made a great escape en masse downstairs. A bag of loud clinking caught his attention as he pulled at it, and he peered inside; several bottles of sloshy red liquid stared back at him, each labelled in Merlin's hurried scrawl: Vitamyne A.
"What are these for?"
"Dunno," Rowan said again. But being the veritable font of knowledge that he was, he deigned to add, "Master Merlin drinks 'em every night. Some kind of supplemental nutriment." The polysyllabic words were forced out with some great effort, which meant that he'd only heard Merlin saying them and had no idea what he was really talking about.
"Not necessary, then," Arthur deduced. He removed the bag, to the horse's immense relief, and handed it to Rowan, who managed not to fumble it. Before long, the foot of the courtyard steps were littered with a large selection of Merlin's possessions unsuited for the trip, which, incidentally, happened to be most of them.
"Why --" said Merlin, when he returned to find half his luggage discarded.
"Fifteen books, Merlin, really. You won't even have time to read any of them," Arthur said, ushering him forward. "Now, let's get a move on; we're losing daylight as it is."
Amid a flurry of But those are my things and We'll be away for a week, Merlin, not three years, they managed to get themselves astride their horses and on the road eventually, with both of them having given Rowan strict instructions to bring all the leftovers back up to the tower and not to let it all just sit and rot outside (and Arthur had provided extra incentives for good work with mention of a vacancy in the stocks). The start of the journey was silent, due to Merlin challenging himself to pout as long and hard as he could, but the day was bright and lovely, and the trill of songbirds so pretty that Merlin was forced to give up his sulk within ten minutes.
"This is nice," Arthur said, and frowned at himself for having unwittingly turned into a paragon of banality.
"Mm," said Merlin in agreement, his neck craning all over the place to trace the flitter of little birds overhead.
Still yet to surrender his monopoly on insipid conversation, Arthur added, "Bit like old times."
Merlin smiled at the sky, and it shone back at him. "Well, sort of. I mean, when we used to ride out together it was usually because we had to fight something, or find something, or kill something. Couldn't really just amble along and enjoy the scenery," he said, and plucked a leaf off a low twig, twirling its tiny stalk between his fingers.
"Yeah," said Arthur, watching the leaf spin, and felt his heart dance a similar pirouette.
Whether it was destiny or just luck, there was something truly remarkable about how his and Merlin's lives had twined together; there had been countless -- countless -- battles they'd had to endure, within Camelot and without, and death had reached for them at every turn -- that they were even both still alive and well and still by each other's side was almost beyond belief. How could he not love Merlin? The man had been through everything with him and for him. Even if he was fated never to win Merlin's heart, he knew he'd already received more than his fair share of fortune by earning Merlin's loyalty.
"No fights, no quarries; nothing to look forward to but peace and quiet and your mother's cooking," Arthur said, smiling widely to squash down the tragic prospect of never having his affections returned. "This is just -- for us."
Merlin gave him a brilliant smile in return, and it stayed for a second; then, like someone had just come along with a snuffer and capped a candle, the light behind his eyes went out. He looked down his shirtfront, as though expecting to find something there, but only ended up rubbing absently at his chest, a curious look on his face. When he met Arthur's gaze again, a polite smile slotted into place. "Er, what were we just talking about?"
Arthur opened his mouth, but unable to decide whether to berate him for not paying attention or for being the most frustrating man to ever walk the earth, only said, "Nothing important."
He spurred his horse forward so that he rode in front instead, and felt Merlin's eyes burning on him, but did not turn to look back.
By the time they stopped to set up camp for the evening, however, Arthur had regained his good humour; after all, it wasn't Merlin's fault that Arthur was in love with him -- well, actually it was, but Arthur couldn't very well order him to stop being so appealing; besides, with Merlin being such a contrarian, he'd probably just unearth some new way to be extra attractive, and where would Arthur be then? In any case, ignoring him the whole trip was the exact opposite of what he'd set out to accomplish, and Arthur hated not being able to tick things off his to-do lists.
There was a large stream nearby, its icy flow refreshing after a long day in the sun and a bit of a temper. Standing at the edge of the bank while Merlin tied up the horses, Arthur's repeated attempts to snare a fish for their supper proved futile, and Merlin sauntered by, looking amused as he watched. Arthur considered drenching himself in the stream so as to have an excuse to wear less clothing, but decided it wasn't worth being squelchy for the rest of the evening.
"You could help," said Arthur.
"But you're doing so well, my lord," Merlin said, with a hint of laughter in his voice.
"Stop it with the my lords and make yourself useful, sorcerer."
A brown trout flew out of the water at Merlin's command, barely a flick of his wrist -- Merlin rarely had to use spoken words anymore, so potent were his powers now, and Arthur took a brief moment to wonder whether it was a total waste of talent to have Merlin use them to catch dinner, but he was getting sick of standing at the stream looking a fool, and the fish swimming past were starting to look like they were having a bit of a laugh at his expense. He trudged his way back to their camp, shaking his hands of excess water, and gathered up a handful of dry sticks from the ground to add to their firewood pile.
Another slight movement sheared the fish clean of its scales, and Merlin padded over with their catch, a long stick threaded through it, and burst a merry fire to life.
"Lazy," said Arthur, sticking his hands close to its warmth.
Merlin chuckled, turning the fish over the flames. "You wouldn't have dinner if it wasn't for me."
Arthur smiled wanly to himself, and looked straight at Merlin, holding his gaze. "I'd really be lost without you, Merlin," he said, trying to keep his tone light, but he could feel the edge of emotion elbowing its way through.
The fish swayed dangerously; Arthur hadn't imagined the serious sincerity in his own voice after all. Merlin stared with wide, vulnerable eyes, seemingly at a loss, before hastening to his feet. "Here, hold this a minute, will you?" he said tightly, handing the stick to Arthur, and strode over to where he'd stationed the horses.
A deep sigh rumbled out of Arthur's throat at having been stonewalled again. He prodded the fish carelessly and then sucked at a charred finger. There was still a little light in the sky, and he could make out Merlin's silhouette, not far away, riffling through their bags.
"Arthur?" said Merlin, after a few minutes of increasingly frantic searching.
"Yes?" Arthur called back.
Merlin came back into view, approaching the fire. "Er, you wouldn't have happened to see a bag with a lot of little bottles in it, would you?"
"Of red stuff?"
"Yes," Merlin said, with hope.
"Right, your nutritious supplement things?" Arthur picked at the fish, jabbed it in Merlin's direction. "Fish is ready."
"The bag, Arthur?"
"Left it," said Arthur, and at Merlin's horrified expression, thought it better to carry on until the expression went away. He stood, so there'd be less height from which Merlin could lour at him. "Well, look, Merlin, we're only out for a week; we really didn't need to carry all those extra things. Plus, all those bottles -- on top of everything else you'd wanted to bring, you were this close to laming the horse where it stood. And what do you need all that surplus nutrition for, anyway? Don't the cooks feed you well enough? I know your mother certainly will. You're not ill, are you?" he finished, slightly out of breath. With any luck, he'd have laid down enough misdirectional threads for Merlin to get tangled up among them and forget to be angry.
As hoped, Merlin looked a little stunned. "Well," he began slowly, "I'm not ill, not really."
"Not really?" Arthur picked up.
"Not ill," Merlin amended. "I'm fine."
"You're not," Arthur insisted, in the same sort of tones one might shout 'Aha!' upon espying a comrade's feet under a tapestry during hide-and-seek. As this was probably as good an opening as he was going to get to address what had been bothering him, he forged ahead with the relentlessness of a battering ram. There would be time for regrets and offering to pay for the damage later. "You haven't been fine for a while."
Merlin shook his head. "What are you talking about?"
Arthur gestured widely; now that he had an audience, he had no idea where to begin without sounding like an overly sensitive tit, what with the horrendous amount of feelings involved. "You're -- different," he said, which he thought was rather a stupid way to start off. "We never finish half our conversations now because you just -- you go blank and then have to ask me what we were just talking about."
"Oh..." said Merlin, his eyebrows rising a fraction. His mouth twisted downwards as some realisation dawned upon him. "Oh dear."
"Yes, exactly," said Arthur, though he wasn't entirely sure they were oh dearing about the same thing.
"I'm sorry -- about the forgetfulness. I'll be better about it, I promise. Look, the fish is getting cold."
When they'd got themselves all sorted out, Arthur thought, he'd really have to teach Merlin some better diversionary tactics. He waved the stick away; perhaps such jejune distractions worked on amateurs like Rowan, but Arthur was too well-versed in the art to fall for it. There was no time for fish when he was finally making some kind of headway. It would only give Merlin a reason to stop talking, and then they'd end up right back where they'd started, with Merlin closing himself off and Arthur whining and scratching to be let in. "The fish, Merlin," he said, "is immaterial. What do you need that red stuff for, anyway?"
"Erm," said Merlin, toppled off-guard. He glanced at Arthur quickly, a sheen of guilt in his eyes. "It's for my mother. Health tonic, you know."
Arthur screwed his mouth into a frown. Whatever Rowan's myriad faults, there was no reason for the boy to lie to him. "Your apprentice said they were yours."
"He must have been mistaken."
"He said you drink it every day."
Merlin's lips pressed together, probably to stem his regret at having taken Rowan on, useless in every way except when it came to helping Arthur dissolve his lies. Arthur likely wouldn't have even bothered about the bottles had Merlin not made it so plain that there was something significant about them he was trying to keep out of scrutiny.
"Don't worry about it; it's fine, really," he said lightly, like their conversation hadn't just been veering out of his control and Arthur could be put off the scent so easily.
"Merlin."
"Really."
"Merlin."
"Just leave it, Arthur," Merlin said, stalking across the clearing and clearly piqued at having nowhere to hide, though even if he had, it wouldn't have lasted for long, as Arthur had always been very skilled at detecting lumps behind tapestries.
"There," Arthur said, following right behind him, frustration bubbling in his gut and threatening to spill everywhere. "That's what's different. You used to trust me. You used to talk to me. Even when I had no inkling about your sorcery, we had a better friendship than this; I can barely get two sentences out of you now without coming up against a wall. Every time I think I'm getting somewhere, every time you bloody insult me, I think, 'Oh, good, there's Merlin again,' and then you go and smile some vacant smile and call me sire, and it's like we've never met before."
Merlin said nothing, only stared at him, and Arthur wondered if he'd have to repeat the whole thing.
"Look," Arthur said quietly. "Is it something I've done? Have I offended you in some way?"
"Arthur, no."
"Then for god's sake, Merlin, what is it?" he asked, shouting like Merlin was at the other end of his father's council table. He could see why Uther had liked doing this; it was rather cathartic. He shouted some more. "Just bloody tell me what's wrong, and I will fix it."
Merlin opened his mouth, exhaling loudly through it as though pained. He shut his eyes. "I'm in love, Arthur," he said evenly, though a bitter aftertaste tinged the air. "With someone I can't ever have. That's what's wrong."
In his many years of physical training, Arthur had learned the most efficient ways to block blows and parry punches, but he'd never had the distinguished experience of deflecting words that hit so hard it hurt, and what they dislodged from his throat was surprising, even to him. "It's not that lady from the lake, is it?"
That earned him more staring, which was all well and good, as it gave him time to shore up the indifference he'd surely have to display while Merlin talked about being in love with someone else; served him right for prying. His concentration on assembling his features into perfect nonchalance was broken, however, when Merlin barked out a loud, incredulous laugh.
"No," he said, shaking his head like it was ridiculous for the thought to have even occurred to Arthur and worse still for him to have voiced it. "No, that was a lifetime ago, and it never was -- Well, anyway, it's -- mm, never mind."
"Anyway it's what?" Arthur ground out, feeling up for a little bout of self-torture. He'd got himself this far, might as well see it all the way through.
"Anyway," said Merlin, smiling sadly. "Anyway, it's you I've been in love with for years." He laughed again, soundlessly this time, at his shoes, as though he couldn't quite believe he'd found the gall to say such a thing out loud. He pulled at a supple branch, setting it to spring up and down. "Sorry. I really shouldn't have said anything. But you did ask."
Arthur nodded slowly, reeling. "I did."
Merlin turned back towards the fire, and added quietly, over his shoulder, "Don't worry, though, that's what the potion's for. Helps me forget."
Arthur said nothing.
"Reckon I should get another fish? That one's probably gone off a bit by now. Also, you dropped it on the ground."
The sudden about-turn of Merlin's tone, a didactic cheerfulness apropos of some other conversation that didn't exist, snapped Arthur out of his mental freefall, and he came over to stand next to Merlin. The ground beneath his feet felt a lot more solid now; boiled down, what he was dealing with wasn't Merlin being inexplicably distant or untrusting, it was that Merlin was simply being an idiot of the highest order, and that was something Arthur had no trouble with. He had what felt like eons of experience taking Merlin to task for being an idiot; he could fill volumes with it. Everything was going to be all right. Everything was going to be fantastic.
"You could have saved yourself a lot of trouble, you know, if you'd just come to me with this years ago."
Merlin's face twitched, but he busied himself with poking at the fire.
"What would I have done then, you wonder," Arthur went on, feeling obnoxiously happy and also just plain obnoxious. "For starters, I probably could have avoided having all those grubby courtiers falling on top of me. It's not very comfortable breaking other people's falls all the time. Hurt my wrist once, you remember? When Lady Cecily took me down with her?"
"Mm," said Merlin, his face now a mixture of confusion, resignation and relief. The fire received a very enthused stoking.
"Probably still would've had to marry Gwen," Arthur conceded airily, "to shut all the advisors up. But she would've understood. She knows, you know, that I've had my heart set on you long before I was even king."
Merlin froze, a dry branch halfway to the flames. His gaze slowly arced round, disbelief etched all across his features. "Say again?"
Arthur eyed him with mild suspicion. "You had better stop drinking that stuff if you expect to carry on any sort of meaningful conversation with me, Merlin. Whether you prefer the right or left side of the bed, for example. I'm not fussed either way, so long as you don't steal all the blankets."
Merlin matched his look, but his eyes shone. "You're just being a prat now."
"So I am. I suppose you expect me to make it up to you," said Arthur with a wide smile, and pulled Merlin to him.
He had dreamed, once or twice, or maybe one or two hundred times, of kissing Merlin like this, of that sweet effervescence simmering underneath his skin from having Merlin's arms wrapped around him, and it came as something of a surprise that his imagination, which normally served him so well, had been complete rubbish when it came to this. The heat of Merlin's lips searing his, the way his fingers dug into his skin, the warmth and affection that enveloped him -- it was more than he'd ever dared to hope for, and now it was all his. And he hadn't even had to end a chicken for it.
Arthur laughed into the curve of Merlin's smile, and let delirious happiness in.