who: merlin & arthur ( @immcrtalhearts ) when: timestamp 001. where: merlin’s home, blightbird.

“i cannot imagine how busy you are right now,” merlin announces, the words coming along with two cups of tea, steam curling up from the surface. “thus why i’ve sworn off of politics for the last few centuries, and i think i’ll do it for a few more.” the joke is obvious in his tone, but it is something of a serious threat. at this point, the only advising he does is for friends, and of course for arthur. it’s the old patterns. with the harvest looming on the horizon, both close and distant at once, it’s not surprising that people are looking for guidance, especially those too young to remember the last one. the tea cups clink softly as they touch the tabletop, and one of the cats winds their way across the apartment towards arthur steadily. the cats by now are familiar with arthur.

even now, centuries later, they find time to talk every so often, or when it seems most necessary. and sometimes for no reason at all. merlin finds himself fond

merlin gestures down towards the floor. the cat in question sits right near arthur’s foot, tail swishing back and forth, utterly expectant. “do your kingly duty then and help charlie onto the couch, and then you can tell me if you need my advice on something or if this is just for those ever-rare pleasantries.”

goreamour​:

                  ( ✲ ) —  the  narrative  speaks  of  merlin  ( @labyrinthed​​ )  &  krampus 

the    monster    finds    himself    with    a    third… no    second… no    third    beer. drunken    eyes    look    beside    him    to    the    familiar    figure. he    wasn’t    fond    of    the    harvest    (    let    alone    anything    that    summoned    him    to    submit    )    a    scoff    leaves    his    lips    occasionally. yet,    nothing    more    or    less. 

              krampus    wasn’t    as    complicated    as    many    people    believed.

misunderstood    (    and    broken    )    these    thoughts    are    never    drowned    out    by  liquor.  if    anything    he    wonders    if    they    begin    to    intensify.

“i  suppose  we  can’t  escape  this  thing.”  a  chuckle  forms  with  a  sneering  tone. gently  placing  his  glass  on  the  counter. “why  you  so  quiet?”

time and isolation make strange bedfellows, but merlin is past the point of finding krampus strange. they have known each other for too long, and found ways to exist comfortably and easily around each other. like this, sometimes: cheap beer and conversation and not much else. merlin watches the wall blankly for a moment, glass grasped idly between his fingers, and sighs. because there is no good answer to what he’s thinking about, or why he’s so quiet.

“just thinking,” he says. then he chuckles to himself. “about how busy things are, mostly, and how it seems they’ll only get busier. all this is a momentous occasion that i can’t wait to be done and over with.”

who: merlin & thanatos ( @godweary​​​​ ) when: timestamp 001. where: crossroads bookshop.

of course merlin frequents bookshops. they suit him, so long as he’s left to his own devices. there are old fondnesses — illuminated texts, diagrams that he can take apart in his head and break down to their constituent ideas. as much as magic is a feeling it’s an art and a science too, and like all of those, it requires study. there are books here that are strange and terrible but they aren’t what he’s interested in. sometimes you just want to read what’s new, and hope to find it novel at an age when very little is novel any more. there is nothing new any more. there are only iterations. and death, he thinks, would know that more than anyone.

perhaps that’s why he comes back to the bookshop, again and again. the same kinds of knowledge and understanding.

he plucks a book off the shelf — some locked room murder mystery, flipping idly through it. sometimes, despite the third floor being where all the texts of particular interest are, it’s nice to linger on the first floor and pretend. merlin slides the book back onto the shelf after a moment and spies thanatos at the end of the aisle. “quiet today,” he says. “not that i find that to be a shame.” a pause. “you’d think more people would be looking for escapism, but nevertheless. how has business been?”

goreamour​:

       ( ♡ )·—   for once she can feel a sense of hope in something. this body was nothing promised in the lines of her fates. she cursed her mother ( asteria ) and her father ( she wouldn’t mention his name ) and their traitorous exchange to zeus.  here she stands among mortals and supernaturals and only now in her thousand years existence did she ever truly feel as if she was at home.

she is grateful to him and worried about him at the same time. “it’s a lot to ask. THIS,  I  KNOW.” she mutters at the difficulty of such a request. the young star was willing to fall at the mercy of immortal magic. she knew the power lied within her. “I heard the harvest summons the blood moon. Do you think such a thing can help with this?”

i have a weak spot for unfortunate circumstances, he thinks, which is perhaps an understatement. since the beginning merlin has seen things he could fix, plots and plans and a future that he wanted to make. sometimes he tries to not look too deeply into things and then somehow glances even deeper despite that. serena, in her way, is perhaps not a friend but someone he would be willing to aid. he doesn’t even do trades in the old way for magic, a bartering system of aid for aid that has long since dissolved. owing people gets you nowhere. it only forges bitterness between individuals.

if she asks about payment, he isn’t sure what he’ll say. could be something small and innocuous, like baked treats for the cats, or just wave it away. people think you’re lying, then, but nevertheless.

“yes, it is,” he agrees mildly. “most worthwhile things are, though.” offering wisdom to a star is probably nonsense, but it happens almost automatically. always the advisor. “…. perhaps. things are strange now and they will only get stranger, and perhaps strange is what we need.” a tilt of a smile. “dangerous and an opportunity. if you’re willing to possibly take some risks, then i am too.”

I’m leaving. With or without you.

who: merlin & lancelot ( @dmndmyth​​ ) when: timestamp 001. where: merlin’s home, blightbird.

how many years does it take to forget something? or maybe forgive is the better word, but it sounds more dire.

the answer varies, really, especially when it comes to anyone longer lived than the average mortal lifespans. everything seems to intensify: love, hate, grief, all of it. and then eventually things level out. they numb. you get far enough away from the event and look back. it almost seems quaint then. strange, to have invested so deeply. and then there’s the round table, which is something that still lingers in merlin’s mind, as clear as the day it was formed. it took machinations and schemes and plans and one simple thing to destroy it, which, of course, was love.

not that he entirely blames lancelot. it’s become clear that the heart does what it will, and that’s part of the reason that he sometimes invites lancelot over to tea.

“i hope there’s not a scarf hidden somewhere on you,” he says to her, half-distracted by the arranging of mugs, varying degrees of ugly and mangled. “at this rate i’ll have to start making requests. maybe a blanket for one of the cats. nina’s frightened easily and likes to burrow under things.” the cat in question peers out from under merlin’s coat, left hanging on the back of a chair and pulled down by unruly claws, her ears back. he pulls his coat back up and shoos her away from the chair. “ah — how have you been? well, i hope?”

merlin has never really said the word forgive aloud between them, but to him, actions could maybe be synonyms enough. they matter more than the words.

goreamour​:

         ( ♡ ) —  the  narrative  speaks  of  merlin  ( @labyrinthed​ )  &  serena   in  the  forest.

SHE IS AWFULLY SILENT ON THIS DAY.  for all the years ( near thousand ) she’s exited only now does she know the true meaning of the life that she has been granted. it’s temporary  —  this reminder leaves her stomach in bits. her cloak protects her from the iciness felt by the merciless snowfall. silence shared between them often allowed for comfort as she knew merlin could only ever feel burden. a prophet-like figure constantly responsible to help those who seemed to often seek him out. 

Her gentle gaze moves towards the familiar figure as most of her face is hidden by the hood. she can feel herself fading out. “my days are numbered  —  I  FIGURED  YOU  COULD  SENSE  IT.”  disappointment leaks from her tone. a deep breath escapes her lips as her sight returns to a beautifully centered tree. rotten apples lay at it’s roots while snow covers it’s branches. “surely, you must know of something else.” 

he likes winter because it bites. it hurts to stand in, most hours, and he doesn’t mind. he always wears a layer or two less than he ought to to bear it, and there’s probably some interesting things there to dissemble, if he felt like he had the time. merlin has spent too much time dissembling other things and other people, though. he finds himself permanently moved to the bottom of his own priority list. there’s something funny about that. he exhales and watches his breath dissipate in the air.

“something like that,” he says. “sensing’s a strong word, but… yes.” it’s complicated. the blurriness of some things; the solidity of others. sometimes it feels like pure chance, what he knows and what remains murky. he shifts his weight from one foot to the other, gaze distant, staring out at the trees. thinking, running through options, turning them over in his mind. “every situation like this — a mortal body, an immortal self — is different. complicated. but i’m willing to try things.” a small smile, clearly mocking himself and not her. “innovate, as they say now.”

who: merlin & morgana ( @enchantrcss​​ ) when: timestamp 001. where: merlin’s home, blightbird.

“don’t scare thelonious again,” merlin says halfway through opening the door, one foot shoved aside to keep billie and nina from skittering out. they love morgana. in fact, three of them do, minus thelonious, who is the most skittish and anxious of all the cats and thus merlin’s favorite. something about projecting yourself onto your pets, maybe, a critique morgana would probably make if he ever voiced this opinion. but he keeps it to himself, the little creature comforts he’s made, and he moves about the smallness of his apartment like he could do it without a single sense at all. it is hard to escape patterns, after you’ve lived long enough. morgana would know, but at the same time, she’s better at changing things up than he is. then again, she brings chaos everywhere with her.

much to his many and varied complaints.

a pause. “i’ll make coffee and you can even put some liquor in it. i’ll pretend to look the other way. like always.” there’s something rueful in his voice but not particularly cruel. “chocolate liqueur’s in the cabinet still from the last time we decided to day drink together.” could be weeks ago. could be years. days slip together when you’ve lived as long as they have, marked only by matters of import. he moves among the warm colors of his apartment for a moment, seeing if he can beckon thelonious out from under a chair. no success, so he sighs and straightens. “then again, i suppose now’s the time to day drink. what with current events.”

who: merlin & vlad ( @underwcrldbound​ ) when: timestamp 001.  where: merlin’s home, blightbird. 

things are busy where they weren’t previously. and that in itself is something that irks him. the easiest thing in the world is to create a kind of precision when it comes to a schedule. a routine. you do certain actions to ward off certain things, like boredom or too much quiet. merlin has spent years perfecting his routines, and building them in such ways that they’re elastic. they can work with just about anything. except, well — this. he spent more than enough time wandering and the whole point was to settle, and now he feels unmoored. old friends. old enemies, as rarely as he commits to enemies any more. enemies were for back in the era of chivalry and knights and myth that he managed to outlast, and now things are ever so more complicated, even when he would prefer them to be anything but.

the future is something he could look into, if he wanted, but things are too murky. it would be like peering into the depths of a clouded pool and trying to see the bottom from the surface. pointless. a waste of time.

one of the cats winds between his legs, meowing, and merlin mutters a reprisal under his breath, no real fire behind it. “alright,” he says mildly. “i assume you want something. neither of us are the type to catch up, i’d say, and if you’re going to ask what’s going to happen then — well, i’m not a magic-8 ball. the best answer you’ll get from me is that the answer’s unclear, wait and see.”

a pause. the oven clicks on. “unless you are here for pleasantries. color me surprised and a very poor fortune teller after all.”

be gifted a chair that will kill anyone who sits in it, aside from your friend’s unborn son. Dub it the Dangerous Chair and put it at the round table immediately.