A New Spell
It was the longest day of the year and Merlin finished all of his chores to find it was still light outside, despite the late hour. The young warlock returned to his bedchamber, threw open the window, cast off his boots and neckerchief, and flopped onto his bed with a huge sigh of relief.
After a moment of relaxation he turned onto his side and flopped over the side of the bed, quickly sliding the loose floorboard to one side, hauling his heavy spell book from its hiding place and opening it to the page he'd been studying the night before. He smiled as he looked at that particular incantation again – committing it to memory just in case it would be useful. He could already think of numerous dangerous situations he'd been in recently where this would have been especially helpful. As Merlin undressed and started to fall asleep, his mind begun to wander as he though of various times that might justify him using such a spell.
When he eventually fell asleep, he had a huge grin on his face.
xoxOxox
Merlin had left the window open last night and so the early morning bird chorus woke him up at dawn, an hour earlier than he really needed to get up at this time of year. He turned over with a groan, wondering whether he dared risk falling asleep again, only to suddenly sit bolt upright as he recalled his previous night's reading.
"Should I? Dare I? What if I got caught?"
But surely, that was the whole point of this spell. He couldn't get caught and, after all of the heartache and stress he'd been under lately, he could really do with a bit of fun.
Suddenly decided, Merlin quickly dressed, went over to the very small square of mirror leaning on the shelf and raised his hand towards it. He squinted at his mottled reflection cast in the poor quality reflective surface, and cast the spell. He saw his gold eyes glow and then, as the colour started to fade, so did the rest of him.
He was invisible.
He'd learnt a serious lesson from his experiment with that ageing spell though and so the young man quickly cast the counter enchantment just to be certain that it really worked. Within a heartbeat his reflection reappeared; his eyes already back to blue by the time he could see them. With a huge grin, Merlin cast the spell once more and vanished.
He opened the door to his room, walked down the few stairs into the main chambers and stood in front of Gaius' longer, higher quality mirror and seeing … nothing - just a reflection of the physician's cluttered room. Turning to his left he saw a small bottle perched on the edge of a wooden bench, picked it up and turned back to the mirror to see it apparently hovering in mid air. Gaius was still snoring in his cot and, as Merlin waved his hand back and forth and watched the vial dance this way and that, it was all the young man could do not to laugh out loud.
This was going to be so much fun.
The castle was quiet at this time of the morning - just a few of the first servants were starting to stir - and so Merlin walked quickly down to the kitchens and opened the door to find the large room very much quieter than when he usually came down here. A sleepy scullery maid was trying to light the main fire for cooking, with little success, whilst all the time she muttered and complained about how hot it was going to be in here when the sun reached its height in a few more hours. The pretty red head stood up and stamped her foot in annoyance, still unable to set the wood alight, and so Merlin walked closer, unseen, and quietly cast another spell, aiming at the hearth. The fire abruptly sprung to life and the girl screamed loudly, causing the few other sleepy servants nearby to come running and ask her what the matter was. The young warlock used this distraction to quickly grab some food for the prince's breakfast, before heading back out to deliver it to it's intended recipient, still grinning broadly.
He wasn't a fool. The corridors were now getting busier and he knew that anyone seeing a plate full of food floating all by itself would soon go running to Uther screaming 'sorcery', and so he quickly cast the counter-spell and walked, visibly, towards Arthur's chambers, only vanishing again as he quietly opened the door.
The prince was fast asleep, as he'd suspected, and so Merlin carefully put the plate of food down on the table, quietly tidied up and set Arthur's cloths and armour out on the table ready for training before slowly opening the curtains and looking back at the Prince's sleeping form.
Arthur winced as the sun hit his face but, other than that, didn't react to the sudden light. Merlin bit his lip as numerous interesting ideas jostled to get his attention. In the end, he opted for simplicity, carefully walking over the bed before shouting.
"Let's be having you, lazy daisy!"
Arthur sat bolt upright in his bed - Shirtless of course - with a priceless glower on his face.
"Merlin, what did I tell you about …?" He looked around the empty room in confusion. "Merlin?" His servant now had both hands over his mouth, in a desperate attempt not to laugh out loud. The look on Arthur's face was priceless. "Merlin? Where are you, you idiot?"
The prince's eyes fell on the full platter on the table, his clothes neatly laid out for him and his expression became even more confused, if that were possible. With a lazy shrug and a huge yawn, Arthur got out of bed and made his way over to the table to eat his breakfast, the strangeness apparently forgotten. Now really struggling not to laugh, Merlin quietly walked to the door and opened it boldly as he walked out, hearing the scape of Arthur chair behind him as the Prince ran to the door, wondering who had opened it.
Merlin made it just as far as one of the alcoves in a deserted corridor, somehow managing to calmly cast the counter-spell, before he collapsed in a heap on the floor, laughing uncontrollably.
xoxOxox
A/N Hello! Yes, I'm still here. Just hit one of my occasional writing lulls and, despite a long 'to-do' list, haven't felt inspired to write recently, especially as many of the ideas are long, complex and potentially serious/angsty.
Anyway, I recently gained 100 followers on Tumblr and wanted to give them a thank-you present so I rummaged through my notes and found this little story. It was inspired by a review of 'The Invisible Servant' ages ago but has just ended up hidden in my 'ideas' folder since then.
Since publishing it on Tumblr I debated putting it on here but wasn't sure how to extend it, so I've decided to leave that up to you!
What do you want Merlin to do with this new spell next?
Who do you want him to play a trick on next?
The only rules are (a) He will not be found out (b) He won't suffer any pain or heartbreak during his mini adventures (c) Rating is flexible as I suspect there might be a few cheeky/naughty ideas, but let's keep it T rated or lower.
This is because I intend this fic to be comic and light-hearted – a nice break from the more angsty stuff I've written recently and our poor Merlin deserves a little fun after everything he's been through, don't you think?
I originally set this between S3 & 4 as there is a reference to his ageing spell from 3.10 but, let's not be too pedantic here, if you want to include a character or situation from S1 or S2, go ahead.
Give me as much or as little prompting as you like. You could just put a character/situation such as "He wakes Arthur up and enjoys seeing his confusion when he opens his eyes to an empty room,' or you could give me far more detail - even an opening sentence/paragraph. Either way, I promise to credit you.
8/4/12