Chapter 7: The Changeling
"I brought you your ceremonial sword."
Without looking behind himself at Merlin, Arthur asked, "Is that for me to fall on?" He might have been joking, even.
"Hopefully not." There was some kind of mirth in Merlin's voice, as if the whole situation amused him on some level.
Arthur merely stood there and breathed, trying not to fall over or – or run away from Camelot entirely. Merlin would come with him if he did, though, so there was that to look forward to. At least he hadn't eaten much for breakfast, since it was likely to come back up if he had to wait there, thinking about what he was about to do for much longer.
Merlin took a soft breath behind him and asked, "What's wrong?"
"You wouldn't understand, Merlin. You have no idea what it's like to have a destiny." Arthur blinked a few times in total disbelief of the fact that this was his life, even though he'd always known, always. He took a breath in the hopes of feeling less lightheaded and added, "You can't escape." He said it like he had only just realized that, or it had only now been driven home. How embarrassing would it be if he passed out before the doors opened?
"Destinies…" Merlin sounded amused again, the idiot. Cheeky, but also maybe apologetic, as if he bloody well knew something that Arthur didn't. "They are troublesome things."
Arthur shook his head, irritated and sick of being made to look and feel a fool, tr apped in his own life, powerless… Merlin was standing there with that irritating not-quite-smile of his, as if Arthur were being quaint again, or showing his noble naivety or something. Arthur took the sword from his hands and flicked his cloak out of the way so that he could sheath it. God, his hands were shaking.
"You feel trapped." Merlin had his head down, but not like a servant's bow. It looked more like shared secrets. Like something personal. But Merlin couldn't know; he was nobody. So it couldn't be personal. He sounded like he knew, though. He sounded just as frustrated as Arthur. Just as reluctantly resigned. "Like your whole life has been planned out for you, and you've got no control over – " He cocked his head in a pointed nod to the way that just rankled like nothing else, and huffed, " – anything." The word came out bitten, like irony. "And sometimes," he continued, his eyes fixed on something in the middle distance, something only he could see. "…you don't even know if a destiny decided is – " He blew out a wistful little breath, as if getting this out, getting it off of his chest, were both a relief and an added frustration. " – really the best thing at all."
Arthur focused on his sword hilt again. He wasn't looking directly at Merlin, but he could see, in his periphery, Merlin pursing his lips and shaking his head after all of that. Arthur stopped fiddling with his sword, his head coming up in a jerky arc to stare. That was…too close. It was far too close for a servant. For a – a peasant. Because it was right there on Merlin's face: knowledge. Arthur could swear that Merlin knew – that he knew what this felt like. Himself. Personally. Arthur let his brow wrinkle, ashamed at feeling so desperate, all of a sudden, for confirmation that he wasn't alone – that Merlin really did know. That he shared this…terrible feeling of being trapped inside a gilded cage, a slave to a crown he never asked for, doomed to never be free to pursue his own happiness. Shackled the way commoners never were. He flicked his eyes down Merlin's deceptively bland exterior and then reset his feet to demand, "How come you're so knowledgeable?"
"Hmm?" Merlin still wore that look, like he knew something Arthur didn't. Like what he had just said was truer than it could have possibly been. Secrets never told. Some Merlin hidden beneath his clumsy, annoying manservant. "Oh, I read a book."
Arthur scoffed, his lip curling as he balked, because no. That wasn't something one reads in a book, and Merlin had that look on like what he'd said was some kind of inside joke that he expected to watch glide right over Arthur's head. Arthur slid his eyes, and then his face away, head cocked in contemplation because Merlin was making shifty eyes over that tiny smirk of his. Still amused. Still finding something about this mess funny. "What would this book tell you? Should I marry her?" He looked back up to see what Merlin's face was doing now, unwilling to give him any sort of privacy to hide this unlikely kinship.
Merlin straightened a bit and let his eyes unfocus off to one side. He seemed to think about it, to have some kind of sagely answer to give, but then he said, "It's not really my place to say, si –"
"I'm asking you," Arthur interrupted, forcing his temper down, his impatience… Forcing his voice to be soft and steady because he didn't think that he could afford to scare Merlin off of this, or annoy him until he clammed up. "It's your job to answer."
Merlin peered up at Arthur from a slightly downturned face, his voice rapid when he replied, "If you really want to know what I think?" Truly curious, that.
Arthur bobbed his head in affirmation.
Rather than reply right away, Merlin remained still for another heartbeat, his mouth slightly open as if ready o drop words all over the floor – as if he could barely restrain himself, but the look in his eye, peering askance at Arthur, spoke of something else. Not quite cunning, not quite coy. He was measuring something about Arthur before he decided whether or not to speak. Arthur tried to keep his face open and encouraging, because he wanted to know how Merlin would answer – how this Merlin, the strangely prescient one, would advise him.
Finally, Merlin ticked his head to the other side and quirked an eyebrow as if he were going all in on a gamble and couldn't entirely believe he was about to do so. "I think you're mad." He said it with conviction, swiveling to more fully face Arthur, and that familiar insolence invaded both his voice and his posture, though it sounded clipped at the edges, and his tone wasn't entirely controlled as he spoke. It wavered as if he wanted to shout, but couldn't. "I think you're all mad. People should marry for love." All of that sass and attitude that Arthur both loved and hated rushed to the forefront. It had the unlikely effect of cementing Arthur's attention though, because Merlin was insolent as a rule, not…this. Angry and borderline disrespectful, as if he were delivering a lecture to a child. As if he were disappointed that he had to say it at all. "Not convenience. And if Uther thinks an unhappy king makes for a stronger kingdom, then he's wrong, because you may be destined to rule Camelot, but you have a choice." He bobbed his eyebrows at Arthur as if to demand how Arthur could not know this. Something in Arthur's face must have met with his approval, because he nodded, just a tiny thing, and finished, "As to how you do it."
Arthur swung his already cracked quarter stave at a lone straw man propped up haphazardly in front of the armory door, and reveled in the swift snap of wood. Half of the staff spun through the air over his head to scatter the gaggle of squires collected like geese by the weapons racks as a plume of straw and stuffing exploded in his own face. It was ridiculously, highly satisfying. And he hated how the violence of it soothed him. Before he could give himself a chance to indulge again, Arthur dropped the now useless stick left to him and fought to breathe through his temper as he stalked past the armory and into the castle. How did they expect to survive, fighting like amateur bandits – the arrogance! And to imply that Arthur was the one with the problem – that he needed to unwind and get laid? What did that have to do with sword stance? Bleoberis was a damn toad; Arthur would pair him with Percival from now on in training. Let him get his backside handed to him by a common tradesman, and then see how much getting laid mattered in a battle situation.
Of course, it didn't help that the whole conversation had started with Bleoberis implying that his sister would be a perfect match for Arthur. Never mind that she was a second daughter from a second-rate bit of land with no prospects or wealth of her own, no lands, nothing to tempt a king –
Arthur stopped cold in the corridor and shut his eyes, his fists clenching hard enough to make his knuckles ache. It wasn't the girl's fault that she had no riches to bring to a marriage. It was also Uther's voice screaming through Arthur's head in that moment that a king must make an advantageous marriage, and that wasn't the girl's fault either. Arthur sucked in a snarling sort of deep breath and blew it too hard out through his teeth. Guinevere had brought nothing but her good nature to their marriage, and he wouldn't have had it any other way. It wasn't station that bothered him now, but the comment from one of the ladies observing them that Arthur had surely mourned long enough now to avoid any offense to his dead queen.
"You're allowed to be happy."
Arthur dropped the hand he had raised to dig at his brow and looked up. "How dare you – " Then he blinked, turned around, and found an empty corridor behind him too. Arthur quelled the feinting hollow in his chest and forced himself not to hold his breath as he turned in a full circle to confirm that no one else was there. For another dozen heartbeats, he held himself perfectly still as if he were hunting (without Merlin along to crash around scaring everything off for a mile). No footsteps, no breathing, no swish of a dress or pat-pat of bare feet made its way to his ears in the silence. Nothing. But he would swear that what he heard was a woman's voice, soft and aching. Barely there.
It was mad. Utterly beyond the pale, but Arthur felt a soft shiver pass over the surface of his skin, down one arm to drip off of his fingers, and then nothing. Just a draft, and a lone voice carried by chance through stone and distance. He realized with a start that he had stopped breathing, and gasped as his vision blurred from the lack of air. Knowing how pitiful he was for even considering it, Arthur bit his lip and then whispered, "Guinevere?"
A burst of laughter made Arthur jump, and then he cursed his own stupid heart. The laundry room was down at the other end of the corridor, and if he'd heard anything, it was just one of the washing maids' voices carrying clear through the stillness. Arthur sighed and let his eyes slip briefly shut before turning to find his way back to the main part of the castle, his temper gone like a whiff of flowers on the wind. He didn't have time for fancy any more than he did for anger. There were too many tasks to complete before the feast tonight honoring Merlin's appointment as Court Physician.
Arthur found Leon in the privy council chamber, tallying grain reports. There were times Arthur thanked god for Leon's ridiculous attention to mundane details, because whenever Arthur tried to do that, he came up with three different sets of numbers and a splitting headache. Leon, on the other hand, wore a satisfied smile and seemed to regard arithmetic as some kind of cathartic pastime, like a nice hot bath that never grew cold. A lot like the baths Merlin drew for him, actually. Because he really did have no sense of self preservation, the idiot. Ever-hot baths weren't even the most obvious of his tells.
Leon glanced up and his happy little smile grew to show teeth. "Sire! You seem calmer."
"Bleoberis is terrible with a sword. He's going to get himself killed – a bandit could take him out in two strokes."
Leon chuckled and offered a nod in response. "Shall I go over the grain reports with you?"
Arthur perched himself on the edge of the table and crossed his arms, absently peering about the rest of the mostly empty room. He chose to ignore the grain reports entirely and merely said, "So we're just not going to talk about it, then?"
Leon skipped a beat, and then straightened from his bend over the report-littered table. "Was there something you wished to clarify?"
"No," Arthur shook his head, brows raised in a kind of uncertainty. "I just…expected more opposition on the matter. I mean, I named him heir to the throne in front of two knights and a servant. It's kind of official now."
"Yes…?" Leon drew the single syllable out to a point just shy of disrespectful. "He is next in line to the throne, unless you reverse your disinheritance of Agravaine's sons."
Arthur replied with an absent nod and frowned down past his own arms crossed over his chest like a breastplate. "He's right, though. They'll never accept it," he said, meaning the council in particular, but also the noble classes in general. "Naming commoners to the knighthood is one thing. Elevating a blacksmith's daughter to the queenship, fine. But naming my manservant heir to the throne?"
"He's not just your manservant, though," Leon pointed out reasonably. "He is heir. He's a member of the royal family through the marriage alliances of his mother's family, and through Aurelius' indiscretions with a princess of the royal house of Dyfedd. There is precedence and legal justification to naming him heir."
"Yes," Arthur allowed, but it tasted sour in his mouth.
Leon hesitated, then offered, "Would you feel better if I disagreed with you?"
Arthur narrowed his eyes at Leon and let his nostrils flair. "It annoys me sometimes that you can be so eminently reasonable."
Leon evidently took that as a compliment because his eyes crinkled and his facial hair moved around to obscure the upturn of his mouth. He sobered quickly, though. "It will cause unrest when it gets out." When, not if. "Myrddin isn't forgotten in Camelot. He's not spoken of, but he's not been erased either. Everyone will know he was magic, and that he was executed for it. They'll know that his claim to the throne could have challenged Uther's. That could work both for and against you, really; those sympathetic to magic will see Merlin as some kind of a savior – the vindication of his murdered great uncle, and a chance for a Camelot that they believe should have come to pass. Those who aren't sympathetic, who agreed with your father, will see him as a threat to Camelot, and to you."
That was at least more honest than Leon's typical supportive optimism. Arthur sighed. "I've put him in an untenable position, haven't I."
Leon's brows bobbed up once, but that was all he would grant. "Would you rather continue denying him his heritage altogether?"
"I'd rather see him happy with his life," Arthur said without thinking. "And he's not, right now."
Leon blinked and leaned back for a moment, straightening and turning away from his pile of dull reports. "Not everyone needs prestige for that."
Arthur glanced at him, long enough to see the confusion in his stance, and then pushed himself off of the table to pace slowly toward the other end of the room. "It's not material yet, anyway. Merlin can't confirm it; his mother never told him the names of his forebears. He doesn't know for certain that his lineage is what we think it is."
"Then we shall have to make certain." Leon approached him but stayed at a respectable distance from his king. "If you tell me where to find the Lady Hunith, I will go and escort her back to Camelot. Then we can have the truth from the source."
Arthur stared morosely at a wall tapestry – dragons wheeling in the sky above the highest turrets of Camelot. "She may have had good sense in leaving all of this behind," Arthur pointed out. "In raising Merlin to be his own free man."
"But she hasn't," Leon countered gently. "She's lied to him, hidden his roots from him, and then she sent him here, where he could have been killed."
"I cannot believe it to be malicious," Arthur replied, shaking his head. "She loves her son – I've seen them together."
"I don't doubt that," Leon said. "But the fact remains: she sent him to Camelot, knowing the danger. We have to ask why a mother would do that to her magical child."
Arthur's eyes roved unseeing over the tapestry until it caught on the figure of a man with his hands held up toward the dragon. He hadn't thought too deeply about the manner in which his father had betrayed Merlin's – of the cruelty inherent in it. To extend the hand of peace to a man so good, so guileless that he believed it and accepted. And then to use that man – force him to unwittingly betray his own kin – and afterwards, pursue him through enemy kingdoms like a madman, drive him from those he loved, deny him his son, and leave him to rot alone in a dank, musty cave at the edge of the wilds. And for what? "Because Camelot is ruthless," Arthur replied, calm and empty at the thought. "Because my father would have killed him, if need be. And Merlin's power frightened her." Arthur skewed his gaze over to Leon. "The way it frightens Merlin himself."
Leon studied Arthur for a moment too long, impolite simply in its duration, and then asked, "And does it frighten you, sire?"
Arthur swallowed, the bob of his throat a hard click against his trachea, and whispered, "Yes. His power frightens me. But I'm not afraid of him."
"And that," Leon acknowledged, so like the teacher of battle drills he had once been for a much younger, unformed Arthur, "is an important distinction, sire."
Arthur looked back for a moment, and then pressed his lips into a dissatisfied line. "If you leave at first light and ride steady, you can reach Ealdor by nightfall tomorrow. It's just beyond the ridge of Essetir, in the vale on the other side of the river. You can see it clearly from our own borders."
Leon smiled as if Arthur had passed some sort of test of character. "Then I shall ride at first light, sire."
As Leon started to turn away, Arthur snapped out a hand to grasp him by the bicep. "I won't have her forced to come here."
Leon turned back, attentive. "Of course not, sire. She is, after all, a queen."
Suspected, Arthur thought. But all he said was, "Yes, assuming that her mother no longer lives, which is likely. But she gave that up, and has dwelt in poverty for most of her life. I have to respect that she may have good reasons for that. She may even be happy as she is. You will tell her beforehand what we want her for, and give her the option to refuse."
Leon gave a small bow in concession. "I will not interfere with the queen's will."
Arthur released him and stepped back. "I hardly need stress the confidential nature of this errand."
"I understand what is at stake, sire."
"Good." Arthur glanced away, and then said, "I plan to have a small dinner in the dining hall tonight, in honor of Merlin's appointment. He would be glad to see you there."
At this, Leon finally grinned. "I wouldn't miss it." Then he bowed, gathered his records, and left with no further delay to prepare for his upcoming journey.
"Mordred saved my life," Arthur pointed out. "What greater debt could there be?" He descended into a gully and stepped over several branches.
"The debt to your people," Merlin replied, walking too close behind him. "To your destiny."
"You almost sound as if you care." Arthur peered around on instinct, looking for threats or anything out of place. Merlin's attitude about all of this troubled him; it wasn't like his servant to be so bitter. So cold. Just getting him to agree to this excursion back out to the cave of the Disir had been a challenge in patience.
"I do care."
Could have fooled him. In truth, Arthur was under no illusion that he could force anything from Merlin. And it made him wonder why on earth Merlin had come at all when he seemed so against it.
Merlin dogged his footsteps, just a hair away from treading on Arthur's ankles. "About who you are, Arthur." He sounded winded from their hike through rough forest. Or maybe it was something less benign. "Who you are destined to become."
"If it's fated, it doesn't matter what I do, does it?" Arthur snapped, annoyed now. He was tired of hearing this time and again – this destiny rubbish from his idiot secret sorcerer. "It'll still happen."
"There is a difference between fate and destiny."
Rounding on Merlin, he managed to speak over the tail end of Merlin's assertion. "You think too much, Merlin." He watched the insubordinance rise to twitch in Merlin's face like a shadow of contempt, and then fade again. When had he grown so bitter? He used to speak of Arthur and destiny as if it were glowing right in front of him. His faith used to be more than just…habit. Like a tired old chore. As if his belief in Arthur were a necessary inconvenience. As if he had no choice but to have faith in his king, and resented that fact more often than not.
It was probably entirely unnecessary for Arthur to seek out Sir Geoffrey as soon as he parted from Leon, but it ate at him, and while he relished the thought of Geoffrey finding out that Arthur knew in some other more shocking manner – maybe an announcement at court, or just some vague, offhand comment and a pointedly dark look over a state dinner – Arthur was tired of the subterfuge and intrigue of court. It was exhaustion that drove him to just get this over with now, and let them both know where they stood with the other. Geoffrey was the official court historian and records keeper; Arthur needed them aligned, and he needed the secrecy of his father's reign to end once and for all.
Sir Geoffrey was not in his library as usual. Arthur eventually found him in the vaults taking inventory of those objects and treasures which remained locked away for various reasons, either for their value, their significance to the crown, or their magical properties. Of course, this was also within the purview of Geoffrey's role, so it was not unusual for him to verify the contents at regular intervals. Arthur watched him counting things for a while, ticking off various items here and there in a ledger, oblivious to the intent gaze of his king behind him. Eventually, Arthur grew bored with this and pulled the vault door closed to allow them privacy for the conversation that Arthur needed to have.
Sir Geoffrey jumped at the soft boom of the large wooden door as it thumped and echoed shut. "Sire!"
Arthur nodded and ambled forward, loose as if he were baiting an opponent on the field. He kept his gaze directed to the left, at the various glittery objects kept behind bars down here like prisoners of a mad king's greed. "I heard an interesting bit of information today."
Geoffrey went still, and Arthur could see clearly for once that he used to be a knight. "Is it something I can assist you with, sire?"
"I assume that you are familiar with the old court at Dyfedd."
It was subtle, but there: the hesitation. "Yes, sire. As I'm sure your highness is aware, the last king of Dyfedd was defeated by your father in the battles waged by the sons and clansmen of Hengist the Saxon. He did not survive, but many of the royal court were given clemency to live out their lives in the court of Camelot."
Arthur nodded. "Is that, then, how my cousin, the so-called mad prophet, came to be here at the start of my father's reign? With his mother the princess Adhan, and the rest of his family?"
Geoffrey glanced around and took a step back until he could lean for support against an old cedar chest. "Adhan was queen by then. She was permitted to retain her rank, though her lands and rule passed to Camelot."
"I see that it is not ignorance which kept this information from me." Arthur clenched his hands and fought to remain calm. "Perhaps then, Sir Geoffrey, you would like to explain why I had to learn from two of my knights like some sordid tavern rumor that I have kept as my manservant, for over ten years – " Arthur bit his tongue and lowered his voice again; he didn't want to attract the attention of any guards to eavesdrop on this conversation. More modulated, Arthur continued, " – a boy who is not only of noble blood, but royal?"
"Your father would have killed him."
Arthur paused a moment, and then had to ask, "And am I so like him that you would think the same of me?"
Geoffrey seemed bent in that moment, and older than his years alone might indicate. "Forgive me, sire. But your change of heart has been quite recent. You have killed many who may not have deserved it."
Arthur let his head slide to one side, and his gaze hovered somewhere low toward the floor. Finally, he simply said, "Yes."
"The boy deserved a chance at a normal life. To see him killed for nothing more than paranoia over the magic that flowed in that family…if he had none of it himself, as I had always thought…it would have been unjust."
"Then it's true. His heritage." Arthur shook his head, but not to negate any words spoken here. "You know this for a fact? You would swear to it?"
Geoffrey took a breath long enough to expand his ribcage, but for all of the air he took in, it still sounded shallow in his body. "The Lady Gwendydd is his grandmother. I knew her quite well, and Bleise was a brother in arms, for all that he was not a knight. I will admit, I pretended ignorance to protect their grandchild. He knew nothing of where he came from, and it seemed little harm to allow him his life. But yes; the boy…" He shook his head then and corrected, "Not a boy anymore. Merlin. He is directly descended of Dyfedd, and the last born of its blood. He is its heir."
The air seemed stale and close, unmoving through the corridors amongst the detritus of years of war spoils in the vaults. Arthur felt lighter for a moment – vindicated, though it seemed a terrible secret on its surface. "You have lied to me," he felt compelled to point out. "To my face, directly and with intent to deceive."
To his credit, Geoffrey made no effort to lessen the offense with excuses. "Yes, sire. I have."
Arthur merely nodded. He could make an issue of it, and as king he probably should, but the prospect alone exhausted him. He had grown sadly accustomed to being lied to; what was once more in the grand scheme of things? And he agreed on one point at least; Merlin did deserve a chance to live his life. His birth, his blood, was no fault of his. And Arthur himself would have been a poorer man without the challenge that Merlin laid at his feet every day to be better. To be that shining king of a golden age that he used to talk about.
Finally, Arthur turned back to regard Geoffrey's bowed back, and the top of his lowered head. "Thank you, Sir Geoffrey. For both the lies and the truth."
Sir Geoffrey looked up at that, his face oddly devoid of expression.
"I'll leave you to carry on with your work." Arthur took a breath and turned away, but not quickly enough to miss the surprise and relief on Geoffrey's face, or the way it seemed to break whatever thin veneer of composure he had managed to affect. When Arthur reached the door, he glanced back simply as a side effect of turning to slip through the heavy door. Geoffrey had sagged awkwardly on the cedar chest, his face in one hand, shoulders heaving in silence as he breathed. There was no need for Arthur to threaten him, should he ever lie or mislead again.
Arthur cast a frantic look around the ring of knights, of common people – everyone – materializing from the trees around the sword in the stone, then whirled on Merlin. He tried for incensed but what came out in his voice unfortunately tended more toward panic. "What the hell are you playing at?"
"I'm proving that you're their leader and their king."
He wanted so badly to just smack that smug look right off of Merlin's face, the bloody sorcerer. "That sword is stuck fast in solid stone." Did Merlin take him for a fool? Was this a trick? Really? After all of this time, he was going to betray Arthur now? Wasn't he already all but ruined?
Merlin just looked at him, his expression full of…full of faith and love for his king. Surety. "And you're going to pull it out."
"Merlin, it's impossible." This had to be a trick. What better way to humiliate him? Arthur had just lamented the night before how he misjudged everyone, how he all but allowed them all to deceive him, and here was a sorcerer, a liar of a man Arthur thought was on his side, against all odds, setting him up for failure.
"Arthur, you're the true king of Camelot."
Oh god, he wasn't kidding. Merlin was…serious. This was genuine – he actually expected Arthur to do it, and succeed. It was terrifying, the complete lack of doubt on his face. Arthur glanced back at the stone, then past it to the crowd of people arrayed in sections of concentric rings all around them. He rounded on Merlin again because that was easier than looking at a hundred people all wearing the same kind of faith that Merlin had for him. "Do you want me to look like a fool?"
"No, I'm going to make you see that Tristan's wrong; you aren't just anyone. You are special. You and you alone can draw out that sword."
He meant that. Every word. Merlin was a shit liar; Arthur knew when he was doing it. And right now, he wasn't. He was being weird and intense and just…spouting off rubbish like any sorcerer Arthur had ever met, but he was so earnest about it. Arthur looked at the sword stuck into the stone. It was a beautiful sword. It was. But seriously, how could Merlin's ridiculous "legend" be true? Arthur would have heard of it. Or his father would have found and destroyed the thing, magical as it was. He shouldn't do this. Magic…he saw what it did to Morgana. How it warped and ruined her. But Merlin was magic too, and Merlin… Arthur had misjudged so much in his life, but Merlin never wavered. He never changed, he never…corrupted. Magic was dangerous. It had to be. But Merlin was not. Were there other magics out there like him? Benign ones? Something…pure in the midst of all of the rot?
Arthur glanced around at the trees, aware that he was looking for an excuse now not to do it – not to touch the magic sword. His father would be appalled. Arthur himself couldn't believe that he was going to do this. But Merlin had a way about him. He wasn't like other magic. Arthur wished he knew why a sorcerer would ever stand beside him. He wished he could accuse Merlin of spying for Morgana, of manipulating and betraying him. But he couldn't. Nothing Merlin did spoke of subterfuge. He was just loyal. Stupid-loyal, the way he had always been.
The old worn sword hilt caught for a moment in Arthur's belt as he drew it out and awkwardly thrust it into the ground near Merlin's feet. He looked at Merlin, and he wanted to say something about the secret between them, about the magic. But it wasn't the time. "You better be right about this."
Merlin merely looked pleased, his mouth curving in a wry, knowing line. Arthur put his back to his utterly mad sorcerer and approached the stone on hesitant feet. It felt like watching magic at his father's deathbed, too close. Too immediate. Too easy to touch. He contemplated whether this temptation were part of the corruption of magic, or part of the wonder. It seemed innocent enough, that sword. Rich and shining, gilt with runes and gold braid. Arthur pursed his lips and flickered his gaze over the still crowd, waiting as if holding their breath. It made him uncomfortable, how no one else seemed to see the peril of what was in front of him.
Arthur licked his lips and swung both hands to the hilt, the leather of his gloves creaking as he adjusted his grip and set his feet, still not sure that he should be doing this – touching it, a magical relic. It didn't feel magical, though. It felt like any other sword, hilt cool from the earlier morning dew. And it only shone in the sunlight. He clenched his jaw with a deep breath and pulled, but the sword merely shook from the strain of Arthur's muscles. It wouldn't budge.
"You have to believe, Arthur."
Arthur started at the creak of his chamber door hinges and accidentally dislodged George's fingers from plucking at his stubborn jacket buttons. "Merlin. I should make some comment about knocking, but it gets tired after ten years."
Merlin tipped his chin and gave Arthur a look from the corner of his eyes as if to say that he should know better by now. "Why? Are you doing things in here that you shouldn't?"
Against his will, Arthur barked out a laugh. "Shut up, Merlin. George, go on about your business. Merlin can help me with the rest of this."
George bowed and gathered up a bundle of bedding before also bowing to Merlin and making a silent exit. Merlin paused halfway across the room as soon as George bent in the middle at him. Once the door closed over the other servant, he tilted his head and then swiveled to peer suspiciously at Arthur. "What did you do?"
Arthur made his eyes wider, like an innocent puppy, he hoped. "I have no idea what you're talking about. Help me off with this." He gave his collar a pointed tug. "It's too tight."
"Yes, well if you would – "
"If you value your continued existence, you will think very carefully about what you say next."
Merlin merely smirked at the buttons as he undid them. "Oh, I wouldn't dream of mentioning your circumference again, sire."
Arthur's eyes narrowed of their own accord, but since the damn fabric finally parted ways with his neck, he let it go. "You know, it just occurred to me. All these years I've been harping on you about proper address and titles, and as it turns out, you've been completely within your rights to call me by name this whole time."
Merlin's hands slowed as he drew the jacket from Arthur's arms, but he recovered a moment later, fingers picking imaginary lint from the sleeves as he turned to put it back in the wardrobe. He made some kind of sound that Arthur assumed was supposed to be a laugh, but it sounded strained. "I thought you didn't like this jacket."
"I don't," Arthur confirmed, frowning at Merlin's back and the way it moved under his clothes as he arranged the offensive garment back onto a hanger. "George hasn't learned my preferences yet."
"Ah." Merlin paused to regard the jacket, bit the inside of his cheek, and then slotted it into place on the rod with the rest of Arthur's formal jackets. "I'll, um. Fill him in, then." When he came back, he was holding a fresh tunic rather than a properly fitted jacket. "Take that one off, then."
"This one's already clean," Arthur told him.
"Yeah, but it's the itchy one. Come on." Merlin gestured at him with the new tunic. "Off."
Arthur blinked down at himself before he went ahead and tugged the laces loose so that he could slip it off over his head. "Right." He handed it over, and probably studied Merlin a bit too intently as he tossed it aside and held the new tunic up for Arthur to slip his arms through. After Arthur ducked his head through the collar, he stopped Merlin from doing up the laces and instead, pressed his open palm to Merlin's chest, over his sternum. Merlin stilled like the aftermath of a knee jerk reflex and seemed to breathe deliberately while Arthur felt around the edges of the royal crest concealed underneath the thick brocade of his robe. He gave Merlin an apologetic smile after and shifted his focus. "This was Gaius's robe, wasn't it?"
Merlin cleared his throat and stepped back to compulsively smooth the brushed olive-hued wool down his ribcage. "George took a few of his council robes to alter so they fit me. The nicer ones, anyway. He didn't wear this one much." His fingers gentled and traced some of the jacquard patterned stitching along the centerline of his chest.
"Looks good on you. Better than your drab brown leather jacket thing." Arthur stepped around him and tugged at the looser fabric near Merlin's hips to reveal the long cuts splitting the skirt of the surcoat into four cardinal sections. "Ah, and you can ride in it. That's good." He realized what he was doing only because Merlin stopped breathing entirely that time and twisted his head to look past his shoulder at Arthur. "Um." Arthur removed his hand and blinked awkwardly down at his own fingers while he collected himself. "Sorry."
Merlin swallowed and also faced away for a moment before turning to do up Arthur's tunic laces. It seemed like he wanted to suck at his lower lip or bite the inside of it, but didn't want to give himself away by doing it.
Just to try and dispel the sudden tension bleeding out between them like a severed artery, Arthur remarked, "George really is frightfully efficient."
Merlin started to say something but it fizzled out in his throat somewhere. He rubbed at his nose with the almost-too-long cuff of his sleeve, and then spun away to find a suitable jacket, his eyes lowered where Arthur couldn't see to read the expression in them.
Arthur sucked a breath deep into his chest, puffed out his cheeks, and then sighed. "Look, I know that this isn't exactly a festive occasion. You wouldn't be court physician if Gaius weren't…" He stopped himself defining that because he really didn't know if it would be insensitive or not.
"Dead?" Merlin approached him with a more well-worn jacket, wearing a false veneer of nonchalance. "Here." He held the jacket up and open for Arthur.
Arthur studied the garment for longer than it deserved, and then reached up to cover Merlin's fingers on the jacket's empty shoulders. He pushed them toward the floor so that he could see the shadows in Merlin's downturned face. "He would be proud of you."
Merlin's jaw went hard for a moment, and then he nodded, but he didn't look up. "I know."
"And, um." Arthur prevaricated, breathing harder than the situation justified. "Guinevere too. She would have…." Arthur squeezed his eyes shut for a moment to force back the upwell that threatened to stop him finishing. After swallowing something that felt like wads of carded wool in his throat, and then clearing it, Arthur continued, "She would have been happy for you. Sad as well, about Gaius, but she always wanted…good things…for you. She would have been pr – "
"Don't."
" – oud of you." Arthur ticked, confused. "Don't?" He dropped his gaze to his now empty hands, fingers curling where Merlin had wrenched his own back out of Arthur's grasp. The jacket appeared in front of his face again, held open, and Arthur wondered if it were possible for someone to hold a jacket aggressively. Rather than risk forcing a confrontation, Arthur elected to speak to the jacket instead of to Merlin directly. "Look, I know I've been…angry, lately. When anyone mentions her."
"Please don't." Merlin all but shoved the jacket at Arthur's chest, and then tried to get behind him as if he could just slip it onto Arthur without him realizing.
Arthur allowed it and shrugged until the jacket sat comfortably across his shoulders. Merlin came around front of him again, and as he plucked the fiddly buttons through their proper holes, Arthur murmured, "Thanks."
"Oh," Merlin drawled, the levity thin and forced. "You're taking this alleged nobility thing seriously if you're thanking me now."
As he turned away, Arthur scoffed under his breath. "It's not only that. I should have been saying it before now."
"Manners were never your strong point." Merlin rummaged about the shelf in the wardrobe and pulled down a long surcoat-like vest. It was one of Arthur's older coats – one that his father had given him – supple dark brown leather that reached from shoulders to ankles. Merlin turned around, still inspecting the vest for damage, and said, "So I'm sure you'll understand if I find it a bit disingenuous." He slowed his steps and then leaned onto his back foot with a long breath. "I'm sorry. That wasn't – "
Arthur came forward to meet him, and shook his head when Merlin tried to hold out the vest. When Merlin didn't make any attempt to finish his broken sentence, Arthur inhaled carefully. "I haven't been a very good friend. To you."
Merlin bit his lip and swallowed at the leather bundled in his hands. "We'll be late to the dining hall." He shook out the vest and held it open for Arthur. "Sire?"
Arthur stepped closer and ignored the vest, causing Merlin to fold his arms in to hold the vest to his torso. "Guinevere used to lecture me for being insensitive." He let the smile surface for a moment, a memory painted in sepia tones in his mind of a small cottage and a warm fire, and the heat of Guinevere's frustration with him as she yelled at him for taking her bed without even thinking of her circumstances. When he blinked away the feeling of her, Arthur caught Merlin forcing the lines of his own face smooth again, but not from a happy memory. He looked pained at the mention of her name again. "You said that you hear her voice," Arthur ventured, and Merlin flinched back again. "What does she say?"
"It's not important." Merlin flapped the leather vest to hang smooth again and shoved it at Arthur as if he could press it through his skin and onto him that way. "Come on – we'll be late."
"We've plenty of time," Arthur countered, his brows drawing into a furrow. It occurred to him that however much he himself prickled and shouted at the mention of his deceased wife's name, Merlin hardly mentioned her either. "Why can't you talk about her?"
"I've tried – you don't want to hear it. Put your arms up." He tried to angle around behind Arthur again.
"No, you haven't." Arthur rotated to keep them facing each other, even if Merlin wouldn't exactly look at the man right in front of him. "You cut it off too, every time someone does more than just mention her in passing." They danced around in a circle for a moment before Merlin gave up and scrubbed his sleeve across his forehead, the vest still dangling from his fists. Arthur shook his head, worried and confused. "What does she say to you?"
Merlin barred his teeth from under the forearm blocking his face, then sniffed in a huge breath as if to fortify himself. He held the vest up again, face forcibly blank. "Nothing. Here – hold out your arms."
"She doesn't…" Arthur felt his lip curl up at the very notion, but said it anyway. "She doesn't blame you, does she?" Not that he believed Guinevere would wander around the castle as a shade talking to people, whispering poison at them, but grief could do funny things to people. "Because she wouldn't," Arthur told him more forcefully, aware like a trickle of spring water from a rockface that he was thinking of the other Myrddin in that moment – the one who everyone seemed to know for his madness. "She would never blame you for what happened." For visions that may or may not have been true.
"Would you please just stop and put this on." Merlin shoved at his shoulder in an effort to turn him around.
Aghast, Arthur demanded, "Is that what you hear her say?"
"No, just… We have to go to dinner." Merlin wasn't breathing exactly right, but any number of emotions could have caused that, and his face wasn't doing anything especially telling. His hands were trembling, though. Not much – not enough to be alarming – but enough to notice. Kind of like muscle fatigue, fine and shivery.
"No? Then what?" Arthur pushed his hands aside again, the vest dragging on the floor for a moment as a result.
"Stop." Merlin wrenched himself out of Arthur's grasp and went to force the vest up one of Arthur's arms. "It's not important. Just put this on so we can go."
"It is important." Arthur extracted himself calmly and left Merlin with the vest again. He could tell that the calm, the steadiness was fracturing, and it may have been cruel of him, but he wanted to break it to see what lay beneath. Merlin twisted around to go at Arthur with the vest again, and as absurd as it was, Arthur danced back as if he were on a battlefield parrying blows from a leather garment. He tried not to let his concern or his puzzlement show, but he wasn't sure it worked, and when their gazes finally strafed each other, there was something wild in Merlin's. Without thinking, Arthur reached a hand out to touch it, it looked so foreign there. "Merlin – "
"Don't – " Merlin flinched back to avoid Arthur touching his face.
"Just stop," Arthur whispered, pleading. He feathered his hands at Merlin's collarbones instead, and then firmed them up to hold him still. "Stop."
It was a relief when Merlin actually did stop, subsiding between Arthur's hands with the vest clenched to his diaphragm, the bottom a pool of leather covering his feet like a blanket. Merlin swallowed and looked down at it, eyes gliding shut while Arthur held him by the shoulders as if holding him down to the ground so that he didn't float away.
There was something captivating about another man's pain – how it twisted his insides and wrung him silent and limp like a wet bath sheet. As soon as Merlin seemed calm again, Arthur let him go and stepped back, hands held out and open in a gesture of surrender. It occurred to him, as Merlin pulled at the leather vest's seams as a focus to stay where Arthur put him, that maybe Merlin carried more guilt than anyone realized. He had no one to absolve him, after all; how could he when nearly everything of consequence that he did had to remain secret? The only perspective he had on any of his actions was his own, and Merlin wasn't the kind of man who forgave himself easily. Arthur knew that – he had seen enough of it to know that this responsibility, this guilt, defined a large part of who Merlin was, just as it defined Arthur as king. Merlin didn't let it go, though. Maybe he didn't know how, but one thing Arthur could say for certain was that if he didn't, it would eat him alive one day.
"She wouldn't blame you for her death." Arthur backed up another step because he wasn't sure that Merlin could understand or accept that, and Arthur had seen enough of his temper breaking lately that he thought it prudent to offer space for it this time. "You did everything you could to save her."
Merlin twitched his head to one side and Arthur watched the leather crease in his fists. "If that were true, she would be here." He seemed to be trying to swallow again and failing, like bile that wouldn't go back down. He held up the vest one more time, a puppet dangling in a box repeating the same trick again and again and again with painted-on eyes that never actually focused on the things they faced. "If you'll just put this on, sire?"
Arthur shook his head in disbelief and finally just allowed Merlin to put it onto him, since he seemed so fixated on the act. Once they were facing each other again, Arthur stared at the furrowed eyebrows in front of him while Merlin laced up the front of the vest. "You really believe that – you have that much ego?"
"It's not ego." Merlin yanked too hard at the laces, and Arthur concealed the wince via manly tongue biting. "I'm the most powerful sorcerer to walk this land."
Arthur scoffed. "And that's not ego? I'm not sure I'm the prat here anymore."
Merlin squinted and blinked, his fingers pausing on a tangle of leather laces, but he shook his head a moment later as if Arthur were the one being stupid. "I can control the balance of life and death. If I had wanted Gwen alive, then she would be." He fiddled the laces back into order and tightened everything in a line down the center of Arthur's chest, from the notch of his throat to that delicate space between belly button and groin.
"Merlin, that's…" Arthur shook his head, aware that he was baring his front teeth under a wrinkled lip in that manner that made him look like a simpleton, and yet not really caring for once. He couldn't find a word suitably strong enough to convey how utterly wrong the whole notion was. "Do you even remember what happened there?"
Merlin tied off the laces and flared his nostrils as he headed away toward Arthur's desk to retrieve the crown. He ducked his head a bit and scrubbed his face into the crook of his arm, an uneasy and self-conscious motion. "No. It doesn't matter."
Arthur let his eyes go wide and his face slack. "Doesn't matter? You're judging conduct you don't even remember."
Merlin made a show of concentrating on the crown, as if their conversation weren't worth his full attention. As if it didn't mean anything to him, which was a huge tell as far as Arthur was concerned. Merlin cared about everyone and everything. "It's obvious. I don't need the memory of it to know what happened." Merlin frowned and sniffed at the crown, then picked up a cloth to buff at bits of filigree before bringing it over to Arthur.
Arthur waited for the weight of the crown to fall over his brow, then immediately removed it and tossed it behind him onto his bed. Merlin blankly watched it bounce across the mattress and tip over against a pillow, nodded, and then just wandered away to sink down on the bench at the tree table. Arthur remained where he was for a moment, just watching the sag of Merlin's shoulders and the way he drew his elbows in as if to protect his own ribcage, one hand picking in compulsive bursts at his forehead and hairline, his head hanging lower than the nobs of his upper spine where it merged to form his neck. Eventually, Arthur sighed and glanced back at the discarded crown before going over to perch next to Merlin on the bench. He rested his forearms on his knees and clasped his hands between them, then turned his head to look at Merlin, at the curve of an ear peaking out from beneath dark hair. At the arc of a tree branch covered in a corner of bedsheet stretched hanging over his head like a ghost. Arthur waited for Merlin to say something first even though he knew that wouldn't happen, and then he sighed. "You did everything you could to save her. I saw it, Merlin."
"Then why isn't she here?" Just a breath, that. Merlin may not even have said it, except that the syllables lingered between them.
Arthur shook his head and sucked his lips in against his teeth. "You didn't see her body after." He had thought he could spare Merlin from the memory of that day, but keeping his peace made it worse. Secrets festered, after all. Hadn't Arthur learned that time and again? Silence was a disease, not a mercy. "It wasn't just the enchantment. When Morgana threw her away from the water, it…broke her. She hit the ground hard, and it…she just…" He tried to bring words to it, to the unnatural protrusion of vertebrae when he went to move her cooling body. To the…the bend of her. "And it was killing you. You were pulling it out of her, and… You remember the welts." He reached out on reflex to trace the back of Merlin's hand where a ropey red wheal had wrapped over the skin for a month afterwards, but Merlin shrank from him, so he let it be. "The black things. You remember what you said? They were trying to get inside."
"That was a dream," Merlin croaked. He traced the phantom line of the same welt Arthur had been reaching to touch.
"It was a memory," Arthur corrected. "You were pulling them out and they screamed like banshees."
"Mandrake." Merlin turned puffy, pale eyes onto Arthur's face. "You heard them?"
Arthur nodded.
"Only magic folk are supposed to be able to hear them."
Arthur shrugged. "There was magic everywhere that day. Maybe that was enough." He looked away again when Merlin did. "I had to make a choice, Merlin. She was dying, and you were… You wouldn't stop. So I pulled you away." Arthur rocked in place and shook his head, swallowing and breathing to force back the smell and the sound, and the sight of it. Merlin fought him on it, of course. All the way into the water, he screamed at Arthur to let him go, to let him finish, and Arthur wouldn't. And behind them on the rocks, when he looked, Guinevere was crying, and smiling in what looked like gratitude, and coughing out blood and black sludge, and Arthur turned his back on her so that he didn't lose his hold on Merlin as he fought Arthur like a spitting angry cat to get loose. "If either of us bears any of the blame for her death at the end, then it's me. I made the choice."
Merlin shook his head, hair ruffling down to obscure his features as he ducked his face into his arm, away from Arthur. "I could've saved her."
"God help me, Merlin. I adored Guinevere. I loved her with all my heart, but she didn't want you to die for her. I know that. And there was no guarantee. You might have ripped the enchantment out, you might have healed whatever Morgana did to her soul, but her body was broken, and even you've said you're rubbish at healing magic. She was going to die either way. It would have been a waste for you to follow her just for that."
"I can command life and death; it just needs to stay in balance."
Arthur felt his eyes grow hot and sucked moisture into his mouth to dispel the cotton there. "I'll say it again, Merlin: however willing you are, she would not have wanted you to die for her."
"I didn't have to!" Merlin shot up off of the bench and stalked in a tight circle as if looking for something to hit. "Morgana did this – she should have put it right!"
Morgana. Arthur's next breath came shallow and quick despite his best efforts to regulate it. Morgana, laughing. Morgana bleeding out and chanting, like a joke, Emrys…Emrys…Emrys…fingering the tip of the sword protruding from between two ribs, the sword that Merlin had just put there. "Like the questing beast," Arthur realized. The sorceress paying for the life she tried, unnaturally, to take.
Merlin washed up against the bare middle of the room and wobbled there. "Like the questing beast," he agreed. His legs bent a bit before he steadied himself and put his back to Arthur, lost in the stone corner he faced.
Arthur let the sick heat spill over his cheeks and then immediately scrubbed at the slick wetness there, angry and betrayed and… It was his own fault, wasn't it? He remembered coming back out of the water, Merlin splashing and frantic in front of him as he gained the shore first and rushed immediately to Morgana's body, still and lifeless now with Arthur's sword still in her. Water streaming from his clothes, his hair as he screamed at Morgana's face and then broke down into horrible, wrenching sobs while Arthur just stood there, numb. Merlin wailing over Morgana's dead body not because he had to kill her, not because he regretted it the way Arthur had thought at the time, but because his chance to save Guinevere died with Morgana. Arthur should have been terrified and repulsed by the cold calculation of such a thing, playing lives like cards, but looking at Merlin waver on the other side of the room – remembering the sound of him howling at Guinevere's wrapped body the next morning as he realized for a second time that he failed… It wasn't a cold thing that drove Merlin. It may have been a cold thing to do, but the motive for it was not so simple. Fairness…a balance…giving back what you take and paying for your trespasses… It was the oldest justice there was. Like the old religion, it was brutal sometimes, but it wasn't necessarily undeserved. It wasn't unfair.
"I stole the Horn of Cathbhadh."
Arthur looked up, his breathing unsteady, and made a confused sound.
"After we got back, after…"
And then Arthur realized what he was getting at. "After the burial. When we fought, and you disappeared for three days."
Merlin nodded, but all Arthur could see of him was the line of his back in Gaius's warm, re-stitched and altered robes, with a fluff of dark hair in the dim light of the room. "I went to Nemeton. I wanted…" His voice guttered out like a candle in a sudden draft. "I needed to apologize. For letting her die. She deserved to know."
Arthur shook his head and tried to will Merlin to turn around, because the way he was talking implied it went poorly, and Arthur couldn't imagine – he couldn't fathom that Guinevere was the one to put all of this self-loathing into Merlin's head. The Guinevere he knew would have forgiven Merlin before he even managed to get his mouth open. And he was jealous, too, that Merlin had a chance to make amends whereas Arthur didn't think he could have faced her himself, so soon after. "What did she say?"
Merlin's ribcage expanded and Arthur watched him refuse to look back, away from the stones in front of him. "She didn't." He tipped his head up to gaze at the ceiling, and a bit of wan light from the window caught and reflected the sheen on one cheek like frost. "She wasn't there."
Arthur blinked. "Then… Where is she?"
"The Teine Diaga is dark magic," Merlin replied tonelessly. "It consumes the soul to make room for the will of another."
"Merlin, where is she?"
"Nowhere." Merlin swayed and let the momentum carry him over to the bed, where he picked up Arthur's crown and absently smoothed away imagined smudges. "The abyss." He paced slowly back to where Arthur now stood, unaware of having moved until he found himself at eye level with Merlin. "It's what the Dochraid said would happen if we failed." He met Arthur's gaze now, unflinching and flat. It was artificial. Merlin raised the crown and placed it back on Arthur's head, shifting it until it sat straight and centered. He then proceeded to tug Arthur's clothes back into place, minor adjustments here and there until he presumable looked regal enough.
Arthur could feel the shock running cold in his veins. He stood perfectly still while Merlin fussed, unable to fully appreciate the irony or the horror of the situation. Merlin moved around him, draping an intricate chain set with the Pendragon colors around his neck to hang in glittering red and gold across his chest, heavy and suffocating. He had never realized their weight before.
"She forgives me."
Arthur blinked away the threat of a wet spill he refused to acknowledge and looked at Merlin in confusion. "What?"
"When I hear her voice," Merlin clarified, his face complicated and pinched. "That's what she says. That she forgives me."
Arthur let his gaze drop to where Merlin's hands shook in a fine, delicate shiver against the gold and jewels draped over Arthur's breast. It was ironic, wasn't it? Merlin's own mind was doing that, tormenting him with her voice, and the most damaging thing it could contrive to give him was forgiveness. Mercy...absolution... They were sharper weapons than anyone gave them credit for.
"We'll find a way to bring her back, Arthur. I promise."
~TBC~
