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Merlin has to admit: it’s nice that everyone knows about his magic. At first it had been awkward, with the whole ‘you lied to me’ bit and the whole ‘well you’re a great big prat and I didn’t want to die’ bit and the part with the ‘I wouldn’t have killed you if you told me’ and the other part where they said ‘we’re both stupid let’s kiss and make up’. Merlin really liked that part.
Anyways. Merlin had to admit that it was tremendously nice to have his friends know about his magic. Much less tiring than hiding it all the time.
The only problem, which Merlin was just now realizing, was that his friends knew absolutely nothing about magic at all.
Look. He didn’t expect them to be experts. But the lack… anything living in the Round Table of Shining Pants’ brains was, well, astounding. Merlin is still not sure if they think he’s got as much magic as Arthur has in brains (nothing) or as much as Arthur has in pratiness (enough to fill a planet).
(Don’t ask the druids about that last part. Merlin is not a god, no matter what they try to say.)
Well, maybe Merlin should backtrack. Arthur can’t figure anything out, and the knights just haven’t bothered. It was a laziness vs. clotpoleishness type of situation. Case in point.
“How do you…” Arthur wiggles his fingers, like he’s teaching magic to a five-year-old, “conjure the fire?” Conjure?
Ah, right. That. He guesses this is his life from now on, lighting fires in damp caves and being subject to questions that involve the word conjure. Next will be summon, he knows it. Merlin doesn’t prefer either, as a matter of fact, and would much rather say that he just does. Not that anyone would listen to him, of course.
“Oh, that’s easy,” Merlin starts, because what the fuck else does he have to do, and Lancelot just looks at him with that stupid look he always does when Merlin’s about to say something particularly stupid, “I call it forth from the deepest pits of hell.”
The cave goes silent. Arthur takes a very obvious and very scared step back, jaw hanging open. Of course, Arthur was by definition, an idiot, so really it shouldn’t have been all that surprising that he believed Merlin.
On the other hand, both Percy and Elyan have stopped moving altogether and are swiveling their heads back and forth like they can’t decide if this is real or not. Merlin keeps a straight face. See? It’s totally real.
Gwaine raises an eyebrow that says something along the lines of this is either true and Merlin is a crazy asshole or Merlin is just the fucking funniest person I have ever met. Suffice to say it’s both.
Lance just continues to stare at the ground, disappointment radiating off of him. And because Merlin has the slight hunch that Lance also thinks this to be absolutely hilarious but because he’s such an upstanding and great person, won’t say that in a room full of rowdy knights that will most definitely make fun of him.
Then he takes a look at the final knight in the room. Or more he looks up, and locks eyes with Leon, who is staring deep into the depths of his soul. By the Gods of the Old Religion–
Oh. Leon knows. Leon knows and Leon is going to rip him to shreds later, after Arthur has his little princely breakdown and falls asleep like a child after a temper tantrum.
“You cannot be calling magic from hell. This isn’t-” Arthur cuts himself off. “Merlin, I cannot have you conjuring hell magic. I can’t. What’s next? A demon? A hellhound?”
“Oh I see, now.” Merlin's smile stretches wide and long. “You’re gatekeeping my magic. Oh, don’t help the poor innocent animals get away, Merlin. Don’t make the chores easier for yourself, Merlin. Don’t make us a fire in the cold, wet cave with demon magic, Merlin. Is there anything I can do?”
Arthur stares at him for a long, long time. Arthur stares at him for an eternity and no time at all. It’s all very beautiful and everything. Arthur then punctuates this by walking up to him and placing his hands on Merlin’s shoulders. Merlin’s next thought is along the lines of are we about to kiss? Is this all I had to do? I should’ve made these jokes way earlier if that was all it takes. It’d be really nice to get another kiss. Arthur, it seems, is not thinking the same thing. “What the fuck, Merlin.”
Well. There goes the moment. Flying away while simultaneously laughing into Merlin’s face. He’s suddenly overcome with the urge to flip the moment off and subsequently flip Arthur off. Merlin does this, and then storms off to the back of the cave again for good measure.
“You suck!” He calls from the back of the cave.
“I’m going to bed.” Arthur sighs back in response.
This seems to spark the rest of the knights, who proceed to also go to bed while Merlin pouts in the back of the cave, and Lance sadly stares at him as he rolls out their bedroll, and Leon stares out a rain blankly. All in all, a fairly normal night.
“So this is what we’ve come to.” Leon says sometime later, like the dramatic bitch he is.
“Yes.”
Leon looks at him like he’s the stupidest person on the planet. Look, it wasn't that bad. But it might have been a slight oversight on his part. He really didn’t think he’d make it this far with a joke as stupid as that. “You draw your magic from the earth. Not the pits of Hell.”
Merlin turns to look at him. “Yes.” He blinks back up at the ceiling. “Did you see Arthur’s face?”
The cave goes quiet. Lance sighs. Leon sighs. “Fair enough.” They say, in sync, and Merlin’s slightly worried about what that could mean.
Either way, he was going to have so much fun with this, he just knew it.
The next time it happens, Merlin is even more shocked than the last time. It starts with the skies opening up and raining absolute buckets on them. Actually, no. It started with Arthur being a stupid, arrogant prat like usual.
“Sorry everyone!” Merlin announces to the group at large, and Lancelot looks at him with pleading eyes. Sad. Merlin doesn’t know how Lance knows what’s coming next, it’s not like Merlin has said anything-
Oh. Yeah. Maybe he doesn’t have the best track record of… being truthful about his magic. “Please tell me this isn’t something you did, Merlin. I am begging you.” It isn’t, but Merlin still smiles at Arthur like it is, because it will piss him off, and Merlin entire existence is dedicated to pissing Arthur off.
“The weather and I got into a bit of a spat this morning.” Everyone stares at him like he’s just admitted to cooking and eating knights with shiny red cloaks in his free time.
Lancelot sits down heavily onto the dirty floor, head in his hands. “Please, Merlin.” The man whispers sadly.
He… maybe kinda feels bad about this now. He should probably not continue. But he also could because honestly that’s what Arthur deserves after being a prat every time Merlin saves his life from horrible, terrifying, and frankly quite ugly monsters every other day.
Leon, looking all the world like he wants to get struck by lightning (Merlin could make that happen if he wanted), bravely steps forward towards Merlin. “Why…” He hesitates, but no one else seems like they’ll help him, and Leon seems to resign himself in a way that says what is my life? Yeah, honestly Merlin could agree. “Why would that matter?”
“Well I was telling it how I wanted it to be sunny this week, and it insisted on being cloudy, so I told the weather it was supposed to be sunny and the weather thundered even with no clouds that sounded suspiciously like a fuck you to me, which is quite rude, I have to tell you, and then stormed off. Ha! Stormed. So anyways we had a bit of a spat, and now it’s been thunder storming all day, so sorry.” He shrugs, like it’s no big deal.
Leon looks out at the rain sadly, and Arthur’s face twists into something entirely too hilarious to regret anything, let alone the way Lance just looks so sad.
Leon is so funny. Such a good actor. Merlin’s glad that he figured it out. “Apologize to the rain, Merlin. Apologize to the rain right now.”
“No. The rain was being more of an ass than you, Arthur. It should be apologizing to me.”
To add to the effect the sky rumbled something fierce around them, which made it all the more better. “I’m sorry the rain was rude to you, Merls. You don’t deserve that.”
Lancelot nods. “You’ve done too much for this kingdom, my friend. I wish there was more I could do to help you.”
“I don’t.” Leon says under his breath. He’ll come around eventually, Merlin is sure of it.
“What do you mean you can’t die?!”
“You heard him, Princess. He said he’s immortal.” Gwaine takes another swing from his waterskin, which Merlin has a slight suspicion might be alcohol. Actually, it is alcohol, because Merlin lost a bet and had to replace the water in Gwaine’s waterskin with mead.
Merlin’s glad that Gwaine is in on it now. Gwaine helps him. Gwaine is fun. Gwaine’s a good best friend. Lancelot and Leon are not being fun, and not being good best friends. Merlin can attest to this, as they’ve been trying to stop him at every turn.
This is all Arthur’s fault, really. If Arthur wasn’t so thick, then maybe he would have figured out that Merlin has been fucking with him for the past month. Well. And fucking him, but that’s beside the point.
Merlin raises his hands up and to the sides of his arm. “I do not fear death, for it is a mere insect in the vastness of my powers. I am Emrys, and I am immortal.”
“That’s not possible, Merlin.”
“And what the hell do you know about my magic?”
“I know that you’re not fucking immortal!”
Arthur looks ready to jump off a cliff. That would be very unfortunate, as then Merlin would have to save him, and Merlin doesn’t really want to have to save them. One heroic act is enough for the next few hours.
Merlin has to have time to recover, okay? There’s only so much that he can give at a time, and stopping a mountain from crushing you and your idiot friends is enough for at least three hours of rest. He just doesn't understand what the big deal is about this.
For all he knows, he could actually be immortal. It wouldn’t surprise him all that much at this point. He doesn’t know if anything actually surprises him anymore. Last week an army of ghosts tried to invade in the middle of the night, and the only way to stop them was to travel to the underworld and eat a flower.
Nobody but Lance even knows about that one, and it’s only because he had to go with him to be a ghost witness. A ghost witness. So nothing really surprised Merlin anymore.
What the hell. He was actually probably immortal. “I haven’t died yet.” Merlin shrugs, looking sadly at the remnants of the mountain. He liked this mountain. He was going to move here when the whole world went to hell eventually.
Arthur’s teeth clench. “That. Doesn’t. Mean. You’re. Immortal.”
“I just stopped a mountain from crushing us and now you’re going to start questioning if I’m immortal. Arthur, I know there isn’t much rattling around in that big head of yours, but even this shouldn’t be that hard to process.”
Elyan and Percival had stepped back to Leon and Lance, eyes flicking between the other three and their co-conspirators. Occasionally Elyan would whisper something to the two, and Merlin was glad to have more people be on his side.
Gwaine very obviously scans Merlin up and down, eyes alight in humor. “He looks immortal to me.”
Arthur’s eyes narrow. “Back off, Gwaine.” He snaps, and Merlin sighs. Here they go.
“A little protective there, princess?”
“No.” But Arthur’s blushing and looking at the ground. Merlin is kind of proud of that in the way that even though he’s an idiot, he’s Merlin’s idiot. Not that his behavior has changed all that much since they started… doing things, but it’s still funny.
Gwaine shrugs, and Merlin has the feeling that he’s about to say something treasonous. Not that Merlin doesn't commit treason on a daily basis, and most (all) of the knights here have a certain lack of respect for the rules, but the treasonous look that Gwaine has on his face right now is probably going to make Arthur go into a coma, and Merlin just prevented that from happening.
He still needs a little bit more time before he can deal with Arthur in a coma. Those always take so much out of him. “You don’t have to worry about anything, Arthur. I’m fucking Percy now, so Merlin is all yours.”
There the fuck it is.
Arthur screeches. “What did you just say?!” Merlin stares at Gwaine. Gwaine smiles and bites into an apple. He seems to have an obsession with those. Leon spits out his water. Elyan holds out his hand to Lancelot. “Give me my money.” Percival sighs. “ Gwaine .”
“You… Gwaine …?”
“You were not the first, Arthur. Besides, Gwaine’s hot. And funny.” He tacks on, because why the hell not. He apparently can control the weather and summon hell fire and is immortal by Arthur’s standards, and it really is all his fault, really.
If Arthur hasn’t figured it out by now, he wonders if he’ll ever. “Thanks, Merls. You’re not that bad yourself.”
“Thanks, Gwaine.” Merlin loves Gwaine so much. He’s the greatest best friend ever.
“Won’t this be your second marriage, Merlin?” They’re riding through the forest, and the sky is bright, and leaves are green and Merlin has found an obsession in playing with the new ring gracing his finger. It’s gold and has these beautiful engravings that almost look like dragons. Elyan is pretty good at that smithing stuff. Elyan is pretty good at playing pranks.
“Oh, yes. You know me, one is never enough.”
Arthur stops his horse, stares back at Merlin. “Your second? You haven’t even dated anyone else.” His eyes drift to Gwaine, who’s smiling innocently, because he can. “...except Gwaine.” He spits out the last part like he still can’t believe it. Merlin can. Merlin really, really can.
“Well no. There’s also the Lady of the Lake. Who is my wife.”
“You married a lady that lives in a lake?!”
“Do you remember the time that she summoned three water dragons? Truly a marvelous sight.” Percival remarks. His friends are the best.
“I personally liked when she drowned all those bandits.” Elyan tacks on.
“What about when she gave me a water flask of unlimited mead?”
“I still can’t believe you convinced her to do that, Gwaine.” Elyan grumbles, crossing his arms like he actually has something against Freya, his imaginary wife. Actually, she’d probably find this whole thing hilarious. He’ll have to tell her the next time he goes to visit. He should bring Gwen along too. They’d probably get on.
His roguish friend flips his hair over his shoulder. “It’s my rugged good looks.”
“Are you sure it’s not because you promised to bring her two apple pies the next time you visited?” Lancelot remarks dryly.
“And a bouquet of flowers?” Leon adds on. Leon gave up trying to stop him. Especially with Gwaine: The Instigator Extraordinaire™, Percival and Elyan the: Fuck Around for the Hell of it Twins™ and Lancelot: Chaos Enabler™ constantly making his life a living hell.
Which is why Leon has taken the new position of: I’m So Done with My Friends and No, I Do NOT Enable Them, Stop Saying That, They’re Just All Idiots…
It’s better this way. Merlin wasn’t going to stop. Nobody was ever going to stop. “...it could be that.” Gwaine admits, like this is a real-life situation, and Gwaine really does owe Freya some pies and flowers. Not that she wouldn’t like those things.
“You can’t get married twice, Merlin.”
“Sure I can. I’m marrying you, aren’t I? Besides, Freya was fine with it. I talked to her last night while you were asleep.”
“Oh, well, I’m glad your secret wife is fine with it.”
Merlin smiles at him. “Thank you, love.”
Arthur blushes, Gwaine wiggles his eyebrows. Merlin has a secret wife now, apparently. He wonders how long it’ll take Arthur’s thick head to figure out that all of this is bullshit. It can’t be that much longer… right?
Three years later, Arthur walks up to him and says: “Was it all a lie?”
“Yes, obviously.” Merlin doesn’t need more context to know what Arthur is asking. He’s honestly surprised he’s made it this far.
“Good.”
“Except for the immortal part. I’m fifty/fifty on that. And Gwaine, of course.”
“ Merlin! ”