The clockroom

Honest lies

AN.:// Chapter 9 has been edited. This is where I left off the first time around, I will now continue where this chapter left off.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Arthur shot up from his bed, heart racing and hands in front of his face.
He'd been shot. In the head. He dreamed of it. He could still feel the metal piercing his head.
Arthur reached for the spot between his eyes and found only a tingling sensation there.
It was the middle of the night, but like hell he could go back to sleep like that.

He took long and slow breaths, before he stood up and looked in the mirror. There was no scar there. No reminder of his encounter the other night.
It's been days, but the memory felt real enough to haunt him for years.
How he had managed to sleep the first night without a care in the world was beyond him now.
Then again, he hadn't really registered what had happened over there until he woke up that next morning.
When he had gone to sleep, he had felt almost content with the visit. With the peace within war. With the talk with Merlin that was so far off Merlin's depressed state from Salem.
Maybe Merlin was just easily satisfied. Yet... there was something else, still.

Was this how dream Merlin felt? After being killed so often? Was this how he lived? How could the man be so calm about it all? About the scars, the torture, everything?
Arthur stared in the mirror and wondered how Merlin had felt after losing Arthur so soon after they met.
Was he sad? Was he angry at how careless Arthur had been? Was he blaming himself for not protecting Arthur with magic? How was he feeling?
Did Merlin survive the next day? The day after that?
How often had he been shot in war? How many wars had he been fighting? And what for?

Arthur took a deep breath. He sat down beside the window and decided to watch the sunset.
How come that the sun rises even in war? Even after death? Did the sun never get tired of it? Of rising every morning and watching humans bleed on the earth?
How many stains did the earth already have? How many more would it gather? How many raids would Arthur lead in the future? How many wars would he fight?
There, between the front lines of that war he had been in, what had he been fighting for?
Arthur didn't even know what side he had been on. Whom he was meant to protect besides himself. Whom had he been supposed to shoot. What had he been doing there? Had the soldiers there known? Had they felt the same? Asked the same questions?
Had they even believed in the cause, if they put their weapons down, just to have one night of peace and silence? Sharing it with their enemies no less?

Arthur bridged his nose and closed his eyes. Seriously, how HAD he been able to sleep after that? Merlin's smile couldn't simply have been enough to calm him, could it?

How many wars had Merlin fought? Which sides had HE been on? He travelled between the countries, the kingdoms and leaders. Did he switch sides during war? How did he go on like that, if he had no place to truly call his home?
Why defend a place that you will see fall either way?
Dream Merlin would live to see the Apocalypse. He would see everything fall apart. Why engage with it? Why fight?

Arthur blinked away frustrated tears. Whenever he had fought for Camelot, he had seen it as a necessity. He had fought for the heart of Camelot. To protect the people and what was just.
What would Arthur do, if Camelot ever fell? If he ever lived long enough to see ashes where his home had been? What would he do, if it was taken from him?
Could Arthur ever stop fighting for it?
Could he expect of his people, of his knights, to fight that war for him?

Arthur didn't even flinch when Merlin crashed into the room like usual. "Rise and - you're up." Merlin came to a halt in the middle of the room.
Arthur wasn't dressed yet, but he didn't move a muscle either.