Story Notes: Yeah. Basically, screw the people who thought ep. 3x05 would be a good idea. This is Arthur/Morgana and Gwen is quite miserable.

Merlin is property of the Beeb.

"Some people are just born to be Queen"

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"I cannot tell you I am sorry, my lady, because I have done no wrong."

"And I do not want your apology, though you did wrong the moment you made for the man you cannot have. You may well marry Arthur, Gwen, but know that you shall never have his heart or his love, for both have long since been in my keeping."

"You still believe Arthur loves you?"

"I know Arthur loves me, as he told me so each time he came to stay in my bed at night and each time he woke up beside me." Morgana's words are her parting blow to the servant girl who has tried to take her place in the Prince's heart, and they hit their mark. Morgana knows it will cut Gwen to think of the nights Arthur spent with her, curled around her body and murmuring his love until the light of dawn reminded them of reality.

"You were never meant to be his queen." Gwen's eyes shine with tears as she whispers her words, but Morgana can feel no remorse. She knows that soon, Arthur will have to take a wife and yet she knows it will not be her. Though it burns her inside to do it, she cannot help but think Gwen is right. She was never born to be Queen of a land where she will be hunted for being what she is.

"Perhaps. Indeed, Arthur must marry, and since he cannot marry me, he may settle for you." Her ice-blue eyes are contemptuous, because contempt shall retain her dignity while anguish cannot. "But never forget that I was his first choice. Always remember that I was the first and last one to have his heart, and I was the one he wanted above all others." Morgana's voice is cold, for she seeks to hurt Gwen because Gwen has hurt her, though she cannot let it show.

Gwen is not the one who is being driven out of Camelot for an accident of birth. Gwen is the one who will remain and take Morgana's place beside the King, despite her own accident of birth. Morgana has been born a lady, and she is made for Arthur in every way but one. Gwen has been born a servant girl, humble and lowly and a poor match for a Prince of Camelot. And yet it is the lady who must leave and the servant who will become Queen.

"Now this is farewell, Gwen, but I do not think it will be the last time we meet." And then the red of her hood covers her head and the long cloak billows behind her as she turns her back on her old servant. In doing so she turns her back on Camelot and her Prince, sat astride a black horse.

It is fifteen years before her scarlet robes reappear on Camelot's soil. Queen Guinevere has withered as the seasons passed, her face growing haggard from difficult years. Her life has never been kind to her, for even when she got her wish and married the Prince of Camelot, she did not find her happiness. Morgana's words, spoken like a curse some fifteen years ago, have never left her. Gwen has woken each morning alone in her bed, always reminded that she married a man who only chose her second. Just as the Lady Morgana had said, Gwen never found Arthur's heart. It was always a long way from Camelot, held in the white palm of his first and last.

Though Arthur is still youthful and strong in body, his spirit is not the same. After Morgana left him, he changed as the years went past. That golden gleam and confident swagger have disappeared and given way to a sadness which is always just under the surface. Guinevere gave him time to grieve his loss of Morgana, always hopeful that one day she would have the Prince's undivided attention, but when it is Morgana's name Arthur whispers as he burns with fever five years after she left, Gwen realises. She was never meant to be Arthur's queen. She was not born to be queen. She was always born to serve Arthur's queen.

She turns for comfort to Arthur's best knight; the man who had stirred her fifteen years ago and still stirs her now. For once she just seeks to be the first choice for someone, and she finds that with Lancelot. While Arthur's gaze is distant when it falls on her, Lancelot's is devoted. It is wrong of her to stray from the man she swore to love forever, but it was wrong of Arthur to marry her when he was retaining his heart for someone else. There is little right about their world, and so it is hardly surprising that Gwen's affair should come to light in humiliating force. Arthur finds her with Lancelot and her life, already cracked and strained, shatters completely.

Arthur has Lancelot exiled. He is still too good a man to have his old friend put to death, in spite of his betrayal. Or perhaps he cannot execute Lancelot when he knows he himself is the reason Guinevere strayed from him in the first place. He knows he has neglected her, knows that each time she told him he loved him he only turned a saddened gaze upon her and could not return her love. They are childless after their years of marriage, and Gwen sees that she will never be the mother of Camelot's next king. She cries when Arthur turns to her, because his eyes are not ignited with fury at being betrayed. They are bleak; they are just as bleak as they have been for fifteen years. He says nothing, but leaves her chambers in silence as Gwen falls to the stone floor, sobbing. He does not come to her again.

And of course, just as everything turns to dust around Queen Guinevere, she rides to Camelot. Gwen sees her from her window and it she wonders why it is no surprise to see her return, looking more like a queen than she herself ever did. She can only think it is fitting that, just as she ascended when Morgana fell from grace, Morgana returns at the height of her downfall. Her former mistress seems just as she was on the day she left all those years ago: swathed in brilliant red and as beautiful as ever she had been. Her dark hair is long and glossy, her eyes are every bit as blue and piercing. Her lips are full and red and they curve into a smile of triumph as she rides through the gates of Camelot on her fine white horse. Frozen in place by her window, Gwen thinks that perhaps Morgana is not just as she was when she left.

This Morgana is not quite the wrathful, bitter witch who exiled herself in hatred of Uther's tyranny. She is regal and poised and though her eyes and her smile still keep that mischievous element of danger very much alive, she looks on Camelot's castle with love. Uther has been dead and buried for a many seasons now, and perhaps he took Morgana's hatred with him. Arthur is King of Camelot, and just as Morgana had told him a long time ago, he is a better man than his father.

Arthur looks like he has seen a ghost when he sees her. He is stood on the stone steps in the courtyard, flanked by two of his knights, neither of whom has served long enough to remember this woman, but both of whom are able to see the effect she has on their king. He stands and stares with a face as pale as chalk and his sword frozen in his hand. Their eyes are locked and nobody dares move for a heartbeat, but then he stumbles down the steps, his sword clattering from his grasp, and Morgana smiles that smile at him from her perch on the horse.

"My Queen..." Gwen hears him murmur. Her heart twists, for he has never said those words to her in that way.

Who is she to speak one word of protest when Arthur reaches up to lift Morgana from the saddle? Gwen is Queen in name, but she is not Queen in Arthur's eyes. He sets Morgana on the ground; only to press her body against his and kiss her smiling mouth. Gwen watches as they entwine themselves in each other's grasp, both beautiful and dazzling in their robes of royal red. Gwen's tears fall unseen, and she lowers her head. She has no claim on Arthur's heart any more. She is sure now that she never did. She can only look on as the Lady Morgana takes her man back from her, and yet she still cannot turn from the open window.

At last, Morgana breaks the kiss and pulls back, her sky-blue eyes laughing and her face slightly flushed. She keeps her arms locked around Arthur's neck, and he holds her waist tightly. He has eyes only for her, and Gwen knows she is the furthest thing from his mind now. She thinks neither of them will remember her, but then Arthur pulls Morgana into a tight hug, her chin tilted up to rest on his shoulder. Her eyeline is cast up to the tower window and her blue stare locks onto Gwen's. Gwen freezes and holds her breath, waiting for the darkening glare of malicious hatred.

It does not come, though, and Morgana simply stares Gwen in the eyes for a long moment. The cruel triumph Gwen thinks she will find is not there. There is no apology either, but why should there be? Morgana is not sorry. She warned Gwen that Arthur's heart was hers many years ago, but Gwen married him anyway. She had believed those who told her Morgana was never meant to be Queen. But now, staring her in the eyes as she embraced Arthur, Gwen finally knows.

Morgana was always meant to be Arthur's queen.

o-o-o

Fin

Thank you for reading. Reviewers get my undying affection. :)