Whoo, actually finished writing something again! Established Gwen/Merlin/Arthur, though mostly Merlin/Gwen and Merlin/Arthur, because they both focus on Merlin in this. ^^ Again, ffnet doesn't allow brackets in the title, hence the shortened version.

I don't own BBC's Merlin, I don't make any money with this.

In Which Everybody Hates Merlin's Neckerchief (Except When They Don't)

He's walking up the stairs with Arthur's breakfast tray when he almost bumps into Gwen, dressed in that low-cut purple dress of hers, and who's standing on the stairs for no apparent reason, which makes him think that maybe she must have been waiting for him there.

"Hi," he says, and smiles.

It's nice to see a friendly face before having to confront Arthur; the prince is definitely a morning person, unless he isn't, in a convoluted way; he's certainly energetic, anyway, which makes him twice as likely to hurl complaints and inhuman amounts of tasks at him; sometimes, the resulting arguments are fun, but often they aren't. Arthur doesn't know when to stop.

"Hi," says Gwen, and returns his smile in a decidedly forced way; she has that shifty look about her that Merlin remembers from the early days of her crush. "You're – going to see Arthur."

"Yep!" Merlin holds up his tray. "Can't expect the prince to fetch his own breakfast."

This time the answering smile is genuine, but Gwen's eyes still do this thing where they avoid his to then stare straight at him with a kind of bravado.

"Was there something you wanted?" Merlin decides to ask.

Gwen opens her mouth, closes it again, stares at a spot somewhere beneath his chin and intertwines her hands.

"Er, no. But, I like your scarf."

Merlin glances down at said object self-consciously.

"Thanks?" he tries; it is, after all, the same one he's been wearing the day before, and the day before that.

Gwen gives a nod.

"I don't think I've ever seen you without it. Except..."

The spontaneous smile seems genuine again and very bright, and Merlin smiles back.

"Sorry?" he says, uncertainly, though still smiling, because he felt there was something accusing in her tone.

Instead of contradicting him, Gwen gives him another nod, looking down. There's a silence.

"Er, I'll be going then," Merlin says uncertainly. "Arthur must be waiting."

"All right."

When Merlin looks back at her from the top of the stairs, she's still standing there, intertwining her hands, as if internally struggling with something. With a frown, he makes his way to the prince's chambers.

Arthur is up when he comes in, sitting on the bed, naked from the waist up, a sight that makes Merlin feel very welcome. Arthur, of course, ruins it when he takes one look at him, makes an affronted face and declares in a voice that suggest that this should have been obvious already:

"Merlin, you look ridiculous."

"What?" Merlin says, and looks down at himself in bewilderment; for being unwarranted, Arthur's insults are not usually this random.

"This thing," Arthur says, gesturing at him vaguely. "It makes you look like an idiot."

"What thing?" Merlin says, and walks to the table to put down the tray.

Arthur stands up and comes to sit in front of his breakfast, but in answer he only shakes his head at him in a despairing manner, and Merlin does suddenly have a thought.

"Do you mean my neckerchief?"

Arthur throws his arms up dramatically.

"Of course I mean your neckerchief!"

"But I'm always wearing that!" Merlin defends himself.

Arthur gives him a Look, and gestures with his hands "and it follows..."

"And you always, look ridiculous."

This is so weird, Merlin can't even bring up the will to be angry.

"Have you been talking to Gwen?" he asks. Because either there's something about his neckerchief today that he hasn't noticed yet, or this is a really weird coincidence.

"Not since yesterday," Arthur says, a little too quickly, and pouts down at his breakfast in a way Merlin would find endearing if he hadn't just been insulted. "Why," he adds, eager, and takes a piece of bread. "Did she tell you you look ridiculous?"

"I think I'll be going now," Merlin says firmly. He doesn't have to take this. Well, he kind of does, but there are limits. "Or do you want me to get you dressed?"

"No." Arthur gives him a decidedly friendlier, if asserting look. "I have to be somewhere this morning. Anyway," he adds, looking back down, "you'd probably mess it up."

Merlin slams the door on his way out.

It's only later in the afternoon that he finds out what those two strange scenes were about; he comes to Arthur's room after training, to find him there already, Gwen next to him who must have helped take off his armour; they seem to have been arguing, if the loud, indistinct voices and the way they're poised across of each other are any indication, but they stop talking when he comes in. He doesn't have time to wonder about that, because there's something else, something decidedly worrying: Arthur is holding the cloak of his stupid Camelot servant's garb in one hand, and in the process of weaving it emphatically when Merlin enters.

"I'm not wearing that again," he says pre-emptively, glad that Gwen is here: she's going to back him up on that one.

"Of course not," Gwen does indeed say.

"No," Arthur agrees, to Merlin's surprise, and makes a few steps in his direction. "But you're wearing the rest of it."

"I'm not wearing the hat."

Arthur actually pouts at him, but doesn't seem overly put off.

"All right, but you will wear –"

"Stop it," Gwen breaks in, and comes to stand next to Arthur; Merlin steps forwards as well, and they're almost touching now, all three of them; Merlin it tempted to do just that, but there's a danger still to be avoided. "We should just ask Merlin."

"Ask me what?"

Arthur heaves a sigh, and lets the cloak fall to the floor.

"This thing," he says, and hooks a finger under his neckerchief and drags; Merlin steps forward obediently, close enough to kiss.

"Thing?" Merlin repeats, and leans down to capture Arthur's lips with his, just for a moment, soft and warm and, uncharacteristically, yielding.

"We just thought," Gwen says from behind him, and then her lips are on his neck, right above the red scarf, and he can feel her breath tickling over his skin when she adds: "That maybe you could... not wear it, sometimes."

"Hm?" he asks, absently, and his lips ghost over Arthur's even as he speaks, and there's something delicious in that, in not kissing when they so easily could; but he's distracted from the closeness of Arthur's lips by Gwen gently sucking at the back of his neck, while one of her arms comes to embrace him.

"Stop wearing that stupid thing," Arthur clarifies, though his voice, a murmur grazing his lips, lacks in decidedness.

"Arthur!" Gwen snaps, briefly stopping her ministrations.

"What?" Arthur says, and makes a small step back and holds up his hands.

"Why do you suddenly hate my neckerchief?" Merlin asks, even as he reaches out to drag Arthur close by the shoulders again; the prince offers no resistance, rests an arm on his hip, above Gwen's arm..

"Suddenly?" he asks

"It – well." Gwen leans her forehead against his back for a moment; then, carefully, her hands are drawn away, and an instant later, she's loosening the knot of his scarf. "It hides your neck." The scarf is placed in front of his eyes. "May I?"

"Go ahead," Merlin says; he feels Gwen tugging faintly as she ties the blindfold. "It hides my neck?"

"It – stop that!" Arthur interrupts himself, when Merlin raises a hand to blindly grab at his face; then Arthur captures his wrist, and engulfs a finger in his mouth, sucking with dedication.

"It's just that we like your neck," Gwen completes, though Merlin would bet Arthur would have said something less friendly. "See anything?" she asks, letting her hands sink.

"M-m," Arthur makes, then lets go of his finger to say: "No, he doesn't."

The blindfold is indeed secure, and all Merlin can see is a vague redness amidst the darkness.

"Good." Merlin can hear the smile in Gwen's voice.

"Much better," Arthur agrees.

"Is that why you threw dirty water all over it last week?" Merlin asks, even as Gwen puts her hands on his shoulders and makes him turn slightly, in direction of the bed, then pushes gently; Merlin makes a few steps, holding out a hand, but Arthur must have moved out of the way.

He's beginning to suspect that there is something about Arthur and wanting to see him dripping wet, but in retrospective, the latest assault looks like it has been directed specifically against the neckerchief.

"It just looked like it needed washing," Arthur's voice comes from somewhere around the vicinity of the bed, less smug, Merlin guesses, than it would have been if Gwen wasn't here. "Mind the step."

Automatically, Merlin raises his foot higher with the next step, and stumbles when he meets no resistance of a higher ground. There are no steps in the middle of Arthur's chambers, he remembers belatedly. He raises his arms again angrily into the direction of Arthur's laughter. Gwen says nothing, but she makes him advance faster, so he almost trips over one of Arthur's boots – "Oh God, I'm so sorry, I didn't see that" –, and within instants he's close enough to hopefully poke Arthur's eyes out by accident.

Instead, in blindly flailing around, he finds Arthur's nose, and pinches it once – "hey!" Arthur says in a changed voice – then trails his fingers down to Arthur's mouth, and lets him suck in two fingers again. Gwen has let go of his shoulder, and with his free hand, Merlin grabs behind himself, until Gwen, by his side all the sudden, takes his searching hand into both of hers, raises it to her lips as well, and kisses his palm. There is a pause; Merlin wonders if they're once again looking at each other in that amazed, wondering way they still get, after two mouths into the relationship.

"Well, I like it," he says when it seems safe to break the spell, as Arthur has gone back to curling his tongue around his fingers; he's flattered, in a way, actually, but Arthur is a prat. "It doesn't hide that much of my neck anyway."

"Too much," Arthur mumbles indistinctly, even as Gwen says "well, if you don't want..." She lets go of his hand, and Merlin softly lets it trail down to her neck and her chest.

"You're weird," Merlin says, amused now, with a quick movement of his head into Arthur's direction, to make it clear that he doesn't mean Gwen; the latter lays a hand over his. "Where's the bed?"

"Right behind you," Arthur offers promptly, but Gwen tugs him forward; Merlin withdraws his fingers from Arthur's mouth, and when his knees bump against the bed, lets himself fall forwards; he climbs up completely and can feel something heavy fall unto the bed at his left – that'd be Arthur, jumping onto the thing like he shouldn't know best of all of them that it might break – then a softer shifting to his right, Gwen climbing up next to him.

An instant later, Arthur's hands are all over him, on his torso, pushing up his shirt, and then one of Gwen's hands as well, fingers intertwining with Arthur's; Merlin turns his head to the side, and the blindfold must have slipped, because over its red rim, he can faintly see Gwen, lying next to him and smiling.

She catches his eye.

"Can you see?"

He grins.

"Yeah, a little."

"Wait."

They sit up so she can fix it; for a moment he can see Arthur, who's sitting in front of him, cross-legged, and looking more dishevelled than is strictly logical, in his bright red shirt, or maybe it's still the post-training scruffiness; it's something about the hair; the prince smiles at him, and then his vision is once again engulfed in darkness as Gwen replaces the blindfold.

"Good?" she asks.

"How many fingers am I holding up?" Arthur adds.

Merlin rolls his eyes behind the blindfold.

"It's fine, I can't see."

And that's why he's completely taken by surprise when Arthur pounces on him, makes him fall backwards, his knees still bent, and half onto Gwen; his head bumps against her chest, which is nice, he has to admit; she leans backward, making the two of them fall further, while Arthur half-lies above him, and bends down to kiss his neck. Gwen lays a finger on Merlin's lips, circles them slowly, evading every attempt to capture it.

"Much better," Arthur says again; he must have looked at Gwen, because a moment later she's letting out a half-laugh half-snort. "You should wear it like that all the time."

He kisses him again. Merlin snorts half-heartedly.

"Yeah, because that would be practical."

"No-one would notice any difference, I'm sure," Arthur says, and adds. "Talk again."

"What?" Merlin asks, then bites down very faintly on Gwen's finger.

"Talk," Arthur repeats, and attaches his lips to his neck like he's planning to stay like that forever.

"Arthur is a prat," Merlin tries. "A royal – Ah!" he cries out, when in retaliation Arthur bites down on the sensitive skin of his neck, and not very gently; he buries a hand in Arthur hair, and tugs; Arthur holds on to his neck though, all soft lips and tongue again, which is nice. "Gwen?" Merlin asks, reaching up blindly, as her finger has disappeared.

"I – wait a moment."

She moves away from beneath him, so that he falls flat on his back – and he could swear Arthur's mouth doesn't lose contact for an instant; he feels her shuffling about on the bed behind him, and then suddenly her lips are above his, only weird – upside down, and their noses are kind of in the way. He kisses back as well as he can, even as he can sense her head bumping against Arthur's above him. Arthur makes an indistinct, unhappy sound, then retreats downwards, and pushes his legs apart, sitting between them. Merlin sighs contently against Gwen's lips.

The End

AN: As always, reviews would be greatly appreciated. ;)