“Well now, that dinna get us far, did it?” Granny said, brushing cookie bits off of her lap and onto the floor. Young Angus helpfully vacuumed them up, growling at ET when he tried to help. ET growled back, then subsided back onto the arm of the couch, pretending he hadn’t wanted them anyway.
Morgan gave him a rueful look. “I can’t believe we haven’t come up with an idea that will at least hold her off for a while. I feel completely useless.”
“How do you think I feel?” Arthur rumbled. “I once ruled an entire country and yet I cannot find a way to thwart the plans of one evil woman.” He shook his head ruefully. “Of course, I could not defeat her the first time, either. I am getting sorely tired of having that woman ruin my life.” He banged one large fist on the coffee table, shaking even more crumbs onto the floor for Young Angus.
Morgan sighed. Her house was never going to be the same. Of course, neither was the rest of her life. Once you’ve had a mystical king delivered to your doorstep in a big box, everything else would have to seem pretty tame.
Besides, she’d kind of gotten used to having the big guy around. She was even looking forward to seeing what kind of miracles he could work as senator, although she’d never admit that to him. The man had enough fans already. He needed a little constructive criticism occasionally to keep his massive ego in check. Morgan figured that was her role. Although, of course, her real role was supposed to be “Witch in Charge of Getting The World Out of This Mess.” But apparently the Powers That Be hadn’t gotten that memo.
“There must be something we can do,” she said firmly. “Granny, isn’t there some spell from the Old Country that you can think of that might at least make Fay think twice about taking us on?”
Granny thought for a moment, then creaked to her feet. “Maybe there is something. Let me go get my Book out of my luggage, and we’ll take a look at it.” She wandered off through the disarranged living room, Young Angus trailing behind her like a small black cloud.
“A book?” Arthur asked. “This hardly seems the time for reading.”
Morgan laughed. “Not a book, Arthur. The book. Her Book of Shadows. Every Witch has one; it contains her spells, herbal recipes, notes on magical workings, sometimes even dreams or records of tarot readings and the like. Granny’s Book is much larger than mine, since she’s been practicing for so much longer, and she also has some of the old spells that have been passed down through the generations.”
Arthur’s face took on a peculiar look, a contrary combination of hope and uneasiness. “Your entire family is witches?” Morgan tried not to laugh as his deep voice went up half an octave at the thought.
“Not at all, ye silly man,” Granny answered him. She flounced back to her seat on the couch opposite him, a large black book clutched tightly in her wrinkled hands. Young Angus barked at Arthur as if to reinforce the foolishness of his words.
“Morgan is a witch, as ye know, and so am I, but there are many in our family who have never been called to the practice of The Craft. Why, Morgan’s own mother is something much worse than a witch.” The old woman said that last with a spooky tone.
Arthur was taken aback. “Worse than a witch? What can be worse than witch?”
Granny cackled, “She’s a lawyer, of course.” She and Morgan howled over the old family joke. ET just gave a wide cat yawn. He’d heard it before.
“Oh, very funny, Madam Granny,” Arthur said dryly. “Now that you are done with teasing me, do you think you might have something in that great black book that might be of some use to our cause?”
“Don’t get yer knickers in a twist, boy,” Granny said to the king. Arthur could see once more where Morgan had gotten her lack of respect for authority, as well as her demented sense of humor. “Let me take a look. There are spells in this book older than you are.” She studied him more closely. “Well, maybe not, all things considered.”
She bent her white head over the dark book, turning pages and muttering to herself. One gnarled hand tapped each page restlessly as she flipped through from the most recent notations back through to the earlier ones. Periodically, she’d hesitate for a moment over a faded scribble, causing Morgan and Arthur to lean forward eagerly, but she always shook her head and went on to the next page and they sat back again.
Eventually, ET grew tired of the wait and wandered off through the cat flap to try and kill something smaller than him. Which only left half the neighborhood. Arthur lasted a little longer, but after about an hour he rose to his feet and started to perambulate restlessly around the small room.
Without looking up from her perusal, Granny said, “Yer makin’ me nervous, yer royal majesty. Why dinna ye and Morgan go take a walk while I look through the rest of this Book. It’ll be easier fer me to concentrate without ye walking all around and knocking things over.” She snorted, making the white hair hanging in front of her face dance wildly.
Arthur looked at Morgan hopefully. “What do you think, Morgan? Shall we go for a stroll? We do not seem to be accomplishing anything here and I would be glad of a chance to breathe the night air.”
Morgan shrugged. It was probably safe enough. Fay was still in California (Michael would have called to tell them if she wasn’t), Mortimer was no doubt tucked up for the night with Crystal (ew) and she wouldn’t mind some fresh air herself.
“I don’t see why not,” she answered. “Maybe the exercise will move some blood to my brain and I’ll get a brilliant idea.”
Granny snorted again and waved them toward the door. “Well, anything is possible. Arthur here is proof of that. Now get on wi’ ye, and let an old woman work.”
As they walked out the door together, Granny rubbed her hands with satisfaction and remarked to Young Angus. “Well, my lad, there’s more than one kind of magic afoot here tonight and I’m guessing that sorceress is in for a rude surprise, somewhere down the road.” She cackled quietly to herself and got back to her reading. Angus, wisely, said nothing.
Chapter Nineteen
Arthur walked through the quiet streets in silence, the witch at his side. He felt no need to speak; for some reason the silence between them felt comforting. Of course, that could be because when she spoke to him, it was usually to say something rude.
No, it was more than that. He was comfortable with her. What a strange thought. In truth, he felt at ease with Morgan in a way he could not remember ever having been with any other. He had loved Guinevere, it was true, but the difference between their ages and his title as king had always put a subtle distance between them, even before that cursed sorceress had torn them apart.
And what of the others he had known? Merlin was his mentor and his guide, perhaps even his friend at the end, but there was always a feeling of teacher and student, then king and wizard—never equals. The other knights, even Lancelot, had treated him with the respect due their sovereign and their liege. They would never have presumed to consider themselves his equal, either. They were friendly, but never truly friends.
Was Morgan his friend? There was an even stranger thought for him to ponder as they walked side by side through the empty moonlit streets of her quiet city neighborhood. The trees rustled overhead in a musical counterpart to his musings. Somewhere an owl hooted, reminding him of the forests around Camelot.
Arthur braced himself for the usual wave of homesickness, but surprisingly, it did not come. Was he growing so accustomed to this place that he no longer wished to return to his home, to the time where he belonged? That thought was perhaps the strangest of them all.
“Penny for your thoughts,” Morgan said softly, interrupting his swirling introspection.
He shook his head ruefully in the darkness, doubting they were worth even that small amount. “You need not give me money, Morgan. I will share them with you freely.” Resting by a streetlight for a moment, he pondered the best way to phrase his question.
Did he even want to know the answer?
“Morgan—” he started, and then stopped, with rare uncertainty.
“Yes, Arthur?” The witch tilted her head up to look into his eyes, the green tints of her own sparkling in the pool of light under which they stood. The breath caught in his throat, so beautiful a sight was it.
Then she tapped her foot impatiently, returning to the Morgan he knew so well. “You wanted to ask me something?”
Arthur scratched his beard, then took a deep breath. “Are we friends, witch?” he asked her. Then tried to still his beating heart while he waited for her answer. ‘Twas not so important of a question as all that, after all. Merely a clarification of where they stood. Nothing more.
Morgan looked surprised. “Of course we’re friends, you big oaf. What do you think we are?” She started walking briskly down the road again, arms swinging loosely at her sides.
Two long strides and Arthur had caught up with her. “To be honest, I was not sure if you thought of me in such terms. This is an odd situation we find ourselves in, thrown together by the fates—”
“And my accidental miracle,” she added with a laugh. “I’ll grant you it’s an unusual way to start a relationship. But I would definitely call you my friend.” She looked over at him shyly as they walked along. “Unless you would rather I didn’t.”
A squirrel ran across the street in front of them, an acorn gripped tight in its teeth like a treasure. Arthur had a moment of empathy for the beast. He did not wish to lose this gift, either, although he could not see a way to hang on to Morgan’s companionship and still make his way back to the life where he belonged.
“You will think me mad, no doubt,” he said to the witch, “but I would be honored to call you my friend.” He spared a sideways glance to see if she was laughing at him, but all he saw was her profile as she walked up the tree-shadowed street beside him. “We are an odd pair, ‘tis true, but I think we work well together for all of that.”
Morgan nodded thoughtfully, quickening her pace to keep up with his longer legs. “I suppose we do, although I wish we were accomplishing more. I can’t help feeling like we are missing something.”
“I miss my sword,” Arthur said without thinking first. “I feel naked without it.”
The witch blushed, the color almost invisible in the dark. The moon, a luminous crescent edging towards full for the first time since the fateful night she’d brought him back, glowed on her shining countenance and Arthur lost his breath for a moment. It was most unfair, how lovely she was in the moonlight. Well, all lights, truly, with her dark hair floating around her shoulders and her green eyes with their thick lashes. And the curves of her body…
Arthur stumbled over a curb and came back down to earth. He should not be thinking of any woman in such a manner, most especially not a witch who was his friend. Most especially, he should not be thinking of touching her in the way in which he was thinking of touching her, feeling her warm body up against his—
“So where do you think it is?” Morgan asked him.
Arthur choked. “What?”
“Your sword. Where do you think Excalibur is?” she repeated, as if talking to a not-very-bright child.
His sword. His sword? Oh, that sword. Yes. Right.
“I have no idea,” he answered. He cleared his throat and tried again. “The last I saw of it, I had given it to Bedivere, to return to the Lady of the Lake. That was as I lay dying on the field of battle, so I know not what became of it after.” He swallowed hard as he thought about the loss of the weapon that had come to symbolize the legitimacy of his reign. It had been a powerful icon of his right to be king. And now it was gone, lost forever in the mists of time. Did that mean he was, in truth, no longer king?
They walked in silence for a while after that, making a loop through the neighboring streets until they arrived back on hers. The living room lamps glowed in the front window with an inviting warmth and it struck Arthur forcefully how much Morgan’s tiny house had come to mean to him. He straightened up and walked faster, ignoring the witch’s indignant squawk as they covered the last block at twice the speed of those that had preceded it.
“What’s the hurry?” She gasped, trying to keep up with him. “Are you afraid that Granny will have eaten all the cookies?”
She might claim to be his friend, Arthur thought, but she understood him not at all. They needed to find a way out of this trap, and the sooner the better. Before he woke up one morning and discovered that he no longer wanted a way out at all.
Granny looked up at them as they came into the living room. Young Angus snored lightly underneath her chair, but the elderly woman looked wide-awake despite the late hour. Morgan shook her head. Maybe if she lived long enough, she’d eventually get as much stamina as her eighty-six year old grandmother. Maybe.
“How was yer walk?” the old woman asked, grinning wickedly. “Enjoy the moonlight, did ye?”
Morgan rolled her eyes. The woman was as subtle as a walrus in heat.
“The walk was fine. The moon was fine.” She plopped down gracelessly on the couch, waving away the explosion of cat fur caused by her abrupt movement. “More importantly, did you find anything we can use?”
“Maybe so, maybe so.” Granny said. “Are there any more cookies in the kitchen?”
Morgan gritted her teeth and refused to scream. Arthur, standing next to her, let out a barely audible groan.
She glanced up at him. “Sit down will you? You’re blocking all the light, towering up there.” Turning to Granny, she said. “And you, old woman—tell us what you know or there’ll be no more cookies for you, tonight or any night.”
Granny gave a whinny of laughter, not intimidated at all. “Right then,” she paused, waving at Arthur to sit down next to Morgan, “go on then, sit yer royal self down. I’ll tell ye what I found.”
“So you did discover something we can use to stop the sorceress?” Arthur sat as commanded, then leaned forward eagerly.
Granny shrugged, her flyaway white hair even more disarrayed than usual. “I canna say fer sure, mind ye. But it is the only spell I found that might be of use to us, at least that I can see.”
“Well?” Morgan clasped her hands together so tightly they turned as white as her grandmother’s hair. “Did you find some sort of an anti-sorceress spell? A keep-the-bitch-away-from-us spell? What?”
“Nothing quite so dramatic as all that, lass,” Granny said with regret. “More like a super-duper-find-the-lost-wizard spell.”
“Oh.” Morgan’s head drooped in disappointment. “I’m sorry, Granny, but I already tried a finding spell. It didn’t work.” She didn’t want to look at Arthur and see her own frustration mirrored on his bearded face. Drat.
“Tch,” Granny said. “If it dinna work, ye probably dinna use the right spell.” She held her tiny hand out imperiously. “Well, dinna just stand there with yer mouth open, go fetch yer Book and show me which one ye used.”
Morgan obeyed with the habit left over from many a long summer vacation, her feet moving in the direction of her bedroom before she even realized they were in motion. As she left the room, Arthur turned to Granny with a smile.
“You must tell me how you do that,” he said, scratching his head. “I can never get her to do anything I command, no matter how reasonable the task.”
The old woman smiled back at him. “Nothing to it. But I’m afraid ye had to start training her up when she was about five, so ye are a few years too late.” She cackled at the expression on his face. “Sorry, yer royalness, but I’m afraid ye’ll just have to take her as she is, warts and all.” She chortled at her own joke. “Get it, ‘warts and all,’ since she’s a witch?”
Morgan came back into the room in time to overhear that last comment, and swatted her grandmother affectionately with her Book before dropping it into the old woman’s waiting hands.
“How many times do I have to tell you—those aren’t warts, they’re beauty marks.” She sat back down next to Arthur, barely avoiding ET, who had decided to come back inside before he missed something important. The cat had a quirk of sliding into the s
pot a person was about ready to sit down in, then looking indignant when he got smushed. It was amazing how many treats you got that way. But Morgan was wise to his tricks and just shoved him out of the way as she reclaimed her place next to Arthur.
“I marked the page,” she said, gesturing at the Book. “That’s the spell I used when I tried to find Merlin the last time.”
Granny bent her white head over the Book. “Hmmm…it’s not bad.” She looked up at Morgan. “Has it worked to find other lost items?”
Morgan nodded. “Just about every time I’ve ever used it. I don’t understand why it didn’t work to find Merlin.”
Granny thought for a moment, absently scratching the tip of her nose. “Hmmm…” she said again.
Arthur looked at her, his need for an answer written openly on his face. “Madam Granny, what does ‘hmmm’ mean?”
“Well, yer kingship,” she said with a wink, “it can mean any manner of things. But in this particular case, it means that I am fairly certain I know why this spell didn’t work.”
Morgan knotted her hands together so as not to strangle her favorite relative. “Granny…” she warned.
“Oh, pish tosh, girl,” Granny said, “I’m tryin’ to tell ye. That spell would have worked if yer wizard was truly lost. It didn’t work, so that means he isn’t lost at all.”
Chapter Twenty
“Not lost!” Morgan shrieked. ET jumped down and hid as much of his bulk as would fit under the couch. “Of course he’s lost!” She gestured wildly around the living room, almost knocking over a lamp. “Do you see Merlin anywhere around here?” She subsided into mutters of, “Not lost, of all the stupid…”
Granny shook her head. “Just because he is not here, dinna mean he’s lost, lass. It just means we dinna know where he is, that’s all.”
Arthur looked confused. “I do not understand, Madam Granny. What is the difference between Merlin not being lost and our not knowing where to find him?”
King Me! Page 15