Discord's Apple

She didn’t think he was. This was just what he’d done at Troy—talking his enemy into betraying themselves. Merlin was being paranoid.

“Or he’s distracting her,” Arthur said. “The car is unguarded now.”

“Not for long enough to save Dad.”

The afternoon shadows were stretching.

“I’ll circle the grounds,” Merlin said. “Try to catch a hint of what they’re saying.”

He smoothed the lapels of his suit and strode off, a man with purpose. Evie watched: he looked both ways, started crossing the street, raised his hand as if calling a cab, then disappeared. A shimmer in the air remained for a moment, like a line of heat rising from the pavement. Evie blinked, and blinked again.

She said, “He could have done that and just walked into the house to take the sword, if he’d wanted to.”

Arthur shook his head. He was watching her, rather than the vanished Merlin. “When he turns incorporeal like that, he can’t affect the physical world. He couldn’t have turned the doorknob. Besides, your house is guarded.”

“That’s what they tell me.”

“Merlin has followed your family’s fortunes for many years. You were always the Keepers.”

“It seems like everyone knew that but me.”

They leaned against the wall like vagrants, out of sight of the cemetery. Waiting was hard, when she knew how close her father was, and what might happen to him before she could help.

She said, “When did you wake up? I mean—when did you know it was time to return?”

He looked to the distance, where her own gaze had lingered a moment before. “It happened slowly, I think. I was injured when I went to sleep. I’m still not sure how long ago that was. When I woke, they—the ladies who healed me and made me young again—told me that much had changed. I lived in the world again for a time, to learn the new ways. I was in a village in Wales. A modern version of the place where I grew up. Then Merlin came. Then I knew my destiny.”

He spoke with the simple clarity of a mystic whose world-view was uncluttered, whose path was set in a perfect line. In the midst of all this talk of magic and destiny, she wondered if there was room for a person behind the legend. If Arthur was a person—or an archetype.

“It must be hard. Not having a choice. What if you wanted to stay in the village? Get married, ha

ve kids. Be normal.”

He smiled wryly and shook his head. “I’ve learned something: What many of us call destiny is really our own instinct. We know what is right, but we don’t want to admit it, especially if what is right will lead to our own death. We call it destiny so we don’t have to accept responsibility for making those decisions. Human instinct is stronger than anyone will admit.”

“Do you miss them? Guinevere, Lancelot. The others.”

“That life—it was another life. It seems like a dream now. I slept so long, everything before waking was a dream. I would prefer to remember it as a dream, I think.”

“Hey, look.” Evie touched his arm and pointed to the cemetery.

Hera and one of her henchman—the young one whom Alex had called Robin—were leaving, walking to the edge of the grounds and presumably beyond. Another minion, a polished man in a suit and trench coat, walked back to the sedan. Alex, hands shoved in his pockets, walked with him.

Alex and the other man were with her father now.

“I like these odds a little better,” Arthur said.

With a hiss of air and shimmer of heat in front of her, Merlin appeared. Evie flinched, startled, as if a television had flashed to life nearby.

“Arthur, I think you can fetch Mr. Walker yourself,” he said before her heartbeat had calmed down. “I’ll follow the others and delay them if I can.”

“Agreed. My lady, wait for us here.”

Before she could argue, they were across the road, Arthur moving at a jog, as if to battle.

Alex might have told Hera where to find them, and told her that Arthur and Merlin were with her. Hera was probably looking for Evie, and she’d set a trap for the others. Or maybe this really was their chance.

In either case, if things went badly, she could still give Hera the apple, use that to bribe her father free. She touched the shaped gold in her pocket, warm against her fingers. For the fairest.