Awakening Camelot: A Wizard's Quest (Awakening Camelot Duology Book 1)

by Dan Wingreen

  "So—"

  "Never, in the history of humanity, has everyone decided they wanted to be one thing," he cut in. "It'll never happen. You wanna argue, argue with realistic arguments. But you're at least a bit right. Not everyone will get their dream job or fantasy life. But they'd have choices. And they wouldn’t be punished for makin’ ‘em. And two terrible choices are better’n none at all. Even making the wrong choice is better than having the right one forced on you."

  "How can you say that?" Aidan asked incredulously.

  "Because it's the truth," Eallair said without hesitation. "I know what it's like havin’ a choice and not havin' one. I've made choices. I've been makin’ ‘em my whole life. Have you ever made a choice?"

  "Of course," Aidan snapped.

  "A real choice, I mean. Not just deciding what you wanted for dinner, but something that actually affected your life in a meaningful way?"

  "Yes!"

  "Then what was it?" Eallair asked.

  "I…" Aidan paused. He was drawing a blank. Which was stupid, because he'd made choices before. Important choices. He just…couldn't remember them. He thought back over his whole life, all of it he could remember anyway, but he couldn't think of one truly meaningful choice he'd ever made for himself. As much as he liked Carl and the kids at the meetings, even moving to his new Wizards' Quarter wasn't his choice. He'd just been told he was moving because his current Quarter was overcrowded.

  Except, there actually was one thing.

  "I didn't turn you in," Aidan said finally. "When you attacked those—"

  "Saved you from," Eallair cut in.

  Aidan sighed. "Saved me from those co…guys."

  Eallair looked like he was going to say something about Aidan's slip, but in the end, he let it go. Instead, he asked, "Why didn't you?"

  Aidan scowled. Of course he'd ask that. "I…don't know," Aidan lied.

  "Really?" Eallair raised a skeptical eyebrow.

  Aidan let out a breath. "Fine. Because I was grateful, okay? And…scared, I guess," he admitted, although he had no idea why.

  "Scared of what? Me?"

  "No," Aidan scoffed. "Of, you know, them. Finding me. Or being arrested as your accomplice. Not that I seem to be going out of my way to avoid that, now," he added under his breath.

  Eallair flashed a quick smirk but didn't give any other hint he'd heard. "So, your first real, actual choice in life was to not turn in a criminal because you were scared of the police? And this sounds like a government worth keeping around?"

  Aidan glared at him. "That doesn't—and so what if I don't get to make my own choices? Maybe, if that's such a horrible thing, it's a fair trade off for being safe and protected. Have you ever thought of that? If you get rid of the government, who's going to protect everyone? You?"

  "Oh, for the… Everyone can use magic!" Eallair shouted. "People can protect themselves."

  Aidan stared at him, horrified. "You…you want people to just…attack each other with spells?"

  Eallair sighed. "Of course not, but they don't need to stand around like some kind of powerless child and wait for some all-powerful government to save them. A quick stun spell and a call to the cops and most situations that normal folk would ever run into are dealt with, easy-peasy."

  "Oh, so now there are cops in this fantasy world of yours? What happened to getting rid of the government?" Aidan asked with a skeptical eyebrow raise of his own.

  Which was met by another sigh from Eallair. "I never said anything about getting rid of the government forever. You need something running things, to a degree; you—"

  "Oh, so now you want a government? Make up your mind, terrorist boy," Aidan snapped. He knew he was being a prick, but he couldn't really bring himself to care.

  Eallair glared. It was the first time Aidan had ever seen Eallair get mad at him and he took it as a victory.

  "If you'd actually listen to what I'm saying instead of trying to make snide little comments, you'd have heard the 'and replace it with something better' part. Government itself ain't evil. It ain't even alive, so it can't be good, evil, or nothing but what people make it. But when a government only exists to perpetuate its own existence at the expense of the people, it's beyond time to scrap it and start over. A government should be run by the people what live under it and not by a bunch of lifelong paper pushers in their drab little towers."

  "Fine, whatever." Aidan bit back another "get Eallair mad" comment because he actually had something to say to that. "And what about all the things that can't be solved by stun spells or calling the cops? What about if someone walks into a building and sets it on fire and doesn't keep it in one room? What about when a siphon attacks?" Aidan glanced away and hesitated. "What about wizards?"

  "What about them?" Eallair asked.

  "You are insane," Aidan said, almost in awe of the fact. "We're dangerous. How do you keep wizards from killing people if you don't have the government constantly watching us? Or does your super free, happy land only apply to sorcerers?"

  Instead of arguing back like he expected, Eallair just crossed his arms and gave Aidan a hard look. "So, you're wantin' to kill people then, is that it?"

  That brought Aidan up short. "Wha…no. Of course not!"

  "Well, why not?" he asked.

  "What?" Aidan asked.

  "Why don't you wanna kill people?" Eallair asked again, slowly. "You're a wizard, right? Dangerous? In need of constant supervision and regulation?"

  "Yes," Aidan agreed.

  "So, you must wanna kill people all the time if you're that dangerous, right?"

  "No!" Aidan shouted. "We're dangerous because if we try to use magic, we cause fires or explosions or earthquakes, and we kill a lot of people."

  "Oh," Eallair said, nodding in understanding. He paused thoughtfully, then asked, "So, when's the last time you used magic?"

  "What? Never! I mean, once when I first manifested but—"

  "Wait. So, you're telling me that you only used magic once in your entire life?" Eallair cut him off.

  "Well, yeah," Aidan said.

  "So, I guess you just never wanted to use magic again after that, right?"

  "Huh? No, I…" Aidan ground his teeth in frustration. Every little inconvenience he'd ever endured throughout his whole life flashed through his head, from that first cold, dark apartment to the light at the meeting center. "Of course I want to use magic. I want to every day."

  "So why don't you?" Eallair asked.

  "Why are you asking me stupid questions?" Aidan snapped.

  "Is the question really that hard?" he asked, not answering Aidan. "I'd have thought it was more’n a bit simple. Why. Don't. You. Use. Magic?"

  "I just told you. I live in a city. I'm surrounded by people. If I used magic, I could kill them!" Aidan shouted.

  "So, let me get this straight. You want to use magic, but you don't, because if you do you could hurt or even kill people? Am I right?"

  "Yes!"

  Eallair smiled suddenly, his confrontational manner slipping away as if it was never there. "So, tell me then. Exactly what part does the government play in any of that?"

  Aidan froze. "What?"

  "Well," Eallair said. "Seems to me like you're doing a pretty fine job of not using magic all on your own, because you make the choice not to. So how does anything that the government does keep you from hurting people?"

  "I…" Aidan licked his lips.

  "Is it the license? Because I'm not seeing how having one of those does anything except let people know to be scared of you."

  "It…"

  "Is it the yearly renewal? Because, unless you used magic out in the middle of a field where no one could get hurt, I'm pretty sure they'd know about it way before they could test you. And if you were using magic where it couldn't hurt nobody, why does it matter?"

  Aidan couldn’t think of a single thing to say.

  "Is it how they shove you all in together and force you to live apart from everyone else? Is that why yo
u don't wanna use magic? Because you're best friends with your neighbors? Because they're all just like you?"

  Aidan thought about the night he was attacked, about how he could have used magic, but didn't. Thinking about the little girl at the shop and her family was what stopped him, but it never once crossed his mind to stop because she and her family were wizards. He wouldn't have wanted to hurt anyone, wizard or sorcerer. In fact, now that he thought about it, he couldn't think of a single reason, other than not wanting to hurt people, why he'd never tried to use magic. Sure, he was scared of the government finding out, but he only ever thought of that later on. When he was tempted, when he really wanted to let the fire out, it was always the thought of what he could do to someone else that stopped him.

  "I…" Aidan said softly. "I don't know."

  "Exactly," Eallair said, not unkindly. "So why does the government need to be in your life to stop you from doing something you stop yourself from doing all on your own?"

  Aidan swallowed. He couldn't think of a single reason. And it bothered him. He didn't like agreeing with Eallair. Not about something like this. Not when it contradicted everything he'd ever known. Or thought he knew.

  "What about… I mean, that's just me. What about other wizards? Maybe they…" Aidan trailed off.

  "Maybe some of them might hurt people, aye. That’s always an option. But think about this. If a wizard was gonna be usin’ their magic right now, today, what would be stoppin’ ‘em? A license don’t prevent you from usin’ magic. That’s why they test you when you get it renewed. If a wizard had an accident, or if they willfully decided to use magic, nothin’, nothin’, could stop ‘em. So why aren’t there more times when it happens? Why is it so rare for a wizard to actually use their magic?”

  Aidan pressed his lips together.

  “Maybe, in the end, they're just like you," Eallair said gently. "Maybe you're all not as dangerous as you think you are."

  "Of course we are! We learned—" Aidan's eyes lit up. "We had to be taught! The government taught us not to use magic, taught us why we shouldn't use it. If we didn't have that, we wouldn't have known—"

  "And that's fine," Eallair cut in smoothly. "But you can have that without all the rest. You can be taught about your magic and trained on how to keep it in without being a prisoner and an outcast your whole life."

  Aidan slumped.

  Eallair sighed. "Why are you taking it so personally?"

  "Because…" Aidan clamped his jaw shut to keep from saying anything else. He shouldn't give Eallair the satisfaction of admitting that he was taking it personally.

  Except…that wasn't the real reason he wanted to keep quiet. Aidan had put up with a lot in his life because he believed it was necessary. Screw what Eallair said. Maybe he didn't know what "rights" he supposedly didn't have, but he'd always known he wasn't the same as everybody else. That he never would be. That he'd always be on the outside, that he'd always be looked down on. That people would always be scared of him or even hate him because of how he was born. But he'd accepted it. He'd dealt with it and went through life, if not with a smile, then at least with a sense of peace knowing what he went through was for the greater good. But if he was wrong about that, if he'd been wrong about that his entire life…

  Then Eallair is right. And if he's right about this, what else could he be right about?

  Aidan didn't want to think about it. But he was anyway. And that was what made Eallair so dangerous. Not that he could wake up King Arthur and wage some kind of terrorist crusade against the government, but that he could convince people that, maybe, it wasn't as terrible an idea as they first thought it was.

  Almost as if summoned by his thoughts, three cop carriages—a decent distance apart from each other but heading in the same direction—tore down the street Aidan was parked next to, sirens blaring. They were heading back towards the DMS building, if Aidan had his directions right. I could stop him. This is my chance. No matter what he said, it's still wrong and I can still stop him.

  He watched as the first carriage approached.

  "You gonna turn me in?" Eallair asked quietly, startling Aidan.

  He snapped his head around. "Wh-what?" he asked, guilt staining his cheeks red.

  "You could, you know. Just step out and flag them down. One of them would stop; you know they would."

  "I—"

  "Of course," he went on. "You know they wouldn't just let you go. You're a wizard, and you helped me escape. For all you just turned me in, in their eyes, you still helped me get away; you’re still an accomplice. They'd give you a nice, manly pat on the back and say 'Good on ya; you caught yourself a terrorist. Here's your reward.', then they'd revoke your registration on the spot. Probably wouldn't even bother askin’ you any questions."

  Aidan didn't say anything, merely watched as the first carriage went by.

  "You'd be willing to die?" Eallair asked, "For a government that doesn't care about you? That treats you like you're barely even worthy of the air you breathe? Even though you know that you'd be better off if things changed?"

  Aidan gripped the door handle as the second carriage raced towards them. He kept his eyes locked on it.

  "Just because it might not be as good as I thought, doesn't mean you have any right to destroy it. I…" Aidan swallowed his fear and sat up straighter, steeling himself. "I can stop you."

  "Could you?" Eallair asked gently. "Do you really think getting any of those cops over here is gonna do anything other than get them killed?"

  Aidan started, surprised at the question and the gentle way Eallair asked it. Aidan turned to look at him as the second carriage sped by.

  "I like you, little fire," Eallair said. "Truly I do. You're this little slip of nothing, powerless in pretty much every sense of the word, but you ain't scared to speak your mind. Tellin' me right to my face what you think and not holdin' nothin’ back. You're willin’ to die for something you believe in, misguided as it is. You live up to your name, in every way imaginable."

  Eallair smiled sadly. "But as much as I wouldn't wanna hurt you, I'm not gonna let you stop me. You flag those cops down, and I'll blow their carriages to the hell you don't believe in anymore before they can even get out. And it wouldn't even tire me out. I'll walk away and do exactly what I was gonna do before, and the only difference is that they'll be dead. And it'll be your fault. Sacrificing yourself is one thing. Could you really sacrifice them?"

  Aidan grasped the door handle so hard it hurt, but he barely noticed. He felt hollow. Because Eallair was right. Again. Aidan couldn't bring himself to get anybody else killed. He thought briefly about using magic himself, blowing himself and Eallair up, stopping him that way, but the truth was that Aidan just didn't want to die.

  Aidan loosened his grip and his hand slipped from the handle as the last carriage went by.

  "For what it's worth," Eallair said gently. "You did the right thing."

  "Shut up," Aidan said as he stared at the steering wheel. There wasn't any heat behind his words. He didn't know what to feel, whether he should be relieved he wasn't going to die or ashamed he wasn't strong enough to do what he thought was right, but anger didn't seem like an option.

  If he actually does it, if he actually destroys the government, it will be at least partially my fault now, and I can't even get angry at myself. What does that say about me?

  They sat in silence. Aidan kept expecting to hear Eallair open the door and leave, but he didn't. Aidan felt like he was being watched but he refused to turn his head and see if he was right. He wasn't sure he cared. He just wanted to go home and sleep, even though it was the middle of the day. Finally, Aidan heard a soft sigh coming from next to him.

  "You know, if you wanted, you could…come with me?" Eallair asked hesitantly. "See Arthur for yourself?"

  Whatever Aidan might have been expecting, it definitely wasn't that. It was tempting. More than tempting. The scary excitement of realizing the scroll was real started to build up inside him again.
He could actually see King Arthur, be there when he woke up. What would he really look like? How would he act? Would he be the selfless hero Aidan had quietly idolized his whole life? Could anyone live up to almost two thousand years of legend and myth, of promises and expectations? If anyone could, Aidan knew it would be Arthur. And he could be there to find out firsthand.

  Except…

  Aidan sighed. There was always an except.

  "I-I can't," he said. "I want to. You have no idea how much, but I can't go with you if you're going to try and take down the government. It's bad enough I'm not trying to stop you. I can't support you. That would be… I just can't."

  He glanced over at Eallair. He looked disappointed, but not altogether surprised. "Well," he said, giving Aidan a rueful smile. "Just figured I'd ask."

  Then he suddenly clapped his hands once, the sharp sound startling Aidan. "All right then!" Eallair sounded like his old self. If somebody Aidan had known for a week could have an "old self" anyway. "I think I've imposed on you for too long. I can't thank you enough for being my somewhat unwillin’ getaway driver, but I think it's time I'm on my way."

  Aidan was surprised at the tiny pang of regret he felt, but he was sure it had more to do with Eallair being the only person in the world who could take him to see Arthur, rather than him leaving.

  At least, he was mostly sure.

  Eallair gathered up his scroll case and opened his door. He got out of the carriage and stretched. "Ah! Feels great being out of that cramped box." He closed the door and slung the case over his shoulder.

  Aidan blinked. Was he just going to leave? For some reason, Aidan was insulted at the thought, but the feeling didn't have long to grow. Eallair snapped his fingers, and the window lowered. He leaned in, resting his arms on the door.

  "Thank you," he said, his voice solemn. "I mean it truly. You're a good man, Aidan Collins."

  "Um, thanks?" Aidan felt his face heat up slightly and chose to believe it was because he was embarrassed about how terrible he was at accepting compliments, and not because it was the first time that Eallair had used his actual name. His full name, no less.