“Sherlock…what’re these?” John eyes the bouquet of flowers on the cluttered coffee table suspiciously.

Sherlock Holmes, spinning round in agitation at John’s interruption of his—whatever was he doing at their tiny kitchen counter, anyway?—replies, “Viola, a genus of the angiosperm family Violaceae. Obviously.”

“You could’ve just said that they’re violets,” retorts John irritably before taking a seat at his chair in the living room. After a long shift at the clinic, he wants nothing more than to curl up with the newspaper and just relax—

“Well?” Sherlock’s baritone cuts through John’s daydreams. He sighs.

“What?”

From behind him, John hears The click-click-click of Sherlock’s pristine shoes on the hardwood floor. The detective lifts his protective goggles to rest on his forehead. “Aren’t you going to ask me what they’re for?”

Flipping through the front-page headlines, John shrugs. “I assumed they’re a part of whatever strange concoction you’re making over there—by the by, if you make anything explode again, you’re paying Mrs. Hudson for the repairs.”

When he receives not a single snide remark in return, John looks up from the newspaper. Sherlock is gazing at him, blue eyes piercing, unwavering. “Sherlock? You okay?”

Sherlock moves to stand in front of John, his arms crossed. “I thought I made it relatively self-explanatory. They’re for you.”

“Well, what’s self-explanatory you to might be—what?” John sputters, standing abruptly, feeling a blush rise to his cheeks.

“I think I made myself clear.” There’s a hint of a smirk on Sherlock’s face, now; he’s reveling in the fact that he’s caught John completely off-guard.

Two can play that game.

John promptly reaches up, yanks the goggles off Sherlock’s head, throws them to the ground, and presses a firm kiss to the other man’s lips. “You don’t need to buy me flowers to prove anything to me, you daft git,” he murmurs after pulling away just enough that he can feel Sherlock’s quickened breath on his face.

“Isn’t that what one is supposed to do? To show affection?”

John smiles, running his hands up Sherlock’s chest to rest on his shoulders. “You just need to be you.”

No, John Watson doesn’t need flowers from Sherlock Holmes. But if every so often finds a violet tucked into the breast pocket of his clinic cloak, or beside his evening cup of tea, he certainly doesn’t complain.

You’re being creepy, Xander will say.

Willow will give him the disbelieving shifty-eyes when he says yeah, what the hell, he’ll order a pizza and watch the Niblet tonight.

And then the little lady herself, with the attitude only a Summers girl can muster, will cross her arms in front of her chest with a huff: You don’t need to watch me every second of every day, Spike. Geez.

No matter what anyone says, though, Spike stays.

It’s half past two in the morning, now, and Dawn fell asleep about an hour ago to a rerun of Goosebumps (“Buffy used to talk about how silly this show is. Totally inaccurate. Zombies don’t even look like that, do they, Spike?”). She’s curled up on the couch, and Spike stands a little ways off, his hands stuffed in his coat pockets.

Out of habit, he reaches for his cigarette lighter in one pocket, his pack of smokes in the other. He hesitates. Puts them away again.

Who would’ve thought? Ruthless William the Bloody, electing not to smoke in the house because it’s not good for the girl living in it. What the hell’s happened to him, anyway?

He knows the answer to that question already, whether he likes it or not.

Spike shuffles over to the corner of the room, snatching up a thick quilt, absently fidgeting with the fabric between his fingers. Gently, as not to disturb her, he places the blanket over Dawn’s sleeping frame.

He turns off the television, and the lights.

He could leave. Go back to his crypt. Smoke. Drink—vodka and blood and vodka …

Spike steps out into the chilly air, takes a seat on the front steps. Finally lights that cigarette.

No, he’s not going anywhere.

He made a promise to a lady.

I think I loved you when your hair
was seven shades of pastel colors
and your voice an exciting rarity
to my quiet, timid ears.

I think I loved you when your eyes
were innocent and all chocolate brown,
and your smile a manic, addictive high
that somehow quelled my fears.

I think I loved the way you talked
in pixelated promises of
plans in which we’d leave this old world behind,
together standing tall.

And while I loved all that appeared
before me in the bright star you are,
it took the telescope of time to see I
did not love you at all.

I think I loved my dreams of you,
that filled the waning gap between us.
Half of you was fabricated in my
longing and lonely head.

So—farewell to imagined things,
to your pretty portrait in my mind.
I hope you’ll perk up your faux ears, darling,
to my words left unsaid. 

JLT 2013

Summary: In which the last words Merlin said to Arthur before he died had been more than mere words, and maybe Arthur and Merlin’s reunion was meant to happen, but for the first time Destiny had absolutely nothing to do with it. But it appears Destiny wants its King back…
Author’s Notes: Here’s the third part of the series that began with the ficlet you all liked (“You Found Me”); it can be read independently of the other two, though! All you need to know is that Arthur’s been reincarnated and reunited with Merlin, and all the memories of his life in Camelot came back to him six months prior to the start of this story.
Word Count: 4803
Disclaimer: I own nothing except a broken heart caused by BBC Merlin.

It starts out with small, strange happenings—the kind that seem insignificant at the time, but hover in one’s mind just long enough to be tucked away for future nights lying awake thinking—like tiny ripples in an ocean that are almost invisible.

Arthur Pendragon will be walking down the office corridor when a passerby suddenly collides smack into him, pushing past with a disgruntled head-shake as if attempting to walk right through him.

Or he’ll be in the middle of pitching an idea to win over a potential client, and his father will look past him with a vacant expression in his fierce yet worn face before muttering, “ … Oh. Arthur? Were you saying something?”

And even something as simple as ordering lunch at the deli has become a problem lately, considering people have the audacity to cut right in front of him in the sandwich line. Arthur muses that if they knew he’d ruled over their land once, maybe they’d think twice.

But at the end of the day, Merlin is always waiting for him when he gets home, all but throwing his arms around Arthur’s neck and holding him close in a warmth that feels like home, and everything is all right again.

Until it isn’t.

Read More on my AO3 account (juxtapose)

this merlin oneshot i just finished is 10 pages long

why does fandom allow me to exist anymore

While we’re all still in mourning of our favorite retelling of Arthurian legend since Merlin ended on December 24th, I decided I’d add some fuel to the fire. Last semester, I took a course on Medieval Literature. I couldn’t help but think, looking back on the show (as I’ve had a lot of time to do since its conclusion), that the Merlin/Arthur dynamic very much reminded me of a poem I’d read in class, called “The Wanderer.” In this essay I will illustrate the various parallels I made between the speaker in this poem and Merlin as a character (both during the show and how I believe he might feel after Arthur’s inevitable death), as well as compare the Merlin/Arthur relationship to the lord/thane dynamic emphasized in “The Wanderer.” (Any current or aspiring medievalists who happen to stumble upon this little essay, feel free to correct or criticize me as needed. I’m mostly working off an anthology and old class notes! I should also mention, as Matt has pointed out to me, that Old English is such a, well, old language that words often have multiple meanings. I’m using the Crossley-Holland translation of “The Wanderer” and it does retain the same general feeling of the poem, though some words are not direct translations. Just a fact to keep in mind!)

SOME INTRODUCTORY FUN FACTS

So, if someone were to ask you the time period in which Merlin is set, you’d say, “the middle ages” or “medieval times.” Those answers aren’t wrong, especially because Merlin very much modernizes the legends we know and love, in the writing, setting and costuming, and a specific time frame for the setting of the show is never set. This is probably because the show took from a number of retellings of legend that span over hundreds of years—Arthurian legend comes from bits and pieces of different cultures and writing styles, whether you’re looking at Geoffrey of Monmouth’s tales, Tennyson’s poems, or French romances about Lancelot and Guinevere.

But for those of you who are interested in the facts behind the terminology, the history of the English language can be divided up into sections. First off, when you say “the middle ages”, you’re talking about a time period that spans over ten centuries. There’s the “Early,” “High” and “Late” middle ages, which can be defined by a lot of factors, but let’s just look at how the language was divided up for our purposes. There’s the Old English/Anglo Saxon period from around 500 to the Norman Conquest in 1066. From then until 1500 is known as the Middle English period, where we got poems like Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and where lots of Arthurian characters really thrived in literature. After that came Early Modern English and what we know as Modern English which we speak today (englishclub.com). With each period came various works of literature that reflected the social, political, and economical influences of the time; for the purposes of what we’re talking about here the important periods are the Old and Middle English periods.

The poem I’m about to discuss is written in Old English. Merlin’s spells are spoken in Old English. So when you say Merlin is a show about ‘medieval’ times, you can say specifically that it emphasizes the romantic aspects of the Middle English literary period while retaining some aspects of the Old English language, through the spells on the show! The more you know, right?

Read More

• NO YOU DON’T UNDERSTAND I’VE BEEN IN MERLIN FANDOM FOR THREE YEARS
• AND MY WRITING WAS MOSTLY REGARDED AS JUST ‘MEH’ WHICH IS UNDERSTANDABLE BECAUSE THERE ARE WRITERS OUT THERE LIKE FAYJAY AND JUNKSHOP-DISCO AND A LOT OF MY FRIENDS (LOOKING AT U CAITLIN)
• NO ONE HAS EVER STOPPED TO READ MY SUB-PAR PIECES OF CRAP
• I’M SO HAPPY

Summary: Merlin has found his Arthur again—but while his King’s spirit lay sleeping, things have changed. Not just in the surrounding world, but in Merlin, who’s had to watch it all go by.
Author’s Notes: Well, you all seemed to like the little fix-it reincarnation thing I wrote, so here’s its angsty sequel. Because if you know me, you know that angst is my specialty.
Disclaimer: I own nothing except a broken heart caused by BBC Merlin.

Give him time, Merlin. Be patient. You know how to be patient.

The clock mounted on the doorway in Merlin’s flat ticks deafeningly. Merlin sits across from Arthur at the kitchen table, the silence of almost-asked questions crammed between them.

For thousands of years, Merlin treaded a familiar worn path to what was once known as Avalon Lake, yearning to use his cracked and aching and tired voice to speak Arthur again.

And now, in a strange twist of irony that is certainly not lost on him, Merlin has no idea what to say.

And so it was that Merlin Emrys and Arthur Pendragon were reunited at last by means of spilt cocoa and a stained azure blouse. On a London street in the middle of winter, on what seemed to Merlin like any other day at its start, he found his King once more. Merlin, twining his hands through Arthur’s hair and peering into those very familiar and timeless blue eyes, had felt it was almost too good to be true. The expression on Arthur’s face—genuine shock combined with immense relief and unadulterated affection—seemed to reciprocate Merlin’s own feelings, and together they’d run off to escape the surrounding world and delve back into the one they’d built side by side so long ago.

<p>But as it’s turned out, the moments that have followed thus far have been inexplicably, unexpectedly awkward. He watches, carefully, as Arthur sits back in the creaky wooden chair, seemingly trying to sort out the memories flooding back to him.

Read More on my AO3 account (juxtapose)

It’s the twenty-first century.

Merlin’s walking down the busy street with a hot chocolate in his right hand (because how many flavors of coffee can you have these days, really; it’s just easier to order the simplest thing on the Starbucks menu, and Merlin remembers when all there ever was to drink was tea if you wanted something fancy, and once he drank some that was made of his own bathwater but that’s another story), and honestly, for all his super-strong magical senses and the alertness he wishes would accompany his young, spry appearance, he’s not paying much attention.

The world around him is the same as it has been for thousands of years. Merlin may change his face and the style of his clothes, but otherwise—it’s all the same.

A weighty, empty grayness forever clouds his vision, fills up all his senses until he feels as though he is drowning. It has done, since he watched the love of his life, his purpose, his great big Destiny, float away on Avalon waters.

It’s become more of a buzz in the background of his daily life, now, but watching the bright blue glow fade from Arthur’s eyes is something he dreams about even now.

Merlin and Loneliness are old friends.

So Merlin is not paying attention. He’s got a lot on his mind all the time—centuries’ worth of memories and reflections, and all the while he pushes past Londoners on their way to work or school. Awaiting their own destinies, whatever they might be.

Merlin’s still waiting on his … 

“Ow! Watch where you’re going! Ah, dammit, it’s all over my—”

And suddenly Merlin, the renowned Emrys, great and legendary sorcerer, finds himself plopped down on the sidewalk, his hot chocolate cup cast off to the side of the road, its contents splattered all over the light blue dress shirt of the extremely perturbed man peering over him.

Merlin doesn’t know how it happened. He really doesn’t. Maybe clumsiness is something you never grow out of, even after millenniums. Even now he’s always fumbling and, apparently, walking right into people. A certain someone would’ve called that sheer idiocy. Merlin himself just considers it part of his charm.

“Oi! What’re you just staring for? I was on my way to an important meeting—my father’s going to … “

That voice.

The man’s still shouting at him, but at the moment, Merlin can do nothing but watch and listen in awe.

It hits Merlin like a crashing wave, thunderous in his ears and coursing through his veins.

That voice. That voice. And, looking—really looking up at the man he’d bumped into, with golden-blonde hair and crooked teeth and an intense, piercing blue gaze, Merlin thinks, those eyes. Merlin sputters a little, attempting to stand but his legs suddenly feel as old as they are, rickety and rubbery.

This is it. This is him. This is everything.

“Are you deaf? Blind? Or just completely stupid?”

Slowly, Merlin finds the strength in him to stand, leans forward a little and places his hands on the man’s shoulders. “I’m sorry,” he says very seriously, before bursting into an uncontrollable grin.

The man rolls his eyes, shoves Merlin off him, runs a hand through his hair, but there’s an air of curiosity in the way he furrows his brow and stares at Merlin for a long moment. “…Step aside, you complete nutter, before I—”

“All right, all right.” Merlin raises his hands defensively. “You’ve had your fun yelling at me, my friend. I said I was sorry.”

The man blinks a few times incredulously. “Do I know you?”

Yes. “No.”

“Then sod off.” The man begins to walk away, but Merlin finishes, because he knows he has to: “I’m Merlin. And you’re an arrogant prat, but some things never change, my lord.” And Merlin lowers slightly into a bow, able to peer up just enough to watch the man abruptly halt in his tracks.

And Merlin can’t help but think that even now, in the morning grayness of the clouds, his King simply glows. “What … what did you call me just now?” The arrogance he’d displayed mere moments prior has been replaced with the tremor of a man who’s got memories on the tip of his brain that are coming over him like waves.

“Hello, Arthur.” Merlin’s crying, now, ignoring the flabbergasted stares of onlookers. Thousands of years, he’s waited. Only to find what he’s been searching for all this time, right outside an old Starbucks. “It is good to see you.”

The man—Arthur Pendragon, the Once and Future King, turns round completely, frozen in place for a fraction of a moment. He shakes his head a little before nodding slowly, confidently, as if everything in the twenty-odd years of his life has led up to this moment.

(Because it really has.)

In one fluid motion, Arthur strides toward Merlin, the widest grin on his face that Merlin thinks he’s ever seen.

“Merlin,” Arthur says, voice heavy and thick and beautifully familiar. He lightly clasps a hand behind the base of Merlin’s neck, the fingers of his other hand splayed across Merlin’s back. He leans in, gently, and their foreheads touch. They stay this way for a long while, as twenty-twelve happens around them but they don’t seem to notice, because right now, everything is red and gold and promises come alive.

Arthur takes Merlin’s hand, leading him down the busy street. “You owe me a new shirt, idiot.” It’s the first thing either of them have said for quite some time.

Merlin squeezes Arthur’s fingers. “As you wish, my King. Only if you buy me another hot cocoa. Do you realize how much these places charge nowadays?”

“Oh, for God’s sake, I’m not buying you a—”

“I could turn you into a toad. Right now, on this very sidewalk.”

“You wouldn’t.”

“Watch me.”

It is the twenty-first century. And for the first time since the days of old that can only be read about in storybooks, Merlin can stop looking. For the great Emrys’ destiny has found him.

-JLT 2012

i just

i’m really sorry merlin fandom

you probably thought i’d left you alone with my shitty writing ages ago

but i’m back again, just for now

i’m so sorry