Chapter Text
“No!” Merlin shouted at his mother. He stomped his feet, crossed his arms and pouted.
Hunith sighed. Her son hadn’t adapted well to life at court. She’d unnecessarily worried that moving him from Ealdor to Camelot would change him from a softhearted boy to a spoiled, demanding little Lord.
Merlin glared at the velvet doublet. She shouldn’t have worried. He refused to give up his simple tunics and breeches. She’d been unable to get him to stop wearing neckerchiefs. Six months among the royals of Camelot and Merlin retained his country airs and lack of grace.
“Merlin,” Hunith patiently pleaded, “your father will be here soon. This feast is in his honor. You must dress appropriately.”
Merlin took the doublet from his mother’s outstretched hand. He wrapped the soft dark blue velvet around his bruised knuckles, stuck his bottom lip out and with a stubborn glare threw the doublet to the ground.
“I hate it! I hate Camelot! I hate you!”
In eight years of being a mother, the past six months had been the hardest. Balinor’s absence made the move from Ealdor hard on them both. Merlin fought with the noble boys, ran away from the Citadel and more and more often lost control of his magic. It was worse than when he’d been a precocious toddler who conjured sparks accidentally setting furniture ablaze.
Hunith took in her son’s split lip, the fading bruise upon his cheek and looked for a trace of the sweet child she knew. His eyes turned gold.
“Don’t you dare,” she warned.
Threads along the seams of the doublet began to unravel.
“Merlin Emrys!,” she shouted, “You stop this instant!”
The gold faded away from his eyes as he began to cry. Fat tears rolled down his cheeks. Hunith scooped him up. She sat upon her bed with him in her arms.
“I don’t want to wear it,” Merlin mumbled between hiccups and sobs.
“I bet Prince Arthur’s going to be wearing one.”
Merlin glared up at his mother. “I don’t want to dress like him. He’s mean.”
“So you’d rather he look more handsome than you?”
Merlin’s nose wrinkled in disgust. “He isn’t handsome,” Merlin insisted while wiping his runny nose on the back of his hand. “He’s a prat.”
“What a rude thing to say of the Prince,” Hunith admonished gently. “You are not rude.”
“Because then I’d be like Arthur.”
Hunith tried to hide her amused smile. She shook her head. Merlin snuck a weary look at the damaged doublet. His eyes glimmered gold again and the doublet levitated into the air stitching all its loosened threads back together again.
“I’ll be handsome,” Merlin decided with a sniffle.
“You’ll be the handsomest,” Hunith agreed.
“But I’m only doing it for father,” Merlin told her, climbing out of her lap to begin changing his clothes.
“And I’ll wear my best dress. It’s velvet as well and your father will be so proud.”
⭐️🌟⭐️
Arthur wore a red velvet doublet, a gold circlet and still had the faint trace of a black eye and a split lip. He glared across the crowd at Merlin. Merlin stuck his tongue out. Arthur did the same.
His mother grabbed his ear, leaned down and harshly whispered, “Arthur Pendragon, you behave yourself or you’ll spend the night in your room.”
“But Merlin-“ Arthur whined.
“I won’t hear another word on the matter. This is an important day for the Emrys family and I won’t have you ruin it.”
Arthur gnashed his teeth and returned to glaring at Merlin. Merlin smirked and behind his mother’s back, made a face at the Prince. He scrunched up his nose, stuck out his tongue and put his thumbs in his ears while wiggling his fingers.
“Mum!” Arthur pointed at Merlin, pulled at his mother’s skirt and whined.
By the time the Queen looked between her petulant son and his nemesis, Merlin stood politely beside his mother with his hands behind his back. Ygraine gave her son a withering warning glare. Arthur pouted but said nothing more as he began plotting his revenge.
He would put toads in Merlin’s chambers. Merlin hated toads. Or perhaps he would find a way to dump a bucket of cold water over him while he was still in his fine clothes. Or he could trip him into a puddle of mud.
The sound of flapping wings distracted Arthur. High above the castle, a large dragon circled as it descended from the clouds. The closer it came the more noise its enormous wings made until the dragon’s claws touched the ground and an awed silence fell over the amassed crowd of knights and nobles.
A man slid down from the dragon’s back.
“Father!”
Merlin took off running down the steps. He jumped into Balinor’s outstretched arms. Arthur felt a pang of jealousy as the man swung Merlin around and lifted him up to pat the great beast’s snout. The dragon let out an amused huff. Smoke curled from its nostrils enveloping Merlin in a hazy cloud.
“That’s supposed to be my dragon,” Arthur grumbled.
Ygraine took his hand in hers. She lowered herself to look her son in the eye. With a smile, she brushed his hair from his forehead.
“It may take years for you to realize the importance of this day. The dragon is not yours to own. It thinks for itself. It feels like you and I. To shackle it would be akin to enslaving a man.”
Arthur shuddered at his mother’s words. He’d heard of kingdoms that thought so little of its citizens that they enslaved them—treating them like cattle or oxen to be used rather than citizens to be protected.
Ygraine squeezed his hand pulling his attention back to her.
“It is an honor that Kilgarrah has come to Camelot. It is a sign of peace and goodwill. We can provide a haven for his kind and in return they can help protect us.
“Do you understand my Prince?”
Arthur nodded. He turned back to the dragon. Even as Lord Balinor held Merlin aloft, Lady Hunith hugged her husband tightly. After kissing her husband’s cheek, she curtsied to the scaled creature. In return the dragon lowered his chest and bowed his head.
“M’Lady.” Kilgarrah’s gravelly voice boomed louder than any man’s.
Arthur felt the vibrations in his bones. Hairs stood up on the back of his neck as his mother began to gently pull him forward. Arthur dragged his feet.
Kilgarrah straightened to his full height. Arthur had never before seen a creature of such size. He towered over even the tallest of men. When he spoke he showed gleaming, sharp teeth and a mouth large enough to swallow a man whole.
Merlin smiled up at Kilgarrah. He clambered out of his father’s arms and awkwardly hugged one of Kilgarrah’s forelegs.
“I’ve missed you.” Merlin pressed his face to Kilgarrah’s rough scales and the dragon’s eyes softened.
Kilgarrah lowered himself once more so he could speak softly. “It has been too long, young Lord. Have you taken care of your mother in your father’s absence?”
Merlin nodded enthusiastically. Kilgarrah let out a rumbling laugh and though the noise reverberated off the walls and rattled the windows, Arthur refused to fear it. If Merlin could face the dragon, then so could Arthur.
He straightened his back and held tightly to his mother’s hand as she led him close enough that he could see the individual scales covering the creature’s leathery skin. Kilgarrah hurriedly bowed his head, taking care not to squish Merlin who refused to let go of his foreleg. Arthur glared as Merlin petted the dragon’s leg as though it were a dog until his mother unwrapped his thin arms from the stocky leg.
“Your Majesty.” Kilgarrah turned his large yellow eyes to Arthur. “Prince Arthur.”
Arthur ignored his mother’s cordial greetings. He stared at the massive claws, the shiny rough scales and the way the dragon seemed nothing like what he expected. From the way it moved with grace to the way its gravely voice captivated the crowd, Arthur became more and more interested in befriending it.
Before Arthur could summon the courage to speak, Lord Balinor hoisted Merlin up onto Kilgarrah’s back. With Kilgarrah’s assistance Balinor climbed between his shoulders and sat behind his son as Kilgarrah took to the sky.
⭐️🌟⭐️
Merlin hated Camelot’s feasts. They lacked the jovial carefree atmosphere of celebrations in Ealdor. The dancing felt stiff. Merlin didn’t know the steps or the old women who pinched his cheeks as they swung him around between them.
He escaped to a quiet corner as soon as he could. He pulled at the collar of his doublet. The embroidery thread made his neck itch.
“Allergic to fine things, Mer lin?” Arthur came up behind him, taunting him as he always did.
“I’m not allergic,” Merlin insisted. “I just hate it. Like I hate you.”
“That’s treason!” Arthur shouted, crowding Merlin further into the corner.
“Is not! You aren’t a King!” Merlin shouted back.
“I will be and all you’ll ever be is a-“
“A Dragonlord,” Merlin interrupted smugly. “You’ll be a boring King and I’ll get to live with my dragons.”
Arthur’s face turned red. His hands balled into fists at his sides. Merlin narrowed his eyes and raised his arms to protect himself if needed.
“Dragons aren’t pets,” Arthur haughtily sneered.
“They’re my kin.” Merlin puffed up his tiny chest. “And one day, you’ll be begging me to be your ally and protect your lands with my magic and my kin and I’ll say no.”
Arthur lunged. Merlin ducked. Arthur caught hold of Merlin by the front of his doublet. He pulled Merlin forward as he shouted.
“You take that back!”
“No! I’d never be friends with a prat!”
Merlin lost control of his magic. Arthur’s hands reddened, swelled and began burning and itching. Arthur dropped Merlin’s shirt instantly. He took one look at his hands, the fading gold in Merlin’s eyes and punched Merlin squarely in the jaw.
The night ended with Ygraine dragging Arthur to see Gaius and Merlin being sent to bed after a stern dressing down from his mother.
⭐️🌟⭐️
Arthur should’ve been in a lesson with Geoffrey of Monmouth. Merlin should’ve been in a lesson with Gaius. Neither were surprised to see the other at the edge of the large clearing where Kilgarrah slumbered.
“What are you doing here?” Arthur asked.
“Visiting my friend. What are you doing here?”
A fresh purple bruise stood out on Merlin’s otherwise pale face. Both of Arthur’s hands were wrapped in bandages. The two glared at each other until Kilgarrah stirred.
“Boys,” Kilgarrah rumbled.
With one last angry glare, Merlin stomped away from Arthur and plopped himself onto the ground beside Kilgarrah. Kilgarrah shook his head at the young boys. He knew a great many things that they did not, but he’d agreed with Balinor that they were too young for such worries.
“Shouldn’t you be in your boring prince lessons?” Merlin taunted Arthur as he made himself comfortable against Kilgarrah’s side.
“Merlin,” Kilgarrah warned. “Manners.”
Merlin huffed. Sometimes Kilgarrah felt like a third parent rather than a friend.
“What’s it like to fly?” Arthur wondered, addressing his question to the dragon and ignoring Merlin.
“I imagine it’s similar to riding a horse as fast as it can go. The wind in your face and the freedom to go wherever you wish,” Kilgarrah said wistfully. “What do you think, Merlin?”
“It’s nothing like riding a horse. It’s a thousand times better.”
Kilgarrah’s laughter rumbled the ground beneath them. On a chuckle he promised that one day he’d take Arthur flying.
“Really?!?” Arthur crept closer to Kilgarrah, eyes wide with excitement.
“If your mother says yes. I’ve yet to drop this one,” Kilgarrah covered Merlin with one of his wings.
“Hey!” Merlin complained as he scrambled out from underneath the leathery wing.
He emerged with rumpled hair and leaves sticking to his tunic. He brushed the dirt and leaves away and then shoved Kilgarrah. Kilgarrah didn’t move an inch. He let out another deep laugh and beckoned Arthur forward by scratching at the ground. Arthur sat on the opposite side of Kilgarrah from Merlin.
“Have either of you heard the story of the very first dragon?”
They shook their heads and Kilgarrah began to tell them about the valley of his ancestors where the trees blossomed pink and the water ran clear as crystal. The warm afternoon sun and the steady breathing of the dragon against their backs lulled the boys into a peaceful sleep. Hours of panicked searching later, the two boys were taken back to the castle by Sir Pellinore where their parents were so relieved that they’d been found and hadn’t been fighting that all notions of punishment were forgotten.