AN: Quicker update than last time, but I apologise if this one is kind of shoddy; my excuse is that I only had an hour to write it :P. Anyway (If I say this word more than twice in my AN, feel free to shoot me. Actually, that's kind of extreme, but flame away ;). It's an annoying habit. Kind of like rambling ;]), I'll leave you to dedeuce your own conclusions about this one as a lot of it is intentionally vague.
Anyway (that's the second time ;]), thanks to Isis the Sphinx (cool name btw!), GoodyThreeShoes and luvondarox for their recent reviews :D. Eleven more then I'll have 100 :D:D
In Arthur's chambers, there's a mirror, the frame gilded, the glass heavily polished. It hangs on his wall like ivy on cold stone, creeping, creeping to the front of his mind. He can't bear to look at it and yet he won't have it removed. Fascination is a deadly thing and so is the mirror. In the day, it's simply a mirror; at night, it is a terror.
It should be okay, Arthur tells himself, because he's real and the mirror's not. Where he is flesh and blood, the mirror is just metal, cold and empty. It's never been alive, never taken a breath or felt the gentle pulsing of its heart. It's never felt, nor smiled, nor cried or screamed.
It's never even existed.
Arthur knows it's not real. He knows that where it hangs is just a cold stone wall, a bare face reflecting the moonlit chamber. He knows that no light bounces off its surface, no face appears that is his own. The mirror has no other purpose than to torment him with his imagination. With his fears. To take every little dream he has and twist it into something unrecognisable. Something horrible.
The mirror is good at that.
From where he perches, Arthur watches it with a hawk-like intensity. Outside, the world grows black but the mirror grows blue, and he readies himself for the attack. Explosions of red and yellow and green are fired out at him, vivid images that wrench his heart from his chest and step on it. He takes clawed fingers, rakes them across the air in front of him and cries out.
It stops.
He is frozen and the mirror does not stir. He feels it in his sub-consciousness, an enemy force rooting around his brain. It pulls him towards it, slowly, purposely, so strong that his legs cannot refuse. His mind fights for control but it loses, as he knew it would. It does so every night, and yet it never stops trying just as the mirror never stops calling. The two are linked; the mirror and his mind, the man and the memories.
He stops in front of it. A bottomless pool of navy blue awaits him, still and threatening. He feels himself being drawn towards it, leaning forward, taking a deep breath. Resistance is futile as he falls forward. Submersion is a shock and life no longer matters.
His own personal nightmare rises to meet him.
The picture before him makes way for another. Water drains away and Arthur is left shivering, blue eyes staring beseechingly at the scene taking shape before him. A face, so familiar and yet so different. Arthur's own features stares back at him, and yet it is like they belong to a stranger; where his eyes are sad, the stranger's are merry; his mouth is down turned, the strangers alive with a smile.
Two men. Two emotions.
He raises a hand to touch his doppelganger's face but instead meets a hand. The skin is soft, smooth, glowing healthily. Arthur looks down at his own grey scars and scowls. The stranger grins, reaches out a hand; it passes straight through Arthur and meets with that of another. Three pairs of blue eyes but only two that can see. Arthur is a ghost drinking in someone else's joy.
His joy, he realises, or at least, what should have been his had his mother survived. He watches her now, her pale face luminous with life. He knows that the tall, graceful figure before him is her by the love that radiates from her, seeps into her son and warms him. This is a prince who can smile, a prince who knows how to love.
He is not Arthur.
The vision fades to reveal a boy of twelve being sang softly to sleep by a woman Arthur knows well; Nimueh, her beautiful face devoid of any malice. She cuts a proud figure, but there's a gentleness in her that Arthur never dreamed she could possess. Her voice too is sweet, delicate, not that of a hardened killer. In her eyes, Arthur sees love towards the blond haired boy she is caring for. Arthur knows that it's him
Another fading, another sight. His father this time, happy and smiling, his booming laughter echoing around the hall. Opposite him is a man, his face alive as he recounts some story. He has dark hair and blue eyes, and Arthur is reminded of Morgana. Sure enough, on his knee perches a girl of no more than ten, her raven hair hanging in long tendrils down her back. She is smiling, and yet it does not reach her eyes. Arthur remembers that look. Finally, something he recognizes! The little girl looks up at him, seems to see him. As he watches, she slips off the man's knee, skips over to Arthur and grins. There's so much innocence then that it makes him feel queasy.
"You don't belong here," she says, and at once all recognition fades. What Arthur had mistaken for sadness had actually been something else, something deeper, something that he cannot explain. The girl before him is Morgana as he has never known her. "You're sad." He nods not trusting himself to speak. "Why?"
The childish question hangs in the air and he shrugs. He could give her any number of reasons why, but she is too young; she won't understand. Morgana takes hold of his hand, grins again and then begins to pull him from the room, first at a walk and then at a run. Arthur is dragged along behind, too slow, too weary to be able to keep pace. As they run, she seems to grow, blossoms into the young woman Arthur has learnt to love.
All the while, the mirror world grows fainter.
He does not realise at first what they are running towards. He does not see until it's too late what they are about to hit. He opens his mouth to cry out but then they are through, smashing through glass and sending shards flying. Arthur shuts his mouth, his eyes, wrenches his hand from Morgana's to cover their heads.
She is gone and Arthur is staring at what they have broken.
Morning breaks and birds chirp at the window. Arthur opens one sleepy eye, stares at the pigeon in annoyance. He is tired and his head is pounding. He slips out of the bed, throws cold water over his face. His reflection shows heavy bags under his eyes, a small gash on his forehead that's red in the amber light. Immediately, the dream comes rushing back to him in a swarm of pain. The happy faces seem to taunt him, berate him as he whirls round to face the mirror ever hanging on the wall in his dreams.
It is gone.
Not that he expected it to be there, of course. It is a dream mirror after all; insubstantial, imagined whilst he was asleep. In his dreams, he invents time, and time in turn invents the mirror. He goes over to the wall, runs calloused hands over it, searches for the icy smoothness of cold glass, a nick in the wall. Nothing.
He is a fool.
On the stone flags, something sparkles. Like a magpie, he is drawn to it, bending down until his sweaty palms clasp around sharp edges. His pressure is too much and the shard cuts straight into his skin. Numb to the pain, he picks it up, looks at it with confusion.
He sees.
Morgana, more beautiful than he has ever seen her, smiling serenely, her delicate hand upright in a wave. In the shard she is tiny, but he can see her as clearly as if she were before him. She mouths to him three words, smiles once more and then vanishes into inky blackness. A flash of blinding white light and then Arthur is looking at dust, trailing it through his fingers like sand on a beach.
A smile and then a sigh.
Three words and he is cured.
AN: Anyone got any idea what the words are? And do you reckon it's a dream or not? :) Hopefully this little oneshot had intrigued you anyhow :)