by Ben Zackheim
Simon started running. “Have you heard from Merlin?” he asked, sprinting in circles around her. The wizard hadn’t been seen for a week. After he and Gwen had wrapped up their description of the dark castle for him, he’d run off without a word.
“What, we’re having a conversation now?” Maille chided. “Just focus on getting that heart pumping, will you?”
“Talking will help!”
“Fine. No, I haven’t heard from him. I did hear that the assassin killed herself before she gave up any useful info.”
“Wow, who told you that?”
“None of your business. How’s the heart doing?”
“What can I say? I can’t get it pumping that fast anymore,” he said with a cocky smile. “Must be all that training.”
“Maybe I could get Gwen up here.”
“Maille...”
“She could bat her pretty eyes and giggle like a nymph. Would that do it?”
“Whatever,” Simon said. “Is there really such a thing as nymphs?” It was his best effort to change the subject.
“There’s one in Baltimore.”
“Really? No way!”
“Right. No way. You ready?”
Simon zipped by her. “Do you believe in ghosts?”
Maille Rose closed her eyes and let her head fall forward, frustrated. “No.”
“I’ve been reading a lot of books lately... “ Simon started.
“Yeah, at Tapper. All the girls make a point of watching you turn those pages.” She swooped her hands through the air as if she were dramatically turning the pages of a huge book.
Simon ignored her. Since Merlin had crawled off into some dark corner of the castle, it had been much easier to kick back and enjoy New Camelot. Cracking open a book at the waterfall was at the top of Simon’s list. After every training session he’d run to the library, a fantastic single room, almost as high as the castle’s tallest tower. Russ and Josh even joined him sometimes. Of course, Russ would end up with a book on his face, snoring. While Josh, for his part, would talk to anyone, including himself, about anything.
“I found one book about ghosts,” Simon said, feeling his heart start to pump harder, “It says if you keep your field of vision as wide as possible you may see one.”
“That’s the Haunting book,” Maille moaned.
“Mr. Haunting’s Fully Formed Spectres, Spirits and Sprites,” they said together.
“That guy’s a crackpot, Simon,” Maille said. “He lives outside town in a house made of gryphon feathers.”
Simon could tell he wouldn’t get anywhere talking with Maille about this. He looked forward to seeing Gwen at the golden tree later in the morning. She was a good listener.
“Okay, ready,” Simon said, panting.
“Good. Now come at me with your sword out and hit the ground with it as hard as you can, as close to my feet as you can get. Yell Slipitent! really loud. If you hit me, I kill you.”
Simon didn’t like the sound of that. The floor was solid stone. Hitting it with a metal sword would hurt. A lot. But his desire to learn real magic overruled his own sense of self preservation. He swallowed hard and ran at Maille, weapon raised over his head.
He let the sword down with all his might.
“Slipitent!”
Hitting the stone hurt as much as he thought it would. He reeled back and fell on his butt, wincing. Much to his surprise, the ground underneath Maille glowed a pulsing blue. She slipped and fell onto her knees as if she were perched on solid ice.
“Well done!” she said, grinning. She slid off the patch of slick floor on her butt. “It’d be better if you spoke it more clearly, but that’s a start.”
“It’s hard to yell some weird word when you’re in agony.”
The blue glow was fading. Simon slid his hand over it. It was as slick as oil on glass. “Wow,” he said, impressed with his own handiwork.
“That’s the only sword spell I know. There’s a whole bunch, but you’ll have to ask Hector to teach you.”
The two packed up their stuff and descended the spiral staircase. They stopped at a hidden door that Maille liked to use. It led to a secret passage, called Conspicuous Way, which ran through the entire castle. Conspicuous Way’s windows looked out on the rest of the castle’s halls, so everyone knew it existed but no one seemed to know how to get into it. New Camelot’s citizens were familiar with the sight of Merlin moving swiftly past its windows. But today they saw Maille and Simon. It caused no small amount of elbow nudges and curious stares as the kids zipped by.
Maille showed Simon and Gwen the secret doors because everyone in New Camelot had heard about the dark castle, which was now known as Shadow. Gwen and Simon were bombarded with questions, concerns and conspiracy theories when they stepped out in public. So Maille thought it best that they find private ways to get around. Until Merlin could provide some answers.
Simon thought he was seeing things when Gawain turned a corner and appeared in front of them, walking from the other direction. He took long strides as if he were in a hurry to get somewhere. Gawain, for his part, did a magnificent job of pretending Maille and Simon didn’t exist. The two of them stopped in their tracks and watched him go by.
“Hello to you, too, Gawain!” Maille hollered after him. But she only got the rushed click-clack of footsteps as a response.
“Is his real name Gawain?” Simon asked, pulling a miffed Maille along with him. “Or do people just call him that because Gawain is his ancestor?”
“Oh, he’s Gawain, all right,” she grumbled, catching up with Simon. “His family is serious about their heritage. They pass everything down from one generation to the next.”
“Including grudges, I guess.”
“So you know about the history of Gawain and Lancelot?”
“Not really. I just know that they had some kind of problem with each other.”
“You could call it that. They had been best friends. But when King Arthur found out about Lancelot and Queen Guinevere’s love affair, he ordered Lancelot captured. Lancelot escaped, but not before he killed a couple of Gawain’s brothers.”
“Just like that? Like, in cold blood?”
“Lancelot? Pssht. No way. Lancelot was all about chivalry. He’d never start a fight. He took them down when they tried to nab him. So Gawain spent the rest of his days trying to track down his ex-friend.”
“Did he find him?” Simon asked. Maille shrugged. “I wonder how Gawain knows about this passage.”
“His family has stuck by Merlin for hundreds of years. If I had to name actual friends of Merlin, it’d probably be them. I bet Gawain has his run of this place.”
She pushed through a small set of doors and they emerged in a dark storage room. A couple of steps later and they were outside, on the edge of the training grounds. Maille put her hands on her hips and took a deep breath of fresh air. She raised her face to the sky and closed her eyes to soak in the sun. Simon noticed how pretty her smile was.
Suddenly, she yelled at the top of her voice, “ALL RIGHT! KEEP YOUR BEARD ON!”
“Merlin?”
“I hate it when he talks in my head. But I really hate it when he does it with his 3267 year old attitude. Bye, Simon.”
“You think something is up?”
“What do you think? Have fun with Gwen.”
“Thanks. Wait. How did you know I was meeting...”
“You brushed your hair this morning,” she said, the smile reappearing, if only for a second.
He watched her walk off, half in awe of how smart she was, half wanting to wring her neck.
SIMON MADE A point of walking past the magic door to his uncle’s place. He found time to do this every day, knowing full well that on the other side of the door his lone relation had a lot of answers. Simon was convinced that Victor knew more about his parents’ death than he’d let on. He also believed that Victor knew he, Simon, was in New Camelot, packed to the teeth with probing questions. But Simon couldn’t just rush in
to danger without knowing what he was getting into. His uncle could be dangerous.
So Simon picked up what information he could from his quick walk-bys.
“Heya Simon,” Caradoc grunted from behind him.
“Hi Caradoc,” Simon said. He and the troll got along well now. They’d even gone searching for other secret passages in the castle with Maille the week before. “You okay?”
“Yeah,” the troll grumbled, though it was clear he was about to explain why he actually was not okay at all. “Just those ugly towers, y’know?”
“The wood things? What about them?”
“Well, that’s why Merlin had me uprootin’ trees! To build ‘em!”
“What are they for?”
“Who knows? He’s probably makin’ me help him build some kinda evil weapon that’ll kill baby ducks, knowin’ my luck. Hey, you heard anythin’ about Red?” Caradoc liked to ask about Red once in awhile to make sure things were still okay with Simon.
“No. I don’t even know where to start looking without Merlin’s help.”
“Yeah, he has that way about him. Hard to get up in the mornin’ without checkin’ in with the old man.”
It dawned on Caradoc that they were strolling up a hill toward Gwen, who sat on the grass reading a book. The troll stopped.
“Ach. See you have, uh, plans. Okay, well, good! Yes...”
“See you around, Caradoc,” Simon said, smiling.
“Absolutely! Couldn’t have said it better meself...” Caradoc backed down the hill and almost stepped on an old lady. He apologized to her profusely as Simon sat down next to Gwen.
She knew he was there but she didn’t look up.
“Hello?” he said. No response. “Uh-oh, what did I do?”
“Nothing,” she muttered.
“Is Hut being a jerk again?”
“You could say that.”
“What did he do now?”
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
Simon let her stew for awhile. He watched people walk by, hoping they wouldn’t rush him with more questions about that stupid castle.
“Do you have a spell that can hide us? I think people are starting to notice us here.”
“Why yes I do,” Gwen said, a fake smile on her face. “Would you like partial invisibility? Or perhaps you’d like to look like a zebra?”
“Uh. The partial invisible one sounds less painful.”
“Oh! Sorry! Hut says I can’t do magic outside class!” Her voice was getting higher and louder. Passers-by were definitely noticing them now. “Did he allow former accomplices to practice outside class? WHY YES HE DID!”
“Shh. Okay, okay. Bad Hut. Very bad Hut. Just keep it down, please?”
Gwen noticed the attention they were getting and put her head between her knees, as if she were trying to make the world go away. “Sorry, Simon. I don’t think he trusts me is all. It gets tiresome. Especially when he expects me to make any progress. How can I make progress between one day and the next if I can’t practice?”
“Yeah, that’s not fair,” he said. She raised her head up and peeked to see if he was being serious, or teasing. He was dead serious. He was living with the same pressures she was, and in that moment, Gwen clearly remembered as much. She laid her temple on her knees and smiled at him.
He looked away before his heart exploded.
“What’s going on over there?” Gwen asked. Simon followed her gaze. A crowd was forming in the town center. The streets were shoulder to shoulder with people, all walking in one direction.
“I don’t know. Come on.” Simon guessed they were all headed to the town square. He knew an alternate path. He and Gwen ran from the park and sidled through an alley that led to a small road. After dodging several angry cats, they emerged in the square to see the entire kingdom gathered together. And in the middle of them all, towering over the crowd as usual, was Merlin.
Simon wove through people with Gwen doing her best to keep up.
New Camelot’s soldiers, young and old, were out in force. They numbered in the hundreds. Their armored shapes ran from the town square all the way up the hill to the main castle.
Merlin didn’t even need to use magic to be heard. When he raised his arms the crowd went as silent as a windless night.
“As you may have heard from a bird here or a troll there, I will be heading to the dark castle momentarily. While I find it comforting to see all of you here, it shouldn’t become a habit every time I take a walk over the hill.” Merlin’s special version of charm brought out polite chuckling. “If there’s something to fear you’ll know soon enough. If there’s not, well, I’ll get around to telling you what I find someday, after I return.”
Everyone gathered, including Simon, believed that whoever lived in Shadow didn’t like them. Why else would they have kept their presence secret for who knew how many years? The logical conclusion was that this invisible neighbor was the threat Merlin had sensed. But how could something the size of a castle slip by the wizard?
Simon couldn’t help but wonder if the assassin had been right when she said Merlin was losing his touch. Was it possible that he fooled people with his humongous height and simple tricks? Simon’s mom used to say that people were gullible, especially when they wanted to believe something. Merlin was their best defense, no doubt. But it was possible he had used that perception to his advantage over the eons.
And now, washed out or not, it was time for him to deliver.
Citizens stepped aside to let the wizard pass as he descended from his perch. Merlin spotted Simon in the crowd and gestured with his staff for him to tag along.
“I believe your friend Red is a descendant of Mordred,” Merlin mumbled to Simon, as they moved through the parting throngs, all of whom chattered away with updated theories.
Simon stopped in his tracks as what Merlin had said sunk in.
He remembered Mordred from the tales his father had always told him. Mordred was the mortal enemy of Arthur. It was a bloody battle between the two of them that ended in both their deaths.
Merlin glanced over his shoulder. “Yes, you brought our worst enemy into our midst. Keep up the good work.”
“I wasn’t the one who kidnapped him!” Simon said, catching up again.
“Yes, yes, which comes first, the chicken or the egg, and all that. I would not have taken him into custody if you’d never…” Merlin collected himself. People stared. “Listen to me,” he said quietly. “Do not cross the walls of New Camelot. Do not look for your friend. Do not follow me.”
“I don’t even like you,” Simon said. “Why would I follow you?”
“Maybe you can irritate the enemy to death with questions. You’re doing an excellent job on me. Do as I say! Now smile and wave goodbye like you’ll miss me.”
With that, Merlin picked up the pace and left Simon to wave.
But he forgot to smile.
31
That afternoon, as Simon walked to the training field, he wondered if anyone else felt as vulnerable as he did with the old man gone.
Was Red really Mordred’s descendant? And what did it mean if he was? It could definitely mean that Red was an enemy of New Camelot. Mordred, after all, was the original King Arthur’s killer. He was a traitor to Camelot. Sure, the details of his betrayal changed from story to story. Some tales claimed he was the son of a powerful witch, the beautiful and dangerous Morgan le Fay, who constantly fought with Arthur. Other tales claimed he was King Arthur’s son.
Whatever the truth, sadness haunted Simon more than anything else. Red was the only guy who’d dared hang out with him when he’d first arrived in Scotland. Red was the friend who had guided him away from danger after Professor Tillman was killed.
Josh and Russ noticed Simon’s dark mood and insisted that they train with him. In the vestibule just off the training grounds they strapped on their shoulder armor and fastened their scabbards around their waists. Simon had become skilled at armoring up in the last week. He beat hi
s friends by a solid ten seconds.
“Sure is creepy to think that castle’s been there all along, watching us.” Josh said, swinging his sword a few times to check the weight. It made a low whistling sound that Simon had become accustomed to since he started training. It comforted him in a way he didn’t understand. It sounded familiar.
“I was thinking about that,” Russ said, tying up his boots. “Could be that they didn’t see us either.”
Simon shrugged. “I guess it’s possible. I just don’t get why Merlin went alone. Seems kind of stupid to me.”
“Yeah, he does stuff like that all the time.” Josh shook his head. “He also went after Trejure by himself. Almost didn’t survive.”
“Who’s Trejure?” Simon asked.
“The biggest dragon ever,” Josh replied. “He’s the size of a castle. A real monster. He loves gold. He came out of hiding a couple years ago and went after some underground vault in Glasgow. The police said it was an earthquake. Split the earth open and the gold dropped into endless pits.”
“Yeah, so Merlin went after him,” Russ said.
“Probably to pocket the gold too,” Josh mumbled.
“Sure, Merlin likes gold almost as much as Trejure.”
“So what happened?” Simon asked. As much as he liked Russ and Josh, he got frustrated with them sometimes. They both hated lulls in a conversation, even for a second, so the two of them together could be hard to follow with their chattering.
“He battled the dragon in its lair,” Russ continued. “We could hear and feel the battle rage for a few days.”
“Which doesn’t mean it was nearby,” Josh inserted.
“Nah, dragons make a big ruckus,” Russ said. Sometimes you might think you hear thunder in the distance, but it could be a dragon with a toothache. So, finally, after like four days, the booms stopped and the ground was still. A few hours later Merlin comes stumbling back here. He didn’t actually make it all the way. The scouts saw him on the top of Mount Tripper over there. He reached the top, wandered about a little, and fell down the edge.”
“He must have stumbled a few hundred feet before Maille stopped him with a spell,” Josh said. “He was covered in burns.”
