Chapter Text
The transformation felt like diving headfirst into magic itself. While his human self had magic, his dragon self was magic. Magic was the fabric of the world and his being was woven into the tapestry of life itself.
Senses sharpened. Colours shifted. Everything was more. He could hear his humans' breathing quicken, he could smell them, little mammals carrying their fragile bodies' reactions in their scent like they carried their hearts on their sleeves.
His king's mate gasped as he lowered his head to her. She was more beautiful than any gemstone, she was his queen-friend-love-mistressnowandforever. “Amazing,” she said, full of awe, and rightfully so, for he was magic, and awe was his birthright. It flattered him, and he turned on the spot so she could admire his gleam-glisten-glow.
His scales rustled softly where his tail brushed against a wall, his claws were clicking on the stone tiles.
“Careful, Merlin,” his king said, his destiny-beloved-otherhalf.
The dragon-body was so big, not as big as his ancestors for he was still young, but as he had grown with his transformation, so had his urges. Every dragon has a hoard, and his were the golden king and queen of Camelot. He would guard-protect-keepsafe, put his hard shimmer-scales between their soft-flesh bodies and any enemies' steel-bite spikes, and he would tear their foes apart and drink their life-force-blood and from it grow even stronger.
That night, he was allowed to keep his treasure close, to guard it as it was his nature, curled up before the bed-nest when they went to sleep, his wings tucked in, tail winding around the bedpost.
But sleep did not come easily to them, too excited were they by the day's events. He opened one eye, then the other, and yawned. His head came to rest on the edge of their bed, eye to eye with his fair-precious-radiant Gwenhwyfar.
She raised her hand and touched the side of his jaw.
There was a sound grumbling deep in his throat the way the cats do it, and in their frames in the walls the see-through-glasses trembled.
He remembered the kiss she had given his human form once. A silly mating ritual for soft-lipped fleshy beings who didn't have the teeth to do it properly. But the human form had liked it.
And then, the human form was back. “Whoa,” Merlin said as he found himself half on the floor which suddenly felt rather uncomfortable, and half on the bed, which seemed more inviting. His vision adjusted, colours shifting back. Still, he was eye to eye with Gwen.
“Hello there,” she said, smiling.
Arthur had draped himself half over her such as to not miss anything that was going on.
“My lady,” Merlin said, “my lord.” He cleared his throat, the remnants of the dragon-language-magic stuck in there.
Gwen's hand was in his hair now, pulling him in.
Arthur rolled his eyes. “Will you just-” He reached to grab his arm. “Merlin, just get in the bed, now.”
Gwen's lips were as soft as he remembered, and this time he got to appreciate them fully. “Why didn't you tell us,” she asked gently once they interrupted their kiss.
“Don't know. But I didn't really lie about it either, did I.”
Arthur nestled closer and gave him a look that tried for stern but veered towards besotted. “You stared into nowhere like the idiot you are, probably thinking about dragon business, and told us you were communing with the ancestors.”
“I kind of was though.“ He tapped his forehead. “In a way they're all in there. The collective memory of our species.”
“That sounds useful.”
Merlin needed to bring the topic from mind things back to more physical things. “So, any scales left this time?”
Gwen immediately got the hint. “A thorough check might be in order,” she said, and her hands thoroughly checked.
Arthur, not wanting to be left out of the fun, double-checked, then hovered over Merlin. “Gaius knows, doesn't he? Or he wouldn't have come up with that nonsense excuse so quickly.”
“The first transformation tends to be involuntary. It happened in my sleep. I jumped up and got stuck in the doorway and he couldn't exactly miss that.”
Gwen chuckled. “Would've loved to see it.”
“It's not funny,” Merlin said, part of him finding it very funny, the dragon part enraged to have been so undignified. “Completely destroyed my bed.”
“Oh no,” she said in a tone that made Merlin's face feel very hot, “will you break this one too?”
“I can certainly try, my lady.”
She laughed at that, called him naughty, and triple-checked for scales. “How shall we feed you, you'll eat us out of house and home,” she murmured into the crook of Merlin's neck as she splayed her hands across his ribcage.
“It's just the transitioning period, I'll stop growing eventually.” Right now, he was feeling a different kind of hunger, and nibbled on her.
“Good.” Gwen gasped as Merlin's mouth wandered lower. “But don't stop that just now.”
Arthur was still hovering when Merlin came back up to flop down next to Gwen, eyes fixed on Merlin's, then darting down towards his mouth, and there was a sudden shyness between them. They had never kissed before. Merlin vowed to be gentle with him, and with a hand on the nape of his neck brought him down on himself.
The gentleness didn't last too long, for this was his love-devotion-onceandfuture-mate, the pen-y-ddraig, and he was his, and he flipped them over and pressed Arthur into the mattress, forwent any more of the silly-human-soft-lip-kisses and went straight to biting.
Luckily, Arthur was into it, and as Merlin told him how they were bonded, how he would claim him and keep-guard-love him forever, the words hot against the helpless tender skin of his unguarded throat, Arthur moaned and asked, “It's not really Greek, is it,” and Merlin realised he'd been switching back and forth again.
“No,” he muttered, “but I'll let you conjugate my verbs all night.”
“What,” Arthur laughed, “what does that even mean,” and then his laugh turned into a hiss and then another moan as Merlin resumed the biting and Gwen took over the kissing part.
A dragon's urge is to guard his treasure, a human's urges can manifest in many ways, and that night, fulfilling all of them, Merlin thought that of all men and dragons, he, for sure, must be the luckiest.