The School for Good and Evil #6: One True King

by Soman Chainani

  “The knight lied,” Agatha argued. “You heard your dad—”

  But Professor Sader’s voice had returned, a new panorama filling in.

  “Needless to say, the king had no intention of delivering his wizard to the knight and blocked the entrance to his castle with a thousand guards. Yet, to the Green Knight, he and the king had made a deal. The king had taken his cut; now it was the knight’s turn to strike Merlin. And as long as Arthur refused to honor these terms, then his people would pay the price.”

  Around Tedros and Agatha spawned a montage of destruction: the Green Knight, head restored, setting fire to castles and carriages; slashing through armies with his axe; launching avalanches to crush villages; terrorizing the streets of kingdoms, Good and Evil. Every arrow that pierced his green chest, every sword that drew blood, he easily swatted away, his skin healing instantly, his force invincible. Mobs gathered in Camelot’s square and at the castle gates, jeering the blockade of guards, shouting slurs at Arthur, demanding the king come out and kill this green monster.

  Instantly Agatha was reminded of Japeth and his brother, slithering into the Woods and terrorizing the people to turn them against Tedros. They had succeeded just as the Green Knight had.

  “Past is Present and Present is Past,” the Snake’s brother once said. “The story goes round and round again.”

  Coincidence? Agatha wondered. Or did Rhian and Japeth have ties to the Green Knight? Ties that made this first test as significant to Japeth as it was to Tedros? Was the Green Knight the key to solving who Rhian and Japeth really were?

  But now the scene in the black box was changing: this time, to King Arthur’s chambers, as the king stood at his window, watching smoke rise over distant kingdoms, along with the protests at his castle gates.

  “Should have let him have me,” said a voice.

  Arthur turned to find Merlin at the door, the wizard in his purple cape, dented cone hat, and violet slippers, his long, thick beard scragglier than ever.

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” said Arthur, turning back around.

  “A deal is a deal,” said Merlin.

  “Our knights are having no luck against him,” Arthur confessed stiffly. “Then again, Lancelot left them in quite a state. Gone without warning: their captain revealed to be a traitor, adulterer, deserter. No wonder they can’t find the strength to take down this green fool. I’ll have to ride into battle against him myself.”

  “You’ll die and he’ll have me in any case,” Merlin replied.

  The king said nothing for a moment.

  “Why does he want to kill you?” Arthur asked.

  “We have history,” the wizard answered.

  “What kind of history?”

  “Personal history.”

  Arthur kept his eyes out the window.

  “He believes I owe him something,” the wizard sighed. “Something he can only take if I’m dead.”

  “And what is that thing? What is it that he wants?”

  “I’m afraid I can’t tell you.”

  Arthur whirled around. “I am inflicting pain on the whole of the Woods, in your name, and you can’t tell me?”

  “What I can tell you is to stop your martyrdom and deliver me as agreed,” said Merlin. “This is between me and the knight.”

  “Then go, you doddering prat!” Arthur exploded. “Go like Gwen did! Go like Lance! You and your personal history. Settle your business without me!”

  “I would have done that from the beginning, but he made the deal with you,” Merlin answered. “You must deliver me. Or his terror will not stop.”

  “Why am I a part of this? This has nothing do with me!” Arthur assailed. “He’s acting like I should remember him. Like I should know who he is.”

  “Do you?” Merlin asked.

  “Clearly not!” the king snapped. “So why me? Why do I have to deliver you?”

  “Isn’t it obvious?” said Merlin, quietly. “He would like to see us both suffer.”

  Arthur stared at him.

  “Merlin? Is that you?” said a soft, young voice.

  A young boy pulled in, eight or nine years old, with sleepy blue eyes, floppy gold hair, and rumpled pajamas. “Can you make me a toddy, double marshmallow and candy cream, like usua—”

  The young prince caught his dad at the window. “Oh. Thought you were alone.” The boy started to leave.

  “Tedros, wait—” Arthur began.

  Young Tedros spun around. “Why are you still here? Go find Mother! You promised! Just like you promised to keep the Woods safe. But you’re not doing that either! You’re not doing anything!”

  He stormed out of the room.

  Arthur didn’t go after him, pain clouding his eyes, looking even more the child than his son.

  Next to Agatha, the grown Tedros was breathing raggedly, reliving this very moment, watching Merlin step towards his dad.

  “You’ve lost your wife, Arthur. You’ve lost your best friend,” the wizard said gently. “Don’t lose him too.”

  A tear rolled down the king’s cheek.

  “I’ll send word to the Green Knight,” said Merlin, touching the king. “Tomorrow at dawn in Ender’s Forest. Where no one will see us.”

  The king gazed off into the distance . . . then turned. “Ender’s Forest? No one knows how to find that except you and me—”

  But Merlin was already gone.

  As the scene vanished, Tedros looked more confused than ever. “We still don’t know what the Green Knight wanted from Merlin. The secret he came for. Which means we still don’t know the answer to my first test.”

  “The story isn’t over yet,” said Agatha, watching colors begin to fill in the darkness once more.

  Tedros exhaled. “Was your family this messed up?”

  “You have no idea,” Agatha said, forcing a smile.

  Cramped close in the black box, she held her prince’s hand.

  “We know the end to the tale,” Tedros said. “Merlin survives. Dad does too. The Green Knight dies.” He looked at his princess. “So why do I feel like something terrible is about to happen?”

  This, Agatha had no comfort for.

  Because she had the same feeling too.

  A purple forest melted into view around them, the leaves and flowers of every tree, bush, and shrub spanning shades of plum, violet, orchid, amethyst, and lavender.

  “Tedros will know Ender’s Forest well, of course, for it’s where Merlin used to give him lessons,” Professor Sader spoke.

  “When I could find it,” Tedros murmured.

  “If the Celestium was the wizard’s place to think, then Ender’s Forest was the wizard’s place to practice—a forest that appeared only to Merlin whenever and wherever he wished, his space to workshop new spells and hexes and disguises away from prying eyes . . .”

  Merlin and Arthur heard the knight before they saw him, his resounding steps rattling the tree beneath which wizard and king waited, the dust of dawn rippling through darkness.

  “Right on schedule,” said the wizard, combing his beard with his fingers.

  “Took me ten tries to find this place the first time,” said Arthur. “How did he know how to get in?”

  Merlin didn’t answer, the knight’s footsteps growing louder.

  Arthur instinctively touched the sword on his belt—

  “Whatever happens, you are to stay out of it,” Merlin ordered the king, his voice sharp. “Our trust has been strained of late, Arthur. You broke into my quarters. Stole my gnome potion so you could snoop after Guinevere. By betraying me, you only hastened her departure. But the stakes now are even higher. You have delivered me to the Green Knight, per the terms of the agreement. You are to play no further role.”

  Arthur looked distressed. “Merlin, you can’t expect me to stand here and let him—”

  “Remember why you are here,” Merlin retorted, stone-eyed. “To be a good king. To be a good father. Do not undo what is right with what feels right. Promise that you wi
ll do as I say. Promise that you will trust me to handle myself.”

  “But—”

  “Promise me.”

  The wizard’s tone left no doubt, no room for bargaining.

  Arthur could see the shadow of the invincible savage approaching, his boots crushing the lilac beds, his golden axe spattered with blood. The king held back tears, faced with the inevitability of what was to come and no recourse to stop it.

  “I promise,” he said emptily.

  Merlin faced the knight.

  “No tricks, Merlin,” his green nemesis flared, a hot flush already in his cheeks. “You have too much dignity to cheat me. I expect you to honor the terms.” He glanced at Arthur. “You, too. Though I can’t say the same about your dignity.”

  Arthur reached for his sword—

  He saw Merlin glaring.

  The king drew back.

  “Let us finish our business, then,” the wizard resumed, stepping towards the knight. “Come, Japeth. Strike your blow.”

  Agatha gripped Tedros so hard she almost broke his hand. Tedros choked on his spit—

  Japeth? Agatha screamed in her head.

  JAPETH?

  The Green Knight hadn’t moved, his sad, dark eyes on the wizard. “How could you choose him over me, Merlin? How could you put your lot in with that?” He stabbed a meaty finger at Arthur. “This coward. This cuckold. When you could have had me. When the Woods could have had me.”

  Arthur looked between them. “What is he talking about, Merlin?”

  The wizard’s gaze stayed with the knight. “I didn’t choose Arthur over you, Japeth. Arthur was destined to be king.”

  “Don’t. Lie. No lies,” the Green Knight spat, his voice sounding younger, uncontrolled. “You favored him over me from the beginning. Even though I was Ector’s real son. Even though Father brought you to be my tutor. I was always stronger and better than that . . . wart. That’s what everyone called him, remember? Wart. A blemish on our house. A foster brother no one wanted. And still, you shined your light on him. Only him. That’s why he could pull the sword out of the stone. Because you helped him—”

  “Not true, Japeth.”

  “I should have been king,” the knight said, his eyes welling. “I should be him!”

  Agatha’s hand went cold in her prince’s.

  “Your wart of a son . . .”

  The pieces slammed together in Agatha’s head: the knight’s taunts to the king, that wrong file in the Library, the one the mouse said was Japeth’s—

  The Green Knight wasn’t a stranger at all. The Green Knight was . . .

  “Kay?” Arthur gasped, big-eyed.

  “Don’t call me that, Wart,” the knight snarled. “I’m not Kay anymore. I’m Japeth, the name my mother gave me, not the puffed-up name Dad thought would be better for a knight. ‘Sir Kay,’ the bold and strong, fated for glory. Until you stole my destiny. Until the Storian made you legend and me the footnote. Sir Kay, the buffoon brother. But you know that wasn’t the truth. So you offered me a place as your first knight to make amends—only to mock me by giving Lance all your attention and love, the same way Merlin chose you over me. Not just Sir Kay, the idiot now. Now Sir Kay, the joke. Sir Kay, the Runt of the Round Table. That’s why I left Camelot. That’s why I waited to take my revenge until the time was right. Until the Woods could see the failure that was their king. I bet that’s why your wife left you? Because she knew the Wart I knew? Lancelot, too. He didn’t just steal your wife, he abandoned you, your choice to love him as wrong as Merlin’s choice to love you. You must wonder why everyone leaves you . . . Guinevere, Lancelot, soon Merlin, no doubt. Even Sir Kay has gone. A relic of your fairy tale. It’s Japeth, now. Mother named me right. A name fit for a Snake.”

  He turned on Merlin. “As for you, old man, I only want what you promised me as a boy. You swore when Arthur pulled the sword that I would go on to a destiny even bigger. That I would have a life I’d be proud of. That I wouldn’t resent that wart becoming king.” His cheeks burned a darker green. “And if I didn’t have a good life, a great life, if you were proven to have lied to me, then I could claim your Wizard Wish. The one wish every wizard keeps hidden away where only he can find it. A wish that can grant any desire said out loud, but one you save to choose when to leave this world, like all wizards do. Only it’s not your wish anymore, Merlin. Because you said if I didn’t find my destiny like you promised, then I could take your wish for myself. I could wish for anything I wanted to make up for what you deprived me of. Well, Merlin . . .”

  He prowled towards the wizard, gripping his axe.

  “I wish for a death.”

  Merlin showed no fear, no remorse. “I said you would live a great life if you allowed yourself to have it, Japeth. But you held on to your bitterness towards Arthur. Envy is a green snake that swallows the heart whole. Look at what it’s done to you. It’s swelled inside you, this green poison, devouring your soul, consuming your humanity, until it’s become bigger than you. Jealousy has no bounds. It cannot be quenched, even by death. You will live forever this way. Invincible, immortal . . . but eaten alive by the green snake of your heart. Unless you learn to let it go. Unless you learn to forgive. Not just me and Arthur, but yourself too. Only then can you begin again. Only then can you have the life you were meant to, the life I said you could have if you chose it.”

  “More lies! More excuses!” the Green Knight cried, his lips trembling. His towering form loomed over the wizard’s. He smeared at his eyes, forcing composure. “Kneel, you dog. My turn for a blow.”

  “As you wish,” said Merlin.

  He slipped off his hat and bent to the ground, laying his head against a fallen tree, tilting his long beard to the side and bearing his white, scrawny neck.

  Chills raced up Agatha’s spine, seeing Merlin so vulnerable, remembering the wizard was as mortal as she—

  “Wait,” Arthur choked out, rushing forward, sword in hand. “Don’t do this, Kay!”

  Merlin shot a spell, pinning Arthur against a tree, the king’s chest invisibly bound, his fist with Excalibur flailing in vain.

  “Take your blow, Japeth,” the wizard spoke, his cheek to the log. “Do what you’ve come to do.”

  Agatha could see the Green Knight quaking harder as he stared down at Merlin’s neck, the axe unsteady in his palms.

  “Why, Merlin?” he whimpered. “Why didn’t you love me?”

  The wizard lifted his eyes. “I love you as much as I love Arthur. As much as I love any of my wards. But love has to be received as much as it is given.”

  Tears spilled across the Green Knight’s face. “Tell me I would have made a better king . . . Tell me you made a mistake . . . That I should have been the Lion. Instead of the Snake.”

  Merlin gave him a warm, loving smile. “I hope you find peace, Japeth.”

  The knight let out a sob. “Curse you, Merlin.”

  He raised the axe.

  “No!” Arthur screamed, thrashing against the spell.

  The Green Knight swung the blade down, cutting through Merlin.

  With a cry, Arthur flung his sword across the forest—

  Excalibur impaled hard in the knight’s chest.

  The green-skin hulk glanced down as blood gushed out of him . . . only to flow back in neatly, the wound closing around Arthur’s sword, the knight’s immortal skin healing once more.

  But Arthur wasn’t looking at the Green Knight anymore.

  He was gaping past him . . . at the wizard over the log . . .

  “Agatha . . . ,” Tedros said.

  Tedros was pointing at Merlin . . . Merlin, who Agatha couldn’t bear to look at because he’d have no head . . .

  Only he did have a head.

  Because the axe hadn’t cut through it.

  The knight hadn’t aimed for Merlin’s neck at all.

  He’d aimed for Merlin’s beard, shearing the long, raggedy patch of hair from the wizard’s chin.

  Arthur froze as the Green Knight c
almly retrieved the wizard beard from the dirt, the gash in the knight’s chest sealed around the blade.

  Slowly, Merlin raised his head, surprised to be alive. He watched the Green Knight hold up the shorn beard, a deep steel in the knight’s eye. Only then did Merlin understand his plan.

  “Listen to me, Japeth. Let’s talk first,” he said. For the first time, the wizard looked scared.

  The Green Knight noticed. “So it is still here. You told me you hid it in your beard when you promised it to me. All these years. You could have moved it somewhere else . . .”

  “Don’t do it, Japeth,” Merlin begged.

  “Thank you for giving me your Wizard Wish, Merlin,” said the knight, his voice steadying. “I know you wanted me to be happy. But I need this wish now. More than you.”

  “There are other ways—” Merlin insisted.

  The Green Knight pressed the wizard beard to his heart. “I wish to give up this bitterness, this envy, this hate. I wish to feel love and forgiveness and peace. I wish to be restored to the man I’m meant to be.” He looked right at Merlin. “I wish to be . . . free.”

  “No!” the wizard cried.

  Instantly the green started to fade from the knight’s skin. His muscles deflated, his veins shriveled, his sculpted cheeks sagged, until the Green Knight was nothing more than a soft-bellied, pallid, middle-aged man, out of place in an enchanted wood. Sir Kay took a deep breath, his chest rising and falling, his focus lifting to the sky.

  “So this is what it’s like . . . ,” he whispered.

  He closed his eyes, the last tints of green draining.

  The sword in his chest quivered.

  The wound reopened, blood flooding his chest.

  Kay opened his eyes as bright as the sun.

  “Goodbye, Merlin,” he said.

  Then he fell down dead.

  Merlin ran to his side, scooping him into his arms.

  But it was too late.

  The wish granted.

  The deed done.

  Not Merlin’s death chosen . . . but the knight’s own.

  The wizard wept softly, cradling Kay like a child.