Title: The Final Goodbye

Rating: PG

Summary: A Kink Me Merlin prompt: Arthur finds a goodbye letter from Merlin when he planned to run away with Freya.

Pairing: Arthur/Merlin, Freya/Merlin

Warnings: Nothing in particular, just slightly angsty

Spoilers: 209

Beta: None

Notes: The full prompt from kinkme_merlin, Meme #7: Freya/Merlin, Arthur/Merlin. Arthur finds a goodbye letter from Merlin when he planned to run away with Freya. He feels hurt, betrayed, confused. Either he keeps it to himself or he confronts Merlin about it. Smut as a resolution is always welcome, but I like angst too.

( The Final Goodbye )

Holy fuckaroni, this is my 20th fic in this fandom! And I've only been here 6 months! @_@ This fandom is EATING MY BRAIN!

So, to start with a technical side, I have been looking up the stuff in the commercial to see if they come from original legends. They do not.

Interestingly enough, though - while Medhir seems to be made up entirely, 'Idirsholas' could possibly have an Irish origin. Idir is a preposition meaning 'between', while 'sholas' means 'light', thought many phrases use it to mean 'life' as well. So, Idirsholas could possibly mean 'between lights', or at a stretch, 'between lives' - and maybe it's mean to mean both? I tried looking up Medhir, got nothing, and looked up 'me dhir' - me is a pronoun, but there is no dhir. Anyone have any clue, or is it just completely made up?

Also - anyone know if there's anything about undead knights or weird fires or whatever in Arthurian legend?

Anywho, Morgause is back, and all of Camelot is asleep - except Arthur and Merlin (and possibly Morgana). Merlin and Morgana are kinda easy - they're magic, so they're immune - and perhaps Arthur somehow fell under Merlin's protection, due to something involving proximity? A spell? Who knows.

Morgause seems to be willing to attack Morgana - or, those creepy knights aren't acting completely under Morgause's control. Hm...

Thoughts?

So, mostly, we see Morgana being persuaded to betray Uther and get the Druids that crystal which will help them defeat him.

1.) Does she know what they're planning with it?

2.) Her eyes - they flash gold. Nimueh, Cedric - their eyes went black when they did magic. Morgause's eyes, who is a deliberately ambiguous though antagonistic character, when red. Mordred's eyes were screwed shut the one time we saw him do magic. Morgana and Merlin's eyes both go gold when they do magic.

Just something to keep in mind.

And, a meta on Morgana:

Everyone's been complaining about her being too passive and missing the Season 1 Morgana.

That's exactly the point.

In the last season, everyone loved Morgana - the adult female audience loved her as a feminist, the kid females loved her as a role-model, and the kid-males thought she was kickass.

So it sucks that she's going to be evil.

Notice how every episode that she's more and more passive in, we hate her more? Now are we going to feel so bad about her turning evil?

Keep in mind, my friends. ^+^

ETA: I looked up "the witch's quickening", which go no response, so I looked up "quickening": it's described as a state of pregnancy where the child shows signs of life that the mother can feel, i.e. kicking. Think this matters?

Okay, so, I'm seeing a lot of love and a lot of hate for this episode, mostly on random levels of spaz. People with serious personal investment in the show hated the ep, people sitting back for comedy loved it. I've got issues with both.

And, I give up all together on the linear reviewing. Character by character is much easier. ^_^

( So, The Much Loved, er, Hated, um, Something Episode )

Title: Held By A Kiss

Rating: PG-13

Summary: Companion piece to my fic Rapture - Arthur's POV of the events. Arthur gets flogged for his kindness.

Pairing: Arthur/Merlin

Warnings: torture

Beta: Jusmine

Notes: What, you thought it was over? Shame, my friends, shame. ^_^

( Part 1 - Deliver Us From Evil )

( Part 2 - Held By A Kiss )

Title: A Sword and Some Stars

Rating: PG

Summary: A triple drabble about a pirates vs ninjas wedding in Reno. Need I say more? Slightly crackish.

Pairing: Arthur/Merlin

Warnings: Um...suggestive themes? Slightly crackish?

Beta: None

Notes: Written for lassroyale as a late birthday present. For her fic All Bets Off, I kinda fell in love with it and told her I was going to have to kidnap her and marry her in Reno. She said she'd go if it was a pirates vs ninjas wedding, and I gave her a sword and she gave me some shuriken, and then I got an LJ alert a few days ago saying her birthday was coming up, and then real life got in the way in the form of Honors Chemistry and an Algebra test, but then, lo and behold, here we are!

Word count exactly 300.

( A Sword and Some Stars )

Title: Black Friday

Rating: PG

Summary: Only Americans would have a holiday dedicated to shopping. They weren't even Yanks, and yet somehow Merlin still got dragged along for this. They were so going to pay for this...

Pairing: Arthur/Merlin, Gwen/Morgana

Warnings: None

Beta: None

Notes: Oh, come on, Americans - you know you wanted to. ;)

For Brits And Other Non-Yanks Who Don't Know What I'm Talking About: the day after Thanksgiving in America has always marked the start of Christmas shopping, and a time when revenue was almost guaranteed to be highly profitable for retailers. They nicknamed this Black Friday - for the color profits used to be labeled in, as opposed to the red of lost margins - and the consumer population caught onto this, and thought it was funny, and started shopping on this day more and more for lack of anything better to do. The stores caught onto this, and started making more deals on this day, which the people latched onto more, which made the companies more interested, and well...all this bouncing off each other has resulted in a holiday dedicated to shopping. It's one step away from getting government recognition, and if it helps give a little boost to the economy that many people are hoping for, then it probably will get government recognition.

Only in America will you get a holiday dedicated to consumerism on the day after a holiday created to celebrate the nation's original anti-materialists.

*eyeroll*

( Black Friday )

Okay, so, I actually don't have much to say about this trailer. Arthur's going to get enchanted over this Vivienne chick and nearly start a war over her. In the show, Gwen's jealous, and in fanon, Merlin's probably going to be jealous (though considering we can all universally accept he had some kind of love for Freya and was genuinely heartbroken over her, it should be interesting to see how this'll play out).

And many of us are, of course, excited to see Arthur stick a rose in his mouth and scale the freakin' wall to get to her window. He seems to keep doing that for the women he loves... :D

There are actually two things that strike me as interesting as Vivienne.

1.) Merlin's going to perform magic on her...and that means in front of her, in this case. She knows, and as a royal/high noble, she could get away with accusing Merlin of magic, and not suffer consequences of her own use as Merlin, a servant, can't really stand in a good position to accuse her of magic. Something's going to have to be done about this. But, she's a princess - if she mysteriously dies, there are going to be major repercussions, including a possible war with Camelot. This is going to get interesting...

2.) Her damn name. Seriously, Vivienne is normally Merlin's love interest - and the Lady of the fucking Lake. I'm sensing a severe disconnect here on the part of the writers, now.

Let's just wait and see, and hope the writers don't fuck it up royally (though I admit, from the trailer, I'm not holding out much hope, for once).

Okay, so, I only have a quick review, today, mostly in response to all the issues people have been raising over the episode. It all boils down to one key factor:

This episode was NOT about Merlin and Freya - it was about Merlin.

( Get Over It )

Bonus Trailer Dissection Here

Title: Snuggle

Rating: G

Summary: "Arthur blinked awake to the rather bizarre sight of Merlin dressed up as a giant teddy bear." In which there are teddy bears. And hot chocolate. And snuggling. Not necessarily in that order.

Pairing: Arthur/Merlin

Warnings: Um...gooey!fluff warning? IDEK

Beta: None

Notes: Inspired by this Pudsey!AU fic by eos_rose and the following comment from rotrude: Can I say that I adore you for writing this? Morgana being in the habit of filching Pudsey? Arthur making a teddy bear out of Merlin? I loooooove this. I want to print this and read it once a day. Thanks for sharing!!!!

Naturally, I couldn't resist. *headdesk*

( Snuggle )

Title: Second Star To The Right, Straight On 'Til Morning

Rating: PG-13

Summary: Modern!AU. Having little time left to live once the cancer wins, and in too much pain to do so, Merlin decides to end his life to get away from the pain. Arthur holds him in his last moments of life.

Pairing: Arthur/Merlin

Warnings: tear-jerker, euthanasia

Beta: None

Notes: Not much porn, but still from kinkme_merlin: Arthur/Merlin, Merlin has Cancer and only a small amount of time to live. In pain, he decides to end his life with an overdose of morphine. (You can get doctors to do thisin the UK, if the intention is to "free from pain" rather than "end life") With Arthur there the whole time, of course.

Also, a brief note on the terminology: euthanasia literally means ‘good death’. While the legality of euthanasia as a whole is still quite up in the air, the act of using morphine to end pain is legal in the UK.

ETA: to detail this issue, there is something called the principle of double effect which is used. If a doctor uses morphine to end a patient's pain, it's legal - even if it results in that person's death. So long as the intention was to end pain, not end life, the doctor will not be prosecuted for murder or assisted suicide. At best, it could be a malpractice suit, and this would involve the family or someone similar pressing charges - and if the patient had intended to die, then the family is usually in on it, so they're not going to. It's a legal loophole which isn't all that commonly used - especially as patients who are in conditions to warrant euthanasia are usually so close to death, anyway, that no one really looks too deeply into the matter - but it exists. It allows for euthanasia so long as no one calls it euthanasia (so people can feel good about themselves, the hypersadistic idiots) and so long as no one actually brings it up. Somewhere along the lines of all the other legal issues which are considered just and equal so long as no one actually mentions it.

( Second Star To The Right, Straight On 'Til Morning )

Title: Burning The Darkness

Rating: M/NC-17

Summary: Merlin left Ealdor for a reason. And that reason's back, in Camelot. Now he has to hide his past and save the prat, er, prince, while hiding the truth behind his fears. His growing magic isn't helping, either. Rating for later chapters.

Pairing: Merlin/Arthur

Warnings: blood play, burn/fire play, non-con, rape, dub-con, alcoholism, drunk-con, abuse...you get the idea.

Episode warnings: set after 113...so entire first season, basically...

Beta: Jusmine

Notes: Chapter title is a reference to the myth of the same name.

Master Post (Chapter Index)

Previous Chapter

( Chapter 02: The Scorpian and The Fox )

Title: Lineage, Chapter 1: A Season's Pass

Rating: PG-13 (for now)

Summary: Thanks to his magic, Merlin always knew he had a weird heritage that his mother did not liking talking about. What he didn't expect was to find out she was a princess of the kingdom of Dyfed - making him heir to the throne. This changed...everything.

Pairing: Arthur/Merlin

Warnings: mentions of violence, swearing, some explicit sex (all later chapters)

Episode warnings: Makes hints to all of Season 1 and some of Season 2

Beta: Jusmine

Notes: Be warned: there's an A/N of doom just under the cut!

Prologue

( Chapter 01: A Season's Pass )

Title: Ivory and Gold

Rating: NC-17

Summary: Just some more smut from kinkme_merlin. The prompt: "Arthur/Merlin. "Arthur will tremble at your voice, he will kneel at your feet!"". Warnings for dub-con, breathplay, and bondage.

Pairings: Arthur/Merlin

Warnings: dub-con, bondage, breathplay

Spoilers: S2

Beta: Jusmine

Notes: Please remember to comment!

( Ivory and Gold )

So, because it's 2am and I'm about 10,000 words behind on my NaNoWriMo fic, I've decided to further procrastinate by starting a discussion about Episode 208, based on the trailer!

Okay, I don't have a link to just the 208 trailer, so if anyone has one (like, the one from the end of the episode), it would be greatly appreciated.

My particular dissection/analysis/prediction/rambling of the trailer for Episode 208:

So, before we begin the trailer, I wanted to analyze who 'Morgause' is in the legends. She is often named as either Arthur's half-sister, or Morgana (in the form of Morgan Le Fay). Or, she is named as Igraine's sister (in which case, she is also usually named as Morgana's aunt). Now, in the trailer, she's somewhat young and could possibly be their sibling. but we've seen how little that can actually matter (especially when magic is involved). However, she know Arthur's mother, somehow, so I'd guess a friend, and possibly she is Arthur's aunt in this particular case. Somehow, she is very closely related to the family, one way or another. Maybe not by blood - Morgana is Arthur's sister by honor in this TV version of Arthurian legend, and Morgause being a close friend of Igraine's or her sister would certainly be a justifiable reason behind her knowing about Arthur's birth.

The other main thing to know about Morgause is that she is actually the original mother of the character Mordred. In fact, it is only when her character is ever combined with Morgan Le Fay's that Morgana becomes Mordred's mother. We already know that Morgana, while close to Mordred and having already taken on a nurturing role in relation to the boy, is not actually his mother. Do I think Morgause will turn out to be Mordred's mother in this series? Not likely. But, between this reference and the scene in the trailer with her standing at the altar of candles and the crystals, she is deeply involved with magic, somehow.

I'm hoping out that Morgause's character will be a remedy for the show's latest stream of feminism fails from 205 and 206, as Morgause is in chainmail and armor in the first scene we really see her, and she kills a guard using a sword, and it seems to hint at her going up against a knight in the arena, either in a tourney or as a challenge of some kind. As a side note, she is frequently also named as Morgan Le Fay's sister, so perhaps this common bond of feminism between the two will serve in its place.

The next episode will likely be very largely Arthur centric - or at the very least, we will see a dramatic development in Arthur's character. He's going to learn something about his mother, and he's going to go up against his father. On the note of his mother, we can see his loneliness concerning her, as he clearly wants to know all he can about her, and yet has likely run into a midieval equivalent of a firewall concerning her in his life so far. In that sense, he is like any other 'little boy' who just wants to be with his mummy. Flip side, something makes him go up against Uther and attempt to actually fight and/or kill the man. For the obvious reasons, we all suspect this is due to Arthur finding out about the circumstance of his birth. But, be careful - we've been duped before. :D (Though, yes, I admit I will firmly believe Arthur's going to find out about his birth, until I see something otherwise). And even if not, if what he finds out is going to make him go up against Uther, then it has to be BIG.

And, yay for Sir Leon! ^_^ Merlin's concern for Arthur is great, and I think his magic will get a bit of a development in this, too - the cracked old castle in the back ground seemed strangely familiar to a certain character-changing isle's set...:D His character will hopefully also get some attention as he apparently stops Arthur and Uther from killing each other (or at least trying to).

Now comes the hard part - waiting and seeing. :|

Thoughts? And, if any of you have any other (spoiler) material on the episode - interviews, photos, screen caps, sneak previews, ect. - feel free to post! (Though, do remember to include a spoiler warning in the subject line for it!)

ETA: Found two caches of promo pictures of the episode (which is apparently being called The Sins of the Father). I'd go into speculation, but like I said, it's 2am, and I'm going to be doing so much homework and NaNoWriMo writing tomorrow, so frankly, I NEED SLEEP. If I don't get swallowed up by the work the earth, I'll come back to speculate on them.

http://lhwo.hostrator.com/merlin/season2/promo/2008/promo1.htm (actual promo pics)

http://lhwo.hostrator.com/merlin/season2/promo/2014/promo2.htm (some behind-the-scenes stuff)

Title: The Quality of Mercy

Rating: PG-13

Summary: Uther starts to notice a few things about Arthur and his manservant. Which remind him a bit too much of a Queen and Sorceress from his own past for his comfort.

Pairing: Arthur/Merlin, Igraine/Uther, Igraine/Nimueh, Igraine/Nimueh/Uther

Warnings: threesomes, violence, swearing, sex, bit of general mindfuckery

Spoilers: Season 1

Beta: Jusmine

Notes: To be honest, this fic is actually just a single one-shot that only got split into four parts because it was too big. But, multiple parts across multiple dates it is, so...here is the master post for it!

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4