The Ring of Morgana (The Children of Camelot)

by Donna Hosie

  “My bag,” cries Lilly. She starts coughing as her vocal chords strain.

  Her little red sequin bag is lying at the bottom of the stairs. I can’t recall it being there when we left.

  “Do you want to sleep with me?” I ask her, yawning. It’s early morning, and my dad is already climbing the stairs to bed, having been awake all night. She shakes her head and skips up the stairs after our father.

  “Titch, Bedivere, you two have the spare room,” calls my dad.

  My mother walks into the kitchen. I see her spread her hands out across one of the kitchen units. She lowers her head and her long dark hair falls forward. Her shoulders are convulsing, but she makes no sound. My mother doesn’t like to cry in front of people because she thinks it’s a sign of weakness.

  A hand rubs up and down my back. “Go to bed, Mila,” says my uncle. “You deserve the rest.”

  I kiss him and Auntie Titch on the cheek and climb the stairs. My legs feel like I’m wearing the world’s heaviest trousers. I ache and stink and I’m so hungry for vinegar-soaked chips I could eat a mountain of them.

  My bedroom door is open. Now I know I didn’t leave it like that because I always make sure I hear the click of the latch before I go anywhere.

  There’s a school exercise book on my bed. I pick it up and fall down onto my covers, too tired to even remove my boots. I flick on my bedside lamp and long for the woody smell of burning torches.

  The school book isn’t mine because the handwriting is so messy it’s like reading a different language. It’s Rustin’s. Then I remember he asked to be let back into Avalon Cottage, just before we left. He must have dropped it off, which explains why my bedroom door was open.

  It’s his history homework book. On the third page, I find his essay on the legends of the village. He’s taken an orange highlighter to several sections that refer to ghosts like Sir David of Starston and his fiancée, Lady Mary. There’s a grey lady, of course, and a headless man.

  And there’s also a reference to the ghost of an old woman in a black cloak. She sits smiling on the steps of the new church, before terrifying late night churchgoers by removing her hood to reveal a completely bald head.

  Freya? No. I shake my head in a futile effort to remove my thoughts of Logres. I’m starting to see things were I want to see them, not where they truthfully exist.

  And then I see his name. He hasn’t highlighted it because it doesn’t refer to a ghost. Instead, it refers to the artisan that built the first place of worship on the site.

  Rustinian.

  A future in the past.

  Outside, the wind is starting to pick up. It’s going to be another cold and windy March day. I flick off my light, kick off my boots and listen to the ghosts in the trees.

  They know I’m back.

  My computer pings. The ghosts hitch up and I know it’s an email from Rustin. We usually message on our phones, but his battery will be dead like mine.

  I clamber over the bed and touch the screen of my computer. Rustin’s email springs open.

  CAN YOU HEAR THEM? it reads.

  I type in YES.

  THEY TALK TO ME HERE NOW!

  WHERE ARE YOU? I type.

  MEET ME AT THE CHURCH – NOW.

  My parents are going to kill me.

  OK.

  Fifteen minutes later, I arrive at the village church. Everything about it is old, from the lichen-covered headstones that no one can read anymore, to the rotting wood that holds the stained-glass windows in place.

  It’s getting lighter as dawn breaks, but the sun is hiding behind the clouds. I see Rustin, standing next to a small cross that was probably white once, but has since been stained with age and decay. He hasn’t changed out of his Logres clothes either.

  “You’re going back, aren’t you?”

  “We could go together,” replies Rustin. “You always wanted to travel.”

  “To New York and Paris and Rome,” I say, tears prickling my eyelids. “I can’t go back to Logres, not yet. I need to be a big sister, not a princess, just for a bit longer.”

  “I can’t stay, Mila,” says Rustin. “There’s nothing for me here. No prospects, no real family, no hope.”

  “How do you know you’ll be able to get through? You won’t know the way back to Camelot. You’ll get lost or attacked.” The tears are flowing freely now and I make no attempt to wipe them away.

  “The trees will show me the way.”

  “You’re putting a lot of trust in some blocks of bloody wood,” I cry, wiping the back of my hand across my face.

  “I have to try.”

  Rustin wraps his arms around my waist and pulls me into his body. I want to fight him off. I want to pummel him with my elbows. He promised me he would stay with me and now he’s leaving, just like I feared he would. I thought I had him back, but he lulled me into a false sense of security.

  And I hate myself for feeling like this because I know I have to let him go.

  “Promise me you’ll go straight to Camelot,” I sob. “Promise me you’ll go there and wait for me.”

  “I’ll find you, Mila. Your Uncle Bed told me he travelled through time to find your aunt. You’re a princess, a child of Camelot. Of course I’ll find you. You’re my everything.”

  Epilogue

  One month has passed since Lilly took the Ring of Morgana.

  If I thought my father would cut me some slack with the revision for exams, I was hopelessly wrong. I crammed until my eyes saw the world in duplicate. The last exam finished this afternoon and now I’m at Katie and Aidan’s engagement party - in the wet and the dark outside the church hall - trying to avoid the acne-covered dickheads from school who think they’re all that because they can ride a 50cc motorbike.

  But they’re nothing. They’ve done nothing.

  Rustin should be here, but he’s not. Everyone was told he had dropped out and gone travelling. It wasn’t a lie, but I miss him so much it hurts.

  I’m debating whether to head home to Avalon Cottage. I’m bored and I feel like a freak. Katie says I’ve changed, but I can’t tell her how because I don’t really understand it myself. All I know is this little village is way too small for what I know of the world now.

  Then I see movement across the road in the graveyard. For a split second I think it’s Rustin, and my heart rate quickens, as if I’ve just smoked one of Michael Kent’s “special” smokes.

  But the figure is too tall to be Rustin, so it’ll be one of Marty Carter’s conquests, hoping for his reward no doubt for going into the graveyard at night.

  Then the figure steps out from the shadows and I gasp. My eyes are playing tricks on me, seeing Logres in my time.

  The boy bows, just like he did that first time I saw him in the forest.

  I’ve finally seen one of my ghosts. I smile and wave, pulling off the hideous high heels my mother begged me to wear, before running barefoot across the road towards him.

  “What are you doing here, Melehan?” I cry.

  “I have much to tell you, Lady Mila,” he replies, kissing my hand. “Of Logres, and Freya, and Rustinian too. May I walk you home?”

  “Yes!” I cry. “Tell me everything.”

  The walk home is always my favourite part of the day.

  The Ring of Morgana

  Copyright: Donna Hosie

  Published: 2014

  The right of Donna Hosie to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in retrieval system, copied in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise transmitted without written permission from the author. You must not circulate this book in any format.

  About the Author

  Donna Hosie is an English writer currently living in Australia. The Ring of Morgana is her fourth novel. You can find details of releases on her blog, Musings
of a Penniless Writer, and on her Facebook page.

  Also available by the same author

  Searching for Arthur (The Return to Camelot Trilogy 1)

  The Fire of Merlin (The Return to Camelot Trilogy 2)

  The Spirit of Nimue (The Return to Camelot Trilogy 3)