Archive of Our Own

Who says the moon has no heart?

A thousand long miles it has followed me.

—Bai Juyi, from a poem featured in “The Sun, The Sea and the Stars: Ancient wisdom as a healing journey”

There is something about seeing Merlin under pressure that almost seems to bedevil the brain.

Where in every day life Merlin is clumsy, optimistic, effervescent in his bright attitude towards the world and the shine of his own sarcastic wit, under pressure, he shines.

While so many others can break under pressure, golden softening, tarnishing, it’s almost like being in life-and-death circumstances awakens something in Merlin. Allows him to shine, stronger than anyone has ever given him credit for.

His eyes narrow. His focus contracts. Gone is the clumsy manservant, trading japes and teasing and insults with his king; in his place lies a man who grew up in a village beset by bandits and knows what to do when lives are on the line.

(Sometimes, Gwen thinks that the best advisor that Arthur ever could have asked for is Merlin. That at his right side at the Round Table should sit Merlin, just as Gwen sits at the left.)

But Merlin doesn’t know how to wield a sword. He holds it limply, incorrectly, between tight fingers, yes, but fingers that don’t know how to balance, fingers that seem pained to hold the blade, as he whirls around to face the Lamia.

And as Gwen checks on the side of Elyan’s neck, Merlin charges forward like a fucking idiot.

Gwen reaches out a hand, to stop him, but Lamia’s serpent tail wraps around Merlin, hauling him up into the air, holding him tight, going to strangle him.

There is a small flash of gold, of magic, between her coils, and Gwen doesn’t know where it is coming from, if it is from Lamia immobilizing Merlin, or what might be the issue.

All she knows is that Merlin grunts in pain as the sword tumbles to the ground.

As the sword clatters against the cave floor, against the stones, and Gwen lunges forward to grab it, outside of the view of the monster who is so focused on restless, brave, reckless Merlin, the Lamia’s head curls in and sinks her fangs into Merlin’s shoulder—

Merlin’s head falls back, unconscious collapses beneath the Lamia’s teeth, and it is up to Gwen to save his—and all of the knights’—lives.

It is a tall order to fill.

But Gwen has to be brave. She has to sharpen herself against the whetstone.

She can wield a sword. She is a blacksmith’s daughter.

And more than that, she knows a couple of things about magic and iron. About to bleed dark magic out of a wound.

(What? She has paid attention to how Gaius treats wounds. How the people who entered the blacksmith’s shop looked for iron fillings when they had wounds associated with those who burned on the pyre.)

And she knows that the best way to defeat the Lamia, to save Merlin, is the same way that destroys most creatures.

Before the Lamia has a chance to devour Merlin, she drives the sword into the serpent’s side.

The serpent screams, twisting in Gwen’s hand, twisting away from Gwen, twisting Gwen’s wrist out from under her—

But Gwen holds on. She holds on, because she is as stubborn as an anvil, because she was strong before she ever had the chance to be soft.

And the serpent dissolves into blood and guts and scale, dropping Merlin to the ground.

Gwen dives to Merlin's side.

He is sweating, hacking, aching, and when she rips the jacket back to check the site of the wound, she finds his red tunic ripped through and the skin bubbling, the line of the veins a strange green shade instead of the usual blue, pulsing beneath the surface.

Magically enhanced, she has to think, though her specialty is far more in sewing, in smithing, than in skin.

Merlin is their physician’s assistant. Their expert on healing and medicine. He should be the one who knows what they need to do, not Gwen.

But Gwen is what they have. 

And Gwen is going to use what she knows in order to heal him.

A fang is still buried in his side, and she knows that she has to get that out of him as quickly as possible.

So, praying under her breath that he will survive, that she will not be the cause of his death, that she can help instead of hurt, Gwen pulls the bandages out of Merlin’s satchel, then braces her hand against the stone wall and pulls the fang out.

It works, in a way—the poison stops spreading, but blood trickles out of the wound. Gwen gets to work in an instant to pull iron fillings from her own bag in order to wrap them into the bandages so that she can press them into Merlin's skin.

When the iron bandages touch Merlin’s skin, his skin sizzles, like hot oil on a pan, like water against hot iron coming out of the forge, and it makes something in Gwen’s heart crack open, the way that his body almost seems to cringe away from the touch.

Merlin whimpers as the iron touches his skin, and the green does seem to cringe back from the iron—good, Gwen hopes, that the iron is fighting the magical poison, that it is giving Merlin even a chance at life, at breath in his lungs, at the poison not strangling him whole.

Gwen is currently being courted by a king, she knows. But it’s clear, from any glance, that a king and her share the same feelings for a manservant, for a stranger to Camelot.

It’s hard not to fall in love with someone as gangly, as earnest, as wildly immune to social standing as Merlin. He comes barreling through every room like a cannon shot, bright as the sun, catching all light. 

Now, though, he is restless, aching, wounded, and Gwen has to do whatever she can to make sure he survives.

But Merlin’s groans and gasps, along with the end of the Lamia’s influence, are causing the knights to start to wake up.

In an instant, Gwaine lets out a cry and is at Merlin's side, cupping Merlin’s cheek, checking in on him, because he has never been Arthur’s knight or Gwen’s knight or anyone’s knight as much as he is Merlin’s, but it isn’t enough, because he was one of them, one of the ones that defended Lamia over both of them.

The others are stirring, groggy, and Gwen shouldn’t blame them for being hooked under Lamia’s spell, but they are supposed to be the protectors. They are the ones that made the vows.

And if Merlin, scrawny, sarcastic, without training, without a sword, without anything save his wits, managed to resist the Lamia’s hold for so long, to keep her safe instead of Gwen, instead of Merlin, the only one of them that doesn’t know how to hold a sword, then what do knights have to say for themselves?

“We are getting him back to Gaius as quickly as possible,” Gwen says, using the sort of voice that is far more commanding than her usual one, but she is betrothed to a king, and maybe it’s something she needs to get used to, being in charge, making sure that things get done when and how they’re supposed to be. “If he dies, then all of you shall be partially to blame.”

Gwaine lets out a small, wounded sound, while Elyan’s expression turns down in shame.

“Yes, Your Highness,” Percival says, and he sounds just as ashamed as her brother. Gwen is not usually one prone to pettiness, but right now, she is too exhausted, too worried, to think anything but good.

Gwaine nods and quickly takes Merlin out of the cave to strap him to the saddle with him. He has the strongest and largest warhorse, technically suited to riding two people, but if they’re going to ride through the night—and they must—then they’ll have to stop a few times to get Merlin transferred to different knights and their horses.

But Gwen will make sure that they do such a thing. She refuses to let Merlin not make his way back to Camelot.

---

So Gwen does what she can to keep Merlin alive on their way back to Camelot because she cannot bear to see him die.

She stays close to his side, because she knows, rationally, that the knights are not at fault for what happened, that they were not in their right minds when they lashed out, but there is still part of her that is terrified to leave Merlin with them. What might happen, if she is not there to take care of him? To aid his wounds, to maintain the iron dressing keeping back the poison, to keep him in a stable enough state so that he can make it back to Camelot for Gaius to take care of his wounds and stop the poison in truth?

Gwen is not a healer. She is a blacksmith’s daughter, a maidservant, someone who knows what to do with needle and metal but not with poultice and poison.

But she can protect, in some small way, right?

(She has to believe that she can. Because if she loses Merlin because their closest thing to a healer went down, she could never forgive herself.)

Merlin grows paler and paler with every step, despite the fact that Gwen does what she can to keep the iron where it is supposed to be, to fight off the magical effects.

The green is arrested around the bandages, but it doesn’t go away, a constant ring up the side of his neck.

Gwen has never been one who blamed magic for the evils of the world. She has seen it do evil, yes, but also seen instances where it has saved lives, like Arthur’s in Ealdor when Merlin’s friend Will died saving them all.

But if it kills Merlin— 

Merlin is her best friend. The one person who kept her going through so much. Through her father’s death and Lancelot’s death and being captured by Cenred and everything else, Merlin has been there as much as Arthur has, if not even more.

Her father is already a ghost. Morgana has gone, her loneliness and her ache turning her entirely against Gwen.

Gwen cannot lose another person, especially not Merlin, such a constant source of sunlight.

Gwen knows a thing or two about stress. About the way that a sword can break when it’s too hot, when it’s hit by ice cold water, how even the strongest steel can break if hit just right and the strongest iron can rust if exposed to too much water.

Everything has its breaking point.

Merlin, for all of his strength, his optimism, his casual cheer, in the face of quest or stocks or whatever is thrown at him, rotten tomatoes and all, is no exception to the rule. If anything, he proves it.

Because now, he is dim. Quiet. Silenced.

Merlin is silent.

Merlin is saying nothing, no rambling, no bickering with Arthur or teasing the knights. And it feels against the laws of nature.

(She still remembers what it felt like to kiss him, the last time he was poisoned. She’d set aside that crush a long time ago, once she realized that Merlin was in love with Arthur, but there is something in her that always dreamed of it. That always dreamed of getting to kiss him again.)

---

At the first stop, the first transfer, where Gwen is supposed to check on Merlin’s bandages, Gwaine is hovering. 

Gwen wants to ask him to stop, to stop looming, to give her space. It crunches in on her, that reminder of what happened to her, of what Gwaine and all the other knights did and failed to do— 

But all Gwaine is there to do is to beg her to find some way to save Merlin’s life. “Please, Gwen,” Gwaine says, and all of his usual mirth is gone from his eyes, nothing more than plaintive care for a friend. “Save his life,” as if she isn’t doing everything she can already.

But she recognizes the worry, the panic, in Gwaine’s eyes, because it is the same as what is reflected in her own when she gets fresh water from the creek to dribble into Merlin’s mouth, and especially when she goes to press a rag damp from the creek against Merlin’s forehead and she she finds him twitching, eyelids spasming.

The iron should be healing him. It should be. It should be wiping the magic from his veins, burning away the poison, giving him a chance to survive and heal.

But when Gwen presses the rag against his forehead, there is gold sparking from beneath his eyelids, a lightning strike contained beneath his eyes.

Magic.

Not magic like the Lamia’s, seeking to destroy, to devour, to consume— 

It is bright like the sunlight. Like gold when it is finally polished, the tarnish wiped away.

There is sunlight trapped inside of him.

Magic trapped inside of him.

If Merlin is a creature of magic, and she put the iron on him to hold off the Lamia’s magically enhanced poison— 

She might have only hastened him being killed.

She was the one that introduced the rust. She was the one that put iron where it did not belong.

Gwen doesn’t even hesitate. She peels off the bandages, wipes off the iron fillings, shoves the pouch away, stamps it into the ground.

There are burns on his skin where the iron sat, the skin so mottled with burns and bruises and poisoning that it’s almost impossible to find any patches of pale, unmarked skin in between.

Gwen doesn’t even get the chance to hold her breath. Doesn’t even get the chance to pray.

Because the moment that the iron leaves Merlin’s presence, his body twitches. Gold bursts through his eyelids, through the wound, bright as the fucking sun streaming through the leaves.

Something in Gwen collapses in relief, wanting to fucking weep. A reprieve. A blessed reprieve from the poison.

Merlin is going to live. Her mistake will be an easy one to fix. They are going to be fine—

But when it dissipates, there is still green in Merlin’s skin. He still has not awoken.

The skin is still mottled. Less so now, yes, but still marred. 

Getting rid of the iron is not enough.

They need to get back to Camelot. They need to get Merlin back on the horse. They need to get him home.

When she looks up, Gwaine is the only one close enough to have seen the gold.

And he looks at her, and she looks at him, and he looks down at Merlin—

And for once in his life, Gwaine shuts his fucking mouth.

---

So they take off faster than before, taking no stops, riding straight through the night.

They don’t stop. They can’t stop. They have to make it back to Camelot, to Gaius, for someone that can fix Gwen’s mistake.

Each bump in the road, each hill, each jostle of Merlin’s body in the saddle, makes Gwen’s heart lurch inside of her chest.

Her eyes burn. She wants to sob. She wants to fall apart.

Because the truth has settled into her veins like ice in the middle of winter, like a blizzard’s touch against skin without furs:

She did this. She made this worse. She added the iron, she stopped Merlin’s magic, she— 

---

Gwen is barely holding it together by the time that they make it back to Camelot and Arthur’s eyes go wide at the state of both of them, at Elyan and Gwaine as they help carry Merlin’s body down from the horse where he has been strapped.

He is carried in Gwaine’s arms, tight as can be without dislodging the bandages on his shoulders, to Arthur’s side and into the citadel.

In an instant, Arthur is at their side, hand to Merlin’s cheek, tender as the way that he touches Gwen, the sort of tenderness that Arthur only ever shows Merlin when he is injured or sick or unconscious, just like the last time that he was poisoned.

For all that Arthur teases Merlin, for all that they bicker and fight, every person in Camelot save Arthur himself knows that he is in love with Merlin.

Gwen does not begrudge him that fact—the fact that Arthur loves Merlin is half the reason she loves him as well, because Arthur has always been at his best when he is in love, when he is selfless, when he listens to the plight of the poor.

So many see Merlin as a reflection of Arthur, the moon to the sun, the silver to his gold. For awhile, even Gwen made such an assumption, except in her case, it was not that silver was a reflection, the moon to the sun; it was that silver and gold were perfect complements to each other.

But now she knows that they are both reflections of each other, both golden, that one cannot live without the other.

Arthur turns to Gwen, and he is a King, he cannot cry, but there is something pinched in his expression that tells Gwen that if they were in a private area, he would.

And thus, neither can Gwen. 

It feels like a single breeze might make Gwen fall apart. One bad outcome. One twitch—or, rather, lack of twitch—in Merlin.

If Merlin dies, her best friend, the person she cares about most, and she might have hastened it—

If Merlin’s magic had been able to fight off the poison, and she stopped it—

She could never forgive herself. 

So Gwen doesn’t focus on her own pain, her own agony, despite the fact that she is bruised.

“Merlin was poisoned by a monster called a lamia while we were out,” Gwen informs Arthur, “He needs Gaius.”

There is so much else she could say, could tell Arthur, about iron, about Merlin, about magic—

But Gwen doesn’t want to share Merlin’s secret with Arthur.

Or, rather, she wants to, but she can't.

Who knows why Merlin didn’t tell them?

He deserves to be able to share his secret when he is ready for it.

And Arthur— 

Magic is still illegal, in Camelot, and Arthur is far more fair a man that his father, but she has no idea how far that fairness extends.

And as much as she loves Arthur, as much as she thinks him an honorable king— 

She does not know if she could look at him ever again if he hates magic more than the loves Merlin.

She could not marry a man who killed his best friend, the man he loves—whether he will admit it or not.

(But if Merlin dies, it will be partially her fault, as well, as much as the knights’.)

And Gwen cannot lose one more she loves to the hatred over magic.

“We need to take him to Gaius,” Gwen demands, and she can see the same fear in Arthur’s eyes as she feels in her own heart, that sword through the ribs, that blade through the senses.

If they lose Merlin—

If they can’t—

It is a possibility that cannot be entertained, the loss of sunlight, the carving away of her senses, the introduction of emptiness.

A life without Merlin, a life without sunshine, cannot be contemplated. 

---

The moon is high in the sky, even on its way down towards the horizon, by the time that they manage to get Merlin carried down to Gaius’ chambers.

There is a thrum in Gwen’s chest. A crack that is threatening to turn into a canyon.

They are running out of time, she knows, as is clearly displayed by the first good look she’s gotten at Merlin’s wound since she swept the iron away.

Because as soon as Arthur gets Merlin laid out on Gaius’ examining table—for lack of a better word for the cot that he gets patients to lie on while he makes examinations—Gaius makes sure to get Merlin’s jacket and tunic peeled off to reveal the extent of the wound that he needs to be examining.

And thus, Gwen and Arthur get a glimpse at the full extent of what Merlin’s chest looks like, the planes of his shoulders, of his chest, of his ribs, and yes, he has slightly more muscle than she was expecting, but it’s hard to concentrate on the shape of his chest and how much she knows she enjoys hugging him when his pale skin is littered with the ropy, raised texture of scars and the mottled, yellowed form of bruises. Some are from the way that the knights had treated them under the influence of the Lamia, but not all of them—they’re too old for being today’s issue.

Magic, Gwen thinks, and wonders just how many of these scars and bruises are from Merlin’s clumsiness, and how much of it might have come from other sources. What kind of injury can a boy who has magic be unable to heal?

Gwen has this awful, nasty curdling in her gut as she is reminded of the last time that she saw Merlin sweaty and out of it like this, back that first month that he lived in Camelot, when he took the poison for Arthur.

(This time, the only difference is that he took it for her.)

“You have done a decent job of dressing the wound,” Gaius says, and for a moment hope flares like a lightning bolt inside of Gwen’s chest, the forge firing— 

But then Gaius’ next words crush her. “But he will need magical cures for a magical wound,” Gaius says, and under Uther, that would have been treasonous to say, Gwen knows, but Gaius says it without fear, and she wonders—

He has to know, doesn’t he? He has to be aware of the fact that Merlin has magic. That the iron burned him.

Why didn’t you say something? Gwen wants to scream, because if she’d known, she never would have done it, she never would have hurt Merlin like that.

But the past is the past and she can’t spill what she’s thinking to Arthur—even if it burns to keep such knowledge inside, away from Arthur—so she presses her lips together as Arthur works through whatever hang-ups that he has about magic, about healing Merlin, and eventually comes around to the solution that she'd certainly hoped that he'd end up at, even if she could never have had a guarantee, given the way that he was raised, by the father that he was raised by.

Arthur swallows, hard. “Do you have any such cures around?"

"I can certainly try,” Gaius says, “But I am not sure if they will work. There was…too much damage, from both the Lamia and other sources.”

He knows. He has to know. 

There is no way that he doesn't. That he doesn't see the iron burns on Merlin's skin, that he hasn't lived with Merlin, that he doesn't understand the way that Merlin nearly burned his entire life down staying a sorcerer at Arthur's side.

“There is one thing that always fixes magical spells, though,” Gaius muses, and despite the grief that he is, the worry he must be feeling, there is something knowing in his gaze as he looks between them as he says, “True Love’s Kiss.”

There is something that opens up in Gwen’s stomach at the prospect.

Yes, she has feelings for Merlin. Always has, from that first kiss. That never stopped, even as she fell for Arthur, as he started to court her, when he proposed to her.

But Merlin doesn’t feel the same for her. He is in love with Arthur, everyone and their mother can see that. Merlin devoted his life nearly from the moment that he stepped foot in Camelot to a prince who didn't seem to deserve it at first. No one can make Merlin smile as fondly or roll his eyes half as much as Arthur can.

And yet, when Arthur’s gaze flicks up to Gwen’s, some frisson of lightning goes down her spine, a spark lighting the forge.

“But I understand that such a solution is hard to find, and that your Majesty has duties to attend to,” Gaius says, “So I can watch over Merlin here while I research to see if there are any other solutions to the matter—"

“As if either of us would ever leave his side,” Arthur says, and it is an assumption on Gwen’s part, but he is not wrong.

And Gaius clearly not surprised. If anything, he arches a knowing eyebrow at both of them, as if he might suspect something along the lines as to who might be able to fulfill the requirements of True Love's Kiss, the cure for the poison, for the iron, for the magic leeching away at Merlin's insides.

But he does care, Gwen knows, because Gaius' shoulders slump just a bit before he nods and leaves. “I shall be back as soon as I can,” he says, “Hopefully with a better, more practical solution.”

There is something soft in his gaze as he leaves, something pinching his mouth tight together, because apparently Arthur and Gwen can be trusted at Merlin's side, to watch over him, to keep him stable at least for a little while.

And that just leaves Arthur and Gwen in the room with Merlin. With Merlin, who is laying almost unnaturally still in the bed, in a way that feels antithetical to Merlin’s very existence.

Merlin shouldn’t be this quiet. Shouldn’t be this still. Gwen should be able to see the way that his bright eyes dance, the way that the corner of his mouth lifts in humor, the way that his voice crackles and leaps like a fire, like a river, like a waterfall, not a single person able to resist the life within him.

That has always been the course of Merlin, hasn’t it? He is not a pot of water, a contained fire in the oven; he is the water coursing through the riverbank, rushing towards the waterfall, determined to spread life-giving water wherever he goes and shake up the lives of every single person that he touches.

Gwen and Arthur are not immune. If anything, they have fallen the furthest, had their lives knocked the farthest off of their expected paths.

If Merlin had not come to Camelot, Gwen would still be a blacksmith’s daughter. Maybe she would have married Lancelot, if he’d still come to Camelot, but in all likelihood, she would have married a baker’s son or even gone with Morgana when she’d turned evil.

Arthur would be long married off to a princess by now. Vivian, Mithian, Elena, Sophia—take your pick.

And speaking of Sophia—

Most like as not, Arthur would have been killed by a princess or a prince or a sorcerer by now.

Because now that Gwen thinks about it, if Merlin has magic, and he knows how to wield it as he doesn’t wield a sword, then it makes sense how so many magic users managed to not kill Arthur, all the way from that first sorceress that led to Merlin becoming Arthur's manservant. There are likely even more magical threats that have passed through that Gwen might not be aware of.

And now, Arthur can watch over Merlin, protect him in the same way that he has done more than once before, such as the first time that Merlin was poisoned.

In the long term, Camelot might grind to a halt without Arthur there, but for this day—

For this day, Arthur can be selfish. He can wreck himself in the pursuit of making sure that Merlin doesn’t crumble to ruin.

(Arthur has always been at his most lovely when he is at his most devoted.)

Gwen reaches out a hand to touch Merlin's forehead, to get an insight into how his body is responding to the poison. Not good, it seems; Merlin’s head is still clammy, as it was on the path into the castle. The gold is not flickering behind his eyes as his body tries to fight the iron, but it is surely going to happen soon if they do not find a way to purge the poison from his system.

The silence in the room is impossible to bear. Merlin's chatter is like a river rushing towards the sea, a babble of comforting sound, a reminder that life-giving water is nearby. It is empty without him.

And Gwen cannot stand to stay in one place.

So Gwen heads for the water bucket to dampen a cloth. Now that they are not on the road, it is only right to clear the dirt and grime from his head, to give him some relief from all of the dirt of the road.

But when she returns to relieve some of the heat and sweat from Merlin's forehead, Arthur is there to insist: "You should rest, Guinevere. I shall take watch."

Gwen's eyes are burning from lack of sleep and worry, but she cannot leave Merlin alone. She cannot let all of the burden drop onto Arthur's shoulders. "I cannot leave him," she insists, "No more than you can."

And that, for some reason, makes Arthur swallow. “Of course you won’t leave,” he says, and there is a strange note to his voice.

“Of course I won’t,” Gwen agrees. “He’s my best friend, just as he is yours.”

Normally Arthur would protest something like that, but instead, Arthur looks to Gwen, something aching in his eyes. “It’s you, isn’t it?”

Gwen’s brow furrows. “It’s me what, sire?”

“You’re the one who should kiss him,” Arthur says, and there is something disappointed in his voice, but also—something at ease in the small curve of his smile.

And why?

Arthur is a King. He is someone that all should ache for—and so many do. Gwen does. Her feelings for Merlin do not carve away her feelings for Arthur.

But none would know that, not without asking. They would not understand that feelings do not eclipse each other; they merely buttress each other, allowing both to stand tall and strong as steel.

Shouldn’t Arthur be jealous, that the man he loves loves another, that the woman he is courting has feelings like a river running for another man?

And most of all, shouldn’t Arthur understand that there is no way that it is Gwen when it is so clearly him?

Before Gwen gets to argue the point, though, Gwaine bursts in, half-drunk, because apparently guilt has driven him to his cups (not that Gwaine ever needs an excuse, of course, but she knows that the red rim around his eyes is far more likely to come from tears than from the drink itself, considering how ever since Lancelot died, Gwaine is usually Merlin's most strident defender among the knights). 

And Arthur's eyes flash with dragonfire, nostrils flaring in fury, mouth opening to scold Gwaine for drinking—

“I am sorry, sire,” Gwaine says, and there are tears in his eyes that glimmer in the light just starting to come in through the windows. The sun has not quite crested the horizon, so the sky is just beginning to lighten, but the lanterns in the courtyard and the gently awakening sky are catching the tears in Gwaine’s eyes. “I am sorry, milady.”

It is still such a strange thing, to have someone call Gwen a lady. That is not something that she’d ever prepared herself before, in her past life, before she found herself in this strange place with Morgana gone, with her role as a maidservant no longer necessary, being courted by a king even as she helps out around the castle, doing what she can to assist the staff with whatever they need done even as she advises the king.

“What are you sorry for, Gwaine?” Arthur asks, and it’s clear that he wants this conversation to be over. That he wants to focus on Merlin, on the issue at hand, at the question of kisses and truths and the like.

“For what I did, under the influence of the Lamia,” Gwaine swallows, and something in Gwen thinks—he is devoted to Merlin in the sort of way that many of the knights are, yes, everyone around the castle has fallen in love with Merlin in one way or another, she thinks, but Gwaine loves Merlin more than most. While every other knight swore himself to Arthur first, above all else, she is certain that if Merlin ever left Camelot, Gwaine would go with him. “I hurt Gwen and Merlin.”

Gwaine is far more honorable than people give him credit for, Gwen has to think, to admit such a thing, to beg: "I must beg your forgiveness, milady," he says, and the late night is such a turn from the usual Gwaine, from his usual joking manner, but it speaks to him and his devotion to Merlin quite strongly.

But before Gwen can decide how to respond, Arthur’s eyes flash, stormcloud bright. “What did he mean, he is sorry for what happened to both Merlin and you?” Arthur asks.

Gwen is used to carrying bruises and aches in order to get her job done.

Yes, as Morgana’s maidservant, she was protected from a lot of harassment, but other nobles were not as kind before Morgana, and it’s not like Gwen grew up a noble maiden. She grew up in a forge, where you weren’t alive if you didn’t bang a hammer against a limb at least once.

Gwen swallows. It is too late at night to allow herself to break. She has to keep herself together. She has to focus on Merlin’s pain, not her own, not the way that she’d been shoved, been insulted, been pushed into the Lamia’s cave to be devoured by knights in armor, knights who were bigger and stronger and more armored than her—

But where she refuses to answer, Gwaine does. “The Lamia took us all in her magical hold, save for Gwen and Merlin, who were far stronger than us. And as they were unarmed, we were the ones that marched them into the cave where they were the ones that took down the Lamia."

“Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t lock all of you in the dungeons for what you have done and what you have failed to do," Arthur commands.

And Gwaine doesn't seem like he's going to stand up for himself. He doesn't seem like he's going to defend himself.

And more than anything, Gwaine doesn’t say a word about Merlin, about his magic, and Gwen has to appreciate him for it

“They don’t deserve it,” Gwen says.

“Yes, we do,” Gwaine says, “We’re supposed to be knights. Supposed to protect those who cannot protect themselves. You shouldn’t have had to pick up the sword and slay the beast. You are a hero, and for that, I am forever in your debt.”

Gwaine hasn’t even properly sworn himself to Arthur, not in the same way that he has sworn himself to Merlin, and yet, in this instant, despite it all, despite her own failures when it came to Merlin—

Gwen feels a queen in all but name, a crown upon her bedraggled curls and her stained gown.

So Arthur sighs. "By Guinevere's request, I shall stay you from time in the dungeons. But you, Percival, and Elyan shall be in charge of taking care of your own armor and assisting Guinevere and Merlin in their duties until Merlin is fully recovered."

It is an assumption that Merlin will recover, and one that Gwen has to appreciate, because she needs it to settle into her bones more than anything.

Gwaine nods, seeming actually relieved. "Of course," he says, "That's only right—"

Arthur rolls his eyes. "I'm sure that Merlin will appreciate you bothering him. Just don't drag my servant or my betrothed down to the tavern, alright?"

Gwaine actually smiles, and it is less blindingly bright than normal, but it is still strong, the sort of thing that only Gwaine could wear easily. "Of course, sire," he says. His expression squeezes when his eyes turn to Merlin, but he reaches out, touches Merlin's limp hand in his gauntlets—perhaps a gesture of fortune—and then bows to all three of them and leaves the room.

The moment that Gwaine is gone, Arthur is immediately reaching across the table to her, taking her hand in his. “Guinevere,” he says, the only one to ever say her full name, but the way he says it doesn’t sound like a title, but somehow intimate, a sweetness, a fondness, a tenderness. “Whatever they did to you—I am gravely sorry. You deserved to be protected. I am ashamed of my knights and what they did to both of you, and I should have been there to help you—"

And Gwen cannot hold on anymore. She cannot hold back the truth of what occurred.

“It was not just them that caused the harm, though. It was the Lamia, in most, and also—" Gwen chokes on the words, but she has to speak them, has to be honest. “It was also my fault, as well.”

Arthur is incredulous as he protests: “How in all of Albion could it have possibly have been your fault?”

Summoning the words to her lips feels like pulling up a bucket of steel from the bottom of a well. How is she supposed to admit the truth? How is she supposed to give away not just her own sins, but Merlin’s as well?

But if she doesn’t—if she isn’t honest—

She has to believe that Merlin would forgive such a thing as the words spilling through her teeth. That Arthur would be good enough a man to understand Merlin’s lies, his secrets.

Still—it feels like she is carving something within herself open in order to offer this up to Arthur. It feels like she is digging deep into the bottom of the entire earth in order to bring up the core of herself.

She does not know if she will ever be able to make it out of the cave. If she will ever be able to forgive herself for admitting such things.

But she has to do this.

She has to confess the truth, if it means Merlin living, if it means Arthur understanding what happened, if it means the two of them being able to figure out what happened and how to reverse it.

Gwen cannot let the clock keep ticking if the ring of the bell with bring about Merlin’s death.

And so Gwen swallows and says, “It was the iron. I used iron, to stop the magical poison from travelling through Merlin’s veins. And it did the job, it arrested the spread of the poison, because iron halts magic, according to the legends, but—" She swallows, hard, but she is swallowing dry. She is swallowing in the middle of a desert, too much fire, not enough water, because her own guilt has evaporated it all away as quickly as water through against a pot directly out of the forge, still glowing red-hot from the flame. “I might have—with the iron I was using, I might have made it worse. I might have killed him—"

Gwen is babbling, she knows, but Arthur’s hand rises to steady her. He places a hand on Gwen’s shoulder. Steadies her with one hand as he races his way around the table in order to pull her into his arms and hold her close so that she can break down as a sob rips its way from between her teeth.

Gwen doesn’t know what to do with such tenderness. With such comfort. Her entire life, she has had to take care of herself, take care of her father, take care of Elyan, be the anchor for the family, be the person to assure Morgana, be the source of comfort for others.

The only two people she’s ever felt truly comfortable pushing back against, truly speaking against, arguing to the core of the matter, the core of herself, have been Arthur and Merlin, and that took time to come about.

But now, Arthur gives Gwen comfort. Gives her reassurance of the sort that he was so desperate to grab for himself, all of that ego-soothing he reached for as a reckless, restless prince with an ego to match his desire to prove himself.

“It is not your fault,” Arthur murmurs, fingers carding through her curls, and all she wants to do is to lean into the touch, to let him in closer, to invite in the idea that she didn’t do what she did. “You were doing your best to save him, and that is the greatest thing that he could have asked for. You did push back the poison for awhile, did you not? It is not your fault that no one could have guessed that he had magic—"

Gwen draws back, yanking herself half from his arms. “You—" Her jaw drops. Her body draws tight. “You know?”

Arthur doesn’t even hesitate. “I’ve known for awhile. I figured it out on my own. You do not think that someone that had to handle armor on a regular basis—armor with iron in it—would try to clean it on his own, or do you think that he’d use magic and fabric to do it so that he wouldn’t have to touch it with his bare hands? It only took one time entering the room to see a flash of life that shouldn’t have been there.”

“You know and you never said a word? You never punished him for it?”

It seems impossible, not because of who Arthur is, but because of who his father is. What the entire kingdom of Camelot has been crafted in order to persecute. How could a prince that grew up in such a word not have a hatred of magic clinging to his very bones?

“Is that what you think of me?” Arthur asks, and the pain in his voice is like a lance through her heart. Gwen winces—she hadn’t meant to imply things like that about him, especially when it is clearly not true.

“I’d like to think not,” Gwen says, “And clearly, today—" She glances back to Merlin, to the man laid out on the bed, pale as the moon in the sky, verging closer and closer to death, and she knows that they need to do something, and quick—and then back to Arthur. “You cared for him.”

And that is the realization that nearly bowls her over.

The sigh of relief that rips itself from her body is almost enough to topple her.

He knows.

He knows, and he does not blame Merlin for the magic that courses within his veins, so inherent to his body that the touch of iron against him was enough to cause injury, was enough to arrest any healing—

“Do I wish he had trusted me enough to tell me?” Arthur asks, “Of course. But do I understand why he didn't, considering how my father operated? Yes. So I have been waiting for him to trust me.”

Gwen swallows. “I only realized today, with the iron, but I didn't tell you because I did not wish to betray his safety.”

But despite the fact that she kept this from him, Arthur offers her a small, wan smile. “Because you are a good woman.”

If I was a good woman, I would have realized the issue earlier and not have left him adrift on the agonizing line trapped between iron and magic, between nature and a smith’s daughter’s instincts.

“And you are a good man. You are not your father’s son.”

But Uther Pendragon has always been a sensitive subject for Arthur, and Gwen knows that,. She should have been more careful when she spoke.

Because somehow, this is what loses the small curve from Arthur's lips. He sighs, looking down at Merlin, and his mouth pinches. “Am I truly, if the man I trust most in the world did not trust me in turn? He met the stocks with the roll of the eyes, listened to me speak of my anger towards my father and my regrets over my mother, and yet did not trust me with this. With his greatest secret.”

“I think, maybe, that when you are more used to lying than telling the truth, the lie sits more easily on your tongue than a confession," Gwen says. "Especially when you love someone as he does you."

Arthur's brow furrows. "He loves you."

And they are back to this discussion, now, this debate that shall determine Merlin's fate.

“He devoted himself to your life and reign,” Gwen insists, “Meanwhile I am made of iron, and I nearly killed him—"

But Arthur isn’t having it. “Through trying to save his life. He loves you,” Arthur says, and she’d say that he is the most stubborn person she knows, but she’s met Merlin, she herself is made of steel, and so he can only ever draw for the title, “He risked his life for you just this day—"

The sun is rising through the windows. It was yesterday, in truth, that everything with the Lamia occurred, but they have been awake for so long that it is hard to keep track of all that has occurred, all of the pain that has been dealt, within the scope of a single day.

But what Gwen can tell is that at the end of the day, at the end of the night, at the end of every argument—

They both have a point.

And if this betrothal is going to work, if this relationship is going to be equal, if they are going to save Merlin's life—

There's only one answer, isn't there?

Gwen swallows. “It’s both of us, then. We both love him, and based on his actions, the fact that he has been reckless enough, foolish enough, to risk his life to save both of ours—we are both lucky enough to be loved by him. So if True Love's Kiss will work for him, then it has to be both of us."

“You will make an excellent queen, you do know that, right?” Arthur asks, and there is something tender in his eyes. Some sort of awe.

And something in her wants to protest. She was the one to introduce the rust. She was the one who mixed in too much iron and upset the delicate balance of nature and magic and steel.

But there is also something in her that thinks—

A spine of steel cannot be too bad a thing. 

If Merlin is sunshine, if Gwen is the fire of the forge, if Arthur is the steel between them—

There is something here, brighter than gold, stronger than steel, more enduring than iron. Something that will not rust.

And they have to do what they can to make sure that they can actually get to that sunlight. To that gold.

To get rid of the sorrow staining Merlin’s shoulder, the poison that is spilling through his veins, a sludge that will destroy him.

Gwen needs to be able to see Merlin’s smile again. Needs to watch it light up the world.

And Arthur needs that as well.

“Perhaps—" Gwen swallows, hard. It seems an impossible suggestion to make, an impossible suggestion to believe, but something in her wants to believe it. Wants to believe that two halves of one heart can share an affection for a single person. That a heart, in general, is not made of only one facet.

That when Merlin stayed here, in town, he didn’t just stay for Arthur, didn't just stay for Gaius, didn’t just stay to save the kingdom, but for multiple people. For her and Arthur alike.

She loves them both. She knows that for certain. She knows that losing either one of them would tear her apart.

Why can the same not be true of Merlin? 

“Perhaps it can be both of us," Gwen offers up.

“You would share your heart with two people?” Arthur asks, and there is something in his voice that trembles.

Gwen’s brow furrows. “I have for years.”

Arthur lets out a shaky breath, as if in relief, as if he thought—

Something cracks in Gwen’s heart, cold water poured onto hot metal. “Wait a moment,” Gwen says, “Did you think that I did not feel for you what I do for Merlin?”

Arthur’s bright gaze drops to the ground, rain falling onto dusty, dry soil. “Perhaps,” he admits, voice quieter than she’s ever known it from his lips.

Never in a million years would Gwen have ever predicted that this could be her life—a sorcerer in need of her love, a king terrified that he might not love her.

Gwen grew up in a smithy. A blacksmith’s daughter, never dreaming above her station. She’d always thought that being elevated to being Morgana’s maidservant would be the greatest privilege that she’d ever get.

Then, she’d become Merlin’s friend. Had started to become closer to Arthur, after she’d called him out, after he’d smiled at her, after the world had upended itself in Morgana’s absence and Gwen’s own growth.

At some point in her life, it all tangled together, the three of them braided together with golden thread.

She sees that plainly, now. There is no love for Arthur without his love for Merlin, and there is no love for Merlin without his love for Arthur, and there hasn’t been since the day that she kissed Merlin all of those years ago after Arthur hunted down the cure for his poisoning.

Gwen reaches forward, grabs Arthur’s tunic, and captures his mouth in her own, spilling what feelings she can into his lips, and she does not care that it is not proper, because things in this room have long passed beyond that sort of measure.

The sun is rising. Their watch is ending, if this only goes right. There is something magical in the air that cannot be ignored, the blessing of the warmth of sunlight, if they can only get the gold to stay within this world with them.

And when they part, she says, “Together.”

It is not a question, though maybe it should be. A maidservant doesn’t order a King around, after all.

But Arthur just smiles, because he respects her, because he understands her, and because he’s learned to listen to her, over the years.

And so he nods and holds her hand as they lean over Merlin. 

In the end, they both kiss Merlin’s cheeks at the same time.

It is far from the most romantic kiss in the world, by the stories and tales of knights and their maidens. Merlin's cheek is cool, clammy, beneath her mouth, his skin tacky with sweat and ache and fever.

For a moment, her heart stops as nothing happens.

But then, as she begins to pull back, gold blooms up from the spots where both of their mouths make contact, swirls of golden light twirling through the air as they simultaneously seep through his skin, purging away the green lines, washing the poison from his body.

Arthur’s bright eyes and golden hair catch the gold, reflecting it like sunlight on the water, like a crown upon his curls.

Gwen’s own skin seems to glow as the light flares against cheek and jaw alike, travelling down her neck like water. The magic is warm against her skin, almost a caress, and delight bubbles in her chest, sweet as can be, because Merlin loves both of them.

And she reaches out her free hand to touch—

Merlin’s eyes open beneath them both, him finally breathing out under his own accord.

For a moment, when he sees them both, he smiles, groggy, instinctual—

But then his eyes seem to catch the magic out of the corner of his vision, and his smile arrests in its spot.

“I can—” His voice, unused for an entire day, rasps beneath him, just as it did when he was pulling out from under the poisoned chalice. “I can explain—”

“You don’t have to explain anything,” Arthur says, and there are tears glittering in his eyes like diamonds. “Other than the fact that you have been risking your life for so long without anyone to confide in because you are an absolute imbecile, Mer-lin."

“Oi, you clotpole,” Merlin protests before his throat devolves into coughing, into choking hacks. Arthur reaches out, on instinct, to clutch Merlin's hand in his free one, to pull him close, to anchor him, to reassure him, to give him a place to rest.

Then, once the coughing dies down, Merlin looks to Gwen. His voice is tentative, hesitant, as he says, “So…you both know?”

Gwen nods, and something relaxes in the line of Merlin's shoulders, the weight of a secret held for so long sloughing off of the line of his aching spine.

And with that worry out of the way, Merlin moves onto the more pressing immediate issue at hand. “What got me here? Last I remember, the Lamia was biting me, and Gwen was—" His eyes go wide and he raises up a heavy, trembling hand, to graze Gwen’s shoulder. (She thinks he might have been aiming for the cheek, but he’s been poisoned and dying for nearly a day, now, and there is something so endearing about the motion.) “Gwen, are you alright—"

What it means to her, that her well-being is the first thing that Merlin thought of, even when last he was conscious, he was the one in mortal danger. “I am fine, now that you are as well. And as far as how we escaped—I managed to kill Lamia with a sword."

Merlin beams from ear-to-ear, smile bright as the sun, proud as anything of her, and there is something so warm inside of her chest that she doesn't know if she'll ever be able to feel the dark again. “And now? The sun is rising. Last I remember, it was dark out. Dusk."

“A lot has gotten you here, after you were bitten by magical venom," Arthur begins to explain.

There is so much that could be discussed, that could be explained, all of the steps and iron and magic that took to get here, but more than anything: “True Love’s Kiss,” Gwen blurts, and Merlin’s eyes go wide.

“I’m—I’m sorry?”

Now that Merlin is awake, Arthur seems to be more at ease with teasing, as he grins and says, “It seems as if you fancy your King and your Queen, Mer-lin,” arrogant as anything.

“Not a queen,” Gwen clarifies.

“Not yet,” Merlin says, something as sure in his voice as a prophecy, and Arthur nods.

"Guinevere, you are going to make the greatest queen that Camelot has ever known," Arthur says, "And so shall Merlin make a great sorcerer."

Merlin's eyes go wide, his head snapping just slightly towards Arthur. Nausea creases his expression at the quick motion, but it's quickly replaced by: "I'm sorry, what did you say about me being a sorcerer?"

"You can't expect the True Love of the King and Queen to be asked to keep himself secret," Arthur says, something heart-wrenchingly sincere in his voice.

Because at the end of the day, Arthur Pendragon is not his father. He is not afraid. Or, if he is afraid, he is more brave than he is terrified, and he is more willing to love than he is hate.

---

As Merlin recovers, his awakened magic purging the poison from his system quickly but his body needing a day or two to get up back on his feet, Arthur and Gwen take a quick nap of their own but the moment that they wake, they make an effort to rid Arthur’s chambers of iron. The candlesticks, the iron rings on the tapestries, even nails where Gwen can get them.

“Most servants wouldn’t expect you to do such a thing for them,” Gwen says.

“Well, if I can make the effort to get wildflowers and laws overturned for my future queen," Arthur says, "Then I can certainly rid iron from the room where our true love works, can I?"

Gwen kisses Arthur up against the wall, tasting the pride right from his lips, and he tastes of sweets, of promise, of the future, and when she pulls back, he is laughing, smirking, the sort of thing that makes her flick water from the baths at his face.

Arthur rolls his eyes and flicks the water right back at her, leading to more shrieks of laughter and the sort of ease that Gwen was so afraid yesterday that she would never feel again.

“No wonder you need a servant, if this is what you get up to with your betrothed,” comes a familiar voice from the door, that lovely familiar accent settling against Gwen’s ears like a welcome blanket.

Gwen grins as she spins around to find Merlin leaning against the doorjamb, his brown jacket and red shirt and blue neckerchief back in place where they should be, looking still a tad pale but that's not that strange, given Merlin's infamously moon-pale complexion.

And she knows that Arthur has discussed, on this day in between them working to get rid of all of the iron, the possibilities of the future. Of the laws that he needs to overturn, regarding magic, regarding love, regarding consorts—

(Because, at the end of the day, as long as Camelot has its queen, has its future heir, as long as Gwen can provide the kingdom a prince or princesses, well—is there truly any reason why the King cannot have a consort, as well? Is there any reason why they cannot make the gold in Merlin’s magic into a crown of his own?)

Gwen skips forward to grab Merlin’s hands and pull him forward into a kiss, and for a moment, Merlin freezes, caught somewhat off-guard, but it only takes a moment for his body to relax, for his body to ease, for his arms to wrap around her waist, his hands finding solid purchase against the small of her back.

Merlin kisses back, this time, his mouth tasting of salted bread, his mouth warm as the hearth, and it turns out that his smile tastes not of lightning, but of the very sunlight that she'd seen in it for so long.

And when they pull back, Merlin is smiling at her, this beautiful thing.

Arthur clears his throat, catching both of their attention, and Gwen is more than happy to shove Merlin just a little bit in his direction.

Merlin stumbles just a bit as he hastens to Arthur's side, something tentative in his smile as he finally faces something that he has yearned for for so long, but as he eagerly responds to Arthur pulling him in for a kiss, Gwen can't help but think—

There will be no more silence from here on out. She will be able to hear Merlin until the day that they all die.

---

They insist on Merlin sharing a bed with them.

It is a scandalous thing, for a king to take two servants into bed, but when one bears his betrothal ring and the other his mother's sigil, well, the expectations of nobles and dead fathers and the ghosts of monarchs have nothing to say, not when it means waking up to this.

Because god, this.

When Gwen wakes to the golden light against her eyelids, she smiles to wake to the sunlight. To the warmth of two bodies against hers, Merlin between her and Arthur—

But not just the sunlight.

Merlin’s magic has cascaded out in sleep, finally at ease at being out in the open. And sure, the open is just private between the three of them for now, until the laws are overturned, until Arthur can finally change the kingdom forever, but for now—

For now, it is a gift to wake to gold swirling above her and Arthur's heads, caressing their brows, giving them golden crowns, a promise, a gift, from the man that loves them both most.

Turn this darkness into sparks like blazing hearts

I tell you darling

All I know

When the nights grow cold

And it's all gone to rust

We can turn it into gold dust

-BANNERS, Gold Dust