The castle was asleep. But Gwaine wasn’t.

The knock came soft. Careful. Like someone who didn’t want to be heard — but needed to be answered.

Gwaine opened the door slowly. He already knew who it would be. He just didn’t know how undone he’d look.

Merlin stood there, hair mussed, cheeks flushed deep with heat, lips parted like he’d been biting them all the way up the stairs. His eyes flicked up once, then down, and the silence that followed was louder than words.

Gwaine leaned against the doorframe, gaze dragging over him, slow.

“Didn’t expect to see you.”

Merlin didn’t answer. But he didn’t leave, either. He hovered just outside, back straight, hands twitching like he didn’t know what to do with them. He looked—

—wrecked. Not broken. Not sad. Just wired tight with something he hadn’t dared name.

“Say something,” Gwaine said softly, the corners of his mouth curling just slightly. “Or come in.”

Merlin stepped forward like it cost him. Gwaine stepped back, and the door closed with a soft thud behind him.

Silence again. Merlin still hadn’t spoken. But Gwaine could hear everything — in the way his breathing shook, in the slight tremor of his hands, in the way his gaze kept catching on Gwaine’s mouth.

He was practically vibrating.

Gwaine didn’t crowd him. Didn’t touch him. Just watched him like he was reading something on the edge of being said.

“You’ve been pacing for hours, haven’t you?”

No answer.

“Thinking too much. Wanting too much.”

Still nothing. But Merlin’s jaw flexed.

Gwaine took a single step forward — slow, deliberate.

“You’re standing there like your skin’s too tight. Like one wrong breath and it’ll all come out.”

Merlin finally looked up — and this time, he didn’t look away.

Gwaine’s voice dropped even lower, the warmth of it sliding into something deeper.

“Say it. Or just show me.”