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It started, unsurprisingly, on a bad day for Arthur. No one debates the fact that this was unsurprising, though the reason why it was unsurprising is less certain. Gwen would sigh and say it’s because nothing is ever easy with them. Gwaine would say it’s because it made a better story. Morgana would say it’s because Arthur has more bad days than good. Merlin would say it’s because Arthur was, is, and always will be, a prat. And Arthur would say it’s because Merlin always brought out the worst in him—and the best. And then Merlin would have to hit him for sappiness, and Arthur would call him a girl, and it would end in laughter.
But that’s later. First came the bad day.
It wasn’t a particularly bad bad day. No tragedies, no test-failing or grandma-dying or even sickness. It was just—a bad day. One which started with Arthur oversleeping for his 9 AM seminar and continued with a frantic call from one of the student committee members during his ten minute break between classes, then proceeded to him blanking on the reading and so making a stupid comment, and him being so drained for practice that fucking Gwaine outshot him, and that was all sorts of not okay. Lance he could take as competition. But fucking Gwaine. Then a call from his father, and it wasn’t even dinner time.
So. All in all, a bad day.
Which might have been why he was less than politic to the boy in the common room who came up to him, all bright smiles and enthusiasm, asking when try-outs were.
“Last month,” he said simply. Gwaine snorted. Leon rolled his eyes. Lance just covered his face with his hands and pretended none of this existed. “Unless you were too busy partying to note the huge signs on the bulletin boards? On all of them? Or maybe you’re just too stupid to read the emails. Or to look up the information online.” The kid’s face was falling, his shoulders curving in, and Arthur felt bad about it, he did, but they had gone out of their way to publicize try-outs, and it had just been a bad day, alright? “Better luck next year, if you can manage to pull your head out of your ass and—”
“Hey, lay off, mate,” a voice interrupted in, and Arthur spun, all his ire retargeted.
“Who said I’m your mate?” he shot back in the general direction of the sound. There were two people there—a girl who was trying slowly to sink back into her armchair, and a boy who was slowly getting to his feet, looking at the kid rather than Arthur.
“My mistake,” that boy said, sarcasm dripping from his tongue. He was tall, taller than Arthur and gangly with it, and even if Arthur couldn’t see his face he still immediately disliked the shock of red neck-scarf wrapped around his neck. “I wouldn’t want a prat like you as a mate.”
And that was it, that was just the last straw on top of a very bad day, because even Arthur could admit his pride was his weakest part and who did this guy think he was, just insulting him like that? “Do you even know who I am?” he spat, tossing his hair back in his most regal, my-family-has-a-building-named-after-it way.
The boy turned to him now, straightening and shifting his gaze—and something clicked. Something in the way his focus was a little off, in the blankness in eyes of an odd grey-blue, in the cane he held in his left hand. Oh. Shit.
“No, I don’t,” the boy drawled, his cane tapping on the floor. “And I’m quite happy with that.”
“Look, I’m sorry,” Arthur held up his hands before realizing it was pointless. But still. You didn’t go around insulting blind people. It just wasn’t on. “I didn’t realize—”
A line appeared in the pale skin of his forehead, and full lips pressed together. Something tingled up Arthur’s spine. “What, so you’ll bully some kid but not a blind person? Is that where your line is drawn? How much disability is the cutoff?” He took a step forward, cane sweeping in front of him, and there was fire in those blank eyes, something hot and full of icy scorn at once. “Big man on campus doesn’t mean you get to forget the little people.” He spun, abruptly, and his hand landed near the kid’s shoulder. “Come on, Morris, let’s go get some dinner.”
“What? Oh, yeah,” the kid stammered, and let the guy lead him away—or maybe it was the other way around. His head was held high and his shoulders pulled back, and if Arthur didn’t know he was blind, you almost couldn’t tell from his purposeful stride.
“Shit,” Leon said into the silence. Gwaine agreed with a long whistle.
“Arthur—”
“I know, Lance, okay?” Arthur snapped. He ran a hand through his hair, because yes, he knew how bad that was. “I’m not hungry anymore.” And he stalked off in the opposite direction as the blind guy, where he could just go to sleep and pretend this day had never happened.
It went slightly better the next time. Mainly, Merlin would say, because this time Arthur was not having a bad day, and so was only barely a clotpole. Arthur would say that he was not at all a clotpole, and really, Merlin could have been more thankful. To which Merlin would respond that he didn’t need help, thank you very much, and then Arthur would point out that he hadn’t known that then and it was the thought that counts. Which is neither here nor there, except for how it’s true.
It was a beautiful fall day, the kind where you can taste the crispness of the air and the leaves fall red and orange against green grass and you only need a light jacket to counter the bite of the wind. Arthur was simply minding his own business, walking down the street on his way back from class, enjoying the day, when he saw Valiant and his crew.
Valiant was the sort of person who hadn’t realized high school was over yet, and teasing and bullying and shoving and generally being pointlessly nasty were hopelessly passé this far into college. Unfortunately, he had managed to find a number of other kindred souls who shared his narrow-minded vision, and thus had formed a gang that everyone knew to avoid if at all possible.
Arthur was reckless and brave, but he wasn’t stupid, and Valiant had three buddies with him, so he was preparing to cross the street to simply avoid the issue altogether when he noticed that among the four thugs was a fifth person. A smaller person. One with a cane. Who was reaching into the air for a backpack that was being thrown between Valiant and his crew to the sounds of taunting laughter.
So Arthur huffed out a sigh, and sped up, his own backpack bouncing against his hip.
“Come on,” the blind guy was saying, sounding more exasperated than frightened. Which was a mistake, really, because standing up to Arthur was one thing but Valiant and his crew might actually think it a lark to hurt the kid who couldn’t fight back. “Just give it back already.”
“Why don’t you take it back?” Valiant taunted, and plucked a phone out of the front pocket. “Ooh, this where you call your little boyfriends from?”
“Worried you’re smaller?” the guy threw back, and Arthur almost winced for him, because he couldn’t get there before Valiant’s face froze into something that was cruel and cold and small, and dropped the phone onto the ground.
“Gonna pick that up, Emrys? How you gonna find it?”
“Well, for one,” Arthur cut in, trying for cool and probably coming out at mad, “You could pick it up for him.”
Valiant turned to face him, as his three thugs stiffened. “Stay out of this, Pendragon.”
“Or you could just leave him alone,” Arthur went on suggesting. He could almost feel his father talking through him, that whip-snap tone that made people listen. His father had taught him some useful things, who knew? “Permanently. And maybe then I’d forget this, and not mention you to anyone. Like the Dean of Students.”
“You wouldn’t dare,” Valiant hissed, snake-like, his face contorted with rage.
“I believe he plays golf with my father on Sunday. My father always wants me to be more interested in his work; I’m sure I could drop it into the conversation.”
Valiant glared, but he met Arthur’s ice-cold eyes, and as always, he backed down first. “Come on,” he snapped to his thugs, “Let’s go. This is getting old anyway.”
Arthur only watched them long enough to make sure they really were leaving before he turned back to Emrys. “See, that was a bully. Not me.”
“Fine,” Emrys snapped. His arms crossed over his chest, and his whole stance was the textbook definition of defensive. “I didn’t need your help.”
Arthur paused midway through picking up the other boy’s phone. “Sure you didn’t,” he retorted. “Because they would just have left anyway.”
“They wouldn’t have hurt me.”
“You can’t know that.”
Something curved on Emrys’s lips, nothing so warm as a smile. “I do.”
“Well I didn’t.” Arthur held out the phone, and had only begun to realize that wouldn’t work when Emrys reached out and took it. “So sorry for helping you.” He spun on his heel and stalked away.
He made it two steps before he was stopped both by a voice and that same electric tingle he had felt before. “Look,” Emrys said, softer now, without the hard edges. “Thank you.”
He wasn’t really that bad looking, all told. Though the ears were unfortunate. “It’s fine.” Arthur paused, then, “Stay out of Valiant’s way for a while, okay? He might try to find you when I’m not around.”
Emrys did smile then, a wide flash of a grin that was somehow bright as the sun and intimate as a whisper. “I’ll do my best.”
Which might have been the end of it. And would have been. If it hadn’t been for Lance. So maybe it could never have been the end of it, because even then they were tied together too closely to fall apart.
Because the next time Arthur went to sit down at the table for lunch—for a nice, normal, easy lunch, please God—Lance had apparently made a friend, as there was someone unusual at the table. Someone with dark hair and a long, straight back, with that same stupid red neck scarf, and the cane leaning next to him.
“Arthur,” Lance smiled and nodded, and did not look like the traitor he was. “And—I think you know Merlin?”
“We’ve met.” Arthur was rather satisfied with the coolness in his tone.
“Sort of,” Emrys—Merlin—added, with that same bright grin Arthur remembered. Somehow, it reached his eyes. He stuck out a hand in Arthur’s general direction, though a little low. “Merlin Emrys.”
Arthur raised an eyebrow at the hand. Then, gingerly, he took it, shook it with only a little bit of undue force. But really, the man had yelled at him twice. “Arthur Pendragon.”
“You know, if you’re making a snooty face right now it’s wasted on me,” Merlin pointed out cheerfully.
“So that’s why you’re so obnoxious,” Arthur countered, before he thought better of it. “You can’t see people’s reactions.”
“Nope, the obnoxious I was born with. What about you? Was the prattiness innate, or learned?” While Arthur gaped and sought fruitlessly for a comeback, Merlin twisted in his seat. “So, Lance, how’s Gwen?”
“She’s fine. She said she’d call you soon,” Lance replied. In the ensuing conversation, Arthur learned that Merlin was a good friend of Gwen, which meant, everyone knew, he was a good friend of Lance’s, because they were one of those sickening couples who had become one being. It was lovely and adorable and full of bunnies and kittens and flowers, all things Arthur usually loved, except when it made him gag. Not even he and Sophia had been that bad, no matter what Morgana said.
“Valiant give you any more trouble?” Arthur asked, when Lance got up to get more food.
Merlin turned to him. “Not really,” he replied, with a shrug. He seemed to focus a little off, which made sense and all, but was a bit unsettling.
“That’s not a no.”
“That’s a, no more than usual.”
“There’s a usual?” Arthur demanded.
Merlin raised his eyebrows. It was a surprisingly skeptical look, and surprisingly emotive. “This may come as a shock to you, Arthur, but being unable to deal with people’s BS tends to make me a target.”
“And the blindness?”
“Doesn’t help,” Merlin admitted easily. “Usually. Sometimes it does because people don’t like to pick on the blind kid, it looks bad. You get in a lot more trouble for it because, you know, not PC.”
“They shouldn’t do it because it’s wrong,” Arthur muttered, and Merlin snorted.
“You were willing to pick on me before you noticed I was blind.”
“I yelled at you, I didn’t pick on you.” There was a very clear difference, there. Arthur may have been a bit of an ass sometimes, but he had never kicked anyone while they were down. “And,” he swallowed as he played with the pasta on his plate. Good thing about talking with a blind person, he couldn’t tell when Arthur wasn’t making eye contact. “I—well, it was a bad day. I wouldn’t have done it otherwise.”
Merlin reached down, slowly, and stabbed at his plate. It took him three tries before he picked up a slice of pepper. “Daddy not give you the Mercedes you wanted?” he drawled.
It had been a long time since those sorts of jabs had affected Arthur. “No,” he replied shortly, “It was only a Corvette.” So maybe not that long.
Merlin snorted again. “So what makes the great Arthur Pendragon have a bad day? I thought the whole world rearranged itself at your whim.”
“Well you’re still here, so clearly not,” Arthur shot back, and even as he winced because there went any chance of being friends with his best friend’s girlfriend’s friend who was coincidentally rather attractive and also a bit of a prick, Merlin chuckled. It was a nice chuckle, rich and deep and warm and only a bit sardonic. It struck something in Arthur, something that made him glare at his plate and continue, “My dad and my sister are fighting again, and now it looks like she’s moving out for good.” Merlin’s gaze fixed on him, and his eyes were blue like the sea before a storm. “She hasn’t told me, though, so I don’t know where she’s going or with who.”
Merlin blinks once, slowly. “Younger or older?”
“Older,” Arthur replied. “But—it’s complicated.” Complicated like illegitimacy and custody battles and Morgana forever pulled between her two families, which he did not want to get into with anyone, including himself.
“Okay. Have you talked to her?”
“What?”
“Have you called her? Asked her where she’s staying, and all that.”
“We don’t—”
“It’s the simplest solution,” Merlin pointed out, before Arthur could finish his protest.
“She won’t want my help.”
“And you listen to her?”
“Yes.” Merlin raised an eyebrow, and Arthur subsided back in his seat. “Sometimes.”
“Never?”
“Not often,” Arthur admitted. “But—I think I’m getting better about it. I’m, trying, which is more than my dad is.”
“Listening’s always the hardest thing,” Merlin agreed. He drummed his fingers against the plate, tapping around the edges with a click of his nails. Tracing it, Arthur supposed before he let himself get annoyed.
“I’m better at doing,” Arthur nodded, careful to speak with it.
“Clearly,” Merlin grinned at him, dimples pocketing in his cheeks, and Arthur laughed before he remembered he didn’t particularly like Merlin.
Merlin would take full credit for reconciling the siblings, no matter what Arthur says. He’s not sure why, but it’s one of his proudest accomplishments, like he finally solved a puzzle he’s been worrying over for years.
“Holy shit,” Arthur snapped as he strode across the quad to stand over Merlin. “What the hell happened to you? Was it Valiant?”
Merlin crouched over the leaf-strewn sidewalk, cane clutched in one hand, his other hand groping for his scattered books. At Arthur’s words he looked up, his lips pressed together into a long, obscenely red line. “Arthur—”
“I knew he wouldn’t leave you alone,” Arthur went on. He dropped to his knees as well, shoved the books into a pile. “I should have said something to my father. I will now. He can’t be allowed to get away with—”
“Arthur,” Merlin said again, sharper this time, with a hint of amusement. “Arthur, it wasn’t Valiant.”
“It was someone else? How many people have you antagonized? The number of people bullying you is really ridiculous—”
“I tripped.” Merlin didn’t look away, but his cheeks stained pink.
“What?” Arthur cut off his rant mid-word.
“I tripped,” Merlin repeated, enunciating as if for a child. “And dropped my books. It happens. To me, a lot, actually.”
“Oh.” Slowly, Arthur got back to his feet, Merlin’s books tucked under one arm. “Well, that was stupid.”
“Thanks, I hadn’t noticed,” Merlin shot back. The blush faded over his knife-blade cheekbones.
“You should be more careful.” Arthur ignored Merlin’s sarcasm, and reached down to wrap a hand around Merlin’s arm. “I won’t always be around—”
“And I would have handled it.” Merlin tried to pull away, but Arthur’s grip was firm as he yanked Merlin to his feet, not bothering to be gentle about it. Merlin clearly didn’t need it gentle. “I don’t need your help.”
On his feet again, he pulled his arm free. Arthur let him go.
“Clearly, you do.”
“I really don’t.” Merlin snatched the books out of Arthur’s hands, spun on his heels—and nearly tripped over a loose stone.
Arthur caught him before he fell, moving before he thought as if he had known that was going to happen, one arm around Merlin’s waist and the other at his wrist. “As long as you’re such a klutz, you do,” He retorted. Merlin was warm against him, pressed flush, and for a moment Arthur met his clouded eyes and something almost flashed, hot and golden and timeless, between them.
But then Merlin was steady and Arthur released him, and Merlin’s gaze drifted aimlessly away. “Oh, I’ve always been a klutz,” he admitted cheerfully.
It took Arthur a second to draw his thoughts back o the conversation, away from golden eyes and warmth that came from nowhere and heat that came from him. “It’s not the blind thing?”
“I wouldn’t know.” Merlin took another, slower step in the same direction. Arthur didn’t have anywhere better to be, and he wanted to know, wanted to know more about this boy with bright smiles and a quick mouth and no fear, so he followed. “I’ve been blind since before I could crawl.”
“Fever?” Arthur guessed from his vaguely remembered history of scarlet fever.
Merlin’s grin flashed, dimples and all, like a blow to Arthur’s heart. “Yeah, something like. Before I can remember, anyway. But I think that I’d be clumsy anyway. I’m that kind of person, you know?” Arthur pulled him to the side to avoid a misplaced stone; Merlin accepted his guidance easily. “Thanks.”
“No problem.” Arthur wondered what Merlin’d be like without the blindness, if he’d be as cheeky, as optimistic, as stupidly, stubbornly brave. Probably, Arthur decided. There was just something about him. Almost definitely.
When he felt like teasing, Merlin would date that as when Arthur fell in love with him. It was his clumsy charm, he would laugh, and Arthur would scoff and pooh-pooh and slide a hand over Merlin’s mouth to shut him up, and call him ridiculous and claim that he had only overlooked Merlin’s clumsiness with great difficulty and what charm, anyway? Because he needed to hide the truth that sometimes it felt like Arthur started loving Merlin before he was born, like he came into the world loving Merlin and would leave it the same way, and that was a truth too deep for him to share so soon.
When Arthur was elected captain the year before, Gwaine and Leon had sat him down very seriously and told him that he was a stick-in-the-mud of the first order and too serious and he needed to cede the party-throwing duties to Gwaine, or else there would be a rebellion. Arthur had agreed immediately. He cared about people, his teammates especially, and wanted to improve their lot, but he didn’t actually like people very much, on a day-to-day basis.
Which was why Arthur was so surprised when he found himself liking Merlin. Not just the thrum of attraction between them—or at least, on his side, because Arthur wasn’t sure if blind people dealt with attraction in the same way, were attracted to the same things—but his easy humor and biting sarcasm, the way he seemed to have no shame whatsoever. The way he never pulled his punches, not for anyone.
“Can I touch you?” Merlin asked, at one of Gwaine’s parties, when they sat next to each other on the couch. Arthur nearly spit out his beer.
“What?”
Merlin rolled his eyes. “I mean, your face. Narcissist, honestly. I want to feel what you look like.”
Arthur took another sip to steady himself, and clamped down hard on the wank fantasies that had just sprung fully formed into his brain with those words. That was for later. “Yeah, sure.” Then, because that wasn’t enough, somehow, “Be prepared to be amazed.”
“Don’t be so sure. Getting a bit heavy around the middle, aren’t we?” Merlin shot back, and poked at his stomach.
Arthur slapped his hand away. “How would you know?”
“You walk heavier,” Merlin replied immediately, almost too fast. “I’m blind, I notice things like that.”
Arthur looked down at his middle instinctively, let his fingers run over his six pack like another man might have hugged at his teddy bear. Merlin was crazy. He was as fit as ever. “You’re insane,” he retorted, “You should hurry up and do your blind face-touching thing before I find someone actually interesting to go talk to.”
“You’re so gullible,” Merlin chuckled, but he reached up and over.
It was intimate, obviously, because the man’s skin was on his, mapping him in a way that only lovers had before. Arthur closed his eyes as Merlin’s fingers reached them, and the party dropped away, the bass thrumming in the background like a heartbeat, just him and Merlin caught in the instant, Merlin’s skin against his and his face close enough to kiss. Merlin’s fingertips were smooth as silk, for all Arthur knew his palms were calloused, and they were butterfly-light as they brushed over his cheeks, to his ears and then back down to his chin, over the jut of his jaw that Sophia had once called strong and Gwaine called overwhelmingly square. Arthur wondered which side of the debate Merlin would fall under, if he liked the angles of it, the angles of his face, like Arthur liked Merlin’s sharp cheekbones and pointed chin and full lips.
And then Merlin’s fingers ended, delicate as a kiss, over Arthur’s lips, and Arthur could still feel them resting there as he breathed, “So, do I pass?”
Merlin’s voice sounded hoarse, but it was impossible to tell with the music so loud, so Arthur opened his eyes. Merlin’s eyes were wide and his face was pale as paper, and for an instant Arthur actually considered letting his tongue flick out to taste the skin of Merlin’s thumb, to swirl it over the pad of his finger and see what happened.
But then there was a crash and Valiant appeared out of the crowd, face set in an ugly smirk. “Do you even know you’re touching a man there, Emrys?”
Merlin yanked his hand away, but he was cool enough as he turned to Valiant. “Do you even know you’re an ass, Valiant?”
Valiant made a growling sound, low in his throat. “Fucking faggot,” he threw out, and Arthur was on his feet even as Merlin flailed in his direction and hissed a warning.
“Were you insulting my friend here?” he asked, right up in Valiant’s face, and it sounded like a growl and a threat and there was a part of him that loved it, that loved how his body was tensed and ready to move and fight.
“You were there as much as him,” Valiant retorted, and Arthur’s fists clenched at his sides.
“I was,” because he had never made a secret of his sexuality, if he could come out to his father he could come out to anyone. “That a problem?”
“Wonder if he’s the cock-sucker or if it’s you,” Valiant threw back, “He like to take it from you? Like to—” and Arthur’s fist flew before he could think, smashing into Valiant’s face with a sickening, satisfying crack.
Valiant roared and he moved to punch back, but somewhere amid the screaming and the hoots of excitement a full can of beer flew out of the crowd and crashed into Valiant’s head, throwing his punch off, and he stumbled, drawing back a few paces to regain his balance.
And by the time he was back, eyes red like a maddened boar, Arthur felt the familiar, welcome weight of his men at his back.
“Problem here?” Leon asked, steady and sure, and Arhtur didn’t have to look behind him to know Gwaine was grinning like he hoped there was, and Lance looked solemn and severe and ready.
Valiant wasn’t an idiot, and so he only glared. “No,” he spat, and slunk back into the crowd.
Arthur turned, ignored the crowds, slapped Leon on the shoulder and nodded his thanks to the others—and only then noticed Merlin was gone.
They would fight a lot. It wouldn’t be unexpected, by either of them or anyone who knew them; two men with sharp tongues and strong beliefs. And their fights wouldn’t always end in make-up sex, but in harsh words and insults and a bed half-empty. But in the end, after the glacier of Merlin’s anger had run its course and the fire of Arthur’s wrath had deadened, they would always return, two halves of a whole, and Merlin would trace Arthur’s smile with a finger and Arthur would let Merlin’s laughter settle into his soul.
Arthur found Merlin outside Gwaine’s building, looking perfectly able in a way that made Arthur’s blind panic turn into rage. “What do you think you’re doing?” he snapped.
Merlin kept walking, didn’t even turn to face him. “Going home.”
“Alone?”
“No, with the guy I just picked up. Yes, alone, Arthur.”
It was dark and late, and Arthur had personally seen Merlin have at least two drinks. “I’ll go with you.”
“No, you won’t.”
“Yes I will.” Arthur caught up with Merlin, even if the other man was walking bloody fast—long legs, Arthur supposed, and didn’t let himself think on those legs any more.
“No, you really won’t,” Merlin snapped, and his cane tapped an even quicker rhythm against the ground, knocking against a lamppost he sidestepped but Arthur almost knocked into in his hurry, right before he almost tripped over a branch that he was almost certain wasn’t there before. Maybe he was drunker than he thought.
Regardless, he was not letting Merlin walk home alone. “Yes, I really will,” he echoed, and kept his place one step back and to the right of Merlin.
Merlin continued to ignore him. Arthur continued to walk. Merlin might have been a klutz sometimes, but when he was angry that apparently all went away, because he moved through the streets as easily as if he could see.
They made it two more blocks before Merlin finally stopped and whirled on his heels so he faced Arthur, his eyes icy and hard. “Are we really going to do this now, Arthur?”
“Do what?”
“Have this argument. Because I am tired and drunk and I would have preferred to fight later when I wasn’t furious, but we can do it now too.”
“Do what?” Arthur repeated, but Merlin’s rage had sparked something in him, too. Would it have killed him to be grateful? “Talk about how you’re walking home alone in the dark—”
“It doesn’t actually matter to me if it’s dark here, you know—”
“In the dark,” Arthur bit off, “and I came to make sure you were okay even though I was just in a fight—”
“A fight you didn’t have to be in!” Merlin’s cane thumped against the ground, and his face was pale with fury.
“A fight I was in for your sake!”
“I didn’t ask you to. For the last fucking time, I don’t need you to defend me. Being blind doesn’t mean I’m helpless.”
“I never said it did.” Softer, this time, because he hadn’t, and because he had never meant to. Because Arthur had been on the receiving end of Merlin’s wit enough to know that. Because Arthur knew, somehow, with a deep and certain surety that really hadn’t ever been confirmed, that Merlin wasn’t helpless.
That didn’t mean he didn’t want to protect him.
Merlin sighed, and ran a hand through his hair. “You acted like it.”
“Would you have preferred to fight Valiant yourself?” Arthur’s eyes narrowed at the thought of that, of Valiant having a chance, even a chance, to hurt Merlin.
“I would have ignored him, because he’s an ass and doesn’t matter.”
“He was insulting you.”
“Who cares? It’s just an insult. It’s just words.” Merlin huffed out another breath, exasperated this time. “He wouldn’t have started anything there if you hadn’t provoked him.”
Which, Arthur had to admit, was probably true. Not there in Gwaine’s apartment, filled with his teammates, who had by now more or less adopted Merlin as Gwen’s friend, and Arthur’s.
“He insulted you,” Arthur repeated, and Merlin rolled his eyes again.
“Why does that matter? He didn’t say anything that wasn’t true. I am blind. I am gay. Neither of those facts are important enough to be kept a secret.”
He was gay. The words echoed through Arthur’s head, and he promptly set them aside for later consideration in favor of repeating, enunciating each word with deadly clarity, “He insulted you. No one insults my friends.”
At that, all the wind seemed to go out of Merlin’s sails. He deflated, leaning against his cane, his face somehow softening into something irritated and fond and lovely, “Oh, Arthur. You really are ridiculous, aren’t you?”
There was no fighting that look. “I am not,” Arthur protested. “You’re ridiculous.”
“I’m reasonable. You’re noble. Now walk me home before I trip over something.”
“You didn’t trip over anything yet.” Arthur stepped up, slid an arm over Merlin’s. He wasn’t entirely sure what he had done right, but he was happy for it. Their skin brushed, bare and pale and warm, and something sparked, like static, so quick Arthur assumed he hallucinated it.
“Pure luck.” Merlin grinned, eyes golden in the lamplight. “You know me, bumping into everything.”
“That’s why you need me.”
“That’s why I keep you around,” Merlin corrected firmly, and Arthur decided that was a battle for another day.
When reminiscing about that argument, Merlin would laugh and wonder how Arthur could never have noticed. Arthur would say it hadn’t occurred to him, except it had; he had noticed how Merlin tripped and flailed but never seriously, how he only seemed clumsy when others were looking. But how would he have thought to look? And how would Merlin have thought to tell him? Some truths were too big for words.
Arthur still had a quiet chat with the team, the next day. He had seen the angry-boar glint in Valiant’s eyes, the humiliation as he slunk away, and he knew that he would strike out again, and it wouldn’t be at Arthur. And not because Merlin was blind, or helpless, but because he was too skinny and too insolent and had ridiculous ears and ridiculous cheekbones, and it made something roll over in Arthur’s gut to think of Merlin at Valiant’s mercy, Arthur dropped a quick word with the lads, and they set up a schedule.
It took Merlin two days to notice. To be fair, it only took him that long because Gwaine was talking for most of the first day and it was hard to pay attention to anything when Gwaine was really on a roll, especially when Merlin was possibly the only other person who could talk quite as much. And then the morning of the second day was Lance, and no one could ever suspect Lance of anything. So it was Arthur’s shift, in the afternoon, when Merlin turned to him and glared.
In retrospect, Merlin may also have waited until Arthur was around to yell at him. But at the time, Arthur’s didn’t suspect that, and only knew he had been caught out.
“You set your goons on me,” Merlin said, and it wasn’t a question.
It was also true, so Arthur found the one part he could deny. “They aren’t goons.”
“Fine, Lance is not a goon,” Merlin admitted. “But Percy is lurking. And Gwaine is actually not very subtle, Arthur, I don’t know if you’ve noticed.”
“How on earth do you know Percy’s been around?” Arthur demanded, as he led Merlin down the sidewalk, and wondered idly, in the part of him that wasn’t busy hoping this wasn’t going to be another fight, when it had gotten so natural to do this, to wrap his arm around Merlin’s and guide him.
“He’s very large, it makes him distinctive. And you have set your goons on me.”
“Maybe they just like you. I don’t understand why, but it is a possibility.”
“They do like me. Probably more than you, because you’re an overbearing prat who gives people bodyguards they didn’t even ask for.” His toe hit a sidewalk crack and he stumbled sideways, jolting his body into Arthur’s, his chin brushing against Arthur’s cheek, and it was in the shock of that contact that Arthur muttered,
“I just don’t want Valiant finding you when you’re alone.”
Merlin sighed as he righted himself, and bumped his hip into Arthur’s. “What will it take to get you to realize I can take care of myself?”
“I’d do this for anyone, you know,” Arthur said, to preempt the argument he knew was coming. “Valiant’s a thug and a bully and—”
“I know, you’re just a protective clotpole in general,” Merlin replied, and sounded like he meant it. But that was wrong, Arthur realized all at once. He would do a lot of this for anyone, any of his friends—defend them to a bully, keep them safe. But he wouldn’t do all of it, wouldn’t keep track of his classes and make sure he had someone with him at all times and dream about the pressure of his fingers on his lips. That was Merlin’s alone, Merlin with his oddly variable clumsiness and sharp tongue and lovely fingers.
Merlin, who, was also, unsurprisingly, still talking, without any consideration for Arthur’s dawning realization of feelings. “But I have actually managed on my own for twenty years—well, less than that, because when I was a baby I obviously depended on my mom and there were a few years there where Will was awesome, but maybe more like fifteen years, really, but that doesn’t matter. Point is,” and he stabbed at Arthur’s chest, hit him right over the heart, and wasn’t that a fucking metaphor, “I don’t need supervision all the time. Valiant will get me or he won’t, it doesn’t—”
“Won’t.”
“What?”
“He won’t get you,” Arthur growled out, from somewhere underneath the civilized, modern boy, from the parts of him that were still savage and untamed and possessive in the way his ancestors might have been when they hunted with spear and sling. His fingers clenched over Merlin’s wrist like an anchor and a bond. “He won’t.”
Merlin’s wrist was thin beneath his fingers, but Merlin chuckled as he peeled Arthur’s fingers off of it, only slightly breathless. “Because you saying so makes it sure?”
“Yes,” Arthur agreed, and breathed, trying to steady himself on the feel of Merlin’s fingers against his own. On the sun on his shoulders and the ground beneath his feet and the fact that Merlin was still there, wasn’t leaving him behind, or being left behind. “Yes, it does.”
Arthur would never be proud of the dark streak in him, the jealousy and rage that always simmered beneath the surface, but he never denied it, either. He would always be bad tempered and quick to anger, or, as Merlin would say, a right prat, usually as he would roll his eyes and lean into Arthur’s side, assuring him without words that no he was not flirting he was just talking, you idiot. But Merlin would never be a picnic either, with his grudges and defenses and the simple fact of his blindness and, as Arthur would say, his idiocy, usually as he had to mediate another fight between his father and Merlin because Merlin never knew when to shut up even if he was right. But that was okay. Neither of them had ever liked anything that came too easy.
Despite all of Arthur’s planning, though, Valiant did manage to find Merlin alone. Because Valiant wasn’t stupid and Merlin was reckless and after a week Arthur had stupidly, stupidly let the boys relax, and he didn’t think anything of it when Merlin walked back to his room from class without an escort, a simple five minute walk that Arthur wouldn’t have realized had turned into fifteen except Lance called from Gwen’s to report it.
He made the run to Merlin’s classroom in three minutes. Merlin wasn’t there; he must have left already. It was probably nothing, he assured himself. Merlin had probably just started talking to someone or wandered off in search of a delicious smell, like he had done once before and had ended up charming the new bakery owner into giving him and Gwaine free samples and Gwaine her phone number. It was probably something as simple as that.
Except Arthur was in many ways a simple person, run by instincts and feeling, and all he knew was that his gut was pounding with the urge to find Merlin, now, because he was his and he was in danger. There was something almost familiar about this, the frantic search through the streets for Merlin, hoping and dreading and not allowing himself to think the worst.
A shout came from up ahead, and for an instant Arthur’s heart stopped even as his legs pumped onwards, bringing him skidding to a stop, legs burning, in an alleyway a minute from Merlin’s rooms.
Merlin was there, cornered against a wall, his chin up and mouth set defiantly, and there was Valiant and five of his thugs surrounding him, and Valiant was saying something that Arthur couldn’t hear through the roaring in his ears and his arm was drawing back to punch, or slap, or hit, and Arthur charged forward—
And then there was a wind out of nowhere, like a whirlwind and a hurricane and a tidal wave, and it smashed into Valiant and threw him and the thug next to him against the wall, where they hit with a crack and went still. The others turned, to where the wind had come from, and the one closest to Merlin fell with a garbage can to the head, moved by no hands Arthur could see, and the other two started for Merlin as their only target and Merlin raised his hands and there was wind in them, rocketing out of them like a gun, and they both fell back and then, as one, started running out of the alleyway, eyes white with fear as they shoved past Arthur.
And Merlin was standing there, eyes golden in the reflected light of the bright sunlight—or maybe just golden, because Arthur knew what he saw and he could accept the proof of his eyes for all that it was impossible, because it wasn’t impossible, clearly, and then Merlin turned to face Arthur and his hands came up again and Arthur realized, suddenly, that Merlin could not know that he was the other person in the alley.
“Merlin!” Arthur called, because he had seen what those hands could do, and instantly Merlin’s hands dropped, and he drooped back against the wall, his face tilted up to the sun as if absorbing its warmth and its strength.
Arthur forced his legs to take the last steps to Merlin, barreled his way through the fear, of Merlin and for him, made his hands reach out and brush against his cheek, because Merlin was there and safe and inexplicable.
Merlin didn’t move beneath his touch. For an instant, something seized in Arthur, that maybe something had broken in Merlin, maybe what he had seen had come too late, and his hand moved from Merlin’s cheek to his shoulder, down his side, mapping him like Merlin had, making sure he stayed.
It was only once Arthur’s hand reached Merlin’s waist that Merlin’s eyes opened, and they were the clouded blue Arthur had come to know and love. “Arthur,” he said, on a breath.
“You,” Arthur replied, still out of breath from adrenaline and worry and relief, “Are an idiot. What happened to staying safe?”
Merlin shrugged, but there was no mirth in it, no spark, just a steady sort of resignation. “I’m fine.”
“But only just, and Valiant did find you, so I was right.” Nothing provoked Merlin like a direct challenge.
“I guess so,” Merlin admitted, though his lips twitched. “But I told you I wasn’t helpless.”
At that, Arthur shivered, because he could still see that wind throwing Valiant like nothing, and the way Merlin had stood cold as ice as it had happened, without remorse or fear or hesitation. Ruthless, the word came—not like Arthur could be, violent and dangerous in his fury, but something calmer, saner, and all the more dangerous for that. But he had meant to do the same thing, with his fists, hadn’t he? And Merlin was safe, and here, and he couldn’t regret that.
“You aren’t.” Arthur hesitated, but he couldn’t not ask. “Was that—” He didn’t know the word, didn’t want to say it, as if saying it would break something between them.
“Magic? Yeah.” Merlin bent down to pick up his cane, pulling Arthur’s hand off him with the motion. Arthur tucked the hand behind his back, so he didn’t give in to the temptation to touch, to make sure Merlin really was safe. “Or at least I’ve always called it that.”
“That’s—”
“Impossible, I know.” Merlin pushed back against the wall to straighten up, then moved slowly to Valiant, his back turned firmly towards Arthur. Here were his walls again, Arthur thought, the walls made of blunt honesty built to protect this thing at the heart of him. “I’ve come to terms with that, I promise.”
He sounded so cold, so bitter, that Arthur had to move, had to walk behind him and slide his arms around him in a hug, like he could retroactively protect him from all the hurts and barbs and doubt that had made that bitterness. “So you’re a bit magic,” he breathed into Merlin’s ear, as Merlin’s back tensed against him. And Arthur was ready to move away, ready to believe he had read everything wrong—until Merlin’s chin tipped back, just a bit, so Arthur’s lips brushed against his cheek as he spoke. “Doesn’t mean you aren’t a reckless idiot.”
“It does mean I can take care of myself,” Merlin retorted, as he pulled himself away, though Arthur could see the smile curling on his lips, the breaking of the ice.
And then he poked Valiant vindictively with his cane.
It was the magic that took his sight, Merlin would tell Arthur later, much later, when Arthur had time to sit him down and demand answers to all his questions. Magic coming on him all at once, and the heat of it burned out his eyes, or maybe that was the only way to balance the equation, he didn’t know. Or maybe it was karma for something he had once done, or would do, he would go on to theorize, with that far-away look in his eyes like if he concentrated hard enough he could remember. And then Arthur would cuff him on the back of the head to jolt him out of the angst-cycle, and decide they needed to see what he could do, if only because Merlin’s eyes were hardly ever cold when they flashed golden.
Arthur went to see Merlin the next day, after he thought about everything for a bit and came to the conclusion that no, it didn’t really matter, and that he was thankful Valiant was suspended no matter how it happened, even if he would have been happier if he had got to throw a few more punches.
Merlin opened the door before Arthur could knock, and let him in. Arthur had always liked the hominess of Merlin and Gwen’s flat, the soft cushions and strict organization so Merlin could find everything.
“How did you know I was there?” Arthur asked, as he stepped around Merlin.
“Magic.”
Arthur’s head jerked, because usually he answered that sort of thing with something about footsteps and scents. “Really?”
Merlin’s dimples flashed, but he nodded. “Yeah.”
“So what, your magic makes you into a bat?” Arthur paused, close enough to touch, but he didn’t reach out and do it. Touch was different for Merlin, both more practical and more unexpected, because it came out of nowhere. And Merlin was safe now, and Valiant wouldn’t bother him, and so Arthur didn’t have that excuse to touch him anymore, to make sure the world stayed away.
“No. Unless I could—but no. It’s just… a sense of where things are.” Merlin didn’t sit, but he cocked his head as if studying Arthur, for all Arthur knew he wasn’t. “More like infrared, really, except I can’t tell differing heats, obviously, so—”
“So you really don’t need help getting around.”
“Not so much, but it’s not perfect or anything. It’s not the same as seeing.” And there was an ache there, an ache to address on a later day, but right now Merlin’s hand fluttered out, pawed at Arthur’s face until he found his lips and traced the straight line of it. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
“You’re overthinking, aren’t you?” Merlin took a step forward, so they were almost touching, but he dropped his hands so that there was no contact. “Look, I know I’m not easy. Even discounting the blindness. But you’re also a bit of an ass, and really I don’t know who else would put up with you, so I think you should just kiss me now to shut me up.”
His head jutted forward, and Arthur was struck for a moment at the sheer unrelenting bravery of him, who could simply say something like that and not care that it could be thrown back into his face, not care that he couldn’t see the emotions playing over Arthur’s face, the want and the pull of it. And for another moment he wondered if he should pull away, because he already knew he was too invested, knew he loved too fiercely and too much, knew that he wanted to wrap Merlin in cushions and lock him in a tower and keep him safe forever even if Merlin would never let him do that.
And then he realized he was hesitating when he could be kissing Merlin, and fixed that.
He dreamed with sight, Merlin would tell Arthur as they lay in bed, his head resting on Arthur’s chest, comforted by the rise and fall of it. He shouldn’t be able to, he couldn’t remember what it was to see, but he did. He dreamed in green grass and blue skies, of a grey castle on a hill, of red flags whipping in the breeze and swords bright in the sunlight. He dreamed of a crown golden as the hair it sat upon and a dragon black as night, and another white as clouds, and most of all of eyes blue like the skies and armor shined to a blaze and laughter, over and above it all.
And Arthur would roll his eyes and say that sounded lovely, really, but right now he was trying to sleep, or at least Merlin could do better things with his mouth than talk, and Merlin would chuckle and let them drift into sleep together. And he would dream of a voice like destiny and the sight of Arthur galloping over a ridge, his golden sword like fire.