Woot woot! I have another chapter! Sorry for keeping all of you waiting, so it's extra long this time. Really, I have an explanation. It's a doozy. I get very...antsy when I don't have a lot occupying my attention. Like, a mega amount of things to think about. So it's not 100% my fault that I'm currently immersed in 23 fandoms at the moment.

Yes, 23. And I counted, there are 284 significant characters altogether. I can even name all of them. The Merlin fandom is just one of them. Fear not, though, that doesn't mean I pay less attention to crafting this story. By the way, I can't tell all of you how much your reviews mean to me. Thank you so much.

Merlin is mine. MINE, I SAY! MWA-HAA-HAA-

(yeah, no)

-HA-HA!

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Arthur could name exactly one other time when he felt this way. It wasn't hard to remember the shock, the horror, the utter betrayal that had raged through his mind upon hearing Morgana claim the throne for herself.

He remembered the single thing keeping him sane had been Merlin. Merlin, who had gently pulled him away from the throne room and out of the castle to their hideout. Merlin, who had helped guide him until the world had regained order. Merlin, who had been as saddened as he by the betrayal of a friend.

Saddened, but not surprised.

Arthur sat on the edge of his bed, not taking his eyes from Merlin.

"And her?"

It surprised Arthur how level his voice was. Not a tremor or shake let slip the turmoil inside his mind.

Instead, his voice was bleak. Blank. Empty of anything, be it rage, hurt, betrayal, blame, as if he was too far gone to make the effort to care anymore.

Merlin knew what Arthur was asking. "I knew for months. Nearly right after she was rescued."

His voice was the same quiet tone. It matched Arthur's perfectly.

Merlin didn't know how everything had gone askew. He was supposed to be Arthur's guardian spirit, working from shadows so deep he had grown afraid of the light. Now, though, everything was being pulled out into open, where all his flaws and mistakes were so painfully visible. Everything he had done wrong, chosen not to say, turned his back when he shouldn't have, because he should have done better.

Terrified didn't even vaguely come close to what he was experiencing. Because if he had let slip that he'd known about Morgana, what else could come out into the light? What if he accidentally gave a hint to his magic, with Arthur and Guinevere and the knights all staring at him in horror?

What then?

So he was silent, hoping against hope that someone, anyone, would speak.

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"So."

Anyone except Gwaine.

"The way I see it," Gwaine said, very deliberately and clearly. He seemed to be choosing his words with upmost caution, which was in itself uncharacteristic for him. "Merlin's been protecting you, Princess. And it seems that there's been something of a war going on. So I think that we should get all the facts before passing judgement."

Merlin slid his gaze over to the knight, surprised. Gwaine was not only being uncommonly serious and cautious, but logical as well.

It hit Merlin that Gwaine had not brought him to the room just to make a ruckus. He had wanted Merlin to provide his side of the story, to tell them what was going on before they made a mess of trying to figure it out on their own. He may have prevented any number of misunderstandings from happening.

In his own way, Merlin reflected, Gwaine was something of a genius.

"I concur." Leon sounded relieved, alongside surprise at Gwaine's burst of wisdom.

"Me, too." Elyan voiced and Percival nodded.

Gwen looked anxiously over at Arthur, still sitting on the bed. Slowly, he nodded, and Gwen gave a tenative smile at Merlin.

Merlin took a deep breath. Well, this was better than he expected, considering the circumstances. Being heard out was an achievement in itself. The real test would be how they would react when they hear the whole story.

Maybe he was a pessimist, but he didn't see that turning out very well.

Very quickly, he decided not to tell them about the poison. He would not, could not look his friends in the face and tell them what he had done. It would stay in the shadows.

"After Morgana came back," he began slowly. "she was...different. It was hard to see, but I just put it down to her ordeal. But then the invasion came."

Merlin looked to Leon, Gwen and Arthur, the only ones who had been present. They nodded. The other knights had been in Camelot long enough to have heard the tale.

"An army of skeletons, right?" Elyan put in.

"Yes. An army of the undead." Leon said gravely.

"You seem to have those a lot." Gwaine mumbled.

Everyone glared at him.

Gwaine raised his hands in defeat, looking slightly alarmed.

"Morgana did that." Merlin stated. Really, he might as well say her crimes now. Maybe they could distract attention from him.

Of course, since she wasn't here, and he was the one telling them, that plan was liable to backfire. Their outrage would probably be directed at him.

Still, it wasn't like he had a choice.

Arthur's eyes refocoused on him, going wide.

"I followed her." Merlin stumbled out. "To the forest. She met with Morgause, and they talked about their plans."

Arthur was quiet.

Everything was whirling around in his head. He felt as soon as he tried to catch ahold of a thought, it was drowned out by cries of betrayal, lies, stupid, how could you not see this?

There was a thing inside his chest, clawing and shredding his heart to bloody scraps as it tried to escape the pain he was drowning in.

With an effort, he drew his attention back to Merlin, who had paused nervously.

There was something in his eyes, something Arthur instinctively knew that only he could see.

Fear. Beyond simple nervousness, or shame. There was very real fear in Merlin's eyes, that was expertly hidden.

Nobody was just that good at hiding fear, or pain.

They had to have experience.

"How much?"

"What?"

"How much have you been hurt? For me?"

A lot of people have tried to kill me.

Merlin was a friendly person. Everywhere he went, he was smiling and ready with a greeting. He was well liked, as far as Arthur could determine, and had many friends. Before today, Arthur would have said with confidence that Merlin had no enemies.

All that couldn't be a lie. Everything he had said in the armoury was said out of loyalty to Arthur and his close friends. Arthur was still certain that Merlin didn't have any personal enemies.

He simply took on Arthur's.

None of them really succeeded.

It was that one word, really. Without it, the sentence would be None of them succeeded. Which was, obviously, true. But there was that word. It changed the statement of fact into an implication that some of 'them' had come very, very close.

How close to death had Merlin been, without Arthur ever knowing? How much pain had he been through because he took on Arthur's enemies as his own?

"How much?"

Merlin echoed Arthur's question, staring at him.

Slamming into hard stone, back screeching in agony as Arthur stood by blankly with red eyes

Smelling his own charred flesh as he was treated by Gaius, unable to fall into unconsciousness because his magic was slamming into him, making him feel every twitch and rumble of the ancient rites he'd used unknowingly

Chains digging into his wrists, agonizingly tight as the serkets came closer and he tried to fight them off but he was failing

Dropping the chalice as thunder ripped through him, tearing him into pieces so small he didn't know how he could even begin to understand enough to become whole again

Suddenly, Merlin wanted nothing more than for Arthur to know. Know what had happened for years behind his back. Know who tried and failed to harm him. Know that Merlin would never let them succeed.

Know how much it cost him.

Merlin shrugged off his jacket. He tugged at his sleeve, and pulled the shirt over his head.

"This much."

Every morning, Merlin would take a moment to look at himself before putting on his shirt. Sometimes, he tried looking at his back, but it was hard to see all of it and his spine twitched if he moved it wrong, so he didn't really bother.

Merlin knew what he looked like, though. He lived with it everyday. He was used to it.

So Merlin didn't fully realize the impact his scars would have on everyone else.

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They were everywhere.

Gwen had only just processed that Merlin was taking off his shirt, of all things, when she registered the scars.

There were so many. Gwen knew Arthur had a few battle scars, as well as the nasty one from the Questing Beast, so she knew they were an inevitability when fighting. She had even guessed that Merlin had a few scars. He could hardly go out on seemingly suicidal missions on a regular basis and escape unscathed.

But if she had ever really thought about it, she had assumed they were minor things, more of scratches and maybe the occasional deeper but nonfatal cut.

Never in her darkest nightmares could she have come up with the sight she was seeing now.

In the exact center of Merlin's chest was a burn. Gwen vividly remembered the dragon's attack, and all the burn victims. This one was comparable to the most horrifying. Nearly seven inches in diameter, the flesh was melted and puckered. The burn actually looked like it made a slight depression inward against his ribs.

There were smaller scars as well, redder and shorter, mostly on his arms. They looked vaguely familiar to her, though she couldn't remember why.

Then it hit her. She flashed back to the terrible feast when Merlin had drunk the poison. When Gaius had been reassuring her that Arthur would get the herb needed in time to save Merlin, he had discovered the rash on his arm.

Gaius hadn't told her the rashes scarred.

On his throat, there was a straight, vertical line that abruptly jerked downward over his collarbone. With a shock, Gwen realized someone had tried to cut Merlin's throat. Faint lines encircled his wrists from manacles. How many times had he been put in manacles for scars to form?

Smaller, more innocuous scars were scattered among the harsher ones. Those, Gwen knew, were more like the ones Arthur had. They were from training, or accidents.

Right?

Gwaine made a choking sound. He was standing to Merlin's left, and was staring at his back.

Abruptly, he grabbed Merlin's shoulders and turned him around.

Gwen saw the serket sting.

Everyone in Camelot knew of the serkets. It was rare that a year went by that some poor citizen wasn't stung by the creatures. Nobody ever survived, and everyone in the castle agreed that killing whoever was stung was by far the kindest thing to do. Gaius kept special herbs that gave a swift death to their consumer solely for that purpose.

Yet there was a serket sting on Merlin's back.

Gwen tried to breathe, but she found there was a sudden lack of air in the room.

She darted her eyes to Arthur. He was rigid, unmoving, staring in undiluted shock at his best friend who had deceived and lied and suffered for him.

"Merlin."

It was not Arthur, but Gwaine to speak first, moving Merlin to face him. His voice was rough with a maelstrom of terror, confusion and anger.

"What happened, mate?"