Fic-A Rose By Any Other Name, 1b/?
Title: A Rose by Any Other Name, Chapter 1/?
Author: ne_rien
Rating: PG14-ish
Word count: This chapter (parts a & b) runs at about 3,107 words
Characters/Pairings: Arthur/Gwen, Merlin, Morgana, Morgana/Merlin if you squint really hard and stand on your head
Spoilers/Warnings: Modern AU so it’s slightly crack-tastic. Contains mild language and sexual content. Also, this hasn’t been Brit-picked and I know almost nothing about football so forgive any errors.
Disclaimer: If I owned this show, it would be sexy!times all the time bbs. I also didn’t write the lines from the play; that was all good Mr. William Shakespeare.
Prompt: Written for camelot_love's Spring Fling prompt U-5: Arthur, Gwen, Morgana, and Merlin all get in their high school spring play "Romeo and Juliet” courtesy of the lovely wickedvampirate's . Writing high school!Merlin & company broke my brain bb, sorry. I had to make them a little bit older; I hope you don’t mind!
Author’s notes: This is the second half of chapter one.
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(The Following Tuesday)
Gaius, the theater instructor who also taught several Shakespeare-centric literature courses, held up his hands for silence. “Listen up everyone. We have a great deal of work to do and not very much time, so let’s get started. I’m assuming you have all read the play or at the very least watched the American film, so the first few scenes of the play we’ll skim over for now. Just keep in mind that we are introduced to Tybalt and Romeo and we’re given background information on the Montagues and Capulets.”
“God, please tell me he’s going to stop talking soon,” Morgana whispered lowly to her best friend as Gaius proceeded to give an in-depth bio of each character. Gwen shushed her, looking ahead attentively and not noticing that Arthur and Merlin five chairs down from them were glancing in their direction.
“You ready for this?” Merlin asked, barely moving his lips and looking straight ahead to avoid detection. As a close friend of Hunith’s as well as a professor, Gaius tended to be especially hard on the young man in an effort to instill ‘a proper sense of discipline’.
Arthur felt his palms go sweaty as he caught sight of Gwen chewing her bottom lip thoughtfully. “As ready as I’ll ever be.”
Gaius continued on, so caught up in the story that he was momentarily deaf to the whispered conversations going on about the room. “Now that we have all of that background information in our minds, we’re going to spend the most time on scenes where I feel actors typically have the most difficulty. We’ll start with scene 5 from Act 1 from line 93; Merlin, Arthur, Gwen, Morgana, Bryan to the front of the room please.”
The five settled down on the stage in front of the rest of the cast and crew. Morgana and Arthur sat on either side of Gwen, with Bryan and Merlin sitting on the ends.
“Whenever you’re ready Romeo, please begin,” Gaius instructed them, sitting in the front row with the rest of the cast and crew to watch them, his arm crossed over his chest.
Arthur took a deep steadying breath. He knew all of the lines by heart but in an effort to distract himself from the fact that he was mere centimeters from Guinevere, he read rather stiffly from the script.
“If I profane with my unworthiest hand
This holy shrine, the gentle sin is this:
My lips, two blushing pilgrims ready stand
To smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss.”
Gwen’s voice was so soft and lyrical that he felt himself slip into a kind of stupor in which he was unable to hear or think or do anything other than bask in her heady presence…that is until she took his hand in hers as she finished her line.
“…For saints have hands that pilgrims' hands do touch;
And palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss.”
He met her gaze-at last-startled she was looking at him so sweetly. He felt his heart racing and silently prayed he didn’t look half as nervous as he felt.
“Have not saints lips and holy palmers too?” he replied, forgetting to pretend to read from the script.
Gwen apparently didn’t need hers either. “Ay pilgrim, lips that they must use in prayer.” She squeezed his somewhat sweaty palm reassuringly, her eyes bright with amusement.
“O’ then dear saint, let lips do what hands do;
They pray-grant thou lest faith turn to despair.”
Neither Arthur nor Gwen was aware that their performance had managed to captivate the entire room, Gaius included. The chemistry between them was undeniable.
“Saints do not move, though grant for prayers’ sake.”
Arthur’s eyes lowered unconsciously to her mouth, his voice lowering slightly. “Then move not while my prayer’s effect I take.” They simultaneously turned their bodies toward one another as Arthur gently pressed his lips to hers.
Gwen initially stiffened but then relaxed into him though the script called for her not to move, her grip on his hand tightening almost imperceptibly.
Arthur ended the kiss reluctantly, a slight smile on his face as he spoke his next line. “Thus from my lips, by yours, my sin is purged.”
‘Juliet’ took a moment to respond, her brown eyes seemed to search his for something. “Then have my lips the sin that they have took,” she replied breathily.
“Sin from my lips? O’ trespass sweetly urged.
Give me my sin again.”
This time their kiss seemed to last a lot longer-though not nearly long enough to suit Arthur.
Gwen’s smile was slightly mischievous afterward. “You kiss by th’ book.”
“And we’ll stop there a moment,” Gaius interrupted, startling them both. Somehow they’d managed to forget they were performing in front of a room full of people. “Excellent work Arthur; you started off a little dull at first but ended very well. Gwen my dear, you are a natural. Brilliant performance both of you. Everyone take notice that these two have already memorized their lines. I fully expect everyone to follow their leads by no later than Friday. Now, let’s continue the scene. Morgana, you start us off.”
Morgana made a face but dutifully obeyed. Gwen spoke her lines when it was her time but found that her focus was shattered, most likely due to the man sitting beside her. Something had happened between herself and “the crowned Prince of Camelot” as her best friend jokingly called him. If only she could figure out what that something was…
** **
“Oi, Gwen! Wait up!”
Guinevere sighed resignedly as Morgana caught with her after rehearsal and the two moved to a quiet corner in the hall.
“Right, you’ve known me long enough to know I don’t like to beat around the bush. Do you fancy Arthur?” The serious expression on her face said she wasn’t joking.
“Yes Morgana, you’ve caught me out. I’m secretly dying to be Mrs. Arthur Pendragon so that I can be related to Uther and interact with him on a daily basis, not to mention having all of the media hounding you lot deal with. Oh, and did I forget to mention how much I’d love to fend off his mad stalker ex, Vivian? And let’s not forget--”
Morgana laughed holding her hands up to stop the sarcastic tirade. “All right, all right truce. I was just a bit concerned by the two of you at rehearsal tonight.”
Gwen managed a weak laugh of her own as she recalled her body’s reaction when Arthur had first pressed his lips to hers. “Don’t be silly. It’s called acting.”
Her friend arched her brows, her gaze searching Gwen’s face intently. “Any chance you’re doing just that here with me right now?” she asked quietly.
She didn’t respond right away, gazing out of a nearby window unseeingly. “It’s the strangest thing really. I’ve never even thought of Arthur as anything other than your obnoxious brother and the university’s darling, and now…it’s as if I’m seeing him for the first time as an actual person.”
Morgana tutted sympathetically. “You’ve obviously contracted a rather serious case of Arthur-itis. It’s a grave disease that’s been known to turn perfectly sane women completely barmy, saints into sinners, average men into…Merlin.”
Gwen rolled her eyes. “Morgana, this is serious.”
“I hope to God it isn’t. Maybe it’s just a onetime freak occurrence brought on by the circumstances at the time. And if not, well, it’s my job as your best friend to make sure this doesn’t get out of control.”
“What doesn’t get out of control?”
Gwen and Morgana jumped as Merlin’s voice broke into the conversation unexpectedly.
“God Merlin! Keep that up and I’m going to have them put a bell ‘round your neck,” Morgana seethed, scowling at the grinning biochemistry wizard.
“Wow. You sounded an awful lot like Arthur just then,” he told her, winking in Gwen’s direction.
The pale brunette huffed. “Now you’re just being hurtful.”
Gwen smiled at the pair. They really did enjoy-perhaps too much-taking the Mickey out of one another. “All right Merlin? What brings you around?”
“You mean to this little corner of the hall you two have been standing looking somber for the last 10 minutes? Curiosity mostly, and I wanted to tell you how brilliant you were today.”
Morgana snorted derisively as she took out her cell and began to rapidly text someone. “You’ve been spying on us Merlin. That’s disturbing and yet coming from you, not all that surprising.”
“Cheers mate.”
“Merlin, are you coming ‘round later to catch up on Being Human with us?” Gwen asked, trying to change the subject.
His face fell. “Can’t. Arthur needs my help with his maths homework and knowing him, it’ll take all night.”
Gwen felt an unexpected jolt at hearing his name and her smile faltered. “Oh. That’s too bad.”
Morgana snapped her phone shut suddenly, her face so full of delighted mischief that both Merlin and Gwen unconsciously took a step back from her. “I’ve had the best idea! Gwen here would never admit it-too modest this one-but she’s a damned genius at maths herself and more importantly, she’s already seen all of the episodes already.”
Gwen whirled to face her friend, her expression aghast as she realized what her friend was suggesting. “Morgana!”
Merlin looked mildly alarmed himself. “You mean you want Gwen to take my place tutoring your prat brother while you and I watch the best program in the world on your big screen telly?”
“I don’t care what Arthur says, you’re much smarter than you look Merlin. And yes, this would be a great opportunity for those two to work on their scenes for the play as well as any other ‘issues’ they may have between them.” She raised her brows pointedly as she met Gwen’s gaze.
“Wouldn’t it be better if we were to save that sort of thing for rehearsal where we’ll have witnesses?” her best friend shot back, her own brows raised.
“Not at all,” was the matter of fact response. “Best if there is anything amiss that you lot sort it out in private before it has a chance to become serious. Right Merlin?”
“Uh…right. That is if you are talking about what I think you are and not secretly talking in code about something else entirely,” he replied, shooting Guinevere an apologetic look.
“Ta very much, mate,” Gwen replied, her tone sarcastic.
Morgana hugged her friend reassuringly. “Don’t be cross. This will fix your little problem we were talking about before it has a chance to spread. Think of it like an influenza inoculation; a bit of mild exposure to the disease to help you develop immunity to it later on.”
“Disease?” Merlin echoed looking uneasily at the two of them.
“Arthur-itis,” Morgana replied absently. “Trust me Gwen. This will work.”
Gwen felt her shoulders droop in resignation. In all the years that she’d been friends with the enigmatic Le Fay, she had never been able to tell her ‘no’ and this time was no exception. “All right, I’ll do it,” she assured her friend, though inwardly she was terrified that this would wind up being a mistake. Common sense told her that getting involved with her best friend’s foster brother who also happened to be the son of the most ruthless and successful businessman in Great Britain was a bad idea. But there was a tinny part of her that she could scarcely bring herself to acknowledge that was dying to really kiss those gorgeous lips once again…consequences be damned.
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Click Here for Chapter Two