Rain.

Merlin swatted away the hand that prodded at his neck. 'Ow, don't do that.'

Arthur pulled back, rested the hand on his hip and glared at him. Merlin leaned back against the pillow on the hospital bed, hands supporting the motion as they pressed down against the blanket. He had gotten used to that glare. He'd been the target of it for the last three and a half hours. On and off. Sometimes it came with an accidental pout and he had to work hard to maintain a serious expression.

The two previous hours had involved a lot of hand holding, reassuring words and passive aggressive comments aimed at hospital staff as they waited in A&E. The paramedics, while initially baffled at the minimal damage, were grateful for the demoted emergency. They gave him some treatment in the ambulance and reported him to the hospital. He then joined the other people waiting.

Arthur had been dutifully angry about the wait, but the hospital was a busy place and Merlin kept trying to tell him he was fine. The word 'fine' always sounded too hoarse though, and Arthur picked up on the little winces Merlin did his best to hide whenever he said anything. After being assessed they admitted him, and Arthur never left his side. The doctor had checked his breathing, his throat, did the whole torchlight in the eyes procedure and then left to fetch some paperwork. Merlin fiddled with the admissions wristband sealed around his left wrist.

Now Arthur stood glaring at him next to the hospital bed in the Evan Jones Ward. 'You've had worse. Let me look at it.'

Merlin sighed and titled his head back slightly so Arthur could investigate. The hospital air smelled cold and and clean, all personality scrubbed out of it and sterilised. Arthur's expensive hair products were a welcome relief of individuality. A light liquorice scent clung to his dirty blonde hair and when he leaned down, fingertips lightly tracing the skin around his neck, it was the only real thing he could smell.

There were three other patients in the room: one with a kidney problem, another asleep, and the last soon to be transferred to Nightingale Hospital. The first, an elderly man, ignored them with his eyes fixed on an old copy of Anna Karenina. The third, seventeen and called Charlie, watched them with curious brown eyes from his bed across the room.

'You moonlight as a health care professional now?' Merlin asked him with a half-hearted smile and heard Charlie stifle a laugh.

'Well, you'd know if you didn't completely blank me like some hormonal brooding teenager half the time,' Arthur shot back and moved back, satisfied with whatever he'd been checking for. Merlin's smile faded and he took the paper cup of tea Arthur had brought him earlier from the side table. It was lukewarm at that point but it gave him a reason to look away. 'Sorry.'

'No,' Merlin said after he'd taken a sip. Drinking wasn't as bad as he'd thought it would be but the sensation wasn't entirely comfortable. It was like swallowing a little too much and having a moment of calm panic. You know it'll be fine and it goes away a second later, but there's a second when you question your judgement. 'I deserved that. Kind of.'

'I'm just worried about you. You didn't answer my texts or my calls,' Arthur paused and let out a breath, 'then Morgana freaks out and I see you with Aredian. Explain it to me again?'

Merlin nodded with understanding and made eye contact with Charlie. They hadn't spoken much when Arthur left to get tea from the ward's kitchen, but they boy was surprisingly open about himself. Charlie Daegal: admitted for walking into traffic in Camberwell during a psychotic episode. He'd been clipped by a lorry. Apparently it wasn't the first time he'd gotten hurt like that and he seemed at ease with an arm sling and stitches running along the side of his forehead. There was something about the boy that made him want to be honest, something in the way he observed Arthur and himself.

Arthur glanced at Charlie too and opened his mouth again, probably to stop him from answering with an audience, but Merlin replied before he could. 'When Aredian tried to kill me that dark magic I told you about a few weeks ago kind of took over. It protected me. I protected me, I guess. Apparently the process of saving my own life turned Aredian's powers against him. Somehow. I honestly have no definitive idea about what happened, or how.'

Merlin shifted his gaze back to Charlie, who stared back at him with a slight frown. Arthur coughed and moved closer to the bed to give him a pointed look. Merlin shrugged at him took another painfully small sip of the too sweet tea. Arthur put a lot of sugar in most things as it turned out. He smiled. 'So the doctors gave you the all clear?'

He sighed and put the cup back down on the side table. 'For the tenth time: yes. I'll have some bruising, should take it easy for a while and all that, but nothing major. My magic isn't healing it which is only mildly concerning. They're giving me a prescription for some pain killers, though, which helps.'

'Merlin,' Arthur hissed under his breath. The old man hadn't heard them with the little buds poking out his ears muffling most of the world. Charlie on the other hand hadn't stopped staring. Merlin lifted his eyebrows at Arthur in silent question, who scoffed in return and looked down at his watch. 'The cab should be here in a few minutes.'

'We could just take the bus, or the tube, or walk. It'd be cheaper.'

'It's not like money's a problem, Merlin.'

'DS Emrys,' someone interrupted, and they looked to Dr Andrews who came in with several sheets in his hands. Merlin shifted on the bed so his legs hung over the side. He dragged the hospital sheet with him at an odd angle and shifted to get it out of the way. 'Miraculously, you seem to be alright, in spite of the circumstances. Normally I'd recommend we keep you overnight but there doesn't seem to be any permanent damage and the oxygen deprivation to your brain hasn't caused any issues. You really are quite lucky. I just need your signature on the discharge form and you're free to go. Here's a copy of a report we've sent to your GP, and your prescription has been sent over to Notting Hill Pharmacy. You can pick up your medication tomorrow, and for now take these.'

'Thank you,' Merlin said and signed with the biro Dr Andrews provided. Arthur took the medicine box the doctor had fished out of his coat pocket and stuffed it into his own jacket pocket.

'If you have any problems just visit your GP and they should be able to help, okay?' Dr Andrews went on with an easy smile as he took back the form. 'Hope you both have a nice weekend.' The doctor stopped short of leaving the room when he saw the wide-eyed look on the boy's face. 'Everything alright, Charlie?'

'Yeah, no, I'm great, thanks,' Charlie said and Merlin finally recognised him. It was like seeing an old road or park he'd forgotten about for years. Daegal. He remembered watching him die. Dr Andrews smiled and left.

Arthur put a hand on his shoulder. 'Come on, Merlin.'

'Are you in a rush?'

'Not a huge fan of this hospital,' he said and looked at the door. Merlin frowned when he realised. It hadn't entirely crossed his mind, more focused on what had just happened, on Arthur being there and how he could be there with him, on the strange boy who was watching them at that very moment.

'Oh,' was all he managed to say.

St Thomas' Hospital. They'd taken him there at Christmas. Both times Arthur had been the one who got to him first.

'Yeah,' Arthur said softly. Merlin stood up and changed back into his clothes as quickly as he could. Arthur looked away while he did, even though there wasn't anything indecent about the process. Once he'd changed and a nurse had begun sorting out the ruffled mess of the bed and taken the gown from him they headed for the door. He could feel Daegal watching them and met the boy's stare. There was something in his eyes.

Behind the confusion and humour Merlin felt like part of Daegal remembered too. He didn't know whether he should say anything as he left, or maybe show him some magic, but this Daegal was Charlie. Charlie experienced positive symptoms of Schizophrenia. Seeing magic would make it worse and Merlin couldn't do that. He wanted to do something but he didn't know what, so with Arthur's hand resting at his back he gave the boy a smile and let Arthur lead him out toward the lifts. The walk was filled with their silence and the hospital's noise. 'You scared me, Merlin.'

Merlin looked at Arthur when he said that. Neither of them pressed the button when they reached them. 'I'm sorry.'

'Don't be sorry, you idiot.' Arthur sighed and his glare turned soft. He pressed the button when a nurse and a pregnant woman came to stand by them. He moved closer to Merlin. 'I mean you really scared me, and you're acting like it was nothing.'

'I didn't think brooding about it would make the situation any better,' Merlin said and tucked his hands into his jeans' pockets.

Arthur gave him a smile when the lift doors opened. They waited for the nurse to wheel the woman in first. 'Merlin, this is the one time you're allowed to brood, to cry, to hit something.'

'To kiss you?' he asked and Arthur's smile faltered. When they didn't move the lift doors shut with its newest passengers and left them staring at each other in the corridor.

Arthur's eyes trailed down to stare at his mouth with an oddly serious expression. 'Always.'

Merlin reached out and pulled on his shirt. When he was close enough he pressed his lips against Arthur's. He breathed in his cologne and kept the kiss soft and light. He opened his eyes to see Arthur smiling at him.

'I feel better already,' Merlin said. He took Arthur's hand, felt the rough and calloused skin, and didn't let go until they reached his flat. The sun was still out, but it was getting darker, and the Friday night traffic made their twenty minute journey last forty five instead.

Arthur told him about their suspensions, the interviews they'll have to go in for, how Morgana would be remanded in Holloway. Once the professional topics had run their course he started on the new gym Percy had taken him to in Borough on Wednesday. It had a Bodycombat class that had impressed him and a boxing ring he and Percy took full advantage of.

By the time they reached St Stephens Gardens it was close to eight. Arthur paid their fare and walked with Merlin to his flat in the warm evening air. Merlin took a second to breathe it in before he unlocked the doors, first to the house and then to his ground floor flat. Arthur walked in ahead of him and turned on the living room light.

'You haven't unpacked,' he said.

Merlin shut the door. 'Yeah.'

'You've been here for a week,' Arthur went on. Merlin looked around the room. He'd unpacked three days earlier, then he'd packed it all up again when he'd gotten back from Arthur's flat that morning. Everything except his bedroom. For whatever reason he hadn't gone back up to it since taking a shower and changing his clothes. It was too personal. Too permanent. The boxes were stacked up in a meaningless arrangement, no more than three banker's boxes in a tower. It made the room feel smaller than it really was.

'I've also been arrested and hunted down, with a psychotic Nimueh plotting doom and kidnapping Mordred,' Merlin said with a shrug. That's when it hit him. Mordred. He hadn't heard from him since the ambulance.

Arthur pulled a face. 'You make a fair point.'

Merlin smiled at him and walked over to open one of the boxes and stare at its contents. Books. Most of the boxes were filled with books. Gifts from friends, old university and police academy texts, things he'd picked up, collected and treasured for years, for only a few weeks. It might have been a quirk he'd kept from his past life, the love of paper and the smell of the binding, the weight in his hands, the messy piles he made when doing research at Senate House Library just for fun. He wondered if Arthur had ever been like that, if Mordred had ever gotten the chance.

Mordred? Are you okay?

The connection was still there, but for whatever reason Mordred's end felt blocked. Dampened.

'You have food now, though, right?'

Merlin took a confused moment to pull back into the current situation and realise Arthur was referring to the previous Saturday when they'd gone to the Wildflower café. It didn't feel like enough time for everything that had happened. One week earlier he'd been attacked by Nimueh and patched up by Gwen. A week before that he'd joined his magic with Mordred only to have it all torn apart.

Arthur waved a hand in front of his face. 'Merlin?'

'Food, right,' he said and frowned with thought. Had he bought anything? Maybe on Tuesday? 'There should be some, yeah. Can't promise anything fancy, though.'

'If it's really that bad we can always use Deliveroo,' Arthur suggested with a mocking smile and headed into the kitchen. Merlin saw the soft golden light spill out into the small entrance hall then turned back to the box and ran his hand down the side of the cardboard. The magic was back and recovering from whatever Nimueh and Edwin had done to Mordred, to him. It was like seeing dust specks in the air. Coloured and faint but swarming and floating around each book, each box, the air where Arthur had stood a minute earlier. He smiled at the familiar buzz. He was alright, he wanted to live, and now he could. With Arthur. With Mordred.

What happened, Mordred?

Still no response. There was a new and scratchy sensation that tapped its way along his skin, but he couldn't figure out what it meant. Merlin let out a long and calming breath before he tested out the magic. He spread out his fingers and the palm of his hand heated up. Then the books started to slot up out of the box and hover in the air, one carefully floating up and out, then the next in a neat row. They bobbed along through the air in a neat file to reach the dark wooden bookcase sat beside the french doors.

'Merlin,' Arthur said behind him, and he turned with the smile still on his face as the books danced out of their boxes and pushed themselves onto the shelves. He'd done it by hand beforehand, laboriously and painstakingly unpacked then packed it all up again. Using magic to do it now felt right. Like it was meant to be. Merlin was in a very good mood. Arthur's eyes were fixed on him, lips downturned with a deep frown.

'Yeah?'

'What is this?' he asked and Merlin looked at the sheet of paper Arthur held between his hands. Black ink seeped through to the other side slightly and marked it with strange dark shapes, spots and lines. He recognised his own handwriting and remembered the surreal hour it took to write the letter that morning. Merlin's breath caught and the books still mid-air thumped to the ground. Panic crept through his limbs and over his skin like frost.

'Arthur, let me explain.'

'Explain?' Arthur repeated quietly, eyebrows lifted and eyes catching the light. They were wet and angry. 'Tell me this is some kind of sick joke. Please, Merlin, tell me you're not that much of an idiot.'

'I thought,' he started then paused, chest tight and throat aching. 'I didn't think there was another way, Arthur.'

'You're telling me that it's true? You spoke with Aredian and asked him to do that to you? You planned on letting him kill you?'

Merlin watched as hard and upset expressions grabbed at and moulded the ex-King's face. 'Arthur.'

'And all in my name? How,' Arthur stopped and swallowed. He looked away for a second and Merlin could see he was working hard to control himself. The silence was cold, everything was cold, even the coloured dust specks had frozen in the air and turned a faint and dying blue. 'How could you do something like that. How could you write this? You come to me and we,' he paused again. Merlin could see his pain. He felt it too. 'And the whole time you were just going to throw yourself away? You had no right. You should have told me.'

Merlin didn't know what to say. He could only watch Arthur stand in the doorway with the letter he'd wanted him to read without him there, a letter that wasn't fair, that was cruel. What had he been thinking?

'I was supposed to find out like this?' he went on and shook the paper in the air. Arthur scrunched it up into a ball and threw it to the ground before running his hands through his hair. 'How could you, Merlin? Is that all I am? Is that all you think you are? That you can just write yourself out of life, out of my life, like some kind of offering? You should have told me. You should have let me help you!'

'Arthur, please calm down,' Merlin told him with a weak voice. This wasn't how it was supposed to go. They were supposed to be okay now. Merlin had fought to live, he'd changed his mind when Aredian tried to kill him. He opened his mouth to say as much when Arthur shook his head.

'No,' he said, and the wet eyes started to spill out. Arthur let the tears run down, either oblivious to them or he simply didn't care. He gave Merlin a look that hit all his breath away like a door slamming shut with a too-strong breeze. 'This is too much. I get we haven't exactly been dealing with your run of the mill situations, but this is just fucked up. We spent the night together and you left me alone in the morning for that? I can't-'

Merlin tried to take in a breath. 'Arthur, you don't understand.'

'Understand? I love you, Merlin, and you lied to me. You had sex with me without saying a thing and you left a note? Vivian was right. You do have a death wish.'

'It's not that simple.'

Arthur grew still and stared at him with his wet eyes. 'I don't think I can do this.'

The colour drained out of the air like rain washing away art on a wall. It smudged and blurred the image. The paint grew diluted and streaked. 'What do you mean?'

'You know what I mean. What do you want me to say, Merlin? That I'm okay with you lying to me? That it's fine you're willing to die at the drop of a hat if it means saving me? That's not okay. If me being in your life means you value it less,' Arthur said and anger flashed across his face. 'I can't be a part of that.'

'Arthur,' Merlin began but he had already turned around, had already started walking towards the door. Merlin moved after him, the frost burning at that point and the colourless, airless, world thick and empty as he walked through it. He fought against the resistance, the sensation that he couldn't breathe, and grabbed onto Arthur's forearm. 'Wait, Arthur. You don't understand.'

'And I don't think I ever will, Merlin,' he said, his blue eyes sad and honest. He tried to take his arm away and he let him but stepped around to block the door. Arthur pressed his lips together and more tears fell. 'Let me go.'

'If you could?' Merlin asked. His whole body burned and his heart thudded too heavily in his chest. He didn't know if he could do it, if it was worth it. Merlin knew what he'd thought for weeks, for months, but he wasn't sure anymore.

'Merlin,' Arthur's voice was soft but commanding, 'let me go.'

'If you could understand?' he said again. 'If there was a way for you to understand why I did this, why I'd do it again, would you want to? Even if it hurt you?'

Arthur gave him a confused look. 'I'd do anything for you, Merlin. You know that. I'm breaking up with you for god's sake. Just,' he closed his eyes, eyelashes dark and wet. 'Just let me go, Merlin.'

Arthur opened them again when he didn't move and all Merlin could say was, 'I can't lose you. Not again.'

He stepped forward and took Arthur's face in his hands. Before Arthur's protest could sound Merlin remembered. Everything and anything, he let it fill his mind and saw Arthur's blue eyes fill with a golden shimmer. The area around them grew out of focus and different smells, temperatures, voices bombarded them both.

I've been trained to kill since birth.

You're threatening me with a spoon?

If I need a servant in the next life . . .

There will never be another like you, Arthur.

Merlin stared into Arthur's eyes as he opened that gateway and let him remember. He felt him take in a sharp breath and then it was quiet, and Merlin drew himself back into the moment. The glow left Arthur's eyes. He didn't take his hands away immediately. Only when Arthur stepped backwards did he drop his arms.

'Arthur?'

He didn't say anything, didn't look away, didn't move. Merlin stared at him, barely breathing, and waited.

When he finally spoke his voice was tired and low. 'I need to leave.'

'Please,' the words left his lips instantly, 'don't go.'

Arthur didn't frown or look confused. He wore an expression Merlin had never seen before, in either lifetime. Merlin hesitated, then moved out of the way. The moment he did Arthur walked forward, opened the door and left. A cool breeze blew in when the main house door opened and closed and then all he could hear was ambient traffic and the wind rustling trees in the small park opposite.

The door clicked shut with a soft push of Merlin's hand. He leaned back against it and stared at nothing in particular. Knowing is better than being left in the dark. He recalled the session with Dr Ruadan. The man had essentially predicted the outcome weeks ago. He should have known. He should have accepted it sooner. Merlin could feel his tears, how they grew in his eyes hot and wet and unwelcome. The magic he'd used cooled until he didn't feel it anymore, the panic faded away and colour returned to the world. It soaked back into the air, floor, wall, like a cloth mopping up spilled paints, blood, or coffee. Everything was stained with life again, he'd lost Arthur again, and Merlin didn't know what to do.