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Gwaine saw the looks Merlin sent Arthur’s way. Of course he did. Everyone did.
But one thing Gwaine was not--and never would be--was a quitter.
“Give me a chance,” he murmured into Merlin’s skin in the torch-lit twilight of Camelot. They curled together in a shadowy alcove of the courtyard, a halfway point between Gaius’ quarters and the Knights’ barracks.
“I don’t know-” Merlin’s doubt was cut short by Gwaine’s lips pressed softly against his.
“Just a chance,” Gwaine promised. Merlin hesitated, though he couldn’t stop himself from reaching for the warm flesh of Gwaine’s side.
“You know how I feel about Arthur,” he warned. “I just. Don’t want you to feel...used.”
“You can use me anytime,” said Gwaine with a ridiculous eyebrow waggle that usually brought at least a smile. Now, though, Merlin just looked him in the eye and waited. “It won’t be that way,” he said finally.
“How do you know?” Merlin’s eyes were big, worried. Gods bless him, he cared. As if Gwaine wouldn’t be happy with any scrap of his affection.
“I promise,” Gwaine said softly. “I’ll do everything I can to make you happier every day.” He dropped a kiss to Merlin’s forehead, doing his best to erase the creases of worry.
Merlin smiled into his eyes. “You do that already,” he said, his skin flushing in the torchlight.
Gwaine couldn’t resist kissing him then, with intent. They fell into each other, losing track of time and only emerging to breathe. They began to exchange ever softer kisses, slowing down and lingering longer. It took all the strength Gwaine had to be patient as Merlin made his decision.
“Okay,” he said, just when Gwaine thought he would lose his mind.
“Yeah?”
“Yes.”
They were both smiling so large their faces hurt and Gwaine barely stopped himself from shouting in victory. He leaned in to kiss Merlin again.
“Alright,” he said when they came up for air. “Let’s get to bed, it’s bloody freezing.”
*
Arthur tended not to pay attention to gossip amongst the knights. They were always on about something or another, from who was trying to catch the attention of a noblewoman, to who was rolling in the hay with girls from the lower town.
Useless nonsense, usually.
The only thing that piqued his interest was gossip that centered around the knights themselves. It was useful information. Through the palace whispers accompanied by his own firsthand knowledge, he’d come to have a thorough understanding of the knight’s lives.
Percy had a habit of falling head over heels for the wrong sort, so he had to be watched when untrustworthy ladies and lads were about.
Elyan spent far too much of his time betting on silly things like rat races, so he had to be watched to ensure that his excitement didn’t sweep him away and lead to a poor decision.
Lancelot had no vices, but he was just the type to sacrifice himself too much for others. Arthur did his best to block those efforts, though he ignored that advice when it came to his own life.
Gwaine, of course, was just the subject of speculation about how many barrels of ale he downed each night.
Usually.
Lately Gwaine had been on the receiving end of a lot of lewd smirks and nudging elbows. Sometimes he straightened his spine and kept walking, other times he laughed and rolled his eyes. So, Arthur concluded, something was happening that the knights didn’t feel inclined to tell him. He was starting to nervously eye the kitchen maids for baby bumps.
He would have asked Merlin to snoop around, but he was incompetent and lacked the ability to be even a little stealthy. Besides, he was clearly losing his mind.
For starters, he had begun to show up. On time. To every. Single. Training. And if he was late it was only by minutes instead of his usual extravagance of tardiness.
It was downright unsettling, so much so that it began to make Arthur uncomfortable.
“Merlin, what are you doing here?” He finally demanded one day a month into the mystery. Merlin looked up, seemingly startled, from shining some armor on his lap.
“What do you mean, Sire?”
“See, that. Have you been possessed? You’re doing chores, Merlin! You’re here on time, you’re calling me “sire”...” his eyes widened. “Oh god, what did you do?”
At this, the knights closest to them couldn’t help snickering. Arthur swung around to demand they go back to practicing, but as he opened his mouth he heard one knight say, through his laughter:
“More like WHO’d he do?” And the other knights chuckled louder.
“Back to your paces,” Arthur ordered, an edge to his tone that didn’t bode well if he had to say it twice. He turned back to Merlin and found a bright pink face that confirmed the knight’s words more concretely than any confession.
Arthur narrowed his eyes as Merlin started to open his mouth.
“You know you can’t lie to me for shit Merlin,” He reminded him. Merlin’s mouth swung shut.
“Wasn’t going to lie,” he muttered.
“So who is it?” Arthur asked, looking around at the knights. They weren’t his best, mostly new trainees and the trainers that were doing their best with what they had.
His eyes caught on one trainer who wasn’t moving, instead staring in their direction. Gwaine. Proud, beautiful Gwaine, with his shoulders back and sweat glistening along his jaw. He caught Arthur’s eye and held his gaze, one eyebrow going up as if in a challenge.
Arthur turned slowly back toward Merlin, barely keeping his mouth from falling open in shock. The red on Merlin’s face was all he needed to see.
He spun on his heel without another word. It would be a harsher training than usual today, and if anyone had a problem with that, they could go see Gwaine.
*
“I’m dead,” Merlin told Gwaine after training. “You’re courting a dead man. When he walked away I felt my heart fall into my boots.”
Gwaine, though he tried for a jovial attitude, was similarly on edge. “We’re not dead yet,” he said. “We live to fight another day.”
They ignored the catcalls from the other knights as they stooped down to gather the armor Merlin helped him lug them back, but his mind wasn’t on the task. His mind, like Merlin’s, was on Arthur.
He knew why he was worried, even if Merlin didn’t. Arthur loved Merlin. Platonically, romantically, upside down and backwards. But the prat was too stupid and repressed to recognize it for what it was, so he gave himself the role of being “protective” of Merlin. All so he could be jealous in a way precious father Uther would approve of.
Gwaine had known he would be annoyed at not being told and that he would throw one of his royal fits. But he wasn’t sure what to expect after that.
Warning about proper knight conduct? A grim talking to about his intentions with Merlin and the consequences of breaking his heart? Or, on the other end of the spectrum, a duel to the death on the training grounds? Or would Arthur throw out his honor altogether in favor of just stabbing him through the back at the next opportunity?
He truly didn’t know. Arthur had been unreadable, and he was already difficult enough to understand.
“Oh no, no no,” said Merlin as they entered the armory hut. “You’re the big brave knight, remember? You’re not supposed to be nervous.”
“Me?” He asked with a raised eyebrow, dropping his handful of equipment on the nearest bench. “What about you? You’re the one with, you know,” he wiggled his fingers to indicate magic.
“Shut up,” said Merlin, as if anyone besides the chain mail could hear them. Gwaine grinned. This was one more thing that perfect princess Arthur didn’t know about, not that he was counting.
“That’s a good idea,” he said softly, slowly backing Merlin against the rough stone wall and proceeding to patiently and agonizingly ravish him. Merlin went willingly, tangling his long fingers into Gwaine’s hair and failing miserably at keeping his moans behind his teeth.
This was something else Arthur didn’t know about, Gwaine thought. Arthur didn’t know the shape of Merlin’s lips under his or the scent of his skin. He didn’t know--
“What. The hell. Are you doing ?” Arthur shouted. Merlin froze, all happy indulgence evaporating. Gwaine froze too, but in anger instead of fear. He turned slowly to face Arthur, standing in the doorway like a shocked child.
“I’m trying to have a private moment with my love,” Gwaine said stiffly. “If that’s alright with you?”
Arthur couldn’t have gone redder if he was enchanted into a tomato.
“It is certainly not alright with me!” Arthur bellowed.
Gwaine gritted his teeth. “I apologize,” he snapped. “For implying either of us give a damn.”
Arthur’s jaw dropped, and Gwaine wondered if it would be treasonous to just…punch him. Right in the stomach. Or the balls. Before he could decide, Merlin stepped forward.
“Come on,” he told Arthur in a voice that said there would be no argument. “Let’s go.”
And then the love of Gwaine’s left with the love of his, and Gwaine felt strangely like Merlin described before: as if his heart was sinking to his toes.
*
Merlin steered Arthur far away from the armory. All the way across the green, through the castle and to his chambers. The entire way, Arthur blustered about indecency, and knightly conduct, honor, and treason.
By the time they reached his rooms he was nearly out of steam. Merlin knew he would be, that was the point.
He stepped into Arthur’s room, turned to face him and said: “What is it?”
Arthur scowled at him. “Were you not listening to anything I said?”
“It sounded like a lot of nonsense to me,” said Merlin. “You don’t give a damn about any of that when one of the knights has knocked someone up, or started a fight or drank half a tavern. So what is it? What’s your problem with Gwaine and I?”
Arthur frowned. He bit his lip. He began to pace in front of his chamber doors, clearly frustrated. Finally, he took a deep breath and stopped walking, facing away from Merlin.
“I suppose,” he began. “That Gwaine is very handsome. Roguish, but handsome. A liar, but handsome.”
“Gwaine is not a liar,” Merlin snapped.
“You’re too good for him,” Arthur snapped back. “He will break your heart!”
“As if you care what happens to my heart!”
Oops.
Merlin hadn’t meant to cry that out loud, so raw and so open. Hadn’t meant to lay his heart bare in those words, the echo of his true cry beneath: you will not choose me, that cry said.
Because he wouldn’t.
Arthur would never choose Merlin, even if he wanted to. He was loyal to Camelot, loyal to his role as prince and future king. He would at the very least marry a woman, if not one of good birth, to give the kingdom an heir.
So, even if he did care for Merlin in that way, as Merlin sometimes suspected he did, he would never show it. Never speak it, never express it. He would bury it and do right by the kingdom.
Gwaine, on the other hand, could barely keep his passion in check. He whispered sweet things in Merlin’s ears all day long, kissed him every chance he got, would spend his life by Merlin’s side if Merlin allowed it.
And Merlin would.
Because he would rather have a man that loved him and may not be quite what he wanted than pine after a cold and impossible dream.
In the silence after his outburst, Arthur stared at him. Merlin wondered if he saw the decision in his face.
It didn’t matter. The choice was made regardless.
Merlin strode past Arthur and flung the doors open. Then he walked away.