#myficssneakpeek
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SNEAK PEEK! (Coming.... somewhen?)
Summary: Prince Arthur Pendragon, Captain of the Llamrei, would far rather spend his days patrolling Camelot's waters than assume his place on the throne. Yet when he finds the wreckage of a vast ship and one lone survivor on board, nothing can prepare him for the path his life will lead.
Nor the demands his heart will make.
(A 4k word first chapter to a Merthur age-of-sail fantasy AU, because I'm weak for world-building)
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The waves boomed against the Llamrei's hull: a steady rhythm like the heartbeat of the ocean. The breeze hummed through the rigging, plucking tunes upon the sheets and swelling the sails. Under Arthur's palms, the wheel rested easy, their bearing steady and sure: homeward bound, back to Camelot.
They had been at sea for two long months, patrolling the boundaries of their waters, seeing off pirates and incursions alike. Their hold lay heavy with the loot of those ships who had surrendered their cargo in recompense for trespass. All-in-all, their voyage had been a success.
He knew his men craved solid land, good company and a drink with more flavour than the mead ration or water, but for him there was little joy in his home-coming. More and more, his father expected him to put his sea-faring days behind him and take on the burden of his role as Crown Prince. He thought a kingdom could be ruled from a throne and was content to let others ride the waves.
The thought of that, of land-lock and narrow horizons, made Arthur's breath catch in his throat. He understood his duty, the one he had been born to. He would not shirk it when the time came. He only wished he were free to rule how he wanted, rather than being forced to follow his father's edicts. It was not as if the man had any intention of letting go of his power in the near future. Uther Pendragon would live forever if he could.
'You could always hope for war, Captain.' Leon Delgrace narrowed his eyes against the sun, his hair bleached bright bronze and his face scattered with freckles. 'That would see us back to sea soon enough.'
Arthur huffed. 'And with whom should we fight? Lot, fat and useless to the east, but with more ships to his name than most? Bayard, to the North, who rules his waters with an iron-fist, or Caerleon to the West, who would block trade and starve us rather than raising a finger towards our annihilation?'
'Any one of them would shit themselves to face down Camelot's fleet,' Gwaine said from where he was adjusting one of the sheets, shifting the angle of the sail to better catch the breeze. 'Lot's got more ships, but half of them are in splinters. Bayard's men are in a constant state of revolt against his admirals and Caerleon… All right, Caerleon's a swine who's got every other kingdom by the balls since he's got control of the Strait of Caerdor, but he won't hold it for long. Not against the Wildwash.'
Arthur glanced down at his bosun where he stood on the quarterdeck. Gwaine wasn't wrong. The Albion Sea existed in a constant state of teetering balance. At the moment, there was a reluctant truce, each kingdom too busy dealing with their own strife to turn their mind to war. Still, all it would take was a tiny shift to send it all plunging into calamity.
Caerleon was an obvious target. The other kingdoms looked upon his control of the strait with greed because it meant he could restrict and tax the flow of trade along the Southern Way: a rare safe route of good water. It was a ripple-road that led to the MittelMer, the sea that was encircled by the remnants of the old-lands, where the Romans had once dwelt.
They conveniently forgot, however, that he also bordered on the Wildwash, the vast stretch of open ocean to the west that brimmed with legendary creatures, roaming sorcerers, mad gods and vengeful spirits. The sailors who ventured out into those waters rarely returned, and if they did, they came back changed.
Worse, the denizens of that vast, fathomless ocean – lawless and unruled – were constantly encroaching on the Albion Sea, finding their way past the towering reefs and ocean mountains that had once protected them. They sought the relatively tranquil, warmer waters and the wealth they had brought the Five Kingdoms, and they sowed death and destruction in their wake.
'I do not envy him being so close to the frontier.'
'I fear that, one day, we will hear the news that he is overcome,' Leon admitted, raising his voice to call out an order before resuming a more normal volume. As Quartermaster, he was of almost equivalent rank to Arthur's Captain: his right-hand man and, in the event of a calamity that took Arthur's life, his successor – at least where the Llamrei was concerned. If Arthur died at sea, Camelot would fall to Morgana. Sometimes he was tempted to abdicate and let her have it. He suspected she would do a better job than he.
Except that Uther would never permit it.
'No, we pray Caerleon holds fast against the Wildwash. Let some other political strife call us back to the waves. The goddess knows my father is good at stirring up conflict when it suits. Or even when it does not. We will enjoy our time back in Camelot. I will play the obedient prince, and in a week or two, he will grow bored and we'll be back at sea.'
'Better be,' Gwaine muttered. 'Don't think there's enough beer in all Camelot's taverns to keep me happy on land.'
'Captain!' Elyan's cry was as clear as a sea-bird, carrying with ease. He had a spyglass pressed to his eye. A sextant hung from his belt and one foot was braced on the top of the crow's nest, as if he were about to take flight. Arthur hated it when he did that. A fall from that height, onto deck or into the water's embrace, would be the death of him. If the grief of that did not gut Arthur hollow, then Guinevere's pain at losing her brother surely would.
'What do you see?'
He squinted, noting the way Elyan swayed, a shift of his weight back and forth. He was too high to make out his expression, but that small tell had lost Elyan many a card game. It meant he was uncertain and questioning himself.
'Wreckage, Captain, off our port bow. Sharp turn!'
Arthur picked up the order, calling it out and watching the crew come alive as they set about their duties, tending the yard-arms and spanker as they tacked the Llamrei, altering her course in a stately sweep. The sails slackened as they turned through the eye of the wind before filling anew, the thick cloth swelling as they caught the edge of the breeze.
Almost immediately, Leon gave the order to reef so that they could slow as they approached whatever it was Elyan had seen. They could circle if they had to, scouting the area in large sweeps. Arthur would rather not bring the ship to a full stop until he was sure what they were dealing with.
'Bugger me,' Gwaine breathed as he squinted at the water. His unease was a living thing among the rest of the crew as they took in the flotsam: broken spars and tattered sails like bridal veils upon the waves. It covered a large area, yet it had not dispersed with the currents, and Arthur surrendered the wheel, moving to stand with Gwaine and Leon as they stared.
The Llamrei was a Destrier class, a medium sized warship with good manoeuvrability perfect for patrols and privateering. Whatever had once sailed the waves before them was far bigger, and the possibilities spilled from the lips of the men around him.
'Too much wreckage for even a first-class Charger,' Leon pointed out, speaking of the behemoth four-deck war ships that were the jewels in any kingdom's fleet. They carried more than a hundred cannon each: floating fortresses.
'Not much left that's bigger than that,' Gwaine muttered, folding his arms across his chest and making room for Lancelot. The ship's surgeon's hands were white-knuckled around the rail. Where they saw the carcass of a mighty vessel, Arthur knew that Lancelot would be thinking of the souls lost on board.
Arthur ducked his head in agreement, looking over his shoulder as Elyan's bare feet hit the deck. His quick stride brought him to the rail, and he took up the space to Arthur's left. The only one not with them was Percival, and that was because he would not leave the cannons until he knew he would not be called upon to put them to use. No doubt he was watching out of the hatches as the debris drifted by and the Llamrei continued her steady circling.
'A merchant Draft, maybe?' Elyan sounded doubtful even as he said it. He was fully aware that he was wrong. They knew what this was, but none of them wanted to say it out loud.
This was all that remained of A Stables – a colony ship. They were huge, used for moving large numbers of people: evacuations, refugees – that sort of thing. There weren't many left, any more. One fewer, now. The last resort of the desperate. This was all that was left of the sort of event that went down in the history books.
A Desolation: a wreck that was akin to an extinction. One that wiped out hundreds, if not thousands of lives at once.
Arthur swallowed down the low nausea of heartbreak as he stepped back, calling out commands to bring the Llamrei to a complete stop. Those who were not tending the sails and rudder instead watched the water, searching both the surface and its depths for any dangers.
'Colours!' Someone cried. There was a flurry as they reached for poles to pull the pennant from the sea's clutches. It hung, sodden and torn, squelching as it hit the deck. Immediately, the men got to work unfolding it. They clustered around, Arthur with them, the chill biting at his fingertips as he straightened out the flag.
'It was Lot's,' Leon murmured, indicating the black serpent on the white shield that represented the kingdom of Essetir. 'A long way from home.'
'In Camelot's waters.' Arthur grimaced, a trickle of horror rushing down his spine. This was a political powder-keg, and suddenly their jokes of war seemed like a poor showing. 'If we're not careful, we'll stand accused if its destruction.'
'The Llamrei couldn't take down a Stables alone, even Lot would know that,' Lancelot murmured, shaking his head. He looked as if he had aged five years in moments. 'They're too big. Base crew to manage a ship that size is more than a thousand souls.' He pressed a curled fist over his heart, this thumb pointing up towards his collarbone in a traditional symbol of mourning: a mute plea to whatever gods might lurk beneath the waves to carry them safely into the afterlife.
'Where are the bodies?' Gwaine asked, shifting back to the rail and peering around. 'That many crew, plus whatever refugees and passengers they carried… there should be some afloat. Even if the hull dragged them down as it sank, there should be some trace of 'em.'
Arthur caught the glance Gwaine shot in his direction, one grim and shadowed with fear. It was enough to make him turn his eye back to the water, reading the evidence that wrote itself in the wreckage.
Some bits of wood showed evidence of cannon-fire: round shot, the kind used by raiders. They'd disable the ship, take its cargo grab those they could to sell as slaves and kill any who put up too hard a fight. Raiders were like wolves; they gave chase in packs, and a Stables ship was a gold mine for them – a slow, easy target.
But that didn't answer the question of why it was out at sea in the first place. Many of the colony ships were in dry dock and had been for decades. There had been no conflict or boundary change that would mean people needed to move en-masse. It didn't make any sense. Not unless these people, whoever they were, were chased out of port by some threat – but what?
Arthur sighed, shaking his head. That was the problem with being at sea. As much as he relished the freedom, it left him disconnected from news of the kingdoms. Answers probably awaited him in Camelot, though whether he would wish to hear them was another matter. A Desolation was the kind of thing that would have the Five Kingdoms at each others' throat, eager to place and dodge the blame in equal measure.
'Spread those out to dry,' he ordered, indicating the colours on deck. 'We'll take them back with us as proof. Man the row boats, set up a search.'
'What are we looking for?' Elyan asked, raising his voice to be heard over the cries of the crew carrying out Arthur's orders, reaching for ropes and pulleys as they prepared to winch the twelve-man row boats down towards the surface.
'Survivors.' Lancelot did not sound hopeful, but he straightened his shoulders and lifted his chin as he crossed his arms over his chest. 'Bodies, if not. We need to know where these people came from. Their families…'
'People deserve to know what happened.' Arthur rested a hand on Lancelot's shoulder. 'Anything that can tell us what fate had in store for this ship will be of benefit. A figurehead, if we can find it.'
All ships had unique carvings upon their prow, something to mark out their identity so that even the illiterate would know what vessels lay at harbour or had gone to sea. Some were panels with carved symbols, others were creatures, flowers or objects, each with its own significance. The ships of royal houses, like the Llamrei, stood out amidst any fleet thanks to the gold paint that coated their prow and flared back along the hull in sweeps and whorls: a blessing for strong winds and good tides.
The ship that had sunk here had a name, once, Arthur did not wish for it to be forgot – lost to the obscurity of the ocean depths.
'Leon, the helm is yours. Gwaine, you take the other boat. Keep your eyes peeled.'
'Aye aye, Cap'n.'
The boat eased into the waves, the oar tips pressed briefly to the Llamrei's hull to ease them away from her embrace before they set forth. This close to the water's surface, the ocean was a living, breathing thing beneath them. Brine flavoured Arthur's top lip and roughened his hair as the wind caught in the linen of his shirt and plucked at the laces of his collar like an eager lover. On a better day, he would have relished it, but he was too absorbed in the carnage before him.
It was every sailor's nightmare: a risk they all took but prayed to forever avoid. Wrecks were a messy affair, made worse by the voracious hunger of the sea. Within a day, all sign of what had happened here would be scattered, carried off by the currents or pulled beneath the waves. Death, he fancied, rode the breeze here, and he reached into his belt pouch for a gold coin before tossing it overboard: payment for the ferryman.
Behind him, he heard his men do the same, keeping one hand on their oars as they gave up whatever trinkets they may have: copper, silver or stone, it mattered not. None of them would leave a debt standing.
'Captain!' Pellinor's pointing finger thrust out to the east, and Arthur narrowed his eyes against the sun, taking in the section of hull that bobbed like a cork off the starboard bow. It was a fragment not much smaller than the craft in which they currently sat, but that wasn't what mattered. He knew what had caught Pellinor's eye. This debris did not bear the scars of shot that splintered the other pieces of wood he had seen from the Llamrei's deck. Instead, gouges raked the planks, parallel lines that sheared through the wood, exposing the timber beneath.
Arthur swore. Bandits and cannon-fire were one thing, but this?
'Leviathan. Keep a sharp eye.'
'In these waters?' Pellinor's voice was faint, and Arthur could not blame him. Leviathans were meant to make their homes in the Wildwash. They were huge creatures of the deep, bigger than any ship that rode the waves. According to the old salts, those few who had made it back from beyond the western horizon, they came in many shapes, but they were all monstrous in size and temper. They lived only for their hunger and sated it with neither thought nor conscience. There was a bounty, never claimed, for any sailor who could bring back the eye of one such beast.
No one had ever managed it.
'Watch the depths. Hold your tongue.' He could not risk a panic, not among the rowers nor aboard the Llamrei. Yet if there was a Leviathan that had made its home in the Albion Sea, then all Five Kingdoms needed to know of it. It would care not for the boundaries of their realms. If vengeance took its fancy, it would drag down any vessel that crossed its path.
Arthur scanned the water before him, looking for anything moving down in the murk as they rowed, slow and cautious, past the floating piece of hull. A thick silence lay over the men at his back, tar-black and gilded at its edged with the flash of fear, but they were stout souls all, and they did not forget their purpose. Not that their search yielded much to speak of, at least not until the rise and fall of the ocean pushed them closer to the centre of the wreckage, and Owain gave a bellow from the port side.
'Survivor!'
Arthur whipped his head around, scanning the flotsam until he saw it: a flat piece wallowing in the water, threatening to go under with every wave that washed over it. The figure sprawled upon it did not stir, and Arthur wondered if Owain was too optimistic. From here, the man looked dead, pale and limp, yet he had clearly had the strength and savvy to climb atop the makeshift raft. He lay on his back, insensible to the cold water that still threatened, even now, to grasp him in its clutches.
'Haul him in!' Arthur ordered. 'Be quick about it!'
Some of his men reached for hooks and poles while the others tilted the oars, guiding their boat as close as they dared. Arthur lifted a foot onto the boat's side, braced and ready to jump in if it were necessary. Dead or alive, he could not lose this soul to the seas. At least one deserved to be buried with proper rites, if that was all he was good for, and if he yet lived?
Perhaps they'd get their answers after all.
He reached out and down, tangling his fingers in the sodden fabric of the man's tunic the moment he could reach. The others joined him, half the crew shifting to counter-balance the craft as they wrestled with the suck and swell of the tide. Arthur tried to ignore the coldness of the body beneath his touch as they manhandled him into the boat, laying him on the deck as they panted from the effort.
'Back to the Llamrei. Double-time!'
Arthur's fingers pressed to the hollow of the man's jaw as the oars dipped and splashed, his crew grunting as they threw their all into skimming back towards the safety of their Destrier. It took a moment, but at last a flutter of life stirred against his skin, thready and weak, but there all the same. It seemed Owain was right. They did have a survivor after all.
'Hey.' Arthur tapped the man's cheek, noticing his youth: younger than Arthur, if he had to guess, though perhaps only by a year or two. He had the rangy, lanky look of someone who'd lived a life on the uncomfortable cusp of not enough to eat, and the wet fabric of his clothes was simple and home-spun. 'Hey, come on. Open your eyes.'
Those dark lashes didn't so much as flutter, and Arthur whispered a curse as he patted down long limbs, checking for breaks and blood. The sea could batter a person to a pulp in a heartbeat, but there was no trace of harm. Not until he pressed his fingertips to the wet, black hair and drew them away to find a crimson stain. There was an impressive knot there, up high behind his ear. Something must have struck him, though he was otherwise in one piece.
Arthur only hoped it hadn't addled his wits.
The ropes were secured to the prow and stern, the pulleys squeaking their protests as the row boat was winched back up to the main deck. Lancelot was there immediately, thrusting the spyglass back into Elyan's grasp before he reached out, helping Arthur and Pellinor get their human salvage to safety.
He wasted not a moment, checking for a pulse as Arthur had done as others hurried to find a stretcher. Honestly, Arthur thought he was light enough to carry without breaking a sweat, but on a shifting ship it was all too easy to overbalance, and he had no wish to drop the newcomer on his already brutalised head.
'Well?' he demanded.
'Doesn't look too bad,' Lancelot decided. 'Skull seems sound, though he'll probably wake with a nasty headache. He's chilled through though. We'll get him out of these wet clothes and under some blankets, see if he doesn't come back to us before day's end.'
'See it done. Come and get me the moment he wakes.'
'Aye, Captain.'
Arthur stood back, watching Lancelot and Elyan lift the man's lax body onto the stretcher before bearing him away, a strange, still figure amidst the bustle of the Llamrei's crew.
'Your orders, Captain?'
He turned, blinking his way free of his thoughts to stare at Leon. Over on the starboard side, Gwaine's row boat had just settled into its cradle. Their time here was done. The remnants of the ship that had once sliced through the waves had given up all its secrets, and in Arthur's mind, none were so intriguing as the survivor.
Questions itched at him, but they would have to remain unanswered for a while yet. Until he awoke to tell his story, the newcomer would hold his silence, and Arthur would have to bear it as best he could.
'Resume our course for Camelot,' he said at last, tapping his hand on the ship's rail. The ring he wore chimed against the hardwood, and to Arthur's ears at least, it sounded like a death-knell: a final farewell to all who had found their watery grave here. All souls, it seemed, but one.
'Let's go home.'
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I will trick or treat on tumblr! Merlin please. I am a scary vampire.
You are a very scary vampire! Have some Love is Never Lost (currently in its draft stages - so many WiPs 😅)
A rattle at the door made him look up, and he watched Merlin carry in his midday meal on a tray. Once, he would have been all smiles and jokes, kicking the door shut in his wake. Now, he balanced the tray on one hand and eased the panel closed on its hinges without a sound: the perfect vision of servitude.
Arthur hated it.
'Lunch, Your Highness.'
He hated that, too. Merlin rarely ever called him by any kind of title, and when he did it was the same grossly incorrect "Sire" that the knights used. Technically, that term only belonged to the ruling monarch. "Your Highness" was the right title for the crown prince, but until a few days ago, Arthur would have bet good money that Merlin neither knew nor cared about such etiquette.
Merlin placed the tray in front of Arthur, keeping both hands in plain sight. Before, he would have snatched a morsel with a cheeky grin and set about faffing with Arthur's things, but now he simply stepped back, pale and ghostly, waiting for his next order.
Well, Arthur had one for him.
'Tell me what's wrong.' He made it a command, one like he used on the knights. Normally, it never failed to draw out the truth, but Merlin kept his eyes downcast, fixed on the floor. Of course, as a servant, he wasn't technically meant to meet Arthur's gaze, but Merlin had never cared about that kind of thing before. Something had changed, and whatever it was, Arthur was determined to change it back.
(Drop "trick or treat" in my ask box for snippets, facts and other fic things - fandoms are Merlin, Sherlock, Fullmetal Alchemist and Hobbit if you want to specify 🎃)
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Trick or treat!
Ohhhhh, thank you lovely! What to curse you with? How about a little (large) bit of Gravity - a hurt/comfort Merlin WiP?
The surly expression on Merlin's face said it all, and Arthur sighed, reaching for the bath-sheet that Merlin had procured from somewhere, or perhaps simply magicked into existence. 'Out you get. You're turning into soup.'
Merlin eyed him doubtfully. 'You could turn your back?' he suggested, pulling a face when Arthur remained unmoved.
'I don't trust you not to do yourself an injury,' he retorted when Merlin appeared determined to skulk in the bathwater. 'Besides, it's nothing I've not seen before.' He raised an eyebrow, deliberately prattish. 'Unless sorcerers are different from other men?'
'Arse.' Merlin grumbled, shifting forward with a regretful sigh and pulling a face as he bent his injured knee. That and his broken fingers were still what plagued him the most, and Arthur tried not to let his winces of sympathy show on his face as Merlin struggled to his feet.
'Good hand on my shoulder,' Arthur ordered, and it was easy to ignore Merlin's nudity in the face of his genuine helplessness. Gaius' warning seemed to ring true: Merlin's estimation of his own strength exceeded the reality. 'Lean your weight on me. Don't try and support it on your bad knee.'
'Arthur...'
'Don't argue.' He shifted closer, offering his shoulder and reaching out to brace Merlin's elbow, mindful of any bruises he might aggravate. It took a wobbly, breathless few moments, but with his help, Merlin managed to step over the high side of the bath without loosing his footing. Still, the moment he put his other foot down, he hissed in pain: a sharp, desperate little noise. Arthur moved without thinking, his grip shifting as he curved his arm around Merlin's back. His fingertips resting in the small of his back as Merlin wobbled against his chest, the hand not resting on Arthur's shoulder lifting to press over the racing thud of Arthur's heart.
They both froze, Merlin's weight canted over to his good hip to spare his knee as he blinked up at Arthur. He looked like a deer caught in the archer's sights. Or maybe, Arthur thought dizzily, it was the other way around. Maybe he was the hunter and Arthur the prey, because there was a gleam of something stirring and predatory in Merlin's gaze -- something that made Arthur want to close his eyes and bare his throat.
(Drop "trick or treat" in my ask box for snippets, facts and other fic things - fandoms are Merlin, Sherlock, Fullmetal Alchemist and Hobbit if you want to specify 🎃)
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hi, trick or treat, pretty please!
For you, lovely? How about a little bit of unseen Hiraeth 😁
'Mage.'
Arthur blinked, leaning forward to look over the horse's nose and staring at the man who stood there. He thought he'd seen Merlin at his worst, but this? It wasn't that he was physically suffering. He was dressed in warm clothes, the stitching speaking of quality. He looked well-fed and cared for. No obvious bruises marked him, and yet... The man standing there was a ghost of the Merlin Arthur knew. He looked like he couldn't remember how to smile. It was impossible to equate him with the loving, compassionate, joyful man he'd once known.
He looked empty. His spirit broken.
'My lord?'
Even his voice sounded wrong, stripped of almost any inflection. The words were flat and dead. When he blinked, it was slow and sluggish. It reminded Arthur horribly of his father, his mind razed and ravaged by Nimueh.
There was a collar around his throat, like you might put on a dog, though far more ornate. The metal was engraved with patterns, as if that could hide what it was: a symbol of ownership, wrapped snug around Merlin's slender neck.
(Drop "trick or treat" in my ask box for snippets, facts and other fic things - fandoms are Merlin, Sherlock, Fullmetal Alchemist and Hobbit if you want to specify 🎃)
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Hiii :D
Trick or Treat 🎃!! (Merlin)
Hiiiiiiiii! All right, here's a little bit more of King and Court for you as well, much later in the story than the last little snippet
'I am not in any way advocating revealing your secret to the Prince,' Gaius began, 'but he may surprise you. Six months ago, I would have thought you had run mad, but then I never thought we could end up here, with Arthur striking out on his own to slip Uther's leash. As for what is happening to you, my boy, I can only continue to advise caution.'
Merlin sighed, running a hand through his hair before leaving it clasped at the nape of his own neck, pressed against the tense muscles there. They felt like bedrock, and he grimaced to himself, his mind racing as he looked at the wrapped book. 'It needs to be used,' he murmured. 'My magic, I mean. It's like an overflowing well. I just. I feel like if I could just do something, it would be easier to control.'
'And yet you cannot. Not without risking your very survival. If you were seen...'
'Then I find a place. A secret place. Somewhere no one goes.' He thought, briefly, of the dragon's cavern, where Kilgharrah, at least, already knew what he was, but something in him shied away from that notion. An instinct, deep in the pit of his belly, warned him against revealing too much to the great, scaled creature. He may have needed his advice more than once, and the dragon may know more about magic than anyone else left living, but Merlin got the impression that he had his own agenda.
'And where will you find such a location?' Gaius asked, raising one snowy white eyebrow.
Merlin bit his lip, thinking of the house, with its cask-lined cellar, the metal gate set in the wall, and the darkness beyond. 'I have some ideas. I just -- I can't keep this up. Arthur thinks I'm sickening with something, Lancelot spends more time fretting over me than training, and...' He shook his head. 'They need me at my best, Gaius. Not dealing with whatever this is and struggling to keep what I am hidden away. It's not been this bad for years.'
(Drop "trick or treat" in my ask box for snippets, facts and other fic things - fandoms are Merlin, Sherlock, Fullmetal Alchemist and Hobbit if you want to specify 🎃)
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Knock knock:
Trick or Treat!
Hnmmm: For you, lovely? A bit of that age-os-sail Merlin AU that won't leave me alone!
Merlin. None of the crew called him "the prisoner" or "the survivor". They used his given name, as if he were a friend. To some of them, it seemed he was. Lancelot and Gwaine, in particular, spent every spare moment down in the Brig with him, talking and laughing. Merlin himself seemed perfectly content in the bowels of the ship, surrounded by iron bars and sturdy planks. Happy enough, anyway, to insult Arthur with a sharp sort of glee every time they spoke.
Worse, he rose to the bait every, single time. He was a captain and a prince: the epitome of control, but there was something about Merlin that slipped beneath his guard to needle at him, making him stoop to snarling and bluster, both of which just made a small, weary smile tilt Merlin's lips.
The boy got to him. That was all. No one spoke to Arthur like that, as if his rank was nothing. No one dared. They looked at him and saw the man that would one day be their king. They respected him not just for the station of his birth, but for his deeds in battle and in defence of their kingdom.
Merlin didn't respect him at all.
(Drop "trick or treat" in my ask box for snippets, facts and other fic things - fandoms are Merlin, Sherlock, Fullmetal Alchemist and Hobbit if you want to specify 🎃)
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Hi!!! Trick or treat! (Merlin) ❤️
Hi lovely. Ohh, a bit of Gravity for you (Merlin hurt/comfort, from earlier in the fic than the last snippet from this one!)
For a few, thundering heartbeats, Arthur could only stare at the empty space where Merlin had been, his mind blank and uncomprehending. No more than a dozen paces away, and now he was gone.
A wretched noise caught in his throat as he staggered forward to peer over the edge, praying he would find Merlin hanging on to the rock by his fingertips. All that met his gaze was the shifting veils of white mist and the seething plunge-pool far below. There was no sign of anyone amidst the froth, nor caught in the eddies. There was just the awful, unsatisfied appetite of the river as it churned ever onwards.
The soles of his boots skidded on the wet rock as he turned around, lunging back into the shelter of the trees as he dashed along the the edge of the gully, his knees aching against the downward slope as he hurried towards the river bank. Distantly, he could hear the other knights calling his name, but he ignored it. They would either catch up with him or not. For now, he could not bring himself to care. All his thoughts were on Merlin and the frantic, fretful horror of what he might find.
He didn't even know if Merlin could swim.
'Gods, please let him be all right,' he hissed, the words little more than panted breaths given shape as he slithered down a steep incline, grabbing on to tree roots to try and slow his descent. 'Let me find him and let him be all right.'
It was a grim plea, but one he meant with everything he had. It would be bad enough to find Merlin dead, smashed upon the rocks or drowned by the waters, but perhaps it would be worse to never find him at all. It loomed in his mind like a grim prophecy: him spending the rest of his life wondering what had become of the man he called his friend.
(Drop "trick or treat" in my ask box for snippets, facts and other fic things - fandoms are Merlin, Sherlock, Fullmetal Alchemist and Hobbit if you want to specify 🎃)
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Trick or treat! Merlin
King and Court for you, lovely! (which is only currently on my Patreon and might be new to you, I hope 😁)
Dining with his father and Morgana always felt more like precarious peace talks than a family meal. Arthur could not recall a time when they had shared food while truly relaxed and enjoying one another's company. The king always sat at the head of the table, presiding over his son and his ward as if they were criminals to be judged.
That left Arthur to face Morgana's cool green gaze.
She was beautiful, there was no denying it, but she was sharp and clever, her tongue cutting even if her lips were sweet. They had grown up sniping at one another, both silently fighting against the expectation of the court that they would one day marry. Thankfully, his father seemed less than keen on that idea. No doubt he thought he could secure them both a better, more political marriage in due time and expand Camelot's influence all the more.
Arthur picked at his meal, watching Morgana push her food around her plate and take the occasional delicate morsel. She always looked pale, but there was an unhealthy transluscence to her face tonight, made worse by the sallow candlelight. The only colour in her face came when she smiled, not at Arthur, but at someone behind him.
Merlin. Of course it was Merlin. Did everyone in this whole damn citadel like his manservant more than they liked Arthur himself?
(Drop "trick or treat" in my ask box for snippets, facts and other fic things - fandoms are Merlin, Sherlock, Fullmetal Alchemist and Hobbit if you want to specify 🎃)
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Trick or Treat! 🧡🖤 Merlin please?? Seems to be the popular choice xx
Of course, lovely. A little (large) bit of Hiraeth again, from the draft of chapter sixty-six (so SPOILERS):
'How long?' Arthur asked, the words slipping from between his lips. 'How long were you bound to him?'
For a while, he thought Merlin wouldn't answer. Even as the scene around them began to change, the verdant grass fading to shadow. At last, Merlin seemed to pick up the pieces of his voice, speaking even though it sounded as if it made him bleed to do so. 'That was the sixth year.' He pulled back, but he didn't meet Arthur's eyes. 'After this, I was bound to him for about another three decades.'
Arthur recoiled. He couldn't help it. Instinct had him flinching in Merlin's arms even as his heart wrenched horribly in his chest. 'Thirty-six years?' he repeated, shaking his head in futile disbelief. He had imagined Merlin bound for months, perhaps, a brief, dark enslavement. Instead, he had spent the better part of a lifetime with no real will to call his own, utterly at the mercy of a tyrant.
'He fell off his horse and broke his neck.' There was something in Merlin's voice, then, something sharp and hard and jubilant: the flash of a grin like an open wound as the shadows seemed to cluster around him. 'Just like that, it was over!' The smile wobbled, fading, and Arthur winced as the gloom washed around him like cool water. Gone was the open sky. Instead, he stood in a large hall, the masonry firm and strong. Tapestries gleamed with wealth and splendour, but Arthur barely paid them any mind.
He was too busy staring at Merlin.
He'd aged, and Arthur's heart gave an odd little thump to see him, a dark beard trimmed close to his jaw, the curls of his hair in softer waves now, and touched by white at their temples. He looked strong, powerful...
Terrifying.
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Trick or Treat Fullmetal Alchemist 🎃
FMA my beloved! Here's a tiny bit of unseen Counterpoint for you (I swear I will finish it one day.)
Heat exploded through his body, a sharp, hard punch of power that had his eyes rolling back in his head. Cramps seized his frame, clenching every muscle tight as his chest heaved and the woman's cries of rage and pain echoed in his ears, dimming to nothing as they were replaced with the frantic thud of a pulse.
Air caught in his throat, choking in lungs that did not want to work as his heart exploded into life beneath his ribs. Every thud was a cramping, bruising ache, but it was more life than he had felt for the past few days, and Ed's fingers clenched into spasmodic fists as he fought against the agony. He could feel blood flowing through every vein, pushing with purpose through thin capillaries and thick arteries alike, burning all the way around and adding to the crashing, drumming misery in his head.
'Got him!' Havoc's voice was jubilant and amazed, barely audible over the hissing roar that filled the room. Alchemy, Ed belatedly realised. Not all in his head after all. Warm fingers were pressed hard against the pulse point in his neck, and he tried to twist away. His skin was shrilling at him, shrieking with sensations as his brain fought to come fully back online. He felt hideously disconnected, alone and awash in a storm of life.
Dragging his eyes open was no help. The room waltzed around one central point, spinning and wobbling as if he had just been smacked on the back of the head, and the press of his left palm to the cool floor did nothing to help anchor him. His stomach was cramped and aching, viciously pained, and his throat was so dry that every fruitless swallow burned all the way down.
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*knocks on your door dressed as a moth* zzizz zer zzrrzz!
[mothlation: trick or treat!]
How about a lil Vamp!lock, lovely!
Instead, he chose to walk back to Regent's Park, some vague notion lingering in the back of his mind about checking he had left no evidence. It was unlikely. He was not a messy eater, and the shadows had ensured there was no corpse, but some long-buried instinct was telling him to make sure. After all, if one Van Helsing descendent had turned up in London, who was to say there wasn't another? He did not wish "intriguing" to become "inconvenient", after all.
The narrow paths led him across the wide, green space and beneath the occasional tree canopy, now shedding its leaves in a pageant of colour. He had no trouble finding the spot in question.
However, it seemed he would not be alone.
John Watson stood to the side of the path, a cup of coffee from Criterion steaming in his grasp. To a passer-by, there was nothing remarkable about the view: a man with a cane, taking a moment to drink in the splendour of the parklands.
Sherlock was not so easily fooled. He was standing in the precise spot where they had met the previous night, his accuracy uncanny. A normal human might have been able to approximate the area from relevant landmarks and features, though they would have struggled to identify such things in the thick darkness of the previous night. They would not be able to stand in the invisible hollows of their own footsteps as John was doing.
The temptation to test him – to see if those hunter's instincts still ran true – rippled through Sherlock's frame, but he cast it aside. To do so would only give off a threatening impression, and he found himself somewhat unwilling to muddy the waters between them with predatory posturing. Besides, he had not survived this long by poking at vampire hunters. They were an unpredictable lot, prone to shooting first and asking questions later.
(Drop "trick or treat" in my ask box for snippets, facts and other fic things - fandoms are Merlin, Sherlock, Fullmetal Alchemist and Hobbit if you want to specify 🎃)
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Standing stones towered around him, twice his height despite their constant exposure to the elements. Ruins lay to the west, all empty arches and tumble-down masonry. If he looked, he would see the scorch marks on the walls from where this place had once been put to the flame, but he didn't care about that. He was too busy staring at the squat altar, as high as his hip and long enough that a man could lie down comfortably.
The Isle of the Blessed. Gods, how he hated this place.
Cautiously, he reached out, recoiling in horror when solid rock met his touch. The sediment on its surface scraped his fingertips, cushioned only by the scant cladding of moss that covered it. This was no figment. It was real. What had happened? Had he been transported here? Had Merlin done it, or something else? And for what purpose? Was it an effort to leave Camelot vulnerable, or did this have little to do with his kingdom? The questions roared through his mind like a swarm of furious bees, but one was louder than the rest.
Where was Merlin?
A faint sound tickled his ears, and he jolted forward, the dew wetting his boots as he shifted his weight. A thin mist coalesced around his ankles, but he ignored it, listening intently. When the noise came again, his heart gave a pitiful wrench, and Arthur reeled. He knew the sound of a man struggling for breath: odd, hitched gasps as he strove to live when his body could no longer support him. He had heard those noises before, right here, on this wretched, cursed isle, and nausea rolled threateningly in his stomach.
'Merlin?' It was the querulous question of a child, almost afraid of an answer. He moved forward on stiff legs, picking his way around the end of the altar and stopping short, shock robbing him of thought.
There was so much blood.
A big chunk, rather than a little one this time, from chapter sixty-four of Hiraeth
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Trick or Treat?
:3
Hey lovely! Not sure what you'd like best so have a little bit of a Merlin ficlet I'm currently writing:
'What happened to your back?'
Arthur's voice sounded tense, stiff and uncertain. The brush of warm fingers against the three, pale lines across his back made Merlin jolt in alarm. He whirled around, the tunic still clutched in his hands as he blinked stupidly, his words caught somewhere in his throat. Not that it mattered. Arthur was too busy staring at the starburst scar the size of a grown man's hand hand that lay right in the centre of it, over his heart. A frown of confusion melted beneath a mask of horror, and Merlin swallowed hard as all the colour fled Arthur's face.
'What happened to your chest?!'
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Trick or treat! I'm dressed as a construction worker and love Merlin! ❤️
*Taps your hard hat* I'm a little late, but here's a treat, a bit more of the Age-Of-Sail fic that won't leave me in peace:
Welcome to Camelot.
Those words haunted Merlin as they made their way into the castle. They nipped at his heels as they waited in the throne room like supplicants before a dais. They rattled around his skull as he stood before the King, trying to breathe around the noose of his fear. He felt like his magic wrote itself upon his skin for anyone to see: raw and exposed. The urge to turn and flee was like a snake coiled around his spine, squeezing until his thighs ached with it. Yet he could not go. Even if he tried, he got the impression that one of Arthur's crew would only scoop him up, and he was too skinny to put up much of a fight.
Instead, he stood before the tyrant of Camelot, his eyes downcast and his head ducked as he prayed he would make it out of there alive.
He might not like Arthur – Prince Arthur – but he had never been so grateful to hear the prat talk. He kept the King's gaze – the grey-green colour of the sea just before a storm rolled in – diverted. Merlin was forced to answer questions only twice, and he did so quickly, practically vomiting out the words in the hopes he could get away from this man, this place, this death sentence waiting to happen.
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