His Love

Chapter 28: THE END

The sunny spring day was innocuously bright, thought Arthur as he gazed out of the window of his chambers and accroess the kingdom that both he and his son, Balithur, would one day inherit. He was sat at his desk, books and scrolls piled up around him, all without answer for how to cure his husband. It had been a week since they had released the dragon into the wild and Arthur had been growing increasingly frustrated sinec. Merlin had been pottering around Camelot with little purpose and, despite the fact that the two of them slept in the same bed still, Arthur missed his husband fiercely.

Over the course of the morning spent deep in indecisioun he had reached a grim resolution and he watched his husband, who was sat in an arm chair by the empty fireplace, innocently creating shapes of dancing kittens and frolicking dragons out the thin air. It was clear that Merlin miss having something, someone, to look after. It must have been in his nature as a servant, Arthur reflected, to want to devote his life to taking care of others- it was certainly something that had continued since he had become a husband and father. The blond man sighed and, as a soft knock came on their door, he rose to his feet, speaking to Merlin as he went.

"Merlin, my love, there's something that I need to tell you," he said seriously. Merlin looked up and smiled brightly in the way that made Arthur's heart flip with affection.

"What is it?" Merlin asked: curious.

There was an additional knock at the door.

Arthur strode to it and wrenched open the heavy oak door using his strong muscles and broad callous hands. Gwaine stood on the other side of the door to the chambers, in the corridor, with a joyfully squealing bundle held in his rakish arms and a boyful grin.

"Gwaine!" Merlin cries happily as he saw who was at the door and stood up and walked towards them. Arthur felt his sadness twist; he was not enjyng his husband's habits of remembering his knights over him and everyone else. Just them, the bundle wriggled and turned towards the Crowned Prince.

"Daddy!" it shouted in pure elation. It was Balithur and Arthur could not hide his proud grin at his son's advanced intelligence- clearly he took after his father- as he reached out his arms to take his son from the rouge knight. Melrin's eyes were still fixed on Gwaine in a way that made Arthur burn with jealousy.

"How have you been, Gwaine?" asked Merlin as he approached the door. Just as Gwaine opened his mouth to answer, Athur, in one smooth movement, swung the door shut on the troublesome night and rotated back to his hsubnad.

"Daddy!" called Balithur again, clapping his hands together in delight as he saw Merlin. Arthur cuddled him closer with his arms and took a bracing deep breath.

"Merlin, I would like you to meet Balithur." He said carefully.

"Is he your son?" asked Merling, starring at the baby enchanted. Arthur nodded a little.

"I didn't realse you were a daddy" Merlin said with a sly look, a langid grin curling across his face.

"Merlin this is serious" Arthur said trying in vane to defeat the blush creeping up his neck.

"Yes daddy, I'll behave" Merlin said with a pout fluttering is eyelastes.

"He's you're son as well!" Arthur said, rather more abruptly than he intended in his imbarrassment.

Merlin stop. Utterly shocked.

"My son?" He asked, with overwhelmed tears in his eyes. He reached out gently to the golden haired pair, staring into Arthur's eyes.

"Can I hold him?" he pleaded. Arthur nodded, fearing to speak should his voice crack with emotion and the fragile guard he had built around his raging torrent of emotions would give and he would be crush under the weight of his own strength of feeling. Merlin scooped Balithur into his arms and held him carefully. He was looking at his son with such wonder that Athur had to turn away, overcome with love and frief that he could not cope as the two emotions churned and boiled in his insides, and, like a maelstrom in the sea, threatened to pull him underneath. Merlin looked up and met his husbands eyes and what Arthur saw there shook him to his core. The usually blue and bright eyes he loves so dearly that sparkled with luaghter now raged with emotion, a firce tordano of pain and fright Arthur had never seen the like of before now.

"I can't remmeber him" Merlin said sadly.

"He's my son and I can't remember him." He looked at Arthur in miserable despertion, knowing that he was breaking the other mans heart but helpless to stop it, his eyes silently begging for understanding. Arthur's resolve finally broke in a collosal explosion, like a burst dam.

"I'm sorry." He whispereds as he turned on his heal and left Merlin alone in their chambers with there infant son cooing lightly in Merlin's twiny arms. The tears that had gathered in his aqua eyes spilled over and left silent tracks on his goden bronzed cheeks as he pulled the door of the chambers open and pushed passed a shocked Gwaine who still lingered.

Merlin stood shocked at his husband's reaction, concern blustering through his thin frame as Gwaine entered the room. Unable to find the courage to face Arthyr and cause him hurt more Merlin paced around the room: a hurricane of panic- while Gwaine took back Balithur and bonunced him gently to sleep.

----

Arthur stood on the battlements, sun glaring down on him more ferociously than Uther ever had at wizards. Arthur had loved this spot since he was first tall enough to see over the walls: the spectacular views it gave of all of the citadel and the lower town and out into the Darkling Woods always calmed him, but today nothing could calm the torrent that crashed and raged through him in waves. Tears pour their way down his face, burning like watery knives of failure. This was it. He was never getting his Merlin back.

He clasped his strong hands around the seal he had given Merlin on the morning of their wedding day, bearing an owl, and sobbed. His grief overtook him. The Merlin he had now was still Merlin, but he wasn't his husband. Spending time with him was like an unfulfilling meal for a starving man, it slacked his basic need, but did not satisfy him on the deep emotional level. He wept openingly, heart broken and worght asunder, for the loss of his warlock, for the fact that he could no longer take his hand in his and talk of the future they once planned for Albion. Snaping with rage at the unfationable chasm of loss that lay ahead og him, and his infant child, he threw the seal towards the battlement door, barely noticing as it bounced off the dark wood as it opened catiosuly.

"Aruthr?" Merlin appeared from behind the door his face crumpled with sadness as Arthur did not answer him, too racked with harsh sobs to respond with more than an animal howl. He glanced down and saw the seal lying on the ground, frowning as he beant to pick it up in his hands. Merlin felled the weight of the steel in his hands and frowned. He recognised this . He felt the love in the metal, warming it even though it remained cool to the touch. Merlin turned over the flat disk and his breathe caught in his throat as he saw the raised design on it. An owl, perched on a pile of books, with a leaf branch crasped in one intricately detailed talon. He knew this design, and he gasped for breath as the memory of his wedding day flooded back to him. His blood was roar in his ears and his body felt numb he didn't feel Arthur beside him, bracing him and grounding him. He remember the smell of the flowers the softness of his tunic, Arthur's hands in his, the cool metal of their wedding rings...he remembered everything.

Merlin's almostuinaudiable gasp caught Arthur's attention and he looked up. For the first time in an era there blue eyes met, recognitions sparking and crackling between the two.

"Arthur," whsipered Merlin before dropping to the ground a dead weight.

"Merlin!" He cried in desporation cradling his husbands black haired head in his hands

"I'm not loosing you again please come vack" he pled through his tears and almost laughed when Merlin frowned and groaned in the groand.

"Arthur" he said again blinking up at his husband looking dazedly at him.

"I remenber everything!' He almost whispered and a smile blooded across his face. Arthur did laugh then, crying, still, but this time the tears were of purist elation, all his fear and sorrow flowing from his eyes, as his body filled with a hysterical hoy. Surgeing forward, he kossed his husband tenderly on one temple: then the other, whispering as he did so:

"Clotpole. I love you and your dollop head. Take better care of it"

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. Gods, Arhthru, I forgot our son" said Merlin in horrorified distress.

"I'ts okay baby, its okay, I've got you back now, your safe, i won't le anything hurt you again" Arthur wishpered like a prayer and the two men embraced, clinging on to on another and bathed in the golden light of the sun.

Deep within the castle, there was a loud yell as Uther found yet another dead mouse in boots.

THE END