Chapter 7: Preparations for Change

"You can't convince me that you can actually understand this," Merlin said, jabbing a finger that the textbook spread open on the dining room table.

From his perch alongside it, Arthur tipped his head upwards and Merlin fathomed he could almost see him sniffing indignantly. "Of course I can. I've told you I can still read, Merlin." As though to prove his point, Arthur shuffled towards the textbook, propping a hand upon the page as though to keep it open. "Normal ocular microflora are predominantly non-pathogenic gram-positive organisms, although some gram-negative and fungal organisms are also present," he recited from the page, his tone just a little pompous but words clipped and articulate. Merlin suspected it to be a result of his royal upbringing, practically being raised with the knowledge that he would be an orator despite the fact that as an adult Prince Arthur had resisted becoming as much at every turn.

Smirking, Merlin drew his attention from the page and met Arthur's expectant gaze. It wasn't smug so much as derisive, as if to say, "See? Just because I've got frog's eye's doesn't mean I can't still read". "That's very impressive."

Arthur gave a croaking snort. "Lose the condescension, if you would."

"I'm not being condescending –"

"Bullshit."

"I'm not!" Merlin exclaimed before dissolving into laughter as Arthur turned towards him. He propped his elbow on the table, dropping his chin onto his palm and covering his smile with his fingers. "I'm being entirely sincere. I've never met a frog who could read before."

Arthur rolled his eyes. He actually managed to roll them slightly in a very human gesture. "Well, there's a first for everything, I suppose."

"What I was actually referring to was the content itself," Merlin clarified, sitting up slightly in his seat and shifting the textbook to draw it closer to himself once more. "Yeah, you can read it, but I meant I didn't expect you to understand what it meant."

"I can understand it," Arthur said shortly.

Merlin raised an eyebrow. "Really?"

Arthur paused just a second too long. Only a second, but Merlin had come to learn Arthur's little ticks over the past weeks. He knew that pause meant that Arthur was speaking bullshit himself yet wouldn't admit it.

The past weeks had been… interesting, to say the least. Interesting, yet progressive, Merlin would have to admit. When they'd returned from London, Arthur had all but secluded himself in the greenhouse like a sulking child. Very much like a sulking child, Merlin considered, though if anyone had a reason to sulk it would be him. After what had happened with Princess Guinevere, after the ineffectiveness of the kiss and the subsequent lack of transformation back into the prince he truly was, he certainly had reason to be.

Merlin had accepted that Arthur was who he claimed to be. Really, he'd accepted it even before they'd met Nimueh, so Nimueh's words had simply fastened the seal upon his belief. It was too outrageous, too unbelievable, for it not to be true, despite logic suggesting it was otherwise. That realisation more than anything else, that and the fact that Merlin did indeed feel sympathy for Arthur and that such sympathy drove him towards struggling to fix him, was what hurt the most.

Merlin had tried to help. And it hadn't worked.

In the days that Arthur was secreted in the greenhouse, Merlin had brainstormed. He and Hunith both, Will and Gwaine, even Gaius via phone when he'd called Hunith to see what had become of the situation. They'd come up with possibilities, alternatives, but nothing solid. No real plan that they could put in place, nor an explanation for why such had occurred. Or more correctly, why nothing had happened at all.

It was horrible. Merlin had promised to himself, if not openly, that he would work to return Arthur to his original form. He'd promised. But he hadn't managed. Instead, Arthur had descended into shuttered despair, had barely spoken a word since they'd returned from London, and for whatever reason, misplaced though Will said it was, Merlin felt responsible. Arthur had come to him, had come all the way from Cardiff in the body of a frog, with an admittedly demanding plea for help. And Merlin hadn't been able to.

He hadn't slept well those first few nights. Merlin couldn't seem to stem the endless turning of his mind, the illogical guilt, the possible solutions that, given what hadn't happened with the princess, were likely useless anyway. It was only three days after their return that Merlin had decided: no, he hadn't been able to help Arthur, but that didn't mean he would leave him in a fit of misery to listlessly while away his time until… what? Until he died as a frog?

Nimueh really was a bitch. What right did she have?

Merlin would have almost marched back down to Cardiff after several days of fruitless pondering, except that Will had intruded upon his thoughts as he'd been letting the horses out of their stable in the early morning. Phone in hand, he'd stopped at Merlin's side and wordlessly turned the screen towards him. Merlin squinted at the minute text and felt a heavy weight settle in his stomach.

"I was going to suggest maybe going to see her again," Will said quietly. His tone was sombre, even more so than usual, without a touch of exasperation to his words. "I don't really give a fuck to be honest – I really don't – but you seem to care. Except…" He trailed off, gaze drifting indicatively down to the phone once more.

There was no need for an explanation. Merlin understood well enough. Nimueh had buggered off. Apparently, according to the news feed that Will had presented to him, she'd 'up and left' after many years of loyal and unwavering service for the crown, long outlasting that which many had speculated after her fast friend, the late queen, had passed away. Gone overseas, apparently, though the article was a little vague as to where.

Fucking hell, nothing's ever easy, is it?

Merlin shook his head, turning away from Will and back to Aisha as she brushed past him with a nicker to ask why he looked so glum. He stroked a hand absently through Aithusa's forelock, the filly naturally glued to her mother's side. Well, that was one option flushed down the loo. Merlin's speculations as to Nimueh's likelihood of actually offering them help had barely surfaced but it had been an idea. And now it was vanquished.

"What are you going to do?" Will asked quietly at his side, fiddling almost awkwardly with his phone. Both he and Gwaine had seemed subdued in the past few days, likely picking up on Merlin's own sobriety. He felt a little guilty for that; whenever Merlin got upset over anything it always seemed to drag everyone else around him down with him. He didn't know why; it just happened.

Taking a deep breath, Merlin shook his head. "I've got no idea," he said, repeating the words he'd spoken days before. "There's really not all that much I can do."

"So…?" Will trailed off indicatively, likely hearing the continuation in Merlin's tone.

"So, I'll just try and work with what we've got." Merlin spared a small smile for his friend. It didn't really feel all that genuine. "I might not be able to turn Arthur back into a human or whatever, but I can maybe stop him from being miserable."

Will offered his own small smile in return, shaking his head though not entirely in denial. "Take it from someone very practiced in being self-pitying: if he wants to be miserable, there's very little anyone can do to drag him out of it."

"You, self-pitying?" Merlin teased half-heartedly.

Will gave an equally half-hearted shove of his shoulder. "Shut up, you tosser."

Merlin had made good his new resolution. That very morning he'd made the trip to the greenhouse with the intention of coaxing Arthur from his melancholy or dragging him if coaxing didn't work. But surprisingly, Arthur hadn't needed much encouragement. Merlin wasn't sure what had triggered it about their discussion, or if Arthur simply needed someone to kick him out of his funk, but he followed Merlin from the greenhouse barely an hour after he'd entered. Will's words, that it took a certain amount of wanting to dwell in misery in order to stay there, rung in Merlin's mind. Perhaps Arthur didn't truly want to be miserable at all. Maybe he was just as lost and at a loose end when considering a possible solution as Merlin was.

For whatever reason, though, despite the melancholic cloud that still hung nearby, Arthur changed after that. It was almost as though he'd decided to try anew, just as Merlin had. And it was strange. It was strange to have Arthur in his company once more, and not so much because Merlin was uncomfortable or unfamiliar with the shadow of a frog following him practically everywhere. It was because Arthur was different.

He was still self-righteous. He was still entitled, and made demands more than he did requests. He still persisted with the reality that he was a human, something that was largely unnecessary now that everyone in the estate – or at least everyone who'd met him – had acknowledged that fact.

But aside from that, Arthur was different. He seemed to be making an active effort towards civility, something that, given the evident struggle Merlin perceived from him, he wasn't particularly practiced in. He would make idle conversation and when removed of its superiority he truly did make a good conversation partner. Prince Arthur was intelligent, logical in his opinions – at least when they didn't directly concern himself – and knowledgeable. More than that, after a few days of following Merlin around, he seemed to spark with a curiosity that hadn't arisen within his prior to that. And that was that he started to question what Merlin was doing.

Not to necessarily 'question', as though considering the validity of his work with the horses, his studies, his maintenance duties and those that drifted more towards the cleaning end of the spectrum. Arthur actually asked as though he was curious to know.

"How often does the farrier come out to your estate?"

"The names of the stable hands – I can remember the two with the blond hair but that third one I have no clue."

"How many horses do you have agisted altogether? You look after them practically all by yourselves; do the owners ever actually come out to visit them?"

And what Merlin thought was the most amusing, "What exactly is that you're using to scrub the floor with? I don't think it's particularly safe to be using your bare hands."

He'd been sitting atop one of the doors in the stable at that point, peering down at the damp floor dubiously as though questioning the safety of what was little more than soapy water. The only difference was that the detergent Merlin used came directly in a giant, unlabelled bottle from a local producer. It was probably unfamiliar to Arthur and thus the concern. What was surprising was the touch of concern in his voice at all. It was almost as though he actually cared.

"Is that worry for my wellbeing I can detect?" Merlin asked with a grin, pausing in his mopping to glance towards Arthur. The stables didn't get a thorough clean through with an actual mop and bucket more than once a year, and Merlin never really thought it fair to land it upon the stable hands. It was a bit of a thankless task and took up far too much of the morning if done thoroughly enough.

Arthur fidgeted in place as though the he was uncomfortable with the notion of his own compassion. "Hardly. It's simply that I strongly believe that standard PPE should be used in the workplace."

Merlin snickered to himself. "Strongly believe…"

"What?"

"Nothing." He went back to his mopping but couldn't suppress the smile that spread across his face.

They spent almost all of their time together. When Will went back home – because it was closer to work than the nearly hour drive from the estate – and Gwaine took himself off to seek his own amusements during the day – something that Merlin knew was a deliberate attempt to avoid having to do any manual labour around the farm – it was just the two of them. With the exception of Hunith and the stable hands, that was, which Merlin felt almost obliged to avoid because he couldn't include Arthur in his conversations when around them, they really were practically sole companions. The more the days passed, the more Arthur seemed to climb down from his superiority high horse and descend almost unconsciously and just a little reluctantly to Merlin's lowly level, the more Merlin enjoyed his company. He'd always liked animals, but there was obviously something different about Arthur.

It was probably because he wasn't an animal at all, but Merlin chose to ignore that fact. Arthur was simply something… other. He didn't seem quite human, and it was impossible to see him as such given his physicality, but he certainly wasn't a frog either.

Arthur rarely withdrew to the greenhouse anymore, except for at night to sleep. He didn't even flinch nowadays when Merlin showed him with the spray bottle, simply accepting it as necessary to avoid 'shrivelling up like a dried apricot' as he claimed it felt. Merlin still thought it was funny, still nearly cracked up every time the necessity arose due to Arthur's resigned and faintly exasperated expression, but he never teased Arthur about it. He wasn't sure if Arthur's dignity could stand up to the task.

Instead they worked alongside one another in what had become a sort of easy camaraderie. Or at least Merlin worked while Arthur largely talked and watched. They both ignored the elephant in the room that was the fact that Arthur was a frog, that they didn't know how to fix it, and simply… lived. It was surprisingly easier than Merlin had anticipated. And yes, he even found that he did quite enjoy talking to Arthur. He was a prat, true, would likely always be a prat, but he wasn't so bad. Merlin had been friends with the perpetually grouchy Will and the universally-acknowledged-to-be-hyperactive Gwaine for too long to let unique personalities bother him.

It was almost like he was getting to know Arthur. Not anything huge, and nothing particularly personal, because Arthur didn't seem inclined to revealing all that much about himself, but little things. Like how vastly different farm life and work was compared to city life and working at his father's business. How the stable master Tyr's younger sister who came with him one day reminded him of his older sister Morgana for how bossy she was. Of how he considered that the thing he probably missed the most about being a human – if it was possible to miss one thing more than everything else – was that he couldn't sleep in a bed anymore.

Merlin couldn't help but laugh at that, much to Arthur's initial indignation, but that disgruntlement had faded rapidly in a way that Merlin had noticed happened more often in the past weeks. It was as though Arthur simply couldn't muster the energy to remain affronted anymore, a fact that might have been sad in that he was losing a little of his steadfast commitment but Merlin considered a good thing. It was hard to think it anything other when he simply seemed so happy without it. Content, even.

"I think I might have been able to pick you for being a layabout," Merlin said in reply to Arthur's wistful longing as he'd been wiping Yasper down from her drenching bath. She was practically quivering with delight for the raking scrub of the brush over her flanks.

"Why would you think that? I could take serious offence, you know," Arthur replied from where he sat in the trough. He'd finally conceded to seating himself in such when Merlin spent his time amongst the horses, given that otherwise the direct sunlight was too desiccating for him. After he'd requested Merlin at least change the water, that was. Given that he had actually requested rather than demanded – albeit a little begrudgingly and almost embarrassedly – Merlin had agreed readily enough.

Arthur's words were deceptively mild, and Merlin could almost hear the threat of 'watch what you say next' beneath them. Patting Yasper's shoulder and urging her to turn around slightly, he shrugged. "I don't know, you just don't seem much like a morning person."

Arthur huffed a grumble of something or other beneath his breath before replying. "Well, not everyone can be as ridiculously sprightly in the morning as you, Merlin."

"I'm not ridiculously sprightly."

"Have you seen yourself?"

Merlin glanced his way. "Have you seen yourself?"

Arthur frowned. "What do you mean?"

Merlin smirked as he turned back to Yasper. "I mean, you're as grouchy as Will is most of the time. I expect you were the sort of teenager that needed turfing out of bed to get to school every morning."

Arthur paused for just a heartbeat too long for his following denial to be believable. "I'm more than capable of getting out of bed myself, thank you."

"Of course you are."

"Merlin?"

"Hm?"

"Shut up."

Merlin could only laugh. His amusement only grew when he saw Arthur smile. It was a frog's smile, but discernible nonetheless. It was the first time he'd ever seen Arthur make such an expression.

Such was the way of their conversations. It was as much teasing as anything else, yet less and less did Arthur's claims that Merlin was 'an idiot' and his sighs of exasperation seem genuine. It was almost voiced by rote, automatically, like a sentence stopper rather than words with any meaning. He didn't even seem all that indignant anymore when Merlin insisted on calling him a prat or a self-indulged princeling, which Merlin would have to admit were similarly more offhanded comments than truly sincere.

Arthur was still arrogant. He was still entitled and still a little too big for his britches considering he was very much simply a frog. But he was changed slightly. Almost forcibly, as though struggling to ignore the horror of his continued amphibious shape and their inability to determine a solution to the problem. At times he was even enthusiastic, animated, such as when Merlin lost himself in readings in preparation for the next year of uni.

Unfortunately for him, Merlin didn't buy Arthur's enthusiasm as being real understanding even for a second.

Arthur was almost glaring down at the textbook spread before Merlin as though accusing it of something. "I do understand it, I'll have you know. I'm not incompetent."

"I'm hardly saying you are," Merlin said. "Just that your specialisation isn't exactly in veterinary science."

"Of course it isn't."

"So I couldn't think that you would really know what gram-positive organisms and ocular microflora are."

Merlin was sure that had his arms been able to fold that way they would be crossing his chest defiantly. "I can... discern the meaning well enough through deduction."

Merlin bit back a smile. He didn't comment further, even if teasing Arthur when he clambered back onto his high-horse had become one of his favourite amusements for the day. Instead, he merely shrugged. "Yeah, I guess it is fairly self-explanatory, some of it," he agreed without really feeling it. Arthur was entirely full of himself.

"Personally, I don't find all that much appeal in vet medicine," Arthur said. "Especially after seeing some of what you're studying."

Merlin shrugged. "To each their own."

"I mean that?" Arthur gestured vaguely towards a picture of a horse's eye reddened, crusted and milky in blindness. "That's disgusting."

Smirking, Merlin leaned forwards as though to better peer at the picture. "Are you squeamish by any chance."

"I'm not squeamish," Arthur said with a huff. "I can just recognise when something is disgusting."

Merlin could have replied, could have provoked him further, but he didn't. Instead, in a show of his consideration, he turned the page of the textbook to relieve Arthur's view of what he considered disconcerting. He pretended he didn't see the slightly uneasy shift in Arthur's perch where he sat at the edge of the book.

"Merlin!"

Glancing over his shoulder, Merlin tipped his head in the direction of his mother's call. She sounded like she was outside. "Yeah?"

"Do you know where the old full-length waders have gone?"

"Waders?" Arthur asked, glancing towards him. "What are – is your mother going to go swimming in the paddock dam?"

"I doubt she'd be wearing waders if she was actually going to go swimming," Merlin replied. He hoped she wouldn't go into the dam at all really, given that the heat spell had finally cracked and an autumn chill had set in over the past few days. He turned more fully in his seat and raising his voice in reply. "Why?"

Hunith was silent for a moment and there was a bang of something clattering to the ground outside. She replied with a grunt. "Tyr and I were going to go and clean all the muck that's stuck in the middle of the dam from the shower on Wednesday."

"Why don't I go?" Merlin offered immediately.

"No, it's fine. I just need to know where the waders are. It's still a little deep for the halfies."

"It's fine, I'll go," Merlin repeated, rising from his seat. He offered a hand to Arthur who obligingly climbed straight into his palm. "I think we put them in dad's old study, didn't we?"

"Yeah, maybe," Hunith replied.

"I'll go and get them. Just leave it, I'll go with Tyr."

"Are you sure?"

"I'm sure," Merlin replied, already starting from the dining room to the stairwell. Hunith offered grateful thanks in reply that was nearly inaudible as he took himself up a floor. He slipped into his father's study, the familiar room not quite dusty but with a very definite air of abandonment, and offered Arthur a spot on the still-cluttered desk before crossing to the wardrobe wedged in one corner.

Balinor's room didn't see much use after Merlin's father had gone. Neither Merlin nor Hunith had much use for anything inside, not any of his books, the personal clothes that he'd kept within its depths for some reason rather than his bedroom, the single, old and worn couch that had only ever been used when Balinor was reading over reports from the university he'd once worked at. The impression of his seat was still evident in the cushion.

Merlin ignored it. He barely spared a glance for the desk, for the mess of personalisation spread across it. He and his mother used the room more as a place for storage of old and only occasionally used items, the waders being one of them. Really, Merlin couldn't even remember why they'd put them up here. He made a note to just leave them down in the shed when he'd finished with them.

"This is your father?"

At Arthur's question, Merlin paused in the act of tugging the pair of full-length waders from where they sagged heavily upon their coat hangers amidst old and largely tattered jumpers and trousers. Balinor had never been one to discard old clothes, wearing them until they were practically indecent. He glanced over his shoulder towards where Arthur sat on the desk, staring at a single, framed picture.

Merlin knew what that picture was without having to cross the room to look at it. It had been one of Balinor's most prized possessions for years. "Yeah. He's the one on the left, though he was only about eighteen in that picture. The guy on the right that he's shaking hands with – Bill Haast – he was one of his idols when Dad was a kid."

"A scientist?" Arthur asked turning slightly from the photograph.

"What gave you that impression?" Merlin said with a smile, folding both pairs of waders over his arm as he drifted across the room towards Arthur.

Arthur snorted. "Lucky guess, I suppose."

"It's okay, you can say it. Most scholarly people have something of a look about them."

"You say that like you have quite an experience with academics," Arthur said, a query in his tone.

Merlin shrugged. "Well, Dad always brought people over for dinner from the university. I had my fill growing up."

Arthur was silent for a moment. A long moment in which he turned back to stare at the picture. It was old, a little grainy, and just slightly faded from where the sun had gotten to it. When he spoke it was without the jesting of his previous words. "Your father. He was a scholar?"

Merlin nodded shortly. He didn't mind talking about his father – he didn't, not really – but it would always be just a little… "A herpetologist, yeah."

Another pause for silence, then Arthur turned towards him solemnly. Entirely solemnly, and when he spoke it was in a heartfelt and sincere tone unlike any Merlin had heard before. "What happened to him?"

Drawing his gaze back to the picture, Merlin pursed his lips. "My dad is…" He trailed off with a sigh. Really, what could he say about Balinor?

Arthur didn't speak for a moment. When he continued, he seemed almost awkward to speak, though for once there wasn't even the vaguest hint of superiority or derision in his tone. "Is he… have you lost him?"

Merlin heaved another sigh. "Yeah, you could say that. He's been lost for a long, long time."

Again, Arthur fell into a brief silence. Then, in a hushed tone, he murmured, "My mother died years ago. I was still young, still a child and it's been a long time so I can hardly remember, but… I suppose I can commiserate for the absence of a parent at least."

Merlin turned his gaze from the picture towards Arthur, eyebrows rising. "What?"

"My mother –"

"No, I mean – shit, sorry, no that's not what I meant." Merlin cringed slightly as Arthur blinked up at him. "My dad's not dead."

Arthur stared. Then his mouth quirked in that way Merlin interpreted as being in a frown. "What? But didn't you just say -?"

"He's off in the fucking Sunda Islands in Indonesia studying dragons," Merlin said, scratching the side of his nose awkwardly with his free hand. "I haven't seen him in over twelve months. He's been taking off and 'pursuing his research' for years now and just kind of disappears. When he does come home it's usually not for long but – I mean, Christ, he's not dead or anything."

Arthur blinked once more. He was still frowning with his mouth, and though at first it seemed in indignation from the shifting of his feet – for Merlin's accidental misguidance, he could only assume – it gradually faded into bemusement. At least Merlin assumed it was bemusement. There was only so much that could be discerned from a frog's expression, even with a gift for reading animal behaviour. "Your father's studying dragons?"

"Yeah, he's –"

"Dragons?" Arthur repeated slowly, deliberately. "Merlin, dragons don't exist. I'm pretty sure they've never existed –"

Merlin's abrupt laughter cut him short. "No, you idiot, not real dragons. Monitors. Komodo dragons. You know, the big giant lizards."

Arthur croaked in an exasperated grumble. "You could have just said –"

"Well, what kind of an idiot would think I actually meant real dragons?"

"You mean what kind of a person would take you at your word? For what those words literally meant?" Arthur croaked once more. "You are an immensely frustrating individual, Merlin. After everything, after all that with the magic, you didn't think that maybe the impossible and unbelievable might seem a little more likely?"

Merlin couldn't help but agree with that. Magic. Fucking magic. He still couldn't wrap his head around it, regardless of how his friends attempted to convince him that his own ability to talk to animals was practically just that. But dragons? Actual mythological dragons? That was pushing it a bit far, surely.

Or maybe it wasn't. Maybe it wasn't at all. Merlin didn't really know anymore.

At the same time, despite his amusement at Arthur's assumption, he sobered slightly. It had been an accident that Arthur had assumed his father was dead, which he wasn't. Balinor was still very much alive and living the life decidedly away from Merlin and Hunith. The worst part of it was that he didn't seem to think there was anything wrong with his behaviour, that there was nothing wrong with having abandoned his wife to a big old estate practically by herself. That was what annoyed Merlin the most.

He didn't like to think about that, though. Merlin didn't like the feeling of being annoyed, especially at an absent person who wasn't even around to bear the brunt of it. Besides, now wasn't the time. He'd accidentally unearthed something from Arthur, urged him to speak of something that his tone more than the actual words themselves suggested was deep and resounding to him. The late Queen, wife to King Uther of Wales, had died something like twenty years ago. Arthur really couldn't have been more than a child himself.

"I'm sorry about that," Merlin said, and though he didn't identify what for he saw in the glance Arthur turned his way once more than he understood the apology wasn't for the confusion with the dragons.

Arthur shifted slightly, arms twitching in what Merlin had come to understand as being a shrug. "It was a long time ago."

Merlin shook his head, folding his arms more tightly around the waders. "It doesn't matter how long it's been. It can still hurt."

Arthur didn't call Merlin out on his words. He didn't blame him for his miscommunication, accuse him of not really understanding because Merlin hadn't lost one of his parents, not like Arthur. Instead he turned to stare long and hard at the picture of Balinor and Bill Haast. When he spoke it was quiet and Merlin considered he likely spoke more to himself than to Merlin. "I can barely remember anything of her anyway."

Merlin bit his lip. That was… just a little tragic. "I'm sorry," he said again, even though such words seemed so inadequate.

Arthur gave another little twitching shrug. "It doesn't matter. I can remember the most important bits." He seemed firm in his words.

"Like what?" Merlin couldn't help but ask. He found himself suddenly curious, and not because he had any particular interest in Queen Ygraine. Arthur sounded different when he spoke, a little wistful, a little regretful, yet with an underlying determination in his tone, as though he was reminding himself of something. As though he were committing himself to a memory.

"Like…" Arthur began slowly, then paused. "Like what she last told me." He paused once more and Merlin didn't speak into the silence. Arthur was very clearly lost in memory in that moment, and when he continued it was in barely a murmur. "She told me that I should live for myself. That I should take every opportunity as it presented itself. That's what sticks with me the most. And I do. I will. I'll take every chance I can get, every opportunity to try something new." There was that determination, almost hard in his murmured words. "I'll try anything."

Merlin stared at him silently for a moment. He didn't really understand that, didn't think he was really grasping the full depth of the meaning behind Arthur's words, but he sensed it was important somehow. More than that, he felt subdued at the weight of what it meant that Arthur had spoken them to him. The memory was clearly important, revealing, even. He felt almost honoured in a strange way to have heard them.

Honour was something that Merlin had very resolutely refused to feel for Arthur's behaviour, because he'd never really had much consideration for royalty and certainly not for Prince Arthur. Yet he couldn't help it this time. It felt very warranted, and more simply because Arthur seemed so… human.

Stepping slowly, to the edge of the desk, Merlin spoke in a voice just a quiet as Arthurs. "Maybe you could tell me sometime. About what you can remember." He paused as Arthur didn't turn towards him, didn't even seem to hear him. "I'd like to hear about her."

Arthur did turn that time. He stared up at Merlin for a long moment, and for one of the first times Merlin couldn't read his expression. That was saying something, because he'd always considered himself rather adept at reading animal expressions. "Maybe," was all he said.

A long silence stretched in which Merlin could only stare down at Arthur. Almost awkwardly long, but Merlin deliberately truncated it before it could descend into that awkwardness. "Alright, then. You said you wanted to try something new?" He held out a hand to Arthur in invitation, tucking the waders under his arm. "Bet you've never raked a dam clean before."

Arthur's sobriety abruptly disappeared with a roll of his eyes as he climbed onto Merlin's hand, toes just faintly and familiarly damp. "No, I haven't. And I must admit, I'm not particularly inclined to wearing waders."

Merlin chuckled. "Have no fear, you won't be subjected to it today. I don't think we have a pair small enough to fit you."

"Thank fuck for that," Arthur said in feigned relief as Merlin started from the room.

"Besides," Merlin continued. "You're a frog."

"I had noticed, funnily enough."

"Wearing waterproof clothes would be kind of stupid for you."

"No shit, really? Wait, you're actually going to make me go in the dam?"

"Do you have a problem with that?"

"It's filthy!"

"And?"

"And I have a standard of hygiene."

"God, you're such a pampered prince."

"No, there's a difference between pampered and having a standard…"


Riding a horse was an entirely different experience when one was a frog.

Of course, Arthur didn't ride alone. Even if he could have somehow communicated with the beasts, the use of reins and stirrups was somewhat inhibited by the shortness of his limbs and he doubted he would have been able to maintain his seat at any real speed. Which was just one reason amongst several that he rode with Merlin.

Merlin was a natural on a horse. He so rarely used a saddle or bridle that it was stranger to see him with than without. He didn't need either, and Arthur was convinced it wasn't only because he could speak to the horses. Arthur had been reluctant to climb astride with Merlin at first, so he'd seen more than enough of him riding.

Arthur knew he was good on a horse. He'd been riding since he was a child, as had been somewhat expected of him. But Merlin... Merlin was something else entirely. It almost wasn't even riding at all. He practically became one with the horse itself, shifting with each turn, body flowing with the movement in a way that it seemed as natural as walking, as breathing, holding on with barely a clench of his fingers locked in the horse's mane and a squeeze of his legs. It was captivating to watch, and Arthur had never been one to become captivated by anything particularly. Certainly not a farm boy riding bare foot and bareback on an Arabian buckskin, the pair practically flying across the undulating countryside and rapidly disappearing into the distance.

Arthur admired it. He'd only realised he admired it after watching with such captivation numerous times. Somehow, quite without precedent, Arthur found that he actually... he actually enjoyed watching.

How very strange. How very unexpected.

At the same time, however, his idle watching didn't last. Arthur didn't let it, had demanded to be brought along as well at every possible chance of late. He didn't think of himself as needy or clingy, actively refused to consider himself as much, but a niggling thought at the back of his mind preached the lies of that opinion. And in hearing that whisper of thought, Arthur discerned the truth.

He was a loose end. Arthur was terrified, had acknowledged he was terrified, to be stuck in a body that wasn't his own, and that he didn't know how to turn back. And he knew that one of the few things that was preventing him from succumbing to that terror was Merlin, the fact he stuck by Arthur, dragging him after him with words more than physical force. Merlin was the one he spoke to him and maintained Arthur's sanity in doing so, spoke of anything and everything but the impossibility of Arthur's situation.

The fact that Merlin was so animated, so enthusiastic, so seemingly carefree and simply loving life in all of its menial and back-breaking labour, somehow managed to brighten Arthur's day. Somehow and incredibly, because Arthur had never been one to care for the opinions of others in less than a business situation, Merlin's good-humour was infectious. Arthur hadn't anticipated stepping from his melancholy, being able to withdraw from beneath the looming, dark cloud of despair for his situation, but somehow it happened. It occurred gradually, over days that turned into weeks, but it was sudden in realisation. One day, Arthur simply woke up in what he had come to consider as 'his' lily pond and realised. He'd understood that he wasn't – that everything wasn't all bad. That it wasn't terrible, and subverted and horrendous as the situation was, Arthur wasn't... he wasn't upset. Not entirely, anyway. And Merlin had a big part to play in that feeling. A huge part.

No, Arthur didn't let himself think he was clingy. He didn't think he was needy, for both suggested a compulsive and insuppressible need to stick to another like glue. Arthur realised his situation, saw that Merlin and his company, that his teasing and his good-natured idiocy, was what made Arthur feel, and he chose to follow him. Arthur wasn't blind to the fact either; he would have to be an idiot himself not to realise that Merlin and his life and simply accompanying him throughout it had somehow become his own. That it was what the knowledge of having a purpose however small, of speaking to another and being a part of their life, that got him up in the morning. It would have been a pathetic situation except that it simply wasn't.

Arthur was learning. He'd learned so much about the farm, about a lifestyle that wasn't his own, and at first it had seemed appalling. That had changed, too. It was curious, fascinating, even. There were no business suits and hour-long meetings. There was similarly no hours spent making phone calls and typing up reports that his PA was seemingly incapable of adequately compiling. There wasn't any formal and innuendo-rich conversations with business partners and clients both, no refined work station and rich offices, towering buildings of multiple storeys thick with workers with heads bowed over their tasks and immobile in their seats. The farm was entirely different to that and in a strange and unexpected way Arthur found it refreshing. It was almost enjoyable to be even a small part of.

That was unexpected, too.

The Emerson estate ran at an entirely different pace to everything Arthur had known. It was both slower and far more efficient than what Arthur was used to. While Pendragon & Co. was a multi-billion dollar company run by thousands of employees and managers, there was barely a handful of workers on the estate. And yet somehow they managed to cover all of the jobs and duties with their collective hands, jobs that Arthur had never undertaken himself in his life, had always seen as beneath him but was steadily realising simply took an entirely different skillset of which he was not proficient in the slightest. They were masters of their work, of hard labour and construction and reparation, of horse husbandry and care and maintenance. Not a one of the hired stable hands were incompetent, not one reluctant to put anything but their best foot forward even after a whole day of work. If a job needed doing, there would always be a pair of hands offered to help.

Merlin was always the first to offer, too. Despite being the employer alongside Hunith, despite holding a higher station than the stable hands, Merlin was never one to simply designate tasks for his own ease. He would always be the first to offer his help with any job, and more often than not Arthur saw him make such offers for the most thankless of jobs, the ones that resulted in his obtaining a layer of filth, or wavering on weary legs, or accumulating cuts and blisters on his hands that were the beginnings of but more callouses that Arthur could see.

Arthur was learning a lot from simply watching. He was learning a lot about the farm, about horses, about what it truly meant to work in a back-breaking industry and yet somehow maintain a positive attitude. And somehow, unexpectedly, just as everything else was somehow unexpected, Arthur found himself changing his outlook. That too was gradual, incremental, but he definitely noticed it. Arthur noticed when his derision of hard-work dampened to all but disappear until it actually did. He noticed when his observation of the dextrous and commanding displays of horse and rider became more than simply acknowledgement and grew into respect for what was truly a work of art.

Arthur realised when he finally acknowledged Merlin as more than simply a light-hearted, good-natured and carefree idiot. Because he was. He was so much more than that and Arthur… for the first time, even if it was initially by necessity, Arthur had come to enjoy his company. Just as Merlin had claimed to enjoy his in turn.

Arthur had always been independent. Always. And yet somehow, quite without his direction, he had grown to develop something very close to co-dependency with Merlin in the past month. Even stranger was that, Arthur didn't find it anywhere near as aversive and horrifying as he perhaps should have. Instead, it simply was. Just like everything.

Simplistic. Inevitable. It was.

Hence, it was similarly inevitable that, given that Arthur spent practically every moment with Merlin – in idle conversation, in teasing banter and exasperation that became less frustrated and more amused with each encounter – Arthur wouldn't stand for being left behind. He might feel uncomfortable on a horse, for who wouldn't when they possessed nothing to hold on with, but he wouldn't stand for it. Arthur had a place, however unlikely that place was, and it had become at Merlin's side.

Thankfully, Arthur didn't need to admit as much aloud.

The first time Arthur made his demand – because demanding was the only way he could manage in such an embarrassing situation and still maintain his dignity – Merlin didn't seem surprised or even teasing in the slightest. Urging Mordred, who Arthur had come to the understanding was something of Merlin's personal favourite, in a steady warm-up circle around the inner wall of the arena, Arthur cleared his throat in a croak loud enough to be heard.

Merlin, as Arthur had almost come to expect of him, noticed immediately and drew Mordred to a stop alongside him. There was no word that he offered the horse, and seemingly no urging with hand or foot. Arthur still couldn't quite work out how he directed as he did. "What's wrong?" Merlin asked immediately, his eyes flickering just faintly golden in a way that was only too familiar to Arthur now. Familiar and far from disconcerting; it was almost comforting in that familiarity.

Arthur rolled his eyes. "There's nothing wrong," he said, then stopped. Making a demand that was more of a request would always awkward. Arthur was far from practiced as doing as much and his time spent with Merlin was only gradually reversing some of his long-held habits. It was with less annoyance and more surprised amusement that Arthur realised that, perhaps without his knowledge, Merlin was urging Arthur towards such a reversal of habits. It was simply another thing that was unexpected that Arthur didn't particularly object to. Perhaps he should have, had a right to, but he didn't.

"Then…?" Merlin trailed off encouragingly.

"Are you taking him out again today?" Arthur asked, tilting his head indicatively towards Mordred. He knew from simple observation that the horse who was little more than a colt practically thrummed with energy that lashed out in aggression if he wasn't taken for regular rides across the countryside. The buckskin was a bastard of a creature to practically everyone but Merlin, and Arthur could swear that he saw dislike in the eerie blue gaze the horse turned upon him as he spoke.

Merlin raised an eyebrow at Arthur's words but didn't question Arthur's query. Instead, he leaned forwards to peer at Mordred questioningly in turn. "What do you think? Head out for a run today?"

Arthur couldn't understand horse-speech, which was what he had very much come to understand it actually was after spending days on end with Merlin. But he no longer thought it completely unlikely and just a little stupid that actual conversations were impossible. How could he, when Merlin spoke to Arthur in a way that no one else could? Arthur may be baffled by magic, may still find it ridiculous and confusing and utterly mind-boggling that such a reality existed in his reality, but he could accept it. At least, he could accept Merlin's particular brand of magic. It was a little hard not to when his entire life seemed to have grown to revolve around it.

Yet he was picking up on the cues. He couldn't understand what he meant when Mordred nickered and tossed his head in reply, but it was very definitely a reply. Even more apparently than just a simple yes or no when Merlin continued. "No, it'll be too damp out there after the storm last night. I don't want you tripping and hurting yourself." Another snort and muffled grunt from Mordred and Merlin smirked. "It's not doubting your abilities. I'm just being realistic. Stop being such a whinger."

"I take it that's a yes, then?" Arthur asked. He might accept that he wasn't a part of such conversations but that didn't mean he particularly liked it. Not that he would ever admit as much, for who really wanted to claim that they were regretful about not being able to talk to a surly horse?

Merlin glanced back towards him. "Was there really any doubt?"

Arthur turned his own attention towards Mordred, who had in turn tipped his head to regard him sceptically. "It's been some time since I've ridden a horse," he murmured in what he hoped was a nonchalant tone.

Merlin didn't comment on what he couldn't have overlooked unless he truly was an idiot. A small smile touched his lips, the faintest hint of a dimple that Arthur had become all too familiar with over the past weeks, before reaching out an inviting hand towards Arthur. "Would you like to come?"

Pausing for only long enough not to appear too eager, Arthur rose from his perch on the fence post and climbed into Merlin's hand. "I suppose it wouldn't be too objectionable, though unfortunately I'll have to trust you not to let me fall off."

"Your lack of faith is so reassuring," Merlin said with a widening of his smile. Arthur didn't respond, didn't correct him that really, out of everyone in the world at the moment, Merlin had somehow and with remarkable speed become one of those he could trust the most. It was startling to realise as much, that a young man from a farm estate that Arthur would never have spared a second thought for would suddenly come to be such a prominent part of his life. Entirely surprising, but true nonetheless.

Arthur didn't respond, but he felt his lack of objection when Merlin squirted him for his regular shower from the spray bottle a moment later was as good as any gratitude.

After that first time, Merlin didn't even ask Arthur if he wanted to come along. He simply accepted that he would, or perhaps expected Arthur to object if he didn't want to come. Arthur never objected, and he was grateful for the fact that Merlin didn't require his express request in each instance. It was embarrassing enough in a lot of ways that he was so dependent upon Merlin, terribly embarrassing, especially given that he had always been so independent, so alone and self-reliant.

It took him a long time, weeks of ignorance, for Arthur to realise that he'd come to need Merlin.

Nearly two months after Arthur had first come to the Emerson estate, autumn had heartily set in and what remained of the summer warmth had shrivelled into clouds and chill mornings that made Arthur reluctant to leave the relative warmth of the greenhouses. Despite the turn for the cold, however, life on the farm persisted as it always had; the stable hands still showed up consistently, as ready and sprightly as always, and ran the farm like clockwork alongside Merlin and Hunith. Rain or shine, there was work to be done, horses to care for and stables to muck out. That was only one more thing that Arthur had grown to respect for the farming life; they never had a day off.

It was just another reason that Arthur suspected he could never live such a life. He didn't think he could survive it, something he would never admit aloud.

The morning was spent doing just that, Merlin working alongside his mother as they set about conducting what Arthur had come to realise was one of many frequent routine inspections of the horses under their care. Arthur did little more than sit upon the fence and observe, something that he'd considered boring and frustrating for its distraction from his problem in the past when he'd been attempting to convince Merlin but now saw as somewhat fascinating. He was far from excluded, however; what Arthur had come to realise, what he'd come to like about Hunith as he'd grown to appreciate from Merlin, was that she accepted him as a person. Despite the fact that she couldn't understand him in return, she always spoke to him and waited expectantly and respectfully for Merlin to translate any of Arthur's replies. It was so casual, so comfortable, that experiencing as much had left Arthur with little confusion as to why Merlin cherished Hunith so much, appreciated and enjoyed her company so dearly.

Arthur couldn't help but be a little wistful for that. Memories of his own mother were never stronger than when he was around Hunith.

By midday, however, after a thorough hour or two of sweeping through the hay shed and raking clean any must and mildew that lingered from the autumnal storms that had struck the estate weeks prior, Merlin suggested they take a ride because "Mordred needs to stretch his legs. Duchess says he's getting insufferable again". Arthur could only gladly accept the unspoken offer; he'd come to quite enjoy the rides.

They set off at a rapid pace that swiftly grew into a gallop as Merlin gave Mordred his head. Arthur had something of his own spot these days, propped against the edge of the saddle blanket that Merlin was insistent on using and Mordred's withers. It was a little precarious, or had been at first, but Arthur had gotten practiced at maintaining his balance. He wouldn't admit it, but the fact that on the few times he'd slipped Merlin had grabbed him before he could fall was reassurance enough.

As they drew towards the dam, Merlin urged Mordred to slow to a trot with a murmured word. The dam itself was swollen in comparison to how it had been the last time Arthur had seen it, the storms raising the water levels until they nearly overwhelmed the jetty entirely. The sharp, cool air seemed to erect a tranquil flatness to the surface as though it were frozen into ice, though Arthur knew it would be some months yet before it would freeze if it hardened at all. It was a pristine, picturesque scene stepped right out of a landscape painting. Or at least it was until, moments after Merlin had swung himself and Arthur down from Mordred's back, the horse, ploughed into the dam as though he didn't feel the chill of the water, shattering the stillness and perfection.

Arthur could only snort at the sight of the horse leaping and frolicking, tossing sprays of whitened water into the air in a display of childishness that Merlin's tales of his supposed maturity entirely refuted. That at least was a difference between Arthur as a frog and every other animals he'd come across; he would never deteriorate into such embarrassing acts, regardless of how much he'd come to appreciate the comfort of submersion.

"Would you like to go for a swim too?"

Arthur turned to glance up at Merlin were he'd turned his attention down towards him. He was cupped loosely in Merlin's hand in a hold that had become so normal that Arthur didn't even consider it anymore, and offered a semblance of a frown at his words. It was almost as though Merlin had heard his thoughts.

"If you're insinuating that I would like to make as big a fool of myself as your horse over there then you don't know me very well at all," Arthur replied disdainfully.

Merlin only smiled. "Oh, I think I know you pretty well by now," he said offhandedly. Arthur doubted he even realised the profoundness Arthur himself felt for the words, and more than that that they were likely very true. "But no, I didn't think you'd quite take after Mordred. I just thought you'd like the chance to go for a swim. It's got to be better than being sprayed in the face."

Arthur could only agree to that and as such didn't protest further to Merlin's assumption as he started towards the jetty. Merlin lowered him down to the wooden planks at the end and similarly without comment Arthur obliged. True, the world was a dangerous place for a frog and Arthur had grown more than aware of that fact. But though the pond would likely be far too cold for a normal person – a human – to swim in, he wouldn't protest the opportunity when it presented itself. With a backwards glance towards Merlin to notice him lowering himself to sitting on the jetty, Arthur took a leap into the dam.

It was cool. Very cool, and far colder than the last time Arthur had swum in it. And yet despite the coldness that he could already feel settling upon his muscles, slowing down their functioning, it was relieving. Arthur had never much been one for swimming, but he would admit that his perspective of such submersion had similarly changed over the past weeks. Even knowing that it was simply because he was a frog, that the necessity for water to maintain the dampness of his skin was what drove his inclination, Arthur accepted it. It was simply easier to accept than to fight the reality, at least in this situation. Arthur practically revelled in it, now.

Frog's eyes were far better as seeing underwater than human, and Arthur made the most of that. There were few things that he would appreciate in his transformed shape, and though appreciation might be a bit too expansive of a word, he recognised its applicability. The murkiness of the dam was alleviated by his sharper vision, and in rapid, strong kicks of his hind legs Arthur dove deeply into the depths.

He wouldn't spend long beneath the water, Arthur knew. Enjoy it though he would, it would always be disconcerting to be so completely in his element as a frog. Arthur disliked how familiar, how right it felt, because it shouldn't feel right. It shouldn't feel so inhumanely right for him to be propelling himself through the depths of the dam, the shadow of the jetty overhead blotting out most of the wan light from the clouded sky. Arthur could still make out the tangled reeds below in spite of that shadowing, however, the mounds of rocks and pebbles speckled in thin films of algae. Dips in the ground revealed a scattering of minute fish, even a snail or two, and around the descending posts of the jetty hid more shadowed shapes, none were large enough for Arthur to consider a potential threat.

Then he saw it. Its shine was dimmed by muck and the depths of the water, but he saw it anyway. With a hint of exasperation, more to himself then in memory of Merlin's actions, Arthur swum with rapid strokes of his legs towards the half-buried shape of the phone directly beneath the jetty.

It was wedged firmly, Arthur noted as he slowed to a drifting pause alongside it. The sucking mud of the bottom of the dam held it tightly in place, propped against a rock and half curled beneath a tendril of reed that stroked it like a fond finger. Surprisingly, unexpectedly, as were so many things of late, Arthur found an upwelling of nostalgia flood through him at the sight of it. It was ridiculous, and the memory invoked derision and following upwelling of exasperation because Arthur couldn't believe that Merlin had such incompetent butter fingers that he'd dropped the phone twice. How he managed such competency with manual labour, such coordination riding a horse when he clearly possessed a clumsiness gene Arthur didn't know.

But regardless, despite the clumsiness that made Arthur question the capabilities of human fingers in general, there was a touch of fondness to his thoughts when he considered the stupidly gaudy phone discarded and lost in the depths of the dam. Merlin had said that Gwaine had gotten him the golden cover as a joke. That Merlin had kept it, had even used it despite clearly having little inclination towards such gaudiness, spoke something of him. Now Arthur saw it as typical of Merlin's character; of course he would keep it, and would use it even if it was given him as a joke. That was just the kind of person Merlin was.

In many ways, the phone had been the start of it all. Not in quite the way Arthur had intended, and he could still recall his desperation that had urged him to demand that Merlin take him back to his estate with him because dammit, he needed the help, despite being too proud to ask for it. And Merlin had done it. Even when Arthur had retrieved him only a broken and useless phone as a boon, a phone that had subsequently been lost once more.

Arthur never would have done something like that had he been in Merlin's place. He knew he wouldn't have, because why would he? Other people's problems weren't his own, despite what his father and the world had drilled into him were his responsibilities as a prince. Arthur lived for himself, he always would, and only conducted such duties out of necessity because there was little avoiding them. He would never be like Merlin in that regard.

In many ways, that made Merlin just so… special. Arthur had never considered his mind-set a… a failing until that moment.

The thought arose quite without Arthur's immediate understanding, and when it did register, it was for him to blink rapidly at the sincerity of that thought as Arthur hung suspended in the cool water of the dam. It was sincere. It was true. Merlin was special, and even more so because he was so vastly different to Arthur. Arthur knew himself to be smart, business savvy and capable of running verbal rings around most of his competitors, but he doubted he would ever be deemed a particularly respectable person. He didn't try to be and hadn't ever felt the urge to either because it wasn't him.

He'd never felt the urge until he'd been presented with someone who simply was. Merlin didn't have any reason to be a good person, yet he still tried to be. That was certainly enough for Arthur to deem him 'special'.

Arthur stared at the phone for a moment longer before he couldn't help himself any longer and swum downwards towards it. His fingers grazed across the algae-slick casing, slipping across the filthy glass in a struggle to grasp a handhold. It was pointless, though. It held fast. Arthur knew from last time he'd struggled to pick it up, last time he'd managed, how awkwardly it was to haul it to the surface of the water with his frog arms. It likely wasn't wedged all that tightly all things considered, yet in his form he couldn't make it budge.

For some reason, it felt a little sad to consider leaving it behind.

With a mental sigh – for really, what was he being so sentimental for? – Arthur turned and kicked his way to the surface. The water level was high enough that it took little more than a slightly stronger kick to propel himself from the water and onto the jetty once more. The cool air seemed even colder for the autumnal chill, but it wasn't insufferable. Arthur had long ago learned that for whatever reason his frog senses weren't as objectionable to the cold as a human's would be. Discomforting, yes, and a little debilitating, but it wasn't impossible to all but ignore.

And ignore he did, something that was enhanced by a far different distraction.

Merlin was stretched sideways along the jetty, arms propped beneath his head and legs dangling at the knees over the edge so that his booted toes dipped into the surface of the water. He'd closed his eyes, sounded to be humming something to himself that Arthur couldn't discern, and there was the faintest of smiles upon his lips that looked entirely natural. Merlin, Arthur had come to realise, was always like that. His face seemed to natural sit in a smile, his natural emotion be of happiness. Arthur had merely accepted that happiness, that smile, until…

For some reason it looked different. Or perhaps Arthur saw it differently. Maybe it was simply that his mind was caught upon the reminder of the phone and the memory it had unearthed. Maybe it was the dam itself that served as a reminder, the dam that they two hadn't more than visited in passing since the day Merlin had picked Arthur up. But for whatever reason, he saw Merlin differently in that moment.

He saw the smile.

He saw the long length of his body stretched out along the jetty in a sprawl that was somehow graceful, denying in stillness Merlin's clumsiness in motion.

He beheld the entire aspect of him, from the sharpness of his features, his cheekbones, his nose, his pointed chin, seemingly almost carved into a strange sort of perfection that contrasted starkly against his mud and dust-stained jeans, his smeared t-shirt beneath a thin jacket similarly filthy with sleeves shucked to his elbows. His long arms stretched overhead until they too nearly dipped into the water, fingers that Arthur had always begrudgingly and almost frustratingly considered elegant twitching and tapping to the beat of his humming.

Arthur stared and he couldn't look away. For a moment he was stunned, because he'd never conceived that before. It was as though he'd always viewed a picture tipped on its side, has accepted it in such a state and grown familiar with it like that, only to have it turned straight and to reveal a familiar yet somehow starkly different image, a different impression entirely.

Maybe it was because of how Arthur felt. Maybe it was because he'd finally, finally reconciled himself with the fact that he knew he needed Merlin and, more than that, that he actually wanted… he wanted to be around him. Because even without the fact that Merlin was the only person he could talk to, the only person who truly kept him sane, Arthur enjoyed his company. He was an idiot, true, and so vastly different to Arthur it was almost uncanny, and yet Arthur had grown to enjoy their time together, their conversations, the comfortable silences between them. To sincerely enjoy it, even if he wouldn't tell Merlin. Merlin would probably just grin widely and reply with an offhanded yet oddly deep quote pertaining to friendship or something, a comment that Arthur would only realise later held any real meaning.

Merlin was like that, Arthur had come to realise. His depth was at times hidden beneath superficial brightness, but it was certainly there. It just perhaps took some time to discern. Just as it had taken Arthur some time to see him like that.

Arthur had always quite simply categorised potential partners into 'possible's and 'discarded'. He didn't think himself cruel to do so; it was simply a matter of preference, of personal tastes in which fellow men and women he spent his time with. More often than not, vastly more often, such preferences were based upon physicality, and such partners thence discarded days or even hours later when their character and intelligence was found to be wanting. It was Arthur's process. It was how he worked.

Somehow, his impression of Merlin seemed to have been flipped. He hadn't considered, not even for a second, any kind of attraction, and it wasn't because he was a frog. Arthur's mind was still very much human, even if his body denied him that truth. It was distinctly human thoughts that rose to the fore as he stared at where Merlin stretched along the jetty before him, a surprised and dawning understanding of what he had never suspected capable of arising. It was baffling, confusing, and for the first time when contemplating any kind of relationship Arthur was unhinged because –

The thought abruptly snapped off when he saw the snake. Something in Arthur's subconsciousness kicked in, some kind of uncharacteristic protectiveness and sudden panic. The snake wasn't quite touching Merlin, wasn't quite on top of him, but was close enough that a darting bite to the face could prove dangerous. Arthur reacted instinctively.

In a jump that took him fully on top of Merlin's chest, he barked out a sharp and yes, slightly panicked, "Merlin!"

The snake reacted at the same time that Merlin did. Blessedly, somehow Merlin managed to either move faster than it or anticipate its behaviour. As the snake swung its head towards Arthur, forked tongue spitting from its mouth, Merlin was lurching into sitting and seemingly reflexively reaching for it. Arthur was thrown from his chest and onto the jetty in an awkward splat as Merlin's fingers locked around the nape of the snake's neck.

The suddenness, the unexpectedness and the panic was over in a second. Arthur rolled himself into a less tangled position and any lingering hysteria was vanquished to the sound of Merlin's brief, slightly incredulous laugh. Righting himself, climbed to his feet, Arthur turned towards Merlin and the snake both to find Merlin staring down at him with a mixture of amusement, surprise and confusion. It was a strange picture he made, half reclined and holding the length of a grass snake aloft at his side in one hand. Even stranger for the residue of Arthur's unexpected epiphany that seemed to draw his gaze across every plane of his face, catching upon his dimple and the curve of his lips, the brightness of merriment in his eyes as they swirled briefly golden. It made it impossible to be truly annoyed at him.

But then, Arthur couldn't remember the last time he'd been really irritated by Merlin. That reality in itself was strange.

"What just happened?" Merlin asked, laughter still touching his tone as he glanced from Arthur to the snake held in his hand. Arthur couldn't understand snake speech, but he was fairly certain the creature grasped in Merlin's hand wasn't amused. "Kilgharrah, please tell me you didn't just try to eat Arthur."

Kilgharrah. Ah. Arthur hadn't even registered that the snake was familiar to Merlin, had only seen Snake! and for some irrational reason – irrational because he was a bloody frog – acted reflexively. Of course the snake wouldn't hurt Merlin. Even if it were one he didn't know it wouldn't have hurt him. Arthur understood that now. He knew that and…

Yes, he felt a little bit like an idiot himself in that moment.

Struggling to smother his rapidly rising embarrassment, his mortification for acting so out of character, Arthur cleared his throat. "Pardon me for my distress," Arthur said shortly. "But a snake isn't exactly high on my priority list of species I feel comfortable in close proximity of."

Merlin glanced towards him from where he'd apparently – probably – been listening to Kilgharrah saying something. He raised an eyebrow at Arthur, smile widening. "Understandable, yeah." He sighed a little dramatically. "And here's me thinking from what Kilgharrah said that you seemed to be worried about me."

Stupid snake, Arthur muttered to himself but otherwise ignored the serpent entirely. "Well, that too."

Merlin's eyebrow twitched higher. "Really?"

"Of course," Arthur said with a nod. "How else would I manage to get back to the house if you didn't tame that beast you call a horse for long enough to get astride it?"

Merlin was silent and staring for all of a second before he burst out laughing. His smile widened further, eyes closing as he tilted his head back. Arthur couldn't help but stare. What had happened to him? All for one simple, passing thought, one realisation, and he could only stare a little wonderingly. Merlin wasn't outstandingly attractive at first glance, but that was only 'at first glance'. He had unusual features that were somehow more captivating for their uniqueness. Arthur wondered how he could have overlooked that, even in the throughs of the magical mania.

Even as he thought as much, Merlin was rising to his feet – a little awkwardly and clumsily, for which Arthur couldn't help but be fondly exasperated by for it's contrast to his previous impression – and carrying the snake to the end of the jetty. He lowered it to the ground, spared a murmured word for the gaze turned almost sceptically towards him, before the snake seemed to shake its head in its own exasperation and disappear into the short grasses surrounding the dam. Arthur hadn't realised the instinctive nervousness that had flooded through him until he was suddenly relieved of it, the feeling faded with Kilgharrah's absence.

Merlin returned to his side a moment later, crouching down to offer him his palm. "Good swim?"

Arthur instinctively shrugged as he climbed into the proffered hand, even knowing logically that he was incapable of adequately conducting such a gesture. Merlin always seemed able to discern it anyway. "Define good."

Merlin smirked. "You couldn't just say yes?" He asked.

"Why would I do that?"

"Life would be far simpler for you if you were just a little bit less objectionable."

"Maybe I enjoy being objectionable," Arthur replied as Merlin turned and started from the jetty once more. He deliberately turned from Merlin towards where Mordred, as though anticipating their approaching departure, stood dripping with ears pricked to attention at the shoreline. It was easier than looking up at Merlin and being assaulted with the confusing yet certainly intriguing afterthought. He would certainly have to think about that.

"You know, I could have pegged you for that," Merlin muttered, seemingly more to himself than to Arthur. Arthur didn't reply and none was apparently necessary. They departed promptly.

The rest of the day Arthur considered. He thought and he watched as he followed Merlin through his afternoon duties. He only grew more baffled and surprised by the moment, because it was simply so unexpected. This was Merlin, who he had known for two months – admittedly longer than most of his temporary partners – and who he had only grown familiar with at all due to extenuating circumstances of the absolutely impossible variety. Arthur hadn't even liked him for the first few weeks of their acquaintance. When had that changed exactly? When they'd visited Cardiff? Afterwards, when Merlin had drawn him from his melancholic slump of despair? Arthur wasn't sure exactly, but at some point their relationship had evolved into something that wasn't quite friendship but certainly wasn't simply teasing antagonism anymore.

Arthur had always found himself drawn more women than men. He'd had his phase of curiosity, and though he'd often found relationships with men easier, more agreeable even, it was simply more often than he found himself in the company of women. Except for the past two months, anyway, in which Emerson estate had practically become his world. Until Merlin had become the one he'd spent the most time with, had almost solely spoken to, had even come to appreciate his familiarity with.

That surprising realisation, that surprising attraction… it added a whole new layer, a new dimension to the mix. An intriguing, unexpected dimension that was made only utterly infuriating for one particular fact.

Arthur was a frog.

Fucking hell, what had his life become?

Another storm struck that night. It seemed to be the month for it, something that Arthur was only truly aware of because of the additional work it added onto the long list of that which Merlin and the other farm workers already had to perform. Gwaine barged through the door at just after nightfall, dripping wet and staggering into the dining room with heavy, panting breaths and a wide grin upon his face. Merlin all but ignored the intrusion while Hunith slowly lowered her fork to her plate and affixed him with an unblinking stare.

"Gwaine. Go and take yourself for a shower."

Gwaine's grin only widened, not a hint of sheepishness to his expression. Arthur had hardly seen him since he'd offered to help Merlin with his chores two afternoons ago, and then only briefly. "Sounds like a marvellous idea," he said, immediately turning on his heel and starting back out of the room.

"You're cleaning up the mess you walked in by the way, Gwaine," Merlin called, glancing over his shoulder after him.

"Aw," Gwaine called back distantly. "Won't you be a darl and help a man out, Merls?"

"Hell no," Merlin replied, turning back to his dinner. "I'm not that nice."

What utter bullshit, Arthur couldn't help but think to himself. He was actually more surprised that Merlin hadn't suggested he do so straight away. Good on him for making that lazy arse do it himself. It was with a touch of satisfaction that Arthur turned back to his own dinner; he even managed to consume it with something less than constant and reflexive gagging. Arthur fathomed he was getting better at that.

"Do you want me to take you out to the greenhouse, Arthur?" Merlin asked as he cleaned the dishes after dinner, Hunith bustling around behind him.

"Oh, yes, that might be a good idea, Merlin," Hunith said. "It's blowing an appalling gale outside. We wouldn't want you to get swept away, Arthur." She smiled fondly at Arthur as she wiped her hands on a tea towel.

Arthur only shook his head. He didn't much fancy going out into the storm when it was still raging so violently, and he doubted that Merlin would either. Why he'd asked in the first place was… well, that was simply Merlin's habit, but Arthur wasn't so heartless as to force him to do so. "No, I'll take myself. I'll just wait until it eases up a little bit."

"You sure?" Merlin asked, draining the sink and washing his hands free of suds with clean water. He flicked a peppering shower towards Arthur as he did so, the cool droplets coating Arthur's skin that Arthur absently spread with a brush of his hands over his head. "I don't mind."

"If it's all the same to you, I mind," Arthur replied. Merlin only grinned before scooping him up and making his winding way up through the numerous hallways and storeys of the house to his room.

Arthur had become familiar with Merlin's room over the past months in a way that disregarded the cluttered mess and replaced his disdain for such untidiness with fondness for the quirkiness he beheld. He'd come to appreciate that the desk was slightly sloping, a product of being hand build from a distant ancestor. Merlin claimed he would never get rid of it because he 'liked its character', despite the fact that pens had a tendency to roll off sideways. Arthur liked the quirky little dragon-shaped bedside lamps – real dragons, not of the monitor variety – that Merlin always sighed over and shook his head for in memory of his father buying them for him years ago. Arthur suspected that regardless of how much he might seemed to uncharacteristically resent his father, there was no way he was getting rid of those lamps.

Arthur liked the casual messiness of shoes propped beside the door, of clothes discarded and half-hanging from the clothes hamper, of textbooks and novels lying scattered across the floor and desk chair as much as in the bookshelf itself. He'd even found one such book, alongside a highlighter and several pencils, wedged beneath he blankets of Merlin's bed one time a week before; Merlin had exclaimed that he'd wondered where it had disappeared to, and Arthur could only shake his head at the notion that Merlin hadn't even known he'd been sleeping in bed alongside a bloody textbook for God only knew how long.

And Arthur liked the bed. It wasn't as wide, as soft or as deep as his own, but he liked it anyway. Maybe it was simply that it was a bed, but for some reason he was always partial to perching himself between the plump folds of the quilt. Merlin didn't seem to mind, nor even hesitate for a second to spray him with a shower of water that inevitably dampened said quilt to keep him comfortable.

Merlin placed him upon the bed without comment before he began scouring the room, idly picking up clothes and tossing them in the vague direction of the hamper before scooping up an old shirt and slacks and disappearing briefly from the room to get changed. Arthur was abruptly grateful for that barely-considered modesty. Given his thoughts of the day, he didn't think it a particularly good idea to see Merlin without such privacy. In reality, normally, Arthur wouldn't have had a problem with it, would have even encouraged it, but being a frog sort of put a dampener on such things.

Besides, it felt sort of… wrong, to so look without Merlin even understanding what he was thinking. Arthur was as startled as he was sure for his stance in that regard.

"I swear to God, if Gwaine forgets his bloody towel one more time…" Merlin muttered as he returned, shaking his head and rolling his eyes as he did.

Arthur glanced towards him. He'd clearly just used the shower, if ridiculously briefly in Arthur's opinion for he'd barely been gone for five minutes. His hair was still damp, sticking up just slightly as he ran his fingers over his head. Arthur could almost see the warmth of steam radiating from his body. What it would be like to be really warm again…

"Did he rope you in to fetching him one?" Arthur asked. He didn't dislike Gwaine, not really, and could even identify a kindred spirit in him in many ways. But even so, the unconscious dismissal he perceived from him because of Arthur's current amphibious form would always be a barrier between them.

Merlin snorted approached the bed, a second cool, damp towel in hand that he offered to Arthur and propped on the quilt in a familiar nest that Arthur immediately climbed atop. Then Merlin slumped back onto the bed beside him, sprawling flat on his back with a sigh. "Not hardly. He doesn't give a shit, just does a runner through the house."

Arthur blinked, then frowned. Or at least he tried to; his lack of eyebrows tended to make such an expression difficult to assume. "Really? It's not even his own house."

Merlin shot him a sidelong glance. "Are you trying to preach modesty to me? You?"

Ignoring the statement and what it entailed – Arthur didn't need reminding of some of his more compromising media scandals from the past – Arthur shook his head. "I'd have though your mum would hound him to have a little more respect, is all. She seems to be a bit of a stickler for that sort of thing."

Merlin nodded absently, smirking up at the ceiling. "Yeah, well, it's not like she hasn't seen it all before. It's been something of a habit of his since we dated."

Any further words pertaining to Hunith died on Arthur's tongue in surprise. "Wait. You dated Gwaine?"

Glancing towards him without rolling his head, Merlin cracked a smile. "Is it that surprising?"

"And you're still friends with him?" Arthur asked, ignoring Merlin's words. They were still friends after breaking up because they had to have broken up. Arthur was sure of it, because they weren't… he was sure they weren't… they weren't still dating. Couldn't be. Suddenly, that fact was something Arthur wanted to make very clear. "Why?"

Merlin shifted until he rolled on his shoulder, turning towards Arthur and curling an arm under his head. He frowned slightly, his smile dying. "What's wrong with still being friends with him?"

Arthur turned more fully towards him in turn, struggling to thrust back his unease. It was likely – almost certainly – a product of his surprising revelation of that day, but abruptly Arthur found he wasn't really all that fond of Gwaine after all. "It's not normal is what's wrong with it."

Strangely, Merlin's confusion and vague disgruntlement eased at that. He even smiled a little. "Oh. Well, that's fine. I've never really seen Gwaine or myself as being particularly normal."

"Were you friends before you were dating?" Arthur asked. For reasons he chose to ignore for the moment, he very much found himself wanting to know the details.

Merlin shook his head, which only enhanced Arthur's desire to properly frown. "No, we actually met in my first year of uni and started dating. Then we just stayed friends after we broke up. Gwaine's like that with most of his exes."

"That is entirely abnormal."

Merlin smiled once more. "Yeah, well, like I said, Gwaine isn't exactly normal. I've always known that."

"Neither are you," Arthur pointed out, reminding him of his own words. And Arthur's opinion, for that matter, though 'abnormal' wasn't quite as aversive to him in this regard as it perhaps should have been. As it once had been.

The smile on Merlin's lips died slightly, enough that Arthur abruptly regretted his words. "Yeah, and that's fine. I don't really want to be normal anyway either."

"I didn't mean it as a bad thing,' Arthur muttered. He wished he could retract the words almost as soon as he'd said them for how embarrassing they sounded. Really, how humiliating…

Merlin didn't tease him, however. He only offered a small smile that wasn't quite the wide grin he usually wore. "Thanks, Arthur," he said, reaching out to prod Arthur on the top of his head. Arthur let him; from anyone else he would have objected but with Merlin – Merlin he would let. Just this once, anyway.

They fell silent for a time. Arthur wasn't particularly surprised at that; Merlin was an 'early to bed, early to rise' sort of person, and for the amount of work he managed to squeeze into a day, roaring at a rapid pace with the exception of the moments he would spend reading through textbooks or pausing for lunch, it was no surprise that he would exhaust his energy reserves earlier than most young men in their early twenties. Arthur found it at once a ludicrous and also, strangely, just a little fondly amusing.

Merlin's eyes had slipped closed and Arthur was almost convinced he'd fallen to sleep when he spoke again. "You… I've never heard that you've had a steady girlfriend before, Arthur," he murmured.

Arthur froze. Admittedly he hadn't been really moving, but he felt himself still internally too. This was going into dangerous territory. "No," he said shortly.

Merlin's eyes blinked open slowly. He did look ridiculously tired, head dropping heavily into his pillowing arm, but he seemed determined to stay awake for at least a little longer. "Why not?"

Biting back the automatic reply of "Because I don't want one or need one!" Arthur took a slow, deep breath. He didn't want to get angry or indignant for once, and that reason was because he was speaking to Merlin. Because when Merlin asked, there was no accusation, no condescension or pity. He always genuinely asked Arthur, as though he were speaking to an equal rather than a prince.

Arthur surprisingly found that he actually quite liked that. He'd come to really like that over the past few weeks. That neutrality and equality deserved a proper answer.

"There's not really a particular reason," he replied as nonchalantly as he could. "I simply don't have the inclination to… settle down with one person."

That at least was the truth. Arthur had always had something that was… it was almost like fear that he would miss out for lack of searching, of seeking and trying, in every aspect of his life. It was the same with his partners; if Arthur stopped searching, settled for one person, no matter how wonderful they were, he would be missing out on the new, the unseen, the unprecedented. How did one know they'd found the perfect person when they'd met so few people?

Arthur wouldn't take that chance. Not when perfect was unattainable as it was. What would he be missing out on?

"You don't want to settle down," Merlin murmured, and the touch of sadness in his tone was what drew Arthur's attention back towards him. There was no rebuke in his expression – if there had been, Arthur would have snapped in sudden fury because no one had the right to rebuke him – but simply a slight wistfulness. Almost regretful but no, not rebuking. Arthur hadn't ever had someone speak as such to him before. "That's… kind of a little sad, Arthur."

"It's not sad," Arthur replied, shifting slightly in his towel nest. He tried not to get angry and was surprised when it was easier than he'd anticipated. He found he simply didn't want to get angry with Merlin. "It's my decision."

"Don't you ever wonder what you might miss out on, though?"

Arthur blinked. What he might…? He blinked again, confused. Yes, he did. And that was one of the primary reasons didn't want to – couldn't – simply settle with one person. That was just – what Merlin was saying was just –

Before Arthur could reply, Merlin was speaking again. His words were little more than a murmur grounded in a sigh, his eyes blinking in slow weariness. "I've always thought it would be wonderful to have just one special person. To have someone that you can talk to about absolutely anything and feel entirely comfortable with. One person who thinks the world of you and who wants to be with you more than absolutely anyone else." He huffed sigh that was barely more than an exhalation and closed his eyes briefly. When he blinked them open one more, there was a distant, distracted cast to his gaze that wasn't solely attributed to sleepiness. "Wouldn't that be nice too?"

Arthur stared. He stared long and silently, unable to speak a word. Just one person, one person who was more important than anyone else in the world and who he wanted to be around more than anyone. Who he was entirely comfortable with, who didn't judge him for what he wasn't and accepted what he was. Arthur had never contemplated as much before. His entire life he'd been independent and sought what he wanted alone, relying on no one else. He'd never wanted that before.

Arthur didn't realise he'd spoken his final thought aloud until Merlin spoke a murmur in reply. "That's awfully lonely, Arthur."

Once more there was no rebuke in Merlin's voice. No reprimand for not thinking such a way, and to Arthur's ears it sounded almost as though Merlin was considering his own situation introspectively. Just as Arthur was himself.

With a long, slow breath, Arthur heaved a sigh to rid himself of the hanging cloud of unexpected confusion and consideration. "Well, it's not like it matters now. I can't imagine many people would exactly want to spend the rest of their life with a frog." Arthur tried not to let as much misery and resentment as wished to arise in his tone shunted to the back of his mind.

Merlin didn't reply. Not immediately, anyway. He stared at Arthur for a long time, long and slowly blinking, and Arthur found himself locked in his gaze. He'd never really noticed it before, but Merlin had very blue eyes. Dark, not the eerie flatness of Mordred's, and deeply unwavering. When he didn't speak they were absented of their golden tinge, and it was perhaps because of that more than anything that Arthur hadn't realised. He couldn't help but stare right back.

"I'm sorry, Arthur," Merlin finally said. He sounded genuinely regretful, too. "I'm sorry I couldn't help you."

Arthur struggled to shake his head. It was ridiculous that Merlin would feel any such guilt, even if Arthur accepted that, however briefly, he had pinned his own blame to him weeks before. "It's hardly your fault, Merlin."

"I know," Merlin replied with a sigh that was a mixture of that persisting guilt and weariness. "But I'm still sorry. And just so you know, you really are free to stay here just as long as you want."

Arthur would have smiled if he could. Really smiled, actually grateful for the first time in… could it really have been years? Unfortunately, a frog's lips weren't conducive to such expressions and his attempts were in vain. "I… thank you, Merlin."

"Any time," Merlin said easily. They were such commonplace words, practically a platitude, but from Merlin they actually sounded sincere. Heartfelt, as though he really would offer the same any time Arthur had need. "And – I mean, it's hardly the equivalent, but…" Visibly struggling to prop himself up on an elbow, Merlin leaned towards Arthur. Surprisingly, unexpectedly – as was the recurring way with Merlin – he dropped his chin to press a brief, small kiss atop Arthur's head.

Arthur could only stare at him, speechless as he drew away with a slight smile and slumped back on the bed, head dropping to the pillow this time. "I might not be as exceptionally royal as you or Princess Guinevere, but whatever."

Slowly, Arthur eased himself back more fully onto his seat. It was that or face plant forwards in his continued surprise. Who in their right mind would want to kiss a frog? "Why did you do that?"

Merlin appeared to have signed off for the night with his spontaneous gesture. It didn't seem to have fazed him in the slightest. His eyes had slipped closed once more and he'd rolled onto his belly, half burying his face in the pillow. "Well, enough frogs have asked me for just that in the past. It sort of seems poetic that I should do it at least once. Especially when a real prince is right in front of me."

Arthur had to clamp down upon the upwelling of something akin to relief, to gratitude, that rose within him with Merlin's words. He'd never really wanted to be a prince in the first place but… at least someone still sees me as who I am. "So it was for entirely selfish reasons, then?"

"Entirely," Merlin murmured sleepily.

Arthur didn't believe him for a second, but he didn't voice his thoughts. Instead, he simply settled back on his haunches and watched as Merlin's breathing slowly eased and smoothed, as he considered what an entirely selfless act Merlin had taking him in, caring for him and seeking to help him really was. Why he'd done that Arthur still didn't fully comprehend. He wasn't sure he ever would.

But as he sat in his nest of damp towels, the cold wetness easing the tightness of his skin from the air-conditioned room, Arthur couldn't help but think. He couldn't help but acknowledge the understanding that arose in response to Merlin's words.

If there was only ever going to be one person… if it was Merlin, it probably wouldn't be that bad.

Arthur knew his own thoughts to be an understatement, even as he closed his eyes and let the shallow mimic of sleep that he always assumed envelope him.