This may be immature and unrealistic, but I had a blast writing it. My sincerest wish is that you enjoy reading it as thoroughly as I enjoy putting it together.
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Morgana's Request
As nice a day as it was in Camelot's many flowering gardens, things were not working out.
They sat under the damp shade of a drooping willow, well away from prying eyes - and ears.
Arthur was looking at her as though she'd lifted her skirts and flashed him her bare legs.
"What?" she demanded.
"You're not serious, are you?" Perhaps it was her imagination, which her tutor ensured Uther was extraordinarily inventive, in the most embarrassing ways possible, but Arthur appeared uneasy. If he hadn't been appraising her with a look that plainly told her he thought her insane, Morgana would have found it comical. "...Are you?"
Morgana tilted her chin defiantly, narrowing turqoise eyes. She shot him a glare that nearly spat, Arthur, you're depriving some hapless village of an idiot. "Of course I am serious. I wouldn't have mentioned it if I'd been anything else."
Arthur found himself becoming very still. He must be dreaming. Yes, that was it. He was dreaming. Soon, but certainly not soon enough, he would awaken and there he'd be, in his room, alone, with the sound of scraping swords outside his window, not having this conversatin with-
"I'd like an answer, Arthur," Morgana pressed, and he could almost hear the tip of her foot tapping, the way it did when they were fighting in the castle corridors. A moment passed, and another, and a third stretched on until Arthur feared it would burst like an over-full wineskin. "Well?"
Oh, gods have mercy. "I...don't think I can, Morgana."
"What do you mean, you 'don't think you can'? It's just a kiss!" With a flutter of long dark hair and whipping skirts, Morgana clambered onto her knees, peering down her nose as severely as she could at the fidgeting fifteen year old who was slowly but steadily inching away from her. She thought she saw his eyes fill with tears. Morgana tried very hard not to take offence; she found him the most insufferable, repugnant, arrogant, deluded git in existence - that he returned those feelings wasn't surprising. Not in the least. After all, he was the son of Uther, King of the Britons. And he was well on his way to becoming a brilliant swordsman - and though she'd die before she admitted it, perhaps he was slightly better than her. Very slightly.
But that did not mean that he was any less of a git. And Arthur Pendragon needed to learned it.
For the moment, however, she needed him.
There was a rather simple explanation to support Morgana's proposal. Given the circumstances, Morgana didn't think that what she was asking was altogether too unreasonable; if he helped her, she'd might just be able to get out of his hair.... In truth she was very curious; Sir Gaheris was awfully clever, certainly worth an uncomfortably half a minute pressed to Arthur's skinny chest. She was sure he'd have much to talk of - she'd heard of his winning the jousting tournament in Tintagel - and much knowledge to share with her, which she was convinced he was willing to do, because he'd often sought her out at feasts to talk. Most importantly, she was absolutely certain he'd help her put Arthur from her mind.
Uther Pendragon's son has made himself quite at home in Morgana's dreams and musings, an arrangement she was unspeakably uncomfortable with. It had put an unseemly kink in the pleasant order of her daily routine, bigger than the one Arthur himself had previously made. She could no longer ignore it (though not for want of trying.)
She had to get him out.
And if she had to kiss him to do it, she would.
Morgana would use Sir Gaheris as an excuse. The handsome knight, and her own ignorance of the ways of romance. Normally, Arthur would have laughed outright and turned her down before she could lift a finger in protest. But she had leverage. Solid evidence with which to blackmail him. It was delightful really - she'd humiliate and unsettle him with one blow. Morgana nearly smiled. Chest bubbling with malicious intent, Morgana sent silent, profuse thanks to Gwen for her help. She'd make sure to repay the smithy's girl, somehow.
"Just a kiss?!"
"Yes!"
"What's got into you, you madwoman?" Arthur sputtered, voice comically pitching and deepening with his discomfort.
He grabbed her wrists, and Morgana tugged, with annoyingly little effect, to loosen his grip. "Morgana," he said, closing in on her face. For a single, astounded droplet of time Morgana thought he was about to kiss her. Instead he leaned in very closely and sniffed her breath loudly. "You haven't been drinking, have you?"
"Are you mad?" she snapped, imitating him word for word, tone for tone without meaning to, before realising she'd done it. Morgana then came out with a much mellower, "Definitely not."
"Well what's all this about then?" She roughly attempted to pull her forearms from him ear-reddeningly calloused hands, shrieking strings of, 'let go of me you bas-', and 'how dare!-'. Arthur relentlessly held on. Damn him. "I'm not letting go until you tell me. Morgana, please, this is embarrassing." He turned his gleaming blond head to his left, to his right, and then looked behind him, worry etched into the lines of his face, plainly terrified at being discovered in such a situation with, of all of Camelot's beautiful young women, his father's ward.
"I'm not letting go until you tell me," he repeated stubbornly.
Morgana knew from experience that he meant every word.
She gave in. "It's...Sir Gaheris."
"Sir Gaheris," Arthur said, and she doubted he understood her meaning.
"The knight from Orkney."
"I know," he said, in a way that implied her wits were lacking. "What about him?"
Arthur, can you truly be so thick? thought Morgana in desperation. The puzzled expression on his face clearly showed that he could.
"He has asked me to the feast."
To Morgana's amazement, Arthur cringed.
"And I would like to know how to...to kiss properly," stammered Morgana, having enough decency to blush. "I'd like to get to know him better."
"What the devil for?"
"I just told you-"
"Kiss him? Morgana, I always knew you were cross-eyed, but I'd have never guessed you were blind!" He accentuated the jerky tones of his speech with well-timed tugs on Morgana's wrists.
"And I'd never have guessed you were jealous!"
He had the nerve to raise an eyebrow. "Forget it."
"I wouldn't." He tugged again, hard. "For goodness' sake, stop or I'll bruise!"
"That's the point."
That's it. "You haven't been very discreet, have you?" Morgana said, forcing calm, and composure. She'd have to tread wisely now. He was still barely out of childhood, but he was strong, Morgana knew. On rare occasions, he had stood up for her, and once, secretly, held her while she cried, though he'd denied doing any such thing afterward: you really are delusional, aren't you? Me? Help you?
"What are you on about, girl?"
"I'm talking about Cecily, and Bronwyn, and Brangaine-"
Before she could blink Morgana's back had thudded against the tree behind her, its bark scratching her freshly scrubbed back through the fabric of her dress, and Arthur's hands were no longer childishly clasping her wrists; now they clamped hard on her arms and forced her to stand still. "Stop squirming - ouch! Stop it, I said!"
"Not until you do as I ask."
"Can't you ask Gawain?" he pleaded desperately.
"No," she said. "This is humiliating, and I don't want anyone to know about it. I know for a fact that you'd rather put out your own eyes than admit to doing anything like this with me." Oh, gods, was that bitterness?
"No, I wouldn't - but I'd put out yours if you tell anyone about Cecily!"
"I won't if you kiss me." Just kiss me and put me out of my misery.
The only way to figure out how you really feel is to test things out, Gwen, always pragmatic, had said. And even if it doesn't solve your problem - and it probably won't, my lady - at least Arthur'll willingly keep out of your way after it.
At the time it'd seemed a fantastic idea - because she'd actually wanted to try it. If she were truly honest with herself, Sir Gaheris, intriguing as he was, was just an excuse.
To exorcise Arthur from your thoughts, or to indulge your own fantasties, you wicked girl?
To her horror, Morgana didn't know.
And then it happened, so quickly she didn't know what to make of it: Arthur's lips, stiff with distaste, moved closer, closer, closer still until they just brushed hers, feather light, and then planted firmly on her mouth. As it turned out, Arthur wasn't much of a reptile - his mouth was broad, and warm, and very red, and it covered her own completely. Morgana wondered at how impossibly full things felt. For a long time, he didn't move, but only expelled deep, hot breaths against Morgana's cheek, making her insides churn up and tighten in strange and colourful ways. When she opened her eyes, at last, after an aeon of being held immobile between Arthur and the tree behind her, Morgana nearly did become cross-eyed. Arthur's eyes, not blue, but an altogether very different shade caught somewhere between emerald green and sea grey, were wide open and focused intently on her face.
He pulled away, panting.
Morgana needed to breathe. She seemed to have forgotten how. Quite some time passed gasping air into constricted lungs passed, in which Morgana glanced anywhere but at Arthur.
When she finally opened her mouth to speak, Arthur put his hand against it, something very like regret on his awkwardly angled face, and stopped her.
"Morgana," he said, kissing her one more time, swiftly. "Shut up."
He stood in a single movement and shot away before Morgana had a chance to call out.
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Exeunt.