Merlin's magic (Oneshots) 1

damsel in distress

Like many people in the world, Arthur had always loved stories. Not just stories. Tales. Fairy tales were his favorite. He loved the endless stories of evil sorcerers that bewitched the fair maiden.
He loved the giant dragon that held her captive.
He was excited about the knights and princes that fought their way through danger and mazes and villains to be the hero.

At least, that was how it was in the beginning. When Arthur was still a child. Maybe five years old. Too young to watch the beheading of sorcerers outside.
Too young to understand the war that his father had been waging since his birth.

When Arthur grew older, and met Morgana, he learned to challenge his mind. And tried to see his favorite tales from a different perspective.
Just like saw his father as a good man who had to slaughter men and women to save his people - he turned around the characters in the books.
His nurse refused to cooperate at first, but she couldn't evade Arthur's and Morgana's pleas forever.

The prince was suddenly the bad guy. Not because Arthur thought he himself was bad. No. He did it to understand what made a prince a good man in the first place.
Morgana helped a lot. She told him that a good prince was there for his people. So the evil one would be burning their crops. Would hurt their children etc. Just so Arthur could see the consequences of his actions.
The evil witch or the sorcerer were suddenly healers. Secretly and kindly. They were the ones the fair maiden and her best friend, the dragon must safe.

At some point it became too boring for them to just hear these stories. So they decided to play them. Morgana was always the Dragon. Sometimes she would be double crossing Arthur, the damsel who was trained to kill since birth and wanted to save the prince. (Arthur insisted to save a sorcerer at first, but when Uther found out, Arthur had been lectured so bad, he had nightmares for an entire week.)

Sometimes, when Morgana was crying about the knew dolls she had gotten for her birthday (she always wished for knifes, but Uther insisted that girls had long hair, wore dresses and played with dolls), Arthur asked her to play tea party with him.
He would cut the dolls hair, and play court with them. He only cut their hair, because again, Uther had insisted only women had long hair. He cut them, so his father couldn't be mad that his entire court consisted of women.

("They have short hair father. They are men." "They are wearing dresses, Arthur."
"Excuse me? Those are robes! ROBES!"
Women in disguise. Uther had accepted Arthur's weird reasoning. )

Arthur also got to wear Morgana's necklaces and rings and all that. Because those were his treasure. They showed his wealth.

Arthur loved these games. Especially when he got to spar with Morgana. And exercise, which they did in secret to hide from Uther as well.
In all fairness, they had to hide a lot from Uther.

Arthur loved fairy tales. And he loved to twist them and understand what stereotypes were made of.

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That was why Merlin left such a great impression on him. It was their first encounter. And a farming boy, a low class foreigner, had decided to challenge a knight.
Well, not any knight. The prince himself. But the boy didn't know that at first glance. Arthur knew, courage was rare to find in a man. Loyalty was a promise hardly earned.
His own knights were taught lessons on noble and honorable behavior then and there. But Merlin - a boy with pale skin and worn clothes - he portrayed some sense of nobility that Arthur had rarely witnessed.

And when he saved Arthur's life and became his servant - a part of him wanted to test this boy. See if he could hold a sword well enough to become a knight.
It had been Arthur's dream, long ago, that one day, when he was king, any man could attempt to become a knight.
(Maybe women too. He was not quite sure about that, because of how his father had taught him how pitiful it was to loose to one. Arthur was an adult now. Some of his games had to stay where they came from. His childhood memories. At least until he became king.)