Broken Crown - Merlin

Arthur - King Of Silence

There was a good amount of tall and skinny, pallid trees in this part of the woods, all trying to catch a glimpse of the sun. Their long branches reached out after the knights, a bunch of them looking like skeleton hands.

The sunlight was showing its many pale faces to the bear forest floor, warming he horses' fur – the four-legged animals were already exhausted. The horses let out a neigh now and then, it was no surprise that they were being told to move rather rapidly forward, two of them only trying to keep up with Arthurs horse.

Wonder if they knew what they were doing? To them, – the horses – they were doing nothing more than riding around in the woods, following instructions from the heavy man on their back.

"You're awfully quiet, princess," Gwaine said.

Arthur ignored him.

Nothing important ever exited Gwaines mouth – outside of battle, that is. It was a bit like Merlin, actually. Was that the reason he and Gwaine got along to well? They did know each other before Gwaine was knighted, after all. Gwaine was all about having fun. Merlin was all about seeing the good in the worst of people. They were a rather good match of personalities if you chose to look deeper into their similarities. Although there was one difference between them;

Arthur liked Merlin.

Not to state that Arthur didn't fancy Gwaine's company, but at times Arthur wished for the man to just stop talking. In fact, he wished that for Merlin as well. To just shut up. Shush. Don't talk. But it wasn't that simple, both Gwaine and Merlin had a way with their mouths, they never shut up. Always talking nonsense, always trying to be funny when they shouldn't, always bringing light to the king's boring, dark days.

Wait, what?

Arthur sighed. He was thinking too hard. Stop doing that.

He looked around. A bird had landed on the tree to his right, chirping a nice little melody he imagined Merlin would find marvelous. He always did. Arthur wondered why, sometimes.

He cleared his throat, realizing Gwaine was, in fact, correct; he was awfully quiet. And it's not like he wanted the knights to be aware of the reason, even though they had created their own ideas already.

"We'll take a break. Water the horses..." Arthur said. He pulled in the horse's mouth, enough for it to stop moving.

Arthur dismounted and looked around at his choice of resting spot. A fallen tree covered with moss was positioned across the clearance he had picked out oh so beautifully – merely a quick spontaneous decision.

"now?" Sir Leon asked confused. Arthur gave a nod in response, so Leon only followed the instructions Arthur had given them. Not serious instructions though, they were simple, maybe a bit boring.

-

Arthur leaned against a tree.

They had not sat there for a long time before Gwaine had started talking. Again. It was often that the knights enjoyed his positivity during darker evenings, and due to the awkward silence, that floated in between them, Leon was quite happy to hear Gwaine's voice.

"Still not dreaming about cheese tasting of apple pie?" Gwaine smiled, referencing to the time he... Well, had a dream about cheese and apple pies. And, not to mention the time he scared everyone around him, making a loud noise sounding like an arm being broken. The source of the noise? An apple. He had eaten an apple. Only Gwaine could do such a thing in such a situation.

Leon chuckled lightly, relieved some of the tension had been lifted. Arthur smiled slightly. You would have to pay attention to see it.

Something was off about Arthurs silence. The two knights had obviously picked up on it quickly though, it had been explained subtly many times, so they didn't really have to ask for a reason. They knew it had to do with Merlin.