The next morning was a bright and sunny one. Golden light streamed through the bedroom window of the Prince and his sorcerer, basking their bed in radiant hues of yeloow and amber. It was a cruel brightness that was starkly different to the sober tone of the man sitting visul inside, bent over the the prone form of his husband who was still inconscious on the bed. Arthur had linked their hands together and he whispered to Merlin, calling his name to tempt him back to the waking world.

"Merlin. Wake up. You have to wake up" whispered Arthur squeezing his husbands hand and blinking back the tear's that were threatening to seep down his tanned cheeks. Merlin finally stirred sligtly. His eyelids cracking open like the crust of the earth in the fire mountains that Uther had told Arthur tales of when he couldn't sleep as a child. Looking over at the blond prince of Camelot he was rocked into his senses quickly.

"Arthur!" he cried again and flung himself at the other man, sobbing into his neck as Arthur sat bemused but holding his husband close.

"You know it should be me who is the one who is supposed to be upset right?" Arthur said, holding Merlin away from him at arms length to look caringly into his face and brushing Merlins tears up with his hands. Merlin's eyes were wide and swimming with untold agony that broke Arthur's heart to see.

"What's wrong?" He asked in concern. He didn't like Merlin being so upset, it made him feel as though he had failed to keep him safe.

"You...you jumped!! You jumped out the window! And then there was a dragon, and you were gone, and-" Merlin was desperate and working himself into a panic as he relieved the moment.

"Whoa whoa Merlin, calm down. Tell me what happened." Arthur's voice was velvelty smooth to calm Merlin but it allowed for no argument as though he were soothing a skittish colt.

"I woke up last night, and you were gone! I saw you at the window in the moonlight, but to me it seemed you seemed to not be able to hear me when I spake your name –" Merlin started racing through his explanition his eyes fixed at a point ahead of him and not looking at Arthur in the face.

"...Merlin" Arthur tried to interrupt winding his hand around Merlin's wrist.

"-As I approached you, you lept into the window frame and though I cried out in terror, you threw yourself from the sill into the courtyard. I ran to the window and an enormous dragon appeared before me outside in the air, a terrible beast glittering with an internal flame." Merlin ratted on, paying his hubsand no attention.

"Merlin." Arthur's voice came sharper now, but still it fell short, like an arrow fired into a wind blowing against it. Merlin was shaking now as he spoke and Arthur could see glistnening tears threatening to form in his eyes once more.

"It took off into the air and disappeared, and when I looked down, my heart torn in two, to see your mangled body on the ground below, there was not a sight of you at all." Merline was finished, and he took a great gasping breaths, before finally turning his bue eyes to Arthur, their gaze searching, and worried, that Arthur could have been hurt, that there was something wrong and Merlin had no idea how to fix it.

"Merlin! You were dreaming. Clealry I am not a dragon. None of that happened, I'm right here, I told you I'd never leave you" Arthur said in soothing tones like he was talking to someone delusional, which he did think Merlin was being like. Merlin wanted to believe him, but he knew in his heart and in his magic that wasn't the case. He took a deep breathe.

"Arthur, I think your a dragon" there was silence as Arthur blinked at Merlin. He had not been expecting him to say that, if all things.

"Merlin I am not a dragon." He said. He wanted to laughter at the absurdity of the situation but he was a niggling worry that maybe this was a terrible side effect of the pregnant. Arthur had never known anyone be pregnant so he couldn't be sure. Sometimes Morgana acting trangely During her moon time, maybe this similar?

"You need to listen to me! Last night you turned into a dragon. I don't know how and I don't know why, but I think you've been curserd" Cursed. The sound of the faries warning echoed in his head 'We curse you!' But he hadn't noticed anything different, he can't have been cursed! Though he was tired often now...

"The faeries..." he started, speaking more to hisself than anything, before drifting off into a consued and stunned silence.

"Faries?! Arthur!" Merlin sherieked

"What faries? What did they do?" He demanded grabbing Arthurs arm roughly and stared at his face. Arthur frowned.

"When I went to gather the plant for your medicie, it was guarded by faeries. They permitted i take the plant but said they cursed me. I fainted then and when I came too nothing was wrong, so I just ingored it and came home." Arthur explained and shrugged. Until today he hadn't considered they had actually done anything, but that they had just hoped to scare him, not reckoning with him being Arthur Pendragon. He was not easily scared. Merlin sighed deeply and buried his head in his heads. His husband was an idiot.

"What did they say. tell me exactly" he said, summoning all the patience that could be mustered.

"Um. That because I was protecting you, they would excacerbate my protectiveness" explained Arthur; sheepishly.

"Arthur!" Merlin exclaimed, and punched Arthur lightly on the shoulder.

"What? I didn't want to worry you!" Arthur said and put his hands up defendsively. He looked deeply into Merlin's briggt cornflower eyes as he spoke trying to convey his love with just a look as well as with his words.

"Well I'm worried now! They turned you into a dragon! Your father will kill you! He sent you out to kill yourself!" ranted Merlin angry out of concern for his clotpole of a husband.

"Look, we'll go back to there and ask them to undo it. It can't be that hard we'll just apologise and explain the situation! We'll go tomorrow." He said authorititively and nodded firmly.

"Today Arthur!" Merlin yelled glaring at Aurthur.

"Ok ok! We'll go today! I'll tell my father we're going hunting or something. Let's get ready" Merlin glared and threw a pillow at his husband which hit him in the face.