Work Text:
There was one rule in Camelot that everyone knew but nobody actually knew was a rule, for how confusing that was. That rule was Merlin has magic but he is absolutely awful at hiding it so make up any excuse possible. Everybody in Camelot thought they were the only person who knew that Merlin had magic and each was dedicated in their own way to keeping him safe from detection and execution.
The flaw in that theory was that everyone actually knew about Merlin’s magic and so each accidentally managed to work against each other in giving Merlin an alibi for whatever magical act he had managed that day. Take a random boring report given by Prince Arthur and his closest knights – Sir Leon, Sir Lancelot, Sir Percival, Sir Elyan, and Sir Gwaine (the latter four were slightly on probation as knights owing to their commoner status but had been grudgingly allowed by the King) – to King Uther. They had gone against a travelling band of sorcerers/slavers who had only been defeated by Merlin (not very inconspicuously) using magic to kill them. Without Merlin, the Prince and the knights knew they would not be standing in front of the King.
Except they could not say that for the King would have Merlin executed for sorcery. So each, believing they were the only one who knew Merlin’s secret, gave a slightly differing report.
“There were only three of them.” Arthur.
“Six men each carrying a sword.” Leon at the same time.
“Yes, six men, thank you Sir Leon.” Arthur.
“Percy knocked one out.” Elyan.
“Two.” Percy.
“We fought them off.” Lancelot.
“Merlin was totally not anywhere near the action.” Arthur.
“Yeah, Merlin was definitely not close.” Gwaine, still hungover.
“He was tending to our horses.” Lancelot.
“He was hiding behind a tree.” Elyan at the same time.
“With the horses.” Lancelot.
“Yeah, hiding behind a tree with the horses.” Gwaine.
“Totally hiding behind a tree with the horses.” Arthur, nodding his head vehemently.
“Nowhere near us.” Elyan.
“Thank you, the bandits are defeated and that is all that matters. Return to your usual duties.” The King broke in, dismissing them all summarily.
That was a normal report. A mess of different stories that each would contradict themselves with and frantically agree with. It would be a problem if King Uther – the greatest hater of magic ever – did not also know of Merlin’s magic.
You see, King Uther did actually know of Merlin’s magic. He had found out after six months of Merlin being in Camelot – quite an average time really for people to work out Merlin’s secret (Lancelot found out within days while Arthur was the longest (sadly) at over a year) – and, after freaking out and seriously contemplating his execution, had decided that Merlin really was the most useless manservant ever but he would never do anything to harm Arthur. After observing Merlin for a few weeks he realised that not only would Merlin never harm Arthur, he was actively protecting him. Once that realisation was made, Uther decided to allow Merlin to live and aid Merlin in his staying hidden. Quite helpful really when the knights were hopeless at keeping Merlin’s secret.
Uther was probably the only person in Camelot that realised everyone knew. He might take a little vindictive pleasure in that fact. It was mind-numbingly boring being King of Camelot so he had to have some amusement.
Merlin had lived in Camelot for four years and had gained the undying loyalty of each and every member of Camelot, not that he knew that. The only people who did not like him were the councillors and members of the court who were loyal to Uther’s thinking and hated servants. Not even Merlin could get through to them. Each servant, knight, or townsperson had their own story behind them finding out about Merlin’s magic. Most of those involved one of two things – overhearing Gaius talking to Merlin about the latest magical threat to Camelot and how he had to stop it or actually seeing Merlin perform magic in various guises (whether that meant him using it to do his chores, heal someone covertly, or defeat a threat). After each had an existential crisis over Merlin being a sorcerer and how he couldn’t be evil but how could that be since he was a sorcerer, they came to the conclusion that Merlin wasn’t evil but that meant that not all sorcerers were evil, which meant magic wasn’t evil. Once that was over, they each silently swore to protect the small innocent bundle that was Merlin – even if it wasn’t from being caught as a sorcerer but from falling down the stairs while doing chores for the Prince.
Merlin was perhaps the most protected and loved person in Camelot.
Which meant that when there was a serious situation involving Merlin and his magic, then it caused absolute chaos, but not in the way that Merlin (or Gaius even) expected.
You see, there was another run of the mill banquet to commemorate the visit of one of Camelot’s further away major vassals who had not attended court in five years – in other words before Merlin ever arrived in Camelot. This lord was vehemently of Uther’s previous stance on magic – which, truth be told was still his stance on magic just he allowed that Merlin was an exception because of course he was – and had hated magic years before the Great Purge (it was because he had tried to learn magic but had failed unlike his elder brother who was a very good sorcerer and was so unfortunately caught up in the Purge). Therefore, it was the worst possible timing for Merlin to publicly deal with a magical threat.
Merlin was, as per usual, stood behind Arthur’s chair ready to serve whatever His Pratness wanted. To cope with the boredom, he was shooting significant looks at Gwen, who was behind Lady Morgana’s chair on the other side of Uther, practically having a full conversation through glances. The knights were all seated on one of the tables – Leon, Lancelot, Gwaine, Elyan, and Percy were all at the top of it closest to the dais – with Gaius at the other one with the councillors having an in depth discussion with Geoffrey on the classification of books in Geoffrey’s library. Arthur was smiling politely – read grimacing – at the vitriol coming out of the guest lord’s mouth, shooting occasional glances at Merlin to check how he was doing. Even Uther could not resist the occasional look at Merlin either, so cruel were the lord’s words.
The feast had been going on for a few hours at this point and Arthur was begging his father with his eyes to allow him to go sit with his knights. Morgana had a glazed look on her face as she slept with her eyes open. Merlin and Gwen were massaging their aching arms and hands, hurting from holding the pitchers of wine, and subtly flexing their feet which were begging them to be seated.
It was into this that the doors burst open. It was quite clever of this particular assassin, to wait until all the knights of Camelot were rather inebriated and their reaction times considerably dulled, as well as sneak in among the visiting lord’s servants. This assassin wished to kill the Pendragon’s (what else) in retaliation for Uther’s laws condemning his parents to death for sorcery when that had in fact done no such thing. The assassin had covertly learnt magic in order to finally achieve his revenge.
He was not subtle in his assassination. A fireball went hurtling towards the dais and Uther and Arthur. All at the high table, Merlin and Gwen included, flung themselves against the floor. Luckily the fireball had been thrown depending on them being seated, and so it went harmlessly over their heads.
By this time Leon, Lancelot, Elyan, Gwaine, and Percy had shot to their feet and were rushing towards the assassin. This must be explained by the fact that Gwaine was such an exceptional drinker that all who drank regularly with him – which was Leon, Lancelot, Elyan, and Percy along with Merlin and Arthur on a semi-regular basis – had their alcohol tolerances increased and so were definitely tipsy but not yet drunk even after hours of drinking at a feast, unlike the other knights who were absolutely hammered. They reached the assassin and proceeded to run him through – later they would argue over who dealt the fatal blow with Percy and Gwaine both insisting that it was them which would put them second in the ‘most assassins killed’ leader board behind Merlin.
Unfortunately, three things happened in quick succession. Arthur stood up with his sword ready to fight the evil sorcerer – ignoring that swords had never been particularly effective against sorcerers unless Merlin was involved. The assassin gave it one last effort and sent another fireball towards the dais, intent on killing Arthur. Leon’s sword dropped the assassin which meant the fireball – which would have sailed harmlessly over everyone’s head (except Arthur but Uther was already taking his legs out to force him to the floor) – instead went hurtling towards the underside of the table and the prone figures hiding behind it.
Merlin didn’t think. It may be said that Merlin rarely thought these things through. Which was a problem when one was the most powerful warlock in the world, was trying to hide that fact (extremely badly) from everyone, and was about to unthinkingly use magic in front of everyone. Arthur, afterwards, swore to train Merlin to actually think before doing anything but he knew it was a fruitless endeavour.
He reacted instantly and instinctively. Seeing the fireball come hurtling towards the dais – and himself so there was some self-preservation somewhere there – he threw out his hand, still laying on the floor, and created a barrier against which the fireball harmlessly dissipated.
Silence fell.
The general consensus was disbelief that Merlin’s self-preservation was so low. Then it was that he had just saved the lives of the royal family and visiting noble. Afterwards, it was how on earth they were going to be able to each come up with an excuse that would adequately protect Merlin’s life.
This realisation came over almost the entire hall at the same moment for they each spoke at once creating a huge cacophony of sound that led to no-ones excuses being heard individually. Except that each person heard that of the person next to them and hurried to tally their excuse with that one. Within seconds, the population of the feast had managed to create an utterly ridiculous excuse for what had just happened.
“Some sort of seeing agent.”
“In the fireball.”
“Not in the fireball, in the other spell the assassin did.”
“In the amulet around his neck.”
“Made us see things.”
“Spell on the pillars to stop magical attacks.”
“Which combined with the seeing agent.”
“Oh yes, combined with the seeing agent to stop the fireball.”
“There probably wasn’t even a fireball to begin with.”
“No, totally figment of our imagination.”
“We all dreamt up the same thing.”
“I’ve had enough drink to be seeing things.”
“Same here. Can’t count how much I’ve had.”
“Drinking too much in Camelot tends to lead to that.”
“Well, the assassin’s dead and we’re alive. That’s that. Drink anybody.”
Unfortunately for the well-meaning Camelotians – to be honest it was mainly the knights who were coming up with these reasons, you would think that since they had the most experience in creating lies they would be better at it, alas they were not – the visiting lord did not accept the, admittedly pathetic, reasons.
“SORCERER!!!” He shouted (screamed more like), pointing at Merlin as he did so.
“What? Sorcerer? Where?” Arthur made a thing about searching for a sorcerer before looking at Merlin, “Not Merlin. He can’t even fold my shirts properly. The worst manservant there ever was. If he had magic he’d probably have killed himself by stupidity with it by now.”
Kudos to Arthur for his reasoning which was the best one he had ever come up with. He always did work better under pressure.
“I demand that you arrest that sorcerer immediately Sire.” The lord continued, “I’ve never heard of such a thing, a sorcerer being the manservant to the Prince of Camelot. How much damage he could do!”
Uther, to everyone’s shock didn’t move. He had re-seated himself on his chair and was rubbing the bridge of his nose in despair.
“Sire!” The lord was insistent and starting to get agitated.
“I heard you the first time my lord.” Was all the reply that Uther gave, “Merlin, bring me more wine.”
Merlin gulped, sure now that he was going to be executed, but the servant training kicked in and he glanced down at the pitcher he had been holding before his drop to the floor.
“It’s empty Sire.” He was remarkably respectful but then again he had just performed magic in front of the entire court of Camelot.
“Then refill it.”
Merlin stood and took one step towards the servant’s door when Uther’s voice stopped him dead.
“There’s no point going out there or are you telling me that after everything you can do, you cannot refill a wine pitcher with your magic?”
Merlin did the sensible thing – for once – and fainted clean away.
There was dead silence in the hall after Uther’s very nonchalant declaration. Geoffrey had to help Gaius sit before he followed Merlin into unconscious and, in doing so, took the liberty of informing Gaius that if he had wanted to keep Merlin’s magic a secret then he would have been better to not talk about it – loudly – in the middle of Camelot. Most of Gaius’s neighbours agreed with this and finally worked out that everyone had known about it. The knights all groaned – whether that was from the realisation or the alcohol was never clear – at how oblivious they had all been and how much easier it would have been if they had just told each other. Morgana was hopeful that if Uther knew of Merlin’s magic – and he didn’t seem in a hurry to execute him – then perhaps he may allow her to survive despite the prophetic dreams and accidental magic she was experiencing. Arthur’s brain had stopped computing.
Only the visiting lord was able to speak – albeit in stammers – demanding to know that the meaning of this was. After all, magic was illegal in Camelot and here was the king of Camelot, who everyone knew hated magic, not immediately executing a known sorcerer.
“Merlin is such an idiot that he would not be able to harm Camelot – he’s ridiculously loyal to Arthur as it is. Anyway, he’s had four years to do something and I’ve watched him closely for three and I’ve seen no sign of him using magic for evil.” Uther said, “This does not mean that magic is accepted in Camelot. It is still illegal and anyone found practicing it will be executed. Apart from Merlin.”
The feast ended quickly after that with the knights decamping to the local tavern for some more drink and to inadvertently spread the word on Merlin’s magic being known. The visiting lord declined to stay another night and instead rode out immediately for his lands, with the threats of Uther ringing in his ears if he ever decided to go against Camelot. A few of the servants carried the still unconscious Merlin back to Gaius’s rooms and left him there, shaking their heads at his general Merlin-ness.
The next day was a strange one for everyone. Merlin, after waking up and having an existential crisis, found himself called before the King where he was told that he was not going to be executed but everyone would be watching him a lot closer and so anything he did that was even remotely hazardous to Camelot would be met with swift action. This meeting made him late for his duties to Arthur who insisted that Merlin waste no more time and simply do what he had missed with magic. The knights had him collecting the lost arrows and a few of them came up with the idea of Merlin throwing balls of light at them so they got better at dodging magical attacks.
Needless to say, with Merlin no longer needing to hide (however badly) his magic, it made defeating magical enemies a lot easier. It normally now involved whichever person was around noticing the enemy was using magic, them yelling Merlin’s name, and him knocking them out. Quick and simple and the knights and guards never missed the convoluted methods of pre-Revelation again. It got to the point that, when on trips with Arthur and the knights, if they were ambushed and simply couldn’t be bothered to deal with the bandits, they had Merlin deal with them instead. After a time, magical users (and bandits) learnt that Camelot had sanctioned the use of one sorcerer (warlock) against threats who was too powerful for them to stop. In the end, most of them simply gave up – many sorcerers secretly hoping that once Uther went and Arthur was the king, that the ban against magic would be lifted after seeing the good that Merlin did with it – and those that didn’t were swiftly dealt with.
Once Arthur became king he did relax the ban on magic. It was no longer illegal to simply practice it but there were strict laws governing what could be practiced and harsh penalties for those breaking them. Merlin was offered the position of Court Sorcerer (Warlock) but he refused, preferring simply to remain as Arthur’s manservant (that triggered a great rant from Arthur but secretly he was pleased that Merlin was staying where he was). Instead, Morgana became Court Sorceress and happily terrorised Merlin with that position.
The first rule of Camelot never changed, even to the end of Arthur’s reign. Protect Merlin was taught to all children and newcomers alike. Admittedly, the reason behind the rule had changed – it was no longer stop his magic being revealed by making up terrible excuses but make sure that he didn’t slip and break his neck being Merlin – but the spirit didn’t. And somehow, Merlin never found out about the rule.
He was an oblivious idiot after all.