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. .
Arthur thinks it’s a joke, almost laughs until he catches the look on his father’s face and immediately sobers. He thinks the dagger Lady Helen aimed for his heart would be a kinder punishment than this: the boy who so taunted him and showed him such little respect, appointed to his personal household.
Merlin . His new manservant.
At breakfast the next morning, his father’s voice carrying over Arthur’s near-pleading protests, Uther tells him it’s a mark of respect and prestige; says it’s evidence that he’s growing into his position as first in line to the throne of Camelot. But to Arthur it feels like suddenly having a nursemaid again, and he’s made it twenty years being more or less self-sufficient.
And sure, he knows the castle teems with servants (he is a red-blooded male after all, and has tupped his fair share of the the girls who titter about the scullery), but his rank and position mean he’s never had to want for anything or really ever had to bother himself with the specifics of where his dirty clothes go, or how his bath gets filled and emptied, or how his bed is perfectly turned down every night. For all he cares, it’s magic that makes fresh clothes appear in his wardrobe, and sees his mail was always polished and free of grime or rust, and has his breakfast delivered quietly and discreetly while he bathes or dresses himself behind the changing screen.
Maybe his not knowing, his blind eye when it comes to the daily inner workings of the palace, should be expected of a prince of the realm. Or maybe his ignorance is entirely the problem.
Either way, Arthur may be a prince but more importantly—at least in his mind—he’s also a knight. Knights don’t have manservants . Maybe that’s why it stings, then, the sudden appointment of a smart-mouthed country boy to his personal household. And maybe the problem isn’t Merlin, specifically. If he’s honest, the problem is what Merlin represents – his loss of freedom, his independence, yet another constricting link in the ever-tightening chain that reminds him his life is not his own.
. .
At first, Arthur doesn’t know what the point of his manservant is, doesn’t know where to send him or what to tell him to do. He’s only ever been taught how to lead armies and command soldiers, not household staff.
Merlin’s full of noise, chattering from the moment he wakes Arthur up to the moment he’s dismissed at night and in between, in those rare moments when he’s at a loss for words, Merlin still fills the silence with his sighs and restless shifting. And for Arthur, who prefers peace and quiet , Merlin’s presence feels like a stone that’s lodged itself in his boot; one that, no matter how hard he may shake, he can’t get rid of.
Merlin huffs for the third time in as many minutes, the sound grating on Arthur’s already fraying nerves.
“Oh, for—” Arthur feels his face twist with a level of petulance he hasn’t felt since childhood when Morgana used to whine her way into his private lessons with Sir Bedivere. “Go do something, would you,” he snaps at last, slamming his quill down on top of the report he’s trying to read.
He’s been stuck repeating the same sentence over and over because even on a good day – which today is not – Sir Ulfic’s handwriting is nearly impossible to read. And Arthur just simply can’t concentrate with Merlin moping about and constantly grabbing Arthur’s attention with every restless shift of his feet and every breathy, bored sigh he puffs between his lips.
“Like what?” Merlin spits back, as bracing and defiant as ever.
“Just,” Arthur falters, waves a hand expansively. “ Whatever it is people in your position are supposed to do.”
For just a moment, Merlin’s face relaxes and he blinks owlishly at Arthur before a frown tugs across his features, his arms knotting tightly across his chest. “I believe you’re supposed to tell me that, sire .”
In all his twenty years, Arthur has never met a single person who has made his title sound like such an insult. It would be refreshing if it also weren’t so enraging.
Arthur reaches for the ties of his tunic and tugs the hem from the belt around his waist. In his anger and frustration, his arms flap wildly for a moment as he wiggles them through the sleeves. Pulling the garment over his head, he tosses it in Merlin’s general direction, doesn’t bother to see if his aim is true or if the boy catches it. “Clean that.”
“Just this?” Merlin frowns, his knuckles white, the red tunic swinging listlessly from his tight grip.
“Yes,” Arthur says, the word barely more than a growl, the consonants scraping over the ridges of his teeth, his jaw clamped almost painfully tightly.
Merlin turns sharply, the large door to Arthur’s chambers quite literally rattling on its hinges as he slams it shut behind him. Arthur seems to feel the force of it in his bones, feels it in the way his heart seems to constrict at the implied slight of it all. But Merlin is a servant and Arthur is a prince and he has better things to do with his day than spend another moment worrying about something as trivial as the feelings of his manservant.
He pulls on a new tunic and stomps down to the training ground, the weight of his sword as he rotates the weapon in his grip soothing away whatever lingering tension he can feel knotting his neck and clawing behind his eyes. And if he’s a bit more aggressive, swings his sword and shoves his shield forward with a bit more force than strictly necessary, well then he’s simply pushing his men to be better.
It’s late by the time Merlin finally slips through his door again, the sun well past the horizon and the candles only a mark or two away from guttering out altogether. Merlin strides through Arthur’s chamber with barely a knock, throwing a ball of linen in Arthur’s face as he passes. Arthur’s senses are suddenly assailed by something floral, something new, and he knows without a doubt that the garment hasn’t been washed in the usual manner – and he will absolutely, eventually, give Merlin a talking to about that.
The sole of Merlin’s boot is a whisper along the stone floor as he spins towards the hearth, throwing another log or two onto the embers before he prods at them, stoking the flames until they catch the fresh wood. Merlin moves and folds back the linens on Arthur’s bed in sharp, efficient movements.
“Anything else, sire?” Merlin asks, sounding almost bored. His eyes flick to Arthur and slowly trail him from head to toe. “I trust you can prepare yourself for bed?”
“Obviously,” Arthur drawls. “I, unlike you , don’t have my head so far up –”
Merlin doesn’t wait for Arthur to finish that particular line of thought, doesn’t bother waiting to be dismissed, doesn’t bow or even acknowledge Arthur’s existence; he simply spins with that same whisper-soft sound of his boot twisting along the floor and eases through the doors.
They’re not friends, there’s barely any mutual respect between them, and yet Merlin’s casual, indifferent exit feels like the sharpest sort of barb.
Although, Arthur supposes, his thumb tracing absent circles along the hem of his tunic, Merlin did at least do a half-decent job of washing the garment. There’s always been a persistent stain just above the wrist on the left sleeve and no matter how many times he’s passed the top off to be laundered, the stain has remained fixed, as seemingly immovable and stubborn as his new manservant. And yet, when Arthur pulls the sleeve through his hand, he can no longer find any trace of it.
And when Arthur lays the tunic out to look the whole thing over, he catches again that delicate perfume from earlier and it clouds around him not unpleasantly. He does not bring his tunic to his nose after Merlin leaves and inhales the scent of clove and lavender and sage clinging to the worn fibers.
. .
“Your job,” Arthur bites, “is to do as I say.”
Merlin snorts, actually snorts like the barnyard animal he clearly is, and despite his protests, or maybe actually because of them, continues to push the soapy brush across the stone floor of Arthur’s chambers, his ridiculous neckerchief swaying like a pendulum with each rock of his body.
In the month or so since Uther thrust the boy’s company on Arthur, not a day has gone by that Merlin hasn’t complained about something – the number of stairs from the kitchen to Arthur’s chambers; the way his fingers are sore from repeatedly pricking himself sewing surprisingly tidy stitches across tears in Arthur’s clothing; how his shoulder aches from taking a blow Arthur landed on the shield Merlin was cowering behind (and it wasn’t even that hard of a strike. The boy’s just too weak, too soft ).
“Really?” Merlin muses, his lips barely moving as he mumbles to himself. “So is it your job to be a prat?”
“I could fire you for such insolence!” Arthur threatens, his face flaming.
The problem, they both know, is that Arthur has fired and rehired Merlin no less than three times a week since they entered into this arrangement, and so the threat has lost its bite. At present, it’s been four days since the last time Arthur sacked Merlin. Perhaps that explains why Arthur’s quick to anger, feels the need to pick a fight itching along his skin.
“Please,” Merlin laughs, the sound building, rolling like thunder through summer clouds. Suds from the bucket of water next to him slosh down the sides as he tosses the brush he was using to scrub the floors back into the murky depths. Arthur does not track the way Merlin’s limbs unfold from under him as he stands, doesn’t watch the flex of Merlin’s forearm as he pushes at the slightly damp sleeve that slides down over the delicate peaks of his wrist. “ Please fire me. I dare you to sack me for longer than two days.”
“You don’t think I can make it two days without you?” The idea is absurd. As if he needs Merlin of all people.
“You haven’t yet,” Merlin challenges, his brow raised in a defiant arch that could challenge even Gaius in its skepticism.
Arthur pushes his seat back and rises only far enough to stand and cock a hip against the edge of the table. He takes his time regarding Merlin with a look he’s been honing for nearly two decades – the same two decades he’s spent without Merlin by his side, second-guessing every other word that falls from Arthur’s mouth – cold, calculated, and impassive. And for once it seems to work; Arthur thinks he catches a slight wobble in Merlin’s bravado the longer they stand in silence.
He will not be bullied into giving Merlin what he wants. Instead – simply to see the look that will spread across Merlin’s face, to watch as his brows draw together until deep tracks wrinkle his forehead, his expressive mouth sinking down in to a frown – Arthur sends Merlin to the armory, ticking off with his fingers the list of chores he invents for Merlin to do there.
The chores are just an excuse to drive Merlin away but, Arthur reasons with himself, he’s not actually being cruel. No, it’s for Merlin’s own good to spend so much time surrounded by all those weapons and pieces of armor. Because somehow, perhaps due to his own stubborn ignorance, Merlin is still clueless about which bits of plating go where and how to fasten everything together, and more than once Arthur’s pauldron has come loose while a fellow knight has swung a sword at him.
On the training ground, it’s embarrassing. In combat, the mistake could be deadly, and Arthur will not allow Merlin to be his cause of death.
Besides, this sort of tedium is how Arthur learned to use a crossbow: he spent hours hunched upon a stool in the armory, his fingers caked with grime as he set about disassembling the weapon piece by piece, memorizing how each part fit together before slowly put everything back together. And once reassembled he started over again. Hour after hour, Arthur trained his hands to learn every inch of the weapon until he could take it apart and put it back together again by touch alone.
And he’s right, although Arthur tries not to crow about it, tries not to tell Merlin I told you so when only a week later Merlin fits him for a tournament with quick and efficient movements. Merlin only bumbles with the strap of Arthur’s couter once, though they both let it pass without comment.
. .
It’s not that Arthur wants or even needs Merlin to join him on a hunt. It’s just that Leon’s been dispatched to the border with Mercia and the rest of his father’s men are far older than he is and complain of sore limbs and joints that ache when it rains, which is, as of late, nearly every day.
And Merlin’s been complaining about the city for weeks: the heat, the smell, how the lower town swells with people and so much noise it makes his head throb during market days. It makes his errands for Gauis take even longer and makes him even more snappish and belligerent when he storms through Arthur’s chambers later. Plus, Merlin’s surprisingly good with Arthur’s horses, the pair of them never showing the stablehands any of the kindness they extend towards Merlin.
Even though Merlin crashes through the forest like some great oaf, his stumbling footfalls or panting breaths or even, sometimes, a combination of the two scaring away all the animals in the wood around them, he is surprisingly adept with the fire, the logs catching quickly despite the damp that seems to hang in the air.
In his pack, Arthur has hard cheese and bread he nicked while still hot from the kitchens this morning, but the dismal weather feels as if it has sunk into his very bones and he wants, desperately, for something hot to eat; can practically imagine the feeling of warmth spreading from his stomach to his water-logged toes with every bite. He wastes no time then, grabbing one of hares he trapped earlier from where it’s slung across Llamrei’s haunches. He unsheathes his dagger and, by the light of the fire, he makes quick work of separating meat from hide, trussing the limbs, and preparing the meat to cook over the fire.
Arthur looks up for just a moment as he stoops over the flames, his movements arrested as he catches Merlin watching him.
“I guess I forgot you aren’t totally useless,” Merlin says by way of explanation, his gaze darting from Arthur’s hands to the fire and back again.
“Please do continue to insult me, Merlin,” Arthur drawls, though there’s no real heat to his words. “I would love to eat this hare I trapped all by myself .”
Merlin looks affronted only long enough for Arthur to roll his eyes, swaying where he sits until their shoulders knock against one another.
They already know, though the truth of it remains unspoken, that whatever one of them has, they will readily share with the other.
. .
They’re not friends – a prince can’t be friends with his manservant – and yet they’re not not friends.
It should seem odd how easily Merlin is able to fill all the places of Arthur’s life that he didn’t know were empty; and yet, perhaps even more oddly, it doesn’t feel that strange. It almost feels right.
Whatever it is between them – this swirling tempest of friendship and animosity and fondness and resentment and status and duty but also friendly shoves and exasperated sighs muffled by reluctant smiles; the way Arthur knows which shirts Merlin’s personally laundered by smell alone until, eventually, all his clothes and his bedding and even his cumbersome red cloak smell like that particular blend that he begins to think of as home ; the way Merlin already seems to know Arthur’s fondness for the sticky ginger cakes Cook makes only when Camelot hosts visiting nobles, and how an extra always seems to be waiting for him back in his chambers after a long night of endless toasting and speeches; how Arthur demands extra sausage for breakfast only to push the plate towards Merlin with an announcement that he’s not as hungry as he thought he was.
Whatever it is between the two of them, it’s all a bit like trying to stare up at the sun.
Arthur can’t quite make out the shape of it, no matter how much he may squint at it.
. .
“Morgana says I don’t need to serve you wine, you know.” Merlin’s voice is only loud enough for Arthur to hear, his breath a spot of warmth across Arthur’s cheek.
Arthur raises his refilled goblet to his lips, draws the tannic wine through his teeth, across his tongue. “She’s a harpy who should mind her own business,” Arthur says without turning; knows that if he does he’d be confronted with the delicate arches of Merin’s lips, the high jut of cheekbones that cast deep shadows across his cheeks in the light of the hall, the teasing laughter he knows to be dancing in Merlin’s endlessly bright, expressive eyes.
It’s better, he knows, to keep his eyes diverted, no matter how much he may want to look.
“She says, ” Merlin presses, sliding an arm between them to brace his weight atop the table, his body a wall between Arthur and the others seated at the high table around him. It’s completely inappropriate but Arthur can’t find the words to tell him off, not with the wine still sitting hotly in his mouth, not with the way Merlin’s lips are twisted in a small half-smile. “I’m actually insulting Sir Bors by doing it.”
“Sir Bors is – and truly his name is an unfortunate coincidence – a bore who has a penchant for spilling more wine in my lap than what makes it in my cup.” Arthur tells him, face somber and serious. Merlin laughs at that, a proper laugh that comes out rich and warm, the echo of it mingling with the rest of the din around them.
“Besides,” Arthur carries on, hiding the rising blush he feels begin to heat his cheeks behind the rim of his goblet, “you’re not taking his job. He’s welcome to continue to serve my father and anyone else in attendance. You’ll simply be serving me. ”
Merlin sighs, his fingers absently tracing a knot on the tabletop. “I knew it would be too much for you to even think of giving me the night off.” Merlin cranes his neck, eyes sweeping the hall around them. “These dinners are so…” he waves a hand around and even without words Arthur knows what he means.
“What would you do with a night off anyway?” Arthur challenges. He catches his father look down the table at him, can already hear the lecture Uther will level at him in the morning, full of sour phrases like unbecoming and not appropriate for someone in your position and duty to your people, your kingdom , Arthur and irresponsible to spend the night gossiping with that servant of yours, and yet when he blinks away, he finds he can’t be bothered to care, not when Merlin’s tongue flashes out quickly to wet his bottom lip and Arthur thinks he catches the plummy stain of wine on his tongue.
“Well,” Merlin leans in even closer, though Arthur’s not quite sure how that’s possible. If Merlin were to lose his balance, which Arthur knows he’s prone to do, he’d land in Arthur’s lap. “Gareth might have heavily implied that he’d –”
“Gareth?” Arthur startles back, frowning. “ Gareth? Surely, Merlin, even a simpleton like you can do better than Gareth.”
And already he’s trying to recall the rotation for patrol assignments and wonders how soon and for how long he can send the boy away from the city. Away from Merlin.
Perhaps a beat too late he realizes the more predictable, the more reasonable response should have been shock and outrage at Merlin being so open, so flippant about his preference in sexual partners. But even so, that information seems to be second fiddle when presented with the fact that Merlin would rather tup Gareth – the average and plain and unremarkable fourth son of King Lot, and a middling squire to be sure – than, well…
“And what?” Merlin’s face has suddenly lost all amusement, his features hard and angry, his tone defensive. And Arthur doesn’t know what’s wrong with him for being able to constantly draw Merlin into such a state of outrage and insolence over and over again. “Am I supposed to draw up a list of everyone who wants to suck my cock – or whom I might want to suck my cock – for you to sign off on? Give your royal seal of approval? Because I’ll go –”
“Don’t be stupid,” Arthur sours, face flushing. And just like that, like a passing summer squall the argument is over as fast as it arrived and Merlin laughs for good measure, dispelling the last of their preposterous conversation to the air.
But later that night, the wine making his heart thump heavily between his ribs, his head spinning, the world swimming before him pleasantly, Arthur thinks that it’s perhaps not quite a terrible idea: to be presented with those men of the court who would wish to know Merlin in such an intimate way. He thinks, perhaps, there’s one name in particular he’d place at the top of the list.
. .
“Llamrei’s bitten another groom.”
“Who was it?” Merlin asks at the same time Arthur sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose and asking, “Well, what did he do?”
“Beric,” Sir Hoel says, addressing Merlin first. “And I believe he tried to remove her bridle, sire,” this to Arthur.
“She’s particular,” Arthur frowns.
Merlin snorts. “And whose fault is that?”
Arthur ignores him, turning back to the Master of the Horse. “He must not have done it right. Merlin, you’ll see to her from now on, won’t you? Hengroen too.”
Sir Hoel’s face pinches in a frown but he remains silent. Merlin, however, has never shown such decorum, especially not towards Arthur, and wastes no time before complaining. “Why me ?”
“She likes you.” Arthur says by way of explanation, his attention already turning back to the report in front of him. He pretends it's interesting; Merlin knows it’s about reserved stores of grain and anticipated mill yield in advance of winter and knows, therefore, it isn’t.
Merlin sighs, collapses into a chair beside Arthur and reaches out to rip a hunk off of the bread on Arthur’s plate. “Have Beric reassigned to assist Kay with Sir Palamedes’s latest gelding,” Merlin tells Hoel, his authority in the matter undercut by the bread he chews on while speaking. “Kay will be starting his training as a squire within the month and his position will need to be replaced soon anyway.”
Hoel pauses, looks to Arthur for approval and permission and he grants it with an agitated nod of his head. “Sire,” Hoel agrees, departing with a quick bow.
“That’s his job, you know,” Merlin says. “Looking after Hengroen.” He puts his feet up on the table, long limbs stretching out as he tosses a berry Arthur didn’t even see him take from off his plate into his mouth.
Arthur hums something vague and noncommittal and spears a piece of sausage with his fork, taking his time to chew it slowly as he watches the way Merlin’s face twists as if preparing to lecture a small child. “Sir Hoel,” Merlin says, slowly. “It’s his job to care for your horses personally. The king’s too.”
“I’m the prince,” Arthur reminds him. “I can do as I please.”
“Right,” Merlin rolls his eyes, the bread he’s chewing distorting his words and making one side of cheeks bulge rather inappropriately. “It’s just, you know…”
At Merlin’s hesitation, it’s Arthur’s turn to roll his eyes. He leans forward and swats Merlin’s feet off the table. “For some deranged reason, people around here think it’s an honor to do your pratness’s bidding.”
“I’m the prince, Mer lin,” Arthur reminds him for a second time in as many minutes. “I didn’t dismiss Sir Hoel from his position, I just reassigned his duties, as far as my horses are concerned, to you .”
“Just as it was Sir Bors’s honor to serve you wine until you pushed that off to me as well?”
“Right,” Arthur says with finality, the argument settled.
“I seem,” Merlin grumbles, stealing the last of the berries off Arthur’s plate, “to be collecting jobs that don’t belong to me.”
. .
“Morgana says –” Merlin starts as he strips the linen from Arthur’s bed.
Arthur thinks he must have sighed more since he met Merlin than he had done collectively all his life prior. “How many times must I tell you she’s a harpy and not to be listened to?”
“She says,” Merlin presses, his arms full of bedding, “you’ve stopped fucking the scullery maids.”
“How she – how you –” Arthur sputters, his face quickly turning as crimson as his shirt. “I hardly see how that has anything to do with anything . I could…could have your head for such a comment, Merlin.”
Merlin only shrugs; they’ve long since moved past the point of such empty threats. “So it’s true then?” He asks, his tone suspiciously casual.
“I fail to see how that’s any of your concern.”
“Well,” Merlin says, depositing his armful of linen into a nearby basket. “It’s just that I seem to be the one doing all your laundering now.”
“Right,” Arthur says slowly. “As I believe is your job.”
“Okay,” Merlin says with a final shrug.
And honestly, it’s damned near infuriating how Merlin seems to always dance around whatever it is he really seems to want to say. “Okay what?” Arthur presses.
A few papers flutter to the ground as he quickly moves from behind his desk and he can hear Merlin tsk over the mess, as if Arthur’s very existence is a never-ending burden to him, as if it’s not Merlin’s fault he’s so agitated, so disoriented in the first place.
Merlin’s tunic is twisted in his grip before he knows what’s happened, before he’s even aware that he’s covered the short distance between them to walk Merlin back against one of the thick stone pillars in his chamber. Gods, even after nearly a year in Camelot, Merlin’s still a slip of nothing, all arms and legs, like a sapling. It’d be so easy to break him. Not physically, not in that way at least, and for a moment Arthur’s struck with the image of Merlin flushed and naked under him, his black curls stark against the cream of Arthur’s pillows, his spindly knees pressed to his chest and –
Merlin trips but Arthur is there, unmovable despite the wild riot of his nerves and he barely needs to tug, nothing less than a quick jerk of his arm, before Merlin stumbles closer into his space. Merlin catches himself, hand splayed on Arthur’s shoulder and Arthur leans in further, uses his body weight to his advantage and crowds Merlin against the pillar, barely a whisper of air between their bodies.
Arthur ignores the way his body thrills at the proximity, the way each pounding thump of his heart seems to rush blood down to his increasingly attentive prick. And maybe he’s not the only one affected by their nearness because Merlin’s pupils are blown wide, more black than gem-bright blue, his tongue darting out to quickly lick at the swell of his bottom lip, his breath catching in his throat.
“I just thought, maybe Gwen… ” Merlin murmurs.
“Guinevere?” Arthur frowns, startled, moving away from Merlin as if slapped.
“Yes?” Merlin says, boots slipping as Arthur suddenly drops his hands from him. “Or are we still pretending that you didn’t make me pick flowers for her? That you didn’t take her out to the woods for a private picnic the other week?”
Right. That.
Guinevere .
Arthur can no more easily put a name to his feelings for the blacksmith’s daughter than he can for Merlin; only that when he thinks he might alight upon what one means to him, he finds he often thinks of the other while he does it.
The problem, Guinevere aside, is that there actually is some truth in Morgana’s petty aspersions – it has been a while since he’s taken anyone, scullery maid or otherwise, to bed. He could, upon reflection, perhaps pin-point the moment when he no longer found the soft, swelling curves and melodic, breathy sighs while his fingers grew slick sliding between a laundress's thighs, appealing.
He could , but he won’t .
“Merlin,” Arthur bites, scrubbing his hands down his face. “Get out .”
Except Merlin doesn’t, not immediately, because Merlin never does as he’s told. He stays for a beat or two longer, something unreadable on his face – and that’s new, Arthur will remember later, the way for once he’s unable to decipher exactly what Merlin is thinking – before he takes his leave without another word.
. .
Arthur’s still sore from the fight, from the ride, mud and worse caking his clothes that still stink of the funeral pyre they built for Merlin’s friend before they left. In the handful of hours he was able to quiet the tumult of his mind and slip away into sleep, he’d been visited again and again by the image of Matthew’s limp body draped across the back of his horse.
He was trying –
Matthew, who had no knack for the staff Arthur was desperately teaching him to wield, who would have been killed during the course of the skirmish, is dead anyway because of Arthur. Because he was just –
He was trying to save him.
All Arthur’s ever done is try to be good, try to be the son his father demands, the prince his kingdom expects. It’s not enough. He’s not enough.
He was just trying to save them all.
“This has gone on long enough,” Uther says, a familiar clip of fury in his voice. “I’ve turned a blind eye to your indiscretions.”
“Indiscretions?” Arthur startles, his sleepless brain trying to keep the conversation from slipping between his weary fingers, but already he feels a step behind, feels as if, perhaps, this anger from his father has some deeper meaning he can’t, in his current state, place. “Father, I –”
“ Four days you were gone!” Uther roars, the leather of his gloves pulled tight across his knuckles as he grips at the ornate chair beside him. “There are rules , Arthur. Rules that I have turned a blind eye to when you’ve shown blatant disregard for them. But you are the Crown Prince now. Enough is enough.”
Arthur wants to press his fingers into his bleary eyes, wants to turn his back on his father, this lecture, to sink into a warm bath and slip below the surface and let the water press against his ears until the noises of the world, even his very thoughts, are muffled and his lungs burn.
“I should have never appointed that boy to your service,” he hears his father carry on. “He’s been nothing but a nuisance. Sir Bors, Sir Hoel, Sir Pellinor,” the king ticks off each name with his fingers, “have come to me, telling me of the offenses you have caused by reassigning their appointed duties to your manservant. And for your benefit, in the name of your freedom , I have previously –”
“That’s enough,” Arthur says at last, his voice low, and yet it seems to echo in the great hall; he hears his words said again and again in his ears.
“The wine, the horses, whatever other blame the men of your court wish to lay at Merlin’s feet – Merlin is simply doing as I ask,” he explains slowly, trying to keep his voice steady despite the anger, the annoyance he feels over such trivial matters. How dare his father and his retinue of counselors – old, stuffy men, all of them, with tedious, outdated traditions – try to tell him , the future king, how to conduct himself. How dare they try and control Merlin . “If anyone has an issue with that, then they may address it with me directly.”
“Arthur, I am trying –”
“No. This discussion is over,” he tells his father with a confidence he doesn’t quite feel. “I’ll hear no more of it.”
He thinks his father might say more, even expects him to raise a hand or send him to the dungeons for such brazen insolence. Arthur waits, breath baited, until Uther sends him away without a look and a dismissive wave of his hand.
And for a while, Arthur’s stern words seem to be enough and it keeps his father and Sir Pellinor, and Sir Bors, and Sir Hoel, and Sir Beric, his father’s Steward, and the whole rotten lot of them out of his affairs until bruised egos are healed and castle life moves on until, without anyone’s notice, the world seems to simply shape itself around Arthur and Merlin both until Merlin just simply is.
Until he is as common as the very stones of the fortress, as welcome to be seen as the sun on a winter day. With time, there is no errand or service or honor that people would frown upon seeing him doing. He is Merlin as simply as Arthur is “Arthur”; one rarely seen without the other.
Most days, Merlin can be found more often in Arthur’s chambers than in his own. It helps that for those who care about such things, the boy is oddly brave, loyal to his prince; he is always the first to ride out with Arthur and somehow always comes back unscathed. (Except, of course, for the rare times he doesn’t, and by then everyone knows to steer clear of the prince’s chambers, later the king’s chambers, until the all-too familiar sounds of Merlin’s laughter once again bounce down the palace halls; until the unmistakable sound of Cook running him out of the kitchen can be heard early in the mornings; until the sound of raised voices – Merlin’s and Arthur’s own – can be heard from the courtyard through open windows.)
. .
Merlin so rarely bothers with knocking that it takes Arthur a moment or two to catch the noise. “Come in,” he calls and is surprised, although he shouldn’t be, to see a face much younger than Merlin’s own peer around the open door.
“S-sorry, my lord,” the page stutters, “I was looking for Merlin?”
“Merlin?” Arthur frowns, setting aside the apple he was peeling to regard the boy fully. “Whatever for?”
The page blanches, his face turning as white as the neat stack of bedding he has balanced across his forearms. “I have, erm, the clean linen he requested? For – for Lady, erm, Princess? Mithian. My lord.”
“Well, come on then,” Arthur stands and ushers the boy back through the door. “He can’t have wandered off far.”
Except, it seems, he must have and it takes Arthur longer than he’d care to admit to catch a sign of his wayward manservant.
“I really should put a bell on you, you know,” Arthur calls once he spots the familiar mop of raven curls. “Or perhaps a leash,” he muses as Merlin stops and turns, walks towards Arthur with a smile tugging at his lips. “So you can’t wander too far.”
“My lord,” Merlin’s voice is low, nearly gruff and the smile from only moments before has slipped; is now something smaller, something private meant just for Arthur. “I had no idea you had such desires to tie me up. You need only ask.”
And for a moment, Arthur can see it so clearly: Merlin, naked, his back against the solid post of Arthur’s bed, his prick straining against his bare stomach, the kerchief currently around Merlin’s neck being put to a better use while Arthur kneels before him. And for a moment, Arthur can’t breathe through the immediate aching want of it all.
“Right,” Arthur says, a blush bright on his cheeks as Merlin continues to stare at him, his eyes fond, perhaps a bit too knowing. “Where have you been, then?” Arthur asks with a bluster he doesn’t quite feel.
“Honestly, I don’t know why I bother telling you anything before you’ve had breakfast,” Merlin sighs. “Are these for Princess Mithian?” he asks the page nervously fidgeting at Arthur’s side. The boy nods, arms shooting out like an arrow fired from a crossbow to present the bedlinen to Merlin.
“Thank you, Roderick,” Merlin says and the boy bobs an awkward series of bows, first to Merlin and then, as if remembering who he’s standing next to, jerking awkwardly down towards Arthur before repeating the same, stiff movement back to Merlin again.
“Did you actually need something?” Merlin asks. “I know you don’t believe me but I am, actually, quite busy helping to get things in order for Mithian’s stay.”
“First name basis with the princess now, are you?”
“Jealousy doesn’t look good on you, Arthur,” Merlin tuts. He waits for a moment or two for Arthur to offer up an excuse to explain his presence here in this wing of the castle, opposite from Arthur’s own, and when none comes, Merlin tips his head for Arthur to follow him.
It’s uncanny, the way Merlin moves through space. For years, Arthur used to think Merlin awkward, clumsy, but he can see now the quiet strength of his body, the easy agility of his long legs. The corridors are crowded with people ferrying things about in preparation for Mithian’s impending arrival – he passes rolled up tapestries on the shoulders of half a dozen pages to be brought outside and aired; bright, fragrant bouquets of flowers so large they appear to float down the halls all their own; new beeswax candles in sconces and dozens of servants sweeping and mopping and dusting. Not for the first time, Arthur’s struck with how much life, how much activity occurs within the walls of the castle that he isn’t privy to.
Merlin twists through it all, the bundle of bedlinen he effortlessly lifted from Roderick balanced perfectly in the cradle of his own arms, not even one crisply folded corner out of place. And Arthur, for all his training and stamina and reflexes that make him a formidable knight, actually struggles to keep up. So much so that he nearly collides with a door as it swings open into the corridor.
“Merlin, oh thank goodness I’ve run into you!” Guinevere’s voice wavers between relief and hysteria as she pulls Merlin into the room. She almost doesn’t notice Arthur as he trails behind, barely dips into a curtsy before she and Merlin devolve into a conversation that has to do with who knows what. But it’s fine, because with the two of them otherwise engaged, it’s a simple enough thing for Arthur to be able to watch Merlin unobserved. To watch the way the afternoon sunlight catches his cheekbones, the way his deft fingers make quick work of rolling up the sleeves of his tunic past his elbows, the way he seems to shift the gravity of the room, his voice kind but firm, instructions doled out with the kind of efficiency Arthur’s only ever heard from seasoned soldiers before.
Arthur doesn’t know how long he stands there, only seems to startle out of his reverie when Merlin’s hand lands gently on his shoulder. “What are you still doing here? You should be out on the training field.”
“We,” Arthur corrects, grabbing at the loose fabric of Merlin’s tunic and dragging him from the room before he can protest.
. .
“Merlin’s writing your speech for the feast tonight?” Gwaine almost sounds surprised, but it’s hard to tell with the way his voice is strained, ducking to avoid the pommel of Arthur’s sword.
“Clearly,” Arthur huffs, twisting around to land his sword with considerable force against Gawine’s shield. “I am busy .”
“Right,” the other man says, shoving forward and meeting Arthur’s blade in a counter-attack. “And what was that earlier, then? During the council meeting? Were you busy then too?”
He means, of course, the way it was Merlin who suggested Leon lead a small group of knights south to observe the reported unrest along the border and parlay with Lord Childeric.
And of course, Gwaine means without saying it, how in that same meeting it was Merlin who presented a list of sons from noble houses who might be amenable to coming to Camelot and starting their training as knights. And it was Merlin again who, with little more than a look, quelled a boisterous quarrel between Sir Yvain and Sir Erec before the two came to full blows.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Arthur says instead, driving strike after strike at Gwaine who parries them easily.
“Right,” Gwaine laughs, as if there’s some great joke at Arthur’s own expense that Arthur isn’t privy to, doesn’t understand.
Arthur steps out of the reach of Gwaine’s sword, shakes his shield from his grip and drags a hand across the sweat at his brow. It’s a reprieve they won’t get in actual combat, one he shouldn’t enforce even when they’re safe within the citadel, practicing with blunted swords, but Gwaine matches his movements, tosses his shield aside and pushes a hand through his hair.
“He looks tired, is all,” Gwaine notes, sparing a glance towards the base of the battlement wall where Merlin is sat, his legs curled towards his chest, a stack of parchment balanced in his lap, his fingers stained with ink as his quill seems to practically float across the page. “Gaius is getting on and Merlin’s taken on more of his daily rounds and –”
“If Merlin is so tired he can simply tell me. But as it is –”
“Merlin thinks the sun shines out of your arse, Arthur.”
“I don’t know what you’re implying, Gwaine,” Arthur says, his voice tipping towards something cruel, something violent. And were Gwaine anyone other than who he is, it might be enough of a warning to drop the matter entirely.
“No, naturally,” Gwaine says dryly. He smiles, a wry thing, one that feels as if it’s crawling under Arthur’s skin, one that taunts his ego.
Arthur doesn’t know what happens, only that at one moment his sword is firm in his grip and next his hand is free of a weapon and balled into a fist swinging towards Gwaine’s face.
“Have I touched a nerve, Princess?” Gwaine goads but there’s no time to answer – not that Arthur would, not that he needs to anyway – because Gwaine’s own fist is making a quick path for Arthur’s side and if Arthur knew he’d be spending his time out on the training ground fighting like young squires trying to settle petty arguments he would have opted for full mail instead of the light leather vest he has protecting his torso.
Arthur’s elbow finds somewhere soft to land and he can hear the hitch in Gwaine’s breath at the contact. It’s enough to slow Gwaine down, enough for Arthur to hook his foot around Gwaine’s heel and pull until the other man topples to the ground. But Gwaine’s only winded and manages to reach for Arthur as he falls, and then they really are like children scuffling through the dirt, arms and limbs lashing out without any real precision.
Arthur glances up only long enough to catch sight of Merlin across the field, his work forgotten, inkwell upended, his body frozen, weight braced on one arm, his heels digging into the grass as if at any moment he might need to take to his feet and intercede.
He pushes away from Gwaine, gets to his feet before extending a hand down to Gwaine to heave him upright. There’s laughter, then – light, easy, no offense taken – and cat-calls from the rest of the knights who rib them both equally while amongst them, a few coins trade hands.
When Arthur steals a glance over at Merlin again, he’s settled back against the wall once more, papers a neat stack in his lap as if nothing happened at all.
. .
The sun is at Arthur’s back, the faintest wisps of orange and pink beginning to color the sky as it sets, and the courtyard in front of him is empty, expectant.
Arthur’s never particularly cared for the pageantry that decorum dictates for visits of this scale, and he knows Princess Mithian would be just as happy to be led, unnoticed, through the southern gates and spend a quiet hour or two tending to her horse than suffer the stuffy traditions of court.
“You could at least pretend you’re enjoying yourself,” Merlin comments from over his shoulder.
“What are you doing up there anyway?” Arthur grumbles. He twists, has to raise a hand to shield his eyes from the bright glare of the setting sun before he can begin to see the amused twist of Merlin’s lips. “Get down here.”
Merlin obliges, descends the two empty steps that previously separated them and drops the pretense of pretending to hold himself with any decorum once he’s at Arthur’s side. “She’s one of your oldest friends and one of Camelot’s greatest allies,” Merlin reminds him.
“I’m aware, Mer lin.”
“Right, it’s just your face that says otherwise.”
Arthur would retort, has a perfectly good insult about what Merlin’s face looks like, but the courtyard suddenly fills with noise as Mithian and her retinue finally arrive.
And it should be his job to extend a hand and help her dismount, but instead Merlin’s the first to step forward, his hands familiar on her waist, his lips upon her cheeks, his so good to see you again, my lady dimpling his cheeks.
It should be insulting, this unconventional welcome, the easy way in which Merlin stepped forward in Arthur’s place and yet it feels right, appropriate, like it’s how things are actually meant to be.
Already he can hear Mithian laughing and Arthur watches as her head tips back at something Merlin must have said while reaching to unload the bags across her horse's back. Mithian stops before him and curtseys deeply, her chestnut hair catching gold and copper in the sunlight, and when Arthur takes her hand and brings her knuckles to his lips, her eyes are bright and kind and shining and he wants to hold on to her, and perhaps even Merlin too, and the quiet sanctuary he feels in their presence. She squeezes his hand, and in that touch alone he thinks she knows, she understands, too.
Arthur welcomes Mithian properly then, straightens his spine and gives a speech full of rehearsed words his father used to say when welcoming guests into their kingdom and their castle. All the while Mithian rolls her eyes and pulls silly faces meant for just Arthur and Merlin beside him and he nearly laughs, covers it with a cough, and already he’s glad she’s here; already can’t bear the thought of her leaving, feels the ache of it within his chest. Although, if things go to plan, if she’s amenable, perhaps they’ll begin to see more of each other.
Merlin escorts Mithian inside, her hand nestled into the crook of his elbow, their heads bent in conversation, undoubtedly the pair already gossiping together like the pair of old crones they are.
. .
“Your speech,” Mithian comments later that night, the Great Hall warm and loud with so many bodies sitting side-by-side. “Not to mention the flowers in my chamber – I hardly expected you to remember that daisies are my favorite. And this feast you’ve put on,” Mithian says, gesturing to the half-eaten platters around them. “Composed entirely of my favorite dishes.”
“Is it?” Arthur murmurs, though Mithian’s coy smile says enough for him to know that she sees through his disinterested bluff.
“Well, it’s just all a bit Merlin , isn’t it?”
Arthur watches her and worries the tip of his tongue between his teeth. “I’ve no idea what you’re talking about,” he says at last, busying himself with finishing his wine and refilling his goblet.
“Arthur, we’re too old of friends for you to lie to me so blatantly,” Mithian chides. She slides a date between her lips and chews thoughtfully for a moment. “When are you giving that man a proper title?”
“Who?”
“Merlin.”
“Merlin?” Arthur frowns, eyebrows knotting together. “A title ? That’s the stupidest –”
Mithian snorts, sips at her wine. “Of course. But if you don’t, I’ll drag him to Nemeth and do it myself.”
Arthur looks out across the room until his eyes settle on Merlin, seated instead of serving for once, sharing a table with Arthur’s most trusted circle of knights. “Merlin stays in Camelot,” he says, hoping his voice carries a certain finality to it. Although the way Mithian regards him, he begins to wonder when his threats began to lose their edge.
“Sir Leon, on the other hand...” Arthur trails off, leaning forward to look down the table at his First Knight. “Is the third son of one of my family’s strongest allies. He’s a skilled diplomat and the kingdom’s finest warrior – aside from yours truly, of course. He’s tall and by all means quite attractive if that should matter to you at all.”
Mithian smiles, elbows Arthur in the ribs in a way she hasn’t done since they were small, though Arthur does catch the blush that colors her cheeks, the way she looks down the table with curious interest.
. .
“You’re unusually moody tonight,” Merlin says later in the privacy of Arthur’s room. Merlin leans against one of the stone pillars in the chamber, his hands behind the small of his back, his head tipped back, eyes closed while he waits for Arthur to come around from behind the changing screen. “I thought everything went well.”
“It did,” Arthur agrees, though even to his own ears his tone sounds flat. It’s just that he hasn’t been able to shake Mithian’s words; has worried all night she’s been right; has convinced himself, in the dour, spiraling way of the nearly drunk, that Merlin is unhappy and would, if given the chance, leave along with Mithian for Nemeth in a fortnight when the delegation is set to depart.
“I could barely read that speech no thanks to your terrible handwriting,” he lies instead, moving to perch at the edge of his bed. “Didn’t you have tutors?”
“I didn’t actually, no,” Merlin laughs, tugging down the clothes Arthur draped along the top of the screen. “And yet it’s never stopped you passing your work off on me before.”
Arthur flops inelegantly back across the bedspread, speaks to the canopy above him. “Mithian says you deserve a title.”
“Well, Mithian will one day be a better queen than you are.”
“Piss off,” Arthur groans, launching, without looking, the nearest pillow towards Merlin’s general direction. By the squawk Merlin lets out, he knows he must have stuck him.
“I don’t want a title,” Merlin says at last, disrupting the quiet. “I don’t – that’s not why…”
Arthur sits up, his shoulders slumped as he scrubs at his face. “Are you unhappy?” He asks. “In Camelot? Or with your job?” Arthur pauses, shudders in a deep breath and fixes his gaze at the wall over Merlin’s shoulder. “Or with me ?”
Merlin says nothing, only bends to pick up the pillow and hugs it to his chest and Arthur feels his heart sink, is ready to send Merlin away for the night at least, maybe longer, maybe permanently, when Merlin’s hands cup Arthur’s cheeks, tipping his head back until Arthur looks at him properly.
To be touched, to be held in such a way by Merlin. They’ve never – though he’s wanted , has dreamed...
“Did it ever once occur to you that if I didn’t want to do something, I wouldn’t?” Merlin asks softly, the thumb of one of his hands absently soothing back and forth across Arthur’s cheek.
“Well,” Arthur pauses and Merlin shifts closer, his hands falling to Arthur’s shoulders, their legs pressed against one another. Arthur doesn’t know what specifically compels him to reach out and capture the hem of Merlin’s tunic but he simply feels a need to hold on, to keep a part of Merlin in his grasp. He watches the slip of red slide between his nervous fingers. “I –”
“When have I ever done as I’m told?” Merlin smiles, his fingers sliding along the nape of Arthur’s neck to tangle through his hair there. “When was the last time you saw me muck out the stables? I don’t clean your room or sweep the ashes from your hearth. I stopped doing that ages ago, Arthur.”
And only then does the truth of it strike Arthur. He can’t, actually, remember the last time Merlin stomped through his chambers, covered in muck and stinking like horse dung; can’t remember the last time he walked in to find Merlin on his knees, his face ruddy with dusty ashes from the fireplace; can’t recall the last time Merlin so much as dragged a mop across his floors. Arthur always feels Merlin’s presence in his chambers, so he just assumed…
“I do, however, make sure your bed is turned down and warm and that the fire in your hearth is enough to see you through the night because I like knowing you might sleep a little better if I do. I don’t wash your clothes, but I do tell the scullery maids what herbs you like mixed in with your soap. I don’t polish your armor or mend your clothes and I certainly don’t clean your boots because you think you’re punishing me. I do it because I want to. Because I like knowing what you like and how you like things done. I like seeing part of me become part of you .” Merlin speaks simply, so easily, no pretense to his words, and it’s that alone that makes Arthur believe him.
Arthur’s hands settle at Merlin’s waist, tug until Merlin crowds against him, until Arthur’s nose is pressed against Merlin’s chest. He inhales deeply, the familiar scent of clove and lavender and sage soothing as it fills his senses. And under that familiar balm he smells Merlin, and maybe even himself too, and Arthur doesn’t know when it happened, when they so claimed, so marked one another as simply theirs – and maybe there, at last, the only title that Arthur would ever wish to bestow, the only one Merlin might accept: mine and yours and ours – knows only that it did, and now that he knows, really, truly knows, he wouldn’t want it to be otherwise.
Arthur slides his hands down below the swell of Merlin’s arse, fingers dimpling into the soft flesh of his thighs as he presses a kiss to Merlin chest, feels the wild thump of Merlin’s heart against his lips.
Arthur places kisses up Merlin’s torso, his mouth open, messy in his sudden hunger, his desire. His hands resettle, one at the small of Merlin’s back, the other along the back of Merlin’s neck and distantly he wonders at how well his hands seem to fit these spaces of Merlin’s body, as if Merlin was simply formed to be held by Arthur’s hands.
Mine .
He barely needs to flex his forearm before Merlin moves to meet him and their lips find one another at last.
Yours .
Arthur tastes the truth of it all there again on Merlin’s lips and with each sweep of his tongue. He feels it in the way Merlin’s hands tighten in his hair and hears it in the soft sighs and quiet moans they share.
Ours.