[Merlin] Rain
Title: Rain
Genre/Pairing: Merlin, Merlin/Arthur unrequited(?)
Rating: Mentions erections. Otherwise, PG-13.
Warnings: Angst. And some schmoop, although that...doesn't need to be warned, I guess.
Spoilers: For The Poisoned Chalice and Valiant, sort of, but that's it.
Wordcount: 2245
Summary: They'd been hunting the same creature for three days now, following it deeper into the forests near the hamlet where it had struck. Two children had been found dead - both girls, as pale as stone, with deep slashes in their chests and their hearts torn out. They'd been making good progress - that is, before the rain had started and washed away any trace of a trail.
The rain dripped mercilessly from the trees. Arthur cursed and stumbled, Merlin catching him before he could land face-first in the cold mud. "This blasted weather!" Arthur grumbled. Merlin kept silent, his grip on Arthur's arm sliding down to his hand.
For a moment Arthur didn't seem to notice, then he raised their joined hands, and an eyebrow. "What's this?"
Merlin glanced at their fingers, entwined, at their wrists curled around each other. He could have said "love", he could have said "destiny", but instead he just widened his eyes innocently and explained, "In case you fall again."
"I won't." Arthur snapped, but he eyed the mud and didn't let go.
After about half an hour of stumbling about, Merlin got tired of using his free hand to clear his eyes of water. "Maybe we should turn around?"
"No!" Arthur growled. "I'll find the beast. I promised my father." He was silent for a moment, and then, quieter: "I won't let it kill again."
They'd been hunting the same creature for three days now, following it deeper into the forests near the hamlet where it had struck. Two children had been found dead - both girls, as pale as stone, with deep slashes in their chests and their hearts torn out. They'd been making good progress - that is, before the rain had started and washed away any trace of a trail.
It started raining harder, and Arthur cursed and stumbled again, his fingers tightening on Merlin's. Merlin steadied him and sighed. "Then perhaps if we make camp...just until the rain lets up."
Arthur pounded on through the underbrush in grim silence for a moment, then stopped and stared around with an almost hopeless expression that Merlin wanted to hug out of him. "Yeah, alright." he said finally. "But at the first sign of a clear sky we head out again."
Merlin's head hurt - it had since they'd found the girls - and his feet were freezing and aching, but he knew better than to argue. "Yes, sire."
By the time they'd fashioned a shelter it was growing dark, and there was no sign of an end to the storm. They sat under the oiled canvas in silence, shivering in their sodden clothing. Finally Arthur sighed heavily and stripped off his shirt. "Take off those clothes and get over here."
Merlin gaped at him, certain he was dreaming. Arthur stood to rid himself of his britches, and Merlin stammered, "What?"
Arthur rolled his eyes. "I really did choose the most dull-witted manservant in all of Camelot," He muttered, and then beckoned again. "For warmth, Merlin. There's no way we'll find dry enough wood for a fire, and I'm not getting sick because you have nudity issues."
Oh, thought Merlin. That...that makes sense. But Arthur was standing feet from him, naked and beckoning, and his brain refused to work beyond that.
So Arthur strode forward and his fingers were at Merlin's waist, lifting his wet shirt over his head. Warm palms grazed his sides and Merlin shivered.
"If you're this cold now, imagine when it is fully dark," Arthur murmured, mouth too close, and Merlin closed his eyes tight. "You're not getting sick, either, you know. You won't get out of your duties so easily." There was a note of true affection in his voice, and Merlin's heart clenched.
When Arthur's fingers moved to the laces on his trousers, though, Merlin's eyes flew open. He was achingly hard, and Arthur's fingers were right there, and if he moved his hand Merlin thought he might explode. "You should sleep. I think we'll find the beast tomorrow, when the rain lets up, and you'll need your strength for the fight," he babbled, too loud in the small shelter. Arthur's eyebrows shot up, but he let his hand fall away and crossed to his bedroll. "Alright." He turned to look over his shoulder, his eyes shining blue and regal in the twilight, and Merlin felt like he was drowning. "But I expect you over here as soon as you're undressed. I need your warmth." He paused a moment before he added softly, "And you need mine."
Half-certain he wasn't meant to have heard that, Merlin climbed clumsily out of his britches, willing his erection away. When it had subsided (and it took a strength of will that only a mage as powerful as Merlin possessed to force it to) he slid under the blanket of Arthur's bedroll, as far away from the muscled back of his Prince as possible. He screwed his eyes shut and wished desperately for morning.
Arthur muttered something, half-asleep already, and flung an arm across Merlin's chest. He breathed slow and heavy into Merlin's ear and the mage felt his own breath slowing and he fell asleep, listening to the beat of the rain on the canvas and the beat of Arthur's heart beside him.
He woke to sunlight with a jolt, half-crying out Arthur's name. His headache had returned, intensified, and he cast around for his Prince, but Arthur was nowhere in sight. An image flashed across his mind - Arthur, sword in hand, facing - something. Something huge and dark and overwhelmingly magic.
He closed his eyes and sorted through that place inside himself, grasping immediately the thread that connected Arthur in him, the thread that had always connected them, even before he grew aware of it. It twisted with fear in his metal fingers, silver-blue and shining. It was this that had woken him, thrumming with danger.
He followed it as fast as he could, racing through the woods, still-wet leaves and branches whipping against his naked flesh. He came out on a rise above the beast and Arthur.
It was enormous, half-scaled and half-furred, not a thing of flesh and blood but purely of sorcery. It coiled and roiled in on itself like smoke, and Merlin knew at a glance that Arthur's sword was useless. The prince's left arm hung already at his side, bloody and wrong, and his flesh was greying even as Merlin watched.
Taking a deep breath, Merlin began to speak. The words rolled off his tongue, liquid and strange. They were familiar to him, perfect, though he had never heard them before nor read them in any book. This was his gift - this was what separated him from any other sorcerer that had ever lived, this easy, intense knowledge. He knew what they meant - knew what they would do to the creature, and knew what they would do to him.
He started down the hill, steps slow and measured. This, too, was part of the spell. The creature's eyes were drawn to his eyes, his voice, as it grew louder, stronger. Merlin saw, out of the corner of his mind, Arthur lower his sword, heard his voice as if at a great distance, the questions, the accusations, his name - even on those lips - meaning nothing. Merlin, Merlin, Arthur cried, but the beat of Merlin's heart said Emrys.
The beast just watched as Merlin approached and laid his hand against its flat, snake-like forehead. Speaking the final words of the incantation, Merlin pressed - and then pulled.
The magic that animated the creature flowed into him, setting every nerve on fire. It was wonderful and exhilarating and the most painful thing Merlin had ever experienced - ever imagined. He pulled and pulled until it felt as if he might burst at the seams and then he pulled some more, not stopping, not daring to, until the thing collapsed into a pile of scales and dust. Only then did he let himself scream, let himself fall to his knees in the mud.
Arthur darted forward, but Merlin thrust out a hand at him to make him stay back. He was too full. Too full of roiling smoke and words and power. If he were touched...
Arthur stopped in his tracks, and Merlin saw his eyes widening in fear. Arthur, the Prince who was fearless to the point of stupidity, was afraid of him.
With a half-choked sob, Merlin gathered all the magic inwards and then did the biggest, most harmless thing he could think of with it. He poured all of it upwards into a sky that quickly cleared. He screamed and shouted it to the clouds which filled with water, darkening and rumbling with thunder. He fell to the earth and with him fell water, torrents of it.
Merlin curled into the mud and made it rain and rain and rain.
The walk back was made in strange, echoing silence. Merlin slipped and slid, falling flat on his face several times, and each time he would raise himself on trembling arms to see Arthur looking back at him, face unreadable.
When they reached the gates of the castle, Arthur stopped. "Go home." He said, the first words he'd uttered since the beast had collapsed. "I shall send for you when I am in need of your services."
Merlin, too weary and heartsore to argue and not sure what he would have said even if he could have said anything, stumbled to his room in Gaius' quarters and slept. He woke to find his pillow damp, though with rainwater or tears he couldn't tell.
Arthur sent for him later that day, sending a page to his rooms. Merlin went with feet like lead. He felt drained, washed out, his mind blank. It was like walking to his execution - perhaps it was walking to his execution. Uther would know, by now, of his sorcery.
He found Arthur standing at his window, staring out at the continuing rain. He looked as if he hadn't slept at all, his hair sticking up at odd angles, his face blurred and weary. They stood in silence for a few moments before the prince spoke.
"I didn't tell my father about you." He said, with no inflection whatsoever. "I didn't tell anyone."
Merlin's head snapped up. He'd though for sure - "Thank you, sire." He responded. He waited a beat, then ventured, "Might I ask why?"
"No!" Arthur snapped, spinning from the window. He leaned over the table, palms flat on its surface, muscled arms tense. "No. You are not here," he said deliberately, "to ask questions. You are here to provide answers."
Merlin dropped his eyes and nodded.
"How many times?" Asked Arthur. "How many times that I took for skill or luck, how many times have you used sorcery to make me win?"
Merlin swallowed. "I don't know."
Arthur's voice was harsh. "You don't -" He paused as he realized what that must mean. "So many? So many that you have lost count? Have I done nothing myself?"
Merlin felt tears prick his eyes. He could feel the anguish that Arthur was trying to hard to hide, the anger and sorrow and most of all betrayal. It hummed and wailed across that thread between them, pulsing and awful.
"The light in the caves, that was you?" Arthur asked.
Merlin nodded, remembering. That was the first time he'd seen the flashes - lying near death, the poison and fever clouding his vision, the only clarity had been Arthur, Arthur, danger.
"And Valiant's shield?"
"I forced the snakes to reveal themselves, but you slew them and him. I swear, that was none of me." He took a shaky breath. "My magic is rarely martial."
"Rarely martial?" Arthur's voice rang out in utter disbelief. "You turned that thing to dust with a few words, Merlin! It had me on my last legs and you- you saved me." He subsided a bit, talking now more to himself. "Always, it was to save me."
He started to pace, thinking, and then burst out, "Why didn't you tell me? Again and again you could have, again and again you had the chance. Why keep it a secret from even me?" Here, at last, was the heart of his pain, and Merlin closed his eyes against the tears. "I trusted you!"
"Because I wasn't sure that I could trust you," Merlin responded, realizing only as the words left his lips that it was the truth. "Not at first. Not, truly, until yesterday. And then, when I was sure...well. I suppose I've always been better at actions than words."
Arthur chuckled bitterly. "There, we are the same." He leaned again at the table, frowning. Merlin let tears run freely down his cheeks - there was no point in hiding them, and he was sick, so sick of hiding things.
Finally Arthur came around he table and stood facing Merlin. "Kneel," he said, and Merlin's knees gave out immediately.
Arthur took his right hand and forced him to look up, warm fingers on his chin. "Do you, Merlin Emrys, swear to use your sorcery only in the service of myself, your prince and future king, and only when I ask it of you?"
Much as his throat worked to say yes, a thousand times yes, if it would only make Arthur trust him, Merlin took a moment to breathe and think, really think, about what Arthur was saying. "Or when it would save my prince's life." he interjected after a moment. "There isn't always time to ask!" He said to Arthur's look, and the tiny smile that curved the prince's lips made his heart leap.
"Only in the service of myself, your prince and future king, when I ask of it or when it will save my life?"
Merlin swallowed, and nodded. "I do so swear."
Arthur looked expectant, and Merlin leaned in and pressed a kiss to Arthur's ring, holding his eyes.
"Then rise, Merlin Emrys." Arthur finished, pulling Merlin to his feet. "Rise and serve me in good health."
Merlin grinned, and the clouds cleared from the sun.
Genre/Pairing: Merlin, Merlin/Arthur unrequited(?)
Rating: Mentions erections. Otherwise, PG-13.
Warnings: Angst. And some schmoop, although that...doesn't need to be warned, I guess.
Spoilers: For The Poisoned Chalice and Valiant, sort of, but that's it.
Wordcount: 2245
Summary: They'd been hunting the same creature for three days now, following it deeper into the forests near the hamlet where it had struck. Two children had been found dead - both girls, as pale as stone, with deep slashes in their chests and their hearts torn out. They'd been making good progress - that is, before the rain had started and washed away any trace of a trail.
The rain dripped mercilessly from the trees. Arthur cursed and stumbled, Merlin catching him before he could land face-first in the cold mud. "This blasted weather!" Arthur grumbled. Merlin kept silent, his grip on Arthur's arm sliding down to his hand.
For a moment Arthur didn't seem to notice, then he raised their joined hands, and an eyebrow. "What's this?"
Merlin glanced at their fingers, entwined, at their wrists curled around each other. He could have said "love", he could have said "destiny", but instead he just widened his eyes innocently and explained, "In case you fall again."
"I won't." Arthur snapped, but he eyed the mud and didn't let go.
After about half an hour of stumbling about, Merlin got tired of using his free hand to clear his eyes of water. "Maybe we should turn around?"
"No!" Arthur growled. "I'll find the beast. I promised my father." He was silent for a moment, and then, quieter: "I won't let it kill again."
They'd been hunting the same creature for three days now, following it deeper into the forests near the hamlet where it had struck. Two children had been found dead - both girls, as pale as stone, with deep slashes in their chests and their hearts torn out. They'd been making good progress - that is, before the rain had started and washed away any trace of a trail.
It started raining harder, and Arthur cursed and stumbled again, his fingers tightening on Merlin's. Merlin steadied him and sighed. "Then perhaps if we make camp...just until the rain lets up."
Arthur pounded on through the underbrush in grim silence for a moment, then stopped and stared around with an almost hopeless expression that Merlin wanted to hug out of him. "Yeah, alright." he said finally. "But at the first sign of a clear sky we head out again."
Merlin's head hurt - it had since they'd found the girls - and his feet were freezing and aching, but he knew better than to argue. "Yes, sire."
By the time they'd fashioned a shelter it was growing dark, and there was no sign of an end to the storm. They sat under the oiled canvas in silence, shivering in their sodden clothing. Finally Arthur sighed heavily and stripped off his shirt. "Take off those clothes and get over here."
Merlin gaped at him, certain he was dreaming. Arthur stood to rid himself of his britches, and Merlin stammered, "What?"
Arthur rolled his eyes. "I really did choose the most dull-witted manservant in all of Camelot," He muttered, and then beckoned again. "For warmth, Merlin. There's no way we'll find dry enough wood for a fire, and I'm not getting sick because you have nudity issues."
Oh, thought Merlin. That...that makes sense. But Arthur was standing feet from him, naked and beckoning, and his brain refused to work beyond that.
So Arthur strode forward and his fingers were at Merlin's waist, lifting his wet shirt over his head. Warm palms grazed his sides and Merlin shivered.
"If you're this cold now, imagine when it is fully dark," Arthur murmured, mouth too close, and Merlin closed his eyes tight. "You're not getting sick, either, you know. You won't get out of your duties so easily." There was a note of true affection in his voice, and Merlin's heart clenched.
When Arthur's fingers moved to the laces on his trousers, though, Merlin's eyes flew open. He was achingly hard, and Arthur's fingers were right there, and if he moved his hand Merlin thought he might explode. "You should sleep. I think we'll find the beast tomorrow, when the rain lets up, and you'll need your strength for the fight," he babbled, too loud in the small shelter. Arthur's eyebrows shot up, but he let his hand fall away and crossed to his bedroll. "Alright." He turned to look over his shoulder, his eyes shining blue and regal in the twilight, and Merlin felt like he was drowning. "But I expect you over here as soon as you're undressed. I need your warmth." He paused a moment before he added softly, "And you need mine."
Half-certain he wasn't meant to have heard that, Merlin climbed clumsily out of his britches, willing his erection away. When it had subsided (and it took a strength of will that only a mage as powerful as Merlin possessed to force it to) he slid under the blanket of Arthur's bedroll, as far away from the muscled back of his Prince as possible. He screwed his eyes shut and wished desperately for morning.
Arthur muttered something, half-asleep already, and flung an arm across Merlin's chest. He breathed slow and heavy into Merlin's ear and the mage felt his own breath slowing and he fell asleep, listening to the beat of the rain on the canvas and the beat of Arthur's heart beside him.
He woke to sunlight with a jolt, half-crying out Arthur's name. His headache had returned, intensified, and he cast around for his Prince, but Arthur was nowhere in sight. An image flashed across his mind - Arthur, sword in hand, facing - something. Something huge and dark and overwhelmingly magic.
He closed his eyes and sorted through that place inside himself, grasping immediately the thread that connected Arthur in him, the thread that had always connected them, even before he grew aware of it. It twisted with fear in his metal fingers, silver-blue and shining. It was this that had woken him, thrumming with danger.
He followed it as fast as he could, racing through the woods, still-wet leaves and branches whipping against his naked flesh. He came out on a rise above the beast and Arthur.
It was enormous, half-scaled and half-furred, not a thing of flesh and blood but purely of sorcery. It coiled and roiled in on itself like smoke, and Merlin knew at a glance that Arthur's sword was useless. The prince's left arm hung already at his side, bloody and wrong, and his flesh was greying even as Merlin watched.
Taking a deep breath, Merlin began to speak. The words rolled off his tongue, liquid and strange. They were familiar to him, perfect, though he had never heard them before nor read them in any book. This was his gift - this was what separated him from any other sorcerer that had ever lived, this easy, intense knowledge. He knew what they meant - knew what they would do to the creature, and knew what they would do to him.
He started down the hill, steps slow and measured. This, too, was part of the spell. The creature's eyes were drawn to his eyes, his voice, as it grew louder, stronger. Merlin saw, out of the corner of his mind, Arthur lower his sword, heard his voice as if at a great distance, the questions, the accusations, his name - even on those lips - meaning nothing. Merlin, Merlin, Arthur cried, but the beat of Merlin's heart said Emrys.
The beast just watched as Merlin approached and laid his hand against its flat, snake-like forehead. Speaking the final words of the incantation, Merlin pressed - and then pulled.
The magic that animated the creature flowed into him, setting every nerve on fire. It was wonderful and exhilarating and the most painful thing Merlin had ever experienced - ever imagined. He pulled and pulled until it felt as if he might burst at the seams and then he pulled some more, not stopping, not daring to, until the thing collapsed into a pile of scales and dust. Only then did he let himself scream, let himself fall to his knees in the mud.
Arthur darted forward, but Merlin thrust out a hand at him to make him stay back. He was too full. Too full of roiling smoke and words and power. If he were touched...
Arthur stopped in his tracks, and Merlin saw his eyes widening in fear. Arthur, the Prince who was fearless to the point of stupidity, was afraid of him.
With a half-choked sob, Merlin gathered all the magic inwards and then did the biggest, most harmless thing he could think of with it. He poured all of it upwards into a sky that quickly cleared. He screamed and shouted it to the clouds which filled with water, darkening and rumbling with thunder. He fell to the earth and with him fell water, torrents of it.
Merlin curled into the mud and made it rain and rain and rain.
The walk back was made in strange, echoing silence. Merlin slipped and slid, falling flat on his face several times, and each time he would raise himself on trembling arms to see Arthur looking back at him, face unreadable.
When they reached the gates of the castle, Arthur stopped. "Go home." He said, the first words he'd uttered since the beast had collapsed. "I shall send for you when I am in need of your services."
Merlin, too weary and heartsore to argue and not sure what he would have said even if he could have said anything, stumbled to his room in Gaius' quarters and slept. He woke to find his pillow damp, though with rainwater or tears he couldn't tell.
Arthur sent for him later that day, sending a page to his rooms. Merlin went with feet like lead. He felt drained, washed out, his mind blank. It was like walking to his execution - perhaps it was walking to his execution. Uther would know, by now, of his sorcery.
He found Arthur standing at his window, staring out at the continuing rain. He looked as if he hadn't slept at all, his hair sticking up at odd angles, his face blurred and weary. They stood in silence for a few moments before the prince spoke.
"I didn't tell my father about you." He said, with no inflection whatsoever. "I didn't tell anyone."
Merlin's head snapped up. He'd though for sure - "Thank you, sire." He responded. He waited a beat, then ventured, "Might I ask why?"
"No!" Arthur snapped, spinning from the window. He leaned over the table, palms flat on its surface, muscled arms tense. "No. You are not here," he said deliberately, "to ask questions. You are here to provide answers."
Merlin dropped his eyes and nodded.
"How many times?" Asked Arthur. "How many times that I took for skill or luck, how many times have you used sorcery to make me win?"
Merlin swallowed. "I don't know."
Arthur's voice was harsh. "You don't -" He paused as he realized what that must mean. "So many? So many that you have lost count? Have I done nothing myself?"
Merlin felt tears prick his eyes. He could feel the anguish that Arthur was trying to hard to hide, the anger and sorrow and most of all betrayal. It hummed and wailed across that thread between them, pulsing and awful.
"The light in the caves, that was you?" Arthur asked.
Merlin nodded, remembering. That was the first time he'd seen the flashes - lying near death, the poison and fever clouding his vision, the only clarity had been Arthur, Arthur, danger.
"And Valiant's shield?"
"I forced the snakes to reveal themselves, but you slew them and him. I swear, that was none of me." He took a shaky breath. "My magic is rarely martial."
"Rarely martial?" Arthur's voice rang out in utter disbelief. "You turned that thing to dust with a few words, Merlin! It had me on my last legs and you- you saved me." He subsided a bit, talking now more to himself. "Always, it was to save me."
He started to pace, thinking, and then burst out, "Why didn't you tell me? Again and again you could have, again and again you had the chance. Why keep it a secret from even me?" Here, at last, was the heart of his pain, and Merlin closed his eyes against the tears. "I trusted you!"
"Because I wasn't sure that I could trust you," Merlin responded, realizing only as the words left his lips that it was the truth. "Not at first. Not, truly, until yesterday. And then, when I was sure...well. I suppose I've always been better at actions than words."
Arthur chuckled bitterly. "There, we are the same." He leaned again at the table, frowning. Merlin let tears run freely down his cheeks - there was no point in hiding them, and he was sick, so sick of hiding things.
Finally Arthur came around he table and stood facing Merlin. "Kneel," he said, and Merlin's knees gave out immediately.
Arthur took his right hand and forced him to look up, warm fingers on his chin. "Do you, Merlin Emrys, swear to use your sorcery only in the service of myself, your prince and future king, and only when I ask it of you?"
Much as his throat worked to say yes, a thousand times yes, if it would only make Arthur trust him, Merlin took a moment to breathe and think, really think, about what Arthur was saying. "Or when it would save my prince's life." he interjected after a moment. "There isn't always time to ask!" He said to Arthur's look, and the tiny smile that curved the prince's lips made his heart leap.
"Only in the service of myself, your prince and future king, when I ask of it or when it will save my life?"
Merlin swallowed, and nodded. "I do so swear."
Arthur looked expectant, and Merlin leaned in and pressed a kiss to Arthur's ring, holding his eyes.
"Then rise, Merlin Emrys." Arthur finished, pulling Merlin to his feet. "Rise and serve me in good health."
Merlin grinned, and the clouds cleared from the sun.