Merlin loved storms. She always had. She adored the release of the muggy pressure in the air, the cascades of cleansing water, the clash of colliding clouds beating the dust from the earth – the ambient magic of the ground reaching up in tendrils and mixing freely with lightning fires, streams of rain and the air swirling it all together.
It was all so beautiful. In fact, it was so unbelievably magnificent that that Merlin had given up all pretense of working. When Arthur entered his chambers, the polishing rag loosely wrapped around her hand was forgotten, as was the line of boots she was supposed to be cleaning. He scowled at the look of distant awe on her face as she squinted through the window made his already clenched insides twist guiltily as he barked out.
"Close those shutters, will you? Then maybe a simple bit of weather won't stop you doing what you're supposed to." He finished snidely, and sat stiffly behind his desk with a book on Mercia's history (a delegation would be arriving soon to renegotiate trade routes), because he was far too tense to even contemplate lounging on his spacious bed.
"Yes sire," came the too cheerful response. Arthur fought the urge to bury his face in his hands. Thunder and a jovial, talkative Merlin were not his idea of a relaxing night.
Not that Arthur was afraid of storms, of-course. It was just rain, after all. Even if there was that one time, when he and his knights were hunting, a bolt of lightning struck a tree and the resulting falling branch almost crushed him and Sir Leon. Or that other time, when bandits were chasing them through the forest, but the roar of the thunder was so low and loud that it was impossible to tell when they'd lost them.
Okay, so maybe Arthur found storms just a little bit worrying. But that was understandable. After all, he reasoned, sorcerers wouldn't be able to summon storms if they weren't dangerous, because sorcerers were evil so the storms were probably evil too. Therefore, some caution was necessary, wise even.
"Are you alright?" Merlin's voice was soft compared to the chaos swirling in the storm outside, and the unanticipated care there soothed him, just a little.
"Fine," he answered gruffly. Even with his eyes firmly on the page of his book, he could feel her gaze scrutinizing him. He couldn't say the quiet stretched out between them – the damn storm was far too loud for that – but a long moment passed before she spoke again.
"Good, I'll be off then, Gaius wants me to catch up on some reading," She said, the levity returning to her tone.
"See you tomorrow," Arthur dismissed, steadfastly ignoring the rising panic stemming from being alone with the thunder raging outside.
"Actually…" Merlin's hesitation made him look up, "Do you mind if I do it here? Gaius is out tonight."
"No problem," he replied, a little too quickly, "have a seat."
She shot him a grateful smile, grabbed book from her satchel (she never remembered to return it to her room after hunting trips) and sat in the chair he pushed towards her. The gentle sound of turning pages and her absent humming allowed him to relax somewhat as the storm faded outside, until there was only a gentle patter of raindrops on the window pane.