Hot hate is twin brother to hot love.

~Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Chapter 21

You don't miss her. You didn't miss her.

He commanded himself for the fiftieth time today, for the thousandth time this year.

She moved around the hovel like a lion in a cage: regal, elegant, dangerous. And he felt like a tasty rabbit that'd unwittingly stumbled into her lair. He watched her, wary and edgy. The rope chaffed his wrists, his hands were numb, his throat dry but that wasn't what demanded his attention.

He was transfixed by her. He was starved for her. The subtle movements of her white hands. The slight tilt of her chin. The soft pout of her pale lips. The gentle flutter of her eyelashes. Every few minutes she'd glance his way and he'd have to avert his gaze, terrified that she'd see his fear. Or worse, his fascination.

His position was uncomfortable; the wet fabric of his shirt clammed against his skin and his triceps stiffened in the confined position. But he'd had worse before, likely would have worse in the future.

Waiting was the torture. If it wasn't death then what was he waiting for? What would she do to him? He shuddered to think of what she might do to him. Her creativity knew no bounds…he was terrified of that thought. Although maybe not as much as he should be.

He so wanted to be brave, to be the kind of man who didn't flinch in the face of such danger. But she'd always been his Achilles' heel, his weakness. Now she made his skin crawl with passion and his body squirm with restrained lust.

Morgana made him feel like he was tied up in knots. More than literally. He couldn't decide if he wanted to kiss her or throttle her. Or kiss her then throttle her. That he could hate someone so vehemently and yet be so attracted, so seduced by her was astounding to say the least. He wished it were just lust, infatuation-those same feelings that Morgana had once purported was merely what passed between Gwen and Arthur.

With Freya, it had been different. He'd loved her for sure, but he loved what she'd done to him, what she'd made him feel. All the dormant feelings she'd roused, all the secrets he'd shared with her in the stretch of a few days; that had been enough. A few minutes of borrowed time in his world that ran far too fast.

But love? God, was love supposed to feel like this? Was love supposed to hurt so damn much? Poison in his glass, wounds to his body, even the chill of the undead, that he could deal with. Freya's death had even taken pieces of his soul that couldn't be easily replaced. But this twisted and wretched pain that churned in his gut was absolutely unbearable. Damning her to hell and wishing to save her all in the same moment. He hated what she made him feel. He hated these feelings that she roused. Hot hate. Feverish love.

He knew her better than she knew herself. Or did he? They were the same and yet, she had never truly know him and never would. What madness was this? His feelings were wrong. This lust….this love, God, love…was disloyal to Arthur.

He couldn't love her; she was unlovable. He'd said so himself. Then what was this intensity? This desire to protect her, to comfort her, to be near her? She could kill him. She would hurt him. His heart-his stupid, useless, wretched heart-called to her, demanded her.

As she suddenly moved closer and pressed a rag soaked with some concoction against his wound, he prayed it was poison. Because he didn't know if he could take this anymore. This mad, stabbing sensation buzzing through his body. It felt like pleasure. It felt like pain. The soft touch of her fingers on his collar. He wanted her to be rough, to scrub the cloth against his gash and draw every ounce of pain from the process. To release the sensations from his body with a raw and gaping wound right over his heart.

But she was as gentle as if she was bathing a newborn, tenderly touching the puckered skin with the soothing dampness of her rag. She was ethereal. Like some type of dark angel sent to drag men to hell. And he was in hell. Her lithe body wrapped in black lace, her scent clean and lovely. Not perfumed or flowery like she used to smell, but…human, sensual. How could she still be this beautiful? This alluring without all the trappings of her courtly attire? There was purity in her beauty, in the pale skin that lit up the dark hovel. His fingers had long ago fell asleep; why were they suddenly desperate to run over the ivory skin of her collarbones? To slide down the S curves along the side of her body?

He was breathing hard. Panting as he felt her warm breath against his exposed skin.

This was the torture. To be near her, to feel her hands on his skin, and to be able to do nothing. He wanted to push her away and to pull her against him. He grunted as her icy fingers brushed over his naked chest. Let her think it was from pain.

But it was a different type of pain. Wretched, angry pain. He couldn't look at her, fearing that she'd see the naked emotion in his eyes. The love, God, the love that was slowly kindling despite their combined best efforts to stamp it out. He longed to purge the tenderness that was threatening to overwhelm him in this moment. He was powerless. Tied up. At her mercy. But she'd brought him to his knees so long ago.

"You know, there's one thing I don't understand, Merlin. You're Arthur's servant, nothing more. Yet time and again you've proven yourself willing to lay your life down," she asked, continuing her ministrations.

"What are you doing?" he asked, the question loaded. What was she doing to him? What would she do to him? Why did she care if he was injured?

"Have you never seen Gaius clean a wound before?" she replied sarcastically.

"I know what you're doing, what I don't know is why," he croaked out.

She grabbed his chin between her icy fingers and forced his eyes to meet hers. They were too close. He couldn't think. His eyes, transfixed, flickered between her lips and her eyes. Tension crackled between them, hot and palpable.

"I believe I asked you a question first," she said. "Why are you so loyal to Arthur?"

She shoved his chin away and he kept his eyes on the ground. Truths that he never would speak dying before they ever reached his lips.

Suddenly emboldened, he responded, "I don't expect you to understand, Morgana. You have no sense of duty, no sense of loyalty."

"You're wrong. Don't think I don't understand loyalty just because I've got no one left to be loyal to," she said defiantly. She was lonely, her voice full of longing, of desperation.

Give me your loyalty. The thought came out of nowhere. An impossibility-too much had passed between them, her loyalty had been betrayed long ago with one sip from a poisoned pouch. He didn't want her loyalty anymore, she would only disappoint him. He would only disappoint her. Magic, they shared that loyalty, although they were on opposite sides of the spectrum.

Her palm flattened against his wound. Heat crackled across his skin. When he hissed, he let her think it was from pain. His traitorous body leapt to attention; his cock knew where his loyalty would lie.

Healing heat spread through his body, removing the vestiges of ache from his wound and from his entire body. But it couldn't compare to the ecstasy her touch evoked. He closed his eyes against the maelstrom of sensations that radiated from the press of her palm against his heart.

Her heart now. He was repulsed and relieved to admit that. He hated her for making him feel it. Her hand on his face pushed him back, the drugging pull of sleep and magic lulling him into oblivion. Whatever happened, nothing could be worse than this. To be here, separated by mere feet and rope from her, and yet he might've an entire world away from her.

Love was a sadistic bitch; she could rot in hell, right alongside he and Morgana.

FINIS

I'll admit, I'm never quite sure what to make of this scene. While my Mergana sense tingles with the whole bondage bit (yeah!), the entire time I can't quite tell how Colin's trying to play it. He's panting, avoiding her eyes, putting on this weird ecstasy face when she touches him. If it's not meant to be teasing us Mergana shippers, then they should've gone another route. Too hot to handle. And she never does answer the question about why she's cleaning his wound! Me thinks that it's just an excuse to get her hands on Merlin's delicious body-it would certainly serve her plans well if he died from an infection after his assassination attempts on Arthur. What say you? What do you make of that scene?

Please review!