Toughest Art Tool Yet: Watercolors

aight its time to clock out for a bit. im tired, this has me tired. im gonna draw some dragons getting their heads stuck in things. someone give me some ideas 

hes ur “emotional support blorbo”??? girl he cant even emotionally support Himself

Some time after Arthur was reincarnated.

Arthur: reading in the living room

Merlin: Can you help me with the dishes?

Arthur: Yeah wait a sec

Merlin: I did my waiting!

Arthur: not again

Merlin: over 1500 years of it!

Arthur: *facepalms*

Some writers: *meticulously plan out every plot point and the tone and meanings before they start writing*

Me:

I'm sorry but can we talk about this?!?!?!

Excuse me cloysterbell: “because she’s the light of the sun and all that is precious and he may or may not have made a little red neckerchief for her too.”

"I have a secret."

Arthur looks up from a report and glances across the room absentmindedly to Merlin holding a dagger he was polishing in his lap as he watches Arthur with a tilt of his head.

Arthur huffs a laugh, "Is it that you're secretly a girl?"

Merlin's lips tick upward for just a moment before continuing his stare.

Arthur watches him for a few moments, and then puts his quill down.

"You have a secret." Arthur repeats seriously.

Merlin just smiles, a small one, "I have a secret. It's an important one. But I can't tell you the secret. And I can't tell you why I can't tell you."

Arthur squints his eyes as Merlin looks down to keep polishing.

"Are you in danger?"

Merlin pauses to think which makes Arthur clench his fists in worry, not that he'd say that.

"...I suppose," He says slowly, thinking over his words, "But it's to my understanding- at this time at least -that it's no more or less dangerous for me whether you know or not. I do think it may be more dangerous for you if you know though."

Arthur hums and watches Merlin's face but sees nothing but earnestness as they meet eyes across the room.

"And why do you tell me this?"

Merlin just smiles again, but bigger this time, "I've decided I trust you with it. I trusted you before of course," he add hurriedly as if Arthur would ever think otherwise,

"But I just realized that I trust you with this, too. And this is something I've never trusted anyone enough to share it with- before I mean. And if it comes up, well, I'd rather be able to tell you that I can't tell you then to lie to you. So, this is me telling you there's a secret."

Arthur looks thoughtfully before raising one eyebrow along with a ghost of a smirk on his face, "So you have a secret you can't tell me. But you trust me with it. When do I get to hear the secret?"

Merlin leans his head on his hand as he looks sideways at him impishly, "I will tell you no lie if you ask."

Arthur hears the unspoken words bright as day:

I'm not going to say anything by myself cause I don't think it's time yet, but I will tell you the truth regardless if you so choose.

Arthur hums to himself before nodding once and then twice, ignoring the giddiness in his heart.

Picking up his quill again, he says, "You missed a spot," so he can hear his manservant squawk from across the room, "I'm not finished yet, you prat!"

They meet gazes one more time with matching fire in their eyes and grins on their faces before resuming their activities.

It's nice to be trusted.

Gertrude Robinson

arthur knows there is something to be said of the way a man wears his scars.

his father wears his, an angry silver cord right above his eyebrow, with defiant pride. time and time again, he has seen a visiting noble alight their gaze on the mar, and his father's bellicose stare in return, a silent war between them. i have survived this, the king would say without words. i will survive you.

on his father's men, a constellation of pink, raised flesh-- a rope of gnarled skin on sir bedivere's left arm from the slice of a blade; a thick, white tear in the fabric of ector's neck. when arthur's young, he sits by fires and listens to the tales of bandits, beasts, and brethren who leave the marks on the warriors who arthur loves.

and, in time, they come to arthur. a snaking vine on arthur's right hip. a thin slice along his left bicep. none of them grow angry and purple the way he's seen after the battle dust settles. he's lucky, in that regard, that all his settle into the skin like they belong there. a man who wears his scars not without pride, but whose scars wear him with the same reverence.

his new knights collect them with the same wonder arthur first collected his. a memory of a battle well fought. a time where death reached out its hand and missed. i have survived this. i will survive you.

but they never come to merlin.

at first, when he's young and naive to all the things merlin has done for him, it stands to reason that merlin is never scarred. he doesn't do anything. later, when the truth outs, arthur knows that was as foolish a thought as trusting his father blindly.

merlin fights alongside him, now, in their older years. he watches as blade lunges, as arrow pierces, as spear aims-- and yet, merlin walks away from battle without a scratch. surely, arthur thinks, merlin has just been lucky. maybe his scars are like arthur's-- not quite as visible as his father's, as his men's. hidden underneath cloth and armour.

merlin shares his battlefield, his kingdom, and-- on the luckiest night of arthur's life-- decides to share his bed, too.

it's after arthur has run his hands over every inch merlin will allow him that he realises. not once, in the fog of their union, did arthur's fingers ever stumble over raised skin, divots or grooves.

"what's wrong?" merlin asks, his voice quiet, his lips pressed to where their hands are joined. "tell me if you're about to kick me out of your bed, at least, so i can figure out how i am going to walk after all that."

it's a joke to mask how scared merlin must feel. this is a new development, though one as easy as breath, as predictable as the sun rising in the sky. arthur will tell him that later. for now, though--

"you promised," he whispers into merlin's neck, "to keep nothing more from me."

merlin frowns, his brows drawn together. "i haven't? i mean, if you're talking about my affections, surely we can both admit that yours were the more hidden--"

arthur places a hand over the groove of a lower rib. "here," he says, "is where you were almost run through by bandits, a few seasons ago." his fingers trail down to a hip. "here, you intervened in my fight with some beast or another, and i had to watch gaius give you stitches. and here--"

merlin stops his hand, sucks in a breath. "arthur."

"did you use magic to heal?" arthur finds he isn't angry, not in the way he expects. "i understand, merlin. you had to explain away so much; it would make sense--"

"it's a glamour," merlin admits in the space between his words.

arthur frowns. "a glamour."

merlin can only nod.

arthur knows what the word means, sort of, from the magical instruction and history merlin has given him in the time past their-- arthur's-- new found knowledge of their bond. but glamours, as merlin had explained, are oft for the use of enchantment, so as to make one's romantic interest view them as beautiful--

oh.

he rolls merlin onto his back.

"show me." it is a plea more than a command. it is not from merlin's king, but rather, arthur hopes, his heart.

merlin sighs. his eyes glow gold.

like roots spreading through the earth, a tide rippling over sand, his appearance changes. angry pink gnarls. fine, silver cuts. the faint shadow of where a burn once sat. they litter merlin's pale skin, old and new, in places arthur never could have imagined.

he knows his face must show something that makes merlin turn away from him. with a shaking hand, he turns merlin's chin back to him.

"tell me one thing," arthur says. it is a command, now. "were these all for me?"

there is no air in the room as merlin nods.

slowly, arthur draws in breath. he leans down, then, and presses his lips to one at the base of merlin's neck.

"then," he starts, shakily, "this is mine." another kiss, to his ribs, the puckered flesh of a sword wound. "this is mine." to his wrist, where chains must have sat at the behest of his father. "this is mine," and he's choking up, now.

merlin's trembling underneath him, a quaking branch in the wind. arthur spreads his fingers over merlin's heart, takes its beat in his palm, and looks him in his eyes.

"i will love everything you show me," arthur breathes, a promise, "because it is mine."

"as am i," merlin promises back. "as am i."

decaying crown