It begins in a kind of after-space, a time of quiet. The prince is much-healed; her lady's sleep, while never easy, is less violently troubled; Merlin's mother has grown well enough to return to Ealdor.

A time when their nights are once more their own, and neither Gwen nor Merlin sleep.

Rest should be nearer, with Arthur well, but the near-loss has left Gwen shivering deep. It's easier to turn her steps towards Gaius's chambers than her own bed, and so she does, with little thought and no ready pretense. On finding Merlin awake, Gwen stumbles a greeting, suddenly too nervous to truly look at him; when she does look, she stops mid-word and thinks, Of course. Of course Merlin shivers too.

He sits with his chin propped on his folded arms, and meets her eyes only briefly. His angles are too sharp, his skin pulled too thin and too pale. Gwen thinks Merlin hollow, at first; thinks she knows how he feels.

They speak little. There seems no strangeness in it. Gwen's seen so many small hours through in this room: when Merlin was poisoned and dying, when her father was killed, when it seemed Merlin's mother's life could be counted in rattled breaths. In her chair she sits tall, straight-backed. That has long been her way of holding together.

When the shadows are close and the candles burn low, Merlin shifts position. As he rolls his shoulders back, stretching slowly, Gwen catches sight of the bruise through the laces of his tunic. Even in this light, it's a brutal red-purple. She looks to his face, startled. "What ha -"

Gwen is accustomed to not receiving straight answers from Merlin. Sometimes she gets a joke, sometimes words that probably make perfect sense to him, but none to her, and sometimes nothing at all - usually then because he's run right out of the room, gone who knows where. But that's never stopped her from trying to find out whatever she wants to know. What stops her now, what gives her to change her question, is what she sees in Merlin's eyes.

He is nothing like hollow. He is, she thinks, so full of - of something that he is barely keeping himself in.

Gwen swallows, and says, "Have you medicine for that?"

"Some ointment," Merlin said, gesturing to Gaius's worktable. There's a stiffness to the way he moves his arm, and Gwen wonders just how deep and how wide that bruise spreads. "It stinks. I think Gaius did it to annoy me."

Gwen smiles, reflexive, even as she wonders. Merlin gives back a grin that's incredibly familiar - good humour, with a touch of relief that she seems content not to press further.

That first night, they stay awake until the sun streaks.

And so it works like this: when the night is too long in her quiet house, Gwen makes her way to Gaius's quarters. She only knocks once, and takes care to do so gently.

If the door swings open at her touch, she is welcome.

Gaius snores softly in his narrow bed. He always sleeps on his back. Merlin sits at the table. There are neither books or nor papers nor mortar and pestle in front of him, and she never knows what he is doing by candlelight. She would have asked, before.

He pours her a cup of wine, and they sit and she drinks until only tiredness is loud inside her, and the dark around is warm instead of cold. Then Merlin leads her to his bed, touching only her elbow; he leaves her there - she does not know where he goes - and she is always comfortable and always alone when the light breaks.

One night, the pattern changes; the door stands ajar. Gwen's fingernails bite into her palm. She could knock, she could peek around the door, she could go away.... She taps her knuckles against the wood, and is answered by a voice - Gaius, awake far later than he should be. On entering, she sees he is at his worktable. There is no sign of Merlin.

Gwen makes her apologies and tries to leave, but Gaius bids her join him. She crosses the room quickly, knowing that someone must be hurt or ill for the Court Physician to labor at this hour. "Is there something I can do to help?"

"No, child," Gaius says, and sighs. He is looking much more drawn these days, she thinks, the lines on his face scored deep. "There is nothing that you can do, and very little that I can."

"Then -"

"You are right; you should go. But please do not take that to mean you should not return another day. Or night." Gaius's smile curves small; the true warmth is in his eyes. "I thank the gods that Merlin has you."

"But he doesn't," Gwen says, and now, oh, now she's on fire. "Not - not have me - I mean -"

"Gwen," Gaius says, his rough old hand catching hers. "When you speak, he listens. And I am glad of it. Glad beyond the telling."

Gwen's fingers convulse in Gaius's once, tightly. She does not want to hear this. She does not want to think this. She does not want to believe that when Merlin asks things like, "If you had the power of life and death over Uther, would you kill him?" that he has actual need of her answer.

She does not want to acknowledge how little she is surprised.

This time, when Gwen makes to leave, it is Merlin's arrival that forestalls her. He comes rushing in with one shoulder leading, and Gwen wonders if that is something to watch for, that way he sometimes has of meeting the world at an angle of his choosing.

"Gaius, it's -" Merlin breaks off. "Gwen."

Gwen gives a silly little wave. She watches while Gaius and Merlin carry on a completely silent conversation, Gaius asking the questions, Merlin giving the answers. It ends when Gaius says, "Have you need of anything?"

Merlin shakes his head. "Nah. You should go to bed."

"Yes, thank you, Merlin," Gaius says drily. But he wishes them good evening, and retires to his cot. When he settles under his blankets, it is with a long, quiet sigh.

And once again, it is just Gwen and Merlin and the slow dark.

They take their places at the table; that does not change. Merlin is favoring his right hand, cradling it in his lap, where he probably thinks Gwen cannot see. She watches for a moment before saying, "Which jar?"

"Um." Merlin's eyes dart over to the bed; he must not want Gaius to know. "The amber one, on the second shelf."

Gwen retrieves the jar while Merlin rolls up his sleeve. At first he tries to apply the mixture himself, but what he succeeds in doing is getting brown smelly stuff everywhere. Gwen takes the jar away from him, and carefully tilts his wrist for a clear view. The skin is blistered but, strangely, not reddened. She grew up around burning metal, she knows what heat can do, and it seems that in front of her is only half of the experience, half of a story. The blisters spread from his palm to the tender places between his fingers, and she keeps her touch light, as much salve as possible between her fingers and what must be pain.

"Thanks," Merlin says, after a moment.

"Merlin," she starts to say, but then she doesn't know what she wants to say, so she just half-smiles. She gave this boy her father's sword. He gave the king a sword that could kill the dead.

That night, they both drink wine.

The energy that brought Merlin barrelling in does not last. He seems to fade, everything about him growing dimmer except his eyes, which in contrast seem fever-bright. When their cups are empty, they rise, and he stumbles. And so it is Gwen who steadies Merlin on the stairs, Gwen who gently leads him to his bed.

She does not leave. She sits in a chair by his side and when the things he mutters in his sleep sound strange and foreign, she does not let herself be frightened. Gwen does as she does for her lady: strokes a thumb over his cheek and a palm over his brow, and waits until morning.