LC2: Entry 9A: Outside the Lines
Title: Outside the Lines
Theme word/s: Portrait
Author: eurydice72
Rating: PG13
Word count: 10,048 (9A: 6658)
Characters/Pairings: Arthur/Gwen, Merlin
Warnings: None
Disclaimer: Not mine no matter how nicely I ask.
Summary: Though she just considers him a friend, Arthur has been in love with Gwen practically since meeting her through Merlin, but an impromptu gift sparks changes for all of their lives that none of them could have ever imagined.
Author’s notes: N/A
Mod Note: This fic is split between two posts, 9A & 9B - make sure you read all of it :D
Hundreds of feet had trampled the field, leaving packed ruts for new browsers to avoid as they wandered up and down the rows of vehicles. A Saturday boot sale was not Arthur’s idea of a good time, but he had been the one to agree to drive, as well as insisted when reports warned of morning storms.
“What if it starts tipping down?” Gwen had asked on her front step, frowning up at the sullen sky.
“That’s what the brolly’s for.”
Merlin held his tongue. Wise man. The last thing Arthur wanted was for Gwen to suss out he only subjected himself to the sales for her sake.
They walked a few yards behind, presumably not to distract Gwen from finding her treasures, but really because it allowed Arthur to watch her to his heart’s content. He had met her three years earlier when he and Merlin had been thrown together in a political history course at uni. Since Merlin and Gwen were a package deal, friends since childhood, Arthur became her friend, too. She wasn’t in school, though. She’d opted to try and make a living off her handcrafted silver jewelry, and for the most part, she did. When bills got tight, she took odd jobs from their wide circle of friends until she was caught up.
In all his sheltered, public school upbringing, Arthur had never known anyone like her. She fascinated him more than any woman he had ever met.
And yet, as far as she was concerned, he was just another friend.
The boot sales gave Gwen both inspiration and materials to work with, without breaking her meager bank account. When she stopped to look at some vintage jewelry, he and Merlin did, too.
“What do you think?”
Gwen had a large pendant draped over her arm to display its thick chain. Merlin wrinkled his nose.
“Awful.”
“He’s asking pennies for it.”
“Because it’s awful.”
With a sigh, she turned back to the table and set it back down. Arthur slapped Merlin in the arm with a scowl, ignoring his petulant grimace to step up to Gwen’s side.
“There must be something else here that you like.” Scanning the table, he immediately settled on a silver cuff, thick and slightly tarnished, with a filigree edging and small red stones in a curved design at its center. When he picked it up, the metal was warm, almost hot to the touch, but the heat was seductive rather than off-putting. “What about this?”
Gwen tilted her head to better look at the piece. Strands of her hair tickled across his arm, and his head filled with the delicate scent of her perfume. “It’s beautiful, but I could never melt it down or rework it. It’s better the way it is.”
“So don’t. Just keep it for yourself.”
“Oh, no. It’s much too expensive.”
He glanced at the small tag hanging from the filigree. ₤25. A lot more than Gwen usually paid for pieces, but hardly prohibitive. “So I’ll buy it for you.”
Behind them, Merlin suddenly had a coughing fit. Gwen frowned at him for a moment before shaking her head at Arthur. “I can’t.”
“Just see what it looks like on.” Before she could say no, he grasped her hand and pulled her arm straight to slip the cuff onto her slim wrist. Next to her dusky skin, the silver seemed to take on a fresh bloom, gleaming like it was new. Even the red stones deepened in hue.
Her soft sigh was almost a caress. A smile curved her lips as she traced the scalloped edge. “It’s gorgeous.”
“We’re getting it.” He had his wallet out and the notes in hand before she could protest, passing them over to the grizzled man behind the table.
“Arthur-”
“It’s done.”
Her eyes searched his, so he held still and let her look to her heart’s content. Would she see how much he cared for her? Would it frighten her away, or maybe, would she understand his feelings because she might feel a measure of the same?
“Why?”
He shivered at the gentleness of her tone. This was it. This was his chance to come clean and tell her everything. Her frown was back, and he could choose to kiss away the tension in her mouth, but that required more bravery than he could muster beyond the nerve it had taken to buy her such a personal gift.
He took a deep breath. “Because you spend all your energy making beautiful things for others. How often do you get to have something for yourself? I can afford it, so why not let me do this for you, Gwen?”
She clearly wanted to argue some more, but her eyes dropped to her wrist again, her fingers resuming their hypnotic stroking. “It’s too generous, but…thank you. I’ll treasure it.”
“You’re-” His breath caught as she stretched to brush a kiss across his cheek. He was frozen in place when she turned around and headed farther down the line of tables.
Merlin came up to his side. “Idiot,” he muttered.
Merlin’s assessment pulled Arthur out of his fugue. “What? She loved it.”
“You should’ve told her.”
He didn’t need Merlin to tell him the obvious. “It’s better this way.”
“For who?”
Good question. “Oh, shut it.”
“I’m just saying.”
“Don’t.”
His eyes were drawn to where Gwen had stopped at another display, a figure of such unconscious beauty he sometimes felt like he couldn’t breathe for the sight of her. It had been the ideal opportunity, and he’d blown it.
Merlin sighed. “Idiot.”
* * *
Shutting the door behind her, Gwen leaned against the heavy wood and closed her eyes. She adored the boot sale runs with Arthur and Merlin, but more and more, they were harder to take, especially when Arthur pulled another of his too-generous stunts. He was always paying for things, from meals to petrol to small gifts. The money meant nothing to him-he’d never had to worry about paying his bills or buying groceries-but when the present ended up being something as beautiful and intimate as the bracelet, Gwen feared he’d see what they really did to her.
They were friends. Good friends. Each one of them would do anything for any of the others. But where she saw Merlin as a surrogate brother, Arthur was different. He was the golden boy, too good-looking for his own good, oddly aloof and companionable all at the same time. He hadn’t known what to do with her when Merlin first introduced them, and it had amused her to introduce him to her way of life. To the working class pubs and the artisan fairs, the whimsical underground galleries and the cafes with questionable sanitation practices. He’d teased her a little, but all in all, been such a good sport about her motley lifestyle, she’d fallen a little in love with him.
But it was the scorching attraction he held that really did her in.
Her hand went to the cuff she still wore, replaying the moments when he’d put it on her. He didn’t always have such an uncanny eye for picking out what she liked, but the magic of this particular gift erased all previous misfires. Something about it had called to her, but its price tag had put her off. Then Arthur had swooped in. So typical of him. She’d been so overwhelmed by the bracelet-by him-she’d impulsively kissed him.
Her lips burned from the memory, as much as the cuff did against her arm. She would do nothing to erase either sensation any time soon. She’d been foolhardy, yes, but sometimes the risk was worth it. She’d have fuel for fantasies for months now.
With a sigh, she pushed away from the door and dropped her small bag of goodies onto the couch. She’d planned to spend the rest of the day working, but nothing from her stash was inspiring her as much as the cuff was. She would never deface or mar it. Instead, she had the urge to dig out her sketchpad and draw for a while. Though she wasn’t nearly as good with pencils and paint as she was with metalwork, it filled a need for her that her jewelry couldn’t always satisfy. Today felt like one of those days.
* * *
“Huh.”
Arthur glanced away from the telly to see Merlin standing in the doorway of the kitchen, his phone in his hand. “What?”
“Gwen’s not picking up.”
“Maybe she’s in the loo.”
“I tried three times.”
“So maybe she ran out to the shops.”
Merlin arched a brow. “This is Gwen. Plus, we had plans. It’s not like her to forget.”
Arthur scooped up his phone from the coffee table. “Let me try.”
“Your phone works the same as mine.”
“Yes, but she’ll see it’s from me and not have to pretend she’d rather get a root canal than pick up.” Grinning, he ducked to avoid Merlin’s phone hurtling through the air toward his head, but inwardly, he was worried. Merlin was right. Gwen wasn’t the type to blow off a meeting without at least letting them know she wouldn’t be there. But as he listened to the rings on the other end of the line drone on, he realized that this time, she had.
Merlin flopped down on the couch next to him and snatched up the remote. “Her loss, I guess.”
Arthur was slower to set down his phone. “You don’t think we should go check on her?”
“And have her laugh at us for acting like a couple of girls? Nah. Her battery’s probably dead, or she’s got it on mute, or something daft like that. She’ll show up here any minute. You’ll see.”
He let it go, because Merlin was letting it go, but as they bickered over what to watch, a vague sense of unease settled in Arthur’s gut.
Five hours later, when Gwen had still not shown up and a final call put them through to her voicemail again, it was a solid lump.
* * *
Her eyes burned. Watery sunlight trickled in through the nets, but even that made her squint as she tossed the sketchpad down and stretched. Something in her neck cracked. What time was it? She had no idea. Morning by the looks of it. She wasn’t sure where the night had gone at all.
Gwen rubbed at the crustiness at the inside corners of her eyelids. She needed tea. Scalding hot to wake her up and help her get past the fact that she’d somehow failed to get to bed. She had things to do, people to-
Merlin and Arthur!
Scrambling up, she searched frantically for her phone. The early morning hour it displayed mocked her, but worse was the numerous missed calls from both men. She called Merlin first, but when it went to voicemail, she babbled her apology to it instead.
“I’m so sorry. I don’t know what got into me last night. I was working on something, and I swear, I didn’t even hear the phone ring. Stupid bloody thing. I knew I should’ve got the new one when I had the extra money last month. But I’ll make it up to you, I promise. Both of you. Call me.” She started to disconnect, but decided to add one more, “Sorry!”
Arthur was next, but his didn’t even ring. She left the same message, though a little more composed because she didn’t need him to think she was an even bigger flake than she was. When she was done, she tossed it aside and buried her face in the couch cushion.
“Bugger.”
Adrenaline had done more to wake her up than tea ever would. Rising, she stuffed her phone into her pocket, just in case either of them called back. She wouldn’t miss them again. Her pad sat discarded on the floor, but when she picked it up, her eye was drawn to the dark lines she’d scribbled over night.
The pad was full. Each page held a similar drawing, the back of a woman’s head. It was tilted to the side, almost in anticipation of exposing her profile, but the clumsy shadings did little justice to how Gwen imagined her hair would be. It should’ve been rich and lustrous. Under Gwen’s hand, it felt sparse and sallow. Each sketch was the same, devoid of passion, of life.
What a waste. She could’ve spent the evening with the two people in the world who meant the most to her. All she had to show for it were poorly rendered drawings of a woman that was more ephemeral than real.
She’d take a shower, then head over to Merlin’s. If he wasn’t home, she’d use her key to get in and clean the flat from top to bottom as a surprise. She could even throw something together for dinner to make it up to him.
Her mind made up, she dropped the pad in the rubbish and marched to the bathroom. She began peeling off her clothes along the way, but when her fingers slid over the warm silver cuff, a small shock shivered through her.
Gwen faltered.
She glanced back at the bin.
Giving up on it now would be a waste of an entire night. She wouldn’t have worked so diligently if it wasn’t for a purpose. Merlin would accept her apology as it was, and Arthur already found her entire artistic process amusing.
One more attempt couldn’t do any harm.
She had to rummage around for another sketchpad. When she curled up in the corner of her favorite chair again, however, the blank page stared up at her. Her pencil rested awkwardly in her hand, too, like it didn’t fit, like she didn’t understand how to work it. Frowning, she rolled it between her fingers, testing its weight. It slipped free, and she snatched to grab it with her other hand before it fell to the ground.
Her hesitation disappeared. The dull tip of her pencil flew in swift, sure curves across the paper. The strokes felt different, but she dismissed that as drawing with her non-dominant hand.
It never occurred to her until much, much later that the weight of the cuff on that arm might have added to it, too.
* * *
A day stuck in some of the driest, dullest meetings he’d ever been forced to sit through prevented Merlin from checking his messages until he was packing up to head home. The first he noticed was Gwen, and her rambling, almost skittish apology had him smiling before he’d finished logging off his laptop.
The subsequent calls from Arthur, however, weren’t quite as engaging.
“Did you hear from Gwen? Did she sound odd to you?”
“Where are you? You never have your phone off this long.”
“Gwen’s not picking up again. Let’s go buy her a new phone and take it over tonight.”
“If you’re not answering because you don’t want to pay for the thing, just say so.”
The latest had been left half an hour earlier. Merlin dialed Arthur’s number as he tucked his laptop into its case.
“A bit impatient, are we?”
Arthur sighed. “Did you hear the way she sounded?”
“She sounded the way she always does.”
“She was talking like that squirrel from Hoodwinked.”
He chuckled. “It wasn’t as bad as all that. She was flustered, that’s all.”
“What about the fact that she hasn’t returned any of my calls today?”
“Her phone’s obviously broken. Have you picked up a new one yet?”
“Oh. I hadn’t thought of that. I’ll run into a Vodafone and meet you there.”
Arthur disconnected before Merlin could tell him he was only joking. For Arthur, though, it was serious business. How Gwen hadn’t figured out his feelings for her by now, Merlin had no idea.
An hour later, he rounded the corner of Gwen’s street. Arthur sat on her front step, a Vodafone carrier bag dangling from his fingers. At the sight of Merlin, he hopped up.
“She’s not answering the door.”
The glib response he would’ve given died at the look on Arthur’s face. The last time Arthur had seemed this worried was when Gwen had to go to A&E with a nasty burn from her soldering iron. He’d ignored everyone’s assurances that she would be fine, and then scolded her mercilessly to be more careful.
“You couldn’t have called me to save me the trip?”
Arthur shuffled back and forth on his feet. “I was hoping you’d use her spare key to let us in.”
“Gwen would kill us.”
“Then she should’ve answered one of our calls.”
“She’s probably at the store.”
“We won’t stick around.” He rattled the bag. “We’ll put the phone somewhere she won’t miss it, write a note telling her to use it, then leave.”
Merlin didn’t believe for a second that Arthur would let it go at that, but he also knew Arthur wouldn’t budge from her step if Merlin didn’t agree to this plan. Gwen would be annoyed they’d used her key for such a frivolous reason, especially without her prior knowledge, but they’d find some way to smooth her ruffled feathers. She could never stay mad at either one of them for long.
“Promise me we’re out of there as soon as we write the note.”
Arthur brightened at the prospect of getting his way. “Absolutely.”
Though Arthur allowed Merlin to approach first, he still crowded close, nudging with the bag, a foot, an elbow, as Merlin wiggled the key in the sticky lock. The bolt finally gave, and Arthur reached past him to flat-hand the door open. He fairly knocked Merlin out of his way to be the first to enter.
Merlin rolled his eyes. Until Arthur’s “Gwen!” jolted him to the same haste.
The scene that greeted him turned his blood to ice. Drawing paper was strewn everywhere, on the floor, on the furniture, even peeking out from under the couch. From what he could tell at a quick glance, each pencil sketch was almost identical to the next-a woman’s head and shoulders as they would appear from the back.
But then he looked closer. They were different. Because little by little, page by page, the woman was turning around.
When Gwen had run out of paper, she’d moved to the magnolia walls. Bold strokes revealed a stunning profile, full lips smeared with a surprising scarlet hue, a fine nose tilted like a coquette’s. Each became sharper, more realistic, climbing around and behind obstacles until they reached the doorframe of the kitchen. By that point, he could almost meet the woman’s eyes. More color had been added as they were revealed, a glittering, seductive green.
They drew him across the gap, ready to drink in the next portrait. A couple sweeps of black hinted where it had originated, but there it ended. The wall seemed to have melted. Reds and blacks and greens and golds had bled down its surface, pooling into a sludge at the baseboards. It still looked wet.
And crumpled on the floor in front of it was Gwen.
Arthur cradled her in his arms, pushing her hair away from her face. Her skin was ashen, and she wore the same clothes from their boot sale run. Pencil dust mottled the front of her shirt, while her fingertips were stained from the various paints she’d used on the walls.
“Call 999.” Arthur’s anxious voice brooked no argument, though this time, Merlin whole-heartedly agreed with him. “She’s burning up.”
As Merlin made the call, Arthur rocked her back and forth, murmuring the entire time. If Gwen came out of this all right-when, he hastily corrected, when she came out of it-he didn’t think Arthur would be able to go back pretending he didn’t have stronger feelings for her.
Merlin snapped his phone shut and crouched down on Gwen’s other side. “How’s her pulse?”
“Too fast.” He lifted his bleak gaze. “What the hell happened here?”
He looked as helpless as Merlin felt. “I have no idea.”
“Did Gwen do all this?”
“She must’ve.”
“But she hates drawing. She’s always complained it’s too limiting.”
He wondered how Gwen would react if she knew how well Arthur really understood her. There was no time to respond, though. Gwen stirred in Arthur’s arms.
“Gwen?” Arthur cupped her cheek, steadying her neck. “Come on, luv. Talk to me.”
She moaned. The muscles at the corners of her mouth pinched. Her lips were dry and cracked.
“Gwen?” Merlin tried. “An ambulance is on its way.” If she was cognizant at all, she’d protest. She hated being a burden.
No more sounds. They held their breath, waiting.
Arthur was the first to break the silence. “How are we going to explain what happened?”
“We don’t. We can’t.”
“But-”
Gwen moaned again. Her lashes fluttered. When they opened, Merlin forgot about the portraits and the explanations and the paint bleeding down the wall.
Instead of their usual warm brown, Gwen’s eyes glimmered gold.
Her lips moved, but the words she uttered were too low to be clear. Both men leaned in.
“What was that?” Arthur asked.
She swiped her tongue over her lower lip and tried again. “Morgana. She’s back.”
* * *
Arthur paced back and forth in front of the locked doors that led into the heart of A&E. It was as close to Gwen as they’d allow him. So what if he wasn’t family? All she had was her troublemaking brother who couldn’t last more than a few months at a single address without being forced to move on. Arthur and Merlin were all she had. The doctors should have taken that into consideration, but no, here he was, stuck in the waiting room with a gaggle of people annoying him more and more by the minute. He couldn’t even bribe his way past the admitting nurse to sneak into the back and find Gwen on his own.
“Is that actually doing any good?” Merlin commented with a tip of a brow.
Arthur glared at him without stopping. “They have to open that door sooner or later.”
“When Gwen’s ready.”
“She needs us.”
“Unless you picked up a medical degree I don’t know about, she needs the doctors more.”
Arthur grunted in frustration and pivoted to pace away from him. Merlin hadn’t budged from the neon-orange plastic seat he’d taken at their arrival, except to run once to the loo. Arthur envied his calm. He could always be counted on in a crisis, whereas Arthur was better at forging ahead. Chained back like this drove him mad, even when he knew it was necessary.
“What do you know about this Morgana she mentioned?” Neither one of them had brought up the subject of Gwen’s brief episode before she’d passed out again. Arthur’s focus had been on Gwen, not some unknown woman. “Is she an old friend or something?”
Merlin shook his head. “First I’ve ever heard of her.”
The way he said it, though…carefully nonchalant, a glance away from Arthur at the last second. Arthur wanted to press, but something told him he’d hit a wall head-on if he did.
But there was more than one way to get past an obstacle.
“I wonder if she’s the woman in all the pictures. That didn’t look like anybody I’ve seen Gwen hanging around with.”
“I don’t know. Could be.”
“She could’ve hired Gwen.”
“To draw her portrait on Gwen’s wall?” Merlin grimaced. “That’s a ridiculous theory.”
“Do you have a better one?”
He paused. Too long. Arthur barely managed not to pounce on it. “Not really.”
“Well, whoever she is, she’s stunning.”
“You think so?”
His back had been to Merlin for his surprised question, but he turned in time to see the flash of emotion that flickered across Merlin’s face before he donned his mask again. An odd mixture. Anger. Frustration. A little bit of lust. An even smaller dose of pity. Proof enough for Arthur to know something was going on there, something Merlin didn’t want to share.
Oddly, that hurt. As much as his fear for Gwen.
“Don’t you?” he countered. He folded his arms over his chest and squared off with Merlin, daring him to continue the half-truths to his face.
Merlin shrugged. “I guess. I was too worried about what might’ve happened to give it much notice.”
So had Arthur, but he didn’t miss the passive-aggressive stab at his conscience. “Has Gwen ever done anything like that before?”
“She’s always drawn.”
“That’s not what I mean.”
“But she’s done the series work, too. Remember the bathing nudes she did for that collector in Uxbridge?”
He did, all too well. She’d created six sculptures in total, of a woman in a bath from infancy to old age. She’d used her own body as a model for two of them. Arthur had hated the collector for having access to even a faulty representation of Gwen’s bare body when he wanted it all for himself.
“It’s probably just some new job she got,” Merlin continued. “She didn’t have time to tell us about it, and she got so wrapped up in what she was doing that she lost track of time.”
“Why would she paint her walls? Only nutters do that.”
As soon as the words came out, he regretted them. Gwen wasn’t nuts, but something was clearly going on with her. A fever that had her hallucinating? Had somebody visited and slipped her some drugs? Those were the only logical explanations, especially in light of this Morgana she claimed was back.
Perhaps Morgana wasn’t the woman in the picture, but the woman responsible for Gwen’s strange actions. She could’ve been the one to spike her drink or food. That would explain it all.
“I’m sure the doctors will be able to tell us what’s going on,” Merlin said.
Arthur cast a dark glance back at the doors. “If they ever decide to come out of there.”
It took another fifty minutes for that to happen, almost an hour of more pacing and more arguing and no more answers and Arthur well and truly thought he was going to explode by the time the door swung open and a nurse beckoned them to follow her. He leapt forward, crowding behind her as Merlin double-timed to get to his side. He almost knocked her over when she led them to a small room.
Gwen was on the lone bed, an IV hooked up to her arm. Another monitor beeped in time to her heart, its wire disappearing beneath the hospital gown she wore. Her eyes were shut when they walked in but as they came around the curtain and stood next to the bed, they fluttered open.
Their usual brown. A knot in Arthur’s stomach eased.
“How do you feel?” he asked before she could speak.
Her nose scrunched up into the cutest moue. “More than a little foolish.”
“Don’t. You should’ve rung as soon as you thought something was wrong.”
“That’s just it. I…” Her gaze flickered to Merlin, the final protest dying on her tongue. Arthur was accustomed to seeing them exchange some silent understanding-years of friendship did that to people-but the look that passed between them was different than anything he’d seen before. More, if that made any sense. It made it clear he was the odd man out here, and the sudden irrational certainty that Gwen and Merlin had developed feelings for each other that weren’t just friendship reared its ugly head.
“It’s good to see you awake,” Merlin said with a soft smile.
“I’m sorry I worried you. It all seems so silly.”
“It’s not,” Arthur assured. He braved resting his hand on hers, but when he saw the mark on her wrist, he hissed and drew back. “What the hell…?”
Gwen followed his line of sight and grimaced. “Oh. That. It’s from the bracelet you bought. The doctors think I might’ve had an allergic reaction to it.”
That was a burn mark branding her skin exactly where the cuff had been-exact shape, exact contour. The edges were red and enflamed, and the design had been etched into her arm in slivery lines. Gwen didn’t seem to be in pain from it, but they probably had her on pain meds. It looked awful. His arm ached just from the sight of it.
His heart ached even more. Because that meant all of this was his fault. Buying her the bracelet had made her sick, and now she might even have a scar to remind her of the whole ordeal and his thoughtlessness.
Good work, you idiot.
Merlin pushed past Arthur to pick up her hand and more carefully examine the burn. Gwen laid there patiently, but she watched Merlin with just as much intent. Arthur retreated another step.
“Did they have to cut it off?” Merlin asked.
Gwen shook her head. “It just slipped off. Which is a little funny considering it kept getting stuck when I tried to do it.”
“When did you try?” It was important for Arthur to know. Maybe all the blame didn’t have to be laid at his doorstep. “When you were still at home?”
“I…” Her gaze jumped between them, and the fact that she kept going back to Merlin rather than meet Arthur’s for more than a moment spoke volumes. “I’m not sure.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Merlin said. Giving her a small smile, he gently rested her hand back on top of the blankets. “The good news is that it’s off, if that’s what was causing all the trouble.”
“Arthur…” At the sound of his name on her tongue, his senses heightened, only to be dashed again when she added, “Could you go ask one of the nurses if I could have some water? I’m so thirsty.”
What was he going to do, say no? Even though a blind man could see what Gwen was doing.
So he put on his best smile, agreed to get whatever she needed, and walked out.
He left the door slightly ajar behind him and stood off to the side out of their view. Sure enough, as soon as he was gone, they started.
“Tell me you remember,” Gwen whispered.
“I do. God, I don’t know how, but I do.”
“Does Arthur?”
“I don’t think so. He kept asking me about Morgana in the waiting room.”
“But he bought the bracelet.”
“He bought that because he wanted you to have it. No other reason.”
“Oh, God…” She sounded stricken. “I remember all of it, Merlin. Not just the good times. He’s going to hate me when he finds out.”
“Arthur could never hate you.”
“But I hurt him so badly.”
“That wasn’t you, Gwen. Not really.”
“If it wasn’t us, then why is she back? Why now?”
“I don’t know. Are you sure it was Morgana?”
“You saw the pictures.”
“What made you paint them?”
“I think it was the bracelet. I think…I think it was hers.”
“Did she say anything to you? Anything at all?”
“Not really. She just…smiled down at me, like I was some kind of pet that had done a good trick or something. I thought she was going to pat me on the head for a moment. And then she said thank you and disappeared.”
“She’s here for Arthur.” Merlin sounded grim. “It’s always been about Arthur.”
The back of his eyes throbbed. He knew he shouldn’t have eavesdropped, but clearly they weren’t going to talk to him. And why? Who was this woman? Why did Gwen think he could ever hate her? Had something happened between her and Merlin that they’d never told him about?
Except she used the past tense, not the present or future. Like she’d hurt him before in some deep, wrenching way he could never forgive. That was impossible. She never had, and he was hard pressed to think of anything that she could even do now that would turn his feelings for her so sharply.
He almost marched back in to demand some answers, but the near certainty they’d stonewall him again held him in place. Until he had something concrete, he had to rely upon himself to figure it out.
She’s here for Arthur.
Or this Morgana they were so determined to pretend they didn’t know.
* * *
The last thing she wanted was to stay in hospital overnight, but the doctors were insistent, and she was too tired to argue effectively. Arthur and Merlin promised to return in the morning and hopefully help her escape their medical clutches, so she finally resigned herself to sleeping in a ward that smelled of antiseptic with a nurse coming in every couple hours to check her vitals.
Sleep was difficult. Every time she closed her eyes, she saw those portraits, the wall coming to life as Morgana had stepped out of the plaster like one of Michelangelo’s uncompleted statues breaking free of its marble. That was when the memories had started.
Standing behind Morgana at her vanity table, brushing through her silken hair in long strokes in preparation for one of Uther’s feasts.
Standing on the parapet with a shawl wrapped around her shoulders, waiting for Arthur to return from battle.
Standing at Arthur’s side in the throne room, doing everything in her power not to glance toward Lancelot.
Tears pricked her eyes when she thought of how she’d hurt Arthur. She tried to banish thoughts of Lancelot completely, but he was entwined with everything that had happened at Camelot, part of the roots incapable of being excised. He had been the one to learn of that final battle, of Morgana’s plan to ruin Arthur once and for all with the wrath of that druid boy she’d raised. He had been the one to ride off to warn Merlin, leaving Guinevere alone to fear for all the men she loved.
None of them had come back. She’d wept for months after she learned of how they had fallen.
She didn’t want the memories. She liked her life. She wanted to adore Arthur from afar and laugh with Merlin and create her art like she’d always done. That girl who’d fallen in love with her husband’s favored knight…Gwen didn’t know her. She couldn’t fathom splitting her loyalties like that. But now that the knowledge had returned, she couldn’t separate it out, either. Because they had all found each other again, loved each other again. It was real, even though it seemed too ridiculous to be true.
Arthur would despise her when he remembered, too. As well he probably should.
But what purpose did Morgana have coming back? Why uproot everything like this? Simple revenge? Wasn’t killing Arthur the first time enough?
Did she intend on doing it again?
Frantic, Gwen reached for the call button, struggling to sit up against all the tubes and wires. The nurse arrived just as she was getting to a seated position, but instead of ask what she needed, the nurse took Gwen by the shoulders and firmly pushed her back down.
“None of that now,” she chided. “You need some proper rest.”
“I need to go home.”
“Not tonight, you don’t. Doctor’s orders.”
She wasn’t strong enough to overpower the nurse. Getting out wasn’t an option yet. “I need to call someone, then. It’s urgent.”
“It’s the middle of the night, dearie.”
“He won’t mind. Please.” Her mind raced for some lie she could feed the nurse that would allow her the phone call. The only thing she could come up with was, “It’s my dog. He’ll be tearing my flat apart if somebody doesn’t get over there. Please. I just want to call and ask my friend to check on him.”
The nurse seemed unsure, her frown masking her face in shadows. “You can’t use mobiles in here, not with all the equipment.”
“So could I just dial out on the ward phone?” One hung on the wall behind the nurse. The cord could easily reach Gwen’s bed. “It’s not long distance, and I promise I’ll keep it short.”
Though her insides were crawling with anxiety, she kept her voice and features as reasonable as possible. The nurse needed to trust her to be talking sense, even though she was positive that if she told the truth, they’d have her committed.
“Two minutes.” The nurse picked up the receiver and passed it over, her other hand poised over the touchpad. “What’s the number?”
Gwen rattled off Merlin’s mobile. Though she waited for the nurse to leave, the woman didn’t budge an inch. Two minutes was all she was going to get. Supervised, at that.
“Hello?”
His voice was wary, but alert. She hadn’t woken him. Unsurprising considering the events of the day.
“Hi, it’s me.”
“Gwen! Are you all right?”
“Yeah, I’m fine. I’m sorry to be calling so late.” She glanced at the nurse, weighing her next words. “I don’t suppose Arthur’s with you, is he?”
“No, he went home after we left you. We’re going to meet up for breakfast before coming to pick you up.”
“I’m worried about him.”
“Don’t be. He’s probably sleeping.”
“You’re not.”
“That’s because I’m trying to put all this together. Arthur doesn’t remember anything. I tried feeling him out when we left hospital, but he’s still drawing a blank.”
If he didn’t remember anything, he had no defenses against Morgana. She could attack him and he’d never see it coming.
“He can’t be alone right now. You have to go over there.”
“He’ll start asking questions if I just pop around without a reason.”
“So make one up. You have to do this. For me, please, Merlin?”
He sighed. “All right. But I can’t lie to him for much longer. I’ve had enough of that already.”
“Whatever it takes.” The nurse was tapping her foot in impatience. “Look, I have to go. You’ll take care of him?”
“I will. I promise.” He paused. “We love you, you know that, right, Gwen?”
She gripped the receiver until her knuckles hurt. “I know.” At least, until Arthur found out the whole story. “Thank you.”
After she passed the phone back, she collapsed against her pillows and closed her eyes. She’d done all she could for now.
It would have to do.
* * *
Continued Here
Theme word/s: Portrait
Author: eurydice72
Rating: PG13
Word count: 10,048 (9A: 6658)
Characters/Pairings: Arthur/Gwen, Merlin
Warnings: None
Disclaimer: Not mine no matter how nicely I ask.
Summary: Though she just considers him a friend, Arthur has been in love with Gwen practically since meeting her through Merlin, but an impromptu gift sparks changes for all of their lives that none of them could have ever imagined.
Author’s notes: N/A
Mod Note: This fic is split between two posts, 9A & 9B - make sure you read all of it :D
Hundreds of feet had trampled the field, leaving packed ruts for new browsers to avoid as they wandered up and down the rows of vehicles. A Saturday boot sale was not Arthur’s idea of a good time, but he had been the one to agree to drive, as well as insisted when reports warned of morning storms.
“What if it starts tipping down?” Gwen had asked on her front step, frowning up at the sullen sky.
“That’s what the brolly’s for.”
Merlin held his tongue. Wise man. The last thing Arthur wanted was for Gwen to suss out he only subjected himself to the sales for her sake.
They walked a few yards behind, presumably not to distract Gwen from finding her treasures, but really because it allowed Arthur to watch her to his heart’s content. He had met her three years earlier when he and Merlin had been thrown together in a political history course at uni. Since Merlin and Gwen were a package deal, friends since childhood, Arthur became her friend, too. She wasn’t in school, though. She’d opted to try and make a living off her handcrafted silver jewelry, and for the most part, she did. When bills got tight, she took odd jobs from their wide circle of friends until she was caught up.
In all his sheltered, public school upbringing, Arthur had never known anyone like her. She fascinated him more than any woman he had ever met.
And yet, as far as she was concerned, he was just another friend.
The boot sales gave Gwen both inspiration and materials to work with, without breaking her meager bank account. When she stopped to look at some vintage jewelry, he and Merlin did, too.
“What do you think?”
Gwen had a large pendant draped over her arm to display its thick chain. Merlin wrinkled his nose.
“Awful.”
“He’s asking pennies for it.”
“Because it’s awful.”
With a sigh, she turned back to the table and set it back down. Arthur slapped Merlin in the arm with a scowl, ignoring his petulant grimace to step up to Gwen’s side.
“There must be something else here that you like.” Scanning the table, he immediately settled on a silver cuff, thick and slightly tarnished, with a filigree edging and small red stones in a curved design at its center. When he picked it up, the metal was warm, almost hot to the touch, but the heat was seductive rather than off-putting. “What about this?”
Gwen tilted her head to better look at the piece. Strands of her hair tickled across his arm, and his head filled with the delicate scent of her perfume. “It’s beautiful, but I could never melt it down or rework it. It’s better the way it is.”
“So don’t. Just keep it for yourself.”
“Oh, no. It’s much too expensive.”
He glanced at the small tag hanging from the filigree. ₤25. A lot more than Gwen usually paid for pieces, but hardly prohibitive. “So I’ll buy it for you.”
Behind them, Merlin suddenly had a coughing fit. Gwen frowned at him for a moment before shaking her head at Arthur. “I can’t.”
“Just see what it looks like on.” Before she could say no, he grasped her hand and pulled her arm straight to slip the cuff onto her slim wrist. Next to her dusky skin, the silver seemed to take on a fresh bloom, gleaming like it was new. Even the red stones deepened in hue.
Her soft sigh was almost a caress. A smile curved her lips as she traced the scalloped edge. “It’s gorgeous.”
“We’re getting it.” He had his wallet out and the notes in hand before she could protest, passing them over to the grizzled man behind the table.
“Arthur-”
“It’s done.”
Her eyes searched his, so he held still and let her look to her heart’s content. Would she see how much he cared for her? Would it frighten her away, or maybe, would she understand his feelings because she might feel a measure of the same?
“Why?”
He shivered at the gentleness of her tone. This was it. This was his chance to come clean and tell her everything. Her frown was back, and he could choose to kiss away the tension in her mouth, but that required more bravery than he could muster beyond the nerve it had taken to buy her such a personal gift.
He took a deep breath. “Because you spend all your energy making beautiful things for others. How often do you get to have something for yourself? I can afford it, so why not let me do this for you, Gwen?”
She clearly wanted to argue some more, but her eyes dropped to her wrist again, her fingers resuming their hypnotic stroking. “It’s too generous, but…thank you. I’ll treasure it.”
“You’re-” His breath caught as she stretched to brush a kiss across his cheek. He was frozen in place when she turned around and headed farther down the line of tables.
Merlin came up to his side. “Idiot,” he muttered.
Merlin’s assessment pulled Arthur out of his fugue. “What? She loved it.”
“You should’ve told her.”
He didn’t need Merlin to tell him the obvious. “It’s better this way.”
“For who?”
Good question. “Oh, shut it.”
“I’m just saying.”
“Don’t.”
His eyes were drawn to where Gwen had stopped at another display, a figure of such unconscious beauty he sometimes felt like he couldn’t breathe for the sight of her. It had been the ideal opportunity, and he’d blown it.
Merlin sighed. “Idiot.”
* * *
Shutting the door behind her, Gwen leaned against the heavy wood and closed her eyes. She adored the boot sale runs with Arthur and Merlin, but more and more, they were harder to take, especially when Arthur pulled another of his too-generous stunts. He was always paying for things, from meals to petrol to small gifts. The money meant nothing to him-he’d never had to worry about paying his bills or buying groceries-but when the present ended up being something as beautiful and intimate as the bracelet, Gwen feared he’d see what they really did to her.
They were friends. Good friends. Each one of them would do anything for any of the others. But where she saw Merlin as a surrogate brother, Arthur was different. He was the golden boy, too good-looking for his own good, oddly aloof and companionable all at the same time. He hadn’t known what to do with her when Merlin first introduced them, and it had amused her to introduce him to her way of life. To the working class pubs and the artisan fairs, the whimsical underground galleries and the cafes with questionable sanitation practices. He’d teased her a little, but all in all, been such a good sport about her motley lifestyle, she’d fallen a little in love with him.
But it was the scorching attraction he held that really did her in.
Her hand went to the cuff she still wore, replaying the moments when he’d put it on her. He didn’t always have such an uncanny eye for picking out what she liked, but the magic of this particular gift erased all previous misfires. Something about it had called to her, but its price tag had put her off. Then Arthur had swooped in. So typical of him. She’d been so overwhelmed by the bracelet-by him-she’d impulsively kissed him.
Her lips burned from the memory, as much as the cuff did against her arm. She would do nothing to erase either sensation any time soon. She’d been foolhardy, yes, but sometimes the risk was worth it. She’d have fuel for fantasies for months now.
With a sigh, she pushed away from the door and dropped her small bag of goodies onto the couch. She’d planned to spend the rest of the day working, but nothing from her stash was inspiring her as much as the cuff was. She would never deface or mar it. Instead, she had the urge to dig out her sketchpad and draw for a while. Though she wasn’t nearly as good with pencils and paint as she was with metalwork, it filled a need for her that her jewelry couldn’t always satisfy. Today felt like one of those days.
* * *
“Huh.”
Arthur glanced away from the telly to see Merlin standing in the doorway of the kitchen, his phone in his hand. “What?”
“Gwen’s not picking up.”
“Maybe she’s in the loo.”
“I tried three times.”
“So maybe she ran out to the shops.”
Merlin arched a brow. “This is Gwen. Plus, we had plans. It’s not like her to forget.”
Arthur scooped up his phone from the coffee table. “Let me try.”
“Your phone works the same as mine.”
“Yes, but she’ll see it’s from me and not have to pretend she’d rather get a root canal than pick up.” Grinning, he ducked to avoid Merlin’s phone hurtling through the air toward his head, but inwardly, he was worried. Merlin was right. Gwen wasn’t the type to blow off a meeting without at least letting them know she wouldn’t be there. But as he listened to the rings on the other end of the line drone on, he realized that this time, she had.
Merlin flopped down on the couch next to him and snatched up the remote. “Her loss, I guess.”
Arthur was slower to set down his phone. “You don’t think we should go check on her?”
“And have her laugh at us for acting like a couple of girls? Nah. Her battery’s probably dead, or she’s got it on mute, or something daft like that. She’ll show up here any minute. You’ll see.”
He let it go, because Merlin was letting it go, but as they bickered over what to watch, a vague sense of unease settled in Arthur’s gut.
Five hours later, when Gwen had still not shown up and a final call put them through to her voicemail again, it was a solid lump.
* * *
Her eyes burned. Watery sunlight trickled in through the nets, but even that made her squint as she tossed the sketchpad down and stretched. Something in her neck cracked. What time was it? She had no idea. Morning by the looks of it. She wasn’t sure where the night had gone at all.
Gwen rubbed at the crustiness at the inside corners of her eyelids. She needed tea. Scalding hot to wake her up and help her get past the fact that she’d somehow failed to get to bed. She had things to do, people to-
Merlin and Arthur!
Scrambling up, she searched frantically for her phone. The early morning hour it displayed mocked her, but worse was the numerous missed calls from both men. She called Merlin first, but when it went to voicemail, she babbled her apology to it instead.
“I’m so sorry. I don’t know what got into me last night. I was working on something, and I swear, I didn’t even hear the phone ring. Stupid bloody thing. I knew I should’ve got the new one when I had the extra money last month. But I’ll make it up to you, I promise. Both of you. Call me.” She started to disconnect, but decided to add one more, “Sorry!”
Arthur was next, but his didn’t even ring. She left the same message, though a little more composed because she didn’t need him to think she was an even bigger flake than she was. When she was done, she tossed it aside and buried her face in the couch cushion.
“Bugger.”
Adrenaline had done more to wake her up than tea ever would. Rising, she stuffed her phone into her pocket, just in case either of them called back. She wouldn’t miss them again. Her pad sat discarded on the floor, but when she picked it up, her eye was drawn to the dark lines she’d scribbled over night.
The pad was full. Each page held a similar drawing, the back of a woman’s head. It was tilted to the side, almost in anticipation of exposing her profile, but the clumsy shadings did little justice to how Gwen imagined her hair would be. It should’ve been rich and lustrous. Under Gwen’s hand, it felt sparse and sallow. Each sketch was the same, devoid of passion, of life.
What a waste. She could’ve spent the evening with the two people in the world who meant the most to her. All she had to show for it were poorly rendered drawings of a woman that was more ephemeral than real.
She’d take a shower, then head over to Merlin’s. If he wasn’t home, she’d use her key to get in and clean the flat from top to bottom as a surprise. She could even throw something together for dinner to make it up to him.
Her mind made up, she dropped the pad in the rubbish and marched to the bathroom. She began peeling off her clothes along the way, but when her fingers slid over the warm silver cuff, a small shock shivered through her.
Gwen faltered.
She glanced back at the bin.
Giving up on it now would be a waste of an entire night. She wouldn’t have worked so diligently if it wasn’t for a purpose. Merlin would accept her apology as it was, and Arthur already found her entire artistic process amusing.
One more attempt couldn’t do any harm.
She had to rummage around for another sketchpad. When she curled up in the corner of her favorite chair again, however, the blank page stared up at her. Her pencil rested awkwardly in her hand, too, like it didn’t fit, like she didn’t understand how to work it. Frowning, she rolled it between her fingers, testing its weight. It slipped free, and she snatched to grab it with her other hand before it fell to the ground.
Her hesitation disappeared. The dull tip of her pencil flew in swift, sure curves across the paper. The strokes felt different, but she dismissed that as drawing with her non-dominant hand.
It never occurred to her until much, much later that the weight of the cuff on that arm might have added to it, too.
* * *
A day stuck in some of the driest, dullest meetings he’d ever been forced to sit through prevented Merlin from checking his messages until he was packing up to head home. The first he noticed was Gwen, and her rambling, almost skittish apology had him smiling before he’d finished logging off his laptop.
The subsequent calls from Arthur, however, weren’t quite as engaging.
“Did you hear from Gwen? Did she sound odd to you?”
“Where are you? You never have your phone off this long.”
“Gwen’s not picking up again. Let’s go buy her a new phone and take it over tonight.”
“If you’re not answering because you don’t want to pay for the thing, just say so.”
The latest had been left half an hour earlier. Merlin dialed Arthur’s number as he tucked his laptop into its case.
“A bit impatient, are we?”
Arthur sighed. “Did you hear the way she sounded?”
“She sounded the way she always does.”
“She was talking like that squirrel from Hoodwinked.”
He chuckled. “It wasn’t as bad as all that. She was flustered, that’s all.”
“What about the fact that she hasn’t returned any of my calls today?”
“Her phone’s obviously broken. Have you picked up a new one yet?”
“Oh. I hadn’t thought of that. I’ll run into a Vodafone and meet you there.”
Arthur disconnected before Merlin could tell him he was only joking. For Arthur, though, it was serious business. How Gwen hadn’t figured out his feelings for her by now, Merlin had no idea.
An hour later, he rounded the corner of Gwen’s street. Arthur sat on her front step, a Vodafone carrier bag dangling from his fingers. At the sight of Merlin, he hopped up.
“She’s not answering the door.”
The glib response he would’ve given died at the look on Arthur’s face. The last time Arthur had seemed this worried was when Gwen had to go to A&E with a nasty burn from her soldering iron. He’d ignored everyone’s assurances that she would be fine, and then scolded her mercilessly to be more careful.
“You couldn’t have called me to save me the trip?”
Arthur shuffled back and forth on his feet. “I was hoping you’d use her spare key to let us in.”
“Gwen would kill us.”
“Then she should’ve answered one of our calls.”
“She’s probably at the store.”
“We won’t stick around.” He rattled the bag. “We’ll put the phone somewhere she won’t miss it, write a note telling her to use it, then leave.”
Merlin didn’t believe for a second that Arthur would let it go at that, but he also knew Arthur wouldn’t budge from her step if Merlin didn’t agree to this plan. Gwen would be annoyed they’d used her key for such a frivolous reason, especially without her prior knowledge, but they’d find some way to smooth her ruffled feathers. She could never stay mad at either one of them for long.
“Promise me we’re out of there as soon as we write the note.”
Arthur brightened at the prospect of getting his way. “Absolutely.”
Though Arthur allowed Merlin to approach first, he still crowded close, nudging with the bag, a foot, an elbow, as Merlin wiggled the key in the sticky lock. The bolt finally gave, and Arthur reached past him to flat-hand the door open. He fairly knocked Merlin out of his way to be the first to enter.
Merlin rolled his eyes. Until Arthur’s “Gwen!” jolted him to the same haste.
The scene that greeted him turned his blood to ice. Drawing paper was strewn everywhere, on the floor, on the furniture, even peeking out from under the couch. From what he could tell at a quick glance, each pencil sketch was almost identical to the next-a woman’s head and shoulders as they would appear from the back.
But then he looked closer. They were different. Because little by little, page by page, the woman was turning around.
When Gwen had run out of paper, she’d moved to the magnolia walls. Bold strokes revealed a stunning profile, full lips smeared with a surprising scarlet hue, a fine nose tilted like a coquette’s. Each became sharper, more realistic, climbing around and behind obstacles until they reached the doorframe of the kitchen. By that point, he could almost meet the woman’s eyes. More color had been added as they were revealed, a glittering, seductive green.
They drew him across the gap, ready to drink in the next portrait. A couple sweeps of black hinted where it had originated, but there it ended. The wall seemed to have melted. Reds and blacks and greens and golds had bled down its surface, pooling into a sludge at the baseboards. It still looked wet.
And crumpled on the floor in front of it was Gwen.
Arthur cradled her in his arms, pushing her hair away from her face. Her skin was ashen, and she wore the same clothes from their boot sale run. Pencil dust mottled the front of her shirt, while her fingertips were stained from the various paints she’d used on the walls.
“Call 999.” Arthur’s anxious voice brooked no argument, though this time, Merlin whole-heartedly agreed with him. “She’s burning up.”
As Merlin made the call, Arthur rocked her back and forth, murmuring the entire time. If Gwen came out of this all right-when, he hastily corrected, when she came out of it-he didn’t think Arthur would be able to go back pretending he didn’t have stronger feelings for her.
Merlin snapped his phone shut and crouched down on Gwen’s other side. “How’s her pulse?”
“Too fast.” He lifted his bleak gaze. “What the hell happened here?”
He looked as helpless as Merlin felt. “I have no idea.”
“Did Gwen do all this?”
“She must’ve.”
“But she hates drawing. She’s always complained it’s too limiting.”
He wondered how Gwen would react if she knew how well Arthur really understood her. There was no time to respond, though. Gwen stirred in Arthur’s arms.
“Gwen?” Arthur cupped her cheek, steadying her neck. “Come on, luv. Talk to me.”
She moaned. The muscles at the corners of her mouth pinched. Her lips were dry and cracked.
“Gwen?” Merlin tried. “An ambulance is on its way.” If she was cognizant at all, she’d protest. She hated being a burden.
No more sounds. They held their breath, waiting.
Arthur was the first to break the silence. “How are we going to explain what happened?”
“We don’t. We can’t.”
“But-”
Gwen moaned again. Her lashes fluttered. When they opened, Merlin forgot about the portraits and the explanations and the paint bleeding down the wall.
Instead of their usual warm brown, Gwen’s eyes glimmered gold.
Her lips moved, but the words she uttered were too low to be clear. Both men leaned in.
“What was that?” Arthur asked.
She swiped her tongue over her lower lip and tried again. “Morgana. She’s back.”
* * *
Arthur paced back and forth in front of the locked doors that led into the heart of A&E. It was as close to Gwen as they’d allow him. So what if he wasn’t family? All she had was her troublemaking brother who couldn’t last more than a few months at a single address without being forced to move on. Arthur and Merlin were all she had. The doctors should have taken that into consideration, but no, here he was, stuck in the waiting room with a gaggle of people annoying him more and more by the minute. He couldn’t even bribe his way past the admitting nurse to sneak into the back and find Gwen on his own.
“Is that actually doing any good?” Merlin commented with a tip of a brow.
Arthur glared at him without stopping. “They have to open that door sooner or later.”
“When Gwen’s ready.”
“She needs us.”
“Unless you picked up a medical degree I don’t know about, she needs the doctors more.”
Arthur grunted in frustration and pivoted to pace away from him. Merlin hadn’t budged from the neon-orange plastic seat he’d taken at their arrival, except to run once to the loo. Arthur envied his calm. He could always be counted on in a crisis, whereas Arthur was better at forging ahead. Chained back like this drove him mad, even when he knew it was necessary.
“What do you know about this Morgana she mentioned?” Neither one of them had brought up the subject of Gwen’s brief episode before she’d passed out again. Arthur’s focus had been on Gwen, not some unknown woman. “Is she an old friend or something?”
Merlin shook his head. “First I’ve ever heard of her.”
The way he said it, though…carefully nonchalant, a glance away from Arthur at the last second. Arthur wanted to press, but something told him he’d hit a wall head-on if he did.
But there was more than one way to get past an obstacle.
“I wonder if she’s the woman in all the pictures. That didn’t look like anybody I’ve seen Gwen hanging around with.”
“I don’t know. Could be.”
“She could’ve hired Gwen.”
“To draw her portrait on Gwen’s wall?” Merlin grimaced. “That’s a ridiculous theory.”
“Do you have a better one?”
He paused. Too long. Arthur barely managed not to pounce on it. “Not really.”
“Well, whoever she is, she’s stunning.”
“You think so?”
His back had been to Merlin for his surprised question, but he turned in time to see the flash of emotion that flickered across Merlin’s face before he donned his mask again. An odd mixture. Anger. Frustration. A little bit of lust. An even smaller dose of pity. Proof enough for Arthur to know something was going on there, something Merlin didn’t want to share.
Oddly, that hurt. As much as his fear for Gwen.
“Don’t you?” he countered. He folded his arms over his chest and squared off with Merlin, daring him to continue the half-truths to his face.
Merlin shrugged. “I guess. I was too worried about what might’ve happened to give it much notice.”
So had Arthur, but he didn’t miss the passive-aggressive stab at his conscience. “Has Gwen ever done anything like that before?”
“She’s always drawn.”
“That’s not what I mean.”
“But she’s done the series work, too. Remember the bathing nudes she did for that collector in Uxbridge?”
He did, all too well. She’d created six sculptures in total, of a woman in a bath from infancy to old age. She’d used her own body as a model for two of them. Arthur had hated the collector for having access to even a faulty representation of Gwen’s bare body when he wanted it all for himself.
“It’s probably just some new job she got,” Merlin continued. “She didn’t have time to tell us about it, and she got so wrapped up in what she was doing that she lost track of time.”
“Why would she paint her walls? Only nutters do that.”
As soon as the words came out, he regretted them. Gwen wasn’t nuts, but something was clearly going on with her. A fever that had her hallucinating? Had somebody visited and slipped her some drugs? Those were the only logical explanations, especially in light of this Morgana she claimed was back.
Perhaps Morgana wasn’t the woman in the picture, but the woman responsible for Gwen’s strange actions. She could’ve been the one to spike her drink or food. That would explain it all.
“I’m sure the doctors will be able to tell us what’s going on,” Merlin said.
Arthur cast a dark glance back at the doors. “If they ever decide to come out of there.”
It took another fifty minutes for that to happen, almost an hour of more pacing and more arguing and no more answers and Arthur well and truly thought he was going to explode by the time the door swung open and a nurse beckoned them to follow her. He leapt forward, crowding behind her as Merlin double-timed to get to his side. He almost knocked her over when she led them to a small room.
Gwen was on the lone bed, an IV hooked up to her arm. Another monitor beeped in time to her heart, its wire disappearing beneath the hospital gown she wore. Her eyes were shut when they walked in but as they came around the curtain and stood next to the bed, they fluttered open.
Their usual brown. A knot in Arthur’s stomach eased.
“How do you feel?” he asked before she could speak.
Her nose scrunched up into the cutest moue. “More than a little foolish.”
“Don’t. You should’ve rung as soon as you thought something was wrong.”
“That’s just it. I…” Her gaze flickered to Merlin, the final protest dying on her tongue. Arthur was accustomed to seeing them exchange some silent understanding-years of friendship did that to people-but the look that passed between them was different than anything he’d seen before. More, if that made any sense. It made it clear he was the odd man out here, and the sudden irrational certainty that Gwen and Merlin had developed feelings for each other that weren’t just friendship reared its ugly head.
“It’s good to see you awake,” Merlin said with a soft smile.
“I’m sorry I worried you. It all seems so silly.”
“It’s not,” Arthur assured. He braved resting his hand on hers, but when he saw the mark on her wrist, he hissed and drew back. “What the hell…?”
Gwen followed his line of sight and grimaced. “Oh. That. It’s from the bracelet you bought. The doctors think I might’ve had an allergic reaction to it.”
That was a burn mark branding her skin exactly where the cuff had been-exact shape, exact contour. The edges were red and enflamed, and the design had been etched into her arm in slivery lines. Gwen didn’t seem to be in pain from it, but they probably had her on pain meds. It looked awful. His arm ached just from the sight of it.
His heart ached even more. Because that meant all of this was his fault. Buying her the bracelet had made her sick, and now she might even have a scar to remind her of the whole ordeal and his thoughtlessness.
Good work, you idiot.
Merlin pushed past Arthur to pick up her hand and more carefully examine the burn. Gwen laid there patiently, but she watched Merlin with just as much intent. Arthur retreated another step.
“Did they have to cut it off?” Merlin asked.
Gwen shook her head. “It just slipped off. Which is a little funny considering it kept getting stuck when I tried to do it.”
“When did you try?” It was important for Arthur to know. Maybe all the blame didn’t have to be laid at his doorstep. “When you were still at home?”
“I…” Her gaze jumped between them, and the fact that she kept going back to Merlin rather than meet Arthur’s for more than a moment spoke volumes. “I’m not sure.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Merlin said. Giving her a small smile, he gently rested her hand back on top of the blankets. “The good news is that it’s off, if that’s what was causing all the trouble.”
“Arthur…” At the sound of his name on her tongue, his senses heightened, only to be dashed again when she added, “Could you go ask one of the nurses if I could have some water? I’m so thirsty.”
What was he going to do, say no? Even though a blind man could see what Gwen was doing.
So he put on his best smile, agreed to get whatever she needed, and walked out.
He left the door slightly ajar behind him and stood off to the side out of their view. Sure enough, as soon as he was gone, they started.
“Tell me you remember,” Gwen whispered.
“I do. God, I don’t know how, but I do.”
“Does Arthur?”
“I don’t think so. He kept asking me about Morgana in the waiting room.”
“But he bought the bracelet.”
“He bought that because he wanted you to have it. No other reason.”
“Oh, God…” She sounded stricken. “I remember all of it, Merlin. Not just the good times. He’s going to hate me when he finds out.”
“Arthur could never hate you.”
“But I hurt him so badly.”
“That wasn’t you, Gwen. Not really.”
“If it wasn’t us, then why is she back? Why now?”
“I don’t know. Are you sure it was Morgana?”
“You saw the pictures.”
“What made you paint them?”
“I think it was the bracelet. I think…I think it was hers.”
“Did she say anything to you? Anything at all?”
“Not really. She just…smiled down at me, like I was some kind of pet that had done a good trick or something. I thought she was going to pat me on the head for a moment. And then she said thank you and disappeared.”
“She’s here for Arthur.” Merlin sounded grim. “It’s always been about Arthur.”
The back of his eyes throbbed. He knew he shouldn’t have eavesdropped, but clearly they weren’t going to talk to him. And why? Who was this woman? Why did Gwen think he could ever hate her? Had something happened between her and Merlin that they’d never told him about?
Except she used the past tense, not the present or future. Like she’d hurt him before in some deep, wrenching way he could never forgive. That was impossible. She never had, and he was hard pressed to think of anything that she could even do now that would turn his feelings for her so sharply.
He almost marched back in to demand some answers, but the near certainty they’d stonewall him again held him in place. Until he had something concrete, he had to rely upon himself to figure it out.
She’s here for Arthur.
Or this Morgana they were so determined to pretend they didn’t know.
* * *
The last thing she wanted was to stay in hospital overnight, but the doctors were insistent, and she was too tired to argue effectively. Arthur and Merlin promised to return in the morning and hopefully help her escape their medical clutches, so she finally resigned herself to sleeping in a ward that smelled of antiseptic with a nurse coming in every couple hours to check her vitals.
Sleep was difficult. Every time she closed her eyes, she saw those portraits, the wall coming to life as Morgana had stepped out of the plaster like one of Michelangelo’s uncompleted statues breaking free of its marble. That was when the memories had started.
Standing behind Morgana at her vanity table, brushing through her silken hair in long strokes in preparation for one of Uther’s feasts.
Standing on the parapet with a shawl wrapped around her shoulders, waiting for Arthur to return from battle.
Standing at Arthur’s side in the throne room, doing everything in her power not to glance toward Lancelot.
Tears pricked her eyes when she thought of how she’d hurt Arthur. She tried to banish thoughts of Lancelot completely, but he was entwined with everything that had happened at Camelot, part of the roots incapable of being excised. He had been the one to learn of that final battle, of Morgana’s plan to ruin Arthur once and for all with the wrath of that druid boy she’d raised. He had been the one to ride off to warn Merlin, leaving Guinevere alone to fear for all the men she loved.
None of them had come back. She’d wept for months after she learned of how they had fallen.
She didn’t want the memories. She liked her life. She wanted to adore Arthur from afar and laugh with Merlin and create her art like she’d always done. That girl who’d fallen in love with her husband’s favored knight…Gwen didn’t know her. She couldn’t fathom splitting her loyalties like that. But now that the knowledge had returned, she couldn’t separate it out, either. Because they had all found each other again, loved each other again. It was real, even though it seemed too ridiculous to be true.
Arthur would despise her when he remembered, too. As well he probably should.
But what purpose did Morgana have coming back? Why uproot everything like this? Simple revenge? Wasn’t killing Arthur the first time enough?
Did she intend on doing it again?
Frantic, Gwen reached for the call button, struggling to sit up against all the tubes and wires. The nurse arrived just as she was getting to a seated position, but instead of ask what she needed, the nurse took Gwen by the shoulders and firmly pushed her back down.
“None of that now,” she chided. “You need some proper rest.”
“I need to go home.”
“Not tonight, you don’t. Doctor’s orders.”
She wasn’t strong enough to overpower the nurse. Getting out wasn’t an option yet. “I need to call someone, then. It’s urgent.”
“It’s the middle of the night, dearie.”
“He won’t mind. Please.” Her mind raced for some lie she could feed the nurse that would allow her the phone call. The only thing she could come up with was, “It’s my dog. He’ll be tearing my flat apart if somebody doesn’t get over there. Please. I just want to call and ask my friend to check on him.”
The nurse seemed unsure, her frown masking her face in shadows. “You can’t use mobiles in here, not with all the equipment.”
“So could I just dial out on the ward phone?” One hung on the wall behind the nurse. The cord could easily reach Gwen’s bed. “It’s not long distance, and I promise I’ll keep it short.”
Though her insides were crawling with anxiety, she kept her voice and features as reasonable as possible. The nurse needed to trust her to be talking sense, even though she was positive that if she told the truth, they’d have her committed.
“Two minutes.” The nurse picked up the receiver and passed it over, her other hand poised over the touchpad. “What’s the number?”
Gwen rattled off Merlin’s mobile. Though she waited for the nurse to leave, the woman didn’t budge an inch. Two minutes was all she was going to get. Supervised, at that.
“Hello?”
His voice was wary, but alert. She hadn’t woken him. Unsurprising considering the events of the day.
“Hi, it’s me.”
“Gwen! Are you all right?”
“Yeah, I’m fine. I’m sorry to be calling so late.” She glanced at the nurse, weighing her next words. “I don’t suppose Arthur’s with you, is he?”
“No, he went home after we left you. We’re going to meet up for breakfast before coming to pick you up.”
“I’m worried about him.”
“Don’t be. He’s probably sleeping.”
“You’re not.”
“That’s because I’m trying to put all this together. Arthur doesn’t remember anything. I tried feeling him out when we left hospital, but he’s still drawing a blank.”
If he didn’t remember anything, he had no defenses against Morgana. She could attack him and he’d never see it coming.
“He can’t be alone right now. You have to go over there.”
“He’ll start asking questions if I just pop around without a reason.”
“So make one up. You have to do this. For me, please, Merlin?”
He sighed. “All right. But I can’t lie to him for much longer. I’ve had enough of that already.”
“Whatever it takes.” The nurse was tapping her foot in impatience. “Look, I have to go. You’ll take care of him?”
“I will. I promise.” He paused. “We love you, you know that, right, Gwen?”
She gripped the receiver until her knuckles hurt. “I know.” At least, until Arthur found out the whole story. “Thank you.”
After she passed the phone back, she collapsed against her pillows and closed her eyes. She’d done all she could for now.
It would have to do.
* * *
Continued Here