I refuse to bend and think this is anything other than misdirection. Not Bae. Like you said – I expect Baelfire to be jaded by his father abandoning him for power, tormented and a variety of trust issues…
Honestly (and I’m going to have to go back and re-read Quinn’s bio) this sounds more like the Merlin I know. Highly intelligent. Does get credited for helping the ‘good’ guys through a lot of bad situations and can definitely be viewed as kind. But he is also capable of doing a lot of dark things as long as he felt they helped the greater good – for the kingdom. I’d kind of like to see Merlin coming off as an antagonist in ONCE- for awhile at least. 😀