by James Riley
Damian looked down at the flooring holding him in place and sighed. “Really? I didn’t come here to fight any of you, mostly because I’d have to be way too careful not to permanently injure you. Why would you want to do this?”
“Sounds like someone’s full of talk,” Rachel said with a smile, then threw Fort a quick, terrified look. “Get us out of here, now!” she whispered too softly for Damian to hear.
Wait, she’d been stalling? So she did actually get how out of their league Damian was. Fort nodded and quickly opened a teleportation circle directly beneath them, to the London airport instead of Stonehenge, just so he didn’t give them away.
All four of them dropped through, landing on the runway. But before they could move, a second portal opened beneath them, and they landed back on the floor of Big Ben, right in front of Damian.
“Did you enjoy your trip?” Damian said, then casually brushed the flooring off his legs like he might a bug.
“Damian, you’re right—we don’t want to fight you,” Jia said, and Fort nodded vigorously in agreement. “But we can’t tell you where the book of Spirit magic is!”
“Oh, I took that from your heads the moment I got here,” Damian said. “Stonehenge, huh? In King Arthur’s tomb? If I hadn’t seen it in your minds, I’d have called you all liars.”
Fort gasped. He knew? That changed everything then. They couldn’t run, because Damian could just go to Stonehenge and take the book. And if they tried to get it first, he’d be able to stop them with no trouble at all.
That meant they’d have to stop him here, now. But how? There was no way they could beat him, not with magic. Maybe one of Ellora’s Time spells might freeze him or send him forward a few minutes, but for all Fort knew, Damian would be able to brush those off as well. The boy was just way too powerful.
“King Arthur is not only real, but he’s someone who wouldn’t back down, even if the odds were totally against him,” Rachel said, throwing a look at Fort and Jia. She wasn’t exactly being subtle about her message, but Fort still didn’t know what to do. He could try teleporting the boy away, but Damian could just bring himself right back. He knew a lot more Summoning magic than Fort did, after all.
Damian, though, made a disgusted face at Rachel’s comment. “I always thought those stories were so dumb.”
“What?” Rachel shouted. She stared at him in anger, probably half real, half to just distract Damian from Jia, who was standing behind Rachel, her hands glowing blue. “You take that blasphemy back!”
“A bunch of good-guy knights going off on quests? So boring,” Damian said. “And totally wrong, too. They weren’t good people at all. Did you hear the story about how Merlin told Arthur he was going to lose his throne to a boy born on May Day, so Arthur rounded up all the boys born that day and sent them out on a boat? He tried to drown them all, just to save himself. Only the boys all survived, and probably wanted to take him down after that. Talk about your self-fulfilling prophecies.”
“That’s not true,” Rachel said, her voice low and threatening.
“It actually was,” Ellora whispered, but at a look from Rachel, she winced and went quiet.
“Never trust a hero,” Damian told her. “They’re all hiding something.” He shrugged. “Anyway, this has been fun and all, but I really have to go find the book of Spirit magic, and then use that to get the book of Time magic.”
“You’re not going anywhere!” Rachel shouted, and launched a series of fireballs at him. As they drew closer, Damian blew out at the fireballs, snuffing them like candles.
“You could have all just helped me, you know,” he said, sounding irritated about it. “But I get it. None of my classmates ever trusted me, right, Jia?” He smiled mockingly at her. “So this is nothing new. At least now you can pretend it’s because I’m a dragon.”
“It’s because you’re a jerk!” Rachel shouted, and shot lightning at him.
This time, he made circles with one hand, and the bolt of lightning curled into a ball in the air above him. “You’re just wasting your time—”
Out of nowhere, a blue light covered him, and he released the lightning bolt in surprise, letting it sizzle out over the city of London beyond the clock tower. His movements slowed as he yawned widely and started to wobble. He quickly raised a hand, sending the blue light exploding in every direction. Instantly, he seemed wide awake again.
“Really, Jia?” he said. “A Sleep spell? That’s just embarrassing, and this is getting annoying. So I’m going to go before I lose my temper and accidentally hurt one of you.” He raised a hand, and it began to glow red with Destruction magic. “That said, if you follow me to Stonehenge, then I can’t be held responsible for what happens. I’m not letting you or anyone stop me from my mission.”
“And what’s that?” Fort asked, trying to stall him any way he could. Maybe Ellora could try to freeze him, or Jia could paralyze him instead of putting him to sleep? “What is your mission exactly? Because it seems like the more magic you learn, the easier a time the Old Ones will have finding you.”
“Good,” Damian said. “Considering they turned all the other dragons into those monsters, I want them to find me. By the time they do, I should have all six books of magic and will have the power to destroy them. Now, I’m sorry, but I really can’t waste any more time with you humans. Hopefully, we won’t see each other again, but if we do, feel free to thank me for saving the world from the Old Ones.”
With that, he saluted them, then disappeared in a blink of green light.
- NINETEEN -
NO!” JIA SHOUTED, LOOKING ABSOLUTELY distraught. “Fort, take us there now. We have to stop him!”
“I have no idea how we’ll do that, but she’s right,” Rachel said, giving Fort a worried look. “We have to try.”
He sighed. Rachel was right. What choice did they have, even if they couldn’t beat Damian? They couldn’t just let him get the book, not with the future they’d seen.
“Everyone get ready,” Fort said, and pictured Stonehenge in his mind. Maybe they could distract him somehow, get the book first, and destroy it—
“Wait, Forsythe!” Ellora shouted, grabbing his shoulder and pulling him around to face her. “Don’t open that portal yet. We’re not going to Stonehenge.”
“What?” Fort said, completely confused now. “But Damian’s there, and he’ll get the book!”
“We can’t just sit here; we have to stop him!” Jia shouted. “I thought that was the whole reason you brought us here!”
“It was, but here’s the thing: The book isn’t actually at Stonehenge,” Ellora said, blushing again. “I, um, might have told you all that so he’d get the wrong information from you. Arthur Pendragon’s tomb is actually somewhere else completely.”
They all stared at her in shock. “You … lied?” Rachel said, then slowly smiled. “Wow, Time Girl. Normally I hate that, but right now, I’m pretty impressed.”
“Well, it’s a bit easier when you can see things coming,” Ellora said. “And I knew Damian would find us with his Mind magic. So at least I bought us some time. Not much, but a little.”
“Okay, that’s great, but where is it?” Jia asked, shifting from foot to foot anxiously.
Ellora turned to Fort. “Remember the photo I gave you? Take us there.”
The photo? Right, the one she’d folded up. He pulled it from his pocket and unfolded it, frowning.
This definitely wasn’t Stonehenge. Instead, the photo showed a large hill with tiers on it, like a wedding cake almost, and a tower at the top.
“I have no idea where this is,” he said to her, and she rolled her eyes.
“Just take us there,” Ellora said. “The less we call it by its name, the harder a time Damian will have finding it.”
That was fair. Fort concentrated on the photo and opened a portal to the top of the hill, right next to the tower, and they all stepped through. He quickly closed it behind them, then turned to look around.
Just lik
e in the picture, the grassy hill had strange tiers on it, covered in grass as if the hill had been formed that way. But that couldn’t be possible; it had to have been cut by humans. Other than the light being much darker below the dome, the only other big difference between the hill in the picture and here in the present was how many construction machines were surrounding it, everything from bulldozers to excavators.
Someone was planning on digging into the hill. But from what Fort could see, nothing had actually been done yet. All the construction people below were staring at the hill in confusion, frozen in that state by the dome.
“Hey, I know where we are!” Rachel said, looking around. “This is Glastonbury Tor! I knew this was where King Arthur was buried! It all made sense, what with that abbey nearby finding a gravestone—”
Ellora sighed loudly. “What did I say about not calling it by its name? Damian will be looking for us soon, and he’ll find us faster if he can read the name in your mind!”
Rachel made a face. “Okay, right. Let’s call it … Strawberry Fields. Damian for sure has never listened to the Beatles.”
Fort just stared at her, having no idea what was going on. So the hill was called Glastonbury Tor? “What abbey? And what’s a tor?”
“Don’t use the name!” Ellora shouted.
“A tor is just an old way of saying a hill,” Rachel said, then noticed the workers below. “What’s going on down there? Are they digging for the book?”
Ellora shook her head. “Not exactly. They’re with the government. Fortunately, since they’re frozen in time, we don’t have to worry about that now.” She stared at them for another moment, then shuddered and pointed at the tower. “Let’s get under cover for now and talk about what’s next.”
The others all started walking toward the ruined tower, and Fort moved to follow, having had far too few of his questions answered. But as he did, the scene around him disappeared, and this time, he found himself standing over a large wooden table in the middle of what looked like an enormous but cozy cabin, lit by a fireplace with a bubbling black pot hanging over it. The walls were all made of wooden logs, each one unshaped by human hands, yet where there should have been cracks or holes, there were none.
Even stranger, sitting at the table was Cyrus, holding his hand out as a teacup floated in midair toward him from a steaming kettle near the fire.
This couldn’t be the same cottage Cyrus had shown him before. It looked easily five to six times bigger in just this room than the entire exterior had been.
“Cyrus?” Fort said in surprise. “You brought me back?”
But Cyrus didn’t look up. Instead, he seemed to be concentrating on a large book that looked like an instruction manual of some kind. “I don’t get it,” he said out loud. “There’s not even any electricity going to him. How can he still be here?”
“Cyrus?” Fort said again, reaching out to tap the boy on the shoulder, only for his finger to pass right through him. Of course it did, this was just a future vision. “What’s going on here—”
Before he could finish his sentence, a strange force yanked him bodily away from the table, straight into a nearby door. Fort raised his hands to protect himself, but again, he passed through it without a scratch and found himself in a dimly lit study, filled with bookshelves that held some of the strangest things Fort had ever seen.
Books were everywhere, of course, but so were bottles of bubbling liquids labeled in a language Fort didn’t recognize, some sitting next to the skull of an animal that couldn’t be natural in any way, not with that many bony spikes sticking out of it. A small box sparked every so often with a jolt of electricity, while a mirror on the wall startled Fort as an older version of himself looked back. The mirror Fort had a brown beard and looked tired but waved at the real Fort in an almost friendly way, and Fort couldn’t help but wave back.
A large desk took up most of the room, and seated there was an old man in a tattered brown robe, his long, white beard thrown back over his shoulder, and his hair wispy on top of his head. As Fort turned to him, the man spun around in his seat and smiled at Fort widely.
“It’s about time,” he said. “Nice to see you again, boy.” He frowned. “Wait, you wouldn’t remember that. Forget I said anything. Uh, nice to meet you, I meant!”
“Um, what?” Fort said, completely confused. “Sorry, who are you?”
“You haven’t figured it out?” the old man said with a wink.
“Who are you talking to?” Cyrus shouted from the other room. “You better not have brought anyone here, old man!”
The old man rolled his eyes. “Mind your own business, you ignorant lump!” He turned back to Fort. “That boy has so much to learn. So much potential he’s going to waste. But that doesn’t matter. I brought you here so we could speak privately, without all the judgment.” He nodded at the door, meaning Cyrus.
“But … why?” Fort said. “Who are you? I don’t understand any of this.”
The old man shrugged. “Who I am isn’t important, and you’ll find out soon enough anyway. For now, I brought you here to try to guide you, Forsythe, as well as Rachel and Jia, as I promised. It won’t work, but I did give my word.”
Fort felt a chill go through his insubstantial body. Jia and Rachel? How did the man know about them? Cyrus could have told him, yes, but considering how Cyrus seemed to feel about the man, that didn’t seem too likely.
“But … how—”
“My advice is this,” the old man said, leaning in with a much more serious expression, his voice now low and eerie. “Beware the queen of Avalon. Every Arthur I ever knew fell victim to her, and I don’t wish it to happen again. Rachel must not take the sword. Jia must not bargain with the queen.” With this, the old man rose from his chair and towered over Fort. “And under no circumstances should you accept any deal to save your father!”
- TWENTY -
WHAT? HIS FATHER WAS IN danger? Fort felt dizziness begin to wash over him, and he reached out to the nearby wall to catch himself, only for his hand to pass through it.
Fortunately, he was able to regain his footing before falling over and turned back to the old man in shock.
“What do you mean? What’s wrong with my father?” Fort asked quietly, the most important of the thousands of questions now cycling through his head. He had no idea what Avalon was or why he couldn’t trust its queen, let alone what sword Rachel shouldn’t take and what bargain Jia shouldn’t make. But all of that paled before his father. “Is he not okay? Why would I make a deal—”
“What’s going on in there?” Cyrus said, the handle of the door moving back and forth slightly. “Why is this door locked? That shouldn’t even be possible. Let me in!”
“You’ll discover those answers and more on your quest,” the old man told Fort. “Above all, you must find your true future, and accept the consequences of your past, or you will lose everything.”
Lose everything? What was the man talking about? Why couldn’t he just say things in plain English? “What’s my true future? And what consequences of the past?”
“Fort?” Cyrus shouted. “Is that you? Why can I barely hear you? Are you hiding him from me, old man?”
He began to bang on the door but stopped abruptly as the entire door began to glow with black light. As Fort watched, the nails all turned to red dust and dissolved away, leaving the wooden boards to fall to the floor.
Cyrus stood in the doorway, glowing with a stronger black light than Fort had seen on any of the other Time kids, his face a mask of anger. “Fort, you need to go, now !” he shouted, and waved a hand.
The cottage began to dissolve, then reappeared out of nowhere. “Not just yet,” the old man said, not even moving.
“You really want to do this?” Cyrus said, his eyebrows rising. “I told you not to interfere. What did you tell him?”
“Only what I promised I would,” the old man said, crossing his arms. “And don’t presume to lecture me, boy, until you’re a few thous
and years older.”
Whatever that meant—Fort couldn’t think about it now. “Cyrus, what is going to happen to my father?” he shouted. “Why did this guy tell me not to make a deal to save him?”
“That’s what you had to tell Fort?” Cyrus said, sighing loudly. “You probably just ensured it’d happen now by making him ask questions he shouldn’t. You’ll put into motion everything you wanted to avoid! Talk about your self-fulfilling prophecies.”
“I have faith in the boy,” the old man said, nodding at Fort. “And knowing the full truth might be painful but is always better over time.”
“None of them will live long enough to see a better time if you keep messing with things!” Cyrus said. “Why are you fighting me on this? You know how things are supposed to go!”
“I know how you think they should, but it remains to be seen if I agree,” the old man said, settling back into his seat with a smile.
“Cyrus, what is going to happen to my father?” Fort shouted, not caring about plans or the past or anything beyond that.
“See?” Cyrus said to the old man, then turned to Fort. “Fort, what else did he tell you? Other than that your father is in danger?”
Fort gritted his teeth. What did he mean, other than that? “He warned me about a queen in someplace called Avalon, that Rachel shouldn’t take her sword, and Jia shouldn’t make a deal with her.”
Cyrus groaned, then dropped his head into his hands. “Ignore all of that,” he said. “He’s misleading you, sending you down the wrong path.” He picked his head back up to glare at the old man, who was watching him, still smiling. “Why are you torturing me like this? Do you have any idea how long I’ve been working on all of it?”
“Not as long as I have,” the old man said, and stuck out his tongue.
Cyrus just stared at him in silence.
“I can’t ignore what he said if my father is in trouble!” Fort shouted. “Cyrus, you need to tell me what’s going on here, or …” He trailed off, having no idea how he could force either of these two to answer his questions. They had the power to bring him forward in time or send him back whenever they wanted, after all.
