Chapter Text
“Please Father,” Arthur said through the bars. “Let me give Gaius the flower. I already got it and it is the only thing that can save Merlin.”
His father grimaced. “I don’t understand why you risked your life for a servant. You are a prince. Your life is worth so much more than his.”
“He’s dying because he drank that poison to save my life.”
“Just get another servant.”
“I cannot just get another Merlin, Father.”
“I know he saved your life, Arthur. Twice now. That’s why I chose him as your manservant in the first place. But there are many others who would be just as willing to lay down their lives for you.”
“It isn’t just that. He’s more to me than just a servant or my… protector.” Arthur grimaced at the thought of scrawny Merlin in chainmail swinging a sword around. Probably dropping it. “Which is a word that does not describe Merlin well at all,” he added.
“I always hear you complain of how he carries out his duties, so he’d be easily replaced with someone more capable.”
“Merlin is plenty capable.”
Uther stared him down.
“Capable enough for what matters to me,” he mumbled, looking away.
“What exactly is he to you that you overlook his ineptitude and risked your life for him?”
“He’s…” Arthur wanted to say a friend, but he knew his father wouldn’t tolerate friendship with a manservant. It would be yet another reason for his father to want Merlin dead.
His father’s jaw clenched. “I cannot ignore that you chose to disobey me and risked yourself for some lowly—”
“Father,” Arthur growled.
His father’s voice rose as he continued, “—peasant that fails to uphold the proper standards of—”
“Father, please!”
“—Camelot’s court!” his father snapped. “I said no and you will remain in this cell for the next week while you consider your proper duty to the crown.” His father turned on his heel and began to walk away.
Merlin’s last hope was walking away. Arthur couldn’t just give up. He refused to accept his father’s decision. It was wrong. Merlin deserved better.
Arthur gripped the bars of his cell. “Please Father! He’s…” He searched his mind for a word that wasn’t friend. “He’s my companion. I can’t lose him. Not like this.” His voice cracked as he fought back tears. He couldn’t cry in front of his father. “Not when I have a chance to save him.”
Bile rose in his throat as his father turned around with wide eyes.
“Your what?” Uther asked incredulously, his voice barely audible even in the quiet of the dungeons.
But Arthur’s tactic seemed to have worked. Instead of leaving, Uther stood frozen as he stared at his son, waiting for an answer rather than talking over him. So Arthur continued. “I knew you wouldn’t approve, but I can’t just let him die. Father, I beg of you! Put me in the stocks for a week or keep me here in the dungeons for a month; I don’t care. But please, let me save him! I cannot bear to lose him.”
“But he’s your manservant. And a man.” Uther paused for a moment, grimacing before shaking his head. “Not that you could really call Merlin a man,” he said dismissively with a wave of his hand.
Arthur cringed at how closely his father’s thoughts matched his own unflattering imagery of Merlin as an incompetent fighter. “Just because he isn’t a knight doesn’t make him less of a man. And I don’t see how being male changes the fact that he is my companion.”
“I had assumed you had a preference for women.”
Arthur frowned. He had rarely interacted with women besides Morgana, servants, and foreign nobles, and he didn’t think he had ever shown a strong connection with any of them. Morgana was probably the closest, but they had grown apart as they grew up and their expectations and responsibilities went separate ways.
“If I did, I suppose I prefer male companions,” Arthur said thinking of his knights, unsure where this conversation was heading.
“I suppose it would help avoid scandal being alone together so often.”
His father was correct that deciding to befriend a woman would make people question his intentions. But Arthur was having a hard time following his father’s logic. Why were they talking about women? They were talking about Merlin.
“I’ll admit, it is discreet and few would think to even suggest it,” his father continued. Arthur supposed having his manservant be his friend could be considered discreet, as he was expected to be around. If his father was so against him being friends with someone in a lower class, discretion was important.
“And I know I can trust him with my life. He has proven that time and again.”
"He does show you the most extraordinary loyalty." Uther nodded. “Not to mention, this completely avoids the risk of a bastard.”
Arthur had completely lost the thread of the conversation now. By spending time with Merlin, then he wouldn’t slip up and impregnate a woman? Was his father going senile? “Right…” Arthur said, not wanting to contradict his father when it seemed like he was reconsidering letting Merlin live.
Uther stared at his son, apparently searching for something to help make his decision. Arthur wasn’t sure what his father was hoping to see. The moments dragged on. Arthur mentally screamed at his father to make up his mind. Merlin’s life was fading every second. He rested his forehead against one of his hands still gripping the bars of his cell and took a deep breath, struggling to remain patient while his father deliberated.
“He makes you happy?”
Arthur raised his head to look his father in the eye.
His father was now asking about his happiness? Arthur had expected anger and displeasure, not empathy. But it gave Arthur hope. “Yes,” he insisted. “More than anything.”
“You have been in a better mood since he started service at your side.”
His father stared at the torch beside the cell for several moments before Arthur grew impatient.
“Please, Father.”
Uther grimaced, but he didn’t say no. Arthur waited, gripping the bars until his knuckles turned white.
“Fine,” Uther said quietly.
“What?”
“I said fine, Arthur,” his father said with a sigh.
Arthur’s grip on the bars of his cell loosened. “Truly?” He couldn’t remember the last time his father made a decision that wasn’t directly for the benefit of the kingdom. It was as if his father was back to indulging Arthur’s childhood desires again. A time when he couldn’t tell Arthur no. “You’ll save him?”
“Yes. I shall take your flower to Gaius. You can keep your lover.”
Merlin was going to live!
Wait. My what!?
The reason for his father mentioning a preference for women finally hit him. Contradicting his father’s assumption implied that he was more attracted to men than women. Men like Merlin. And in this case, Merlin himself.
His father’s expression turned harsher, as if he were trying to shake off the uncharacteristic sentimentality. “I shan't resent you having a servant to suck your cock to keep you from running off or fathering bastards.”
Arthur flushed at his father's vulgarity as his mind offered a surprisingly pleasant image of the suggestion. Something he had never considered before. A grinning Merlin, crawling onto his bed on his hands and knees to approach Arthur and his morning wood.
Arthur was pulled away from his thoughts when his father lifted a finger and pointed it in Arthur’s face. “However, in exchange for my generosity, you will do something for me.”
Whatever it was, it would mean Merlin might live. “Name it.”
“You will marry the woman I choose within the year. And you will produce an heir. Those are my terms to allow you to keep the boy.”
“I accept!” Arthur shouted through the bars. “As long as I have Merlin, I can handle a marriage of convenience.” After thinking of some of the women that had paraded themselves through the castle, he amended, “As long as I don’t find her repulsive.”
“If you break your promise and refuse what I consider a suitable match, I take him from you.”
Arthur’s blood ran cold. Just like that, the empathetic father was replaced by the merciless king again. “I understand, Father. Now please, take this flower to Gaius. Immediately.” He held it out and his father let him drop it into his hand. “Save Merlin for me.”
“I will, my son.”
“Thank you,” he whispered, resting his forehead against the bars.
His father walked towards the stairs and then paused, staring at the little flower. “Had you told me about this relationship before, I would have let you get the flower. I would have sent men to help you.”
“Really?”
Uther looked back and met Arthur’s eyes. “To save someone you love? Of course, Arthur. Just… next time… talk to me.”
To save someone Arthur loved. Did he love Merlin? Maybe not in the way his father was asking. But he found himself closer to and trusting of Merlin more than most. More than anyone if he was being honest with himself. That had to mean something.
"I wouldn't have told him to drink from that cup if I had known what he truly meant to you," Uther added.
Arthur whispered, “Thank you.” His father nodded once and turned away.
Arthur fought back tears as he watched his father ascend the stairs, staring again at the flower pinched between his fingers.
Merlin had a chance.
Was saving Merlin worth his father believing him to be gay and in love with his manservant? Yes, Arthur told himself. He’d risk the entire castle believing that he was sleeping with his manservant if it meant Merlin would live.