Of The Dangers of Partridges and Leaping Lords.
The twelve days of Christmas, Merlin stylie. In which Gwen is loud, Morgana is wistful, Merlin wants some love and Gaius wants to get rat-arsed. It's the Christmas Special you all want to see.
I don't own Merlin. I wish I did. I'm not Shakespeare either. I also certainly don't own all the song lyrics I have pinched and pushed in to make it more enjoyable. I find it quite nice to pick up on the little things in the fics. If you spot one, you get a glass of seasonal mulled wine or a glass of apple juice if you're driving or a scrooge.
It's also crazily AU, but it's Christmas so we don't mind.
Rated R really for my skills at cussing like a sailor and some MerlinArthur action later on.
25th December.
On the first day of Christmas, my true love gave to me,
A partridge in a pear tree.
He is very well-favoured and he speaks very shrewishly; one would think his mother's milk were scarce out of him.
Twelfth Night, Act I, Scene V.
Christmas morning dawns crisp and cold, like something out of a Christmas card. The courtyards are empty and all of Camelot is either asleep, with the exception of Morgana, who never sleeps. She sits and watches as down below in the town, an offical looking cart starts to make its way up to the castle. But there's no official business in Camelot today, she thinks. What is this? The cart reaches the gates, the driver converses with the one guard in Camelot unlucky enough to be on duty today, and trots into the courtyard. The driver descends, lifts something off the cart and leaves it in the middle of the courtyard.
It could be a weapon, forged by some evil power of doom.
It could be an assassin, train in the art of disguising himself as a sack.
Or, as Morgana realises, a tree. A tree with a bird in it.
"You're a sweet little thing," she cooes, reaching to stroke its speckled brown neck.
Something you must know about know about partridges. They're vicious buggers if you've kept them cooped up under a sack for three days.
"You swine," she squeals, knocking the bird in her attempt to get her hand away. It makes a break for freedom, and she watches as it disappears into one of the castle's many conveniently open door. "What sort of a bastard sends angry birds?" she grumbles, fumbling with the note she finds on one side of the tree's pot. "Shit."
Arthur was looking forward to a morning of peace and warmth in bed. He was looking forward to doing bugger all for once. He was really looking forward to being able, for once, to drink tea in bed. He was therefore not best pleased when Morgana burst through the doors to his room, shouting that she's just caused a major diplomatic incident.
"I've just started a war with Mercia!"
"Are you sure?" he yawns.
"Arthur!"
"Yes?"
"There was a bird in a tree and I've lost it."
"So? Find it."
"I don't know where it is and it was from the King of Mercia and if we don't get it back, there may be a war."
There are words that Arthur doesn't like in that sentence, but one, 'we,' makes him feel distinctly uncomfortable.
"There is no we. You lost something, you find it." He rolls over in preparation to go back to sleep but Morgana's had more than her fair share of dealing with uncooperative males. With a flourish she tugs away the prince's covers.
"Arthur! Up!"
"Cold!"
"Put some clothes on then!"
Arthur remembers his modesty and scrambles to cover himself with a pillow despite the fact Morgana seems unphased by his nudity.
"You're meant to be a lady!"
"And you're meant to be gallant. Get up and help me."
Arthur curses his chivalrous nature. If he's going to be up helping damsels in distress, he's bloody not doing it on his own. For this reason, Merlin finds himself answering the door to Gaius' rooms in his dressing gown, to find an aggravated royal on the doorstep.
"Get dressed," Arthur says sharply. "We're on a mission."
"I don't want to go on a mission," Merlin wails to the walls as he searches for something to wear. "I want to stay in bed."
"I'd happily join you," the prince grumbles. The warlock picks up on that blatant innuendo and blushs while his masters angrily consumes porridge.
"What are we looking for?"
"A partridge. Morgana went and bloody lost one this morning and apparently if we don't get it back, there's going to be a war."
"We'll need a cage then."
Therefore, in the interests of disturbing yet more peoples' Christmas morning, Morgana, Arthur and Merlin make their way into the lower town.
"Open up!" Arthur declares, banging on the door of a forge.
"Not for love nor money."
"Gwen, please," Morgana says.
"Do you have a goose?" the maid asks through the closed door.
"No."
"Firelighters?"
"No."
"I can get you more mulled wine than you can possibly drink," Arthur offers. The door opens.
"You better mean that."
"What happened to 'milord' and 'milady?'" he asks, affronted.
"Twelve days of Christmas? When every man in the land is free to talk as he wishes?"
"No wonder Uther's escaped," the prince sighs.
"Come in, come in," Gwen says. "Have you eaten? I've got bacon."
It's quite a sight. Twp royal and a maid feasting on fried pig sandwiches as a warlock stands and looks slightly unwell.
"We need a cage," Gwen says with her mouth full, "and breadcrumbs."
"Breadcrumbs?"
"Don't you know anything about birds?" she chuckles.
It becomes quite clear, as the morning drifts on, that Gwen knows just as little about birds.
"I'm quite sure this worked the last time I had to do this," she assures Merlin as they sit with their legs dangling over the battlements.
"When was the last time you did this?"
"I've caught chickens," she offers. "But that doesn't really count, does it?" She toes off her shoe and dangles it on the end of her foot, into space.
"Be careful," Merlin warns. "You don't know-" What he wants to explain is the dangers of having fair maidens creeping up behind you and making you jump. However, Morgana puts this in less words for him.
"Surprise!"
"Shit! My shoe!" The three of them watch as it falls through the air, down, down and down some more onto the cobbled streets of Camelot.
"Ooh, sorry," Morgana starts, rushing to peer over the side of the castle.
"Watch it up there!" a man shouts. "You could have killed me."
"Sorry!" she shouts down.
"Wait," Gwen says. "What's he holding?"
The three of them glance down to see the man hobble away with a stick under one arms, and a bird under the other.
"That's my bloody partridge!" Morgana declares, hitching up her skirts and breaking into a run. Merlin slides out of his position in the crenulations and follows her.
"Oh, yes, everyone forget about Guinevere," Gwen grumbles. "She can handle herself." She throws herself out backwards, scrambles to her feet and begins to hop down to the lower town. "I hate royals."
"That could get you locked up," a regal voice behind her tells her.
"You wouldn't do that, R'arthur," she says. "You like me too much."
"Don't think that," he says smiling. "Think yourself disposable."
"Give us a piggyback?" she asks.
"Not on your arse. Hop."
"You're a bastard, Pendragon."
"I'm not. I assure you, my parents were married when I was conceived."
"Excuse me," Morgana says as she catches up with the hobbling man.
"You!"
"Yes, I do apologise for that. Now-"
"You could have killed me!"
"I know, I know. Please-"
"You've got to learn some manners."
"Sorry," Merlin says politely, appearing just behind her, "but you've got her bird."
"This en't her bird," he snaps. "This is my dinner."
"Please," Morgana says. "We've got to get this back. Please!"
"If you give us that bird," Merlin says, "we'll get you a better bird. A bigger bird. A hundred better birds."
"Pah," the man snorts. "Who do you think you are, Prince Arthur?" The two of them turn, as if waiting for their prince to make his spectacular entrance.
"I'm the king's ward," Morgana declares, playing her trump card.
"Do royals regularly go around taking people out with shoes?"
"Oh, leave the shoe out of this! We need that partridge!"
"You en't getting this bird."
"Excuse me, but you seem to have the Lady's partridge."
"Give him the pissing bird!" Semi-shoeless Gwen and Prince Arthur arrive on the scene almost together. "What did you do with the slipper? It's the only one I've got." Grumbling, the man hands over the partridge and one of Gwen's shoes. "Oh, it's crap it in. I do not sodding believe this."
"Thank you," Morgana says, handing the bird to Merlin, who looks thoughrally baffled as to what he's supposed to do with it.
"Oi," the man reminds her. "You said I'd get birds."
"And I'd like a new shoe."
And so it comes to pass that at the Christmas feast, Earnest McDougal, pig herd and general miscreant, gets to sit beside the beautiful king's ward, who he impresses with his descriptions of pig mating rituals, and to eat as much goose as he can, much to the envy of most of the court. When Uther asks what Earnest is there for, his son tells him he helped avert a war with Mercia. Uther is thoughrally impressed. Gwen gets a new pair of shoes.
It is, Morgana thinks, an execellant start to the season of Christmas.
I do hope you enjoyed. This is lots of fun to write.
With love from Cosmia and Augustus (le chat indifférent), although I'm not sure Augustus knows how to love anything other than sardines.