Once & Future

by Cori McCarthy

  Copyright

  The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Copyright © 2019 by Amy Rose Capetta and Cori McCarthy

  Foreword © 2019 by James Patterson

  Hachette Book Group supports the right to free expression and the value of copyright. The purpose of copyright is to encourage writers and artists to produce the creative works that enrich our culture.

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  JIMMY Patterson Books / Little, Brown and Company

  Hachette Book Group

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  First ebook edition: March 2019

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  ISBN 978-0-316-44928-1

  E3-20190205-JV-NF-ORI

  Contents

  COVER

  TITLE PAGE

  COPYRIGHT

  DEDICATION

  EPIGRAPH

  LOST & FOUND

  AGAIN & AGAIN

  FRIENDS & ENEMIES

  MEAD & CONSEQUENCES

  WINNERS & LOSERS

  HEARTS & ACHES

  WIVES & ADMINISTRATORS

  GOODS & BADS

  MEMORY & DEATH

  PRISON & BREAK

  LOVE & LOSS

  IMPOSSIBLE & UNACCEPTABLE

  HOME & DRAGONS

  CASTLE & PAWN

  PAGEANTRY & REALITY

  GRAVITY & GRUDGES

  CHECK & MATE

  CAVE & SPARK

  COST & CROWNS

  FIRE & SPACE

  CIRCLES & CURSES

  ONCE & FUTURE

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  ABOUT THE AUTHORS

  JIMMY PATTERSON BOOKS FOR YOUNG ADULT READERS

  NEWSLETTERS

  For SAGA, with hope for a better future

  “The destiny of Man is to unite, not to divide.

  If you keep on dividing you end up as a collection of monkeys

  throwing nuts at each other out of separate trees.”

  —T. H. White, The Once and Future King

  Love. Death. Betrayal. Evil. Magic.

  The story of King Arthur has it all. That’s why Le Morte d’Arthur by Sir Thomas Malory could be called the Western world’s first bestseller. And when I read Once & Future, a bold, unexpected retelling of King Arthur as an immigrant teenage girl, I knew it had all the same thrilling elements that would make the legend—first told sixteen hundred years ago—a modern favorite once again.

  Amy Rose Capetta and Cori McCarthy have written an Arthur for the twenty-first century: a female king on a quest to overthrow a tyrannical corporate government. Ari is a girl who learns to live boldly and to fight fiercely for the right to be who she is—and to love who she loves. She’s the hero we all need.

  —James Patterson

  Ari was hiding out in the Middle Ages.

  The rubber knight’s costume she wore squeaked with each movement and smelled like her brother—before he’d embraced deodorant.

  “This is a weird secret spot, Kay,” Ari said through the slits of the visor on the knight’s helmet. She stiffly turned to take in the glass cases bursting with period drama: mannequins in knight regalia, sweating horses, and piercing swords. Off to the side, hook-nosed and formidable, was a lone figure labeled MERLIN.

  “It’s the best Old Earth myth,” Kay muttered, going over the grocery list on his watch. “Don’t you remember our classes on Lionel? Arthur was the one true king who saved his people from the Dark Ages. He gave a voice to all, righted the wrongs… made a round table.”

  “Round?”

  “So that no single person would be at the head. An equal voice for all.”

  “An equal voice for all, plus he’s the one true king? Sounds like delicious hypocrisy.”

  Kay blew out an annoyed breath. “No one comes in here, Ari. It is a good secret spot.”

  Ari let him have that one, reminding herself that while this place felt like a harmless museum in a forgotten wing of a giant floating mall, it was also ground zero for the Mercer Company. The starship Heritage was the galactic corporation’s flagship, teeming with associates who would arrest her as soon as sell her a souvenir. She teetered back around in the stiff suit to face her brother. “How did you ever train in this thing at knight camp without peripheral vision?”

  “Knights don’t need peripheral vision. They need chivalry.”

  Ari snorted so hard her visor flew up.

  Kay smacked it back down. “And the ability to realize when they should not draw attention to themselves.”

  “Really? That plaque over there says chivalry gave birth to toxic masculinity, which caused Old Earth a few millennia of bullshit patriarchy.”

  “Are you seriously picking fights right now?” Kay asked. “You’ve got to lie low. I’ve got to get supplies. Don’t make me wish I left you on Error.”

  “You couldn’t. Mercer is doing random spot checks in the parking docks.”

  “I could have left you stuffed in a trunk.”

  “The patrols would look there.”

  Her big brother picked up her rubber-gloved hand and slapped a coin in it. “Go. Over there. Let me think, will you?” He pointed to a telescope by the nearest window. Ari squeak-walked toward it. She dropped the coin in the slot and pushed up the visor enough to peer out at the main attraction on Heritage, Mercer’s most popular shopping and tourist destination: the view.

  Ari squinted through the telescope. Up close, Old Earth was downright puny. Only a few thousand miles from the planet, and she could not figure out what was so sacred. She zoomed in, and the blue-and-white marble revealed green-brown clumps. When Kay stomped over on his magboots, she asked, “Is that all the land? Can’t be.”

  “There were ice caps in its heyday,” Kay said. “Less water, more land.”

  “Cradle of civilization, my ass.”

  “Hey.” Her brother grinned at her, a maniacal, desperate, Oh, my gods, just listen to me look. “Keep your voice down, okay? That planet means a lot to most people.”

  Ari glanced at the crowds just outside of the museum wing, taking in Old Earth from the observation deck. The space rats were easy enough to rub elbows with, even if they were overemotional at the sight of the retired planet. They were like Kay, born on ships and tailored in patchwork flight suits. The other humans, the crisp, smooth, elite Mercer Company patrons, were more unnerving.

  And Ari? She didn’t belong to either camp.

  Kay eyed a pair of mall cops in stark white Mercer uniforms as they made their rounds.

  “Help me finish the list. We need to get out of here.” He pushed his silvery-gray hair from his scalp, and it arced damply over his brow. Her brother was doing what he always did under pressure: thinking with his stomach. “Did you like those protein preserves? The garlicky ones?”

  “They made your breath stink up the entire ship for days.” />
  “So, three cases?”

  Ari side-eyed him, and he added, “Plus breath mints. And for the cake, chocolate this year?”

  “I don’t need a cake, Kay.”

  “Ten years is a big deal. I vote chocolate. I eat most of it, anyway.” Kay hadn’t even glanced out the window; Old Earth was old hat to Ari’s adoptive brother. He’d been on board Heritage a bunch of times as a kid and claimed to be over the view. Still, whenever their provisions ran low, Kay set course for this exact starship no matter how far away they were.

  “How many times did you come here with our parents?”

  “Salt. Wounds,” he gruffed, confirming Ari’s theory that this place reminded him of better times, before his moms had taken in Ari and they’d all had to start dodging Mercer.

  Ari turned her telescope to the motley, cratered moon. Unlike Old Earth, it had been overrun by domed colonies named after ancient vehicular gods. Each one featured its name and mascot in great, glowing letters. Even from this distance, a neon ram’s head charged through a wall over and over, the letters DODGE blinking.

  “Hey, we should stop there on our way out,” she said, pointing to the overrun moon with its billboards more brilliant than stars. Live shows. Dance halls. Oxygen bars. Something called an Elvis. “When’s the last time we went dancing, Kay?”

  Kay snapped his fingers in front of the telescope, and for a second the automatic focus zoomed out dizzily and gave her a view of the powder granules of orange cheese from his favorite tortilla chips.

  Ari lifted her face, watching a drop of sweat travel down Kay’s cheek to his scruffy chin.

  “Stop sweating. They’ll think you’re sick. Or hiding a secret Ketchan in the medieval times section.”

  “Hilarious, Ari. Truly.” Kay wiped his face with his forearm. “Tell me, are you able to stop your body from sweating on command?”

  Ari squinted. “I haven’t tried. Maybe.”

  “Look, don’t move from this spot while I pick up our supplies. Don’t talk to a soul, and if you must? Lie, Ari. I want you speaking eloquent, exquisite, capitalistic lies. Repeat after me: ‘Mercer is my king, my God, my salvation. I love to shop ’til I drop.’”

  Ari’s lips pruned; she’d make herself sick uttering such nonsense. “I’ll stay put.”

  He put his hands on her shoulders. Worry folded his adorably brutish forehead into lines. “If something goes weird, run. Take off in Error. Don’t wait. Promise?”

  “I got it, Kay,” she said, slipping past promises she’d never keep. Ari clapped Kay’s shoulder, before he headed out of the museum exhibit and down the stairs that led to the heart of the mall. Ari moved to the balcony to watch him go, taking in a bird’s-eye view of bleached consumerism. The ceramic tiled walls and floor were white. So were the identical Mercer storefronts: the symbols for grocery, pharmacy, clothes, and spaceship hardware among the most visible.

  Worst of all, even the light pouring from the lofted ceiling was blinding and pale, the kind she couldn’t look straight into without wincing—which was exactly what Mercer wanted.

  “Don’t look at us looking at you,” Ari murmured, her nerves prickling. She couldn’t blame Kay for sweating in this place. The Mercer Company didn’t mess around. Ten years ago, the Mercer Company placed a barrier around planet Ketch, sealing everyone in—their response to the Ketchans, who had begun speaking out against the company’s monopolistic tyranny. Not even communications could pass through. The Mercer Company proclaimed that the Ketchans had become hostile, that they were bad for the economy and therefore must be walled off. Mercer had become more than just a greedy corporation with a monopoly on goods and services for the entire galaxy—they were the galaxy. They controlled everything from people’s food to healthcare to the freaking government.

  Around the same time that Ketch got walled off, Kay’s moms found seven-year-old Ari abandoned, starved, afloat in a piece of space trash. They’d taken her in, loved her. They’d even tried to find a way to get her through the barrier and back home to Ketch—and gotten arrested in the process. That was three years ago, when Ari was fourteen, and there hadn’t been any word since. They could have died in a Mercer prison or on a factory planet. Kay said not knowing was the easiest part; that was his favorite lie.

  “Welcome to Heritage Mall.”

  Ari managed not to shout. The words came from the image of the Mercer Company’s CEO, known only as the Administrator, whose bust was now projected above her watch screen.

  “We’re so glad you could join us today on Heritage. All pilgrimages to Old Earth are rewarded with a twenty percent discount on souvenirs and government documents.” The man’s blank eyes and digitally smooth skin hinted at intrigue, explicit knowledge, and caustic mischief. Ari wondered if he looked that way to everyone or just her. “Whether you’re in the market for a keepsake pebble from terra firma or a quickie divorce, the Mercer Company is at your service.”

  The Administrator’s face disappeared. Ari swore inside her smelly rubber knight’s suit and silenced her watch. “It’s just a pop-up ad,” she murmured to herself. “He’s not actually on this starship. It’s just an ad.…”

  “Look, my sweets! A knight!” An elderly couple swept into the Middle Ages display, as swift as a pair of roaches. They were on top of her in a moment, groping her suit, all up in her personal space.

  “Hey!” she shouted. “No touching!”

  Unfazed, the old man with dyed dark hair held up his watch. “Can I take your picture with my wife? We honeymooned on Lionel more than fifty solar cycles ago, back when the planet was much more Mercer friendly, you understand.”

  The sprightly old lady posed on Ari’s arm, and all of a sudden Ari was seeing spots from a brilliant bang of light.

  “What the—”

  “Spotlight flash. Erases all shadows and lines digitally before the picture is even taken.” The woman chuckled. “It is a bit bright.”

  “Take mine now!” the elderly man yelled, handing off the watch to his wife, gripping Ari and repeating the blinding-by-luminescence. “Now let’s do one with the sword!”

  Ari snuck a fist inside her helmet to rub her stinging irises while he pulled her toward the only display in the museum that wasn’t roped off. A golden, bejeweled sword stuck out of a stone in the center of the fake-cobble courtyard. Its handle was worn with smudges and dirty fingerprints. Gross. How many people had yanked on it since the last time it had been cleaned?

  “Give it a tug! I’ll stand by and act surprised, like, ‘Oh, heavens, we’ve got ourselves a new King Arthur!’” he shouted.

  Ari sighed and gripped the handle. At least the galaxy-worth of germs was only getting on Kay’s old rubber armor. When the flash shattered the air once again, she gave the sword a heartless tug. It didn’t budge. “Sorry, pal. Looks like we’re stuck in the dark ages.”

  He waved her words away like they were annoying liberal chatter and beckoned for his wife to come over. “Now you take our picture,” he ordered.

  Ari held out her hand for their seriously large watch while they got in position. Her eyes caught the platinum diamond on the back that denoted elite Mercer status, the shining proof that this piece of tech had access to data that most people’s did not. How easy would it be to type a few words and find out what kept both Kay and her awake in the endless night of deep space?

  Ari glanced at the couple. They were discussing who should stand where, dissolving into a full-on argument. “Can I check out the photos you’ve taken?”

  “Sure, hon,” the woman said. She elbowed her husband out of the way in order to give the sword her own series of entitled tugs.

  Ari opened up the universe-wide web and typed in the search bar. She didn’t think about what kind of alarms might fly up when she entered her adoptive mothers’ names; she didn’t care. She would give anything to hand Kay some answers, a bandage for their wounds. Besides, what were the odds that Mercer was watching this particular platinum account at this exact moment?
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  She tapped ENTER, and the Mercer Company emblem spun lazily before blinking wide open with information on her parents’ arrests. It listed their names, dates of birth, planet or spaceship of birth, and their joint status: Incarcerated. Deceased: Blank.

  “They’re still alive,” Ari breathed, hardly believing it. She clicked on LOCATION, but a flaring red light darkened the screen. Ari dropped the watch, spun on her long legs, and ran from the blinking warning:

  REMAIN STATIONARY.

  MERCER ASSOCIATES ARE COMING TO ASSIST YOU.

  Ari ripped off the knight costume and slid into the command chair on Error. She put her feet flat to the metal grating of the floor and engaged the ankle lock on her magboots. Hauling the crisscrossing safety belt across her chest, she pulled it more taut than usual. Only loose enough to breathe, and barely that.

  Kay appeared in a flash of sweaty fear, his watch still buzzing from the alarm Ari had sent. He locked in, lording over the control panel. His frenetically moving fingers ticked against Ari’s anxiety, a tally running ever higher against them.

  If this were a normal takeoff, Kay would have wandered into the cockpit five minutes after their preset hour, still in his boxers and clutching a mildly poisonous energy drink. This was entirely too reminiscent of the last time they’d run from Mercer—after their parents’ arrest.

  Kay pressed the anchor release once, twice, before hammering it with his fist. An echoing bang announced that their tiny lifeboat of a ship had disengaged from the mall parking dock. He wasted no time in gearing up the thrusters, pushing toward the bumper-to-bumper lane of compact spaceships waiting to pass through the parking booth.

  “Don’t suppose you paid for parking at the kiosk on your way out,” Ari said with a badly timed chuckle.

  Kay groaned and hit the accelerator. They shot over the lane of ships, over the security bar at the parking booth. The alarms blazed, and he hit max throttle. Ari and Kay could have been mirror images of each other, leaning forward, staring at the small mouth of an exit, willing it to stay open long enough to blast through. They were both holding their breath—until they burst out of the parking area and into the black of space.