I was transposing some music the other week, and I was thinking about some of the Merlin fics I've read where Merlin or Arthur or both of them are musicians and one thing led to another and this little baby came into being. It's just a nice little campy, modern day fic about our favorite medieval characters going to a special school for the musically gifted, sprinkled with plenty of teenage/young adult angst and drama through-out.

Now, seeing as how I live in the US, where the public school system is a joke, and know very little about the UK school system, I've gone ahead and made up my own rules for this nice school they'll be attending. Because I can.

So. This first chapter. Rather boring, really just provides a bit of background info, but the first few chapters are always like that, aren't they? Enjoy it anyway.

Disclaimer (A collective one for the whole goddamn fic because having to come up with a new, witty way to say I don't own jack becomes rather tedious and damn near impossible after a while): I don't own Merlin or anything else that I might ever mention in this fic that you might have even an inkling of thought of me owning. I don't own jack, man. Let's not bring it up again.

Title:
The Institute

Chapter One:
Prodigy

Merlin had been known as a child prodigy, playing the likes of Beethoven, Bach, Brahms, Tchaikovsky, and many others well before the age five. He started composing his own music by the time he was seven. He played to sold-out concerts, traveled all over the world, played with the best classical musicians of his time, had been written about in the best music magazines, been on many television shows, interviewed by the greatest there was—he was a household name all over the world by the time he was twelve.

Swept up in everything, he hadn't really been sure how he felt about the life he had seemingly been thrust into. He enjoyed playing, enjoyed the ivories under his fingers, enjoyed getting lost in the music, enjoyed being swept up in the melodies that became home to him in a world where he never had a firm place to plant his feet for too long at a time, sure, but he had never liked the limelight much. He never got used to all those eyes on him, everyone watching him, so interested in what he was doing and what he had to say about this or that at any given time. He never quite got used to his face popping up in the most unusual of places. He was a classical musician, why everyone in the world was so interested in him was always beyond him.

His parents meant no harm in urging him into this life, he knew, and they never made him do anything he didn't want to—they always asked how he felt about playing that concert hall or that celebration, this award show or for that president, this country or that one—but he could hardly say no to them; he knew they just wanted the best for him, and they thought: what better way to give it to him than to use his talents to his advantage?

He could hardly hold something like that against them.

By the time he was sixteen, however, he felt… worn out. He was under so much pressure from his parents, his peers, the world, really, that he could hardly enjoy playing anymore; rather than reveling in the familiar curve of his fingers as he sat down to play, getting lost in the music, the notes flowing from him, scratched down on music staffs when he went to compose, he dreaded it, felt a pressure on his chest when he sat down to play, felt anxiety prick at his chest, his head start to pound, his fingers suddenly heavy and uncooperative, the music no longer flowing when he sat with his pencil and pad of blank sheet music.

Suddenly, as though overnight, music became more of a prison cell than an escape. It was the furthest from bliss, from happiness and enjoyment, that he had felt in his entire life.

He couldn't take any of what he was going through to his parents, however, he didn't want them to blame themselves, didn't want them to think they'd done something wrong in encouraging him in such a way. It wasn't their fault, he often told himself as he fought through the mental block, exhausting himself physically as he fought his heavy, stiff fingers, and mentally as he pushed himself more and more each day as the burden just became heavier and harder to bear. If anything, it was his fault; music was his thing, this was his life, his career, and becoming so fucked up... Well, somehow it must have been his own damn fault.

And so he pushed on, bringing himself to the brink of whatever sanity remained, losing himself a little more each and every day. If his parents noticed anything—if anyone noticed anything—like the way he tensed up, his posture so much different than it used to be, dark bags under his eyes from the sleep he lost in trying to go back to the way he had been before, they said nothing, didn't even hint at it.

So for seven months, he continued to push himself, getting through the days and nights one at a time—if even that—through the concerts and appearances day by day by moment. For seven months, he barely existed, everything happening with so much effort on his part that he couldn't even tell who he was most days.

For seven months, he was convinced that he was going to die from exhaustion in front of his piano any day now.

Until one day, when he flubbed a concert, forgot the notes halfway through—he had never played with sheet music in front of him; it was part of the appeal of seeing him play live—and had to improvise for fifteen minutes before ending what everyone thought was a carefully thought-out and planned movement that had them all on their feet…

Suddenly, as he faced the applause and took his bow with a perfectly fake and pleasant sort of humble smile on his face, he was awakened for the first time in those long seven months. He saw everything with clarity, saw that this was not a very good situation for him to be in, saw that he needed to put a stop to this before he actually killed himself—either on purpose or accidentally. As soon as he was off stage, he found his parents and told them that he was done. Done with the concerts, done with the appearances, done with the piano—he was just... done.

At first, no one quite believed him. They thought he simply wanted a short break to maybe date a few girls or mend his broken heart—he had just recently been dumped, but that had nothing to do with his decision, he assured them—or make some new friends or what have you.

No one thought Merlin Emrys, arguably the world's greatest pianist at the tender age of 16, was really quitting. None of the news outlets that picked it up believed it, no one that talked about it believed it, no one in the world believed that he was genuinely quitting—"Retiring," he would always correct during the handful of public appearances he needed to make to announce such a thing—and throwing away his career like that. No one.

After a month of him not even looking in the direction of his piano, his parents realized that he might have been serious, that maybe this wasn't just some passing teenage rebellion of sorts.

After three months of not touching the piano, not looking towards the piano, not talking about the piano, or anything of the such, his retirement was confirmed to the world by his parents, and Merlin didn't know what they told the press about his sudden departure from the music world—he himself had always evaded the question, as no one else needed to know about what he'd gone through simply for the sake of his music—but he didn't much care; he felt lighter now that he didn't have so much weighing on him, now that he wasn't expected to play so much, compose something new every month.

Now that the world quit watching him so much—they would never really quit, he realized, not when it came to someone like him, but at the very least the interest died down enough that he could scan a newspaper without seeing his name splashed through-out it—he felt like he could be himself, whoever that might be. For the first time since he was a child, he felt as though he could breathe properly again.

And it was an amazing sort of feeling. While it lasted.

He shortly realized that, just because he moreorless quit the piano—he hadn't touched it since that night he messed up at his concert and had his moment of revelation and clarity—didn't mean he could give up music entirely. He'd been immersed in it his entire life, after all, it was foolish of him to think he could just quit entirely. He likened his predicament to that of a drug addict and what quitting cold-turkey could do to a person—because that's what he was, really, just another addict trying to give up what would eventually be the death of him.

Granted, quitting—retiring—was probably the best thing there was for him in such a situation, but still, not a month after his official retirement, when his parents had confirmed his plans, he felt as though he would go insane if he didn't get some music back in his life. If he didn't feel the music flowing through him, didn't feel the vibrations of some instrument or another flow through him soon, he was sure he would explode. It was the perfect sort of irony: he quit music because it became too much to bear and he honestly feared as though it would be the death of him some days, but he needed music in his life because he honestly feared as though not having any in his life would be the death of him.

He could never really win, could he?

He thought education of some sort might be a decent sort of distraction, but, having been homeschooled his whole life and having finished up his required education long before he retired, he didn't see it as a very plausible distraction. His parent suggested, more than once, that he attend a college of some sort, but the prospect had never appealed to him much.

Without anything else to occupy his time, he decided to take up learning another instrument. He needed more music in his life, needed it to feel whole and right again, but... it needed to be something other than the piano—anything but the piano. Perhaps he would dedicate more time to studying music notation and theory while he was at it, as he had been more concerned with playing, with knowing the notes as they were to be played and not where they were on the staff if they weren't his own notes. And even then, he usually just memorized the notes, the chords, as opposed to checking against the music every time he played.

Yes, perhaps this was a fine opportunity to get a better grasp of his craft while slowly trying to heal himself of the trauma he'd gone through for those seven long months.

From the time he was sixteen to the time he was eighteen, he busied himself with learning to play the flute, the violin, the cello, the clarinet, the guitar, even, when he became disillusioned with classic music for a few months. He studied music theory, learned where every note belonged on the music staff, what they were to sound like, what his posture should be like, what it took to master the instrument he happened to be playing at that time.

For two years, he mastered new sounds and tones, and he felt himself healing, felt a mental sort of scar forming around the memories of those seven long months.

Of course, the psychiatrist his parents had him seeing to adjust to his new life probably didn't hurt his progress any, but when he said things like, "Merlin, my boy, I know you feel as though you've over-come this, but, to be perfectly honest, this was a sort of trauma, you have been through a lot. I know it feels as though two years is plenty of time to over-come something like this, but, from what you've told me, you still have a ways to go. This experience has left you damaged and scarred in ways that you can't seem to comprehend. You were contemplating suicide, that's not just something you walk away from. Even after all this time, you still shy away from the truth of it all and hide from the real implications of what you went through. You still have a lot of sorting out to do," Merlin wondered why he bothered wasting valuable time that could be better spent practicing his music sitting in an uncomfortable leather chair, talking about things he would rather deal with with an instrument in his hands.

During those two years of his retirement, while he played other instruments and explored different sounds, he played others' music from old books and sheet music given to him by fellow musicians who knew of his plight, not daring to compose his own for his instrument of choice until he was sure he was at an advanced level. But then—oh then—was when he really felt at home in everything. Playing around with the notes and melodies, getting lost, swept up in a sea of familiarity as his emotions danced around the room, hitting the walls and bouncing back at him, sounding lovely to anyone he might let hear his tunes—never more than his parents and a few close friends and family—but never quite right to him...

It all felt as amazing as it had once upon a time.

Granted, nothing he ever composed on any other instrument ever felt anywhere as near beautiful, graceful, elegant, to him and his ears as anything he'd ever written on his piano had, but it was close enough to keep him sane, close enough to lift his spirits and bring him back to being the Merlin he had once been.

He sometimes allowed himself to wonder where he would be right that second if he were still playing, if he hadn't retired. Would he be in a different country? Would he be composing? Would he be playing right that second? Would he even still be alive?

He got so caught up in those thoughts, in the memories and what-ifs sometimes, that he had to remind himself that that life was behind him now. He wasn't a pianist anymore. He missed it sometimes, yes, but every time he looked at his old piano, the one he had grown up on, the one he had spent many days and hours at, he felt a pang in his chest of what it came to mean to him. He could hardly stomach looking at it some days, he could only imagine what he would feel sitting down to play at it again.

No, he told himself when his thoughts swirled in such a direction, that life was behind him now and it was for the better.

He still often dreamt of it, however, and woke up many nights humming a made up tune to himself, his fingers ghosting around the air, playing at something he would not allow himself anymore.

He might have mentioned it all to his psychiatrist, but the old man already made that worried face and had prescribed a handful of different medications to him over the years to deal with his anxiety, sleeping problems, and other issues that he said stemmed from all those years of being in the limelight, and those dreadful seven months that Merlin liked to refer to as "Seven months in hell," as a sort of play on the popular party game he never had the chance to play in his younger day, and he didn't quite feel like adding to that, thank you very much.

His other instruments kept him busy enough that he never missed it too much unless he allowed himself to dwell, anyway. So it was probably fine.

*.*.*.*.*

When Merlin was just a few months shy of his nineteenth birthday, his parents, Hunith and Balinor, sat him down for a talk.

They were worried about him, they said. He spent too much of his day locked away in his room, playing music, obsessing over getting it just right. And when they didn't hear the melody coming from his own fingers, they knew he was listening to it, reading up on it, sightreading—he had found the exercise silly, tedious at first, he was a prodigy, after all, but eventually found that it dulled the buzz in his brain to a low hum instead, allowing him a moment to relax, come down from his stress and anxiety that seemed to always be surging through him for some unknown reason. Now, he picked up books, printed off music and just read over it, imagining in his head what it would sound like in the different instruments he played. He found the exercise just as soothing as the actual act of playing was—or something of the such.

They admitted, much to his dismay, that perhaps it was partially their own fault for thrusting him into music when he showed such skill, that they hadn't encouraged him to explore other avenues enough, that they hadn't introduced him to people not involved in music, that it was their fault he was so… obsessed. And the way they said it made Merlin wonder if they'd been talking to his psychiatrist.

According to Dr. Gaius, the kind old man who listened and liked to look at him with a face full of worry and a look that said he was almost afraid Merlin was much more fragile than he realized, he had anxiety issues, OCD, a sleeping disorder, was a bit of an eccentric—he had done everything but come right out and call him bat-shit crazy. He liked the old man well enough, he was one of the few people who didn't give two shits what Merlin had been able to do when he was seven, but he often wondered if he broke doctor-patient privilege to confide his own concerns to Merlin's parents after their sessions.

After an hour or so of them voicing their concerns and going on about how he really needed to do something else with his time, with his life—not that he did, actually; he had earned enough that he didn't ever need to work another day in his life, but he couldn't very well just hole himself up in his room for the rest of it, playing music that was never perfect anyway, hiding from what he wanted to play most of all but wouldn't allow himself near anymore—they brought up his friend William.

William, just Will to most, was a childhood friend of Merlin's, and a bit of a prodigy himself, though he had never received the fame that Merlin had, thank God. His instrument of choice was the trumpet, and then later the trombone. Unlike Merlin, he had played most of his life, learned music theory as he honed his skills and craft growing up, he attended normal school, made friends, had a real life and girlfriends and all that normal stuff. He had a relatively normal life, he just so happened to be crazy talented as well. And Merlin would be lying if he said he wasn't jealous of that fact.

And Will, as it turned out, would be attending the famed Camelot Institute For The Musically Gifted starting the coming school year. He'd been hoping to get into it for most of his life, as most aspiring musicians in London and all over the world did, and had managed to get in some how—Merlin suspected it had something to do with the letter of recommendation he'd typed up and made Merlin sign a few months back, but he didn't give his friend a hard time about it, as getting in had made him happier than he had been before in his life.

Merlin was glad for his friend, really he was, but he didn't see what it had to do with him.

As it turned out, it had everything to do with him.

The second he turned 16, he had started to receive letters, phone calls, e-mails, personal visits from those involved in admissions over at The Institute, as it was so fondly called, wanting him to enroll there. He always turned them down, always on the basis that his musical career was much more important than school at first, and then, once he'd retired, he said that he needed a break from music, not to be somewhere he would constantly be surrounded by it.

Even so, they still called, still sent letters, still made sure he knew his presence was very much wanted there. Until he turned 21, the cut-off for admissions, he suspected he'd still get letters and calls and e-mails. Hell, he strongly suspected that even after he turned 21,they'd still try to recruit him, but he wanted no part of it.

His parents had always supported his decision in turning them down, but now that Will was going, now that he wouldn't be alone there…

He was going.

No amount of begging, dealing, pleading, crying, yelling, arguing, silent-treatmenting could change their minds. They'd already called the admissions office, got everything set up and in order. All he had to do, they told him, was fill out the papers detailing what instrument he'd be "specializing" in, move into the house they'd bought for him near the school campus, get himself to class every day, do his school work, and just... take care of himself.

They were thrusting him, a child prodigy with no prior experience with peers outside of those he met on the musical circuit, with no real experience with things outside of his music and life there at home with his parents and instruments, into the life of a student at a place like The Institute.

If Merlin didn't know any better, he would have been inclined to think that his parents hated him.

*.*.*.*.*

That... was quite a bit of information for the first chapter. I hope it didn't come off as... haphazard as it felt. I really tried to clean it up, but this first chapter was never going to be such a clean-cut sort of thing, anyway.

Anyway, your thoughts are always appreciated.

Always,
Hisa-Ai