Reposting some ficlets
So, I have been scattering comment fic and ficlets all over the internet recently and thought I should have a bit of a round-up repost below.
First, some ficlets I wrote for glomp_fest 's Glomp Gifts thing.
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Balinor/Hunith preseries, PG, 472 words, written for jungle_ride
“There?” Balinor asks, trying to follow Hunith’s gaze.
She laughs and takes his hand, draws a shape in the air with it, and he can see the stars she’s tracing. “No, do you see? It’s a plough.”
He takes her hand in return and points to one of the stars making up the handle of the plough, then makes a different shape around it. “The dragons have different names for the stars. That one is a cave, and the two stars in the middle are the eyes of whatever dwells inside.”
Her voice hushes as it does whenever he speaks of the dragons, mourning the creatures even a peasant girl saw flying overhead as she grew. “Did they tell you the stories behind them?”
“There was so much to learn from them. I never thought to ask more about the stars than they mentioned in passing.” There are a thousand things he’ll never learn, now. Kilgharrah won’t want to teach him, if he’s ever freed-the last dragon, betrayed by the last Dragonlord. He doesn’t know if that rift can be healed.
Hunith yawns and turns her face into his shoulder, looking so young suddenly it makes him ache. He’ll bring trouble to her doorstep, when someone looking for money tells Uther where he is, and she deserves none of it. “Don’t do that,” she whispers, lifting her head again.
“Do what?”
“Take the whole world on your shoulders. You weren’t to know he would betray you like that, and I’m glad to take you in and have you here.” She starts to stroke his hair, brow knit, and cuts herself off with another yawn.
“It’s late,” says Balinor, and pulls himself to his feet before giving Hunith his hand. She clings to it when he would let go and walks half a step ahead into her cottage, taking one last look at the stars. “You should get some sleep,” he says when she doesn’t move to the curtained-off area he insists on to preserve her modesty.
“I’m not a child,” says Hunith, and kisses him. They’ve exchanged a few kisses, chaste and sweet like Balinor hasn’t indulged in for years, since he came to Ealdor, and each one is a little longer, a little more insistent. This one goes on, and he can’t bring himself to pull away even if he should. “Not a child,” she repeats when they pull apart at last, and smiles when he steps away anyway. She doesn’t push. She never does.
“No,” he says. “I suppose not.”
Hunith smiles softly, as if he’s proved some point of hers, and retreats to her curtain. “I’ll see you in the morning.”
“You will,” he promises, and ducks back out to look at the stars, tracing a plough and a cave with his eyes while Hunith falls asleep inside.
*
Leon/Morgana (and various other pairings) modern AU, PG, 476 words, written for wanderhomeagain
Morgana decides that, as with all things, she can blame Arthur and Merlin for her current situation. Sometimes she can withstand Leon when he ducks his head and gives her a shy smile, but she certainly can’t when the two of them are sitting on the sofa like the geriatric busybodies they’re one day going to be saying “Don’t bother, Leon, Morgana would never lower herself to do it and you shouldn’t ask,” because then of course she has to prove them wrong.
And all of this, somehow, has led to Morgana sitting in the one bar in all of London that does Christmas karaoke, listening to Gwaine croon out “Blue Christmas” while Elena laughs and eggs him on. She’s already suffered through all the lads making an attempt at “Feliz Navidad,” Percival doing “The Little Drummer Boy” for some inexplicable reason, Gwen and Lancelot’s disturbingly-well-choreographed version of “Jingle Bell Rock” (she suspects them of practicing beforehand), and Arthur and Merlin doing “Let It Snow” horribly out of tune.
“You aren’t having fun,” says Leon, sounding horribly worried about it.
“Yes, I am,” she assures him, and she’s only lying a little bit. “If nothing else, I’ve got enough blackmail material on all of you to last a century.”
“It’s just that it’s tradition,” he starts, and she shushes him with a kiss. “Okay, if you’re sure,” he says, and then Elyan is dragging him away to prod him to the stage, assuring him that his “usual song” is all queued up, and Morgana wonders how on earth she’s missed that Christmas karaoke is apparently a tradition well-established enough that Leon has a usual song. Working late has its drawbacks.
Leon only ever sings in the shower, or every once in a while when he’s happy and in the mood to dance her around the living room, so it’s a pleasant surprise when he opens his mouth to sing “White Christmas” and turns out to be more tuneful than the rest of them put together. Morgana smiles at him the whole time he sings (probably more soppily than she’d like to admit, judging by Merlin’s smirk), but when he comes down off the stage to applause she only has a second to kiss him before Elena’s snagged her by the back of her shirt. “Come on, I need back-up singers,” she declares, and Morgana is dragged off despite her objections, Gwen trailing behind them.
It’s “All I Want For Christmas Is You,” of course, so Morgana ends up standing next to Gwen trying to improvise some sort of Supremes dance routine while Elena beckons to and makes hilariously unsexy faces at Gwaine. Leon is watching when she looks over at him, so she puts on her most lascivious face to make him smile.
Make my wish come true, she mouths, and joins in on the chorus.
*
Elena/Vivian modern AU, PG, 359 words, written for leashy_bebes
Elena comes home to find Vivian splayed across their bed, textbooks littered around her and one arm thrown dramatically over her eyes. She gives serious thought to fleeing, and then tells herself sternly to buck up and clears her throat. Vivian just wiggles her fingers in a half-hearted wave. “Bad day?”
“I’m going to move to the city and become a personal shopper,” Vivian says to the ceiling.
So it’s been that sort of day. They’ve been growing in frequency as Vivian tries to put her end-of-term papers together. Elena bounces onto the bed and messes up what must be a very carefully arranged system of book-stacking, judging by the outraged look Vivian gives her when she finally removes her arm. “A personal shopper who writes poems to go with all her clients’ purchases?”
“A personal shopper who doesn’t have to analyze Ginsberg. Again.” Vivian makes a face. “If it were all writing poetry I wouldn’t be running away to be a personal shopper.”
Elena sweeps books out of her way to lie down next to her girlfriend and rub their noses together when Vivian squeaks an objection. “You should take the night off.”
“I can’t, I’ve got this paper for Gaius and then practically have to rewrite my favorite poem from scratch for Morgause because she doesn’t like the form, and I have to-”
Elena kisses her. Sometimes it’s the only way to shut her up. “None of that’s due till next week,” she points out. “So right now, you’re going to take a nap with me. And then tonight, we’re going out so you and Merlin can whine about how Morgause hates you and Morgana can look superior and Arthur and I can get drunk and whine about how we actually have to work for a living while you lot get to hang around school. Does that sound good?”
Vivian scowls, then allows herself a smile when Elena pulls her down farther into the pillows. “Fine, I suppose I could allow that.”
“Good,” says Elena, and lets Vivian fuss around until they’re cuddling properly. She only kicks one more book off the bed in the process.
*
Xena: Warrior Princess, Xena/Gabrielle canon-ish, PG, 515 words, written for dreamer_98
Only Gabrielle would go into the seediest taverns in all of Greece and start telling starry-eyed stories about the great deeds of heroes.
Well, only Gabrielle would do it twice. And a third time. And that’s just when Xena gave up counting.
She doesn’t mind too much, really. She nurses a drink and listens to Gabrielle talk to whoever will listen (and whoever won’t, Gabrielle’s got a talent for that too, and if there’s a fight Xena’s pretty sure the thug she’s talking to right now will be the one to throw the first punch; he looks about ready to swat her like an insect), and when the inevitable fight breaks out, she’ll put whoever’s sober enough to be a danger out of commission and drag Gabrielle outside and get treated to the end of whatever story she was in the middle of. It’s usually one about her, by that point in the night.
Tonight’s crowd lets her get farther than usual-they’re feeling charitable, or maybe they’re just ignoring her. Nobody tells her to shut up until she starts talking about Xena brokering peace between the Amazons and the centaurs (skipping most of her part in the story, of course-“I’m not a hero, Xena,” she’d explained one night over the campfire, like it was the most obvious thing in the world, and for all Gabrielle can be full of herself sometimes she’s never budged on that), but once that happens it only takes a few minutes before everyone’s throwing punches.
Gabrielle’s not in any real danger and not too drunk to use her staff, but Xena fights her way through the crowd anyway and ducks Gabrielle’s staff when she swings around as Xena comes up behind her. She jerks her head towards the door. “Want to get out of here?”
The look on Gabrielle’s face is clearly a no, but she sighs and goes anyway, completely ignoring the fight still going on around her and letting Xena keep them from getting punched on the way out.
Xena waits until they’re nearly out of the village, heading towards the woods where they’ll make camp for the night, before she tries talking, since Gabrielle’s still pouting. “You’re getting good at telling that one,” she says. It’s a peace offering, and they both know it.
Gabrielle smiles anyway. “I think I might have to write it out again. I know more about how to tell it now.”
“You should do that,” Xena agrees, and since that seems to have fixed things she keeps quiet and lets Gabrielle chatter away while they find a clearing and make camp. Gabrielle doesn’t fall silent again until they’re settling in, looking up at the stars through the trees, and Xena lets a few seconds pass. “I’m not too popular in most of these places. If you don’t want them to throw you out,” she says at last, “you probably should stick with telling stories about heroes.”
Gabrielle turns over, settles on her side. Xena keeps looking up at the sky. “I do,” she says, and Xena can hear her smiling.
*
I also wrote a ficlet for the Magical Reveal Meme.
Arthur/Merlin preslash, PG, ~1400 words.
Merlin’s imagined a hundred ways it could go, over the years. A thousand.
Most of the time, he tells Arthur. Something happens, some wondrous thing that makes Arthur believe in the goodness of magic, and Merlin steps forward and explains everything he’s done for him, and Arthur forgives him-for the lies more than for anything else. He tells the stories of the times he’s saved Arthur’s life and the lives of others, and the rest of the stories as well, and Arthur forgives him those, too.
Sometimes, when he’s angry mostly, he shows him. There’s a foe, there’s a plague, and Arthur laughs at Merlin’s attempts to help until Merlin lifts his hand and the enemy goes up in flames. In his head, Arthur is always very impressed after times like that, and makes Merlin his Court Sorcerer immediately. When he isn’t daydreaming, he still sometimes thinks it the best way to go-Arthur’s fond of heroics, after all.
When he’s very tired, when he wonders if Arthur will ever see him as more than a servant, when he wants nothing more than to be close to him, Merlin imagines showing him in smaller ways. He imagines pouring harmless flame into Arthur’s cupped hands. He imagines making him fly. He imagines making a tree grow. The scenes are always candlelit, or at dusk if it’s outside, and he knows it will never happen that way but sometimes when Arthur looks at him just the right way, he wonders …
And when he’s more tired still, when the weight of everything is too much and five years of lies weigh so heavily on him that he can’t forgive himself, much less expect Arthur to forgive him, he imagines that Arthur already knows. That when Merlin opens his mouth to begin the litany, the one from the very beginning that he practices in odd moments (less, now, so much less than a year ago, or two), Arthur just shakes his head and says “I know. I know all of it, and you don’t have to tell me. I’ve had time to come to terms with it.” Because that would hurt, but it might be best, after everything.
He never, never imagined it happening like this.
Never, after all of Gaius’s warnings not to use magic where he might be caught, expected the door to the physician’s chambers to bang open while he was doing a spell, hand hovering over a crystal he’s trying to use to spy on Morgana, and for Arthur to walk in and just stop talking in the middle of saying something amused and deprecating. Never expected that in the silence afterwards, as the door creaked shut again, that he would have nothing to say.
Arthur’s face goes tight and almost grey in the evening light, and if Merlin had thought Morgana’s betrayal or Uther’s death or anything at all made him look strained, if he’d thought banishing Gwen had bowed his shoulders, it’s nothing compared to this. Nothing to the way he takes one small (massive) step backwards and lets his eyes slide closed like he can’t even bear to look. “Of course,” he says, voice flat, and Merlin flinches.
Because what he always tries to forget, when he’s thinking about it, is that Arthur is smart. Now that he knows, Merlin won’t have to explain, because Arthur is already putting together everything he knows, every unexplained incident over the last years, and it’s too late. He bows his head, and sees that his hands are shaking over the crystal. “Sire,” he whispers, but there’s nothing he can say to make this better.
“All this time.” It’s not a question. Merlin doesn’t even bother looking at him. He’s not sure he can lift his head. “All this time, and-”
It takes Merlin three tries to choke the words out. “I’m sorry.”
“Sorry? Good lord, Merlin.” Merlin manages to look at Arthur and finds him leaning back against the door like his feet can’t hold him. “I should-I should-”
“Call the guards,” Merlin finishes, numb. This is never how he imagines it going, but he knows the next part from his nightmares. The dungeon. The pyre or the chopping block. Sometimes, in the worst ones, Arthur’s sword and his own choked pleas-please, please, let it be anyone but you who kills me so I can pretend that you-
“Yes, I suppose I should, shouldn’t I?” Merlin looks at him again just in time to watch him scrub a hand across his face and then let out a short, disbelieving bark of laughter. “So I know now. After everything, this is what turns me into a hypocrite. I’d thought perhaps when I sent Gwen away I’d assured myself that I can uphold the laws, even the ones that hurt me, but it turns out that all it takes is you and I can’t keep to the law my father held above all others.”
It’s hard to believe, but he knows Arthur well enough to understand him. “You aren’t having me killed,” he says, and finally turns to face his king.
“No. Of course not. Fine thanks that would be, to someone who’s … I told my father once that I thought there was someone looking out for me. It was so soon after you’d come. I should have known then.”
Merlin drops his gaze again. “So what will you do with me?”
“If I can’t kill you, I don’t have any illusions about banishing you, if that’s what worries you. So I’m left with knowing I’m a liar, and knowing I’ll spare the life of someone who breaks the law if the situation is right.”
There’s nothing worse he can do than what he’s already done, in Arthur’s eyes, and everything is ashes around them for now, so Merlin makes himself speak. “Or if the law is wrong. You would kill me just the same as anyone if I turned traitor and told Morgana or the Mercians your secrets, wouldn’t you?” Arthur’s only response is to take a step to the side like he wants to begin pacing. “If Gwen hadn’t … if she’d done magic, instead, would you have had her killed?”
Arthur’s jaw tightens just a bit. He’s forgiven her as much as he can, but it was still the wrong example to use. “It depends on the magic.”
Merlin tries again. “If you’d known Morgana was a witch, long ago, before she ever left Camelot, before she’d done anything wrong, would you have protected her?”
“Yes. I suppose I would have.”
He swallows. “And if you’d come in here and I’d been … hurting someone, somehow, with my magic, you would have called for the guards.” Arthur gives half a shake of his head. “You would have.”
“Maybe. But if you’ve done even half of what I think I can credit you with, you have hurt people.”
All he can think is how tired Arthur looks still, tired like he should look by all rights with the kingship thrust on him and so many difficulties, but like he never has until now. “Yes. I’ve tried not to, unless I had no other choice, but I have. Do you want me to tell you everything? I can.”
“Not yet.” Finally, finally, Arthur straightens his shoulders, and Merlin’s world tilts just that bit closer to normal. Gaius is due back soon from checking on the last few patients recovering from the sweating sickness, and they should leave before he returns. He isn’t ready to let anyone else intrude. “I need to hear it all, but not yet.”
“Yes, fine.” Both of them stand there and just breathe. Merlin thinks about asking what will change after this (everything), whether Arthur will bring magic back for him, a hundred other questions. He swallows them all. There’s time enough for them later. “What can I do?” he asks instead.
Arthur gives him a sharp, challenging look, almost his usual self. “Show me.”
He could do something big and showy, like Arthur’s trying to goad him to do. He could call for Kilgharrah or bring lightning down from the clear sky. But Merlin remembers his foolish candlelit daydreams, and this is private, just for the two of them. He whispers a word, throat dry, and lights every candle in Gaius’s chambers. “What do you want to see?”
After a wide-eyed moment, like he was surprised after all, Arthur takes one step closer and crosses his arms. “Everything.”
*
I also wrote three little ficlets for the Three-Sentence Ficathon, all under the same cut for ease's sake, all PG.
Downton Abbey, for the prompt "Mary, to have and to hold"
Mary is bad at keeping things. Once she has them they slip through her grasp.
But this time, she thinks that perhaps she wants it enough, and maybe if she says the right words, maybe if she holds on tight, this might be something she can have forever.
The Vorkosigan Saga, for the prompt "Gregor, let's see what happens"
As Emperor, Gregor has to think of all the consequences; he can only gamble carefully.
But sometimes, when things need shaking up, when the Vor need to be reminded of who he is, he allows himself a smile, and a pull of the strings, and sometimes a call to Miles. "Let's see what happens," he says, and sits back in his chair.
Inception, for the prompt "Saito & Ariadne, summer internship"
Ariadne is almost out of the airport when Saito flags her down, moving like he's forgotten how his joints work and smiling like he knows something she doesn't. "When you are free for the summer, you should come to my company--we are always looking for those who know how to build."
She thinks about a ticket to anywhere and how small her life feels now, and takes the card he offers her, one with nothing but a number on it in neat black print.
*
And finally, I seem to be getting into the habit of writing notfic at my Tumblr. I won't repost the text here (and probably won't mention them here after this, but I thought I'd let you know that it's a thing that is happening), but I will link you to the two I've written so far: Freya/Gwaine and Elena/Mithian (I seem to have fallen hard for this ship, you guys. Expect it to start popping up).
First, some ficlets I wrote for glomp_fest 's Glomp Gifts thing.
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Balinor/Hunith preseries, PG, 472 words, written for jungle_ride
“There?” Balinor asks, trying to follow Hunith’s gaze.
She laughs and takes his hand, draws a shape in the air with it, and he can see the stars she’s tracing. “No, do you see? It’s a plough.”
He takes her hand in return and points to one of the stars making up the handle of the plough, then makes a different shape around it. “The dragons have different names for the stars. That one is a cave, and the two stars in the middle are the eyes of whatever dwells inside.”
Her voice hushes as it does whenever he speaks of the dragons, mourning the creatures even a peasant girl saw flying overhead as she grew. “Did they tell you the stories behind them?”
“There was so much to learn from them. I never thought to ask more about the stars than they mentioned in passing.” There are a thousand things he’ll never learn, now. Kilgharrah won’t want to teach him, if he’s ever freed-the last dragon, betrayed by the last Dragonlord. He doesn’t know if that rift can be healed.
Hunith yawns and turns her face into his shoulder, looking so young suddenly it makes him ache. He’ll bring trouble to her doorstep, when someone looking for money tells Uther where he is, and she deserves none of it. “Don’t do that,” she whispers, lifting her head again.
“Do what?”
“Take the whole world on your shoulders. You weren’t to know he would betray you like that, and I’m glad to take you in and have you here.” She starts to stroke his hair, brow knit, and cuts herself off with another yawn.
“It’s late,” says Balinor, and pulls himself to his feet before giving Hunith his hand. She clings to it when he would let go and walks half a step ahead into her cottage, taking one last look at the stars. “You should get some sleep,” he says when she doesn’t move to the curtained-off area he insists on to preserve her modesty.
“I’m not a child,” says Hunith, and kisses him. They’ve exchanged a few kisses, chaste and sweet like Balinor hasn’t indulged in for years, since he came to Ealdor, and each one is a little longer, a little more insistent. This one goes on, and he can’t bring himself to pull away even if he should. “Not a child,” she repeats when they pull apart at last, and smiles when he steps away anyway. She doesn’t push. She never does.
“No,” he says. “I suppose not.”
Hunith smiles softly, as if he’s proved some point of hers, and retreats to her curtain. “I’ll see you in the morning.”
“You will,” he promises, and ducks back out to look at the stars, tracing a plough and a cave with his eyes while Hunith falls asleep inside.
*
Leon/Morgana (and various other pairings) modern AU, PG, 476 words, written for wanderhomeagain
Morgana decides that, as with all things, she can blame Arthur and Merlin for her current situation. Sometimes she can withstand Leon when he ducks his head and gives her a shy smile, but she certainly can’t when the two of them are sitting on the sofa like the geriatric busybodies they’re one day going to be saying “Don’t bother, Leon, Morgana would never lower herself to do it and you shouldn’t ask,” because then of course she has to prove them wrong.
And all of this, somehow, has led to Morgana sitting in the one bar in all of London that does Christmas karaoke, listening to Gwaine croon out “Blue Christmas” while Elena laughs and eggs him on. She’s already suffered through all the lads making an attempt at “Feliz Navidad,” Percival doing “The Little Drummer Boy” for some inexplicable reason, Gwen and Lancelot’s disturbingly-well-choreographed version of “Jingle Bell Rock” (she suspects them of practicing beforehand), and Arthur and Merlin doing “Let It Snow” horribly out of tune.
“You aren’t having fun,” says Leon, sounding horribly worried about it.
“Yes, I am,” she assures him, and she’s only lying a little bit. “If nothing else, I’ve got enough blackmail material on all of you to last a century.”
“It’s just that it’s tradition,” he starts, and she shushes him with a kiss. “Okay, if you’re sure,” he says, and then Elyan is dragging him away to prod him to the stage, assuring him that his “usual song” is all queued up, and Morgana wonders how on earth she’s missed that Christmas karaoke is apparently a tradition well-established enough that Leon has a usual song. Working late has its drawbacks.
Leon only ever sings in the shower, or every once in a while when he’s happy and in the mood to dance her around the living room, so it’s a pleasant surprise when he opens his mouth to sing “White Christmas” and turns out to be more tuneful than the rest of them put together. Morgana smiles at him the whole time he sings (probably more soppily than she’d like to admit, judging by Merlin’s smirk), but when he comes down off the stage to applause she only has a second to kiss him before Elena’s snagged her by the back of her shirt. “Come on, I need back-up singers,” she declares, and Morgana is dragged off despite her objections, Gwen trailing behind them.
It’s “All I Want For Christmas Is You,” of course, so Morgana ends up standing next to Gwen trying to improvise some sort of Supremes dance routine while Elena beckons to and makes hilariously unsexy faces at Gwaine. Leon is watching when she looks over at him, so she puts on her most lascivious face to make him smile.
Make my wish come true, she mouths, and joins in on the chorus.
*
Elena/Vivian modern AU, PG, 359 words, written for leashy_bebes
Elena comes home to find Vivian splayed across their bed, textbooks littered around her and one arm thrown dramatically over her eyes. She gives serious thought to fleeing, and then tells herself sternly to buck up and clears her throat. Vivian just wiggles her fingers in a half-hearted wave. “Bad day?”
“I’m going to move to the city and become a personal shopper,” Vivian says to the ceiling.
So it’s been that sort of day. They’ve been growing in frequency as Vivian tries to put her end-of-term papers together. Elena bounces onto the bed and messes up what must be a very carefully arranged system of book-stacking, judging by the outraged look Vivian gives her when she finally removes her arm. “A personal shopper who writes poems to go with all her clients’ purchases?”
“A personal shopper who doesn’t have to analyze Ginsberg. Again.” Vivian makes a face. “If it were all writing poetry I wouldn’t be running away to be a personal shopper.”
Elena sweeps books out of her way to lie down next to her girlfriend and rub their noses together when Vivian squeaks an objection. “You should take the night off.”
“I can’t, I’ve got this paper for Gaius and then practically have to rewrite my favorite poem from scratch for Morgause because she doesn’t like the form, and I have to-”
Elena kisses her. Sometimes it’s the only way to shut her up. “None of that’s due till next week,” she points out. “So right now, you’re going to take a nap with me. And then tonight, we’re going out so you and Merlin can whine about how Morgause hates you and Morgana can look superior and Arthur and I can get drunk and whine about how we actually have to work for a living while you lot get to hang around school. Does that sound good?”
Vivian scowls, then allows herself a smile when Elena pulls her down farther into the pillows. “Fine, I suppose I could allow that.”
“Good,” says Elena, and lets Vivian fuss around until they’re cuddling properly. She only kicks one more book off the bed in the process.
*
Xena: Warrior Princess, Xena/Gabrielle canon-ish, PG, 515 words, written for dreamer_98
Only Gabrielle would go into the seediest taverns in all of Greece and start telling starry-eyed stories about the great deeds of heroes.
Well, only Gabrielle would do it twice. And a third time. And that’s just when Xena gave up counting.
She doesn’t mind too much, really. She nurses a drink and listens to Gabrielle talk to whoever will listen (and whoever won’t, Gabrielle’s got a talent for that too, and if there’s a fight Xena’s pretty sure the thug she’s talking to right now will be the one to throw the first punch; he looks about ready to swat her like an insect), and when the inevitable fight breaks out, she’ll put whoever’s sober enough to be a danger out of commission and drag Gabrielle outside and get treated to the end of whatever story she was in the middle of. It’s usually one about her, by that point in the night.
Tonight’s crowd lets her get farther than usual-they’re feeling charitable, or maybe they’re just ignoring her. Nobody tells her to shut up until she starts talking about Xena brokering peace between the Amazons and the centaurs (skipping most of her part in the story, of course-“I’m not a hero, Xena,” she’d explained one night over the campfire, like it was the most obvious thing in the world, and for all Gabrielle can be full of herself sometimes she’s never budged on that), but once that happens it only takes a few minutes before everyone’s throwing punches.
Gabrielle’s not in any real danger and not too drunk to use her staff, but Xena fights her way through the crowd anyway and ducks Gabrielle’s staff when she swings around as Xena comes up behind her. She jerks her head towards the door. “Want to get out of here?”
The look on Gabrielle’s face is clearly a no, but she sighs and goes anyway, completely ignoring the fight still going on around her and letting Xena keep them from getting punched on the way out.
Xena waits until they’re nearly out of the village, heading towards the woods where they’ll make camp for the night, before she tries talking, since Gabrielle’s still pouting. “You’re getting good at telling that one,” she says. It’s a peace offering, and they both know it.
Gabrielle smiles anyway. “I think I might have to write it out again. I know more about how to tell it now.”
“You should do that,” Xena agrees, and since that seems to have fixed things she keeps quiet and lets Gabrielle chatter away while they find a clearing and make camp. Gabrielle doesn’t fall silent again until they’re settling in, looking up at the stars through the trees, and Xena lets a few seconds pass. “I’m not too popular in most of these places. If you don’t want them to throw you out,” she says at last, “you probably should stick with telling stories about heroes.”
Gabrielle turns over, settles on her side. Xena keeps looking up at the sky. “I do,” she says, and Xena can hear her smiling.
*
I also wrote a ficlet for the Magical Reveal Meme.
Arthur/Merlin preslash, PG, ~1400 words.
Merlin’s imagined a hundred ways it could go, over the years. A thousand.
Most of the time, he tells Arthur. Something happens, some wondrous thing that makes Arthur believe in the goodness of magic, and Merlin steps forward and explains everything he’s done for him, and Arthur forgives him-for the lies more than for anything else. He tells the stories of the times he’s saved Arthur’s life and the lives of others, and the rest of the stories as well, and Arthur forgives him those, too.
Sometimes, when he’s angry mostly, he shows him. There’s a foe, there’s a plague, and Arthur laughs at Merlin’s attempts to help until Merlin lifts his hand and the enemy goes up in flames. In his head, Arthur is always very impressed after times like that, and makes Merlin his Court Sorcerer immediately. When he isn’t daydreaming, he still sometimes thinks it the best way to go-Arthur’s fond of heroics, after all.
When he’s very tired, when he wonders if Arthur will ever see him as more than a servant, when he wants nothing more than to be close to him, Merlin imagines showing him in smaller ways. He imagines pouring harmless flame into Arthur’s cupped hands. He imagines making him fly. He imagines making a tree grow. The scenes are always candlelit, or at dusk if it’s outside, and he knows it will never happen that way but sometimes when Arthur looks at him just the right way, he wonders …
And when he’s more tired still, when the weight of everything is too much and five years of lies weigh so heavily on him that he can’t forgive himself, much less expect Arthur to forgive him, he imagines that Arthur already knows. That when Merlin opens his mouth to begin the litany, the one from the very beginning that he practices in odd moments (less, now, so much less than a year ago, or two), Arthur just shakes his head and says “I know. I know all of it, and you don’t have to tell me. I’ve had time to come to terms with it.” Because that would hurt, but it might be best, after everything.
He never, never imagined it happening like this.
Never, after all of Gaius’s warnings not to use magic where he might be caught, expected the door to the physician’s chambers to bang open while he was doing a spell, hand hovering over a crystal he’s trying to use to spy on Morgana, and for Arthur to walk in and just stop talking in the middle of saying something amused and deprecating. Never expected that in the silence afterwards, as the door creaked shut again, that he would have nothing to say.
Arthur’s face goes tight and almost grey in the evening light, and if Merlin had thought Morgana’s betrayal or Uther’s death or anything at all made him look strained, if he’d thought banishing Gwen had bowed his shoulders, it’s nothing compared to this. Nothing to the way he takes one small (massive) step backwards and lets his eyes slide closed like he can’t even bear to look. “Of course,” he says, voice flat, and Merlin flinches.
Because what he always tries to forget, when he’s thinking about it, is that Arthur is smart. Now that he knows, Merlin won’t have to explain, because Arthur is already putting together everything he knows, every unexplained incident over the last years, and it’s too late. He bows his head, and sees that his hands are shaking over the crystal. “Sire,” he whispers, but there’s nothing he can say to make this better.
“All this time.” It’s not a question. Merlin doesn’t even bother looking at him. He’s not sure he can lift his head. “All this time, and-”
It takes Merlin three tries to choke the words out. “I’m sorry.”
“Sorry? Good lord, Merlin.” Merlin manages to look at Arthur and finds him leaning back against the door like his feet can’t hold him. “I should-I should-”
“Call the guards,” Merlin finishes, numb. This is never how he imagines it going, but he knows the next part from his nightmares. The dungeon. The pyre or the chopping block. Sometimes, in the worst ones, Arthur’s sword and his own choked pleas-please, please, let it be anyone but you who kills me so I can pretend that you-
“Yes, I suppose I should, shouldn’t I?” Merlin looks at him again just in time to watch him scrub a hand across his face and then let out a short, disbelieving bark of laughter. “So I know now. After everything, this is what turns me into a hypocrite. I’d thought perhaps when I sent Gwen away I’d assured myself that I can uphold the laws, even the ones that hurt me, but it turns out that all it takes is you and I can’t keep to the law my father held above all others.”
It’s hard to believe, but he knows Arthur well enough to understand him. “You aren’t having me killed,” he says, and finally turns to face his king.
“No. Of course not. Fine thanks that would be, to someone who’s … I told my father once that I thought there was someone looking out for me. It was so soon after you’d come. I should have known then.”
Merlin drops his gaze again. “So what will you do with me?”
“If I can’t kill you, I don’t have any illusions about banishing you, if that’s what worries you. So I’m left with knowing I’m a liar, and knowing I’ll spare the life of someone who breaks the law if the situation is right.”
There’s nothing worse he can do than what he’s already done, in Arthur’s eyes, and everything is ashes around them for now, so Merlin makes himself speak. “Or if the law is wrong. You would kill me just the same as anyone if I turned traitor and told Morgana or the Mercians your secrets, wouldn’t you?” Arthur’s only response is to take a step to the side like he wants to begin pacing. “If Gwen hadn’t … if she’d done magic, instead, would you have had her killed?”
Arthur’s jaw tightens just a bit. He’s forgiven her as much as he can, but it was still the wrong example to use. “It depends on the magic.”
Merlin tries again. “If you’d known Morgana was a witch, long ago, before she ever left Camelot, before she’d done anything wrong, would you have protected her?”
“Yes. I suppose I would have.”
He swallows. “And if you’d come in here and I’d been … hurting someone, somehow, with my magic, you would have called for the guards.” Arthur gives half a shake of his head. “You would have.”
“Maybe. But if you’ve done even half of what I think I can credit you with, you have hurt people.”
All he can think is how tired Arthur looks still, tired like he should look by all rights with the kingship thrust on him and so many difficulties, but like he never has until now. “Yes. I’ve tried not to, unless I had no other choice, but I have. Do you want me to tell you everything? I can.”
“Not yet.” Finally, finally, Arthur straightens his shoulders, and Merlin’s world tilts just that bit closer to normal. Gaius is due back soon from checking on the last few patients recovering from the sweating sickness, and they should leave before he returns. He isn’t ready to let anyone else intrude. “I need to hear it all, but not yet.”
“Yes, fine.” Both of them stand there and just breathe. Merlin thinks about asking what will change after this (everything), whether Arthur will bring magic back for him, a hundred other questions. He swallows them all. There’s time enough for them later. “What can I do?” he asks instead.
Arthur gives him a sharp, challenging look, almost his usual self. “Show me.”
He could do something big and showy, like Arthur’s trying to goad him to do. He could call for Kilgharrah or bring lightning down from the clear sky. But Merlin remembers his foolish candlelit daydreams, and this is private, just for the two of them. He whispers a word, throat dry, and lights every candle in Gaius’s chambers. “What do you want to see?”
After a wide-eyed moment, like he was surprised after all, Arthur takes one step closer and crosses his arms. “Everything.”
*
I also wrote three little ficlets for the Three-Sentence Ficathon, all under the same cut for ease's sake, all PG.
Downton Abbey, for the prompt "Mary, to have and to hold"
Mary is bad at keeping things. Once she has them they slip through her grasp.
But this time, she thinks that perhaps she wants it enough, and maybe if she says the right words, maybe if she holds on tight, this might be something she can have forever.
The Vorkosigan Saga, for the prompt "Gregor, let's see what happens"
As Emperor, Gregor has to think of all the consequences; he can only gamble carefully.
But sometimes, when things need shaking up, when the Vor need to be reminded of who he is, he allows himself a smile, and a pull of the strings, and sometimes a call to Miles. "Let's see what happens," he says, and sits back in his chair.
Inception, for the prompt "Saito & Ariadne, summer internship"
Ariadne is almost out of the airport when Saito flags her down, moving like he's forgotten how his joints work and smiling like he knows something she doesn't. "When you are free for the summer, you should come to my company--we are always looking for those who know how to build."
She thinks about a ticket to anywhere and how small her life feels now, and takes the card he offers her, one with nothing but a number on it in neat black print.
*
And finally, I seem to be getting into the habit of writing notfic at my Tumblr. I won't repost the text here (and probably won't mention them here after this, but I thought I'd let you know that it's a thing that is happening), but I will link you to the two I've written so far: Freya/Gwaine and Elena/Mithian (I seem to have fallen hard for this ship, you guys. Expect it to start popping up).