I nodded. I didn’t question how the Lady of the Lake knew these things about me, but I was bummed that she did. I had hoped that my magic would give us a much-needed edge over Alex and company. Now our victory was less certain.
I’d grown to respect Arian’s tremendous skill as a sword fighter. He’d nearly killed me quite a few times. I’d been humbled by Mauvrey’s aptitude with her metallic gloves. She’d beaten me before and I would never forget it. And then there was Alex. He was my brother. He’d taught me to fight when I was growing up. He knew my moves and my instincts better than anyone. How could I go up against him?
“Do not be afraid,” SJ said, reading my thoughts. She touched my shoulder and gave me a reassuring smile. “You can do this.”
I put my hand over hers and smiled back. “Thanks,” I said. “I wish you guys were coming with us.”
“That would be too easy,” Blue said. “The universe likes testing us.”
She gave Jason an impassioned look. “Please don’t die again, okay? And don’t have too much fun battling the bad guys without me.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it,” he said. “Just get some rest. You’ve already destroyed an immortal monster today. I think you’re set for action in this act of the story.”
I exchanged hugs with all of my friends except for Kai. She gave Jason and me an encouraging nod then kissed Daniel goodbye. A twitch of awkwardness passed through me and I darted my eyes away from their embrace.
“Take care of yourself,” Kai said to Daniel. “I’m not going to be able to magically poof up next to you if you get in trouble and need someone this time.”
“If he needs someone, we’ll be there,” I replied adamantly.
“That’s right. We’ve got each other covered,” Jason agreed.
I pivoted to address all three girls. “We’ll be back soon to put an end to this story arc together. I promise.”
I transformed my wandpin into a spear and Daniel passed Kai our Merlin map. SJ suggested that our SRBs would probably count as outside enchantments, so we took them off and gave them to her for safekeeping. Lastly, Jason removed his Mark Two—which he still had—from his pants pocket and handed it over to SJ as well.
That done, we were about to turn away when Blue abruptly embraced Jason again, quick and hard. She clearly surprised him; though it didn’t surprise me. It made me smile. Seeing this display of affection between Blue and Jason warmed my heart—unlike what I’d seen between Daniel and Kai.
I walked across the sand with the boys. “We’re ready,” I said to the Lady of the Lake, who’d been patiently waiting for us to say our goodbyes.
“Only two per boat,” she declared, gesturing to the vessels.
I climbed into the one on the left. Daniel followed me, so Jason hopped into the second boat. I looked around inside for the paddles, but the boat was empty. Before I could ask how we were supposed to row, the vessels began to skate across the water on their own. Pretty soon, SJ, Blue, and Kai were nothing but tiny figures on the bank.
It was smooth sailing for a minute, but the joy ride didn’t last. The boats soon began to pick up speed. Then about halfway across the lake, Jason’s boat veered right while ours went left.
I panicked, clutching the side of the boat. “Jason!” I called. But the boats moved too fast and the mist around the isle was growing thicker. I could no longer see his boat or the bank where we’d left our friends. The atmosphere had changed unexpectedly and even the sky had abruptly clouded over.
“What’s happening?” I asked Daniel.
“I don’t know,” he said. “But we’re slowing down.”
He was right. Our boat had curtly changed speed and was now barely moving along. Something was about to happen. I could feel it. The mist was dense and icy cold. My skin felt clammy and I found it hard to breathe.
Daniel and I stood up in the boat—trying to make out the isle, or something, anything. That’s when we saw it. Up ahead we spotted a slender, graceful arm stretching out of the lake like it was reaching for the sky.
An arm? Really?
My memory sparked.
I remembered this. I’d dreamed about this moment before. But what happened next? I racked my brain. There was the mist and the arm and then … then we were underwater and Daniel was in trouble!
“Daniel—”
“Knight, look,” he said, cutting me off.
More arms were rising out of the water. They slowly extended from the lake like reeds. Each arm penetrated the surface up to the bicep then remained perfectly still. I wish they would’ve waved or given us the thumbs up or something. The way they reached up and froze like that was creepy.
Our boat passed through the watery field of arms. I moved closer to Daniel protectively. Alas, while my instincts were good, my understanding of the danger was not. In the next moment, we were attacked.
An arm shot out of the water by the side of our boat and extended past the bicep, but it was not connected to a shoulder—just more arm. The thing was like a giant noodle, and it snatched Daniel by the jacket and yanked him overboard.
“Daniel!” I lunged to my knees at the edge of the rocking boat, but he was gone. He’d been dragged under. The other arms that had risen out of the lake curtly disappeared below the surface too.
Crud.
Crud! Crud! Crud!
I dropped my spear in the boat, took a deep breath, and dove into the water.
I was surprised at how well I could see under the lake. It was like I’d entered a different world. The surroundings were beautiful but odd. Everything swirled with silver and blue strokes like I was trapped in an oil painting.
I spotted Daniel twenty feet down. Countless hands were dragging him below, each of them attached to a long, pale noodle arm that stretched so far into the depths I could not see where it came from. Other unfathomably long arms swayed in the water like disturbing sea kelp.
My own arms cut through the water sharply as I swam after my friend. I was a good swimmer, but as I went deeper and deeper, the creepy arms grabbed at my ankles, legs, and wrists. I dodged them for a while, but eventually a hand firmly wrapped around my forearm. Half a dozen more hands saw their opening and zoomed in to clutch my other limbs. Instead of dragging me down like Daniel though, they held me firmly in the water. I would have shouted angrily had I not been holding my breath. I watched a thrashing Daniel get pulled farther and farther into the darkness until he vanished completely.
Suddenly, the Lady of the Lake materialized before me. Her glow lit up the water like moonlight in a bleak December sky. She waved her hand and a silver bubble formed around my head. The bubble made my face dry and I could breathe.
“Your friend will not run out of air either,” the Lady of the Lake said. “I have enchanted him as I have enchanted you. While his bubble has put him to sleep, yours will allow you to breathe and speak underwater.”
“Can I yell underwater?” I asked with a scowl, trying to pull away from the hands that restrained me. “What’s going on? Your weird lake arms took my friend. That wasn’t part of the deal.”
“It is for his own good, child,” the Lady of the Lake responded in her deep, resonating voice. “The spirits of my lake foresaw some of your friend’s immediate future on the isle. His fate will change in a very unfortunate way if he journeys there. Proceed with your other friend alone. The two of you can try to claim Excalibur and I will preserve this hero within my lake until you return.”
I glanced into the depths where Daniel had been taken. “But I need him,” I said. “Without him we won’t stand a chance.”
The Lady of the Lake studied me with a poker face that would’ve made a seasoned gambler wet himself. “The choice is yours,” she said. “You are the one trying to fulfill the Great Lights Prophecy. However, I warn you that taking this hero to Avalon will result in a great challenge for him that no one should wish on a friend.”
I thought hard on the proposition.
“But he’s not going to die
on the isle or anything, right?” I asked. “He won’t get killed or badly hurt if he comes with us?”
“Not today. But my spirits can only see into the immediate future. As I said, setting foot on Avalon will only bring an unfavorable twist to his fate.”
I considered this critically. I didn’t want to saddle Daniel with anything bad, but I also knew that Jason and I would probably get killed if he didn’t come with us. Without my magic, the two of us against Alex, Mauvrey, and Arian yielded very low odds.
This wasn’t a fight we could afford to lose. If we didn’t claim Excalibur, then Arian would trade the sword to Rampart for the Simia Crown and recover Paige’s mind from Glinda’s memory stone. And if that happened, then he’d learn where Book’s genies were hidden and the antagonists would have all the power they’d ever need to take over the realm.
Daniel was too important to leave behind. I could feel guilty about this later. For now, I had faith he’d be able to handle whatever challenge the isle threw at him. I would help him get through it and protect him from whatever unfavorable twist of fate came next. We’d faced many obstacles together and always overcame them as a team. This would be no different.
“I need him,” I said decidedly.
“Very well,” said the Lady of the Lake, nodding solemnly. The giant noodle arms released me and shrank back into the depths. “I will break your breathing enchantments and you can try to save your friend before he drowns.”
“Wait! I thought you were trying to help Daniel by keeping him from going to Avalon. Now you might let him drown? Taking away our ability to breathe makes no sense.”
“Child, this is the Isle of Avalon. Valor, worth, sacrifice, heroism—these are words that matter here. Sense, fairness, consistency—those are words that do not. Everything is a test, and if you’d like to pass this one, I suggest you start swimming.”
The Lady of the Lake snapped her ghostly fingers and the silver bubble around my head began to disintegrate. I took a deep breath before it popped.
“Better hurry,” she whispered as she faded away.
Panic surged through me and I swam with everything I had. The water got darker and darker, colder and colder. My strokes were long and intense; my kicking was powerful and desperate. All that lit my way were tiny glowing fish like aquatic fireflies. Then I saw the arms.
The colony of arms grew from the squishy, glowing green floor of the lake. They swayed in the water like anemones. I found Daniel floating in a dense bed of them. The arms were not holding onto him any longer, but he wasn’t moving and his eyes were closed.
I swam to him and pulled one of his arms over my shoulder. Then I grabbed him around the waist with one hand and boosted off a chunk of smooth underwater rock to propel us to the surface. I stroked through the water with my free hand while my feet kicked so hard that mermaids would’ve been impressed, Stella included.
The water changed from black to navy to crystal blue. The surface grew closer and closer until we burst through. I gasped for air, but Daniel was still unconscious. I looked around. Our boat was long gone, but the isle shore was barely fifteen feet from where we’d surfaced. Trying my best to keep Daniel’s head above water, I paddled toward it.
When I felt sand under my boots, I grabbed Daniel under the arms and dragged him the rest of the way. Although he was heavy, I managed to heave him onto shore before collapsing on the white sand beside him. I turned Daniel’s head sideways like I’d learned in First Aid class at school to allow any water in his mouth to fall out. Then I put my fingers to his neck. I couldn’t find a pulse.
I placed my head to his chest and listened closely for a heartbeat. It was barely there, but it was there, which meant I could revive him. I carefully straightened his head and started chest compressions. I pumped hard and fast thirty times, but he was still unconscious. I was about to continue to the next phase of CPR—mouth-to-mouth resuscitation—when I hesitated.
If there was ever a time to use magic …
Daniel’s face was white and still. My own chest tightened. I wanted nothing more than for him to open his brown eyes and look up at me. Water from my wet hair dripped onto him.
I’m sorry, I thought.
I closed my eyes, tilted his chin back with one hand, and plugged his nose with the other, and moved closer. Then something warm rushed against my skin. I opened my eyes and saw a silvery glow blow past us like a gust of enchanted wind. The Lady of the Lake was hovering a few yards away. She smiled at me cryptically. Then Daniel coughed. I took my hands away and backed up as he sat up, hacking water.
He put his hand to his head and groaned. “Ugh, what happened?”
“Daniel!” I threw my arms around him and hugged him tightly, quick and hard like Blue’s goodbye to Jason on the bank of the lake. My embrace surprised Daniel as much as hers had surprised Jason. I pulled away a second later, a little embarrassed.
“You, um, almost drowned,” I said.
He glanced at me, warmth in his expression. “I guess the reason that sentence has the ‘almost’ in it is because of you?”
“The Lady of the Lake helped a bit,” I said. I glanced up, but she had disappeared back into her depths. She did leave a parting gift, though. My spear, which I’d left in the boat, was now stuck in the sand a few feet away.
Water dripped down my face. Without our SRBs, Daniel and I would need to dry naturally. I brushed a strand of hair behind my ear and looked into the distance. I still wasn’t able to see the other side of the lake where we’d left our friends. The ring of mist protecting the isle blocked the rest of the world from view.
Daniel got to his feet. I stayed on my knees for a beat and stared up at him. I couldn’t believe how close I’d come to losing him. He gazed at the mist, but I continued looking at him—his eyes, his nose, his lips …
A weird tingle passed through me. It wasn’t fear or awkwardness—it was a bit like electricity. I couldn’t believe how close I’d come to … I mean, if the Lady of the Lake hadn’t shown up and revived him, I would have continued with the CPR and had to …
Daniel tilted his chin down toward me. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” I said, standing swiftly. “Um, are you okay to keep going?”
“Well, it’s not like we can go back after that,” Daniel jested. He started walking across the sand, heading inland.
The cold mist caressed my cheeks. “No. I suppose we can’t,” I muttered. I yanked my spear from the sand and hurried after him.
he Isle of Avalon was much larger than it’d seemed from the mainland. Lavender-colored mountain ridges began about fifty feet from the water and spiraled around the island like the spikes on the back of a dragon, reaching mighty heights.
The mysterious landscape concealed the heart of the isle from where we stood on the beach. We had no idea what could be hiding within the mountains. As we walked down the beach though, we spotted another boat coming ashore. It was Jason’s.
The three of us were glad to be reunited, but our attitudes soured when we spotted something else on the beach a short distance away. Two other boats were resting on the bank—Alex and company’s, no doubt. Our greatest enemies were already ahead of us on the hunt for Excalibur.
I chose to look on the bright side. If they hadn’t returned to their boats, that meant they hadn’t found it yet.
As we forged ahead, I detected a strong presence of magic in the air. I’d felt it since the morning, but now that we were getting closer to midday, the Aurora’s energy was becoming more potent. I wished I could use my powers here—Arian, Alex, and Mauvrey would have no chance.
My eyes were wide and alert as the three of us trekked across Avalon in search of Excalibur. We knew for certain that it was on the isle but had no idea where. The legend (and instructions) that had been guiding us ended here.
While we scoured the terrain, I also looked for anything that resembled a pond or a spring. This isle was where the Four Waters of Paradise could be found—the waters with th
e power to cure my Pure Magic Disease. It was the only substance with the power to give me a clean slate and today, the day of the Vicennalia Aurora, was my only chance to use them. If I decided to use them.
Honestly, I still didn’t know what I would do if I found the waters. I’d saved Jason already, so I didn’t need to worry about that. But our conversation back in Gwenivere’s castle haunted my conscience. Did I really want to cure my Pure Magic Disease? If you’d asked me a couple of days ago, I would have said yes. But now I didn’t know.
If it weren’t for my magic’s growing power, I would have died when those magic hunters shot me, I would’ve been killed in Bluebeard Tower, and I wouldn’t have been able to resurrect Jason. In the last couple of days, I was beginning to value my growing power on a new level and feel its strength in a more exhilarating way. But was that power and potential worth the risk of losing control, corrupting myself, and turning dark? Was it wiser to keep my Pure Magic so I could use it to make a difference, or should I wash myself of this affliction while I had the chance?
I dreaded having to make such a permanent decision.
None of us knew much about Avalon, but we knew that the isle was dangerous and full of treacherous obstacles. After twenty minutes, we came upon our first. It happened when we were passing beneath an arch of lavender rock that was encrusted with hundreds of barnacles. I placed my hand on the thick arch for balance as I stepped through. When I did, the previously unobtrusive barnacles started to flash red—slowly at first but speeding up rapidly. Then they starting making a high-pitched beeping noise.
My friends and I were familiar enough with danger—and the movie Die Hard—to recognize charges when we saw them. We dashed down the rocky path before the barnacles blew like explosives and the entire arch came crumbling to the ground. The boom and clatter echoed around the canyon. If Alex, Mauvrey, and Arian didn’t know we were here before, they certainly knew now.
Our next obstacle occurred in the form of quicksand. The boys stepped in it and within three seconds they were consumed up to their knees. Luckily, I had been a few steps behind them at the time. I braced one boot against a rock as I extended the staff of my spear and pulled them out.
Crisanta Knight: To Death & Back Page 40