"Pass It On" - A Sick Collection
Title: Pass It On - A Sick Collection
Fandom: Merlin
Characters: Gwen, Lancelot, Merlin, Arthur, Gwaine, Elyan, Percival, Leon, Gaius
Word Count: 3151
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Fluff, silliness and snot
Summary: A collection of drabbles about how the characters of "Merlin" deal with a cold.
Author's Notes: I wrote it in October while I was nursing a cold, and sharing it here now, nursing a cold again, but this time without inspiration to write more about sick people. Sets between season 3 and 4. Also, let's assume that Gwen isn't with Arthur, but with Lancelot.
Pass It On
1.
Gwen hated having a cold; her head became heavy and her senses went blunt, not to mention that it made her feel weak. She hated that feeling, especially when there was so much work to do in the castle. She would have stayed there, doing her job, but hearing her constant sniffing, Gaius had sent her home. Although she really needed some rest, she wasn’t happy about the physician’s orders. If she had stayed in the castle, she could have kept her thoughts away from her illness, but now she had nothing else to do but lie in bed and feel miserable. And also, blow her nose in every other minute.
Hearing a knock on her door made her frown. She hated to be seen like this: helpless and weak with a pale face and red nose. No matter how childish it was, she didn’t say a word, pretending she wasn’t at home, hoping that the visitor would go away.
But he didn’t.
“Gwen?” she heard Lancelot’s voice from outside. “Are you home?”
She bit her lip to avoid any words escape from her mouth, lying motionless in bed. Lancelot definitely shouldn’t see her like this! Not that he would mind it; she was sure he wouldn’t, but she still didn’t want to meet him with a swollen red nose and a puffed face.
However, Lancelot didn’t share her opinion about it, because he opened the door, making her pull the blanket over her head, trying to hold her breath.
“Sorry for coming in just like this,” Lancelot apologised, entering the house, “but I haven’t seen you in the castle today, so I wondered if you...”
At that moment a sneeze interrupted him. He raised a brow and looked around to see a trembling blanket on the bed. Putting the pieces together he couldn’t help smiling; although he knew that otherwise he would have done the same. He stepped to the bed and carefully pulled the blanket off Gwen’s head.
“Have you caught a cold?” he asked.
She nodded her head. Her hair was messy, her skin pale, except her nose which was as red as if she had drunk too much wine. She looked up at him with eyes widened, at the point of crying, as she realized how pathetic and childish her behavior was.
“I’b so sorry,” she mumbled with a stuffy nose. “I just didd’t wadt you to see be like this,” she admitted.
Lancelot sat on the edge of the bed with a smile and shook his head.
“It’s alright,” he said, sweeping some locks away from her face. Her skin was warmer than usually; she might have had a little fever, too. “I wouldn’t want you to see me with a swollen nose either,” he told her. “Although you look much better than I,” he added.
Gwen smiled vaguely hearing his compliment, then took his hand and squeezed it a little. Now that Lancelot was there, she started to feel a bit better. Her smile grew wider as their eyes met, but the moment broke as she, sniffing, started to look for her handkerchief which had fallen off the bed when she pulled the blanket on her head.
“Thank you,” she said when Lancelot picked it up from the floor and handed it to her. Very romantic, she added in thoughts with some irony.
He made her some tea, brought her another blanket and was chatting with her, sitting by her bed to keep her mind away from the illness.
However, she was still shivering, even under two blankets, so he, led by a sudden idea lay next to her, pulling her into his arms to keep her warm. They hardly had enough space in her small bed, but he didn’t mind it at all.
His body against hers made Gwen feel warmer; however, she didn’t want him to get ill.
“You will catch it,” she warned him, although she wasn’t very convincing with her feeble voice.
“No, I won’t,” he promised her and kissed the temple of her head.
2.
“I’m so sorry. This is all my fault,” Gwen said, standing by Lancelot’s bed a few days later.
“Don’t worry about it,” he told her in a hoarse voice, sitting up. “I think I would have caught it anyway.”
It didn’t matter how it had happened, Gwen stayed with him, feeling guilty for passing the cold on him. Although she would also have been curing him even if he had got the illness from someone else. She made him tea, changed his handkerchiefs and sat by his bed to keep him company. When Merlin brought his medicine or chicken soup from the kitchen, he always joined them until the whole castle was echoing Arthur’s angry voice calling after him. Whenever Gwen wasn’t there, Merlin started to flutter the smaller objects in the room with magic to make his friend feel better.
Once he filled the room with butterflies, drawing a wide grin on Lancelot’s pale face. He was always amazed and also amused by Merlin’s tricks, although he knew that his magic was much more than that.
He was watching a butterfly landing on his cup when the door opened and Gwaine came in without knocking. Both Lancelot and Merlin went breathless for a moment - what if he saw the butterflies? How would they explain all that?
“Spider!” Lancelot exclaimed and Gwaine turned around looking for it, so he couldn’t see Merlin’s golden eyes as the young warlock made the butterflies disappear.
“I haven’t seen it,” Gwaine said, then he noticed something unusual in the room. “A butterfly!”
It seemed Merlin couldn’t make all of them disappear. He and Lancelot exchanged a quick look, both struggling with laughter as Gwaine opened the window to set the butterfly free. Then he sat down on the edge of Lancelot’s bed, starting a story of how he had won a new belt in the tavern, when Lancelot sneezed, although it was so low that he and Merlin could hardly hear it.
“I can’t believe this!” Gwaine exclaimed. “You’re clean, you don’t talk in your sleep, you beat me in a swordfight and you sneeze like this?! Are you even human?”
Merlin laughed at Gwaine’s outburst, since it wasn’t the first time he had accused Lancelot with being perfect. However, said knight just shrugged his shoulder and smiled modestly as an answer.
“I bet whenever you sneeze, a fairy is born,” Gwaine said, shaking his head.
However, before Lancelot could have reacted to that someone sneezed outside, but so loudly that it even shook the walls of the castle.
“Now that’s what I call a decent, manly sneeze!” Gwaine commented.
Merlin and Lancelot laughed then looked at each other, trying to guess who had caught the cold this time, when they heard Elyan’s voice.
“Eww, that’s disgusting!”
“I think I have to see this,” Gwaine said with a wide grin. “If you’ll excuse me...”
He left the room to take a look at the disgusting thing and as the door closed behind him, Merlin and Lancelot burst out laughing.
“Just for the record,” the knight said, “it’s not a fairy. It’s a unicorn.”
3.
“I wadt to go! I’b perfectly fide!”
“No, you’re not! You can’t come to the training!”
“I’ve told you, I’b FIDE!” Elyan yelled, but after the last words he started to cough so hard that it made his whole body shake.
Percival pressed his lips together and shook his head. He was arguing with Elyan for about five minutes to convince him to stay in bed, but he didn’t want to hear about that. Elyan, just like his sister, hated being sick, so whenever he got ill, he was trying to make everyone believe that he was fine. That was why getting up, the first thing he did was dressing up for training, even though his legs felt as if they were made of stone and he could hardly keep his head on its place, since it was so heavy. Then along came Percival, trying to make him stay.
Once he stopped coughing, Elyan threw an apologetic glance at the giant knight and nodded his head. His lungs were still in pain after the coughs and he had to sneeze again.
“I’ll be a good boy,” he said. “I’ll stay.”
He wouldn’t be able to fight holding a handkerchief, after all. Well, he might defeat Leon, who was so afraid of catching the cold himself that he was wearing a scarf to cover his nose and mouth. It would be enough to shake the handkerchief in front of his face, he thought, smiling a little.
“Good,” Percival said with a small smile as they returned to Elyan’s room. He decided to watch him climb into his bed, wearing his sleeping clothes - he knew him well enough to make sure he wouldn’t sneak out of his chambers later. “I was afraid I would have to carry you back to bed,” he added.
Elyan raised a brow then he burst out laughing. It was low and weak, but still a laughter.
“Would you have dode that?” he wondered.
“If necessary,” Percival shrugged his shoulder.
They both stayed in silence, although Elyan, while changing his clothes, was still chuckling at the mental image of Percival carrying him back to bed.
“Do you want to watch the training?” Percival asked.
“Bay I?”
“Sure,” the giant knight said, then picked up a chair and placed it under the window that looked at the training field, where the servants were preparing for the morning session. “Sit down,” he said, then he took the blankets off the bed and after Elyan had taken his seat, he covered him with them.
“Thanks, man,” he said, nesting himself in the chair, smiling widely.
None of them had thought that the next day both of them would be sitting there with a handkerchief in one hand and a cup of tea in the other.
“I think we deed a bigger widdow,” Elyan said.
4.
Leon leaned back contentedly in his bathtub as his muscles released in the hot water. He was tired, not really knowing why, since the training wasn’t really exhausting, nor was the ride in the afternoon. He shrugged his shoulder and stopped thinking about it. He would sleep it out and be more than fine tomorrow.
His thoughts wandered back to the training which was quite boring this morning, since only him and Gwaine were there: Arthur had to sign some papers in the name of the king and the rest were nursing a cold. Leon couldn’t be happier that he hadn’t caught it yet. He even agreed on a bet with Gwaine on who would be the last to fall ill, hoping that it would be him. He took the soap from his servant and while rubbing it on his skin, he opened his mouth to sing, like he always did, but what came out of his throat was more like a frog’s serenade.
Which could mean only one thing.
Gwaine was more than surprised when entering Leon’s chambers he found him sitting in his bathtub, with a face so long that it even reached the bottom of the tub. He let down his sword, disappointed. At that moment the rest of the knights arrived: all armed, wanting to know what had happened. So did Arthur, Merlin, Gwen and Gaius, who came a little later.
“I’ve caught it, too!” Leon cried out in a hoarse voice, making everyone sigh in relief. Hearing his scream, they had been expecting something much worse than this, so after wishing him well, everyone left his room, except for Gaius, who stayed to examine the devastated knight and Gwaine.
“You know what this means, don’t you?” he asked with a wide grin.
“You’ve won,” Leon said silently, lowering his head.
Gwaine’s grin became wider and he was about to take a theatrical bow to Leon: he had already bent down a little, when something unexpected happened. He sneezed.
“Oh, no,” he muttered and started walking backwards towards the door, noticing the flames in Leon’s eyes. “Sorry, man. Well, er... look at the bright side, you’re still in the tub, so you can wash it off...”
But Leon couldn’t look at the bright side right now.
5.
Gaius raised a brow in surprise as Merlin stormed into their chambers around ten o’clock in the morning. He had thought he was still in his room, sleeping.
“I quit!” yelled the young warlock passing by the old man, then entering his room, he threw himself onto the bed. “I can’t take this anymore!” He shouted into his pillow.
“What happened?” Gaius asked, following him.. “Where were you last night?”
“Ask Arthur,” Merlin mumbled. “He sent for me in the middle of the night, because he couldn’t sleep due to his stuffy nose. And if he can’t sleep, then I shouldn’t either!”
Gaius let out a low sigh as he sat down on the edge of his nephew’s bed, placing a hand on his shoulder. He knew that in a situation like this the best remedy was to let the boy rant about his master. Not to mention, he also knew how bad patient Prince Arthur could be. Oh yes, he knew it very well himself.
“It seems he can’t bear it as easily as the others,” he said with a bit of sarcasm in his voice.
Merlin chuckled hearing it, with his face still buried into the pillow. Easily? he thought to himself. Leon started to cry, Elyan was arguing with Percival, Gwen hid away from Lancelot - well, comparing to Arthur, they indeed bore it quite easily.
“He’s driving me crazy!” Merlin admitted rolling onto his back. “‘Bring me soup, Merlin! Oh no, take it away, it’s too hot!’” He spoke, imitating Arthur’s tone. “And then later: ‘It’s too cold, Merlin. Take it to the kitchen to warm it.’”
Gaius sighed again with a bitter smile on his face, finding the scenario familiar; but he didn’t say a word, feeling that the story hadn’t ended yet..
“He doesn’t even call me an idiot or anything, just groans when he wants me to shut up,” Merlin continued. Not that he liked to be called an idiot, but he knew that if Arthur didn’t call him names, something was seriously wrong with him. “And once he blew his nose into my scarf, because he couldn’t find his handkerchief,” he added.
Gaius’ eyes widened at first, but then he couldn’t help himself and chuckled as he tried to imagine how it could have happened. Merlin sat up on his bed, furrowing his eyebrows.
“It’s not funny!” he protested. “I was just arranging his pillows and he started sniffing, and then suddenly he took my scarf and blew his nose into it!”
Gaius had to press his lips together in order not to laugh as he tried to imagine the scene, and Merlin just shook her head, but didn’t say a word. He had to admit that if it hadn’t happened to him, he would have also considered it funny.
At that moment a squire knocked on Gaius’ door saying that he was bringing a message from the king.
“It’s for his manservant,” the young boy said as the court physician let him into his chambers. “He doesn’t have the voice for it right now, so he asked me to give him a message.”
“What’s the message?” Merlin asked, suspecting that it couldn’t be anything good.
The squire grinned and after taking a deep breath, he shouted:
“MER-LIIIIN!”
6.
Waking up, Merlin tried to breathe through his nose, but realising that it was still stuffed, he let out a groan, wanting to drift back into sleep. There’s no use to be awake with a cold, he thought; however, noticing someone sitting by his bed, he changed his mind.
“Are you feeling better?” Arthur asked.
Better? It depended. Comparing to his normal state of health, it was still horrible, but to how he had been on the day before - better, indeed. At least, his head had stopped aching and his throat was less sore now.
“Yes,” he replied in a hoarse voice.
“Good,” Arthur said with a cheeky smile. “My armour needs polishing.”
Hearing this, Merlin’s eyes widened, and if he wasn’t feeling so weak, he would have definitely sat up, but all he could say was this:
“What?” He took a deep breath to start an outburst, even if it would be a hoarse and feeble one, when Arthur started to laugh.
“Have you really thought that I would let you polish my armour while you’re sick?” he asked. “Don’t be an idiot, Merlin!”
The young warlock smirked at the prince - no, he would never have thought about such thing.
“But seriously, Merlin, I hope you can come back soon,” Arthur said. “That Jasper is really getting on my nerves.”
Hearing the name, a small smile touched Merlin’s lips. It was no wonder that Jasper was getting on Arthur’s nerves - he was the most useless member of the staff, but as a cousin of the Kitchen Head, he could stay in the castle. Merlin didn’t know who had sent him to Arthur, but he liked the idea. He felt as if it was some kind of well-deserved reward after how Arthur had treated him while being sick.
“I’ll try my best, Sire,” he promised, joking a little, since it wasn’t completely up to him. “The soup helps a lot,” he added, throwing a glance to the empty pot on his nightstand. “I get one from the kitchen every day,” he continued, “although I didn’t order any. Gwaine said I have a secret admirer.”
Hearing this, Arthur couldn’t help laughing. A secret admirer, he thought and shook his head a little.
“Of course, Merlin, a secret admirer,” he said skeptically. “It’s me.”
“You admire me?” Merlin raised a brow with a grin. “Secretly?”
“No, you idiot! I sent you the soup!” Arthur said, trying to sound serious, but he couldn’t help laughing.
“Oh,” Merlin said and his grin faded away immediately. Then, seeing Arthur frown, he started laughing. “No, I was just kidding,” he said. “Thank you for the...”
He couldn’t finish the sentence due to that annoying urge that twisted his nose and filled his eyes with tears before a loud sneeze, which was followed by a clatter of glass from Gaius’ room.
“Merlin!” the court physician shouted and the two young men could hear him coming towards them. “How many times do I have to tell you not to...” he continued, opening the door, but seeing Arthur there, he stopped talking. “Good afternoon, Sire,” he finally said, flashing a small smile at the prince, who smiled back at him, nodding his head a little.
It seemed he hadn’t noticed the flash of gold in Merlin’s eyes.
Fandom: Merlin
Characters: Gwen, Lancelot, Merlin, Arthur, Gwaine, Elyan, Percival, Leon, Gaius
Word Count: 3151
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Fluff, silliness and snot
Summary: A collection of drabbles about how the characters of "Merlin" deal with a cold.
Author's Notes: I wrote it in October while I was nursing a cold, and sharing it here now, nursing a cold again, but this time without inspiration to write more about sick people. Sets between season 3 and 4. Also, let's assume that Gwen isn't with Arthur, but with Lancelot.
Pass It On
1.
Gwen hated having a cold; her head became heavy and her senses went blunt, not to mention that it made her feel weak. She hated that feeling, especially when there was so much work to do in the castle. She would have stayed there, doing her job, but hearing her constant sniffing, Gaius had sent her home. Although she really needed some rest, she wasn’t happy about the physician’s orders. If she had stayed in the castle, she could have kept her thoughts away from her illness, but now she had nothing else to do but lie in bed and feel miserable. And also, blow her nose in every other minute.
Hearing a knock on her door made her frown. She hated to be seen like this: helpless and weak with a pale face and red nose. No matter how childish it was, she didn’t say a word, pretending she wasn’t at home, hoping that the visitor would go away.
But he didn’t.
“Gwen?” she heard Lancelot’s voice from outside. “Are you home?”
She bit her lip to avoid any words escape from her mouth, lying motionless in bed. Lancelot definitely shouldn’t see her like this! Not that he would mind it; she was sure he wouldn’t, but she still didn’t want to meet him with a swollen red nose and a puffed face.
However, Lancelot didn’t share her opinion about it, because he opened the door, making her pull the blanket over her head, trying to hold her breath.
“Sorry for coming in just like this,” Lancelot apologised, entering the house, “but I haven’t seen you in the castle today, so I wondered if you...”
At that moment a sneeze interrupted him. He raised a brow and looked around to see a trembling blanket on the bed. Putting the pieces together he couldn’t help smiling; although he knew that otherwise he would have done the same. He stepped to the bed and carefully pulled the blanket off Gwen’s head.
“Have you caught a cold?” he asked.
She nodded her head. Her hair was messy, her skin pale, except her nose which was as red as if she had drunk too much wine. She looked up at him with eyes widened, at the point of crying, as she realized how pathetic and childish her behavior was.
“I’b so sorry,” she mumbled with a stuffy nose. “I just didd’t wadt you to see be like this,” she admitted.
Lancelot sat on the edge of the bed with a smile and shook his head.
“It’s alright,” he said, sweeping some locks away from her face. Her skin was warmer than usually; she might have had a little fever, too. “I wouldn’t want you to see me with a swollen nose either,” he told her. “Although you look much better than I,” he added.
Gwen smiled vaguely hearing his compliment, then took his hand and squeezed it a little. Now that Lancelot was there, she started to feel a bit better. Her smile grew wider as their eyes met, but the moment broke as she, sniffing, started to look for her handkerchief which had fallen off the bed when she pulled the blanket on her head.
“Thank you,” she said when Lancelot picked it up from the floor and handed it to her. Very romantic, she added in thoughts with some irony.
He made her some tea, brought her another blanket and was chatting with her, sitting by her bed to keep her mind away from the illness.
However, she was still shivering, even under two blankets, so he, led by a sudden idea lay next to her, pulling her into his arms to keep her warm. They hardly had enough space in her small bed, but he didn’t mind it at all.
His body against hers made Gwen feel warmer; however, she didn’t want him to get ill.
“You will catch it,” she warned him, although she wasn’t very convincing with her feeble voice.
“No, I won’t,” he promised her and kissed the temple of her head.
2.
“I’m so sorry. This is all my fault,” Gwen said, standing by Lancelot’s bed a few days later.
“Don’t worry about it,” he told her in a hoarse voice, sitting up. “I think I would have caught it anyway.”
It didn’t matter how it had happened, Gwen stayed with him, feeling guilty for passing the cold on him. Although she would also have been curing him even if he had got the illness from someone else. She made him tea, changed his handkerchiefs and sat by his bed to keep him company. When Merlin brought his medicine or chicken soup from the kitchen, he always joined them until the whole castle was echoing Arthur’s angry voice calling after him. Whenever Gwen wasn’t there, Merlin started to flutter the smaller objects in the room with magic to make his friend feel better.
Once he filled the room with butterflies, drawing a wide grin on Lancelot’s pale face. He was always amazed and also amused by Merlin’s tricks, although he knew that his magic was much more than that.
He was watching a butterfly landing on his cup when the door opened and Gwaine came in without knocking. Both Lancelot and Merlin went breathless for a moment - what if he saw the butterflies? How would they explain all that?
“Spider!” Lancelot exclaimed and Gwaine turned around looking for it, so he couldn’t see Merlin’s golden eyes as the young warlock made the butterflies disappear.
“I haven’t seen it,” Gwaine said, then he noticed something unusual in the room. “A butterfly!”
It seemed Merlin couldn’t make all of them disappear. He and Lancelot exchanged a quick look, both struggling with laughter as Gwaine opened the window to set the butterfly free. Then he sat down on the edge of Lancelot’s bed, starting a story of how he had won a new belt in the tavern, when Lancelot sneezed, although it was so low that he and Merlin could hardly hear it.
“I can’t believe this!” Gwaine exclaimed. “You’re clean, you don’t talk in your sleep, you beat me in a swordfight and you sneeze like this?! Are you even human?”
Merlin laughed at Gwaine’s outburst, since it wasn’t the first time he had accused Lancelot with being perfect. However, said knight just shrugged his shoulder and smiled modestly as an answer.
“I bet whenever you sneeze, a fairy is born,” Gwaine said, shaking his head.
However, before Lancelot could have reacted to that someone sneezed outside, but so loudly that it even shook the walls of the castle.
“Now that’s what I call a decent, manly sneeze!” Gwaine commented.
Merlin and Lancelot laughed then looked at each other, trying to guess who had caught the cold this time, when they heard Elyan’s voice.
“Eww, that’s disgusting!”
“I think I have to see this,” Gwaine said with a wide grin. “If you’ll excuse me...”
He left the room to take a look at the disgusting thing and as the door closed behind him, Merlin and Lancelot burst out laughing.
“Just for the record,” the knight said, “it’s not a fairy. It’s a unicorn.”
3.
“I wadt to go! I’b perfectly fide!”
“No, you’re not! You can’t come to the training!”
“I’ve told you, I’b FIDE!” Elyan yelled, but after the last words he started to cough so hard that it made his whole body shake.
Percival pressed his lips together and shook his head. He was arguing with Elyan for about five minutes to convince him to stay in bed, but he didn’t want to hear about that. Elyan, just like his sister, hated being sick, so whenever he got ill, he was trying to make everyone believe that he was fine. That was why getting up, the first thing he did was dressing up for training, even though his legs felt as if they were made of stone and he could hardly keep his head on its place, since it was so heavy. Then along came Percival, trying to make him stay.
Once he stopped coughing, Elyan threw an apologetic glance at the giant knight and nodded his head. His lungs were still in pain after the coughs and he had to sneeze again.
“I’ll be a good boy,” he said. “I’ll stay.”
He wouldn’t be able to fight holding a handkerchief, after all. Well, he might defeat Leon, who was so afraid of catching the cold himself that he was wearing a scarf to cover his nose and mouth. It would be enough to shake the handkerchief in front of his face, he thought, smiling a little.
“Good,” Percival said with a small smile as they returned to Elyan’s room. He decided to watch him climb into his bed, wearing his sleeping clothes - he knew him well enough to make sure he wouldn’t sneak out of his chambers later. “I was afraid I would have to carry you back to bed,” he added.
Elyan raised a brow then he burst out laughing. It was low and weak, but still a laughter.
“Would you have dode that?” he wondered.
“If necessary,” Percival shrugged his shoulder.
They both stayed in silence, although Elyan, while changing his clothes, was still chuckling at the mental image of Percival carrying him back to bed.
“Do you want to watch the training?” Percival asked.
“Bay I?”
“Sure,” the giant knight said, then picked up a chair and placed it under the window that looked at the training field, where the servants were preparing for the morning session. “Sit down,” he said, then he took the blankets off the bed and after Elyan had taken his seat, he covered him with them.
“Thanks, man,” he said, nesting himself in the chair, smiling widely.
None of them had thought that the next day both of them would be sitting there with a handkerchief in one hand and a cup of tea in the other.
“I think we deed a bigger widdow,” Elyan said.
4.
Leon leaned back contentedly in his bathtub as his muscles released in the hot water. He was tired, not really knowing why, since the training wasn’t really exhausting, nor was the ride in the afternoon. He shrugged his shoulder and stopped thinking about it. He would sleep it out and be more than fine tomorrow.
His thoughts wandered back to the training which was quite boring this morning, since only him and Gwaine were there: Arthur had to sign some papers in the name of the king and the rest were nursing a cold. Leon couldn’t be happier that he hadn’t caught it yet. He even agreed on a bet with Gwaine on who would be the last to fall ill, hoping that it would be him. He took the soap from his servant and while rubbing it on his skin, he opened his mouth to sing, like he always did, but what came out of his throat was more like a frog’s serenade.
Which could mean only one thing.
Gwaine was more than surprised when entering Leon’s chambers he found him sitting in his bathtub, with a face so long that it even reached the bottom of the tub. He let down his sword, disappointed. At that moment the rest of the knights arrived: all armed, wanting to know what had happened. So did Arthur, Merlin, Gwen and Gaius, who came a little later.
“I’ve caught it, too!” Leon cried out in a hoarse voice, making everyone sigh in relief. Hearing his scream, they had been expecting something much worse than this, so after wishing him well, everyone left his room, except for Gaius, who stayed to examine the devastated knight and Gwaine.
“You know what this means, don’t you?” he asked with a wide grin.
“You’ve won,” Leon said silently, lowering his head.
Gwaine’s grin became wider and he was about to take a theatrical bow to Leon: he had already bent down a little, when something unexpected happened. He sneezed.
“Oh, no,” he muttered and started walking backwards towards the door, noticing the flames in Leon’s eyes. “Sorry, man. Well, er... look at the bright side, you’re still in the tub, so you can wash it off...”
But Leon couldn’t look at the bright side right now.
5.
Gaius raised a brow in surprise as Merlin stormed into their chambers around ten o’clock in the morning. He had thought he was still in his room, sleeping.
“I quit!” yelled the young warlock passing by the old man, then entering his room, he threw himself onto the bed. “I can’t take this anymore!” He shouted into his pillow.
“What happened?” Gaius asked, following him.. “Where were you last night?”
“Ask Arthur,” Merlin mumbled. “He sent for me in the middle of the night, because he couldn’t sleep due to his stuffy nose. And if he can’t sleep, then I shouldn’t either!”
Gaius let out a low sigh as he sat down on the edge of his nephew’s bed, placing a hand on his shoulder. He knew that in a situation like this the best remedy was to let the boy rant about his master. Not to mention, he also knew how bad patient Prince Arthur could be. Oh yes, he knew it very well himself.
“It seems he can’t bear it as easily as the others,” he said with a bit of sarcasm in his voice.
Merlin chuckled hearing it, with his face still buried into the pillow. Easily? he thought to himself. Leon started to cry, Elyan was arguing with Percival, Gwen hid away from Lancelot - well, comparing to Arthur, they indeed bore it quite easily.
“He’s driving me crazy!” Merlin admitted rolling onto his back. “‘Bring me soup, Merlin! Oh no, take it away, it’s too hot!’” He spoke, imitating Arthur’s tone. “And then later: ‘It’s too cold, Merlin. Take it to the kitchen to warm it.’”
Gaius sighed again with a bitter smile on his face, finding the scenario familiar; but he didn’t say a word, feeling that the story hadn’t ended yet..
“He doesn’t even call me an idiot or anything, just groans when he wants me to shut up,” Merlin continued. Not that he liked to be called an idiot, but he knew that if Arthur didn’t call him names, something was seriously wrong with him. “And once he blew his nose into my scarf, because he couldn’t find his handkerchief,” he added.
Gaius’ eyes widened at first, but then he couldn’t help himself and chuckled as he tried to imagine how it could have happened. Merlin sat up on his bed, furrowing his eyebrows.
“It’s not funny!” he protested. “I was just arranging his pillows and he started sniffing, and then suddenly he took my scarf and blew his nose into it!”
Gaius had to press his lips together in order not to laugh as he tried to imagine the scene, and Merlin just shook her head, but didn’t say a word. He had to admit that if it hadn’t happened to him, he would have also considered it funny.
At that moment a squire knocked on Gaius’ door saying that he was bringing a message from the king.
“It’s for his manservant,” the young boy said as the court physician let him into his chambers. “He doesn’t have the voice for it right now, so he asked me to give him a message.”
“What’s the message?” Merlin asked, suspecting that it couldn’t be anything good.
The squire grinned and after taking a deep breath, he shouted:
“MER-LIIIIN!”
6.
Waking up, Merlin tried to breathe through his nose, but realising that it was still stuffed, he let out a groan, wanting to drift back into sleep. There’s no use to be awake with a cold, he thought; however, noticing someone sitting by his bed, he changed his mind.
“Are you feeling better?” Arthur asked.
Better? It depended. Comparing to his normal state of health, it was still horrible, but to how he had been on the day before - better, indeed. At least, his head had stopped aching and his throat was less sore now.
“Yes,” he replied in a hoarse voice.
“Good,” Arthur said with a cheeky smile. “My armour needs polishing.”
Hearing this, Merlin’s eyes widened, and if he wasn’t feeling so weak, he would have definitely sat up, but all he could say was this:
“What?” He took a deep breath to start an outburst, even if it would be a hoarse and feeble one, when Arthur started to laugh.
“Have you really thought that I would let you polish my armour while you’re sick?” he asked. “Don’t be an idiot, Merlin!”
The young warlock smirked at the prince - no, he would never have thought about such thing.
“But seriously, Merlin, I hope you can come back soon,” Arthur said. “That Jasper is really getting on my nerves.”
Hearing the name, a small smile touched Merlin’s lips. It was no wonder that Jasper was getting on Arthur’s nerves - he was the most useless member of the staff, but as a cousin of the Kitchen Head, he could stay in the castle. Merlin didn’t know who had sent him to Arthur, but he liked the idea. He felt as if it was some kind of well-deserved reward after how Arthur had treated him while being sick.
“I’ll try my best, Sire,” he promised, joking a little, since it wasn’t completely up to him. “The soup helps a lot,” he added, throwing a glance to the empty pot on his nightstand. “I get one from the kitchen every day,” he continued, “although I didn’t order any. Gwaine said I have a secret admirer.”
Hearing this, Arthur couldn’t help laughing. A secret admirer, he thought and shook his head a little.
“Of course, Merlin, a secret admirer,” he said skeptically. “It’s me.”
“You admire me?” Merlin raised a brow with a grin. “Secretly?”
“No, you idiot! I sent you the soup!” Arthur said, trying to sound serious, but he couldn’t help laughing.
“Oh,” Merlin said and his grin faded away immediately. Then, seeing Arthur frown, he started laughing. “No, I was just kidding,” he said. “Thank you for the...”
He couldn’t finish the sentence due to that annoying urge that twisted his nose and filled his eyes with tears before a loud sneeze, which was followed by a clatter of glass from Gaius’ room.
“Merlin!” the court physician shouted and the two young men could hear him coming towards them. “How many times do I have to tell you not to...” he continued, opening the door, but seeing Arthur there, he stopped talking. “Good afternoon, Sire,” he finally said, flashing a small smile at the prince, who smiled back at him, nodding his head a little.
It seemed he hadn’t noticed the flash of gold in Merlin’s eyes.