Warnings: Merlin's disposition, swear words, attempted murder, cross dragons, and lamp abuse. Eventual slash.

Chapter Three: Let the Record State He Did NOT Bloody Faint

To make a long story short, Merlin was not one for flying spells.

Let's be honest: the universe at least owed him a private jet or a suitably plus-sized winged beast by now, with all that 'Chosen by the Land' muck. But so far Kilgharrah hadn't been keen on the idea of existing just to ferry Merlin about (and the unsettling tendency of Merlin's imaginary dragon to become suspiciously realistic was rather the point of all this anyway) and Merlin had to get around somehow, so there you were. Flying spells.

May they all die a most fiery death.

Merlin, hovering above a nondescript tree in the middle of a nondescript forest, with little idea about how to get down (let alone get moving again), checked his watch and swore.

Since King Prat had made himself wretchedly scarce (and Merlin's last attempt to sneak into the filing office had resulted in a two-hour repentant conversation with a dour Gaius—not for the faint of heart), it was currently three in the morning. Tracking spells were about as time-efficient as using an abacus. At this rate, by the time Merlin bloody got this murder over with, he'd get no sleep tonight either. He suspected his biology marks would reflect that.

Resulting, of course, in another two-hour session of remonstrance with Gaius. Damn it to hell.

Why did King Prat have traipsing about in the middle of a sodding woods, anyway? Couldn't he just have a cozy flat in time? Or a convenient heart condition? For that matter, why couldn't Merlin have night vision, allowing him to traipse through the woods after prats, without sleepily tripping over things in the dark and killing himself?

"Perhaps," Merlin muttered aloud, drawing his jacket tighter around him as the bollocksing wind made his teeth chatter. "This is fate's way of telling me I shan't get away with this."

Naturally, this was when his flying spell abruptly remembered its purpose. The young warlock catapulted into the sky, train of thought quite forgotten.

And then he found why King Prat was in the woods at three o'clock in the morning.

"Typical," Merlin snarled. He was earthbound—brushing leaves out of his hair after the, ahem, interesting means of landing he'd, er, attempted—and staring upwards with the sort of expression one got when one realizes the word is a cold, lonely place where small children starve, human beings suffer, and the real tossers get to live in palaces, laughing at the plebians.

It had a moat. That was what really brought the injustice home.

King Prat Arthur Pendragon was on the third floor of, if not a castle, a passing imitation of one. Merlin, warlock extraordinaire was really trespassing with the intention of putting an end to all Kind Prat's pissantry.

"This is ridiculous," the warlock extraordinaire decided. The universe provided silent, sheepish agreement.

Well, Merlin had learned his lesson. The next time he tidied up after a sprinkler system, a sleeping spell would go over the school building first.

Merlin was good with sleeping spells. He honestly didn't know how good he was with murder spells. He might be completely rubbish. Perhaps he would embarrass himself and all this curse would do was give King Prat a sore toe.

Merlin shuffled his feet a bit, and told himself firmly that this option was not appealing. Mediocrity was never a good thing. Unless, of course, he'd been told to do something by someone else. Then it was necessity.

And now Merlin was going to stop thinking and get a move on. He had a test.

(In a class he paid no mind to.)

A test!

Merlin hunched his shoulders in case the wind had another go at him, and stepped into the moat. Merlin glided across the moat's inky surface hastily and once he was underneath the right window, Merlin's eyes bloomed over with light.

He coasted upwards like a bit of dust caught on an air current; reaching out to grab the prat's windowsill was a simple matter. There was a lock in his way. A twist of Merlin's fingers would be sufficient to make it unlock, to open the window wide enough for a skinny boy to wind his way inside. And then—

Bloody get on with it.

Shuddering (with the cold), Merlin opened the window and pushed the curtains aside. The soft material whispered across his skin like welcoming hands. Gentle. The warlock landed with a muffled clump on a carpet that felt deep enough to drown in, curtains fluttering at his back, and stared into the gloom.

It was unreasonably large for a bedroom (typical), but it did have a bed—which could have fit four people. Merlin scowled around the room, looking for Arthur. He saw trophies, posters stretched over the walls, flowers in a vase (which Merlin immediately knew had bugger all to do with Arthur) rugby equipment, an errant football. It was meticulously clean, but the belongings were strewn about in cluttered angles, like they were plotting rebellion. There was a certain, distinct smell that made Merlin instinctively decree, prat.

When he kicked it, would this room smell like anything at all?

From the sofa (really now; a sofa in a bedroom?) there came a rustling sound as a figure shuffled about under his covers—Arthur. Merlin froze in place. The prat turned his back to the window and burrowed under the sheets, grumbling another sleepy noise. Merlin's shaking hands balled into fists. The curtains billowed against his neck, ushering him forward.

I don't have to get any closer, Merlin thought desperately. I can do it from here. Just have to speak the words—

But his feet carried him until he was standing close enough to feel Arthur's warmth. Close enough to hear the steady, soft breathing.

In the corner of a room a vase began to rattle—Merlin squeezed his eyes shut. This was not the ideal moment for his subconscious to get chatty. None of that, he told himself firmly. Don't you understand what you'll lose if you don't keep Arthur quiet?

'Course. A mum who's never home. Kindly Druids who expect me to save the world once I finish exams. My only friend is a dragon that I made up—

Merlin glared viciously until the rugby ball rolling across the floor stopped moving. You've killed before, Merlin reminded himself, ignoring the way his chest tightened. One person in the ground. What's done once could be done again. Simple stuff.

I didn't want to kill before. And I don't want to kill now.

A picture frame to his left began to pirouette. Merlin refused to gratify its childish antics with a response.

The incantation was stuck in his throat like his mum's idea of a casserole, and another voice was pointing out, It's entirely your choice whether this bloke lives or not. Doesn't he deserve it? He's just a bully. Just some rich, entitled brat, and if anyone's ever deserved it, he does.

Tell the truth. Haven't you always hated Arth—no. Hated King Prat?

Merlin's lips parted.

And then three things happened at once, very fast.

The first was that Merlin saw a lamp's power cord dangling in front of his nose and thought, I didn't do that.

The second was that he heard a very loud crack and without further warning, pain radiated from the back of his skull.

And the third was that the figure dozing on the sofa jolted awake and let out a high-pitched, unmistakably feminine scream.

Merlin was unconscious before he hit the ground. When his vision deigned to return, it was full of exceedingly toothy smiles.

0o0o0

"Hell," he managed. His head felt like one big bruise. Kilgharrah's amused visage was moving about more than it ought to have done. "I'm asleep?"

"Unconscious, it seems." Kilgharah's grin widened. "It's good to see you, young warlock."

The feeling was very much not mutual.

Merlin groaned, and tried to lever himself into an upright position. It was more difficult than it should have been—and where was the lava? Why was he sitting on one of Kilgharrah's talons? Considering the way that they'd last parted, Merlin felt uncomfortable about this.

"Er," said Merlin.

"So you failed to kill the young Pendragon," Kilgharrah observed.

This earned Kilgharrah a dirty look. "Can't you just light me on fire?"

"The very thought," Kilgharrah replied breezily, as if he had conveniently forgotten the death threats. Merlin was not greatly reassured. For one thing, Kilgharrah looked smug beyond belief, and Merlin did not foresee anything that made Kilgharrah look that pleased ending well for him.

Merlin hazarded a guess, "You're not going to lecture me on the sanctity of life again, are you?"

This time the dragon chuckled, shaking the cavern walls. "Oh goodness no," Kilgharrah replied. "But I am going to take advantage of the fact that, having been knocked unconscious, you aren't going to be able to wake yourself up."

0o0o0

While Merlin discovered the consequences of making dragons cross with you, Arthur Pendragon was standing on his bedroom floor, eying the unconscious boy flopped on his carpet, and adjusting his grip on the lamp he'd grabbed from the bedside table. "Morgana?" He called, not taking his eyes off of his foe. "Are you alright?"

Morgana replied in the calm, collected way that made Arthur respect her so much.

"What in the bloody hell was that?!"

What indeed, thought Arthur. He hadn't gotten a good look until Morgana had turned the lights on, but there was no mistaking that face. Or those ears. "I think he climbed through the window," he declared.

Arthur suddenly found Morgana attached to his arm. "Is he dead?" She asked in a hushed whisper, resolutely refusing to be pried off.

Arthur rolled his eyes. "Of course he's not dead—I hit him with a lamp. All he's done is fainted."

Morgana's expression asserted that she did not appreciate Arthur's tone; she proceeded to stomp on his foot. All while clutching Arthur's bicep in a death grip. "We should call the police."

"No," Arthur replied, looking down at the intruder again. He'd managed to assume the extremely awkward pose of fresh roadkill before he fell. "No, I… know him."

Morgana's nose wrinkled. "A friend of yours?"

"No," Arthur replied, deciding that Cleaning Rag Boy was really too pathetic to merit the continued brandishing of the lamp. He tossed it on his bed. "He's the one that broke my nose."

"What?!"

Arthur didn't like just leaving him on the carpet. Perhaps he could just push him back out the window.

"You told Father it was a rugby accident!"

"And neither of you believed me," Arthur replied, prodding Cleaning Rag Boy with his foot.

"We should definitely call the police!"

"We're not calling the police," Arthur sighed. "I refuse to call the police. I barely touched him and he fainted. He's pathetic."

Morgana wrung her hands at him. "Well—" She froze, eyes widening like alarmed teacup saucers.

At their feet, Cleaning Rag Boy made a small noise of dismay, and his eyes cracked open. As his gaze made its way up from their ankles, Arthur raised an eyebrow. Morgana just looked petrified.

And Merlin wheezed, "I did NOT bloody faint."

A/N: Oh yeah. Lookit. You know how you all were mad at me for promising chapters and then failing to deliver? Let the record state that I, Feather Ice, have for the first time taken my writer's block, shoved my foot up its...

Yeah, never mind. Anyway. Look, chapter three! It had many incarnations, all of which sucked beyond belief. It is my earnest wish that this is of sufficiently not-horrific caliber that you do not wish to stone me and instead would like to encourage me to write more. However, if you think it's a lost cause, it's good to tell me that too. All critiques go towards the ultimate vanquishing of foul procrastination trolls. To make a long story short: hope you liked it! See ya later.