Summary: Arthur hated Christmas. No, he hated the Christmas holiday, the same every year, the same trip, the same boredom. At least until he met the young man who breathed wonder and abruptly turned such monotony into excellence itself.
Arthur didn't like the Christmas holiday - except for one aspect, one friend, one glimmer of the impossible in the form of a man who wasn't quite human.
Rating: NC-17
Tags: Merlin/Arthur, Episodic, WARNING: Suicidal Triggers, Dark Themes, Not-Really-Christmas-ey, Temporary Character Death
Arthur Pendragon: Ten Years Old
Unwilling participant in the Annual Christmas Holiday Trip
The first time Arthur saw him, he thought he was dancing in the snow.
He shouldn't have been outside at all, really. Not without his parents, despite knowing that at ten years old he was practically a teenager, and a teenager was practically an adult. Regardless of his claims, Arthur's mother would always insist he came indoors before dark.
That day was different. It had been an accident that he'd stayed out as late as he had, but Arthur had been distracted. Not by friends, of course, for the little Swedish town north of Jokkmokk that hardly even warranted the title of village had no fellow children that Arthur would consider friends. Not even after visiting that very town every year for as long as he could remember.
That was a long time.
The best part about the annual trip that Arthur and his family undertook, the only part he really considered worth it, was the lookout. It wasn't much, was barely elevated atop a modest cliff as it peered out over a lake frozen white and icy, but it got a full blast of the wind in the afternoon. For some reason it always had.
And Arthur liked the wind. For reasons he couldn't quite define, he liked the lick of insubstantial fingers upon his cheeks, slapping them until they stung in the chill. He liked breathing in the sharp iciness until it scored his lungs and set them into frosty fire. He loved the feeling of teetering on the edge of cliff, feeling as though the wind might rock him from his feet or even pick him up and cast him flying into the air.
It wasn't Arthur's fault he'd been distracted by a particularly strong blast that afternoon. so distracted that he hadn't even noticed the sun sinking as night crept forth. When he'd blinked his eyes open to notice the stretching shadows, it was to a moment of panic before he'd brushed it aside.
Mum's going to freak out, but who cares? It's not like anything even happens in this town for her to worry about.
Turning from the lookout, Arthur had paused only a brief moment longer to bathe in the embracing, pulling, pushing forces of the north wind before starting his trudging way back to the cabin that they always staying in. Always. Every year. Exactly the same. He shucked up the heavy jacket on his shoulders a little more, stuffing his hands into his pockets and ducking his head into his scarlet scarf. Arthur loved the wind, loved the chill it brought along with it, but he still registered it as the almost painful freezing that it was.
A light fall of snow just began to speckle from the sky.
It was halfway home that Arthur heard the voice. The laughing voice of sheer delight with the brightness of youth and carefree excitement was pitching high to carry through the chilled evening air. It wasn't anything particularly exceptional, wouldn't have given Arthur pause even for a moment had he been back in his home in London, or in Ireland, or France or Belgium where they'd moved to more recently. His family, moving almost every year for his father's work, had all been exposed to their fair share of wondrous sights. In this little town, so small and unremarkable that it didn't even warrant a proper name, nothing happened. Nothing to invoke such avid amusement. Nothing that should induce laughter, or at least not in Arthur's opinion. That was what drew his attention.
Despite the rapidly encroaching darkness, Arthur followed the sound of that voice. He followed it through the town, diverging from the roadside and through the sparse spread of dark, snow-laden trees, boots crunching through the thick layer of snow and leaving deep footprints in his wake. He paused only when he crested a small incline to stare down upon the frozen river that was barely wider than the single lane of a road.
He really did look like he was dancing. The young man – a man to Arthur's eyes, though he couldn't have been much older than his sister Morgana – spun and twirled in the slowly thickening fall of snow. Tall and slender, he seemed almost too skinny, and it was only when Arthur stared at him in silence, immobilised for a moment longer, that he realised what was wrong with the sight.
The young man wore no jacket. A thin black sweater, threadbare and stretched, was all that he had to stave off the chill of winter, one sleeve torn off at the elbow and the other fraying at the wrist cuff. The black trousers he wore would have provided little enough protection too, shucked as they were to his knees, but more than that he wore no shoes. Not even a pair of socks, his pale feet as white as the ice beneath his toes.
White and black. That was the impression Arthur was given of the young man that spun and twirled in the fluttering shower of snowflakes. Black of clothes, of slightly overlong hair peppered by the flakes falling from above, and yet his skin the colour of the snow that surrounded him, almost faintly blue for its paleness. He must have been freezing, a detached part of Arthur's mind registered, and yet he didn't seem to care, turning and jumping on his toes as his arms stretched around himself as though to embrace the winter night.
Except that he wasn't dancing. No, he wasn't just dancing. The longer Arthur stared the more he realised; the young man's feet brushed the ground and he tiptoed across the frozen river, but only briefly before he leapt away from it as though teasing it with his touch. He didn't just dance. He flew. It was impossible, a part of Arthur knew, and yet he didn't care. The man seemed to dance not just upon the frozen water but upon the very wind itself.
Arthur had never considered anything beautiful before that moment. He wouldn't realise for some years the very truth of that thought.
A long moment of staring passed, of wide-eyes and captivation, before Arthur even realised that the laughter hadn't come from the young man at all. That he was silent even for his smile, and that bubbling mirth instead echoed from a second figure that he hadn't noticed at first, a little way along the river as he was. The boy must have been from the town, looked barely five years old though it was difficult to tell for the cap pulled down his forehead, the heavy jacket that made him almost as wide as he was tall. He was spinning around in dizzying circles himself, panting in excitement enough to make his cheeks appear visibly flushed even from the distance Arthur stood.
There was no grace in the boy's motions, no finesse or beauty in the way he stumbled in circles, slipping on the ice and flapping his arms overhead as though to catch the snow. Arthur didn't quite know why he was excited at first. To him, the young man and the boy appeared nothing if not opposing characters glorying in the sharp chill of encroaching night. But Arthur couldn't help but stare, captivating by the dancing, by the flying of the black and white man, so he saw.
He'd always wanted to fly.
Arthur saw when the man swept towards the boy and spun around him in an arc that didn't turn the boy's head almost as though he didn't even see him. He saw as the man raised his arms over the boy's head and fluttered his long, slender fingers as though playing a piano in the air, a wide smile drawing across his lips. And he saw those fingers rain down a sudden, swirling storm of snowflakes like powdered icing sugar atop the boy's head, heard as the boy gasped in delight and shrieked another bout of laughter before leaping into the air with renewed vigour in an attempt to catch the conjured shower.
Arthur didn't know how the young man had done it. He didn't understand how that was possible, but couldn't shake himself to question, to move towards or away from the anomaly. He could only stare as the man spun in another flying twirl, skating around the boy – really, the boy didn't seem to notice him at all – and drew another curtain of dusty snow in his wake like the shower of water behind a jet boat. The boy laughed and chased right after him, mittened hands clapping at the air in an attempt to grab the train that followed in the man's wake.
It was captivating to watch, both the man and his flying dance and the strange clouds of snow that he conjure with his fingers, from every step on the air. Arthur couldn't look away, even as the night darkened, even as a detached part of his mind knew he should leave to get back to the cabin because his mother would worry.
But he didn't move, and that was why he saw it happen.
Even in the darkness it was unmistakable. The moment the boy slid into the centre of the river, stumbling to his knees, and the crack of fractured ice that snapped through the air. The boy wasn't as stupid and carefree as he'd seemed, Arthur saw. He knew what such a sound meant as all children up in the northern reaches must have. From the top of the incline, Arthur could just make out the sudden widening of his eyes, the vanquishing of joy from his face as he sprawled on hands and knees on the ice, frozen in sudden fear. Another crack followed a bare second after.
Arthur didn't move, felt frozen himself as though he were watching a horror movie unfold and couldn't draw his gaze away. The young man noticed, too. He noticed and with steps that didn't quite touch the ice he crossed the river towards where the boy lay. The boy, who was now visibly trembling with each successive cracking and snapping sound that ensued. He didn't appear to notice the man as he stopped before him, as he cocked his head and peered down at him as though curious for the sight, for the terror that tangibly radiated from the child.
He didn't move to help, however. Not when the boy uttered a faint sob. Not when a particularly fierce curl of wind whistled over the surface of the lake and seemed to only double the sound of splintering ice. He didn't move a hand as the boy finally raked together the courage to attempt to move, to push himself into motion and scramble to the edge of the river.
He didn't make it. He barely moved an inch before the river caved beneath him With a cry swallowed by the following splash, he fell through the water.
Arthur still couldn't move. He still stared at the river, at the jagged black hole that was all that was left of the boy, fallen into frigid water beneath disappear, to be dragged upon whatever currents had snatched at him. He should call for help, should run to the nearest house and explain in his garbled Swedish what he'd witnessed.
But he didn't. Arthur didn't move, could only watch as the young man cocked his head back in the opposite direction and regarded the hole in the ice ponderingly, as though he'd only just happened upon it and hadn't just seen the boy disappear, sinking to his death. He raised a finger to his chin and tapped as though thoughtful, pursing his lips slightly. Then…
Even at the distance he stood Arthur could see the faint upwelling of gold surface in his eyes as the man dropped to a crouch. He saw the glowing illumination spill forth as he extended a hand over the icy hole, his long fingers fluttering and swirling as though stirring a bowl of water. Arthur saw as the icy particles descended from his fingers like a gossamer curtain, as the edges of the ice hole crackled and extended and slowly then rapidly grew to consume the opening, vanishing any trace of the break in the ice. Within moments there was nothing to suggest a hole had existed, that a boy had fallen through and had –
Had drowned.
Arthur stared. He was stunned, but not for the right reasons. He stared because it suddenly struck him. Eyes blown wide but not in terror but awe, without his intention, words slipped from Arthur's lips. "That's magic…" he breathed.
The young man heard him. He must have heard him, even quiet as Arthur's words were, for it was only then that he raised his gaze from his handiwork and turned towards Arthur. Even through the darkening evening, the darkness illuminated faintly by the surrounding snow, Arthur could see the residual gold in his eyes. That was magic too. It had to be.
Arthur knew that magic wasn't real. Or at least he had until that moment. Now he knew for certain that all of his father's sighs and exasperated proclamations of otherwise was false. He knew it.
The young man was rising in an instant, in another was sweeping towards Arthur in rapid strides, almost a run and yet not touching the ground. Arthur knew he didn't touch the ground for not a footprint marred the flat perfection of the snow where he stepped. He ascended the slight hill and paused just before Arthur, tilting his head slightly just as he had peered at the hole in the ice.
Arthur could see him better up close. He saw him and with that realisation that he didn't quite understand he perceived beauty all over again. It was a different kind of beautiful that that which the rest of the world claimed, wasn't the sort of handsome that Arthur's father told him boys were supposed to have. It was almost unearthly.
The young man had wide eyes, dark in the night yet not quite black. His eyelashes were flecked with snow, painting them with spots of silver, and they blinked down their own snowy shower onto his cheeks that were sharper even that those of Arthur's sister. One thin eyebrow quirked slightly, a slight smile touching his lips, and Arthur knew immediately that this man, this magical, flying person – he was the sort that knew how to have fun. How to find enjoyment in the quiet town where nothing happened.
Even if that fun did seem to include killing a boy.
"How did you do that?" Arthur found himself asking. His eyes flickered briefly towards the flat surface of the river. He knew he should be more concerned about the boy, about the child who had fallen through the ice barely a minute ago. His mother always gave a faint, sad little mew whenever she heard about lost or dead children on the news, his father shaking his head as though accusing someone for letting such happen. Even Morgana appeared regretful when she beheld such stories.
But Arthur had other things on his mind. Other magical things. Drowned boys hardly even touched his thoughts.
The young man stared down at him for a long moment. He was tall, maybe even as tall as Arthur's father, but Uther Pendragon had never smiled like that before. Not the slow, spreading smile that widened until it brightened his whole face, impressing delighted dimples into his cheeks. "You can see me?"
Arthur blinked, confused yet just a little captivated all over again as he stared up at him. "What?"
The man pointed to himself, tapping his chest. A flourish of snowflakes swirled like a blooming flower from the touching finger. "Me. You can see me?"
Arthur found himself nodding slowly. "Of course I can. Why would you…?"
He trailed off as the young man's smile spread impossibly wider, as he gave a little jump that swept him into the air until he was hanging suspended a full foot off the ground. He bent over slightly, over Arthur, until Arthur had to tilt his head back to look at him properly, before spinning in the snow slightly and touching down once more. Arthur turned to follow his movement; the sight of the man walking on air was one he wouldn't miss even for a second. His eyes only dropped as the man reached a hand towards him, tugging at the scarf around his neck.
"That's wonderful," He said, grin still spread wide. "That's splendid! And I – I love your scarf."
Arthur, turning to follow the man's passage once more and mouth dropping open to reply, paused in confusion. "You what?"
"Your scarf." The man tugged on at the scarf once more indicatively, seeming only the more delighted for it. "Red's my favourite colour, you know, but most people don't like me touching their things. Not when they can't see my. They just brush me away."
"Most people can't see you?" Arthur asked.
The man shook his head, and, eyes still caught on Arthur's scarf as though it was something wondrous, drift a step backwards. Entwining his fingers behind him, he gave a strolling twirl around Arthur once more. Arthur turned in place to follow his movements. "No, not usually. Some people do occasionally, but… not for a very long time. They just feel my snow."
"You're snow?" Arthur asked, confused.
The man nodded, his gaze finally rising to meet Arthur's. He raised a hand before him, cupping his fingers, and with a distinct flicker of gold in his dark eyes once more, a swirl of snow appeared and settled into a little heap in his palm. It was almost the same colour as his skin, and must have been freezing upon his bare fingers, but the man didn't appear to care. "My snow," he said indicatively.
Arthur sighed out a puff of white smoke in wonder as he stared wide-eyed at the manifestation. "That's so cool…"
"Yes, it is very cool," the man nodded sincerely. "Very, very cool. That's the best part about snow."
It took Arthur a moment to realise that the young man spoke more of temperature than of awe, but he disregarded it a moment later for more important questioning. Not about the boy – the disappeared boy had fled his thoughts almost entirely. "Who are you?" He asked, turning once more as the man strolled around him. Arthur's eyes followed the motion of his arm as the handful of snow was cast into the air, only to flutter downwards in particles in a way that it shouldn't have been able to after being so condensed in the palm of a warm hand. "And how do you do that?"
"I've always been able to do it," the man said, his tone light and nonchalant as though unfazed by the impossibility he so easily cast. "As for who I am… I'm called lots of different names."
"Lots of names?"
The man nodded, then shook his head with a smile as though ridiculing the notion, sending a scattering swirl of snow into the air as he spun with the motion. His smile was slightly rueful as he glanced back towards Arthur. "I've had people call me Jack Frost. The old, old people used to call me Ullr, though they have stories about that person that aren't about me. I've also been called Old Man Winter, although," his lips quivered slightly as though on the verge of bubbling with laughter. "I don't know where they got that idea from. Last I checked I wasn't an old man, even if I have been around for a while."
Arthur didn't know what any of that meant. He vaguely knew the name Jack Frost from a movie he'd watched when he was younger, but couldn't quite recall who it was. "Then what do you like being called?"
The man paused in floating step, blinking wide eyes down at Arthur. "What do I like to be called?"
Arthur nodded. "Or what were you called first? What's your actual name?"
The young man stared curiously for a moment. A finger slipped to the single cuff of his jumper and tugged it idly, encrusting the fabric with a touch of white ice. Arthur couldn't help but stare, his attention only drawn away as the man spoke once more. "I don't really have a first name, but if I could choose… probably Merlin."
"Merlin?" Arthur asked, confused. He knew of 'Merlin' about as well as he did Jack Frost. "Why that name?"
Merlin pursed his lips slightly before smiling overly brightly. Arthur was beginning to suspect, however, that there wasn't all that much 'overly' about it; it seemed to simply be his normal smile. "Well, I probably had the most fun when people knew me as Merlin. A lot of people could see me then because a lot of people had magic. Of course, I'm different to you humans but it was a lot more fun to be around then. Did you know I used to be the advisor to a king?" He laughed heartily as he pranced a little in the air as though the thought amused him, though there was a touch of fondness to the sound.
Arthur only shook his head, baffled as he stared up at him. "Different to humans? So you're not a human at all?"
Merlin shook his head, grinning. "Of course not." He didn't elaborate, however, baffling Arthur all the more. Only for Arthur to be forcibly distracted from such confusion as Merlin started forward in a springing step and peered into his face once more. "But you're the interesting one, that you can even see me. How odd. I wonder if that means something?" He tapped his chin with a finger again once more, before visibly discarding his confusing thoughtfulness to speak instead. "What's your name, little boy?"
In any other circumstances, Arthur would have been more than a little affronted at being called 'little boy', but he was thoroughly distracted from any such thoughts by the overwhelming and slightly awe-inspiring confrontation. Merlin was… he was strange. And yet something told Arthur that he was special. Very special, and perhaps even for more than his magic. He replied immediately, almost couldn't help himself. "Arthur," he said. "My name's Arthur."
Merlin stared at him for a long moment, his eyebrows shooting upwards as though he was surprised. They he danced a step backwards in a thin puff of thin snowflakes, throwing his head back and loosed a shout of heartfelt laughter once more as though Arthur had told some sort of wondrous joke. He tipped his head back towards him with his wide smile spread once more. "Is it really?"
"Of – of course," Arthur said. He couldn't even bring himself to be indignant.
Merlin chuckled, shaking his head and turned in a circle with arms spread. Snow scattered with each drift of his arm. "You're the second Arthur I've met that could see me, you know?"
"Really?"
"Really." Merlin hummed, shooting him another smile over his shoulder. "Yes, how interesting. This should be fun. Would you like to be my friend, Arthur?"
Arthur didn't have to think about a reply. This Merlin, whoever he was, whatever he was, was interesting. It didn't matter that he hadn't helped a drowning boy. It didn't matter that he danced on the air and cast magical snowflakes from nothing in a way that Arthur's father would surely have disapproved of, would have called wrong and evil. Arthur nodded fervently, and was only further gratified by the beaming smile that Merlin afforded him in return.
"What about that boy?" Arthur couldn't help but ask, gesturing towards river over his shoulder. "Was he your friend too?"
Merlin glanced towards the river. "That boy? Of course not. He couldn't even see me. What kind of a friend would that be?"
Arthur blinked back towards him. "Who was he, then? What's going to happen to him?"
Merlin only shrugged as though Arthur had asked him a simple and uninteresting question that held little merit to answer. He didn't appear regretful, nor the slightest bit repentant, for what had happened at all. "I don't know. He fell through and he's gone now. Not much for it."
"Why didn't you help him?" Arthur asked, more curious than accusing.
Merlin shrugged once more, spinning on his foot and dragging his foot across the snow. It actually sketched a line, a perfect arc like the curve of a rainbow, but in a mound rather than a runnel. "I couldn't. Can't touch people, you know." Then he glanced sharply up to Arthur, tipping his head in that curious way that made him look like a bird. "But then, I haven't been able to talk to anyone for a long time either. I can talk to you though. I wonder…"
Merlin swirled forwards in a slight gust of chilling wind and Arthur took an unconscious step back. Not far, however, and when Merlin reached a hand towards him it wasn't in a stretch. A single finger, so cold it felt as though Merlin had been swimming in ice water himself, pressed against the end of Arthur's nose.
The smile that followed, that stretched across Merlin's face and lit it up even in the smothering darkness, was radiant. Arthur could almost feel it beaming upon him. Merlin bent down slightly, dropping his hands onto his knees so that he was eye-to-eye with Arthur. "This is fantastic," he said before spinning on his heel and starting off into the snow. He moved so quickly – he was flying again, beautifully and impossibly flying – that he disappeared into the darkness as though he'd abruptly disappeared. Only his echoing words called behind him in memory of his presence. "I'll see you tomorrow, Arthur. We can do something fun!"
Arthur stared after him for a long moment before he could move. He had the thought that he'd just met someone wonderful. Strange, and perhaps a little terrifying, but certainly wonderful.
He took himself back to the cabin after that. Arthur didn't want to but he knew he should, and besides, Merlin had disappeared anyway. He couldn't wait for the next day, his excitement giving speed and his own sort of flight to his feet as he raced along the dark, streetlamp-lit road.
Arthur stumbled through the door with a huff and a flurry of snow, the snowfall itself having only thickened with his return until it was a veritable downpour. As soon as Arthur stepped inside, it was to hear his mother's voice crack in a sharp, over-loud call. "Arthur? Arthur, is that you?"
Arthur didn't get a chance to reply, not through his heavy breathing and abrupt shivering as he closed the door, before his mother appeared from the living room of the cabin. Her brow was wrinkled as she stepped into the hallway in a mixture of concern and anger, strands of blonde hair popping free of her bun as though she'd been running her hands through it. She exhaled sharply as she started towards him. Arthur could already hear the scolding in her tone before she stopped before him, grasping his shoulders and squeezing tight enough that he could feel her fingers like claws through the thickness of his jacket.
"What have I told you about getting home before dark," she said, and despite the reprimand thick in her tone Arthur could hear the worry too.
Arthur didn't like to worry his parents. He especially didn't like to worry his mother, because she always got upset more easily than his father did, and it was annoying when she got upset. But that evening he wasn't quite so regretful. He'd seen something special, met someone exciting, someone magical, and he'd made a friend who was the most interesting thing that he'd ever met on their holiday trips to Sweden. Certainly more interesting that the Aurora Borealis; Arthur saw the northern lights every year and they weren't anything special. Not to him.
He didn't comment as his mother drew him into the dining room-kitchen, muttering and scolding as they went. He didn't complain as she pushed him perhaps a little more forcibly than was necessary into a seat and swept toward the kitchen counter in the direction of the kettle. Arthur simply rode out her worried anger, allowing it to ease in her own time.
Which it did. Eventually.
"Your nose it very red," his mother finally said when something less that a frown settled upon her brow. She bustled around him, her small frame seeming larger for her dithering, and clicked her tongue before setting a cup of cocoa on the table before Arthur. She had already ordered him to take off his gloves and jacket. "See, this is what I worry about, Arthur. Are you coming down with a cold now?"
Arthur reached a hand up to his nose, unconsciously pressing at the very point that Merlin had touched before. He found himself nodding slightly at his mother's words. "Maybe," he mumbled.
He thought it might have been a different kind of cold, however, and this one wasn't so bad as all that.
A/N: Hi everyone! I hope you liked the first chapter (liked? A bit morbid, yes...?). Please leave a review to let me know your thoughts. Thank you!