Title: The Winter Princess
Author: brickroad16
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairing: Merlin/Morgana
Summary: As Midwinter approaches, Merlin strives to prove to Morgana that she's not alone.
Disclaimer: Merlin and its characters belong to BBC/Shine. I own nothing.
A/N: This takes place after a vaguely AU season three, in which Morgana was not involved in the events of The Coming of Arthur.

I was trying to write a Christmas story, and I got more angst than I bargained for. Reviews are love. :)

Morgana stands at the windows of her chambers, looking out upon the snow that coats the courtyard. It glimmers in the winter sun, but she can't drive the chill from her rooms, from her bones. Midwinter used to be a time of joy and of laughter. She and Arthur would chase each other around the grounds, kicking up the untouched powder. They'd build men out of snow and use carrots and chestnuts to make their faces. He'd throw a snowball at her, and she'd turn around and pelt him right back until he was indistinguishable from their snowmen. Her aim always was better than his.

Arthur is preoccupied now—with ruling in Uther's stead, with leading his knights, with Gwen. Even if he weren't, he's not the sort of person she can have serious discussions with. She needs someone to talk to about the sister who shares half her blood, about her parentage, about the pain that clamps around her heart and tightens until she thinks she will die.

The last two years have been filled with confusion and heartache, and she doesn't want to feel it anymore. Feeling nothing would be preferable to feeling too much.

She sips her wine. It's dark and sweet, and it should warm her from the inside, but all it does is make her feel empty. If only her sister were here to talk to, to learn from. She needs Morgause's loving, guiding hand more than she needs the wardrobe full of fancy gowns or sumptuous suppers every night. She needs a friend.

Arthur, dressed in his armor and his hair sweaty from training, walks through the courtyard below. Merlin trails him, carrying his shield and helmet. He says something that makes Arthur laugh, but as Arthur makes his way through the frosty courtyard, Merlin stops in his tracks. He casts his gaze up to her window.

She steps back into the shadows. She'd thought once that Merlin was her friend, but she'd been mistaken. Every time she looks at his face, all she can see is tear-stained cheeks as he stood there and refused to help her. All she can feel is poison in her lungs instead of air.

She leans forward ever so slightly. Merlin's still standing down there, his expression searching. When he catches sight of her, he smiles. It's so unexpected and odd that she doesn't move away this time. She doesn't do anything except stare back at him and ignore the fuzzy feeling that sparks to life in her chest.

Merlin lifts a hand in a wave. Then he gets hit in the face with a snowball. Arthur stands across the courtyard, hands on his knees as he laughs. Merlin wipes the snow from his face, drops the equipment, and launches a snowball back at Arthur.

She's left forgotten, and that flicker of recognition Merlin had shown her is put out just as quickly as it came.

She feels like the Winter Princess, a character from a story her mother had told her as a child. A princess had been locked up in a tower made of ice for so long that she herself turned to ice. A servant in the tower watched as the cold took hold of her bones, but not before he fell in love with her. When he discovered her frozen at the window one morning, he set out to search for a dragon.

After long and arduous trials, he won the dragon's friendship. He brought him back to the tower and implored him to save his beloved. The dragon blew his great fiery breath and melted the tower, melted the ice around the princess.

But even freed from winter's grasp, the princess found she couldn't return the servant's love. The dragon may have destroyed her icy cage, but he couldn't destroy the cold that had taken root in her heart.

That was why she was called the Winter Princess—not because of her entrapment, but because of its result. That's how Morgana feels, like she's been left up in a tower and told to be a lady, to not touch anything, to not even breathe.

She doesn't mind it so much. Soon, she won't be able to feel a thing. The worst part, though, is knowing that there is no one—no one—in her life who loves her enough to save her.

But what does it even matter? She's beyond saving anyway.

Despite the evergreens swathes and red bows hanging from the alcoves, Merlin trudges through the corridor, his heart heavy. He cannot excuse Morgana's behavior, but every time he looks at her, he remembers how compassionate she once was, how idealistic and brave.

Had he been the one to let her down, or has he been only one of many? There's no sense in thinking in 'if's. What she needs now is not his distrust, his censure, or his judgment. She needs a hand to hold. She needs her kin, someone who will listen without distorting her mind. He alone can give that to her if only he'll reach out and offer it.

He shuffles into an alcove to look out the window at the frozen ground.

Only what can he do? Perhaps he's let this course run on for so long that he's now powerless to correct it. He's just a pebble on a streambed, the river flowing above and around him and he unable to stop it.

He takes a slow, deep breath to inhale the winter air. It's chilled, refreshing, and it mingles with the magic in his veins. He is the most powerful wizard this world has ever seen. If anyone can save Morgana, it is he. And Midwinter is the time for truth. It's the time for hope.

Arthur calls for him from down the corridor. As Merlin sighs, he expels all the doubt and self-loathing that's plagued him for two years now. He must not stay idle. For once in his life, he must act. And he will. He will find her and bring her back from the brink.

Amidst the revelry, Morgana sits at Arthur's side. The guests are boisterous in their anticipation of Midwinter, but their good humor does not touch her. She drinks her wine and longs for simpler times, and she sits quietly, observing rather than joining in the festivity.

What she would give to be with her sister on this night. For all her ambition and unbridled hatred of all that Camelot stands for, Morgause loves her in her own way, nourishes her magic even while dismissing her nobility.

There are two spirits warring within her, neither of which she can silence with any finality. The lady and the witch. It sounds like a children's story, but she is not a character in a book, not mere words on a page. Is it too much to ask for someone to love both?

She stands and leaves the room without an explanation. No one follows, which is just what she expected. All she needs is a bit of air, and despite the winter chill, she ventures into the courtyard. Her boots crease the snow, her footsteps the only ones in the evening's fresh snowfall. As it should be. She walks alone, no one before or behind, no one alongside her.

She crosses her arms to rub warmth back into them and throws back her head to look at the stars. There are legends that speak of the death of great men and how they are cut up into little pieces so that their light may be placed in the night sky. As a girl, she wanted to achieve such greatness. Now, she understands the sadness and sacrifice inherent in such an end. She no longer wants to be great for the world. She wants to be great to one person, just one.

Then again, she's always been such a selfish creature.

Footsteps crunching behind her alert her to another's presence. Probably just a knight who got lost on his way to the privy. She takes a deep breath of cold night air, relishing the way it clears out her mind as well as her lungs.

The person coughs softly.

She drops her head and contemplates the snow in the moonlight.

"Morgana," he says.

Because it is a man, a man whose voice she recognizes almost as well as her own. She doesn't want to talk to him, doesn't want to see his face. All it speaks of is betrayal. She has no interest in dwelling on a friendship that could have been, especially a friendship that could have rewritten her story.

"Please," Merlin says plaintively. He takes a shuddery breath and says, "You don't have to turn around, but will you please just listen to me?"

She doesn't reply, and he must take her silence as acquiescence because he continues, "I only ever wanted to protect you. I see now that I went about it all wrong."

She rubs her hands together and blows on them for warmth. In his pause, she can imagine him running a hand through his unruly hair as he thinks up new ways to deceive her.

"I see now that I've hurt you instead."

His words reverberate through her icy heart. It's not quite an apology, but it's the closest anyone's ever gotten.

A low indistinct growl comes from his direction, like he's pushing out pure emotions and willing her to understand because what are words but too few and too imprecise?

"But I want to do it over," he tries. "I want to do it right. I want to show you who I am and that you have nothing, absolutely nothing, to be afraid of."

He whispers—too softly for her properly to hear above the winter breeze.

Then, slowly, snowflakes float off the snow layering the cobblestones and into the air. She reaches out to touch them as they drift around her. It's a caress, the barest of breaths against her skin. The snow swirls faster and faster until she's lost in a wondrous cloud.

Except her feet are still on the ground.

Just as suddenly as it started, it stops. The snow falls back to the ground and looks as undisturbed as a moment ago.

He has magic. He's had it all this time, and all this time, he could have helped her. He could have told her that this power inside of her was something to embrace rather than something to suppress out of terror. He could have showed her what it was to choose the good side of it. He could have been her friend.

He was her friend. For a while. He had hold of her hand and still let her fall into the black, black sea.

She turns to face him, but she's taken aback by the hesitant fear that lights his eyes. Her voice is soft, deadly when she says, "I should slap you. I should kill you."

She should. On any other day, she would. But tonight, she is tired, and she is tired of the hatred that twists her heart.

He steps forward. In the silvery moonlight, he looks like the idealistic boy who came to Camelot only a few years before.

"But you won't," he tells her. "As much as you hate me, you won't."

"Why are you so certain?"

"Because I don't hate you. I never have. In fact, I . . ." He swallows hard and refuses to take his eyes from hers.

She can't trust him. She can't trust anyone. The only person she can rely upon is herself.

But he has magic. He has magic, and he is trying to make things right. He has magic, and he is reaching out a trembling hand to her.

Can she ignore his heart calling out to hers?

"If there is even the smallest possibility," he says, "the smallest hope that you can trust me once again, then take my hand."

A lifetime passes in the space of one breath. Then her hand is in his, and a great vise lifts from her heart. For the first time in a very, very long time, she can breathe.

Gently, he pulls her out of the courtyard, into a tower, and up a spiraling stairway. Up and up they go until they reach the castle roof. She halts on the penultimate step, mesmerized by the vision before her. The entire roof is a palace of crystal. Walls of snow surround them, pillars of ice form archways that shelter footpaths, and evergreens covered in tiny flickering lights line the pathways.

She can still see the stars above them.

He hasn't let go of her hand. He gives it a squeeze and draws her through an archway, and she has to suppress a gasp. It's a winter garden, full of lighted evergreen bushes and the reddest roses she's ever laid eyes on. In the middle of it all sits a snowy bench. He sits down. He doesn't make her sit, but he doesn't release her hand, either.

His hand, so warm in her frozen one, feels like her last tether to all that is good on this earth. She sits. The bench isn't cold as she expected. In fact, now that the surprise is past, she realizes she's not cold at all up here.

He waits for her to speak, but their past isn't one so easily gotten over. His betrayal is sewn into her skin, sewn into the fabric of her very soul. How will she ever forget the feel of his arms around her as she died? How will she ever forget all those times he could have helped her and yet he stood by, all those times he could have chosen to soothe her anger before it twisted into hatred?

But as she looks at him now, as she takes in the uncertainty and hope in his face, her heart lightens and her breath comes easier. Couldn't it be that easy? To simply choose to forgive him.

"Why are you doing this?" she asks softly.

He runs his thumb over her knuckles. "I'm finding another way. If you'll let me."

She inhales deeply but doesn't draw away her hand. "This doesn't make it easier to forgive you."

He lifts her hand, and the spot where his lips touch warms. The tingle spreads down her arm and fills her chest. The remembrance of this emotion is close enough to touch, yet she's locked it out of her heart for so, so long, and she's terrified to let it back in.

"I know," he murmurs, his breath tickling her skin.

But he's making an effort, a vast one, and is Midwinter not the time for forgiveness?

He presses another kiss to the back of her hand, then another before turning her hand over to press kisses to her palm.

"Together," he says, voice husky with something dangerously close to desire, "we can right this. Together, we can find a way to bring magic back to this kingdom. Only say you'll give me the chance, Morgana." His lips brush her wrist. "Say you'll forgive me."

Her breath hitches as she speaks. "How do I know I can trust you?"

He pauses, his head still bent, and his fingers lightly caress her wrist. "I suppose you can't. But it's Midwinter, the time for truth, and I . . . I can't bear the thought of life without you on my side. Imagine what we could do once you embrace your gift, once you learn it is a part of you and that you can make it the best part of you."

He lifts his face, and she's struck by the moonlight on his cheekbones, by the ardor in his dazzlingly blue eyes. He's the lover, come to melt her icy prison and free her captive heart.

He reaches out to cup her cheek with a light and comforting touch. "But I see that pretty promises cannot undo the pain I have caused you."

He withdraws his hand, and she feels the absence of his warmth as surely as she feels the night's cool kiss on her face. He stands and turns his back to her, contemplating the snow at his feet. His shoulders are tense, and even with his back turned, his posture gives voice to his unspoken regrets.

She had trusted him once, and perhaps the memory of that can carry them until his words ring true once more.

"I have nothing more to offer," he says quietly, "nothing to prove my truth to you."

When she considers, though, all the things she's done against him, it makes no sense for him to want her trust. Yet if he's willing to overlook her treachery, should she not overlook his, as well? She's spent so long fueling her own hatred that, as she exhales and lets it seep out through the cracks he's formed in her heart, her vision clears. She needs this—this truce he's proposing, this partnership. She needs him.

She rises. "Perhaps it is enough."

He spins, surprise and hope alive in his eyes. Before she can take a breath, he's in front of her, his arms wrapped around her waist and pulling her tight to him. She doesn't know how she's longed for his kiss until his lips are on hers, tentative and tender. She lifts her hands to his chest, delighting in the feel of his warmth and magic and affection encompassing her. His kiss ignites something within her, melts the edges of her frozen core until her heart is free once more. It seems to say he won't abandon her again, won't let her struggle against the tide of fate alone. It seems to promise a future she never dreamed she could attain.

He breaks the kiss, but, loath to give him up just yet, she drags him back to her and loses herself in the spark of magic on his tongue.

It begins to snow.