Work Text:
Arthur stared at the door to Merlin’s room in shock as the locked door banged against the frame as something clearly was trying to force it open. There was a distinctly unhuman groaning and clanking noise coming from behind the door as well. He turned to look at Merlin, who was next to him, bent over, hands on his knees, as he panted heavily from running up the stairs.
Arthur pinched the bridge of his nose in exasperation. “You know, when you said that you had some ‘skeletons in the closet’ that you had to show me, I assumed you meant a secret and not, you know, ACTUAL REANIMATED CORPSES TRAPPED IN YOUR ROOM!” Arthur yelled, voice rising in intensity the longer he talked.
Merlin winced. “Whoops… yeah I probably should have clarified that earlier, huh?”
Arthur growled in frustration. “How does this even happen, Merlin?” he asked. “Did they just appear in your bedroom? That doesn’t make any damn sense… this is weird even for you.”
“Hey!” Merlin cried reflexively. “I am not weird!”
Arthur rolled his eyes. “That’s the part of the sentence you take notice of,” he huffed in disbelief. “Answer the question Merlin… How did this happen?”
Merlin fiddled nervously with the bottom of his tunic. “Would you believe me if I said I had no idea?”
Arthur stared at him deadpan, and in a flat voice simply said, “No.”
“What about if I said that they came at me while I was collecting herbs in the woods for Giaus and then they chased me back here and nobody else noticed them?”
“Merlin,” Arthur said through gritted teeth. “I swear to all that is holy, if you do not tell me the truth right now I’ll have you thrown in the stocks for a week.”
Merlin laughed nervously, his eyes flitting around the room as if looking for someone or something to save him, but when he found nothing he swallowed hard.
“Soooo…” Merlin stalled. “I may have a secret I need to tell you… Another skeleton in my closet, as if were,” Merlin tried to break the tension with the joke, but Arthur was not amused and just kept staring at Merlin expectantly.
An especially hard hit to the door startled Merlin out of his silence, and he yelled out, “I have magic!” in a rushed tone. Arthur’s face shut down even more than it had been before at Merlin’s words, and Merlin tried to reassure him. “I’d never use it against you or Camelot, though! I’ve actually saved your life more times than I can count at this point…”
“And how does summoning skeletons into the castle protect me, Merlin?” Arthur asked coldly. “Seems pretty harmful to me.”
Merlin hated the monotone way that Arthur was using with him. “Well… you see, I was trying to figure out a spell to defeat the chimera that’s been terrorizing the countryside before you and the knights got yourselves killed trying to fight it, but I think I accidently pronounced a word wrong or something, and this happened instead… perfectly accidental, I swear.”
Arthur placed his hands on his hips, working his jaw in anger. “If you cast the damn spell, then you must know how to reverse it… And don’t think we’re not going to discuss this much more in depth the minute you get rid of these monsters. I’m half a mind to banish you for treason.”
Merlin winced. “Well… the thing is, the minute they appeared, I fled the room and locked the door so they couldn’t escape, but I forgot to grab the spell book before I did so. Even if there is something in the book that can help us with this situation, I can’t access it without getting mauled by reanimated skeletons.”
Arthur sighed heavily. “What do we do then?”
Merlin bit his lip. “I… have no idea,” he admitted. “I was hoping that you could help me fight them and that you wouldn’t ask any questions about why they were here…”
“Do you at least know how many of them there are?” Arthur asked. How stupid did Merlin think he was, that Merlin seriously thought Arthur wouldn’t ask any questions?
Merlin nodded quickly. “There are seven of them… too many for me to take on by myself, but with your help I think we could take them. I put a spell on the door that should keep it sealed until we’re ready though.”
“Do you know if they can actually be killed?” Arthur inquired. “Since they’re technically already dead, will me chopping at them with my sword actually do anything?”
Merlin made a sound of indecision as he shifted from one foot to the other. “Not entirely sure to be honest, but I don’t know what else to do and I didn’t want to alert everyone to the fact that I have magic, so I thought it’d be best to just grab you.”
Arthur sat down in a chair by Giaus’ workbench, his mind racing. He wasn’t sure how Merlin had hid his magic from him for so long. They had been in a relationship with each other for a year, for god’s sake. They’d been friends for almost five! Arthur had thought that their relationship had meant something, but did Merlin feel the same way? How could Merlin love him, if he was keeping a secret this large from him?
Arthur put his head in his hands, trying to think things through without letting his hurt feelings get in the way. He felt Merlin come over to stand besides him, and Merlin’s hand tentatively rested itself on Arthur’s shoulder.
“I swear I didn’t want you to find out this way, Arthur… I did want to tell you, but I was scared of what would happen…”
Arthur looked up, feeling devastated. “Did you think I’d kill you?”
Merlin smiled sadly, but shook his head. “I didn’t think you’d really hurt me. Well, maybe when we first met, but I haven’t had that fear for years, Arthur… but I was afraid you might send me away in anger. Maybe it was selfish of me to keep it from you, but I need to be here to protect you… and because I love you Arthur. Please never doubt my feelings for you.”
Arthur was looking into Merlin’s eyes throughout his entire speech, and he couldn’t detect any deception in them. For as long as Merlin had kept this from him, he had never been very good at lying about point blank questions, and so Arthur found himself trusting Merlin’s words. As much as Arthur did feel hurt, he couldn’t bring himself to be mad at Merlin, and he also understood why Merlin would have had to be cautious about hiding his magic
At that thought, Arthur felt his throat constrict in fear. “Why would you come to Camelot if you know magic?” Arthur pleaded, grabbing Merlin’s hands in his own. “You could be killed! Oh my god, Merlin, why would you practice magic within the walls of the castle my father lives in??”
Merlin smiled ruefully. “I didn’t really ever have a choice, Arthur… I was born with magic--was causing things to float in midair before I could walk-- And you get into so much trouble that I couldn’t leave. You’d get killed within 24 hours if I left. I refuse to apologize for having magic because it means I’m able to keep you safe.” Now it was Merlin’s turn to plead. “Please don’t make me leave, Arthur.”
At the clear desperation in Merlin’s voice, Arthur shushed him, trying to calm Merlin down as he clearly was working himself up. “As long as you’re careful, I’m not gonna send you away… Maybe it’s selfish of me, but I also don’t want to be apart from you, even if it would be safer for you to get as far away from Camelot as possible.”
They stared at each other lovingly for a second, before Arthur centered himself and stood up, a new sense of determination within him. He was going to figure out how to kill these damn skeletons without alerting anyone else so he could protect Merlin.
He turned and grabbed Merlin’s chin, tilting his face up so that Merlin could see the earnesty in Arthur’s eyes.
“Alright, I’m not mad at you. Are there any other magical books or people who might know the answer to how to kill reanimated skeletons?”
Merlin shrugged. “Geoffrey’s kept some magical tomes in the library against your father’s orders in a secret, back corner… And Gaius knows things from before magic was outlawed, but I’ve never seen anything like this in any of the books, and I’ve gone through them all at this point. Plus, Gaius won’t be back from his trip for another week.” Merlin bit his lip hard enough that he drew blood. “And don’t take this the wrong way, but if I had thought they’d know anything, I wouldn’t have told you about it…”
Arthur shook his head. “I’m really not mad, Merlin… My feelings may be hurt, and we will talk about this more later, but I understand.”
Merlin teared up a bit, and Arthur swept away the tears that escaped with his thumb.
“I love you, you prat,” Merlin said, voice cracking slightly.
Arthur rolled his eyes fondly, and for the first time since he’d entered Gaius’ chamber he felt something in him relax. Arthur placed a chaste kiss on Merlin’s lips, trying to channel all of his feelings into it, squeezing Merlin’s hand reassuringly. When they pulled apart, they smiled at each other.
“So,” Arthur finally said. “Should we get this over with, or do you want to double check Geoffrey’s library for information.”
Merlin sighed. “I don’t want to risk the spell on the door running out and the skeletons running around the castle while we’re in the library. I think we just need to take our chances and attack. I’ve never dealt with skeletons before, but I’ve fought other undead creatures and they’ve been killable so I don’t see why this would be any different.”
Arthur felt his jaw drop. “I haven’t fought anything undead? When have you been off fighting undead creatures? Is this what you get up to when you ‘go to the pub’?”
Merlin laughed. “Yeah… That wasn’t one of Gaius’ best lies. I actually don’t drink, all the times he said that to you I was off trying to save your behind.”
Arthur shook his head, a feeling of fear in his chest at the idea that Merlin was regularly putting himself in danger with no backup. “You’ll have to fill me in on everything later, but for now why don’t you let those creatures out and if they can’t be killed… well… we’ll figure something out then I guess.”
Merlin nodded, moving towards the entrance door to Gaius’ study and locking it so that none of the skeletons could make an escape, before returning to his place next to Arthur who had drawn his sword. Raising a hand up towards his bedroom door, his eyes flashed a beautiful amber color, and Arthur was astonished by how beautiful and powerful he looked like this.
His appreciation of Merlin would have to wait however, because the door to Merlin’s room suddenly broke down and the skeletons clambered out. Arthur braced himself for attack, and Merlin spoke an incantation that set two of the skeletons aflame.
Three of the remaining skeletons moved towards Arthur, and he lunged forwards, cutting one down with three blows. Relief rushed through Arthur. It seemed like these skeletons weren’t much more hardy than a normal human. He turned his attention to the second one as he saw Merlin battling the last two skeletons at once.
Arthur struck out at one of the skeletons, hitting his mark, but out of the corner of his eye he saw the third skeleton jumping to tackle him and knew that he couldn’t get out of the way in time. His body went stiff with fear, but right before the skeleton made contact, he heard Merlin yell something and the skeleton disintegrated.
Staring over at Merlin, it was clear that he had already dispatched the rest of the skeletons and Arthur let out a breath.
Merlin laughed, and relaxed as well. “That was a bit anticlimactic, huh?” Merlin asked ruefully, and the two of them started to giggle at the absurdity of the situation. “Probably didn’t even need you after all,” Merlin bragged. “You got in the way more than anything.”
Arthur stalked over and pushed Merlin playfully. “You’re lucky I like you, the rate at which you say absolutely treasonous things all the time would get you in big trouble otherwise.”
Merlin stuck his tongue out, the rush of adrenaline through his body giving him a high. He quickly sobered up though and looked at Arthur thoughtfully.
“Even though I most likely could have handled this myself, I’m glad you know about me now…” The sincerity in Merlin’s voice made Arthur feel warm inside.
“I’m glad I know too.”
Arthur looked around the room, noticing the fallen door and other items scattered around the room. “We should probably pick these up before Gaius comes home… I hate when he glowers at us with his bushy eyebrows.”
Merlin groaned, “He won’t be back for another six days at least, let’s get some food and rest before we start.”
Arthur smirked at Merlin. “Weren’t you just saying a couple seconds ago that you could have fought off all those skeletons by yourself without any trouble… I would have thought a big, strong wizard like you could do some chores after something so ‘anticlimactic’.”
Merlin narrowed his eyes, trying to look menacing, but Arthur thought he looked about as scary as a kitten.
“I’ll have you know that I could turn you into a frog if you get on my bad side, you ponce,” Merlin muttered.
Arthur simply laughed, “Alright, let’s go back to my chambers and get some rest and we can deal with this in the morning.”
He and Merlin walked through the castle halls quietly, not really knowing what to say to one another now that the danger and the accompanying adrenaline had passed. When they arrived at Arthur’s chambers, they both slowly got undressed before climbing into bed. Arthur pulled Merlin into his chest, holding him as closely as he could without hurting him.
“Tell me about all of this magicking you’ve been doing behind my back,” he whispered.
Merlin snorted softly, “That’ll take days to do and I’m tired, Arthur.”
Arthur huffed, but ran a hand through Merlin’s hair lovingly. “Fine. But you’re not getting out of this in the morning… I’m not letting you out of my sight until I’m completely caught up.” Arthur knew he was acting slightly childish, but he honestly didn’t care.
Merlin was silent long enough that Arthur thought he had already fallen asleep, but after a few minutes Merlin whispered, “I’d like that…”
Arthur made an inquisitive noise. “You’d like what?”
“Not leaving your sight for days,” Merlin murmured. “Now shut up and let me sleep.”
Arthur bit back a sarcastic retort, and instead just kissed Merlin on the top of his head. He wouldn’t ever admit it to Merlin, but the fight had tired Arthur out enough that he didn’t want to get into a verbal sparring match with Merlin either, and he quickly drifted off to sleep.