A/N: Thanks for all of your positive reviews guys, they've motivated me to continue with haste

Disclaimer: I don't own Merlin or it's affiliated characters, the BBC does.

No, no, no! Arthur screamed inside his head.

"ARTHUR PENDRAGON, What do you think you are doing? This…this…disgusting…act?" Uther's nostrils flared as he flew across the room towards the two naked, horror stricken boys.

"Guards, GUARDS!"

Arthur began to stand up, only to be slapped square across the face by his seething father, cheek stinking, and warm as he felt a careless trickle of blood flow down his face, mingling with the tears that soon followed.

The cold floor didn't seem as comforting as it had a few moments ago, instead the room was now filled with musky anger, fresh tears, blood and chaos.

Guards rushed into the room, and began to drag the prince's manservant away, fiercely and ruggedly. A desperate glance in his direction, into his blue eyes, wide with fear, as the guards dragged his exposed form to the dungeons.

That left Arthur alone in the room with his father, lying naked on the floor, looking up to the man helplessly, eyes wide with the same fear that had been present in Merlin's..

"Father, I can-" Arthur started, shakily.

"NO, you, you…disgrace! How could you Arthur? How could you do this to me? How will you live with yourself?" The King's booming voice filled his chambers, curling around Arthur, the disgust evident in his voice weighing down on him, pushing him further into the ground.

How could this be happening? It was a mistake, never meant to happen, a big, fucking, cataclysmic mistake…

Arthur sucked in a razor sharp and shaky breath; "It was…a mistake, father, i-"

"Do not call me that, I am no longer happy to call you my son, you, have shamed me too much." It was almost a whisper, but to Arthur's ears, it was the loudest thing that had ever been uttered to him.

I am no longer happy to call you my son

Uther's words drove a blade of pain deep into the bottom of Arthur's heart, into his very being, so sharp, it seemed to slice the will to argue right out of him, instead, he slumped onto the ground, and curled up into a protective position.

The young prince had never looked to vulnerable.
And he'd never felt so…much…bad.

MERLIN'S POV

The young warlock wanted to pretend that the fact that nothing felt real meant it was so. That he wasn't being dragged along the castles grounds, to the dungeons, naked, bloody, and numb.

Skin broke but he did not feel.

Tears formed but he did not cry.

He hadn't even wanted that, whatever that was…

He didn't realize that they'd reached the dungeons, until he was thrown carelessly into a dark, unlit cell at the very depths of the dungeon, landing hard and heavy upon the stone ground, discovering that all the strength in his body seemed to have left him, he didn't even think about what had happened.

Yet, his lips were still tingling, and he reached to touch them, placing his fingers where Arthur's own lips had been a few moments ago, and his lips flickered into what might have been a shadow of a smile.

Silent tears of regret formed a bloody soup beneath him, that he could do nothing but lay in, curling up into the fetal position, aching, bare and broken. Not even the buzz of his magic seemed to warm his blood now, instead, it rushed towards his aching fingertips, and filled them like concrete would fill a mold.

The sorcerer merely drew his stony fingers back up to his lips, and sighed and sobbed, his frail and mangled self creating its own earthquake inside his body, erupting from deep within him.

The Young Warlock had never looked so defeated.
And he had never felt so powerless.

***
ARTHUR'S POV

Days had passed; Arthur began to gather himself back up again, not daring to look a soul in the eye since that day. The whisper's that followed him seemed to haunt his very existence, taunting him, twisting around at his feet and nipping at his ankles, though he dared not retaliate.

"The boy is to be flogged, publically" His father had said, with a large, cruel grin.
Arthur tried to tell himself that he didn't care, that what he did was so, so wrong, and that Merlin had pushed him into it, indirectly, but it was his fault nonetheless.

He told himself that he held no feelings for the servant, yet he began to immediately shut down at the thought of him on his knees, hands bound, too clumsy to get up and run away, too broken to even want to. Large, angry welts oozing with betrayal forming on his back after every excruciating flick of the whip.

He imagined Gaius, frail and powerless, watching, in horror as the boy he'd come to know as his son was almost surely sentenced to a slow death via infection, that they physician would most likely not be allowed to treat.

The knights, who had come to know and love Merlin in their own way, watching with guarded expressions. Lancelot not being able to help shedding a tear or two for his old friend.

Gwain looking away with a twisted grimace plastered over his face, Percival, stoically looking down, eyes squeezed shut, not wanting to falter.

Elyan would be pulling Gwen into his shoulder, shielding away both of their faces from watching the pain being inflicted upon a man who had helped them in more ways than they could remember, more ways than they'd ever know.

Leon, good old Leon would be the one to carry out these acts, as a statement to the people. Leon would wear a veil to hide the deeply pained expression that one would most surely possess for quite some time after indirectly killing a good friend.

A good friend, clumsy, silly, happy Merlin.

What would they tell Hunith? Arthur's stomach sank at the thought, of intruding upon the small, friendly village of Ealdor, and having to tell his mother and everyone who grew up with him, surrounded by his light, his unyielding smile, and his massive ears. He imagined Hunith, breaking right in front of him, blaming him, looking up at him with those same blue eyes that Merlin possessed, as she sank to her knees, begging, why? Why is my son dead? Why didn't you protect him? He needed you, he always needed you, and you'll always need him, and it's YOUR FAULT that he's gone, he's all I had.

But he didn't care, and he couldn't. He was the crowned prince after all. He had been assaulted, as he told his father, and these were the consequences.

Yet with the knowledge of what was to happen the next morning, he lay in bed, dirty, hungry, and surrounded by a messy room that would not be clean for a while, and he cried.

MERLIN'S POV

It's my fault.He'd decided. He didn't know what was going to happen to him, and he was so, so scared.

A/N: Short chapter, I know. Prepare your little hearts for the flogging scene next chapter D: