Merlin had collapsed to the floor, tear tracks staining his face as he gasped for breath. Yet Arthur stood over him, impassively, his kingly mask determinedly in place. Only his eyes gave away his true feelings. Behind the cerulean blue burned an avid hatred, both bred and learned through bitter experience, and the far deeper burning sting of yet another betrayal. This one all the worse for how unexpected, how wrong it was.
Despite everything his eyes said, despite the blubbering pile of bones on his floor, Arthur did not waver when he spoke. "Go…leave Camelot and never return, now, while my mercy holds long enough to spare your life,"
Merlin was shaking violently, sobs wracking his body. Tears were streaming down his face, blurring his vision, transforming his once-friend into an ominous red-coloured blob. Merlin shook his head, ever so slightly.
"Arthur…please…"
"Enough!" shouted Arthur, gripping his gleaming sword in a trembling hand. That sword, it was the same one that had lain in wait for him, thrust into a rock in the centre of some obscure clearing in the middle of a forest. The sword Merlin had led him to. The sword Merlin had used to convince Arthur that he was worthy, destined, to be king. The sword Merlin had used to make Arthur believe in himself again.
'Lies, all of it…absolute lies…'
Arthur advanced on the trembling form of his manservant with the gleaming blade in his hand, not poised to strike, but held ready to move should he have need to.
"Get. Out. Of. Camelot," said Arthur, gripping his blade with a white knuckled hand, "You do not belong here." 'Liar, traitor, sorcerer.'
Merlin gasped, whimpering like Arthur had just run him through with his blade. The only move Merlin made however, was to curl into a ball, as if trying to ward off physical pain. But Arthur was having none of it.
Grabbing the destroyed man by his scrubby, threadbare neckerchief, Arthur hoisted him up and threw him against the wall next to his chamber door, pining him there. Arthur was inches away from Merlin's face as the slighter man gasped for breath. "Get. OUT! And never return here. I never want to see you, ever again, sorcerer!" Arthur opened his door, and proceeded to throw Merlin bodily from the room before slamming the door closed on him.
Arthur stood staring at the closed door, his mask of kingly fury still firmly in place for several long moments before it finally cracked, then fell away. Arthur dropped the blade in his hand from numb fingers. It clanged loudly against the stone floor, but Arthur paid it no heed. Slowly, Arthur sank down to the floor and cradled his head in his hands.
He was deaf to the world. Knew nothing beyond his own racing thoughts and the deep, sharp pain in his chest. 'Not again. Why did it happen again? Why did Merlin of all people, have to betray me, and with magic no less! Why did this happen to me again?'
Outside Arthur's chambers, when Merlin was thrown from the room and had the door slammed closed behind him, he hit the opposite stone wall, and slid down it into a tangled mess of gangly limbs on the floor. Merlin cried openly, gasping for breath with tear-shrouded eyes, not even bothering to untangle his knotted limbs.
'Get. Out…' Merlin could still hear Arthur's voice. It had been cold, hard. Yes, there was anger there, but it had not been the blind rage he had honestly expected. He had expected a blind rage that burned hot and fast, yet ate quickly through it's own fuel. Instead it was a cold rage, one tinged with reason, and was all the more frightening for it.
'You do not belong here…leave and never return…sorcerer'
'…you do not belong here…'
'I do not belong here…I don't belong…I don't…'
Suddenly Merlin was on his feet, he was gasping, and shaking, his eyes still too blurry to see from the tears that would not stop. There was an itching pain that was gathering at his shoulder, digging it's claws into his flesh. Merlin could feel it claw it's way through his skin, inching it's way deeper into his body, towards his heart. Merlin felt his magic begin to react to the pain, a lick of comforting warmpth in his veins he had never lived without. But the second Merlin felt that warmpth begin to gather, he heard a voice speak inside his head. Cold, demanding. 'You do not belong here…'
Merlin gasped like a drowning man coming up for air, and pushed away that warmpth, shivers wracking his body. It was then that Merlin began to move. How he found his way through the castle without being seen, when he himself could not see, Merlin would never know. Every time Merlin felt that tell-tale warmpth gather, he would gasp and push it away, shivering from the voice in his head. '…you do not belong…'
As Merlin moved, ghosting through the shadows of the lower-town in the dusk, his mind started inventing words a part of him still somehow knew his king had never said. '…you do not belong…sorcerer…freak…aberration…monster…'
'You are a monster. You should have never been allowed to exist in the first place…death is too good for you…he is an old friend who comes to greet those who were meant to be at the end of their time in this world…He will not come for you…He will never come for you…freak…aberration…monster…Emrys…'
Somewhere in his mind, Merlin felt such a deep truth to those words, and it broke his very soul. A strangled scream, soft in the night, flew past Merlin's lips as the ground came up to batter his abused body and mind.
That clawing pain from his shoulder had by now inched it's way down Merlin's arm, was crawling across his chest looking for his heart. It had even torn it's way up his neck, and was now burrowing into his skull just behind his ear. Merlin could not even lose himself to the pain enough to scream out in the agony he felt. All that escaped his mouth was the pathetic whimpering of a dying man who was not dying.
The sound was little more than a breeze in the night. Merlin was only lucky that someone happened to be listening to that breeze.