Back where I almost died, I find that I’m weaker and stronger. My leg aches with a constant sharpness that pushing away physical sensations doesn’t mute. And if I send those away, that means distancing the touch of Callie too. I can’t bring myself to do so.
I let it hurt.
She asked me to move in together. On Earth. Her world, our place.
It’s hard to envision. It feels like a movie I heard demons discussing during their version of pop culture happy hour. But that doesn’t stop me from wanting it as badly as I want this pain gone. Possibly more.
The day is warmer than yesterday, the afternoon air thick and humid. I extend my powers around us, sealing us inside an envelope that should make us stick out less. Tourists turn in our direction, then away again, shaking their heads. Did they see something?
Being here is materially different this time. I concentrate to put my fetching finger on why that is, and realize how to describe the source of my discomfort. Harder to spot or not, there’s a palpable sense that we’re being watched. That eyes are on us.
And if they aren’t the eyes of the tourists around us, whose are they?
“Do you feel that?” Callie asks and, by turns, everyone nods, even Porsoth. He sails up to us with his scholar’s robes whirling around him.
“Not just me, then,” I say.
“Definitely not,” Sean says.
“There is something here.” Porsoth fusses with his collar. “Something uncanny. Eldritch.”
Saraya unsheathes her sword.
“Not yet,” Callie says, and Saraya doesn’t even bother to threaten her. Those two have gotten practically chummy overnight. “I didn’t think anyone actually used the word eldritch.”
“Only when horrors feel near,” Porsoth says. “Or when torturing Howard Phillips.”
Ugh, I hope we’re not about to discuss Lovecraft. Nothing creepier than that guy, even dead. No second chances forthcoming for him. I think of Agnes and wonder how she’s doing. She must be convinced we’ll fail, with Porsoth having abandoned Hell to come to us and a blood moon in the sky. Little does she know that—at this point—getting her a fresh start might be the easiest of our tasks.
Callie won’t give up on her. Or me. Which means we have to successfully do all of this.
And if we can’t, Sean better keep his promise to me.
Mag spins in a slow circle, taking the abbey ruins and lovely environs in. They give Jared a dazzling smile when they face him. He and his mother are goggling too.
“Yes, there’s something kind of creepy-feeling about this … But it’s all so beautiful,” Callie’s mother says. She seems almost shy as she explains to Vale. “I’ve never been out of the U.S. before.” A couple pass by us a few feet away, talking loudly about lunch. “There are British accents everywhere! It’s like we might see the TARDIS at any second.”
Vale, who I’d previously taken for constitutionally stern, smiles at her.
“I think we might see something a lot weirder than the TARDIS, Mom,” Callie says. “At least before this is over.” She puts her hands on her hips. Planning Callie is back in action. “Should we split up? I can’t believe I just suggested that, after all the yelling I’ve done at everyone who ever does on-screen … But should we?”
“No,” Saraya says. “Splitting up the party is always a bad idea.”
I don’t point out that she did it earlier when she sent her guardian squad in after Sean. And they ended up as our allies in result. Then again, that could be what she means.
She goes on. “We should keep close together. That way our defenses are at hand. At least until we find the Grail castle.”
I don’t want to be the bummer, but someone has to ask. “And how do we do that?”
That term worthy comes back to me yet again. If that’s the key that fits in the invisible lock, we’re in big trouble. I doubt anyone in charge of revealing this thing would count me as worthy in any sense of the word, soul or no soul.
“Shouldn’t it be our castle now?” Sean says. “If we’re the Fisher King twins? Can’t we demand it show itself?”
Callie tugs on her lip, thinking. “Yes. It should recognize you. Maybe. If that’s how this works?”
“Should we walk around calling for it like a dog?” I lift my voice a hair. “Here, castle castle castle…”
“What if it’s a metaphor?” Callie’s mother asks. “The castle?”
“How can a metaphor house the Grail?” Callie shakes her head. “Luke’s wound isn’t imaginary. It’s got to be some sort of real.”
Jared is nodding cool cool cool style. “Some sort of real. Sounds like a description of reality from a conspiracy theory handbook. Should we consult the internet?”
Mag pulls out their phone with a shrug. “Why not?” They tap in an unknown string of search terms.
Porsoth has been standing, stroking his beak-chin in that way he does when he’s deep in thought. “I am attempting to recall the commonalities in the stories of the knights. Usually, there was an encounter that led them to the discovery of the castle. Whether they knew what it was at the time or not.”
“An encounter.” That’s … spectacularly vague. As is the rest of his sentence.
Callie wears a frustrated frown. She’s swiveling to check out different directions, lifting her hand and squinting when needed. If she still had my powers, steam would probably be emerging from her ears in a steady stream.
“What if we split into two groups—so not a full split-up. One with Sean, the other with Luke,” Callie says. “One group can comb the grounds here, and the other can try the Chalice Well and White Springs shrine.”
“I already said no splitting up.” Saraya dismisses the idea. “Let’s start where we are. You can spread out a bit, but stay within my view.”
I don’t know what threats she thinks we’ll face here in idyllic Glastonbury that need her weaponry or Vale’s (or brother Sean’s—wait, I just got his priest costume joke, invoking our father). What things we might encounter that are worse than us. But those unseen eyes are still present.
Doing as she says, we separate slightly into pairs and threes and Porsoth on his own and begin to weave our way through the grounds, closer to the ruins. I cast my senses to their limits—both to insulate us and to detect anything unusual. Other than the prickly unseen stares, I don’t.
Mag and Jared disappear inside the walls of the ruins we visited before, but … “Let’s avoid going over there,” I say.
Callie takes my hand. “I just realized I never wanted to see this place again either.” She’s quiet for a moment as we loop wide around the side. “Luke … you aren’t keeping any more secrets, are you? You’re planning to fight this? To not let your father win, right?”
Each question slices through me with the ease of a holy blade. She senses that I’m not convinced we’ll get through this. That I’m not convinced I will. She’s the most perceptive soul I’ve ever met.
Worse, I don’t know that I can answer truthfully. The answers might not exist yet.
“Would I do something that stupid?” I ask.
“Like disappoint your father?” she asks. “I hope so. He doesn’t own you. No one does.”
I hear not even me, and want to disagree. I’m yours.
“Someone should tell him that,” I say.
“Luke…” she says, a warning.
“I promise I’m trying,” I say, “to beat this.” Beat him. I’m not sure it’s possible. He’s the king of Hell. I don’t want to be like him.
My wound sings and shrieks, reminding me that it’s trying to have its way with me. Figures I’d make the hottest possible date and stumble into a legend instead.
“If you do decide to do something stupid, please tell me first.” Callie sniffs. “I can talk you out of it.”
We round the last set of lower stone ruins in front of us, and come into an open green. Why couldn’t Sean have decided to climb these puny walls earlier? There’s a brown historical marker ahead. Callie stops and points.
“There,” she says. “Let’s go read it.”
That’s my girl. Better plans through reading.
We speed up to get there first. The rest of the group trails along behind us, some faster, some slower. In a few steps, Saraya strides even with us. “Is that important?” she asks, nodding ahead.
“I’m not sure,” Callie says. “But maybe.”
We approach it, getting up close and personal. The grass here has a grave-shaped rectangle of stone setting some of it apart, but the marker confirms that no bodies rest within it. A spray of yellow flowers is positioned against the bottom of the sign telling the story of what happened to King Arthur and Guinevere’s supposed resting place. The official story goes their bodies were originally found on the grounds in 1191, and then were moved in 1278 to a more permanent black marble tomb with another king and queen—alive—watching. When the abbey dissolved in 1539, the tomb went the way of extinction. Not even ruins left.
“I bet they were pissed off, being moved around so much,” I observe.
“And then basically disinterred for good,” Callie says. She gives me a sly glance through her lashes. “Remember the first tomb we entered together?”
The site of our first kiss? Yes. I remember. “Burned in my brain. You want to be buried in pajamas.”
“Or a ball gown,” she says.
“Really?” I raise my brows. “When did that change happen?”
“I’m keeping my options open.”
“Ugh,” Saraya says. “Stop it. You’re embarrassing.”
Callie and I exchange another glance.
Sean has joined us and skims the text on the marker. “I think they’re enviable, not embarrassing.”
Saraya grunts again, an of course you do grunt. I don’t point out he said much the same thing about us early in our acquaintance.
Sean watches Saraya, without her noticing, and I want to shake him and tell him not to wait too long. Jared, Mag, and Callie’s mother join us.
Porsoth trundles up last. “I remain certain there is something here,” he says. “I remember Morgan the Fay used to say that the hills of Avalon were filled with secrets, that they were in the ground beneath your feet.”
“The ground beneath our feet,” Callie says. “Humor me.”
She looks at the long body-like shape of the grassy grave labeled as Guinevere and Arthur’s initial resting place and then she lowers to her bottom. She stretches out on top of the grass, lying there. Her stormy eyes gaze up at me, and she reaches up and motions for me to join her.
Oh, it hurts, the way my leg protests, but I choose not to care about that. I settle down beside her with as much grace as I can manage.
“Did this just get weird for anyone else?” Jared asks.
Mag elbows him.
“What do you see?” Porsoth asks.
His face. The faces of the others. The clouds drifting by above us.
“Close your eyes,” Callie says.
I do.
For a long moment, there’s only sounds—birds and breathing and Callie’s heartbeat if I strain to find it beneath all that. There’s the smell of the grass, like the scent of green itself. A note of dirt beneath it, beneath us.
And below that … Secrets. Faint voices reach my ears or they could be inside my head. I can’t quite make out the words.
But something is happening, that much is plain.
Callie’s hand reaches out and takes mine. Her fingers are chilled despite the warmth and sun on us. There’s the whispers of giant trees speaking to each other. The echoes of conversations long past. A wind filled with ghosts, cold as the grave, floats over us.
I realize the sensation of the sun is gone.
“Oh my god,” Mag says. “Sorry if that offends anyone from Guardian City.”
I open my eyes, and there’s a man in full armor charging toward us on a fast horse through a sudden mist. The ground shakes, the sound of the horse’s hooves loud enough to rattle my jaw. I grab Callie’s hand and pull us both upright, forgetting my injury.
Until my leg folds beneath me. My wings extend from my shoulders and I might fly once my balance returns …
The knight keeps coming.
Saraya has her blade up, but she hesitates. I lift slightly off the ground, not enough. The horse is going too fast. The knight’s lance is too steady. Sean dives at me to get me out of its path and takes a hoof to his own leg.
“Fuck!” he shouts.
I watch as he falls to the ground and the rider canters past like they were in a tournament. “Nice ambush!” I call, my heart thundering in my chest.
Sean rubs his leg.
Now we’re both wounded.
“Are you whole?” Saraya demands from Sean. She has her sword up, and is clearly doing the math on taking on a ghostly knight with a sword and this amount of backup.
“I’ll live,” he says, and I can tell he’s pleased she asked. Asking means she cares.
Don’t wait too long, brother.
The knight wings the horse around and slowly clops back toward us. “What is your business here?” the knight asks, voice feminine.
“Where is here?” Callie asks. “Just to be sure.”
“You have breached the grounds of Camelot,” the knight responds.
We made it. Callie’s intuition found an entrance.
“We’re here to visit the castle,” I say, breathless. “We seek the Grail.”
“My apologies,” the knight says. She drops the lance on the ground. “I thought you intruders. It has been years since a rightful seeker came—the last visitor was some sort of actor.”
She pushes up her visor and removes her helmet, holding it at her side. Her face is lovely but skeletal and decayed. Long white-blond hair flows down her back.
“The Lady Guinevere,” she says. “At your service.”
“I think I’m going to pass out,” Callie’s mother says.