[ Arthur doesn't suspect. Arthur never suspects. While he may be more inclined now to look twice at others, Merlin has his implicit trust in all things - for all that perhaps he shouldn't. But the king has been riding all day and he's starving; if there's a certain strange aftertaste to the first goblet of wine he drains greedily with his dinner, it's soon lost in the second. Lost in the continuous stream of totally inconsequential information on the state of exactly nothing at all around the palace, part gossip heard in the kitchens and part whatever pops into Merlin's head. Arthur regularly tells his friend he neither needs nor cares about these updates, but they both know he'd miss both the entertainment and the noise were Merlin actually to shut up as directed.
Arthur decides on a bath. Only bothers dressing halfway for bed. Is a lot less unkind about the order to have his armour polished for the morning than he would have been in years past.
And all the while he hasn't the faintest idea that his best and most trusted friend might have done - be doing - anything to betray that trust. They have met in his dreams before and no doubt they will again; but he can't know that this time will be no accident.
It starts the same way it always starts. The sky is aflame and there is an army - a great army, dark and blank and faceless, an unending mass seeming to move as one being; a swarm of insects crawling over the earth all vicious points and beady eyes. There is always an overpowering force. He stands alone though he knows he wasn't always; his knights lay fallen at his back, Leon chief among them. He never sees them fight, but he always knows they did. They fought to the end and it wasn't enough. Camelot burns before him and every time he despairs at the thought that he's been so arrogant as to think his paltry strength alone could be enough to protect the once-great kingdom.
It's his dream - his nightmare - but he can't change it. Can't stop it.
And then suddenly, it's different. Because in this dream there's one person he never sees. One person who never appears and whose fate, try as he might, Arthur can never later recall.
This is the part where he's supposed to meet Morgana. Where her magic forces him to kneel at her feet, just as she was forced to kneel to their father's will. But it's not his sister who stands before him on this barren plain, flanked by restless masses of spidery black soldiers. ]
... Merlin?
[ Arthur is hoarse and breathless and he falters, sword in hand. ]
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
no subject
Arthur decides on a bath. Only bothers dressing halfway for bed. Is a lot less unkind about the order to have his armour polished for the morning than he would have been in years past.
And all the while he hasn't the faintest idea that his best and most trusted friend might have done - be doing - anything to betray that trust. They have met in his dreams before and no doubt they will again; but he can't know that this time will be no accident.
It starts the same way it always starts. The sky is aflame and there is an army - a great army, dark and blank and faceless, an unending mass seeming to move as one being; a swarm of insects crawling over the earth all vicious points and beady eyes. There is always an overpowering force. He stands alone though he knows he wasn't always; his knights lay fallen at his back, Leon chief among them. He never sees them fight, but he always knows they did. They fought to the end and it wasn't enough. Camelot burns before him and every time he despairs at the thought that he's been so arrogant as to think his paltry strength alone could be enough to protect the once-great kingdom.
It's his dream - his nightmare - but he can't change it. Can't stop it.
And then suddenly, it's different. Because in this dream there's one person he never sees. One person who never appears and whose fate, try as he might, Arthur can never later recall.
This is the part where he's supposed to meet Morgana. Where her magic forces him to kneel at her feet, just as she was forced to kneel to their father's will. But it's not his sister who stands before him on this barren plain, flanked by restless masses of spidery black soldiers. ]
... Merlin?
[ Arthur is hoarse and breathless and he falters, sword in hand. ]