Chapter Text
It was a well-known fact to all who passed through Camelot that the heirs apparent to the throne were utterly, hopelessly enthralled by their respective servants.
It was a less accurate, but far more entertaining, rumor that the prince and his ward were secretly entangled themselves—or that their servants performed… additional duties best left to imagination and scandalized whispers.
What was not spoken of nearly enough—though it was widely suffered—was that nearly everyone who set foot in the castle found themselves just as disastrously afflicted.
Knights forgot their oaths mid-sentence. Visiting nobles developed sudden, urgent needs to take air in the courtyard. Servants discovered an unprecedented passion for “herb gathering,” “water fetching,” and, on one memorable occasion, “staring blankly into the middle distance until their soul returned to their body.”
It was even less widely known that Arthur and Morgana were painfully aware of their own inclinations—and, worse, each other’s.
They had, once, engaged in a brief and entirely unserious flirtation, back when such things were little more than games played by children with too much time and too few consequences. There was simply nothing there. The appearance of something suited them both quite well however as they snipped and snarled and laughed their way into adulthood together, comfortable in their quiet little nothing.
Many a late-night conversation had been spent over stolen small-beer, dissecting the shade of a knight’s eyes, the sound of a milkmaid’s laugh, or any other dangerously appealing feature the pair found themselves ill-equipped to endure alone.
Gwen, for instance—
—had been introduced to Arthur by way of a door kicked near off its hinges, a panicking noblewoman, and a breathless, warbling shriek best left to distressed songbirds.
"Arthur - she's HELP."
Arthur had, of course, dismissed the deeply offended manservant attempting to insist that Morgana return once he had dressed more completely (or at all). Morgana, meanwhile, had taken to pacing his chambers with the energy of a woman moments from either revelation or collapse.
Arthur tugged his pants up and began lacing them clumsily while he waited for her to calm enough to tell him the damn problem. He had moved on to searching a nearby chest when he realized she wouldn't without further prompting.
“Morgana—” Arthur began.
Morgana stopped pacing only long enough to press her hands flat to her face.
“She’s lovely.”
Arthur, who had been attempting to locate a shirt, paused not seeing the problem yet. “Who exactly are we discussing?"
“She’s kind, Arthur,” Morgana pressed on, lowering her hands only to gesture wildly. “And gentle, and she apologized when I stepped on her foot—”
Arthur sat down heavily to wrestle on the boots he could find before bothering with the still missing shirt. “That sounds unbearable, yes, but who is she?”
“She curtseyed,” Morgana said faintly. “At me. As though I were something worth curtseying to.”
Arthur glanced up eyebrow cocked incredulously. “You are.”
“Yes, but she meant it.”
Arthur stared at her.
Then he stood, crossed the room in three long strides, and caught her by the shoulders.
“Morgana,” he said in a calm tone reserved only for siblings being particularly stupid right before you planned to end them, “you have handled this sort of crisis before and you will do so again."
He gave her a small shake.
“Now—who is she?”
Morgana blinked at him, as though surfacing from deep water.
“My new maid,” she said.
Arthur waited.
“…Gwen. Guinevere,” Morgana clarified, correcting herself midsentence.
Arthur released her with a quiet exhale, scrubbing a hand over his face as he turned away.
On one hand, it was a relief Morgana knew the girl’s name—the “girl with the silver-thread apron” had been both impossible to identify and utterly maddening to discuss after sustaining Morgana for a fortnight based on a single conversation.
On the other hand -
“The blacksmith’s daughter. She had flowers in her hair—I don’t think she knew they were there. And then she—”
She was still rambling and lovestruck, Arthur braced himself to ask the expected question that would tell him what the plan was from here. “Then she…?”
Morgana made a small, strangled noise.
“She thanked me,” she said. “For choosing her. As though I had done something kind.”
Arthur frowned. “You did.”
“I chose the most qualified candidate,” Morgana snapped. “I didn’t even know her yet, and—that is not the point.”
Arthur finally unearthed a shirt from the chest and dragged it over his head, still not entirely convinced he was getting the full story.
She turned away, pacing again, narrowly avoiding walking into a chair.
“She stood so close while I was being dressed,” Morgana went on quickly, words tripping over themselves. “Close enough that I could have—”
She stopped.
Arthur narrowed his eyes, a maid and a noblewoman could not be seen to have such a relationship, it would ruin Morgana utterly. That sort of thing—if seen, if spoken of—would end badly, and quickly. “You could have what, exactly?”
Morgana froze, then very deliberately did not turn around.
“Anything,” she said.
Arthur stared at the back of her head.
“Morgana—”
“I didn’t!” she added, whirling on him, desperate to be believed. “Obviously. I am not completely without sense.”
“You just implied—”
“I implied nothing,” Morgana said, flushing furiously. “I merely—observed—the possibility of—circumstances.”
Arthur smiled, suddenly far less concerned than he had been a moment ago and decided to be an ass. “You considered kissing your maid.”
“I did not say that.”
“You didn’t have to.”
Morgana made a high, frustrated sound and pressed her hands to her face again.
"She looked at me,” Morgana said, as though this explained everything. “Directly. With eyes. I cannot be expected to survive that.”
Arthur, despite himself, was beginning to understand.
“…Ah,” he said.
“If she stands that close again,” Morgana went on, peeking at him through her fingers, “I may simply perish. Or commit a crime. I haven’t decided which.”
Arthur pushed himself off the table, pacing once in a short, restless line before turning back to her.
“Morgana, she is your maid,” Arthur said. “If you cannot handle having her near, then dismiss her.”
“I couldn’t!” Morgana said immediately. “She needs the position—and besides—” She faltered.
Arthur tilted his head. “And besides… you like her.”
“…I like her near me,” Morgana admitted, miserably. She dragged a hand down her face, as if bracing herself into something resembling sense. “So I will be kind to her. I will give her everything she asks for. I will make this the safest place in Camelot for her to stand.” A beat. “And I will still want things from her that I have no right to want.”
Arthur snorted. “You’ve known her all of five minutes.”
“And I have already decided to ruin her life,” Morgana said grimly. “You see my difficulty.”
Arthur threw his hands up. “Morgana.”
“Arthur, please,” Morgana shot back. “What was it you said about Sir Kalcin of Castille a few summers ago? That you would cheerfully die at his hand? This is the same.”
“…That was entirely different,” he said looking to the door and making a Princely Decision that they best leave before someone comes looking for them. "Come on. We're going hunting."
"Arthur, I hate hunting."
"You like falconry, you like the woods, and you need to get out of the castle. For this conversation, I’m going to need to kill something. I’ll grab the small-beer and tell the servants to prepare the animals. You get to go talk to Father about leaving the castle… unless you’d rather sneak out."
"Arthur, you are a worthy confidant and an utter bastard. I'll meet you at the stables."
They opened the door just as a beautiful maid's knuckles rapped lightly against it a shy smile on her face. Arthur only just registered Morgana lunging into his back with a strangled noise, burying her face in his shoulder as he blocked the doorway.
Oh.
Arthur supposed that Morgana could be forgiven for a smile like that. Guinevere, was it?
Then Gwen’s face went bright red, and he realized exactly what she was thinking.
Morgana stumbled forward, fingers tangled in her hair, while Arthur’s pants—clumsily tied in his rush—threatened to betray him. Behind them, his otherwise empty, unmade bedroom added the perfect backdrop for disaster.
They were the both utterly fucked.