“Who needs to be a knight when you can be an outlaw?” Lam asked with a rueful laugh, spinning back to Val. “I know this is not your preferred life path, but you need to come with us. Mercer is not kidding.” No one mentioned Lam’s hand; no one had to.
As much as Merlin wanted to stay on Lionel, he didn’t want Ari facing Mercer until she was ready.
That was how his Arthurs died.
Val sighed. “Come to the tournament. Mercer isn’t invited, and if they do crash the party, Gwen will knock them out of the sky. After, I’ll think about going with you. But only if my queen agrees. She might have given Ari a run for her money, and tossed handkerchiefs at Kay,” he shuddered, “but she’s the best damn sovereign Lionel’s ever had. She needs me.”
Ari clenched with determination. Merlin couldn’t help thinking she’d need very different weapons to face this Gweneviere. He could see only one thing to be done: prevent them from interacting. Merlin could do that, couldn’t he? He was a magician, after all. And Gweneviere breaking Arthur’s heart was a repetition Merlin was most keen on avoiding. This cycle was already so different. This could be different, too.
No devastating heartbreak. No finding this Arthur on all fours, weeping so hard that not even one of Merlin’s famous indoor downpours could conceal it. He imagined Ari’s predecessors in that broken position; updating it with her image made him sick.
Of course, there had been one Arthur who had no interest in Gweneviere.
And Merlin had made him weep the hardest.
Merlin mustered his most mature voice. “We should avoid this queen’s business.”
“Agreed.” Val looked them over one by one. “Another thing. If you want to stick around, you need to change. Plenty of shops here sell appropriate garb.”
“Garb?” Kay asked, as if the word was making him as uncomfortable as the clothes inevitably would.
“Your fiery-haired friend can keep his robes,” Val added. It took Merlin a quick beat to realize Val meant him. He kept forgetting his hair was red instead of gray. That bother aside, he felt more than a little proud that Val had singled him out—or at the very least, his attire.
“He’s the only one with good clothes?” Kay asked, pointing at Merlin. “Him?”
“The rest of you look so… future-y,” Val said in a distinctly pained way. “Come find me at the tournament ring when you can blend in.”
Merlin waited in a small courtyard as everyone else got dressed in the public restrooms. The result was a buffet of Old Earth costumes. Kay wore highly anachronistic cargo shorts that would have made him look like any white American teenage boy of the late twentieth century if they hadn’t been paired with a billowing linen blouse and bracers on his wrists. Lamarack looked slightly better in dark-blue leggings and a tunic that showed off how broad they were in the shoulders. Ari had picked a shirt with a crosshatch of leather cords at the chest, and a shiny leather pauldron.
“Hey, that thing on your arm looks cool,” Kay said. “Let me wear it.”
She dodged Kay’s unsubtle grab. Merlin had never seen a Kay-and-Arthur pair act so much like true siblings. It was… refreshing, really. Ari patted the fitted and oiled scales of the pauldron, then drew Excalibur from the sheath on her back—another gift of the Lionel market. “At least she fits in,” Ari said, staring at the sword with the sort of approval Merlin wished she would point at him.
“Yes,” Kay said. “That’s what I’m worried about. How your sword feels.” He stomped around, facing Merlin. “It’s new-face time.”
“Pardon?” Merlin asked.
“We have new clothes,” Kay said, slowing his explanation to an insulting trot. “Now give us new faces so Mercer won’t be able to pick us out of the crowds.”
“My magic isn’t boundless,” Merlin said.
“What exactly can it do?” Ari asked, sitting down on the stone wall of the courtyard, one knee up, casual in a way that made it clear she cared far too much about the answer.
Merlin put on his best all-knowing voice, dry and authoritative as the pages of an old tome. “I have the ability to warp existing physical realities. My magic can be drained, of course. Which means that after flying from Earth to moon, creating a lightning bolt, and making extra Kays, I’m a tad exhausted.” He hummed again, and a small pink lizard appeared in his palm.
“Aw, cute,” Lam said, patting the lizard with a finger.
Merlin’s lips pinched. “I was trying to make a dragon.” He shook his head, the lizard disappearing in a puff as Lam drew back. “That’s the other bit. My magic is temporal, which means that anything I create has to be sustained by me.”
“Sorry, Kay,” Ari said, slapping him in the blouse. “No permanent face replacements.”
Lam winked at Ari. “We shouldn’t have gotten his hopes up for trading that one in.”
“We’ll just have to fight off Mercer the old-fashioned way.” She leaped to standing on the stone wall and took a few practice stabs at the air. Light streamed along Excalibur’s blade and her long hair, which she’d freed from its ties. Even if she hadn’t been covered in golden rays, she would have looked heroic to Merlin. Arthur always looked most like a storybook hero before he had to face the true darkness of the cycle.
“Let’s begin our training,” he said nervously, trumpets lighting the air. It took him a moment to realize that the trumpets were not just in his head but thundering across the village grounds.
“Two hours to the tournament,” Lam said, interpreting the horns.
“Hours, truly? I’ve even heard you mention years,” Merlin noted. “Are these not time constructs of Earth?”
“Old Earth calendar,” Kay said, fighting with the laces on his period-appropriate boots. “It’s the standard on most planets and in space.”
“And you all speak English,” Merlin said. “Mighty interesting surprise there.” Ari pointed her sword at Merlin and spouted a string of words he didn’t quite catch, in a language he was only somewhat familiar with. “And you speak Arabic, apparently.”
“I speak Ketchan,” Ari corrected.
“We’re speaking Mercer, dude,” Lam said.
“Beg your pardon?”
“This language is called Mercer.”
Merlin leveled his British shoulders. “It is not. Or at least it was not.”
“Ketch is the only planet that’s been able to hold on to their culture. We speak Mercer because that’s the only language Mercer lets us access,” Lam said, darkly. “Which is supposedly unifying.”
“What a business, this Mercer. To co-opt cultures like a fish swallowing smaller fish…” Merlin shivered. “I don’t like it.” He glanced up at the spot where Ari had been sitting a moment ago. “Where did Ari go?”
“She’s tricky,” Kay said. “Impulsive. Impossible. And definitely not interested in your ‘training.’”
Merlin hauled himself up and over the stone wall, falling down on the other side. Ari was disappearing between two buildings in the distance, and he followed her. He caught up with her behind what appeared to be horse stables. She stood, facing a blank corner, taking a picture with her watch. “Have you stumbled into a fond memory?”
“No,” Ari said, whipping around. “An annoying one.”
“I know your strength. It is a dedication to absolute truth. Quite Arthurian.”
“Quit it with the Arthur stuff, will you?” Ari was taller—and possibly a touch older—than Merlin. But none of that changed what he needed to tell her. Merlin took a deep breath.
“You are the forty-second reincarnation of King Arthur.” He kept going, ignoring the sharp cut of her doubting eyes. “You can wield Excalibur. Only Arthur can do that. The Lady of the Lake forged that sword for a hero. You are that hero, Ari. Or at least, you’re the latest version.”
Ari continued to stare.
“I won’t lie,” Merlin said. “This bit usually goes better… and you’re usually younger.” Most boys secretly believed they should be heroes: the stories t
old them so. Thus, when Merlin came along and delivered the destined news, he was usually greeted with something between nervous excitement and ecstasy. Arthur 2 had cried. Arthur 27 had cried. Most of the Arthurs in between had at least thanked him. Ari was blinking at Merlin like he was a flickering lightbulb. “This universe needs help, Ari! Mercer is clearly cancerous, and people are suffering. King Arthur is destined to defeat threats to peace and unite all of mankind.”
“Humankind,” Ari said automatically.
The back of Merlin’s neck prickled with embarrassment. He decided this was not the best time to mention that he needed Ari—needed an Arthur who could bring this cycle to a close. To stop him from aging backward before he required diapers.
Ari crossed her arms. “What if I’m not interested in living somebody else’s life?”
Merlin nodded. He’d wanted to believe they would work together to defeat the cycle, but if that wasn’t in the cards, he would play a different hand. He crossed his own arms—alarmed at how skinny they’d grown. “You aren’t getting a bit of my magic for your parents’ prison break unless you agree to train with me first.”
That was for her own protection, as much as for Merlin’s benefit. Ari would die if she went storming into a prison with nothing but love for her adoptive mothers.
“Fine,” Ari said, waving her hand. “We’ll train.” Her eyes glimmered behind the casual acceptance. “But you should know I was a conscientious objector at knight camp.”
They returned to the courtyard where Lam and Kay had begun sparring, the clash of cheap metal ringing out.
“Get this,” Ari shouted over the din of poor swordsmanship. “Merlin wants to train me to be like your hero, Kay. King Arthur.”
“I never said he was my hero. I said I liked his exhibit on Heritage.” He turned his sword at his sister and Ari whipped out Excalibur to meet his blade. They tangoed for a little while before Merlin had all the proof he needed that swordplay was not Ari’s weak point.
“No more bickering. Your training begins now. Step one, best Lamarack,” Merlin ordered. He was surprised when Ari listened, spinning in a way that made Lam dive out of the way.
Instead of reaching for their sword, Lam caught Ari around the waist. “Hey,” they said, head lodged under Ari’s arm. “Has anyone ever told you that you look excellent from this angle?”
Ari blushed, hesitated, and Lam knocked her sword free, sounding a victorious cry.
“That was cheating,” Ari huffed, amused but unwilling to admit it.
“Lam used their charm,” Merlin said. “It’s a perfectly good way to disarm someone.”
“So, you want me to flirt past the prison guards? Make out with Mercer Associates?”
Now it was Merlin’s turn to huff. “If you can get past someone you know, you will be able to bypass greater obstacles. It’s harder to face down friends than enemies. Friends know you better and can use that knowledge against you.”
Merlin didn’t have friends, so he never got destroyed in that particular manner. Arthur was always hurt by the people he loved best. Gweneviere. Lancelot. His children—who had the unnerving tendency to kill him—starting with Mordred in that very first cycle. Come to think of it, Ari was a little too old. “You don’t have any children, do you?”
“What?” Ari asked, blanching under her tan complexion. “No.”
“Geez, dude,” Lam said.
Kay leaped in with his sword, too eager for a rematch, his black eye glistening plummy purple. He let out a blunt shout and charged Ari like an angry goat. At that moment, Merlin noticed a procession coming down the street that bordered the courtyard. A palanquin carried someone important—probably royal—toward the tournament.
Gweneviere.
The procession was headed right toward them. Merlin’s magic sparked out of him in a frantic burst. Ari, Kay, and Lam froze on the spot.
Within the small, tented carriage, he saw a young woman in a blue silk dress with dark hair pinned in an elaborate, braided style. She was waving at her subjects and tourists alike, and Merlin found himself ducking to avoid her gaze, the one that ruled everything it landed on. He noted that—by the seemingly undying Earth standards—she was of mixed Asian and European heritage.
Something about her felt familiar, but then Gweneviere was always regal, beautiful, terrifying.
When the procession was well out of sight, Merlin unfroze his knights. Ari squinted at him. “What was that?”
“Sneeze,” Merlin said.
Ari shrugged, then drove her entire weight into the softest part of Kay’s belly. They wrestled without honor. Kay tugging hanks of Ari’s hair, Ari yanking at Kay’s belt, pulling his cargo shorts low enough to produce an unseemly crack. But it was a final kick to his shin and a few crunched toes that allowed Ari to run around him to the far end of the courtyard, doing a victory dance that was mostly knees and elbows.
Merlin shook his head, even as Ari celebrated. “You won, but you failed. You used your brawn, not your brain, Arthur!” She looked stung, and he corrected. “Ari. Your muscles will only get you so far. Your brain can get you everywhere. It can get you anything, if you use it.”
“I do use my brain.”
“Oh?” Merlin feigned. “Remind me, did you convince your brother to come save your friend, or did you beat him into submission?”
“I just needed him out of the way,” Ari said with a bluntly honest shrug.
In that moment, Merlin discovered the weakness of his new Arthur. Ari wasn’t a mindless brute or bully. But she was boldly impatient, and when she wanted to fix something she did it the fastest way possible.
“What will you do when your impulses aren’t enough?” Merlin asked. “Not all problems are best solved alone.”
The trumpets sounded again, and Ari’s eyes hardened with challenge. Merlin was encouraged by this look, and a little frightened by it.
“Nearly tournament time,” Lam said. “We have to go meet Val.”
Merlin hesitated. Gweneviere would be at the tournament, but the likelihood of Ari meeting her face to face was minuscule. She would sit in the queen’s box, and Ari would be one of a thousand commoners underfoot. Besides, Merlin hadn’t seen a good joust in millennia.
The tournament ring was packed when they arrived. Lam used their watch to send a message, and a few minutes later Val appeared from the great churning mass of tourists, many of them wearing the colors of the knights they favored.
Merlin noted how many people sported black feathers. “The black knight is popular.”
“Odds are always on the black knight,” Val said.
“Remember our black knight?” Lam asked, their dark brown eyes glazing with nostalgia, and something a bit steamier.
“So hot,” Kay crowed over the crowd.
“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” Merlin said. Lam and Kay went in search of turkey legs, and somehow Merlin and Val ended up walking down a row of stalls.
He steered Merlin gently, and Merlin felt five fingertips like a bright constellation on his back. “I don’t know how Ari and Co. got you on board, or if you’re planning to stick around, but if you’re still here tonight, you should go to Knight Club. I’m always there after a tournament.”
Merlin watched Val surveying the crowd. “Don’t misunderstand, I love a pun as much as the next magician, but you have a nightclub? Here?”
“We’re only as period appropriate as we want to be,” Val explained. “For instance, not many queens in medieval Europe had black advisers, but that’s no excuse to keep doing things the same old shitty way, now, is it?”
“That makes a great deal of sense. I’d still like to have a word with your sign painter, though. The dragons are wrong.” Arthur 4 and Arthur 7 had both faced dragons—well, one had technically been a wyvern. “There should be less smiling and more scale rot.”
Val ducked his head and laughed, Merlin’s attention caught on the curve of his eyelashes.
“What’s funny?” Merlin asked, his voice
gruffer than he meant it to be.
Val leaned in as the rest of the crowd broke into cheers. They were so close their bodies were nearly brushing, and yet Val had to yell to be heard, his voice hot on Merlin’s neck. “I asked you out and you’re talking about scale rot!”
Forget constellations—Merlin’s body lit up like the night sky.
“Hey,” Kay said, reappearing, not seeming to notice or care that Merlin and Val had been talking. He’d squirted his blouse with turkey juice and shucked it off, revealing a “Lionel is for Lovers” T-shirt underneath. “My mouth is all salty. Where’s ye olde water fountain?”
Val nodded to one of the servers, saying, “Official state business! Queen’s adviser!” and tossed a coin to a person who caught it in ample cleavage and passed out a round of drinks. Cleavage was certainly a theme on this planet.
“Mead?” Kay asked, nuzzling into his cup. “Thanks for the free upgrade.”
Lam downed one in less than ten seconds and started in on another. Merlin grasped a flagon, taking in the crisp-sweet smell and the deep golden tone. He had never been asked on a date, in any of his lifetimes. He didn’t know what to do.
So he drank.
The first sip danced on his tongue. The second one turned his stomach into a festival.
Ari watched them all guzzle. “I’ll take water.”
Val leaned toward her like they’d reached a conversational bridge he didn’t want to cross. “Truth is, we have a severe water shortage on our hands. Mercer is hovering at the outer edges of the system, withholding our latest hydration shipment.”
“Wait,” Kay said, holding up a finger before he swallowed a mouthful of mead. “You get your water from Mercer? What happened to ‘absolutely no Mercer goods—’”
“If you have a better suggestion, I’d love to hear it,” Val said, sipping from his own flagon, wincing as if the honeyed drink was sour. “Mercer is the only company with potable water to trade in the galaxy. They’ve made sure of it. In return, for their terrible water, we have to give them a small percentage of our natural resources. They want more, of course.”
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