Damn the Gray that Gains the Sky [NC17] Arthur/Merlin
Title: Damn the Gray that Gains the Sky
Author: queenklu
Beta by: ...dammit
Pairing: Arthur/Merlin
Rating: NC17
Word Count: 1300~
A/N: Written on the occasion of macbyrne's birthday, because she's just about the coolest person i've ever even heard of, and do you know how hard she's going to rock motherhood? SO HARD. (Especially if she names her baby after that guy from Galaxy Quest, hinthint. ;3) HAPPY BIRTHDAY BB! ♥ ♥ ♥ You asked for angst and J2 or Sam/Dean and here it be! With SCHMOO!
P.S. Pretty much everything stolen from Richard Shindell's gorgeous song, Fenario. <--dl it.
Arthur can barely hear the creak of horse tack, thick cloth walls smothering sound as if a blanket had been tossed carelessly over the world. He'd see his breath if he opened his eyes, could watch the way it puffed against the unruly mess of Merlin’s hair. But it can’t be morning yet.
His mind’s been thumping rapidly throughout his dreams, strategies and fields of battle, the smell of horses, mud, and blood already haunting in the back of his throat. He tucks his face in close to the nape of Merlin’s neck, breathes him in. Merlin smells like a hard ride.
A moment later Merlin tenses in his arms and Arthur can feel the heartbeat under his palm start pounding. He smirks, lets Merlin feel the shape of it against his skin. “Still dark,” he rumbles, voice rough and so, so quiet in the stillness. “Relax, Merlin. Go back to sleep.”
“Prat.” There’s a certain unsteadiness in Merlin’s huff that makes Arthur’s fingers tighten, and then Merlin’s are there, tangling them together as he turns in Arthur’s arms. “I was asleep.”
Arthur wants to see him with such ferocity that it makes him ache. He’d see Merlin’s storm blue eyes heavy lidded with sleep, dark hair at every angle, his drowsy smile. But he can’t bear to see the tightness around Merlin’s lips as he puts on a good show, the worried circles under the smudge of his lashes. Not yet. It’s still dark.
He nuzzles forward blindly and Merlin meets him, catches his mouth and delves inside, tongue slick and hot and bordering so close to desperate Arthur barely manages to stifle a groan. He’s pretty sure his men suspect, but he’s the crown prince and he-oh-he can have-is expected to have-bed-warmers. Fuck, there. He can..he can let them think that’s all Merlin is as long as he’s allowed to have this.
Merlin’s fingers fumble with his breeches-too cold to sleep without them-and Arthur’s eyes slide open as his hands slide down the shape of Arthur’s arse. He’s still wet from when Merlin took him in the woods, shoved up tight against a massive birch, scrabbling for purchase in its bark as Merlin’s wicked tongue ate at him, plunging inside as Arthur shook and Merlin left fingerprints over his hips.
Any other time Arthur wouldn’t let Merlin have him twice in one night, not when he has to be on a horse tomorrow. Today. But god, oh god, Merlin’s two fingers deep in him already and they slipped in like nothing at all, and Merlin’s hunger is writ out across his face, in the tense line of his brow which he presses against Arthur as if he’s trying to hide it, the swell of his lip where he’s bitten too hard.
“Merlin,” Arthur murmurs, fitting his palm to the sharp angle of Merlin’s jaw, trying to settle him. “Merlin-“
Merlin cuts him off with a kiss and an impossibly good twist of his fingers, and Arthur gasps, rocking up, control shattered and done with. His nails dig in too hard on Merlin’s back, leaving welts as Merlin fucks in and opens him up, splaying him wide and holding him down. Arthur swallows a moan and cants his hips up, flexing around the shape of Merlin buried so deep in him he can almost taste it.
God, he loves-he loves…this. This and this boy. He’d move mountains.
“Don’t,” Merlin pants into his skin when Arthur reaches down to touch where Merlin’s stretching him open, shocked at the fill of it. “Arthur- Arthur, I-“
Arthur eats the words from his mouth before they can be said, and with his hands locked around the curve of Merlin’s ridiculous ears he comes, Merlin’s fingers and cock and need wringing it from him before Arthur’s in any way prepared for it to be over. His cry hurts his chest, strangled too late into submission as Merlin thrusts and thrusts and thrusts again into his shivering, shaking body.
Arthur fits weak hands to Merlin’s bony hips, urging him along while he tries to remember how to string words back together. He’s over-sensitized, needle sharp shock waves darting through his blood as his cock twitches painfully, trying to give more than it can. Arthur slides his trembling fingers through the wet mess he’s made across his stomach but Merlin’s eyes are squeezed shut, breath and distressed noises stuttering out of his mouth as if he’d give anything to make them stop.
He’s too pale and shuddering too hard; Arthur has them flipped before he realizes he’s moving, pinning Merlin to their bedroll with fierce single-mindedness he usually saves for battle. Merlin shakes in his grip like he has a fever, high flush across his cheekbones the only color in his skin, eyes still shut as he turns his face away.
Arthur growls his name, and the only sign he gets that Merlin’s heard is a faltering gasp and a fresh swath of sweat on his brow. No. His hands clench tight on Merlin’s wrists and Merlin bucks up, reddened weeping cock throbbing so hard Arthur can see his pulse. He should have come-Arthur’s never seen anyone so hard-and-and Arthur’s mouth is so wet so sudden he has to-
His saliva drips down Merlin’s cock, chased by Arthur’s lips as they fit around the swell of him, swallowing him down. Merlin thrashes, entire body jerking in Arthur’s restricting embrace. Arthur feels him shift, looks up without pausing to see Merlin propped up on coltish, shaking elbows as his mouth parts, and his eyelids drift open.
Merlin’s eyes are gold.
They twist shut the next second as Merlin’s head falls back and his hips pump up, just once into Arthur’s mouth and he lets go, lets his come flood Arthur’s mouth as he spasms and moans, short, needy sounds that make Arthur’s skin burn and his heart ache, and as Merlin collapses back into the bedding the first misty yellows of dawn light up his skin.
His eyes flit open-blue-and Merlin’s heart looks broken. “I didn’t… I…” His voice is all but gone. “Arthur, I…”
“Merlin,” Arthur says, his own voice in not much better shape with the taste of Merlin thick on his tongue, “did you really think I wouldn’t notice when the sun just didn’t rise?”
“I-“ Merlin stops and swallows, brows knitted together in a scowl. “You are supremely unobservant about quite a lot of things, sire.”
Arthur can’t help laughing as he gathers Merlin’s unhappy self into his arms, and if Merlin clings a little tighter than he should, Arthur’s not in a position to judge. “I will be back,” he whispers into Merlin’s hair, against the shell of those ungainly ears. “I will be back, and I want the kingdom in one piece when I return.”
“I want a lot of things,” Merlin says, quite loftily for someone with his breeches round his knees, “like not to muck out your stables and not to polish your smelly boots and-“
“Not to be hung for magic while I’m not there to protect you,” Arthur says, fingertip against Merlin’s well-kissed lips.
Merlin glares. “Not to hear you’ve been killed because I wasn’t there to save your princely arse.”
“Mm,” Arthur hums, shifting and settling his body more firmly over Merlin’s. “I know in what high regard you hold my princely arse. In fact, I suspect it will be a great deal of time before my princely arse forgets about you.”
“Better not.” Merlin gives it a swat, hard enough that Arthur has to bite back a yelp. He’s grinning when Arthur pins his hands near his ridiculous ears, though, so Arthur counts it as a win. “Don’t you have things to do, my lord? Men to march, menservants to send back to Camelot?”
“It’s only just dawn,” Arthur murmurs against his mouth, and feels it curl into a smile.
Later, when he’s watching Merlin’s brown mare disappear into the mist, with his men at his back and Fenario to the north, he’ll think to himself, That boy stopped the sun for me.
But not yet.