Fic: The Knife's Edge (Merlin, Merlin/Arthur)
Title: The Knife's Edge
Author: suaine
Rating: R (for descriptions of violence and potentially disturbing content)
Spoilers: general for all episodes, specific for 1x11, 1x13
Summary: Arthur has been trained to kill since birth, Merlin just kind of stumbled into it.
Notes: Sparked by a discussion with frogspace and comments by allothi on Merlin's body count.
The Knife's Edge
1.
When Merlin is four years old he sneaks away from the women at slaughter day and seeks his best friend Will. Will is with his father and the men, who are surrounding a great ox with horns as long as Merlin's legs.
Will cocks his hip and tells Merlin to watch, because "this is great".
The men joke easily together, speak of feasting and fresh-faced women and the harvest. Will's father gets out a long, thin knife and grins at Merlin in a way that sends fear dancing over Merlin's skin. At first, he doesn't know what's happening, but the laughter of the men suddenly grows sinister in his mind. He wants badly to slap his hands over his eyes and run away, but Will, caught in excitement, has a hold of his arm Merlin can't shake.
"Watch," Will says, and Merlin is helpless to stop himself.
The men are careful with the creature, stroke it and coo at it, so as not to taint the flesh, when the knife slices and Merlin turns around violently, tears in his eyes. He can hear rattling breath and only wishes that it would stop. Stop! he begs, please stop.
His eyes flash golden and it does.
2.
"Mother," Merlin says. He feels small, wrapped in his blanket, barefoot and scared. His dreams have had the color of blood.
His mother smiles at him, opens her arms, lets him cry even though she has sewing to do and the festival is coming up. "There, now, Merlin." She rubs his back and whispers into his hair, rocking him as if he was still a small child and not six years old. It would rankle him if not for the monsters in his dreams, snapping at his ankles.
"Mother," he says, sniffling, "what happens when people die?"
She looks at him a bit strangely then, sad like the old dog in Simmons' garden, and very tired. "Do you remember what I said about how children are made from the earth?"
Merlin nods. It's a favored story. "The god man took a lot of clay and made a man and a woman and then they made children with more clay." Merlin likes to play with mud and sometimes he imagines what it must have been like. To shape something and give it life. Sometimes the mud twitches under his hands.
"Well," she says, "when people die, we put them back into the earth, where they came from. Most people come from earth and water, that's why we have a graveyard. There they can become earth again and new people can be made."
It makes sense to him, like a bucket of water that can only be filled again when it is empty. He wonders if Will's father is the kind of water that swapped over the edge before reaching its destination. But he knows, too, that it's so very hard not to spill anything when getting water from the river. He kind of wants to be more careful next time he is asked to do this chore.
"Where do the other people come from?"
For a long while, his mother is silent, her hand still and warm on his back. Her eyes are fixed on a far-away thing that Merlin can't see. "Some people," she says, and does not look at him, "very special people, are made from air and dragon fire. They are brighter than the stars and shine long after their time is up."
Merlin can see it, shining knights and great sorcerers, the kind of people all the great stories are about. "Can they die, too?"
His mother smiles, kissing his forehead. "Of course they die. Everything has to die, so new things can take its place."
"But we can't put them in the earth!" Merlin says, agitated at the idea. He once tried to put a fire in a tiny mud-hut for his mud-people and the hut crumbled onto their heads, burying them completely.
"No," she says. "Do you remember the last festival, the one where John spoke that wonderful poem?"
Merlin crosses his eyes to see the past better, but the images in his mind are all of fresh fruit, shining on large platters, and maidens taking him and Will to dance wildly around a fire. He shakes his head, not remembering John at all.
"What we do with the fire people," his mother says, "is this: We tell stories of them and their deeds. We return them to the fire so they become the air around us."
Merlin sneezes, and his mother grins at him. "Now you look right tired, if you want you can sleep in the bed and I'll tell you one of those great stories."
He nods; already his eyes are heavy and burn with sleep.
3.
They are in the woods, it's Will's favorite place. The girls have followed them out of curiosity, and Merlin makes faces to draw out some of their high-pitched giggles. The little blond one, whose name is something like heffer, has attached herself to Will's arm, much to his chagrin and Merlin's amusement.
"And then," Merlin says from his vantage point on the tree stump, "Will's father stuck his sword into the dragon and the beast screamed so loud it nearly made him deaf." He flails his arms in the air in an approximation of the dragon's death throes.
"Oh," the red-headed one says, big-eyes and wondering, "did he kill it?"
Merlin grins at her. "Oh yes, cut its head off and everything."
Mary, the older sister, all put on airs and graces, like the princess on the pea, frowns and shakes her head. "Why didn't he bring a souvenir then? Why doesn't Will have a dragon tooth necklace?" She worries her own necklace, a creepy thing made of old bones polished to a shine.
"Because," Will says, rolling his eyes, "necklaces are for girls and-"
The piercing howl freezes them all in their places. They adults have warned them time and again not to play in the depths of the forest, warned them of wolves. The sound is one that rings out at night, when the fires in the hearths blaze strong and hot to keep the wolves away. They have never heard it outside.
Little Heather begins to cry, and Merlin, who puts his arm around her, can feel her shake. He wants to cry too, but he's a big boy now, big enough to help in the harvest, and big boys don't cry. Will looks very pale as he bends to pick up a stone.
"Merlin," Will says, "when I say run, you take the girls and run back to the village as fast as you can. Whatever you do, don't look back."
A heavy knot of fear sits in his stomach, as Merlin grabs Mary's hand, and Heather's, and turns to the path they'd taken to get here. "What are you going to do, Will?"
"What I have to," Will says. The words bury themselves in Merlin's mind and he hears them over and over as he runs through the undergrowth. Heather falls and starts crying, and Mary looks at Merlin like he is some kind of bug.
"Go help him," she says, because she fancies Will. Her words are harsh - she'd never liked Merlin much - and her eyes are very scared.
The wolf is small as wolves go, thin and shaggy, with large teeth and terrible eyes. Merlin shudders. Will stares at it, his knuckles white on the hand that holds the stone. It is a small, ineffectual weapon against such a predator and Merlin knows how this is going to end. If he lets it.
"Will," he yells, "throw the stone."
Will swallows hard and his trembling hand sends the stone flying, the arc too wide to hit the wolf be several inches. Merlin stares at the stone, wills it to fly true, all his being concentrated on this one thing. The stone connects with a satisfying crack as it crushes the thin bone of the wolf's skull right above the temple. It yelps, even as it crumples to the ground, whimpering on every breath.
"I missed," Will says, shaking his head, "I should have missed. I slipped and I should have missed." He turns to Merlin. "What did you do?"
And Merlin shakes with fear, the kind of fear so ingrained it's hard even to give it a name. His mother loves him, forgives him for all sorts of pranks and stupid ideas, but this she will forever hold against him. This, his secret revealed. Yet, there lies the wolf that would have torn his friend to pieces and that makes all the difference. "What I had to," Merlin says in a small, but proud voice.
4.
The summer night lies heavy on his shoulders as he walks through the undergrowth of the forest. His forest, now. The trees speak a language he doesn't understand, but it soothes his mind when he listens. The animals do not fear him and do not attack, accepting him more than the people of his village ever could. Even Will, who is at this moment likely being bedded by Mary after dancing with her all night, doesn't understand Merlin.
A dark calm surrounds him, caresses him, and the magic slithers over his skin and imbues his bones. He tugs at his clothes, wanting nothing more than shed these last few scraps and fully immerse himself in the life of the forest. There is a stream ahead that runs as clear as crisp winter air up in the mountains.
Cries ring through the depths and Merlin looks up, frozen and suddenly back in an all too human space. The cry is that of a woman, desperate and utterly distraught, and Merlin finds himself running toward the sound with not so much as a thought. He finds them under a tall fir tree, disturbing the soft bed of needles with their thrashing. The man, his laces undone, arse pale and naked in the night, has her pinned to the ground by the wrists, with his legs on either side.
"Hey," Merlin say, breathless and red-hot angry. "Let her go."
The woman - girl, really, no older than Merlin himself - begs for help, sobbing on every other word. She's shaking with fear and pain. Merlin hopes against hope that it's mostly fear.
As the man turns, Merlin recognizes him as Jason, a son of the village elder Jacob. A brutish man who'd hit a child if they trespassed on his land and apparently takes what no one would give him freely. His face is red with alcohol and rage. Merlin spits at him.
"Leave her alone," Merlin says, "Or are you afraid to take on someone of your own size?" Jason laughs, a bark of a sound, and Merlin wonders if he can back all his bravado up if need be. He is surrounded by nature and magic on all sides, it feeds into him like dried wood feeds a fire.
"Oh, you will pay for this, little boy." Jason comes at him and Merlin ducks under the punch. It unbalances Jason to the point of toppling him into the soft ground. Merlin spares a glance at the girl who looks upon them both with terrified, empty eyes. It hits him, then, that the damage has been done, that Merlin is too late to help and a blinding light of anger fills his mind.
"You monster," he yells, "you animal."
The magic curls and twists around him as he hits Jason and kicks at him, raging against the inevitable cruelty of men. He loses himself in the motion, and the violence of it, and the magic reaches out, reaches out to wrap Jason tight and then it squeezes.
An inhuman scream pierces the night.
Merlin falls to his knees, breathing through his sobs. The girl comes back to herself slowly and as Merlin looks at her, she shivers so hard, Merlin can feel the vibrations through his fingers on the ground.
"Don't," she says, and there is something terrible in her voice, "don't you dare. Don't touch me, you monster."
5.
He tells his mother everything.
She sobs and hugs him without hesitation, and for a moment everything looks to be alright. Until the elders come, stricken eyes and hard lines, telling them in no uncertain terms that Merlin is to leave the village by next daybreak.
Merlin has no time to say goodbye to Will and Mary and Heather, not like he wants to. Will looks shattered, but his hand is in Mary's so Merlin knows they will be fine. Heather kisses his cheek and gives him a fresh loaf of bread.
It hurts for miles, this tug in his heart, the knowledge that he can never go back home. He wants to turn around and beg for forgiveness, but there is a part of him that knows he isn't sorry.
If he had to do it all over again, he would merely make sure that the girl couldn't see.
6.
When he finds the spell for killing, he slams the book shut and throws it onto the bedcovers. It's a simple word, with such power he can feel it through the pages of the book, calling to him. He doesn't want to know the spell, doesn't want to be able to take life with a single measured word.
He can't forget.
It's too simple, too easily remembered. It comes to him when he hunts mice in Arthur's chambers. It follows him on hunting trips. It dances over his tongue when Arthur is fighting for his life against a group of renegade knights.
He uses it only once. The rat is too fast for anything else and he's hungry enough to think it's a good idea. Preparing the stew convinces him otherwise, it smells atrocious. Still, it's kind of worth it to see the smile of glee on Arthur's face when Morgana comes in.
It takes him a while to figure out what bothers him about the spell, long after Nimueh dies, but then Arthur takes him on a hunting trip. Just him. Arthur has two longbows slung over his shoulder and a strange smile on his lips.
"So, no crossbows today?" Merlin has become, if not adept, at least tolerable with the contraptions.
Arthur shakes his head. "No, I want to show you something."
Merlin hopes it doesn't end in another disaster, like the unicorn. They find a large clearing by mid-morning and Arthur sets the weapons against a large stone. He looks gorgeous and absolutely terrifying and Merlin wonders if this is how it ends.
"I do this with all of the young knights when they first come to serve me." Arthur starts measuring the clearing with his stride, marking a tree with chalk, then another. "The longbow is a weapon that takes skill and heart," Arthur says, "it is more personal than the crossbow and far more efficient at killing a target, if you know how to use it."
Merlin shudders, thinking that he knows what this is about, that Arthur has found him out. He feels a churning of fear in his gut, a maelstrom of suppressed emotion. Arthur wouldn't kill him in the woods, surely? There are no witnesses and accidents happen, another part of his brain reminds him. It would be a kinder fate than the executioner's block even, but not by much.
"Arthur, I-"
Arthur lays a hand on his shoulder and the fear is gone as fast as it appeared. He can't look into Arthur's eyes and fear him, it's an impossibility. Merlin licks his lips, oblivious to the flick of Arthur's eyes following the movement.
"A crossbow," Arthur says, "Is a fast and easy tool, but it's crude and without soul. If you want to control the power to kill, really master it, you have to learn the harder, more intimate ways."
Merlin's eyes widen as it all begins to make sense. "You know... about me. About what happened on the Isle of the Blessed."
Arthur ducks his head, a sheepish, embarrassed grin on his lips. "Yes, well," he says, and then he looks at Merlin with such emotion, it knocks the breath right out of him. "Morgana was a little distressed after you left and she does trust me. She wanted me to go after you. Save you."
Merlin huffs. "I didn't need any saving."
"So I heard."
"But who-"
Arthur rolls his eyes. "Do you really want to have this discussion right now? Because I assure you there is at least a week in the stocks waiting for you for lying to me all this time."
Merlin shakes his head, feeling lighter than he has any right to feel, and grabs one of the bows by the string. Arthur looks a little harried as he corrects his grip, but doesn't take his hand off Merlin's wrist.
7.
Kissing Arthur is like fire and water and magic. Kissing Arthur is inevitable. Kissing Arthur is the one thing Merlin never thought he could have, not even with all the power of the old magic at his fingertips. Kissing Arthur is its own kind of magic.
8.
Arthur is magnificent on the battlefield, striking down his enemies with grace and efficiency. Merlin is never far away, one eye - magical or real - always on Arthur to make sure that his king lives. Anything else is not an option.
"Merlin," Arthur says, "what would I do without you?" The question is old and worn, said in jest and treated lightly, but Merlin knows something he can't ever tell, not even Arthur, for he would likely not believe it.
Merlin knows that Arthur without him is just Arthur, a good king, a great warrior. Perhaps a little sadder, a little smaller in his dreams and ambitions, but unchanged nonetheless. The ways in which Arthur needs him are personal and not very important to destiny at all. While Arthur might notice the absence, Camelot and Albion would not so much as blink.
Merlin needs Arthur in much the same way, except, without Arthur there would be nothing to balance his power, nothing to stop him. He's afraid every day of the moment Arthur dies, the mere thought drives all the air from his lungs and sets his magic alight. Without Arthur, Merlin would be a very different, very dangerous man, and he is glad to have someone like Arthur to serve. He is glad of the constraint, and fears the end of his stupid, brave, reckless king as much for Albion as he does for his heart.
"The same thing I would do without you," Merlin says, "I imagine you would be very put off at the inconvenience."
Arthur laughs with an edge, and reaches for Merlin, tugging him close. "I imagine," he says into the skin behind Merlin's ear, "I would be terribly inconvenienced by that, so try not to die or anything."
Merlin smiles. "Yeah, same to you."
It feels like an oath. Every time.
Author: suaine
Rating: R (for descriptions of violence and potentially disturbing content)
Spoilers: general for all episodes, specific for 1x11, 1x13
Summary: Arthur has been trained to kill since birth, Merlin just kind of stumbled into it.
Notes: Sparked by a discussion with frogspace and comments by allothi on Merlin's body count.
The Knife's Edge
1.
When Merlin is four years old he sneaks away from the women at slaughter day and seeks his best friend Will. Will is with his father and the men, who are surrounding a great ox with horns as long as Merlin's legs.
Will cocks his hip and tells Merlin to watch, because "this is great".
The men joke easily together, speak of feasting and fresh-faced women and the harvest. Will's father gets out a long, thin knife and grins at Merlin in a way that sends fear dancing over Merlin's skin. At first, he doesn't know what's happening, but the laughter of the men suddenly grows sinister in his mind. He wants badly to slap his hands over his eyes and run away, but Will, caught in excitement, has a hold of his arm Merlin can't shake.
"Watch," Will says, and Merlin is helpless to stop himself.
The men are careful with the creature, stroke it and coo at it, so as not to taint the flesh, when the knife slices and Merlin turns around violently, tears in his eyes. He can hear rattling breath and only wishes that it would stop. Stop! he begs, please stop.
His eyes flash golden and it does.
2.
"Mother," Merlin says. He feels small, wrapped in his blanket, barefoot and scared. His dreams have had the color of blood.
His mother smiles at him, opens her arms, lets him cry even though she has sewing to do and the festival is coming up. "There, now, Merlin." She rubs his back and whispers into his hair, rocking him as if he was still a small child and not six years old. It would rankle him if not for the monsters in his dreams, snapping at his ankles.
"Mother," he says, sniffling, "what happens when people die?"
She looks at him a bit strangely then, sad like the old dog in Simmons' garden, and very tired. "Do you remember what I said about how children are made from the earth?"
Merlin nods. It's a favored story. "The god man took a lot of clay and made a man and a woman and then they made children with more clay." Merlin likes to play with mud and sometimes he imagines what it must have been like. To shape something and give it life. Sometimes the mud twitches under his hands.
"Well," she says, "when people die, we put them back into the earth, where they came from. Most people come from earth and water, that's why we have a graveyard. There they can become earth again and new people can be made."
It makes sense to him, like a bucket of water that can only be filled again when it is empty. He wonders if Will's father is the kind of water that swapped over the edge before reaching its destination. But he knows, too, that it's so very hard not to spill anything when getting water from the river. He kind of wants to be more careful next time he is asked to do this chore.
"Where do the other people come from?"
For a long while, his mother is silent, her hand still and warm on his back. Her eyes are fixed on a far-away thing that Merlin can't see. "Some people," she says, and does not look at him, "very special people, are made from air and dragon fire. They are brighter than the stars and shine long after their time is up."
Merlin can see it, shining knights and great sorcerers, the kind of people all the great stories are about. "Can they die, too?"
His mother smiles, kissing his forehead. "Of course they die. Everything has to die, so new things can take its place."
"But we can't put them in the earth!" Merlin says, agitated at the idea. He once tried to put a fire in a tiny mud-hut for his mud-people and the hut crumbled onto their heads, burying them completely.
"No," she says. "Do you remember the last festival, the one where John spoke that wonderful poem?"
Merlin crosses his eyes to see the past better, but the images in his mind are all of fresh fruit, shining on large platters, and maidens taking him and Will to dance wildly around a fire. He shakes his head, not remembering John at all.
"What we do with the fire people," his mother says, "is this: We tell stories of them and their deeds. We return them to the fire so they become the air around us."
Merlin sneezes, and his mother grins at him. "Now you look right tired, if you want you can sleep in the bed and I'll tell you one of those great stories."
He nods; already his eyes are heavy and burn with sleep.
3.
They are in the woods, it's Will's favorite place. The girls have followed them out of curiosity, and Merlin makes faces to draw out some of their high-pitched giggles. The little blond one, whose name is something like heffer, has attached herself to Will's arm, much to his chagrin and Merlin's amusement.
"And then," Merlin says from his vantage point on the tree stump, "Will's father stuck his sword into the dragon and the beast screamed so loud it nearly made him deaf." He flails his arms in the air in an approximation of the dragon's death throes.
"Oh," the red-headed one says, big-eyes and wondering, "did he kill it?"
Merlin grins at her. "Oh yes, cut its head off and everything."
Mary, the older sister, all put on airs and graces, like the princess on the pea, frowns and shakes her head. "Why didn't he bring a souvenir then? Why doesn't Will have a dragon tooth necklace?" She worries her own necklace, a creepy thing made of old bones polished to a shine.
"Because," Will says, rolling his eyes, "necklaces are for girls and-"
The piercing howl freezes them all in their places. They adults have warned them time and again not to play in the depths of the forest, warned them of wolves. The sound is one that rings out at night, when the fires in the hearths blaze strong and hot to keep the wolves away. They have never heard it outside.
Little Heather begins to cry, and Merlin, who puts his arm around her, can feel her shake. He wants to cry too, but he's a big boy now, big enough to help in the harvest, and big boys don't cry. Will looks very pale as he bends to pick up a stone.
"Merlin," Will says, "when I say run, you take the girls and run back to the village as fast as you can. Whatever you do, don't look back."
A heavy knot of fear sits in his stomach, as Merlin grabs Mary's hand, and Heather's, and turns to the path they'd taken to get here. "What are you going to do, Will?"
"What I have to," Will says. The words bury themselves in Merlin's mind and he hears them over and over as he runs through the undergrowth. Heather falls and starts crying, and Mary looks at Merlin like he is some kind of bug.
"Go help him," she says, because she fancies Will. Her words are harsh - she'd never liked Merlin much - and her eyes are very scared.
The wolf is small as wolves go, thin and shaggy, with large teeth and terrible eyes. Merlin shudders. Will stares at it, his knuckles white on the hand that holds the stone. It is a small, ineffectual weapon against such a predator and Merlin knows how this is going to end. If he lets it.
"Will," he yells, "throw the stone."
Will swallows hard and his trembling hand sends the stone flying, the arc too wide to hit the wolf be several inches. Merlin stares at the stone, wills it to fly true, all his being concentrated on this one thing. The stone connects with a satisfying crack as it crushes the thin bone of the wolf's skull right above the temple. It yelps, even as it crumples to the ground, whimpering on every breath.
"I missed," Will says, shaking his head, "I should have missed. I slipped and I should have missed." He turns to Merlin. "What did you do?"
And Merlin shakes with fear, the kind of fear so ingrained it's hard even to give it a name. His mother loves him, forgives him for all sorts of pranks and stupid ideas, but this she will forever hold against him. This, his secret revealed. Yet, there lies the wolf that would have torn his friend to pieces and that makes all the difference. "What I had to," Merlin says in a small, but proud voice.
4.
The summer night lies heavy on his shoulders as he walks through the undergrowth of the forest. His forest, now. The trees speak a language he doesn't understand, but it soothes his mind when he listens. The animals do not fear him and do not attack, accepting him more than the people of his village ever could. Even Will, who is at this moment likely being bedded by Mary after dancing with her all night, doesn't understand Merlin.
A dark calm surrounds him, caresses him, and the magic slithers over his skin and imbues his bones. He tugs at his clothes, wanting nothing more than shed these last few scraps and fully immerse himself in the life of the forest. There is a stream ahead that runs as clear as crisp winter air up in the mountains.
Cries ring through the depths and Merlin looks up, frozen and suddenly back in an all too human space. The cry is that of a woman, desperate and utterly distraught, and Merlin finds himself running toward the sound with not so much as a thought. He finds them under a tall fir tree, disturbing the soft bed of needles with their thrashing. The man, his laces undone, arse pale and naked in the night, has her pinned to the ground by the wrists, with his legs on either side.
"Hey," Merlin say, breathless and red-hot angry. "Let her go."
The woman - girl, really, no older than Merlin himself - begs for help, sobbing on every other word. She's shaking with fear and pain. Merlin hopes against hope that it's mostly fear.
As the man turns, Merlin recognizes him as Jason, a son of the village elder Jacob. A brutish man who'd hit a child if they trespassed on his land and apparently takes what no one would give him freely. His face is red with alcohol and rage. Merlin spits at him.
"Leave her alone," Merlin says, "Or are you afraid to take on someone of your own size?" Jason laughs, a bark of a sound, and Merlin wonders if he can back all his bravado up if need be. He is surrounded by nature and magic on all sides, it feeds into him like dried wood feeds a fire.
"Oh, you will pay for this, little boy." Jason comes at him and Merlin ducks under the punch. It unbalances Jason to the point of toppling him into the soft ground. Merlin spares a glance at the girl who looks upon them both with terrified, empty eyes. It hits him, then, that the damage has been done, that Merlin is too late to help and a blinding light of anger fills his mind.
"You monster," he yells, "you animal."
The magic curls and twists around him as he hits Jason and kicks at him, raging against the inevitable cruelty of men. He loses himself in the motion, and the violence of it, and the magic reaches out, reaches out to wrap Jason tight and then it squeezes.
An inhuman scream pierces the night.
Merlin falls to his knees, breathing through his sobs. The girl comes back to herself slowly and as Merlin looks at her, she shivers so hard, Merlin can feel the vibrations through his fingers on the ground.
"Don't," she says, and there is something terrible in her voice, "don't you dare. Don't touch me, you monster."
5.
He tells his mother everything.
She sobs and hugs him without hesitation, and for a moment everything looks to be alright. Until the elders come, stricken eyes and hard lines, telling them in no uncertain terms that Merlin is to leave the village by next daybreak.
Merlin has no time to say goodbye to Will and Mary and Heather, not like he wants to. Will looks shattered, but his hand is in Mary's so Merlin knows they will be fine. Heather kisses his cheek and gives him a fresh loaf of bread.
It hurts for miles, this tug in his heart, the knowledge that he can never go back home. He wants to turn around and beg for forgiveness, but there is a part of him that knows he isn't sorry.
If he had to do it all over again, he would merely make sure that the girl couldn't see.
6.
When he finds the spell for killing, he slams the book shut and throws it onto the bedcovers. It's a simple word, with such power he can feel it through the pages of the book, calling to him. He doesn't want to know the spell, doesn't want to be able to take life with a single measured word.
He can't forget.
It's too simple, too easily remembered. It comes to him when he hunts mice in Arthur's chambers. It follows him on hunting trips. It dances over his tongue when Arthur is fighting for his life against a group of renegade knights.
He uses it only once. The rat is too fast for anything else and he's hungry enough to think it's a good idea. Preparing the stew convinces him otherwise, it smells atrocious. Still, it's kind of worth it to see the smile of glee on Arthur's face when Morgana comes in.
It takes him a while to figure out what bothers him about the spell, long after Nimueh dies, but then Arthur takes him on a hunting trip. Just him. Arthur has two longbows slung over his shoulder and a strange smile on his lips.
"So, no crossbows today?" Merlin has become, if not adept, at least tolerable with the contraptions.
Arthur shakes his head. "No, I want to show you something."
Merlin hopes it doesn't end in another disaster, like the unicorn. They find a large clearing by mid-morning and Arthur sets the weapons against a large stone. He looks gorgeous and absolutely terrifying and Merlin wonders if this is how it ends.
"I do this with all of the young knights when they first come to serve me." Arthur starts measuring the clearing with his stride, marking a tree with chalk, then another. "The longbow is a weapon that takes skill and heart," Arthur says, "it is more personal than the crossbow and far more efficient at killing a target, if you know how to use it."
Merlin shudders, thinking that he knows what this is about, that Arthur has found him out. He feels a churning of fear in his gut, a maelstrom of suppressed emotion. Arthur wouldn't kill him in the woods, surely? There are no witnesses and accidents happen, another part of his brain reminds him. It would be a kinder fate than the executioner's block even, but not by much.
"Arthur, I-"
Arthur lays a hand on his shoulder and the fear is gone as fast as it appeared. He can't look into Arthur's eyes and fear him, it's an impossibility. Merlin licks his lips, oblivious to the flick of Arthur's eyes following the movement.
"A crossbow," Arthur says, "Is a fast and easy tool, but it's crude and without soul. If you want to control the power to kill, really master it, you have to learn the harder, more intimate ways."
Merlin's eyes widen as it all begins to make sense. "You know... about me. About what happened on the Isle of the Blessed."
Arthur ducks his head, a sheepish, embarrassed grin on his lips. "Yes, well," he says, and then he looks at Merlin with such emotion, it knocks the breath right out of him. "Morgana was a little distressed after you left and she does trust me. She wanted me to go after you. Save you."
Merlin huffs. "I didn't need any saving."
"So I heard."
"But who-"
Arthur rolls his eyes. "Do you really want to have this discussion right now? Because I assure you there is at least a week in the stocks waiting for you for lying to me all this time."
Merlin shakes his head, feeling lighter than he has any right to feel, and grabs one of the bows by the string. Arthur looks a little harried as he corrects his grip, but doesn't take his hand off Merlin's wrist.
7.
Kissing Arthur is like fire and water and magic. Kissing Arthur is inevitable. Kissing Arthur is the one thing Merlin never thought he could have, not even with all the power of the old magic at his fingertips. Kissing Arthur is its own kind of magic.
8.
Arthur is magnificent on the battlefield, striking down his enemies with grace and efficiency. Merlin is never far away, one eye - magical or real - always on Arthur to make sure that his king lives. Anything else is not an option.
"Merlin," Arthur says, "what would I do without you?" The question is old and worn, said in jest and treated lightly, but Merlin knows something he can't ever tell, not even Arthur, for he would likely not believe it.
Merlin knows that Arthur without him is just Arthur, a good king, a great warrior. Perhaps a little sadder, a little smaller in his dreams and ambitions, but unchanged nonetheless. The ways in which Arthur needs him are personal and not very important to destiny at all. While Arthur might notice the absence, Camelot and Albion would not so much as blink.
Merlin needs Arthur in much the same way, except, without Arthur there would be nothing to balance his power, nothing to stop him. He's afraid every day of the moment Arthur dies, the mere thought drives all the air from his lungs and sets his magic alight. Without Arthur, Merlin would be a very different, very dangerous man, and he is glad to have someone like Arthur to serve. He is glad of the constraint, and fears the end of his stupid, brave, reckless king as much for Albion as he does for his heart.
"The same thing I would do without you," Merlin says, "I imagine you would be very put off at the inconvenience."
Arthur laughs with an edge, and reaches for Merlin, tugging him close. "I imagine," he says into the skin behind Merlin's ear, "I would be terribly inconvenienced by that, so try not to die or anything."
Merlin smiles. "Yeah, same to you."
It feels like an oath. Every time.