All That Burns (31 page)

The Faery light spins above us, brighter and brighter.
Our
magic. My spell, fed by his strength. I am the fire and Richard is the flame. My flame. Together we are whole. Powerful.

“I’ve been trying to use it,” he says, staring at the light. “I thought I could get that door unlocked, but it’s a bit tricky to figure out blind. I think I’ve only managed to break a pipe or two.”

The door. Richard might not be able to use his magic to open it, but I can. I weave my hand into his, feel for the power sleeping in his veins. The connection is easy to make, now that I know it’s there. I don’t even really need to use physical touch, but I grip his fingers anyway, start pulling the blood magic into myself.

The door is close, nested beneath ladders and pipes, swimming under the glow of the Faery light. I breathe deep, reach out for the corroded latch. My fingertips tremble with magic and hope.
“Opena
.
”

The spell I weave is almost as rusty as the latch, but still it flows, pries through the steel bolts. The door pulls back with a groan, reveals a dim passageway beyond.

“If we are actually in Westminster’s basement, this
should be the main pipe vault,” Richard says as we start walking. Our footsteps sound empty against the hall’s concrete. “The stairs ought to be just down this way.”

Long walls of pipes crowd around us. The flicker of my light makes them look like snakes, weaving in and out of shadow. There was no other way beyond the door. Just this hall and its long stretch of wires which run along the ceiling like nerve bundles.

Yet I don’t remember being carried past all these pipes. Or walking so straight for so long. The Ad-hene were all twist and speed when they brought me here. . . .

We keep walking. Until every step we take feels like another drill into the pit of my stomach. Something’s wrong. The pipes shouldn’t be stretching this far. There should be a turn, a dead-end, stairs . . . something.

“How do you suppose no one at all has been down here since coronation day?” Richard’s voice echoes off the dark. “These are maintenance rooms. Workers should be in and out all the time.”

Dread swirls like hunger in my stomach. Chasing Richard’s question with an answer: “Morgaine has written blocking spells all over London’s underground—to keep mortals from going where they shouldn’t.” I scan the hall for runes. Sure enough there’s a band of them,
thick and white against the shiny silver piping. A few centimeters from that is a dent in the pipe. “The workers couldn’t come down here without remembering some other urgent job.”

We keep walking and I try not to think of what else the runes could mean.

But I know the truth. It’s hounding me with every step. With every next minute we don’t reach the stairs.

“We should be in the Central Lobby basement by now. If I remember right.” Richard stops and looks back at the darkness behind us. There’s a frown on his face. “Maybe we’re going the wrong direction.”

I look back at the pipes. There, glimmering a few inches away, is another band of runes. Identical to the ones we passed a few dozen meters back. No—I look closer, see the dent in the pipe—not another band. The same. Any hope I might have had dies inside my chest.

“We’re not going in the wrong direction,” I say. “We’re going in circles.”

“What?” Richard stares at me, his face sharp in the light. “How is that possible?”

Alistair has already looped the tunnels—woven them into endlessness with his older-than-dust magic. This hallway has become part of the new Labyrinth, another
stretch of silver on the Ad-hene’s arms.

Alistair didn’t need to lock the door at all. We’re trapped down here by a force far greater than iron or lock. Swallowed whole by the earth.

“There’s an enchantment on the tunnels,” I tell him. “Only an Ad-hene can break it. It doesn’t matter what direction we go . . . we’re still trapped here.”

Suddenly I’m so, so tired. I wilt to the floor like a thirsty rose.

Richard kneels next to me. He wreathes his hand into mine and holds tight. “Guess you won’t be getting that tattoo after all.”

In spite of everything I smile at him.

His thumb runs over my ringless finger. He looks down, noticing its absence for the first time.

“I lost it,” I whisper. “It fell down a sink and I couldn’t get it back.”

Richard’s hand tightens over mine. “I had another ring, you know.”

I can’t hide the shake of my lips anymore. “Even though you thought your kisses might kill me?”

“I was still hoping I was wrong. And even if I wasn’t, I wanted you to know . . .” Richard’s voice fades off and he swallows. “I was going to do it right. I was going to
take you to the Highlands after the coronation. I had it all planned out—we’d hike to some castle ruins where a picnic would be waiting. My vintage records would be playing on a turntable. We’d dance until the stars climbed high. I would pull you close and ask you to be my wife.”

I shut my eyes and see the scene. Old weathered stones lined with candles. The table set with finest china—beef Wellington and strawberries. I hear the music playing: stanzas of classic rock sounding across snow-dusted peaks. Stars scattered like mercury tears overhead. And us—together—spinning beneath them.

“I would hold my breath until you answered.” Richard’s voice is all softness, calling me back through the dark.

I open my eyes, find him. The glow of the Faery light sculpts out Richard’s face. He’s holding his breath as he watches me. Waits.

I tighten my hand in his. “I would say yes.”

Richard’s really smiling now too. And there’s a tremble to it, just like mine. “And I’d be the happiest man in the world.”

I feel the tears again, swelling to the top of my throat. A pure blend of fresh and salt, sorrow and joy. These emotions swim through my eyes; what little light there is
haloes Richard’s face. Swallows it.

I start to stand, because I know if we keep sitting here—if we keep talking about
would be
s and
what if
s—my heart won’t be able to bear the weight.

“We’re not dead yet.” I pull Richard up next to me. “So let’s do it. Let’s dance.”

Richard rises, his arms slide down my waist. “Without music?”

“Brec
.
”
I whisper to the Faery light and it blows like a spent dandelion—spreading pieces to all corners. Less light, more shine. Like the winter sky has folded and burrowed into this small canopy over us.

“To stillness and starlight,” I tell him. “To the end.”

W
e dance and dance. I keep waiting for midnight to strike. For fire to rip through the tunnels, peeling our souls from our bodies even as we cling to each other. For the passageway and everything in it to collapse into dust.

But the darkness around us holds fast and our steps start to slow. We sit back, together, against the wall. Whispering words, weaving fingers. Waiting through unsaid agonies. The end is still out there, lurking like a wolf in the dark, waiting to devour us whole.

I don’t remember falling asleep, but suddenly the shadows melt—give way to green and air and stone and sky. The grass at my feet is thick—lush and woven through with flowers. A whole sea of yellow petals stretches out across the valley floor.

A castle sits on the edge of this golden shore. Turrets and unbroken stones. A Camelot not yet sieged. Banners bright as poppy petals lash images of a white dragon into the sky. A string of knights gallops along the valley’s edge,
their armor winking bright in the noonday sun.

“Where are we?” Richard is by my side, shielding the bright sunlight off his face with a hand to his brow. Wind gusts back at us—cold and clean. A few sunny petals lift and strip from their stems, swirl up past our faces.

“A dream,” I start to say, but another voice speaks. As chill as the wind.

“The paradise before the fall.”

We turn. A woman stands behind us, her gown of ivory and gold embroidery fanning out into the grass. At first glance I see Anabelle, with that long yellow hair flowing over her shoulders. But then I see the color of her eyes: a soft cornflower blue.

“Lady Guinevere,” I whisper.

“You remembered,” she says. Her hands are clasped in front of her, like a prayer. “I was not certain you would solve my riddles.”

“You’re not speaking riddles now,” I say, my words as pointed as the ends of the pennant staffs.

“Morg—” A look of pain lances through Guinevere’s eyes. She clears her throat, chooses her next words carefully. “The . . . sister’s attentions are elsewhere. Runecraft is like a garden. It must be tended or it will wither and die. The runes she wrote on the walls of her cell to bind
me into silence are fading. Slowly,” she adds with a rub to her throat. “I could not tell you—not with the silencing spells and the Ad-hene always watching—so I tried to show you. I brought you here.”

“So you
were
sending the dreams.” I look down at the five crescent-moon scabs which will split open as soon as I wake. “When you cut me with your nails you spelled me . . . but how?”

“The Ad-hene call us
faagailagh
. To many the word means quitting. Surrender. Weakness.” Guinevere’s eyes are so
clear
, blue as plunging skies. Such vast worlds apart from the whitewashed orbs which haunted me in the Labyrinth. “But it also means changeling. You and I. We are changed. There’s a power in love that people like Arthur’s sister cannot understand. All they see is the weakness, the cost. To share your soul with someone, to become one with another takes sacrifice. But what you get in return . . .”

Guinevere falters for a moment. There is a pain—high, high, high—in her stratosphere eyes. Cloudy with guilt. “When I gave up my Faery powers to be with Arthur, he found a way to give me his blood magic. We shared it through our soul-tie.”

“Just like what happened with your Faery light,” Richard murmurs, low enough for only me to hear.

We’re sharing the power through our soul-tie. Just like Arthur and Guinevere.

“One of the things Arthur learned from Merlin was the mortals’ art of dreams: second sight. He taught me how to walk in them, a long time ago. I knew it was a way I could warn you without the sister noticing. She has forgotten what it means to be mortal; her sleep is dreamless.”

“Morgaine . . .” The sorceress’s name rings loud from my lips, over canary fields. “She tricked you. She used a love spell to make you fall for Lancelot.”

“I should have been stronger, but I flipped wrong. Every minute, every hour, every day, I remember this.” The pain of Guinevere’s eyes spreads. Wrings her face with a thousand years of regret, fresh as new blood. “I rode off with Lancelot and now I bear the cross of a burning kingdom. I carry the weight of Pendragon’s doom on my heart. But you . . . I see my warning was not in vain. You chose well.”

“It’s too late,” I tell her. “Morgaine has won. The kingdom will burn anyway.”

“There are more powers waking than just yours and Richard’s,” she says softly. Her eyes stray over my shoulder. “Our stories are not over. Our ends have yet to be written.”

I follow her gaze. One of the knights has broken off
from the long train riding up the road. His horse leaps through the waves of yellow petals, toward us. His armor forged of flash and silver, blinding against the sun.

“You must wake up now. It’s time for you to go.” Guinevere reaches out, her fingers wrap warm over my five scabs. “I do hope we meet again, sister. In a better light.”

“No! Wait!” I want to ask her so many things—all the questions bunch on the tip of my tongue, get tangled there.

She lets go.

I don’t fall this time. My arm still hums with Guinevere’s ghost grip when I wake. I look down, expecting to see five weeping trails of blood, but the red is gone. There aren’t even scabs. The wounds Guinevere’s nails left have closed—five pearly scars are all that’s left.

Guinevere’s spell has been severed. Her dreams are gone.

My stars are still all glimmer and glint above us. Clinging to the pipes and concrete like living jewels. One is brighter than the rest, pulling closer into my dazed vision. I sit up straight, rub the dreams from my eyes.

And the light keeps growing, as bright as Polaris.

This is no star. No fragment of Faery light.

This is the scar of an Ad-hene.

“Richard!” I grip his shoulder and he sits up, hazel eyes trained on the same point of light.

All of me is awake now. Magic hums from Richard’s shoulder; I gather it to myself, start weaving. As I do, the fragments of Faery light above us flare brighter, flush out all the secrets of this hall.

Kieran stops in his tracks, taking in the sudden light with those concrete eyes. His body is angled half-forward—like a jungle predator suddenly stripped of all foliage. Caught mid-lurch.

“Emrys?” he calls out with caution.

“Come any closer and you’ll wish you never rose up out of that miserable island of yours.” My fingers tingle, burning to let go of the curse they’re holding. The only reason he isn’t a pile of ash already is because of those godforsaken scars.

There are two, I realize now. One for each Labyrinth. The old and the new. Flashing betrayal and hope.

Our only way out of here.

“I’ve come to help. We don’t have much time.” Kieran takes a step forward, as if he knows I’m bluffing.

Unfortunately for him, I’m not.

“Cyspe!”
The blood magic is so different from my old
powers—it feels slippery and clumsy as I wield it. The spell works well enough. It wraps, all light, around Kieran’s torso, binds his legs together. The Ad-hene falls to the ground, like a monument of some dethroned king tugged down by an angry mob.

I take care to make sure the binding spell is tight, tight, tight around Kieran before I go any closer. He doesn’t fight it. He just lies there, like a rabbit in a snare.

I stare at him. My eyes and heart are stone.

“I see you found a way to fight fate,” he says, nodding to the light which ropes around him like a python.

“I trusted you! Anabelle trusted you!” The anger in my words rattles even me. They brim with heat. “This whole time you were
using
us. Leading us straight into Morgaine’s jaws!”