Just another short one again, since I'm in the mood and busy ignoring the gigantic urgent workload hanging determinedly over my head.

Title: Liminal
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Merlin/Arthur
Warnings: None
Spoilers: None
Summary: Every day Merlin builds him up and every day he takes him apart

 

Liminal

Arthur likes to say that Merlin is a wonder, but without doubt Arthur is a riddle. There are layers and layers of contradictions behind that princely facade; Merlin knows because every day he helps to put them there.

Every day he dresses Arthur and every day he undresses him. He removes Arthur’s armour piece by piece. Over time Merlin has become good at this task. Where once his fingers were blunt and clumsy now they are quick and clever, darting over buckles and straps in a complicated dance, unfastening and unravelling and lifting away. The metal jangles harsh and discordant as it comes away and the edges bite and grate without Arthur’s body to hold them to their shape; Merlin strips each piece with care.

Arthur stands still for him, lets him take away each defence and deconstruct him until there is no prince, no warrior, no future king. This is Arthur honest and sincere with not a hiding place in sight. This is the Arthur Merlin knows, pressed between the sheets at night, deep inside him, pouring himself out in wordless emotion.

In the morning Merlin rises from their shared bed and dresses him – courtly garments in royal colours – undershirt and tunic in red and gold, and Arthur slips into his role as snugly as the surcoat about his shoulders. His chin lifts and his spine straightens that last regal inch; when his eyes take on that distant proud cast Merlin knows their time is spent.

Every night Merlin takes Arthur apart and in the morning he builds him up again, resurrects his walls stone by stone, cages in his humanity and sends him out to be what he must. Arthur trains with his men and he is a leader; he sits in audience with Uther and he is a monarch; he walks the streets of Camelot and he is proud and poised and perfect.

Arthur has many faces, but Merlin knows the heart beneath the steel, knows the flesh that knits those graceful bones. He knows the flex of muscle and the press of lips. He knows the touch of whispered secrets in the dead of night. Merlin knows what no one else will see, what makes others avert their eyes and bow their heads when any crack shows through; Merlin knows the man beneath the necessity.

Merlin knows Arthur, and though every day he locks that spark away, every night he sets it loose, and is consumed.