Once & Future

by Cori McCarthy

  Now that was a harsh truth. Ari sat up, shoulder to shoulder with Gwen, unable to look at her. “We’re not exactly the same. We have sex now.”

  “Is that supposed to be funny?” Gwen’s eyes flared. “Why are you acting like I’m about to dump you?”

  Ari didn’t look away. She couldn’t. “Merlin says you’re going to hurt me. Like this is part of the cycle.”

  “He what?”

  “I don’t want to believe it, but he’s been weirdly right before. And you said it yourself that this King Arthur stuff has some merit to it.”

  “You believe him? You think I’m going to hurt you because some skinny puppy wizard said so?”

  They both fell silent.

  “I’m sorry,” Ari finally said.

  “About what, Ari? That you believe Merlin is telling the truth and that I’m lying because I won’t tell you everything? You’ve twisted me up inside all over again, except it’s worse because I’m not fourteen anymore and I know that I love you.”

  Ari tilted on the bed, surprised.

  The door opened, and Kay appeared in the aftermath of Gwen’s L-bomb like an octopus at a picnic. Gwen stood up to yell. “Can’t you knock, you buffoon?”

  “This is my room!” He glanced from Gwen to Ari, sensing the frayed ends of their argument. “I need clothes.” He picked up a balled shirt out of a drawer and left, tossing back a few words over his shoulder. “Landing in five. Suit up!”

  They stared at each other silently for a long moment. “I have to go with them, Gwen.”

  “I know!”

  It was a quiet shout, and Gwen pressed her hand over her mouth in such a wounded way that Ari stood and pulled Gwen tight.

  “Don’t you dare say a word about love,” Gwen mumbled, her mouth against Ari’s neck. “I brought it up, and you didn’t respond, and now anything you say is ruined because you’ve had time to feel bad.”

  “My brother rammed into the room.”

  “There was a decent pause before that.” Gwen’s tone wasn’t iciness but plain old pain. “Look, I put myself out there, and you don’t want the risk, so it’s fine.”

  “I want to be with you, but…” Ari admitted. There’s so much I have to do.

  “I don’t think I want to hear that but,” Gwen said.

  Error shuddered as though they were entering heavy wind. They held on to each other while Ari’s magboots kept them rooted to the spot. When the shuddering grew worse, Ari loosened her grip on Gwen, raising her voice over the roar outside. “We’re in the atmosphere. In the storm. This is going to happen fast.”

  Gwen balanced through the ship’s shudders, strapping on Ari’s pauldron and the sheath she kept across her back. She tightened the buckles. Looped the extra leather in tightly.

  Ari watched Gwen’s bowed head and soft, curved neck. Her hair was down in beautiful waves. “People think there are only two ways to react when someone brings up love,” she started so quietly that Gwen pulled herself against Ari to hear. “The first is to say it back. The second is not to. But if you don’t say it back, you have to compensate. Soften hurt feelings with, ‘Oh, thank you’ or ‘That’s so sweet.’ I didn’t do either.”

  Gwen tightened Ari’s belt, which was unnecessary, unless Gwen was aiming for the tiny groan she managed to tug out of Ari. “You’re telling me there’s a third option?”

  “To not say anything. To look like a confounded idiot. To wonder why your heart has turned into a hurricane and how love could be possible when you’re supposedly a cursed, dead king in the presence of a very powerful, very alive queen.”

  Error slammed into the icy ground of Urite, and Ari and Gwen held on to each other again, this time desperately. When the ship finally slid to a stop, Ari picked up Excalibur and thrust the sword into the sheath. She dug in her memories, all the way back to knight camp. She took Gwen’s hand and pressed her lips to her knuckles. “Upon my honor,” Ari said.

  Gwen nearly laughed. “Upon your honor… what?”

  “See? I suck at this stuff,” Ari tried not to burn with embarrassment. This was why she’d stopped playing knight at camp with the rest of them. The game wouldn’t ring true, no matter how hard she tried. “I’m supposed to promise you something, aren’t I?”

  Gwen nodded. She turned her face up to Ari’s, waiting to be kissed. Ari touched her cheek, looked over her eyelashes, nose, cheekbones. Her chin and mouth and slight, slight smile. Gwen had forgiven her. It was tucked right there in the turn of her lips. Why was that as endlessly attractive as their arguments?

  “I’ll come right back,” Ari promised. She slipped off her watch and put it on Gwen’s wrist. “There are some pictures on there. Something to look at until I get back.”

  Kay, Lamarack, and Ari made slow tracks through the frigid tundra. They wore thick, wool Lionelian horse blankets around their shoulders and heads, but it wasn’t nearly enough. The endless rows of graves could barely be seen through the icy black night and whipping cold, but they were everywhere, threatening each step.

  And falling down on this planet meant shattered bones.

  “This isn’t a prison break!” Lam yelled over the roar of the wind. “It’s grave robbery!”

  Kay led the charge through the freezing gusts. He walked too fast, erratically searching. They worked their way to the section that boasted the fresh mound of a mass grave. A slit in the earth beside it revealed a new chasm for those who were currently dying inside the prison walls.

  “Fucking Mercer!” Lam stumbled. Their face didn’t look right, and they were from Pluto, used to this sort of deep freeze. “Kay! We can’t stay out here much longer. We’re going to die. Your moms wouldn’t want that!”

  “I’m not giving up!” her brother shouted. “Something sparkled over there like one of Merlin’s stupid fireworks. We have to keep going!”

  Ari clawed her way closer, took his face in her hands and tried to warm his cheeks with her breath. “Kay, calm down. We have to think about what we can do next.”

  “There!” Lam’s voice was weak, but they both heard their urgency. They were pointing at a small, bony hand sticking up out of the mound like a damn nightmare. Ari rushed to it, peeled her gloves off, and clasped the hand.

  It clasped back.

  They dug at the ground without luck. It was frozen solid, and Ari could see in the distance the laser devices that they must use to dig out the soil—but the machines were far away, and there were definitely prison guards over there.

  Ari flung the horse blanket off her shoulders and unsheathed Excalibur. She screamed in frustration as she stuck the sword into the earth around Merlin’s pale, limp hand, using the blade to pry up the ground in great crumbling sections.

  When they’d uncovered half of him, Lamarack and Kay took the young magician by the shoulders and hauled him out of the earth with screams of their own. It had become so painful to move—to breathe—that Ari felt like all was already lost. Particularly when Merlin didn’t open his eyes. They rested him on one of the horse blankets, and he looked as far from his bombastic, ridiculous self as possible, his blue flapping robes replaced by a torn, gray uniform.

  He bled from a jagged cut on his shoulder that had undoubtedly been caused by Ari’s enthusiastic use of Excalibur as a shovel. She knelt beside him. “Merlin! Merlin, you damn fool, wake yourself up.” She held his cheeks, kissed him on each side. “Come on!”

  Ari held his hand up for him, remembering that moment on the moon when he was so terribly beaten by Morgana—and yet still had a little lightning in him.

  Merlin’s mouth formed a word Ari couldn’t hear. He pointed one finger toward the howling, black night and managed a small flourish.

  In a blast of orange-red, dazzling heat, the entire setting transformed. Kay, Lam, and Ari hid their heads beneath their arms as a sudden, searing light burst forth. Warmth fell over her like a soft rainstorm. They were in a tropical bubble. The frozen ground had turned to warm, yielding sand, and above, a hot, beautiful sun
shone. There was no wind here, but—did Ari imagine it?—there seemed to be music. A classical guitar strumming somewhere nearby. There was even a damn palm tree next to Lam.

  “What the hell is this?” Kay blustered.

  “Bermuda,” Merlin said with a small shrug that made him stumble. “My happy place.”

  “We should hurry,” Lamarack said. “I have a feeling that everyone on this sad frozen rock is extremely interested in what’s happening right now.”

  “Where are my parents?” Kay yelled.

  Merlin motioned to the spot in the mound beside him. “I had to turn them to stone for a little while. Easiest way to fake a frozen death.”

  Kay and Lamarack began to dig at the now melting earth, uncovering a mass grave that made them turn their heads away and curse at the staggering loss of life.

  Merlin tried to sit up, but his shoulder was a bleeding mess. Ari pressed the wound firmly between her hands. “Bermuda?” she asked, trying to distract him from his pain.

  Merlin closed his shadowed eyes. “Just a little piece of it I stole a long time ago.”

  She tutted. “You shouldn’t steal, Merlin. Didn’t your parents ever tell you that?”

  “Parents? I was born a few thousand years old in a cave made of crystal.” He slid into a distinctly musical way of speaking that Ari had grown to care for, albeit against her will. “Besides,” he said, his tone sinking, “there are worse things to steal. Like children from their families.”

  Ari pulled him to his feet, held him tight. “You’re out of your head, old man.” He clasped her back with a whimper that made his injury even more obvious. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have sent you. I’m so sorry,” she murmured into his ruined hair. “You’re never going to have to do anything like this again, okay? I promise.”

  For once, Merlin the magician didn’t fight back. He nodded furiously and kept his face tightly against Ari’s chest.

  “I’ve got her! I’ve got her!” Kay yelled, unearthing Captain Mom’s rigid form. He pushed the dirt away from her eyes and hair. Lamarack excavated Mom at the same moment. Ari wanted to run to them, but Kay’s groans kept her locked in place. Or was it Merlin’s arms still around her?

  “Fix them, Merlin. Now!” Kay growled.

  Merlin took a few deep breaths. He kept one arm around Ari’s waist and wiggled his fingers through the air. Nothing happened. He tried again, leaning even heavier on Ari. Finally, a bit of magic trickled out and struck Captain Mom.

  Her stone visage softened until she gasped for breath. Kay didn’t give her a moment to recover. He grabbed her with both arms and sobbed. He was much bigger than Captain Mom, and that was new, wasn’t it? When they had been arrested, he’d still been short.

  “Kay,” Captain Mom said. “Calm down, baby. I’m okay.”

  He couldn’t stop crying. Couldn’t calm down. Not even when the sirens blasted over the soft melody of the invisibly strumming guitar.

  “We have to go!” Lam yelled. They’d pulled Mom out of the sand. She was still stone, and unlike Captain Mom, she seemed to have been frozen on her side, curled up.

  Captain Mom and Kay got to their feet. Kay looked at Mom’s tiny, frozen form. “Change her back, Merlin!”

  Merlin jumped at the threatening heat in his voice. He opened his mouth to speak—to tell Kay that he was too weak. It was obvious to Ari, but Captain Mom beat him to it.

  “She’s safer like that. We should wake her up when we’re away from here. She needs medical attention.” The no-nonsense command in her voice reminded Ari of Gwen, which was strange. Captain Mom straightened her shirt and looked at Ari for the first time. She reached one hand out, and Ari looked at it for so long, remembering that moment in the water barrel.

  Finally, she stepped forward and hugged her.

  “Look at you,” she whispered in Ari’s ear. “My hero.”

  Ari felt frozen pieces cracking off her. “Mama,” she whispered, pulling her even tighter. “We missed you so much.”

  Lam cleared their throat, lifting Mom higher in their arms. “The whole planet has been alerted to our presence, and we’ve got to get out of here.”

  Error swept low, just visible outside of the dome of brilliant, tropical light. In the next moment, a fiery blast shot through the bubble, breaking the world with furious cold.

  “Run!” Ari screamed.

  A second blast caught Lam in the leg, and they went down, shouting in pain. Kay shot forward to catch Mom, and Captain Mom helped Lam toward the spot where Error had landed.

  “Go!” Ari yelled to Merlin, turning to face the prison guards streaking toward them. “I’ll be right behind you!”

  Merlin whimpered as he stumbled toward the ship, and Ari swung around, Excalibur bared to face the guards running at her. The one in front fired, and she swung at the blast as if it were a game. The fire hit Excalibur, turning the entire sword blazingly hot. Ari dropped it, shocked, and was instantly surrounded by Mercer associates who battered her to her knees.

  “It’s the one from the vid feed!” one of them crowed. “We’re going to get promotions!”

  “Kill her,” another one said. “She’s too dangerous to take alive. We’ll get the same perks if she’s dead.” The guard raised a large weapon and pressed it against Ari’s head.

  Ari felt it charging up, crafting impossible heat.

  “No!” one of the guards yelled. “She has to be recognizable. Do her in the chest.”

  The guard moved the weapon lower, and Ari kicked out, taking their legs out from under them. In a heartbeat, three guards were on top of her, holding her down on the ice while the one she’d knocked over got up, angry and spitting. They stood, pointed the weapon at Ari’s chest, and Ari felt King Arthur come through her, urging her to call out one word.

  “Morgana!” she cried.

  “Arthur,” a familiar voice purred through the wind, making the guards pause and look around. They could not see Morgana in their midst. But Ari could.

  The associates froze as if she’d turned them to ice, and Ari kicked them away. Morgana came so close that Ari felt the specific cold that belonged to this ancient enchantress.

  “I hear my brother in your voice,” she said. “He controls you well.”

  “It isn’t control,” Ari managed. “It’s alliance.”

  Ari picked up Excalibur, fingers numb. She would not die unarmed or without a fight. “Thank you. Although I’m worried you stopped them just so you could kill me yourself.”

  “Most likely,” Morgana sneered. Her eyes trailed the long, silver blade, gleaming so much more than the metal ever could. When she came to the deep red spot along the edge, she paused. “My dear, what is that?”

  “Merlin’s blood,” Ari said, the words sticking in her throat. She couldn’t feel the residual warmth of Bermuda anymore. She was freezing solid where she stood. Morgana looked ready to laugh. To scream with delight.

  And Ari’s mind fractured as Morgana moved through her.

  Merlin stared out into a blinding rash of snow. “Ari!” he cried. “Ari?”

  Everyone else had run aboard Error. She had to be close behind. And yet waiting another minute gave him nothing but white spots in his vision as the frozen wind cut through his prison uniform and plague-touched skin. There was also the matter of his shoulder, which Excalibur had taken a bite from. Blood was crystallizing in the wound, gritty and painful.

  But none of that could stop him from searching for Ari. He’d been stumbling along with Ari right behind him—and then she was gone. Merlin had told the rest of the knights to run onward, trusting his Excalibur sonar to find her when the rest of his senses failed. But he was too sick, too drained.

  And Excalibur did not sing back.

  “Get your ass in here, magic-boy!” Kay shouted from inside. “And bring Ari with you! They’re about to fire on us!”

  The snow cleared just enough for Merlin to see heat cannons revving up—the grown-up versions of the guns that the prison guards carried
. They were pointed rather directly at his face. He turned and ran into the ship, seconds before the door slammed closed.

  “Where is Ari?” Kay asked, looking around Merlin as if he might have been hiding her.

  “I… I couldn’t find her,” Merlin said, the words stirring up all the ways he’d lost Arthur. All the failures Morgana wouldn’t let him forget.

  Kay raised the heat gun he’d brought on their rescue mission. This one was definitely pointed at Merlin’s face.

  He cringed. He cowered.

  It was a horrible showing, and shame paraded through his body. What was worse, he didn’t have any magic to stop Kay from shooting him. And the absolute worst of all? A small part of him believed he deserved this fate.

  “Hey!” Val shouted, getting between the two of them. “Shooting the person who just saved your parents isn’t a good look, Kay.” He grabbed the gun by the barrel, yelped at its heat, and tossed it across the cargo den.

  Jordan caught it in one hand.

  “No time for boyfights!” Lam shouted from where they sat, leg mangled and black. “We have to go.” A blast of heat rocked the ship, as if confirming Lam’s words. Everyone tipped on their feet, and Val fell hard.

  “How long will the heat-skin hold?” Gwen asked Kay, as an uncomfortable warmth seeped through the walls.

  “Error is still mildly damaged from when someone broke a planet,” Kay announced.

  “It was a moon,” Merlin muttered.

  “We must take off, my queen,” Jordan said shakily as another gust of dragon’s breath hit the tiny ship. “This moment demands bravery and decision. If we do not meet it with both, we will perish.”

  “Ready to jettison Ari already, are you?” Merlin asked wildly, pointing his accusations at this would-be Lancelot. “Think it will give you more time alone with your beloved queen?”

  “We’re not jettisoning anyone,” Val said, fighting his way back to his feet. “We’re saving our lives now, so we can still save Ari. Those guards on your tail must have grabbed her.”