"Why haven't you knighted Merlin?"
It was a simple enough question but there was no simple answer. The knights were training when they stopped to watch Merlin as he worked by the armoury.
"He would probably kill himself by accident by just holding a sword never mind wielding one." Arthur scoffed.
"But so would all of us if we had never been taught." Lancelot objected.
"Good point..." Arthur trailed off when he got an idea, he walked over and brought back another sword from the rack. "Merlin, come here!" He shouted over.
Merlin looked up, confused at first but proceeded to walk over.
"Defend yourself." Athur threw the sword to him which he surprisingly caught very easily.
"What's going -"Merlin didn't get chance to finish his question before Arthur charged at him.
The kinghts could tell Arthur was going easy on him but they also noticed something else... Merlin could fight. Every hit that was thrown towards him he blocked perfectly, he even aimed some back at Athur.
With a look of confusion still clearly on his face Arthur went against his idea of going easy on him and started doing the complete opposite. The knights saw that Arthur was now trying his hardest.
For years Merlin had sat at the side watching, learning all the knights fighting styles. He had the upperhand no one had seen him fight before, they didn't know what to expect. Just as Arthur went in for another hit Merlin side stepped but kept his sword there and flicked Arthurs sword out of his hand at the same time that he put his foot out and tripped him up, Merlin turned to look at him on the floor with his sword to his chest.
"WHAT...WAS...THAT!" Arthur panted out.
Merlin's face suddenly went pale, he stepped back and dropped his sword as he looked around at the knights of the round table and Arthur who were all looking at him shocked. One moment he was there the next he was sprinting away and up the steps of the castle.
"What the hell just happened?" Gwaine exclaimed, after Merlin was out of sight.
"Merlin just beat me in a sword fight...how did Merlin beat me in a sword fight?" Arthur said, still on the floor looking confused and dazed.
"Why did he run away aswell?" Elyan spoke his thoughts.
They were all determined to know more. Now they knew their friend had a secret, and whose to say he didn't have many secrets. Also why didn't he tell them?
OoOoOoOoOoO
"Stupid, stupid, stupid, what have I done? I didn't mean for it to happen, it was just my instinct. Now they might ask questions, who am I trying to kid, of course their going to ask questions. I can't tell them the truth, can I? They might think I have betrayed them or even lied to them this whole time." Merlin muttered to himself in the physicians chambers, luckily for him Gaius was out delivering medicines, he dragged his hands through his hair.
"Well You kind of did." He continued to mutter to himself.
"Not helping Merlin! Your supposed to be better than this, why is a small mistake making you so frustrated?" He grimaced and sat down against the wall.
"Small? You call this a small mistake?"
"Oh would you look at that, I'm talking to myself. I've gone mad, absolutely bonkers!"
"Clearly you have, you just exposed one of your big secrets to Arthur and all the knights!"
"Will you shut up!" This was how the knights all found him when they walked in, talking to himself, pulling his hair out and sitting on the floor.
"Erm... Merlin?" Gwaine started, slightly scared about the mental health of his friend.
"If your just going to criticise me again I'm fed up-" Merlin started talking thinking it was 'himself' but then realised it was the knights when he looked up, "oh, it's you, I..Erm..I.I should probably just erm.. go..." Merlin got up and trailed over to his room. Before he could get there a hand on his shoulder stopped him and spun him around, it was Arthur, he was giving him a sad look. It was only now that he had calmed down slightly that Merlin realised he had been crying, quickly wiping he tears from his cheeks he turned to look at all of the knights.
"What was that all about?" Arthur asked sounding like he actually cared.
"The freak out bit," Merlin gestured to where he had been previously sitting on the floor, "Or the sword fighting bit?"
"The freak out bit," Arthur grinned, "Well, both bits really." He laughed
"I suppose the freak out was about the sword bit..." Merlin stopped to think about it, "Why did you get me to fight you?" He turned to Arthur, at some point they had all sat down on benches, Arthur and Merlin on one and the other knights scattered around the room.
"The knights asked me why I didn't have you knighted, so I thought to test your sword skills and they are a lot better than I thought they would be." Arthur grinned. Merlin stared at him for a bit, looked around at all the looks on the knights faces, realising they were all actually serious, then burst out laughing.
"You want me...me? To be a knight?" Merlin laughed his words out.
"Is that such an absurd thing to think of?" Percival asked, for a man of very few words it was a good question.
"Absurd? More like impossible."
"Why is it impossible? Because your not a noble, neither are we. Because you can fight, you just proved that wrong." Elyan asked.
This was it, he was going to tell them, it wasn't that bad anyway. They wouldn't hate him surely. But there was still that small part of his brain urging him to keep it a secret. No. He was going to tell them, he was going to tell them right now.
"It's impossible because how can I become a knight... if I'm already a knight?" Merlin continue to laugh. The knights all looked on with utter confusion. Merlin? A knight? Why did he think he was a knight? He didn't hit his head did he?
"I'm pretty sure I would remember if I knighted you Merlin, and I don't remember it." Arthur waited for an explanation.
"You don't remember it because you didn't do it. It was a different king completely, in a different kingdom actually." Merlin grinned casually.
"Wait, so your a knight of a different kingdom?" Leon asked, Merlin nodded, "Why are you here then?"
"To gather information on how to take down Camelot." Merlin said with a blank face. All of the people in the room froze and looked at him, their hands instinctively going to he hilts of their swords. "I'm kidding! God! Don't all kill me at once." Merlin laughed, they all joined in.
"So why are you here? The real reason this time." Leon asked again, grinning at the end.
"There was someone here that I needed to talk to, and to do that I..." Merlin thought carefully about his next words, trying his best not to make him sound bad, "I needed contact inside the castle, they thought it was best for me to come here as a servant because they can have access to passages around the castle and people pay little to no attention to them." The knights thought over this information.
"So all this," Arthur gestured to Merlin, "servant act, is fake. 'They'? Whose 'they'? And being our friend, was that fake too?" Everyone noticed he was starting to get angry.
"Yes, the servant act is fake but no, being your friend was not. I didn't even plan on making any friends or even staying this long. I only planned on doing what I came here for then leaving, Gaius offered me to stay with him whilst I was here."
"Still, who is 'they'? The people who sent you? People from the kingdom your from? What kingdom are you from anyway?" Elyan asked.
"'They' are my King and Queen. Yes I am loyal to you Arthur but first comes my loyalty to them and to Mirstone."
"Mirstone? Never heard of it." Percival said.
"It does sound familiar, I think I went there when I was travelling." Gwaine added.
"Yes well we do have very good mead so I wouldn't be surprised if you knew it and we like to keep to our selves so not many kingdoms have heard of us." 'Especially Camelot because its a kingdom of magic' Merlin thought it might be best not to say that bit though.
"Well then why don't you tell us about it."
This story kind of got a bit out of hand at the end, I wrote the beginning of this ages ago and I was in the mood to write so I tried to finish it off. I got too many ideas and didn't know how to end it so I'm sorry that it's a mess. I will continue this if you want me too, I do have a small idea about the knights convincing Merlin to take them to Mirstone or something like that. Please review, thanks for reading!