One True King

by Soman Chainani

  “Was on my way here anyway after leaving Camelot myself,” Sir Japeth admitted. “And truth be told, you offered me friendship at a time when I had none.”

  “Two fair souls, equally cursed,” Evelyn cracked.

  “We do share a bit in common,” Sir Japeth remarked. “Betrayed by our families. Forced to watch our brothers steal our fate. Our glory. And they say the Storian is balanced! Bah. The Pen favors them with impunity and leaves us to rot. No wonder our brothers fight to protect it. When there is no other pen to fight for the likes of us.”

  “August and Arthur. Even their names sound alike, dripping with self-importance,” Evelyn mocked. “No doubt they’ll be bosom buddies soon enough. August finds every way to suck up to power.”

  “And to think, all that power blessed on a wart,” Sir Japeth said grimly, as Evelyn’s butterfly spy returned from the forest, whispering to the Dean. “If only there was a way to humble them both . . .” He sighed ruefully. “Sherwood Forest, home of outcasts and dreamers.”

  But now Evelyn’s face was changing, the butterfly at her ear . . .

  “My dear Sir Japeth . . . ,” she said, peering up at him. “Perhaps there is a way.”

  She slipped open her hood, letting her tiny spy flit back into her dress of blue butterflies, nestling amongst the ones near her stomach—

  Tedros’ eyes bulged.

  Agatha choked.

  She was pregnant.

  Evelyn Sader was pregnant.

  “Yes . . . there might be a way after all . . . ,” she mused, thinking it over.

  She whispered to Sir Japeth, who cocked a brow, listening.

  “Oh, how I love your wicked little mind,” he said, when she finished. “And the surest sign yet that you’ve returned to full health.”

  “I have only you to thank, Sir Japeth,” Evelyn pointed out. “You could have left me to die. Instead, you’ve given my child a path to a throne. The throne of a king who hurt us both.”

  “And you’ve given me a chink in my brother’s armor,” said Sir Japeth.

  “Sounds like we both have work to do, then,” said Evelyn. “Our time together may soon be at an end.”

  “Wherever our travels take us, know that you’ll always have a knight at your service,” said Sir Japeth.

  “My Green Knight,” Evelyn anointed him. “My child will know your story.”

  “Then let me bless it with all the love I have left.” Sir Japeth put his hand on her pregnant belly. Evelyn closed her eyes. For the briefest of moments, her skin tinged green, before it restored milky smooth. Her eyes fluttered open.

  “The Green Knight . . . I quite like that . . . ,” Sir Japeth said. “You’ve given me a name, my lady. Perhaps I can give your child mine?”

  Evelyn smiled back at him. “Perhaps.”

  The lights in the bar went out, plunging Tedros and Agatha into darkness.

  Crisp air chilled Tedros’ skin. He could smell the oily hollow of the serpent, he and his princess returned inside its body. Agatha’s eyes pierced through the dark.

  “So the Snake is Evelyn Sader’s child,” she said, with certainty. “Only not her child with Arthur.”

  “He’s the son of Sir Kay and Evelyn,” Tedros agreed. “Explains the connection between the Green Knight and the Snake. And the vision you saw in the pearl. Plus, Sir Kay and Arthur were brothers. If Sir Kay was their father, Rhian and Japeth would have had Arthur’s blood. It explains everything—”

  “No it doesn’t. Kay and Arthur were foster brothers, remember? They weren’t related by blood,” said Agatha, the confidence in her voice fading. “Lady of the Lake wouldn’t have mistaken Kay’s blood for Arthur’s. And it doesn’t explain how Japeth would have wizard’s blood to get into the Celestium. And Evelyn’s tone with him . . . she called it ‘my’ child, not ‘our’ child—”

  “We have our proof Japeth isn’t my father’s son, Agatha. We have the Snake’s secrets. All of them,” Tedros disputed. “We can use them against him. We just need a way out of here—”

  “Tedros?” Agatha said.

  “What?”

  Then he caught the green glow reflecting in her pupils.

  Slowly, Tedros turned.

  Just in time to see a new snake about to swallow them.

  CRIES OF A baby.

  Two babies.

  That’s what they heard first, suspended in a wash of white, before the scene filled in, like the Storian inking a page.

  On a rumpled bed, stuffed in the corner of a cluttered one-room house, Evelyn Sader swaddled her twin boys in her arms, the Dean’s face ashen and sweat-soaked, the sheets around her stained with blood. The babies were almost identical; one had a rosier complexion, with sea-green eyes, the other milky pale, his eyes ice-blue. A woman with long gray hair bent over her—the midwife, Tedros assumed—patting her forehead dry and wrapping the boys in fresh blankets.

  “Is he coming?” Evelyn said weakly.

  “Soon,” said one of two more midwives in the corner, rinsing bloody towels and boiling tea, both of whom had the same stringy gray hair, high foreheads, and—

  Tedros balked.

  “Mistral Sisters,” Agatha said, her eyes shifting between the three women, who looked just as old nearly two decades into the past as they did in the present.

  What were they doing here? Tedros wondered. As far as he knew, Evelyn Sader and the Mistral Sisters had never crossed paths . . .

  “I need to see him,” Evelyn insisted, trying to soothe the paler boy, who was wailing, while the ruddier boy smiled and cooed on her arm. “You promised he’d come.”

  “Patience,” said the Mistral named Alpa.

  “You did a wise thing writing us,” said Bethna. “Your brother, August, has spent years maligning our efforts to find the One True King, who can bring the Storian’s reign to an end. We’ve had few allies in our search. Even our own brother doesn’t believe the One True King exists, despite his continued efforts to control the Storian.”

  “But now we can all work together for the same goal,” hissed Omeida next to her, pouring a cup of smoky tea. She brought it to Evelyn. “Drink this, dear. It will give you strength to nurse them.” She held it to Evelyn’s lips and the Dean took a sip, still trying to calm the pallid, unruly child.

  “They’ll be safe here in Foxwood, won’t they?” Evelyn asked, anxiously cuddling the newborns. “Couldn’t stay in Sherwood anymore. Too many high-ranking leaders coming in and out. Needed a place where we could blend in. Especially with two.”

  “No surprise that you’d have twins,” Omeida chuckled. “They run in the family, after all.”

  “Have you given any thought to their names?” said Alpa.

  “I have,” a voice said.

  A man’s voice.

  Tedros’ heart stopped.

  A voice he knew.

  Slowly the prince and Agatha turned to a shadow in the doorway. Behind him, an empty street of cottages swirled with autumn leaves, as if he’d arrived by wind. He glided inside the house, hooded silver robes billowing over his slender frame. A silver mask covered his face except for puckish blue eyes and full lips, pulled into an impish smile.

  “No . . . way . . . ,” Agatha gasped.

  His eyes flicked to the prince and princess, as if even from the past, he seemed to know that they were standing there.

  “Hello, Evelyn,” he said, his focus turning to her twins, his lithe fingers touching the head of the pale, crying child. Instantly its wails ceased. “Two boys. Imagine that.”

  “Past is Present and Present is Past,” said Evelyn, peering up at him.

  “Indeed.” The man’s eyes moved to the rosy, genial child. “But you only need one to complete your plan. Let me take this one to school. Spare him the indignity of growing up in Foxwood. Hello, little cub. Should we make you an official student?” He put his finger to the boy’s, as if to unlock a spell, and the child’s fingertip suddenly glowed gold, alive with magic. “Sweet nature . . . dashing smile . .
. and now he has a fingerglow too . . . My precocious Everboy, soon to walk the halls of Honor Tower. Proof I’m as Good as people think.” He winked at the child.

  “I know you well enough to know you’re joking,” said Evelyn, though she pulled the boy closer to her, out of his grasp. “If I was still a teacher at your school, you would have the right to see them whenever you wish. Your school that took me in when Arthur banished me from the Woods. You saved me in a time of need. You, my true love. But then my brother convinced you I wasn’t your true love. And you listened to that lying fool, expelling me like I was nothing, despite my loyalty to you . . . Well, disown me and you disown my children too. After today, you will never see them again. Nor me.”

  The man’s eyes twinkled through his mask. “And yet, a part of me lives inside you forever . . .” He pulled aside the bedsheets and put a hand to her chest, a subtle blue glow lighting up at the heart of her butterfly dress. “I never questioned your sincerity, Evelyn. I believe you loved me. Yet I also believe your brother: that I will love someone more in years to come. Even so, I can’t discount the possibility that you are right. It’s why I imparted a piece of my soul into you before I expelled you from school. And if you are correct that you are my true love and that August Sader will destroy me . . . then one day you will use that piece of my soul to bring me back to life. Wouldn’t that be something? You and me together again.” He looked down at the boys. “This time, a family.”

  Evelyn stared at the masked man, their eyes meeting, and for a brief moment, her face blushed with hope. Then she hardened, drawing away. “Go and make your own family. I almost died in the Woods because you betrayed me. Because you threw me out like Arthur did. If it wasn’t for a kind knight named Japeth, these boys never would have been born. A man like that should be my true love.”

  “Except he isn’t. Otherwise he would be standing here instead of me,” replied the visitor. “Your heart only loves me, Evelyn. We both know that.”

  Evelyn glowered. “I don’t need you. Nor will my children. They’re mine now.”

  “You summoned me here, Evelyn. And not just to insult me, I presume,” said the man coolly. “Your letter proposed a plan that I found compelling. A plan to rule Camelot. A plan for which you need my help.”

  “To be fair, brother, you will benefit as much as she will,” Alpa chirped, alongside Bethna and Omeida in the corner.

  “As will you, Sisters. All of us will benefit,” said the masked man, without a glance. “And you’re sure of what you saw, Evelyn? Arthur and a woman not his wife . . .”

  A butterfly fluttered off Evelyn’s dress into the visitor’s hands. A scene magically replayed across its wings for him. His eyes grew bigger as he watched.

  “Quite sure,” said Evelyn.

  The man let the butterfly return to her.

  His gaze moved back to the paler child, silently studying the visitor. Next to him, his sunnier brother fixated on his new fingerglow, making it beam on and off.

  “Very well, then. The boys can stay with Evelyn,” spoke the man, as if the matter was still in question. “Let them grow up together, the way my brother Rhian and I once did. Only one can be the King of Camelot, of course. But they can fight it out for themselves, Good versus Evil, brother against brother. Like two School Masters did, before one rose to power . . . But this time, it is a King who will rise. A King who can ensure that Camelot is in the hands of our bloodline, as much as the school is. The two great forces of the Woods fully under our control.”

  “Provided you stay alive,” Evelyn observed. “Your alliance with my brother certainly limits those odds.”

  “Then you would bring me back to life, wouldn’t you?” the masked man needled. “My brother was a far more deadly opponent and I put Rhian in his grave. Wizard blood runs through my veins. A blind seer hasn’t a chance against me. Besides, from what I can tell, your brother has done nothing other than tell you the truth: that he does not see you as my true love.”

  “Whoever he does see as your true love will kill you,” Evelyn scorned. “And knowing my brother, she’ll kill me too. And who will bring you back to life then? My brother is a greater threat than you realize. He may play the friend to both Good and Evil, but he is as surely on the side of Good as your brother Rhian once was. August won’t rest until you and I suffer the same fate as Rhian. Why do you think August came to teach at your school in the first place?”

  The man could see Evelyn’s conviction. Doubt flickered in his pupils . . .

  He turned to the Mistrals. “In the unlikely case that Evelyn and I both perish, then it will be up to you, Sisters, to guide the boys to Arthur’s throne. To make them believe they are King Arthur’s sons, so that they may seize control of the Woods. With a little help from me, of course . . .”

  He reached down and lifted a single butterfly from Evelyn’s dress. On his finger, it morphed into a small, scaly, black eel, which he raised to his ear, before the tiny eel slithered inside. The masked man closed his eyes, as if imparting his thoughts to the creature, before he gently drew it out the other ear.

  “Everything they need to know is here for them to find.”

  He held the eel up on his finger, twisting and gleaming in the house’s dull light.

  “Including how to bring me back if I die?” asked Evelyn. “Including how to take the Storian’s power?”

  The masked man hesitated.

  In the corner, the Mistral Sisters smirked. “She believes in the One True King, brother,” spoke Alpa. “It’s why she’s brought us here, too.”

  “I’ll leave specious theories to my sisters,” the man said sourly. “But even if the myth of the One True King is true, it would not be enough to claim the powers of the Storian. These boys have my blood. And the Pen rejects my blood, ever since I killed my brother. Even if my sons make all the kingdoms burn their rings, even if they sever the bonds between Man and Pen . . . the Storian’s powers will not be theirs. For the same reason I’m unable to control the Pen. Good is too strong. The balance still intact. But there is a cure, says August Sader. Marrying a queen whose blood is as Evil as mine. A queen whose blood bonds with ours to tip the balance. A queen your brother promises me I’ll find.”

  “And if my brother betrays you? If this queen kills you instead?” Evelyn pressed. “Then what?”

  The masked man considered this. He whispered to the eel, a wizard making a prophecy: “Then my son will have my revenge . . . by making that queen his own.”

  He let the eel morph back into a butterfly before returning it to the rest of the butterflies on Evelyn’s dress. “In the event of our deaths, give them this dress, Sisters. It will lead them to a pen that shows them their future. A new pen. A pen that ensures that even death cannot stop our blood from ruling the Woods.”

  “Which pen?” Evelyn asked, unsure.

  “The better question is: Which son?” the man spoke, watching the boys. “Which will succeed if we fail?”

  He honed in on the ruddier, cheerier boy, still playing with his new fingerglow, Evelyn trying to keep him from squirming off her arm. But then the man noticed the other boy grinning at him. In a flash, the skin on the boy’s face coated with scales, like a snake’s, before it reverted milky and smooth. He saw the man’s eyes widen and the boy giggled, his mother none the wiser.

  “But I have my suspicions . . . ,” said the man.

  The rosier boy began to whimper, showing distress for the first time. “Shhh . . . my good boy,” Evelyn whispered. “My sweet Rhian.”

  She didn’t look at the masked man, her lips curled with triumph, as if she knew the name had made an impact. As if she knew that he was glaring right through her.

  “And his name?” the man said, pointing at the paler child.

  Evelyn held the second boy close, kissing his face that had just been a snake’s only a moment before. “For a middle name, Japeth, after the knight who saved him. That’s what I’ll call him.”

  “And his birth name?” the
man asked, stone-cold.

  Evelyn finally looked up at him. “Rafal,” she breathed. “For his father.”

  The man pulled off his mask and hood, revealing young, frost-white skin, a shock of silver hair, and a smile as wide as the devil’s.

  Tedros heard himself scream, Agatha’s own scream slashing into his—

  But they were already falling into darkness, the cool insides of a snake opening up into a vast, strange sky.

  23

  AGATHA

  Flesh and Blood

  Past is Present and Present is Past.

  The Snake.

  Son of the School Master.

  Son of Rafal.

  Pure-blooded Evil.

  Following them across time. Across death.

  To the End of Ends.

  No more time to think—

  Agatha’s feet sank into softness, her eyes flying open to a fluorescing green cloud, Tedros landing on a green cloud above her. A black sky expanded around them, with a glossy sheen, as if its surface was wet. Stars pinned against this sky, not childish five-pointed stars but steel snowflakes, edges deadly sharp like a handblade’s, the center of each star a glowing green marble, like an all-seeing eye. In the stars’ dim light, Agatha glimpsed etchings in the black sky, like tree carvings, but Agatha couldn’t make them out, the darkness too thick.

  “Help me up,” said Agatha, reaching for her prince.

  “The Celestium,” Tedros surmised, hoisting her to his cloud. “Must be reflecting Merlin’s mood, wherever he is . . .”

  Except Agatha was on her toes now, shining her fingerglow at the sky’s carvings.

  Agatha skin crawled. “No. Not Merlin’s.” She lit up the sky—

  “Japeth & Aric.” Tedros shrank backwards. “Agatha . . . this is the Snake’s place to think.”

  “Rafal’s blood . . . ,” Agatha rasped. “Wizard’s blood . . .”

  “Which means he knows we’re here,” her prince said. “He brought us here.”

  Panicked, they scanned the Snake Sky, but found only more glowing green clouds, razor-sharp stars, lovesick carvings.

  A noise scuffed behind them and they whipped around—