A Hunting Trip

Scar

Arthur rushed in, Merlin in his arms. He lay him on the patient's bed and Gaius got straight to work.
"Gwen, I'll need some fresh water from the well!" Guinevere sprinted off before Gaius had even finished.
"What can I do to help?" Arthur asked.
"Could you, leave me for a minute..." Arthur saw the slight pain expressed in his face. He nodded and left. He didn't know what to do, so he strolled around the castle. He never saw anyone through the halls, only a few servants running about. After almost an hour, he decided to check up on Gaius and Merlin.
He walked into the physician's room to see Merlin with a bandage over his stomach. Shockingly, this was the first time Arthur had seen Merlin without a shirt on. Arthur also saw his scars, all of them, for the first time as well.
"Arthur!" Gaius exclaimed, dropping a vial in shock. Arthur took no notice, he was too focused on the cuts, bruises, scars and a big burn on his friend's body. He walked up slowly and pulled up a chair and sat next to the bed. As he examined closer, he realised Merlin had more scars then all of his Knights, even himself! He also discovered that some of the marks were old, definitely not from the bandits. Gaius was saying something, but Arthur couldn't register anything. Anything but the pale, fragile body before him, hitched breaths from pain. His cheeks flushed with pink and a dark red bleeding through the bandage.
"Arthur?" Gwen asked, finally reaching Arthur. He looked up and saw his vision blurred with tears. Merlin had gone through so much pain, and he hadn't ever told anyone! It seems some of these might of been before he came to Camelot as well!
"Are you alright, Sire?" Gaius asked him as the tears fall off his cheeks and land on his friend's almost-lifeless body. Gwen walked over to Arthur and turned his head away and pulled him into a hug.
"He'll be alright, Arthur... I know it," she muttered through short sobs.
"I'm sorry, m'lord..." Gaius stated, and Arthur looked up to the physician.
"For what?"
"Not telling you about all of this. And having you know it all at once. Merlin would tell me most nights that he wished he could tell you. But he couldn't. He feared you, m'lord, for his life."
"M-Merlin was... sc-scared of-f m-me?" he managed to question before he cried into his wife's shoulder. And she was there for him, as Merlin had been. But, Gwen trusted him, not like Merlin. It broke him, thinking even for a second that Merlin was afraid of him.