Knight of Darkness

by Kinley MacGregor

  Calming down a degree, he made a noise of disapproval.

  “Hmmm…” Merewyn sat down on the ground in front of him. She held his arms as she looked him up and down, trying to think of a suitable name for her new friend. “How about Peter?”

  He whined loudly in protest.

  “Very well, no Peter.”

  “How about Beauroche?” Blaise asked.

  He stopped making noises and appeared to stare at her.

  “It means handsome rock,” Blaise explained.

  Rocky actually purred in approval.

  He was definitely a male rock. Laughing, Merewyn shook his hand. “Nice to meet you, Beauroche. Would you mind if I called you Beau for short?”

  Beau nuzzled against her in an affectionate hug.

  To her surprise, Blaise came over to them and held his hand out in friendship. “Welcome to our motley crew, Beau.”

  Beau eeked and rolled to Merewyn’s side, where he stared up at Blaise. After a few seconds, he peeked around her shoulder, then hesitantly held his hand out to Blaise, who shook it gently.

  Merewyn was curious about his actions. “How is it he can see?”

  Blaise shrugged as he moved to tend their fire. “Not sure really. It’s one of those strange things in nature. Rocks, trees, even the soil can see. They don’t always have the ability to understand what they’re viewing, but they can see it. It’s why you have to be careful. A powerful sorcerer can use that ability to spy.”

  “Really?” She didn’t know why she found that so shocking. It actually made sense now that she thought about it. “Is that how Narishka is able to learn so many things about others?”

  He put a few more pieces of wood on the fire. Embers shot up and rained down harmlessly on the ground. “Probably. But it’s not an easy thing to do, and it takes its toll on the one who does it.”

  He dusted his hands off on his brown leather breeches. “I remember when Varian was a young boy. There was a pupil of my father’s, an older adolescent, who had him do it. Because he was so young, it ruptured part of Varian’s brain and caused him to have a seizure. It damned near killed him.”

  Her heart clenched in sympathetic pain as she tried to imagine the fear and pain Varian must have felt. “Are you serious?”

  He nodded. “When Varian’s father learned what had caused his illness, he beat Varian for it and almost killed him again.”

  That was so harsh that she couldn’t even fathom it. “Why would he do such a thing?”

  Blaise shrugged. “Even though he was born from a Merlin’s bloodline, Lancelot hated anything to do with magick, especially the darker part of it. Some say that’s why he never really quested for the grail. He never wanted it found because of the magick it holds.”

  “Is that why he hated Varian? Because he was part Adoni?”

  Blaise’s lavender eyes were sad as if he felt for his friend. “Lancelot hated him for numerous reasons. There weren’t many at Arthur’s Camelot who would suffer Varian’s presence without insult or injury.”

  That didn’t make sense to her. Why would Varian stay where he wasn’t wanted? “Then why hasn’t he joined his mother’s side?”

  Blaise pinned her with a gaze that was filled with aged wisdom. “Would it be any better there? Honestly?”

  No, and Varian was a smart man to realize that. Most wouldn’t see it that way, and they would use it as an opportunity to strike back at the ones who’d hurt them. It said a lot for Varian that he hadn’t succumbed to that need for vengeance.

  “I don’t understand why the Lords of Avalon can’t see him for what he is.”

  “What is he, Merewyn?”

  “He’s a champion.”

  “A champion who tries to tempt the Lords of Avalon from the path of light and when they fall, he kills them for it.”

  She frowned at him and his harsh words. “You make him sound ruthless.”

  Blaise came to sit before her. “Don’t get me wrong. I respect Varian for who he is and what he does, but never mistake him. He is ruthless, my lady. To the core of his being. He was born of the darkest of his mother’s powers, and he has a direct line to them even now.”

  “I don’t understand. Why did Lancelot sleep with Narishka when he hated dark magick?”

  “He didn’t.”

  That confused her even more. “Then how was Varian conceived?”

  Blaise let out a long breath as he reached to pluck a blade of grass from the ground beside him. He twirled it idly between his long, graceful fingers as he appeared to gather his thoughts so that he could explain this to her.

  “I guess I should go back to the beginning. From the moment she first heard of Lancelot, Elaine of Corbenic was in love with him. So much so that she was willing to do anything to have him. Anything. Even make a deal with an Adoni.”

  Now she was beginning to understand. Elaine had been as foolish as she had. “She summoned Varian’s mother.”

  He nodded darkly as the flames highlighted the sharp angles of his handsome face. It made the lavender of his eyes practically glow.

  “Narishka agreed to help her, and her price was simple. Elaine would spend one night with Lancelot and conceive his children. Two sons. One for Elaine to use to tie him to her and one for Narishka, who didn’t want the pain of childbirth, but who wanted a son born of a Merlin’s bloodline. To make sure that the child would be a blending of her Adoni blood and a Merlin’s, Narishka implanted one of her own ovaries inside Elaine.”

  That didn’t make sense to Merewyn. There wasn’t even a tiny hint of motherly instinct inside the Adoni. “Why did she want a child so badly?”

  “Narishka believed that a child born of Lancelot’s genes and hers would have powers even greater than Morgen’s and her son Mordred’s.”

  “Does he?”

  Blaise gave a very subtle nod. “There are some who speculate that Varian’s are even greater than any of the Merlins’. But Varian refuses to prove or disprove that theory. He believes his powers are his, and what they are or aren’t is no one’s business but his own.”

  And again she was impressed. Most people, male or female, would be more than happy to show the world the exact extent of their abilities. Especially those who’d been so tormented.

  But that being said, she found it odd that Blaise knew so much about someone who preferred to keep to himself and not interact with others. “You seem to know a lot about Varian.”

  Blaise looked down at the blade of grass in his hands as he continued to wind it about his index finger. “Yes and no. I was there at Camelot, and I remember well the angry boy he was, not that it wasn’t well justified. Both his father and his stepmother scorned him. Even though Elaine had carried and birthed him, she held Varian up to everyone as worthless. I think it was a toss-up as to who hated him more, Elaine or Lancelot.”

  “It still doesn’t make sense that his father hated him so for something he had no control over.”

  Blaise met her gaze and held it. “You have to understand what happened the night Varian was conceived. Elaine didn’t appear to Lancelot as Elaine, like she’d planned. Narishka had disguised her so that she was Guinevere. Lancelot had been drugged during supper and wasn’t in his full senses. He tried to do what was right and push her away, but she refused to leave him. For that matter, she practically raped him. It wasn’t until after they’d had sex and Lancelot had passed out that Elaine saw her reflection and realized she was Guinevere—when she’d made her bargain, she’d told Narishka she wanted to be irresistible to him. She forgot to stipulate how, and so Narishka gave her the one form that Lancelot wouldn’t be able to deny—Guinevere’s. In the morning when he awoke and Elaine was again in her own body, Lancelot was sickened by the sight of her and the deal she’d made.”

  Merewyn understood. It was bad enough that he’d been duped, he’d also been found out with irrefutable proof. “Elaine knew his secret.” He’d been in love with his queen.

  Blaise nodded grimly. “And she threatened
to expose it to Arthur unless Lancelot married her.”

  Merewyn winced in sympathetic pain at how betrayed Lancelot must have felt. “That poor man.”

  “You’ve no idea. Lancelot was born from the grail merlin and had spent his entire life wanting to follow in his mother’s footsteps, trying to prove himself worthy of her. With that one action, his chances of being pure enough to achieve the status of grail merlin was taken from him. He’d been corrupted by the Adoni, by his love for a woman he could never have, and by Elaine, who’d blackmailed him over that love. He was never the same again.”

  Closing her eyes, Merewyn hated to see anyone so hurt over something that should bring happiness. Love shouldn’t hurt. But what was so bad was that he’d turned on the one person he shouldn’t have—his own son. “Did he hate Galahad, too?”

  She saw the pain clearly in Blaise’s eyes. “No. Even though Galahad’s mother had deceived him, her Merlin’s bloodline was pure, and so was Galahad’s. The sad thing is, Lancelot would have loved Varian, too, had Narishka not come to claim him an hour after his birth. When Lancelot tried to drive her away, she told him of the bargain Elaine had made and that Varian was her son, not Elaine’s. Lancelot was so angry, he tried to kill Varian before Narishka could take him.”

  Tears pricked the back of her eyes as her heart ached for Varian. How awful to be so hated over something he’d had no part in. “How do you know all this?”

  “I was there when Narishka came for him. Because Galahad and Varian were born from a Merlin’s bloodline, my father, being the Arthur’s Penmerlin, was there for their births. Back in those days, the birth of any Merlin was watched closely, and each Merlin was carefully raised to protect their purity.”

  As opposed to now. After the fall of Camelot and Arthur, the Merlins and the magical objects they governed had been sent out into the world to hide them from Morgen so that she couldn’t use them to spread her evil to the other side of the veil and subjugate mankind. It was why Morgen and Narishka both had spies trying to locate the Merlins and their objects.

  “Varian’s purity wasn’t protected.”

  He shook his head. “Even though Merlin tried to stop it, he couldn’t. By the laws of magick and the Adoni, Varian was Narishka’s son, and she was fully entitled to him. So Varian was taken to live with his mother’s people in their nether realm. And it was there that he learned the darkest arts imaginable…” Blaise paused to give her a sad smile. “Then again, you’ve seen enough of Narishka’s work to be able to imagine them quite well.”

  Yes, she had. Narishka’s cruelty was second only to Morgen’s, and even then it was a thin margin Morgen led by.

  “But he was returned to his father. Why?”

  Blaise leaned back on his arms. “Varian was born of light and dark. Those two parts of him are at war with each other, and they won’t let him walk purely on either side. He’s too dark to be true to the light and too pure to walk solely in darkness. It’s his hell to be caught between the two forever.”

  Still, that didn’t make sense to her. “Why can’t he just choose one side or the other?”

  “He has too much conscience for evil and too much id for sainthood. It’s what makes him unpredictable. In any given situation he could be good or evil. It just depends on which part of him wins the internal battle. That’s why none of the Lords of Avalon trust him. And it’s why Varian doesn’t even trust himself. When we went to war against Morgen at Camlann, Varian stayed home.”

  She was stunned by that news. The battle of Camlann was the one where both Arthur and Morgen’s son Mordred had been fatally wounded. That battle had been the one that destroyed the knights of the Round Table. After their defeat, they had fled to Avalon to regroup while Morgen had marched her army to Camelot and seized Arthur’s throne.

  The two groups had been battling ever since. Morgen trying to keep her throne and the Lords of Avalon who were trying to rid her of it forever.

  She couldn’t imagine a man like Varian not even taking part in such an important event. “Why didn’t he fight?”

  “You have to remember, Varian was just seventeen when the battle came and he’d only been knighted a few weeks before it. He was still mastering his powers and torn greatly between his father and mother. Since he despised his father, he was afraid he’d see Lancelot on the battlefield and turn against Arthur, and he loved Arthur too much for that. Arthur was the closest thing to a father Varian had ever had and the last thing he wanted was to take a chance that his mother or someone else would turn him to Morgen’s side. So he stayed in Glastonbury while we rode out.”

  “And Arthur was killed.”

  He nodded, his eyes dark with his own pain. It was obvious Blaise had loved Arthur, too, and Merewyn wished she’d met the man who’d inspired such love and loyalty from these men. He must have been great indeed. “Varian has never forgiven himself for not being there to fight by Arthur’s side.”

  “But he won’t fight for evil. You saw how they beat him in the dungeon, and still he refused to serve them.”

  “And yet he would have allowed your throat to be cut before he joined them. A purely good man would never sacrifice an innocent life for any reason. Varian would. As I said, he’s not firmly planted on either side.”

  Perhaps that was true. Perhaps it wasn’t. But she refused to believe that Varian would ever be purely evil.

  “Not all of you hate him, Blaise. You don’t.”

  “Only because I understand him.”

  “And his brother—”

  “Hates him bitterly.”

  She was surprised by that. Even though Varian had refused to speak of Galahad, she would have assumed his brother, who was reported to be so noble and pure, would be able to love Varian in spite of everything. “Why would he hate him?”

  “He blames Varian for Elaine’s suicide.”

  She frowned at him. “Why?”

  “Elaine was brutal to Varian after Narishka returned him to Camelot. She couldn’t stand to see him because he reminded both her and Lancelot of Narishka’s treachery. Elaine was embittered by the fact that her husband loved someone else. She’d tried everything to win Lancelot’s love, but it was hopeless. Even though he never touched Guinevere, he loved her more than his life. Since Elaine couldn’t hurt Lancelot without ruining herself and Galahad, or attack Narishka, she turned her hatred to Varian.” He flinched as if something had struck him.

  “What?”

  Blaise wiped his hand over his face. “I was thinking of one summer day when Elaine had caught Varian boasting to other boys that he would grow to be the noblest knight in all the land. One who would fight for Arthur and drive back the evil in the kingdom. He was wearing Lancelot’s grail medallion. Enraged by the sight of it and by his words, Elaine tore it off him and washed his mouth out for lying. But not even that soothed her. She sheared the hair from his head with a dagger that left him bleeding, then threw him out into the sty with the pigs and told him to stay there until his father returned that night.”

  His words nauseated her. How could any woman do something like that to a child? “What did Lancelot do?”

  “He had Varian whipped for daring to touch his medallion. When it was over, he cut Varian from the post and kicked him over. He’d heated the medallion, and while Varian lay sobbing on the ground, begging for his father’s mercy, Lancelot branded the medallion’s symbol into Varian’s shoulder. ‘That’s as close to the grail as you will ever come, worm,’ he’d said to him. ‘Let it serve as a reminder to you of what happens when the unworthy touch it. Maybe its goodness will burn the evil out of you.’ Then he cooled the medallion down and gave it to Galahad.”

  A single tear fled down her cheek as her throat closed from the agony of such a thing happening to anyone. Clearing her throat, she wiped the tear hastily away. “Didn’t anyone stop it?”

  “The only one who had the authority to do that was Arthur, and he wasn’t there at the time.”

  “No one else would stand up
for him? My God, he was only a child.”

  He shook his head sadly. “After that, Varian never spoke of being noble or a knight again.”

  “Yet he’s a knight now.”

  “Only because Arthur went against his entire court to make it so. Lancelot was so angry over it that neither he nor Galahad even attended. Instead of the ceremony and celebration that men enjoy when they’re knighted, Varian was actually booed by the knights of the Round Table when he took his vows. The entire Brotherhood of the Table turned their backs to him when he stood up to receive his sword. Disgusted with all of them, Varian never took the sword from Arthur’s hand. He took his dagger from his waist, cut the mantle from his shoulders, and walked out with his head held high.”

  “Why would they do such a thing?”

  “Because they all expected him to turn on them. All of them. Even Arthur, I think.”

  “But that doesn’t explain why Galahad blames him for his mother’s death.”

  Blaise drew a ragged breath before he continued. “Picture this. Varian was twelve, tall for his age and extremely thin. Arthur had chosen him to be one of the royal squires, and he was at a crowded banquet, serving wine to the guests. When he drew near Elaine, she began her usual condemnations of him that had the people around her laughing. As he withdrew, he accidentally spilled a bit on Elaine’s dress sleeve. Incensed, she started berating him on how worthless he was. Varian had suffered her tongue in silence for years, but that night, as people laughed at the insults she dealt him, something inside him snapped. He turned on her with the fired eyes of an Adoni and snarled at her, ‘They may laugh at me openly, Elaine, but you they mock behind your back. Why not, for once, speak the truth of why you hate me so? We all know it. You hate me because I’m nothing but a reminder of the fact that my father doesn’t love you. He never has, and he never will. You had to trick him to marry you because he loves someone else.’

  “Arthur shouted at him to be silent, but Varian refused. Too many years of their cruelty had built up inside him. He scanned everyone there, and curled his lip. ‘All of you have made deals with the Adoni, and you hate me because I know who you are and what deals you’ve made. I may be a bastard whose conception was bartered so that a whore could have one night’s pleasure and a knight-merlin to call husband, but at least my sins are on the table for all to see. I don’t hide them from the person sitting next to me who thinks he’s my friend while I secretly plot his destruction. So laugh at me if you will. Insult me if you want. But in the end, it doesn’t change the fact that I know all of you. All of you and the meanness that you hide from everyone, even yourselves.’