The Seven Swords

by Nils Johnson-Shelton

  “Qwon’s important for another reason, isn’t she?” Artie asked Merlin directly.

  Merlin squinted as he said, “Yes, she is.”

  “Kusanagi—the Japanese sword—it’s Qwon’s, isn’t it?” Artie guessed.

  “Yes, my boy,” Merlin said with a smile.

  Kay couldn’t believe it. She threw up her arms and said, “And I suppose Gram belongs to Erik Erikssen? I’m pretty sure he’s like a thousand percent Norse, or Swedish or whatever.”

  “Ha! Right! Can you guys imagine?” Artie said with a laugh.

  But neither Merlin nor Thumb returned his laughter.

  “Actually, yes,” Thumb said.

  “What?” Kay blurted.

  “This is all pretty convenient,” Kynder said. “Artie, Kay, Qwon, Erik. All in Shadyside?”

  “Convenient my foot,” Merlin quipped. “Do you have any idea the lengths that I had to go to get these children’s families to move closer to you? The Onakeas are from Hawaii. Imagine how hard it is to convince Hawaiians that their lives will be better in Pittsburgh—nothing against Pittsburgh, of course, lovely place. The Erikssens were easier since they were from Ohio, but even so.”

  “So it’s not all a coincidence?” Kay asked. The idea that she and Erik, who happened to like her a lot, were meant to spend time together was slightly nauseating.

  “No, Kay, it’s not,” Merlin said.

  “It makes sense,” Artie said, standing up. “It’s why Qwon knew what she was doing with Cleomede that day, Kay. It’s why Morgaine could key in on her. She’s like us. She’s . . . different.” Merlin nodded, and Artie continued, “All right. How do we go about this?”

  The wizard smiled. “Using the pommel, you will leapfrog around this world and the Otherworld, opening crossovers as you go, seeking out the Seven Swords. Naturally Morgaine will try to stop you when she can. Of course she wants to prevent you from returning to Avalon, but she also does not want the crossovers opened. They devour magical energy through the ether, so more open crossovers equals less power for Morgaine, and the less power she has, the easier she will be to defeat!”

  At this Merlin clapped his hands excitedly.

  “Fine, but how are we going to get Excalibur?” Artie asked.

  Merlin sighed and said, “I’m still working on that.”

  “Great,” Kay said flatly.

  Artie wasn’t totally satisfied either, but what choice did they have? He said, “Okay. Let’s get started. Like, now.”

  “Tomorrow, lad,” Thumb said. “We’ve got to recruit Erik first, and also ready ourselves.”

  “Yes—tomorrow,” Merlin said. “I’ve drafted a half dozen magical letters that will enchant whoever reads them, making them unaware that you’re not around. They’re for Erik’s parents and your school, since you’ll be absent for the next week or so. Lance—can you run them to the post office in the morning?”

  “Course,” Lance said. “Then can you send me to Sweden? I really want to help find Gram. I don’t enjoy feeling like a fifth wheel so much, you know?”

  “Of course, Mr. Lance,” Merlin said with a broad smile. “But this time you can help in any way Artie sees fit. You will be joining us in the Otherworld!”

  “What?” Lance barked.

  “That’s right! I’ve brought back some talismans that will enable you to cross as easily as Artie or Kay or Mr. Thumb.”

  “Hoo-ah!” Lance said, standing up and knocking his chair over. He bounded into the backyard whooping and hollering.

  “That’s awesome,” said Kay, happy to know they’d have another ally over there.

  “Seriously,” Artie agreed.

  “Well,” Kynder said, smacking his thighs and standing up. “Merlin—why don’t we let the guys take this all in? I have to go and do some dishes. Do you feel well enough to give me a hand?”

  “Yes, of course,” the wizard said, easing out of his chair. He joined Kynder and they went into the kitchen, leaving Artie, Kay, Thumb, and Bedevere to talk about going back to the Otherworld.

  Kynder rinsed dishes and Merlin loaded them into the dishwasher, and for a while they didn’t speak. Kynder broke their silence when he said, “Merlin, there’s something I’ve been meaning to ask you.”

  “Yes?”

  “A few weeks ago you mentioned that Arthur was genetically engineered by someone in the Otherworld.” Merlin nodded. “Do you know who it was?”

  Merlin put down a plate and removed a smooth, dark pebble from his pocket. “Take this, Kynder, and keep it with you at all times. I need you to do something for me. You must come to the Otherworld this time as well and go to the Great Library of Sylvan. I need you to do some research for us.”

  “Okay . . . ,” Kynder said cautiously, taking the pebble.

  Merlin cleared his throat and said ominously, “The children cannot know what I am about to tell you. Promise you won’t tell them.”

  Kynder’s grip on the little stone tightened. “Okay, I promise,” he said hollowly, almost like the wizard was casting a spell on him.

  “Morgaine, Lordess of Fenland, made Artie. I know it sounds crazy. But King Arthur needed to return so he could get Excalibur and free me. And I needed to be freed so that Morgaine could try to kill me. She never could have reached me in the invisible tower. It was my prison, but it was also my refuge. Her plan went awry—she never intended for Artie to be stolen from her—but the end result is the same. I stand here before you a free wizard.”

  “Whoa,” Kynder said, his hairs rising along his neck.

  “I know. Now, this is what I need your help with. According to the Lady of the Lake, it’s not just Morgaine who wants to kill me. Excalibur does too. I need you to find out why the sword wants me dead.”

  Kynder pursed his lips. “Okay,” he said, feeling a little dazed. “But what should we tell Arthur?”

  “We’ll tell Artie that you’re being sent to the Library to try to discover the identity of the person who wields the Peace Sword.”

  “Got it,” Kynder said, clutching the pebble with purpose. Already he could feel the Otherworld’s power pulsing through it.

  This time, when his kids went to the Otherworld, Kynder Kingfisher would be going too.

  4 - IN WHICH QWON HAS THE DISTINCT PLEASURE OF MEETING SHALLOT LE FEY

  Once again Dred carried Qwon up and down many stairs, and in and around many turns. The effect was disorienting; she had about zero idea of where she was being taken.

  Eventually he stepped outside and walked the length of a long portico. Birds chittered and trilled. The air was still.

  They stopped at the end of the portico, and Dred dropped Qwon onto the damp flagstone. He knelt and uncorked a small bottle and held it to her lips. She drank eagerly, knowing it would allow her to move. But before she could drink it all, Dred pulled the vial away. She could hold her head up, but couldn’t move the rest of her body yet.

  “You can talk, if you like,” Dred said matter-of-factly. His voice had a nasal quality it lacked before, like he was really, really stuffed up.

  Qwon started to ask, “I can?” but all that came out was a weak “Ike?” Her body, still mostly paralyzed, wasn’t quite ready to speak.

  Talking was not what she wanted to do, though. What she wanted to do was scream. She wanted to snatch the sword from Dred’s belt and show him a thing or two about how to use it. She wanted to see her kidnapper’s face, but he was still wearing that stupid helmet. So annoying.

  Dred studied this girl. He’d never seen one like her before. Her hair was thick and black and straight and cut like a boy’s. Her dark, unwavering eyes were slightly slanted. Her face was flat and broad, and her cheeks were high and round.

  He thought she was pretty, but he wasn’t about to say so.

  “Who’re you? Where’s’iss place?” Qwon’s mouth was starting to feel better, and she was regaining the ability to form clear words.

  “You heard. I’m Mordred. And you know where you are. Castel Deorc Wæters
.”

  Qwon shook her head, never allowing her gaze to shift from the narrow slit in Dred’s faceplate.

  For the first time, the oddness of the helmet registered with her. Its general shape was unremarkable, like an upside-down, handleless pot with a crease rising from the forehead. A section was cut out for Dred’s face, but this was covered with the faceplate, which was shaped like a giant leaf. There were perforations over his mouth and nose, and a long slit for the eyes. Rising from the top of the helmet were a pair of crooked deer horns, one red, the other blue.

  “I mean, where’s th’castle?” Qwon asked.

  “Oh, right,” Dred said, turning away. “The castle is in Fenland, and Fenland is in a place known simply as the Otherworld. The Otherworld is your side’s dark reflection. Fairies live here, and dragons, and shadows—and bad people like me!” He whipped his head toward her, and her heart skipped a beat.

  “Forget it,” Qwon said, frustrated that this Dred guy wasn’t making any sense. “Just take me to my quarters,” she said, fully regaining her speech.

  “As you wish,” he said. Dred stood and unlocked a super-thick yellow door that was covered with bands of dark metal and rivets and spikes. In there were her quarters. In there was this feral fairy Morgaine had mentioned.

  Dred pushed open the door, but instead of tossing her in, he gave her the rest of the liquid. She drank it quickly as he said, “Well, I’ll be seeing you, Qwon of Shadyside.” Then he stepped through the doorway, pulled the door shut, and threw the lock.

  Wait. She was being left outside?

  Energy coursed through Qwon’s body from her shoulders to her toes as the liquid took effect. She moved her arms and shook out her legs. She cracked her neck. She put her hands on the ground and gingerly stood.

  The portico ran around three sides of a square courtyard that was about fifty feet across. A high stone wall at the far end marked the fourth side. Beyond it, Qwon could just see the top of the dark-green glass tower. By the position of the sun, she guessed that this marked the southern end of the yard, and somewhere past that was the drawbridge. She hoped all of this information would prove helpful in eventually escaping.

  The roof of the portico slanted down toward the inside of the courtyard, and it was covered with shards of broken glass jutting up at all angles. The pillars supporting it were also covered in jagged glass. No escaping that way.

  There were several doors along the walkway under the portico. All were heavy-looking, each painted a different ridiculously bright color, and, Qwon presumed, locked from the inside. In the middle of the yard was a chest-high birdbath made from some kind of turquoise metal. Qwon stepped onto the grass. The ground was soft. The courtyard smelled good.

  It smelled remarkably good. Like . . . like shavings of Ivory soap and fresh-cut grass and newly plucked honeysuckle all at once.

  While she was enthralled by the smell, Qwon was knocked in the back of the head. She fell onto her hands and knees, and something whisked by her in a blur of pink and black, disappearing in the shadows.

  “Who’s there?” Qwon demanded of the blur.

  A high-pitched giggle came from her right, and Qwon realized the source of the smell was there too. Still on the ground, she whipped her head around and saw the end of a wooden stick as it disappeared at the far end of the yard. Aha!

  Qwon sprang to her feet and followed her nose. Adrenaline fueled her movements. She looked desperately around for anything to fight with, but there was nothing.

  She raced to the western side of the portico, but when she got there, the thing—which must have been this fairy—darted to the other side.

  “Stop moving!” Qwon yelled.

  The fairy answered by giggling again.

  Just then a long pole came shooting out of a little window in Dred’s yellow door. Qwon knew exactly what it was: a quarterstaff. Qwon ran for it, but the fairy somehow tripped her, and Qwon fell on her face, taking a mouthful of grass. As she was about to get up, the fairy bolted across the length of her body. The fairy’s feet felt like little hooves on her back.

  Qwon thrust her right arm forward and snagged the ankle of the lightning-quick sprite, causing it to fall face-first in the grass, too. The fairy squealed. And then—and then it sprayed Qwon, just like a skunk!

  Only the smell was amazing.

  Qwon’s grip loosened as she was transported to a field of lavender and flowering sweet peas. A smile crawled across her face. Her eyes brightened.

  The fairy wriggled free and churned toward the staff. Qwon came around and yelped, “No!” just as the fairy bent to pick it up. But before it could, it was plonked on the forehead with a stone that Dred had thrown from the little window. “Ouch!” the fairy barked.

  Qwon got her first good look at the fairy. She was very thin and stood a little less than five feet tall. Her shoulders were only a foot across, and her legs were so long she hardly had a torso. Her arms were also disturbingly long, and she had pink hair drawn into an athletic ponytail that nearly reached the back of her knees. Her hair had three thick black streaks, one down the middle and two on either side above the ears, which added to the skunk effect. She was barefoot, but was otherwise dressed in plain cotton pants and a matching shirt.

  The fairy bent to pick up the staff again, and this time a small fusillade of stones sailed from the window. She screeched and bolted away without looking back.

  Qwon sprinted forward and slid feet first, scooping up the staff as she passed it. She threw her back against Dred’s door and said through the opening, “Thanks.”

  “Don’t thank me yet,” her kidnapper replied wryly.

  He was clearly enjoying this.

  Jerk, thought Qwon.

  She slid left along the wall to the corner, turned, and continued moving until she reached the middle of the next wall, where there was another door. She tried it. Locked. Just as she’d suspected.

  Qwon let the staff fall into the crook of her arm and quickly tore two small strips of fabric from the bottom of her T-shirt. She balled them up and stuffed one in each nostril. She had to do something to defend herself from the fairy’s intoxicating scent. Then she stepped toward the clearing, but before she even reached the grass, the fairy came from nowhere and poked Qwon’s back. She tumbled forward, her staff in front of her, and wheeled around.

  The sprite was in a semicrouch, her stick held across her body. Her face was twisted into a gnarly grimace. She was small but powerful.

  Her eyes were the color of tropical seas, and their pupils were as deep and limitless as the night sky. Something about the balance of her features, the clear hue of her skin, and her tiny, knowing smile made Qwon freeze.

  She was almost achingly beautiful. How was Qwon going to strike this creature?

  But then the fairy hissed like a cornered cat, and sprayed again.

  Qwon’s nose plugs didn’t block the scent completely, but they helped. She lunged forward and twirled her staff, knocking the fairy in the shoulder. The fairy did not retreat. She hissed again—revealing a mouthful of pointy teeth that belied her beauty—and continued fighting with a flurry of jabs and swings. Qwon parried them all, mixing in attacks of her own.

  They were too equally matched.

  Finally each jumped back. Qwon could hear Dred’s muted laughter, which she did not appreciate. She did not like this game.

  Qwon looked the fairy squarely in the eyes and said, “My name is Qwon Onakea, and I’ve been kidnapped. Who are you and why are you here?”

  The fairy cocked her head. She said something that Qwon had a hard time understanding because, like her smell and her beauty, her voice was borderline enchanting.

  The fairy repeated herself, taking pains to suppress whatever it was that made her voice so enrapturing. “I am Shallot le Fey,” she said. “I was taken too, from my home in Leagon. I have been in this yard for a month, and until today have not seen a single person.”

  Qwon nodded slowly and said, “Well, Shallot, I’m from Penns
ylvania, and I think we’re going to be prisoners here together. Wherever this place is.”

  Qwon dropped her staff to her side. Shallot did the same.

  Shallot took a few cautious steps and asked, “Are you also here because of the prophecy?”

  Qwon frowned. “Prophecy?”

  “From The Fairy Book of Pretelling. The one about the sword,” Shallot explained. “The one about Excalibur. The one about Arthur and Merlin Ambrosius.”

  Qwon said weakly, “You mean the one about Artie Kingfisher?” As she said the words, she couldn’t help but feel like they were the beginning of a bad joke.

  Shallot stepped forward. She held out her hand palm down, in some unknown gesture of greeting, and said in her lovely voice, “Yes. The one about Artie Kingfisher.”

  5 - HOW ERIK ERIKSSEN IS KIDNAPPED AND TAKEN TO THE OTHERWORLD

  The morning after the Kingfishers were told about the next phase of their adventures, Erik Erikssen showed up at their house complaining of a headache, saying, “I don’t know why, but I just had to come over to your guys’ house.”

  Merlin hadn’t given advance warning about the spell he used to call Erik, and to her revulsion, Kay was the one who answered the door—in her nightgown. Thankfully, Erik was so out of it that he didn’t seem to notice. He pushed by Kay, made for the living room, and dropped onto the sofa. Before Kay could get a word out, Merlin floated into the room and asked Kay to fetch a glass of warm water. She did. Merlin poured some powder into it and stirred the mixture with a finger. Then he gave the glass to Erik and with a velvety tone said, “I suggest you drink this, my boy.”

  Erik drank. No sooner had he handed the glass back to Merlin than he fell completely asleep.

  “Knock him out to take him to the Otherworld,” Kay observed. “I like it.”