It was a week before Gaius took the stitches out. During that time, Arthur had a guard at the physician's door to prevent Merlin from attempting to do any kind of chore until he'd fully healed. Which meant time to study with Gaius. He was learning a lot as an apprentice and hoped one day he could be half the healer that his mentor was. When patients came through the room, Gaius insisted that Merlin treat them and provide the remedy. The Knights came by occasionally to see how he was doing. When they saw he was treating patients, they felt the need to inform their King. Arthur came by and observed one day claiming to want to hide out from his council meetings and no one would suspect to check with the physician. He watched as Merlin skillfully and caringly attended to each patient that came in while Gaius watched and provided input when asked. At the end of the day, Gaius had taken Merlin's last stitches out. They put an ointment on them to help reduce the scarring.
"Merlin, you can resume your normal duties tomorrow. I expect whenever you're needed Gaius will send word to me." Arthur said and bid them goodnight.
"Hmm. Why do you think he was in here all day?" Merlin asked.
"I have my suspicions, but who can say for sure." Gaius responded. Merlin rolled his eyes.
"Alright. Well I'm going to get some rest. Who knows how much Arthur is going to have me doing tomorrow."
During the night, Gaius was woken as several people had fallen ill with a sweating sickness. Merlin assisted where he could. There were at least a half dozen who had fallen ill. When dawn came, both men were very tired. Merlin left Gaius to go fetch Arthur's breakfast. When he got to the kitchen Diana hugged him so tight he almost couldn't breathe. Then she hit him in the arm and said it was for making her worry so much. The others beamed at them. Apparently the sentiment was shared.
When he got to Arthur's chambers, he walked in and set the tray down at the table and went to open the curtains. He managed to trip on a shirt on his way to the curtains and landed hard on the floor and groaned before getting back up. When he managed to get the curtains opened, he turned to find Arthur watching him.
"Merlin, you look terrible."
"Yes, Sire. Thanks for that. We were woken up sometime after midnight as several people have come down with an illness. We were up treating them most of the night." He said and then started to gather up the laundry he had tripped over.
"Does Gaius need your assistance, or can he manage?"
"He should be fine. We have those who came in stable, but if there are too many more, then he might need me again." Merlin was piling the clothes in a basket and putting Arthur's training clothes on the changing screen since he had training first thing this morning. Arthur nodded. Merlin helped him dress and then waited while he ate. Once he was done, he strapped on the armor and they headed down to the training field together. Merlin kept his eyes on the ground not wanting to look up and see what expressions people had regarding his appearance. But by doing this, he missed seeing his friends and had no time to react before he was thrown over someone's shoulder and ran around the field. Arthur couldn't contain his laughter and watched as Percival ran Merlin past the others. Merlin was a very vivid red by the time Percival stopped and put him down. All the Knights were laughing and happy to see him outside with them all again. Arthur noticed Lancelot had put himself between Gwaine and Merlin and kept giving Gwaine a glare. Huh. Guess he didn't have to worry too much about protecting Merlin from Gwaine. Lancelot was doing well enough.
"I've got an idea for today's training." Arthur said, bringing their attention back to him.
"What's that, sire?" Gwaine asked.
"We're going to practice some knife skills, non-dominant hands." Arthur said garnering some groans from the Knights. Merlin just grinned. "Merlin, I want you to throw three daggers from each hand and then we'll have everyone see if they can tell which is which."
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Becoming Magic
FanficBased on BBC's Merlin, takes place post season 3 and leads in to season 4. Arthur Pendragon has been crowned King of Camelot as his father's condition worsens. His coronation is celebrated with a fortnight of festivities. Merlin shares some secret...