Chapter Text
Morgana was very nearly ten when she found herself, inexplicably, with a brother. She’d never much been fond of the concept of a brother before and she didn’t think that a brother such as Arthur Pendragon was would ever be able to change that. He was seven and exuberant and childish and full of an energy that always made her head ache and her mouth twist in envy. He was also prone to tantrums and demanding everything to bend to his whims. She had been that full of life sometime, she was sure. She couldn’t remember it now.
One night, a month after she had first arrived in Camelot, Arthur came crashing into her chambers after supper and demanded that they sneak out into the castle grounds. Morgana refused, obviously, and the situation clearly devolved from mild frustration to not so mild frustration as Arthur argued and cajoled and tried to work his way into spoiled, stubborn hysteria.
‘You never play with me,’ he pouted, golden hair glistening red in the candle light.
‘It’s because I don’t like you,’ Morgana said calmly and told him to go away. Arthur merely stared at her, confused.
‘Why? You don’t even know me. I’m brilliant, you know.’
‘You’re childish. Now go away.’
He was childish, she told herself, even as his pout grew in magnitude and his eyes narrowed as he straightened himself. It looked comically insufficient, short as he was, even for a seven year old.
‘I’m not childish. I’m the future king,’ he proclaimed importantly with a scowl, ‘You are childish. And I don’t like you either. You just sulk all day and don’t talk to anyone. Only because father said that your father died that I waste my time—’
Morgana shoved him out and closed the door before he could finish.
It was another two months before she could wake up and not immediately be surprised to find herself in Camelot. The sun shone too brightly here and there was not enough rain. Gauis had told her that the rain would come in time, there was time to winter yet and that she would feel more like home eventually, but Morgana didn’t believe him. It was hard to believe him when he talked to her in that gentle tone as if she was a child to be coddled like Arthur.
She didn’t like it, but she did talk to him, seeking him out in the physican’s chambers occasionally, especially when Arthur was being irritating again. He had not tried to persuade her into breaking the rules again, but he did sometimes pester her with questions and wanted to play with her in the training grounds. Morgana refused, always, and he threw a tantrum, sometimes. Gauis always listened to her complaints though, and even thought he told her that Arthur would mature with age, his wince told her that he agreed with her assessment of the capabilities of the Prince to annoy the calm out of even Gauis.
Arthur did not, as it turned out, mature with age. Uther Pendragon gifted him a sword on his eighth birthday and set a training schedule up for him. Morgana’s eyes lingered on the silver blade, but she sat still in her corner. Her father had tried to teach her with a wooden sword, once, when she’d asked him. The sword had been rather heavy for her and he had promised her that he would teach her with a real one when she got older. She wondered if he’d remembered that when he went to the war that killed him—that he’d leave her all alone if he died.
Her grief was slowly morphing into rage, and it wasn’t her fault that Arthur was on the receiving end of it most of the days. It was his own fault for being an idiot. They never had lessons together, but Morgana still caught glimpses of him being an absolute menace to all his tutors, atleast until one day Uther summoned after training and berated him for almost an hour. He was subdued for the rest of the week, but not enough to sulk during training.
Training was quite possibly, the only time Arthur looked at all focused, his movements precise and his usual antic vanished as Morgana watched from her window. Her own tutor was a stately woman with grading hair and a kind smile who bored her to death. Watching out of the window to Arthur being taught by an old knight was still more interesting than listen to her monotony about Camelot’s culture and etiquette.
She asked Gaius a few days later, quite bluntly to mask the hesitation, if she could not also receive training in combat with a sword. He looked just as kind as ever, but somehow happier instantly.
‘There’s no such law in Camelot agaisnt women swordfighters, my dear, even though it is not the norm,’ he said, ‘I suggest you ask the King if you wish to acquire a tutor.’
Morgana nodded at him, disappointed. She knew Uther Pendargon was her guardian, but she hadn’t talked to him after the first time he’d tried to dine with her and ended up looking disappointed in her reserved silence. It had been a mere week after her father’s death, and while he hadn’t been unkind, she had hated him with everything she had been left with. She put the thought of training out of her mind and went to the library.
Morgana was 12 when she finally plucked up the courage to ask Uther for training lessons. She’d been getting used to her life in Camelot, and while it was still lonely and she still despised the heat, she had found peace in the large corridors of the endless library and the bright gardens that her maidservant accompanied her to every evening. She had made a few friends as well—Gaius and Geoffrey the librarian and the her tutor, who she’d realised was not as monotonous if she put some effort into listening. She still couldn’t bear Arthur, who was at times more annoying than any toddler, but when he’d asked her one morning if she’d like to accompany him to training, she had acquiesced, for lack of anything better to do.
Sir Kay was one of the most trusted of Camelot’s knights, and while she was certain Arthur had only asked her to come to show off his skills to someone who was not one of the other knights, who probably didn’t take him all that seriously. She stood alongside a serving girl several years her senior as Arthur fumbled along with the sword, still better at it than anyone his age should rightfully be.
It was then that King Uther Pendragon stopped by a few paces from herself and watched. He watched and she knew that he watched her watch, but she didn’t know what else to do. Ever since she’d arrived, the King hadn’t once summoned her, except for the first welcome dinner, and hadn’t even given her the slightest hint that he was even aware of her presence in Camelot. Maybe he had forgotten about her, She’d never known him very well before—not even when she’d visited with her father and though she couldn’t remember why, she didn’t give it much thought. She’d been a different girl then, carefree and careless. She hadn’t cared for anything, and now that she felt herself grow into the adulthood that came with being entirely alone, she felt that she still didn’t care half the time, but it was not the same as before.
As King Uther watched, Morgana gathered her courage, reminded herself that she didn’t care what the answer would be one way or the other, and said, ‘May I learn too?’
At first she wondered if the King had even heard her at all over the noise of metal clanging together, since he stood immobile for a long moment, but then he turned. A strange expression had taken over his face and she added a belated ‘Your Majesty’ only to watch as the expression became even stranger.
King Uther stared at her until Morgana felt the serving girl fidget behind her, and then he turned away and left without even the barest acknowledgment.
The next morning she woke up to a sword and armour laid out on the wooden desk beside her bed.
Morgana was not tutored by Sir Kay. She was was not even tutored by a proper knight, which she bitterly thought was rather unfair. Arthur was even more obnoxiously arrogant when he found out that she was to train with him, even though not as rigorously. While he spent nearly six hours each day on the training field, Morgana did for only one, usually in the morning, before her other lessons while Arthur did some of his less taxing routines.
Morgana found that she did not like the arrangement very well, mainly because it meant that she would take longer to learn even the basics, but she decided to do something about it later. On the first day of her training, Sir Leon introduced himself as the son of Lord Bodir and Lady Mariann, both of whom she’d never heard of, but since she hardly paid attention at court, it was likely only her lack of knowledge and not their lack of status. He was not yet one of the Knights, even though he had completed his training and was now only waiting to be of age to join the ranks. He taught her the basic footwork and posturing techniques— last fo what she’d known already, but he didn’t seem to hear when she mentioned it.
Just mumbled something along the lines of ‘We must cover each step of the routine, My Lady,’ and carried on.
Arthur was, for some inexplicable reason, even more energetic during the first hour of training that she shared with him. He talked before they started, and talked during the five minute break they got every half hour, and kept sneaking glances at her from across the circular training grounds, as if in anticipation. It had been more than two years, and while Arthur still wasn’t ashy less irritating at times, he’d grown up to be calmer, more aware of his surroundings and more sceptical than he was at seven. He was tolerable. Some days. Morgana refused to admit anything more.
But when he sneaked into her rooms one night and grinned conspiratorially at her before lifting a single key dangling from a silken thread, Morgana couldn’t muster her usual disdain of his childish antics.
‘Would you like to go to the vaults with me, My Lady,’ he asked around the grin, mock bow and everything, and she giggled at the picture he created.
She jumped off the perfectly made bed and approached him, ‘Are you trying to break the rules?’ She asked sternly and he just grinned wider. It had been too long since she’d relished the satisfaction that came with breaking rules. Her father had been awfully fond of rules and regulations, but never too fond. He never punished her when she broke one of his rules, just tickled her until she couldn’t breathe and then whisked her off for a ride because he knew that she hated horses. He always tried to teach her to ride whenever she made a mistake—somehow of the opinion that every punishment must be a lesson in disguise.
Ever since she’d arrived in Camelot, she’d never even had the opportunity, nor the motivation to be rebellious.
But Arthur had the childish grin on his face—the one that had been getting less and less frequent as the years passed, and she couldn’t sleep anyway.
The vaults were everything she’d ever imagined them to be—dark, caving in under the ground as they progressed further and further, and entirely too scary. She hadn’t had as much fun as she was having in ages. Skirting around the already half dozing guards had been both exciting and terrifying—even though she had almost giggled at one point. But ever since they’d entered, there was no room for fear in favour of absolute curiosity. There were carvings on the walls, and shelves every now and then holding fragile looking things that they faintly traced with fingertips. A few withering books were lined by one corner, but they were encased in glass and then in metallic bars for good measure. She wondered what sight be written in them, but quickly got distracted as Arthur wandered off into a much less dustier corridor. It was lined with cobwebs in the corners, but otherwise looked like it got cleaned regularly, unlike some of the other nooks and crannies. She thought she had an idea as to why when she saw Arthur standing in front of a large portrait of a woman hung on the far wall. It was the only thing in the entire corridor, and it looked like it had been painted yesterday and ages ago at the same time—the colours aged yet not faded, the canvas stiff and well preserved.
A glint of blue was the brightest spot on the entire canvas, and Morgana realised that she had seen those eyes. She saw them nearly every day.
Arthur didn’t move, didn’t breathe, she thought he had perhaps stopped thinking altogether. He just stared and stared until she stopped up beisde him, looking up at the life like portrait of Queen Ygraine.
‘Do I look like her?’ Arthur asked in a small voice after what felt like hours— might’ve been hours—and Morgana wondered with something like nausea building up her stomach if this was the first that Arthur was seeing of his mother.
She’d heard it said many times, mostly by Gaius, that King Uther did not talk about his late wife, that it was a sore topic, that any mention of her just made him angry, most likely because it made him sad.
But to never have shown Arthur—his own son who’d never known his mother. To have never told him how much he resembled her, how much of her was living with him. It was just cruel.
‘You look just like her,’ she said, and couldn’t do anything about how not enough it sounded.
Sir Leon, Morgana decided, was a massive bore. He had light brown curls that looked almost red under the golden glow of the sun overhead, and his eyes were somewhere between green and blue.
He didn’t talk much and when he did talk, it was something dreadful about the history of sword making or the different kinds of metal that went into it. He was punctual to the degree of being ridiculous, and he always addressed her as My Lady, even though he was considerably older than she was. She asked him one day, uncomfortable in the silence of their break after half an hour of maintaining proper combative postures. It had been nearly three weeks of boring sessions and slow progress.
He looked amused, even younger than he had a moment ago, and said, ‘I will be sixteen this winter, My Lady.’ That was not as old as she’d been expecting—she’d thought him to be nearly eighteen.
‘Oh. I’m twelve,’ she said, not knowing what else to say, and he only looked more amused.
‘You needn’t call me My Lady,’ she added, ‘It makes me sound dreadfully old. Or important.’ She only tolerated it when Arthur called her that, and just because he made it sound like an insult, a mockery. She could tolerate well meaning jokes, but she was neither old not important and she didn’t like the title. Sir Leon just frowned, ‘You are King Uther’s ward.’
She doubted that—she was just the daughter of His Majesty’s friend who’d been given shelter after she had no one left, but she said nothing. Sir Leon was already back into the training arena anyway.
When the fourth week was nearing its end, she finally refused to do any more boring routines that had to do with the right defence position and the right way to hold a sword. She refused to go slower than a snail while Arthur smirked his boyish satisfaction over at her from across the grounds. It was an insult to her ability to learn that she refused to bear any longer.
‘My lady—’ Sir Leon began cautiously, his voice resembling that of Gaius but without the confidence. Morgana was twelve—very nearly thirteen, to be accurate, and she refused to be treated like a child.
‘I have not been one for years, you see,’ she concluded quite calmly, and Sir Leon looked momentarily troubled, but began speaking as she ended her tirade.
‘I understand, My Lady. No one means to slight your ability to learn sword fighting. It is merely that it has been King Uther’s specific request to make your lessons safe and harmless. He is greatly concerned about your well being and he was highly adamant about there being no accidents.’
Morgana might’ve taken offence to that as well, but Sir Leon said it with such gentle melancholy, that all she could say was a quiet ‘oh!’
She had never considered that King Uther might’ve been even remotely concerned about her well being, or even that he should remember the lessons and want to avoid any accidents.
Her father had been always present whenever she had received her lessons at home, even though they had been with a wooden sword instead of a real one. He had been the one to teach her whenever he could, but when he couldn’t and she had requested for far too long, he had sat there with his reports and inkwells, overlooking the proceedings. She had not considered that King Uther might be of the same mind, but even as she thought of it, another possibility entered her thought. Maybe he was just concerned about her getting hurt while under his care and how it might reflect badly on his hospitality.
She shook any thoughts of concerned guardians out of her mind and held her chin up, looking at Sir Leon.
‘I believe we have been cautious enough, Sir Leon. I know all about where to keep my feet and how to angel my wrist and what materials went into the smithery a century ago. I would like to proceed further.’
Sir Leon looked as though he might object, or smile—neither of which were the appropriate reactions—but her merely said, ‘Of course, My Lady.’
For the next few days, Sir Leon trained her in the basic sparring techniques, and even sparred with her once when she knocked her sword against his chest plate in silent challenge. He was an admirable sparring partner for someone who was not yet a knight, which was probably why he had her sprawled unceremoniously on the ground in less than five minutes.
‘You need to fight with your whole body,’ he instructed from up there somewhere, ‘not just your sword. If your opponent is able to sweep your feet from under you like I just did, then the sword would be of no use to you.’
‘Yes,’ she admitted through the grass in her mouth as she stood up and faced him.
‘In my defence,’ she added where there no blades of grass in her mouth, ‘you are quite tall.’
Sir Leon looked momentarily stunned at that, and then he did smile—it was very much like she had first seen her etiquette tutor curse in front of her when she’d been drenched in wine by a serving maid during one of their lessons. It changed his entire countenance, and she thought that if someone saw him like this, they would never guess about his inherent tendency to bore everyone around him.
‘I apologise?’ He said, still smiling.
‘It is by no fault of yours,’ she said, sighing faintly and shaking her head in mock distress. She could feel the humour peaking through her voice, and it had been so long since she’d heard her voice sound that light that she just kept going.
‘One must, after all, bear the consequences of one’s own stubborn requests.’
‘You are not stubborn, my lady,’ he answered gravely and she decided to take that as insult.
‘I am, actually,’ she said, equally grave and stumbled through a blind attack with her sword in the general direction of his well armoured torso. He blocked, of course, then spent the better part of an hour trying to tell her about the harms of unplanned attack and how she might’ve been harmed had he not been careful in blocking her attack. He was an efficient tutor, in any case.
She decided it could be pardoned, just this once, his tendency to bore