“I don’t know what it is with these demons,” Daniel says, swinging his sword around and almost dropping it, “but they’re much stronger than anything we’ve ever faced.”
“That can’t be hard considering you’ve never had to fight any before,” Keva retorts, though her shaky voice betrays her seeming unconcern.
As another contraction relents, I ease one of my hands free from the woman’s crushing hold to grab a handful of snow and spread it on my burning forehead in a vain attempt to dispel my growing migraine.
“I’ll tell you one thing,” Daniel says. “If I were one of them Fey, I wouldn’t want to fight Percy. That guy’s a total lunatic.”
“He’s not crazy,” I retort, bristling at the hated expression, one thrown so carelessly around by people when they don’t understand someone. “As if you’re so superior yourself.”
“Yeah, Daniel, nobody’s better than the Triumvirate, least of all you,” Keva says, using the school’s nickname for the good-looking, highly-skilled trio formed by Lance, Percy, and Arthur.
She suddenly yelps as the earth heaves under us like a tidal wave, scattering knights and laymen alike over the field like seeds in the wind. I feel my hold on the woman slip, despite her deathly grip, and shout out in fear. If she gets tumbled around too roughly, she may lose the baby!
I come to a sliding stop by the lake’s edge and immediately push myself back up to look for the pregnant woman. Another explosion hits the ground and, in its flare, I finally spot her large form lying beside the glowing circle.
“Morgan, watch out!”
I turn at the sound of Gareth’s voice as a gargantuan, scaly beast slams into me. There’s a loud crunch and my ears pop as I fly backward into the air.
I land on the lake’s frozen surface, jarring my elbows with such force the ice cracks underneath me.
“Morgan!” Arthur exclaims, but another Fey tackles him and they both fall rolling to the ground.
“No!” I scream, wincing as pain shoots down my spine, anchoring me to the ice as if someone’s nailed me to it.
I watch the few knights left as they keep on fighting, their movements getting more and more sluggish, their blows less effective. At this rate we’ll all be slaughtered before the sun rises.
I struggle to get back up, biting hard on my lip not to scream at the pain every movement produces, trying to force my body to respond the way I want it to.
“Don’t. Move.”
I blink sweat out of my eyes as the tattooed Fey draws closer.
“Stay away from me,” I whisper with dread.
I scramble further back onto the lake, crying out as spasms lance down my body. Then the ice disappears from beneath me and I feel myself slip backward into the frigid waters.
“Morgan!” Mordred yells.
I see him dive after me a second before the water closes up over my head. My clothes, threaded with iron, drag me further and further down towards the lakebed. My lungs scream for air, my ears buzzing from the increasing pressure. I feel something wrap itself around my waist and I come to a sudden stop. Then, slowly, I feel myself get dragged the other way.
The bitter wind nips at my face the moment I break the surface and I feel myself get unceremoniously dumped onto solid ground. I gasp, coughing up water.
Mordred grins above me, his teeth flashing white, his hair sticking to his face in wet strands. “That was a close one,” he says through the ringing in my ears. “Still better than becoming another reaping for the Teind though, right?”
“A what for the what?” I ask through chattering teeth, distracted by a distinctive clip-clopping coming from the lake.
Something blows warm air on my face. Blinking furiously against the snowstorm, I turn around to find a large, round eye the color of dying embers staring at me.
The beastly horse suddenly rears up, its dark mane spraying me with icy droplets of water.
“Time to get going,” Mordred says, calming his steed down. “Though I suppose I should get rid of this first. Wouldn’t want any more accidents to happen, would we?”
Winking at me, Mordred strides over to the magic circle, its edges still pulsating with that strange purple light. He pauses beside the pregnant woman.
“One more, I suppose,” Mordred says, placing his foot on her large stomach.
“Don’t!” I yell, my voice raspy.
Mordred looks over his shoulder at me, and a strange glint enters his eyes. “As a sign of my good will towards you,” he says at last, “I’ll grant you your wish. But remember that you owe me now, Morgan.”
He removes his foot from the inert woman before slowly sweeping his hand around the portal. Steam rises from the earth in response, momentarily hiding him and the woman from view. But when it dissipates again, all that remains is a large patch of mud.
The woman finally stirs, and I realize that the music’s stopped.
In one lithe movement, Mordred jumps onto his horse then looks down at me, his golden eyes gleaming brightly in the darkness.
“You should come with me,” he says. “You don’t belong with them.”
There’s something about Mordred that draws me, a lilt in his voice that lulls my instinct of self-preservation. I frown. What is wrong with me? Why am I willing to trust him so easily, especially after everything I’ve seen him do?
“I heard you wanted to learn more about your mother,” he insists.
A frisson runs down my spine. “You know who she is?” I ask.
The sounds battle all around us roar louder—the clang of swords, explosions of elemental attacks, and the growing screams of the crowd who’s finally rising from its stupor. Mordred leans down and holds his hand out for me.
“Morgan, don’t!” I hear Arthur yell, his voice drifting over the din of the fight.
I stop, just inches from the mare’s side, before I realize I’ve even moved. Startled, I look up at Mordred, his face split with a knowing grin. Can he hypnotize people with his voice? I hug myself to stop from shaking, scared at the thought of going with him, scared at the thought of staying behind.
This could be my only hope of finding out about my mother, I realize. Even Arthur admitted he didn’t know a single thing about her.
I take another step towards the tattooed Fey, his warm fingers already closing around mine. As I get ready to jump on the horse behind him, I glance one last time at those I’m leaving behind and stop.
Knights are still struggling to defend the terrified population while the Fey chase them down on the muddy pool the field’s become. I see Arthur hack his way through a group of Fey, his body the only thing keeping them away from the pregnant woman I tried to help.
“No,” I say, the word leaving my lips with a tinge of regret.
“Are you quite sure?” Mordred asks, pulling me to him.
I pry my hand loose. “Leaving chaos and destruction in your wake may be your thing,” I say, feeling more confident, “but it isn’t mine.”
Dropping his smile, Mordred shrugs. “Maybe next time you won’t be so picky,” he says, before sending his Fey horse galloping over the lake’s frozen waters.
I watch him raise a long, curved horn to his lips and let out a deep, drawn-out blow. The remaining Fey halt their slaughter, shackles raised, then howl in unison before bounding over to their leader.
“They’re escaping!” Percy yells, veins bulging on his muddy forehead.
“Let them,” Lance shouts back.
The ice sheet glows red as a circle forms around the pack of Fey, Mordred in its center. He gives me a brief salute, and then they all vanish.
“Morgan?” Arthur asks, turning me around to make sure that I’m not hurt.
My eyes focus on the woman panting on the ground, her arms wrapped around her protruding stomach, in obvious pain.
“The baby!” I say, automatically reaching out for her frail figure.
But Arthur holds me back. “Help is on its way,” he says, “but we can’t stay here. They can’
t know what we are. What we do.”
“But she already saw everything,” I say as Arthur drags me away.
“They’re confused,” Arthur says. “By tomorrow they’ll only remember the fire and think some of them died in it, while the others lost their minds fleeing.”
“After all of this?” I say, skeptical.
“People believe what they want to believe,” Arthur says stopping out of sight behind a large house.
I look down at myself as we stand before the lit kitchen window, the light’s warm glow catching the silvery threads of my dirty uniform. And I see that I’m not covered in mud, but in blood.
Yes, I finally admit to myself as Arthur grabs me around the waist then launches us into the air, the mind does like to play tricks.
Chapter 12
We land next to the cars, snow whirling around us in a wide circle, Percy’s salamander orbs lighting our way. As our feet touch the ground, Arthur brusquely lets go of me and I nearly slip.
“What did I tell you?” he yells, his face red.
I stare, wide eyed, caught off guard by his sudden anger.
“I told you to stay out of trouble!” he continues.
“I went looking for Daniel,” I say, stung. “Besides, I couldn’t let all those poor people—”
“We would have gotten to them without you meddling in!” Arthur explodes.
“I sent for help, Keva—”
“—almost got killed because you decided to go check things out on your own,” he cuts me off again. “You never listen, Morgan! How can I trust you, when you keep getting everyone around you killed?”
“That’s not fair,” I say, as the rest of our troop lands in the parking area around us.
“And you,” Arthur snaps, pointing at Daniel who’s jingling a now fat pouch filled with oghams, “you failed your very first mission. You were to remain with the squires and keep an eye on things over here, not try to play the hero.”
Daniel’s face turns ghostly white, but for once I’m too mortified myself to enjoy his predicament.
“If you call a hero someone found cowering in the bushes,” Gauvain says, his dreadlocks bobbing up and down as he shakes his head.
“You’ve got no nuts,” Gareth tells Daniel with a deep frown. “I should teach you to grow them bigger so you don’t hide next time.”
“He means ‘guts,’” Gauvain says, “but I agree with him. You can’t consider yourself a knight if you run away from danger.”
“Give him a break, guys,” Percy says, an excited gleam still lodged in his eyes, “he’s just a button[54]. Might be he ain’t knight material yet, but he can still grow into his britches.”
“We should probably call the base,” Hadrian says, looking at his watch. “Lance is still back there, but the longer the laymen are left alone, the harder it’ll be for us to take care of them.”
“Right on it,” Gauvain says, the glowing orbs of fire now hovering above him.
We crowd around him as he tilts the nearest car’s side view mirror towards him. In a few quick strokes, he draws a few runes in the condensation then mutters a couple of foreign words.
The surface of the mirror swiftly fogs over before turning dark. Suddenly, a single point of light appears in its center, growing bigger and bigger until a face comes into view.
My mouth drops open as I recognize Bri’s father.
“Sir Neil,” Gauvain says, “we have an emergency to report.”
Sir Neil’s eyes grow into the side view mirror until all we can see is his veiny eyeball, eyelid lined with dark lashes blinking rapidly over it. His voice crackles in the air, as if coming from very far away through an old phone line. “Who is this?”
“This is Sir Gauvain,” Gauvain says, “reporting from battle. We need a team of cleaners sent over urgently, as well as one from the trauma center.”
“The trauma center?” Sir Neil exclaims. “For how many people?”
“We’re not sure,” Gauvain says.
“Two dozen laymen,” Hadrian interjects, reading off a list Keva’s holding before him.
“Two dozen!” Bri’s father exclaims, dousing the surface of the mirror with droplets of saliva. “Y-yes, of course,” he says, quickly wiping his spit away. “I’ll let Lady Irene know straightaway.”
“We’re at Little Lake Butte des Morts,” Gauvain says. “An exit away from US 10, on the northwestern corner of Fritse Park, but the teams are needed further north along the coastline.”
“Noted,” Sir Neil’s dim voice responds as the side view mirror fogs up again.
“I’ll wait here for them,” Percy says.
Arthur frowns at him. “You should go back and get your wounds treated,” he says. “I can stay here until the teams arrive.”
“Ya’ve got quite a few injuries too,” Percy says, resisting the cousins’ attempts at forcing him into his bright orange car. He grins with pride despite the new gash on his forehead. “And ya’ve got Morgan to think about,” he adds.
“True,” Arthur says with a scowl in my direction. “I’m still not done with her. Very well, please report to me as soon as you get back from Dr. Cocklebur’s. And do put your shirt back on.”
“Righto,” Percy says, waving at me as I drag my feet back to Arthur’s car, then sink into the passenger seat.
I watch the others through my window as they pack up, envying their Arthur-less state, until the car turns down a corner and the group drops out of sight.
An uncomfortable silence settles between Arthur and me, and my thoughts drift back to Mordred. The tattooed Fey is a knot of contradictions, one minute offing everyone who stands in his way, the next saving me and that woman.
I made the right choice not to go with him, I tell myself, trying to quell the feeling of regret growing inside me. He’s got no qualms killing humans like animals at the slaughterhouse. He probably lied about my mother too so I would go to Carman without resisting.
I shiver at the thought, remembering how he said I now owed him for sparing the woman’s life.
“What’s the trauma center?” I ask Arthur to distract myself from my disturbing thoughts.
“A treatment center for laymen,” he says in clipped tones.
“I gathered that much for myself,” I say. “But what does it do?”
Arthur casts me a furtive look. “It’s where we take care of those who’ve been in contact with the Fey,” he says.
“Like the asylum?” I ask, finding it suddenly difficult to breathe.
“Not exactly,” Arthur says. “Regular people react differently than we do. The trauma center consists instead of different forms of treatment, mostly psychological. Anything to get them over their encounter.”
A strong sense of suspicion descends upon me. “You mean brainwash?” I ask.
“You could call it that,” Arthur says. “We basically find ways to recreate the events they went through and turn them into something more believable, something more rational, that their minds will more readily accept.”
“It’s still brainwashing,” I say. “Manipulating people against their will.”
“We’re helping them live their lives with fewer worries,” Arthur says. “Even if they knew about the Fey, they wouldn’t be able to do a thing against them. Would you rather they live in constant fear? You saw all those people out there. Did they look like they were taking things well?”
The laymen’s screams when they woke up from their trance echoes in my mind, giving credence to Arthur’s assertion.
“What’s your success rate?” I ask instead, unwilling to admit he’s right.
“About seventy six percent,” Arthur says. “But we’ve got people working to get that figure up.”
“What happens to the remaining twenty-four?”
Arthur shrugs. “They’re sent back to their families just the same.”
“Just like that? I didn’t think you’d be comfortable with people spreading around your dirty little secrets.”
“I
t’s easy to discredit people when others think they’re crazy,” he says, casting me a careful glance. “Some ideas catch on, of course, like UFO abductions and whatnot. But they never truly become mainstream, which allows us to continue with our mission.”
“Your mission to rid the world of people like me, you mean,” I retort.
“Of getting rid of the Fey who are a threat to humans,” Arthur says.
But we both know that, to some, those two statements are one and the same.
◆◆◆
We arrive at Lake High just as the morning church bells ring Lauds. I groan at the thought of having to attend another interminable hour listening to Father Tristan while I’m still caked in blood.
I find Keva already seated, all prim and proper, as if she hasn’t just spent the whole night out battling Fey.
“What took you so long?” she asks.
“Arthur’s grandpa driving,” I say, sitting next to her.
Keva scoots further away from me, wrinkling her nose in distaste. “You could have at least cleaned yourself up.”
“I took a dip in the lake,” I say, stifling a yawn. “That’ll have to do.”
I stare sightlessly at the back of Arthur’s head, struggling to keep my eyes open. Now that my system’s no longer flooded with adrenaline, my whole body wants to shut down. Which is strange. I’ve pulled my fair share of all-nighters before, back in Switzerland, when I wanted to escape the confines of the boarding school. But I’d never had such a hard time staying awake afterward, despite the nuns’ own brain-deadening lectures.
My eyes close of their own volition as the first notes of the Kyrie Eleison ring out. Moments later, I jerk awake as a sharp elbow digs into my ribs.
“Ow,” I say, rubbing my sore side.
“You were snoring,” Keva whispers. “Can’t you at least wait till mass is over?”
I note Arthur’s look of reprobation and smile sheepishly back at him.
“In short,” Father Tristan says, his deep voice echoing down the nave, “I entreat you not to lose faith and courage in the face of adversity. For let me remind you of these words from Deuteronomy, ‘Do not fear or be in dread of them, for it is the Lord your God who goes with you. He will not leave you or forsake you!’”
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