chaletian | [Merlin] Waiting :: PG :: Het

Title: Waiting
Author:

chaletian
Fandom: Merlin
Rating: PG
Spoilers:None
Summary: Arthur and Guinevere wait.

They wait.

Days slide by, one blurring into another. Seasons change, the sun dipping lower and darker, leaves blowing to the ground, damp rising. The time comes for a new dress for Gwen. Arthur finds himself needing new armour.

Months pass. New enemies attack Camelot and old enemies return. Uther’s hatred of magic grows, if anything, stronger. There are tournaments, festivals, feast days and executions. (Arthur decides to grow a beard.) Morgana is exiled, and they watch, separately, as she rides out of Camelot. (Gwen makes him shave it off, and he obliges because he sees how much she misses Morgana, and can’t stand for her not to be happy.)

And eventually, months roll into years. Arthur Pendragon is not a boy any more; no longer a sulky prince but a king in waiting, and Camelot a land in waiting.

“It feels like everyone’s waiting for something,” Arthur says one day, leaning against a pillar as Gwen folds laundry, an every day sight that no one heeds.

Gwen thinks, “They’re waiting for Uther to die,” but she doesn’t say it, even though it’s true, even though they are, even though she is, even though Arthur is. Instead she says, “You’re getting mud over everything,” and he smiles and looks sheepish and backs away slightly, scuffing muddy boots on uneven stone flags, and she falls in love all over again.

“Sorry,” he says, then, “it’s a bad harvest this year, isn’t it?”

“Dreadful,” says Gwen, and they discuss what might be done.

They wait. And one day Uther Pendragon dies, and amongst the pomp and plumes and gilded grandeur of his funeral and Arthur’s coronation, Guinevere and Arthur exchange glances no longer secret, because their wait is over.

FIN