MERLIN AND ARTHUR DO NOT GO TO WHITECASTLE.

Arthur drives, paper napkin map balanced on one thigh. Merlin contended the trustworthiness of this map, noting that Arthur was putting an absurd amount of faith into something that he could alternately read off of and wipe his nose with. Arthur didn't reply directly. "Get me a plastic bottle from the back."

Merlin turned in his seat, scanned a critical eye over the back seat. He could see the neck of a bottle there, half hidden under the remnants of a Chinese to-go carton and a crushed three-ring binder. The trick was unearthing the bottle without touching anything else that might be hiding in the carnage that was the back seat. He grabbed it quickly, wincing when he dislodged the carton, but relaxing when nothing crawled out of it.

He handed the bottle to Arthur. "You seriously need to clean out your backseat. Whatever that fuzzy thing used to be has formed its own society now. I'm worried that you'll pull up to my apartment someday and be completely taken over by it, like some crazy Cyberman made of mold."

Arthur closed his eyes briefly. The face that he made he loudly proclaimed was the one he made when he was asking the gods for patience, because Merlin had a way of using up all of it. "Do you think it's clean?"

"You should be asking me if I think anything in your car is clean, you'd be getting a very interesting answer right now." Arthur ignored him. "You're cleaning the bottle with our map…you're doing that just to bother me, aren't you? Prat."

"There was a monster like that on Primeval, now that I think about it."

"A Prat Monster? What, did it have your head pasted onto a little grabby body? Did it get drunk and call itself The King of the Britons?"

Arthur punches him, friendly-like, in the ribs. He pretends not to notice when Merlin coughs and grabs his side. "A mold monster, you dunce. It took over some bloke and ran around the sewers like a fungus-inspired Phantom of the Opera."

Merlin looks sideways at him. "I swear to God, you're making this shit up. No self-respecting script writer would use a mold-monster as a major plot piece."

Arthur shrugs.

They sit in blissful silence for as long as it takes for Arthur to demand something else. "You will find a piece of tin foil in the glove box."

"Okay." Merlin doesn't move, only blinks innocently at Arthur. He grins when Arthur scowls. "Oh, I'm sorry, was that supposed to mean: Merlin can you please get that bit of tin foil for me out of the glove box, in prat speak? I had assumed that you would actually ask me like a human being, not as if I were your serf or something. My mistake." He dives for the glove box before Arthur can take his hand off of the wheel and punch him again.

Arthur unrolls the small ball of foil, alternately using his mouth and one hand, for one terrifying second taking both hands off of the wheel. Merlin swore he saw his life flash before his eyes.

"Are you trying to MacGyver a death ray out of that crap or does it actually have a real-life purpose?"

"Real-life purpose? Merlin. These two objects should be sanctified, their purpose is so holy. Don't accuse them of making anything as secular as a Death Ray."

"Then what does it make?"

"I'd tell you, but then I'd have to kill you."

Merlin demands that they stop at a road-side stand so he can use the bathroom. Normally Arthur would argue, saying that he can deal with his undersized bladder until they get to the campsite, but just this once he agrees. While Merlin is in the loo, Arthur tries to figure out where they are (he's not lost. Really. He's not.) And simultaneously puts together what Merlin still refers to as the Death Ray.

He uses the cork screw attachment on his pocket knife to make pin-sized holes in the tin, and drapes it over the mouth of the bottle. Arthur can't trust the tin to stay on the bottle by sheer force of will, so he goes looking for tape. He finds a roll of duct-tape under the passenger seat. While he's connecting the two in an unholy union, he thinks about leaving the tape and a coil of rope in the trunk for Merlin to find. Maybe a couple of weights or a cinderblock for some added flair.

The next time they go on a trip, he decides, and hides the bottle-tape-tin conglomerate under his seat.

Merlin gets back to the car not even a minute after Arthur hides his experiment. "We all set?"

"Now that you're here, princess." Arthur replies without missing a beat.

"You'll be fine. Promise."

"That's what they told everyone while the Titanic was going down." Merlin shoots back. "And you know what? They weren't fine."

There's a pack of drunken people three rings deep around the campfire. Merlin wants to go closer, because twilight is coming and the amber light of the sun makes strange shadows in the branches of the trees, but he's afraid of being vomited on by an errant heiress. He laughs suddenly.

Arthur looks over, eyebrow raised. He had been scanning the crowd, hands on his hips. Merlin liked to pretend when he stood like that it meant he was getting ready to conquer foreign lands, dividing fire pit and keg bench into Merlin-friendly territories.

"Errant heiress." Merlin says and smiles.

Arthur smiles back, creases forming at the corners of his eyes. "Thinking of my sister, are we?"

"Always. And you can tell her that."

"Suck up."

"You're just jealous because she likes me more."

Arthur vanishes for a little while, disappearing when Merlin turns away to watch a cat fight unfold.

Merlin clutches a plastic cup as camouflage and edges around the outskirts of the party, trying to find his idiot.

He finds him later, leaning against a tree with Lancelot, sucking smoke out of his Death Ray. Arthur notices him and looks up; blocking the hole he burned into the side with his thumb, smiles unabashedly at Merlin.

"I'm slightly disappointed that it wasn't really a Death Ray."

"You would've have stopped me if I told you."

Merlin shrugs; put his fingers over Arthurs; somehow pleased that Arthur's fingers are warmer than his, and takes the bottle away from him. Arthur watches as Merlin's eyes fall shut when he breathes in, open again when he breathes out. "Maybe not."

Lancelot holds out his hand. "Greetings friend."

Merlin laughs at him, shakes the hand that's offered. "Should've known that you did drugs. Your attitude is far too nice to be natural."

Arthur watches over the two of them, slumped at the foot of a tall tree. He stares down anyone that comes too close, is too loud, stares too long. He finds a long stick and holds it like a sword.

They pass the bottle between the three of them. Merlin trades Lancelot the plastic cup for another of water. Arthur steals it from him, shamelessly. Merlin steals it back. "I'd be careful with that stick if I were you m'Lord. Poke someone's eye out, you will."

Lancelot chokes on the horrible contents of the plastic cup. "If Yoda were medieval." They all attempt to do several Yoda impersonations, each markedly worse from the last.

The world is strangely still when Merlin stands up, nearly falls over, and announces that's he off to go get another drink, would anyone care to join him? Lancelot offers his escort services under Arthur's steady stare, and they make their way to the keg bench.

What was once a boring walk from keg bench to fire to Arthur's tree is now full of mystery. The trail is full of interesting bumps and curves, ones that Merlin's feet take ample chance to investigate, tripping over nearly every single one. Lancelot maintains slightly better balance than him, but is still entranced when he sees and empty beer bottle glowing in the flame of a fire, amber light reflected through dusky green and amplified, making jade. Merlin had the sensation explained to him by Will once, who is far more adventurous than Merlin and will take every opportunity to tell him so: That it's like having someone else drive your body, while you are content to lounge in the back seat, watching the scenery go by like it's painted on rolling curtains. (A loud humming sound coming from the moon is optional, but not exactly favorable.)

Merlin makes it at last to the keg bench, and filters his way through half-empty bottles of assorted drinks. Lancelot is content to rest his hip on the bench and scan the proceedings. Merlin wondered if that trait, scan-and-watch-the-horizon, was one that Arthur specifically cultivated. He didn't know anyone other than Arthur himself and his friends that did it. Was it fun, perpetually looking like you were waiting to see the enemy hoard run over the horizon, or did it mean that he was just bored?

"Hey." Lancelot taps his elbow. "Someone's over there with Arthur."

Merlin turns, time moving like syrup, and see's her. In his current state he can't be an accurate judge, but the first thing he thinks is: She's beautiful. She glows in the firelight, taking all the heat and light that is offered to her and reflecting it back, like a miniature sun.

"What should we do?"

Merlin shrugs and looks away. Watching them talk is making him uncomfortable, he doesn't like the look of naked desire on both of their faces, and going over there would just make him feel worse. Suddenly, he wishes for a milk shake. Comfort food. He rests his hand on the table, knuckles coming into contact with something shockingly cold. He looks down, and there's a metal cup full to the brim of something that looks remarkably like a chocolate milk shake with a neon blue bendy straw coming out of it. He takes a sip. Screw Arthur, he decides, you don't need bros before hoes when god obviously adores you and grants you magical mystical milk shakes.

Lancelot looks over after a solid five minutes of quiet contemplation. He blinks at the cup Merlin is holding. "Where did you get that?" Anything else he was going to say is stalled in the face of supernatural drinks.

Merlin shrugs innocently. "Found it."

"On the table?" Lancelot finally realizes that the enemy hoards are not coming and scans the table instead. "…do they have strawberry?"

The shake gives Merlin enough strength to look at Arthur and his new friend again. They're sitting side-by-side at the base of the tree, staring into each others eyes. Merlin winces, gives his drink a good stir. Bit creepy, that. "If Morgana were here, she'd make me break the two of them up. She made me swear to ensure that Arthur didn't make any bastard children while I was around." Arthur and the new girl started to snog, enthusiastically. "…but I can't really stop him if he's set on it, can I?"

Lancelot frowns. He can't find any strawberry. "Morgana is Arthur's sister, correct?" Merlin nods. "Dead scary?" Merlin nods again. "Then perhaps you should do what she wants, no matter what Arthur may feel. Whatever she does to you will be far worse than anything he could do."

Merlin sighs, and puts down his drink. "I suppose you're right." He's off through the crowd before Lancelot can respond. Lancelot stands at the bench for a moment, completely at a loss for what to do, the only people he knows here just may be about to start a major row and he doesn't feel up to talking to anyone in his condition.

Someone on the opposite side of the bench gets his attention. "Oi, mate, is that yours?" And points.

Directly behind him is a shake. Strawberry. Lancelot nods and makes his escape, off to find a corner to hide with his prize.

Any distance you have to walk is suddenly magnified by five when you're high. Merlin figures that that's the only reason Arthur and his new friend aren't there when he makes it to the tree. The stick that Merlin started to secretly call Excalibur is left behind. He looks for them over the heads of the fire-people, wondering if maybe the girl convinced him to move closer to the fire. The taste of chocolate that lingers in his mouth turns sour. He makes a circuit of the camp, returns to the keg bench to see if he can recruit Lancelot to help him track down Arthur. He's vanished as well. Out of the corner of his eye he sees a flash of gold.

It dances between the small gaps in the branches of the nearby forest, fluttering from side to side like an exotic bird. As he watches the gap widens to a small opening, and he can see a pale hand, backlit by gold, grabbing an arm clothed in red.

The trees are so close together that however far away they may be is suddenly doubled. It will take him too long, he feels, to get to Arthur. Too long to wait for Arthur to come back. He has a bad feeling. Merlin bends down, grabs Excalibur, tests his grip. He pauses on the threshold of action, considering. The blended gold and red disappear completely. He follows, picking out the faint trail they left behind. No one notices that they left.

He says that maybe they should wait for Merlin and Lancelot. Won't they want to see the river too? She shushes him, says that they can come back for the other two later. She wants to show him the river first, make it special for just the two of them. She smiles. He thinks that she has a nice smile, maybe one of the best that he's ever seen. (Something in the back of his head says no. Not the best.) They keep walking, deeper into the forest even though complete darkness will be on them soon.

Merlin can't see anything. It's too dark and the trees make false-shadows, pointing him in the wrong direction. The high makes him a good bloodhound, turning his focus into a knife point, but there's only so much that he can do. He spins in a slow circle, trees making Rorschach blot shadows on the back of his eyelids, trying to find the trail that Arthur left behind.

His palm itches furiously, and he has to wipe it off on the fabric of his jeans, he switches Excalibur to the other hand. It gets so bad that he hisses; certain that it's no longer a physical issue and instead is a mental one, a sign of his impending mental breakdown. All because he can't find Arthur, because he doesn't own a cell phone, can't simply call him instead of holding a wild goose chase throughout the forest. Because the thought of him having sex with someone that is not him, not Merlin, is enough to make him so emotionally ill that it feels like his hand is about to fall off.

His hand-

-is glowing.

Blue light hangs between his fingers, entirely immune to gravity (he plays with it, moving his hand a number of ways because he's high and none of this is real and because he can) clinging to the skin of his palm like static. He grins suddenly, like a child, and holds his hand out in front of him. The light grows brighter, more defined, slithers between his fingers like a cat. This is how Harry Potter must've felt.

He finds the trail again and starts moving. Ten feet down the path he finds a swatch of fabric. Gold. His hand tightens around Excalibur.

Arthur likes it here. In the water. He thinks Merlin would like it too, if he ever got a chance to tell him about it. He floats on his back, looking up at the sky. Immediately he tries to name as many constellations as he can. He and Morgana used to have competitions, who could name the most in five minutes. She presses down on his forehead and he slides under, innocently.

Merlin is half certain that the forest is alive. The fact that he's more sober than high now lends credence to his argument. The trees keep moving, altering the path. He can hear them move behind him, the organic cry of roots being torn up, scrabbling to a new spot and climbing back down. He doesn't dare turn around, doesn't think he can handle it. The more sober he feels, the dimmer the light tracing his palm gets. He doesn't like the correlation.

But he will find Arthur. He has to.

He takes a step, ignoring the way the dark moves around him, and an entire line of trees moves out of the way like a double set of doors being opened.

The girl standing in the still river turns to stare at him. There's no light in the water, nothing to show him where Arthur might be. Suddenly more sober than he has ever been in his entire life, he swears that her eyes glow red. The glow in his hand sputters out completely.

He dives behind a fallen log. Lightning arcs over his head. River stones dig into his body, and there's a long cut on his arm. He wonders where it came from, detachedly. More lightning. Merlin hopes that's her only power. It ignites a tree behind him, adding threat of combustion to electrocution. He sees a glint of metal in a hollowed out space under the log, he reaches for it, because even if it's a bit of metal it's still something he can throw at her. A crunch of stone-on-stone. She followed him onto the shore.

The metal in his hand is familiar with a worn grip. He very nearly laughs when he pulls it out, because the entire time he was running through the forest he didn't notice when Excalibur the stick became Excalibur the sword.

"And you haven't been able to do the crazy light show since?"

Merlin shakes his head. "No. I figure I was only able to do it because I was so panicked in the first place. A kind of crazy wizard fight-or-flight response."

"Or maybe-" Arthur says as he rolls down the window, sticking his arm out to test the air. "It was because you were toasted."

Merlin looks at him so fast Arthur is surprised his neck doesn't crack. The car veers dangerously. Arthur calmly reminds him that Merlin is driving Mr. Pendragon's car, could he please not wreck it and put his eyes back on the fucking road?

Merlin tells Mr. Pendragon that Mr. Emrys is not taking any of his shit, especially considering that he just saved his life a couple weeks back and calmly adjusts course. "Are you saying that we were smoking mystical magic pot and that's the only reason I was able to do any of it?" Arthur nods. "Stop smoking crack. That is ridiculous. Just because you're teaching me to drive doesn't mean I have to listen to your conspiracy theories."

"Have you been able to work your mojo since?" Arthur says with a straight face and Merlin hates him for it, because no one should be able to say mojo with a straight face. Merlin shakes his head. "And have you been high since?" Abstinent silence. "And you just proved my crazy conspiracy theory, thank you."

Merlin scowls, rubbing at the old cut on his forearm. Arthur bats his arm away. "Keep thinking with your dick and I'm sure you'll give me plenty more chances to prove my theory right."

"I was enchanted." Arthur argues, "Magical roofies."

Merlin nods sarcastically. Maneuvers the car so the setting sun is directly behind him, like a halo. "Likely story." Arthur likes the light glinting off of his cheekbones, so sharp it could cut. There's a feeling of something in his chest, and he likes it.

"Mr. Pendragon thanks Mr. Emrys by the way, for not letting him die and all."

Merlin smiles, the force of it making his eyes shut but Arthur doesn't yell at him; ignores driving safety in favor of this. "Mr. Emrys would like to inform Mr. Pendragon that it was no trouble at all."

(Arthur wakes up, still sopping wet, in the passenger seat. He looks over blearily at Merlin, who is driving with a very satisfied look on his face. He wants to ask Merlin what he's doing, since when did he get his license, wasn't he still a communist the last time Arthur checked, all public transportation and three-speed bicycles? But sleep is more important. He's out before Merlin can even register that he woke up in the first place.

Excalibur lies across the back seat, buckled into place.)