Check out The List of Destiny to see where we ranked all Merlin episodes so far and write in for our Lessons Learnt game by Sunday midnight, the week after the episode airs.
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In this episode we recommend some of our favourite Merlin fanfic set post The Diamond of the Day – Part 2. (and some others, because Michelle is bad at sticking to theme!)
Please remember to leave kudos and comments for anything you read and like. Fanfic writers are the backbone of fandom.
Check out The List of Destiny to see where we ranked all Merlin episodes so far and write in for our Lessons Learnt game by Sunday midnight, the week after the episode airs.
Visit Poetry & Chicken to delight in our listener’s creative output.
Warnings angst, dubious lots of stuff characters not making good decisions. 75.5K
Tony O does not befriend losers. Tony O is not gay, not crazy, he is not particularly nice and he is most definitely not royalty. Destiny disagrees.
Basically, this fic is the kind of madness you get when you mix reincarnation with denial, doubt, ust, the stupidity of awkward boys and the past in general. And trains! A lot of trains
Warnings for sexy times, war discussion, global disaster discussion 50735
King Arthur sleeps in Avalon, waiting to return at the hour of Albion’s greatest need. But once a year he awakes and spends a single day with Merlin, who will never, ever leave him.
The routine has been the same for centuries: Arthur begins a new life in wherever they are in time, he and Merlin meet, Merlin’s memory spell lifts, Arthur’s memories eventually flood back, the idiot has a chuckle at his expense, hugs him senseless and then cries for a bit when it hits him that Arthur’s really with him again. After that they pick up from where they left off until Arthur’s life in that time ends and it all starts again in his next life.
Except this time, when Merlin’s memory spell proves too strong to be lifted simply by their meeting, Arthur is forced to win Merlin over the hard way: with small-talk and dandelions.
Historical AU with magic. It’s 1913, the practice of homosexuality is unlawful, so is the practice of magic. When Arthur Pendragon and Merlin Emrys meet as Cambridge undergrads, they are both hungry for a real and true connection without secrets. For a short time they believe they may have found it. But war breaks out and separates them, and it seems unlikely that they will meet again. After all, what are the odds?
Sometimes, people seem to forget, in all this fighting for equal rights, that ‘gay couples’ are just ‘couples’. Merlin and Arthur, and a first-time hundreds of lives in the making.
Summary: The world remembered the legend. Merlin was beginning to forget the man. Thousands of years later, Merlin is still waiting, but he is beginning to wonder if Arthur will ever actually come back to him.
Post-finale reincarnation fic. Angst, but with a happy ending.
When Merlin Emrys is sent on a ’round-the-world assignment, he begins remembering a life of magic, dragons, and kings. To make matters worse, a strange woman starts stalking him along the way. And that’s before he even meets Arthur Pendragon, whose answer to climate change is going to save the world. Because apparently just saving Britain won’t be enough this time around.
NC17, 10000 words, Warning for mild consent issues inherent in prostitution written in a way that could be triggering
Merlin works in Camelot Massage Parlour, London. This is where Arthur finds him. | ‘Arthur’ chokes and flushes, as though they’re not standing in an erotic massage parlour, as though ‘Arthur’ doesn’t have a copy of Penthouse held loosely in one hand. “I’m hardly trying to pick you up, Merlin.” He chuckles a little bitterly. “Look, d’you really not know who I am?”
Reincarnation story set in 1940. In Albion’s hour of need Arthur is brought back from his rest in Avalon. He learns that the world is at war, and that the enemies have dark magic at their disposal. With the help of the mysterious Vril society the invaders are about to gain air superiority and become unstoppable. Only Merlin could fight the new magical threat, but Merlin has been missing for a long time.
Note: Written for this Kink Meme prompt: Arthur/Merlin, years into King Arthur’s reign. Merlin is immortal. As a result, he has stopped ageing physically ever since he came of age (or he simply ages at an incredibly slow rate)
Warnings: Character death , violence, swearing, 59,500
As Newton’s Third Law of Motion states: ‘For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction’. For years the world of ‘reality’ has pushed away the ideas and creatures of magic, forcing them back. Now magic has returned bringing with it chaos and nightmares and the only person who can reunite the worlds of reality and the supernatural is the Once and Future King. However, Destiny has lost its way and a small group of complete strangers (or so they think), guided by a mad woman, are left to search for the only weapon that might save them. But without their memories to help them they’re off the beaten track. Here there be dragons.
Merlin, in the wake of his breakup with Will, allows himself to be dragged off to the Midsummer Festival, an annual week-long SCA camping event run by the Barony of Camelot. Here he meets Arthur Pendragon, Prince of Albion –handsome, popular, and a complete prat. Merlin hates Arthur, Arthur hates Merlin; it is all perfectly simple, until it isn’t anymore.
16,368 Mature – Themes of depression, attempted suicide (historic)
Yet another autumn wanes and Merlin is tired. He wishes he could sleep through it, cover himself in leaves and hibernate until the world crumbles to dust, and he with it, the point of anything long since gone. And then, he finds a book whose author writes stories he doesn’t remember are his own.
This story features themes of depression and survivor guilt, experienced by Merlin at having lived through centuries as the last of his kind in every way. There is mention of an unsuccessful past suicide attempt. I have not warned for Major Character Death because Arthur’s canonical death is not directly written about or discussed, however, it is implied and assumed as known to have happened.
A Modern day Merlin AU set at the University of St Andrews, featuring teetotal kickboxers, secret wizards, magnificent bodyguards of various genders, irate fairies, imprisoned dragons, crumbling gothic architecture, arrogant princes, adorable engineering students, stolen gold, magical doorways, attempted assassination, drunken students, shaving foam fights, embarrassing mornings after, The Hammer Dance, duty, responsibility, friendship and true love…
Contains spoilers for 4×04.. A dragon egg can remain unhatched for a thousand years, but it takes many more for a dragon to grow. This is the story of Aithusa from birth to the dawn of Albion as the white dragon to guide Camelot towards its golden age.
Arthur was supposed to lie in wait for England’s moment of need, but it never came. It never will come. So instead, Merlin’s bringing him back for his own moment of need.
“Will he live?” Arthur asks, and curse the stupid tremble in his voice. Arthur’s lost men in battle before. Good men, honorable men, well before their time. But Merlin isn’t a knight, or a soldier. He’s… Merlin. Brainless, foolish, inept, devoted, kindhearted, courageous Merlin.
R, 3200 words, Slight angst that comes with immortality
For small creatures such as we, the vastness is bearable only through love. Or, four discoveries that shattered Merlin’s world and one that didn’t, not really, when he thought about it.
Join us for the Season 5 Round up, as we discuss all things Merlin Season 5.
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