Half Sick of Shadows

by Laura Sebastian

  “There’s something else,” I tell Morgana. “I think my niece is an oracle.”

  Morgana looks sideways at me, her eyebrows raised high. “Are you sure? You only saw her for an instant, and she’s too young for her gift to have matured.”

  “Matured, yes, but it doesn’t come all at once like that—I’ve had visions my whole life, I just couldn’t remember most of them. They twisted and blended with my dreams and nightmares and imagination. Even looking back with what I know now, I couldn’t tell you what was a vision and what was a dream.” I shake my head. “But . . . the way she looked at me. I remember that look. Like she recognized me even though she’s never seen me before.”

  “Perhaps she’s just overimaginative,” Morgana says.

  “I hope you’re right,” I say. “Our family doesn’t need another oracle—especially not one named for my mother.”

  For a moment, Morgana doesn’t say anything. “And if your suspicion proves correct?” she asks finally. “What will you do with that information?”

  The question wriggles under my skin. “I don’t know,” I admit after a moment. “But if she’s inheriting the gift from my side of the family—which I would wager she is—her mother won’t know what she is or what to do with her when her visions begin in earnest. At least my mother understood what was happening to me, even if her methods for helping me were flawed—her mother will be at a loss entirely. You told me yourself that people fear what they don’t understand. What happens when her mother begins to fear her?”

  “You can tell Nimue,” Morgana says. “I’m sure she’d welcome another pupil, especially one from your bloodline.”

  I shake my head. “I left my family because staying was dangerous for me and I didn’t have anyone who could help me here. She’s a child—she can’t be more than six. I don’t want to pry her away from her parents unless it’s necessary. I want to talk to her first. Maybe I’m overreacting—maybe I’m seeing oracles where none exist. Being here again . . . it’s strange. Perhaps it’s only my mind playing tricks on me.”

  “Perhaps,” Morgana echoes, but she sounds dubious.

  27

  AFTER THE ELABORATE ten-course feast in the banquet hall, I feel like I can barely move, let alone dance, but when my father raises a toast and offers Arthur the first dance of the night with his daughter, I can hardly refuse. Arthur takes my hand and leads me into the center of the grand ballroom, beneath the great, glittering chandelier casting prisms of light onto the stone floor below.

  In one corner, a string quartet begins to play, the melody light and cheerful and familiar, even after all these years. All of a sudden, I am back in dancing lessons, trying not to trip over my own feet and never quite succeeding.

  “I don’t know how to dance to this,” Arthur murmurs in my ear.

  “Not to worry,” I reply. “The steps were more or less burned into my mind. Just follow my lead.”

  Though the steps of the dance are simple enough, with everyone’s eyes on us, I find myself faltering, and Arthur faltering along with me. We stumble together, bumping legs and arms. His expression is so tense with concentration that I have to bite my lip to keep from laughing.

  “Hush, or I’ll step on your toes,” he says, and I’m not sure if it’s a threat or merely an earnest warning.

  Luckily, after a moment, other couples begin to join our dancing, crowding around us and shifting some of the focus away.

  “Not much like bonfire dancing, is it?” he asks with a half smile.

  “No,” I say with a laugh. “Do you miss it? Avalon?”

  He considers for a moment, his eyes still stuck to his feet. “Not as much as I thought I might,” he says. “I miss Nimue, of course. I miss the island, too, and the freedom that we had. But there was something about life there . . . like I was always lying in wait for something to happen. I’m not waiting anymore, and I am glad about that.”

  I nod. “I agree, in a strange way,” I admit. “Are you nervous about seeing Gwen again?”

  “Oh yes,” he says without missing a beat. “Not just nervous—terrified. Don’t tell anyone I said so, though.”

  “Of course not,” I say. “We couldn’t let anyone think their future king is so frightened of a girl.”

  “Not before they meet her themselves, at least. Once they do, I’m sure they’ll understand.”

  I think again about the Gwen in my visions—the one who was by turns cold and cruel and foolishly romantic. Arthur doesn’t even know about those versions of Gwen and he’s afraid of her, though I wonder if it’s a different sort of fear altogether. She turned him away already, but that was through a letter. A cold, impersonal thing, and even that crushed him. What will happen if she rebuffs him face-to-face, if he holds his heart out to her and she walks away?

  “Just promise me one thing,” I say as the song reaches its final trilling notes. “Promise you won’t challenge anyone to any duels.”

  Arthur looks at me, bemused. “Of course not,” he says. “Gwen wouldn’t have any patience for that kind of chivalrous nonsense.”

  A dangerous thing begins to unfurl in my belly at his words. It is something that might best be called hope.

  * * *

  I TRY TO LEAVE the dance floor to find a place to sit down, but before I get two steps away from Arthur, Torre meets me to request the next dance. Lavaine takes the one after that, and then I dance with each of Arthur’s knights. Only Lancelot stays away from the dance floor, leaning against a sliver of wall nestled between two floor-to-ceiling windows that overlook a rose garden. He doesn’t so much as glance at me, and so I try not to look at him, either, but it’s difficult. I find my eyes straying toward him every time I forget myself.

  By the time Gawain—the last of the knights—releases me, my feet are aching, and all of the spinning has that ten-course meal ready to come right back up.

  A man the age of my father, who dined beside him at the banquet, comes toward me, intention clear in his eyes, and I force myself to smile, knowing it would be unforgivably rude to turn down a dance.

  Before he can reach me, though, Morgana approaches, hand in hand with my niece, Mathilde. The girl, so shy before, swings Morgana’s hand and rolls back and forth onto the balls of her satin-slipper-clad feet.

  “You look like you need rescuing,” Morgana says, looping her arm through mine. “Doesn’t your aunt look like she needed rescuing?”

  Mathilde glances at me thoughtfully, as if she’s still trying to size up who I am and why I’ve suddenly been forced into her life. She looks up at Morgana and nods, smiling shyly.

  “You made friends quickly, didn’t you?” I ask Morgana.

  Morgana shrugs. “Children are never afraid of me,” she says. “In fact, they seem to actually like me for some reason. That baby wouldn’t stop giggling at me.” She jerks her head over her shoulder to where Irina is holding a fussing baby Hal.

  We make our way to a small seating area in the corner of the ballroom, where a velvet sofa sits empty. When we’re settled there with Mathilde between us, Morgana gives her a light nudge.

  “Go on, Mattie,” she says. “Tell your aunt Elaine what you told me.”

  Mattie—it’s easier to think of her that way than as Mathilde; it distances her somewhat from her namesake—looks at me with wide, dark eyes.

  “I thought you were dead,” she says matter-of-factly.

  I glance at Morgana and then back at Mattie. “No,” I tell her. “I was only away for a bit, but I couldn’t write my parents and they worried. Did they tell you that I was dead?”

  Mattie hesitates and shakes her head. Her eyes go to Morgana, and she shrinks back against the sofa cushions.

  “I saw it,” she says, so quietly I can barely hear her. But I do, and it sends a chill down my spine.

  Morgana is equally spooked. This much, it seems, is new information to
her. “You saw it?” she asks before looking at me. “She didn’t tell me that.”

  Mattie sinks further into the cushions, as if she wants to disappear from view altogether.

  “Morgana,” I say. “Can you find some cocoa for Mattie?”

  “But—”

  “Please,” I interrupt, before lowering my voice. “Whatever she has to say, you shouldn’t hear it.”

  Morgana wavers, but her eyes are still locked on mine. “She saw you die, Elaine,” she whispers.

  “We all die eventually,” I point out with an attempt at a smile. “And it’s a possibility, not a certainty. But still, you can’t know it.”

  For a second, I think she’s going to protest, but eventually she sighs, shaking her head.

  “Do you want some cocoa?” she asks Mattie, who nods. “Alright then. I’ll be right back.”

  When she leaves, I turn to Mattie, but words don’t come easily. I don’t know how to talk to children. I don’t know how not to frighten her or traumatize her. She’s so small and fragile, it feels like I could hurt her by breathing too hard near her.

  I try to smile, but I imagine it looks more strained than comforting. Though our corner is otherwise empty, the room itself is crowded with dancing couples and clusters of men and women, talking and laughing and sipping wine from ornately bejeweled goblets. The joyful energy permeating the room is at odds with the heaviness in the air between Mattie and me. We watch the dancing for a moment, watch Arthur gallantly twirl Irina around the dance floor. Without meaning to, my eyes slide to Lancelot, brooding in the corner, but this time his eyes meet mine and hold them.

  I glance away before he decides to come over here.

  “When you saw . . . what you saw,” I say to Mattie, choosing my words carefully, “did I go underwater and not come up again?”

  Mattie’s eyes are wide and solemn as she nods her head. “There was a light,” she says quietly. “And when you saw it you tried to scream, but nothing came out but bubbles.”

  I bite my lip, unsure of what to say next. I try to think about what I was like at her age, how I felt about those dreams that plagued me, what I would have liked to hear someone else say.

  “Did you tell your mother about it?” I ask her.

  Mattie nods. “She said it was a bad dream. That it wasn’t real. But it felt real.”

  I nod. “Your mother was right,” I say. “It wasn’t real—you see, I’m here now, aren’t I? I couldn’t have drowned.”

  Mattie considers this for a moment before smiling slightly. “It was only a dream,” she says.

  I wish I could leave it at that, but it won’t do. It would be a disservice to her. Not so different than the potion my mother gave me to dull my own visions. I always wished someone would have been honest with me—I just never imagined how difficult honesty was.

  “Some people, like you and me, have dreams that aren’t just dreams,” I say carefully. “They aren’t real—not yet. But one day, they might be.”

  Mattie considers this. “You mean, one day you’ll go underwater and not come up?” she asks.

  A comforting lie bubbles to my lips, but I push it down again. “Not for some time, I hope,” I tell her. “And maybe not at all. Whatever you see in your dreams, it is only one possibility. The future is a fluid thing, it’s always changing. The future isn’t set until it’s the past. Do you understand?”

  Mattie shakes her head.

  “No, I don’t suppose you do,” I say. “But there is nothing wrong with you, Mattie. Right now, your visions are uncontrollable, but one day, with practice, it won’t be that way. One day, you’ll understand. But until then, do you think you can try not to be afraid of the future?”

  “I don’t want you to die,” she says, her voice cracking. “And I don’t want Morgana to hurt that woman. And I don’t want the bad man to . . .” She trails off, closing her eyes tight as if that can block out the images dancing through her mind.

  The bad man to . . . what? Part of me wants to ask her, but a bigger part remembers what it is like to see things you are too young to understand, to have to make sense of cruelty and death instead of just being a child.

  “Have you learned your letters yet, Mattie?” I ask her.

  She opens her eyes, though they are still wide and frightened, like a deer in the woods separated from its herd. After a second, she nods.

  “Then here is what I want you to do—anytime you see something that frightens you, I want you to write it down. However you want to write it, whatever you want to say. And when that’s done, you can do one of two things—you can either put the parchment into the fire, or send it to me. It doesn’t matter which, but it helps, I promise. Just writing the words down, getting them out of your mind. And when you do whatever you choose—burn it or send it—I want you to put it out of your mind and never think of it again.”

  Mattie considers this for a moment, her legs swinging back and forth anxiously, rustling her taffeta dress.

  “But what if the bad things still happen?” she asks. “If I send them to you, will you stop them?”

  I open my mouth to say yes, of course I will, but I have to quickly close it again. As much as I would like it to be the truth, it isn’t, not entirely.

  “I will do everything in my power to stop them,” I say carefully, the closest thing I can make to a promise.

  * * *

  THIS IS THE Cave of Prophecies, where all Avalon’s seers train,” Nimue told me on my second day in Avalon. I hadn’t been able to sleep much since arriving, my mind a never-ending blur of awe, excitement, and anxiety. For all of Avalon’s unknowable splendor, my mind drifted back to my mother in her cold, lonely tower too often to give me a moment’s rest. I’d already sent her a letter assuring her I was safe, but I knew my mother well enough not to hold my breath waiting for her response. Still, I’d hoped. And I’d worried.

  And now, standing before the great glittering mouth of the cave, I stifled a yawn. The cave was on the far northern edge of the island, burrowed deep in the mountains there.

  “Does it bore you, Elaine?” Nimue asked, glancing sideways at me as I lifted a hand to cover my yawn.

  “No, of course not,” I said quickly, forcing a smile. “I beg your pardon, the last couple of days have been so exciting I haven’t been able to sleep much.”

  A truth but not a whole truth. Nimue’s eyes searched my face, and I was sure she understood that—I’d never been a good liar, after all—but she didn’t press me on it. Instead, she held up a hand and summoned a ball of flame to her palm, illuminating the small cave in a warm golden light. Though I’d seen bits of magic the day before and from Morgana before that, the casualness of the gesture still made me jump.

  After my eyes adjusted to the sudden pop of brightness, I could make out more of the space. Stalactites hung from the roof of the cave, shining in Nimue’s light and casting a prismatic, dancing glow on the gloomy space. There was nothing in the cave but a tall table with three legs and a burnished mirror resting on its surface, but I barely noticed that. Instead, my attention went to the walls of the cave, which were covered floor to ceiling in small white scrawl. Words and phrases in countless different hands, layered over one another so that some were obscured altogether, the white of the chalk faded and lost to time.

  I wanted to ask Nimue what the words were, but she didn’t give me the chance. Instead, she jumped right into our lesson with no preamble, instructing me to stand at the edge of the mirror and peer into it, summoning a vision. That was all the instruction I was given.

  As I would later learn, the mirror was how Nimue best scried, and so it was easier for her to teach through it until an oracle found their own medium. At the time, though, I didn’t know about any other mediums. All I knew was the mirror and that it did not speak to me the way Nimue seemed to expect it to.

  Later, I would know that
Nimue welcomed curiosity and questions, that I could express my own doubts freely, but at the time I was too intimidated by—and, to be quite honest, frightened of—Nimue, and I felt like asking any questions would only make me look foolish in her eyes. There was a deep-seated part of me that yearned to impress her and that worried that I would be sent back to Camelot if I were found wanting.

  So I tried my best to do as instructed, staring into the mirror and focusing, though all I managed to see for more than an hour was my own face, staring back at me with frustration that increased with every passing moment.

  When I focused so hard my head began to ache, I finally tore my gaze away from the mirror and looked up at Nimue, who was watching me with a critical furrow in her brow.

  “I’ve only ever had visions when I’ve been asleep,” I told her. “I don’t think I can just summon them.”

  For a moment, she didn’t reply, continuing to stare at me like she could see me both inside and out. Panic gripped me, and I wondered if it was a test, if failing it meant she’d send me back to Camelot.

  “That is because when you are asleep, your mind is restful and empty,” Nimue said after a moment. “You must learn to replicate that while you are waking if you are going to control your gift instead of living a life where your gift controls you.”

  Unbidden, I thought of my mother, her life led by and eventually ruined by her own gift. The idea of ending up like her . . . no, I wouldn’t entertain that thought for even a moment.

  “It isn’t that easy,” I told her, trying to push away my frustration, though it bubbled up over the edge anyway. “A person can’t empty their mind completely.”

  “I can,” she said. “And so can every other oracle I’ve trained in the last two centuries.”

  Her voice was sharp, but after another look at me, she seemed to soften and held her hands out toward me, palms up. Her palms were paler than I expected, only a bit darker than my own, but where mine had a web of creases and lines etched into the surface, hers were smooth as porcelain. “If you are more interested in palm reading, perhaps Avalon is not the best place for you,” she said curtly.