The Beginning of A Beautiful Friendship

When Lancelot finished his story, and Leon had a drink of wine to fortify himself, Lancelot led him down to the dungeon where the lord was being kept. They had put him in one of the cleaner cells, with good light and a fire and a proper bed, even. And from the first glimpse Leon caught of Lord Galehaut, it appeared he expected nothing less.

He was a scrawny chap, and dressed as finely as Lancelot described, his clothing at the height of court fashion. He was ginger. Very ginger. Really, he was unsettlingly so. He was sitting on an upturned bucket which, on closer inspection, he had draped a handkerchief over. In the dim light from the barred window, he was doing his nails.

"Lord Galehaut, I presume?" Leon ventured.

The young man looked up, and the biggest, most impish grin Leon had ever seen spread over his face. He stood and walked over to the bars. "At your service, Sir," he said, bowing. "From what my captor has informed me of, you must be either Sir Gwaine or his counterpart, Sir Leon."

"Leon," Leon said. "I'm the--"

"--Steward of Camelot, yes," the young man said, and giggled. "Have you come to inform me of my fate?"

Leon blinked. He himself was known for speaking in a pretty old-fashioned manner, but certainly he wasn't this bad. He cleared his throat. "Sir Lancelot tells me you surrendered the battle to him before there could be any bloodshed."

"You are correct, sir, yes. I knew the whole thing was pointless after that young knight of yours drew his sword," Galehaut said. He grinned ever wider as he glanced at Lancelot. "I see now that it was a fool's errand to try to take a castle so well defended. I place myself at your mercy."

"Yes." Leon swallowed, then said finally, "Well, this is no place for a nobleman. You will be transferred to a guest bedroom, and when Arthur returns you may swear fealty to him."

"Then I am to be released?"

"You are to be made a soldier of Camelot," Leon said. "--if Arthur approves on his return. And if that is more agreeable than remaining in prison."

"Oh, it is, Sir Leon," Galehaut said. The guards unlocked the door and he stepped out, after carefully gathering up the handkerchief he had left on the bucket. What a very odd gentleman.

Leon was certain he was going to like him.

To be honest, Merlin was a little horrified that he’d shouted at Gwaine in the split second after he did it. First of all, why was he shouting at a knight? Second of all, why was he shouting at Gwaine, who was his friend? And why, oh why, were they shouting at each other at THREE IN THE MORNING? Gwaine was not helping his mental state, adding to the guilt and shouting at him and all. And kicking tables over.

Then, of course, because one shout deserved another, and Merlin was becoming so thoroughly irritated his eyes were beginning to sting (it was a sure sign that, like any of the knights worth their salt would have teased him endlessly for, not to mention Arthur, very shortly he was going to be in tears) he started shouting back.

“I haven’t told anyone, Gwaine! It’s not a matter of wanting to! Do you even realize what it’s like keeping it from the lot of you? Uther would have killed me!” he shouted and- yes, right on cue, there were the tears, curse it all, “And Arthur, when he finds out, because you know he will, is going to banish me, at the very least!”

He realized he’d been pacing, at that point, and stopped, and just glared (albeit a little helplessly, and therefore not very effectively) at Gwaine.

Dear Christ in Heaven and in the names of all the Saints in all of Purgatory! Merlin was crying! If that didn't break your heart, you were made of stone. Or something harder than stone. Damn it! And then he had to go and give him that glare, or rather that attempt at a glare, which was really about as intimidating as an aggravated puppy.

Okay, this was so not how Gwaine had wanted this conversation to go.

Gwaine's mouth flapped as he tried to figure out how to attack this problem.

"Arthur is going to banish me--"

And then Gwaine realized that he hadn't thought this whole thing quite through to the end: surprise, surprise. He had been so busy worrying about arguing with a blockheaded friend that he hadn't stopped to consider he was arguing with a warlock. That brought up two things: first being the realization that Merlin, for all his mundane powers of an aggravated puppy, was actually a very powerful young man, and, probably, if he truly didn't want Gwaine to know he could turn him into a toad or maybe snap his fingers and he would just forget, so maybe it wasn't that smart to be getting pushy with him; and second that what he said was very true, it was a serious secret with serious consequences, and maybe Gwaine wasn't the best person to be knowing about it.

"Do you realize what it’s like keeping it from the lot of you?--"

He did care. Of course Merlin cared. He showed how much he cared by not letting anyone know, by not making them choose. And he was crying! Damn his eyes, Gwaine had been trying to negotiate a conversation about trust, or lack thereof or something, and then had to go and make Merlin cry!

Real smooth, there, G. Gwaine told himself. Way to go.

"I--damn it, Merlin," Gwaine finally managed, eloquently, but all the fight had gone out of him. He sighed, ran a hand through his hair. "I didn't mean--" Gwaine turned around, ostensibly giving Merlin a chance to get himself under control, but also to cover for his own deep shame and, if you wanted to call it that, cowardice. He couldn't bring himself to look at Merlin.

"Whatever," he said suddenly. "I'm sorry. Forget I said anything. This never happened, I know nothing, good night." Then, feeling guilty, he added, "I'll walk you home. Don't want--" Yeah, like the guy with super-magic-powers can't walk himself home at night. "Don't want to go to bed just yet," he amended.

Gwaine opened the door, held it open for Merlin, still not meeting his eye, and followed him out.

It turned out that Galehaut had not eaten supper yet, so Leon stayed up for another hour to entertain the new guest with Lancelot. He hadn't eaten with any lords that were near his age in a while, and it felt good to speak with a man who had the same sort of upbringing as he had. There was no danger of the man running away--that was not how noblemen behaved. It felt safe.

The conversation, for instance, was very safe. Instead of talking about how big Percival's little gentleman was or trying to guess how many olives Gwaine could fit in his mouth, Galehaut brought Leon up to speed on the latest art from across Albion, the newest ideas and the most compelling court intrigues.

"...I really do despair of court nowadays, in any kingdom," Galehaut said, eating his brie tart with perfect poise. "There's no celebration of art, no national music, no culture! If I were to become a knight of Camelot, I assure you that chivalry would not be so easily tossed aside."

"I'm sure Arthur will appreciate that," Leon said, and, not quite glancing at Lancelot, "We're a right bunch of uncultured bumpkins when it comes to art--dancing, even. You should see some of the knights try to cut a caper."

Galehaut appreciated his joke. "Oh, yes. I thought I noticed Sir Lancelot's uncivilized manner of not wiping his boots before stepping out of the dungeon," he said, eying Lancelot over a glass of wine. "Tell me, sir, are there other knights of common birth? Oh, please do not think I mean to offend," he added, seeing Lancelot's face. "Us privileged lads are supposed to enrich the lives of those below--otherwise, what's the point of having title?"

"Not a truer word spoken," Leon said. Lancelot said nothing, and appeared a little nonplussed.

After dinner Lancelot and Leon watched Galehaut walked down the hall toward his appointed chamber.

"I don't trust him," Lancelot said, once he was sure Galehaut was too far away to hear.

"You think he's hiding something?" Leon asked.

"He doesn't hide anything--that's the trouble." Lancelot eyed Leon. "Do--do all noblemen act like that? I mean, you don't…"

"Some of them do."

Galehaut had reached the stairs at the end of the hall, and waved once more at them before disappearing up the steps. Leon and Lancelot awkwardly waved back.

"I think he's alright," Leon said, but his grin faded when he saw Lancelot's expression. He coughed. "Anyway, we'll see what Arthur makes of him.”

Gwaine and Merlin walked in silence across the courtyard to the physician's quarters. It was a marked difference from their walk on the way in--what, twenty minutes ago? It felt like hours--which had been joyful, friendly, sloppy, full of shoving and laughing and shouting far too loudly for the time of night and then shushing each other.

Now the walk was quick, direct, quiet. How had Gwaine managed to screw everything up so massively in such a short time? He seemed to have a knack for it. Maybe the whole being a knight in Camelot thing was too good to be true...

It was a complete buzz-kill. He was shockingly sober, now, but his heart wasn't in the idea of sneaking into the wine cellar. No, he'd probably just go back and not sleep.

They were at the door to Gaius' chambers rather quickly, in spite of how the uncomfortable silence crept on.

Gwaine kicked at a rock as he struggled to decide what to say to not make it awkward, knowing that by virtue of the pause and the lingering he was making it incredibly awkward. "'Night," he decided on abruptly, and turned to head back to his room.

Merlin wasn’t quite sure what to say when Gwaine just suddenly gave up arguing, and was honestly a bit too worked up to even try and think of something to say. So he didn’t say anything, and the whole walk back to Gaius’ quarters was absolutely silent. Merlin stuffed his hands in his pockets, thoroughly ashamed at having shouted at Gwaine, until they reached the door. He couldn’t think of anything to say that seemed quite an adequate apology for the amount of yelling he’d just contributed to, so he let Gwaine walk off with an awkward reply to the knights’ own awkward “’Night”.

Gwaine had gone all of three steps when Merlin finally got it into his head to apologize, because it was better than nothing.

“Wait, Gwaine. I’m sorry,” he said as Gwaine stopped and turned to look at him. It occurred to him that he might just provide the simple explanation that had come to his own mind a few minutes ago, because he owed him that much.

“Look, I’m… not used to having a friend who I can trust with knowing that I can do, you know,” it was actually surprisingly hard to admit in blatant terms that he could do magic, but he soldiered on anyway, “that I can do magic.” He shrugged awkwardly and stared at the ground, hands still in his pockets. When he did finally look up, Gwaine was at least not halfway across the courtyard. Actually, he’d walked back Merlin’s direction. And he was looking at him, which was an improvement, and he had the usual wicked Gwaine glint back in his eyes. Merlin was still shrinking a little bit though, and he sobered up.

“No, no, I'm sorry, Merlin, I shouldn't have forced you into that,“ he said.

“So… you know… thanks,” Merlin said, before the silence could stretch from natural into awkward again. Gwaine, apparently done with being serious, grabbed him in a bear hug and when Merlin could breathe again, he grinned wickedly. And, since Gwaine had so kindly given him a moment to compose himself earlier, he gave Gwaine the same courtesy, pretending not to notice that the knight’s eyes had gone all misty.

“Just don’t tell anybody, okay? Or, well…” he trailed off, and his eyes went gold for a moment as he looked right at Gwaine. From a potted plant nearby came an audible ‘plop’ and a small green frog hopped nonchalantly between Merlin and Gwaine, looked around, and croaked loudly. Gwaine stared at it, alarmed, for a moment, and Merlin wondered if that’d been the best idea, but then Gwaine laughed uproariously. Startled, Merlin also laughed, and dodged a good-natured shove that probably would have sent him through the door. He could hear Gwaine guffawing clear across the courtyard, even after he’d gone inside and shut the door. Merlin grinned again as the frog ribbited quietly in confusion and plip-plopped back to its plant to resume sleeping.


*THE END*

***

Follow the further adventures of Merlin and the Friday Knights in Episode 2: The Unquiet Castle