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Arthur had known that his soul mark wasn’t normal for as long as he could remember. Everyone was born with a birthmark somewhere on their bodies that matched that of their soulmate, so it wasn’t the existence of the red dragon on his chest that made him different. No, what made him different was the fact that his mark moved.
His dragon’s movements reflected his mood. It would curl up when he was sad or scared, hiss and blow fire when he was angry, and soar across his chest and shoulders when he was happy.
Everyone knew two things. One: that a moving mark meant that the person’s soulmate was a Druidic merperson. And two: that Camelot had been at war with the druids for almost 30 years. For the king’s son to be destined to fall in love with their greatest enemy was unthinkable.
Uther had done his best to hide Arthur away from the people. As merpeople it wasn’t as if Arthur could wear a shirt to cover his mark up like a human could and Uther didn’t want anyone to know about his son’s mark.
And so Uther worked tirelessly to try and find a way to cover Arthur’s birthmark up. It would have been fairly simple if it was a “normal” stationary mark. Just throw on some water resistant concealer over it and that was that. But since his mark moved so often it was much harder.
Arthur was mostly kept locked in his room for the first ten years of his life while Gaius, the court healer, came in and out of his quarters with new potential ways to cover up his mark. But none of them had ever been successful, and eventually Uther had to let him out so that he could be trained to be the next ruler of Camelot.
Everywhere he went he felt people’s stares and heard the council’s whispers about how he was a traitor. Rumors swirled surrounding if he would run away and leave Camelot heirless.
Uther drilled it into his head that Arthur must kill his soulmate the minute they met, and while Arthur’s heart shriveled up at the thought, he knew better than to voice his unwillingness to harm his love.
When Uther forced Arthur to swear his intent to hunt down every last Druid and have them killed in a public address to the people something inside him broke. Arthur was not allowed to feel love. He would never feel love. Because love was a weakness that would keep him from fulfilling his duty to his father and to his country.
He spent the rest of his teen years training, learning how to fight with a variety of weapons. His body itself became a weapon, swatting enemies away with his strong tail. If people were going to question his loyalty then he would just work harder to prove them wrong.
So it was no surprise that Arthur had long shuttered up his emotions by the time Merlin stumbled into his life.
The black haired merman had dared to fight him in the streets when they first met and then had somehow had the nerve to become his servant.
Arthur was swimming back to his chambers after the attempt on his life as Merlin tried to keep up.
“Wait up you clotpole, not all of our tails are as strong as yours,” Arthur heard the other boy yell out.
Arthur ignored him and if anything started swimming faster. The last thing he wanted to deal with was some bumbling idiot messing with his stuff and keeping him from sleeping.
Unfortunately he wasn’t able to lose Merlin completely, and he followed Arthur into his room, “Look I don’t want to be your servant either, but let’s maybe be at least cordial to each other? No need to make this worse than it is?” Merlin asked between pants.
Arthur treaded in place as he took in Merlin, “Fine I’ll be nice as long as you remember your place— what are you staring at?” Arthur grouched when he realized Merlin was looking at his left shoulder in surprise.
Looking down, Arthur tried to keep his calm when he noticed his dragon mark sitting on his shoulder, trying to crawl as close to Merlin as it could.
Arthur sighed heavily, “Yes I have a Druid for a soulmate. No you don’t have to worry.”
Merlin jumped, looking around shiftily, “Why would I need to worry? What could I have to do with the druids?” He fretted.
“Because I plan to kill them on sight,” Arthur responded coldly. “You don’t have to worry that I will betray anyone for my soulmate because the minute I meet them I’m going to end them.” Arthur spit out the word ‘soulmate’ as if it were something dirty that was stuck in his mouth.
Arthur noticed Merlin’s breath hitch and the younger man fiddled nervously with the red scarf he had strangely wrapped around his neck.
“I see,” Merlin said slowly after a moment, and Arthur could have sworn that Merlin sounded sad. Whatever. It doesn’t matter what my idiot manservant thinks of my soulmark, Arthur thought viciously.
Arthur clapped his hands together, “Well if you’re done staring at me rudely Merlin then you can take my trident and shield back to your room to clean while I sleep.”
Arthur turned away from Merlin before he could get a response and felt his soulmark move onto his back so as to remain facing Merlin. Arthur tried to will the thing to stop acting weird but it didn’t listen.
Arthur ignored Merlin, acting like the other man wasn’t in the room. Eventually he heard Merlin pick up his gear and leave. Breathing a sigh of relief Arthur climbed into bed. Hopefully Merlin would be so bad at this job that he’d be fired before the week was out.
It turned out that Merlin was stunningly terrible at his job, but Uther refused to fire him for some reason. Arthur knew that he was also working part time with Gaius, but it was ridiculous how hard it was to find his stupid manservant.
Nevertheless months passed, and slowly Arthur found himself enjoying the company of the other boy more and more (although he would never admit it).
The strange boy never took off his damn scarf when he was around Arthur and was generally very evasive whenever Arthur asked him about where he was from, but in the end Arthur figured that it was just Merlin being Merlin. At the very least Arthur’s soulmark seemed to like Merlin. It was like the skin over his mark itched anytime he was too far away from his servant.
Merlin also seemed to like Arthur more. They still threw insults at each other but it was more playful banter than legitimate anger at this point. Merlin also proved himself loyal as he often threw himself into danger to protect Arthur, and so Arthur felt his walls slowly come down when he was around Merlin.
Merlin had been his servant for almost a year when everything fell apart. Arthur was searching for Merlin (as usual) and had heard from a guard that the other boy was in Arthur’s chambers.
Wanting to sneak up on Merlin, Arthur kept as quiet as he could, the only sound being the slight swish of his tail parting the waters as he opened the door to his room.
“Hey Mer-” Arthur cut himself off when he noticed that many of his belongings were floating and moving through the water unnaturally.
The minute he spoke, all of the objects started to sink, but Arthur had still seen how Merlin’s eyes had been bright gold when he had first entered the room.
Merlin’s tail thrashed slightly as he tried to put as much room between himself and Arthur as he could.
“Arthur I- I can explain!” Merlin yelped, looking for nonexistent exits from the room.
Arthur could feel his heart pounding in his chest and hear the blood rushing through his ears. He lunged for his trident, grabbing it before pinning Merlin to the floor.
In the commotion, Merlin’s scarf was ripped from his neck and right before Arthur was about to plunge his weapon into the traitor’s heart he was brought up short by the red dragon hissing at him from Merlin’s chest.
The red dragon identical to his own.
Arthur had spent too much time staring at his own dragon in the mirror, wishing for it to go away, for him not to recognize the birthmark on another person.
“W-what,” Arthur stuttered, throwing himself back against the wall. He was still pointing his trident at Merlin, but it felt like more in self defense than a threat.
“I’m so sorry you had to find out this way Arthur,” Merlin pleaded as he got up.
“Were you sent to kill me?” Arthur growled, and Merlin stared at him dumbfounded.
“No, I swear I didn’t know you were my soulmate until that first night Arthur… and I would never harm you…”
Arthur tried to steel himself to deliver a killing blow, but now that he was faced with his soulmate’s face he couldn’t do it. How could he ever hurt Merlin?
He slowly lowered his trident, “I feel like I’m going to regret this but… I believe you for some reason.”
Merlin snorted, “Maybe it’s because I’ve saved you about 100 times by now without a single thanks.”
Arthur rolled his eyes, “We can’t let anyone see you doing magic again,” Arthur said desperately as he swam towards Merlin. When they were close enough, Arthur reached out with one hand to hold Merlin’s, feeling the rough calluses on Merlin’s hands from years of hard work.
They both looked at each other’s connected hands for what could have been seconds or hours, neither of them speaking.
Eventually Arthur cleared his throat and brought his other hand up to graze Merlin’s mark. Both of them shivered when Arthur’s fingers skimmed across Merlin’s collarbone where the dragon now lay curled up contentedly.
“How do you keep it from moving to a place where the scarf doesn’t cover your mark up?” Arthur asked, wonder in his voice.
Merlin smirked quietly, “A little thing called magic.” He replied.
Arthur nodded, “I like seeing it on you,” he whispered conspiratorially.
Merlin brought his hand up to rest on Arthur’s mark as well, “You have no idea how quickly my heart stopped the first time I saw your mark up close Arthur… I thought I was gonna faint, it looked so good.”
Arthur smiled, before it quickly dropped from his face, “Oh my god Merlin I threatened to kill you that night and I didn’t even know it.”
Merlin squeezed Arthur’s hand tight, “And you threatened to kill me not 30 minutes ago… I hope this isn’t going to become a pattern between the two of us.”
Arthur knew Merlin was joking but he still felt nauseous at the idea of Merlin dying.
“I’m going to protect you for the rest of my life,” Arthur said seriously. “I don’t know how I ever thought I could harm you, but I’m so sorry that you thought for even a second that I’d kill you.”
Merlin smiled reassuringly, “Well I’m glad to hear that.”
Both of their marks had traveled down their arms and were now resting on their conjoined hands, trying to be as close to one another as possible.
“It looks like they like each other,” Merlin whispered.
“Yeah,” Arthur responded reverently, swiping his thumb across Merlin’s knuckles. “I never thought I’d get the chance to share this with someone… I never thought I would think of my mark as beautiful…”
They stood in silence, just enjoying knowing that they had each other.
All of a sudden Arthur looked away, “What if my father finds out about this? What if he sees you doing magic? Or your mark becomes visible? Or he sees us together?” Arthur’s breathing was ragged as he felt himself overcome with anxiety.
Merlin drew Arthur back into him, “I don’t have an answer to those questions right now Arthur but I promise I’ll be careful.”
Arthur looked searchingly into Merlin’s eyes, “you promise?”
“I promise,” Merlin reassured, pulling Arthur into a hug.
Arthur felt their chests press into each other and he began to calm down. When his heart rate was back to normal, Merlin pulled away slightly and ran one hand up Arthur’s throat until it cupped Arthur’s face at his jawline.
“I don’t know what to do about your father,” Merlin murmured, “But I’d really like to kiss you now if that’s okay…”
Arthur’s breath stuttered, “I’d like that a lot,” he said, feeling lightheaded.
“Good,” Merlin soothed as he leaned in for a kiss. When their lips met Arthur felt himself relax fully for maybe the first time in his life. Druid or not, the universe had brought them together through their marks. Merlin felt like love and home and all things good.