The reason SAS Captain Arthur Pendragon can't keep a communications specialist in Team Excalibur because none of them are good enough. And then Lieutenant Merlin Emrys gets assigned to his squad, and Arthur does everything he can to prove that Merlin isn't good enough, either. Except he is.

After pining for longer than he'd care to admit, Arthur asks Merlin out and gets more than he expected.

"King Taranis is dead."

Merlin meets Morgana Le Fay at a support group for People With Freaky Unnatural Powers. Alright, it’s not technically called that, but it might as well be.

"I left my key, and Gaius won't let me in."

Merlin looked her in the eye – rare enough, for the man who shares her husband’s bed – and told her he’d no idea what was coming, but that they had all better be more prepared than they were.

"I don't like to share." Arthur smirked at Cadwgan, who was settling himself heavily on a facing bench, just around the curve of the rough circle. Merlin flinched at that, forcing down his natural urge to protest that he was not Arthur's to share, regardless.

Or, How in his tenth year of rule King Arthur chose a man to take the role of Court's Magician, and how Arthur made his decision.

The page ignores the king—foolhardy, but brave and determined, dedicated, and Arthur makes a note of his appearance, to ensure he is rewarded—and goes straight to Arthur. He drops to his knees, and raises a hand. The ring is cold and heavy, and there is blood, smeared and dry, along the crest.

Arthur's yowl of pain was followed rapidly by an attempt to peel the soiled, Armani shirt away from his chest before it burned itself into his skin. "You…You idiot!" he roared, frantically checking his Excalibur to make sure it had miraculously survived the moron's bumbling thoughtlessness.

Arthur is an Oxford Blue. Merlin is an Oxford cox. Lancelot is Merlin's romantic-dalliance-loving friend. Morgana is horribly clever; Gwen is cleverly waiting for Lancelot to grow up. Merlin and Arthur rub each other the wrong way, at first, but it soon becomes clear that Arthur is a university-class rower with a world-class heart (yes, I typed that). Clichés ensue.

Arthur is a rich business man - Merlin is the down-on-his-luck hooker he picks up almost by accident one night. Things Happen Between Them - and not just the things Arthur paid for.

It's not that Arthur won't share his toys, just that he expects to get them back undamaged.

She isn’t exaggerating when she says that there have been rumors about her and Arthur since she was a child, but none of them have ever been true before.

The first time Lt Arthur Pendragon properly met A1C Merlin Emrys, he was doing push-ups on the floor of the Fort Campbell weather station.

There is a small lake near Camelot which will one day become quite a famous park, and the ducks living there will grow fat and canny off of the bread tossed to them by undercover operatives and ex-KGB agents during secret meetings.

Merlin was getting out of hand. Or rather, the people around Merlin were getting out of hand, and Arthur wondered how much his reputation as a benevolent king would suffer if he ended up decking everybody who dared to impose themselves on his -- well, Camelot's resident sorcerer.

Uther has faded, now, from the forefront of statesmanship, and though Camelot’s feasts and her knights are as worthy of envy and awe as ever, it is the promise of Uther’s leadership that has lost its shine — and the betrayal in that realization is an ache, a stone heavy and sickening in the pit of Arthur’s stomach.

Then that particular group of girls who always sit together—and out of all there's only one he thinks is hot but she never looks up at the right time—sitting next to Heineken, a broody kid who takes his skateboard to class, and whose real name is forever lost due to a supposed incident during first year introduction that involved a beer bottle, an unsavoury way of putting it to use and a partner too drunk to care.

King Arthur meets his new manservant, a 16-year-old boy named Merlin.

"Of course. Magical sheep. It scares me that that's not even the least believable magic threat to the kingdom you've ever suggested to me."

One time they get re-born as brothers.

Arthur and Morgana are Metropolitan police officers drawn into a strange case involving robbery of ancient artifacts. Merlin is a graduate student at Imperial College studying the healing plants of Ancient Britain under Gaius – or at least that's what he tells everyone. Soon they, along with Gwen, Lancelot and Uther, will be facing a battle for the future of the country. Can they defend the realm from those who would seek to destroy it?

Arthur grits his teeth and feels Lancelot's hands on his back. "I didn't save one to lose another!"

Merlin thinks his asthma should be downplayed somewhat, it's perfectly controlled (he has set alarms each morning and night to remind him to take his preventer inhaler) and it doesn't stop him doing normal, everyday things (if he's not too energetic or around irritants in the air). After years of his mother coddling him and being over protective about it, Merlin can't help but feel a little freer, fewer pity eyes looking at him when he's being held behind in the playground when the pollen levels are high. Whatever, Merlin thinks, he'll like to be rebellious just this once.

In which Lord Arthur Pendragon loses everything and gains a magician.

"I actually don't even know your name," Merlin replied.

They stared at each other solemnly for a second, and burst out laughing. Arthur couldn't stop, and kept thinking of all the silly angst and stupidity he had gone through during the past week, and all that time Merlin hadn't even known his name. He laughed and laughed and every time Merlin looked at him they started afresh.

"Oh shit, I'm so glad you're not offended, I was going to be so sneaky and try to figure it out some other way, but it kept not happening and then it was too late for me to ask," Merlin said, wiping his eyes. "I was going to steal your wallet--"

Merlin thought he knew what to expect from his life until he met a fortune-teller and then a dragon.

Merlin Emrys had strong convictions on the subjects of love and marriage—namely, that they should be avoided at all costs.