Merthur – Come Home
Arthur Pendragon stared out of his chamber window, watching the ripples of moonlight shine and glitter across the cobble courtyard, and the tiny flakes of snow floating down to rest upon the tops of the houses down in the village.
Beyond the walls of Camelot, a border of trees lined the horizon, trees that Arthur knew like the back of his hand, but that ,until now, had never felt so alien. So dark.
So... consuming
Ready to engulf anything or anyone who strayed too close to them.
He traced the line where white fields met the edge of the trees.
It had been several weeks since Merlin had disappeared into those woods.
He promised he wouldn't be gone long. Just some... things he needed to take care of.
Flashes of his conversation with the boy flooded the young king's mind.
How he was so sure of himself. So confident in the lies he was telling his master, like he had done it a thousand times before.
'I won't be gone long, I promise.'
All said with a grin and a casual joke about Arthur's incapability of surviving without him. All the usual prattle.
But something was off.
Not right.
Arthur had noticed it instantly, yet didn't think to question it in any way. What his manservant felt or did was not of much concern for him, so why should he worry himself about it?
Because.
What happens if questioning that slight difference meant that this servant would be here right now?
What happens if the fact that the king didn't worry himself with that minor detail, meant that he would lose something he never realised he had.
Something that, until recently, he had always taken for granted.
He blinked.
He didn't realise it would bother him so much.
How much he would notice the... emptiness of his chambers.
No constant whining.
No annoying background noise, that had become.. strangely comforting.
No Merlin.
If these past weeks had taught him anything, it was that Merlin was no longer a mere servant to him.
He was his friend, and he refused to deny it any longer.
He was tired of justifying his obvious affection for the boy, trying to make out it was simply because he was a good servant.
He cared for him more than he would like to admit, and now all he wanted was for him to come bounding into the room, without knocking of course, apologising a hundred times over and making up a million and one excuses for his extended absence.
Until then, a kind of energy radiated from the king. An energy that had settled upon him and had grown stronger each day that Merlin was gone.
Worry.
Concern.
Fear.
He had no way of knowing which of them it was. But he knew that only the return of his closest friend would relieve him of it.
Just come home, Merlin.
I don't...care what you've done. I don't need to know.
Please, just come home.
Arthur closed his eyes and rested his forehead on the ice cold glass that stung his skin like needles.
What he wouldn't give for him to emerge out of those woods, grinning like the idiot he was.
Come Home.