eight

Merlin was sitting in the counter of Gaius' shop, swinging his legs to the beat of a just remembered school hymn, his eyes set on the pencil he was spinning in midair. This action enacted his first ever memory, his mother having brought his up to the city at the age of five. He remembered his mother's flustered excuses for the levitating writing implements and his uncle understanding smile and production of an ice lolly from the fridge.

As if on cue, Gaius entered from the back of the shop, just in time to see the pencil clatter guiltily to the floor. He slapped Merlin across the back of the head with a smile, it may have been playful but it hurt.

"No ice lolly now then." Merlin grinned, ducking before he received another push. The grinned at each other in guilty comradeship. Gaius never mentioned his past but his nephew always got the impression, in the way children innocently do, that Gaius may have done all the things he warned his nephew against and more beside.

Merlin's phone started to ring, the Buffy theme tune, much to Gaius' amusement. He scrambled to find it on the floor, answering on the seventh ring.

"Merlin?"

Merlin sighed, Arthur.

"Who else, what do you want me to get you now?"

The muffled voice on the other end sounded perplexed, "Nothing, I just wanted to give you directions for tonight."

"Tonight?"

"My party," a note of superior sarcasm entered his voice "Surely you hadn't forgotten."

"You've been worrying about nothing else. Why do I want directions to your party?"

He heard the dramatic eye role over the over side of the line. "Honestly Merlin, there a village somewhere missing their idiot. You're invited to my party obviously."

Merlin tried to find an answer to this statement that wasn't an unintelligible 'Whaaat?'

"As a guest?" he asked.

Definitely another eye role "No as the half time entertainment. Of course you idiot."

"Pratt," Merlin rejoined "You never said anything."

"Well I assumed you'd realise you were invited, you ignorant plebe."

Merlin bit his tongue, trying to ignore the amused look on his uncle's face.

"No you just assumed I'd assume, you…you … clotpole."

There was a silence long enough for Gaius to mouth 'clotpole'.

"Anyway," Arthur said superciliously "your to be there 7o'clock sharp, the party starts at half past." He reeled off the address, having to repeat it twice with a long suffering air for Merlin to write it down.

"Oh and another thing."

Merlin made no reply, still writing down the postcode.

"It's fancy dress, the themes medieval. See you at seven, idiot."

"Whaaat!" cried Merlin to a now silent phone.

He turned to Gaius. "He is the most proud selfish prattiest…clotpole in the whole of Camelot. He's the…"

Gaius cut him off, "You quite like him then."

Merlin gaped at his uncle, his tirade cut off. "No," he said slowly "I just called him a clotpole."

"What is a clotpole anyway?" He held up a hand to stop Merlin from answering. "So I assume you'll be out tonight?"

"I suppose I'll have to." Merlin moaned "But it's fancy dress, Medieval apparently."

The metaphorical light bulb seemed to go off in Gaius' face. "I might have something."

He whipped up the stairs at the back of the shop returning minutes latter.

"Here." He threw a bundle of cloth to Merlin who caught it clumsily. "I was going to throw it out."

Merlin expected to find something rank and moth eaten, but what he held was a simple bright blue tunic. It also smelt quite pleasant, like lavender moth balls.

"I must have worn that to a collage party." Gaius mused. "I'd wear a belt with it and dark trousers, perhaps that old brown jacket of your mothers been trying to throw out since you were sixteen."

Merlin smiled, he hadn't worn that jacket since Arthur had accidentally used it as a makeshift pillow in the run up to his exams.

"Gaius I don't know how too..."

"Go!" the elderly wizard laughed, pushing his nephew out the door. "And mind you don't stay up too late. Last time I went to one of Uthur Pendragon's parties I had the most horrendous hangover in the morning."

"Hang on, you and Arthur's dad…"

Gaius closed the door with a smile leaving Merlin and his question outside.