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Morgana’s nightmares start up again with the catching and sentencing of Tom Collins. Her distressed cries keep Gwen from returning home to her father at night, and wake anyone whose rooms are situated near hers.
Arthur hears her, and forces himself out of bed about two hours before dawn. He doesn’t like to think of it too closely, but Morgana’s nightmares tend to be a sign of things to come. Not always bad things, but always something life-changing.
He doesn’t like to think of it too closely because of what it might mean – for Morgana and for everyone else. Arthur is just grateful that his father’s chambers are on the other side of the castle.
He doesn’t notice that her eyes are blue until after she storms away, utterly disgusted by his behavior. Her insults still ring in his ears long after she vanishes into the castle.
“You’ve had your fun, little lordling.” Then, when he had informed her of just whom she was speaking, she had not been impressed, nor chagrined. Instead, she had merely raised an eyebrow at him, clearly unmoved, and added, “I thought knights and princes were supposed to protect and look after their people, not torment them like spoiled brats in need of a good slap.” She shook her head. “If you are the cream of the crop of knights, then it bodes ill for Camelot, I dare say.”
If she had been a man, Arthur would have slugged her, thrown her into the dungeons, and then promptly would have forgotten about her. Instead, he is only amazed that any woman – other than Morgana, anyway – would speak to him so brazenly, so forcefully. Other than his father, only Morgana has ever dared to scold him with any heat over the years.
Arthur learns later that she is Gaius’ ward, newly arrived from a village some distance from Camelot. Her words to him spread like wildfire, to the point when even Morgana hears them and has no problem smirking at him whenever their eyes meet. She is clearly thrilled that someone has taken him to task.
Arthur, however, merely sulks, especially when his father too hears of it. Of course, his father is more incensed that a peasant girl would dare speak so to the prince of Camelot, but that is no real comfort to Arthur. Her words sting, and his father’s ire does nothing to soothe that. Especially when he doesn’t directly refute her words, and is instead only irritated that she had been the one to speak them.
Still, when Arthur remembers her afterward, his chief recollection is that her eyes are a wild blue, as brilliant as the summer sky.
He’d intended to forget about her, even if her words stayed with him long after. She, however, made that much more difficult when she saved his life.
Arthur honestly does not know what his father is thinking, making her his personal servant. How is a girl to ready and maintain his armor? A girl to dress him? Why not simply assign her to Morgana, if he is so eager to reward her for her deed? Surely Guinevere wouldn’t mind the extra help, even if Merlin appears to be as clumsy as sin.
Still, none of his protests change his father’s mind, so instead he’s stuck staring at her with an acute sense of… something, while she glares back at him as though all of this is his fault.
Arthur notices that behind her, both Gaius and Guinevere are watching them, the former looking distinctly amused and the latter trying to cover her quiet laughter with a hand.
He glares at them both, and at her. This is her fault, he maintains, and now they are stuck with one another.
“No, Merlin, not like that,” Arthur snaps irritably. He bats her thin, awkward fingers away. “Now, watch again.” He reties the cords that hold his armor together at what seems like a snail’s pace. “Do you see?”
“Yes, Sire. Thank you,” she says through gritted teeth. Arthur wonders if Gaius has warned her about keeping her temper in check, hence explaining the restraint she’s exercised on her impudent tongue. If he has, then Arthur imagines that the old physician’s warnings will not last much longer. She looks like she wants nothing more than to hit him with the armor and stomp out of sight.
He tries not to laugh. She’s really quite amusing when she’s angry, he thinks. Almost pretty too.
He pauses at that thought, and then shakes it away, careful not to think about where it might have originated.
Once Merlin finally finishes, Arthur takes up the two swords lying on the table. He holds one out to her, but she just eyes it quizzically. “Take it,” he orders her impatiently.
She does so, grasping it gracelessly by the scabbard in one hand and by the hilt in another. “Let’s go,” he says, moving toward the door.
“What?” she sputters from behind him. “Where?”
“Where else, Merlin – the training grounds. If you’re going to serve me, you need to be passable with a sword.” He snorts. “I prefer that the people around me be able to defend themselves, even the girls.”
She follows him, of course, but she mutters the whole way about princely lunatics.
Arthur smirks.
The peace plans with Bayard of Mercia are the product of months of work on both sides. Bayard actually consenting to go so far from his borders, into the very heart of his enemy’s stronghold, speaks of his desire to make this new alliance work. Arthur’s father agreeing to the meeting also speaks for his willingness to make peace.
So when Merlin bursts into the proceedings, flinging about accusations of poisoned goblets, Arthur doesn’t know whether to be enraged at her presumption, or alarmed at such trickery.
His father seems to be leaning more toward the former reaction, but has known treachery far too many times to not at least check Merlin’s warning. Arthur watches him pour wine into the goblet and hold it out first to Bayard, and then to Merlin, who promptly pales. As bold as she can sometimes be, she is not immune to fear.
Arthur intervenes, bidding her to apologize for her rudeness, to avoid this heavy confrontation that stems to wreck everything he and his father have worked so hard for. He silently promises to berate her for this later, when they are alone.
She ignores his words, however – as always – and takes the goblet from the king’s hand. She turns in Arthur’s direction and stares at him. Fear is still prevalent in her eyes, but also determination. Arthur opens his mouth to speak –
Merlin does not look away from him as she drinks the wine down in a single gulp.
For those first crucial seconds, nothing happens, and everyone begins to relax. Arthur sees the heat enter his father’s gaze and he raises his hand, ready to throw Merlin to the mercy of his fellow sovereign. Arthur starts to object, intent on promising that she will endure proper punishment –
– until Merlin coughs and stumbles, doubling over. The goblet falls from her hand and crashes to the floor. Arthur’s eyes widen in alarm, and many people around him gasp, shocked.
The gurgling sound coming from her throat echoes horribly in Arthur’s ears long after it fades. When she is silent, chaos erupts, but Arthur pays it no heed. As everyone else in the hall lunges for their weapons – Arthur later hears that even Morgana took up a knife from the table – he rushes over to his unmoving maidservant. Gaius and Gwen are quick to join him.
When Gaius orders that she be removed to his chambers, Arthur does not hesitate to scoop Merlin up. Gwen is right beside him, cradling Merlin’s head carefully while also carrying the accursed goblet, and Gaius hurries along just ahead. Arthur ignores the harsh looks sent to him by his father.
He tries not to notice how light she is in his arms, or how well and easily she fits there.
The cave is enormous, and filled with terrors he cannot see but can hear all too well. He hears the skittering of many legs on stone, the fading footsteps of the woman who wants him dead, and yet will not finish the deed herself. Still, Arthur is suddenly certain he’s going to die here, just as his father predicted.
That is, until the light appears. It comes from below, rising slowly next to him, higher, and higher, casting a lovely blue hue over the area. The creatures squeak in fear, and Arthur watches the light in wonder.
Follow the light, a voice tells him, and a pleasant, warm sensation drapes over him, seemingly restoring his strength.
More magic, Arthur thinks dazedly. The warm, peaceful feeling, however, is far different than the frozen menace he’d glimpsed in the woman’s too-perfect face. It is invigorating, rather than disheartening.
Follow the light, Arthur.
Taking a deep breath, he does as he is bid. He stares at the flower and its leaves, just a beyond an arm’s reach. He must get them home. Merlin won’t last forever; she needs him.
Later, when everything calms down – and his father lets him out of the dungeons – Arthur visits Merlin. She looks tired, and tiny sitting on the bench, which is strange, since her height matches his own.
Still, she smiles at him, thanks him, as Gaius watches her attentively from his work table across the room, and Arthur finds himself relaxing. She’s going to be all right.
Arthur tells himself he’s relieved only because he doesn’t want to have to train another servant to do her job.
It’s something of a surprise to see Merlin waiting for him when he steps off the practice field. She avoids the place as often as she can, since Arthur often traps her into practicing with him. Given the look on her face and the words that fly out of her mouth, though, he knows that this would not be a good time to put a sharp object in her hands. Her thoughts are firmly with Gaius right now, and she might actually manage to gut someone out of sheer determination.
“My father had good reason, Merlin,” Arthur says with exaggerated patience. “Gaius is getting on in years. It’s only natural he’d –”
“Rubbish,” she snaps. “Gaius is as sane as you or I.”
He snorts. “I don’t know about you. I’m still not sure how sane you are, not after –”
“Don’t try and change the subject,” Merlin cuts him off, glaring at him. “What reason could the king possibly have to dismiss Gaius?”
Arthur sighs and stares at her. “Morgana’s illness, for one,” he points out. “She could have died, Merlin. Would have, if not for Edwin.”
He watches her press her lips together. The fury in her eyes does not abate, nor does she look convinced. He adds, “And Edwin says that he found many mistakes in Gaius’ reports and records. He says it’s a miracle no one has died already.”
Merlin’s eyes widen and her jaw drops; she stares at him incredulously. “What?” she sputters. “And you believed him? Just like that? You trust the word of a veritable stranger over someone who has served and looked after you and yours for longer than you’ve been alive?”
Something clenches inside Arthur’s chest. Unbidden, memories of various childhood maladies Gaius saw him through fly through his mind. The old man had served them all ably for many years, done many things for his father that Arthur could only suspect…
She takes no notice of that, though. Instead, a bitter laugh slips out and she turns away. As she storms back toward the castle, Arthur hears her mutter, “If this is how loyal people are ultimately treated around here, I better start looking for something else to fall back on.”
He sucks in a sharp breath, a jolt of panic slamming through him at the thought of her leaving.
Of course, later they find that Edwin is really a sorcerer out to murder Arthur’s father to avenge his parents, who were burned in the fires of the Great Purge many years before. Once the king is recovered, he insists on burning Edwin’s body in the same manner.
It’s the first time Arthur recalls seeing Merlin attending something like this. Normally she and Gaius, like Morgana, avoid the executions like the plague. Not today, though. This time all three of them are present.
Arthur dislikes the ice in Merlin’s gaze as she watches Edwin Muirden burn.
The business with Sophia has left everyone angry or upset with him. His father chides him for his nearsighted foolishness. Gwen shakes her head in disappointment, Morgana glares at him icily, and Gaius merely raises an eyebrow whenever their eyes meet, a tried and true sign of the old man’s displeasure.
Merlin will barely look him in the eye. She and Gaius explained what had happened to him, but Arthur is still skeptical. She hit him over the head with a piece of wood and knocked him into a lake? All right, that’s possible, much as it pains him to admit it. However, something makes him doubt that that was Merlin’s first attempt to stop him. For all that she behaves like an idiot, Arthur readily admits that she has become very perceptive of his moods and such. She would have seen his intentions, long before he vanished from Camelot with Sophia and her father, and that disturbs him a little. If she had seen what he meant to do, then given his behavior toward everyone else… he shudders. He might very well have done real harm to her.
He watches her work after the fact, and notes the stiffness in her movements.
“Merlin,” he speaks up from his chair, “what’s wrong with you? You’re moving like old Brunhilda down in the laundry, and she’s probably three times your age.”
She doesn’t turn around to face him from where she’s cleaning out the fireplace. “It’s nothing,” she says shortly. “Just a little sore.”
Arthur narrows his eyes, frustrated. He doesn’t have to see Merlin’s face to sense the lie by omission. She’s keeping something from him. He struggles to think back, what had happened after he had gone to his father to – he cringes inwardly – ask to marry Sophia? It’s all so hazy, and his memory is disjointed at best…
Anger. Rage. How dare his father do this to him?!
“The king may have been a little… blunt, but he had a point.”
Her words only fuel the fire of his fury.
“Get out, Merlin!” he hisses at her. A sword-point is but inches from her unprotected throat.
“You’re not thinking straight, Arthur! I’m your friend!”
“No, you’re my servant, and an annoying, incompetent one at that.”
Sophia is suddenly there, smiling sweetly at him and holding out her pretty little hand to him. Her father is next to her, stern and silent. Merlin is at his side, her blue eyes wide and alarmed, pleading.
“Let’s go, Arthur,” Sophia murmurs invitingly. “Far, far away from here, where they can’t keep us apart.”
“Arthur,” Merlin shouts, “it’s not real! It’s –”
Then Merlin is on the floor, her face pale and limbs askew. She doesn’t move.
Arthur feels nothing, merely takes Sophia’s hand and leaves Merlin behind.
His eyes snap open. “Damn it, Merlin,” he nearly shouts, “what the hell happened?!” The memory is faint, but it is there. Or is it just his own dark imaginings?
She leaps up at his loud tone, and then cringes, her hands automatically pressing against her ribs. Arthur rises to his feet, still angry and yet also concerned. He reaches for her, ready to push her down into the chair before she faints. He thinks that Gaius will not be pleased if something else happens to Merlin under his watch. However, she only raises a hand, stopping him in his tracks.
“I’m all right, Arthur,” she tells him. “Those staffs that Sophia and Aulfric had… they’re quite hard.”
He considers her words. He doubts Sophia had the physical strength to do Merlin much harm, even with the staff. Besides, Merlin’s become quite good at dodging blows from the swords practice Arthur forces her to participate in.
That leaves Aulfric. Older he may have been, but there was a sense of strength about the man, if Arthur recalls correctly.
Something goes cold in him and he stares at Merlin. She’s still avoiding his direct gaze, but suddenly her labored movements make much more sense.
He clenches his fists and suddenly wishes that the man and his daughter hadn’t departed. He’d have Aulfric flogged for this, no matter what his father might say or the court might remark upon. To harm someone under his protection, someone that is his, was right up there with treason in his eyes.
Arthur rubs a hand over his face. “I,” he starts, shakes his head, and then says, “I’m sorry… I should have done something. Should have looked after you better.”
He really, really dislikes this feeling of failure that churns in his chest.
Merlin studies him for several moments. “It wasn’t your fault,” she replies quietly, and Arthur senses from her tone that she truly believes that. That’s all she says on the matter, though, and she changes the subject. “At least you weren’t thinking clearly enough to take any of your clothing with you, Sire,” she says lightly, pushing an errant strand of dark hair behind one of her ears. “If you had, it likely would have gotten soaked in the lake, and the rest of us would have had to work even harder to clean up after you.”
She grins at him teasingly, and her eyes sparkle. It makes him feel a little better, though the guilt does not fade until after she stops walking and moving so carefully, several days later.
In Ealdor, Arthur faces the life that Merlin lived and breathed before she came to Camelot. Hunith, who clearly adores her only child; the villagers, who eye her with a mixture of wariness and exasperated fondness; and the boy, Will; they’re all pieces of a life that princes and knights have no part in. Still, it is the boy who catches his interest the most. Arthur sees the look in Will’s eyes and doesn’t buy Merlin’s explanation about Will’s resentment against noblemen. No, he has only to watch the young man watch Merlin as she works with Morgana and Gwen to see the truth.
The boy loves her, and she’s too dense to notice.
“They’ve known each other since they were babies,” Hunith says from beside him. He glances at her in surprise. She’s been a little wary around him, but now she speaks to him willingly enough. “Will was her champion even when they were small, wouldn’t let any of the other children exclude her from the games they played together, took care of anyone who tried to tease her for being different.”
He nods slowly, glancing back at Will. He’s still watching Merlin, who is a flurry of movement, until she trips over an uneven patch of ground. Arthur grins just a little, especially when she merely gets up, dusts herself off, and keeps right on going. He looks back at Will and sees a similar expression on the boy’s face. Arthur’s smile fades.
“He didn’t take it well when Merlin decided to join Gaius at Camelot,” she continues quietly. “He wanted her to stay here, to let things continue on the way they had for their entire lives.” Hunith looks in the direction of her daughter and smiles fondly. “Merlin, though, sought something different, something greater, and I knew Gaius could give her that.” Her eyes switch back to William. “He wouldn’t follow her though. What lies beyond the bounds of this place means little to him. He couldn’t understand why she could not be satisfied with what she had.”
Arthur now watches Hunith watch Will watch Merlin, and suddenly, strangely, he feels jealous.
After the battle is ended – with the aid of their unexpected, literal windfall – and Will lies dying, Arthur meets the boy’s, no, the man’s eyes once again. Those dark eyes, clouded with pain though they are, speak their message quite clearly.
Take care of her, Arthur Pendragon.
Arthur does not stay to watch Will die in Merlin’s arms. Later, he scolds Merlin for not telling him about Will being a sorcerer, and… something flashes across her grieved expression. She nods silently, but doesn’t turn her tear-filled eyes from the pyre.
Arthur wonders if he’s missed something during the entire two-day trip back to Camelot. Merlin does not speak to him, does not even look at him the entire way home, but then, she doesn’t say much to Morgana or Gwen either. Just stares into the fire or the horizon, lost in things only she sees.
Merlin barely speaks to him after he kills the unicorn. He does his best to brush off her cold demeanor, telling himself that she’s just being an idiot girl, and tries to enjoy the prestige and the pride in his father’s eyes when he brings the horn home.
That enjoyment lasts all of a day, and the kingdom promptly descends into hell. Gaius had warned the king, Merlin believed the warnings, and it took the looks of pain and suffering in the faces of his people to make Arthur finally believe it too. Anhora’s warning is truer than he thought. Arthur finally understands that his actions truly do have consequences.
The last test, the one Merlin somehow ‘arranged’ for him, is located within the infamous Labyrinth of Gedref. It is well-known for being magical, and his father has attempted more than once to burn it, but has met with failure so many times that he now just ignores its existence.
Arthur spends what feels like hours trying to get through it, and when he does, Merlin awaits him, a prisoner. When the test is explained to him, it only takes Arthur a few moments to figure out how to proceed, but he lets Merlin talk it out nonetheless. He’s already decided on his course of action.
She took poison for him once – something that still haunts him. He’ll be damned if he watches her try to die for him again. That is one horror Arthur never wants to see repeated. He distracts her and combines the contents of both goblets. She protests as he raises the remaining goblet to his lips, demanding that he give it to her, babbling that it isn’t his destiny, but he has chosen this fate. She will not die on his watch.
The liquid is strangely tasteless going down his throat.
When Arthur falls over onto the hard rocks, the last thing he hears is Merlin crying, pleading with Anhora to let her take his place. As consciousness fades, his last thought is if Anhora agrees to Merlin’s desperate attempts at bargaining, Arthur will kill him, curse or no. It is a truth written into his very bones, Merlin must not die.
When he wakes up, she is kneeling over him, peering at him anxiously.
He doesn’t expect to be alive, which is the result of what happens next. Unbidden, the first words out of Arthur’s mouth are, “I know I’m handsome to look at, Merlin, but really, do you have to stare?”
Her eyes widen, shocked, and then narrow. She hits him on the shoulder before helping him to his feet.
Arthur doesn’t let go of her hand as they start the long walk back to where their horses have been left. He wonders if she notices.
Arthur forces himself to feel nothing as the guards march the prisoners through the gates. Anyone who aided Tauren during his time in Camelot will die tomorrow. He does his best not to be moved by the defeated, resigned expressions on the men’s faces, or the weeping of their wives and children.
A sharp intake of breath beside him makes Arthur turn. Merlin is next to him, her tightly-clenched fists trembling at her sides. She turns to face him and he can no longer breathe. Her expression is fierce, and her eyes burn. He can almost hear what she is thinking.
You will be better than this. You will not terrorize your people simply because they did what they do every day for any person in the kingdom. You will not be a tyrant, Arthur.
The day you become one, I will kill you myself. King or not.
Merlin says nothing, but Arthur hears the words. He can’t respond, though. Arthur has lost his voice.
The dreams that haunt him after he is bitten by the Questing Beast are horrible, and they leave Arthur with an entirely new respect for Morgana and how she manages to live with the terrors she faces during the night.
He doesn’t remember much at first, mainly the voices of those who look after him. Gaius, his father, Gwen, Morgana. He doesn’t hear Merlin, but that means nothing. Instead, he sees her, on her horse, on a tiny rowboat, amidst ancient ruins, speaking to another woman – oh God, the woman from the forest of Bador, Arthur recalls vaguely – who cackles gleefully at something Merlin says.
When he awakes, he finds his father near to tears at his bedside. He doesn’t see Merlin until the next day.
There is something different about her, something that he has never seen before. A kind of resignation, of peace. It’s almost as though she is saying goodbye.
“Don’t be a prat,” she warns him, but with little heat and much affection in her voice. Her smile is sad and she reaches out, her calloused fingers stroking his cheek. When she leans forward and presses a gentle kiss to his forehead, Arthur’s breath catches, and he is unable to say anything. As she leaves his room, Arthur has to stem the instinct to run after her, to demand to know just what is wrong with her.
By the next day, Gaius appears to have vanished, and Merlin is seen tearing out of Camelot soon after dawn. No one knows why.
Morgana haunts the castle, pale as a ghost.
Gwen follows her, fretting over her mistress and her friends.
Arthur almost climbs the walls of his chambers, desperate for news, any news at all.
Then the two return, and they make some excuse about gathering important ingredients in case the knights ever come across a Questing Beast again. The king accepts their explanation, but Arthur does not. If it were true, then they would have gone at dawn together. Gaius would not have slipped out in the dead of night, leaving Merlin behind. However, it’s not just that situation that bothers him.
Merlin is different. Oh, she is just as impertinent as ever, as clumsy as ever, but the air about her seems to almost crackle. Light seems to dance in her eyes. She is different.
When she smiles at him, her eyes seem to glow. Suddenly things begin to make sense. Arthur wonders how the hell he didn’t see it before.
“Were you ever going to tell me?” he demands of her days later. He has led her alone out into the forest, away from where any patrolling knights might come across them. This conversation is not meant for the ears of others, will be Merlin’s death if anyone overhears.
She tries to plead ignorance, but Arthur cuts her off. “I’ll spell it out for you, Merlin,” he almost snarls. He points at her, poking her shoulder with each word and forcing her backwards until she is pressed against a tree. “You,” poke, “are,” poke, “a,” poke, “sorceress.”
Even the birds in the trees go silent.
Merlin stares at him, her blue eyes wide. “I…” she starts, but stops.
“Were you ever going to tell me?” Arthur repeats.
She bites her lip, and then says weakly, “Perhaps, later… when you were king?”
Her eyes are filled with fear.
He understands her words, sees the wisdom in them. If his father discovers what she is, it will be the pyre for her, and probably the hangman’s noose for Gaius. There is no way the old physician doesn’t know of his ward’s abilities, and the king will take that as a personal betrayal. It is more than just Merlin’s secret and life on the line here.
“You’re different now,” he states, crossing his arms. “Tell me.”
She does, knowing that it is useless to keep secrets from him now. She tells him of her journey to the Isle of the Blessed, of the bargain she struck with the witch Nimueh: Merlin’s life in exchange for Arthur’s.
He chokes. “Merlin, you idiot –”
The idea that Merlin was anywhere near such a creature, had willingly given up her life to her for his sake… it sickens him. He tries not to succumb to the urge to pull her against him, just so he can fully ascertain that she really is here with him.
Merlin continues the story, of how she brought the water home that cured him. She made her peace, said her goodbyes to all the people that she cared for, and waited to die. Only nothing happened, and the next day, she woke up to find her mother dying on the floor in Gaius’ workroom. Nimueh had forced the consequences of the bargain upon Hunith, rather than Merlin herself. Merlin told Gaius of her intention to trade her life for her mother’s, and how Gaius slipped out of Camelot ahead of her. On the island, Merlin confronted Nimueh again, this time over Gaius’ body. Merlin literally called upon lightning to destroy the witch, and with her dead, Gaius’ life had been restored by the rules of the Old Religion.
Arthur stares at her. Merlin, kind, clumsy, well-meaning Merlin, defeated a witch that even his father trembles in fear of.
“Show me,” he orders. “Show me the island.” He will see all of this for himself, perhaps to better understand it directly, rather than through Merlin’s disjointed explanations or his father’s hateful rants.
Merlin blinks at him, confused, but nods hesitantly, apparently unwilling to further risk his ire.
They leave the following morning. He tells his father they are going to check in on Merlin’s village, Ealdor, to see if they have had any further trouble with raiders and will stay there a day or two.
His father does not stop him, surprisingly enough. Morgana’s eyes are dark and curious, but she too says nothing.
The isle is just like the one in his half-remembered dreams. Surrounded by mists, covered in ruins older than the oldest buildings in Camelot, Arthur can almost feel the age of the place.
The journey had been spent in a state of… anticipation. They ended up actually traveling to Ealdor, because they dared not in case Arthur’s father had them followed. Hunith traveled with them as far as the village, in good spirits despite her close brush with death. Arthur, however, had caught her watching him many times during the trip. Her eyes, grey and so unlike her daughter’s, would flick between him and Merlin, as though sensing that something had changed between them, but she did not ask out loud.
After leaving the village, Merlin led him through thick forests, and past the White Mountains. At night, they took turns keeping watch, and Arthur would wake in the mornings to find Merlin curled up next to him. Sometimes he’d even have his arm draped over her waist, holding her close as though he was afraid she would vanish into the night if he did not.
Once they reach the lake, not long before dusk, they tie the horses to nearby trees and get into the boat. Merlin doesn’t bother hiding her magic, and instead uses it openly to get them across the lake to the isle. Arthur, surprisingly, doesn’t feel bothered by it.
When they reach the other side, Arthur steps out first and reaches out to help Merlin ashore as well. He doesn’t let go of her hand, though, and this time she notices. The look she gives him isn’t something he can put into words, but it matches an unidentifiable emotion of his own. It’s been building slowly between them, had so perhaps since they’d first met, even if they had not noticed until now.
She leads him into the ruins, into the grassy area around what appears to be an altar. Arthur looks around. There are few, if any, signs of a battle. Some parts of the grass are still matted down, and there are a few scorch marks as well, but other than that, nothing.
Except the air is heavy and charged. He turns to look at Merlin.
“If these ruins could speak,” she murmurs, her blue eyes distant. “What stories could they tell? What mysteries could they unravel?”
He tightens his grip on her hand, and she turns to him. Their eyes meet.
Lightning streaks across the sky. Thunder swells. The clouds are dark, threatening rain.
Just that easily, it happens. Their lips meet in a clash just as furious as the gathering storm above them.
Arthur grasps her arms and pushes her back until she is leaning against the altar. His tongue duels with hers – that insolent tongue that has caused him no shortage of headaches. Her hands slide up his arms, his shoulders, and her fingers slip into his hair. Their bodies are flush against one another.
They don’t stop, don’t question what is happening. Both can feel the need, the rightness of their actions. Her fingers leave his hair and move over his armor, tugging furiously at the cords. Piece by piece, it falls off of him so easily that he wonders if Merlin is using magic to aide her. Again, it does not bother him. If he thinks about it, he has never been truly afraid of magic in its purest form – ironic, given that magic is his father’s greatest fear.
Now clad only in trousers and under-tunic, Arthur grasps her and lifts her up onto the altar, putting her neck in the perfect position for him to exploit. His lips slide over it, sucking and biting and marking her, while his hands run over her body. He’s thought of her as his for quite a while, but now he feels like he’s letting not just Merlin but the entire world know it. Even if no one else even knows they’re there, he can’t help but feel that the world will know, somehow.
His hands graze the sides of her breasts, usually hidden by her loose clothing, and she moans his name. Arthur looks up at her and she down at him. Neither of them is fully conscious of it, but this is their last chance to stop, to step back and wait for another day.
She reaches for his tunic and pulls it over his head. He reaches for the ties of her clothing. She doesn’t reach down, but Arthur can feel his trousers being undone and sliding to the ground.
The rain starts coming down as the storm gains power. They barely notice.
Merlin leans back on the altar and he climbs up onto it, kneeling between her knees. Their eyes meet again, and she is the first to reach for him, pulling him closer. Their bodies press together, his hips resting between her legs, his chest against hers, and their mouths begin another dance.
Their hands roam over one another, stoking the heat between them until it is a roaring blaze. Merlin’s hips are pushing against him, urging him on.
It takes only a few small movements, and then Merlin gasps out loud, her eyes widening. He struggles to hold himself in check, but then she is pushing against him. He thrusts gently, and her eyes grow even wider. Her hands move to his head and pull him down, resting their foreheads against one another. Arthur looks into her eyes as he thrusts again, and, perhaps for the first time, everything that Merlin is is laid bare for him to see. He sees destiny in her eyes, but more importantly, he sees the devotion, the love, the trust she has bestowed on him. He can only imagine what she sees in his eyes, but suddenly he just knows.
This is where he belongs.
The thunder roars overhead, the lightning provides them light in the darkness, and the rain soaks their sweaty bodies. It all comes faster and faster, and the thunder barely drowns out their cries of release.
As their hearts begin to slow, so too does the storm. The rainwater slides down in tiny rivers, down his back, down her stomach and between her thighs. The water mixes with the thin trickle of blood, washing it down onto the altar.
Neither of them notices the altar glow faintly for a few moments, too lost in their own emotions.
Neither knows that the Isle of the Blessed, has witnessed the consecration of its new lady, its priestess.
Neither knows that the island has bestowed its blessing on the Once and Future King.
Neither knows that the future awaits them both, large and unknown and new.
In Camelot, Morgana gets her first good night of sleep in weeks.