Disclaimer: Merlin is not mine.
There was something extremely undignified, Arthur decided, about sitting in a chair in his own bedchambers, bleeding and waiting for someone to come in and yell at him.
Someone was bound to come eventually. He may have had his share of random lazy days, but there was almost always something that needed his signature or seal or presence. Someone would come. And he wasn't entirely sure why he seemed to be hoping that it would happen soon. He was bound to get into trouble for it.
It wasn't so much that he was lonely, he knew, or that recent events were making him want to cling more desperately to the people that he most loved. It wasn't even that he was just sad and wanted company, even if that company was going to be less than pleased with him. It was just that there was so much going through his head that he couldn't decide what he should choose to think about and, if he weren't alone, at least he'd have a distraction. Probably a noisy distraction.
Although he was somewhat surprised that he was being left alone. He hadn't bothered trying to keep the news of Merlin's return quiet. What was the point? It was Merlin's own fault for making what may have been the most conspicuous reappearance that was physically possible. The news had probably spread through the majority of the citadel like the fire that would no doubt some day ignite in his castle and burn down the council room, with alarming swiftness and a total absence of pity. But no matter. Arthur may have had a lot of things going through his head and may have been having some difficulty prioritizing, but even he had to admit that hypothetical future destructions of parts of the castle probably should not be very high on the list.
They would probably all happen anyway. He might as well enjoy the element of surprise.
Absently, Arthur looked down at his bloody hand. It had almost stopped bleeding. It probably would have stopped entirely by then if he hadn't kept flexing his palm experimentally every time that it started to slow. He just kept figuring that one of these times, it would have to work.
But now it was only oozing a little bit. He wiped his hand carefully on his once-white tunic—already covered with bloody handprints from his first attempts at staunching the flow—and looked at his palm again. It was still a sort of vague pinkish color, contrasted by the stark whiteness of the sliced skin that had been so needlessly opened. Examining it, he figured that at the very least, it would make an interesting scar. Most of his scars were just straight or oblong. Relatively boring. This would be the shape of the sort of lightning that struck the ground rather than just lit up the sky and that Arthur always found exciting, no matter how undesirable a storm may have been at a given time. Assuming that it didn't get infected and fall off, his hand had just become more exciting.
As exciting as hands got, anyway.
There was a sudden knock at his main chamber door—a distinct knock, knock, knock, knock that identified that the knocker as his manservant. Knights and guards rarely had the patience to knock more than twice, and most others were people with general admittance to his chambers or people who had no business being near them. Robert, even after half of a year in Arthur's service, remained uncomfortable with anything that could even slightly be construed as an invasion of the king's personal space, and he always knocked four times. Arthur, even after half of a year of Robert's service, remained slightly uncomfortable with the distance. But the knock was what he had been waiting for ever since he had cut his hand. Wasn't it?
Arthur opened his mouth to beckon the servant inside, but thought better of it. Feeling like a coward, he just sat motionless in his chair and listened to the second series of four knocks. Maybe he didn't want company. Or maybe he just didn't want that of his current manservant. It didn't matter anyway. After Arthur had not responded to the knocks, Robert would go away. He had a very strict routine for cleaning Arthur's chambers, and the only deviations came during tourneys or emergencies. He could have suspected Arthur of slowly bleeding to death within—which Arthur would be if he didn't stop reopened his wounds—and refused to enter without permission. By the time he'd found Guinevere and been granted access, Arthur would probably be dead.
As far as Robert knew just then, however, Arthur was just somewhere else and it was not time for him to enter. Merlin would have barged in, but Robert had more discretion. Arthur spent more time alone because of it.
Not that Merlin had been that great of company anyway. Just…there.
Again.
And it was all over the place.
The news of Merlin's arrival had no doubt become common knowledge among his peasants while he and Merlin were still making awkward small talk. The only topic that was currently threatening to overshadow the return of the banished sorcerer, Arthur knew, was that he had in fact returned on a dragon. And that the dragon was currently waiting patiently on top of the castle. As far as he knew, however, Arthur was the only one wondering what was wrong with Merlin that he seemed to think that the people of Camelot had such short memories that they did not recall the massacre of their friends and families during the dragon attacks of only a few years before.
Arthur was slightly worried that he seemed to be the only one wondering about that. The people were no doubt upset about the dragon, but he knew that a significant number of them were probably attributing Merlin's bringing it to Camelot as malice on the part of the young man, rather than foolishness. Stupid Merlin. How could he claim that Arthur didn't think things through?
Arthur flexed his hand again and immediately regretted it as the blood began to seep very slightly past the edges of the cut. Would the damn thing never heal? At least, heal enough for him to be able to use it without opening it up with every little twitch of his finger? Frustrated, Arthur put his hands palm together, hoping that the pressure of the uninjured hand would help to staunch the injury as quickly as possible. Sitting back in his chair, he felt rather silly as he held his hands together out in front of him. Sighing, he looked at his hands. And he saw another scar.
Not the most flattering of his many scars.
It wasn't so much a disfiguring scar. Most people didn't even know that he had it, and it was only visible if a person knew to look for it. But there it was, on his dominant hand, right between the knuckles of his middle and forefinger.
He was glad that most people didn't know that he had it.
Not that it hadn't been an enjoyable night when he'd received it. No, it had been fun up until the…incident. He hadn't married Guinevere yet, so there was no one waiting for him so as to exclaim over the stained handkerchief being clutched over his hand. It was altogether a clean affair, so far as it was possible for kings to cut themselves with daggers in taverns. Kings shouldn't even be in taverns. It had been a bad idea from he start.
Fun, though, for an inappropriate tavern game.
Merlin had wisely refrained from joining in. He was still known to nick himself when handling Arthur's broadsword before a battle or tourney; engaging in an activity that involved repeatedly stabbing the wood between his fingers with as much speed as possible seemed like a distinctly un-Merlin sort of game. And Merlin had seemed to be feeling slightly uncomfortable with the whole situation as it was. It had been primarily a night free of duty for the knights, and friendship aside, Merlin was always aware of the lowness of his own status in comparison.
Plus, as Arthur found out later, he hadn't counted on Arthur being present. So he was there at Arthur's side, as he had been so many times before, but not as Arthur's manservant. He had just been there as a…man. He couldn't blame Merlin for being uncomfortable.
Arthur also hadn't known until later that Merlin had actually been asked along for the evening. It shouldn't have surprised him—Merlin was as much a part of the group of knights as it was possible for a non-knight to be. But he'd assumed that Merlin had just been off in the tavern on his own, as he always seemed to be whenever Arthur needed him. Maybe he only liked to go to the tavern on his own when he was supposed to be working. That seemed far more conceivable than Merlin taking part in their game that night.
Gwaine wasn't playing either, although that hadn't been his choice. He had been, by general consensus, forbidden from playing by that point in the night. He was actually by far the best of them at this particular game and had insisted rather loudly that they were only disqualifying him because they knew that he would beat them all. However, as his insistences were distinctly slurred and he seemed to be seeing two hands for every one that he possessed, it was for his own safety that they had disqualified him.
Mostly. Drunk as he was, he probably would have won. Hell, playing with drunk Gwaine would have been comparable to playing with sober Merlin—it would have been entertaining and well-worth a few wagers for a while, but someone was sure to end up bleeding. As Gwaine had been past the point of feeling whether or not he had severed a thumb on one of his four hands, they had forced him out of the game.
In hindsight, one of them probably should have pointed out that it was not the wisest of games for the king of Camelot to be playing either. Especially in public. He hadn't exactly been as far gone as Gwaine was, but he knew now that kings should probably be entirely sober before stabbing a table between their fingers. So, really, it was entirely their fault that Arthur had ended up bleeding all over the damn table. No, Arthur was not to have been blamed, he thought in entirely righteous indignation. Knights were supposed to protect their king, were they not? Yes, it had been entirely their fault. Arthur's mortification was completely misplaced!
It didn't help that the table had been thereafter known by seemingly all of the patrons of that particular tavern as the King's Table.
Stupid knights. At the very least, they could have laughed less and focused more on providing a buffer between himself and the other drinkers of the night. He'd gotten the handkerchief from Merlin, who wasn't even a knight and wasn't even meant to be helping Arthur with anything that night.
Arthur sighed and dropped his hands back to his lap. The memory was serving to do nothing more than thrust him back into the problem that he was trying to avoid. Apparently, embarrassing memories were no better of buffers than were his knights on social occasions.
But it was too late. He'd thought about the people and the people had reminded him of Merlin and magic and legislation and it was all far more inconvenient than remembering self-inflicted wounds of the drunken variety.
The people…Arthur was just glad that the majority of the citizens clamoring about Merlin's return had not yet begun to wonder why he had come back. While he had no problem with the news of Merlin spreading around, he was not particularly anxious for news of Gaius' illness to get around. Not yet. They would find out, of course. They deserved to find out. Gaius had been their physician as well as his own. But this was a time for goodbyes, final goodbyes, and such farewells are worthy of privacy and focus. Merlin had the right to mourn for Gaius when the loss was fresh; those who knew him only as kindly old man and dispenser of potions could express their sorrows later.
Unfortunately, however, Arthur had already focused on the privacy of what he knew had been the final conversation that he would ever have with Gaius, and that had been…
That was also extremely low on the list of things that he wanted to think about. Structural damage to the castle and what he had said and what Gaius had said and what he might be saying to Merlin and whether or not anyone would be able to tell if blond hair ever began to turn white. Hypothetically. He could think about those things later. Or maybe never. He'd go as long as he could.
"As long as I can," Arthur said aloud, as though vocalizing the idea would make it all the more possible. He knew that it was silly, but he was the king, and if he wanted to be silly in the privacy of his own chambers, he would damn well be silly.
Plus, Guinevere always started laughing whenever he made any variations of that statement in her presence. She still wouldn't explain why, but he'd always had the distinct impression that the laughter was directed at him. Which made absolutely no sense.
Women could be so frustrating, Arthur thought absently. And then he wished that he hadn't. He had been so determined not to think about Merlin and what Merlin was going through, but then Arthur just had to go and think about femininity, which usually made Merlin pop into his head. So much for lasting long.
He did not say that aloud.
Merlin…
Arthur forced himself into an exaggeration of a yawn. He wasn't remotely tired—well, not tired in the sense that there was any way that he would be able to sleep anytime soon—but he vaguely hoped that going through the motions of winding down could trick his body into winding down. It seemed farfetched, even to Arthur, but Merlin always accused Arthur of going through the motions of most duties in his life and of being fundamentally vague. Maybe it was worth a try.
So he tried. He tried for perhaps a bit longer than was dignified. Or feasible. After nearly a minute of trying to hold a yawn, he'd achieved nothing more than a sore jaw. Swearing under his breath, he took his uninjured hand to his chin and began to rub it grumpily.
And there was another scar.
This one was nearly unnoticeable and, as far as the majority of the kingdom knew, nonexistent. All that they knew, if they knew of it at all, was that it had occurred on one of his hunting trips when in pursuit of a particularly vicious boar. The public story was that Arthur had suffered the wound after being gored by the boar but being so strong and determined a king that it would not stop him from capturing and manfully slaughtering his prey. Yes, as far as most people knew, the scar was just a remnant of a battle of man versus beast that man had, of course, won. After all, the man in question was Arthur.
Or so Arthur had reasoned. The only other witness of the suffering of the actual wound in question happened to disagree. Merlin had unfortunately been present on the occasion when Arthur had, when shaving, managed to sink his razor deeply enough into his own skin to cause him to bleed alarmingly. He hadn't even noticed at first; Merlin actually managed to sharpen this particular blade with semi-frequency—which Arthur assumed had to do with its diminutive size in comparison to his broadsword and the workload that accompanied each—and it was sharp enough that there hadn't even been pain until Merlin had stopped making fun of his attempt to do something himself to point out that he was bleeding.
Then it had hurt.
It wasn't even the pain that was the worst—it was the fear. Merlin had actually become somewhat sympathetic when he'd seen Arthur's face twisting into an expression of dread rather than hurt, but when he'd learned that Arthur was afraid more for permanent marking on his face rather than the blood that was running down it, Merlin's words of reassurance very quickly became far less concerned and far more insulting. Which was completely unfair. Granted, it was just about the only thing that Arthur attempted to do on his own, but Arthur had also been proven far less likely to accidentally kill someone with a blade than was Merlin. Arthur was clearly the far more qualified of the two of them to safely handle a razor near another person's neck. He could hardly be blamed for wanting to keep Merlin out of the whole ordeal. Besides, Arthur had been a prince at the time. He had to look the part.
Merlin hadn't agreed with that reasoning either, but he'd had enough sense to at least agree to keep his mouth shut whenever Arthur looked as murderous as he knew that he did on that day. He'd even helped by suggesting that they leave the castle for an hour or two for the swelling to go down, the bleeding to stop, and his pride to stop smarting to the extent that he'd throw something heavy at anyone who dared look at him with anything other than reverence. Arthur had approved of the plan and even took it upon himself to expand upon it. Merlin had clearly hoped for a leisurely ride through the forest or the sort of examination of the grounds that Arthur generally took whenever he wanted to do nothing productive whilst looking like he was doing something important. So Arthur wasn't surprised to find that Merlin was rather displeased when Arthur had changed his proposal of leaving the castle for an hour or two into leaving for a day or two so as to go hunting.
And Merlin's displeasure was enough to make him behave completely illogically for the entire excursion. Arthur knew that Merlin hated hunting trips, but that was bloody well too bad. He didn't pay Merlin a completely adequate amount of money—no matter what Merlin claimed about common decency when it came to wages in relation to life-risking tasks—to allow him to slack off on tasks that he disliked. Hunting wasn't so bad. Besides, he let Merlin get away with enough slacking off with his daily tasks back in the castle. Merlin didn't have the right to complain about hunting. His job was to help.
Although his help was usually useless. When Arthur had informed Merlin of his plan for recounting the story of the wild boar and his subsequent goring, Merlin had started whining about the unlikelihood that Arthur could manage to be gored by a wild boar and have the only evidence be a tiny nick on his chin and the fact that they would have to somehow find and kill a wild boar for the story to hold up. Merlin had instead proposed that they alter the story to replace the boar with a deer, which were admittedly rather easier to find. But how was he supposed to have been gored by a deer? As if his massive facial wound could have been caused by a tree branch whipping in his face during his furious pursuit or the death twitch of a stag's antlers! Merlin could be so stupid sometimes.
Arthur was proved right anyway. After the two days in the wilderness turned into four days in the wilderness and they had been reduced to increasingly small rations that were good for the constitution no matter what Merlin said when trying to convince him to ride for home, they had caught the wild boar and brought it back to the castle with triumph in their eyes, weariness in their limbs, and nothing in their bellies. But they were back and Arthur had his story.
Arthur did have to admit that it was possible that Merlin's eyes had been more exasperated than triumphant. But Merlin's expression in Arthur's presence could so often be interpreted as exasperated that Arthur had long ago chosen to believe that that was just pride and wonder at his great fortune for his position as manservant to such an undemanding prince as Arthur reflected in his face. That would make much more sense anyway.
A shiver ran very suddenly through Arthur's body, and he glanced over at the windows in his chamber. He hadn't remembered opening one, but there it was. It must have been Robert in his attempts to be at all times solicitous. Arthur also didn't remember it being a particularly chilly day, and he wondered vaguely if he was growing cold with blood loss. It didn't seem likely. He hadn't bled that much, and he was barely even fidgeting with the wounds anymore as they tried to clot. Save for his bloodstained clothes, he probably could have almost passed for the normal sort of person who did not on a semi-regular basis punch out his mirror with a bare fist. There weren't any pools on the ground or anything. A few drips and footprints, yes. But who was to say that those hadn't always been there and Guinevere just hadn't noticed?
Or maybe another argument would be better.
As it was, he knew that he probably couldn't blame the chill on blood loss. It could be all sorts of other things that were normal and understandable and not at all indicative of his emotional state!
Or maybe it was just reflective of the indecency that he so acutely felt just below his casual remembrances of shaving scars and hunting trips. But it felt equally indecent that he should be thinking about Merlin's status in Camelot, and that thought seemed to keep drifting to the top of his collection of problems. It just wasn't right. This was not the time…this was not what he should be thinking, he somehow knew. This should not be his focus. He could think about something else. He would think about something else. Of all of the qualities that King Arthur of Camelot did not possess, Arthur thought with no small amount of pride, willpower was not one of them. If he did not want to do or say or think about something, it just did not happen.
But what the hell was he going to do with Merlin? That was the question. There were so many variables, so many choices, so many unpredictable outcomes that Arthur didn't know how he was supposed to go about deciding.
So he started with the things that he knew.
Merlin was in Camelot, despite being banished.
That was okay. That was not one of the problems. Merlin had come back at Arthur's request, via Guinevere. Merlin's return had not been some impertinent or vengeful attempt to get back at the king for exiling him. Merlin was innocent.
Merlin was innocent in this, anyway.
Everyone knows that Merlin is back and Camelot, and there have been no riots or gatherings of pitchforks and torches.
Arthur hadn't had a firm grasp on what his people thought about his work to legalize magic. Not really. Whenever he asked anyone, they generally just either agreed with him or said whatever they thought that he wanted to hear, Guinevere excepted. Those were times that he would have relished having Merlin around. A second honest opinion would have been more than welcome. Arthur just didn't know. He generally didn't let public opinion change the way that he made the truly important decisions, but this was different. This affected everyone and changed one of the laws that had most significantly defined the carrying out of what had been called "justice." It was a big change and, even disregarding altruism and the importance of legitimate justice for all subjects of Camelot, magical and non-magical alike, the possibility of revolt among the populace was a very real and uncharacteristically serious concern of Arthur's. Civil war certainly wouldn't help anyone, magic or not.
Sometimes he wished that he was as stupid as some people thought that he was.
The repealing of magic is happening soon.
That was actually something that had been troubling Arthur since before he'd had to call Merlin home, before any of them were ready for it. It all depended on how a person looked at it, Arthur knew. Either Arthur had caught Merlin doing magic and banished him for sorcery, or Arthur had caught Merlin doing magic and had banished him for breaking the law. Or, of course, the fairly popular theory among certain of his peers was that Arthur had caught Merlin in a lie and banished him in a fit of childishness that happened to last for an extended period of time. Arthur didn't like that one.
He couldn't deny that the betrayal had stung, of course. The lying. But was that why Merlin had been exiled? Was that why he had exiled Merlin? Sometimes even he didn't know why he'd done it. There were so many reasons for it…why couldn't he think of the one that must have been the deciding factor and tipped the scale when he'd done it?
But that wasn't the point. The point was that, if Merlin had been banished for illegal sorcery, couldn't he be brought back for good once magic was legal again? Yes, he had broken the law, but who was to say that half a year of wandering around wasn't punishment enough? If Arthur had been able to forgive Merlin, it sure as hell should have been enough for the king to pardon the sorcerer. He could do it. It would be something of a questionable decision, but he could do it. He just didn't know if it would be a good idea for everyone else.
If only the selfishness allowed to a prince had carried over to the duties of being king.
There were doubts. Lots and lots and lots of doubts.
Arthur had to tread lightly. He knew it. Metaphorically tread lightly. Physically treading lightly would have been easy. He wouldn't have had to think about that. He had been many times described as "lithe as a cat and silent as a shadow" when he was in hunting mode. He was good at silently stalking and killing. And, now that he thought about it, good at paraphrasing what other people said about him.
Life was so much easier when it wasn't being metaphorical. Figurative light treading was not something that he'd been taught as a child. It wasn't even something that they had tried to teach him and that he had ignored, like writing speeches and foresight and long division. It just hadn't been present in his education.
Not that he would have run to his father to ask for more lessons, had the omission occurred to him. He usually didn't even need to. His might not have been the most openly affectionate of fathers, but Uther had taken Arthur's education seriously and had done what he could to make his son realize that understanding sums and responsibility and words and other such silly things could be useful. It wasn't Uther's fault that all of the lessons hadn't exactly been taken to heart. Or head. But despite Uther's extensive interference with Arthur's education, he hadn't forced Arthur to struggle to pretend to pay attention for more hours than he already did. It was actually strange, now that Arthur thought about it. He was the heir. But no matter. Arthur wasn't offended. Uther was probably busy lighting people on fire.
That was something that Uther had tried to teach his son.
And it was not something that Arthur had yet come to regret neglecting in his studies.
But Arthur liked thinking about Uther even less than he liked thinking about Merlin just then. Merlin was losing his own surrogate father. Arthur didn't want to make himself relive how he had lost his own.
So he would tread lightly, and he would figure this out.
How would he assuage even a few of the doubts about the legalizing of magic that he knew were in the hearts of a good percentage of his people? It was one thing to decree something. Making them feel it was a whole other matter. They had to see that Arthur truly trusted that what he was doing was right. Arthur had to be public and open about this. Didn't he? He couldn't just let it happen. He was making it happen, and the people deserved to be able to see that he meant what he said. How else would it stick?
So he would accept it in front of everyone. He could do that. He would embrace it.
Maybe that was where Merlin could come in.
Not that Arthur was planning on embracing Merlin. Things rarely got so desperate as for that to happen. Physically. He could embrace metaphorically.
Looking down at his floor, Arthur smiled, and saw his own face, dozens of his own face looking back up at him from the shards of the mirror that he had punched out, each face pale and drawn and smiling with so much weariness that he almost mistook it for a grimace. Was that how he smiled now?
It didn't have to be. Arthur breathed deeply and took a pause to give himself a moment to congratulate himself on his mastery of the metaphor before he dove back into the abyss of all things responsible.
He was getting pretty good with metaphors.
So he would metaphorically embrace Merlin as a sorcerer. He could welcome Merlin back to court and Merlin could…
Ah.
What the hell could Merlin do? Taking him back as a manservant was ludicrous in so very many ways, and as far as Arthur knew, Merlin didn't really have any skills in any other areas. Merlin barely had any skills in that area. But he couldn't bring Merlin back without giving the man some purpose. It would look like he was just snagging the only sorcerer that he knew to act as the figurehead of the new "magic is not evil" campaign.
Besides, if Merlin didn't have something to do, he would either dog Arthur's steps and annoy him so much that Arthur would have to kill him and therefore completely undo the whole thing, or Merlin would be so bored that he'd start fiddling with his magic and things would start collapsing or turning purple or blowing up or collapsing or catching on fire or turning into toads or collapsing…
That damn council room.
Yes, Merlin had to have something to do. Arthur could do that. Of course, he couldn't make Merlin a member of the household staff again, not least because he had no doubt in his mind that Merlin would refuse. Merlin hadn't even volunteered for the position as Arthur's manservant when he had received it in the first place. And Arthur wasn't sure how welcome he would be amongst the staff. And his current manservant was already afraid of Merlin from a distance; how would Robert be able to get anything done if Merlin was actually working near him? Everything would be in shambles. It would be like having Merlin for a manservant all over again.
And he was not knighting Merlin. Merlin may have been able to kill a thousand men with a wink of his eye or whatever he claimed to be able to do, but unless he could pick up a broadsword for battle without hurting himself or maintain a hold on an iron shield for more than five minutes without his arms buckling, he was not knight material.
Besides, "Sir Merlin?" No. That was just…no. The man had named his warhorse Buttercup. Gwaine may have been an unconventional choice for a knight, but at least he rode a stallion called Stormsword. Merlin had chosen a black mare and named her after a yellow flower that he inexplicably claimed that she resembled. Telepathic connection or not, that was not the way to treat a warhorse, mare or not. No, Merlin was not going to be a knight. Ever. Not even a little bit. Arthur bit his lip, thinking. What sort of job was the opposite of the gallantry and fearlessness of the knighthood?
Arthur could always put him on his council of advisors. That would give him something of a title. Sort of. And why not? Arthur wasn't entirely sure what most of his advisors were meant to be advising him on anyway. He had long suspected that some of them had just been recruited off of the streets to make sure that all of the seats at the long table were filled. He'd inherited nearly all of them from Uther; maybe it would be a good idea to bring some fresh—if somewhat moronic—blood into the mix.
A court sorcerer. An official court sorcerer. Why not? There was a court appointment for just about everything else. And what would legitimize the legalizing of magic more than Arthur's personal inclusion of a sorcerer amongst his advisors? It's not like he would be obliged to listen to any sorcerous advice anyway. Advice was advice, and he could ignore all of it just as much as he pleased. Yes, Merlin could be an official court sorcerer.
Arthur shifted in his chair, uncomfortable for reasons that he knew were unrelated to the cuts on his hand and foot. Something seemed…off about making up a title and giving it to Merlin, just like that. It seemed ceremonial, even to him. Gratuitous. Like he was bringing a sorcerer right into his inner circle to try to justify what he was doing.
Bring a sorcerer back into his inner circle was more accurate, he supposed. At least this time he would be known for what he was. And this would be official.
Anyway, wasn't the whole point of this whole mess to show that sorcerers were just like everybody else? Appointing a court sorcerer just seemed like he was setting them apart all over again. Hell, maybe deep down in the part of him that was still the prince to Uther's king, he was still setting them apart. Yet making "sorcerer" part of a title invented for Merlin just somehow seemed counterproductive.
He could always just give the court sorcerer a generic sort of title that he wouldn't remember anyway. He'd gotten to the point that he just referred in his mind to some of his lesser advisors who never spoke as Big Hat or Shiny Shield or Red Shirt or some other descriptor that seemed infinitely more practical and entertaining than the name, house, and title of an adviser who never advised.
Besides, if he needed to know something about magic, if he was ever being usurped by it again, he would be able to just ask Merlin. That would be fairly convenient.
Assuming, of course, that Merlin stayed.
Arthur scowled, annoyed at himself. Of course Merlin would stay. Why wouldn't he? There was no reason not to stay. Probably no reason not to stay. Yes, Merlin would stay.
Merlin had better stay, Arthur thought grouchily.
Maybe Merlin would need a gesture of some sort, something ceremonial and flattering to convince him that he was needed. That had been known to work on Arthur. And Arthur understood that Merlin's first instinct might be to flee the castle that was undoubtedly a constant reminder of his relationship with and the death of Gaius. Arthur could understand that. He himself had nearly wept the first time that he'd had to sit in his father's throne. The memories, he'd learned to his dismay, could be even worse than the death. The happy times forever contrasted by the knowledge that there were no more to come…yes, maybe Arthur would truly need a grand gesture to convince Merlin to stay. And to make sure that it didn't look like it was out of pity for his predicament. Which it absolutely was not.
Which it absolutely was not entirely.
But maybe the people would need the ceremony as well, unappetizing as it may have been to Arthur just then. Maybe he had to make it real, not just another piece of legislation that they couldn't read and that he hadn't bothered to care about before stamping his seal onto it. Maybe there needed to be some legitimate and official attention. Royal approval. After all, as much as he was trying to show to everyone that he wholeheartedly believed that sorcerers were more or less the same as the rest, who was he really kidding? Of course they were different.
Arthur's head was beginning to hurt. He blinked furiously, trying to focus.
Yes, everybody was different. Everybody had different skills. In the grand scheme of things, Arthur may have been far more important a man than any village blacksmith, but he knew damn well that that didn't mean that he could make a horseshoe.
Then again, blacksmiths hadn't been summarily executed whenever their practiced their craft for the past two and a half decades. There was that.
Inexplicably, Arthur's mind suddenly made the jump to another of his scars. At times, the workings of his brain baffled even him. Almost unwittingly, he moved his uninjured hand down to touch the scar that marred one of his legs.
There was no amusing cause for that particular injury, Arthur remembered grimly. It had been one hell of an arrow wound, poisoned to the extent that he'd required Merlin's support to travel the corridors of the castle with any semblance of stealth. Merlin had risen to the occasion and been far more stealthy with Arthur hanging onto his shoulder for dear life than he usually did when trying to walk in a straight line on his own. He'd say that for Merlin—the boy could keep his head in a crisis.
But try as he might, Arthur could not put any positive spin on this scar. He'd suffered the wound on the day of Morgana's first usurping. Or was it the second? He'd been injured on both occasions. He considered for half a second, but he knew. He would never forget. It was on that first fateful day when he'd learned that his friend Morgana was actually his sister Morgana and that his sister Morgana was a sorceress and that his sorceress of a sister Morgana was usurping his father in a move that would break the king's heart and harden Arthur's to a point from which it would never entirely soften again.
But out of the dust of Morgana's betrayal had risen several new knights, knights that would grow dearer to his heart than any who had come before, save of course for Sir Leon. He had lost a friend and sister that day, but he had gained a circle of brothers.
So there was that.
But that arrow had hurt.
Then, before Arthur could grope about his body for another scar to think about before he did what he was going to have to do about the whole magic situation, the knocking on his door resumed once more. Grateful for the distraction, Arthur rolled his eyes, assuming that it was Robert again and halfheartedly wondering if he should just let the boy in to stop him from banging on the door at the top of every hour. Robert was an…enthusiastic servant. This could very well continue past midnight until Arthur made an appearance. Still debating, Arthur waited impatiently for the fourth knock.
It never came.
Three knocks.
Arthur had just enough time to grow baffled before the door opened. Guinevere walked it, taking tiny steps and looking at the floor. Arthur winced preemptively. She was going to yell at him, and he still hadn't recovered entirely from the last time that he'd been on the receiving end on one of her admittedly justified rants. And he'd had Merlin to at least face the wrath with him the last time. Now it was just him.
He couldn't blame her, though. Not really. She loved him too much, he knew, not to be mad at him for something like this. It wasn't as though he had some brilliant argument as to why it was a good idea for him to punch out his mirror, especially considering that he'd done it before and knew what tended to happen. So it was with a tentatively placating smile that he looked at his wife, loving her too much to insult her by attempting to rationalize any of it. He opened his mouth to say something that he probably should have planned out ahead of time, but was spared the humiliation of improvising a dignified explanation for the reasoning that had led to his current state. He couldn't speak. She looked as though something…he just didn't know what to say. He'd never seen her like this.
Guinevere did not look angry or annoyed. As she faced him, he half believed that she hadn't even noticed the blood and destruction that Arthur had wrought in his own chambers. Her hands were clenching and unclenching, clasping together and pressed tightly against the skirt of her gown, the hem slightly puckered as evidence that she had stumbled over the yards and yards of fabric sewn into the dress of a queen. She hadn't done that for quite some time. She looked curiously pale with an expression so close to devastation that his heart gave an alarmed twitch. But it wasn't pure devastation that he saw, not really. She looked…frightened. And so very dreadfully sad.
Forgetting his own wounds in an instant, Arthur stood and began to approach his wife. Whatever had happened, all that he knew was that he had to let it happen to him as well if that could make it somehow easier for her. This was not a time for him to be a king. He would be a husband.
And then he stepped on another shard of glass and found himself swearing at the top of his lungs.
The obscenity seemed to awaken Guinevere to her surroundings, and she looked over Arthur with a critical eye. Her eyes darted over him quickly, her countenance changing rapidly from annoyance to worry to fear to some frantically dreadful and strangely guilty expression that he could not identify for the life of him.
Not being blind, she had noticed what was wrong with him, and from the deep breath that she took as she began to stride hurriedly toward him, thankfully wearing shoes that would spare her feet the gashes that afflicted his, he was about to hear all about what was wrong with him that led to this that was wrong with him.
Not being a total idiot, he had noticed that something was wrong with her, too. Something was very wrong with her, something that was hers. He had seen her worry for him and for Merlin and for her brother and for the kingdom and, most recently, for Gaius, with such capable empathy that he almost envied her for it. But she was worried for her now.
And Arthur suddenly realized that he did not know whether or not his wife would tell him why.
So he kept bleeding.
And waited.
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Reviews would be much appreciated! I was kind of uncertain about this chapter.