CHAPTER 10 : SNOW INTERFERETH

Snow this early in the season was annoying to say the least. It was heavy but small flaked. The wind swirled it around and cut visibility drastically. Merlin knew as they were trudging up a treed slope that leaving the others hadn't been such a great idea. Arthur of course went first and every time he knocked a branch, Merlin felt as if the heavens had opened up triple time.

It was the opposite of a bright sunny day when the snow lay on the ground and decorated everything as in childhood wonder, giving tree stumps marshmallow hats and fir trees skirts. It was grey, foggy and freezing cold. Merlin was actually getting worried about finding accommodation for the night which was bound to come regardless of how far Arthur wished to travel.

"Arthur, maybe we should start to go back or at least look around for somewhere to hole up. It's not too early to call it a day."

"You know, Merlin, you are one of the most pessimistic beings I've ever known. This is just an inconvenience not the end of the world."

"It will be if no one finds our bodies until the spring!" He said sarcastically which earned him a cuff across the head. He smiled, he was now able to read those cuffs and that one could be translated as 'I wish I'd thought of saying that'.

Arthur turned and smiled at him. Merlin's heart did its usually up-tempo beat and he grinned back. Since the summer, Arthur and he had an understanding, that a smile meant that everything was copasetic. Merlin laughed remembering how long it was before Arthur could remember the word. He's tried everything from operatic to copulate to capacious before he had finally got it straight and then Merlin had to put up with a week of hearing it used at least a dozen times a day.

There still was that other smile but Merlin no longer found it threatening. He saw it as representing friendliness. Although he had never really encouraged it, it no longer upset him and he didn't pull away. He'd even seen one of the knights use it when his little son, a page had been credited for good service. It was a softening of the eyes, the face relaxed and a smile gently spread across the face. Merlin realised it represented love.

But there were so many kinds of love that he just smiled back gently. As if saying, 'Yes, Arthur I like you too.' It was not frightening as he knew that Arthur would never hurt him and he seemed quite happy to receive an acknowledging smile.

Merlin however had reached another stage in his life. He was able to understand the feelings he had. Not that he had done anything to reinforce them but they no longer worried him and he just went about his way, secure that he felt safe and happy with Arthur.

Not now however, as the weather and footing were getting worse. "Arthur, this seems to be a more level path, let's follow it." And follow it they did but it petered out when it reached a grazing area and a ruin of some building or other.

"Well, I'm not sheltering here, look at it, the roof could come down if a bird landed on it and I hazard to guess who the last inhabitants were. Anyway, I wouldn't be able to stand upright."

"Arthur, if you are sleeping you won't be upright, will you?"

No answer, so Merlin put his head down and followed his lord and master.

So, on they trudged but finally faced by cliffs and a river, Arthur agreed to backtrack to the ruin. Merlin was impressed as backtracking was another word which wasn't in Arthur's vocabulary. He would have been quite at home in the 'Westward Ho' era.

Merlin scouted around and collected comparatively dry, branches that were under fir trees. They'd need a fire as he could no longer feel his toes and his clothes and bedroll were snow covered.

Arthur had climbed over small boulders which had obviously years ago formed a wall, and said, "It's dry in here. Someone must have stayed here as there are the remains of a fire pit. We could stay unless you want to retrace our steps further."

The snow was still very heavy and building up quickly. None of the lazy large flakes to which they were more accustomed. The man in charge decided, "We'll call it a day."

Merlin came in his arms full of fir boughs which he threw into a corner.

"Hey! The fire pit is here," said Arthur pointing to the darkened area of earth.

"Well, I intend to lie in comfort on something soft. You make them into a bed and I'll start a fire."

Arthur was hopeless with fires; the air was blue before he ever got a spark. He therefore, didn't offer anymore. He came back with a handful of dry grasses which he'd found near the entrance to the ruin. It caught quickly and Merlin felt a little better having not only light but hopefully some heat in the near future.

He turned to see how Arthur had made out with the bed. He'd done a good job but Merlin would have preferred something less high but wider. Arthur looked up and Merlin smiled, "Good job, you could go into the rustic furniture business. Actually, when you become king, if you should find it not to your liking, you could consider trekking as an alternate career. 'Arthur's Albion Adventures' has a nice ring to it. Doesn't it?"

"Merlin, you just can't decide not to be a king. It's a royal honour, a responsibility from birth. I have been tutored and trained for it since infancy."

"Oh," said Merlin smiling, "That explains what's wrong with you!" As he was talking he opened up his bed roll, giving it a good shake before placing it close to the fire doing the same with Arthur's. "One thing about this snow it seems dry, look you can just brush it off," he gave himself a shake and brushed off all the areas that he could reach.

"I thought the fir boughs were like a bed to keep us off the ground."

"They will but by the time we're ready to turn in our bedrolls will be nice and warm. It's not going to get any warmer overnight so we need to take precautions. We don't want to get frostbitten pieces, do we?"

Arthur raised his eyebrows in a knowing way and Merlin laughed. "No, not exactly what I had in mind but you never know. Stranger things have happened. I remember seeing a man in my village whose toes swelled up and turned black because he had been drinking, slipped into a stream and his feet were frozen in the ice the next morning."

"Merlin, you're making it up!"

"I'm not. I helped hang onto him when they tried to pull his boots off and some weeks later my mother had to cut off his toes as they were technically dead and rotting."

That shut Arthur up but he scooted forward so that his feet were a little closer to the fire.

Merlin searched in his knapsack and found bread, dried pork strips and four small apples. "Sorry, it won't be a culinary masterpiece but it will get us through the night." He took the apples carefully running them through with his knife, then spearing them on an elm branch, to toast them over the fire until the skins were crisp. "Not exactly stewed apple but maybe if you close your eyes, it will taste better."

Arthur tried one careful not to burn his mouth and finally said, "You know, Merlin, of all the concoctions you have made while we have been sleeping rough, this is maybe my favourite."

"Or maybe, it's the company?" Merlin froze, why in heaven's name had he said that? It had just popped into his head and slipped out. He'd been so careful over the last couple of weeks that he hadn't said fooling, something which he might later regret. He dropped his head mortified knowing full well that by Arthur's sigh, he could hazard which smile now adorned his face.

But a strange thought flashed through his mind, did he regret saying it? It was the truth but something which he hadn't thought that he was yet ready to reveal. He did like Arthur in 'that way'. He'd even acknowledged it to Gaius but he hadn't realised until this very moment that he had wanted to let Arthur know…well not yet.

He stood up all business like and said, "I'll clear up here and bank up the fire, you lie out the bedrolls."

Side by side, the bedrolls almost fitted on the pine bough bed. Merlin pulled a few of the boughs out a little further so that he would feel more comfortable not encroaching on Arthur. Arthur lay down and Merlin glanced at him. He looked quite comfortable, "Are you all right?"

"Yes! …and you?"

"It's a great bed, Arthur, it's dry and warm."

"Do you think that we will have any visitors over night?"

"Maybe a few mice but I doubt it, as most animals will be curled up nice and warm in their own beds."

"Like us?"

"Yes, Arthur like us…" with those words Merlin rolled onto his side away from Arthur and settled to sleep.

Arthur lay on his back, thinking. Lying here in this little ruin, in the middle of a storm wasn't too bad but he realised that it was not the lack of snow and the warm fire which affected his thoughts it was after all, what Merlin had said earlier, about it being the company.

-0-O-0-

Arthur woke up later conscious of something close to him. He lay perfectly still trying to figure out what is was. Then, he heard the gentle breathing and realised it was Merlin. He must have turned during his sleep and now he was stretched out against him from his feet to his chest. He realised that his head was tucked into him near his armpit, so he gradually moved his arm so that he could shield him from the cold. As his arm encircled him, Merlin sighed and shifted slightly closer to him. In the dark, Arthur allowed a smile of satisfaction to creep across his face and was then shocked to feel quite emotional. Merlin had sought him out… true it was probably because of the cold but it showed common ground or at least he hoped it did.

He angled his head slightly so that it touched Merlin's and fell asleep…