Just The Way He Was

Title: Just the Way He Was.

Rating: R.

Word count: 645.

Pairings: Merlin/Arthur

Summary: Arthur contemplates the difficulties of being involved with Merlin.

Warnings: Nothing I can think of.

Beta:

tli! Thank you, Darling!Disclaimer: I don't own anything at all and I certainly don't make any money from writing this.

Link to this fic on AO3.

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Arthur never thought of himself as very complicated when it came to who graced his bed and in what manner. He had no specific desires, and since getting the mechanics of the act itself down somewhere in his teens he had always considered sex fairly simple. You got hungry, you ate. You got needy, you found a partner and sated that need. Considering also that he'd always had servants around for either of those tasks, he'd never had any reason to believe that they were anything but easily managed.

But when Merlin started sharing his bed, it stopped being simple. Everything just had to be complicated with Merlin. Arthur thought to himself sometimes that he really should have guessed earlier on, simply by how difficult Merlin was making his meals, that in bed it would be anything but easy.

Never had the Prince of Camelot had to go for so long without having his desires seen to and never had he had to work so hard for every single morsel of attention from the target of said desires. Not only had the so-called courtship of the lumbering idiot taken months – Yes! Months! - but when he'd finally got him into bed, Arthur had had to learn the hard way that things would only get more difficult.

Because Merlin was not going to be taken for granted. Ever. Arthur could yell, insult, beg or demand as much as he liked, Merlin never gave anything without a fight. Had it only been a decent manly sword fight, Arthur would have done away with any obstacles easily. But no, Merlin played mind games. Like their current tiff.

Arthur had been harsh to a servant earlier, which he thought was fair, since the empty-headed goose had managed to misplace his favorite shirt. As a result, Merlin had outright refused when Arthur had looked pointedly at the part of his mattress he'd intentionally left clear when he laid down on his bed. Not even asking out loud (horrific as it was) had produced any results and Arthur had had to go to sleep without even a good night kiss. Though he would never admit this to anyone - not even himself - he'd gotten pretty fond of those.

The next morning, Merlin was still completely unresponsive to Arthur's gestures of affections (AND his breakfast was late), and to make matters worse, it kept on all through the day. And the next one. And the one after that. When Arthur finally realised that his knights were taking turns to be in his line of sight at practise, to avoid being pummelled twice in one day, he admitted defeat and summoned the servant girl for an apology. He also made sure that she told Merlin about it by asking her to send him to the princely chambers after practice.

Needless to say he was very gratified by Merlin's change of mood when he did show up. As were half the castle's inhabitants. A grumpy prince was an unhappy prospect for all. Even the king himself had seemed to take notice, which mortified Arthur to no end.

This, however, was a regular occurrence in the life of prince and manservant and as much as it pained Arthur having to replay the same scenario over and over again, he couldn't really say he wanted to change anything. After all, the prickly, whiny, mother hen that was Merlin wouldn't tempt Arthur half as much if he ever stopped being any of those things. As much as he openly complained about the woes of having Merlin in his life, just as much did he secretly relish when Merlin finally did succumb to his (considerable, if he did say so himself) charms.

Because after all, an easy Merlin wouldn't be Merlin. And Arthur quite frankly preferred Merlin just the way he was.

End