Fic: A Wound Too Deep Part 1

[rebbeile]

Title: A Wound Too Deep
Rating: R
Pairing: Arthur/Merlin
Words: 11702
Genre: Fluff, H/C, Angst
Spoilers/Warnings: General Season 1/2
Disclaimer: Not mine.
Summary: Arthur accidentally shoots Merlin. Things can only go downhill from there.
A/N: Written for the KMM prompt Merlin is wounded somehow while he and Arthur are on a hunting trip/journey. The wound gets infected while they're still a few days away from help. Cue feverish, wounded Merlin being forced to reveal his magic to save his own life. Bonus points for an initially-angry-but-eventually-accepting-Arthur. Bonus-bonus points if Arthur is angry that Merlin allowed himself to suffer and get sick rather than reveal his magic to Arthur sooner.


It wouldn’t have happened if not for the bear. Actually, Arthur supposed, if one was going to be completely honest about it, it started long before the bear. It started the second Merlin walked into Camelot and addressed Arthur as though he was a common boy rather than a prince, speaking to him in a way that no one had ever spoken to him before. If Merlin hadn’t come to Camelot, he would never have saved Arthur’s life, and he would never have become Arthur’s manservant, and he would never have ended up in the wildest parts of Albion’s forests on the day that Arthur saw the bear.

They had been out on a hunting trip, one of the ones that Uther often sent him on so that the nobles could see just how adept and how strong the future prince of Camelot truly was. Merlin hadn’t wanted to come, but Arthur had used his mighty powers of persuasion to convince the other man to change his mind.
“You’re coming,” he had said firmly on the night before they were due to leave.
“But-“ Merlin had started, looking up from Arthur’s pack, which he’d been trying fruitlessly to close.
“You’re coming, or you’re staying in the stocks until I get back.” Arthur continued, glancing over at his scowling manservant. There was no real reason that he needed Merlin to come with him - he’d survived many hunting trips on his own - and really, it was probably more beneficial to Arthur to leave Merlin behind, but he’d grown used to having the man around. And besides, if he left Merlin alone in Camelot then the idiot would probably find some way to explode Arthur’s chambers while Arthur wasn’t around to stop him. Really, it was safer for everybody if Arthur took him out of the castle.
“Prat,” Merlin had muttered, frowning in defeat, and that was the end of it.
_____

The thing was, it wasn’t the bear that wounded Merlin. If it had been the bear, Arthur would have been able to vanquish all his strange, uncomfortable guilt by sticking a sword in its chest, killing the thing, eating all of the parts of it that a person could safely eat and then putting its fur on his floor, so that he could tramp all over it every single day to punish it for what it had done to his servant (it wasn’t that Arthur particularly cared if Merlin was hurt, of course, but Arthur had invested a lot of time into training the man, and it would be a waste for him to be hideously maimed so early in his career). If it had been the bear that wounded Merlin, Arthur would have been able to blame the bear and go on a bear-killing spree until all of his anger had been channelled away, and every single bear that dared to pass through Camelot’s forests was dead. But it wasn’t the bear that had wounded Merlin. It was Arthur.

In fairness, it had partly been the idiot’s own fault. They’d been travelling for days, winding their way into the deepest parts of the forest where the herds were the largest and the animals grew fat off the thick greenery. It was quiet there, especially at night, and for the past few evenings Arthur had slept close to Merlin so that the man didn’t grow afraid when the darkness closed in over their heads. Merlin had looked at him in an odd sort of a way when Arthur lay down mere feet away, rather than on the other side of the fire like he usually did, but Arthur had just given him his best imperious expression (the one Uther had taught him when he was only five), and Merlin had simply stared at him for a moment with those pretty, wide blue eyes of his, before rolling over and slipping quietly into sleep.

The next day Arthur had risen early, and had checked his sword and his spears and his crossbow were all ready for the day before Merlin had even opened his eyes. Merlin was supposed to have done it himself, but when Arthur had walked over to the bedroll to shove him awake the boy seemed too vulnerable, too innocent, and Arthur had found to his surprise that he hadn’t really wanted to wake him. If Merlin woke up, he’d have moved his head, and the shadows that Arthur saw playing so beautifully across his cheekbones would be chased away. If Merlin woke up, he’d rise from his bedroll, and Arthur wouldn’t be able to admire the way the man’s hair curled softly around the tip of his ears as he slept.

So instead, Arthur had sat with his back against a log and stared at Merlin, wondering how it was that a common born man could look so utterly beautiful. By all rights, Merlin ought to be as rough and as scraggly as all of the other men that Arthur saw roaming through the streets of Camelot - and probably even more so, considering that he came from Ealdor, and everyone knew that Ealdor was as rural and as rough as a village could possibly get. But as Arthur looked at the way Merlin’s slim fingers curled around the edge of his blanket, and the way his long eyelashes skimmed the tops of his pale cheeks, he had to admit that even the most handsome of his knights couldn’t really compare to the servant. It was just as well Merlin was Arthur’s, really, because it would reflect well on Arthur if he could hold on to the prettiest servant in all of Camelot.

Or at least Merlin was the prettiest until he woke up, Arthur thought, as he watched Merlin flail wildly into consciousness, his limbs whirling through the air as he struggled to pull himself upright. Merlin rubbed a hand across his eyes as he peered around the campsite, and then paused, mid-yawn, as his eyes came to rest upon Arthur.
“Oh,” Merlin said, his brow creasing. Arthur felt a strange, inexplicable urge to smooth the tip of his finger over it, but he resisted, instead crossing his arms firmly across his chest. He raised an eyebrow at Merlin.
“Don’t mind me, Merlin,” he said, the familiar tone of sarcasm slipping easily into his voice. “By all means, go back to sleep. I didn’t want to hunt, anyway.”
Merlin scrambled upright, his eyes crinkling as a ray of sunlight streaming through the branches hit him full in the face.
“What time is it?” he asked. “Why didn’t you wake me? You always wake me,” he said, staring at Arthur in confusion. It was true. Arthur had devised a list of ingenious and varied ways to wake Merlin, and he’d never failed to use one before. The previous morning, for example, it had involved copious amounts of cold water and a foot in the face. Arthur smiled a little as he remembered the feel of Merlin’s face beneath his toes, and the frantic, gasping breaths that Merlin had taken as he woke.
“What was that for, you clotpole?” he’d asked, his voice rough both with sleep and with the copious amount of water that had flowed into his open mouth while he slept. Usually, Arthur would have replied with some witty, scathing retort (of which he had plenty), but he had found that the sight of drenched Merlin, with his hair mussed and his chest bare, splayed helplessly out before him, was doing strange things to his insides, and the low, rough sound of Merlin’s voice was sending heat sparking through his veins. So instead, he’d turned abruptly away and decided that he wouldn’t - he couldn’t - wake Merlin like that anymore, because he was the Prince of Camelot and he didn’t need his body reacting like that to anyone. It wasn’t proper.

But he couldn’t explain any of this to Merlin, of course, and so he’d simply responded to Merlin’s confused questions with a regal glare. He was getting rather good at them. Merlin’s face fell as he turned to pack his bags, and Arthur decided that he’d just have to ignore the odd, uncomfortable tightness he felt inside his chest when he saw Merlin frown. He was a Prince, after all. Emotions like that were just things to be accepted and then overcome, pushed into submission until they were no longer quite there.

They started moving soon after that, winding their way deeper into the forest. Merlin fell behind him, weighed down by his pack, and Arthur let the sound of the trees and the stream they were walking beside calm his mind, until it was just him and the forest and there was nothing that could possibly distract him from the singular thrill of the hunt. Well, except for Merlin falling over himself, and over a log, and over a rock, and over the side of a small hillock that was steeper on one side than the other, so that Merlin bounced his way down its slope for what seemed like hours before he came to a muddy stop at its base. But those were minor distractions, and Arthur had come to expect such things when hunting with Merlin, so he was able to ignore them.

He’d shut everything out so well that he almost didn’t see the bear. It was a big one, brown and bulky and fierce, and Arthur nearly gasped when he saw it. Uther would be proud of a kill like that. He imagined himself bringing the head before the king, and Uther’s eyes lighting up with that fierce pride Arthur sometimes saw in them after he’d done something truly impressive. Arthur treasured those moments, because it was in those moments that Uther clapped him on the shoulder and called him my son and made Arthur feel as though he was the mightiest prince in all the world. He knew that Uther saw him as the next king of Camelot, and that if his father seemed hard it was only because of the responsibility Uther saw hanging over Arthur’s head. But all the same, Arthur sometimes wished that he could be treated as a son rather than a prince, if only for a little while.

So when he saw the bear, he knew that he had to kill it. He would fight it like he’d fought all of the magical beasts and the sorcerers that had plagued Camelot before, and he’d bring it back to Camelot with his head held high and watch as Uther rejoiced. He set his jaw and reached for his crossbow, fitting a bolt into the slot and steadying himself against the tree beside him. The bear was still facing away from him, investigating the boughs of a fallen tree. Arthur inhaled a steadying breath, took aim and fired.
____

Merlin hadn’t been paying any attention to Arthur up until the moment that the prince hit him in the leg with a crossbow bolt. He hadn’t been watching the way the low-hanging branches brushed against Arthur’s muscled shoulders as he walked. He hadn’t been gazing at the curve of the prince’s breeches when Arthur bent to study some marking or other on the trail. And he certainly hadn’t been admiring the way the sunlight shone off Arthur’s soft blonde hair, or the way the shadows dappled along his jaw.

Instead, he’d been minding his own business, wandering slowly along behind Arthur and wondering how long it would be before gravity once more got the better of him and tipped him over another easily avoidable object. He was already coated in mud from his slide down the hill, and he’d ripped his favourite shirt and scared off Arthur’s prey twice that morning. So instead of watching Arthur, which was the usual way he passed time while out on journeys like these, he’d been walking steadily along, keeping his eyes firmly fixed on the ground beneath his feet. He’d been doing a good job of it, too, up until the point where he’d heard something that sounded like a growl, and had looked up to find himself face to face with a bear. Or face to rear, rather, because the bear had its back to him and hadn’t yet noticed that he was there.

Merlin had frozen, his instincts screaming at him to run, and to stay still, and to try patting it because bears were often friendly (though he had a feeling that this last one was less of an instinct and more of a whimsical, fleeting fancy, so he ignored it). The bear huffed, and shuffled menacingly to the side, and when Merlin got a glimpse of its claws, he had decided that he really ought to be getting out of its way before it noticed him. So he had turned to run, his mind focused on moving his legs with some semblance of order. But he only took two steps before there was a whooshing noise and a sharp, sudden pain in his thigh. He gave a scream of pain and stumbled, colliding heavily with the ground as his leg collapsed beneath him. It felt like someone had driven a stake straight through his flesh. He heard a low growl, and he thought that someone roared his name, but then his head crashed hard against the edge of a log and he sunk swiftly into unconsciousness.
____

“MERLIN!” Arthur roared as he saw the man collapse, the end of a crossbow bolt - Arthur’s crossbow bolt - protruding from his leg. The bear looked up, startled, and Arthur hurled his crossbow at it as hard as he could, hoping to send it fleeing before it noticed Merlin. The crossbow bounced off the bear’s shaggy flank, and, to Arthur’s relief, it loped slowly off into the forest.

Arthur ran into the clearing where Merlin was lying. He’d almost forgotten Merlin was with him; he’d been so focused on the bear, and the idiot had walked right out into the path of the crossbow bolt without even hesitating. Arthur felt his stomach lurch wildly, panic crushing his chest as he knelt down beside his servant, holding a cupped hand to the man’s face. Merlin’s eyes were closed, and he had a gash on his forehead from where it had collided with the log. Arthur took a deep breath, steadying himself. It was illogical to feel so disturbed - he’d seen wounds before; he’d watched men die before; he’d killed men before. But those were just men - simple, understandable men, whom Arthur had never talked to, or slept beside, or laughed with. It was easy with those men, because they were nothing more than men.

But Merlin was more than that - he was a man, yes, but he was also a friend. He did and said things to Arthur that other people didn’t dare to, and he had wormed his way into Arthur’s heart - a heart Arthur hadn’t even known he possessed until he’d looked at Merlin one day and realised that the sight of the man made a tiny part of his chest feel unfamiliar and brand new. And it was at that moment, as Merlin lay there beside him on the forest floor, that Arthur realised that Princes, too, could feel fear. It wasn’t the fear of death, or of the enemy - those fears he could live with, because he’d been trained since birth to recognise them and control them. But no one had ever told him of the fear that stemmed from love.

Arthur pulled off his cloak, pillowing it beneath Merlin’s limp head. He ran his fingers lightly over the servant’s body, checking for any other injuries, before steeling himself and looking down at Merlin’s thigh. The bolt protruded from the skin, but it hadn’t gone as deep as Arthur had feared, and there was less blood staining the ground than Arthur had expected to see. He gave a shaky sigh, relief flooding his chest. Reaching forward, he tugged at the crossbow, pulling it cleanly out of the man’s flesh. Merlin twitched, moaning.
“Idiot,” Arthur said gently as he reached for his bag. He pulled out his spare shirt and tore several strips off the bottom. The wound needed to be bound, Arthur knew. He’d seen enough knights fall because they hadn’t thought to stem the flow of blood from an injury, and he knew that bandaging Merlin was the best thing he could do for the man until they made it back to Camelot.

He was winding the first strip of shirt carefully around the gash in Merlin’s forehead when the man came to.
“Arthur?” he asked groggily, trying to sit upright. Arthur pushed him gently back down. “Wh- what happened?”
Arthur looked down at him. Merlin’s blue eyes were hazy with pain, and he was biting the side of his cheek. I shot you, he thought, and the wave of guilt that accompanied that simple phrase made him want to apologise to Merlin, and hug him, and tell him that he would never, ever hurt him again and that he’d carry Merlin all the way back to Camelot if he had to. The servant was silly and idiotic and had skin that was too pale and ears that were too big, but despite all that they were friends, and Arthur knew that friends weren’t supposed to hurt each other.

But he didn’t know how to say that. Merlin had only ever seen the Prince as a master to be reluctantly followed, and he’d fought with Arthur every step of the way. So Arthur simply tucked in the end of the bandage and rose abruptly to his feet.
“There was an accident,” he said quietly. “I’m going to get water from the stream. Stay still,” he warned sternly. Merlin nodded, obedient for once, and Arthur crossed the clearing to the stream as fast as he could. He bent down by the water and let his spare shirt sink beneath the surface until it was soaked. Standing, he walked quickly back across the clearing and knelt once more beside Merlin. The man didn’t appear to have moved, but Arthur noticed that his hand was clasped on the blood-spattered crossbow bolt that Arthur had pulled from his leg. Merlin didn’t say anything about it, though, instead watching quietly as Arthur arranged his makeshift medical kit on the ground beside him.

Arthur picked up a bandage and turned to examine Merlin’s leg again. He would need to clean away the blood and then bandage it tightly, and that meant - oh. This was going to be difficult. Arthur cleared his throat, suddenly aware of exactly how close Merlin’s leg was to his own, and how Merlin’s blue eyes were fixed steadily on his face. He looked down at the bandage in his hands.
“Ah, Merlin,” he started. “To get at your - that is, to bandage - I need-” this was ridiculous, Arthur thought. He was the Prince of Camelot. He didn’t stammer. “I need to take off your breeches,” he finished hurriedly.

There was a moment of silence, in which Merlin’s face turned a fierce shade of pink, the flush spreading wildly from his cheekbones down his neck, to the shadowed line of his collarbones. He opened his mouth as though he was going to reply, and Arthur’s eyes were drawn helplessly to his lips. Gods, those lips. Arthur stamped down hard on that train of thought as he felt warmth curl through his stomach. He didn’t need to be thinking those thoughts. Not now, and not ever. Merlin was his friend.

And right now, he was looking more embarrassed than Arthur had ever seen him.
“I need to get at the wound,” Arthur explained awkwardly, wishing that he hadn’t been so eager to shoot the bear; that Merlin had stayed out of the way like a proper servant would have; that Arthur had never decided to go hunting - that any of the events that led to them being here simply hadn’t happened.
“Ok,” Merlin said quietly, dragging Arthur out of his thoughts. He reached for the laces of his breeches, pointedly staring straight up at the canopy of leaves above him, and Arthur swallowed. He looked back down and started rearranging the bandages, trying - rather unsuccessfully - to feign casual disinterest.

Suddenly, Merlin made a small noise of discomfort, and Arthur’s eyes snapped up to his face, concerned. The other man’s gaze was steady against his, but his features were twisted with pain.
“Ok,” Merlin said again, his voice soft, and Arthur tried to steady his breathing. He picked up the soaked shirt and set his jaw, before sliding his eyes down Merlin’s body and reaching over to start cleaning the wound.
__

This was not a good day, Merlin thought, as Arthur’s eyes moved away from his face and down his body. He was covered in mud, his head ached, he had a hole in his leg and he was currently lying helplessly below the Prince of Camelot with his pants around his knees.

He closed his eyes, trying to focus on his magic, or on Gaius, or on the way his leg ached with pain - anything but the feel of Arthur’s knee brushing against his, and the pleasant, unfamiliar feel of air wafting over his lower body. But with his eyes closed, Merlin could focus on nothing but Arthur’s breathing, which sounded obscenely heavy as the prince leant over him. Even despite the pain, Merlin felt his insides twist with warmth, and he wrenched his eyes open, breathing deeply, trying to clear his mind.
“Are you alright?” Arthur’s face was back over his, his beautiful blue eyes wide with concern. Merlin swallowed, inhaled deeply, and nodded.
“Okay,” Arthur said, his eyes flicking back down Merlin’s body. “I- I’m going to clean it now,” he said unevenly, and Merlin bit the inside of his cheek savagely, trying to stop his body responding to the low rasp of Arthur’s voice. He looked over at the prince, but Arthur’s face was oddly blank as he examined Merlin’s thigh.

Arthur reached out and wiped the damp shirt against the flesh around the wound, the rough material scraping against Merlin’s skin. Merlin twitched, and looked down, unable to stop himself. Arthur’s hands were hovering over his thigh, and as he watched, the prince placed one gently next to the wound, holding Merlin’s leg steady as he worked. Merlin bit back a moan, and wondered what in the world he’d done to deserve this. If this - this torture - was his destiny, he wanted no part of it.

Arthur ran the shirt over the gash in his leg and Merlin gave an involuntary gasp as the pain flared sharply. Instantly, Arthur’s hands were on him, one - oh, gods - stroking his leg, the other curling comfortingly around his wrist.
“It’s okay,” he said softly. “Sorry, that was too rough. It’s okay, Merlin.” Merlin slowly relaxed as Arthur’s voice rolled over him. He’d never heard the prince speak like that before - openly, with no hint of sarcasm or insult or derision. But then, he supposed, they’d never been in a situation quite like this one before, either. Merlin found that it was comforting to hear the prince speak his name gently, the way Hunith used to say it when he was sick in bed as a child.

He’d only ever seen Arthur’s strong, determined, manly side - the side that he showed to Uther, the side that his knights knew, the side that the people of Camelot saw every time Arthur set foot outside the castle. This other side of Arthur had been hidden deep beneath his brazen attitude. Merlin had only ever seen glimpses of it, at moments when Uther expressed disappointment in the prince, or when someone mentioned Ygraine. It during those moments that Arthur's face would fall, and Merlin could see the edge of something else - of some deep, powerful feeling - swarming below his blank expression.

Merlin’s breathing slowed as Arthur spoke, and Arthur, noticing this, gently took his hand away from Merlin’s wrist and picked up a strip of his spare shirt. Merlin bit his lip as he felt Arthur’s hands once more upon his leg, wrapping the bandage firmly around the gash. He was sure that if Arthur didn’t finish soon then Merlin wouldn’t be able to keep himself from focusing on the way Arthur leant over his body, the way his fingers brushed lightly against his thigh, and the way Arthur’s brow creased in concentration as he worked. He held his breath, certain that this situation couldn’t possibly end well. But then the bandage was in place, Arthur’s hands were gone, and the Prince was suddenly on his feet, turning away from Merlin before Merlin even realised he was done.
“Finished,” Arthur said shortly, almost coldly, and he walked quickly off towards the stream, leaving Merlin to struggle with his breeches and wonder just what it was that he’d done wrong.
____

It was late afternoon when they finally got moving again. When Arthur had returned from the stream, he had abruptly announced that they would return to Camelot immediately, which left Merlin feeling more confused than ever. The fact that Arthur was willing to abandon the hunt and return home for Merlin’s sake suggested that the Prince cared at least a little whether his servant lived or died. But he was barely talking to Merlin, instead glaring at him whenever Merlin opened his mouth to speak, as though it was Merlin’s fault that he was injured. It was as though he resented Merlin for forcing them to turn back.

Merlin supposed that Arthur must think him weak, because the knights that Arthur had grown up alongside were often injured much more severely than Merlin currently was, and they were able to continue onwards without complaint. But Merlin hadn’t been trained like them. He wasn’t strong in the way that they were, and so he found that even the slightest slope was enough to send a new wave of pain flooding through his leg. He gritted his teeth against it, though, and didn’t say anything. He didn’t need Arthur to resent him more than he already did.

They reached the river just before nightfall. Merlin recognised the crossing, because they’d passed over it just that morning. It meant that they were still several days away from Camelot, and apprehension curled in his stomach at the thought of spending hours tramping through the forest with his leg burning and Arthur marching angrily ahead of him, setting a pace that Merlin couldn't possibly hope to match.
“We’ll camp on the other side,” Arthur said stiffly, breaking into his thoughts, and Merlin watched as the prince walked onwards, his feet splashing through the shallow water of the river.
“Prat,” he muttered, and hobbled after him. He should be the one angry at Arthur, really, because he’d seen the bloody crossbow bolt and he knew that it was Arthur who’d injured him. But the prince had looked so guilty as he knelt beside Merlin - an expression he’d never, ever seen on Arthur’s face before - that Merlin hadn’t said anything about it. He’d thought the prince felt bad for shooting him. He’d thought, for one silly, fleeting moment, that Arthur had actually cared.

Merlin walked onwards, his boots heavy as they pushed through the water, making each step seem even more painful than the last. He should have asked Arthur for help. But he was almost at the other side, now, and he could see Arthur walking up the bank and into the forest, and it was only a few more steps, and it -

Merlin’s thoughts were interrupted when his foot slipped against a smooth stone beneath the surface, and all of his weight was suddenly transferred onto his injured leg. He cried out in pain as it throbbed beneath him, before his feet gave way for the tenth time that day and he tumbled into the shallows.

The water was cool around his body. He was weighed down by his clothes and his boots and he felt so tired that he briefly wondered whether he couldn’t just stay here until he sunk beneath the surface, or whether he couldn't just use his magic to drain the river away instead, because that seemed like less of an effort than trying to get his feet positioned beneath him once more. But then there were arms around his waist, and a strong chest pressed against his back, and he was being lifted out of the water, Arthur’s voice loud in his ear.
“...clumsy and hopeless and a complete idiot,” he growled as he dragged Merlin through the water. “And the worst servant I’ve ever had the misfortune to employ.” He pulled Merlin up the bank and laid him carefully down beside their packs, before running his hands lightly over Merlin’s leg to check that he hadn’t done any new damage to it.
“Okay?” he asked, his voice suddenly quieter, and Merlin nodded, confused by the Prince's sudden mood swings but too exhausted to care. He leant his head back against the ground and closed his eyes wearily, the feel of Arthur's hand on his soothing him, lulling him into an uneasy sleep.
___

Merlin woke to find himself on a bedroll. It was cold, and his clothes were still damp against his skin. Night had fallen, and Arthur was sitting close beside him with his arms around his knees, staring into the fire he’d lit. He looked over and raised an eyebrow as Merlin sat up.
“I had to make camp,” the prince said conversationally. “And light the fire, and spread out the bedrolls, and take off my own boots and hang up my own jacket to dry.” Merlin wondered where Arthur was going with that statement.
“Well done?” he offered, running his hands down his arms to warm them.
Arthur shook his head. “The point is, Merlin, that I am the Prince of Camelot, and I have just had to complete your duties.”
“How terrible for you,” Merlin replied. He thought that, what with Arthur having injured him and all, it was the least that the prince could do.
Arthur narrowed his eyes. “I do believe you’ll need a week in the stocks for that,” he said imperiously, but a tiny smile tugged at the corner of his mouth as he spoke. Merlin felt his heart give a leap at that, the way it always did when Arthur joked with him, or laughed with him, or showed him that he saw Merlin as a person as well as a servant.
“But sire, if you’re doing my duties, shouldn’t you be taking my punishments as well?” Merlin asked, sitting up from his mat and turning to face the fire. Arthur made a derisive noise beside him, and they settled into an easy silence as they watched the flames. After a few moments, the prince pulled out some dried meat from his pack and offered it to Merlin. He took a piece, and they ate quietly, enjoying the simple warmth of the fire and the salty taste of the meat.

It was strange, Merlin thought, to sit here beside his future ruler as though they were two common boys from the village. The prince was seated on the same ground as Merlin, and he was eating the same meat as Merlin, and they were both damp with river water and coated in the same mud. There was little to distinguish between them, and Merlin felt as though, just for a moment, they weren’t so much master and servant as equals - as two simple men who had been brought together by fate, and who were destined to walk beside each other - to know each other - for the entirety of their lives. The dragon often said that they were two sides of a coin, but as Merlin looked over at the prince, he felt that, just for a moment, they were even closer than that.

Part 2