raven | Fic:: In The Bleak Midwinter [Merlin]

Couldn't sleep. Fic happened.

Fic:: In The Bleak Midwinter
by Raven
R, Merlin, slash, 3500 words. Merlin and Arthur, freezing cold, at the start of things.

It’s raining in Camelot, with a feverish warmth below the large drops and dispersing, murky fog. The new manservant is well-turned out, almost prim, and his boots have been freshly shined. He sits well upon a horse. The ostlers are adjusting his stirrups when Merlin appears, pale and wide-eyed with rain dripping from the tips of his hair. The last time Arthur saw him, he was asleep, hands trailing off the bed with his hair gathered on his forehead, a palpable weakness threaded through his limbs. Arthur raises his eyebrows. “Aren’t you supposed to be recovering?”

“Recovered” – and the smile is dazzling in the murk. “I can come along, as planned.”

“It’s against my advice, I would like to make clear.” Gaius looms out of the fog, stumping along with a cane on the slippery cobbles. “A winter illness is a trifle of a thing, if the sufferer rests. But as you have observed on many an occasion, sire, he’s an idiot.”

“I’m fine,” Merlin insists, and he isn’t actually falling over, so Arthur shrugs. “Get off, then,” he snaps at the replacement, who drops heavily onto the hard ground and slopes off. Arthur thinks, but does not say, that Gaius has not seen Merlin these few days; he rises early, chasing his master across the city and the fields, and he returns long after nightfall, surreptitious and soft-footed, only to leave again at dawn. A brief image: Merlin’s feet, white, with high delicate arches, curled over the edge of Arthur’s bed, the lamplight blurring across his skin. Arthur smiles, glad of the blurring rain.

Gaius is resigned. “Good hunting, princeling. Merlin, at least wrap up warm, won’t you? And try not to be more stupid or clumsy than you can help.”

With a world-weary sigh, he disappears. Merlin grins and swings himself roughly up on the horse, and in the distance, Arthur sees the movement of lights as the last knights saddle up. “They’re ready,” he says, shortly. The replacement manservant – whose name wasn’t quite audible through the rain – is standing by the stables, lit by the lanterns from inside. Arthur doesn’t give him a second glance, and they ride out.

*

Fire and ice, Merlin thinks, dimly, as the valley falls around them. Camelot is at the eye of the storm, set in the lowlands that slope gently into soft sands and open water. There’s still something not quite right in Merlin’s sight, something that sharpens the edges of the landscape, makes him aware of the knife in the air, the something that whispers of snow.

“You’re an idiot,” cuts the voice through the air.

Merlin turns across to Arthur, making out his grin above the scarf. “Why now?”

Arthur drops the reins for a moment, blows steam, rubs his hands together, reaches for the reins again. “You could have stayed at home.”

Merlin grins back, remembering, as if a dream, the winters of his own childhood. Arthur, born in Camelot, is less used to the snap and bite of cold, but Merlin remembers: the morning cracking of the ice, the frozen mud and slate sky above. And these journeys, made as autumn came to the valley and the long cold to the crags above; the king sending his prince through their kingdom, to reassure the populace, to remind them they were not forgotten.

“I could have stayed at home,” Merlin says, to himself, and thinks of fireplaces and blankets, as from a great, wistful distance. Whatever has sharpened his vision has dimmed his memory, as though he carries his past around in the present so it falls out of order, Arthur riding with him through the imminent snows of years ago.

The pathway stretches down behind them, the thickest of the fog left below, and two knights follow some distance behind. They are up here together in this washed-out world.

*

Merlin has no natural grace, all jagged movements and lanky bones. But he rides well, easily; he barely holds his reins, murmurs endearments into his mare’s ears so she picks her way across the craggy, frozen ground, and Arthur remembers, like a snippet of a dream, the uneasy wash of torch light across Merlin’s body, his eyes gleaming in the shadows, and the only curve of him, the scoop and swell of his hips, fitting neatly like a dovetail beneath Arthur’s outstretched hands. Everyone – animals, people, unicorns and sorcerers - responds to Merlin. Arthur knew children like that when he was small, before Uther’s purges, but in a world without magic, it’s a strange touch on a manservant. Perhaps, he thinks wryly, Merlin merely is touched.

At this level of ascent, the path flattens. They are still far above Camelot, and when night falls they will be able to see its lights, but for a few turns up the mountainside, the landscape and the winter are kinder. There is a town here – Willowdale, the last place the gryphon came before it came to Camelot – and they ride in just as night is falling, between lines of small, wooden and wattle houses. At the centre of the town, there is an inn, Arthur recalls. The innkeeper scurries out at the sound of hooves and jingling tack, and even in the dim shadows, cast by the oil lamps burning through slatted windows, the man’s eyes gleam with avarice and fear. Arthur swings down from his horse, with a guarding hand still on the reins. “I am Arthur Pendragon,” he says, with as much stately diction as he can manage at the end of a long day. “I would like food and lodgings for myself and my knights, if there is any available.”

Even if there were none available, it is no doubt being made available. “Come inside!” calls the innkeeper. “I have men to see to the horses.”

“Merlin, go with them,” Arthur says, in low tones. “Just make sure no one nabs the oats for the horses, will you? And come up to my room afterwards.”

“Very good, sire,” Merlin says, all bland obsequiousness, and Arthur knows it would be unbecoming in a strange place to punch him in the shoulder, and lets him go with the merest exasperated exhalation.

Dinner is good. It’s venison – no doubt from wild deer, which are making their way down from the higher places before the winter sets in – and there is some wine. The table is long, the ceiling well-seasoned with smoke, but they are the only guests; very few travellers choose this time of year to journey north, Arthur supposes, and the innkeeper and his wife serve them swiftly.

The two other knights, Gillimer and Edward, are besieged by children, who have taken their parents’ cues and hung back from Arthur, but cannot resist strangers clad in shining mail and bright colours. Gillimer grins at Arthur as they finish their meal. “We have younger sisters,” he says. “They also have no respect for the code of chivalry.”

Arthur laughs as the two of them submit to the children’s questions, and turns his head as Merlin comes in. “The horses are all fine,” he reports. “Any chance of something to eat?”

Arthur motions to the table. “We left some for you. If you want to avoid interrogation by the town’s younger representatives, I suggest you eat fast.”

Merlin grins, and sets to with a will. Arthur sits back in his chair, drinks a little wine, and listens to the children’s chatter, watches the firelight on Merlin’s face and hair.

*

There are two rooms – one for Arthur, and one for Edward and Gillimer. Arthur’s has a small fireplace, which Merlin goes to work on immediately, borrowing tinder from the innkeeper’s wife, who is willing to give him anything once she’s found out he’s Arthur’s manservant. It takes some teasing, but no unearthly whispers, but at length, it flares up. Merlin pauses for a moment, warming his hands on the flames, before he steps back. Turning around, he notes that Arthur has in the meantime removed his own boots and outer clothing, and he's pulling back the sheets on the bed.

"Do you need anything?" Merlin says, tiredly. "If not, I'm going out. There's a space for me to sleep above the stables, they tell me."

"Don't be ludicrous." Arthur gives him an exasperated look, and then a smile. "Stay with me."

Merlin smiles back. "Do you have something in mind, sire?"

"Perhaps." Arthur beckons to him, leans off the bed and grabs his hand. Despite himself, Merlin laughs, let himself be pulled down on the sheets, limbs splayed.

"Let me take my boots off," he says, breathless.

Arthur is still grinning, but lets him go. Merlin pulls off the boots and everything else, everything down to the red scarf, which Arthur touches briefly, wonderingly. "Leave it," he says. "Come down here with me."

Bare and barefoot, Merlin throws back the sheets and pulls them in around them both. "You've got me," he says, not sure in the immediate instance what he means by it.

"You're shivering," Arthur says, but Merlin can't stop; the cold shock takes time to fade, to be smoothed into body heat in sweeps of skin on skin. Arthur is methodical, he works slowly; he kisses the top of Merlin's head, and then his mouth, and then his collarbone.

"You said, today," Merlin says suddenly, "'I am Arthur Pendragon', like those people didn't know. You're going to be king. You look it."

"Even now?" Arthur asks, mildly. "You introduce yourself, Merlin. It's only polite."

It's not only anything, Merlin thinks, and Arthur is nipping at Merlin's neck, his shoulders, moving towards his nipples. It's not just what a thing is, but how it begins and what it becomes. It's like – and he's thinking less clearly now, with Arthur's tongue warm against his chilled skin – Arthur doesn't know how he lacks relativity, he doesn't know he can proclaim who he is to the winter sky, saying and being in a way that no one else can. Arthur just is. He sprang into the world fully-formed, crown prince of Camelot, and Merlin was born into a poor farming family and his first act on this earth was to change it. Around him, things are fluid; around him, magic happens.

"Merlin," Arthur says softly, lifting his head, "do you want this?"

It's not the first time he's asked. Merlin opens his mouth to say yes, please, please, but his lips are parted and there is no sound, because this is just the way things are, and questions and answers don't change it. Arthur knows the shapes and lines of his body, the buck of his hips, he knows and he will always know, and there's a weariness in Merlin's bones to carry him over the edge, a catch of breath even before he's crying out, softly, into the sheets. Something flickers bright at the edge of his vision.

Arthur kisses him very deliberately on the mouth. "There," he murmurs. "There, I've got you."

In your mouth, Merlin thinks. In his mouth, and his bed and his life and the blue skies of his past and in the glittering wastes of his future. Merlin lies back on the pillows and feels himself guttering like a candle after a flare. It's odd, and somehow entirely understandable, that he should make a fire burn brighter without thinking it, to make the world different because of his passion, and that Arthur does not notice, dimming the space around him with his own personal light.

*

In the morning, the knife has come down. Arthur stands in the open doorway, watching the force of the snowstorm hit softly, softly, coating the ground with thick layers of white. Gillimer and Edward are teaching the innkeeper's children to throw snowballs at targets; Merlin is murmuring endearments to his mare, entreating her to step out across the frozen ground and consent to being saddled up. Arthur calls to the innkeeper, who looks half-terrified to spoken to. "Tell me about the route up to Greenswood," he says. "Is it likely to be even remotely passable?"

It's another village where the gryphon came, another place that needs to be reminded it has not been forgotten. The innkeeper loses the hunted look and seems to speak with genuine thought. "I wouldn't like to say for certain, sire," he says, slowly. "It's possible that you may still be able to get through – but if it is, it won't be for much longer."

Arthur is still, considering. He meant to stay here another day with these people, hear their concerns, speak to them of Camelot. But the snow burns, sticking to his eyelashes and melting, and he makes up his mind. "Gillimer, Edward! We're going to try our luck. It's worth trying."

They nod, and bid reluctant farewells to their small companions. Merlin has heard, and is turning his attentions to Arthur's horse, calling for the stable boys to help him with the tack. The chill makes everyone move faster, and once extra food has been taken on, generously paid for, and the children have been soothed with promises to visit again, they ride out.

It's slow going, and the cold is bitter, makes it impossible to hold the reins Arthur's freezing hands. "Merlin!" he calls, after only a few minutes' riding, "be careful."

"You too!" is the reply, dispersed and distorted by the rapidly falling snow. "Oh…"

"What is it?" Arthur shouts, but in another second he's seen it, too. The pathway above them is steep and mighty, and impassable. In the autumn, it was a patchwork of small pools and small waterfalls, with space for the horses to make their way, carefully. Now, it is ice. Arthur looks up and notes the absolute stillness of the icicles on the branches, the lethal points, and breathes a deep sigh that clouds the air.

Gillimer and Edward have stopped, waiting for him to tell them the obvious. The winter is too early, too ferocious: they must just return to Camelot, and make their journeys when the spring has come. Arthur waits just a moment, allows himself a moment of regret for a lost adventure, and nods to himself. "Right, it can't be done," he says, matter of fact. "If we turn around now, we can be in Camelot by evening."

He's turned around, he's considering how best to traverse the route downhill instead of uphill, and then he notices the vacuum at his side, the difference in what things ought to be like. "Merlin?" he says, hesitantly, and turns around. The mare whinnies and shakes her head back in fear, and Arthur moves instinctively to catch her reins as well as his own. Merlin is gone.

"There!" shouts Gillimer. He raises a hand and points it at the moving flash of red, the scarf covering Merlin's head as he walks, slowly, steadfastly up the path to the north. Twice in quick succession Arthur thinks he'll slip, but somehow, he catches himself, keeps on going. Step by step, it's hypnotic, until an especially sharp gust of wind brings Arthur back to himself.

"Merlin!" he yells. "Merlin, come back!"

There is no answer. Angrily, Arthur dismounts, crunches across the ice and snow and shouts into the wind, "Merlin!"

He doesn't think Merlin will hear, but the climbing figure pauses, turns around. And there is a moment – a strange one, and Arthur doesn't understand it, the strange charged quality to the freezing air – and Merlin starts to come back. It takes him time to avoid the ice and keep himself from the headlong fall, but he's coming back. Arthur watches him all the way down, until he's in hearing distance, looking oddly cowled by the scarf on his head and the snow showing white against his hair.

"Merlin!" Arthur yells, and he's furious all of a sudden. "Just what the hell were you doing? You couldn't possibly get up there."

"I could" – and Merlin throws his head back, his eyes ice-cold blue against the white of the storm. "Oh, it doesn't matter. Look, I'm sorry. Let's go back."

He turns away, swings himself up into his saddle in that ungainly way he has, and swings her out and away. Arthur, with a pause to beckon the other knights, follows. "You're mad," he said. "Mad or an idiot or both. You knew we couldn't get up there. What were you doing?"

Merlin glances at him. "Seeing if I could."

"Seeing if you could what, for heaven's sake?"

Merlin looks, suddenly, more tired than Arthur has ever seen him, and more old. "Leave you."

He says nothing more, not through the whole of the snowstorm, not through the whole of the descent.

*

After they return, Merlin is properly ill, the fire in his blood guttering in what feels like a flood of oil beneath his skin, diseased murk that means he can’t move or speak or think. Gaius’s opinion is that there’s nothing to be concerned about, that it is the common cold and the common hangover dressed up in days of high-altitude cold, that Merlin will be fine for some rest and some warmth, and Merlin trusts him. But his dreams are blurry and frightening, and the daylight hurts his eyes, and he’s very willing to wait it out under the rough blankets, drowsing through the daylight. Through the layers of scratchy wool, he drowses and listens to the steady footsteps, the clinks of glass on glass that mean Gaius is working, and is dimly aware that bursts of cold air mean someone has ventured in from outside, usually Gwen, with fresh water, or with messages from the castle.

On a chilly morning, when Gaius is calmly clearing the shattered crockery that means Merlin has, once again, been casting random magic in his sleep, there is a soft knock at the door. Merlin doesn’t move, face down into his sheets, but inclines his ear towards the sound of voices. “Arthur,” Gaius says, and then there is the familiar heavy tread, and the small sounds of leather against metal. “What brings you here?”

“Just checking,” Arthur says, almost too quietly to hear. “Merlin is... he is all right, isn’t he?”

“Sleeping,” Gaius says. “But improving. Give it time, Arthur. Just for now, leave him be.”

There is a long pause, and the sounds from outside grow clearly, as though the door has been pitched wide open. “All right,” says Arthur at last. “For now, I’ll leave him be.”

There is silence then, broken only by the wind whistling through the gaps in the door, and the same old quiet footsteps. Merlin rolls over, lets the grey of the daylight sear across his vision for a few, brief moments, and then sinks back into sleep, feeling oddly like he’s spinning on his edge like a coin, held somewhere between the ends and beginning of things, coming to a standstill in the quiet of a dream where everything is still.

There is snow here, too, but on the ground. The night sky is clear above, the stars laid out in patterns Merlin doesn't know. In the dream he's awake, in the dream Arthur sleeps beneath, and Merlin waits here under the strangeness of the stars. He waits to be needed, and he knows that he will be.

finis

Current Mood: sleepy
Current Music: Stars; Fairytale of New York

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Posted by

kita0610.livejournal.com

This is beautiful.

Posted by

still crazy after all these years

Fic:: In The Bleak Midwinter [Merlin]

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