madimpossibledreamer

            There’s visitors and a big banquet, and Merlin’s kept running around on his feet until he practically collapses with exhaustion, and it’s Morgana who notices what look like little fire trails in the garden.  She looks for Merlin but manages not to find him, and convinces herself it’s not real until she wakes, screaming, and runs to find him.  It’s lucky that Gaius is kept busy elsewhere, gathering herbs for one of the older knights who will be visiting, and she catches Merlin just as he crawls, sleepy-eyed, out of bed.  It lets her speak of her dream without having to try to hide anything from Gaius, who probably knows her better than even Uther, and as if by magic his eyes suddenly sharpen, all sleep forgotten, as he makes her the usual sleeping draught and listens to her story.
            It’s somewhat addicting to be listened to, for once, to not be ignored because she’s a woman or it’s just some silly dream, and from the look on Merlin’s face, sometimes, he agrees.  He wants to talk to someone about it all.  That look isn’t not here, now.  He’s all intense concentration, trying to figure out how to protect Arthur, and she earns a slightly distracted smile as she agrees to keep an eye open and see if she can spot anything else, especially about the visitors.  “If you can help in any other way, I’ll tell you,” he promises as he shoos her out, and true to his word, he does, and as usual the sorcerer is unmasked and there’s a chase across the city.  It’s exhilarating, and Merlin doesn’t complain about her carrying the sword, and he gives her a smile and a thumb’s up and ducks into an alleyway when they hear the guards coming so there are no awkward questions about why the two of them had been chasing a notorious sorcerer instead of all the knights of the kingdoms.
            From the displeased way Arthur narrows his eyes when Merlin joins them casually, he might not have been fooled, but no one else seems to suspect her newfound role in saving the kingdom, more than just the heroic, silly chase in a confining dress.  There’s even an (annoying) joke about making her a knight if she’d been born a different sex, but instead of imagining setting him alight Morgana manages to just roll her eyes instead.