Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“What the hell is wrong with you, Arthur?” Uther is incredulous. “Why on earth do you think I gave you such a young, untrained boy as a servant in the first place? It certainly wasn’t because I thought you deserved the incompetent service. Speaking of which, if you haven’t been using the boy for the purpose nature so obviously formed him for, what on earth have you been doing with him?”

“You made him my manservant, father, not my bedservant.”

Uther looks at Arthur as if he truly is defective.

“One doesn’t make that sort of a declaration in public, Arthur. Besides, the child’s guardian was standing right there and you know Gaius is an old friend. I’d not humiliate him in such a manner.”

“Humiliate him? What about Merlin? What about me?”

“Well obviously I’d intended it as a reward for the boy. What higher honour could such a peasant hope for than to warm the bed of the Crown Prince of Camelot?”

“Father, Merlin is an innocent. Such a thing wouldn’t even occur to him.”

“Innocent? Bah! He’s a country bred boy, not some coddled noble’s son. All those boys learn the way of things young and he’s not that young.”

“By the gods, father, he was only fifteen! I’m not even sure his balls had dropped yet!”

“Yes, well they hardly needed to have done so for the use he was intended for. Are you honestly telling me you didn’t find such a tender lad attractive?”

Arthur shifts, visibly uncomfortable, eyes cast to the floor but he doesn’t answer.

Uther appraises his only son and can tell from the young man’s body language that he does indeed find his “manservant” more than pleasing to the eye.

“You seriously haven’t laid a finger on the boy? You take him everywhere with you, Arthur, why on earth would you do such a thing if he isn’t serving your needs?”

“I-I find him…amusing, Father.”

“Yes well, I’ve no doubt you’d find far more amusement in burying yourself between the boy's lips than whatever pathetic humour you might find spilling from his tongue.”

“Father, you gave him to me. Surely what I choose to do with him is my business and mine alone.”

“It would be had you learned to use Camelot’s resources better.”

It galls the King that he’s given such a comely young boy to his son only to find that the idiot hasn’t bothered to make use of the child. The two had been nigh on inseparable for nearly two years. Arthur dragged the tall, slender youth with him wherever he went, no matter how inappropriate the journey. Uther had been certain it was because he didn’t care to be separated from his favorite carnal receptacle. By the gods, he’d even taken the fragile looking boy along to the final battle where he’d slain the dragon menacing the city.

Though that had been several weeks ago, it was his memory of the sight of the two of them walking back to the castle side by side that had prompted this conversation. The boy had been serving them at dinner and something about the way he moved brought the image back to the King’s mind. He’d stayed Arthur after the meal, intending to remonstrate with him about the inappropriateness of taking one’s bedmate on dangerous missions.

“Arthur, no matter how sweetly the boy might serve you, surely you must see that such a creature was made for the boudoir, not the battlefield. I’m certain you can wait until you reach home to lose yourself inside him. I’ve no doubt the boy himself would prefer the softness of sheets to the blooded dirt of the field of war? Besides, wherever you stash him during a battle, he’ll never truly be safe. If you’re that attached to the cling of his flesh, surely you wouldn’t want to lose him just because you don’t want to practice a little restraint?”

Arthur had first paled and then flushed a brilliant red as he sputtered his denial that Merlin was anything other than his loyal manservant. Uther hadn’t believed a word of it…at first. When it finally dawned on him that Arthur wasn’t being coy or discreet but that he’d truly never availed himself of the fair flesh of the beautiful boy his father had given him almost two years ago the King was flummoxed. Then he was outraged, leading him to question what was wrong with his son that he’d not claimed the succulent little gift his father had given him.

“You realize that by not claiming the boy you’ve just left him wide open for anyone to soil him.”

“I have not! It’s been made more than clear to everyone from the courtiers to the servants that Merlin is under my protection and not to be approached.”

“Are you saving him for a special occasion?”

The Prince flushes a deep, unbecoming red, his eyes widening. Uther can tell he’s hit uncomfortably close to the mark with that question.

“No! I would not so impugn my honour by taking advantage of someone in my power, Father. Especially not someone as innocent and naïve as Merlin is.”

The implied slur to the King’s own honour in that statement has him snarling in irritation. Uther begins to suspect that someone, at some time, during Arthur’s upbringing (perhaps it had even been himself) had failed to appraise his son about honour and the privilege of rank. Part of that privilege was that the true practice of chivalry is reserved for those who possessed power, prestige and the proper bloodlines. Arthur needs to understand that those who hold no position in society can never add to one’s honour, only damage it.

“There is nothing to impugn, you ungrateful whelp! The honour is his for serving the noblest in the land. How many dirt grubbing peasants can rise to such heights as to be deemed worthy to share flesh with royalty?”

“Father, you can’t mean that. It was you who taught me that the people are ours to protect!”

“Yes, to protect from marauding bandits, invading armies and the privations of starvation and pestilence. Not from the pleasures of the flesh, you foolish boy!”

“I don’t see the difference, Father.”

Uther shakes his head in disgust. His son has far too much regard for the peasantry. It seems he sees himself as some sort of servant to the people instead of the other way around. How he’s come by such a skewed world view is beyond him. He’s certainly done his best to make his son aware of his inborn superiority to the peasants. They are barely a step above the beasts of the field and forest. Of a certainty, he doesn’t advocate abusing them any more than he would campaign for the abuse of animals. It simply doesn’t serve their best interests to do so. However, it seems it’s more than past time to remind his son of the difference between nobles and peasants.

“You’re leaving tomorrow to search the Northern provinces, are you not?”

“I am, Father. We’ve thoroughly swept the area surrounding the city; it’s time to widen the search for Morgana.”

“You will not be taking your manservant this time.”

“But Father! I need him along to tend to the camp while we search. I can’t very well make one of the knights do a servant’s work.”

“Take along a few of the squires for that. It’s time you left your…entertainment behind and properly applied yourself to the task at hand. Had you done so sooner, Morgana might already be back home where she belongs. I’ll no longer indulge your distractions. I want her found!”

He can see Arthur grind his teeth before clenching them tightly to reply, “Yes, sire.”

“You may go. I’ll expect to see you immediately upon your return.”

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THIS IS THE BEGINNING OF AN EXTREMELY GRAPHIC RAPE SCENE.
If you don't want to read it skip to next line break.

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“I can’t believe my fool of a son left you untouched for so long.” The King has Merlin pinned to Arthur’s bed, legs spread, breeches slashed from ankle to waist, lying in tatters on the mattress beneath his exposed skin. The dagger Uther had used to cut the cloth away from his long, slender limbs is still in the grip of his left hand. His right hand is roughly combing through the soft black hair sparsely curling round the base of Merlin’s flaccid cock and veiling his tender, pink bollocks in downy wisps.
“Lift your hips, boy, and spread those legs wider. I want to see what you’ve got hiding beneath these soft, pretty cullions.”

When the young boy lies still, silently refusing, Uther brings the blade to his belly.

“Do it boy or I’ll gut you and fuck you while you die. If I cut you just right it will take long, painful hours ere you finally go and I’ll have your tender little boy-cunt anyway. A bit of blood never stopped me before; it sure as hell isn’t going stop me this time. Now lift your fucking arse off the bed and show me what you’ve been hiding from your King!”

When Merlin slowly spreads his thighs wider and arches his back, raising his hips from the deep red counterpane of his son’s bed, Uther grins in lecherous glee. The boy is formed beautifully. He thumbs the small, pretty balls out of the way to reveal a pink, perfect taint, it’s so soft and plump looking, he strokes a thumb-pad over the spot feeling how smooth and hot it is. He forces the youth’s legs higher, so that his long slender feet are almost touching the headboard behind him.

His taut cheeks are so small and slim, it takes only two fingers to spread them open and the King stares, transfixed, at the star-shaped center of the boy’s body. It’s so small, such a tight little clench.

“How old are you, boy?”

It takes several seconds for Merlin to stutter an answer, “S-seventeen, s-sire.”

His small thighs are trembling. Uther prods the tightly closed rosette with the tip of one thumb.

“No one’s ever had you, have they, boy?”

“N-n-no. No o-one.”

“It’s like the gods formed you just for a man’s pleasure, boy. So tall but so very slender.” He forces his thumb in to the first knuckle, smiles as the boy cries out. “And so pleasingly small where it counts.”

Uther can’t resist leaning in to bite at the shallow curve of one tight buttock. He drags his teeth across the soft, hairless swell of muscle and swishes his tongue over the abused flesh. The boy has a distinct flavour. It’s unique to the servant and yet it tickles at his memory. He’s tasted something similar before; however he knows it’s been a long, long time since he’s had anything like this boy in his hands and under his tongue.

He pulls his thumb free from the clench of the boy’s hole, so tight it’s cutting off the circulation to his own flesh. He leans in and runs his tongue over that plump little taint, all flushed with heat from the attention Uther has been giving the boy. He lashes it with his tongue and growls in pleasure as Merlin’s hips jerk and he cries out in protest at the unwanted pleasure the King is forcing on him. Uther’s lips form a seal and he sucks on that sweet spot just under Merlin’s balls. He can hear the anguished denial in the cries that spill from the young boy’s throat. He’s untouched, perhaps has never even imagined anyone using his body this way. That thought arouses the older man in ways little has ever done before. Uther can hear the tears gurgling in the delicious noises emitting from that long, pale throat. He has an arm across the back of the servant’s thighs, holding him in place as the youth jerks and squirms, instinctively trying to escape the sensations being inflicted on him.

Sliding his tongue down the short path from the boy’s balls to the tightly furled entrance to his body, Uther bites down on the tender flesh surrounding the little clench. Merlin screeches and Uther smiles, forms his tongue into a spear and forces it inside the boy’s tight cavern. The strangely familiar flavour he detected before is more pronounced here but in his desire for the youth, he puts his puzzlement aside and concentrates on digging his tongue past the tightly muscled ring that is the boy’s last defense against the invasion of his unwilling flesh.

“Please! P-please stop! Sire, please!”

Uther smiles, he actually enjoys the pleas, they are so different from what he usually hears from his bedmates. He’s missed this. He’s missed the way an unwilling body shakes and trembles, the way an innocent squirms and cries at every unfamiliar touch and he’s especially missed the flawless expanses of velvety skin that sheathe only the rarest of boys this age.

Arthur’s servant is at the age where he should be erupting with unsightly blemishes and rashes but the boy’s alabaster skin is as silky smooth and perfect as the most pampered noblewoman. The only imperfection Uther has yet to detect is a strange patch of slightly darker skin in a perfect circle just beneath the boy’s breastbone. He’d studied the mark (scar?) for only a moment as he’d roughly torn the boy’s tunic from his body before shoving him down on his son’s mattress.

Down here, his most secret flesh is simply exquisite; pearly pale and lightly dusted with rose in all the right places. As the Uther stimulates his unwilling sexual organs, a perfect pink flush rushes across his slender, silky thighs, spreads over the creamy cheeks of his taut little arse and the small, tender, blushing heart of his body furls closed even tighter and darkens to a deep rose. There’s not even a single silky hair beyond the boy’s soft, lovely cullions.

In fact, the youth is entirely hairless beyond a smattering of soft hair thinly scattered across his narrow, firmly muscled chest, a small whorl of black silk beneath each arm and the faintest of treasure trails leading the eye down across taut, defined abdominal muscles to an inky nest of curls where the boy’s lovely, ivory cock lies soft and thoroughly quiescent. Uther loves it, finds the boy’s body unbearably alluring and wonders again at the Prince’s foolishness, wonders also at his own impulsiveness in giving such a gift to his son. He should have rewarded the boy by taking him for his own. He smirks widely, thankful that due to Arthur’s neglect, he’s now able to rectify that mistake.

He uncurls the boy, straightening his legs before crawling between them. He strips off his own belt and tunic, loosens his breeches but leaves them on for the moment. His cock is rock hard and leaking but he’s in no rush. He has every intention of savouring the lovely morsel of young manhood spread out before him. Merlin has his face turned away, his eyes closed. His lush lips are pressed tightly together and his fists are curled into the bedspread beneath him. He’s not physically resisting but it’s also clear he’s not willing. Uther is surprised at how much this excites him.

“Look at me, boy.”

Eyes like jewels flash defiantly in his direction and Uther can’t help but smile. Those wide eyes might deny him but the flush across the boy’s extraordinary cheekbones and the trembling of his plump lips, bitten till they’re dark red and glistening with moisture, betray the boy’s defiance for what it truly is: bravado. The child is terrified. He is just as innocent as his son claimed.

“You should be honoured, boy. How many can say that they were privileged enough to give their innocence to the highest in the land?”

“I’d wanted to give it to…”

The boy bites back the words, wincing, obviously regretful of his over hasty tongue.

“Who? Who were you saving yourself for, child?”

Merlin remains stubbornly quiet.

“Tell me. Or shall I guess? Was it Arthur you were hoping would take you? Make you his own?”

Uther snickered, deliberately cruel.

“He’s had you for nearly two years and never laid a finger on you. Don’t you think it’s time to face reality, boy? He’s not interested. But I am, I always have been. Why not relax and give yourself to me? I’ll make it good for you.”

Tears gather in those deep blue eyes and somehow make the boy even more beautiful as they track down his face.

“I’m sorry, your Highness, but I don’t want this.”

“It’s happening whether you want it or not, boy. You’ll only make it hurt if you resist. Give yourself over to it and most of it will be pleasurable.”

Merlin snorts, “Most of it?”

“Child, every boy’s first time hurts, just as every girl’s first time must hurt. The gods designed us this way, I have no control over that.”

“I don’t want anything from you!” Merlin practically spits the words. “Do what you will, I can’t stop you. I don’t care if it hurts.”

With those words, Uther feels something bestial uncurl in his chest. It’s been more years than he can remember since anyone outright rejected him. There were times back in the early days of the purge where he used rape as an interrogation method, a means to break a suspect but he’s not had a potential lover scorn him so openly since he was little older than this boy himself.

“Fine, then. You want it that way? I shall be a benevolent King and grant you your wish!”

He reaches down and grabs the boy by the throat and yanks him upright. Naturally Merlin struggles but as soon as he is on his knees, Uther releases his grip on that long neck and knots his hands in the boy’s black hair instead. He brings his lips to Merlin’s and forces the lush mouth open. There it is again, that flavour! What the fuck is it? Why does the boy’s taste drag at the edges of his memory and drive him insane? He plunges his tongue into the slack mouth and explores every surface within. He licks at his straight, even teeth, probes the softness of the lining of his cheeks, licks at the bumps and ridges on the roof of his mouth and lashes at his slick tongue. He sucks every drop of honeyed moisture from within and still finds that he wants more.

Biting down on Merlin’s plump lower lip, he breaks the skin and moans even as the servant whimpers. It is there in his blood! Uther sucks at the hot, salted-iron fluid and the taste is there, stronger than in the boy’s saliva, stronger even than it was in the tang of the whore’s hole between the boy’s buttocks. His hands tighten in the downy-soft sable hair until he knows he’s in danger of ripping it out by the roots. He sucks at that trickle of blood like a vampire.

Pulling himself back, voice ragged, he demands, “What are you boy? What the fuck are you?”

Uther stares into the boy’s eyes which show nothing but terror now. He shakes Merlin’s head sharply.

“There’s something about you, something inside you! What is it? What are you?”

The boy tries to shake his head but cannot due to the hold Uther has him in. Instead his eyebrows curl in frightened confusion and his bleeding lips tremble as he whispers, “Nothing. I’m nothing. No one. I’m nobody from nowhere, Sire.”

Uther growls in frustration and hurls the boy back down on the bed with such force that his body bounces as it hits the mattress. He throws himself down on the long slender form and attacks that perfect skin with his teeth and fingernails. He licks at the shallow wounds, drags his mouth over every patch of skin he can reach and inhales deeply as he savages the boy with teeth and tongue, hands, fingers and nails.

Whatever it is that is driving Uther mad is in Merlin’s scent as well as his flavour, he is overwhelmed by it, he has to know what it is. He finds the scent and taste are stronger in certain places on the boy’s body. His neck, particularly behind his ears, and his shining ebony hair reek of it. The delicate skin under his arms is also intense with the scent but it is the boys groin, his cock, his cullions, the skin beneath them, the sweet valley between his arse cheeks and the darkened little clench buried at the bottom of that valley that are simply saturated with the taste and smell Uther can’t get enough of.

He sucks on the soft tube of Merlin’s cock until it finally hardens between his lips. The dripping pre-cum is even better than the boy’s blood. Merlin screams as Uther sucks hard on his cock, hurting him even as he forces him toward orgasm. The Kings fingers are relentlessly rubbing the sweet spot beneath his balls and the hard suction that hollows his cheeks has Merlin writhing in an agonizing mixture of pleasure and pain. Uther doesn’t care, he isn’t blowing the boy to please him, he is in a frenzy to drink his cum, to see if it’s as rich with what he needs as the tiny drops he’s already had across his tongue. He rakes his teeth over the tender flesh to sensitize it further. He wants the boy’s seed and he wants it this instant!

Merlin is crying now, he can’t help it. It’s all too much for him. He’s tried to be brave, he’s tried to be defiant but now he’s almost overwhelmed with fear as much as with the agonizing pleasure-pain Uther is inflicting on his tender flesh. The King appears to be in some kind of mad delirium and it is scaring Merlin far more than even the imminent rape of his body is. Uther is acting as if he intends to cannibalize the sorcerer alive. It doesn’t seem outside the realm of possibility that the King might just bite his cock off as soon as he cums.

He struggles to breathe through the terror and the tears but he knows he is hyperventilating and close to passing out. He can’t think, his magic is gone, out of reach, worse than useless at this point. He casts about desperately trying to think of some spell, something that can save him instead of simply worsening the situation but there is nothing. The madman with his most fragile appendage in his mouth is growling like a beast and clawing at his thighs when he isn’t squeezing his balls or harshly thumbing the flesh beneath them. Finally with a panicked shriek, Merlin unwillingly spills his essence into the King’s mouth.

Uther gulps down the first spurt of the boy’s seed greedily but holds the second and third in his mouth and swirls them around, keeping the softening flesh in his mouth as well. He can feel the tremors nearly shaking the boy apart but he can only concentrate of the fluid in his mouth. It isn’t delicious in the way that a favoured food or liquor is; it’s a completely different experience than that. He can’t bear to swallow it and lose the intensity on his tongue. If only he can keep it there long enough, then maybe he can solve the mystery that’s driving him insane. He knows now that whatever it is that’s buried in his memory, he’s never had as much of it as he is getting now. It is elusive, faint but somehow vital. He knows in his soul that solving this mystery is important, more important than perhaps anything else in his life at the moment.

Finally, he lets go of the whimpering boy’s cock but keeps the cream swirling in his mouth. He lays his cheek against the sweaty flesh of Merlin’s satiny thigh and closes his eyes. Uther isn’t sure how long he lays there with Merlin’s cum sliding back and forth across his tongue but the sweat has dried on both of them before he finally lets it slip to the back of his throat and swallows it in tiny, grudging increments. The answer still eludes him.

Nuzzling the downy hair barely shielding the boy’s balls he inhales deeply and lets his tongue flicker out to taste again and again. He can’t stop breathing the boy in, can’t stop tasting him. Merlin’s shaking has settled to a fine tremor but it still rattles his entire body. Uther lifts his head from between the servant’s thighs.

“Roll over boy.” Shakily, Merlin complies. “Good, now spread your legs. Wider! Bend your knees, I want your arse wide open, boy. No! Stay flat on the bed, just get those legs apart. Just like a frog, boy.”

“It hurts.”

“Child, what makes you think I care what hurts you? You told me yourself you didn’t care if it hurt.”

With that Uther reaches out and yanks Merlin’s legs into the position he wants them and ignores the way he cries out. He settles in the space he’s made for himself and brings his face close to that luscious, tender arse. The position he’s forced the boy into has separated the cheeks but Uther brings his thumbs up and spreads the flesh even further apart until that tiny reddened rosebud is widely exposed to him. He leans forward and runs his tongue up and down the sweet, hairless crack several times before he swirls it around that deeply coveted little clench.

“Boy, you may not want this but this is exactly what you were made for. I’ve never seen such a fuckable little arse in my entire life and believe me, you probably can’t count high enough to number how many I’ve seen.”

Frantic not become another number on that list, Merlin tries again to reach for his magic, any magic but his gift fails him yet again, he can’t focus for fear. As an infant he’d been able to wield magic without conscious thought, but now, even that instinctive power he’s never had to think about using seems to have vanished along with anything resembling coherent thought. The all-consuming pain and terror have even taken over his subconscious mind rendering the powerful mage as helpless as any other weak, skinny, vulnerable boy of seventeen.

“Push back at me.”

Not sure what the King means by this command, Merlin lifts his hips and presses his arse closer to Uther’s face. Immediately his hips are pushed flat against the bed again.

“No boy,” he probes Merlin’s arsehole with his tongue again. “Push back at me.”

Confused, Merlin’s tremoring escalates back to shaking as he is unable to comply with the King’s demand.

“Push with your hole, you stupid boy! Push with your internal muscles, like you’re trying to expel something from inside.”

Tentatively Merlin exerts pressure on his anus as if attempting to pass wind while praying he doesn’t actually do so in the King’s face and suddenly he feels Uther’s tongue press deeper inside his body. Straight away, he clenches back down again, forcing the King’s tongue from his most intimate orifice.

“Keep pushing boy, don’t stop. I want inside this little furl of yours. Come on!”

Cringing with eyes tightly closed and teeth clamped together, Merlin does as he’s told and again feels the tip of Uther’s tongue forcing its way into his body. It isn’t painful it’s just humiliatingly intimate. There is only one person in the world he wants inside him and it isn’t the King.

Uther moans at the intensity of the boy’s essence here. It’s almost as strong as it had been in his semen. He tongues the silent boy for long minutes, savouring the extraordinary scent and taste of the flesh inside. When his tongue and jaw begin to ache, regretfully, he finally eases out of the boy. Lying on his stomach between the boy’s long legs, upper body supported on his elbows, he gazes down in fascination at the tight, tiny little entrance to the boy’s body. Now a bright strawberry red from the King’s enthusiastic attention, it’s still closed up without a visible seam anywhere. He thumbs at it and chuckles when the youth squirms; the action seems involuntary. He takes a moment to run his hands over the firm white flesh of Merlin’s buttocks appreciating the small, narrow, swelling musculature.

Hauling himself up to his knees, he finally pushes down his own breeches and smalls, leaning left then right to free himself of the rest of his garments. His boots had been discarded the minute he’d walked into his son’s chambers to find Merlin hanging Arthur’s clean laundry in one of the room’s several wardrobes. Now, naked as the boy sprawled out on the mattress before him, he lowers himself down over the youth, stretching out fully atop him. Though they are of a similar height, he is built so much broader that the boy disappears almost completely beneath him.

He runs his hands up and down the velvet soft skin of the servant’s sides, thumbing at his hips, tracing the narrowness of his waist and dragging the tips of his fingers over the dip and ridge of each rib. He nips and suckles at the nape of Merlin’s long neck and buries his nose in the unruly sable hair that waves thickly around the boy’s head. Running his tongue along the outer edge of one ear, he smiles at how the thin, delicate shell protrudes out so far from the side of the lad’s head. It isn’t so noticeable when Merlin’s hair is grown out, like it is now, but every time he gets a haircut, those ears of his draw the eye of anyone who looks on him. They really should detract from the boy’s beauty but somehow they just highlight the wideness of his ocean blue eyes and the sharp flare of his cheekbones.

As Uther enjoys the luxuriance of the flesh under his own, he marvels at the elegance of the bones supporting that flesh. Not for the first time, he wonders at the boy’s parentage. He’d briefly met the child’s mother and it was clear that Merlin got his colouring from her but while she was a pretty woman, there wasn’t anything extraordinary about her appearance. Her son hadn’t inherited his elegantly long limbs and exquisite bone structure from that woman. He doesn’t have the sturdy build of the peasantry. Everything about his lithe, slender build speaks of generations of aristocracy. It is even more obvious now when the boy isn’t clothed in the ill-fitting, baggy raiment that did much to hide his beautiful body. Uther’s own family didn’t even have the bloodlines that resulted in such elegance of form, having fought their way into the ruling class as warriors of the first order. His wife’s family had been of such an ancient lineage, she and her brother Tristan had both been as elegantly formed as this supposed peasant. There were others, like Morgana’s mother, who had the same look but they were, all of them, all from the oldest, purest blood lines in Albion.

Arthur had once mentioned in passing that his servant was a bastard who grew up without a father. It was clear to Uther that the boy’s father must have been some kind of noble. There really wasn’t any other explanation for refinement of the boy’s appearance.

As he contemplates Merlin’s bloodlines, he rolls to his side to better enjoy the graceful sight of the boy’s form that had sparked this line of thought in the first place. The sapphirine eyes remain stubbornly closed but the rest of his face is relaxed and for once, Uther allows himself to stare as he’d never dare be seen to do in public. Again, he thinks, there’s no way such a beauty can be a base-born bastard. If one discounts the ears, the boy is utterly flawless. For gods’ sake, he even has beautiful feet! They are long, narrow, high arched with slender, well-formed toes. He appears skinny and underfed when dressed in the rags Arthur has allowed him to live and work in but stripped bare, it becomes obvious that he is simply wiry and slim. True, there isn’t an excess ounce of fat on him but that simply serves to highlight the defined musculature of the flesh beneath that butter-soft ivory skin.

Uther doesn’t merely look with his eyes though. He just can’t keep his hands from roaming over all that enticing skin, massaging the boy’s neck gently and running his fingers down over each faint knob of the long spine. He’d meant it when he told the boy he would make it good for him if he just gave in. It’s only the child’s stubbornness that will cause him pain, not that Uther is averse to inflicting such pain. He is well aware that he enjoys the groans, whimpers and sometimes even the screams that are forced from virgin throats as he plows their bodies open for the first time. There really is little in life to compare with being the one to deflower a virgin. Be it boy or girl, Uther doesn’t care, beauty is beauty and knowing his cock is the only one that beauty has ever known is a power rush unlike any other.

”Every boy’s first time hurts, just as every girl’s first time must hurt. The gods designed us this way; I have no control over that.” Uther knows his earlier words were lies. There are ways to minimize or even eliminate the pain of a first penetration if one is patient enough. It isn’t that Uther lacks patience; it is simply that he truly enjoys the pain each youngling suffers with him. No matter how gentle he makes the rest of the coupling, he always makes those first thrusts hurt. Had Merlin been more receptive of his advances, he’d have made sure the boy would have had some pleasure from the experience as well. Since he’s refused, Uther intends to make opening Merlin’s body especially painful. He’s certain that after this, the boy will be more cooperative in his future dealings with his King. And there will be a future; Uther is already anticipating how many ways he will use the gorgeous creature in the days to come. If the boy remains as alluring as he is now, the King can see this liaison stretching out for months, possibly even years. After all, the boy is still quite young. Plenty old enough for such erotic delights but still youthful enough that his beauty isn’t likely to fade any time soon.

While he is contemplating the boy beneath his hands, those hands are busy. His palms are full of Merlin’s succulent little arse, kneading and pinching the taut flesh, pressing the cheeks together and harshly dragging his teeth down the ridge created by the pressure he’s exerting on them. He yanks them apart and bites every centimeter of flesh between, including the skin of that little pucker. Merlin’s hands are fisted into Arthur’s red counterpane and twisting the luxe fabric so hard it threatens to tear.

Uther grins gleefully as the creamy flesh first turns pink, then bright red and finally a deep purple as he pulls at the skin all around the tight entrance to the servant’s body. He can hear the boy sobbing quietly now and savagely delights in the sound. He’s sure the youth is regretting his rejection of the King and it crosses Uther’s mind for just a moment to give the boy one more chance to give himself to his ruler. Then he remembers why the boy scorned his attentions and decides that he was more than generous in offering the boy even a second chance. Now he’ll truly know what remorse is by the time Uther is finished with him. He digs his teeth into the rim of the boy’s hole, bites down hard and pulls, smiling around the flesh as Merlin arches up screaming.

The servant struggles and tries to crawl away but the King has him firmly pinned on his stomach. Uther is laying on top of the boy’s back, his own knees astride and clamped tightly around the screaming boy’s torso, feet hooked over his shoulders preventing any attempts on the boy’s part to wriggle forward. His hands are still hooked deeply into the firm flesh of creamy young buttocks and there is nowhere for the boy to go as Uther bites and pulls at the boy’s rim until every millimeter is dark purple and quickly swelling. When he’s done there’s no sign of any opening at all, just a deeply bruised circle of puffs that resemble nothing so much as a peony in full bloom.

“By the god’s that’s beautiful!” He exclaims over his work. He drags a fingernail across the “blossom” and the agonized sound that Merlin makes goes straight to his hard cock, stiffening it further.

He lets the boy’s cheeks snap back together and even presses down a bit just to force another cry from the sobbing youth’s throat.

“I wish I had a mirror boy, you should see what a lovely little flower you now have between your cheeks. Perhaps next time I shall have the Royal Artist preserve the sight for posterity, what do you think of that? Hmm? Your little assflower on display for generations to wonder at.”

Giving the boy a smack to his already sore buttocks, Uther demands, “Alright, that’s enough fun for you. It’s finally time for me to take my enjoyment. Where does Arthur keep his slick?”

Merlin doesn’t even pretend to not know what the King is asking for. He points to the ornately carved cabinet beside the bed where an array of keys is always hanging.

“Well, get it boy, unless you don’t want me to bother with it.”

Moving is painful but Merlin still does his best to be quick, fearing that if he takes too long Uther will just dispense with the unguent altogether and the young warlock is already in enough agony. He’s heard what a “dry fuck” is like for the recipient and has no desire to become more of a victim than he already is. He pulls open the top drawer and swiftly locates the small glass jar he knows Arthur uses to ease his self-pleasure (and suspects he uses with the partners he’s too discreet to ever let Merlin see). He holds the jar out to the King but the man makes no move to take it from him.

He looks questioningly at his monarch. It’s the first time he has voluntarily locked eyes with the man since he strolled into Arthur’s room and demanded Merlin strip for him. His pale gray eyes aren’t cold like they usually are; instead they’re burning with an intensity Merlin’s never seen before. Uther’s eyes are hot, his face flushed, his thin lips smirking.

“If you want the ease of that ointment, boy, I suggest you do a good job of applying it wherever you think it needs to go.”

The jar almost hits the hard oak floor as Merlin goes numb with shock but his fingers tighten at the last moment. He knows he shouldn’t be surprised but somehow this isn’t something he’d expected to have to do. Slowly now, he returns to the bed and reluctantly climbs back in next to the King. He tries to turn away for all the good privacy would do him at this point but Uther pulls him back around with a “tsk” so that his inflamed backside is facing the King directly. He uncorks the jar and dips his long fingers inside, scooping out a generous amount of the slick. Cringing, he reaches back and begins to smear it around his hole. It’s so painful, he can’t hold back a cry as his fingers make contact but he bites down on his lip until he tastes blood again and gets on with spreading the unguent as thickly around his swollen entrance as he can. Scooping out more of the greasy substance, he slowly slides a finger inside and tries to smear it around but the pressure of even that well-greased, slender digit is enough to leave him gasping and nearly passing out from the pain. It gets slightly easier with the second finger full of emollient so he adds a third and a fourth before Uther stops him.

“That’s more than enough boy. I actually want to feel your flesh, not a pocket full of liniment.”

Uther had told him to apply the slick wherever he thought it should go so next he turned to the King who sat lounging on the bed, legs spread obscenely wide, his cock proudly rising from a wiry nest of salt and pepper curls. Merlin swallows hard. It’s the first time he’s been able to bring his eyes to rest on the intended instrument of his destruction and he’s frightened out of his mind by the sight.

The King isn’t particularly long but he is thick. Very thick. Very thick and very hard, the brownish-red tip weeping copious amounts of pre-cum. Grinning as the boy’s bright blue eyes widen at the sight of him, Uther tilts his hips up, displaying his achingly hard organ all the more prominently before the frightened youth.

“I see you’re at least smart enough to know you need to slick me up as well as yourself, boy.” His smirk is pure evil. “Have at it.”

This time Merlin practically fills his entire palm with the slippery ointment. Slowly he crawls between the King’s legs and with as light a touch as possible begins to smear the unguent around the swollen pole of flesh rising against Uther’s belly. Eventually he needs to use both hands to make sure it’s evenly coated and his stomach churns as the man he’s touching moans loudly and leans into his grip.

“That’s the way boy, get it everywhere. Better grease up my balls too while you’re at it,”

Merlin really isn’t sure why the man’s cullions need coating as well but he’s scared enough to follow any directions the King is now giving. Anything that might save him more pain is worth the effort, no matter how revolting.

When Merlin’s finished, he backs away on his knees and hesitates a foot or so away from Uther. He doesn’t know what he’s to do next. He dares to glance up at the King’s face once more only to see that predatory smile still stretched lewdly across his face.

“Since you did such a good job there boy, I’m going to give you a little hint.” He wiggles his fingers at the warlock. “There’s one more place you really ought to apply that slick to.”

It takes a few moments for Uther’s meaning to sink in and when it does, Merlin nearly vomits on the bed. Knee-walking back to the King he tentatively reaches for the man’s dominant right hand. Uther allows Merlin to lift his fingers and coat them with the sweet smelling ointment. His smug grin widens as the boy reaches for his other hand and coats all the fingers there as well. Clever child!

"Come here." With the words, he pulls the man-child into his lap. He captures those sumptuous lips again and slips his tongue inside the boy’s honeyed mouth. Sucking on the servant’s tongue, he arranges the youth’s long, slender legs on both sides of his own and wraps an arm around his narrow waist. He then reaches between the now widely spread cheeks of that tender young arse. Keeping their mouths fused, Uther plunges two wide fingers straight up into Merlin’s already abused hole, sinking them both in to the third knuckle with one, vicious thrust.

Ripping his mouth away with a howl of anguish, Merlin struggles in vain to escape while Uther half-groans, half-laughs his pleasure and amusement. Tears pour from those beautiful eyes and they shimmer like the ocean under a summer sun, widened to their fullest extent with the shock of the pain tearing through the virgin boy’s tight little tunnel. Uther seizes Merlin’s mouth once more and begins to draw on his tongue again as he deliberately reams the boy’s tightest orifice open with rough twists and pulls of his fingers. He swallows the cries that the boy emits and savours every one. He knows how painful this has to be for the servant because frankly, the boy’s body is so tight, it’s cutting off the circulation to his own fingers.

Every muscle in Merlin’s body is cramped tight in agony as Uther thick fingers force him open with casual brutality. Those fingers curl and tug, spread wide and pull with all the force the powerful man still possesses until that incredible tightness begins to give. He let’s go of his mouth and feels Merlin’s face drop to his shoulder. He’s shaking so hard Uther figures he’s likely to pass out any moment now. Clearly he has no fight left in him so Uther loosens his arm from around the boy’s narrow waist and uses his free hand to hoist Merlin’s body higher against his chest.

“Put your arms round my neck, child. Come on, hold on to me.”

The young servant finally goes limp in the King’s arms but doesn’t raise his own; instead they simply dangle at his sides, his body pressed listlessly against Uther’s. It’s up to the King to arrange the boy the way he wants him. He manages to drape each of Merlin’s arms over his wide shoulders and brings his free hand down to cup the boy’s small bottom. Now he can spread the cheeks further apart to facilitate his exploration of the body he’s coveted for so long.

Uther eases his fingers out, flexing them a few times to bring the circulation back. He bites and licks at the boy’s delicious neck as the pins and needles recede from his hand. He sucks on an earlobe and swirls his tongue inside the wide shell of one of the servant’s strangely alluring ears. Merlin gasps softly, moans into his shoulder and wriggles just a bit. Uther smiles at having found something that pleasures the boy. Arousing him against his will is almost as stimulating as making the boy hurt. The potential for psychological torment fuels the King’s plans for this boy’s future as his bedservant.

Circulation restored, Uther jams his fingers back inside the warm, close cavern of the boy’s arse and is rewarded by a weak jerk and a feeble cry from his beautiful victim. He flexes his fingers in the boy’s heat and groans in anticipation. Merlin is going to feel so good impaled on his cock. He twists and curls inside the servant, searching for the tiny swelling of the boy’s pleasure gland. However, when he finds it something is…different. The gland is just where it should be but there is…something else, something he’d only found in the rarest of creatures, something he’d never thought to feel on his fingertips again. Uther stills in utter shock, the young boy remains trembling against him, softly whimpering in fear and pain.

Carefully, Uther extends his fingers higher, swirls them around in a circle to confirm what he suspects is there. It is. It is there! Above the boy’s prostate is another opening. There is an opening that leads to a tunnel, a channel in the flesh that in turn leads to organs that shouldn’t exist in a normal human boy.

“Dragonlord!”

He barely breathes the word but the boy obviously hears him anyway, stiffening suddenly and jerking away from the King, desperately trying to throw himself back off Uther’s lap. However, the older man still has the fingers of one hand buried deeply inside the boy and the other clamped tightly around one sharp hipbone. Merlin thrashes wildly, bucking to break the King’s hold on him, adrenaline driving the exhaustion and pain from his body. Still, though Uther may have lost some of the power he’d had as a youth, he’s still just powerful enough to drag the struggling servant back across his legs. In the fight to control the young Dragonlord, Uther is forced to withdraw from Merlin’s body and fling both arms around the deceptively strong young man.

He bears him backward onto the bed and pins the slight youth with his greater weight. Merlin is struggling to bring his thighs back together but Uther is already between them. He lays his left forearm across the Dragonlord’s throat and presses until he sees Merlin’s face begin to turn red and his gasps grow shallow and desperate. Easing up the pressure across that long neck just slightly, Uther reaches down between their bodies and inserts his fingers back inside the struggling boy.

Feeling for the anomalies that will confirm for him that this sweet-faced innocent is in fact the only known Dragonlord in existence, Uther probes the boy mercilessly. He feels for the double sphincter that separates two distinct body systems and finds it easily. Merlin is a Dragonlord, there can be no doubt of it now. Rage explodes through the King and he viciously rams his fingers into both tight internal apertures. The strangled howl of torment that tears from the young boy’s throat is a bestial delight to the maddened man.

“You’re a fucking Dragonlord! I knew there was something wrong with you, boy, from the moment I saw you, I knew it!”

“Please!”Merlin sobs, as tears cascade down his face, lips bitten raw, red and swollen to almost twice their normal size. “Please, I didn’t know! I only found out when he-when-when he died!”

“It was that cur, Balinor, wasn’t it? He spawned you, didn’t he?”

Close to finally passing out, Merlin can only nod his head in two sharp jerks.

“Well, it’s lucky for you boy that I know exactly what to do with a Dragonlord.”

Uther lifts himself off the boy and roughly jerks the youngster up by his waist.

“I don’t want a bastard in your belly so face down on your fucking knees, now!”

Confused by the first part of the King’s statement, Merlin follows the order and turns away from his tormentor and drops to forward onto his elbows. A hard, callused hand presses down between his shoulder blades and Merlin slumps further until his face and chest are both pressed against the bedspread. His nose is filled with Arthur’s scent as he feels the blunt, hard tip of Uther’s cock against the wretchedly swollen mess that is the entrance to his body. He’s terrified and confused. He doesn’t understand how the King figured out that he is a Dragonlord but now that Uther does know, he expects the madman will simply rape him then kill him.

There is no more time for thought, Uther is pressing his obscenely thick cock into Merlin’s already ravaged hole and there is no room inside him for anything other than pain. He’s suddenly grateful that the King had allowed him to slick himself earlier because otherwise he is certain he’d have died of the tearing agony. Mercifully, since his member is no longer than an average man’s, it takes only moments for Uther to fully couch his throbbing, rage fueled erection within the trembling warlock’s body. He roars with something that sounds like triumph and fury and begins to pump into the young man’s raw, torn passage savaging it futher with each hard thrust.

A Dragonlord! All this time the alluring, young boy sticking so loyally to his own son’s side was the child of a Dragonlord! There are no words to adequately describe the emotions and sensations overwhelming the King at this moment. There is rage that such a creature has been hiding in his very own household but there is also triumph because with this final act of possession the beautiful boy he’s always regretted giving to his son is now his forever. Never again can Merlin deny him anything. Uther will now own him, mind and body both.

In addition to the raging triumph is the sheer, exquisite pleasure coursing through his entire body. All the buildup and all the anticipation of slowly enjoying the boy’s mounting torment is paying off for him now. Merlin is choking on his sobs, screeches forcing their way through the constant crying each time Uther drags his cock free of that savaged little clench and then jams the wide, flared head back inside the swollen aperture. Short shallow thrusts follow, jerking the slender boy’s body violently back and forth. Uther savours his obvious agony, he’s determined to hurt the treacherous little creature.

The aroma that had driven him insane since the moment he’d ripped the boy’s tunic from him now rises like steam from the sweat running freely over the boy’s soft milk-white skin. Now he knows what that scent is, Dragonlord. He hadn’t had one of the dragon’s kin under his hands in nearly twenty years. (He had never managed to get his hands on this boy’s father or he’d never have escaped Camelot the way he did.) It is the dragon blood, the dragon essence that permeates every pore of the boy’s skin. The flavour of it saturates even the tiniest drop of the boy’s fluids.

Uther drapes himself over the young Dragonlord’s back and breathes him in even as his hips continue to thrust harshly, deeply into the boy’s fist-tight channel. He licks behind those flaring ears and buries his nose in the thick waves of soft sable hair. The boy’s skin is incredibly soft against his body. Funny, had he thought about it, he’d have imagined a creature that was literally kin to dragons would have rough skin if anything, maybe even something slightly scaly but not this boy. Pampered young girls at court would kill to possess skin so fine and smooth.

Uther forces the boy to arch beneath him and drops to his palms, covering the slender body and trapping him between his straight, iron hard arms and the forceful thrusting of the wide, wet thickness deep inside his torn inner passage. Merlin is still crying out in agony with every inward roll of the King’s hips and Uther smiles, enjoying his pain. As a Dragonlord, the way his internal organs are designed makes this position be even more painful for him than for an untried youth of any other race. It also allows Uther to penetrate him very deeply indeed.

In any other man, there is only one tract, one channel for a cock to penetrate. In a Dragonlord, there are two. Forcing himself up into the boy’s bowels means jamming his cock through a double sphincter that naturally closes tight when the Dragonlord is sexually aroused, Uther is well aware of this. Merlin isn’t the first Dragonlord he’s fucked, he’s simply the youngest. It’s been ages but the King has forgotten nothing. He never will.

He takes his time, rotating his hips while pressing as deeply inside as he can get. He continues to violate the boy’s ear as well as his arse and he knows every touch he gifts the boy with is yet another unwanted torment. Merlin’s lovely blue eyes are tightly closed, tears streaming unabated down his cheeks. Uther leans over and licks at them and moans in pleasure at the taste. There really is nothing like it in all of Albion. He’d forgotten how good it was.

As much as he wants the exquisite pleasure of fucking this boy for the first time to last, he can’t hold back much longer. Merlin is limp beneath him now, his whimpers weak, his shrieks diminished to squeaks. Uther lifts himself up and takes the young Dragonlord with him. Sliding his arms under the boy’s armpits, he rams upward with several hard strokes, using Merlins unresisting bodyweight to make the penetration as deep as possible before he finally lets go and erupts inside that impossibly tight boy-cunt.

Merlin has long since lost track of his body, his mind gone elsewhere to escape the horror gripping his reality. However, as soon as the scald of Uther’s filthy corruption fountains within him he snaps back to reality knowing something far more horrible than a simple rape has just occurred. Uther’s seed is scorching him inside, igniting his bowels and smelting some previously untouched part of him to molten slag, Uther’s filthy cum the flux by which an essential part of his being is being leeched away. When the king yanks his deflating member from Merlin’s ruptured passage, he feels part of his soul flowing from his body, fused now with the King’s release. It is magic but it’s not his natural magic. It is something of his Dragonlord essence. Something vital to his nature has fused with Uther’s semen and is now slowly dripping away from him, dribbling inexorably from his ravaged hole and slipping down his thighs in a bloody trail.

Uther lets the boy go and watches in satisfaction as he drops bonelessly to the bed before him. Settling comfortably on his knees the King surveys the bruised, bleeding body before him. He fingers the bloody seed coating his own limp cock and knows there is more smeared on his manhood than just blood and cum. The Dragonlord’s will is now his. It is nothing less than a piece of the boy’s soul that has liquefied and is clinging to his own triumphant flesh. He issues his first order.

“Turn over boy.”

Obediently, Merlin rolls onto his back even as he cries out from the pressure on his abused buttocks and his viciously torn “boy-cunt”. Merlin can no longer think of it as anything else, not after the way Uther has used it, branding the foul term into his head, treating his body like the lowest sort of whore.

“I want you to bleed in Arthur’s bed so that he knows exactly what he’s lost. Wipe yourself clean with the bedspread then stay there on your back while my seed leaks from you.”

The young Dragonlord says not a word but he dutifully wipes at the mix of their body fluids with the luxurious fabric that covers the Prince’s mattress, doing a poor job of it. He can’t care enough to be thorough. Once he’s done that, he lies back down and spreads his legs so that the foul mixture of his innocence and Uther’s essence leaks directly onto the counterpane. The bedcoverings may be red but the colour is a light one, the dark stains from Merlin’s destruction will be clear for Arthur to see when he returns from the North.

Even covered in tears and sweat, blood and cum the boy is still startlingly beautiful. The King smiles smugly knowing now that the long felt niggling of regret over gifting this lovely creature to his ungrateful son need never bother him again. He continues to admire the boy’s elegant lines, slim, strong muscles, smooth ivory skin and the delicate artistry of his face as he leisurely pulls his royal raiment back on, not bothering to clean himself up.

“Stay there boy, just as you are. Don’t move from that bed until I return. Do you understand?”

Merlin nods weakly and Uther turns and leaves him there, sprawled over his son’s bed. He takes a vicious satisfaction at having done this in Arthur’s own chamber. His only regret is that Arthur isn’t here to see this for himself but perhaps that can be rectified. The Prince has been growing far too arrogant recently. He’d gone from simply questioning the King’s decisions to outright challenges of late. Young, strong, startlingly handsome and disgustingly popular among Uther’s subjects, he needs to be taken down a peg or two. The King knows he could never best his son in any physical challenge; Arthur is a paragon of the martial and sporting arts. However, the boy still has weaknesses to exploit and the young man lying torn, broken and bleeding on the Prince’s bed is one of them.

Now it was time to summon witnesses to Uther’s triumph. After all, what good was a victory if it went uncelebrated?

The first to arrive at the open door to Arthur’s chambers is Gaius. Despite the man’s advanced age, he’s still as nimble of foot as he is quick of wit and what he observes when he reaches the doorway hits him like a fist to the solar plexus. Not having been informed to expect an emergency he does not have his medicine bag with him but he carefully closes the door behind him and rushes to Merlin’s side immediately.

“My boy! By the Gods, what’s happened to you?”

Blue eyes darkened to the hue of the sea after a storm look up at the physician awash with tears of misery and pain. Gaius can also see the insidious shadow of shame lurking in the shimmering depths of what have always been the windows to Merlin’s soul. Everything the warlock ever feels comes through his gaze even when he is able to govern the remainder of his features. At this moment, Gaius can see that soul is shattered and so thoroughly that he is immediately gripped by a fear that whatever has happened might have forever destroyed the boy he loves as his son.

“Uther.”

It is the only word Merlin says but it speaks volumes to the elderly physician. He can see the contusions covering Merlin’s throat, chest, arms, wrists, hips, thighs and even his ankles. There’s a constant trickle of blood leaking from the corner of the boy’s bruised and swollen lips and various contusions and small avulsions are starkly obvious against the whiteness of his skin. Then there is the rest of the blood. It’s smeared all over Merlin’s thighs, and the sumptuous fabric of the bedspread he’s lying on is heavily stained with the drying crimson fluid.

Without even turning him over he can already see evidence of damage to the boy’s genitals. The flesh is abraded in several places and while he’s not familiar with Merlin’s penis in particular he knows that for a man with such pale skin, the colour of his manhood isn’t right. The warlock’s member is flaccid but appears puffy, swollen in a way it shouldn’t be. However, it clearly isn’t the source of the blood smeared everywhere and that’s his main concern at the moment.

“I’m sorry my boy, but I need you to turn over. I need to see how badly he injured you.”

Merlin shakes his head in negation but speaks not a word.

“It’s not your fault Merlin, none of this. There’s no shame in letting me see. It’s imperative for me to be sure he hasn’t ruptured anything vital or you could bleed to death. Please, my boy, turn over for me.”

Looking hopeless, Merlin whispers hoarsely, “I can’t. I can’t move. He told me not to move from this spot and I can’t.”

“Merlin, oh Merlin, please for the love of all that’s sacred…please tell me he wasn’t the first. Please tell me someone else has had you before Uther!”

It is the guardian and not the physician who sees the blighted innocence in Merlin’s eyes before he closes them and turns his face away, a fresh torrent of tears cascading over his cheeks.

“No one.”

“Not Arthur?”

Silent tears become tearing sobs.

“No. He didn’t want me. H-he…he never wanted me. The-the King said he had almost two years, if he had wanted me, he would have had me by now. Said Arthur was never interested…but he was.”

“No one in Ealdor? Will maybe?”

 

“No one Gaius, just the King, just now.”

The old man goes ashen and seems to age a decade in seconds.

“Dear gods,” he whispers hoarsely. “This can’t…no, it just…it can’t…”

“Gaius,” Merlin’s voice is a roughened husk. “Gaius, he knows about my father, s-s-somehow, somehow he knew when he…Gaius, he felt inside me and he knew. How could he know? How?”

Shoulders slumping, the physician shakily seeks a chair and drags it next to the bed.

“Merlin there are things I haven’t told you. Things I meant to tell you but there’s never been a right time, there’s never been enough time.” He met Merlin’s pained gaze and dropped his own faded blue eyes. “You know I promised your mother I wouldn’t reveal who your father was to you. I couldn’t tell you these things without breaking that promise.”

“My father died over a month ago.” The warlock’s tone is flat but his voice still trembles as badly as the rest of his body continues to do so.

“My boy, there’s been so little time since then. You’ve been out with Arthur looking for Morgana and when you’ve been here you’ve been busy chasing after Arthur. We’ve hardly had a moment’s privacy since that terrible day. What I needed…what I need to tell you isn’t…wasn’t something that could be revealed if there was the slightest chance of ears about, I couldn’t risk Uther finding out.”

The tears continue to track down Merlin’s face unabated. It’s clear he’s in every kind of agony. His hands, even fisted as they are in the bloodied bedspread beneath him, shake; his splayed legs tremble and shivers wrack his entire body. His swollen, bleeding lips quiver and work for words that won’t come. After several moments he finally manages.

“He knows now so you might as well tell me what he obviously already knows about me that I don’t.”

“Merlin, I’m so sorry!”

The usual iron-clad stoicism shatters and Gaius’s face crumples as he begins to wring his hands in distress.

“You know now, that you are the son of a Dragonlord but you don’t know everything that it means to be of that race. Your body is…different than other men. Obviously it’s not a difference that is apparent on the outside. Your organs are arranged differently inside you. You have more of them, an entire system that other men do not.”

He pauses for a moment, not knowing how Merlin might react to what is coming. Few men could receive such news with an easy heart and the poor child has just suffered the most horrific violation any person can suffer, short of death. Some survivors claim it is a fate worse than death and for Merlin that may prove especially true.

“Tell me Gaius, I have a right to know! I had a right to know my father before he died, I had a right to know that I’m some sort of inhuman freak before the King…before he…before…” He gasps, throat clearly swollen inside from the rasp in his voice. “Tell me!”

“Dragonlords only ever father sons. It’s physically impossible for them to create girl children but their sons are not like other males. Merlin, you are part of a race that is kin to the dragons. The connection is an ancient one and was created through the most powerful magic of the Old Religion. You are what might be called, a hybrid. You are more than merely human, more than just a man. The dragons and Dragonlords were created together and both creatures were intended to be supremely powerful and thus there were very few created in the beginning. The Old Religion knew that without a check on their power, the dragons would be unstoppable. They could destroy the world or alter it in ways that would be irreversible. Therefore it was, it is imperative that the Dragonlords must survive as a race at any cost, at every cost.”

The boy’s shamed, pained and angry eyes continue to bore mercilessly into Gaius’s haunted gaze.

“Because your race’s survival is so vital, each Dragonlord has the capability of assuring that the next generation can be born, no matter who his partner is.”

Merlin’s face crumples in confusion and Gaius finally comes to the decision to stop side-stepping the revelation.

“Merlin, as a Dragonlord you are both capable of fathering sons and conceiving them yourself.”

“What?!” The word is choked but audible.

“You have within you the organs required to conceive, carry and deliver another generation of sons.”

The young Dragonlord’s eyes appear ready to pop from their sockets, his swollen mouth hangs open and his reddened skin quickly begins to pale.

“Are you telling me that I can get pregnant?”

Gaius winces but nods and rests a tentative hand on Merlin’s shoulder. The warlock squirms away immediately.

“That’s exactly what I’m telling you.”

Head shaking in negation, Merlin’s voice begins to rise in both tone and volume.

“But I’m a man! I have a cock! I have balls! I do not have a bloody cunt!”

The physician nods his head, in agreement with the obvious truth of the negation more to reassure Merlin than to confirm what they both already know.

“No, not exactly but accessible through your rectum you do have the other equipment necessary to mother a child. This is how Uther knew what you were as soon as he put his hands in you.”

Impossibly wide blue eyes snap shut and the sable head digs back deeply into the soft mattress below him. Merlin groans and begins to pant heavily in shock.

“By the gods, Arthur was right all along!” The warlock moans in black humour.

“What do you mean?”

“I am a bloody girl!”

“Merrrrlin!” Gaius’s tone is a sharp reprimand. “You are no such thing. You are very much a man. You just happen to be more than an ordinary man. You’ve always known you were special, this is no different.”

“The fuck it isn’t!” The old man can’t even think to reproach the boy for his unusually profane language.

“Do I even have seed or have I just been spilling lifeless cream from my cock all these years?”

“I told you! Dragonlords can father sons as well. That should be obvious to you since you have a mother who I can attest carried you in her belly for nine stressful months.”

“So you’re telling me I’m both a man and a woman.”

If the circumstances were less terrifying and urgent, Gaius would normally begin to become impatient at this point but given what his poor boy has been through, the old man seems to find a well of forbearance within him that’s not normally present when dealing with his young ward.

“No, I’m telling you that you are a Dragonlord. There are people who are born with both a penis and a vagina and you are not one of them. They actually are far less rare than your kind. As far as I know, you are the last of your kind in fact.”

“Just like Kilgharrah.”

“I’m afraid so.” Gaius pauses and looks down at the grievously injured and hideously shocked young man before him and knows there is another blow he must deliver and he must do it soon before the King returns and vindictively takes another piece of Merlin’s spirit by delivering the catastrophic news himself.

“Merlin, I’m sorry my boy but there is something more and because of it, I fear for us all but for you more than anyone.”

“He’s going to kill me, I know.”

“No, I’m afraid he won’t be so kind this time. He killed all the other Dragonlords after he claimed them. You are the only one left. Believing as he does that Kilgharrah has died, he will not see you as a threat but as a rare prize. Were he to know the Great Dragon lives and flies free now, he would have even more reason to keep you alive.”

The Dragonlord nods from where he still lies unmoving on the bed.

“I won’t tell him. I’ll keep Kilgharrah safe.”

“I’m afraid that’s the problem, Merlin. I-I don’t, “ Gaius takes a deep breath and continues, ”I don’t know any way to put this so I’m afraid I must be brutal, my boy. Because Uther was the first man to claim your body, he now has a certain degree of control over you. If he orders you to do something, you must do it. You will be physically and magically unable to defy him. For as long as he lives, you will be under his control.”

Already ravaged in every way he thought possible, Merlin shakes his head violently in negation at the thought of Uther claiming yet another piece of him.

“No! No, that can’t be true! Not,him!”

“I’m afraid it is. This is how he managed to kill all the dragons save Kilgharrah. Did you never wonder how he’d done it, Merlin? Look at what happened when a single dragon got loose without a master. He brought a city as mighty as Camelot to its knees and he did it with ease. But Uther didn’t merely hunt the Dragonlords, he raped every single one he got his hands on. A few of them had never been claimed before and he used them to call the dragons here to Camelot and then he forced those Dragonlords he commanded to kill them. He made them do it themselves. And then he killed them. When all but one was left he tricked your father into thinking that he was remorseful for his ill-deeds. He told Balinor that he had come to his senses and realized what he had done was wrong. He used Balinor’s sympathy and Kilgharrah’s pride to lure them both. Balinor called for the Great Dragon and as you know, Kilgharrah had to obey. But he also wanted to see Uther grovel, to hear his apology, to witness his remorse.”

Shaking his head, long white hair swishing back and forth, Gaius lets out a deep, mournful sigh.

“Well you know what the outcome of that was. Thankfully your father had already been claimed and that fact was known to Uther so he did not have to suffer the same horror that you have at the King’s hands.
Tears continue to leak from the corners of cornflower blue eyes as Merlin listens to the story of the degradation and genocide of his people at the hands of the man that apparently now owns him.

“Merlin, there is something you must do and you must do it now before the King thinks to question you, for question you he will. He will ferret out every secret, every bit of knowledge he can think to ask you for because you cannot keep an answer from him once he demands it. You must call to Kilgharrah now and order him to leave Albion. To fly as far and fast as he can away from here until he is outside the reach of your voice, far enough away that he can no longer feel the connection between you. It is the only way to save his life for Uther will surely force you to kill him when he finds out he’s alive.”

“Gaius, I can’t even sit up.”

“Then you must do it lying down. I will go and fetch my bag, Merlin, your…injuries are grave, I need to see to them. While I am gone, you must call to Kilgharrah and send him away. I’ll be back soon to help ease your pain, my boy. I promise.”

The last living Dragonlord nods his head, then lies still as Gaius crosses the room to leave. He gathers his scattered consciousness together and focuses. Reaching deep within himself he finds the voice that he and Kilgharrah share. Summoning the final remnants of the energy in his broken body, he opens his mouth wide and calls to the last living dragon in all of Albion.

“Oh Dragon! Listen to my words and heed them for your life! Flee! You must flee Albion! Fly as far as your wings will carry you! Uther has captured me; he has claimed my power and you must put yourself beyond my control.”

Kilgharrah’s guttural native tongue scrapes harshly over a throat already abraded from hours of screaming but he knows it’s the only way to reach the dragon from afar. Having poured the last of himself into the calling, Merlin feels the mercy of unconsciousness finally sliding over him. He welcomes the cushioning arms of oblivion.

“You’ll not touch him physician, not yet.”

“But the boy urgently needs medical attention, my Lord.”

“He won’t die of a good rodgering, Gaius, and you know it.”

“And if you’ll pardon me my Lord he has clearly suffered more than a simple ‘rodgering’ as you put it.”

Merlin has never heard Gaius’s voice so defiant and angry when talking to Uther. He wants to speak up, to tell Gaius he isn’t worth incurring Uther’s wrath for but he can’t seem to find the energy to form the words. Somehow he knows they won’t help anyway. Gaius will argue that he is worth it and Uther will only become more angry that Merlin has dared to interrupt a conversation he is not part of, even if he is the subject of it.

“At least allow me to clean him up and keep him warm, sire.”

“You will leave him as he lays, Physician or I will have you restrained. You may have been the child’s guardian but I am taking that burden from you. From now on he will be mine to look after.”

An icy chill streaks down Merlin’s spine and his chest goes hollow at Uther’s words. His guardian’s outrage is apparent in his immediate protest.

“Sire! He was entrusted to me by his mother!”

“Gaius, for the sake of long friendship we have enjoyed I shall take no action against you for this insubordination but my word is law. Were the child’s own mother here, standing before me she could not stop me. The boy is now mine.”

The young warlock can only be grateful that his mother isn’t standing there for she wouldn’t have merely protested the King stealing her child, he’s certain she’d have also expressed her maternal rage at the twisted man’s assault on her boy. Hunith would likely have been pushed past the point of words and might have even physically attacked the King for his deeds. Her death would have swiftly followed. Thankfully, whilst still making his displeasure obvious, Gaius is more restrained. He understands the futility of starting a fight that will end in his death and in the process cause nothing but more suffering for Merlin.

“Yes, my Lord.” The words come grinding from between Gaius’s teeth in the harshest of tones.

Merlin keeps his eyes closed as he listens. His trembling returned the moment he heard Uther’s voice. He can’t bear to look upon him. Everything Uther did to him is vivid in his mind; all of Gaius’s words are throbbing in his ears. In the back of his head is a horror of the worst kind, he cannot examine it, not now, and yet, it keeps trying to creep forward.

What if the copious seed Uther spilled inside him is already taking root in his belly? What if that monster has planted a child within him? The thought makes him so ill he turns his head and loses the mercifully small contents of his stomach on the bed beside his head.

He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand and turns away from the pile of sick. He still can’t summon the will to move from the position Uther left him in even though every part of his body aches. Deep inside his core, where Uther speared him so mercilessly, and the torn up entrance to his internal passages pain him so severely he begins to wish for death. However, those are far from the only agonies he suffers. Everything hurts, from the top of his tender scalp where Uther tore at his hair down to his knees, still bent at the unnatural angle the King forced them to assume.

_______________________________________________________________________________

WHAT FOLLOWS HERE IS A RATHER GRAPHIC SCENE OF HUMILIATION AND NON-CONSENSUAL DIGITAL VIOLATION OF A RECENT RAPE VICTIM.

If you'd prefer not to read that, skip to the next line break.

______________________________________________________________________________

Within moments of regaining consciousness Merlin begins to hear voices other than those belonging to Uther and Gaius. He thinks he recognizes some. Is that Geoffrey of Monmouth? What on earth is the Court Archivist doing in Arthur’s chambers? Slowly it dawns on him that all of the voices he recognizes belong to members of the Royal Council. What on earth…?

Merlin slowly lifts his head to the bizarre sight of Uther’s full council gathered around the bed on which he lies. Most of them look sickly pale and ready to add to Merlin’s pile of vomit, while a few look interested in a clinical manner but there are several who are examining Merlin’s nude, bloodied body with lust clear in their eyes. The warlock takes note of those men, making sure he has each face burned clearly into his mind’s eye.

Whether sickened, interested or looking to further abuse the naked boy on the bed before them, every man there, save Gaius, is clearly wondering why they have been summoned to the Prince’s bedchamber to observe his violated manservant.

“Gentlemen you have been summoned here to bear witness, as will the Prince when he returns. The boy you see before you has been hiding among us for years posing as a simple servant. However, he is in fact, a Dragonlord.”

Gasps loud and soft are heard from almost every man. Once the audible inhalations cease, there are no further sounds from the council. Merlin can’t help but watch their reactions. Most eyes are widened in shock but there are a few who glare at the boy with suspicion. After all, there are parts of Camelot that are still undergoing construction to repair the damage from Kilgharrah’s recent rampage.

“I have claimed him this very morning. He is now mine to control.” With these words, Uther unlaces his breeches and proudly displays the dried evidence of Merlin’s possession still clinging to his wide, semi-flaccid cock.

A few of the councilors sigh in relief though most are silent. Almost all of them quickly avert their eyes from the King’s outrageous exhibition. Each man who continues to side-eye Merlin with lewdness gleaming in his gaze seems to sport the same knowing smirk though there is one noble who stares outright at the Dragonlord as if he’s about to mount the bed and follow Uther’s example right here and now. Merlin glares at the bastard from where he’s pinned to the bed by his own power, the power that he no longer commands

The King tucks his vile manhood away and continues after a suitable pause.

“You will now each examine the boy to confirm what he is. Geoffrey, you will record each councilor’s findings. Gaius, why don’t you be first?” Turning to Merlin, Uther barks an order, “Turn over boy, keep your legs wide and hold your cheeks open so my councilors don’t have to work to get to that whore’s hole of yours.”

Uther smiled grimly before adding, “You will allow this, boy. I don’t care if they hurt you, you won’t obstruct them in any manner.”

One of the sickened looking councilors speaks up even as Merlin helplessly obeys Uther’s command. The warlock stares over his shoulder. It is Lord Fenwick, who holds the lands that border the sector of the kingdom just across from Merlin’s home village of Ealdor.

“Sire, certainly your word is good enough for all of us. Surely no one would ever question your judgment. I see no need for all of us to confirm what you have already declared as truth.”

Several others nod along hopefully but the King gives Lord Fenwick a steely eyed glare.

“For the sake of both the law and posterity, I insist that there be no doubt in anyone’s mind. You may examine him after Gaius.”

Choosing Gaius to go first isn’t meant to be a mercy to either the physician or Merlin but it turns out to be one, none the less. He produces a small glass jar, exactly like the one Arthur keeps his slick in and sets it on the bed next to Merlin’s hip. The warlock stares helplessly at his mentor, a pained plea in his eye. For the love of the gods, make this stop! Gaius could do it, he could make it stop, he could make Merlin stop, stop his heart, stop his breath and put an end to all of this. However, he sees the anguish in his former guardian’s eyes and knows the old man could never harm him, even if Merlin asked it of him, therefore, he doesn’t ask.

“I’m so sorry, my boy but I at least would have had to do this anyway. I need to know how badly he damaged you. Try to relax, there is a numbing agent in the ointment and I shall be as gentle as I possibly can be but…it’s still going to hurt.”

Merlin bites his lip but can’t help the whimper that escapes when Gaius slips his well-greased fingers inside him. He stares at the curtains above the headboard, tries to block out what’s happening by thinking about the last time he had to wash those curtains by hand because Arthur just wouldn’t leave the room. The damned things are heavy as hell and he usually cleaned them with magic but he couldn’t that day. However, thoughts about the curtains inevitably lead to thoughts about Arthur. Seeing the beloved prat’s face in his mind’s eye just makes his heart hurt and his awareness slips back to what’s happening to his body.

The physician keeps his examination clinical though his hands are shaking with fear, distress and especially rage at what’s been done to the boy his heart calls “Son”. He can feel the flesh inside is swollen and torn in several places. Some of the fissures feel as deep as a woman torn from childbirth and those are still bleeding. Gaius doesn’t want to think about what Uther did to his boy to cause this much damage. He withdraws his fingers, his fears for Merlin’s life only increasing by the minute.

“Well, Physician? Is he a Dragonlord or not?”

He can hear the fear and anxious urgency in Gaius’s voice when he answers but instead of frightening Merlin, the physician’s words make him shake in impotent rage. Uther hasn’t just harmed Merlin with his barbarity; he’s also hurt the only father Merlin’s ever truly known. To force Gaius to witness this, to make him examine the obscene injuries inflicted on his own ward is just an act of cruelty toward a man who has been nothing but a loyal friend to the King.

“He is, Sire. He’s also a badly injured one who needs treatment if he isn’t to die from either infection or blood loss.”

Uther sneers and waves a hand dismissively. “Your sentimental attachment to the boy no doubt has exaggerated your concerns. He will survive until the witnessing is over.”

The King turns to the Archivist. “Record the Court Physician’s findings as to the boy’s race.” He then turns to Lord Fenwick and states, “I believe it’s your turn next, is it not?”

Merlin looks back over his shoulder and stares down the noble who’d been compassionate enough to speak out against Uther’s obscene power play. He gingerly approaches the bed and greases up a single finger as he whispers an apology to Merlin. The Dragonlord merely nods and keeps his hands in place as ordered by the King and suffers the humiliation Uther has demanded the council visit upon him. He’ll remember that at least this man protested on his behalf.

Most of the councilors follow Lord Fenwick’s example and make their “examinations” as quick and gentle as they can. Merlin looks each of them in the eye, his own eyes brimming with tears of fury and pain. He refuses to look away as each one steps up as ordered by the King, he might be helpless to stop this but he won’t be cowed any further.

However, he glares in open hatred at the men who brazenly leer at his exposed and defenseless body. Merlin memorizes every one of their features as they clearly enjoy their explorations of his flesh. If he ever finds an opportunity, he will make these men pay for indulging their lust and reveling in his shame. One man in particular, he’d have immolated on the spot had Uther not had the foresight to forbid him from obstructing the examinations.

The bastard has the audacity to whisper in his ear, ”Oh, that’s sooo sweet! That’s one tight fucking cunt you’ve got there boy. Even after old Uther reamed you out with that big truncheon of his, you’re still tight as a twelve-year old! What I wouldn’t give to get my cock in there, you pretty thing. Too bad the greedy prick doesn’t like to share.”

Merlin’s mouth is still leaking blood and he gathers a mouthful while the son-of-a-bitch enjoys himself at the warlock’s expense. He spits the mouthful of blood and saliva directly in the sick noble’s face. Uther may have forbidden harming these men but he didn’t forbid him any other retaliatory action against them. Before the man can react though, Uther speaks up, making his displeasure in the man’s actions clear.

“Enough, Lord Reaver! Give your conclusion to the Archivist.” It seems the pig is right. Uther wants to humiliate Merlin but he clearly has no intention of sharing his prize beyond this little exercise in cruelty. Reaver turns away and bows to the king but when he turns back and wipes his bloodied face and fingers clean on the bed-sheets, his eyes are hot with anger. Merlin lifts his chin and returns the stare; his own gaze burns with loathing.

And so it goes on until each member of the council “proves” Merlin a Dragonlord. He continues to stare defiantly at every man, no matter how hesitant or eager his approach. He hears several of the men retching into the water pail beyond Arthur’s bathing screen after their required turns and somehow the sounds ease his humiliation ever so slightly. Very few of these men seemed anything other than revolted by the King’s orders. They aren’t all monsters.

Only a few others besides Lord Reaver make it obvious that, to them, their “task” is a sexual pleasure. Merlin commits each of these men to memory, even the one Lord who is gentle about it but still clearly enjoys fingering the young warlock’s body. As far as Merlin is concerned, they are all walking dead men. There will come a time when he’ll revisit this pain and humiliation on each and every one of the perverted bastards, tenfold.

Paying little attention to Uther’s grandstanding at this point, Merlin is focused on not allowing these men to see how broken he truly feels. Finally, the last council member hastily thrusts his finger in then immediately pulls it out of the boy’s hellishly abused anus and confirms as they all have that, “Yes, he’s a Dragonlord.”

Another uncomfortable side effect of these revolting “examinations” is that Merlin is made thoroughly aware of his singular internal anatomy for the first time in his life. He is gripped by the despairing realization that he is seventeen years old and yet knows nothing of the secrets of his own body. It has taken these vile cretins to reveal these mysteries to him.

“As you can all now attest, the boy is a Dragonlord and I have full control of him. I’m going to keep this one as an example to the people, that no one can hide anything from their King for long. Nor can even the most powerful in the land do anything other than yield to me.”

His beatific smile is stomach churning in its smugness.

“I think it will reassure the people to know that their King has their safety under complete control.”

Now that the last councilor has finished, Gaius once again attempts to approach Merlin with his medicine bag but Uther stops him.

“There is one more witness we are waiting for, Gaius.”

A single white eyebrow rises almost to his hairline as the old man questions, “My lord?”

Uther’s smirk is pure evil.

“I sent riders out to bring Arthur back. He should be here soon. After all, he is a full member of the council and must also witness the breaking and taming of the Dragonlord.”

Papery skin paling, Gaius dares to whisper, “Uther, that’s needlessly cruel.”

“Ah but for who, Gaius, would you care to tell me that? For which of them is it so cruel?”

The physician presses his lips together and remains silent. Merlin drops his face to the counterpane and tries to dam back the tears. How will Arthur react to this? Will he be as angry with Merlin as Uther? Will he be cruel, indifferent or simply repulsed by what Merlin is? All he knows in that moment is that he’d rather die than face Arthur now. Even if Arthur stands firm as his friend, can Merlin survive the humiliation of him knowing that Uther has reduced him to this? He clenches his jaw but the tears escape anyway. What will happen to them now? Kilgharrah promised their destinies were inescapably entwined. Can that hold even through something like this?

Gaius continues to plead with Uther to let him treat Merlin now, before he loses too much blood. Callously, the King turns and dismisses both him and the council. As the door snaps shut behind the last of them, Uther returns to the bed loosening his breeches as he approaches. Merlin can do nothing but lie there wishing he could use the power he acquired from Nimueh and strike Uther dead. However, all he can do is helplessly endure whatever indignities the King chooses to further inflict on him and fervently pray for the day that sees the bastard meet his maker.

Arthur storms into the council chamber to find it empty save for his father. Uther is lounging on his throne in a manner Arthur has never seen before. His posture is relaxed, his legs spread wide and he is…smirking. Not only is he smirking but he is smirking like the prick that runs the whorehouse in the lower town smirks at him every time he rides by. There is some kind of cross between a lewd leering and a smug triumph radiating from every inch of the King.

“Ah, Arthur! I’m so glad my messenger was so quick to find you. I feared you might not return before nightfall and this really shouldn’t wait.”

“Father what was so important that you called me back the very day you sent me out? I was told this issue required the attention of the entire council and yet…” He gestures around him at the empty chairs lining the long table.

Uther continues to smile that unsettling grin. If it wasn’t his own father, Arthur would call the expression “lascivious”. It is definitely gloating. The King’s behavior is so bizarre that the Prince begins to be more concerned with his father’s mental health than with whatever crisis he’s been called home to deal with.

Arthur had ridden his favorite horse far too hard in order to return to Camelot as swiftly as possible, certain that only something truly catastrophic would have caused Uther to summon him home the same day he left it to look for Morgana. To find the council chamber empty and his father looking like, well, looking like someone who just left that very same whorehouse with the smirking owner is at the very least unsettling and at the worst possible, seriously alarming.

Finally Uther rises leisurely from his “working” throne and strolls toward his only son, contentment written all over him. Arthur can’t help the creepy feeling coming over him as he observes the King. Nothing makes his father this happy. Nothing Arthur has ever seen has made his father this happy except the burning of powerful sorcerers. Certainly nothing Arthur has ever done in his life has ever made his father this pleased. Considering that the only things that make Uther happy are the screams and scorching flesh of magic users, Arthur is feeling more and more uneasy by the moment.

There had been no pyre being set up in the courtyard. The chopping block was not on display. What could cause Uther to recall Arthur so urgently and yet look as though he’d just experienced the greatest pleasure in the entirety of his life?

“Come with me Arthur. I have something you need to see. It’s been witnessed by the remainder of the council which is why you see this chamber empty. Only you have yet to bear witness to my triumph.”

As he speaks, Uther takes the Prince by the elbow and begins leading him from the room turning right toward the part of the castle that houses most of the nobles’ living quarters.

“Your triumph, Father?”

Arthur ambles alongside his father quite willingly. Apparently it wasn’t a crisis that called him home after all but a victory.

“Oh, yes! A rare triumph indeed. I found a Dragonlord this morning, Arthur, and you’ll never guess where.”

Arthur allows his confusion to show.

“I thought the one that died a few weeks ago was the last one?”

Uther’s eerie grin widened.

“It seems not.”

“There was another one in hiding?”

“He wasn’t in hiding, he was right here under our noses in Camelot.”

Blue eyes widen to their fullest extent as Arthur sputters wordlessly for a moment.

“Is he insane? What on earth would bring a Dragonlord to Camelot? The last one was hiding in a cave in Cenred’s Kingdom for the last twenty years.”

“No actually it was a little closer to sixteen,maybe seventeen years.”

“Whatever, the point stands, Father. What is he doing here?”

They are approaching the hall leading to his chambers but in his curiosity, Arthur is paying little heed to where his father is leading him.

“The point is that apparently seventeen years ago a son was born to this Balinor. A son who never knew his father and never knew he was of another race of men. He only found out about his father when the man perished.”

Uther stopped in front of Arthur’s chamber door.

“Where did you find him, Father?”

Uther chuckles and the sound is so wrong it sends an icy chill down Arthur’s spine as his father opens the door to the Prince’s room.

“I found him folding your laundry this morning.”

As the words leave his father’s mouth, Arthur feels as though he’s just been kicked in the chest by a horse. He can’t breathe. Merlin, it’s Merlin. He has to mean Merlin. But it can’t be, it can’t be his Merlin! Not him, anyone but him!

He pushes past his father, eyes scanning the room until they land on the bed. Bile rises in his throat immediately and he fights to force it back down. That bloody wreck sprawled out on his bed can not be his Merlin. He prays to gods he does not believe in that what he’s seeing is not real.

There’s blood everywhere and in every state of wet, dark and fresh to faded, dried and crusted as well as every hue in between. It’s all over the bedspread and it’s streaked and smeared all over the pale, naked corpse lying on top of the mattress. Arthur’s heart stops in his chest and the colour drains from his golden skin. Dead. His Merlin is dead. His sweet, gentle, innocent beloved friend is dead. He’d joked and laughed with the clever, lovely boy only hours before as Merlin dressed him in the weak light of a newly risen sun and now he’s lying lifeless in Arthur’s bed as that very same sun sinks slowly toward the horizon.

He wants to howl his anguish to the sky but he can’t find the breath to even whisper Merlin’s name. There is a weight crushing him, bearing down on his shoulders, forcing him to his knees and squeezing the air from his lungs. Without his consent, his body is fighting for air he doesn’t want. Every feeling he’s ever had for the ebon-haired, sunny-natured country boy is crashing over him at once. Emotions he has refused to acknowledge batter his heart and squeeze his soul. He loves Merlin more than anything in this world and now he’ll never get to tell him.

Uther watches his son with an obscene degree of satisfaction. He has reasserted his dominance over the boy. Now Arthur knows once again who rules this land, who rules these people, who rules over even Arthur himself. He had suspected his son was deeply and inappropriately attached to his beautiful manservant and now with Arthur prostrate on his knees, his suspicions are confirmed. Why else would Arthur have left the boy alone this long when he was obviously attracted to the lad? Only a man in love would treat the object of his attentions with such delicate restraint.

The King steps away into the hall, unnoticed by his grieving son and summons several of the palace guards. Right now Arthur is in shock but soon he knows that shock will turn to rage. Arthur has threatened his life before and he has no doubts that once realization soaks through grief, Arthur will turn on him as the architect of the young Dragonlord’s destruction.

He returns to the chamber in time to see Arthur stagger back to his feet and stumble toward the bed. "Merlin!" The barely audible whisperdoesn’t escape his notice and he smiles in grim satisfaction. Now Arthur knows what it’s been like for him ever since he lost his Ygraine. There wasn’t much of his heart left when his wife died but what little is still there belongs to his son. However, he realizes that he has sheltered Arthur far too much, allowed him too much freedom. For much of the past year or so, Arthur has been different, less diffident, less eager to please. He no longer acts as an extension of Uther but rather like a ruler in his own right. Uther may love his child but he fought long and hard to win his kingdom and no one, not even his only son and heir is going to take that from him. It’s a harsh lesson for the Prince but the King feels it’s a necessary one. Sometimes love must be tough to be true.

Arthur makes it to the bed and just stares down at the wreck of his love. He’s distantly aware that the air is easily moving back and forth in his lungs again but he still doesn’t care. Long, sturdy fingers reach out to trace a sharp cheekbone arching beneath ashen skin. Merlin is still warm. If he’d ridden faster, spent less time arguing with his father, could he have made it in time to say goodbye? Would there have been time to tell Merlin he was loved? He lets his fingers wander lower and gently traces the full, soft lips he’s always yearned for but has never dared to kiss.

Once again his heart stutters in his chest as he feels the faintest puff of warm air escape those colourless lips. He ducks low over Merlin’s chest and presses his ear to the bruised torso. He has to listen for a couple of seconds but there it is! There’s still a heartbeat! Merlin isn’t dead, not yet. He whirls away from the bed, intent on sending for Gaius when his eyes fall on the grimly smiling Uther and the guards standing behind him.

Realization slams into him. His own father did this! Uther had told him he had “triumphed” over the Dragonlord. He will deal with the shock of knowledge that his Merlin is a Dragonlord another time. Right now it is time to deal with the monster wearing his father’s skin.

 

“You animal! How could you do such a thing, Father? How? Look at him!”

He throws an angry hand in Merlin’s direction. Uther stares back, his grim smile narrowed slightly but still present on his scarred face.

“I tamed him. He’s a creature of magic, left alone he was a danger to the entire Kingdom.”

“He wasn’t a danger to the lowliest crawling worm in this kingdom! He can’t even stand to watch me kill a rabbit for dinner!”

Arthur spits the words at his father with all the contempt in his body.

“He’s a Dragonlord. He can command dragons.”

“There are no dragons! You saw to that yourself! He commanded nothing but the dust in my fucking wardrobe and the rust on my chainmail!”

Uther shakes his head chidingly. His voice mild but the unbearable smugness is detectable to Arthur’s experienced ears. He’s spent his whole life listening for the faint nuances in the practiced lack of emotion in his father’s manner of speech.

“We can’t know that for certain. There may still be dragons hiding beyond the five kingdoms, across the sea.”

Face twisted with rage, Arthur is beyond any attempt to control his own roiling emotions.

“And now you prove yourself a liar as well, you gutless hypocrite! You told me you personally saw to it that there were no more of the creatures left in the entire world. But then again, you told me this when you knowingly had one chained up below the castle for as long as I’ve been alive. Has a single truth ever left your foul mouth, you monstrous prick?”

Arthur feels himself shaking with rage and the overwhelming urge to throttle his father till the man ceases to jerk beneath his hands. Only the fact that he himself is unarmed while his father is surrounded by a cadre of the Royal Guard stays his trembling hands.

“Tell me, Father, how is that you ‘discovered’ that my manservant is a Dragonlord? Somehow I doubt he told you this himself in spontaneous confidence.”

Uther endeavors to smooth his face into a mask of ennui but the satisfaction still oozing from every inch of his skin ruins the attempt.

“Don’t make yourself more of a fool than you already are, Arthur. The boy isn’t fully human no matter what he looks like on the outside. Had you been man enough to use him for what he was intended for, you’d have discovered his nature long ago.”

“You fucking raped him, you vile, sickening beast!” Arthur’s voice is pure venom, each syllable dripping poison from his sharp teeth.

The King shrugs negligently.

“I gave the boy a choice. He chose the option to allow me to use him without resisting.”

Disbelief is painted raw and stark across Arthur’s face. If this is what happened to Merlin by not resisting, what does Uther do to those who doresist his advances? He feels the muscles in his face contorting with the disgust he feels overwhelming him ever more powerfully with each noxious word the King speaks.

“And just what was his other choice, Father?”

“Oh, I simply informed him that should he choose not to cooperate, I’d slice him open from nave to chaps and then I’d still fuck his tight little arse as he slowly bled to death. He was quite cooperative after that.”

Arthur lunges for his father’s throat but his fingertips barely graze the grizzled old man’s wrinkling skin before he is hauled off the King by no fewer than five guards. It takes the strength of all of them combined to hold him back.

“What about the rest of it, Father. Wasn’t simply violating him with your disgusting flesh enough for you? You had to torture him as well? Leave him to bleed to death? What in the name of all that’s holy did you do to him?”

All pretenses of passivity are lost as Uther’s aging body tenses all over and his face twists into the rictus of a raging frustrated vanity so insane it chills some of the boiling fury in Arthur’s gut.

“That dirty little peasant had the gall to refuse me, me! I’m the King, he should have been down on his fucking knees worshiping every inch of the fucking ground I walk on for offering him such an honour!”

Spittle sprays from the King’s mouth as he finally screeches the truth aloud. The pretty young boy didn’t want his attentions, so Uther had made him pay for his rejection. Arthur explodes.

“I told you he’s an innocent, you vile lecher! How could you expect a boy that young to want to fuck a disgusting, ancient reprobate old enough to be his grandfather?”

Eyes bulging, veins popping and throbbing on his scarred forehead and pulsing through the skin over his tightly clenched jaw, Uther screams,

“Because I’m the fucking King!”

The Prince sneers openly and in a voice dripping with disgust and contempt he scorns,

“You look more like a pathetic senile wretch who’s been denied his favorite dessert. There’s not a thing about you that’s Kingly, you revolting old man. Anybody who’s been fucking you and telling you otherwise has been doing it from fear or ambition alone. Those are the only two things that would make anyone share their flesh with you, you disgusting pervert. Merlin seeks neither power nor position and he’s no coward. Of course he refused you. If you had a shred of humanity left in you, you’d have left him alone. He could never want someone like you, no matter what rank you hold.”

To Arthur’s surprise, his words seem to calm his father down. Uther visibly relaxes and that gleefully evil grin returns to spread his thin lips wide over yellowing teeth.

“Well you’re right about that. Seems the boy was saving himself for someone else. Apparently he’s been pining for someone who has never shown him the slightest bit of interest, Arthur.”

Arthur feels his stomach knot. He hadn’t known Merlin was sweet on anyone. There’d always been a tiny seed of hope in the back of his mind that someday, Merlin might come to feel something for him. Something like he’s always felt for Merlin; like he’d felt for his friend and servant almost since the day they met.

He’d found the best way to combat his unrequited feelings was to keep himself (and consequently Merlin) so busy that he fell exhausted into bed each night without the energy needed to fuel his angst. It had been bearable as long as Merlin hadn’t seemed interested in anyone but now…now his father is telling him there had been someone and that Uther has ruined Merlin for his intended.

Arthur looks on his father with a new layer of horror overlaying the overwhelming rage and contempt he’d already been feeling. How can he be related to this beast wearing the skin of a man?

“He had a sweetheart? He had a sweetheart and you knew this? You knew this and you brutalized him for rejecting you, knowing he was in love with another? You callously ruined his entire future with his intended just so you could get your dick wet? How can you stand there and call yourself a man? How can you even consider yourself anything but an abomination?”

“I don’t call myself a man, I call myself a King. I am above the race of man. Men exist to serve me and that’s all they’re in this world to do.”

As ever, Uther addresses his own concerns first and everyone else’s last.

“As it was, I think you misheard me. I said the boy was pining for someone. Someone who didn’t appear to want him back. Someone he’s known very well indeed, almost since his arrival in Camelot. Someone he spends a great, great deal of time with.”

Gwen, it has to be Gwen, Arthur thinks. Instantly he feels a mix of guilt and a shameful satisfaction that he’d apparently been the one standing between the pretty girl and his Merlin. When Merlin had prodded him about his feelings for the maidservant, Arthur had spilled his guts but it hadn’t been Gwen he’d been talking about that time in the woods. Yes, he was on his way to rescue her but only because both Merlin and Morgana had looked at him with wide pleading eyes: Morgana who never pleaded for anything and Merlin, whom he found he couldn’t actually refuse when he was finally the direct focus of that bright blue gaze.

Merlin had poked and prodded and pestered him until he broke and told him that the girl was all he could think about and that he didn’t know what he’d do if any harm ever came to her. He had no real feelings beyond a mild fondness for Gwen, he’d been telling Merlin how he felt about him when he’d said that to admit his feelings hurt, knowing that nothing could ever happen between them. Merlin had tried and failed to comfort him by telling him that he could change these things when he was King,failed because there was no way Arthur could make Merlin love him when he clearly didn’t.

The rest of the walk to the tower where Gwen was being held had passed in silence and looking back he realizes that it had to have been because Merlin’s own hopes had been dashed by Arthur’s duplicitous speech. It’s clear to him now that his servant had been feeling him out on the subject, probably hoping that Arthur would deny any interest and leave the field open for his own pursuit of the pretty, dark-skinned girl. However, his guilt and shame were nothing when compared to the crime that Uther had perpetrated against the innocent hopes of his young manservant.

In time, Arthur’s disinterest would have become clear and perhaps Merlin might have been able to win Gwen’s love after all. But now, now Merlin has been ruined for life. Not only had his father stolen Merlin’s innocence and left him for dead in Arthur’s bed, but even if the boy manages to survive, how can he ever recover from what’s been done to him this day?

“You miserable son-of-a-whore. When you die, I promise you that no one will remember your name with anything but hatred and scorn if I allow them to remember you at all. I’ll be sure your corpse is hung in chains from the communal gibbet until it rots to dust and is lost to the wind.”

Uther steps forward and backhands Arthur across the face with all his strength then follows through with another harsh, open-handed strike to the cheek exposed by the first blow.

“How dare you? You ungrateful whelp! I am your father and your King! You’d take the part of a useless, incompetent, bastard-peasant over me? You wouldn’t even exist if it weren’t for me!”

“No, but my mother would, wouldn’t she?”

The last thing Arthur sees is his father’s face turn puce before a flurry of blows from steel-gauntleted fists causes a black veil to fall over his consciousness.

“Please, Sire, lay still.”

Arthur recognizes the voice on some level but it takes a few moments for him to place it. It’s a testament to how badly his father had him beaten that it takes even that long for him to know that it is Gaius imploring him not to move. Until quite recently, the old man’s voice was always the first one he’d heard upon returning from an unconscious state. These days it is usually Merlin who is there when he wakes.

“Merlin!” he shouts as he tries to jump straight up and falls back down, thwarted by the blanket tangling his legs and the throbbing agony that explodes inside his head. It’s now that he realizes he can’t see. He’s had enough shiners in his day to know that he hasn’t gone blind; both of his eyes are simply swollen shut.

“Where’s Merlin? Gaius, please, where is he? Is he still alive? He was barely breathing when I saw him. His heart was hardly pumping at all! Please, just…tell me!”

“Arthur, stay still! Merlin’s here, he’s still alive.”

The Prince lets out a small sigh of relief but his heart is still clenched with fear. Merlin is alive but for how long? So much blood, there was so much blood! It was everywhere, all over his bed and all of it was Merlin’s. He can still see the waxy ashen colour of his skin; it was the skin of a dead man. The only thing that gave Arthur hope was that he had still been warm, his heart and lungs still working, if only just.

“Here? Here, where? Where is he?”

A callused and wrinkled hand takes his own and tugs gently, guiding it to his right. His fingers encounter baby soft skin, bare and warm under the same blanket he himself is caught up in. He turns and rolls closer to Merlin and whispers his name. There is no response.

“Gaius, please tell me that you can heal him.”

He hears the physician sigh and in the sound he detects the old man’s fear and despair. Unable to help himself, he runs his fingers ever so gently over that skin and realizes that it’s Merlin’s arm. He searches out more of the silent, unmoving boy with his hands. He’s warmer than he was earlier and when Arthur searches for the pulse in one slender wrist he finds it stronger and steadier than it had been. He finds Merlin’s face and strokes the downy skin of his cheeks and nose, almost smiles at the feel of stubble along that narrow jaw and scattered over the stubborn chin. He’s never seen Merlin anything but clean shaven. He hadn’t even been sure his manservant could grow facial hair.

“I have done all I am allowed to do for him, Arthur. I don’t know if it will be enough. He’s a strong lad though, far stronger than you could ever imagine…he might pull through this. If it was anyone else, I’d have no hope at all. The King would not let me treat him until after you saw him. He was adamant that you see exactly what he’d done to him.”

“What did he do, Gaius. I know that he raped him, I know he did that but he did worse. There was so much blood, Gaius, what else did he do to Merlin?”

A pregnant silence meets his question and he gropes around until he finds the physician’s arm. He grips it tightly.

“Please, Gaius. Tell me what he did to my Merlin.”

Arthur hears the soft inhalation from Gaius when he calls the Dragonlord “my Merlin”. He doesn’t care at that moment; he doesn’t care if Gaius knows how much he loves Merlin. He is too desperate to be ashamed to admit it. The worst that could happen already has. His father knows, he’s seen it in the evil old bastard’s eyes. His father knows he loves Merlin, Arthur is certain of it. He’s also certain that it was his own slip at dinner just the night before that tipped off the old man. Last night…can all of this have really happened in a single day and night? He doesn’t know how long he’s been unconscious but the light penetrating his swollen eyelids is extremely dim. It’s candlelight, not sunlight, so it must only be hours since he came back to find Merlin’s bloody, ravaged body sprawled so obscenely across his own bed.

“Arthur, I really think that it’s best you don’t know the details. I don’t know that Merlin would want you to know anyway. Rape victims rarely want to share their perceived shame with anyone and your father has already made sure he’s shared it with the entire council. I fear he also intends to spread at least some of the details with the entire Kingdom.”

Gut tightening in rage again, Arthur tries to calm himself. He’s had years of training and practice schooling his emotions but he’s finding it difficult to keep all his feelings regarding Merlin under control.

“If he’s shared Merlin’s shame with people who care nothing for him then at least share his injuries with someone who loves him.”

Another pause, then, “I know you care for him Arthur, anyone can see that you do but this is…”

Ruthlessly Arthur cuts him off. He’s not about to be put off by Gaius’s infamous evasions. He will have the truth from him and he will get it by giving his own truth to the old man.

“No! I don’t just care for him Gaius, I love him. I have almost since the beginning. I know he doesn’t love me like I love him but I don’t care anymore. I need to know what’s been done to him, I need to know how to help him, I need to know that he’s going to live. Even if he hates me for being related to that sick, twisted bastard, even if he wants to leave and go away from here forever, I still want to know he is alive somewhere in this world. I have to have that, Gaius. I don’t want a world he isn’t part of. There’s no point to any of this if he isn’t alive.”

Again, a rough weathered hand covers his own, eases it off the sinewy old forearm. Arthur returns his fingers to Merlin’s arm, sliding down until he finds the long, elegantly boned hand and grips it gently.

“Oh, Arthur! You boys simply amaze me with your stupidity. Merlin can never hate you. He loves you far too much to ever blame you for Uther’s crimes; he loves you far more than he loves himself. I thought you knew that, everyone else does.”

Despite the dark urgency of Merlin’s condition, Arthur’s heart leaps with startled hope.

“He-he does? I mean, I know he values me as a friend but…he loves me? Truly loves me? As-as in…I mean,” Arthur squirms with some discomfort now, it’s so hard to get the words out to this man, the man who is more or less by default, Merlin’s father. Swallowing hard he forces the words out past the knot of fear and hope clogging his throat, “Does he feel for me the affection of a lover?”

The prince wishes he could see Gaius’s face to gauge his reaction to his fumbling words. Instead, he listens with intense attention and hears the faintest trace of a chuckle in the voice that answers him.

“Of course he does, why do you think he stays here? He’d be much safer anywhere else in the Five Kingdoms.”

 

“What do you mean? Because he’s a Dragonlord?”

Listening intently as only a frightened and hopeful lover can, Arthur hears the swish of the old man’s hair as he shakes his head in negation.

“No. Arthur, Merlin didn’t even know he was a Dragonlord until the day his father died. He didn’t even know who his father was until the day you both left to find Balinor. I had sworn to his mother that I would never tell Merlin of his parentage. She thought he’d be better off not knowing. I disagreed but she is his mother and I have no right to go against her wishes with regards to her son. However, I broke my promise the morning you left and told Merlin the man he was going to seek was in fact his father. So you see, he’s only known for little more than a month what his father was. I hadn’t even had a chance yet to explain to him what that meant for him. All he knew of being a Dragonlord was that he’d inherited the ability to speak to and if need be, control dragons. Sadly, there’s much more to it and now it has brought him to ruin.”

Knowing from experience just how badly a growing child, even a grown man longs to know all he can about an absent parent, Arthur frowns in heavy disapproval. He can recall quite clearly a conversation he’d had with Merlin, while they were traveling to visit Morgause in her ruined castle, regarding their mutual longing to know their missing parents. At least Arthur knew who his mother had been, that she had loved and been loved before she died. Merlin hadn’t even had that.

“It was cruel, to keep that from him, Gaius. A man has a right to know who and in Merlin’s case, what he comes from. You know he thought himself the product of a rape? His mother would never speak of his father and so he thought she must have been forced, that he must be a constant living reminder of her pain.”

He can easily picture the old man’s wince.

“I know but what else could I do? She made me swear never to tell him.”

Sighing, Arthur concedes that Gaius’s hands have indeed been tied. Still idly stroking Merlin’s fingers to reassure himself that his beloved is still beside him, he turns the conversation back to his original question.

“What did Uther do to him?”

He feels Gaius shift around on the bed, it seems as if he’s settling in to a more comfortable position. That means this is likely going to be a long conversation. Arthur tamps down his native impatience and schools himself to listen to what the old man has to say.

“Merlin hasn’t been able to tell me precisely what the King did to him in detail but this is what I can deduce from his injuries and what both Merlin and Uther have said in my presence. Merlin indicated that your father used his…well, essentially he used his hands on him first. This would be how the King discovered his Dragonlord nature.”

Confused, Arthur bursts in, interrupting the elderly man. “How? How could he know just from using his hands on him?”

Another one of Gaius’s deep and long-suffering sighs sounds out in the silence of the room.

“I didn’t want to have to do this, Arthur, but you aren’t going to just accept the major points without the minute details, are you?”

Arthur shakes his head violently. A little too violently as it turns out, pain exploding once again from behind his swollen eyes. He clutches at his head but continues his verbal pushing.

“You know me better than that, Gaius. You can’t plan without information and the details are the information. Stop holding back.”

Being unable to see the old man’s expressive face is a frustration in itself; Arthur has to rely on the hitches and hesitations in Gaius’s voice to tell him when he is attempting to skim over details as he explains just what Uther has done to damage Merlin’s rectum and sex organs. Bile again rises in his throat and his nausea worsens with every word the elderly man speaks but he steels himself to listen and he wills his stomach not to betray his deepening distress. He finds his fingers clutching Merlin’s in a crushing grip and gently eases them away. His belief in Uther’s madness only deepens with the description of each wound the King brutally inflicted on Merlin.

The only part he doesn’t find disturbing is the explanation of Merlin’s physical anomalies. The fact that a Dragonlord (his Merlin!) can conceive and carry a baby is fascinating and strangely alluring to the Prince. Far from thinking Merlin a freak of nature, he thinks him a wonder, a true walking miracle rich in all the ways that nature can offer life. Merlin can be a father, Merlin can be a mother, Merlin can be both, he can be whatever he wants, have whoever he wants without the worry of finding the means to continue his bloodline for another generation. Then Gaius reaches a point in his descriptions where the wonder of the Dragonlord’s nature can become a horror in the wrong hands. Hands like those of his father.

“Arthur, there’s more to how the gods formed the Dragonlords and their power and this is vital for you to know. Once…claimed by another man, that man can command the Dragonlord forever after. As Uther was Merlin’s first, he now controls him and his powers.”

For the second time in one day, it feels as though a particularly large destrier has kicked him in the chest with both of its rear hooves. Uther controls Merlin. His Merlin, a slave to Uther’s will; his cheeky, defiant and endearingly stubborn Merlin will be yoked like a helpless slave to Uther’s every whim? He can’t speak; he just clutches his stomach trying to settle the heaving inside.

While he remains silent, Gaius continues.

“There is more. Uther will find out as soon as he thinks to question him about it, and he will sooner or later because many of the Dragonlords…”

He pauses here, breathing deeply for several long seconds as if the words he speaks are causing him physical damage.

“Many of the Dragonlords also possessed magic. The more common kind, a warlock’s magic.”

Catching his breath, Arthur asks before Gaius can confess.

“And Merlin possesses a warlock’s magic as well?”

He’s surprised by how matter of fact his voice is, then again, if Merlin can be a Dragonlord, why not also a warlock? He hears the relief in Gaius’s tone when he answers.

“Yes, Sire, he does.”

“How much?”

He feels the man still on the bed. The question seems to have taken him by surprise.

 

“How much, sire?”

“How much power does Merlin possess?”

The silence stretches out for far too long. Gaius clearly doesn’t want to answer. Arthur growls low in his chest and gropes around till he finds the old man and clutches at him, his grip harsh and unyielding.

“Answer me!”

Gaius crumples under his sightless glare, his body wilting under Arthur’s hands. His voice is barely a whisper when he answers.

“He is the most powerful warlock who has ever lived.”

The Prince releases the physician and flops back on the bed feeling weak with shock.

“The druids call him Emrys. There have been prophecies of his coming since the birth of man. The poets sing of him and the true followers of the Old Religion revere him. He has a destiny that I fear your father has already polluted.”

Arthur snaps, “My father has polluted him, entirely. His merest touch soils and what he did…he needs to die, Gaius. If for nothing else, he deserves to die for what he did to Merlin. Any other man would swing from the gibbet for this crime but he holds himself above the laws he chooses and hides behind others when it suits his purpose. His vile hand has caused enough suffering for the people of Camelot! It needs to end!”

By the end of this speech, Arthur is shouting his rage. Spittle flies from uncaring lips as the venom he feels within spews forth with razor-sharp force and he is struggling to swing his legs over the side of the bed, ignoring his blindness and the excruciating pain tearing his skull to pieces. Now, it is Gaius’s turn to grip Arthur’s arm, another stills the feeble stirring of his legs.

“How? How will you do this? You can’t see, you can’t even stand and walk, let alone wield a sword. There are guards on your door, your weapons have all been taken and Uther has increased his personal guard.

Golden hair shakes as Arthur swings his head side to side. “I don’t care. I will, I will kill him!”

“Sire, now is not the time. You need rest, you need to heal and you’ll need to plan. This cannot be undertaken lightly.”

Somehow, he’s surprised that Gaius isn’t actually trying to dissuade him from murdering his father, simply counseling that he bide his time to do so. Sullenly, Arthur turns away, lies beside Merlin and curls himself around the warlock’s side. He blindly seeks the beloved face and strokes his fingertips across one fragile cheekbone.

“Why did Merlin let him do this? If he’s so powerful, why didn’t he stop Uther?”

He runs his hand through soft sable hair as he listens for Gaius to explain. He can’t understand why Merlin would allow Uther to violate and nearly kill him if he is half as powerful as Gaius claims.

“I think there were a variety of reasons, my Lord. One, I think that Uther must have surprised him, threw him so off-guard so quickly that he couldn’t concentrate. Also, you must understand Arthur, Merlin is powerful but he is also so very young. He hasn’t had the time or training to master his powers and he has yet to reach his full magical strength. He is only seventeen. The only studying he can do is in utter secrecy and he has little time for such studies considering he works for both you and I. We take up the vast majority of his time. “

Gaius’s next words tear into Arthur’s heart and inject it full of hellish-black guilt.

“What time he has had to study he has devoted to learning spells to protect you. You are his destiny, Arthur, the once and future King. Your coming has been foretold alongside his. Merlin knows this and it’s all he’s allowed himself to focus upon. All he has done, most of what he has learned has been to keep you safe, to keep you well, to protect you from the evils this world continuously attempts to bring down upon your head.”

The old man pauses again and the silence seems to stretch out forever. When he speaks, his voice is much softer, lower and slower than before. It scarcely rises above a whisper.

“Merlin doesn’t know any spells that could protect him from such an attack without his magic being discovered. Even had he the time to concentrate, his only choices were certain death or certain injury. Men have a very powerful drive to survive, Merlin especially. Had he used magic, he might not have been able to save himself from the pyre and even if he had managed to escape, he would have to leave Camelot…he’d have been forced to leave you and that is something he is utterly unwilling to do, Arthur. He’d rather die than be forced from your side.”

Arthur lays his cheek on Merlin’s shoulder and gently strokes his fingers down the long length of one bruised arm.

“So you’re telling me that Merlin would rather be raped and brutalized, made into Uther’s slave than leave me and save his own life?”

“He has already offered his life in exchange for yours more than once, my Lord. Of these times, once you were aware of his sacrifice but the second time, it was impossible for you to know. He has given up more than you can ever imagine to keep you and Camelot safe from harm.”

He’d once told Merlin that no man was worth his tears but Arthur can feel his own begin to stream from his swollen eyes. He’d been so wrong, so very, very wrong. Merlin was worth his tears. The reminder of that conversation squeezes even more moisture from his eyes when he realizes he’d delivered that lecture to Merlin on the very same day the warlock’s father had died, that Merlin’s tears hadn’t been for some strange man and a failed mission but for the father that he never knew, would now never know and it was all Arthur’s fault.

“Could he have saved him, Gaius?” The words are gasped out, his voice raspy and rough.

“Saved whom, Sire?”

“Merlin, could he have saved his father had I not been there? Could he have used his magic to heal him if not for me?”

“Arthur, don’t. Don’t do this. Do not blame yourself for Balinor’s death. Merlin has already tried to take on that burden and it is one neither of you deserve. Once the blade found its mark in his body, Balinor was likely past the skills of even the most powerful of healing magic. Merlin said he survived only seconds after the blow landed. And alas, Merlin has never excelled at the healing arts. So, no, I don’t think there was anything more he could have done had you not been there.”

“Except ensure the battle never happened in the first place. He could have done that, couldn’t he, Gaius?”

“Sire, he would never have met his father at all had it not been for Camelot’s need. Your presence influenced nothing in that regard. We needed a Dragonlord and Balinor was the only one left alive.”

“And now it’s Merlin who’s the only one left alive and I left him to my father’s hands.”

The sharp rap to the back of his head comes as a surprise even as it sets off a ringing in his ears and sends the pain in his skull throbbing up another notch.

“Stop that at once! You had no idea your father would do this. You couldn’t have prevented it even had you been here. Uther is the King. His word is law and it is absolute, even you cannot defy him. Look what happened to you when you tried.”

The prince turns blindly toward the physician.

“I should have taken him with me. When father questioned me about my not…using Merlin, I should have known he would do this.” He pauses then and when he continues he can’t help the anguish in his voice. “Dear gods, no, I couldn’t have. How could anyone do this? How could any man do this to any other man let alone such an innocent boy? He’s my father, Gaius! How could he do this?!”

Suddenly Arthur despises his own flesh. He recoils from Merlin, unworthy of laying his hands on him. The monster that did this, that monster’s blood runs through his veins. His skin crawls from the knowledge. He is tainted, made forever unclean by the sins of his father. Surely Uther wasn’t always like this? Could he not also grow into a monster some day? Could he not view other people as disposable slugs of flesh meant only to serve and amuse him? Men, women, dear gods, children existing only to pleasure him in any depraved way his perverted will decreed?
“No!” he shouts. He will hack off his own hands with an axe in his teeth before he allows that to happen.

“Sire! Sire, calm, please calm yourself!”

“I am not his son, tell me I am not his son, Gaius!” A thought flashes through his mind, the one and only image he has of his mother. “It was true what Morgause showed me, wasn’t it? I saw my mother and I am only of her body. He used magic to force my mother to quicken, didn’t he? Tell me that was real!”

The old man’s voice creaks and cracks as he breaks the vow he’d made to his King.

“It’s true. Your father had the sorceress Nimueh intervene. It was her magic that allowed your mother to conceive but Arthur, he is still your father.”

Shouting again, Arthur denies him, in an instant rejecting utterly a lifetime of indoctrination against the Old Religion.

“No! I was born of magic, not of man! I am none of him!”

The silence from his companion is shocked and the only sound that fills the room is the ragged panting of his own breath. A hoarse, broken whisper breaks into the air and it doesn’t come from Gaius.

“Arthur, you were born of magic.”

 

The rasping statement is followed by a horrifying sound that begins to fill the room. Both men listening recognize it, both men have heard it far too often and it freezes the blood in their veins simultaneously. A death rattle is rising from Merlin’s throat. The distinctive choking noise is unmistakable. The warlock has hours, maybe only minutes left to live.

“No!” The word slithers over withered old lips as a harsh, frozen denial even as it rises as a howl of unimagined anguish from a cracking young throat.

Arthur whirls in the bed to clutch at the young warlock and Gaius rises to rush to the boy’s side.

“Save him, Gaius, please! You have to save him, he can’t die, he can’t!”

“Arthur...Arthur, there is only one way I can save him now.”

“Magic.”

“Yes.”

“Do it. Do it now or I swear by every drop of blood in my veins, Gaius I will kill you myself!”

“For Merlin, I’ll gladly give my life, Sire. You needn’t threaten me.”

“For gods’ sake man, stop talking and do it.”

Gaius finally snaps in a way Arthur has never heard before and never will again.

“I will as soon as you shut your fool’s mouth and let me!”

Arthur falls silent and gropes for Merlin’s hand. He finds it and slides his fingers over the fragile wrist seeking for a pulse. It takes several long agonizing seconds before he feels one sluggish beat, then another agonizing wait until the next throbs weakly beneath his desperately light touch.

From Gaius he hears nothing and he struggles with his frantic impatience, dying to shout at the old man to hurry as he feels Merlin’s life fading under his fingers like smoke in sunlight. Long moments pass before he hears the old physician begin to mutter strange sounding words which can only be the language of the Old Religion. They flake from the old man’s vocal chords like rust from an ancient blade.

Nothing happens to Merlin but Gaius’s voice grows stronger, surer with each word that slips from him. The rust is scraped away and the blade sharpens. The rattle from the warlock’s chest continues to sound and his heart continues to beat only sullenly but sibilant sounds continue to slip from the once retired sorcerer’s mouth and Arthur holds his breath waiting for a change in the fading flesh beneath his hands.

Minutes pass like days as the Prince waits, struggling with his own instincts to do something! He knows there is nothing he can do and to interrupt Gaius now might just mean certain death for the man he so dearly loves. He bites down on his lower lip until he feels it run with blood but he maintains his silence in the face of the old man’s determined attempt to snatch Merlin back from the hands that seek to drag him beyond the veil.

Finally, the string of words cease to fall from the old man’s lips and they both hold their breath. A cough sounds in the silence, then another followed by an audibly deep breath inflating lungs that had nearly collapsed. A lively pulse throbs to life under Arthur’s fingers and he wordlessly cries out his relief. Warmth rushes in to skin that had begun to cool and Arthur’s tears begin to fall again, this time with inestimable joy and relief.

He hears a dull thump and the protesting creak of wood that signals Gaius’s collapse into the chair beside the bed and suddenly Arthur feels as wrung out as a harshly used wash rag and crumples to the bed to lie beside Merlin. He snakes a tired arm across the Dragonlord’s abdomen and falls into an exhausted sleep.

Merlin wakes to the feel of a heavy arm slung across his torso and immediately panics. He tries to tug away but the arm holds fast. He reaches down and grabs the well-muscled flesh and starts to push even as his eyes are still opening. Freezing on seeing a tangle of golden hair tucked in close to his chest, he tries to slow his frantic heartbeat and ease his breathing into something closer to normal. The cornered animal feeling fades as his brain fully registers that it’s Arthur holding him, not the King.
Wait, why is Arthur holding him? He looks closer and gasps in shock at the mess that is his Prince’s face. If he didn’t know every inch of the man’s body better than his own he might seriously doubt that the form curled against his own belonged to Arthur Pendragon. There isn’t a single patch of skin above the waist that’s not some shade of purple, blue, red or black. His beautiful, perfect features are swollen and distorted; his normally full lips are twice their usual size and blood crusts over multiple tears in the fragile pink skin and streaks in dried rivulets down his blond stubbled chin.

Merlin gets his breathing back under control but he can’t stop the trembling. He stares at Arthur trying desperately to focus on his battered face rather than the memories from the day before that are hammering at his consciousness. He can’t think of…he can’t…no…but Arthur? What’s he doing here? What happened to him while Merlin wasn’t there to protect him? He peers at the window and judges by the light streaming in that it’s only a few hours past dawn. Arthur only left yesterday…at least, he thinks it was yesterday. He’s not sure how long he’s been asleep. The last thing he remembers…

“No!” The word is just a fierce whisper as he ruthlessly tries to cut off the images crowding his mind. Uther had come back after the councilors left, he’d…

“No!” This time the fierce denial is louder and Arthur finally stirs against him.

“Merlin?”

“I’m here.”

Again, he concentrates on the Prince’s face and the puffed up eyes that barely slit open, the usual bright blue of his irises impossible to detect.

“Thank gods!” To his immense shock and distinct discomfort, Arthur gathers him closer, wrapping his other arm around him gently.

“I almost lost you. I can’t…I can’t lose you.”

Arthur’s words, his embrace, they are everything he’s ever wanted practically since the day they met but not now; he doesn’t want to be held or even touched by anyone, not even Arthur. He squirms weakly trying to break free.

“Please.” The word is cracked, dry and desperate. He tugs again at Arthur’s arm. “Please, no. Please let me go.”

Immediately Arthur loosens his arms and scoots back several inches but the hurt on his face is impossible to miss, even with his features distorted as they are. Arthur, stoic, manly Arthur with his iron stance on showing emotion is visibly wounded by Merlin’s rejection and it squeezes the pieces of the warlock’s shattered soul. He reaches out a fingertip and runs it gently over the back of Arthur’s hand, unable to deny him some form of reassurance. Could he ever deny this man anything, truly?

“I can’t. I’m sorry, I can’t. Not now…Not…I can’t!” His swollen throat still allows only the hoarsest of whispers to escape but the pathetic plea is there and it disgusts Merlin almost as much as he is sure it must disgust Arthur. As much as he must disgust Arthur now, now that…now that Uther…

Wrenching his thoughts out of that path again, he concentrates on his visibly injured friend.

“What happened to you? Why are you here? Where you attacked, how did you get back?”

Arthur’s face freezes over and Merlin recognizes it as the stiffness of rage.

“The King called me home. He called me home to gloat over what he did to you. He had his guards put me down when I tried to claw his foul, fucking throat out.”

He pauses and Merlin is again shocked to stillness as he sees a tear squeeze its way from beneath one puffy eyelid.

“I thought you were dead. You were just lying here, not moving, not breathing and there was so much blood.”

The prince looks down at the blanket covering them.

“There’s still so much blood, I thought you were dead and he was happy! That foul beast was grinning like a satyr!”

Merlin feels his heart contract.

“Arthur you didn’t! Look at you, this wasn’t over me. He doesn’t care that much.”

The blond snarls.

“The hell he doesn’t. He always wanted you, even when he didn’t know you were a Dragonlord.” He pauses then, takes a deep breath and shuts his already slitted eyes. “I’m so sorry Merlin, if I’d thought, If I’d ever thought he would just…take you like that I’d never have let you out of my sight. This is all my fault.”

It’s a double punch to the gut to hear Arthur call him a Dragonlord as well as bringing back up what Uther had done to him. Merlin closes his eyes and fights the wave of nausea swelling in his throat. His flesh is crawling again. He can still feel all the dried, crusted fluids on his skin. Every wound starts to throb mercilessly. Arthur is still talking but he can’t hear him over the roaring in his ears, all he can hear are the triumphant bellows, the foul grunts of pleasure, the taunts and the threats that poured from his abuser’s lips over and over again.

“Merlin? Merlin? Please come back to me, Merlin?”

He gradually becomes aware of the gentle shake of Arthur’s hand on his arm. He pulls away but opens his eyes again.

“Please forgive me?”

The warlock’s mouth is dry as dust but he tries to speak anyway.

“For what?”

The look on the prince’s face is intensely remorseful, it’s not an expression he’s ever seen directed his way.

“For not protecting you.”

Merlin’s battered chest feels like it’s being squeezed hard.

“Arthur, it’s not your job to protect me, it’s my job to protect you.”

The torn mouth tightens and Arthur grouses, “Yes, Gaius told me. You should have protected yourself, damn it! I’m not worth this, no one is worth more than you are Merlin, no one!” He’s almost shouting as he mouths the last words.

Dropping his eyes in shame, Merlin casts about for a way to explain.

“I…I …couldn’t. I didn’t realize…when I did, it was too late.”

He looks up again when he hears the growl rumbling low in Arthur’s chest.

“I’m going to kill him, Merlin. I’m going to rid the world of his diseased presence. He’ll never hurt anyone like this ever again.”

He feels his jaw drop in shock. This is Arthur; the same Arthur who has always defended his father’s every decision, even when he clearly didn’t agree with man. This is Arthur, who has always been desperate for his father’s approval, ever and always striving to merit the King’s approval. This is Arthur threatening to kill the man he’s hero-worshipped since birth!

“You can’t! He’s your father!”

The blond head jerks sharply in negation, the full lips curling in disgust.

“He is not my father!” The words are shouted and Merlin curls in on himself in and unwanted instinctive reaction but Arthur is too far gone to notice or far too angry to quiet himself.

“I was born of magic. I had a human mother but my father was magic itself. I am nothing of him.”

Arthur looks down at Merlin and finally softens his tone as he takes in the slender boy cowering away from his rage. His expression turns from wrathful to searching, inquiring.

“You knew, didn’t you? You knew Morgause wasn’t lying about my mother.” Merlin nodded tentatively. “ Why didn’t you let me finish him then? Oh Merlin, dear gods, you would have been safe! Why did you stop me?”

Relaxing a bit now that the shouting was over, Merlin allowed his body to uncoil slightly.

“I didn’t want you to hate yourself. Arthur, you would have. You would have hated yourself the minute he died. I couldn’t let you do that to yourself.”

He looks intently into what little he can see of Arthur’s eyes trying to wordlessly communicate how much he believes in the truth of his words. But the prince is having none of it. He shakes his head again and winces as if the movement pains him.

“I wouldn’t have. I won’t now. He is a plague on this land and I will see that curse eradicated from my kingdom. My people will suffer no more under his yoke. I swear it!”

Merlin hears the ring of conviction in Arthur’s voice but his newly enslaved soul doesn’t dare hope that Arthur will succeed, not this time. Uther is holding all the cards. If Arthur had already tried and failed to kill the King, the man wouldn’t let him have another chance to finish the job. He is many vile things but one thing Uther Pendragon is not, is stupid. If he’d already lost enough of his fatherly feeling for Arthur to have him beaten into this state…Merlin begins to fear for Arthur’s life at his father’s hand. Uther might love his only son (as much as such a man can possibly love) but he’ll never allow himself to be defeated by anyone, not even his own blood.

Arthur startles as Merlin’s long fingers wrap themselves around his sturdy wrist.

“Don’t try. Not now. He’ll be waiting for you to try again and he might just kill you for it this time.”

“He needs to die Merlin. I’m sorry it took this to make me see it but that man is a curse on this land and he needs to die. All the atrocities he has done to our people, hiding his own hypocrisy as he slaughtered hundreds, Gods know, maybe thousands of innocent people to justify what he had done to my mother. It has to stop and I’m the only one who can stop him now.”

Something warm and wonderful unfurls in Merlin’s aching chest when he hears Arthur call the persecuted magical community “our people” and he almost smiles. The prince’s gaze swings back to Merlin’s face and catches the slight curve at the edges of those battered lips. He raises a hesitant hand to gently smooth over one fragile, bruised cheekbone.

“You could have killed him any time you wanted, couldn’t you? You even saved his life…”

Never breaking eye contact, Merlin nods.

“Yes, I could have and I did save him, more than once. Many more times than just that once…”

Arthur’s entire face scrunches in obvious confusion.

“Why? Oh, Gods, Merlin, why? He’d have had you killed in an instant if he’d found out.“

Now it’s his turn to shake his head in denial.

“I couldn’t do that to you, Arthur. You love him, he’s the only parent you’ve ever known, I could never bear to see you hurt like that.”

Face twisting, once again Arthur rejects his whole lifetime’s way of thinking and feeling.

“I do not love that monster. I loved the man I thought he was but I was wrong, he is no man. He is nothing but an abomination.”

“Arthur please, don’t do this because of me…”

Though the flesh surrounding his eyes still have them narrowed to little more than slits, Merlin can see the intensity burning in them as they stare compellingly into his own.

“I’d do anything for you, Merlin. Don’t you know that by now? Can’t you see? He could, that’s why he sent me away before he attacked you. He knew I’d never let him lay a finger on you.”

He stops and Merlin can see the distress twisting his swollen features. It hurts him to see such naked anguish on Arthur’s face. He’s so strong, so stoic, the emotion just looks wrong on him. He’s only seen such an expression on his face once before. The day he’d nearly run his father through for the crimes he’d committed against Arthur’s mother. It shakes Merlin to the core to see his prince wearing such a mien for his sake.

When he speaks again, his voice is little more than a hoarse whisper.

“Merlin, you are the most important person in the world to me. I would never willingly allow any harm to come to you…I-I…love…you.”

The warlock feels his heart stop and the breath freeze in his chest. Those words from Arthur’s lips are the most wonderful he’s ever heard but they also fill him with despair and dread for now he belongs to Uther, mind and body if not heart and soul. Those will forever be in Arthur’s keeping. However, if Arthur loves him as deeply as he loves Arthur, then Uther will control them both. Forever.

“Please don’t. Oh, Gods, please don’t say that now, Arthur!”

Tears begin to pour down his cheeks as their predicament becomes all too clear to him. Paradise and perdition have come together to war with each other in this moment but it’s already obvious to Merlin which shall prevail.

“I know, I know you don’t love me that way, Merlin. It’s alright. I know there’s…someone else. My father told me. I’m so sorry for that, I’m so sorry he stole that from you as well.”

Violently shaking his head, Merlin stops him.

“No, Arthur, you don’t understand. It’s you I love! But can’t you see? Even if he doesn’t kill me when he finds out about the magic, he’ll never let me go, he’ll never let me near you!”

If the situation wasn’t so tragic, the stunned look on Arthur’s face would normally have had Merlin at least smiling if not giggling outright but as it is, there is nothing funny about any of this. Arthur seems so surprised though that Merlin feels an overwhelming feeling of shyness and embarrassment come over him.

“Me? It’s me you love?”

Blushing, Merlin nods his head and then tries to bury it in the pillow but a gentle finger raises his chin from the soft cloth.

“Gaius said but I didn’t believe…oh Merlin!”

Arthur’s eyes are wet and Merlin can still feel the stream of salty water trickling from his own eyes as well. The knowledge of Arthur’s love is both agony and ecstasy. He’d long since lost any hope of his feelings being returned and to find out they are is the sweetest news he’s ever received. It’s also horrifying because Uther knows about both of them. He already taunted Merlin with his knowledge and from the sound of it has also done the same to Arthur while he was unconscious. He knows and he will use it against them both.

Before he realizes what’s happening, lips, cracked and scabbed, are pressing softly against his own. He fights down the urge to pull away to curl into a ball and hide inside himself. This is Arthur kissing him. Arthur, whom he’s wanted to kiss almost since he first knew him, from the first moment he realized there was more to this Prince than a spoiled bully, from the first moment he truly believed that Arthur was the man who would save the Kingdom and unite the land of Albion in a golden age. He allows his lips to soften and cling, sharing the gentle embrace for several long moments. Then it’s Arthur who pulls away, seeming to reign himself in even as his body language is telling Merlin he wants more. His actions make Merlin want to cry again for the selfless restraint Arthur is showing him. He knows without Merlin having to tell him that he can’t handle more than this, not now, not any time soon, maybe not ever.

“He’s jealous of you, you know.”

Arthur starts, Merlin’s words are clearly not what he expected after their chaste kiss.

“He’s jealous of you and he will use this against us both. Don’t let him, Arthur. Don’t let him control you like that. He’ll try, he knows it’s you that the people love, that the people look to for protection and compassion, for guidance and a better future. He knows it and he hates it. He’ll try to take that from you. Please, Arthur, as you say you love me, do not let him.”

Features that had been soft with tender emotion firm into a hard mask and Merlin sees real hatred creep into Arthur’s bright blue gaze.

“Merlin, I’m going to end his reign myself. He’s done enough damage to this land and its people. I understand that now, my eyes are finally clear. Yes, it’s because of what he’s done to you that I finally see. You are his latest victim but Gods know you aren’t the only one he’s committed atrocities upon. How many of your people did he do this to? Gaius says he raped every Dragonlord he got his hands on, he raped them and used them and then murdered them all. All but your father, Merlin; he was the only one to escape Uther’s genocide. Thank all the Gods that he did! For all that Balinor said he had trusted Uther he mustn’t have trusted him completely because he got away.”

Biting his lip softly, Merlin contemplated sharing a secret that was not his own. Arthur could be trusted with the truth and it seemed that Gaius had already trusted the Prince with all of Merlin’s secrets…

“Gaius did that. He got him out of Camelot, smuggled him away so he could go to Ealdor where he met my mother. But Uther wasn’t done, he sent soldiers after my father even though he was no longer within the boundaries of his own kingdom. So great was his hatred, he violated another King’s lands in another attempt to kill my father. So he fled again and he never even knew my mother was pregnant. He never went back; he loved her and wanted her to be safe. He didn’t know he even had a son until the day before he died.”

Arthur visibly winces.

“Merlin, I’m so sorry for what I said to you that day, that no man was worth your tears. I was wrong, not just because he was your father but because some men are worth that and more.”

He combs his hand gently through Merlin’s soft black hair.

“He was and so are you. You are worth everything to me.”

Another gentle kiss is pressed to his forehead but Merlin doesn’t feel the need to flinch this time. He’s beginning to relax in Arthur’s proximity, beginning to even long for the prince to hold him again, as he’d been holding him when he first woke up. He nudges closer to the warmth of the man curled up beside him.

“Could you…I mean, would you…would you hold me again? Just-just hold me?”

Arthur smiles and wraps his large arms gently around him, gathering him close to his chest and fitting the top of Merlin’s sable head under his own bruised chin.

“For as long as you’ll let me. I don’t ever want to let you go again.”

Merlin knows it can’t last, that Uther will never let it last but for now he clings to Arthur, feeling safe for the first time since this nightmare began.

“Promise me something, Arthur.”

“What is it?”

“Promise me that you won’t act rashly, that you’ll think about every one of your actions regarding your father.”

A growl rumbles deep in the broad golden chest.

“I told you. That man is not my father.

Merlin shakes his head with some impatience.

“Alright, promise me that you’ll think before you act against the King. I don’t think you realize how deeply he resents you now. After you saved Camelot from the Great Dragon, the people can speak of nothing but you and he hates it. He sees you as a threat and I am afraid that, heir or not, he might try to eliminate that threat if he truly believes himself in danger.”

He pulls back and locks his dark blue gaze with Arthur’s lighter blue eyes.

“Arthur, you must be careful, you must be so very, very careful. I think he’d kill you if he thinks you can’t be controlled. He might only throw you in the dungeon and mislay the key but he also might just kill you if he thinks you could succeed in killing him first. He’ll strike you down, I saw that in him. He crowed about it when…when, oh God, when he was inside me, he was so lost in his own twisted victory that he told me how now that he had me, you could never move against him, that you could never challenge his authority again. I thought…I thought somehow he knew about my magic but now, oh God, now I know it’s because that bastard knew how you felt about me.”

Face crumpling again, guilt and shame written over every distorted feature, Arthur’s eyes grow wet again.

“Oh, Merlin! This was entirely my fault! I let it slip to him, Gods, was it really only the night before last? He was telling me off for bringing my lover along on every quest and I told him you weren’t. If only I’d let him believe…if I’d thought to just let it go but I was appalled. He gave you to me expecting me to use you like that. He expected me to just use a fifteen year old boy for my own pleasure! That should have told me enough, that should have made me realize what he’d do. When he ordered me to leave you behind, I should have ignored him and taken you with me anyway. I’m so sorry Merlin, even then I was blind. I never thought he could do something like this, I swear to you, I didn’t know he was capable of this or I’d never have left you alone!”

Reaching up a trembling hand to softly stroke through golden hair, Merlin tries to soothe him.

“You couldn’t know, Arthur, none of us really knew. I didn’t know what he’d done to the Dragonlords, I didn’t even know I could…oh God, did Gaius tell you?”

He buries his head against Arthur’s chest again, blushing a deep crimson.

“Did he tell me that you can conceive and carry a boy-child in your belly? Yes. He also told me that because Uther had you first that he now controls your mind and will do so until the day one of you dies. It will be him Merlin, I promise you that. I will kill him and free you no matter what the cost.”

When Merlin doesn’t respond, it’s Arthur who pulls back and sees the blush spread all over Merlin’s skin.

“What is it?”

Merlin continues to avert his gaze.

“What is it? I’m like a frigging girl, that’s what!” he wails.

A faint smile tugs at the edges of Arthur’s mouth for a moment.

“No, you’re like a frigging miracle is what you are. Merlin, you can carry a baby! Or you could father a baby! You’ll never have to choose…you’ll never have to try to…I mean, Gods, I love you Merlin but I’ve always known I’d have to marry a woman, some woman to have a child with but you, you can be with whoever you want to be and still have children!”

His eyes are dead serious when he looks at Arthur.

“If I had one, I’d want only for it to be yours.”

Arthur smiles brilliantly at him though the expression must hurt his bruised and swollen face. Merlin wants to smile back but the fear is back again. What if Uther has already planted his bastard in Merlin’s belly? Will Arthur still want him after he’s borne a child for the King?

Arthur must see the fear in his eyes because he gathers him close again and whispers,

“It doesn’t matter to me Merlin. I love you. If it happens, it happens and I’ll hate him but I’ll never hate you.”

“But what if…what if it does? Will you hate it too?”

The prince is quiet for a long moment and Merlin’s heart drops with every second that passes.

“No. I couldn’t hate anything that was part of you. If you can love me after what he’s done to you, I can love any child that’s yours no matter who got it in your belly.”

Merlin begins to sob openly, clinging to Arthur’s chest. He doesn’t deserve this, he doesn’t deserve to have Arthur love him like this. He’s so soiled, so unclean, so polluted. How can Arthur still want him, let alone any child Uther might have planted inside him. He isn’t sure he could love a baby begat by Uther.

“I don’t want it! I don’t want anything of his!”

“Shh, shh. I know, love, I know. Don’t fuss. It probably didn’t happen. It probably won’t. I don’t think he’ll want a sorcerer’s baby in his bloodline. He’ll make sure it doesn’t happen.” He pauses for a moment before continuing, his tone urgent and hopeful, “Merlin, Merlin can you do that? Can you, you know, use your magic to make sure it doesn’t happen?”

Sniffing and rubbing the moisture from his face, Merlin thinks for a moment.

“I don’t know. I don’t know how to do it but I’ll try. If I could do it by will alone…but I don’t know any spells.”

Arthur purses his lips a moment, clearly thinking, searching for a solution like a general on the battlefield.

“Ask Gaius. If anyone would know a spell to keep you from quickening he would.”

Merlin nods against Arthur’s chest and rubs at his face again before drawing a deep breath to speak. However, before he can say anything more, the doors to the chamber burst in and several fully armed guards precede the King himself into the room.

Uther wastes no time on pleasantries. His face cold and impassive, he commands,

“Bring me the boy.”

The guards approach the bed but Arthur swings Merlin underneath him, out of their reach.

“You’ll not touch him again!”

Hesitating, the guards look to the king once again.

“Bring me the boy and if the Prince resists, remove him to the dungeons at once. You are authorized to use any and all force necessary to do so.”

Arthur snarls and grips Merlin tighter to him but the warlock pushes at his arms.

“No, Arthur, don’t! They’ll just beat you again and I’ll still have to go with him. J-just let me go…please.”

Screwing his head around to face the King, Arthur lip curls in disgusted contempt.

“You damn near killed him already! He stopped breathing last night! What more are you going to do to him, you cretinous beast?”

Brushing some imaginary lint from one sleeve, Uther takes his time answering and when he finally does, he looks directly into his son’s swollen eyes.

“I don’t really think that concerns you, Arthur. The boy belongs to me now and you will release him at once or I’ll have you clapped in irons before another minute passes. You know, as a matter of fact, I think I’ve already had enough of your insubordination and insults. Guards, escort the Prince to the dungeon immediately and once there, make sure he remains in iron.”

He turns back to the trembling boys on the bed.

“You will learn to respect me, Arthur, or you can expect to rot down there indefinitely.”

It still takes four guards to pull Arthur away from Merlin. He doesn’t strike at them; he simply refuses to relinquish his hold on the slender Dragonlord beneath him. Eventually his fingers are pried away and he’s dragged backwards through the chamber kicking and screeching ever more creative epithets at his father. Merlin perches on the edge of the bed, still wearing nothing but the bruises Uther left him with the day before. Arthur, wearing only a thin pair of sleeping trousers is being shackled wrist to wrist, ankle to ankle and as further precaution, wrist to ankle, effectively hobbling him.

Merlin wants to plead with Uther not to hurt the Prince further, to allow him to dress before he is dragged off to the freezing cold of a dungeon cell. Merlin has spent time in several of those cells and while some are worse than others, none of them are anything like warm or even remotely comfortable. However, his voice freezes in his throat and he finds he can’t even lift his gaze to the King, let alone raise his voice in supplication.

Uther watches in obscene satisfaction as the Prince is tightly shackled. He takes the opportunity to wander over to the bed where Merlin huddles and in full view of his son, he begins to stroke the soft black hair of the shaking young Dragonlord. Arthur continues to yell and struggle, making the process of binding him take twice as long as it should but as he does not strike any of the guards, they too continue to refrain from hitting him. They simply bring in more hands to hold him down as the King allows his gloved hand to slide down the long, exposed spine of the petrified boy he so thoroughly abused just the day before. His touch is gentle this time but the mere sight of his hands on Merlin has Arthur literally spitting with rage and turning purple as he ceases inhaling in favor of exhaling all his fury.

Merlin curls away from Uther’s touch but the older man simply follows his movements and continues the slow slide of his fingertips down the sorcerer’s back. Eventually Merlin curls in on himself, head to his knees and Uther smiles at the utter submissiveness of the pose. The guards are locking the last restraint in place as the King slides both hands under Merlin’s buttocks and lifts the lightweight boy up against him. Merlin doesn’t uncurl and Uther shifts him until he’s cradling the tightly coiled youth in his arms. He looks over to meet his son’s eyes and smiles widely.

He says only a single word before waving at the guards to take Arthur away.

“Mine.”

Chapter Text

Two years and some seven months later Arthur stood close to the edge of a cliff and looked out over rocky terrain of the Kingdom of Cait. The extreme northerly realm was the last holdout in Albion. The only land yet to fall under his father’s rule and he had been sent here to make sure they too bowed their heads in supplication to the great King Uther. He had no intention of doing so. This land was full of refugees, many of whom he’d sent here personally, who would be slaughtered wholesale if Uther were to get his hands on them.

The harsh landscape of this place made it one of the more sparsely populated Kingdoms in Albion before Uther of Camelot began his bid to force all the disparate realms of the vast island’s territory to kneel before him. Now, little more than two years later, he was the first man to ever achieve the mammoth task. Arthur’s lip curled in contempt at the thought. It wasn’t Uther’s achievement though, it was Merlin’s. Without the power of his enslaved Dragonlord, Uther would likely still be barely clinging to control over a small country hemmed in by increasingly hostile nations held back only by the thin and tenuous agreements hammered out on paper by mutual assent and a verbalized desire for peace.

It didn’t take long for Uther to discover Merlin’s magic. Barely two days after his guards had forcibly ripped Arthur away from the man he loved, Uther made a grand announcement to a crowd of citizens, peasant and noble alike, gathered in the palace courtyard. He had Arthur escorted to a discreet balcony, still bound in iron, to witness his proclamation.

“Citizens of Camelot! I stand before you once again to share great news in our ongoing fight against the evils of magic! I, Uther Pendragon, have personally discovered, subdued and brought under my control the last Dragonlord in existence!”

Naturally, the crowd gasped as one before many cries were heard, a rising cacophony of noise that rendered each voice indecipherable to anyone who was listening rather than yelling along with the clamorous horde. The King raised his hands and silence was slowly restored. Reaching back with one hand and grabbing someone standing in the shadows behind him, he jerked his arm and Merlin stumbled forward, the bruises and blood still evident on his face. His clothes, always shabby at best, hung from him in tattered rags smudged with dark stains that were likely a mix of dirt and blood. Both thin wrists were shackled tightly together though at least Arthur and the members of the council all knew this was merely for show. Uther had no need of shackles to control Merlin. The tall, slender warlock had been rendered incapable of disobedience by a magic older than the bedrock upon which Camelot had been built.

Not for the first time Arthur contemplated how very ruthless those ancient gods had been, even to the recipients of their “blessing”, their power. The individuals so favoured may have ruled this land for countless generations before the common, magic-less folk put them down but he could see that no matter how vast their powers, they always seemed to pay a price for them. Merlin’s price seemed especially steep. Perhaps because, according to Gaius, Merlin’s magic was especially powerful.

The clamour died down when the crowd saw who it was that the King was dangling in front of them. Hushed by the sight, the entire crowd just stared for a long drawn out moment. Merlin was very well known among the citizenry of Camelot, if only because he’d been shadowing their Prince’s every step for over two years now. If they didn’t know him personally, they certainly knew of him by reputation. He was the Prince’s most loyal servant and apprentice to their beloved Court Physician. He was widely known as an affable, rather gentle boy who was fiercely devoted to both his master and his guardian. “Gaius’s boy” was a cheerful lad who worked hard, yet always made time to help anyone who asked for it. That Merlin could be a “dangerous” Dragonlord was incomprehensible to most of them.

Expectantly silent, the people looked to their King to make sense of it all for them. The vast majority of the crowd seemed to note the absence of the Crown Prince from his usual place by his father’s side. Some assumed he was away on the King’s business but enough of the city folk had seen the Prince return from his latest trip to know that wasn’t the case. Some of them possessed connections in the palace itself and knew that Prince Arthur had been sequestered in the dungeon since shortly after his return, though no one seemed to know why. Could his servant be the cause of it all? That sweet-faced boy limply hanging, bloody and battered in the tight grip of their monarch, the Dragonlord, was he the reason Arthur languished in prison? Had Arthur known about Merlin? Was his imprisonment a punishment from his father for not knowing? Some whispering buzzed quietly among the people but most remained quiet, waiting for Uther to continue.

When he deemed that he had enough of their attention, the King shook the boy in his grip. Merlin didn’t resist, he seemed barely able to keep to his feet after what had been done to him over the past few days. Arthur didn’t hold out any hope that his father had left Merlin alone to heal since he’d separated them. There were new bruises circling Merlin’s throat, crusted blood ringing his wrists above and below the needless shackles and his face displayed fingerprint contusions as well as more generalized discolouration in fresh shades of black and blue, overlaying the faded yellow, green and brown. His skin was so pale and fine that each layer of injury was appallingly obvious. Arthur’s shadowed perch just above and to the side of the main balcony gave him a clear and uninterrupted view of his beloved and the monster that held him captive.

“You need have no fear, my people! The creature is completely under my control, trapped by his own magic, another failure of the Old Religion.” Uther spat the term out with contempt. “As I have done so in the past, I have conquered this remaining remnant of that ancient evil. That he still lives is so that he may serve as both an example of my mastery of the Old Religion and as an reminder to all who would use magic against me, that none of you can hide from me forever. Anyone who practices magic will be found, no matter how sneaky,” Merlin was shaken again and this time the boy cried out in obvious pain. “No matter how powerful or clever you might think you are, you can’t hide your corrupt nature from your King. You will be found, just like this treacherous snake that managed to lurk beneath our boots far longer than most.”

Uther smiled widely, the sight chilling Arthur’s blood. It was still gleaming with that same obscenely lascivious satisfaction the King was oozing with the day the Prince returned to find Merlin destroyed and displayed on his bed like some profane trophy.

“Due to his very nature, this creature’s will is now mine to command. I will use him as a powerful tool against his own kind. The few corrupt among you who have managed to elude me until now will no longer be able to do so. I control him, he will find you for me and you will rue the day you ever craved my power for your own, the day you plotted to bring down this kingdom, nay, the very day you were born!”

Diffuse muttering rose from the crowd. They were confused. Was their King declaring that he intended to use magic to fight magic? That he would not only suffer a sorcerer (or Dragonlord) to live but also use his magic? Even if it was to be used against their enemies the idea so clearly went against everything their King had ever uttered about the way that magic corrupts that every citizen within earshot was shocked. Uther continued to smile in triumph, oblivious to his people’s concern, choosing to see them as impressed by his power and cunning rather than worried about this seeming volte-face from a man who’d displayed increasingly paranoid behavior toward magic and magic users over the past year. Perhaps it had been the betrayal of the “witch-finder” that had driven him to these lengths? Perhaps realizing that hitherto, his most effective means of ferreting out magic-users had been a practitioner of those very arts himself was what brought their King to this?

Arthur could easily read the people’s fear and concern while Uther seemed oblivious to it. He saw sympathy in many eyes when the King displayed Merlin’s pathetic state to one and all. They weren't even privy to the full extent of the atrocities done to the boy but it was clear to even the dullest eye that Merlin had been badly mistreated. A lad who’d touched many of them with a kind and healing hand; a boy who stuck by their Prince through every danger when supposedly mightier men fled his side; a boy who smiled sunnily as he mucked out filthy stables, grinned as he scrubbed fouled kennels and laughed as he exercised some of the most unruly beasts the Prince owned, this same boy who knelt on his hands and knees in the castle courtyard to serve as a mounting block for Arthur’s convenience in full view of the populace with an upward curve to his lips that never seemed to waver…this boy was a danger to them, a danger to Camelot? He was such a danger that the King needed to beat the fragile looking thing into submission? Any among them who had doubts about the sanity and stability of their King were only further unnerved by Uther’s grandstanding.

The Prince was able to read all of this in and more in his people’s eyes but their King saw none of it. Arthur wondered if there had ever been a time when his father had been sensitive to the actual feelings of the people he ruled over. He had always emphasized the importance of retaining their respect, of making certain that they knew he was a strong king. Had he always been concerned with nothing but maintaining the fear of these people? Did it ever once occur to him that there were emotions that could and eventually would outweigh fear and destabilize his position as their leader? Did he ever consider that there was a level of fear that people could live with and a level of terror that they could not?

Now that the scales had fallen from his eyes, Arthur realized his father had probably never been the great King he’d always imagined him to be. Perhaps there once was a time the potential had been there but at this moment, it was clear to him that if it had ever existed, that potential had died along with his mother. Uther was a one-dimensional king who ruled through a tyranny that sheltered only those who could not or would not oppose it. There was no greatness to his rule. There was no wisdom in his decisions. His care for his people extended only as far as a farmer’s care does for his livestock. As long as they were docile and useful, he would continue to look after them. Any that became unruly or too costly to deal with would fall at his command in order to feed his position.

The King continued to speak but Arthur tuned him out. He had eyes and ears only for Merlin after that. He had registered the mood of his people and afterward he focused his attention on the boy who owned his heart so thoroughly. His teeth sank into his cracked bottom lip at what he saw. His Merlin was slumped, almost hanging from Uther’s grip though his feet were physically on the platform under them. The new injuries, so clear to his eyes angered him but it was the utter hopelessness in Merlin’s posture that painfully squeezed his heart in his chest. Merlin looked hopeless, listless, like all the fight was drained out of him. His sassy, mouthy, pushy, almost annoyingly cheery, good-hearted Merlin was a shattered wreck of his former self.

It broke something inside him to see Merlin looking so broken. It also broke something else free. He let go of his rage for the moment and a soul deep determination took its place. He knew he would do everything in his power to defy the man who called himself King. He would kill him and free Merlin, no matter what he had to do or how long it took to do it.

In that moment he was able to see what he could not the day Merlin had begged him to use caution in his movements against Uther. The King had never really wanted a son, he hadn’t even wanted an heir, not really. What he’d wanted was another Uther to take his place when he was gone and a man who did not think like him, would not rule like him, would not be tolerated. A man who challenged him or worse, threatened him in any way would be eliminated without a second’s hesitation, even if that man was his son. If Arthur wished to remain in Camelot and live, he must appear to allow Uther his victory. He must allow Uther to think he had broken Arthur, that Arthur could still be moulded in his image.

For a moment, he allowed himself to wonder once again at the wisdom of Merlin’s words. That seemingly simple country-boy had given him so much good advice over the years and he’d heedlessly ignored most of it. Guilt tried to distract him as he wondered if he’d just listened to Merlin more, would any of this still have happened? He ruthlessly shook off that insidiously despairing inner voice. It would do no good to dwell on the what-if of the past. He needed to focus on the what-could of the present. Specifically what could he do to get close enough to Uther to take him down and what could he do to help Merlin in the meantime? Looking out over the gathered crowd once again, he also wondered what could he do to protect his people from their own King until the day the crown rested on his head.

That was the moment when he began to deliberately plan his acts of treason instead of simply raging in his heart and mind that he would destroy Uther and all he stood for. He thought about who he could trust to support him performing the subversive acts that began to form in his mind. Gaius, despite all the years he’d appeared to support and assist Uther, had already been carrying out his own small acts of treason against his mad King. He was cunning and subtle enough to have gotten away with it for over twenty years. Gaius would definitely be of help, if only to learn from him the art of evasion and clever plotting. The extent to which he would be willing to put his own life on the line was debatable but Arthur knew in his heart that even if he wouldn’t actively participate in the Prince’s plans, he would keep his secrets, just as he’d kept Balinor’s secrets, as he’d kept Merlin’s. How many others had Gaius stealthily assisted over the last two decades? He wouldn’t ask, some things were better off left in the past but he was willing to bet there were more people who owed Gaius their lives than a pair of Dragonlords and the patients he healed with his potions and tonics.

He thought of his knights. Sir Leon immediately sprang to mind. As much as the King trusted the tall, young knight for his courage, his intelligence and his lofty family connections, Arthur knew that Sir Leon remained first and foremost his knight. Leon was his friend, one of only a few Arthur could and would trust with the things he was beginning to hammer out in his head. Then there was Sir Kai, the same age as Arthur, they’d grown up side by side. They’d been squires together, then knights in training. Both had finally earned their full status as Knights of the Realm within weeks of each other. Like Leon, he was also Arthur’s man through and through.

Young Gareth, who had been knighted less than a year ago and upon his arrival, had been painfully unschooled in keeping his emotions from his face would be ideal. His mother had been a sorceress and though he served Uther, he clearly did so with a grudging heart that sorely disapproved of his King’s actions and policies. He’d made it obvious he was there only at the insistence of his father. Arthur knew that both Leon and Kay had taken it upon themselves to school the boy in the art of keeping his thoughts better hidden else the boy would have surely been sent home in disgrace long since for the faces he used to pull whenever his King had been near. Only his status as an untried knight had saved him in those early days as it was beneath Uther to pay the least attention to an untested warrior. By the time the lad distinguished himself in battle, he’d become adept at keeping a stoic façade in the presence of a man Arthur knew he despised.

He thought of several others, Sir Marhaus, Sir Ywaine, Sir Lucan, Sir Sagramore and Sir Pelleas for certain. He also suspected he could trust Sir Bedivere and Sir Caradoc but he needed a consultation with Leon and Kai before he approached those two as their allegiance was a little less clear to him than that of the others. There might be more but none that he cared to put his faith in just then. For the moment, the men he had in mind would serve well enough to start with. Sir Marhouse and Sir Lucan were both descended from magical families and Caradoc and Bedivere had both been overheard to express sympathy for the innocents killed in Uther’s war on magic while in their cups. Arthur, who wavered over the years in his own faith that all magic-users had to be inherently evil turned a deaf ear to such talk, so long as it remained talk. He’d never caught any of his knights abetting a known sorcerer so he’d never been forced to reveal their sympathies to the King. He was grateful now for his unthinking benevolence at those times. Both men might likely become valuable allies in his schemes against Uther’s tyranny.

As he was dragged back to his cell In the dungeon, still clad in nothing more than the filthy sleeping trousers he’d been locked up in, he continued to think, his expression dark and brooding had he but known it. The first actions he needed to take would threaten to choke him with his own bile but the more he prepared himself mentally, the more convincing he knew he could be. He first had to practice humility and contrition. Only when he successfully displayed these attributes to the King would he be released from this imprisonment and only then could his machinations commence. Arthur, the skillful warrior needed to become equally skillful at the art of deception and intrigue. It wouldn’t come naturally to him; he knew he would need some time to learn. That’s why he planned to begin at Gaius’s door as soon as he was free once again.

While Arthur was hundreds of leagues away, standing on a cliff overlooking the last bastion of freedom in Albion, Merlin sat curled up in the window of his tower room. He knew he’d get a scolding from Gaius and a new set of orders from Uther if either of them were to catch him there, perched so high above the unyielding wood of the floor beneath but at the moment, he really didn’t care. He needed the view from his prison even more today than he ever had before. He also knew that even if he were to fall, his magic would save him before he hit the ground and damaged either himself or the new life that Gaius had confirmed just this morning was growing in his belly. Still, his old mentor would tell him it was foolish to take risks, while the King would be enraged that he might possibly endanger the progeny he’d “worked” so hard to create. As if it he could.

There was nothing Merlin wanted to do more then to hurl himself to the floor again and again until the thing inside him was dead but he knew it wasn’t an option. Uther had long since forbidden him to harm himself and since the creature growing in his belly was a part of him, he could no more kill it than he could himself.

The order preventing him from deliberately injuring himself sprang from the Uther’s lips when he found Merlin slitting his wrists in the garderobe of the King’s chambers only days after the events that made him Uther’s slave. Due to the nature of business usually carried out in that room and the fact that it was assumed one would have privacy while carrying out that business, Merlin thought he’d have plenty of time to bleed out before he was discovered. Sadly, it turned out that the King had no concept of privacy and opened the outer doors to speak with him. When he answered, something in his voice must have given him away for Uther flung open the inner door and found Merlin perched not on the stone bench where one did one’s business but instead saw Merlin on the floor, long legs wedged against the bench with his back against the far wall, bloody blade in one hand and the job only half-finished. He grabbed the knife and flung it down the privy hole, wrapping strong hands around the bloody line running almost from hand to elbow along the inside of his right arm.

“You will never, ever do yourself another injury, is that clear? Is that clear, you little cunt?”

Merlin nodded limply, already woozy from what damage he’d managed to do before being caught. He hadn’t yet recovered from the blood loss he’d suffered when Uther had so savagely raped him. Gaius had done his best to heal his internal injuries, and they no longer bled but he’d not yet had the time his body had needed to replenish his blood to a healthy level. His magic sped the process along but he’d come very close to bleeding to death before Uther had allowed him any treatment at all and before he was caught, he’d managed to make a long, deep incision in his arm that followed one of the large veins threading so clearly under his pale, translucent skin.

“You’re not escaping me, ever. You are mine and I don’t let go of what I’ve won, do you understand me boy? Do you? I. Own. You. Your body belongs to me now, not to you. You don’t get to choose. Now heal yourself.”

The dizzy warlock shook his head.

“Can’t. Don’t know how.”

He dimly heard Uther shouting for his guards and briefly heard Gaius’s name mentioned but he was already sliding into unconsciousness and when he woke again, he was stretched out on the bed in his new chambers with Gaius dozing in a chair beside the bed and a guard standing at attention just inside the open door. He looked down and saw the clean bandage snugly wrapped around the snowy skin of his arm and let out a small despairing whimper that his attempt to escape had failed so utterly. The noise woke Gaius who turned sad eyes on the child of his heart and reproached him with soft words.

“Don’t. Please Merlin, don’t do that again. Don’t lose hope. I know what he’s done to you is unthinkable and it must seem unbearable but please, don’t give up on the future like that. Camelot still needs you, Arthur still desperately needs you and I…I need you. Please don’t take yourself away from us no matter what Uther does to you.”

His waking must have been a signal to the guard who exited the chamber as soon as the old physician began to speak. Merlin assumed he was informing some superior that the Dragonlord was awake once again. His mouth twisted bitterly and he stared at the black rectangle of the empty doorway for a long moment before he answered his mentor.

“I won’t. I can’t. Not anymore, he’s already forbidden me to harm myself ever again.”

Gaius continued to look at him with haunted eyes of faded blue.

“I can’t say that I’m entirely unhappy with that order, Merlin. I know it doesn’t seem like it now but there will come a day when you are free again. I have faith in that. Arthur will see to it. It will take time but he’ll do it, I know he will.”

Merlin turned away in an attempt to hide the tears he couldn’t stop falling at the mention of the Prince’s name. He ached so badly for his former master. Arthur loved him. That dream had come true only to be turned inside out into a true nightmare. Arthur requited his love and for his affections had been humiliated, beaten, bludgeoned into submission and then banished to the darkness of his father’s dungeons. Their mutual love had become nothing but a source of pain for them both. They’d had a destiny; he’d been told over and over again that together they’d had a destiny. Would it still hold? Or was it broken along with Merlin’s mind, body and spirit?

“I know he’ll try, Gaius. I’m just so scared Uther will kill him. He loves Arthur but he doesn’t love his son more than he loves his position. Not anymore. I think he did, once, before all this but something’s happened to him, Gaius. I think it was Morgana. He’s gone mad since Morgause took her away. I think whatever humanity he had went with her.”

Gaius didn’t reply but Merlin sensed an accord in his silence. He saw it too, the madness in their King’s eyes. Merlin curled up and went back to sleep and when he woke it was to find an angry King standing over his bed with the sunlight streaming through the window behind him. He gave Merlin a very long and very specific set of orders that allowed no loopholes. From that day forward Merlin could never harm himself or allow himself to be harmed if there was anything his power could do to prevent it. Uther had been very thorough.

So as he sat in the window, a good five feet or more above the floor, Merlin knew he was as safe as if he was swaddled in cotton wool in the middle of his own bed. His eyes flickered to the bed in question. It was more decorative than anything, it’s not like he ever got to sleep in it, at least not at night. However, these were “his” rooms and as such they were decorated so as to give the impression that someone actually lived and slept in them.

Similar in design to Gaius’s tower suite, it lacked the homey feel of the physician’s chambers. The familiar crowd of books and benches, not to mention rows of remedies were missing. There were no racks of potions and tonics, no jars of ointments and creams, no herbs hanging in bundles or stored in wax sealed jars. There were books, though not as many as Gaius possessed and all of them banned to any other individual in the Kingdom. Merlin did get to spend time in the room; he was given leave to study so as to become a better weapon for Uther to wield. He had a few workbenches and his own collection of ingredients for potions and spells but it wasn’t the same. He didn’t eat here and he certainly didn’t use that bed for anything other than the occasional cat nap during his “working” hours. All the furnishings were comfortable though simple in nature. That bed was far superior to the narrow cot he’d had in Gaius’s back room, he just wished he was allowed to use it more often. However, Uther kept Merlin close most nights, especially for the last six months as he was determined to “breed” the Dragonlord.

Merlin shuddered again knowing that the King was finally successful. Merlin was fairly certain it took this long only because his own magic was fighting it, as he’d once told Arthur he would. He couldn’t consciously fight any of the King’s demands but his magic had proved to have something of a mind of its own. Either that or it responded better to Merlin’s true will than it did to the one imposed on him. He was revolted by Uther’s flesh and horrified by the man’s true reasons for wanting a son from him but he was constrained by his master’s will and thus unable to reveal the man’s intentions to anyone. It certainly came as a surprise to Merlin when the King announced to him that he would have a son from him. It was such a turnaround from his previous words and actions. Turning back to the view from his window, Merlin couldn’t help thinking about the first days that marked the end of what little freedom a peasant enjoyed under a King who’d never before deigned to notice his existence…

Merlin’s most severe wounds were healed little by little with the slow and subtle application of magic by Gaius over three dangerous days. The old man wasn’t foolish enough to perform the spells outside the privacy of his own chambers but he enchanted the potions he fed to Merlin and the unguents he applied to his broken body. The superficial injuries he left to heal of their own accord. Merlin’s magic had always accelerated the healing process to an abnormal degree but it was never obvious to anyone because no one ever really paid close enough attention to him to notice before.

Uther noticed just one day after he took Merlin from Arthur’s arms and carried him away to his own chambers. He shackled one of Merlin’s narrow wrists to the bedpost and told him not to move from the floor. Then he left for the remainder of the day allowing only Gaius in to see him in order to treat his injuries. He still wasn’t allowed to bathe. As the old man dosed Merlin with no less than four potions and rubbed several ointments and creams onto and into various parts of his body, Gaius muttered about trying to make Uther see sense and at least allow him to cleanse Merlin’s wounds so as to avoid them putrefying. However, no soap or water ever made an appearance and the day wore on interminably. Merlin found himself dozing on and off as the sun waxed and waned.

That night the King didn’t violate him again, he simply unshackled Merlin and ordered him to sleep on the floor at the foot of his bed like a dog. Merlin wasn’t given any clothing and he could only be grateful that the floor here was wood and not the cold stone that Arthur would be sleeping on that night in nothing more than a pair of thin trousers. The following morning, several of Merlin’s contusions and minor scratches were entirely gone. He woke to the King eyeing his nude body hungrily and started to curl in on himself again in horror at what he knew was coming. Instead, Uther’s close, albeit lusty, examination of the Dragonlord revealed the missing injuries and an inquest began instead of another rape.

Merlin was forced to answer truthfully though he found he could choose his words carefully. Yes, he had magic but no, he wasn’t consciously using it to heal himself.

“What does that mean, boy? Consciously using it?”

“My magic…sometimes it acts of its own accord. I’ve always healed quickly, my mother said it’s been that way since I was born. I can only guess that my magic heals me without me having to will it do so.”

Uther shook his head in negation though he knew that the compulsion of his Dragonlord nature forced Merlin to answer with honesty.

“That isn’t possible. Magic doesn’t work like that. Who taught you to do that?”

“No one, Sire. I was born this way.”

“No one is born that way.”

“Begging your pardon, Sire but I was.”

The King peered closely at him and ordered him to get up and sit in the chair beside the bed. He continued to prowl around the room like an agitated cat.

“Tell me what you mean by that.”

“I mean I was born with magic, Sire”

“You mean you were born from magic.”

“No, Sire, there was no magic performed at my conception, nor during my mother’s pregnancy. My father was long gone before my mother even knew she was with child. What I mean is that I was born able to perform magic. I could move objects with my mind before I could even speak. I could make it rain when I was sad and could make the sun shine when I was happy.”

Uther stopped, shocked at the revelation of such power in the hands of an unaware infant. He slowly slumped down on the bed beside the chair where Merlin was sitting.

“And now?”

“Sire?”

“Can you still command the weather at your whim and move things with your will alone?”

“Yes, Sire.”

Uther’s face twisted into an ugly, dangerous expression.

“And other powers? I assume as you’ve grown, you’ve grown into even more power?”

“Yes, Sire.”

“And what have you used these powers for? Have you enchanted my son? Have you enchanted me?”

Having to answer all three questions took him a while but he began with the last and ended with the first.

“Never, Sire, neither you nor your son. I have used my powers to protect you both and to save your lives on several occasions. I have used my powers to harm only the enemies of Camelot and to slay beasts who threatened Arthur’s life. When Edwyn Muirden tried to kill you, I spoke the spell that drew the magical beetle from your brain. I have attempted to heal Arthur in several instances but failed each time. I killed Nimueh to save Arthur’s life, exchanging her life for his when he was bitten by the questing beast. I brought him water from the cup of life before that, bargaining my life for his but she chose to try to take my mother’s life first, then Gaius’s life. When she refused to take my life as I had bargained, I took hers instead and the balance of the world was restored. I have used my magic to do chores around the castle when the Prince’s demands and those of Gaius would allow me no other way to accomplish my tasks, I have…”

Realizing that the compulsion would have had him list every miniscule incident where he’d used magic, Uther cut him off.
“Enough. Cease. That’s more than enough. Have you ever used your magic to harm a citizen of Camelot.”

Merlin shook his head firmly.

“None that weren’t attempting to end someone else’s life.”

“And who is it that you have killed to protect?”

“You, Sire, your son, Arthur, your ward, Morgana, my guardian Gaius...um…actually, every citizen of Camelot and my father, Balinor.”

Face darkening with each name, his brows stayed low until Merlin claimed to have killed for “every citizen of Camelot” when they shot straight up at such a bold assertion.

“Who is it that you killed to protect ‘every citizen of Camelot’?”

“Cornelius Sigan, my Lord.”

“You! That was you! You killed the greatest sorcerer to have ever lived?”

“Technically, Sire, I suppose I didn’t actually kill him, I merely captured and sealed his soul back into the same container Cedric freed it from when he tried to steal it.”

“But Gaius said…so Gaius knows about your powers?”

Uther’s face began to crease and redden, his rage becoming obvious.

“Yes, Sire but it is he who has counseled me to use them only for the protection of you, Arthur and Camelot. He has ever sought only to encourage me to use my power for good.”

Merlin’s voice was quick and just a bit desperate as he tried to divert Uther from thoughts of retaliation against Gaius.

“And yet he concealed a sorcerer from me.”

Again, he answered with alacrity, praying for Uther to understand that Gaius had never betrayed him, even if he had concealed Merlin’s powers from him.

“Please, Sire. He knew I was no threat to you or to Camelot or he would have been the first to condemn me! His first allegiance has ever and always been to the betterment of this Kingdom and the care of its royal family!”

Fully red with fury, Uther practically spit on him when he replied.

“You cannot lie to me, boy!”

Shaking his head, Merlin sought to placate the enraged monarch.

“I am not lying! You know I cannot!”

Letting out a huff of air, the King pinned Merlin with his cold gray eyes.

“How long has he known?”

Swallowing hard, Merlin had answered with the full truth.

“Since the day I arrived in Camelot, Sire. When I first came to his chambers I startled him and he fell from his balcony. I moved his bed so that he would land upon it and not the floor. He knew at once I had used magic to do so.”

“Why did you come to Camelot, boy, if not to destroy it?”

“I came because my mother hoped Gaius could help me find a use for my gifts and a purpose for my life. I didn’t fit in back home and my magic had been discovered by my best friend. She feared for my life in such a small community. I think she hoped that I would be able to hide in plain sight in such a large city as Camelot.”

Uther raised an eyebrow in patent disbelief.

“And did Gaius find a purpose for your ‘gifts’ as you call them?”

His voice was sneering, full of contempt for Merlin’s unbelievable naivety.

“Yes, Sire. The day I first saved Arthur’s life, he said that was my purpose in life, that keeping Arthur safe was why I had been granted my powers in the first place…I learned it was my destiny to protect the Prince so that he could become the greatest king Albion has ever known.”

Uther scowled at the open passion in Merlin’s voice, the devotion so clearly written upon his face.

“And me? Why have you saved my life?”

“Because you are his father and to lose you would harm him. And once because Gaius asked me to.”

“Only once?”

“Gaius only had to ask once, the rest of the time I did it of my own volition.”

That’s when the King shook his head, seemingly overwhelmed by all the information he’d already pulled from the warlock.

“So you are telling me, you have never used your magic to enchant or otherwise harm me, my son or my ward?”

Carefully taking advantage of the loophole in Uther’s question, Merlin was able to truthfully deny any such action.

“I have not, Sire.”

“And you have never conspired with other magic users to do so?”

“I have not, Sire.”

“Have you conspired with anyone to harm this kingdom in any way?”

“Never, Sire.”

“To overthrow this kingdom for what you consider its benefit?”

There was a grim smile on Uther’s face when he asked that question, as if he noticed a possible out in his previous line of inquiry. It disappeared with Merlin’s answer.

“No Sire, I think the only betterment for this Kingdom can come through Arthur.”

Merlin knew at once he should have clamped down on the last part of that response. The jealousy the King displayed so nakedly to him before rose again in those pale gray eyes and Uther rose and backhanded him with all the speed of a striking snake. Already seated, Merlin’s face whipped to the side as his head swam from the blow and his eyes blurred but he managed to not pass out.

“On your knees, boy. Now!”

Merlin hit the floor instantly and looking up into the King’s eyes, knew exactly what his punishment would be for daring to tell a truth to Uther that he didn’t want to hear. Closing his eyes he briefly sent a thanks to the gods that he’d not eaten at all that day so there would be less to vomit after the King was done with him.

When the time came and his stomach heaved up what Uther forced him to swallow, the King beat him for daring to “reject the royal gift” bestowed upon him. Mercifully he passed out soon after the enraged man punched him to the floor and kicked him as he curled up to protect his vital organs from the assault.

Uther almost crowed aloud when his Court Physician delivered the news he’d been anxious to hear for several months now.

“You’re absolutely certain he’s quickening?”

“Yes Sire, there’s no doubt, the babe is already moving within him.”

He smiled with an overweening masculine pride.

“How far along is he? He doesn’t appear to have gained an ounce!”

“I’d say about four months or so, Your Highness. He may not gain weight like a woman would, of a certainty, he’s still a man so I can’t predict exactly how the pregnancy will affect his body. I’ve only a few notations in some ancient texts to go on, Sire. I’ve never treated a pregnant Dragonlord before.”

“But you felt the babe?”

The silver head nodded emphatically.

“Yes, Sire. Merlin is definitely with child.”

If it wasn’t so beneath his dignity, the King would be whooping aloud.

“He’s not merely with child, Gaius, he’s carrying a boy! Hah! A son, my own, natural son.”

Gaius looked askance at the King’s choice of words but he kept his tongue behind his teeth and Uther was far too elated to notice anything.

“Are they healthy, Physician?”

“Exceedingly, Sire. Merlin is far stronger than he might appear.”

“Oh I am well aware of that, Gaius.”

Uther chuckled lewdly to himself forgetting that the boy was once this man’s ward, a boy the old man chose to take in and treat as if he was the child of his own blood. He tended to forget that the Dragonlord he so ruthlessly used to increase his power and ceaselessly violated for his own pleasure was like a son to his old friend. These days he paid little heed to anyone’s feelings but his own. No one else mattered anymore. With Merlin’s seemingly infinite power at his command, there wasn’t a single nation that could stand before him. Keeping the good will of the people was superfluous now. He had Merlin to keep them in line.

He had Merlin, period. The boy was still a constant carnal delight as well as the source of his vast temporal power. Merlin remained as luminously beautiful as he was when Uther first took him to his bed. Well, took him in Arthur’s bed really, and gods hadn’t that just added to the delight he still felt at the memory? He chuckled to himself, still reveling in that triumph almost three years later.

He knew Arthur was likely to go berserk on him when he discovered what his father had done to the boy he so favoured. Uther was prepared and it was a good thing too. Had his guards not been present that day, he was certain his son would have killed him right then and there with no weapon but his bare hands. He was actually surprised at how much Arthur’s failure gratified him. He felt a savage satisfaction at helping the guards beat his perfect son to the floor, especially after the comment Arthur snarled about Ygraine. When the Prince was lying in his own blood on the floor of his own room, he looked down at him and felt another thrill of triumph sing through him. He’d not only enslaved a Dragonlord and taken the virginity of a beautiful boy-child that day but he was finally able to put his increasingly arrogant son in his proper place...at the feet of his King.

Uther wandered over to the bed where the young Dragonlord lay on the blood splattered bed and ran a hand over his bruised and naked flesh. The child was cold to the touch, Arthur wasn’t wrong about that. However, now that Arthur had witnessed the King’s triumph, he could allow the Court Physician the access to the boy he’d been begging him for these last several hours. He turned to the guards standing over his son with blood dripping from their steel-gauntleted hands.

“You, fetch the physician.” The man indicated left the room on swift feet. Uther then turned to two of the others and directed them to remove the Prince from the floor and place him in the bed.

“The rest of you remove any and all weapons from the room. I don’t want so much as an eating knife left behind, you understand?”

All of them nodded in unison.

“Good, now, you work it out among yourselves but I want no fewer than two guards outside the Prince’s door at all times. Only the Court Physician is to be granted access to and from the room. Neither the Prince nor the boy is to be allowed to leave. I also want two guards stationed outside my chamber and two more in the hall between our rooms until further notice.”

Only one of the guards had the courage to ask the question that was clearly on all of their minds.

“Sire, what should we do if the Prince attempts to leave by force?”

Uther glared at the man like the idiot he proved himself to be.

“What do you think? You use force to keep him confined. Otherwise what’s the point in leaving armed guards at a disarmed man’s chamber door? Imbecile”

Gaius reported to him the following morning as ordered.

“Well, how are they?”

He didn’t bother naming names; Gaius knew well enough who he meant.

“Several of the bones in the Prince’s face would appear to be broken and while I’ve done what I can for him there isn’t much I can do there. I realigned his nose but it will take time to see if there’s any lasting damage or disfiguration. He has some moderate brain trauma and as I’ve warned you before, repeatedly being knocked unconscious can cause more permanent damage if…”

“Yes, yes, get on with it. He’s not permanently damaged now, is he?”

“It’s unclear at this point, Sire. He regained consciousness last night and was perfectly coherent in his speech but his balance and coordination seem to have been affected though that may be temporary. I believe the bones around both his eyes to be broken as they were completely swollen shut and he was unable to see. I’m still unable to assess whether or not his vision loss is related to the head injury or the facial damage. Most of the damage to your son would seem to be centered around his head, hands and torso. He seems to have a few broken ribs and he definitely has broken several of the bones in his hands. It will be months before he can wield a sword again.”

He nodded, not terribly surprised by anything the physician had to say about Arthur’s condition. He didn’t actually smile but it was a near thing.

“Well, that might just be for the best, Gaius. He attempted to take my life last night. He’ll have time to come to his senses before he’s able to pick up a weapon again. How fares the Dragonlord?”

“Merlin stopped breathing several times in the night, Sire. However, each time I was able to breathe for him until he could do so on his own again. This morning he seems to have recovered a bit. He’s breathing on his own though he was still unconscious when I visited this morning. He has suffered severe loss of blood from several major internal injuries, my Lord. His internal passages are deeply torn in several places and he continues to bleed and I cannot stop it, only slow it down. His external genitals have also been damaged, if he lives, only time will tell if he ever recovers from that damage. I don’t believe he’s broken any bones but the contusions over the majority of his body are concerning as they indicate damage to internal organs I cannot access and have no way of healing.”

Uther straightened up then, suddenly concerned for the life of his new-found toy. He knew Arthur just had a few broken bones and likely a sore head but he hadn’t realized how badly injured the Dragonlord was.

“Will he live?”

“I cannot say for certain, my Lord. As I’ve said, many of his injuries are inaccessible to me and therefore I can only treat him with certain potions and tonics designed to restore the balance to the humours in his body. He’s still bleeding though at what rate, I can’t rightly assess. He is still in a highly fragile state that could go either way. He has in the past shown remarkable stamina and rapid healing but I’ve only once seen him this close to death Sire and that was through poisoning. There was an antidote that time. This time, there is none.”

Grimly nodding in response to the information, Uther’s mouth tightened briefly when Gaius mentioned the poisoning incident.

“Well, you might as well leave them where they are for the time being. It will save you a trip to my chambers to see to my new ward. And Gaius?”

He looked his old friend directly in the eye, conveying his intent without actually speaking it aloud.

“Yes, my Lord?”

“I want the boy alive, you understand me? Do what you have to do, I want the Dragonlord alive. If he’s a bit damaged, so be it, as long as he lives.”

The elderly man merely nodded his head before taking his leave.

Uther frowned down at the breakfast laid out before him by his manservant, Willhem. He was a bit angry that the Dragonlord had proven so very…breakable. He hadn’t realized he’d done so much damage to the boy. Then again, he’d been angry enough to begin with when the child had had the temerity to turn him down. That it was in favour of his son had just made his rage burn that much hotter. His perfect fucking son; it seemed that the entire kingdom thought the sun shone out Prince Arthur’s arse. He was the gods-damned king! He still felt that the servant should have instantly dropped to his knees in gratitude and worshiped his monarch as any proper subject would have. But no, it had been clear that all the boy’s allegiance and affections were reserved for the Crown Prince. Then his fury had gone incandescent when he discovered the boy was a thrice-damned Dragonlord!

He supposed that he’d probably been rougher on the boy than he’d initially realized. If only to himself, he admitted that he’d lost his mind for a while there. When reason returned to him he’d been so high off his thorough domination of a virgin Dragonlord that he had only seen his triumph in the blood splashed so liberally across his son’s bed. It hadn’t really registered that he might have already destroyed his acquisition before he could even properly use it.

Of course even then he didn’t realize what a treasure he’d captured. A captive Dragonlord seemed quite the glittering prize. He wouldn’t discover until days later just how much more there was to that fragile looking boy than a pretty face, an utterly fuckable arse and the new-found ability to order the man-child to bow to his every whim.

Approaching the walls of Camelot used to be an experience of pure joy for the Crown Prince. Now the sight just made his guts ache. It was still his home and he loved the city more than almost anything else in the world but there was no denying it was a hostile environment for him these days. He’d managed to elude detection for almost three years but he knew Uther didn’t trust him and hadn’t for a long, long time. He wasn’t sure when it was that he’d lost that trust but he knew it was long before his father had betrayed his. He didn’t suppose at this point in time he’d ever know what it was that changed him from an ally to an enemy in Uther’s eyes.

The moment his own allegiances turned was forever burned into his mind. The images still haunted him in nightmares and crept up on him whenever he caught a glimpse of the King’s hands on Merlin when Arthur wasn’t expecting it. The sight wasn’t an infrequent one, it seemed as though Uther liked to keep the Dragonlord within arm’s reach whenever his captive was in the same room. He’d often trail his fingers over the nape of Merlin’s neck, sometimes pausing to massage the flesh there, sometimes simply trailing down the long spine before resting his hand low on his pet’s back. He clearly enjoyed manhandling the slender boy, gripping his upper arm tightly while directing Merlin’s feet where he wanted them to go. It was obvious he reveled in what he saw as his absolute control over the hapless sorcerer.

Arthur couldn’t help but notice how often Uther’s eyes sought his own whenever he made a physical showing of this dominance. The cold gray eyes still held a gleam of triumph every time their gazes clashed with Merlin held between them. As hard as Arthur tried to remain passive and appear unmoved by the sight, something must always give him away because the King never tired of the game. Merlin told him it was his eyes. He said no matter how still Arthur kept his face and body, no matter how relaxed his posture, his eyes always communicated exactly what he was feeling. Merlin once said that if he could see it than so could Uther. When it came to Merlin, Arthur just couldn’t lie with his eyes. Thankfully, that inability only extended to his father’s treatment of the sorcerer or all would have come undone long since. Still, it always enraged him to see that man’s hands on his Merlin. And all too often, it wasn’t just his hands.

He was kept in chains for more than a week following his futile attempt to keep Merlin from his father. When the guards came to take the shackles from him, he initially thought he was being released but instead they simply provided him with a bowl and cloth to wash with and then gave him a clean tunic and breeches of a cloth so mean that even Merlin might have turned his nose up at it. Arthur didn’t. Having been kept chained to cold stone wearing nothing more than a torn and filthy pair of sleep trousers for so long, he was quite grateful for the clean, dry clothing, no matter how humble the material that formed the garments. When he finished washing the worst of the grime from his skin, the water in the bowl swirled black.

His jailors then led him out of the cell that reeked from the accumulation of more than a week’s worth of his filth. However, instead of leading him from the prison entirely, they simply walked him up a level and incarcerated him in a slightly more comfortable cell. “Comfort” in this case came in the form of clean straw on the floor, a bucket in the corner for collecting the discharges from his body and a small raised platform with a thin pallet on it forming a rough bed that at least placed him above the level of the crawling vermin that continually infested the place. There was even a threadbare blanket to shield him from the ever-present chill of the underground chambers. Light streamed through a grate near the ceiling, and for the first time in gods knew how many days, he had the means to mark the passing of time. Quite a lot of it passed before he was released entirely from his confinement.

Naturally, with nothing to occupy his time, he spent a lot of it thinking. He planned for the future , thinking of ways to shelter his people from their mad king. He deliberately plotted against the king, continuing to speculate about likely alliances and schemes to find the means to end the bastard’s rein but inevitably, his thoughts would always turn to the past.

Merlin was always at the forefront of his musings. There was a part of him that still thought about Morgana and prayed she was somewhere safe but thoughts of safety always led him back to Merlin. Everything came back to Merlin and probably always would. When had he become the center of Arthur’s world? It certainly wasn’t from their first meeting, though…he had been as fascinated as he was annoyed by the quietly confident country bumpkin who dared to speak to a Prince as if he was a peasant.

His memories of that day were fond ones. He hadn’t ever been so stimulated by anyone as he was by that tall, skinny defiant boy. Holding him roughly by one arm, forcing their bodies close together had stirred the Prince’s libido considerably. Thoughts of teaching this Merlin to walk on his knees before him were instantly vivid in his mind’s eye. Bringing his face close enough to the lad’s ear to husk his threats right into that ridiculously large appendage had filled his nostrils with the intoxicating scent that rose from the peasant’s heated flesh. When he tossed the young man away and had him thrown in the dungeon he’d swaggered back to his friends as if nothing had happened but something rather extraordinary had happened to him. Just that brief encounter had left a hook in Arthur’s chest and it had never let go in all the time since. In fact, the longer he knew Merlin the firmer the other boy’s presence had lodged itself under his skin. So much so that now he couldn’t even imagine life without him. He’d never want to.

It wasn’t until he’d spent his first day with Merlin as his new manservant that any plans he’d had for seducing him suddenly seemed inappropriate and downright dishonourable. Always chatty, he had let it slip that he was just fifteen summers old and his sweet innocence had become glaringly obvious almost immediately. Arthur constantly called Merlin a fool and a girl but deep down he knew it was inexperience and a total lack of guile that led to Merlin’s seemingly gormless actions and impulsive speech. He’d clearly been a very sheltered child, despite growing up in a village on the border lands of a country ruled by a king vicious with ambition and dripping with disdain for the welfare of his people.

However, once Arthur had met Merlin’s mother Hunith, he was no longer surprised by Merlin’s gentle, sweet innocence. It was clear that the small, mild-seeming woman was fiercely protective of her only child and few of the other villagers looked as if they possessed anything like a spirit strong enough to challenge hers.

That small quest to Ealdor had changed things for Arthur. First, watching Merlin walk away from him after telling him he wouldn’t be returning had made the Prince ache with something he literally couldn’t define for a long time. He’d found himself unable to think about anything but his guileless servant walking off toward almost certain death with a faint smile on his face. His untrained, unarmed, unaccompanied, clumsy, pretty manservant was going to go home and face up to forty ruthless, cutthroat raiders with nothing more than his bare, slender hands to defend his mother and himself with?

He hadn’t known at the time that Morgana and Gwen had also thrown in their lot with Merlin’s insane plan but the thought of what those raiders were likely to do to a boy who looked like Merlin before they killed him had made him sick to his stomach. That was, if they were even kind enough to kill him and not just sell him into slavery or take him along with them for their own amusement. No, there had been no way he could just leave Merlin to that fate and so he’d followed. Arthur was still surprised to this day that they won that battle. He supposed he must give credit for their survival to Merlin’s childhood friend, the ill-tempered sorcerer who had, despite his open jealousy, (an envy that was returned threefold by Arthur) had saved the Prince’s life at the cost of his own.

After he’d seen something of the way Merlin grew up, many of his manservant’s previously puzzling mannerisms became clear to him and they’d only grown closer and closer as friends in the time since then. Of course, Arthur had tried his best to not acknowledge that his feelings for Merlin ran far deeper than friendship. The mere fact that he was always looking for signs from the sweet-faced boy that he too might feel more than friendship for Arthur was enough to shatter any attempt his mind made at denying his deep affections for his manservant. He’d never really seen any of those signs he so desperately watched for and the lack had made him ache with longing most nights as he fought with despondency to find sleep.

Gods, if only he’d known what he did now! He had made the disastrous assumption that Merlin was as easy to read as he appeared to be. That he couldn’t hold a secret no matter how large or small. If Merlin had feelings for someone…for Arthur or anyone else for that matter, he would say so. That he had not expressed any such thoughts, feelings or desires led Arthur to assume he didn’t’ have them. It hadn’t stopped Arthur from hoping he might someday but he’d thought that day far off in the future.

All his assumptions had been wrong. Merlin had only appeared as wide open as a book and as blunt as a battering ram, with all the tact as the latter. It still seemed almost incomprehensible that he’d kept such a life-threatening secret hidden so well and his heart as guarded as the gates to Camelot’s inner courtyard. Maybe Merlin had been waiting on him for a signal, for the opportunity to open his heart and his mind but Arthur had been so absorbed in his own pining that he’d missed what was right under his nose and brought this destruction down on both their heads.

His thoughts continued to run in similar circles, pouring over every memory he had of Merlin with new eyes and a fine tooth comb for all the details he’d previously missed. It was exhausting enough to actually let him sleep from time to time. And eventually, enough of that time passed for his father to release him from his imprisonment.

He found out later that he’d been down there for close to a month. He hadn’t been able to tell for himself because those days spent chained in total darkness had deprived him of any sense of time. It could have been two weeks or two months for all he knew. Unrelenting cold and sensory deprivation skewed his ability to judge the passing of time. When they finally released him, his guards escorted him as far as the turn of the hall leading to his room. That’s where they stopped, stood to attention and instructed him that he was to return to his chambers and wasn’t to leave them unless given leave to do so by the King. They continued to follow him all the way to the closed double doors.

When he approached the entrance to his room he heard some kind of muffled noise coming from within. Puzzled but too exhausted to give the sounds much thought, he slipped inside the door only to come to a dead halt on the far side of the lintel. As he stood there, the blood congealing in his veins, the door slammed shut behind him and he heard the outer bolt slide home. He barely registered the sound at all. Before him, on his bed once again, the King was fucking Merlin with vigorous abandon. The noises that had been incomprehensible on the far side of the doors suddenly became all too intelligible.

Two pairs of eyes flew in his direction. The gaze of gray was smug and jeering, the lips beneath it mouthing nothing but pure filth and degradation aimed toward the helpless body serving as the receptacle for his lewd and cruel appetites. Dark and distressed, Merlin’s eyes were almost all pupil, small pained grunts and whimpers escaping from his red, swollen mouth. Arthur’s rage erupted and he ran toward the bed, intent on ripping the rutting bully from his beloved’s body. However, before he took more than a few steps, Merlin’s eyes flared, bright and gold and he found himself frozen in place, one foot raised in the air, his arms awkwardly stiffened in mid-swing.

The King took his time finishing, obviously enjoying his son’s helpless position. He chuckled openly at Arthur’s unwilling status as witness to what was clearly an act unwanted by the recipient. Merlin closed his eyes after using his magic on Arthur, his face flushed crimson in what looked like shame before he buried it in the new coverlet spread over the bed.

When he finished, Uther roughly ordered Merlin to “Clean me up, boy.” After he was “bathed” to his satisfaction, he reached for his clothes with a languid negligence. He dressed slowly, his eyes on Arthur the entire time, a smug, lurid grin on his face. As he fastened his belt in place, he finally spoke.

“Merlin has a bath ready for you, Son. I assume after your time in the dungeon the first thing you’ll want to do is wash. You smell worse than the stables.”

He turned to Merlin, where he was curled up on the bed, tears running down his face.

“You have your orders, boy. I’ll see you later this evening.”

Turning back to Arthur, his mouth pinched to one side and his eyes went cold.

“Don’t think you can lay so much as a finger on the boy. He has orders not to allow it.”

He walked out the door throwing a parting shot over his shoulder,

“Enjoy your bath, Son.”

The sound of his laughter echoed down the length of the hall as he left them behind.

Arthur found himself free as soon as the door slammed shut again, presumably closed by the guards still hovering in the hall. He ran to the bed and tried to gather the visibly shaking Merlin into his arms only to find that he literally couldn’t touch him. It felt as if Merlin was encased in some kind of transparent bubble. He could see him without hindrance but his hands were blocked several inches from Merlin’s skin by some intangible force.

“Merlin?”

Red rimmed eyes, encircled by spiky wet lashes peered up at him.

“He left very specific instructions.” Merlin’s voice was bitter. “I am not to allow you to touch me in any way. I am only here to assist you to bathe and dress and even then I may not touch you directly but only your clothing, your armour…the washcloth. There is to be no skin-to-skin contact of any kind between us.”

Slumping down on the bed next to him, Arthur stroked the coverlet beside Merlin since he couldn’t actually touch him..

“Merlin, I’m so so…”

“If you say you’re sorry, I will toss you straight into a wall, so just stop it right now, Arthur Pendragon.”

He still wouldn’t look at Arthur, his face remaining hidden in the new silk bedcoverings.

“Thought you couldn’t touch me?”

Merlin sniffed and rubbed at his face with long fingers but continued to keep his head turned away.

“I don’t need to.”

Arthur contemplated Merlin for a moment before lying down on the bed next to him. He couldn’t touch him but he could be close to him.

“I guess you weren’t kidding the time you told me you could take me apart with less than one blow.”

That got him a snort in response. There was the ghost of a smile in Merlin’s voice when he answered.

“No. I wasn’t. Not that I actually would have done it in front of all those people. I was quite fond of the idea of my head remaining attached to my shoulders back then.”

There was such a bitter edge to the words “back then” that it sent a chill down Arthur’s spine. It very much sounded like Merlin’s attachment to his head was not nearly so firm anymore and the implication scared him.

“Merlin? Merlin, look at me, please?”

He stayed still so long that Arthur began to think Merlin would never look at him again. But he did, eventually turning his head, he kept his face half hidden in the coverlet but one bright blue eye reluctantly met Arthur’s gaze.

“I am sorry. No, listen! I’m sorry that he’s hurting you and there isn’t a damn thing I can yet do to stop it. I love you. I love you so damn much and I can’t help you. He’s got a chain around my neck as tightly as he’s got around yours right now.”

Curling in a little closer to him, Merlin showed his acceptance of Arthur’s sentiment even as he opened his mouth to refute the prince’s grasp of the situation.

“Arthur, it’s not…he’s not hurting me anymore. He hasn’t…well, the first week or so but then he stopped.”

“Are you saying you want him to do these things to you? That you want him to fuck you?”

“No! Gods, no!” Merlin shuddered visibly. “I hate it, I can’t stand it when he touches me. He’s not exactly gentle but he doesn’t deliberately hurt me or hit me or…well, you know. Not for weeks.”

He pinned Merlin with his eyes; caught his gaze and didn’t let go.

“Do you want what he does to you?”

“No!”

“Then he’s still hurting you.”

Long black lashes fanned downward, hiding Merlin’s exquisite blue eyes, and some of the tension left his body. He didn’t answer but he didn’t refute Arthur’s assertion either. There really wasn’t any way to do so and Merlin could be stubborn but Arthur knew he wasn’t stupid. For all the times he’d called him that, he always knew it wasn’t really true. Merlin might be impulsive, acting and speaking without thinking ahead but he’d never truly been a fool. Prior to recent events, it would have taken an army of torturers to get Arthur to admit it but Merlin could be downright intelligent, often displaying a wisdom one wouldn’t expect to find in such a young man. He regretted not listening to his friend’s advice on more occasions than he cared to think of.

Deep down, he’d trusted Merlin almost from the beginning. He hadn’t always believed his wild sounding tales (usually to his own detriment) but he never once doubted the sincerity with which they were offered to him. Finding out Merlin had been keeping secrets from him hadn’t lessened that trust. He’d spent a few hours in the dungeon with his heart aching over the fact that Merlin hadn’t trusted Arthur enough to confide in him but in light of what could have happened and what had happened to Merlin (a fate that was possibly even worse than the alternative) when those secrets were finally exposed, he hadn’t been able to hold on to that small pain. Merlin had only been protecting himself and he’d been right to do so.

“Do you still love me?”

Eyes flying open, Merlin answered unhesitatingly.

“Of course!”

“Do you trust me?”

His sable head bobbed up and down once in assent, the eyes holding Arthur’s clear and unwavering.

“Always.”

“Then come here.”

Merlin snuggled closer.

“I can’t touch you, you can’t touch my skin but you can touch my clothes, so wrap your arms around me and hold on a while. I did a lot of thinking while I was locked up. I want to share some of it with you.”

A bright gleam appeared in Merlin’s dampened eyes and the faintest curve tugged at the edges of his full lips. He carefully wrapped himself around the fully clothed prince and even rested his cheek against Arthur’s broad chest. Arthur looped his own arms in a loose arc around the proscribed space surrounding the remainder of Merlin’s body and relaxed into his warmth. It had been so damned cold in that dungeon but that wasn’t why he was relishing Merlin’s body heat, not at all. This was all they could have while Uther controlled Merlin and he was glad to take it.

“Does he know about the magic yet?”

The wavy sable hair under his chin bounced gently as Merlin nodded silently.

“Does he know all of it? How powerful you are? That the dragon is still alive?”

“No, he doesn’t know about Kilgharrah. But he knows all about the magic. He figured it out pretty quickly when my magic started to heal me in some obvious places. It’s OK though, he can’t get to Kilgharrah, I sent him away before Uther would even have had time to think about him. Strange that he hasn’t asked though...”

A deep sigh escaped Arthur’s chest at the news. It was inevitable that Uther would eventually learn of Merlin’s magic but he’d hoped it might take him a while to figure out how strong the Dragonlord’s power truly was. However, he was happy to know that Merlin had healed more rapidly than the average man would. His injuries had been horrific and Arthur had fretted over them mightily during his confinement.

“And you let me think I’d killed him.”

“I-I…Arthur, I’m sorry it was just safer that way. Safer for him, safer for me. I ordered him to never attack Camelot again, told him I’d kill him myself if he did so. He couldn’t anyway, not once I’d ordered him not to. Besides, it was Uther he was angry with, he’s never truly wanted Camelot to fall…he just wanted to be free.”

The last words were whispered in a voice hoarse with suppressed tears. Arthur knew why. Kilgharrah had been imprisoned for nearly two decades. Merlin couldn’t know how long his own captivity would last. Arthur couldn’t know either but he’d do everything in his power to ensure it was the shortest sentence possible. He knew he just needed to find a way to get at the King. A blade between the ribs, a pinch of the right powder in a goblet, an ambush down a deserted hallway…it no longer mattered to Arthur what means he used. Honour had no place in this, Uther didn’t deserve an honourable death, he simply deserved death. If Arthur could have the choice, he’d see the old man suffer every torture he’d visited on Merlin. However, he knew he was unlikely to get such a chance and he wouldn’t waste precious time trying to make the King’s final moments into the kind of death he deserved. As long as he ceased to breathe forever, that would be enough to satisfy Arthur.

Arthur ached to stroke Merlin’s face, to soothe the wrinkle from his brow, to kiss away some of his pain and he chaffed at his inability to do so. The urge to comfort was so strong at that moment that he wanted to shout his frustration at being unable to offer anything more than words to Merlin. However, since his words were all he had to give his beloved, he stifled the impulse to shout and rage and consciously concentrated on relaxing his body, mastering his frustration so that he could use his words to offer Merlin the succor he so badly needed.

“It’s alright, I understand. I truly do. I know you’d never have left Camelot in danger. I trust you. If you say the dragon, Kilgharrah is his name? If you say he is no threat any more then I believe you. Is there any way for Uther to use him against the enemies of Camelot?”

Merlin shook his head and nuzzled his face against Arthur’s less than clean tunic.

“No, I told you, I sent him away. I called to him, ordered him to flee Albion entirely, to go far enough away that he could no longer hear my call or feel the pull of our shared blood. You’ve seen the destruction he can cause; I could allow Uther neither the power to control him nor the power to make me kill him. He is the last of his kind, just as I am, and we are kin. My mother, Kilgharrah, they are the only blood-kin I have left in the world. I needed him to be safe; I needed the world to be safe from him, for him. So…he’s gone.”

“Alright. At least that’s someone safe from the King. Now, about your mother, Merlin, I think she needs to be hidden. Can Gaius get word to her that she must hide?”

Merlin snorted softly at that, his voice both bitter and fondly exasperated as he answered.

“He could get word to her but what could he say? The King raped your son and now controls him? Go hide in a hole for the rest of your life? You met my mother. She wouldn’t leave when Kanen’s gang attacked and threatened to kill everyone. She’s rather like you Arthur, she never backs down. If Gaius writes her she’d probably just come to Camelot to face Uther herself and damn the consequences.”

Arthur wasn’t able to help the tiny smile that curled his lips at Merlin’s description of his mother.

“She does seem to be a fierce little thing when backed into a corner, your mum. I wouldn’t want to get on the wrong side of her wrath.”

“I imagine she’s already got some resentment toward your fath…I mean the King as it is. He was the reason my father had to leave her, alone and pregnant with a magical child. Poor Mother, she had to contend with a baby that could make things fly around the room almost as soon as I could lift my head. She also told me I had a penchant for starting fires before I learned what the word ‘no’ meant.”

“She is a tough woman but she’ll not be safe where she is.”

“You think I don’t know that!”

Merlin pulled his head from Arthur’s chest and glared at him.

“You think I haven’t thought about how Uther might send soldiers to bring her here just to hurt me some more? To punish her for hiding a magical child right under his nose? For daring to lie with and shelter an enemy of Camelot even though she didn’t even live in his Kingdom?”

“Calm down, please Merlin, shhh…it’ll be alright. Gaius and I will think of something. We’ll make her safe. You can’t know where she is but I’ll make sure she stays out of Uther’s hands.”

“How?”

“I told you, I’ve had a month to do nothing but sit in the dark and think. I’ve come up with some plans. Merlin, I-I want to tell you but…”

“You can’t because if I know then Uther could find out.”

He hated the open acrimony in Merlin’s voice even though it wasn’t directed at him. Merlin had been many things in the time they’d known each other, flippant, cheerful, sly, teasing, serious, sweet, earnest and infernally blunt but he’d never been cynical, hateful or acidic. His voice became all of those things when the king made him a slave.

“I’m sorry.”

“No, I am. I’m sorry I ever came here, I’m sorry I am a Dragonlord, I’m sorry I have so much gods damned magic and I’m sorry I was ever fucking born!”

He shouted the last words as he let go of Arthur and stood up, heedless for once of his nude state. Arthur knew it was wrong but he wasn’t able to not stare as Merlin stalked back and forth across his room like an angry cat. If he’d had a tail it would have lashed the air all around him. Arthur wasn’t able to help himself; Merlin was absolutely magnificent like this. He’d rarely ever seen Merlin less than fully clothed, despite all the hunting trips, expeditions, crusades and missions they’d undertaken away from Camelot. He realized that normally, Merlin was fairly body-shy. At that moment he was anything but and Arthur swallowed hard taking in the long, lean lines of his bare form. His Merlin was absolutely beautiful.

“He’s going to use me Arthur, he’s going to make me his weapon. He already told me. He’s going to make me find all the magic users left in Camelot; he’s going to make me take down his enemies, every last one of them. After that, he’ll use me to take down everyone.”

Arthur was unable to take his eyes off Merlin and while he felt deeply ashamed of it, he found himself helpless to look away. Merlin’s skin, gods, his skin almost glowed in the bright sun streaming through the windows. It was perfect…almost perfect. It was then that he noticed a mark just under Merlin’s breastbone, a perfect circle of darker skin. He wondered what had made such a mark. It was too regular to be a birthmark but Arthur couldn’t think of any weapon that could leave such a mark. It almost looked like the remnants of a burn. Not one bad enough to cause the skin to pucker or pinch but enough to leave behind a dark patch…but in a perfect circle? He’d been so distracted by the mark and what or rather who might have marked Merlin in such a way, that he was only paying half his attention to Merlin’s ranting. He tried to refocus on those words because he knew they were important.

“Everyone?”

“Well, he didn’t actually say that last part but I can see it! It’s all in his eyes Arthur, he’s drunk on the power. He isn’t going to be satisfied with just ruling his enemies. He won’t be satisfied until all of Albion is on its knees before him and it’s entirely my fault!”

Still staring at the mark on Merlin’s chest, he somehow managed the wherewithal to ask,

“How is Uther’s madness your fault?”

Merlin bit his lip and flushed a brilliant red.

“I-I let something slip I shouldn’t have.”

Curiosity piqued, Arthur finally managed to tear his attention away from Merlin’s naked form.

“What was that?”

“I told him it was your destiny to unite all of Albion in a golden age of peace and prosperity.”

That shook him.

“What? Why would you say such a thing?”

“Because it’s true. I’ve told you before, Arthur; it’s your destiny to be the greatest King Camelot has ever known. In truth though, you are destined to be the greatest King all of Albion has ever known, the man to unite all the nations of Albion, the man who will bring magic back to the land and restore the balance your father has spent most of his reign trying to destroy.”

It was Merlin’s face he couldn’t tear his eyes off now. Merlin truly believed what he was saying. His voice rang with authority, his face shone with light and hope and his blue eyes became a focused beam of sincerity centered squarely on Arthur. The prince sat there, lips parted in real surprise. Yes, Merlin had spouted something about him becoming a great king someday but he never said anything about uniting Albion and restoring the land and…well, any of that!

“Merlin…Merlin, what…?”

“it’s why I’m here Arthur. It’s why I was born this way, why I was given my powers.”

Arthur shook his head uncomprehendingly.

“They are for you Arthur. For me to protect you until you become King, for me to help you unite the land, for me to serve at your side so that you can bring us all out of the darkness.”

Voice thrumming with feeling, Merlin sounded like some sort of mystic or priest. He also sounded slightly mad to Arthur’s ears. It was one thing for Merlin to believe in him, to think he’d make a good king someday but now he was describing some kind of…messiah! Arthur could never be any such thing, not a messiah, certainly never a holy man, nothing like what Merlin seemed to believe he would become.

“Merlin, Merlin if anyone could achieve that it’s you, not me. I’m just a man.”

The Dragonlord’s lips curled up in a rather rueful smile.

“Actually, Arthur, neither of us are supposed to do it on our own. We are destined to do this together. That’s what the prophecies say about the Once and Future King.”

“That’s madness Merlin! I don’t want to force the world to kneel before me.”

The look in Merlin’s eyes turned tender.

“You won’t need force when the time comes Arthur. Already, every citizen of Camelot would gladly lay down his life for you. In time, it will be every citizen of Albion. It is written, Arthur. They will come to you; you won’t need to force them. They will want you for their King.”

“Where is all this written? Where is this coming from, Merlin? Who told you this?”

Slim white shoulders rose and fell in a casual shrug as Merlin once again settled on the bed.

“First it was Kilgharrah but it is in the prophecies of the Druids and even Nimueh acknowledged much of it, albeit tacitly. I think she’d have preferred to do the job herself but clearly destiny didn’t intend for her to restore what she’d helped destroy in the first place.”

“Enough…please, Merlin, that…that’s enough. Please just…just put your hands on me again.”

Merlin smiled again.

“You know, you still need a bath. I have the water here, why not let me bathe you instead?”

Raising an incredulous eyebrow, Arthur snorted in disbelief.

“So now you want to torture me?”

“Maybe a little.”

There was the faintest hint of a sparkle in those ocean blue eyes and Arthur caught his breath, never expecting to see it so soon after…well, maybe not ever again. It took no more than that slight hint of mischief in Merlin’s eyes to make him putty in the warlock’s hands and he followed him along to the tub with a helplessly willing heart.

Merlin trembled thinking about Arthur’s reaction to all that had come to pass while he’d been away in the North. He looked down at the obvious bump below his sternum he was no longer able to hide, indeed was not allowed to hide. Uther was so damn proud of that lump that he’d ordered Merlin a whole new wardrobe just to highlight the fact that he was carrying the next Prince of Camelot in his belly. The new garments weren’t exactly tight but they were designed and cut to highlight his bulging abdomen. Mostly made of costly silks that clung to every curving line, the clothes were actually quite comfortable and were most definitely luxurious to the touch but they still made him terribly self-conscious as they left little to anyone’s imagination.

There’d be no hiding his pregnancy from Arthur the moment he laid eyes on Merlin and the warlock feared what expression might cross the dense blue of those almond eyes. Nearly three years gone and Arthur was still as bad at hiding his feelings toward Merlin as he had been when all this began. Merlin knew that it was just for him, he knew he was Arthur’s greatest weakness. He despised himself and hated Uther for that fact. The fact that he was what made his Prince vulnerable to Uther’s cruelty was a constant source of pain for him.

He knew that Arthur was hiding a great deal from Uther, and indeed from Merlin as well, due to the nature of the curse he was under. The Old Religion may not have actually intended the innate weakness built into a Dragonlord’s nature to be a curse but it most certainly had become one for him. No doubt had something like this occurred while there were other Dragonlords about, Uther would never have been able to keep Merlin as he did. Since there was no one left in Albion who could challenge Merlin’s power, Uther remained in control of it.

At least he ceased using Merlin as a weapon of war when he got the idea to “breed” him. At that point almost all of Albion had already been conquered and the few northerly kingdoms that remained free could easily be taken by martial force alone. Apparently Gaius had warned the King that to force Merlin to use his powerful abilities would likely bring harm to any child he might conceive and indeed, might even prevent conception entirely. For this, Merlin would remain eternally grateful to his old mentor. He wasn’t certain it was true but it spared him the agony of guilt that crushed him every time Uther made him indulge in slaughter and mayhem. The memory of every act he’d been forced to perform for the power-mad King was forever branded in his memory, the images flashed across his mind’s eye during the day and haunted him with nightmares from which he usually woke screaming.

The first test of Merlin’s powers was a sweep of the city of Camelot for any magic users. Merlin thanked every star in heaven that Uther didn’t specify every person who could use magic. Thus Merlin exploited the loophole and searched only for those actively using it during his search. The results were bad enough. An old man was using magic to heat the hovel he occupied in the lower town and a young woman was brewing a simple potion meant to beautify her hair for her wedding the following day. However, they weren’t the only citizens using magic at the moment he swept the city and he began to weep even before he reported the five year old boy innocently enchanting the copper chimes hung in his bedroom window to sing without any wind to move them.

He begged for that child’s life on his knees but Uther was as cold as stone and twice as hard. He made Merlin watch as the boy was publicly drowned in the town square before the old man was beheaded and the screaming young woman burned to death on the day she was to be married to the frightened, weeping dark-haired man being held close by his family at the edge of the crowd.

“Now you see how lucky you are, boy? That I’ve spared your life? Tell me how grateful you are.”

“I’m grateful, Sire.”

The words gritted unwillingly from behind teeth clenched in horror. A fury so hot burned through him that if he had control of his own magic he would immolate the King right where he stood.

“Yes, now come and show me your gratitude, my lovely pet.”

Uther used Merlin’s body repeatedly for the remainder of that day and night, high off the murder of three “evil sorcerers intent on destroying his kingdom.” It became obvious in the following months that little excited the King’s sexual appetite as much as the killing of Merlin’s kind. Every sorcerer beheaded, every witch burnt meant a night of intense sexual cruelty for Uther’s pet Dragonlord. He never again tore Merlin apart as he had during that first, ghastly assault but he still delighted in the less damaging but highly painful acts he always performed on Merlin after the death of any sort of mage.

Victory over his martial enemies brought Uther’s lust high as well but his excitement then proved less cruel and more…celebratory. The first kingdom Merlin was ordered to defeat was, of course, his own homeland.

None of this came naturally to Merlin. He was forced to study for months before he became an adequate weapon in Uther’s eyes. His innate magic had always been more in tune with nature and the elements of earth, wind, water and especially fire. Not that he wasn’t able to do an incredible amount of damage without any training whatsoever, it was no light thing to be able to call down lightening or ignite a forest to burn with little more than concentrated thought. However, for Uther, knowing that there were virtually no limits to what Merlin could potentially do with just a bit of education, he dismissed these as parlour tricks.

At first, he had proscribed books brought up from the vaults and ordered Gaius to assist Merlin in their study. There was actually little Gaius could do but act as a tutor to clarify certain pronunciations or concepts for his powerful protégé but neither made any complaint since it allowed them to maintain contact with each other. It was contact Merlin sorely needed for Uther kept him largely isolated from the rest of the world.

He found it amusing to still have Merlin occasionally act as Arthur’s manservant when the Prince was home, not realizing that the two young men found true solace in each other’s company, no matter what form the contact took. Sadly, each incident was usually preceded by a display of Uther’s ownership of Merlin. Arthur would return from another fruitless search for Morgana only to find his father either in the act of vigorously taking Merlin in his bed or instead forcing the Dragonlord to service him while on his knees in the middle of the Prince’s chambers. Uther always greeted his son with a casual delight and a cruel light in his eye as he used Merlin in front of him. His intent was always clear, to taunt Arthur with what he’d never have, to visibly assert his dominance over his captive and to drive a wedge of shame and discomfort between the two boys then force them to spend time together in what he imagined must be an agony of distress and embarrassment. It took him quite a long time to realize that despite his obscenely ostentatious displays, Merlin and Arthur were past the shame and embarrassment of whatever acts Uther performed and they simply took comfort from whatever time together they were able to obtain.

In fact, it actually took finding the two cuddled together in the only way they could manage to open Uther’s eyes to his blunder. He decided on a whim to have Merlin sweep the city again for magic users and found them lying together on Arthur’s bed. His pet Dragonlord was curled around his fully clothed son, head resting on Arthur’s chest and Arthur’s arms hugging the air a few inches from Merlin’s skin in what looked like a parody of an embrace but one that still clearly comforted both boys. It was the last time he had Merlin act as manservant to the Prince.

After that day, Merlin had very limited contact with Arthur, or anyone else for that matter, without Uther being present. Gaius, Uther’s guards and a few trusted servants had been the only exceptions. There was very little Gaius could do to instruct Merlin in the kind of magic Uther wanted from him as he’d always been more interested in the healing arts, both the arcane and the mundane, even before magic had been proscribed. He knew some defensive spells and minor offensive spells but the great battle magics remained as much a mystery to him as they were to Merlin.

Then someone broke into the vaults below the castle and stole a minor magical relic and in a fit of paranoia, Uther made Merlin do a search of the palace for any and all objects of power. During the sweep, Merlin discovered a secret room filled with magical artifacts and books upon books of spells reaching to the rafters hidden just off the main library. Uther had all the contents transferred to Merlin’s rooms so that the warlock’s “real education” could begin. There was a brief interruption of his studies when he inadvertently and unknowingly released a goblin from a small lidded barrel that was among the objects taken from the room. The creature wreaked havoc on the castle and its inhabitants for several days before Merlin recaptured the creature. Uther had its container clearly labeled with a warning and securely locked away. The King was so angry (and humiliated) by the creature’s mischief making that he had Merlin locked in the stocks for three days and nights for that mistake.

Afterward, Merlin was ordered to seek and find books detailing the kind of magic Uther had seen employed in battle as a younger man. Knowing these spells would be infinitely magnified by Merlin’s seemingly limitless power literally made Uther’s mouth water over the prospect of bringing not only the Five Kingdoms under his rule, but also forcing all of Albion to kneel before him. He was merciless in his hounding and hectoring at Merlin to learn, practice and perfect his mastery of the magic of annihilation. When he deemed Merlin ready, he marched his army straight into Cenred’s Kingdom.

When the younger ruler brought his own army to meet them, Uther didn’t bother with any niceties or formalities. There were no meeting upon the field, no exchange of heralds’ messages and no warning whatsoever. Uther more or less brought his army along as a symbolic gesture of intent….and to have them mop up the damage he intended to inflict on his greatest enemy. Having fantasized about the moment of his absolute victory over this, his most hated foe, since the moment he understood the full extent of Merlin’s power, Uther planned every detail with great relish and an eye for show. He commissioned a new set of armour for himself, one elaborately etched and enameled with the colours of his royal house. He stood resplendent in shining crimson and gold, a long cloak of silk trailing behind. Arthur was also present; however he declined a similar set of showy armour, preferring his own battle tested arms to the gaudy display pieces his father was sporting. He might as well have taken his father’s offer for he didn’t need his armour that day.

Surprisingly, Uther had Merlin clad in a full set of shining chainmail and articulated plate pieces that resembled nothing so much as full sized dragon scales. A fully functional sword fit for a king was belted to his waist. Merlin’s cloak and surcoat were made of a deeper red, almost a maroon and the Pendragon crest glowed upon its front in shimmering silver gilt but it was unmistakably Uther’s family crest adorning his pet Dragonlord. He spared no expense in the making of that armour, it would withstand the most fearsome assault with no damage for it hadn’t just been expertly and exquisitely crafted but had also been imbued with Merlin’s own magic, as had Uther’s showy but equally functional armour.

Uther proudly pulled Merlin to stand beside him and issued his first command.

“Burn the first, second and third ranks immediately. I want them incinerated to ash, understand me boy?”

Merlin swallowed and nodded, already nauseated but unable to defy a direct order. He raised a bent arm and his hand and forearm burst into bright orange flame. He incanted one of several spells he’d learned to burn the enemy, choosing to use the one that worked the fastest. It was bad enough that he would be forced to slaughter thousands of men that day, the least he was able to do for them was to make it quick. He made as if to throw the flame from him, releasing the coil of his elbow and splaying his hand at the end of the motion. A single ball of flame shot forward from his fanned fingers and sailed in an arc over the heads of the unsuspecting men about to die. Trailing through the atmosphere like a shooting star until it reached the center of the ranks to be immolated, the flame burst outward in a flash that blinded everyone who was watching its path through the air. When watering eyes cleared, there was nothing left of a third on Cenred’s army but a fine layer of black ash blanketing the area where they’d stood only moments before.

There was a shocked silence that extended to both armies for long, drawn out seconds. The gorge rose in Merlin’s throat and he turned away, about to retch forth the contents of a stomach devoid of any food when Uther’s hand clamped down on his shoulder and held him in place.

“You will not be sick in the face of my enemy, you spineless little shit. Swallow it.”

As he choked down his own bile, at least half of Cenred’s remaining army broke and began fleeing the field in panic. The rest stood fast and it seemed that Uther wasn’t the only ruler with a pet magic wielder on the field. A column of fire suddenly appeared only yards from where they stood and Merlin didn’t need any instructions to snuff it out. Then, a mighty tornado spun toward them and it was but a matter of thought to reach out with his silver gauntleted hand and turn the whirlwind back on its creator. It blew itself out almost immediately only to be followed with an attempt to call down lightening upon them. Merlin had mastered lightening so long ago that he didn’t even have to think this time, he simply flicked his eyes and the massive bolts of electricity lanced down among the ranks remaining loyal to King Cenred. It was at that moment that they too finally broke and fled the field for the surrounding woods. The brightly caparisoned group surrounding the opposing King also chose that same moment to attempt to flee Uther’s new weapon of mass destruction.

“Kill his sorcerer and bring Cenred before me.”

Merlin searched with his senses but the magic user had either concealed him or herself well or had already abandoned the King they’d served only moments before. Not knowing which of the men in the royal group was the fugitive king, Merlin simply brought them all before Uther. The startled men who were running away from Camelot’s army suddenly found themselves hurtling straight toward its ruler. A few attempted to take advantage of the proximity and raised swords, axes and maces only to be frozen where they stood. Apparently, King Cenred was not among those with a weapon unsheathed. Two swords remained in their crossed sheaths on his back as he attempted to pull off a cool and unintimidated posture before his mortal enemy. It didn’t quite work as he was visibly stiff and trembling. Still, he stood unbowed, clad entirely in black leather armour, his long dark hair flowing freely about his shoulders unconfined by any helm or royal circlet. It was by posture alone that Merlin guessed his identity. Arthur and Uther had no need to guess, they’d both met the opposing ruler in the past, although never in battle until now.

Before either could speak, Merlin delivered the news of the missing magic user.

“I regret to inform your Highness that whoever it was that was wielding their magic on behalf of King Cenred has disappeared.”

Uther frowned heavily, an expression that didn’t bode well for Merlin’s immediate future.

“What do you mean, ‘disappeared’, Dragonlord?”

Cenred’s eyes widened on hearing the title Uther addressed him by.

“Either they’ve already fled beyond the reach of my magic or they’ve employed a spell to disguise themselves, one which I am unable to detect.”

Turning to Merlin in fury, Uther looked ready to strike him when for some reason, Cenred spoke up.

“Don’t even bother, she’s long gone. As soon as your boy there, “ he raised a negligent hand in Merlin’s direction, “redirected her lightning, she took the opportunity to whirl off into thin air. Sorcerers are notoriously unreliable. But you already know that, don’t you Uther? I find I’m rather surprised to see you employing one yourself after all your rhetoric on the subject.”

Uther smirked at his vanquished foe.

“Ah but this one’s not simply a sorcerer, he’s a Dragonlord, my Dragonlord to be precise. I’m happy to say there’s nothing more reliable than a tame Dragonlord, Cenred. Did you know you’d harbored this boy’s father in your kingdom for almost twenty years? That you’d had this particular little lordling living right under your nose for some…what was it Merlin? Fifteen years?”

Merlin simply nodded while taking in the widening of Cenred’s eyes. Uther knew very well that Cenred had been as ignorant of Balinor’s hiding place as he had been and that Merlin had managed to live much more closely under Uther’s own nose for several years. Not that Cenred needed to know any of that. Uther was enjoying himself far too much for anyone to dare point that out to him. No matter their standing, they would likely die for their temerity.

“Merlin, disarm them all.”

Every weapon held or concealed on the group of Lords before them rose into the air and crumbled to dust at Merlin’s word. Then Uther casually unsheathed a beautiful dagger, one with a hilt wrapped in shining gold and possessed of an edge so sharp it could split a human hair. He stepped forward toward Cenred with the blade flashing in his hand. The moment had been planned in advance and Merlin froze his former ruler where he stood so that Uther could simply raise the blade and slit the man’s throat without any resistance. Cenred was unable to even clutch at his throat as he quickly bled out before their eyes. Merlin had to fight down his nausea again but was able to release the other king as soon as the light of life fled his eyes. The corpse fell to the ground and all of the frozen Lords were released. Uther stood smiling in triumph at them.

“Now, swear your undying allegiance to me this instant or your lives are immediately forfeit.”

Each man fell to his knees and one by one pledged themselves to Uther’s service for life.

“Merlin, mark them.”

Again, as planned in advance, Merlin placed a magical tracer on each of the Lords. It would display itself as a glowing gold sigil beneath each man’s collarbone. When the markers flared to life, each man so branded clutched at the burning spot high on his chest. For as long as Merlin lived, he’d be able to find any one of these men and anyone of their bloodline no matter where they went. Uther gloated openly as he’d delivered that bit of news to them.

“Good, now return to your estates and spread the word that you are now under Camelot’s rule. Send word to any of your allies that I’ll be coming for them soon and warn them what to expect. I’d demand hostages from each of you but as you can see, I have a much better means of controlling you at my command. Remember what you’ve seen today. I’m in control of the most powerful sorcerer who has ever lived. There is nowhere for you to hide from him and therefore nowhere to hide from me. “

By now, Uther wasn’t simply smiling, but was grinning in vicious glee at each cowed face before him. The men turned and began to walk away and Uther grabbed Merlin by the wrist and dragged him away to his own tent for a private, one-man celebration. There were two of them present but only one of them was in on the celebration. Thankfully, Uther seemed to either forget or dismiss the sorceress who’d vanished during the battle. He was too pleased about his victory to punish Merlin for his one failure.

As soon as Uther fell asleep, Merlin staggered from the tent and began retching in the dirt only feet away. To his relief, Arthur was lurking nearby and found him almost immediately. He wasn’t able to hold Merlin but Merlin launched himself at the prince and coiled himself around his only solace and sobbed himself into exhaustion against his metal clad chest. Somewhere along the line, Arthur learned to use his words to soothe his beloved and he did his very best to comfort him in those moments. Heartsick and disgusted with his own existence but too tired and weak to fight him, Merlin allowed it. They stayed that way in the dirt until the sun began to peek over the horizon and the camp began to stir. Merlin was forced to sneak back into Uther’s tent and lay down next to the man he despised with all his being. He burned with hatred and a deep thundering desire to snuff out the monster’s life. Instead, he kept his back to the sleeping king and attempted to find a few hours of rest for himself. It was a very long time coming but eventually he fell asleep with Arthur’s soothing words echoing in his mind, blocking out all the atrocities that he’d been forced to unleash upon all those unsuspecting men.

Uther surveyed his son’s return from a window above the courtyard with an eagle’s eye. He immediately noted that there were no prisoners among the Prince’s retinue and took this as a sign that Arthur failed in his mission to subdue the Kingdom of Cait. He wasn’t exactly pleased by this but he was unsurprised. It also confirmed for him that his actions over the last months were the right ones and his plans for the future completely justified. There was a part of him that was relishing the coming confrontation. Arthur, the darling of the populace, was finally about to fall. Uther would make his disgrace as public as possible and relish the firming of his own position as the ultimate authority in the land.

He wasn’t overly concerned with the tiny Kingdom Arthur had failed to conquer. It was a backwater hell-hole and its only significance was symbolic. He couldn’t claim to have conquered all of Albion if that small stretch of wasteland still didn’t fly the Pendragon banner. However, it was inevitable that it would also fall. As soon as his natural son was safely delivered and the child’s good health assured, Uther would have Merlin unleash the fury of his power upon the defiant land and they’d be kneeling at his feet as surely as the rest of Albion. It would be a long time coming but Uther could wait as he consoled himself with the promise that he’d make the inhabitants of Cait pay far more dearly for their defiance than any other land he’d conquered. His mild frustration at having to wait to truly name himself High King of the entire island of Albion would be appeased by their suffering. In the meantime, he would finally have what he always wanted and never had before.

The King smiled beatifically to himself. A natural son, one he begot with no more than the planting of his own seed in a fertile womb. He no longer considered anything about his elder son to be natural. It took magic to make his wife quicken which made Arthur a freak of magic, not a gift of nature. The irony of his unborn child having been sired on a magical being was lost on Uther. Dragonlords might have magical powers but their ability to reproduce was a natural process, a product of biology, not sorcery. Merlin didn’t have to cast a spell to conceive Uther’s son, all he did was absorb the King’s seed into his reproductive tract and their son was created. Just as easy and natural as it should have been with Ygraine until that witch Nimueh interfered. He convinced himself over the years that it wasn’t Ygraine’s fault, nor any of his own that they needed to resort to magic to beget Arthur. Nimueh clearly planned it all, plotted to intercede in the formation of the Pendragon heir so she could no doubt control him when he finally inherited the throne. An event she attempted to bring to a more rapid fruition on several occasions before she ran afoul of the wrath of a young sorcerer so powerful he made her abilities seem that of a novice. His Merlin defeated the witch with no more than a concentrated burst of will.

Even that damned dragon attempted to subvert Merlin to promote his own agenda but it was clear to Uther now that Merlin was destined to be his and his alone. How else would the boy have avoided detection until such a time where his loyalty to the crown, to Uther could be proven without doubt? He saved his monarch’s life many times at great risk to his own and yet he went undiscovered until fate decreed it was the right time. It took Uther some time to come to this conclusion but now that he knew, he felt the rightness of it all.

Merlin was always meant to serve him, despite the delusions fed to him by the ravings of an overgrown magical lizard. He wasn’t happy when he discovered that the dragon still lived but banished as he was by a Dragonlord, the beast could never pose a threat to his Kingdom again. The next Dragonlord would soon be born and he would be a Pendragon. Camelot would be forever safe from the depredations of the monster and should he be foolish enough to return to Albion when his current master had passed on, he would become the bonded weapon of the Pendragon dynasty, his vast magical powers theirs to command for they would be the only Dragonlords left in existence. The last twenty-five years had been a harsh test for him but now he knew that all this had been dictated by fate and he had passed all her tests to come to this place where his life was finally blessed with more power and prosperity than even he could have dreamed of. And soon, his dynasty’s future would be permanently cemented in the annals of time with the birth of his son.

He sent a page to fetch Merlin to the throne room and ordered another to see to it that the rest of the council gathered to greet the returning Prince. So much had happened in Arthur’s absence and he wanted an audience to witness everything that would unfold as a result of those events. Carefully dressing to emphasize his regal authority and sartorial elegance, Uther exited his chambers and headed for the throne room barely able to restrain himself from rubbing his hands together in glee.

Half an hour later, Uther smirked in satisfaction as Arthur jerked to a shocked halt just inside the throne room. His eyes were fixed on the man occupying the throne beside Uther’s. Merlin wasn’t smiling but his beauty was unmistakably radiant nonetheless. He glanced from his son to his consort and noted all the changes in the young mage that had to be hitting his son right where it most hurt. He idly wondered with no little degree of satisfaction whether it was the coronet circling Merlin’s brow, his position on the Consort’s throne or his obviously swollen belly that hurt Arthur the worst.

Uther wasn’t unaware of Merlin’s unhappiness at being pregnant but the state suited him well. His already luminous skin had acquired an even more beautiful lustre, his sable hair was longer, thicker and shinier than ever, curling around his almost elfin ears most appealingly and his large, sapphirine eyes sparkled with tiny golden lights all the time, as if his magic was so happy with his physical state that it would not be contained. He’d thoroughly kissed his consort moments before leading him to the head of the throne room and as a result his succulent lips were slightly swollen and shining a deep shade of raspberry. The public display and the knowledge that the results of it would be obvious to anyone looking had brought a delicious pink blush across his extraordinary cheekbones and coloured the skin visible above the tunic collar that draped loosely across the top of his chest, exposing his long neck, exquisite collarbones and the beautiful slope of his shoulders.

Now that he’d made Merlin his official consort, he loved to show off the boy’s extraordinary looks. A worthy prize for any King, Merlin wasn’t merely a powerful wizard and Dragonlord but also an exceptionally beautiful youth. And now that he was carrying the next Pendragon heir, Uther was puffed up with masculine pride in a way he hadn’t been while Ygraine had carried Arthur for he’d been unable to attribute his first son’s conception to his own potent fertility. This time, it had taken less than two months of trying to achieve the results that years of fruitless attempts had failed to do before. He glanced back at his obviously gob smacked elder son in time to see him take a few faltering steps forward before regaining his composure and smoothly continuing his approach to the throne.

Seizing the upper hand, Uther began to speak before Arthur had even come to a stop before him.

“Ah, Arthur, finally you return to us. What news of Cait? Have you subdued the little stretch of wasteland as I commanded?”

If Arthur was nonplussed by the directness of the inquiry he didn’t show it.

“I’m afraid not, father. The 'little stretch of wasteland' is over-run with renegades and sorcerers and the force you sent me with barely made it over the border before we were repelled by magic. Magic we had no defense against, I’m afraid.”

“Strange, Arthur. You’ve never had such difficulty overcoming magical foes before.”

“In the past, Sire, I unknowingly had magical aid of my own.” He said, nodding his head significantly in Merlin’s direction.

Uther almost smiled as Arthur walked straight into the verbal trap laid for him.

“So you’re saying that none of your past triumphs were really your own then? That the vaunted praise and fame you’ve gathered for your…defense…of the realm was undeserved? That you’ve actually no achievements of your own to speak of? Every victory was handed to you by my consort?”

He watched as the fury in Arthur’s eyes mounted with each question only to be cut short by his last.

“Your…consort?” The title was spoken slowly, each syllable drawn out in exaggeration clearly brought on by shock. Now Uther allowed himself a smile as he twined his fingers with Merlin’s and lifted the long elegant hand to press a kiss to the back of it.

“Indeed, while you were away, Lord Merlin and I were hand-fasted and he was crowned as my consort a few days later.” His smile widened. “And there’s more happy news! Merlin is with child! Next month you’ll be welcoming your baby brother to the family.”

Arthur’s eyes flew first to Merlin’s swollen abdomen then to his deep blue eyes.

“Next month?”

“Indeed, Gaius assures me that my consort is but a single month from delivering our first child. Isn’t it wonderful? Another Pendragon to strengthen the family dynasty.“ He turned a frown on Arthur. “Something you have repeatedly failed to do by your own admission.”

“Father?”

“You’ve failed me yet again, Arthur. I fear I cannot allow such a weak and useless son to continue in the capacity of Crown Prince so I’m relieving you of your duties as of this moment. If you wish to be considered as heir to my throne, you’ll have to work harder to win back my confidence. A confidence that evidently was misplaced from the beginning. This latest failure to secure such an insignificant piece of land for your King is just one more example of why you aren’t fit to assume my throne. I’ll expect better from you in the future, son or you’ll be excluded from the line of succession entirely.”

To Uther’s surprise, his last statement seemed to disturb Arthur far less than the one before it. It was painfully obvious the boy was still obsessed with Merlin. So much so that he either didn’t care that he’d just been disinherited or it hadn’t registered for the shock of finding his father married to his pregnant, enslaved Dragonlord. The king watched his son carefully, waiting for the expected signs of shock or distress over this latest development. However, the no-longer Crown Prince continued to stare at Merlin with the intensity that a starving man looks at a loaf of bread while Merlin bit his lip and stared at the floor by his elegantly shod feet.

Tired of the standstill, Uther spoke again.

“You are dismissed, Arthur. I’ll speak to you if and when I have need of you again.”

Arthur eventually met his father’s eyes and Uther saw the definite flash of hatred in them before they went carefully blank again. Now that was more like what he’d been expecting from the boy. His once privileged, pompous, arrogant and entitled son had finally been stripped of everything, including his dignity. If there hadn’t been any resentment displayed there then Uther would have been tempted to move up his plans by several months. A lack of response would have meant to him that Arthur had to be planning a move of his own if he wasn’t enraged by his father’s actions. However, as he spun away, Uther saw the unbecoming red creeping up Arthur’s neck and knew it would have spread across his entire face before he made it to the doors to exit the throne room.

Satisfied with Arthur’s impotent anger, Uther relaxed and decided to stick to the original plan. He’d have his son watched, constantly and closely but for the moment, he’d not move against him any further. Merlin had yet to deliver his natural heir and he knew better than most how badly the birthing of a child could go. He needed a healthy heir. He’d not remove one before he had another to replace him. Troublesome as Arthur had become, he was undoubtedly in rude health. There was no guarantee that his Dragonlord’s babe would even survive his birth, let alone prove to be a strong and healthy child. He’d bide his time and see what developed. All the signs were good but he didn’t trust in signs. Only what he could see with his own eyes and feel with his own hands was to be relied on. A healthy pregnancy did not always result in a healthy child as Uther well knew. Arthur wasn’t his first child, just his first legitimate child and only one of the others had survived past their first few days of life.

Mouth tightening, Uther couldn’t help thinking of yet another way Arthur had failed him and betrayed his trust…

”I’m sorry Sire, there’s been no sign of her in any part of Camelot and if we cross into the neighboring kingdoms to search for her, they will likely take it as an act of war.”

Arthur stood before him with his mouth pinched and his eyes worried but Uther was unsure if his expression was due to remorse for having proven unsuccessful in finding Morgana or if it was concern over his father’s reaction. Suspicion already coloured almost all of his interactions with Arthur. He just couldn’t trust that the boy was trying hard enough to find his Morgana.

“Then you will take two knights with you and enter into the neighboring kingdoms by stealth to find her. A small group without knightly crests and armour should attract no attention. I don’t care what you have to do, you will find her!”

“Yes, Sire. We shall depart in the morning.”

“Make sure you take Sir Leon with you. At least I know I can trust him to ensure the search is thorough.”

He noticed Arthur’s wince at the implication that he wasn’t being careful enough in the search for the missing Lady but he wasn’t sure if the momentary gleam of satisfaction that he thought he saw flash across his son’s eye was real or just his imagination. Some part of Uther knew Arthur cared for Morgana but the boy didn’t realize, couldn’t realize the girl’s importance. He also wasn’t able to truly fault Arthur for being unable to locate her since he had Merlin learn and use every scanning, scrying and spying spell he could find in an attempt to locate her as well. According to the boy, if she was still in Camelot or anywhere near to its borders then she was being hidden by some very powerful magic. Otherwise, the Dragonlord concluded, she was either being held somewhere far from Uther’s kingdom or she was gone for good.

Uther refused to believe the latter. He felt he’d know it if she was dead. After all, his blood was running through her veins and though no one else would ever know it, he felt in his bones that their connection would‘ve somehow alerted him if she were truly gone forever. He’d always felt a deep bond with the girl, even before the man who she’d believed to be her father had died. Before she’d come to live with them, he’d longed for…sometimes he wondered if his hesitation in sending Gorlois the aid that he’d promised his friend had been a subconscious attempt to rid himself of a rival and claim his daughter for himself. He never let on whose daughter she really was, it could have potentially muddied the succession as she was older than Arthur by more than a year but much as he loved his girl, he knew no woman would ever be strong enough to hold and rule Camelot. The creatures, though dear, just weren’t made to rule over men. Aside from that, Morgana’s conception and birth had been illegitimate. She’d been sired on his best friend’s wife while his own wife had been struggling to conceive a child for him. The picture of himself as a devoted husband would be forever tarnished if anyone ever found out. Luckily, only two people ever knew of her true parentage and Vivien had died many years ago, taking their secret to her grave. Uther swore to do the same.

However, it didn’t stop his heart and soul from cherishing his eldest child. He loved her with all that he had within him. Uther knew he’d likely been far too indulgent with Morgana; she’d certainly been more openly defiant of him than Arthur had ever been…at least she had been before the Dragonlord had entered his son’s life. It was easy to trace the beginnings of Arthur’s changed attitude to the time when the King had thoughtlessly assigned the beautiful child to Arthur, thinking the boy deserved a reward and Arthur needed an outlet for his passions. He’d been shaping up to be a fine, strong and stoic young man. However, his discipline, while admirable, had been bound to eventually take a toll on him. Every man needed…solace, from time to time. He’d given Merlin to Arthur thinking only that the lovely boy had been a tasty little morsel for Arthur to slake his appetite with. He’d seen only a pretty face, a desirable body and a sweet but clumsy fool when he’d looked at Gaius’s ward.

The fact that the boy appeared so foolish and clumsy, despite having saved Arthur’s life, was the primary reason he hadn’t taken Merlin himself. He’d always preferred a bit of refinement and elegance in his longer-term bedmates. Though beautiful to look at, he’d felt the boy was just too much of a bumpkin for him to tolerate long term and one night in the King’s bed would hardly be a suitable reward for saving the life of the sole heir to the throne. However, gifting him to the Prince instead? He’d felt that to be a stroke of genius right up until the moment he realized that in addition to being a pretty little thing the boy also possessed a fatuously defiant attitude. His antics proved less than amusing but Arthur quickly grew attached to him so Uther tolerated the seemingly idiotic behavior…to a point. Punishments were meted out when warranted and to his surprise, the boy tolerated each and every one with an aplomb that just didn’t seem normal. Giving the issue only a passing thought, the King concluded after a while that the servant must simply be supremely content to be Arthur’s little toy.

Arthur’s attachment proved more intriguing to him. To have so captivated the formerly stoic and indifferent Prince... it made him wonder what that boy must be like in bed. Arthur refused to be parted from his lover on countless occasions, even defying Uther and risking his life to go fetch a flower to save the boy’s life. After that stunt, the King began to watch the slender, dark-haired servant as closely as he dared. He allowed the boy to serve them during family meals and eyed him with intense scrutiny. It wasn’t long before he began to covet the lithe, lovely creature for his own. There was something almost sinuous about the way Merlin moved when he thought he wasn’t being observed. The clumsiness would disappear and a rather rangy grace would take its place. The boy’s spare brand of elegant motion unwittingly drew Uther in.

Had the situation remained that way, Uther could have learned to appreciate Merlin from afar and mastered the need he felt to possess him. However, one day, the boy leaned over his shoulder to refill his cup and Uther got a whiff of Merlin’s scent. He had a nearly overwhelming urge to grab the boy then and there and start licking and sucking on the long, fragrant neck that was arched so enticingly close to his mouth. He managed to restrain himself with an uncomfortable degree of difficulty. It would have been humiliating in the extreme to lose control like that in front of his children, not to mention being completely inappropriate considering that the boy belonged to his son. However, the incident only increased the jealous craving he felt for his son’s lover.

When he finally realized that the boy wasn’t actually Arthur’s lover, learned that his foolish son was instead treating Merlin like some rare flower of nobility, he lost all reason to hold back. Then, when it became apparent to him exactly what Merlin was, he knew why the boy proved such an irresistible lure. Dragonlords had a natural essence that drew in the senses and the only reason he’d missed it in Merlin’s case was because the boy was so young. He’d not come into his power yet and he was barely out of puberty. He was untouched and as such, not fully ripened. Had he come to court as an adult, Uther would have realized much, much sooner what he was.

Uther grimaced ruefully at the memories and cursed the Dragonlord once again as the boy intruded even on his musings over his lost daughter. He still ached for her but even Merlin was unable to find her in any of their conquered lands. Either she was still being held far to the North in Cait or she was gone, his instincts having failed him. However, he consoled himself with all the power gained through his pet warlock. He was the most powerful man in the history of Albion. He owned the most powerful sorcerer in the world, possibly the most powerful sorcerer who had ever lived if one gave credence to the Druid legends that Gaius told him of. His Consort was one of the rarest creatures in the entire world, not just due to his sorcerous powers but also by virtue of being a Dragonlord. The “lord” wasn’t just for show. Merlin came from an unbroken lineage that was so old it was lost in the depths of time. Uther despised them for their magical powers but the Dragonlords were undeniably the oldest form of nobility in all of Albion. Merlin’s antecedents far surpassed Uther’s own, far surpassed even the ancient house his wife Ygraine had hailed from. The peasant blood the boy possessed was clearly so feeble it didn’t even touch the purity of his heritage. One had only to look at Merlin to see it. Everything about him screamed it and Uther felt vindicated that his guess that the warlock must have been fathered by a noble proved correct. He couldn’t help feeling smug that he’d captured such a noble and powerful creature as his bonded Consort. And soon, his blood would mingle with that ancient lineage and then no one would ever dare to call the house of Pendragon a “bunch of jumped up commoners”. Not that anyone dared call them that after he’d had the one lord foolish enough to verbalize the thought burned at the stake for high treason. Still, the comment smarted and the King was sure that while only one man was stupid enough to say it aloud, many more held the thought privately in their heads.

Never again. When his son was born, the Pendragon dynasty would possess power undreamed of, unsurpassed wealth and the noblest blood in all of Albion. Uther would be remembered by every age as the founder of that dynasty. As such, he’d live forever. He turned to his heavily pregnant consort and gazed on him with possessive pride. While he’d been musing, he’d missed the yearning gaze that had encompassed Merlin’s face for long moments after Arthur had been dismissed. By the time Uther looked at him again, he was gazing into the middle distance, his mind clearly a thousand miles away. Grasping his hand and pulling him to his feet, Uther brought Merlin’s attention back to where it belonged, squarely on him.

“Come. Let us retire. You need your rest if our son is to be born healthy and strong.”

Merlin merely nodded demurely, his eyes cast downward as he allowed himself to be led back to the King’s chambers.

It wasn’t until the morning following his return and subsequent disinheritance that Arthur was able to speak to Merlin. On the off chance that Uther didn’t keep him locked up in the royal chambers, he slipped into Merlin’s tower room and found him wedged in the window high above the floor. He was staring out the window but his eyes didn’t seem focused on anything in particular.

“You really think you should be up there in your condition?” He’d meant the words to come out snarky but instead his genuine concern seeped through. Merlin slowly turned his head but wouldn’t meet his eyes.

“I’m safe. Trust me, I’m so safe I could sit atop the edge of the battlements in the worst of the winter winds and never risk a thing.”

Arthur felt his eyebrow rise at the bitterness in Merlin’s tone.

“You don’t sound particularly happy about that.”

Finally deep blue eyes met his and he could see the wariness and the anger lurking in them.

“If you had that son-of-a-bitch’s flesh writhing around in your belly, would you be happy that there was nothing in the world that could hurt it?”

“Hey, I have to deal with having the son-of-a-bitch’s blood running through my veins every second of the day.” He looked at Merlin’s belly pointedly “That is my little brother you are carrying. Do you hate him so much? Do you hate me for being of that same flesh?”

“No! Gods above, no! You know I love you, Arthur.”

He couldn’t help how the tension bled out of him at Merlin’s answer. Every new horror Uther visited on Merlin made Arthur fear that this one would be the final straw that broke Merlin’s back, the final act that made him hate Arthur because he was Uther’s son.

Lips pursed, Merlin peered at him with a curious expression on his face.

“I though you disavowed being related to him years ago?”

Arthur shrugged. It was no less than the truth.

“I did. I’ve gotten over it. There’s no doubt he’s just about the most vile thing to ever stalk the land but he isn’t the sum total of the Pendragon House, just a diseased offshoot. My grandfather and great-grandfather were extraordinary men. I’m sure that among their ancestors, my ancestors, there were more good men. I am more than just his blood, I am theirs as well.”

Suddenly Merlin smiled at him, a genuine warm smile that melted him where he stood. It seemed so long since he’d seen that beautiful smile. Not a hint or irony or bitterness in it, it was pure, sweet, sunny Merlin and Arthur still went weak-kneed whenever that smile flashed his way.

“You are also your mother’s child and from what I understand, she was an extraordinary woman who loved you more than life itself. You know that to be true, you heard it from her lips yourself.”

“I did, didn’t I?” He sighed. “The House of Dubois is an ancient and noble one. I am proud to be of their blood…as my brother will be proud to be of yours.”

Looking down at his swollen belly, Merlin stroked it softly.

“I wanted to hate him…I did hate him at first. I hated him because he was forced on me, because he is Uther’s but then I remembered that you’re his as well and after that, I couldn’t hate him anymore.”

When he looked back up, his ocean blue eyes were stormy and rippling with tears. He whispered,

“I thought you might hate me for him, though. I thought you’d at least be disgusted with me because I’m carrying him. I’ve been so afraid you couldn’t love me anymore knowing I was having Uther’s baby, that he made me marry him.”

Arthur’s chest contracted painfully at the agony of doubt and sorrow he saw on Merlin’s face.

“Merlin, how could I hate you when you’ve done nothing wrong? Do you really think I blame you for things that you had no hand in? I know you, know you are innocent of all of this, of everything he’s done to you, everything he’s forced you to do. He’s the sullied one; your soul is still pure and uncorrupt.”

The tears fell then, Merlin’s face tracked with silver rivulets, eyes wide with disbelief and denial. Arthur knew that despite anything anyone told him, Merlin still felt soiled and corrupted. He carried the guilt for all the atrocities that Uther had forced through him and crawled with the shame of all the horrors that Uther had forced on him. Arthur ached to hold him, stroke him, reassure him with the touch of his hand but that comfort was still denied to them so he used the tender language that continued to feel hard-won to him.

“I’m not disgusted with you or your baby. He’s yours, he’s your son. You’re carrying him, not Uther. He’s far more your child than he is my father’s, just as I am more my mother’s child than I am his. I love you, I’ll love him.”

A dark-haired streak launched from the window at him and Arthur put his arms up to catch the warlock even as he impacted against his chest. He still couldn’t get his hands closer than an inch or two to Merlin’s body but the warlock wrapped his arms around Arthur’s chest and squeezed him tightly. He looked down at Merlin and saw that his shoulders were shaking, in fact his whole body was heaving, wracked with sobs.

“Hey, what’s with the waterworks? Even after all these years you’re still such a girl’s petticoat!” His tone was light, affectionately chiding and Merlin raised his head and gave him a watery smile.

“Despite my current condition, I am not now nor have I ever been a girl, nor a lady’s undergarment.” He knocked his forehead into Arthur’s chest to emphasize his point. “You’ve seen the equipment yourself.”

Grinning, Arthur’s eyes gleamed.

“Can’t argue that, you’ve got a rather impressive arsenal in fact.”

“Right, so from this point on, you do not get to call me a girl. Fuck’s sake Arthur, I was afraid I’d be growing breasts with this thing but apparently, they aren’t strictly necessary. Thank gods, I just need the nipples!”

“Mmmm, you have a nice set of those too.”

Merlin smacked his arm lightly but still smiled at him.

“You really don’t mind?”

“I only mind that he forced it on you. And I only regret that he’ll be my brother, not my son.”

A pained look flashed across Merlin’s face and his soft lips tightened.

“You can’t know how much I wish he was yours.”

“I can because I share that wish. But it’s alright. I’ll love him as my baby brother and I’ll love him as your son because he is yours and because it isn’t his fault how he was created.”

Merlin buried his face against the soft tunic that covered Arthur’s chest but he was crying again.

“Arthur Pendragon, you give me hope for my son. If you can overcome such a father, so can my child. You are the most extraordinary man I’ve ever known. How the hell did that happen? You were such a shallow little prat when I met you!”

“I had you there to make a man of me. A far better man than I ever could have been if you hadn’t come along when you did.”

“You know, I didn’t believe Kilgharrah when he told me we were ‘two sides of the same coin’ and that you were destined to be the greatest king Albion has ever known. You really have shaped up rather nicely with my help!”

There was that cheeky grin Arthur had fallen so hard for the first time he saw it. It wasn’t love at first sight with Merlin, it took the younger boy until their second meeting to flash that grin at him and that’s when Arthur fell head over arse for the impudent brat who asked him, “How long have you been training to be a prat…my lord?” Not that he knew it at the time; he only knew there was something special about Merlin…something that confused him even as it drew him in. He really had been such a self-absorbed little prick back in those days.

Less than a week after Arthur's return and disgrace, Merlin’s first contractions began. Arthur was with Gaius when one of Merlin’s guards sought him out with the news. He’d accompanied the old man to Merlin’s chambers, somewhat surprised but greatly relieved that his father’s consort was occupying his own bed for once.

After a quick examination, Gaius confirmed that Merlin was indeed experiencing genuine contractions even though it was weeks too early by his estimations. He dispatched word to the King at once and Arthur drew him aside with rapidly escalating concern.

“You said he wasn’t due for another month!”

“Sire,” he began but stopped when Arthur glared at the use of his former title. “Arthur, I gave my estimations as best I could. Merlin is a Dragonlord, I really have no precedent to base his progress on. This could be perfectly normal for his race. He could have been further along than I thought when he began to quicken, he could also have a naturally shorter term of gestation than a woman. It is entirely possible that this is exactly the right time for his child to be born. If it is not, be assured, I will do all that I can for them both.”

It wasn’t appropriate for a King to lower himself to attend the birthing of a child, not even his own so Uther arranged to go on a hunt the moment he was informed that Merlin was in labour. Not having specifically banned him from being there (Uther assumed no man would want to be present for such a thing) Arthur stayed by Merlin’s side practically from his first contraction on. Gaius had half-heartedly tried to persuade him to leave but the look on Merlin’s face convinced the old man more eloquently than any argument Arthur’s hard-won silver tongue could have come up with.

Merlin wanted him there and Arthur wanted to be there for him. They were both terrified. He’d known from his earliest memories that it was his own birth that had killed his mother. A lifetime burdened with such knowledge left Arthur a wreck as soon as he realized Merlin was pregnant. When he saw the obviously swollen belly on his beloved he immediately began to panic. What if Uther killed Merlin with the same selfish desire for children that had killed Ygraine? He did his best to master his anxiety right up until the moment that messenger arrived at Gaius’s door. Then all his fears came crashing down on him at once. He couldn’t lose Merlin like this, he could not.

The Dragonlord wasn’t much better off. Men weren’t supposed to bear babies! Gaius’s knowledge proved of little use throughout his pregnancy as his body didn’t react the same way a woman’s did. He didn’t gain any extra weight; a lump just began to form beneath his ribs looking more like a tumor than a child. Morning sickness came late in his pregnancy, not early. He didn’t develop breasts though the area immediately surrounding his nipples began swelling about a week before his contractions began but the swelling remained quite shallow and diffuse. Strangely, what little hair he’d had on his chest had fallen out perhaps two weeks prior to the swelling’s commencement though none of the rest of his body hair had been affected. The baby had “dropped” only two days ago. Events were progressing far faster than Gaius had described them to him and he was frightened witless.

“Merlin?”

Both of them looked up at the soft voice from the doorway. It was Guinevere. Arthur honestly couldn’t even remember the last time he’d seen the girl who’d been his foster-sister’s maid. She held a large basket filled with snowy white cloths and had a timid, questioning look on her face. It occurred to Arthur that Merlin and Guin- no, Gwen, she liked to be called Gwen, used to be firm friends. It seemed a lifetime ago to Arthur. With a small shock he remembered there’d even been a brief period in his life where he thought he might be falling for the gentle maidservant. So much had happened since then. Once Uther had enslaved Merlin, any thoughts of Gwen had fallen by the wayside; wispy feelings of lukewarmth had been washed away entirely by Merlin’s plight and all the events that had followed. He wondered if Merlin still managed to stay friends with her. From the look on her face now, he doubted it. She looked very uncertain of her reception at this moment.

“Gwen!” Merlin’s expression lightened when his eyes landed on the pretty girl and Arthur found his guts tighten ever so slightly in a reaction he refused to name.

“Gaius asked me to…is it…I mean, do you mind…would you want…is it alright if I…?”

“Yes! Oh Gwen, I’ve missed you! Please, please stay!” The girl set her basket beside the bed and reached out to take the hand Merlin was holding out to her. As their fingers twined together, Arthur’s chest contracted, he flushed hot all over and he knew what he was feeling was jealousy. Hideous, burning, green-eyed envy that she could touch Merlin and hold his hand while he could not.

The monster clawing at his guts eased however when Merlin’s glimmering blue eyes sought his and clung. His hand was gripping Gwen’s small sturdy fingers but his gaze clearly said that it was Arthur’s presence he craved. The former prince had never ached to touch another person so badly in his life. Merlin’s black hair was plastered wetly to his brow and he was flushed and panting. Arthur reached out involuntarily, fingers itching to smooth the sweat from his brow only to be stopped a less than an inch from his goal by Merlin’s unwilling magic. He yearned to hold Merlin against him, to hold him through the pain ripping through his belly, to nuzzle his throat reassuringly, to twine his fingers with Merlin’s and let him grip them tight as each contraction painfully squeezed his body. The desire to physically comfort Merlin manifested as a bone-deep ache in him, throbbing dully throughout his entire being.

However, this wasn’t the time to heed his own pain, Merlin needed him and what comfort he could give. He began to murmur a stream of reassurance and encouragement into Merlin’s ear. The warlock’s magic clearly wanted him near as he managed to press his lips even closer to that thin, flared shell as he spoke the words Merlin needed to hear from him. The space separating them compressed to less than the width of his pinkie finger.

Arthur’s world contracted to Merlin’s grimacing face and sweaty brow, the choked whimpers and short screeches of pain that he tried so desperately to muffle. Arthur encouraged him to let it out, to shout his pain, not to bottle it up. Merlin bit his lip but he heeded his beloved’s words and yelped sharply with the next contraction that hit him. They were coming closer and even Arthur’s limited knowledge knew that meant the baby was coming and coming fast. He didn’t know if that was a good thing or not. He glanced at Gaius and while the old physician was attending closely, he didn’t seem overly concerned. However, Gaius was used to playing his cards close to the chest and Arthur knew that a calm Gaius wasn’t necessarily a sign that all was well.

Soon, though, Gaius ordered Merlin up from the bed and Arthur stared at him in astonishment.

“Are you insane? He’s about to deliver a baby and you want him to take a trot around the room?”

“Arthur, it will go easier on him and the baby if he’s upright for this. Normally, I’d use a birthing stool but we don’t have one shaped for a man…I’m sorry, I should have thought to commission one.”

“You’re sorry?! You had months to think this out, dammit! Why the hell is it only occurring to you now?”

Gaius snapped back, “Because I thought we had more time! I was wrong but this isn’t the time to argue about it. You may castigate me all you like when I’ve safely delivered that child, now get him up!”

Gwen helped Merlin to sit up between contractions and Arthur presented his fully clad arms for Merlin to clasp his hands around. They led him to a heavy table Gaius had had dragged in earlier. Arthur had hardly taken note of the furniture arrangements at the time, as focused on Merlin as he was.

Gwen and Gaius were covering the floor with clean linins and urged Arthur to guide Merlin to squat down over them and grip the table in front of him. Gaius supported him on one side and Gwen the other leaving Arthur looming over the three of them feeling helpless. The physician soon put paid to that emotion.

“Arthur, you are going to have to ease the baby out.”

“What? I can’t! I can’t even touch him!”

“You can’t touch Merlin but Uther never said you couldn’t touch the baby. You insisted on being here to help, well now you’ll help! Grab that basket of towels and get one ready. The baby’s beginning to crown.”

Though he wasn’t entirely sure what that meant, Arthur nonetheless obeyed Gaius’s orders to the letter. He brought the basket and carefully unfolded a towel, holding it ready in his hands.

“Now get down here and catch the baby when he comes. Don’t look so scared, you’ll know when it’s time. His head will come first, then another few pushes and the rest of him will follow. Just be careful to cradle his head and neck as he comes. “

Shaking in absolute terror, Arthur knelt on the floor behind Merlin, who was holding on to the table with white knuckles, legs spread wide, knees bent into a deep crouch. He looked over his shoulder and locked eyes with Arthur.

“I love you.”

“Gods, Merlin. I love you too, so much!”

Then Merlin twisted his face away and screamed. His whole body shook and Gaius was there in his ear telling him to “bear down” and “push”. Dropping his forehead to the table, Merlin shook and cried, writhing with effort and Arthur’s eyes were suddenly glued between those pale, straining thighs as blood began to stream down them and a tuft of matted black hair abruptly appeared. Another scream and Arthur saw the tuft of hair resolve into the unmistakable shape of a tiny head. He moved forward and reached for that small, blood smeared skull. With one more wail and a shudder that wracked his slender form, Merlin pushed again and the tiny boy’s entire face appeared. Arthur was already cradling the small head when the miniature shoulders slipped free and the child seemed to rush from Merlin’s body on a frightening tide of blood and other viscous fluids. Arthur eased him away from where Merlin continued to labour and strain, despite Gaius’s murmured instructions to relax.

Swiftly wiping blood and fluids from the impossibly small face, a weak wail escaped the wriggling bundle in his arms. He followed Gaius’s instructions to rub the child’s chest and limbs and a stronger cry echoed through the chamber, followed immediately by another and another until the little thing was making a truly terrible racket. Three exhausted but relieved faces turned toward him and Arthur couldn’t help the grin that spread across his face when he saw the tired smile on Merlin’s.

“He has all his fingers and toes, Love.” He looked back down at his baby brother and couldn’t find even the faintest resemblance to either him or his father in the small face. He supposed it was really too soon to tell, but the child certainly seemed to at least have Merlin’s colouring. Black hair and snowy white skin showed even through the smears of blood and mucous covering the tiny boy.

“Can I hold, him, please?” Merlin’s plea was weak but Arthur instantly moved closer. However Gaius intervened.

“I’m afraid you’re not quite done, my boy. Just a few more minutes and you can hold him. First, you need to expel the placenta so we can cut the cord.”

Merlin tried to protest but at that very moment was gripped by another contraction. He clutched at the table and bent his head in resignation once again. Arthur gently laid the baby in the basket of towels and moved to grab the bucket of clean water warming by the fireplace. He brought it back and with nervous hands began to clean the baby as best he could while he was still attached to his father by the umbilical cord. Gaius said nothing but gave him and approving smile and continued to rub soothing circles into Merlin’s back.

Meanwhile, Arthur realized he was finally able to hold a part of Merlin for the first time in years. He was holding Merlin’s son, Merlin’s baby, Merlin’s flesh! As he gazed in wonder at the tiny form in his arms, the baby’s wails died down and wide eyes blinked open and stared up at him. They were a deep cornflower-blue. Arthur thought them the most beautiful eyes he’d ever seen because they were Merlin’s eyes. His breath caught in his throat and he felt tears slipping down his cheeks as he returned that solemn little gaze. Gentle fingers stroked the downy little cheek and he fingered the black fluff tufting the tiny head in wonder. Then the little thing began to whimper and cry again and Arthur held Merlin’s son close and murmured into his ear, just as he’d done for Merlin throughout the long hours of his labour.

He wasn’t sure how long he cuddled that tiny piece of Merlin close to his chest before he heard a deeper cry and looked up in time to see Gaius and Gwen easing Merlin to the floor in the middle of what looked nauseatingly close to the spatter of gore Arthur had only ever witnessed in the aftermath of battle. Suddenly he was terrified. Surely it wasn’t normal to lose that much blood bringing such a tiny thing into the world? Was he about to lose Merlin as he’d lost his own mother? Would his brother grow up the same way he had? Filled with the shame and guilt of killing his mother with his birth?

“Please, Arthur, I want him, please?”

Without a word Arthur came to Merlin on his knees and passed the child into his arms. For a moment they were close enough that he could feel the warmth coming from Merlin’s body then the exchange was done and he was leaning back on his heels, watching father and son, unaware that his eyes were still leaking.

It galled Arthur that Gaius had to call one of the guards in to lift Merlin back into his bed. It hurt him that he could neither assist Gwen in helping Merlin out of his soiled shift nor in easing a clean, dry one over his head, smoothing it down over his trembling arms. He didn’t even get to hold the baby during these maneuvers because Gaius had taken charge of the infant in order to give him a thorough checking over.

Then Merlin beckoned him over to his side and he went gratefully, settling beside him on the bed while they both anxiously watched the physician examine the baby. Arthur knew only too well that Merlin’s son wasn’t his but he couldn’t help feeling more than a bit paternal toward his infant brother. Gods only knew what sort of father Uther would be to the child but Arthur wanted that baby to be his so badly that a part of him had already claimed his father’s child as his own.

He looked down at Merlin’s drawn, pale face and worried some more. It was true that Merlin was naturally fair skinned but the usual dusting of pink across his cheeks and lips was missing. He was clearly exhausted but other than appearing pale and tired, he didn’t look like he was dying.

“Healthy as a horse, my Lord.” Gaius proclaimed as he handed the baby back to Merlin, completely swathed in snowy white cloth, only the slightly squished but perfect little face peering out from the soft little bundle.

“Gaius, how many times must I tell you not to call me that?”

“Sorry my Lord, you’re the King’s Consort now. If I don’t show you the proper respect, you know who’ll pay the price for it.”

“Yes but he’s not here so, please? Not when he’s not around?”

“Alright my boy. Not when he isn’t around.”

Merlin looked down at his son while Arthur looked at Gaius.

“And Merlin? Is he alright, I mean, there was so much blood!”

Chuckling, the elderly physician reassured him that the mess was perfectly normal and that while Merlin might continue to bleed on and off for a few days, the worst was past them. Merlin was fine. Meanwhile, the Dragonlord looked back and Gaius and asked one more time,

“You’re sure? He’s totally normal?”

“He’s completely healthy, Merlin. I never said he was normal. He’s a Dragonlord. You are all quite special. So, no, I’m afraid he isn’t ‘normal’ but he is perfect.” The old man beamed, as proud as any grandfather could be. Arthur realized that even though Gaius had less of a blood-tie to the child than even he did, he’d always looked on Merlin as a son and this was as close to a grandchild as he was ever going to get. The thought comforted Arthur. At least he knew Gaius would do everything in his power to assure that Merlin and his son were cared for. No matter what the future held for Arthur.

No matter what anyone thought of him, Arthur was neither stupid nor oblivious. He knew what this birth meant to his own future. He just wondered how much time he had left. However short or long it was, he was determined to spend as much of it with Merlin as he possibly could. He leaned against the firm air surrounding Merlin and cuddled as close as he could to what should have been his family; his husband, his child and allowed himself the comfort of the illusion, if only for a little while.

When Uther tried to insist that he would name the baby, Merlin finally, finally pitched a fit. After years of enslavement and abuse, Merlin had lost it and thrown a tantrum that would have made Arthur at the height of his entitled pratitude look like the sweetest of pacifistic druids. The King-Consort of Camelot, last remaining Dragonlord alive and most powerful sorcerer in the known world flew into such a conniption that it left a smoking hole where the tower containing his rooms had once stood and sent the King backing away with more than a slightly intimidated look on his face. Merlin was allowed to name his son. In the end, even Uther had to admit it was a fitting name for the son of a King. “Fair and Equal Chief” would more than suit a son of the House of Pendragon.

Merlin curled into the corner of the large window seat in his newly restored and redesigned tower suite and stared blindly out over the city of Camelot, baby Cynhafar nestled against his nearly bare chest, his chubby little legs cradled by the silken sling Gwen had presented Merlin with when it became clear that he wouldn’t be parted from his son for any reason.

 

 

The clever and talented seamstress had designed him a comfortable and convenient wardrobe to accommodate his unique paternal-maternal status. Since there were no such things as nursing tunics for men, Gwen had improvised by altering some of his simpler garments and designing the rest of his clothing from her own original patterns. His favourite of her new designs were the ones where she’d taken several of his fine night shifts, removed the sleeves and enlarged the open placket so that he could simply slide the garment down over either arm to give the baby access to feed from his father’s teat. Obviously meant only for private wear, they were soft, supremely comfortable and they allowed him to cuddle his baby close to his bare skin. That contact was the most treasured of his entire life as he’d been allowed no skin-to-skin contact with anyone other than Uther and (strictly for the purposes of medical care) Gaius, ever since the vile and corrupt ruler had forcibly claimed Merlin as his own.

Though the child was Uther’s by blood, the fact that Arthur’s hands were the ones that brought Cynhafar into this world made Merlin feel like his son connected him to Arthur far more than he would ever connect him to Uther. Cuddling the baby that Arthur had treasured on his behalf made his beloved’s absence almost bearable. Almost…

He sighed and nuzzled the downy black thatch of hair that crowned his beautiful son’s head. Everything about his baby was perfect. His skin was white as snow and soft as silk. His eyes were the deep jewel-blue of polished sapphire. The sweet button of his nose titled ever so slightly up over a tiny pink rosebud mouth. His cheeks were round and rosy with health and vitality. When he was hungry or wet, his cries were strong and robust, his lungs hale and hearty. He was an exquisite child who looked nothing like Uther Pendragon. Merlin smiled at the thought that Uther’s seed was clearly incapable of dominating the heritage of his children’s mothers. Arthur was a large-scale masculine version of his mother’s extraordinary beauty and Cynhafar had inherited his maternal father’s appearance as well. It was only just that a man such as Uther should go to the grave and leave no copy. Merlin knew he’d have loved his child even had the boy been the graven image of his evil sire but it was a comfort and a delight that he shared not a single feature in common with the monster who’d fathered him. Cynhafar deserved better than to look like the genocidal mad-man who’d raped him into existence.

Merlin needed the comfort of his son’s presence more and more everyday as Arthur’s absence ate at his heart and soul. On the one hand, he was relieved and happy that Arthur was safely away, out of Uther’s reach and the terrible plans he’d had to eliminate the threat his elder son posed to his rule. However, it had been almost six months since he’d last had the joy of seeing Arthur’s face and felt the comfort of his loving words warming his heart. Merlin knew where Arthur must have gone, there was only one place left in all of Albion where anyone could successfully evade the long reach of Uther Pendragon’s unjust hand, the tiny Kingdom of Cait.

Merlin had long suspected that Arthur hadn’t even attempted to capture the kingdom for his father. He had no doubt Arthur had made the long trip there and back but attempt to conquer the last bastion of freedom in all of Albion? No, Arthur knew that’s where all of Merlin’s kith and kin were hiding. He suspected his own mother must be there, under the protection of some practitioner of the Old Religion for Uther had eventually decided that Merlin’s mother should come live with them in the palace, “for her protection”. However, riders to Ealdor had returned unaccompanied and Merlin’s magical search for her had turned up nothing. As she was so closely tied to Merlin by blood, it was impossible that she would have eluded him without someone of vast and ancient power keeping her hidden. Arthur had promised him he would keep Hunith safe and Merlin trusted him. Like Morgana and now Arthur himself, Merlin’s mother was somewhere far away, safe and shielded by some worthy wielder of magic.

He hoped it was the Druids protecting them. Merlin trusted those gentle guardians of the ancient ways of earth and power. Perhaps it was Iseldir himself who sheltered them now. He trusted the compassionate Druid leader, despite the often cryptic wording of his warnings to Merlin, the older man had never steered him wrong and was clearly a force for good in the increasingly dark world Merlin found himself dwelling in.

Now as he ached for Arthur and prayed for his safety, he imagined him living among that trustworthy band of Druids. They’d not hold Uther’s actions against Arthur; indeed, they knew better than anyone that it was Arthur’s true destiny to be their savior. They held the prophecies that spoke of Emrys, the Once and Future King and their eventual fate to unite the land of Albion together and usher in a golden age of peace and prosperity for all. Side by side they would restore the balance of old and new, returning magic to the land and healing the wounds that more than two decades of Uther’s rule had inflicted on the land and its people.

The shadows slowly deepened in the room as Merlin stared out the window, seeing nothing of Camelot, only the face and figure of the man he loved more than life itself. There were times he wished he could have sent his son away with Arthur. It wasn’t that he felt Uther would do his child any physical harm; he just wished Cynhafar wouldn’t have to suffer his father’s corrupt mental and moral influence. However, he knew in his heart that while his son might have been better off away from Uther and Camelot, he himself would never have survived the separation. It was hard enough to live without Arthur. Had he managed to send Cynhafar away as well, he was sure the double loss would have killed him as surely as a blade through his heart. He clasped his sleeping son’s small body to his chest and vowed nothing, nothing would ever take him from Merlin. He’d burn the world to ash before he’d ever allow that to happen.

Eventually, his innate sense of humour asserted itself as he thought about Uther’s reaction to his refusal to allow their son out of his sight at any time. Uther nearly had an apoplexy when Merlin insisted he, and he alone would nourish their child. There would be no wet-nurses, no fussing nannies and no interference from well-meaning elderly Pendragon relatives. The existence of the latter came as a great surprise to Merlin. He always assumed Uther had no living relatives but Arthur since neither King nor Prince ever mentioned any in all the time he knew them. No servant’s gossip regarding such relations ever reached his ears so when a pair of ancient old biddies descended on Merlin in his newly remodeled chambers one day he pinned the imperiously demanding harpies to the wall until he was able to have them removed from his presence. Thus was he introduced to Uther’s maiden aunts Maredud and Morcan Pendragon.

They were both ancient enough to make Gaius seem young and sprightly by comparison and, as it turned out, they were the older, unmarried, sisters of Uther’s father. Apparently they were identical twins but both were both so incredibly wrinkled it was impossible to tell what they might have once looked like before their own skin declared war on their bodies and hid any defining features whatsoever. The only things Merlin could make out from the wrinkles were matching pairs of faded green eyes. The colour, though clouded with age, somehow put Merlin in mind of Morgana and the reminder had made him wonder for the thousandth time whether or not Morgause had been able to save her sister after he’d been forced to poison her. Part of him desperately hoped she had and that she had kept Morgana safely hidden from his sweeping searches. He didn’t want to think what Uther might do to Morgana if he discovered she had magic. He also didn’t want to think what Uther might do to him if Morgana revealed that Merlin had poisoned her only minutes before Morgause had taken her and swept them both away in swirl of wind and debris.

He snorted as his thoughts drifted back to the ancient Pendragon sisters. Several weeks ago they barged in on him without any sort of announcement, appearing in a whirl of gaudy scarves and shawls that flapped about the two crones like garishly expensive sails and tried to snatch the baby from his hands. Both sisters were trying to be the one to lay first hands on the infant prince. Merlin had been enjoying a quiet moment nursing his son while he sat in this same window seat when the attack occurred. Literally cornered and fearing for Cynhafar’s life at the hands of the elderly madwomen, Merlin’s magic had lashed out without him even directing it and in the blink of an eye both of the old shrews were swept clear across the room and pinned harmlessly to the far wall. Their screams brought his guards running (and really, where the hell had they been when the two freakish women had been invading his private chambers?) and the two had engaged in trying to out scream each other in a bid to express their outrage and imperious demands for release. Their shrill screaming scared Cynhafar who began to cry, kick and cling to Merlin all at once. Angry and out of patience he’d silenced the two and directed the guards to remove the insane old ladies from his chambers at once. Both arms-men had faced him with guilty expressions and explained who the women were.

“I don’t care, they are upsetting the Prince and I’ll not stand for it no matter who they are. Take them away at once!”

Since becoming Uther’s consort, Merlin had perfected the imperiously sharp-tongue that had anyone apart from the King himself snapping to with satisfying alacrity. He might not have any control over his own life but no one of inferior rank would question him anymore. Enslavement brought out a ruthlessness in Merlin he’d only suspected he possessed before Uther had taken away most of his free will. Fatherhood had only sharpened his defensiveness. By the gods, he’d not allow anyone to so much as upset Cynhafar let alone lay hands on his precious son. The only thing that had saved the sisters from physical harm was their obvious age. Had they been younger women, they would no doubt be out cold, slammed with savage force against that wall instead of merely pinned there in impotent silence.

His guards obeyed him with obvious reluctance, no doubt fearing punishment from the King for laying hands on his elderly aunts but Merlin was unmoved. As far as he was concerned they weren’t his protectors, they were his jailors. Any suffering they endured at Uther’s hands was deserved for the role they played in his captivity. As expected, Uther showed up less than two candle-marks later practically frothing at the mouth.

“How dare you attack two little old ladies you treacherous little snake?”

Merlin stared at Uther, utterly unimpressed.

“Little old ladies who burst into my private chambers with neither an invitation nor so much as an introduction and who then proceeded to try to pry our son from my arms by force. I didn’t hurt the crazy old bats, I simply stopped them and had them removed from the room. They were scaring Cynhafar.”

“You will allow them access to their grand-nephew and you will apologize while you’re at it.”

“And you will instruct them in the proper way to handle an infant Prince or so help me Uther you’ll regret the consequences for the rest of your hopefully short life.”

Uther stared at him with his mouth hanging wide. The dumbfounded expression didn’t sit well on his square-jawed, battle scarred face.

“Are you threatening me, boy?”

“My King”, Merlin’s mouth tightened around the title, eyes cold, “I couldn’t threaten you if I wanted to, now could I? I’m stating a fact. You tell those aunts of yours to approach the future King of Camelot with a least a modicum of restraint and the decorum due their family name. I will not have them frightening my son again by interrupting his supper and attacking him while shrieking like banshees. Is that understood? If they do not, I will not be responsible for my actions, as I wasn’t earlier.

“What do you mean ‘as you weren’t earlier’?”

“It’s rather simple, Uther. My magic saw them as a threat to my child and reacted without my direction. They are quite lucky, all things considered. This time they were merely swept out of reach of our son.”

Merlin let the implication sink in and saw Uther’s face pale ever so slightly.

“You are not to harm either of them.”

Arching a brow, Merlin stared Uther down.

“I didn’t harm them before. I simply won’t allow them to barge into my private chambers as if they have the right to do so any time they want. Nor will I allow them to fight over Cynhafar like school children over a toy. Did they mention that they both tried to snatch him from my arms while shoving the other away screeching ‘me first’ like a pair of toddlers?”

The King actually flushed at this news and cleared his throat.

“I admit they’ve…regressed a bit in their old age but they are perfectly harmless, I assure you.”

Honestly, Merlin didn’t fear the pair of harridans meant any harm, he simply was no longer the sweet, tolerant boy he’d once been. He and by extension, his son, shouldn’t have to suffer a single moment’s indignity that they didn’t have to. There were still few aspects of his life he could control but he was ferociously determined that he would create the environment in which his child grew and thrived. Even Uther was learning to let him have his way when it came to Cynhafar or Merlin would find ways to retaliate with uncomfortable results. The obliterated tower was just one incident, there had been others. Few quite as spectacular but none of them were incidents the King had any wish to repeat.

Both Uther and Merlin had finally learned that even were the King to ban one action on the Dragonlord’s part, the clever warlock would only find a new way to strike back. He only exerted himself thusly on their son’s behalf but Merlin knew that there was a fear in the back of Uther’s mind that if he pushed his consort too far in any direction now, he might unleash something he couldn’t control. There was no doubt in anyone’s mind that fatherhood had changed Merlin. The submissive, pacifistic, rather hapless boy had developed a hard edge and a ruthless streak a mile wide when it came to his child.

The King decided not to push the issue any further but he also would never allow himself to be perceived to be backing down, even when he was.

“I’ll speak with them both but when they visit again, I expect you to be courteous and allow them access to their great-nephew.”

Merlin smiled serenely, careful not to appear smug. He too knew when to push and when to hold.

“It would be my pleasure.”

The following morning a subdued pair of elderly ladies had themselves announced before entering Merlin’s inner sanctum to meet the newest addition to the Pendragon family. They approached the cradle where Cynhafar lay and cooed with suitable restraint before they each requested in turn to hold the new Prince.

Merlin allowed his natural sunny warmth to shine through and had both ladies thoroughly charmed in a matter of minutes. When Uther appeared later that afternoon it was to find the three of them having tea and discussing what the King had been like as a boy. It was clear that Uther was less than pleased to have such embarrassing tales revealed to Merlin but it was too late. By then both old women had forgotten that the sweet, charming young man cradling their newest relative to his chest in his customary silk sling was anything other than Uther’s Consort and a beloved member of the Pendragon family.

It was hard to hide the grin that tried to spread across his face at the drooping of Uther’s shoulders as he joined them and winced each time one of his aunts revealed a particularly humiliating aspect of his early life. The iron-faced King had once been a bumbling boy, just like any other. It was both amusing and terribly sad to think that such a youth had grown into the genocidal megalomaniac he’d been forced to both serve and marry. Merlin pressed a kiss to his son’s forehead and swore his child would be different, he would be like his brother, not like his father.

As ever, all thoughts led to Arthur. Uther’s initial fury over Merlin’s treatment of his aunts hadn’t been an unfamiliar sight. He’d looked much the same the day he found Arthur had slipped out from under his nose and escaped from Camelot before his plans to eliminate the threat to his crown could be carried out. The major difference between the two incidences were the consequences Merlin suffered for his actions…

Uther stalked into Merlin’s chamber and grabbed the warlock by the arm, yanking him to his feet and pulling him flush against his chest. He was breathing hard and heavy and the fetid odor of stale wine washed over Merlin’s face. Cynhafar, three months old at the time, had been asleep in his cradle beside Merlin’s bed.

“You were very specifically forbidden to warn Arthur of my plans for him, were you not?”

Merlin stared defiantly into Uther’s pale, evil eyes, adrenaline having dilated them so greatly that only a thin rim of gray had shown around the blown pupils.

“You know very well I was, my Lord.”

Uther shook him hard, as if he was a recalcitrant child.

“Then how is it he knew exactly when to slip away from Camelot? Hmph? You tell me warlock! How. Did. He. Know?”

“I imagine you weren’t overly subtle in your planning, my Lord. Despite what you might think of him, Arthur is neither oblivious nor an idiot. At least he hasn’t been either of those things for a very long time. Disinheriting him as soon as my pregnancy was revealed probably tipped him off to a certain extent. “

Uther was pale with rage as he shook Merlin harder; his voice pitched low and dangerous,

“Did you warn him? How did you do it? I forbade you to tell anyone.”

“I revealed nothing of your plans to him, Sire. You know I cannot disobey you in any way. You control my actions utterly. You have for years. How could I possibly defy a direct order from you? Tell me though, am I the only person who was privy to your plans? Perhaps someone listening at doors they shouldn’t have been…maybe one of the guards?”

Merlin had hated those guards ever since the day he’d watched them shackle, hobble and humble Arthur before dragging his battered body away half-naked to suffer in the cold and dark for weeks in the dungeons below the castle. He didn’t care that they were following orders. They should have quit their posts before laying hands on their Prince. Each of their faces was been burned as deeply into his memory as those of the councilors who’d violated him at Uther’s command. Any chance to strike at the traitorous bastards was one he’d grab onto with teeth and toes. However, his satisfaction in having outwitted Uther was too great for him to truly hide.

Hard knuckles backhanded him and he fell back on the bed with a cry. Cynhafar was shaken awake when Merlin bumped into his crib as he staggered backwards. The baby began to wail and Merlin sat up shaking his head as he tried to rise and go to his son. However, Uther was right there, blocking his way and crowding him back onto the bed. He straddled Merlin and began to strip the clothing from him.

“You told him somehow, you deceitful little cow. And you will tell me how.”

Merlin shook his head side to side.

“I told him nothing of your plans.”

“Yes, so you said.” Uther removed Merlin’s belt and began peeling his breeches away. He hadn’t touched Merlin since the baby had been born and Merlin had hoped that Uther had finally lost interest in him now that he had the child he wanted from him.

“So you told him nothing of my plans. What did you tell him?”

The words caught in Merlin’s throat as he tried to shove them back down. They clawed their way forward anyway, the compulsion Uther held over him forcing them to tumble out and spill from his unwilling tongue.

“I told him he must leave Camelot immediately and never return.”

Uther began unfastening his own breeches once Merlin was laid bare before him.

“Is that all you told him?”

“No.”

“Well? What else did you say to my son before you sent him away?”

“I told him that I love him, that I always have and that I always will.”

“I’m going to make you very, very sorry you told him any of that, my little Dragonlord.”

Merlin had become so used to Uther’s frequent violations of his body that he hardly responded anymore, however this time, the rape was seared in his memory because his baby screamed from the confines of his cradle only a few feet away as Uther meted out Merlin’s punishment for long hours, deep into the night.

After Merlin left him saying only that he should “leave Camelot, immediately” with an earnest, pleading and terribly frightened look in his eyes, Arthur knew he had very little time if he wanted to make it out of Camelot with his head still fixed to his shoulders. A trusted page was dispatched with several missives as soon as Merlin had cleared the hall outside his chambers.

He’d known this was coming, he’d known it from the moment he realized Merlin was pregnant. Uther was lining up his replacement. His disinheritance had come as only a slight surprise because he’d figured Uther would wait until the child was actually born before stripping Arthur of his title. However, it confirmed for him what that gleam of hatred he could see lurking in his father’s eyes meant. When he’d helped ease Merlin’s baby into the world, he’d known that every moment spent in Camelot from that point on was borrowed, a chance, a wager that he could get out before the jaws of Uther’s trap snapped shut on him.

Arthur had planned for this eventuality and packed most of what he’d need to take ahead of time. He wouldn’t require the elegant clothes he wore at court and since he’d been stripped of his official duties, it was easy to keep his plainer, more practical garb packed and ready to go. One change of simple clothes hung in the wardrobe beside the sumptuous garments that were fit only for the prince he no longer was. His armour was kept polished and ready; it took little time to pack. He’d honed and polished his own weapons daily, so it was only a matter of strapping them on over his hunting clothes. His sword and dagger at his waist, a skinning knife and a longer blade each found their proper place inside the long tops of his boots. He’d long since had several channels and pockets sewn into these clothes and short blades and slim, sharp poniards were hidden where only he could find them.

He took servants' passages and the hidden tunnels he’d found throughout the castle he’d explored so thoroughly as a boy. These were secret ways he was fairly sure no one but he knew of. Merlin couldn’t say and he had no way of knowing just how much time he had so he made haste. A small wooden door, well hidden by some dense shrubbery brought him within yards of his personal stables.

Uther had taken his title from him but hadn’t stripped him of any of his possessions. He had plenty of gold, mostly won in tournaments over the years, and an entire stable full of horses. He took them all. He wasn’t the only person who’d be leaving Camelot tonight and several of those poor souls possessed only their poorly shod feet for transportation. Guards were bribed to overlook the sight of their former Prince clattering out the rear gate with half a dozen saddled, riderless horses trailing behind him.

Deep in the lower town, he met with a small, ragged bunch of peasants. These were the last ones he could help, the last batch of magic-users he would be able to smuggle out of Camelot and safely away from his father. These people had only survived this long by not using their magic while Merlin’s mandatory “sweeps” were carried out over the city. The community had been warned but a few had still been caught due to an injudicious decision here and there. The rest were slowly smuggled out from under Uther’s nose and his ever growing kingdom via a system of safe-houses Arthur had begun to assemble after he'd been released from prison.

These were good people, his people, Merlin’s people and he’d done all he could to protect them from his father’s mad obsession. As he looked over the motley assemblage, he knew in his heart that he probably hadn’t reached them all. There were far too many who wouldn’t trust a man whose name was Pendragon but there was little he could do for them anymore. As of now, he was just as much a fugitive as they were. If anything, his presence might be placing them in more danger than if he left them to their own devices, but he wasn’t going to leave them behind.

He had enough horses for them, though a few of the children had to ride double. The better speed they made, the better their chances for a clean getaway. Arthur had the last of them saddled up when he was joined by Sir Leon who’d brought several horses of his own. By the time everyone who could ride unaided was mounted on a horse of their own, Sir Kai and Sir Gareth had also arrived, packed and ready to accompany their Prince into exile. There had been other knights willing to follow him, a large number of them actually. However, he’d felt it best to leave the majority behind, knowing that they’d be ready allies when he returned - because he was returning. He assured them all on this point. He would never willingly abandon Camelot. He might be forced to leave temporarily but it was just a stop-gap measure.

Merlin had assured him time and again that he was the “Once and Future King of Camelot” no matter what it looked like at the moment. It was his destiny to rule over the land of Albion and return peace, prosperity and safety to all the people of the land with Merlin by his side.

He believed in Merlin. If he said that was Arthur’s destiny, he trusted it was so. In truth while he loved his people and despised what his father had done to them. He wasn’t so interested in his future role as a fabled King but was desperately looking forward to the time when he would have Merlin by his side. Without Merlin, the rest of it was little more than hollow duty, a duty he would never shirk but one that would mean less than nothing to him without his life’s love to keep him strong.

The small, ragged band of knights and peasants rode out of the lower town under the shroud of a deeply clouded night and Arthur couldn’t help but wonder if the weather wasn’t a parting gift from Merlin, the last thing he could do to aid their escape. It would be just like him to find a way to exploit some loophole in the tightly restrictive rules Uther had bound his life with. As he led the last band of refugees north, Arthur’s mind was full of half-formed plans and schemes. He would find a way to make their destiny come to fruition. He had to; that hope was all he had left in this world.

Uther was informed when his son spoke his first word, “Dada” and took his first wobbling steps without the support of another’s hand. He was also informed when his son began to perform magic. Like Merlin, he began to move objects with his mind before he’d even spoken that first word or taken that first step. It still made him slightly uneasy to think about his own flesh and blood possessing magic but when he actually witnessed the phenomenon, well, that was an entirely different experience.

The first time he’d seen it, Cynhafar had only been five months old. Uther was discussing their son’s health and progress with his consort. The baby had been in his crib making vaguely protestant noises and grabby motions with his chubby little hands. Suddenly, a cloth toy had gone zooming through the air to land in Cynhafar’s outstretched fingers. Uther had spun around in time to see his son gurgling happily with the toy grasped firmly in his tiny fist, eyes blazing with the same unearthly gold that lit Merlin’s eyes whenever he used magic. Cynhafar’s eyes faded back to their usual deep blue and the baby gleefully slapped the cloth bunny against the bottom of his crib, the picture of utter innocence and complete normalcy.

“Did he just…he…dear gods, he…”

Uther had been speechless but Merlin had taken it in stride, strolling over to their son to pick him up and cradle Cynhafar against his chest. He’d lifted his chin defiantly before he’d spoken.

“I warned you he’d probably have magic.”

“But…he’s just a baby!”

“My mother always told me I could move objects long before I could speak.” He’d nuzzled the black hair so like his own. “Clearly our son inherited at least some of my power.”

“Some…” Uther had been unable to form anything like a coherent sentence for several long moments. He’d sunk down on a nearby chair and stared at Merlin and their son. Yes, his consort had told him that he’d been born able to perform magic but part of Uther hadn’t truly believed it though logically he’d known Merlin couldn’t lie to him. However, logic and emotion rarely agreed and somewhere on an emotional level, he’d rejected the possibility that an infant could have magic come to him as easily as breathing did to other children. Cynhafar couldn’t even walk yet but he could do magic. His little brain didn’t yet possess the power of speech but it possessed the power of sorcery.

Only when he’d lifted his head to look back at Merlin had he realized he’d been staring at the floor for gods knew how long. The bunny was dangling in the air, bouncing back and forth but Merlin’s eyes had been their usual clear, bright blue. It was his son’s eyes that had glowed and swirled with that ethereal light and made the toy twirl in the air as he’d giggled and clutched Merlin’s tunic in his small hands.

“Will he be as powerful as you are?”

Smiling gently, Merlin had shrugged his slim shoulders. It had struck Uther anew that he’d truly captured an extraordinary creature the day he’d snatched this boy out from under Arthur’s nose. Despite being a master of life and death, the wielder of a power greater than anything recorded in history and now the mother of a powerfully magical child, Merlin still hadn’t looked a day over sixteen. None of the weight Uther had piled on his shoulders had shown in the smooth lines of his face. The plump curve of his lips had remained unchanged. His wide blue eyes had been as clear as the ocean water they so resembled. His soft white skin had been as smooth and unlined as they day he’d arrived in Uther’s court. His beauty had been undimmed by all the suffering he’d been through at his King’s hands. The only thing that had changed was the expression that usually shone in those thickly fringed eyes of his. No longer wide with trust and shining with eager happiness, they had become shrewd and wary. No less beautiful but never again would they hold the innocence Uther had destroyed with his own hands.

Uther couldn’t help the smug smile that had tugged his thin lips upward. He’d preferred the cunning creature he could see peering out from those pretty blue eyes because he’d known the boy had been transformed by his actions, pressed under the heel of his boot and tempered by the fire of his will. He’d taken an idiotic child, rendered less than useless by a foolish puppy-love and had created a consort fit for any King. Yes, Merlin had still appeared sweet-faced and young but he also fairly radiated power and his once gangly form was now upright and elegant, the noble blood of his ancient lineage apparent for all to see. Uther had felt a surge of pride and triumph in that moment as he’d watched while his young son had sent the stuffed toy sailing back to his crib before curling up against Merlin’s chest with a sleepy smile. His son would be magnificent. With the strength of the Pendragon blood mingling with the ancient power of his Dragonlord heritage, Uther’s son could rule the world. It had made the King feel utterly invincible and he’d strode away from Merlin’s tower that day vibrating with the exalted feeling of immortality.

There was only one thing standing between Cynhafar and the destiny that Uther felt was clear for him now, and that was Arthur. He had his elder son legally declared a bastard (he didn’t bother to explain on what grounds) and excluded from the royal succession. However, he knew the people still loved the damned boy and considered him Uther’s true heir. Merlin had been as unsuccessful in finding Arthur for him as he had been in locating Morgana and his own mother. Arthur had to be behind all of that. His plotting went back much further than Uther was able to comprehend when he first began to suspect his son was scheming against him. First he stole Morgana away to weaken Uther, and then he tried his best to turn Camelot’s people against their King. However, he miscalculated badly when he missed claiming Merlin as part of his spoils. His foolish emotions unwittingly ruined all his plans when Uther discovered and harnessed the boy’s power for himself. Had Arthur behaved like a normal man and just bedded the child when he had the chance, Uther had no doubts he’d be rotting in the crypts below the castle at that very moment.

What was clear though was that Arthur must be in league with several renegade sorcerers or Merlin would have found him by now. It was probably his plan all along, to take Uther down with his most despised enemy, sorcery. The irony that it was also magic that protected him and provided all his own power now wasn’t lost on Uther. However, unlike whatever riff-raff Arthur had allied himself with, Uther was in complete control of the power that fueled his empire. Arthur would have to rely on the treacherous weasels he found running loose in the wilds of Albion. There was nothing more reliable than a captive Dragonlord and nothing less reliable than an unbound sorcerer. Arthur’s time was running out. He couldn’t hide forever. Sooner or later, Uther would sniff him out and destroy the last true threat to his position and the future of the Pendragon dynasty.

Chapter Text

Merlin watched as his son played in the bright sunshine of the Queen’s garden. He was just starting to toddle under his own power now and the grass was soft and cushiony under his little bottom every time he took a spill. Cynhafar had grass-stains on his tiny hands and knees but was still gamely determined to try to run after everything that caught his eye. A butterfly here, a dragonfly there, a fern leaf waving in the breeze, all were pursued with single minded attention and a stubbornness that he’d probably got in a double dose considering his parentage.

He was very proud of his son’s apparent tenacity and fearlessness, it reminded him of Arthur. Not that the child appeared anything like Arthur, or Uther for that matter. If anything, to Merlin’s eyes, Cynhafar had the look of his own mother. Everyone else examining the young Pendragon prince and saw nothing but Merlin in him. However, few of them had ever met Hunith and Merlin prayed that none of them ever would, at least not whilst Uther lived.

“He certainly seems a fearless little thing, doesn’t he?” The King’s voice boomed out from behind the Dragonlord and the unmistakable parental pride in his voice only irritated Merlin. He hated sharing his child with Uther, hated these impromptu visits to oversee their son’s progress. Merlin could see that Uther’s pride was nothing but hubris over his own prowess. There was no love for his son, just an overweening conceit for his accomplishment. He didn’t see Cynhafar as a person in his own right, only as a reflection of himself. He was living clay to be moulded in the King’s image and Merlin would be damned to forever wander the cold night beyond the veil before he’d allow that to happen.

Merlin merely nodded coolly to Uther and turned back to his son.

“It’s true, he has yet to learn caution. It will come eventually. Right now he’s too young to understand the dangers of this world. Soon enough though, he’ll learn when it’s time to be bold and when it is time to take care.”

Uther responded with his customary smug little smirk. That particular expression never failed to inspire Merlin with the desire to slap it off his face. Of course, he never did but the sight of it made his palms itch and his magic crackle beneath his skin. If it weren’t for Uther’s ownership of Merlin’s will, the man would have burned to ash a thousand times over.

“Well, let’s just hope it doesn’t take him quite as long as it took you to earn that particular knowledge. Sometimes you still act as if you’ve not yet mastered that lesson completely, my little Dragonlord.”

Hot, hard hands curled around Merlin’s shoulders from behind and he felt Uther nuzzle the side of his neck. His “training” had him tipping his head to the side to allow the man access but his skin still crawled at the King’s touch. There were teeth nipping at his earlobe and the hated voice was breathing in his ear.

“Is he ready yet?”

Those hands were wandering lower, stroking over the soft, thin fabric covering Merlin’s chest. He hated when Uther handled his nipples most of all. They were always so tender after feeding Cynhafar and had it not been for the special padded garments Gwen had cleverly designed for him to wear under his tunics, he’d be leaking milk everywhere as soon as any pressure was applied to his chest. Uther knew all this and delighted in Merlin’s discomfort, as he did in all the other discomforts he forced his Consort to endure.

“No. He is not. Not if you want to guarantee he survives infancy.”

“I’m beginning to suspect you might be stalling, Merlin.” Shoulders tensing, Merlin gritted his teeth over the pronunciation of his name that only Arthur had ever used. It didn’t belong in Uther’s mouth. “You know, if it takes much longer, I may just have to breed you again.” His hands dropped down to rub wide circles over Merlin’s flat belly. “You know…an heir and a spare? At this rate we might as well create a back-up if it’s going to be a few years before Cynhafar can be safely left without your personal protection.”

Merlin shuddered in disgust at the thought. Yes, he loved his son with all his heart but he did not want to carry and raise another son for Uther. If he ever had another child, there was only one man in Albion he wanted as its father and it certainly wasn’t the King.

“That would only prolong the period you’ll have to wait to use me in combat again, my Lord.”

He could tell Uther’s lust was up though; there wouldn’t be any escape from it today. Now it just remained to be seen if he’d receive his King’s “tribute” (as the arrogant bastard loved to call it) on his back or on his belly. He prayed for the latter, he really, really didn’t want another child from this man. If he was particularly persuasive, he might manage to take it on his knees and avoid any chance of conception altogether. It was a repugnant act but one he’d learned to live with over the years. Just one of a long list of repulsive tasks he’d been forced to perform for his master.

“Surely Gaius can look after the boy while we are gone. It would only be a few weeks if you expedite our travel.”

His hands were inside Merlin’s trousers now, his most intimate flesh in Uther’s hands. Merlin struggled to remain still, to react as little as possible to the unwanted intimacy.

“I keep telling you, Gaius knows nothing of protection and combat magic. Only the healing magics are still his to command. He’s tried but he’s too old to learn and his power is too weak to keep Cynhafar’s magic under control. Not only could someone successfully attack or abduct our son, but Cynhafar himself might accidentally burn Camelot to the ground if I’m not around.”

As if to prove Merlin’s point, a butterfly made of fire appeared in the air and started raining sparks down upon the garden as it flittered about under Cynhafar’s glowing gaze. The season had been a dry one so far and small fires began to ignite wherever the sparks landed. Merlin snuffed each with a thought. He did it slowly though, smothering each fire one by one though it was well within his capabilities to have blown them all out at once. He wanted Uther to see the destruction their child could cause if left without his father’s powers to keep him in line.

“Why is it always fire with him?” Uther asked in exasperation.

“Perhaps it’s the dragon blood. My mother said I used to start fires all the time as a child. Fair wore her to a thread trying to put them out and make me stop. Apparently I was a bit more obedient to her will, or perhaps your son is just more stubborn than I was…or more clever. She said I only did it for a few months before I began to listen to the word, ‘no’. Cynhafar will cease making a particular form of fire when I tell him to stop but he always comes up with a new one shortly thereafter.” Merlin would have probably laughed over his son’s cleverness had the King not continued to molest him as they spoke. Uther licked a line up Merlin’s neck and gave him a final squeeze before removing his hands from Merlin’s trousers.

“Go collect our son and let’s retire to my chambers awhile, it’s about naptime for him, isn’t it? I think Cynhafar needs a baby brother.”

The Druid who led the ceremony that would mark him as their ally smiled when Arthur asked for a dragon and requested that it cover his heart.

“The ritual itself provides the markings, young Pendragon, but if your intent is strong and your heart true, the magic usually answers its call.”

In the midst of shedding his clothing, as per the instructions given him for the ritual, he stopped and looked the man square in the face when he responded, “I believe they are.”

Closing and opening his eyes in a slow, serene blink, the Druid, Allasair continued to smile as he nodded simply and asked if Arthur was ready to begin. His mind full of Merlin, Arthur nodded in return and went to stand in the center of the circle several of the Druids had been creating out in the middle of a rocky clearing in the scant woods. Powders of varying hues marked out patterns on the ground in an intricate design. The colourful shapes seemed to writhe and move away from his gaze when he tried to trace them with his eyes. Small, smoky fires burned at the points of the four major ordinal directions. It took him a few moments to realize that a different scent rose from each fire. Four of the Elders stepped forward and stood between the fires. The eldest stood to the North, the youngest to the South. They started chanting as the entire camp gathered around the circle and the fragrant smoke began to drift inward against the wind, swirling slowly around Arthur.

This was it. This was the ritual which would forever bond him as an ally to his father’s most hated enemies, the Druids. The keepers of the Old Religion had welcomed him cautiously into their midst when he’d come to them with his rather ragged band of knights and magical refugees. After months on the run, traveling mostly at night and hiding from Uther’s men during the day, they’d all appeared more than a bit tattered and worn. Sirs Leon, Kai and Gareth were looking almost as bony as Merlin by the time they’d crossed the border into Cait and he doubted he appeared any better than his men. He knew the rest of his band were badly off as well and this were the first group of Druids they’d come across since arriving in the dubious haven of this barren kingdom.

They weren’t the first people they’d come across but Arthur was determined to find Druids. They were the only people he trusted not to sell him or his men out for the reward money he was sure his father must be offering for their capture. It had taken nearly three weeks to find Allasair and his group but Arthur had considered it a swift and fortuitous meeting all things considered. Even here, the practitioners of the Old Religion were secretive and difficult to find. Luck and-according to Allasair-destiny, had been on their side. Apparently there really were many things written about Arthur and his destiny as the “Once and Future King”. This meeting was no accident; these Druids had been waiting for him.

As Arthur stood naked in the center of a magical circle, surrounded by chanting warlocks and all the curious Druids of the tribe, he found that he wasn’t uncomfortable in the least. Instead, strangely enough, he felt that in some way he’d finally come home to his people, his real people. He would always love all the subjects of the kingdom of his forefathers but at that moment, he felt at one with these men and women in a way he never had with anyone from his native Camelot. Only Merlin had ever made him feel this comfortable in his own skin. Maybe it was true, maybe despite not possessing any magic of his own, in some way, he was magic, just as Merlin had claimed. How else could individuals so steeped in the Old Religion make him feel so renewed? So connected to himself and the world around him?

The chanting changed cadence and Arthur remembered Allasair’s instructions to empty his mind and allow it to be filled by the spirit of the Old Religion. Having been taught meditation as part of his warrior’s training, Arthur took a deep breath and cleared his thoughts. He closed his eyes and the chanting faded from his consciousness. Then the scented smoke filling his nostrils melted away to nothing and suddenly his mind bloomed with sensation. However, instead of some nebulous, nameless spirit, his consciousness was filled with…Merlin. He saw Merlin’s face, inhaled his scent, felt his soft skin beneath his fingertips, tasted the warlock’s sweet spice on his tongue and finally heard that beloved, husky voice fill his mind.

Arthur, finally, you’ve accepted your destiny, our destiny. We are two halves of the same whole and nothing can sunder you from me nor I from you. Know that neither time nor distance can diminish our connection for we were created together though born apart. The whole world has been waiting for our arrival since the Dawn of Time. We have been moving forward toward this time, our time, since the moment we met. The Chief Dragon and the Dragon Lord were always fated to complete and complement each other. You must defeat the Twisted Chief who has usurped your rightful place and almost destroyed the balance of the land, a balance which you must restore. If you do not, then Albion will forever dwell in darkness. Like a disease, that darkness will spread and the stability of the world beyond Albion will eventually shatter and chaos will consume the earth. He has worked tirelessly against your destiny since the moment of your birth. You must free the enslaved half of our soul from the Corrupter not only for our sake but for the sake of the entire world.

A searing pain blazed up both his arms and flashed across the left side of his chest, wrapping around his ribs like the coil and snap of a whip. Shocked by the unexpected sensation, Arthur was about to open his eyes when Merlin’s voice spoke to him once again.

I am your heart and you are my strength. Let your body show this to the world and all will know your heart is true and your conviction enduring. Believe and it will be.

Suddenly Merlin was gone and Arthur was surrounded once again by chanting Druids and fragrant incense. He opened his eyes and staggered slightly as though settling back into his own body. The rhythmic drone of the Druids slowed and came to a graceful end as Arthur stared down at his body. Dark, unfamiliar symbols trailed down both arms and deep blue bands circled his left arm above and below the elbow. A dragon did cover his heart, its tail wrapping around his ribs. As he moved, the scales flashed red to gold and silver to blue. There would be no doubt in the minds of any who saw it that it was the sigil of a powerful magic.

It was done. The success of the ceremony proved these were his people, Merlin’s people, for why else would the avatar of the Old Religion take the form of his beloved if not to bless their destiny? His heart was branded just as surely as his skin was marked. For better or for worse, his destiny was now an undeniable display for all the world to see.

Ever since Cynhafar had been born, Merlin had found that his magic was growing increasingly independent, as the days passed. It wasn’t anything he had conscious control over but it also wasn’t anything he was unhappy about. It had started when he’d blown the tower down in a fit of rage. He hadn’t intended to do any such thing. It was as if his magic, frustrated by years of restrictive control had burst forth in retaliation. Though no one had ever been harmed by any of the magical outbursts, they seemed to alarm the King quite a bit.

Merlin tended to think of it as his magic acting of its own accord rather than his own subconscious directing the power but however one looked at it, his magic had started to become a bit unpredictable when his emotions ran high. He’d told Uther it was partly his own fault since he’d long since directed Merlin to protect himself (and by extension their child) from harm by whatever means necessary. Sometimes his magic perceived an attack when his rational mind did not. Uther had reasserted that he was the only one to be exempted from such retaliatory strikes and Merlin had reminded him with a sunny smile and a slightly malicious sparkle in his eye that none of the…incidents, had had any harmful effects upon the King personally. Conceding the point, Uther had still looked spooked. After that conversation, he backed off a bit. He put less pressure on Merlin to act as a weapon and he kept his interference in their son’s upbringing to a minimum.

For now, he was allowing Merlin to dictate the environment in which Cynhafar spent his days. Merlin had no doubt that as their son grew, Uther would insist on becoming more involved, would issue more edicts and try to wrest control away from his consort. However, while Cynhafar was still too small to put to martial training, he was safe from Uther’s influence.

Even as their son grew, it would be far more important for him to learn to control his powers and only Merlin could teach him that. He didn’t want Cynhafar to suffer the way he had as a child, keeping everything secret, hidden, alternately praised and shamed for his gifts. There had been no one to help him learn to harness his powers and keep them from harming others. He’d been lucky enough to grow up in a tiny village where there were fewer opportunities for causing the kind of mayhem his developing powers might have caused had he lived in such a large, crowded city as Camelot. As it was, he winced every time he thought of the way he’d almost crushed old Master Simmons while downing a tree with his magic. Luckily he’d been able to shift the tree in time and the crusty old goat had been too focused on the tree falling straight at him to notice the gold flashing in Merlin’s eyes as he’d nudged the tree just a bit to the right.

It wasn’t just the potential to inadvertently harm those around him that made life difficult for him as a child; it was the sense of isolation. It’s a rare child indeed who wants to stand out from the crowd and even those children who crave attention want to be noted as something special, something admirable. No child is comfortable in their own skin when that very skin makes them a freak. All his life he’d been made to hide what he was and no amount of reassurance from his mother had comforted him. She told him he was special but at the same time he had to hide what he was because others would hate him for it. Being “special” scared other people so much that he could even be killed just for being what he was.

Uther was hypocritical enough to keep a magical consort and child while killing off anyone else who possessed such gifts. Cynhafar would no doubt be confused by what made him different from all the others who died by his own father’s hand whilst he was allowed to live. He would be given lessons and libraries full of books, taught to use his gifts for King and country while any other child would be drowned or beheaded for even daring to own one such book or use the most innocuous of spells. Merlin saw so many obstacles ahead it made his head spin.

As they so often did, his thoughts turned to Arthur. Would Arthur come back for him? Could he? He’d promised to find a way to free Merlin and he believed with all his heart that Arthur would find the means or die trying. But…how long would it be before he managed the feat? He knew that he and Arthur were destined to be together. That Arthur would one day rule a just land blanketed in peace and thriving with abundance but he didn’t know when their destiny would be fulfilled. Would Cynhafar already be a man by then?

He didn’t lose hope, he never would, but time was something he had no faith in. Kilgharrah had waited for more than twenty years to be freed. Would it take that long for Merlin to be rid of his shackles as well?

Practically speaking, he doubted it. Uther was itching to bring the last free kingdom in Albion under his banner. He’d wait no more than a few years before he hauled Merlin north and forced him to subdue the people of Cait, even if it meant destroying every man, woman, and child who dared to defy him. He’d lay waste to the place before he’d allow it to remain free. Merlin had seen him do it before or rather Merlin had been forced by Uther to do it before.

The people Merlin had been forced to decimate were of the Dál Riata, who inhabited a small island, and refused to yield to Uther's demands. A proud people, they had refused to bow before him and had adamantly refused to give up their wise-men and women (as the magically gifted folk of that place were called). Even after Merlin had begun reducing the island to cinders, they had fled but refused to take the knee before Uther’s tyranny. By the time Merlin had been permitted to cease the destruction, there was nothing left of the island but a smoking field of ash. The fires had burned with such heat they scorched even the earth itself down to the bedrock. It would likely be centuries before that place could again sustain any form of life; in reality, it might never recover.

Merlin suspected that Cait would not go down quite as easily as those Dál Riata had but in the end he’d be forced to destroy them as well, unless Arthur found a way to stop it from happening. He prayed to any gods that might be listening that Arthur had found what he needed in the north and was coming for Merlin. He prayed Arthur would come for him before he was forced to go after Arthur. Uther was cruel enough to do it, to force Merlin to hunt down and destroy the man he loved which would destroy Merlin in the process. His body would likely survive but he’d be nothing more than a living ghost without the other half of his soul. Arthur was what made him whole. He’d not comprehended what Kilgharrah had meant all those years ago when he’d told Merlin that he was the half that made Arthur whole. He understood all too well now.

His faith in Arthur was all that kept him going. In the darkest of his days following Uther’s vicious attack and his subsequent enslavement, it was only learning that he and Arthur loved each other with the same intensity which kept his mind together. Arthur had vowed to free him. Arthur had never failed in a promise before and Merlin knew he’d die before he’d allow himself to fail to fulfill that one. However, if Arthur died, Merlin would lose his reason for living. Much as he loved his son, without Arthur, there would be no Merlin. Should Uther force him to kill Arthur, Cynhafar would lose his maternal father for Merlin knew there would be nothing left of him.

Arthur stood for a moment, attempting to find his bearings after the intensity of the experience he had just undergone. There was no doubt the ceremony was over though the fires continued to burn, their sweet smoke still scenting the air. The Druid elders breached the circle and approached him, all of them managing to smile while still looking solemn. It was a serene, regal expression and one a corner of his mind took note of for future reference. Some part of his mind, still somehow capable of mischief, recognized that such a look, directed at Merlin in just the right circumstances would drive his other half right up the nearest wall.

Incapable of copying their solemnity, Arthur grinned in open delight at the three men and one woman before him. The lady’s eyes sparkled back at him though her facial expression remained unchanged.

“It was Merlin! He came to me and assured me that our destiny remains unchanged.” The smile faded from his face as he remembered the rest of the message. “Though he told me that it’s not just the fate of Albion that depends on my stopping Uther, he said it will effect the entire world if he isn’t destroyed.”

The Druids appeared unsurprised, their facial expressions remaining unchanged.

“Emrys was correct. You cannot destroy all the magically gifted creatures in an entire portion of the earth and expect the rest of the world to remain untainted. The earth itself has need of the practitioners of magic both great and small.“

Shaking his head, brow furrowed and mouth pinched, Arthur was confused.

“I don’t understand. Why would nature be affected by a loss of those who sap its energy?”

Allasair leaned forward, for once his face had lost its usual serene appearance. Whatever information he was about to impart was important; very important judging by the intent look upon his face.

“Once again, young Pendragon, it is about balance. I’ve told you that magic is present in everything around you. What you must understand is that everything that lives also produces magic. Like clouds and rain. Water warms to mist and rises to the sky where it cools and gathers into clouds. Then, in turn, the clouds release the water and return it to the earth.

Magic works much the same way. The magic produced all around us collects and builds and needs to be released. The creatures of magic and the people who have the gift to use and direct magical energy act like those clouds. They gather up the excess magic and release it in the form of spells and enchantments. Did you never wonder why there were still Druids who stayed in Camelot even though Uther hunted us like animals?”

Arthur nodded slowly.

“Yes, I always did wonder why you stayed. I just assumed you were attached to the land in some sentimental or religious fashion, that you felt some sort of bond that was strong enough to overcome your fear of my father’s persecution.”

“You have good instincts, young Pendragon for you were very close to the truth. We stayed because we did feel a bond to the land but it wasn’t sentiment or religion, it was responsibility. You see, someone must siphon off the magic that is constantly being produced by nature or it will build to the point where it becomes confined and begins to pressurize. With no escape, it will seep back into the earth and begin to poison it. We stayed to protect the land from an oversaturation of magic. We were mostly successful in this venture because we avoided your father’s notice at all costs. Dwelling in the wild places and rarely venturing into the areas settled by Camelot’s subjects kept us from his sight.

Then your father captured Emrys and began to use him against us. We know of Emrys, a few of us have even met him, spoken with him once or twice. We’ve had enough contact to know that your Merlin is our Emrys. We have seen that his heart is pure and we know that he is forced by his enslavement to wield his magic against us. Each time he was made to do so, it sickened him but he could not disobey. And though we knew where his heart lay, we could not stand against him. Emrys is far too powerful and Uther is utterly ruthless in his use of that power. So, the King finally managed to drive us from the land. We would have been slaughtered had we stayed and dead men are of no use to anyone. “

He paused for several moments to allow Arthur to absorb and contemplate his words, then he continued with his lesson. Because, even though it was couched in the comfortable terms of conversation, Arthur was in no doubt that he was being schooled.

“Your father has destroyed all the beings of a magical nature that he could find, making no distinction between benevolent and malevolent magical beings. Now, by using Emrys to do it, he’s finally managed to purge the land of all the people capable of directing and using all the magic that the natural world is constantly generating. Worse than that, since acquiring Emrys, he has expanded the scope of his influence to encompass all of Albion save this tiny stretch of sand and rock at the top of the world.

With no one left to siphon off the energy constantly being produced by the land, it has begun to build to toxic levels. Albion is literally being poisoned by magic. And it is no longer simply Albion. The blight is beginning to spread to the closest lands across the sea. Soon it will spread from there and encompass the entire world. However, you can put a stop to the damage and Emrys can repair it. He will have help in doing so but even if he did not, he has enough power of his own that he could accomplish the task unaided were he not shackled so tightly by Uther.”

Arthur slumped a bit. Merlin would have help. Did that mean that hewould not? He was the one who had to “put a stop to it” but how was he to accomplish the seemingly impossible task? Was he expected to end Uther’s tyranny all on his own? The concept was more than just a bit daunting. The entire reason he had come to Cait was the hope of mustering allies for the fight against his father. Had he simply aimed to save his own life he’d have boarded a ship and crossed the sea to the lands of the Dál Riata and hidden there until his father died. Shaking his head he straightened his shoulders. Even if he had to do this alone, he would. Even if the fate of the world didn’t depend on it, he would not abandon Merlin. He had already suffered unspeakably at Uther’s hand and Arthur vowed that he would free his Dragonlord or die in the attempt.

As if reading his thoughts (and for all he knew, they were) the solemn smiles on the faces of the Druids watching him gentled into something more genuine. It was the woman, she who’d stood at the Southern point of the circle, who reassured him.

“You will have assistance as well, young Pendragon. Your father has been busy making many enemies while you have been busy making friends. Your efforts to save those persecuted by Uther’s madness have not gone unnoticed nor will they be forgotten. You will find the allies you seek among both his enemies and your friends.”

Allasair spoke then.

“You’ve taken the first steps tonight, my friend, for you may now count the Druids among your friends. We shall aid you in your campaign against the darkness that threatens us all.”

There had been a general shout of agreement from everyone around them and it seemed to be the signal to begin celebrating. Arthur was pleasantly surprised to find that the formerly solemn and serious Druid-folk were truly capable of letting their hair down, so-to-speak, and a raucous revelry lasted long into the night. Arthur woke the following morning with a hangover, a new resolve and the support of a new fellowship. He had both accepted and been accepted as kin by these people and for the moment, it seemed he’d made a new place for himself in the world.

“You really think this is going to help, Gaius?”

Merlin looked dubious as he stared at the small cone-shaped wax plug in his hand. He was seriously doubtful but at this point he was willing to do just about anything to avoid conceiving another of Uther’s children.

“He didn’t forbid you to try to prevent a conception did he?”

Merlin’s skeptical expression turned sly.

“He forbade me to use my magic to prevent a pregnancy. He never said a thing about using mundane methods.”

“Well you just be sure you get that plug in high enough that he doesn’t discover it or it will mean my head.”

“My fingers are longer than his cock is. He’ll never notice a thing.”

Gaius nearly choked at such a blunt statement. He clearly tried not to laugh but it seemed the expression Merlin put on for his benefit proved too much and the elderly man guffawed quite loudly. Merlin grinned in response. His grin disappeared when Gaius produced a slim, smooth rod with a gently rounded end.

“Just in case you’re overestimating your abilities, use this to be sure it’s in as deep as you can push it.”

He took the rod from Gaius even more gingerly than he had taken the wax plug. Raising an eyebrow at his mentor he drawled, “You cannot be serious, Gaius. You want me to shove this up there as well?”

”Of course I’m serious, Merlin.” Gaius raised an eyebrow in return. “You don’t leave the rod in there, you idiot. It’s an applicator not a sex toy!”

Cheeks flushed, Merlin pursed his lips in annoyance before answering.

“Yes Gaius, I am aware of that. What I’d like to know is, once I use the applicator, how am I supposed to get this thing back out of me?”

“You don’t. Your body’s natural humours will cause the plug to shrink over time and it will slip out on its own and you’ll need to replace it with a new one. I’d say that will probably be every five or six weeks.”

“I see, and what if it decides to ‘slip out’ while Uther is up close and personal?”

“Then I’d say you’ll be in for a world of trouble my boy. Only you can decide if it’s worth the risk. I can’t think of anything else to keep you from conceiving whilst he’s so determined to get you with child again. With women there are cycles that dictate the relative level of fertility at a given time and the associated risks with engaging in sexual activities during those various periods of time. However, from what I can determine about you, my boy, it seems you are fertile all the time. There are no cycles and safe times. If the King manages to hit the proper target, you’re likely to be pregnant immediately. Normally, a Dragonlord could control his fertility with his innate abilities but since you don’t have control over any of your abilities, you’ve no such recourse.”

They both looked down at the contrivance Gaius had managed to devise on short notice and Merlin had to concede that the risk of being caught was outweighed by the benefit of not having to bear another child for the sick bastard who owned his life. If Gaius was willing to gamble this dangerously for his sake then Merlin was prepared to risk it as well. The odds of Uther actually being inside Merlin when the plug loosened and slid out were slim but real. It wasn’t as if Merlin wasn’t used to playing dangerous games with the risk of deadly consequences, he’d been doing it since the moment of his arrival in Camelot. Gaius had been playing alongside each and every step of the way. This latest subterfuge wasn’t so very different from the days before his supernatural biology and sorcerous powers had been discovered.

“Alright. How do I make sure I’ve got it in the right tract?”

Gaius grimaced slightly.

“I gather that you haven’t gone….exploring? I mean, you haven’t examined yourself much since discovering your dual internal anatomy?”

Merlin shook his head most emphatically. Grimacing with his lips pinched in disgust he replied,

“No. Uther is the one who does all the exploring. Do you think I could stand to touch myself like that after everything he does?”

Gaius winced but visibly softened.

“Then I’m afraid that’s going to be yet another uncomfortable lesson I need to teach you. Trousers off and lay back on the table. I’m going to have to guide your fingers. We’ll make this as quick as possible, my boy, I don’t like it any more than you do.”

When Gaius had demonstrated what Merlin needed to do, guiding his hands to learn the correct angles to work at and his body to posture in the right position, he had Merlin insert the first plug himself and then examined him to be sure he’d done everything correctly. As predicted, it was an uncomfortable lesson for both of them.

“Alright, my boy, you’ve got it. You must ensure you do it the exact same way each time. Is that clear?”

Merlin rolled his eyes, feeling like he was fifteen again and being cautioned to not get caught using magic.

“Yes Gaius, I am quite well aware of what will happen if I do not. I’m not a child anymore, I understand what’s at stake here.”

Mouth pinching to once side, Gaius’s retort was clipped and snide but his eyes were sad.

“I’ll make up a supply of these for you. I’d advise you to keep them well hidden. Make certain they are someplace Uther won’t even think to look. Perhaps you should conceal them among Cynhafar’s changing cloths? You know you can trust Gwen to keep what she knows behind her teeth. You’ve gotten much better at evasions my boy but you are still unable to lie outright to the King.”

Merlin snorted. Oh yes, he’d become quite adept at evasion and even outright deception over the years, he’d had no choice. Then again, he supposed, strictly speaking, there had been a choice. He could have just crumbled, allowed himself to fall away and become the mindless tool Uther would probably have liked him to become. However, for all that he’d once been naïve and foolish, he’d never been spineless. He had a destiny to fulfill and no matter how bleak things looked, he’d never give up hoping it could still come to pass. He kept his faith in the promises Kilgharrah had made him, that he’d made to Arthur and most especially to the ones made to him by Arthur.

He had little recourse when given a direct order by the King but over the years, he’d become a master at ferreting out the loopholes Uther left in the commands he gave. Merlin was careful in how he exploited those loopholes because while Uther wasn’t the greatest mind of his generation, he certainly wasn’t a stupid man by any means. He might be blinkered, hateful, power-hungry and megalomaniacal, but he was not stupid. Merlin simply exploited the blind spots created by the man’s character flaws to thwart Uther whenever an opportunity to do so presented itself. They were tiny victories in the grand scheme of things but they helped Merlin keep his despair at bay. Each small win helped him hold his sense of self together and reinforced his faith that one day, Uther could be defeated and all of Albion freed from his cruelty.

Thanking Gaius,.Merlin returned to the nursery used only when he had to be away from his child. There, one of the only two people Merlin trusted enough (and who were brave enough) was looking after Cynhafar. Gwen smiled in relief when he entered and Merlin could smell the tang of oily smoke in the air. He glanced around looking for new scorch marks in the sparsely furnished stone chamber and noticed that a newly replaced table was nothing more than a pile of ash with several pieces of broken crockery scattered among the ruins.

“I’m just glad he doesn’t have your ability to set stone aflame, Merlin!” She sounded cheerful but he could see the slight pinch between her brows and the tired slump to her shoulders as she sat near the small cot his son only used when Merlin was otherwise occupied. Usually Cynhafar slept with Merlin or in a sumptuous little cot set up in the King’s chambers. Merlin rarely let the boy out of his sight and then only with either Gwen or Gaius to look after him.

“Oh, that will probably come to him in time.” His remark was casual and matter of fact and for a moment Gwen looked seriously alarmed but then she must have detected the mischievous sparkle in Merlin’s eyes and she stood up and tried to lightly smack him on the shoulder. Naturally, her hand was stopped several inches from his person but she got her message across.

“Don’t do that to me!” She exclaimed, “He’s getting harder and harder to deal with as he sleeps less and runs around more. The last thing I need to worry about is him literally burning the castle to the ground. I’d quit, I swear to you Merlin, I will quit as his nursemaid if he ever sets fire to a single rock!”

Merlin grinned at her and for a moment he felt lighter as he teased his friend. The woman had become the sister he’d never had.

“Quit the cushiest job in the palace? I mean really Gwen, it’s not like you don’t get paid extra for the hazards inherent in the job and how often do you actually have to look after him? A few hours here and there? One tiny little flaming rock and you’d give all this up?”

He gestured around the barren room as if it were the most sumptuously appointed chamber in the palace instead of a half-empty safety zone designed to contain the frequent fires the infant Prince was constantly setting.

“In an instant, my Lord,” she drawled without missing a beat. The title was used mockingly and Merlin was proud that at least he’d managed to wear away the deference she’d first tried on him after Uther had made him his consort. When he’d officially named her as the Prince’s nursemaid, she’d once again tried to treat him like a noble (she argued that he was now her employer ) and he’d resolutely refused to accept it from her. Uther had insisted that a prince had to have a nursemaid as a matter of form. He was allowing Merlin to raise their son personally (and really, once Cynhafar had started showing signs of being powerfully magical, he saw the sense in Merlin’s insistence) but he was determined that all the formalities would still be observed.

As far as Merlin was concerned, Gwen was the only person for the job. Since Morgana had disappeared, she’d more or less been doing odd jobs around the castle, filling in as a laundress, kitchen scullion, and chambermaid. She also ran errands for Gaius and occasionally acted as a maidservant for the visiting nobility that arrived in Camelot without their own servants. She never complained but he knew she missed both Morgana and the stability of a regular position. He couldn’t do anything about the former but when Uther had demanded he find a nursery maid for the Prince, he knew he could finally remedy the latter problem.

As Gaius’s sometime-assistant, she had been granted permission to lay hands on Merlin if he required medical treatment but other than that, she too was banned from touching Uther’s consort. The man’s memory was long and he hadn’t forgotten that at one time, everyone in the palace had thought Merlin desperately in love with Gwen. In this rare moment of relaxation, Merlin reflected how nice it would have been if he could have received a hug or even a comforting hand to the shoulder from his oldest friend in Camelot. But no, Uther was so insanely possessive that no one was permitted to touch his prize, his most valuable commodity. Merlin was under no illusions that Uther saw him in any other terms. He was a thing, a piece of property, a weapon against Uther’s enemies, an invincible bodyguard for both he and his offspring, a broodmare for the Pendragon dynasty and his own personal sex toy. A sex-toy that he was convinced was universally coveted by all who looked on it. This delusional paranoia was both a source of deep amusement for Merlin and the cause of his crushing sense of isolation. He was touch starved and he knew it. The only hands to hold and caress him made his skin crawl. Until Cynhafar was born, he’d been completely denied the warmth of any welcome tactile comfort.

He tried not to smother his son but he couldn’t help but want the boy with him all the time. He let Uther think the need to have Cynhafar with him was born purely of protective instincts but it was as much for his own comfort as it was for his son’s safety. Thankfully, his baby was still young enough not to mind Merlin’s clinginess and his uncontrolled magical abilities were enough to justify his constant hovering. Gwen seemed to understand and though her eyes often looked worried when he cuddled and snuggled his baby, the worry was always softened with obvious affection for both father and son.
Cynhafar certainly didn’t seem to mind. He reached for Merlin as often as Merlin reached for him. He reached for Gwen and Gaius as well but never for Uther. However, the King didn’t seem to find anything amiss in the situation and Merlin found it both amusing and reassuring that his son seemed to instinctively discern who genuinely cared for him and who did not.

He’d only been about three months old when Arthur had fled Camelot but he’d shown a decided preference for his big brother. The affection was mutual. Arthur had been so good with Cynhafar that it made Merlin ache. It should have been him. Arthur should have been his baby’s father, not his brother. It was clear to Merlin that Arthur would be an excellent father, proving yet again just how different he was from his own father.

As they often did, his eyes subconsciously sought out the window as he thought of Arthur. Gwen was used to the way he’d fall into these pensive moods and sat quietly beside him, seemingly content to just be there for Merlin and his son. As it was positioned adjacent to the King’s chambers, the view from the nursery showed him nothing but the courtyard but he wasn’t really seeing the landscape in front of him. Instead his mind’s eye conjured images of Arthur, far away and safely hidden from his father’s henchmen. Visions of Arthur gathering an army of allies, of him making plans, of him finding a way to free Albion from the terror and tyranny of his father’s rule dominated his musings. And always, always there was a prayer to whatever gods might care to keep Arthur safe and to someday bring him back to Merlin.

As he tied back the heavy canvas flap that acted as a door to his quarters, Arthur contemplated the early morning view before him. Life in a Druid encampment wasn’t an entirely alien experience. It shared many aspects in common with life on campaign. He had a folding cot in a simple tent, a small portable lamp perched on a collapsible table next to the cot, and a coal brazier to keep the northern chill at bay. True, the blankets on the cot were worn and rough but they were still a warm and heavy comfort. And if the rug that covered much of the floor was of braided rags rather than finely woven silk and wool, well, it was actually softer under his feet than the richer alternative. His own trunk of carved golden-oak sat in the corner holding most of his belongings, the bulging leather saddle bags beside it held the rest.

No, his living quarters weren’t wholly unfamiliar, nor was the food on offer. Standard camp fare, porridge and salt pork for breakfast, dried meat and flatbreads for midday and usually some kind of pottage or stew for supper, it was perfectly adequate nourishment, if a bit tasteless and boring. The only variation came when Arthur or another of the willing hunters with the group managed to bring down some of the game that was so scarce in this part of the world. Fish were also welcome additions and Arthur finally mastered the technique for spearing the swift moving creatures that Merlin had attempted to teach him so many years ago.

Shirtless, he lightly stroked the faintly raised edges of the Druidic symbols that now marked his left arm and as ever, thought of Merlin.

So many things Merlin had tried to teach him, so many truths he’d tried to tell him and so many times Arthur had laughed in his face or dismissed him with a haughty sniff. The fishing lessons had outwardly amused him but inwardly amazed him. Merlin was so clumsy with a sword, it had come as a shock to see how gracefully he handled the long, sharpened stake as he straddled a fast flowing stream. Each foot balanced precariously on a slick river rock as the water rushed between his legs, his arm held sure and steady. His aim was true more often than not; when the time came, its movement was swift as a striking snake. He had wondered how Merlin could perform such an athletic feat so well when he could barely keep his feet beneath him and his arm moving when given a proper weapon.

He ached and it had nothing to do with the chill that stiffened his exposed flesh. His small tent was missing something vital. There was no bedroll on the floor beside his cot. No clumsy, loyal Merlin sleeping on the ground beside his own raised bed. From the time he’d become Arthur’s servant, Merlin had accompanied him on every campaign, every patrol and every single one of even the simplest overnight trips. It didn’t matter if he left to hunt, to fish or to simply escape the pressures of the coronet that clamped round his head like a vise, Merlin was always there. For more than two years, Merlin had stuck close to Arthur’s side whenever he was away from Camelot’s sheltering walls. It made no difference that for the better part of twenty years, Arthur hadn’t ever shared a tent with anyone else. Once Merlin had made that place for himself, it was as if he’d always occupied it. It didn’t matter that Merlin had been gone from his side longer than he’d actually been there. The empty space still pained him like an amputated limb, the severed nerves forever raw, forever reaching out for what had been sundered from them.

Cynhafar would be talking and walking by now. It hurt to have missed those milestones. He knew that the child was technically his brother but from the moment he held him, Merlin’s baby had felt like his own. He wanted to be that boy’s father so badly it was a physical pain in his heart. He worried for the child almost as much as he worried for Merlin. Before he’d been forced to leave, he’d seen the golden glimmers beginning to show in the depths of the cornflower-blue of the boy’s eyes. He supposed it was inevitable that any child of so powerful a warlock as Merlin would have some magic. He just feared what his father would do when it became impossible for Merlin to conceal it from him.

Then again, considering the hypocritical delight he took in Merlin’s magic, perhaps he would welcome a son with magic of his own. After all, Cynhafar was a Pendragon and as such, he’d be Uther’s to manipulate and control. Arthur shook his head in negation. He’d not allow Cynhafar to be brainwashed as he was. He’d not allow Merlin’s child to grow up so desperate for his father’s approval that he would turn his back on every decent moral impulse he’d inherit from his maternal parent. He’d not allow Uther to do to his brother what he’d done to Arthur. Nor would he allow Merlin to sit by helplessly and suffer that to happen to his son. It was past time to rescue his family from the warped creature that held them captive.

Arthur crossed his arms over his belly, mindful of the tender skin across his chest and ribs. The dragon that now coiled around the flesh there had its claws raised though Arthur wasn’t sure if they were meant to strike or to defend. Perhaps they were meant to do both as it was now up to him to do the same. He glanced down at the dragon and found comfort in the dual nature of the symbol. He was a Pendragon, a Chief Dragon. Merlin, the other half of his soul, was a Dragonlord. He remembered how the vision-Merlin had called his father the “Twisted Chief” and he contemplated the appropriateness of the sobriquet.

Uther was twisted, in both mind and spirit and most importantly, in purpose. If the Pendragon was supposed to be the Chief Dragon then it followed that he should be led by the Dragonlord, not the other way around. According to the Druids, this was how his family had come to be so named. Just a few generations ago, the House of Pendragon was the sworn ally and staunchest supporter of the Dragonlords. They had been raised from obscurity by their devotion and loyal service to the men who shared blood-kinship to the majestic, magical creatures.

Despite all their power, very few Dragonlords had ever sought to rule over anyone. For untold generations, farther back than even the Druids had recorded, they had sought harmony with nature and balance with the Old Religion. Some lived as the Druids did, adopting a semi-nomadic lifestyle at one with the earth and its magic. Others lived as simple men of simple means and still others lived as respected nobles, revered for their powers and their ancient lineage. However, over the course of countless millennia, none but a handful had ever sought to become Kings or rulers of men. Leaders? Yes. Rulers? Rarely. Then among those few who sought to use their given powers for their own gain were usually reined in by their kin. Only those who gained their thrones through peaceful or righteous means were left alone by their brethren to rule in peace. It was actually far more common for a Dragonlord to serve a King than to become one in his own right.

This was how it had been for thousands of years. The Dragonlords existed in harmony with the dragons and were well respected for their power and the just way they wielded it. Arthur’s ancestors had sworn loyalty and service to these noble men and had upheld those vows through generation after generation. They weren’t the only people to so serve but they had managed to distinguish themselves with particularly outstanding loyalty and staunch devotion. Thus, they had earned their place as “Chief Dragons”. They were the human counterparts to the magical creatures who also served their benevolent lords.

He spent most of his time with Allasair and Sulwen, the sorceress who’d participated in the ritual that had made Arthur one of them. As far as the Druids were concerned, Arthur was kin. From his new brothers and sisters, Arthur learned the true history of his own family and once again felt proud to bear the name he did and know that the blood that coursed through his veins was untainted. His father may have betrayed their lineage; however, Uther was but a single aberration. One that Arthur would gladly put an end to, redirecting the Pendragons from that errant course and restoring them to their proper place in world’s order. Albion might one day call him King but he knew in his heart that, as a dragon, he would serve his Dragonlord. Albion might serve him but he would always serve Merlin.

Arthur was fascinated by the tales told to him nightly by his new fellowship. The only Dragonlords he’d ever known were Merlin and his father, Balinor. Merlin’s father had lived his life as a hermit, hiding from the world in a cave concealed within a forest that had scarcely felt the touch of man. He’d knowingly healed the son of the man who’d destroyed his life and had agreed, albeit reluctantly, to return to the place that was the source of his misery to aid a city full of people who would have been happy to see the last of the fabled Dragonlords dead only days before. Yes, the man was angry and bitter but he’d certainly had more than enough reason to be and yet, he’d answered their desperate plea anyway. Merlin had told him that Balinor hadn’t yet known that Merlin was his son when he’d caught up with them in order to journey back to Camelot. He hadn’t agreed to save Uther’s city from the depredations of an angry dragon because his only child had asked it of him. Merlin had confessed that he’d only informed Balinor that he was his son after his father had already agreed to help. That Balinor had died to protect the son he’d only just learned existed said as much as anything else did about the intrinsic nobility of the man.

Then there was Merlin. A Dragonlord and the most powerful warlock the world had ever known, who’d come to Camelot in rags and served an arse of a Prince with sunny cheer and such a lack of guile that he’d appeared nothing more than a simple-minded fool to most people. Of course, he was no such thing; he’d just been young, sweet, humble and unspoiled. He’d been happy to unknowingly follow in his ancestor’s footprints by serving royalty when he could so easily have wiped them all from the face of the earth and claimed their worldly power for himself. Informed of a destiny where he would always play a supporting role, he’d never once craved the power and glory for himself. The only ambition he’d held was for Arthur to someday see him for what he truly was and acknowledge, if only in private, that Merlin had risked his life and sacrificed his dignity time after time to keep Arthur safe and happy. In return he’d lived in the shadows, repeatedly slighted and often reviled, mocked and humiliated in countless ways by a man who couldn’t admit to his true feelings until it was far, far too late.

Even then, Merlin hadn’t blamed him for anything. Instead he’d kept his faith in Arthur and withstood all the tortures of the damned with a spirit bent but not broken. He no longer suffered with a smile but he endured the unendurable with hope and an unwavering belief in Arthur. He still looked forward to a life where he would always play only a side role. He still longed only to help Arthur achieve glory and sought for himself only a quiet place at his King’s side, at Arthur’s side. Heart clenching, Arthur knew he wasn’t worthy of that level of trust and faith. He’d stood by and done nothing to alleviate Merlin’s suffering at Uther’s hand. However, he was going to. He would not fail Merlin again while there was breath in his body.

Allasair had smiled when Arthur had spoken of Merlin, or Emrys as they all called him. The Druid told him how fortunate they considered him to be, to have known the last two Dragonlords in existence. They were unsurprised by the gentle, humble nature of both men, said that they were typical of their race, typical of those who lived in harmony with the Old Religion. Emrys in particular, didn’t just harmonize with the Old Religion, he was a living embodiment of it.

His coming had been foretold for as long as the Druids had existed. In this blighted land, Emrys contained all that had been taken from it before his birth. No matter what man did, the Old Religion enforced a balance to be maintained in the world. Uther had sought to destroy magic but the task was impossible. The Old Religion wasn’t a set of rituals or the simple blessings and curses of a pantheon of deities. It was everything. It was the life energy that ran through the earth, through everything that grew in its soil or walked upon its surface. It was the air they breathed and the wind that shifted that air. It was the water that formed the clouds that rained life itself down to replenish the earth and nourish its inhabitants. It was the bedrock below and the firmament that arched above.

No man had the power to banish the world itself. Only a madman would think that he could control it and only a fool would claim that he had conquered it. What Uther had done was eliminate so many people who had possessed the ability to direct the magic present all around them that all that talent lost to the world had been returned to it in a different form. It had all returned, packed tightly into a single vessel, Emrys.

The fact that Merlin was a humble and compassionate man was no accident. He, more than any other warlock who had ever lived, must remain incorruptible because he possessed more than enough power to either rebuild the earth or to destroy it utterly. The fact that his power was now under the control of Uther Pendragon was a more desperate situation than any save the Druids and the Great Dragon could truly know. For they held the prophecies; they had the knowledge that what was happening right now was not supposed to be. It had all gone wrong when Uther had taken Emrys away from Arthur, the Once and Future King.

Arthur looked closely at the dark green symbols running down his right arm. They’d been utterly unfamiliar to him when they’d appeared on his skin during the ritual. Allasair had traced each one and explained that they spelled out his family name in the ancient tongue of the Druids, “Chief-Dragon”. His father had always postured and asserted that their name meant “above the dragon” and had claimed that his successful campaign to rid the world of the dragons and the Dragonlords proved their family’s power and destiny. He wondered when his father had first deluded himself into such a belief. Sighing, he realized it didn’t really matter. Arthur knew the truth and that was what was truly important.

He transferred his gaze to his banded left arm. There were fewer symbols etched into the skin there but they were Arthur’s alone, for the concise assemblage of angled and intersecting lines represented his name in the Druid language. A parting gift from his dying mother, she had given him a name of power and strength, introspection and knowledge, dreamtime and transformation. She had called him Bear and Allasair had assured him that by naming him so, she had departed this world having bestowed these gifts upon him. They were his to command. The mother he’d ached for all his life had given him all the attributes he needed to succeed in fulfilling his destiny. Arthur had wondered aloud why the bands embraced only his left arm and not his right and the warlock had explained that it meant that while he was destined to join the dragon, he drew his strength from the bear. The bands marked his personal wellspring, the dominant traits that were his to draw upon in times of need, the traits that made him Arthur.

The chill of the morning air began to bite hard and it reminded Arthur that he had a very important day ahead of him. Merlin was depending on him and the meeting that had been arranged for him today could very well be the key to freeing his beloved. For as much as Arthur cared about the welfare of all his people, the imperative that drove him to rise each morning and strive to find a way to topple the twisted King from his throne came directly from the burning need he had to get Merlin back, to free him from his bondage and to restore the destiny that had been stolen from them by the wrong Pendragon.

Staring out one of the enormous windows in the council chamber, Merlin reflected that it was becoming clear to just about everyone that Uther was growing ever more restless and angry as each day passed. He still had goals to accomplish and he was making no progress with any of them. The Kingdom of Cait still perched at the very Northern tip of Albion, untouched and seemingly inviolate without Merlin’s power to subdue the small but significant irritant. No one had been able to locate his renegade son, his missing ward or even Merlin’s mother.

He wanted another son but had, so far, been unsuccessful at planting one in Merlin’s belly despite an alarming increase in his attempts to do so. He was on Merlin night and day. Any hint of frustration saw him dragging his consort off to his chambers, shoving him into disused rooms and even on several, hideously memorable occasions, simply ordering everyone out of the Throne Room or Council Chamber before taking his on or against whatever surface best pleased his mood.

The more frustrated he was, the rougher his treatment of Merlin became. It became a relatively common sight to see the royal consort sporting obvious bruises and bite marks. Merlin didn’t even bother to cover them, continuing to wear his usual clothing. They weren’t marks of his shame, they were the proof of Uther’s. The one thing he could be grateful for was that he’d at least send Cynhafar from the room before he performed the actual violations of Merlin’s body. He had no compunction about manhandling him in front of their son but he at least had the decency to not actually fuck him when they boy was there, or at least not when the boy was awake. Cynhafar slept on an ornate little cot in the royal chambers and was present for many of his father’s attempts to create a little brother for him, However, to Merlin’s eternal gratitude, Cynhafar was usually a very heavy sleeper. The few times he’d awakened before Uther was finished with him, Merlin would instantly will the child back to sleep.

Oddly enough, despite Merlin’s open contempt for him, Uther had begun to keep the Dragonlord with him more and more. Merlin made no secret of what he thought of this behavior but Uther almost seemed to relish his snarky attitude and the verbal potshots that Merlin was always careful to word in such a way that they could also be taken to mean the most innocuous things. It was the malicious sparkle that Merlin allowed to shine from his eyes that gave his words bite. He knew how far he could push Uther and open disrespect or defiance would result in serious unpleasantness for Merlin. However, he was becoming less and less frightened of his captor.

He supposed it was because of Cynhafar. He didn’t ever want his son to live in fear so he couldn’t. He also refused to show his son what it was to cower before any man simply because he had a title and wielded a stolen temporal power. It came down to what sort of father he wanted to be to his son. He would not be a pathetic, battered partner whose children inevitably looked upon him with a mixture of contempt and sympathy. He’d be a figure of pity for no man, let alone his own child.

Gaius’s contraception device seemed to be working a treat, either that or his magic was working against the King’s attempts to force another pregnancy on him. Whatever the cause, Merlin was grateful. Cynhafar was more than a handful and he couldn’t imagine attempting to run after the child whilst carrying another babe in his belly, let alone what he’d do with two powerful children to keep under control. Uther was mad for even contemplating getting another son on Merlin at this stage but it was clear to just about anyone who had dealings with the King these days that Uther wasn’t in anything like his right mind.

His moods were erratic and his orders often irrational, unrealistic and contradictory, leaving those unfortunate enough to be the recipient of these commands in the worst possible positions. Merlin did revel in such situations when they involved Uther’s personal guards. He would never forgive and never forget the role they’d played in Arthur’s downfall and any time one of them suffered, he crowed inside.

Sadly, it wasn’t just Uther who was frustrated these days. Merlin himself was becoming more and more irritated by the confines of his current position. He no longer had the quiet hours of the day to himself. He used to at least be able to enjoy his magical and scientific studies, often working alongside Gaius on mutual projects and experiments. Now however, Uther was requiring him to sit through the boring and irritating council meetings and public audiences, insisting that as his consort, it was Merlin’s duty to do so.

He despised Uther’s council and it bothered him terribly that despite his title and all the power at his command, there wasn’t a damn thing he could think of to either slow or stop Uther’s cruel madness in any way. He was sick of being a toy, a weapon, a brood-mare. His instincts screamed for him to act but whilst Uther still lived, he controlled all of Merlin’s actions and there was nothing he could do to change anything.

He knew it was making things dangerous for him because the more he chafed at his bonds, the more careless he became in word and deed when it came to Uther. No doubt one of these days he was going to push the King a bit too far and the gods only knew what the consequences of such a blow-out would be. Merlin sighed and turned his attention back to the argument currently flying back and forth between several of the courtiers. He didn’t know why they bothered anymore. It must be clear to anyone with eyes to see that the King no longer took advice. He made decisions and he forced everyone around them to enforce them. Nothing was going to change until Arthur returned and took the throne from Uther

It was after sunset by the time their party arrived at the small, fortified manor house perched on the edge of a short cliff overlooking a rocky shore. Well, it was small by Camelot’s standards, the locals called it “the Castle”. Arthur swung down from his horse with a tired sigh and waited for the others to dismount. Leon was at his side almost instantly, while Kai and Gareth weren’t far behind. Allasair and Sulwen, never in a rush for any reason, dismounted sedately and joined the three knights managing to look utterly regal while wearing humble garments of the basest homespun variety.

One of the pair of heavy oak doors opened before they’d taken half a dozen steps towards the moss covered walls of the house. A young girl, black of hair and brown of eye with skin nearly as pale as Merlin’s stood framed in the doorway. She smiled at their approach but the expression didn’t quite reach her eyes, the wariness in them clear to Arthur immediately. He stifled a sigh, knowing the expression for what it was. He was a Pendragon and as such, not to be trusted, no matter whom he was accompanied by. He’d learned that not all magic users had the same faith as the Druids. He had to prove himself over and over at every village, every encampment, and every private home be it as small as the huts in Ealdor or as large as this Northern lord’s mansion.

The girl was dressed in a simple, modest gown but the dress was made of costly fabric. It was likely this was the Lord’s daughter as she appeared far too young to be his wife. Although, Allasair had only the sketchiest knowledge of who the master of this house was. For all Arthur knew, the Lord of the Redthorn Estate might be a lad scarcely older than this adolescent girl. He prayed against that eventuality.

Pasting on his own smile, Arthur made sure his made it all the way to his eyes as he allowed Allasair to lead the group forward. He saw the child relax slightly when Arthur didn’t attempt to approach her directly. Much as it was his natural inclination to lead, he’d found on this journey that people responded much more positively to him if he allowed the Druids to take point on the initial approach. Once discussions and negotiations began, Arthur slid smoothly back into his position as Arthur Pendragon, heir to the throne of Camelot and his father’s deadliest enemy.

Two years of living with Merlin followed by longer years without him had worn all of Arthur’s youthful arrogance away. He’d never be a meek or mild man but he had learned multiple lessons in humility the hard way. Diplomacy was something he’d applied himself to and had been surprised when it seemed to come naturally to him. He assumed it must be a trait he inherited from his mother or perhaps learned at Gaius’s knee for he certainly hadn’t gotten it from his father. Uther’s idea of diplomacy was the sharp end of a sword or, more recently, the threat of incineration by his pet sorcerer.

As they drew closer to the entrance, the girl’s eyes sharpened and there was no attempt at subtlety as she eyed each of the knights from boot tip to hooded head. Her gaze assessed and quickly dismissed Gareth and Leon but lingered consideringly upon Kai before latching on to Arthur. As soon as her sharp brown eyes met his something seemed to snap into place for the girl and her wariness turned to a visible excitement. She stepped forward and thrust her hand out at him.

“You! You are Arthur, are you not? Arthur Pendragon? The King’s son?”

Slightly startled he took the girl’s hand in his own and nodded in assent as he bent politely over her sturdy little fingers.

“Hah! I knew it! I told her I’d be able to spot you out first off!”

Arthur allowed his confusion to show on his face.

“Told who?”

“You’ll see!” She chirped merrily at him. “You’ve been expected, although, we did think you’d get here a lot sooner than you have. I haven’t stopped teasing her for weeks! I told her that her visions weren’t infallible and you proved me right!”

She was grinning openly now as she tugged Arthur by the hand she still held. She blew past the rest of the group without a word and they simply followed as she pulled him through the wide open door.

“I’m Mairead, by the way. My father is Lord Redthorn and this is his house.”

Bemused, Arthur allowed himself to be led into the warmth of a reception room and settled into a high-backed bench beside a roaring fire. Mairead beckoned the others forward to join them and they all settled in on the cluster of benches and chairs that surrounded the enormous fireplace.

“Alright then, all of you just wait here til I get back. Oh, yer gonna be so surprised!”

Before any of them could blink, the slip of a girl had disappeared through a partially concealed door, set deep into the wall only steps from where they all sat.

Arthur looked at Kai, seated on the bench beside him and let out a loud woosh of air.

“Well, that girl certainly didn’t seem the least bit intimidated by the name!”

“What on earth was that? A girl or a force of nature?” Leon said only half-jokingly.

“She certainly was a bold lass and no mistake. She surely seemed thrilled to meet you, my lord. Perhaps she fancies herself a future Queen?” Kai teased with a smile.

The others just shook their heads and settled back onto warm cushions in the even warmer air. The fire was welcome after the biting chill of the night wind that had whipped off the sea and seeped through even their warmest clothing. Conversation was muted and mostly consisted of speculation about what aid they could hope for from Lord Redthorn. They couldn’t have been waiting for more than ten minutes when the formal doors to the reception room were thrown wide and a black and red streak flew through them heading straight for Arthur. He barely had time to stand and catch the young woman who hurled herself into his arms.

“Arthur! Oh, gods, Arthur, it’s you!”

She had a death-grip on his neck but he’d recognize that voice and that long fall of black hair anywhere.

“Morgana?”

She looked up with watery green eyes from where she'd actually buried her face against his chest, and smiled.

“I’ve missed you,” was all she said.

He hugged her back, holding on tightly, relishing the solidity of her form. They may have sniped and poked at each other but Morgana was the only family he’d ever known apart from Uther. As far as he was concerned, she was his sister, even if they didn’t share the same blood. He fought back the unmanly burst of moisture that welled in his eyes.

“I’ve missed you too. I’ve been searching for you, I never stopped looking, I swear!”

He felt some of that damned moisture well over the corner of one eye and spill down his cheek. She reached up and gently wiped it away. It was an odd gesture coming from her for they’d always had more of a shove-you-I-love-you sort of relationship in the past. But if seeing her could make him cry then perhaps seeing him could make her tender.

“I know, Arthur, I know you didn’t, but I couldn’t be found. You know Uther, how do you think he’d have responded to this?”

She stepped back, muttered a few incomprehensible words and her green eyes flared with a light similar to Merlin’s when he performed magic. She held out her hand to him with a tiny ball of icy mist swirling in the air above her palm. She turned and hurled it at the bronze mirror hanging above the fireplace and Arthur watched as the metal’s surface iced over in an instant.

She seemed surprised when he wasn’t surprised. He reached out and took the hand that she still held stretched out before her.

“I wouldn’t have made you come back once I’d known and I’d never have let- well, after what father…after, oh gods Morgana, you can’t even imagine what he did to Merlin! After that I’d never let anyone with so much as a drop of magic in them near that monster!”

Morgana’s face went cold and she stepped back as if remembering something vastly unpleasant. Suddenly there was suspicion in her eyes.

“Why are you here, Arthur?”

“I thought you’d know. Haven’t you heard? Haven’t you Seen?”

She looked taken aback at the way he emphasized the word “seen”. He nodded his head, acknowledging that she’d heard him correctly.

“Yes, I know about the Sight. So, like I said, haven’t you seen what’s been going on in Camelot? Uther’s got a new heir now. I’m not only expendable, I’m an outright liability. At least he wants you back because he thinks you were kidnapped by a big bad witch. Me? He just wants me dead.”

She looked hesitant for a moment before falling back on her traditionally defensive scorn.

“Poor little Prince, still no love from your Daddy?”

“That foul stain on creation loves no one but himself. If you aren’t an asset, you’re disposable. “

“Yet he’s got your little little pet working for him now, doesn’t he? That traitorous little prick has wiped out more than half the magic users in Albion single handedly!”

“Morgana, Merlin isn’t doing any of that willingly. He’s a Dragonlord and Uther owns his soul. Do you know how one acquires control of a Dragonlord?”

Morgana looked openly unsure of herself for a moment before letting the sneer slip back over her face.

“I heard Merlin got in bed with the bastard.”

Arthur looked her dead in the eye and allowed all his fury and disgust show in his bald choice of words.

“Uther raped him. He brutalized Merlin so badly that if Gaius hadn’t used magic to save him, he’d have bled to death the same night. Then he raped him again and again and again, has been doing so for years! He’s made Merlin his slave, forced him to use his powers against his own kind, raped a babe into his belly and then forced him to marry him to make the child legitimate so he could get rid of me. Apparently, somewhere along the line, Uther realized that I’d started thinking for myself and the King wasn’t about to tolerate that. You, of all people, should remember how well he responds to those who challenge his authority.”

“And you think I should feel sorry for him, for you?”

“He was your friend once, Morgana.”

“Yes, he was such a good friend that he tried to kill me. Did he tell you that?”

Arthur’s brow furrowed.

“Merlin tried to kill you. Merlin?”

“He slipped hemlock into a water-skin and tricked me into drinking it.”

He looked at her steadily and saw the flickering shadow of guilt in the back of her eyes.

“I know Merlin. If he did that, there must have been a reason. What did you do, Morgana?”

She broke eye contact, flushed and remained silent, all actions so out of character for the girl he’d once known that he instantly kenned that there had been a reason and knowing Merlin as he did, the need must have been dire indeed.

“Tell me, Morgana. Tell me why Merlin would poison a friend. Tell me why one of the gentlest souls I’ve ever known would supposedly stoop to murder. What. Did. You. Do?”

Morgana still kept her eyes averted but this time she answered, cheeks still flushed a miserable red.

“It was only supposed to be about Uther. I swear, I only wanted him dead and to see you take the throne, Arthur but…well, I guess Morgause didn’t trust you as I did. She doesn’t know you like I do, assumed you’d be just like your father.” She took a deep breath and shuddered. “I didn’t truly understand what I’d agreed to when I said I would help her kill the King. I don’t even know what she did to me, well, I didn’t then, I do now. She put me to sleep and then anchored a spell in the magic I was just beginning to develop. She made me the source of the spell that put everyone in Camelot to sleep. That’s why I was the only one left awake. Gaius never made any kind of potion for me. Merlin was just…trying to…protect me…”

Morgana trailed off then, as if the importance of the words she had just spoken were sinking into her brain for the very first time though the incident in question had occurred years before.

There was nothing but silence in the room. Their companions remained as silent as the grave, not a one daring to interrupt such an intense conversation. Arthur felt his jaw tighten and his next words gritted through clenched teeth.

“What was he protecting you from?”

She finally looked up at him then and her jade greed eyes were glistening with unshed tears.

“He knew I had magic and he was trying to protect my secret. He thought it was my magic that was making me impervious to the curse. He hadn’t yet figured out that I was the curse. I don’t think it occurred to him until later, when we were dragging Uther…you weren’t there. One of the black knights approached and raised his sword to me but then he stopped. He looked me over very carefully and then walked away, heading for Merlin and Uther. I guess that’s what tipped him off because he questioned me after that, about why one of the mindless, magical knights would spare my life when all they seemed to know to do was kill and destroy.”

There were tears running down her face now. Her lips were trembling and when Arthur glanced down he could see that her hands were shaking just as badly.

“He left me then, just for a few minutes. When he came back he had some supplies. Among them was a water-skin. He insisted I drink because he said we might not get another chance for a long while. I wasn’t thirsty though, I was too confused by what was happening around me. So he took a drink and turned away, when he turned back he forced the water into my hands and insisted I drink.”

She paused and hung her head, she was sobbing now, little hiccups interrupting her speech every few words. Arthur ached for her but he also ached for Merlin. He knew what that must have cost the gentle warlock. He’d done what was necessary for the good of Camelot, to save Arthur and Uther and everyone else but, he knew it must have nearly killed Merlin to have to destroy such a close friend.

“He started to tear up as soon as I took a sip. When I’d finished the water, he was crying outright. I started to choke, I couldn’t breathe and I looked up and when I met his eyes, I knew. He nodded at me, he nodded! He was crying but he still looked me in the eye and acknowledged what he’d done. Gods, Arthur, he held me while I was choking! He wrapped his arms around me and held me while I struggled to breathe. The last thing I remember were his eyes, they were so sad and sorry but he still held me in his arms and let me slip away.”

Arthur took her by the shoulders and waited until she looked up and met his gaze.

“And yet you’re still alive. How is that?”

“My sister saved me, Morgause. She agreed to lift the spell and leave if Merlin would tell her what poison he used. She lifted the spell and Merlin gave her the bottle of hemlock. She said as soon as she had the bottle you came bursting back into the room so she took me away first and then purged the poison from my system. I’ve been with her ever since.”

“Morgause is your sister? How? What…why…how is that possible? You were an only child, like me?”

“It’s a long story but she’s my mother’s child, born long before I was.”

The knowledge that Morgana had family of her own came as something of a hammer blow to Arthur. Somehow it felt like he’d finally found her only to lose her again. He let out a shaky breath.

“So you never were abducted then.”

Morgana smiled and shook her head. Her expression was a strange one, rueful, sly and happy all at once.

“No, I was unconscious when she took me away but had I been awake, I’d still have gone with her in an instant. She’s family, she’s magic, she’s like me. I don’t feel alone anymore.”

Heart growing heavier with each word from her lips, the spark of joy that had lit up his chest when he saw her slowly fizzled and died. She was his “sister” no more. Worse than that, she despised Merlin. How on earth could he convince her to use her powers to help him?

While his thoughts were ticking over, a familiar figure entered the room. Long blond hair tumbled round slender shoulders and piercing brown eyes examined him as if he was a specimen in a jar. It was Morgause and suddenly, he knew how to appeal to both sorceresses. They all shared a common enemy; surely both women would want to see the murderer of their kind dead and magic return to the land. Before he could speak, Morgause preempted him.

“I’ve been watching you, Arthur Pendragon. You’ve done much to aid our people since your father began to use the Dragonlord’s powers against us. It’s clear that you saw what he was doing was wrong. I’ve often wondered why it took you so long to act. I will admit, I was bitterly disappointed in you after I reunited you with your mother. I was certain she’d shown you the need to eliminate your father but you did not. You left me with a strong intent to do so. Why didn’t you kill him then?”

In all the ways he’d ever envisioned meeting this woman again, he’d never once expected that would be her first line of inquiry. He hesitated, feeling caught out. If he told the truth, it would simply harden their hearts even further against Merlin. However, he could deliver enough of the truth without revealing Merlin’s role in his decision.

“I was angry when I left you. You know that. I was enraged by what my mother’s shade told me. I rode back to Camelot with every intention of killing my father. One of the deepest regrets of my life is that I did not follow through on that impulse.”

“Why didn’t you?”

It was Morgana who asked this time. He wondered if she’d been in on her sister’s plans even as far back as that.

“He convinced me that what I’d seen wasn’t real, that he’d loved my mother, that he would never have willingly sacrificed her life for mine.”

He turned to his foster sister and looked into her frosty green eyes.

“You of all people know how persuasive he can be when he needs to be. With my sword at his throat, he needed to be. And…I still loved him then, thought that he cared for me even if I was a constant source of disappointment for him. Somewhere in the back of my mind I was still desperate for his approval.”

Arthur returned his gaze to Morgause.

“After a life-time of being taught not to trust sorcerers, it wasn’t difficult for him to convince me that what I’d seen was an illusion, that you hadn’t truly conjured up the real spirit of my mother.”

He paused a moment, considered the woman standing before him. He’d seen her attempt to conquer Camelot by the use of sorcery and at the time, it had only served to further harden his heart toward magic. Would she still have tried to take Camelot if he’d gone through with his plan to kill his father after what she’d shown him?

“It makes little difference at this point, since I now know the nature of the magic my father employed to engineer my birth, but tell me something , Morgause. The day I came to answer your challenge, was anything you said to me the the truth? Did you know my mother? Was it really her spirit I saw in that ruined castle of yours?”

He thought he detected a slight softening of her eyes though her expression remained impassive.

“I was a child when she died, but yes, I did know your mother, as well as any child could. You see, I was apprenticed to Nimueh. She often took me with her to Camelot when she went to visit your parents. She rarely saw them both together once you had been conceived. Ygraine was a good woman. Her death grieved me as it did Nimueh. Uther will deny it to his dying day but they were once close friends. Your father knew full well that a life would be asked in exchange for yours but he just couldn’t comprehend that it would be an important life. The price paid for such a precious gift must always be a high one. Though he was cautioned, he paid no heed to the true meaning of the warning.”

Arthur nodded then asked again.

“And the vision you showed me? Was that my mother Ygraine or was it a vision meant to manipulate me into killing my father?”

“That was your mother. Had it been an illusion, I’d have been able to maintain it longer, control what she said. I admit I was gambling on whether or not she would tell you of your father’s actions but it was truly your mother you spoke with, those truly were her arms that embraced you, her hand that you felt upon your cheek. I wished I could have held her there longer but though I am a powerful priestess of the Old Religion, my strength isn’t boundless.”

Her face pinched as she spoke the last words, as if it pained her to admit to any limitations. However, in the wake of everything that happened since the vast scope of Merlin’s powers had been revealed, many a powerful sorcerer had been forced to reevaluate his or her standing in the magical rankings. No one had been able to stand before the mighty Emrys.

“Even Merlin’s power, great as it is, isn’t infinite. No one’s is.”

The two women eyed each other for a moment in some kind of silent communication. Arthur watched the expressions that flitted across their lovely faces with curiosity. Eventually it was Morgana who flicked her eyes back to Arthur and took a deep breath.

“Actually, Emrys’s power may actually be infinite. It’s Merlin’s knowledge that has yet to catch up. Thankfully, he no longer has the Great Dragon to guide him or I fear the entire world would have fallen to Uther by now. He possesses the potential to destroy anything and everything he comes into contact with. That’s why it’s imperative that he dies, Arthur.”

“No! It’s Uther who has to die! Once Merlin is free, he will undo all the damage that Father has forced him to do. He is the only one who can heal the wounds he’s been made to inflict on the land.”

“Arthur, no one should possess that much power. It isn’t natural and it isn’t right. He’s been corrupted beyond redemption, surely you must see that? He can’t simply be freed. Who knows what he’ll do with all that power at his disposal and no one to challenge him? Look what he’s done so far.”

Morgana’s voice was strangely gentle but implacably firm. He realized that she knew of his feelings for Merlin, had probably known of them before he had. Morgana knew he loved Merlin but was warning him that it didn’t matter. As far as she was concerned, there was only one acceptable fate for her former friend.

“You’re wrong Morgana. You don’t know him like I do. He is pure goodness. If there were only a single incorruptible soul in this world, it would be his. Think about it…he could have taken the throne for himself the moment he walked into Camelot as a boy. Instead, he used his powers sparingly and always for the greater good. Despite all that Uther has done to him, all that he’s forced him to do, Merlin’s spirit remains inviolate. His soul is pure and bright and true.”

Turning to Allasair and Sulwen, his expression implored them to agree. Allasair spoke first.

“It is as the young Pendragon says. Emrys is a creature of the Old Religion and he was forged for a specific purpose. He will restore balance to the world. He was made to be an instrument of peace, and, no matter what the Twisted Chief has tried to make of him, he cannot break Emrys. He hasn’t the strength to overcome what forms the young warlock. Fate made Emrys for a special purpose and despite all the damage the warped one has caused, he cannot overcome the Old Religion itself. All Uther has done is to usurp what was to be Arthur’s place in Emrys’s life and bend the destiny that they were to share. He has taken Arthur’s destiny upon himself and as he has twisted it. It will remain twisted until it is fulfilled. He will meet the fate that Emrys failed to prevent as a child when he ignored a dire warning from the Great Dragon. This failure on his part would have brought great tragedy into all your lives, now, it very well may be the saving of us all.”

Looking to Arthur, he continued, “Your father has taken the destiny that was to be yours, Chief Dragon. However, in doing so, he has given you a new one, a better one. For he will now meet the ill-fate that was to be yours and in its stead, you will be given a chance to right the wrongs he has done and help Emrys restore balance to the world. If Uther succeeds in fulfilling what was to be your destiny, then he will allow a new future to take its place and it will be a far better one than any of us have ever dared hope for.”

To say that Arthur was confused by the Druid’s words would be a gross understatement. If he understood Allasair, it sounded as if his father’s unforeseen intervention into his destiny was a good thing. How was that possible? After all the suffering Uther had brought down, on Merlin, on Arthur, and upon all of Albion, how could any of his actions be seen in a positive light?

His confusion was no doubt writ large across his face. The Druid smiled and nodded.

“You did not mishear my words. These dark years are but the hours before a glorious new dawn. The coming of Emrys has been looked for since the birth of man. He has always been known to those of us who have the Sight but while the general shape of the future can be known, its exact form is ever in flux. We have known that Emrys and the Once and Future King would bring balance, peace and prosperity to the lands of Albion but to what degree could not be known. The Druid’s have long known that a period of terror and tyranny would precede this golden age but again, we could not foresee just how bleak, how very dire things would become. However, the darker the night, the brighter the day; you and your Merlin have it within you to bring to all of us, a very bright future indeed.”

Sulwen chimed in,

“Yes, if we succeed, more good will come from Uther’s actions than bad. When all is done, Emrys can probably tell you why.”

She then turned to Morgana and spoke her piece directly to the young witch.

“I know you feel Emrys has wronged you personally and has wronged the world at large but if you look inside yourself you will find that you already know the truth. The harm he did you was for the greater good and you saw yourself how much it hurt him to do it. You know that he is a creature of the light. You feel he betrayed you but it was you and your sister who were the betrayers. You are a powerful Seer, Morgana, but did you never wonder why you never Saw Emrys for what he was in all the time you knew him?”

A deep crease appeared in the pale skin between Morgana’s shimmering green eyes and her mouth pinched. Skin flushed and fists clenched to hide their shaking, she nodded.

“Yes. When it became clear to the world what he was, I still could not See him. I never have.” He tone became wondering. “I have never Seen him...why is this? I have Seen everyone else I know, have Seen countless people I don’t know. How is it that Merlin has never once been within the scope of my Vision?”

“Your dreams are warnings, Morgana. You have never needed to be warned about Emrys for he is the vessel chosen and formed by the Old Religion to bring magic, peace and prosperity back to the whole of Albion. Arthur was made to compliment his ethereal power by wielding the temporal. When Uther’s hold over Emrys is broken, together they will sow love where there is hatred, help the injured to pardon their abusers, make the doubters believe, transform despair into hope, sadness to joy and bring light to all that now dwell in darkness. This time approaches but they are but two and cannot accomplish this task unaided.”

Joining Sulwen, Allasair spoke to Morgana and Morgause. The sisters now stood side by side, long pale fingers entwined as if to give each other the strength to stand before the persuasive words of the powerful Druids.

“You both have a part to play in this. As well as the young warlock you’ve bonded so closely with Morgana. His aid is needed as well if we are to bring Uther’s terrible reign to an end and bring magic, balance and peace back to our world.”

Morgause expression turned speculative but Morgana tensed defensively.

“Mordred? He’s just a child, he shouldn’t be exposed to this kind of war.”

“Lady Morgana, do you realize that Emrys is but a few years older than that so-called child? That he was the same age Mordred is now when Uther seized him from his guardian and enslaved him so heinously? You would protect Mordred, pardon him for the wrongs he has committed of his own volition while holding young Emrys’s actions against him? If you think the boy nothing more than an innocent child then you are deceiving yourself and doing him a grave disservice at the same time. He has the right to choose whether or not he wishes to join in this fight. Indeed, his aid is vital if we are to succeed!”

“The Druid is right, Sister. Mordred is young but you know as well as I do that he was forced to grow up early. Life hasn’t coddled him, you mustn’t try to do so either.”

Morgana’s gaze was imploring when she met her sister’s but Morgause didn’t flinch or soften.

“He has great power, as great as you or I, possibly greater. We will need his help if we are to face Emrys while he is still under Uther’s control. Not to mention that all magic aside, he is a wonder with a sword.”

She looked at Arthur and curled her lips in that cat-like smile he’d come to associate with her.

“Indeed, it seems you made quite an impression on Mordred as a child. He has taken to sword-craft as readily as the magical arts.”

She then looked to the Druids flanking Arthur.

“We will need all the magical strength we can gather and that includes your people. Will you put aside your pacifistic beliefs and join this battle?”

Sulwen smiled and Allasair merely raised an eyebrow.

“You still know so little of our people, Priestess. We aren’t truly pacifists. We merely know what is and what isn’t worth sacrificing life for. There is a time for every action. It is past time for the Once and Future King to take his place upon the throne and for Emrys to unite the old world and the new.”

He nodded to Arthur, giving him a meaningful glance. Nodding in return, Arthur shrugged off his long leather coat, loosened his belt and stripped off his tunic. The tattoos marking his skin shimmered with the magic that had formed them and both women gasped in shock.

Sulwen smiled broadly while Allasair contented himself with a small, serene smile. The two spoke in turn, as if they shared the words between them.

“As you can see, Arthur has been Marked. He has accepted his fate as a vessel of the Old Religion and his pledge of service has been accepted in return. The Powers came to him with the voice of Emrys so there can be no doubt. They are two halves of one whole. The world will remain broken whilst they remain torn asunder.”

“We will fight the Twisted Chief so that the Chief Dragon may take his place beside his Dragonlord. We will fight, not just for the future of this land, but for the future of the world itself.”

“Will you accept that Emrys must survive the coming battle? Can you release your hatred of him? Forgive him his trespasses against you? I assure you, if you do so, he will pardon your own misguided actions in turn.”

Morgause’s face pinched, as if they had asked her to swallow a bitter tonic while Morgana’s eyes filled with tears. Arthur knew her as well as he knew anyone. He could see that not only had she forgiven Merlin for poisoning her but that she was also feeling remorse for the part she had played in the act that had shattered their friendship.

He spoke softly to her.

“You were the one who once told me Morgana, Merlin is a lover. You know him, you weren’t mistaken, he was your friend and he loved you. You saw that in him even as he was forced to act against you. He tried to comfort you as best he could even as his heart was breaking. “

Arthur looked to Morgause.

“And you, of any of us, have the least right to hate him. You used Morgana against her own friends, her own people. You forced Merlin to poison a dear friend to save every other person he loved. You forced his hand. You haven’t any right to resent him for what he did. Did it ever occur to you how Morgana would have felt if you had succeeded?”

He looked to Morgana.

“Did it ever occur to you?”

From the sick look on her face, he doubted it. He rather suspected Morgause would have kept Morgana focused only on the “wrongs” committed against her, distracting her from the crimes they had attempted to commit themselves.

“He killed my mentor, Arthur Pendragon. I could hate him for all eternity for that act alone. She was the only mother I ever knew.”

Icy anger frosted over his need to coax at this accusation.

“Yes, he did. After she tried to kill everyone in Camelot, after she tried to murder him, after she tried to kill me, after she tried to kill his mother and after she came within a hair’s breadth of murdering his own mentor, Gaius. She may have been a mentor to you, Morgause but that woman deserved the death she brought upon herself. Do you know how she died?”

Her chin lifted but her there was a shadow of doubt in her eyes as she looked at him.

“Only that he came to the Isle of the Blessed, the sacred home to the Priestesses of the Old Religion and that he murdered her!”

“Then you have only a fraction of the story. He came to her to offer his own life in return for mine when I was bitten by the Questing Beast. He made the bargain without guile, his life for mine. It was your mentor who decided to change the covenant to suit her own twisted purposes. She attempted to take his mother’s life instead. He returned to the Isle to confront her only to find that Gaius had arrived before him. Knowing that Merlin was going to again attempt to sacrifice his life for hers, Gaius offered his life in exchange for Hunith’s in order to keep Merlin safe. When he demanded she take his life and restore Gaius, she refused. Knowing nothing of his nature, only his power, she attempted to win him to her side. When he refused she attacked him, he still has the scars to prove it. He struck back and she died. The Old Religion was satisfied that the balance of the world was restored and so Gaius recovered. Had your loving guardian accepted Merlin’s self-sacrifice, the world would be a very different place now. So you think about that before you accuse him of murdering her.”

Finally, Morgause’s icy calm façade cracked and she staggered though she’d not taken a single step. Morgana guided her to a chair and she sank into its support, all the colour drained from her face. The brown of her eyes was obscured by the shimmering well of tears that filled them.

“I’m sorry, Morgause, I truly am. I know you must have loved her but she brought about her own downfall. Much like you forced Merlin to poison Morgana, Nimueh forced him to kill her to protect the people he loved most. He would rather have died himself but she took that choice from him and sowed the seeds of her own destruction.”

She looked at them where they stood, Sulwen and Allasair with Arthur between them, shirtless with the blessings of the Old Religion shimmering clearly on his skin. Her face crumpled and she attempted to speak. It took several tries before she managed to gasp out,

“I can’t…I can’t do this right now. Please, I need time. I need time to think.”

Morgana gathered up her sister and held her protectively in the circle of her arms.

“Later, Arthur. You’ve given us a lot to think about and we need time to sort through all of it. Lord Redthorn will be along presently. He’ll look after you.”

The walked slowly from the room but no one had the heart to say a word to stop them. It was clear that many dearly held beliefs had been shattered that night for both women. They would need to process their changed circumstances. Having had his own world destroyed and rebuilt several times over the past few years, he could empathize. Looking back at the men who’d accompanied him on his long journey he gave them a tight smile.

“I have a feeling we may be here for a few days, men. At least we’ll be able to enjoy the pleasures of real beds and secure walls for the time being.”

Uther was growing impatient. He’d sent his army north to conquer Cait the old fashioned way, only to have them sent running back, singed tails tucked between their legs and a good third of the men wiped out. They hadn’t made it five miles past the border. A second attempt to insert several smaller companies at different places ended even more disastrously with less than a third of those men surviving to bring back the news of their defeat. It seemed fairly obvious that every magic user left in Albion was holed up in that tiny little backwater kingdom and they had finally drawn a line in the sand. If Uther wanted Cait, he was going to have to wait for Merlin to do the job.

Merlin however, had his hands full with caring for their son. Uther had never anticipated that safely raising a child with magical powers would prove to be such an enormous task. Had he any inkling of what he was getting himself (or rather his consort) into, he’d have waited until all of Albion was under his yoke. With Arthur, he hadn’t needed to do a thing for his offspring until he was old enough to swing a toy sword. The first five years of his elder boy’s life had been a blissfully ignorant slide for him as a parent. He received regular reports from nursemaids and tutors about Arthur’s progress and visited his son whenever the mood struck him, which admittedly had been much stronger when he was an infant, the impulse waning over time. Really, by the time he’d assured himself that the boy would survive those dangerous early years when a child of any station was in constant danger of death from all manner of terrible childhood diseases, his pain over the loss of his wife had begun to fade ever so slightly. After that, he’d begun paying less and less attention to Arthur. When he became old enough to begin his martial training, Uther had watched his progress with the eye of a King in need of a strong successor more than he had with the interest of a father in his son. Oh it wasn’t that he didn’t love his child. He had loved him quite dearly and had often fretted for his life when he sent him off on dangerous missions.

He’d loved Arthur right up to the moment when he realized that somewhere along the line, his child had turned on him. He still wasn’t sure when the change had happened. Perhaps it had always been there, the corruption present in his seemingly innocent son from the moment of his magical conception. No doubt Nimueh had planted the seeds of corruption and betrayal in his son from the moment she successfully implanted Uther’s paternal seed in Ygraine’s womb. Or perhaps it had happened during the years he’d admittedly paid little attention to his son’s upbringing. There was no way he would allow that to happen now. He’d made certain of it.
He’d carefully worded his orders as far as what Merlin could and could not say to their son about him. The Dragonlord wouldn’t be indoctrinating his son against him from the cradle. Uther couldn’t spend anywhere near as much time with the babe as Merlin did, nor did he want to once Cynhafar’s powers had begun to manifest. Their child was a handful and no doubt about it. Raising him was a full-time commitment and unlike Arthur (or any other ungifted child) Merlin was the only one capable of controlling the boy. It was annoying, Uther had so many other things he’d rather be using Merlin for but it couldn’t be helped. Merlin would leave no one but Gaius or that maidservant of his unaccompanied with his child. Therefore, Uther had been vigilant about the restrictions he placed on his consort’s ability to speak to their child about him. He was allowed to voice nothing but praise and could verbally encourage Cynhafar to feel nothing but absolute trust and loyalty for Uther.

Of course, Merlin despised him, of that there could be no doubt. There was no way that his captive mate felt anything other than hatred toward him. He made no secret of his disgust and disdain for Uther and if Uther was being honest, he took quite a perverse delight in dominating the magical creature so thoroughly against his will. He was the last Dragonlord and Uther owned him completely. It helped make up for the countless generations his own family had slavishly served the arrogant Dragonlords.

He’d thought it satisfying when he’d hunted down and lured in all the others of Merlin’s kind before destroying them. However, the destruction of dozens of those powerful men hadn’t proved half as sweet as the enslavement of a single one. He only wished he’d thought to do it sooner. He’d had several opportunities but had chosen to use then discard the Dragonlords he’d raped into submission before. But, Merlin had proven to be so sweet and rare, he’d craved keeping his prize, knowing there’d never be another opportunity to enjoy the unique pleasures that came from bedding a Dragonlord. Merlin was the last one and oh, if there had to be only one, surely the gods had meant this one as a gift for Uther for they’d made him so very young and comely. Probably the sweetest pleasures he’d ever experienced had been between those slender white thighs. All that power, beauty and carnal delight was his alone to savour.

However, much of Merlin’s value to him lay in his immense magical power and at the moment, that was all going into the raising of the next heir to the Pendragon dynasty. As such, he’d felt he might as well have Merlin raise two children at once and get it over with in quick succession but months had passed and Merlin was failing to quicken. Gaius had tried to fob him off with declarations of his ignorance. He didn’t ”know much of Dragonlord biology, Sire. It may well be that they can only conceive again once their previous child is of a certain age.” The old man had gone on to cite several animal species where the mother could only conceive again once their progeny was able to fend for itself. Biologically speaking, this usually was when the previous offspring was finally weaned from the teat. Cynhafar was still nursing and would be for some time to come. He ate very little solid food of any kind, spitting out everything that was offered and stubbornly latching on to Merlin’s milk alone.

Uther had pointed out that humans didn’t reproduce like animals and Gaius had countered, yet again, with the argument that Dragonlords, while biologically compatible with other humans, undeniably possessed a different biology and thus one could assume there would be physiological dissimilarities to go along with the anatomical differences. Facile as ever, Gaius had a logical counterpoint to every one of Uther’s complaints. It was enough to make him want to clap the old man in the stocks for a day but of course, he didn’t really have any justifiable reason to take his frustrations out on the physician. Though the way that Gaius was being so very reasonable and sympathetic as he dismissed Uther’s fears one by one was almost as annoying as it was comforting.

No, there was nothing wrong with Merlin’s health; he was as fit as could be. There was nothing obviously amiss with Uther’s health either. Yes, he wasn’t in the first flush of youth but he was certainly still capable of fathering more children and Merlin was capable of carrying them.

“Then what is taking so long this time?” He’d shouted in frustration. “Last time it was done in three months! We’ve been trying for almost six months now and nothing!”

Gaius arched that eyebrow at him as if to say, did you hear nothing I just said to you? Sometimes Uther was tempted to ban that damned eyebrow of his. It had the power to reduce even the High King of Albion to the level of an errant boy not yet out of the nursery. Maybe he’d order Gaius to shave it off. He caught himself there and realized he was being ridiculous. He’d become so used to having everything he demanded handed to him instantly, he’d forgotten what it felt like to exercise patience.

It was ironic that Merlin was both the source of his expectations of instant gratification while also being the major imperative for him to strive to keep a rusty hold on his patience. The boy was still as maddening in his own way as he’d been back before Uther had control of him. It had taken a long time for it to sink in that while he could control all of Merlin’s actions and his vast wellspring of power, he could not control the boy’s mind. Oh he could force Merlin to do things against his will, and he did so on a regular basis but he couldn’t actually control Merlin’s will itself.

An unavoidable truth was that Merlin wasn’t a boy anymore, despite the fact that he still appeared scarcely a day older than he did when Uther had first claimed him. No, his features hadn’t changed, his skin hadn’t aged and his body had returned to his lean, elegant pre-pregnancy proportions but anyone who spent time with the royal consort for more than a few minutes would know they were dealing with a man, not a boy.

He held himself differently than he had before bearing Cynhafar. Uther recognized the manner in which he held himself. He’d seen it first when he was a boy and many times thereafter but certainly not recently. Years had passed, decades, since he’d last seen someone bear themselves that way. It was a posture unlike any other. Confident but not cocky, secure in his skin, with nothing to prove, it was as if he was to the manner born. Merlin held himself like a Dragonlord. For the first time since he’d met the man before him, Uther felt a shiver of real fear run down his spine.

Mordred came as quite a surprise to Arthur. He shouldn’t have, it had been years since he’d last seen the boy, of course he’d have grown up since then. It was just hard to reconcile the tall youth before him with the small boy he’d smuggled out of Camelot so many years ago.

It almost hurt to look at him because he reminded him painfully of Merlin. It wasn’t because his hair was dark, his skin pale and his eyes a bright blue. His hair wasn’t as black, his skin as white or his eyes as deep as Merlin’s so that definitely wasn’t it. It was more the way he quietly radiated power. It was the way Merlin should have looked at his age and had not. Merlin should never have had to act the fool, to hide what he was, to live in desperate fear hidden behind a mask of clumsy good cheer.

Then again, as Arthur looked more closely at Mordred, he saw things in the boy’s eyes that he’d never have wanted to see in Merlin’s. When he smiled, the expression didn’t warm the ice in his eyes whereas Merlin’s eyes had always been the window to his beautiful soul. His face was mostly still and impassive, his expressions when they came usually sent a chill up Arthur’s spine. Merlin had never inspired any feeling in him that wasn’t at least warm and more often, his emotions had become downright heated in Merlin’s presence, whether it was the fire of annoyance or the sweet searing of passion restrained. Mordred didn’t laugh. Merlin even chuckled to himself when no one else was there to amuse him.

Arthur realized that Mordred had suffered, time and again he’d suffered but so had Merlin and his warlock had never lost the sweetness in his eyes or the warmth in his soul. As Mordred had been raised by Druids, Arthur had rather expected a more gentle and serene young man. However, he could sense the carefully banked rage in the youth. Merlin became angry only when pushed to it, letting it burn through him before quickly releasing the negative emotion and turning to the positive. Mordred’s anger seemed to be his default way of being. He only allowed himself to become distracted into a brighter mood for a while before returning to his cold simmer.

He knew that Allasair and Sulwen had both agreed they needed Mordred with them if they were to succeed but the boy made Arthur uneasy in a way that not even Morgause could replicate. She seemed more misguided than malicious but this boy…for someone so young to give off such an aura of menace was uncanny and unnerving. Whenever Arthur turned his back on the youth, he could feel the icy chill of those unnaturally blue eyes boring into him.

At first he’d tried to put it down to his over-excited imagination but then he’d actually seen the kid doing it. He’d been walking away, back to the boy as he walked out of Lord Redthorn’s dining hall when he caught sight of Mordred in a mirror. It wasn’t his imagination; the youngster was openly staring daggers at him under the assumption that he was unobserved. Arthur had no idea what he could have done to earn the child’s enmity, if anything, he’d have thought the boy would think well of him well of him since he’d smuggled him out of his father’s dungeons and saved him from an untimely death at Uther’s hands. But whatever the reason, Arthur could see the malice directed his way by the strangely silent sorcerer.

Since he’d instantly volunteered to assist them in their fight to bring Uther down, Arthur simply resolved to keep an eye on the boy as he and the rest of their party made ready to depart the Redthorn estate. They had only one more stop on their trip to gather allies for the final assault on Camelot and then they would all rendezvous at a location arranged for them by the Druids.

He already had plans for the attack and so far, all his allies had agreed with them, the only exception being “the three M’s” as he’d come to think of Morgause, Morgana and Mordred. They’d all insisted that they would join Arthur at the head of the frontal assault on the citadel itself. As they were arguably three of the most powerful magic users in his makeshift army, Arthur saw the sense in this. If it came to a direct confrontation with Merlin, he’d need them all to keep Uther’s protector distracted while Arthur took him down. Against most people’s expectations and no little argument, he was planning his attack for the middle of the day.

Arguments melted away when he explained that it was the only time of day when Merlin (or “Emrys” as the rest of them insisted on calling him, all but Morgana and occasionally Morgause), was unlikely to be in the company of the King. In the three months he’d spent with Merlin and Cynhafar, midafternoon had always been their time. Uther was almost always caught up in matters of state, council meetings, hearing petitions, presiding over trials and the like. It was Merlin’s free time and he always spent it playing games with his young son. Arthur thought it unlikely that this pattern had changed much during the period of his exile. From what Morgause was able to scry in that crystal of hers, Merlin still kept his son with him every hour of the day and night and Uther continued to carry out the business of running what was no longer a simple kingdom but a stretch of land that was now nothing less than an empire.

Knowing Merlin’s distaste for such boring affairs and Uther’s opinion of Merlin’s intellect, he sincerely doubted that his father ever sought his consort’s counsel or required his presence while he maintained the day to day minutia that came with the mantle of absolute rule. To him, Merlin was a weapon, an instrument to inspire fear in his enemies and compliance from his allies. Merlin was also his personal brood mare and according to all reports, remained his sole source of carnal pleasure. Those reports turned Arthur’s stomach for he’d hoped that his father might at least have become bored with using Merlin thusly. However, on reflection, he knew it was just wishful thinking on his part. Uther had been obsessed with Merlin practically from the first time he’d noticed him. Why should that have changed simply because the warlock had borne him a child?

So, while his father definitely had his uses for Merlin, they didn’t include helping him run his kingdom. It made a daytime assault much more practical than a late night or early morning attack. Their very best chance for killing Uther would be at a time when Merlin wasn’t physically present. Of course, both Allasair and Morgause had pointed out to him that it was likely Merlin could protect Uther without actually being present to do so. They all still agreed it was a better idea to attack the King without his powerful captive on hand to instantly obey every order given to him by his overlord.

They all agreed that once inside the citadel, Mordred would locate Merlin with his mind-speaking trick, and perhaps even be able to determine the exact whereabouts of the King. When Arthur had asked why he couldn’t just locate Uther directly, he’d said it might be possible but it was likely that Emrys would have Uther under powerful shielding. If that was the case then they would make do with locating and hopefully communicating with Merlin in order to coordinate the final confrontation. They made countless contingency plans, trying to cover every possible scenario and have the counter for every defense Uther could throw at them but when it came down to it, they were leaving a lot to chance once they gained access to the inner palace itself.

Accessing the citadel would be child’s play for Arthur as he’d memorized the layout to the siege-tunnels beneath the citadel by the time he was twelve. By the time he was seventeen, he’d added dozens more that his father knew of in theory but had paid little attention to in reality. Arthur was counting on Uther’s complacency and he knew it but then again, he knew his father. If anything, he’d grown more and more carelessly overconfident the longer he’d had Merlin to protect him from any threat. He’d feel most safe and comfortable within the environs of the Chambers of State and the Royal Apartments. That’s where they would strike and hopefully, take the King off guard. If not, they all agreed they’d wing it as best they could.

“I’m sorry, Uther, but there isn’t much I can do about it.”

“You can bloody stop time! You can shift the tides, speed the sun across the sky and force the weather to bend to your command. How is that you can’t relieve this…blight, this plague or curse or whatever it is?”

Uther was shouting but Merlin had long since ceased to be cowed by the King’s rages. They had reached a point in their association (Merlin refused to call it a relationship), where there wasn’t much Uther could effectively threaten Merlin with. After all, there were few torments he hadn’t already visited upon Merlin during his years of servitude. Inevitably, he became immured within his own mind and the psychological games failed to disturb him. After having been savaged near to death several times, he became numb to most physical torture. Once Uther had realized that Merlin was no longer afraid of his punishments, he’d ceased employing them.

Now that Merlin was his consort, it was no longer appropriate to treat him like the slave he still was. Instead, Uther tended to treat Merlin as his mate, disregarding the fact that said mate would just as soon kill him as look at him if given even a fraction of a second’s chance. So, as a mate, the King shouted as ineffectively at Merlin as any old married man yelling at his intractable wife.

Uther stared at him, lips pressed tightly together, brows lowered, jaw clenched and a muscle twitching madly at the edge of his left eye and Merlin realized he was actually waiting for an answer to his tirade.

“Well, as the reason has to do with magic, how it’s generated and how it’s meant to be used, I doubt you’ll accept any explanation I can give you.”

Merlin watched with perverse amusement as his “husband’s” face turned from bright red to deep fuchsia before darkening to puce, all the while thinking, By all means, my liege, continue to rant, rave, shout and froth yourself right into an apoplexy. Please, do us that favour!

Uther must have seen the malicious gleam of amusement in his eyes because he whipped around giving Merlin his back. His shoulders heaved up and down as his breath huffed sharply in and out. Resisting the urge to chuckle, Merlin held his tongue until the King finally calmed himself. Eventually Uther turned around and again faced him where he was calmly dandling Cynhafar on his knee, seated upon the smaller of the two thrones situated side by side at the head of the expanded Council table. Glancing at the giant piece of furniture, Merlin reflected that Arthur probably wouldn’t even recognize this room as the Council Chamber anymore. As his power and prestige had increased, Uther’s sense of taste and decorum had decreased. Yes, with more territory to rule, a larger table was needed but the hideously ornate monstrosity he had commissioned was a true abomination. It so offended Merlin’s eyes that while stuck in the mind-numbingly boring meetings he was forced to endure, he avoided looking down at all costs. Whenever Uther required his presence in the council, Merlin was quite open about his disdain for the discussions swirling around his head. He answered questions only when forced to and ignored everyone else as he played magical games with his rapidly growing son.

The games all had a point, which was to teach Cynhafar to control his powers and though it was tempting to allow his son to burn that hideous table to ash, he refrained from doing so. Knowing Uther, he would probably just replace it with something even more repugnant.

“Well?”

Realizing that Uther had been waiting for a response from him while he’d been contemplating ugly furniture and baby warlocks, Merlin smoothed his features into a careful blank.

“Since I’m sure there was an actual question buried somewhere in that rant, would you care to repeat it for me?”

He could hear Uther’s teeth grind.

“I want you to explain why you can’t cure this blight that is creeping over the land. At this rate, all of Albion will be a wasteland to rival the Perilous Lands.”

“Ah, yes, that. Well, if I understand the theory correctly, the lack of creatures capable of using magic in the land is creating in it a state of magical toxicity.”

Merlin was deliberately aping Gaius’s school-master style of delivery as he knew the condescending tone from his young captive consort would irritate Uther no end. As he continued to hear the gritting of tooth on tooth, he knew it was working. Merlin’s face remained still but he was certain his eyes were smirking rather obviously.

“What nonsense is this? Magical toxicity? Rubbish!”

“I told you that you wouldn’t accept my explanation even though you know I’m incapable of lying to you.”

“Just because you believe it to be true, Merlin, doesn’t make it so. You may be powerful but you certainly aren’t omniscient.”

It was Merlin’s turn to grind his teeth. Uther knew how much Merlin despised it when he aped Arthur’s pronunciation of his name. Over the years, each had learned very well how to get under the other’s skin and it was a constant round of tit-for-tat between them. Inhaling sharply and exhaling loudly was the only expression of irritation Merlin allowed himself.

“I’ve never claimed omniscience, my lord. However, if I believe it to be true, I certainly can’t circumvent my own thought processes. If you don’t like my explanation, find one of your own and convince me of its validity.”

He raised a brow in challenge and stared directly into Uther’s icy gray eyes.

“It’s toxic alright but it’s not coming from any natural source, you imbecile! It’s obviously a magical attack upon Avalon by our enemies in the north. Find the source and cut it off!”

“I’ve told you, the source is all around us but you refuse to listen! I can’t cut it off when it oozes from every person, every plant, every animal…fuck, every gods damned rock in the bloody kingdom! The world is made of magic and you’ve killed off everyone and everything that used to keep the bloody stuff under control!”
Uther leaned over Cynhafar’s head and yelled straight in Merlin’s face,

“You’re supposed to be the most powerful sorcerer in the world, how come you can’t do it?”

“Because I may be the most powerful man in the world, but I’m still just one bloody man, you jackass!“

The callused knuckles on the back of Uther’s hand connected with his face and snapped his head hard against the solid wood of the throne, nearly knocking him off the seat entirely. The jolt to Merlin’s body sent their son sliding into the space between one of his slim legs and the arm of the oversized chair. The toddler began to wail and immediately all the curtains in the ancient wood paneled room burst into flame. Merlin’s head swam as he clutched Cynhafar to him, simultaneously trying to calm his child and stop the black film descending over his vision. He managed to hold on to the child but lost his battle with the haze dragging him down into oblivion.

Uther realized his mistake as soon as he’d made it. It was all well and good to strike out at the insolent sorcerer when he deserved it but he should have refrained from doing so in front of their son. Cynhafar was wailing in Merlin’s arms and with each shriek, something else in the room burst into flames.

He reached out for the toddler but Cynhafar turned incandescent golden eyes on him and shrieked, “No!” Uther found himself being pushed away by an invisible force, his booted feet skidding on the slick surface of the highly wax-polished floor.

As he opened his mouth to shout for his guards, the city’s warning bell began to toll and several of his guards burst into the room. Three of them halted on the threshold and gaped at the scene before them, the King’s Consort sprawled out, unconscious upon the throne, the screaming prince in his lap, the fires beginning to spread rapidly through the richly appointed chamber and the King himself being pushed toward the wall by an unseen force.

“By the gods! One of you go get Gaius and the Prince’s nursemaid, and the rest of you come here and help me! Don’t just stand there, damn you, move!”

“But Sire! The city is under attack! They bypassed the lower town, control the upper and are already within the citadel itself!”

“What? That’s not possible!”

But it was possible, he knew it was. There was one man who knew the city’s defenses better than anyone alive, including Uther, and that was his son. How had Arthur managed to slip past a city full of guards unnoticed? His face was as well known as Uther’s to every citizen of Camelot! However it had happened, though, now wasn’t the time to ponder it.

“Fine, I still need Gaius and the nursemaid immediately! And you two! Over here, now! Get Lord Merlin and the Prince to safety. ” Uther was now pinned to the ornately carved paneling that decorated the walls. The drapes covering the windows to either side of him were fully engulfed in flame and the paneling itself was on fire and closing in on him. Cynhafar was angry and there was no reasoning with an angry toddler. Merlin remained unconscious and showed no signs of stirring despite the chaos whirling around him. Blood trickled from the corner of his mouth and there was a wide bruise forming along the right side of his face. Uther winced, remembering the loud crack as his consort’s head had impacted on the hard wood of the throne. He hadn’t meant to hit him that hard.

The two guards approached the throne where the small prince continued to scream in angry terror. He alternately plucked at the plush fabric of Merlin’s tunic and glared daggers at the father who’d hurt his Poppa. Uther glanced nervously to either side as the flames began to eat their way toward him across the ornately carved wood of the paneled walls. In that moment, he seriously regretted having covered the original stone walls with something so flammable.

Cynhafar finally noticed the armoured men when they managed to edge within a few feet of the throne. He turned his attention from Uther , who felt the pressure on his chest vanish as his son’s focus was drawn away from him. He took a quick look around the burning room and sprinted for the door, not wanting to chance catching his angry son’s notice before he could make his escape. He spun around in the open doorframe and looked back to see the guards struggling against the invisible force of the Prince’s magic. He looked around the deserted hall for help and saw a few guards in Camelot’s colours run past the juncture with the next corridor.

“Guards! Guards!” He called after them in desperation.

Several of them reappeared around the corner and rushed toward their King.

“Sire, the Citadel is under attack! They have magic!”

Not truly surprised but seriously alarmed by the news, Uther had a more urgent need for these men than defending the citadel.

“Yes, yes but I need you here, now!”

He pointed toward the council chamber door, wisps of smoke escaping through the open portal into the hall.

“The Lord Merlin is injured and he and the Prince are trapped. I don’t care what you have to do, get them out of there and bring them to my chambers immediately.”

The men nodded and darted into the burning room with only a little hesitation. Uther turned and ran for his chambers. Without Merlin’s active protection, he needed the armour that the sorcerer had impregnated with his magic so many years ago. Not trusting it to the open armoury, all of his personal weapons were stored in the royal chambers. It was imperative he get to that armour or he’d actually be vulnerable to any attack Arthur aimed his way. As he ran he gathered a few loyal knights and several of his personal guards, men who’d immediately flocked to find their King when the news came of an attack from within the citadel itself. The number of men following his lead was distressingly small.

“Where is his Highness, Sire?” One of them, Sir Dinadan he thought the man was called, panted as he sprinted beside the King in full armour. “Should he not be with you at such a time?”

“Lord Merlin is already engaged. I am on a separate mission. Now shut your mouth and keep your eyes peeled!”

It occurred to Uther as he ran flat out through the marble corridors of the ancient palace that he’d grown far too dependent on Merlin’s protection. Now, through his own temper, he’d lost that protection when he needed it most. Still, he’d not slipped so far that he didn’t have a back-up plan. All he had to do was get to it.

They managed to slip through the chaotic throng of people milling about in alarm in the castle’s courtyard. It was just beginning to dawn on the townsfolk that something was seriously amiss as masses of what looked like Druids spilled right past the guards watching the main gates (composed mainly of men loyal to Arthur who’d stayed behind just waiting for the message that this day had finally come). A somewhat tattered looking group of armed warriors followed the crowd of men and women in their simple home-spun robes. As far as armies went, they weren’t much to look at. Only a few hundred men with several dozen women scattered among them but despite their mismatched arms and motley appearance, they were well disciplined and skilled. Arthur had spent several months training them himself.

The magic users among the Druids had somehow managed to conceal the small army as they moved through the lower town but had deliberately dropped the spell once they gained the upper. Now the Druids were there to hold back those that didn’t truly want to fight for Uther but had offered the King their obedience through fear alone. That this included a large portion of the army, the knights and even many of the palace guards themselves, only made it that much easier for the rest of them to take the citadel. Arthur knew the Druids were using magic to accomplish this but knew little about the actual mechanism of its action. He’d been assured that the spells were harmless to those they affected as they only amplified what was already in the enchanted person’s heart and mind. Those people who were truly loyal to the King would not feel the effects of the magic. It was up to the rest of Arthur’s people to take care of them.

Arthur had provided the fighters with plans to the siege tunnels below the citadel drawn from his own sharp memory. There was no man or woman alive who knew more about Camelot’s defenses than its former Crown Prince. As most of the Druids fanned out to soothe the majority of Camelot’s citizens who had no wish to fight for Uther, the armed men and women of his fighting forces poured down into those tunnels in order to come upon the defenders of the citadel, hopefully undetected, from below. Several of the less passive Druids accompanied them to provide what magical protection they could.

Meanwhile, Arthur, Morgana, Mordred and Morgause had a different goal. All of them were dressed in Camelot’s colours; Morgause and Morgana had tied their hair back and recreated the humble garb of the palace chambermaids while Mordred was wearing the simple chainmail and surcoat of a palace guard. Arthur wore the same armour he’d had for years. His best chainmail was covered by a Pendragon red surcoat. The embroidered dragon blazing gold in the center of that crimson field was capped by the custom plate hauberk athwart his chest. The etched pauldron, rerebrace and couter which protected his right arm and the vambraces covering both forearms had all been made for him when he’d attained full physical maturity. He lacked only his shield but had deemed it far too conspicuous to carry the damned thing through the castle.

The armour had been a gift from his father and had only been a few weeks old when he’d first met Merlin. He’d been so attached to the things at first that he’d strutted around with just the articulated plate worn right over his tunic, never realizing just how absurd he looked until Merlin had pointed it out. His former manservant, Morris, hadn’t ever quite gotten the hang of adjusting all pieces properly though he’d had weeks to work at it. It had taken Merlin only two attempts to perfect his technique. Arthur grimaced at the memory, remembering his shock when the seemingly incompetent boy had suddenly transformed into a crack squire overnight. No one else had ever been as good as Merlin was with his armour. He wondered fleetingly if he’d used his magic to accomplish the task before realizing that he couldn’t have as Arthur had often stared at his deep blue eyes while he was working and they’d never changed colour. It was as Merlin had said, he was a fast learner.

It was the thought of Merlin that brought him back from the brief distraction of memory and he focused carefully as he led his small party into the palace through one of the many side doors. This wasn’t the time for a stroll down memory lane. The four of them wove through the blissfully ignorant castle workers attracting little attention. Morgause had cast a low-level glamour over Arthur and Morgana so that anyone looking at them would see just another of Camelot’s knights and a humble maid going about their business. Mordred had no need for disguise, not having visited Camelot since he was a boy of twelve and Morgause herself had been known to few of the castle’s occupants during her own brief stint as a guest here so many years ago. With her hair covered and dressed as a maid, the chances of her being recognized were practically nil.

They accessed a dark, little used hall on the first floor and headed for the back wall of the castle. Arthur and Morgause each grabbed a lit torch straight from their iron wall brackets as they passed. Behind a large, dusty tapestry lay a small wooden door that in turn led to a tightly curving staircase carved into the stone of the wall itself. With no one to witness them, they dropped any pretense of decorum and rushed into the cramped space that twisted upward.

“He’s above and to the east.”

Mordred’s words were, as ever, clipped and concise.

“The King is with him and his son as well.”

Arthur cursed in the tight space pressing in from either side. This staircase clearly wasn’t built to allow the traversal of a broad man wearing a full suit of armour. The plates covering his right shoulder kept scraping the stone and striking sparks off the surface as he ran as fast as he could through the confines of the narrow passage spiraling up through the solid rock.

“Can he hear you?”

“No but I think the child can.”

“Shit! Why? You’ve been able to speak to him over distances greater than this before, haven’t you?”

“Yes, but something is blocking me. His mind is shielded somehow. It’s nothing I’ve encountered before. I can sense him but I can’t hear him anymore.”

Arthur slowed and glanced back at him. The young man shrugged as his long legs easily carried his lighter frame up the stairs behind Arthur. His wide eyes were as blank and unreadable as always.

“He is Emrys after all. He is like nothing I’ve encountered and likely never will.”

“Fine, as long as you can find him and Uther. Fucking bastard! Can’t he leave Merlin alone for five minutes in a day?”

Morgana’s voice was dry behind them. Calm and even, as if they weren’t in the process of running full out up a curving staircase in the dark.

“You know how obsessive he is. First it was your mother, then you, then eradicating magic. Now that he’s really gone round the bend, I doubt he ever allows his favourite toy out of his sight.”

Irritated by her logic, Arthur could only retort, “Well, he used to! Before I left he used to leave them both alone during the day at least. That’s why I wanted to do this now, when they weren’t likely to be together!”

Surprisingly it was Morgause who responded to that.

“Even the best laid plans are subject to change. Your secretive little sorcerer proved that to me years ago, Arthur. I would’ve thought he’d have taught you the same lesson.”

Even with the countless scenarios shifting through his worried brain, Arthur still managed a little smirk of pride at the reminder. Yes, even when he’d been forced to act without his vast magical powers, his quietly clever Merlin had been able to thwart an opponent as formidable as Morgause. The thought was fleeting though. If Uther was with Merlin, they’d need to mount a head-on magical attack and none of them were sure of the outcome of such a confrontation. Together, Morgause, Morgana and Mordred were incredibly powerful but would they be enough to take down Merlin? Could anything? And if they did, could they do it without killing him?

Arthur had fought hard to persuade each of them to let go of their individual resentments toward Merlin. They had readily agreed to aid the Prince in ridding Albion of Uther but, getting them to agree to allow Merlin to live had been much more difficult. He knew he could trust Morgana and he felt confident now that Morgause had also seen the error in blaming Merlin for everything he’d been forced to do but for some reason, unfathomable even to himself, he still didn’t quite trust Mordred, at least not completely.

Adrenalin pumping through his system, he continued to run as fast as he could within the narrow, twisting confines of the secret little staircase. He wasn’t sure if it had been built as a secret passage, perhaps it was once meant to be used as a servant’s corridor, but at some point in the building’s long history, it had been forgotten about. He’d discovered it as a child, wandering alone through the huge corridors of the castle back in the days before Morgana had come to live with them. From the dust that rose in thick, puffs from each footfall, he assumed no one had been through here since his childhood discovery of the well-concealed passage. They were almost at the top, where the door (cleverly painted to blend into the stone walls surrounding it) emerged in the shadow of a pillar at the very end of the hall which held all the Chambers of State. However, before he could mount the final few steps, he was halted abruptly.

“Wait! Mordred grabbed his arm. Something’s wrong, something is very wrong. “

Just then, they heard the deafening peal of the warning bell.

“What? Who?’

“It’s Emrys. I can’t tell, the child is too young, but something has happened to him and Uther- it’s definitely Uther, the child is angry, very angry.”

“Are they still together?”

“Yes, the boy has all his focus on Uther, he’s pushing him away. It seems the King has hurt Emrys somehow and the boy is, oh! He’s got his father’s power!”

Mordred sounded positively delighted by that last bit but Arthur was more concerned for Merlin and Cynhafar’s safety.

“What do you mean? Hurt him how?”

“I can’t tell exactly what he’s doing but the boy’s magic is coming off him in bursts. Like I said, he’s angry and he’s frightened. His father, Emrys, not Uther, is not responding to the child and it’s scaring him. Oh, this could be good! He has the King pinned to the wall. He’s determined that he won’t let the king hurt his Poppa again. He doesn’t like him very much.”

Mordred’s voice sounded intrigued, then he snorted in bitter amusement, showing more animation than was his usual wont.

“The boy is very perceptive, I can hear what he’s thinking. Uther often upsets his Poppa and he’s seen him hurt Emrys before, but not this badly.”

Arthur’s chest squeezed and his heart began to pound erratically.

“How badly is Merlin hurt?”

Barely visible in the wavering light from the torches they carried, he could see Mordred shake his head.

“That I cannot tell, just that he won’t wake up. Ah, damn!”

“What?!”

“There are guards approaching, he’s turned his attention from Uther. Damn it! He let him go! Oh, I see now.”

He looked right into Arthur’s eyes with an alarming urgency.

“We need to get up there, immediately! It seems the child has set the room on fire and Uther has made a run for it.”

Arthur felt his blood freeze.

“Oh God!”

“The boy’s not letting anyone near his ‘Poppa’ but at least he’s not setting any more fires. He’s more concerned with keeping the guards away but there’s a lot of smoke and his mind’s starting to become incoherent…well, more incoherent, it’s not like a baby is ever-“

Arthur swore and cut him off.

“Alright, change of plan, you three, go after Uther. I’ll go get Merlin.”

Morgana caught his arm, her fingers curling around the metal of the vambrace that covered it.

“Arthur, are you sure?”

“Yes! Morgana, I can’t lose Merlin, not now, I can’t!”

“But, Arthur, this is the perfect time to go after Uther! If Merlin is- well, he won’t be able to protect him! Arthur, he’s finally vulnerable!”

“And you’re more than a match for him, now let’s go!”

He surged up the last few steps and tripped the latch on the door. The hinges were stiff from disuse but a good shove got them to remember their purpose and they gave with a loud grinding noise. A quick peek around the edge of the door showed the corridor was filled with smoke and a few guards rushing back and forth. He pulled his coif up over his head to hide his cursedly bright blond hair and shouted back over his shoulder as he ran forward,

“Merlin’s mine, the rest of you, go!”

He left them behind, they had his confidence. The three of them were comfortable with each other, had been working together for several years at this point. Without Merlin’s protection, Uther stood little chance of surviving the coming encounter. Arthur had a far more urgent goal.

Plunging headfirst into the smoky hall, Arthur needed no time to get his bearings. He knew this hall better than the back of his own hand. Mordred had said they were to the east, which probably meant either the throne room or the council chamber. The throne room was closer, dead center of the smoke-filled corridor with the council chamber further along toward the other end of the hall. The smoke was too thick for him to make out which room it was coming from so he started forward, heading for the throne room.

Morgana’s voice rang out behind him, shrill but strong.

“This way, if he’s fled from here he’s probably heading for his chambers. He can escape directly from there so we have to hurry.”

Uther made it unhindered to his chamber doors only to find them locked! Damn it! No doubt his manservant had locked the chambers before he fled, his intent to slow or stop any looting of the King’s possessions. Uther drew back and kicked at the door but the hardened oak didn’t so much as budge. He looked to his escorts.

“Get this bloody door open immediately! Move, move, move!”

Sir Dinaden had a go at kicking the door near the keyhole, hoping to break the iron lock. Newly installed, the locks held as fast as the door. Uther fumbled at his belt. He should have the key to his own chamber, shouldn’t he? He’d never needed it but it was likely among the multitude of keys on his belt. He fumbled with the heavy iron ring and looked for it among the unfamiliar shapes dangling there. He tried several likely looking keys before he finally found the right one. Meanwhile Sir Dinadan and the guards had been taking turns between each of his attempts, trying to weaken the door with repeated blows from their heavily booted feet.

Finally, the fourth key turned and the lock clicked. The blows to the door had warped the lock slightly and it took three of the men to finally force the door open. As he was about to slip inside he heard an achingly familiar voice shout his name. It was such a shock that he stopped and looked up to see his daughter running toward him at full tilt. He felt a ridiculous surge of relief on seeing her lovely face.

“Morgana? What? How? It’s not safe here!”

His eyes flickered to the unfamiliar guard on her left, only registering that he had a sword in his hand and he looked rather young. He barely spared a glance for the maid on Morgana’s right until it dawned on him that Morgana herself was dressed as a chambermaid. He glanced at the maid then and realized he knew her, it was the sorceress who’d stolen Morgana from him!

“Morgause! Guards, kill her! Morgana, come to me, quickly!”

He was shocked immobile for a moment when both women’s eyes blazed with a tawny glow, not unlike the bright gold that lit Merlin’s eyes whenever he performed magic. Sorceress! His Morgana was a sorceress! No wonder she’d never returned to him. Traitorous bitch!

It was the sound of his guard’s cries being choked off and the sight of them freezing in their charge toward the witches that jolted Uther out of his frozen state. He hurtled through the open door to his chambers, remembering his mission to retrieve the magic shielded armour he’d forced Merlin to create for him years ago. He’d made it to the chest containing the precious arms and was on his knees with the key in hand when he felt the chill of magic clamp tight around his body. It had been years since he’d personally felt the touch of malevolent sorcery. Cynhafar’s forceful shove earlier was nothing like this. His son had simply been pushing him away with the force of his will. There had been no intent to harm in the magic, just a desire to keep him away from Merlin.

This power curling around him stabbed like a thousand needles piercing his skin all over. He couldn’t move his limbs but apparently his eyes were unaffected by the spell. He looked down at himself expecting to see blood pouring from dozens of tiny stab wounds but his skin was fully intact, the spell caused pain but no visible damage. He felt himself lifted to his feet and slowly spun around to face his attacker.

Expecting to see Morgause, Morgana or even both, he was surprised instead to see the unfamiliar guard who’d accompanied the two women. His eyes were flaring a bright orange that made it look as if his irises were actually on fire, the inferno incandescent with a palpable rage. The spell clutching at Uther tightened and he felt his bones begin to crack. The needles widened into blades that flayed the skin from his body but still there was no blood.

He was shocked when he heard a young man’s voice in his head but the boy in front of him wasn’t speaking. At least, his mouth wasn’t moving but his burning eyes bore straight into Uther’s.

 

“You don’t know who I am, do you? Don’t bother to answer, I know you don’t. I want you to, though. I want you to know who it is that’s going to end your life. My father deserves that. My name is Mordred.”

It should be impossible but it seemed the angry voice in his head was coming directly from the boy holding him captive. Uther tried to whimper in fear but found his own vocal chords were paralyzed, he couldn’t make a sound. That horrid voice continued to reverberate inside his skull.

“I want you to know exactly why I’m going to kill you.”

Suddenly, Uther’s mind was filled with images and they were his! He could see, smell, hear and feel everything as if they were his own memories. He was running through the streets of Camelot, his point of view lower to the ground than he could ever remember. He was a child! They had his father, they’d slashed his arm with a sword when he’d tried to run. He caught a last glimpse of the man who’d raised him as giant wooden gates came together between them. It was the last time he saw his father.

Then he was lying on sumptuous blankets on a stone floor and he could see luxurious curtains, feel the fear in his heart at the sound of the drums outside the window where two figures watched. Uther recognized Morgana and a very young Merlin as they stood guard over him. Morgana came to hold him, Merlin stayed at the window. He heard his father’s voice ring out in the air, then in his head.

“Goodbye, Son. I love you!”

He heard the wet thunk of the axe as it struck wood, taking his father’s head with it. The pressure exploded in his head, a mirror shattered.

Then he was running again, this time in the forest. Merlin was there, just a little older, Uther stared at him a moment before he rejoined his mentor and…Morgana! She was hurt and men were coming to kill them. Merlin led them into the forest then stayed behind to cover their escape. They made it only a few hundred feet when Morgana collapsed. They stopped to help and then Aglain! He saw the arrow strike his mentor, he saw the soldiers coming. He ran and they followed. He stopped and let the pressure build in his head. This time he screamed and the men shattered like the mirror had, flying through the air, leaving him alone once more. He ran.

More men! Prince Arthur led them and Merlin was there yet again. He followed the King’s men this time. He helped them though they did not see. Mordred ran and a tree root sprouted from the ground and tripped him. He turned and saw it was Merlin, and two armed men garbed in Pendragon red, the golden dragons on their chests. They raised their blades to cut them down. He concentrated and lifted two spears with his mind, he hurled them forward and the men fell before him. He looked at Merlin and felt a swelling, intense hatred in his heart. Merlin was supposed to be his friend. He’d helped him before. Now he wanted Uther-Mordred to die. He made Merlin a vow. He still intended to keep it.

Uther came back to his own mind in a rush, all the memories having squeezed his chest and flashed across his mind in moments. He’d been this boy, he’d felt his pain and rage and knew that he was the cause of it all. And now Mordred would make him pay.

There was more shouting in the corridor followed by a few sibilant words hissed in a feminine voice. The shouting stopped and the boy in front of him smiled. Despite the young man’s handsome features it was an ugly expression. The grin paired with his flaming eyes made him look positively demonic. Behind him Uther saw movement in the doorway. Morgana! Then Morgause strode in behind her, both women looking angry and determined. Mordred unsheathed the blade that hung at his side.

Morgause spoke first, praising Mordred for capturing the King.

“For this deed, I shall reward you with his death. You shall be the one to kill him.”

Morgana smiled suddenly and it looked ugly on her beautiful face. Uther trembled to see it, his heart squeezing painfully at the obvious joy she was taking in his predicament.

“Yes, there’s nothing to stop him, now is there, Uther? We thought this was going to be so difficult but you’ve made it all so easy for us!”

She threw back her head, laughing with her whole body. The sight chilled him to the bone. Morgause joined her a half-second later and even the boy let out a wicked chuckle.

Morgause continued as Mordred advanced on Uther holding the sword as if he knew full well how to use it.

“You took out your own protection! That’s just delicious! We thought we were going to have to fight Emrys, distract him so that Arthur could have the chance to kill you, but this! This is so much better.”

The boy’s wicked voice pierced his skull again, apparently unheard by the chortling witches. The message was for Uther alone.

“ Now I get to kill you and I get to kill him. I might even kill Arthur as well, I haven’t decided. It might upset Morgana but it would absolutely devastate Emrys! Decisions…well, at least you’ll never have to make them.”

Uther was frozen, agony piercing every part of his body, unable to speak, unable to scream but apparently able to cry, Uther felt the tears trickling down his cheek before he felt Mordred’s sword pierce his belly. He felt the sharpened steel slide into his unprotected guts and jerk sideways then up. The blade twisted left then right before it was withdrawn. Uther still couldn’t make a sound but his mind reverberated with the screams his paralyzed vocal chords could not produce. Mordred’s laughter vibrated in sick harmony with the screaming in his head and his daughter’s open glee echoed loudly in his ears. His eyes blurred and began to dim but he saw the bloodied blade heading for his chest and then he saw nothing. A final sharp agony pierced the darkness before-

Arthur ducked into the throne room but could see nothing but smoke, more importantly however, he could hear no sound. No screaming child or shouting guards. He called out just once.

“Merlin? Cynhafar?”

Nothing.

He hurled himself down the corridor toward the council chamber and as he closed on it, he could see the smoke billowing from the room and several guards hovering just outside the door, using the hems of their surcoats to protect their breath against the toxic vapor. He shoved himself through the small group and tried to see through the smoke filling the room. There was nothing but darkness swirling around him but he could hear Cynhafar’s weakened cries. He dropped to the floor and began to crawl forward on his belly. The air was clearer down here but the room was still hellishly dark. It might have been midday and the room possessed of windows that stretched nearly from floor to ceiling but the black smoke obscured everything.

Arthur found the leg of a large table and assumed it was the council table. Would the two of them be seated nearby? He scrabbled along the floor sticking close enough to the table to continually knock chairs over, making enough of a racket that it seemed to catch Cynhafar’s attention as his screaming paused before he heard a wavering little voice calling out,

“Poppa? Poppa, wake up! Wake up, Poppa!”

“It’s alright Cynhafar, I’m here to help Poppa, just talk to me. Tell me where you are.”

“Poppa! Poppa!”

The child didn’t answer Arthur but he could hear where the screams were coming from. He called out to Cynhafar and followed the sound of his voice.

“I’m coming little one, I’m coming!”

The boy’s voice was definitely dead ahead but seemed deep inside the room. Perhaps they were near the head of the table? He should have reached it by now, what the hell had happened to the council table? It was like a nightmare where his target remained always out of reach. The line of chairs beside the table seemed to stretch out into infinity but he kept crawling closer, calling out to Cynhafar as he did.

The toddler continued to cry and beg his father to wake up, and Arthur’s heart was pounding in terror that he wouldn’t get to them in time. It seemed that the walls and ceiling were on fire and it was only a miracle that the thickly waxed floor and furnishings hadn’t ignited yet. Almost as if in response to that thought a flaming spar fell from the ceiling and landed on the table behind him, the spray of sparks briefly visible as he looked back toward the terrific crash. The spar was glowing faintly in the dark and he knew that meant it must be burning with incredible heat. Suddenly the glow increased and advanced toward him along what he assumed was the top of the table.

“Oh, gods!”

Arthur surged to his knees and began scrambling forward. He didn’t dare stand up in the heat and blackness but he knew their time was running out.

“Cynhafar? Can you make a wind?”

He knew if the child could, he’d be fanning the fire with more fuel but he needed a path, he couldn’t see anything and he was starting to choke. He was hoping that the child’s magic was shielding him and his father. It had to be, otherwise there was no way the boy would still have been able to scream. This much smoke filling the air should have already baked his tiny throat dry and stolen the air from his lungs. Suddenly the boy went silent and he feared the child had finally succumbed to the choking toxins in the air. Then he felt the faintest breeze against his face and some of the smoke began to clear.

A path opened up in front of him and he could finally make out the pointed tops of the two thrones at the head of the impossibly long table. It hadn’t been a nightmare, the council table was monstrously long! Arthur spared the ridiculous table no further thought as he surged to his feet and pelted down the widening corridor of smoke free air. It was a matter of seconds before he made it to Merlin and his son.

The room was still abysmally dark but he could just about make out both of their forms. He reached for Cynhafar, marveling how much the boy had grown while he was gone.

“Help Poppa!”

“I’m going to help him, sweetheart but I need you to help me with him, alright?”

The small head bobbed up and down in the dark and he allowed himself to be lifted from Merlin’s lap. Arthur set Cynhafar’s little feet on Uther’s throne.

Arthur turned to the chair beside him where Merlin lay limp, slumped against the high back of the throne. He was wedged into the corner of the huge thing, draped diagonally across the seat. Arthur gathered up his limp form and heaved him over his shoulder. He sent a small prayer skyward that his beloved was so slim because a man his height, even one so slightly built, was not exactly a light weight.

When he had Merlin secure across his shoulder he crouched down and wrapped his free arm around the child and hauled him up against his body. Tiny hands clutched at his neck and he swallowed against the constriction. Spinning back around, he headed in the direction he hoped he’d come from. Cynhafar had clearly stopped focusing on his magic and the smoke was rapidly closing around them again.

“Cynhafar?”

A sniffle and a tightening of the tiny hands on his neck were the only responses to his questioning tone.

“Cynhafar, make the wind again!”

“Uh huh.”

Several more sniffles and suddenly a whirlwind ripped through the room. Clearly the child didn’t have a very finite control on his considerable powers. The smoke cleared but the flames roared even higher, suddenly burning hotter than ever. Arthur tightened his hold on Merlin and Cynhafar then sprinted for the door with all his might.

A flaming section of the ceiling crashed to the floor a few feet in front of them and Arthur was forced to detour around it even as more of the ceiling collapsed on the spot where he’d hesitated only a split second before. The room was disintegrating around them, even the floor beginning to blaze. He could feel the heat scorching his boots but the door was only feet away when the flames literally began to lick at his heels.

Arthur crossed the threshold of the door only seconds before the entire ceiling gave way and crashed to the floor behind them, blocking the door with flaming wreckage. The smoky hallway was dark but there was still enough light to determine that it was deserted. He needed to get them out of this smoke but where could he take them that was safe?

This was one contingency that Arthur hadn’t planned for. He had assumed he’d be the one confronting his father and thus executing the coup d'état However, the rest of his team had headed off to the royal chambers and he had no way of knowing if they had prevailed in their mission. With Merlin unconscious, he had no way of knowing whether the King was dead or not. Concerned as he was for Merlin’s health, he also wasn’t anxious for him to wake just yet in case Uther still breathed.

Before he could make a decision as to where to take his two passengers, a familiar figure appeared at the end of the corridor, joined quickly by another.

“Gwen! Gaius!”

They all rushed toward each other. Gwen instantly ran to him and detached Cynhafar’s clingy little hands from his neck, hoisting the boy onto her hip and hugging him close.

“Thank you, Guinevere.”

She nodded at him then looked to Gaius. Arthur did the same.

“I don’t know what’s wrong with him but we can’t stay here, the smoke will likely choke us all in a few more minutes.”

Gaius simply raised an eyebrow as if to chide him for the obviousness of the statement. However, he jerked his head sideways toward the stairs that he and Gwen had just ascended.

“Come, we’ll take him to my chambers. They’re far enough away that we shouldn’t be in any danger from the fire or the smoke. Where’s your father?”

“Apparently he ran away as soon as his son set fire to the council chamber. Hopefully by now he’s dead.”

Both eyebrows raised, Gaius matched his longer stride and inquired,

“Well, if you’re here, who is it that you are hoping will kill the King?”

“Morgana? Morgause? Mordred? We came together but I sent them after Father and went to fetch these two when Mordred sensed what was happening. As far as I’m concerned any one of them can do the job as long as it’s done.”

“Morga- oh, my! You have been busy, haven’t you, my boy?”

Gwen seemed to perk up a bit.

“Morgana’s back?”

“Yes, she came with her sister and Mordred, you remember him? That Druid boy we rescued all those years ago?”

A small crease appeared between her eyes but she nodded.

“I remember. He was a bit of an unsettling child as I recall.”

Arthur snorted in grim amusement.

“He’s not a child anymore but he’s still quite unsettling.”

Speaking of children brought his attention back to the one in Gwen’s arms. Cyhafar was being awfully quiet. So Arthur glanced over at him to see tears streaming down his cheeks, his little mouth quivering. He was reaching out, his hands stretched toward Merlin. His distress was obvious and the longer Merlin remained unconscious the more fearful Cynhafar was becoming. He alternately buried his face in Gwen’s neck clinging to her familiarity before turning again to reach for Merlin. All the while, he never stopped crying. Arthur took his first good look at the boy since his arrival as Gaius answered in the affirmative. Despite having just been seated in the middle of a smoking inferno, there wasn’t so much as a smudge of soot on the boy. He was dressed richly as befitted a prince but it was the boy himself that startled Arthur so. He looked like a perfect, miniature Merlin.

When he’d last seen him, he’d had Merlin’s colouring, that was certain but now...now he looked exactly like his “Poppa”, same eyes, same nose, same chin, same perfect little cupid bow mouth and even with the roundness of his toddler cheeks, Arthur could make out the beginnings of what were sure to be Merlin’s spectacular cheekbones. He even had the Dragonlord’s ears! Arthur wanted to laugh at that, for he clearly remembered Merlin’s fervent prayer that if there was one feature he didn’t want to pass on to his child it was the ears!

Arthur was staring so hard he almost tripped and Gwen giggled at his uncharacteristic clumsiness.

“He does look just like, Merlin, doesn’t he? It’s almost uncanny.”

She grinned at him and he couldn’t help grinning back even as Merlin remained a dead weight on his shoulder. He was completely limp and hadn’t so much as twitched since Arthur had picked him up. Cynhafar continued to cling to Gwen and cry, anxiously watching his father as Merlin bounced gently against Arthur’s shoulder all the way back to Gaius’s tower.

They reached the physician’s chambers and as he pushed inside, Arthur was hit with the sense of coming home. At no other time during this entire mission had he felt as if he was home. It was a military assault that turned into a desperate rescue in enemy territory but here, in this crowded old room that didn’t look as if a single thing in it had been moved in all the time he’d been away, Arthur could feel the comfort of homecoming wash over him.

Gently laying Merlin on the cot Gaius used for patients, he got his first good look at Merlin in close to two years. The first thing that struck him was that his unruly black hair was longer than he’d ever seen it. It curled in impudent abandon around the coronet which firmly encircled his head. Like Cynhafar, he was strangely clean, considering the smoking inferno Arthur had just pulled him from. The only smudges on the light blue of his thick, soft tunic were from where he’d lain across Arthur’s armoured shoulder.

On the other hand, all Arthur had to do was look down at his bare hands to see that they were soot smudged and filthy. His armour, dimmed with a layer of gray, gleamed only dully in the bright sunlight streaming through the room’s single window. When he’d entered the citadel, it had been freshly polished and shining brightly in the afternoon sun. There was something which felt right about that. Some of the struggle should show on the outside.

As Gaius’s gentle hands examined Merlin, Arthur continued his own examination of the man he’d come to rescue. There was a large purple bruise covering the right side of his face and dried blood crusted the edges of his nose and the corner of his mouth but he had no other visible injuries. His face, slack in repose was still the most beautiful thing Arthur could ever remember seeing. Suddenly he realized something. He stretched out a tentative hand and stroked the uninjured side of Merlin’s face with a single fingertip.

“Gaius? Gaius, I think my father must be dead.”

“Why is that, my Lord?”

“Because, I can touch him. I can touch, Merlin! His magic always prevented me before, even when he was asleep! Uther must have been dead before I even got to these two because I picked him right up!”

He rocked back on his heels, mind reeling with the implications of his newly returned ability to touch the Dragonlord. It meant Uther must be dead; there was no other explanation for it. He wondered ho’d done it, who’d been the one to finally strike the monster down. Or had they done it together, working in concert, power singing in harmony as they destroyed their oppressor together?

Even as the various scenarios flashed across his brain, he found he really didn’t care. They were free! Merlin was free, all of Albion was free! It was over, his father was dead. There was a time when such a thought would have brought a spasm of terrible pain to his chest but in all truthfulness, the man Arthur had considered his father had died long ago. Now the tyrant that wore his skin was gone and for the first time in years they could all breathe easy.

Arthur sagged down into the chair beside Merlin’s cot and looked down at the unconscious mage. He was richly dressed as befitted a King’s consort. The sumptuous looking tunic he wore was dyed a soft blue.The open collar was banded by a narrow strip of intricate embroidery and designed by a master hand to display the delicate musculature of his long neck and highlight the set of his extraordinary collarbones. He couldn’t help smiling at the fact that he, Arthur Pendragon, stoic leader of a rebel band of outlaws and sorcerers was mooning over the delicate curl of a pair of collarbones and the pearly sheen of the perfect alabaster skin that stretched over them.

He let his eyes wander down the long, elegant form of his Dragonlord and noted the elaborate knot-work embossed on the black leather of the narrow belt slung low around narrow hips. A leather sheath covered in matching knot-work was suspended from that belt, and protruding from it was the ebony handle of a dagger carved with arcane symbols that looked familiar to Arthur. The pommel was silver set with small cabochons of bloodstone, onyx , sapphire, pyrite, ruby, smoky quartz, spinel & red jasper. Arthur recognized each of the stones and what they represented from some of the long conversations he and Merlin used to have over Cynhafar’s cradle. The stones were a tangible connection to magic and thus had fascinated Arthur for this was something he could actually understand about Merlin’s powers. The subject had given him a much needed bridge to understanding Merlin’s magical nature. He traced a finger over every one and imagined he could feel the power each of them held. This dagger wasn’t a weapon, it was a talisman.

“It’s called an athame. Some of the magic he’s been learning uses rituals and focus objects. The athame is a powerful focus.”

Startled, he looked up at Gaius’s smiling face.

“He’ll be fine, by the way, his skull is intact. He just has a rather nasty goose-egg on the back of his head. I suspect it’s his magic keeping him unconscious this long. It’s rather taken on a bit of its own life, his power. When Uther uses him too hard, his magic sometimes protects him by putting him to sleep. I imagine he’ll wake soon enough, the magic is already healing his concussion.”

“Poppa wake up soon?”

The little boy, had crept up beside the cot without Arthur noticing. One small hand clutched at Merlin’s long fingers and Arthur could see the tears still streaming down the child’s face though his sniffles were quiet. He wondered if Uther had already drilled it into his small head that big boys didn’t cry. Cynhafar was strangely quiet now, considering all the screaming he’d been doing just minutes ago. Gaius turned to him and stroked a gentle hand over the boy’s inky black hair.

“Yes, little Prince, your Poppa is just healing himself. He’ll wake up soon.”

The old man looked over at Gwen and the two locked eyes for a long moment. They seemed to be communicating somehow but Arthur had no idea how, other than the different expressions they seemed to be making in response to each other. Finally, Gwen nodded and stood.

“I think I’m going to go exploring, see what I can find out.”

Arthur opened his mouth to protest but Gwen shook her head at him before he could utter a word.

“I’ll be fine, Arthur, really. I’ve rather perfected the art of going unnoticed these days. We need to know what’s going on out there. I’ll be back before you know it.”

Then, with a swish of her skirts and a look of determination on her face, she was out the door.

Feeling a small tug on his trouser leg, Arthur looked down to see Cynhafar peering up at him with Merlin’s eyes. Small arms reached up for him and without thinking much about it, he gathered the little boy into his lap.

“What’s your name?”

“I’m Arthur and actually, I’m your big brother.”

Cynhafar’s eyes widened and a smile slowly stretched across his little face.

“Poppa says you’re nice.”

Arthur grinned.

“Does he?”

Cynhafar nodded and beamed at him, his black curls bouncing. Arthur felt himself melting because it was Merlin’s smile. It was the sweet, right, happy smile that he hadn’t seen on Merlin’s face in years.

“Careful, my Lord. Our young Prince here has a way of wrapping people round his little finger. If you give the imp an inch he’ll take more than a mile.”

Grinning up at Gaius, Arthur shrugged rather helplessly.

“I think I’m already a goner, Gaius. I think Merlin will have to be the one on guard because I have a feeling it’s too late for me.”

The old man smiled indulgently at them then turned to the cot where Merlin had begun to stir.

“Ah, I believe our Sleeping Beauty is about to rejoin the land of the living.”

Cynhafar instantly squirmed in Arthur’s lap and demanded to go to his Poppa. Arthur lifted him onto the cot and watched as the little boy started to gently pat Merlin on the unbruised side of his face.

“Wake up, Poppa! Wake up!”

Long ebony lashes fluttered a bit before lifting to reveal dazed looking eyes.

“Arthur? Is that really you?’

“Yes, it’s me.”

He reached out and brushed the curling black hair out of Merlin’s eyes.

Suddenly those eyes cleared and widened.

“He’s dead. Oh gods, he’s gone, I can feel it, he’s gone!”

His gaze sharpened and focused on Arthur.

“You did it? You killed him?”

“Nope. Not sure yet who did the deed, I was too busy getting you and this little guy out of the council chamber that your son decided to burn to cinders. Apparently Uther hit you and when you wouldn’t wake up, he set the whole place on fire.”

“Cyhafar! What have I told you about burning things?”

He hugged his son to his chest and buried his face in his hair. Arthur rather wished to be doing the same thing to Merlin at the moment but he held back, respecting the moment between father and son. He watched, fascinated as Merlin began running his hands all over his small son, apparently checking him for injuries. Gaius assured him the boy was fine, that he’d been the only one injured. Merlin visibly sagged with relief before shaking his head and sitting all the way up. He fingered the back of his head for a moment.

“Damn, that throne is hard.”

“Was hard, it’s nothing but ash by now.”

“Can’t say I’ll miss it. No one will miss that monstrosity.”

He reached out and grabbed Arthur by the exposed gambeson on his left arm and pulled.

“You! Come here. Now!”

Arthur went willingly, sitting on the cot beside Merlin and just letting his fingers trail down one arm in wonder. It had been so long since he could touch Merlin in even the most innocent way. However, innocent was clearly not on his Dragonlord’s mind at the moment as he yanked Arthur closer and pressed a kiss to his lips. It took several long minutes of blissful mouth to mouth contact for Merlin’s son to make his impatience known. Arthur looked down to see the little thing tugging hard on his father’s tunic.

“Poppa! Poppa, I wanna play with Arfur!”

Cynhafar’s voice had an enchantingly wispy quality to it which Arthur found as endearing as the boy’s smile. He feared he hadn’t been far off the mark when he’d told Gaius it was too late for him. Cynhafar was rapidly capturing his heart as firmly as Merlin had all those years ago.

“Sorry, Love. Poppa gets to play with him first, I have dibs. I’ve been waiting longer.”

He grinned even as Cynhafar began to pout. Thankfully Gaius stepped in to intervene, lifting the little boy from the bed and leading him across the room with promises of something good to eat. It seemed a good distraction for the child went willingly enough, Arthur and Merlin forgotten in favour of his stomach. However, before they could do more than reach for each other, the door to the room burst in and Gwen, Morgana and Morgause tumbled in, definitely shattering the moment.

Merlin was more than a bit startled to see the three women. Well, he was startled to see Morgana and Morgause. He’d sort of expected Gwen to turn up soon enough. Actually he’d been hoping she would so he could finally be properly reunited with Arthur. However on seeing the two witches he hurled himself in front of Arthur in a panic. Standing with both hands raised, he let the power gather in his eyes, ready for anything they might try to throw at him. He no longer had to hide his magic and he’d be damned if either of them harmed a hair on Arthur’s head.

However, neither made any move to attack, in fact, they looked disconcertingly amused. Morgause eyed him from head to toe while Morgana’s lips quirked into her trademark smirk.

“I gather you two have been too busy to bother with explanations? Really Arthur, I’d have thought after all these years you could have taken a few minutes out of your celebrations to clue Merlin in to what’s been going on.”

“I haven’t had time because he was unconscious until about five minutes ago and he spent those five minutes both consoling and scolding his son for burning down the council chambers.”

To Merlin’s amazement Morgause threw back her head and laughed. Both women looked at the boy, sitting in Gaius’s lap with a sweet-bun stuffed in his mouth.

“Good to know there’s finally a half-decent sorcerer in line for the throne.” Morgana opined.

“Clever boy. I gather it was the fire that sent Uther running straight for his chambers?” Morgause drawled in appreciation. “Thank you little one, you helped us rid the world of a terrible disease.”

Cynhafar looked up at her and stared for a moment before his eyes crinkled up with the smile stretching across his whole face.

“Welcome.”

Merlin knew his mouth was probably hanging open but he couldn’t help it. Why weren’t they trying to kill him and Arthur? He almost asked the question aloud. Arthur stood behind him and wrapped a reassuring arm around his waist.

“It’s alright Merlin. It was never really me they wanted rid of, it was Uther.”

“Bu-but…Morgana…I…I…”

“Poisoned me? I know, I have to admit I was a bit angry about that for quite a while. However, I’ve come to realize that you really didn’t have a choice. We rather pushed you into it. I didn’t mean to, Merlin, I really didn’t but…”

Morgause interposed at that moment.

“But I got a bit carried away with my plans for doing away with Uther. She really didn’t know what was happening, Emrys. How on earth did you figure it out?”

“Kilgharrah.”

When they both looked blank, he explained.

“Kilgharrah, the Great Dragon. He told me what I had to do. I I'm sorry Morgana, I didn't want to, but it was either you or Arthur and Camelot. I couldn’t let you hurt everyone else that I loved. So, I did what he told me to do.”

“Crafty lizard. Had I known you were a Dragonlord, I’d have been a bit more careful.”

“I didn’t even know I was a Dragonlord back then! I didn’t find out until after I released Kilgharrah and he went on his rampage against Camelot.”

Morgause smiled dimly.

“Yes I heard about his little temper-tantrum. Can’t say I was overly upset by the news, just upset that he didn’t manage to kill Uther.”

Arthur chimed in.

“Oh, he was hiding in the citadel as usual, sending everyone else out to fight his battles for him. We managed to track down Merlin’s father, Balinor, the last Dragonlord, only to have him killed by one of Cenred’s patrols on the way home. Of course, I didn’t know that he was Merlin’s father until Uther discovered it.”

Merlin shuddered and shook his head at Arthur. That was not a story he was about to share with anyone.

Arthur cleared his throat and abruptly changed the subject.

“Anyway, while I was in Cait I managed to meet up with Morgana and her lovely sister and we hashed out an alliance. So, here we are.”

He eyed both ladies in turn,

“So which one of you finally did it?”

“You mean who killed Uther? Wasn’t either of us, we let Mordred take care of him.”

Utterly shocked, Merlin blurted out,

“Mordred? The little Druid boy?”

“He’s not so little anymore, Emrys. He’s about the same age you were when you stopped me dead in my tracks and that was about a year after you killed my mentor, Nimueh. Wasn’t it?”

Beginning to shake all over, Merlin sought out her piercing brown eyes, expecting to see nothing but hatred there. He was thoroughly surprised when all he saw was a deep, abiding sadness.

“I know what she did now, Emrys, but I loved her. She was the only mother I ever knew and I loved her, but what Uther did after Ygraine died warped her. She was never the same after he began the purges. I was young when that happened but I can remember what she was like before and that’s how I want to remember her now. For a long time, I let what happened to her twist me but I don’t think the woman who raised me would have wanted this for me.”

“I don’t want to live like that anymore. He’s gone and we’re finally free. Arthur has bound himself to us and he will help us bring the balance back to the world. Help us dissipate the magic that’s begun to poison the land itself. That’s what I want for our future. It’s truly all I’ve ever wanted. So, you have nothing to fear from me, Emrys. I am no longer your enemy.”

“Merlin. Could you please call me Merlin? Emrys is just some mythical creature the Druids made up. My name is Merlin, always has been, always will be.”

“Alright, Merlin. But you should know many people will still call you by the title.”

He sighed knowing she was right but accepting it was true and being happy about it were two entirely different things. He supposed he’d eventually get used to it, just as he’d become used to being called, “Sire”, “My Lord”, and “Your Highness.” What was one more meaningless title? It was just a label; it didn’t dictate who he was.

Mordred had yet to make an appearance but he and the Druids were apparently busy rounding up the last of Uther’s loyal guards and restoring order to the palace and the upper town. They were busydisseminating information and calming concerned citizens and Merlin was happy to leave them to it.

Arthur left them all for a while, intent on checking that the fire hadn’t spread futher than the council chambers and that no one else had been injured during the incident. Merlin thought it unlikely. As much as Uther had covered every inch of that room in hideously ornate woodwork, it was still stone underneath and once the door itself was consumed, there would be no further fuel beyond the room as the fallen King had at least had the good sense to leave the stonework of the hall bare. As for injuries, he figured everyone had likely scattered the second the doors to the room began to smoke. It had just been him and Cynhafar in that chamber with Uther and with him gone, no one else was likely to stick around to save his Consort and child. No one but Arthur.

When he returned about an hour later, Arthur settled on the bed with Merlin and a much calmer Cynhafar. The ladies seemed content to sit around Gaius’s room and chat all evening but Merlin was anything but. He’d been too long without Arthur and he wanted some alone time. So he parked Cynhafar with Gwen and asked the sisters to put out any fires his rather excitable son might light in his absence. Then he made his excuses and grabbed Arthur by the hand, dragging him off to his own private quarters where he was certain they wouldn’t be disturbed for a long time.

The trek from Gaius’s room to his own had never seemed so long! As they wound through the corridors of the palace, he smiled ruefully over his shoulder at Arthur.

“You know he did this just to isolate me even more?”

“Did what?”

“Gave me the tower that was the farthest away from Gaius’s. It’s on the exact opposite corner of the citadel and there’s nothing like direct path from one to the other. I think he figured Gaius wouldn’t be up for the trip very often. Thank the gods he was wrong about that! It’s alright though, I know a few shortcuts.” He felt his grin turn cheeky as he turned back to lead Arthur deeper into the bowels of the castle.

“You do realize I spent all but the last few years living here? No one knows this place better than I do.”

His tone was smug but teasing and Merlin knew he was enjoying the baiting and bantering as much as the anticipation of finally being alone together without any barriers to separate them. It was them, their own personal dynamic and falling back into it was every bit as comforting as the feel of Arthur’s solid wrist under his fingers.

“Ah, well, we’ll see about that! You may have explored this place as a child but I’ve an advantage you never did.”

“Yeah, yeah, the almighty warlock Emrys, trust me, I’ve probably heard more about your powers than you have and yet you’re still the same snarky, impudent, clumsy little idiot you always were.”

The palace was unnaturally quiet, most of the denizens of the place holed up in their rooms or gone home to their quiet little houses in the lower town after the immense excitement of this morning’s dramatic coup. Their flirtations echoed rather loudly in the empty corridors but Merlin couldn’t care less. He’d never felt so free inside these walls. Uther was dead, Arthur was here, alive and well and still in love with Merlin. Life had never felt so sweet.
Neither of them noticed the whisper of a tapestry rippling away from the wall behind them, without a breeze to move it.

It wasn’t until Merlin spun around in a spontaneous burst of joy, intent on taunting Arthur with his latest inspired bit of banter that he saw the man behind Arthur. He was young, pale-skinned and dark haired with the brightest blue eyes Merlin had ever seen. There was a naked blade in his hands and the blue eyes suddenly flared with the red-orange glow of a forest fully aflame. His lips were moving and Merlin could feel the power of the words slipping almost silently from his barely open mouth.

The blade flared to life with a bright red glow and began to descend in an arc that would bring it down directly across the back of Arthur’s unprotected neck. He heard a voice echoing in his head, “I shall never forgive this, Emrys, and I shall never forget.”

“Mordred!”

He screamed the name even as he acted instinctively. His subconscious control of his powers was still brittle and battle-ready, hardened and honed by all the destruction Uther’s merciless campaigns had forced him to rain down on countless scores of men.

The young sorcerer never made an audible sound as his body combusted and he flashed into a burning pillar of flesh that was consumed in seconds. However, the anguished screech that reverberated through Merlin’s mind would be echoed in his nightmares for many a night to come.

By the time Arthur spun around to face his attacker there was nothing left of him but a smoking pile of greasy ash on the floor by his feet. Shaking in reaction, Merlin staggered to the nearest wall and slid down it until he felt his bottom hit the cool stone floor.

Arthur rushed to his side and sank to his knees on the floor beside him.

“Merin! What-what was that? How....why….by the gods, what just happened?”

He flung his arms around Arthur and clung tightly to him panting his fear against the warm skin of Arthur’s neck.

“It-it was Mordred! He, oh, he had a sword, he’d enchanted it, by the time I saw him he was already swinging for your neck! Oh gods, Arthur! I could have lost you, I almost lost you, I would have lost you if I hadn’t turned around. I never heard him coming, I never sensed him there!”

“How did you…I mean…if he was already swinging for me, how…?”

His whole body was shaking in reaction now, he clutched feebly at Arthur and finally the other man’s arms came around to hold him tight. He tried to gather enough breath to answer Arthur but he was on the verge of hyperventilation and he wanted to avoid the embarrassment of losing it like that.

“Incineration spell, the one Uther made me use over, and over, and over again. Every time we went into battle, he made me use that spell. He loved to see his enemies go up in a pillar of flame, the sick fuck.”

“But so fast…how?”

“I’m a warrior too, Arthur. I may not look it to your eyes but I’ve killed more men in battle than you ever could. You know muscle-memory?”

Arthur nodded. His eyes were wide and he was definitely looking awed.

“It’s the same with my magic. It’s been drilled into me now. I could probably do that in my sleep if I needed to. As if I’d let that miserable little bastard anywhere near you. He never stood a chance!”

Suddenly angry, he turned the blaze of his eyes on his beloved.

“I thought you said he was our ally? A trusted friend.”

“I thought he was…well, I’d hoped he was but honestly, there was something there I didn’t like. Something about him always creeped me out. But Morgana and Morgause trusted him, he promised he was here to help.”

“He hated me. Ever since we took the crystal of Neahtid away from his guardian. He told me that day, he said he’d never forgive me, that he wouldn’t forget. I imagine he was still holding a grudge against you as well.”

Arthur groaned.

“Morgana’s going to be devastated. She adored that creepy little bastard.”

“He tried to kill you!”

“Yeah but she’s still going to be upset.”

“How about Morgause?”

“I suspect she’ll be less upset and even less surprised. Though they never said so in front of me, I got the impression they didn’t see eye to eye where Mordred was concerned. I don’t think Morgause was ever really taken in by his act. But Morgana…”

“I don’t care, he tried to kill you. He was using dark magic, I could see it in his eyes. He was corrupted Arthur. He’d have turned on us sooner or later.”

“I just don’t get it. Why now? He had to know he couldn’t defeat your magic. What good would killing me do him?”

“It would have wrecked me and he knew it. I’d have been useless to anyone had he succeeded.”

“Merlin…”

“Don’t Arthur, don’t try to feed me any platitudes. If I lose you, I lose me. It’s as simple as that. Somehow the little fucker knew that.”

“The prophecies, maybe? He did grow up as a Druid. He recognized you as their Emrys the first time he saw you, right?”

Merlin nodded slowly, his shaking subsiding within the reassuring embrace of his lover.

“I love you, Arthur. I love you with everything that I am. If I were to ever lose you…I don’t even want to think about it because I might just start to feel some sympathy for your father.”

Arthur nodded and just held him close a while longer. In a surprisingly short period of time they were making jokes about roman candles and human torches and Mordred’s attack merged with all the other brushes with death they’d endured that day. Eventually, Merlin rose to his feet and took Arthur by the wrist again.

“Come on, we still have half the citadel to cross before I can put my hands all over you!”

Smiling softly, Arthur followed him without a word.

Almost twenty minutes later, they burst through the doors to his chambers. Merlin lit every torch and every candle in the room with just a flicker of will. Then he just stood there, devouring Arthur with his eyes. He was grimy, covered in soot and sweat and gods knew what else. His normally golden hair was as dull as his armour and his face was smeared with what looked like mud and tear tracks. He smiled when he noticed the tiny hand prints of clean amongst all the filth coating Arthur’s neck. He was thinner than Merlin remembered; life on the run had clearly pared him down to the bare minimum of muscle and bone. There’d be no more fat jokes for a long time to come.

He lifted a hand and ran his fingers over Arthur’s cheek, down over one ear, and wrapped it around the back of his neck, just staring at him in wonder. He was here, he was finally here and Merlin could touch him, feel the warmth of his skin beneath his fingers for the first time since that horrible night when- no! No! He ruthlessly cut off the memory. He would examine it another time, when he and Arthur were firm and tight and nothing could ever tear them apart again. Then maybe he could reconcile the joy he’d felt upon finding out that Arthur returned his feelings with the agony of Uther’s ruthless assault and possession of his body and theft of his will. Now was not the time for that, now was the time to just cherish the man in front of him. It was the moment to savour Arthur’s own gentle, exploratory touches and revel in the simple joy of feeling their skin meet for the first time in years.

Merlin’s chest felt funny and it took a few seconds for him to recognize the feeling. It was happiness. It had been so long since he’d felt that emotion uncomplicated by any other that it took his breath away with its intensity. The euphoria rushing through his veins made him giddy with wonder. Arthur’s hand was on his cheek, a thumb rubbing gently across his hungry lips and yet they just stood there, reveling in the moment. His other hand rested low on Merlin’s back, thumb rubbing gentle circles over the soft fabric of his tunic. The warmth of his skin penetrated the cloth and Merlin shuddered to feel it. They leaned toward each other slowly, bending their necks until their foreheads met and their noses nestled side by side. Merlin curled his free hand against Arthur’s armoured chest and Arthur closed his eyes for a moment, but Merlin couldn’t. He couldn’t stand to take his eyes off Arthur for even a moment. He resented every fractured second that required him to blink his curiously dry eyes.

Arthur’s lashes fanned his cheeks, long and golden against the thin film of grime covering his fair, pink skin. Merlin realized that Arthur hadn’t closed his eyes, after all, he was simply staring downward, his eyes locked on Merlin’s lips. He nudged himself forward until his mouth rested against the soft pillow of Arthur’s lips. He threaded his fingers through the golden strands of his hair and softly rubbed their mouths together. Arthur nudged his top lip against Merlin’s bottom and he opened his mouth to give his Prince better access. Arthur gently lipped and nipped at the trembling flesh and Merlin groaned aloud, parting his lips further and adding some suction to the kiss, attempting to draw Arthur further into his mouth. He felt the moment Arthur capitulated and slipped his tongue between Merlin’s needy lips.

He drew Merlin up against his body and deepened the kiss and Merlin buried both hands in Arthur’s hair and held on for dear life. Long, strong fingers were twined in the black strands of his own hair and Merlin moaned when they tugged gently on his scalp. He felt them slip over the coronet that was somehow still firmly circling his brow and Merlin let go of Arthur to try and rip the thing from his head but Arthur stopped him, pulled back, and looked deep into his eyes.

“No. That’s the one and only thing he did right, Merlin. You are my lord, my sovereign, the ruler of my heart and soul and yours is the only head in this land that deserves to be crowned. Leave it, for I am the Dragon and you are my Lord.”

And then Arthur was on the floor, kneeling at his feet, kissing them, stroking his fingers over the soft cloth of the sumptuous slippers he wore whilst indoors. He looked up and Merlin’s heart nearly burst from the love and devotion he saw shining in the azure depths of his incredible eyes.

“Don’t you know that I was made to serve you? All these years, my father had it twisted round. The House of Pendragon was created to serve the Dragonlords, we have done so for generations. It’s why we are called the “Chief Dragon”. We were first among your servitors. We were never meant to rule the Dragonlords, we were meant to be your fiercest protectors, your most loyal servitors.”

Arthur began to tear at his armour, struggling desperately to work it loose from his body. When Merlin leaned forward to help, he gently batted his hands away and continued to tear at the leather bindings that held the metal strapped across his chest. Confused but unwilling to watch his Prince, his King battle against his own protection, Merlin whispered a few words and the buckles loosened and the straps pulled free. Arthur clawed the metal armaments free from his arms and then bent forward to tug the chainmail from his torso. Once free of the heavy, steel tunic, he wrenched apart the ties of his smoke stained gambeson and shrugged it off before grabbing the hem of the linen smock that was the last layer of cloth protecting his flesh from the chill of the evening air.

Merlin felt his eyes widen and his lips part on a gasp when Arthur yanked that last layer of clothing from his torso, leaving him naked from the waist up. A dragon, glittering red, gold, silver and blue, glowed with power as it raised its claws over the left half of Arthur’s chest. The dragon was there to defend or attack, would do whatever was needed to protect his heart. And Merlin…Merlin was his heart, the dragon there proclaimed it for all to see. He read the Druidic symbols running down both arms and recognized the bands bracketing Arthur’s left elbow. Every sigil glowed with the power of the Old Religion and marked Arthur as a defender of his faith. Arthur the Bear, Arthur would be his courage, his protector on his journey, the source of his inner strength . The Bear would sometimes lead and sometimes follow but they would always be together, and together they would bring about the transformation that would take Albion from the inky dark and lead it into the golden light.

This was what Morgause had meant when she said that Arthur had bound himself to them. He was indelibly marked with magic, his skin held his pledge and showed the blessing he’d received. He had offered himself and the Old Religion had accepted him. He was as much a creature of magic as Merlin and for the very first time, Merlin truly understood that they were equal halves of the same whole. They shared one soul housed in two bodies and neither could ever be complete without the other.

Enraptured, he sank to his knees facing Arthur. He let his eyes show his wonder, his understanding, his appreciation. He allowed his fingers to trace the deeply coloured symbols of Arthur’s faith, the proof of his promise to Merlin. He leaned forward and joined their lips together and began the journey that would finally join their bodies in a mating as close as the one their souls had already attained.

Chapter Text

Merlin was curled up in his favourite spot, the window embrasure he’d magically enlarged just for this purpose. Arthur had indulged Merlin and allowed him to burn almost everything in the old royal chambers and they had moved the official residence of the King to an entirely different side of the castle. Merlin had actually enjoyed using his magic for such a frivolous pursuit as expanding and remodeling the simple chambers that had existed here into something comfortable, functional and grand enough to suit everyone’s sensibilities. Arthur hadn’t cared what he did with the place as long as the bed was comfortable but Merlin had the rooms appointed with simple, elegant furnishings fit for his king. Arthur might claim he didn’t care but deep down, Merlin knew he enjoyed his creature comforts. There was nothing ornate about the decor, it was just high quality workmanship coupled with comfortable practicality. Sumptuous bedding had been provided for Arthur’s enjoyment while the enormous window was a purely selfish indulgence on Merlin’s part. He’d picked these quarters specifically for the view. A thick cushion insulated him from the cold stone of the castle walls while he looked out over the Queen’s Garden. Arthur had offered to rename it for him but he’d declined and said that they should keep it as a memorial to his mother, Ygraine. He’d been given a wide smile and a warm hug in response.

Arthur smiled more often and easily in recent months. It was a lovely change from his usual frustrated and careworn expressions. Merlin looked down at the large bump bulging beneath his heart and fondly rubbed his swollen belly. The next Pendragon prince gave him a kick in exchange and he felt a grin spread across his face. His little passenger was the reason behind Arthur’s good cheer and Merlin would always be grateful to his unborn son for the unintentional effect he was already having on his father.

Merlin glanced down into the garden where Cynhafar was holding court. He’d enchanted the Big Oak to produce a miniature throne to grow from its roots and he’d placed his two-year-old brother upon it. Little Talfan stared up at the brightest star in his sky, his five-year-old brother Cynhafar. Gathered around the two, were children sired by knights and servants, nobles and craftsmen. The Queen’s Garden was for the children of Camelot and neither Arthur nor Merlin had wanted to limit whose offspring had access to it. Both of them had grown up very lonely, Arthur isolated by his station in life, Merlin by the powers he was born with. They didn’t want the same fate for their boys.

Three years had gone by and they were still fully occupied with repairing and restoring all the damage Uther had done to this land and its people. While the Druids and other practitioners of magic and the Old Religion were utterly delighted to have Emrys as their sovereign’s consort, many of the citizens of Albion had initially been extremely wary when he and Arthur had married. Under Uther’s control, he’d been forced to use his powers to terrorize the people and many were unaware that he’d been forced to perform those atrocities against his will. Those who lived in Camelot itself were easier to convince, having been witnesses to Uther’s grand speech about “capturing and taming” the Dragonlord, but others had been harder to convince.

Merlin was slowly winning them over with his constant efforts to reverse what damage he could, and help restore what he could not. He’d been forced to act under the open scrutiny of a skeptical populace and much as he hated to be the focus of so much attention, Arthur had convinced him of the need for it. It seemed as if it was finally paying off. His public benevolence, his quiet, self-effacing demeanor and his friendly cheer were winning him more and more of the people’s trust every day. Then there were the heirs he provided for Arthur. After Cynhafar’s birth, every citizen of Albion had become aware of the Dragonlord’s ability to bear children. Few knew he could only bear sons for his mate but all were delighted that the line of succession now appeared so secure. With two healthy, bright and gifted male heirs and what looked to be a third on the way, many a citizen of Camelot would have found themselves warming to such a royal consort.

Glancing down once more, Merlin smiled to see Morgause settled on the ground with several children gathered around her. She was performing little spells for their amusement and Merlin shook his head, amazed as ever how much Morgause, of all people, seemed to adore children. Apparently it was adults she had more difficulty with. Still, she’d turned away from the practice of dark magic and while she didn’t live in the castle, she had her own set of apartments here and spent a great deal of time with her sister and the royal family.

Morgana had been the one who’d had a more difficult time settling back into life in Camelot. She’d left for several months after Mordred’s death, both grieved by his death and mortified by his actions in equal measure. She’d been so proud of him for killing Uther but on hearing of his attack on Arthur and Merlin, something inside her had seemed to break. At first, it had been difficult to convince her of the truth that Mordred had indeed attempted to kill Arthur. She’d only come to accept the facts when Morgause performed a spell on them to confirm the veracity of their accounts of the incident.

Still, knowing that they weren’t to blame hadn’t made it any easier for her to be around them, so she’d gone off on her own, leaving even her sister behind on her journey to find peace. Eventually she’d returned to them, seeming to have found what she was looking for. Now she lived with them full time, a de facto member of the royal family. She did her part to help Merlin in healing the land and rebuilding the kingdom and as they worked side by side, something of their old friendship returned to them. It wasn’t the same, but neither were they. Too much pain and suffering had touched their lives for them to ever go back to the simple relationship they’d once enjoyed, but the bond they’d formed in these last few years was strong.

As though his thoughts of Morgana had summoned her to his side, a knock sounded at the door. When he called out his permission to enter, the door swung open to reveal the black haired sorceress herself. He smiled at her and nodded her forward but found he was too comfortable to move from his perch. As comfort was becoming something of a scarcity as his pregnancy progressed, Morgana was inclined to forgive him the lapse in manners. After a casual exchange of greetings, Morgana had settled on the window seat beside him. He’d purposely made the window big enough for two. She too looked down on the garden where the children played, and where her sister was now seated beside Gwen who dandled little Talfan on her knee. Hunith had her own following of little ones who appeared to be listening raptly as she told them some tale. He could understand their fascination for his mother had filled his childhood with amazing tales of wonder and magic. Her presence here, since she had felt it safe to return from Cait upon Uther's death, was one of the reasons Camelot finally felt like home.

“Has he been setting any more fires lately?”

Morgana nodded toward the toddler, who, much like his father and elder brother, had shown an early inclination toward incendiary magic.

“No, thank the gods. He’s not anywhere near as powerful or stubborn as Cynhafar.”

His eldest continued to be a handful but Merlin relished the challenge of raising such a child. However, Gwen, as the Royal Nursemaid was most happy to contend with a milder boy this time around.

“No, he never will be, but he’ll be a great King.”

Merlin looked at her sharply, her words were delivered in the tones of conviction, not speculation. Her visions came less frequently these days but were more vivid and powerful than the chaotic dreams her developing Sight had once plagued her with. Something in the way she’d just spoken hinted at a knowledge gained from her Sight.

“Oh? Will he now?”

She arched an eyebrow at him as if to chastise him for the coy response. She knew very well that he was perceptive enough to know when she was speaking with authority.

“I had a dream last night. It involved your children.”

She turned back to the window but her eyes saw things that his probably never would. He had technically mastered the use of the Crystal of Neahtid but he still wasn’t comfortable using the damned thing.

“My children or Arthur’s children?”

“Both.”

Merlin tensed. For all that his eldest son displayed no jealousy or resentment of Talfan’s position as heir apparent, Merlin knew the boy didn’t realize what it meant for him. He was so young, who was to say he might not grow up to resent the fact that his younger brother would be the one to inherit their father’s crown? It was a nagging worry in the back of his mind and had been ever since Talfan’s birth. He sighed aloud and asked the question, for he knew Morgana wouldn’t volunteer the information. She always wanted to be asked.

“What did you See, Morgana?”

She turned to him and smiled gently. The expression sat well on her lovely features.

“They will all learn well the lessons we teach them, and they will carry on your legacy, both yours and Arthur’s, well into the future. It probably won’t surprise you but Cynhafar will be a Dragonlord. Sadly, Talfan will not. He will have enough magic of his own that he’ll be a force to reckon with but he’ll follow Arthur’s path more than yours, dedicating himself to the art of the warrior. Cynhafar will be much more powerful but, like his father before him, he’ll use his powers to protect and serve his King.”

He let go of the breath he’d been holding with a loud sigh and Morgana’s smile became a grin.

“Worry not, he’ll be most content with his dragons and will never covet his brother’s throne.”

“Wait, dragons? As in, more than one?”

She nodded and her eyes sparkled.

“Kilgharrah is returning and he won’t be alone.”

Merlin laughed aloud with joy.

Sighing in bliss, he leaned his head back against the cushions piled behind him. The dragons were coming back! Without cracking an eye, he asked one final question.

“Do you know when they’re coming?”

“Soon.”

It was vague but it was enough. The last of Uther’s pollution would be driven from the land with the return of the majestic creatures he’d labored so mightily to eradicate. That knowledge was like the missing piece in the mosaic they’d created from a broken Albion. The pieces would never fit together in the same way but in their new arrangement they formed a picture more beautiful than the original. The old now merged with the new and Albion would eventually be all the better for having been broken as he and Arthur would build a stronger kingdom from the remnants of the old.