Merlin One-shots

The Tavern Pt2: Reunion

{Song: Empty chairs at empty tables - Les Miserables}

Nothingness became darkness and then a faint glow as a pulsing splitting headache dragged Merlin's mind back to the realm of consciousness. He groaned. His fingers twitched, feeling coarse sheets beneath him, and a threadbare blanket tickled the bottom of his chin. It was quiet. Where was he?

He cracked his eyes open but stabbing daylight forced them shut again. The headache tripled. He took a deep breath to calm it and himself, and tried to remember how he could have gotten here or at least why he felt like death.

Oh yes.

The tavern.

Merlin groaned again, this time at himself. He'd gotten himself drunk enough to start a tavern brawl and hallucinate his long-lost friends? He scoffed. As if pretending would erase the fact that it all truly did go wrong. He did lose all those friends to gruesome deaths that he'd failed to prevent. And now he was cursed to live on without them, hoping, one day, that the one he'd failed the worst would rise again. Pretending didn't change any of that! All it did was make the crushing weight of their absence grow tenfold stronger, and feel fresher than it had any right to feel after so many years. The whole thing... was just sad, really. He ran a hand down his face, willing the moisture that was threatening to leak from his closed lids to disappear.

With a sigh, he slowly opened his eyes again. The pain was more bearable this time. Wanting to rid his mind of the images of his friends from last night, he blinked back his tears and glanced around the small room. It was bare. Low ceiling. Rickety door. Small window with no damn curtains. Merlin squinted angrily at the horizontal sunbeams that filtered in from the rising sun. Clearly, he was in lodgings for passing travellers. How did he get to this inn? Had he, in a drunken stupor, paid and forgotten? Had...Aiden? The tab was one thing, but this was too generous. Something else must be up.

Merlin's hand reached for his pocket, and with some relief, he felt his pouch was still with him, weightier than it had been in a while. The rest of his belongings would still be where he left them before the tavern - stashed in the forest, concealed under an enchantment.

He tiredly sat up and slipped his feet into his boots, which someone had kindly left beside his bed. The same someone must have left the waterskin he spotted on the bedside table. He unscrewed and sniffed it carefully, before taking a long drink that soothed his parched throat. Satisfied, he set it aside, rose to his gangly legs with a great stretch, and then plodded towards the door, but he paused with his hand hovering over the handle. Footsteps approached. He frowned and felt his senses awaken with caution, then stepped aside into the corner by the door. There were too many unanswered questions not to be wary. The door opened inwards, concealing Merlin behind it as the visitor walked in while bringing with him the smell of fried eggs and sausages. Merlin heard the man stutter to a halt and took a peek at the back of his head. His tall frame and unruly blonde curls were backlit by the morning light, and he carried a breakfast tray. He swivelled away from the empty bed and stuck his head back out the door.

"Merlin?" he called out, a slight panic in his voice.

His voice.

"Leon?" Merlin whispered. The door slammed shut and the men were face to face. A huge smile split across Leon's face. "You're awake!" he exclaimed.

Merlin gaped at the former First Knight of Camelot, the blood draining from his face.

"You-you're - How?" he stammered. "I-I imagined you. I was drunk. You weren't real. You're not real." Merlin's hands clutched at his hair, which didn't help his pounding headache in the slightest. "Oh gods, I've finally gone mad!" He stormed away from Leon, whose lips were parted as he looked at a complete loss for what to say. Merlin paced to and from the window as he continued to rant. "Add THIS to the list of reasons I don't drink! If I ever run into that Aiden guy again, I'll tell him exactly where he can shove his tab!"