King of Avalon: a Dragon Shifter Paranormal Romance (Rise of the Elder Gods Book 2)

by Vivienne Savage

  The doors flew open with a mighty gust, and wind slammed into Arthur’s chest. Magic pinned him as effectively as a butterfly fixed to a display board, spread-eagled and helpless.

  Then the wizard himself strode forward with his staff in hand, a powerful man who had become a terrifying foe to all who would harm his knights in those years since Arthur’s parents had awakened him. Her fae senses tasted the bitter tang of his indignant rage.

  “I should destroy you where you stand.”

  As expected, Nimue had been right.

  Such was how her relationship had always gone.

  He struck the wall a second time with a backbreaking force that would have crippled an average human. His draconic blood and mystical nature took a mild bruising instead. As did his pride, both evidenced by the colors of his aura shifting in a frantic swirl of colors that might have otherwise given Nimue some amusement.

  Faster than expected, the wizard blinked across the distance in a flash of radiant light. He held the tip of his staff against Arthur’s throat.

  “What are you?”

  “I’m Arthur.”

  “No. Arthur is a child. I saw him only days ago, so I’ll ask again, imposter. What. Are. You?”

  Arthur was strong, but Merlin had magic on his side that the dragon-blooded king seemed incapable of shattering. He pushed against the binding threads of magic, and gradually, they began to yield. “Could an imposter do this, Merlin?”

  Brighter than starlight, Excalibur appeared in his hand. The sword gleamed with fae magic, sharper than the day Nimue gifted it to the king.

  The sight of it, a thorough reminder of how much she’d helped in the past, humbled her. Before Nimue could even consider breaking cover and offering her assistance, the bladed tip of the staff eased. A crimson trickle of blood slid down Arthur’s throat, but the wound instantly clotted. Draconic blood and rapid regeneration restored the king as good as new. Merlin stared.

  “It is you. My king. Forgive me for doubting you.”

  Arthur coughed and rubbed his neck. “No, it’s fine. I guess I should have expected some caution from you.” His gaze cut toward Nimue as if he could see her.

  “My only question is, how in all of the worlds did this happen?“

  Merlin offered Arthur a hand up. Nimue could see the pattern of thought in the wizard’s features, could feel his probing curiosity and that he wondered if elsewhere in the state of California, two parents were wondering why their toddler had become a grown man overnight.

  “I know it’s difficult to believe, but with your last words and what remained of your strength, you sent me here. You wanted me to do now what we lacked the power to accomplish during my timeline.”

  “Your timeline. Well, that does explain some things, but...why?”

  “You sent me to destroy the Titans. Now.”

  At that, Nimue shed her cloak and revealed herself to Merlin. To his credit, the wizard did not flinch or whirl on her to attack and defend himself. He knew her face when he saw it.

  “I should have known you were involved, Nimue.”

  The corner of her mouth raised involuntarily. Merlin was right to mistrust her fae nature, but it stung just the same. Once, he’d been willing to put his life in her hands. She’d taught him magic previously unknown to humans. She wanted to sneer. Instead, she gathered her hurt feelings and locked them away.

  “Then you are wrong, though it wouldn’t be the first time. You believe this, Wizard? That your future self dared to go against the tide of fate and send this half-dragon to the past?”

  “Of course I believe it. Who else but myself would know the way my mind thinks.” Merlin turned to Arthur. “Pray tell, how did I come by such a miraculous spell?”

  “Warren Westbrook.”

  “Ah.” Again, Merlin nodded. A sad smile came to his face. “Brilliant family. I take it they did not fare so well in the future?”

  “None of us have. You perished casting the spell.”

  “I imagine so. Such an enchantment of the power required to pierce the veil of time would require numerous spellcasters. If I gave my life for this quest, myself in the future must have believed it to be the only way.”

  “Well, I’m here now, and it’s time we begin. Where are the Titans?”

  Merlin’s expression mirrored her own in a rare moment as they both stared at Arthur in disbelief. The wizard gathered himself first and shook his head, then gestured to the open doorway.

  “Let us go inside and talk. I fear things won’t be as easy as you’re expecting.”

  Entering the wizard’s lair was a curious thing. Long centuries ago, she’d visited a stone tower filled with countless books, bundled herbs, caged insects, and all manner of plants. For reasons she didn’t understand, it pleased her that those tendencies remained. Bookshelves lined several walls, and stacks of rare tomes piled atop a table, the space shared with paper print-outs. Her gaze roamed across an impressive collection of displayed artwork and antiques. Her envy stirred.

  “You’ve learned to clean after yourself, Merlin. A truly modern man now.”

  “Huh? Oh, yes. I have a Roomba and a housemaid now. Marvelous invention. Fantastic woman.”

  The corner of her mouth rose.

  “But neither of you came to discuss my living habits.” With a finger snap, the staff vanished in a shimmering mist of magical dust, freeing his hands. “For my future self to have sent you here, we must have truly been in dire straits, Arthur. I assume much more occurred in the moments leading to my death.” Merlin held up a hand when Arthur scoffed and continued on before the dragon shifter could interject. “We don’t need details. Too much is already at risk with you coming back to a time where you already exist. Tell me nothing more than what we need to know.”

  “Gladly. My goal is simple. The Titans need to be stopped, and nothing else matters. Are they active yet?”

  “No. I received word from the dragoness Freyja that she clashed with a titan near the former site of Pompeii two days ago, but we have seen nothing of them. They are quiet, perhaps biding their time until they can arise at full strength.”

  “Then they’re weak from centuries of captivity. Now is the time to strike,” Arthur said, his face a grim mask of determination. His green eyes burned bright as embers. “I will need my knights and as many warriors as you can summon. Anyone who can stand with us against them now.”

  “Splendid. I will rally the troops, but what of you, my fae friend? Why did you ignore our call for aid weeks ago when we first informed you that the Titans were awakening?”

  Nimue curved one brow. “I am not a pet to scamper along to your aid whenever I am needed, Wizard.”

  “I recognize that you are not, and I understand your irritation, Viviane.”

  She stared at him.

  “Shall I call you Niniane then, or have you decided to go by the name Nimue this time?”

  She bared her teeth at him.

  “Touchy. What a pleasure to see things haven’t changed and that you remain the same cantankerous fae I’ve always known.

  Once, long before Arthur came along, a young but smitten wizard visited her palace beneath the lake. She’d educated and guided him, teaching him to harness his natural gifts. Despite his interest in her, Nimue never fell in love. Instead, she’d helped him discover his own gift of long life and taught him to share it with the knights who later sought his wisdom.

  When Arthur came to her in need, she’d helped him.

  Nimue had never meant to fall in love.

  It isn’t love, her mental protests cut into her thoughts. It’s lust. It’s a carnal need. Years have passed since…

  No man had touched her since Arthur’s last visit to the mortal world. No man had been good enough, fae or mortal, to take the place of the king who made her blood sizzle each night they’d spent together.

  For that reason, it was better to keep her distance and remain out of his affairs. She couldn’t afford to be dragged into their knightly batt
les again, especially those concerning the Titans.

  “I will have nothing to do with your war against the Titans.”

  “Nimue…”

  “I’m sorry, but that’s my answer. Consider me Switzerland in all of this.”

  “The Titans won’t spare the fae because they didn’t get involved.” Frustration embittered Arthur’s voice, but his gaze filled with an unspoken plea. “Trust me.”

  “The Titans could never pierce the Veil dividing our realm. My people would sooner close it off entirely than allow that risk. This is as far as I go helping you. Good luck, Arthur.”

  Ignoring centuries of his absence had been easy. Walking away at that moment when he needed her most? Almost impossible. Not quite, but close.

  Nimue hated the tension in his shoulders. A tiny voice of reason told her to stay a while longer and to at least help them devise a plan of action.

  No. Those times are behind me. I am no longer the Lady of the Lake. I’m not their advisor now. This isn’t my fight.

  It wasn’t natural to change the order of fate, and by assisting him, she’d alter her own future.

  With that thought in mind, she conjured a portal and returned home before she could succumb to emotions long pent-up.

  Three

  Once Nimue parted their company, Merlin listened to Arthur’s tale without interruption. He unloaded everything, sometimes babbling so rapidly it was a wonder the old man digested anything said about the future.

  Unlike Nimue, Merlin didn’t shy from the knowledge of their fates, but afterward, he sat in silence, quiet so long Arthur feared he may have fallen asleep with his eyes open.

  “Merlin?”

  “I’m thinking, son. You’ve given me a lot to take in.”

  “I know, and I’m sorry for that, but as you can we, we don’t have a minute to spare. We need to take action now and hunt down the Titans.”

  “With who? With what weapons? Using what magic and tools?” Merlin asked.

  “I don’t know. The dragons defeated them in the past, right?”

  “Ah, yes. The dragons did overcome them in the past,” Merlin confirmed, nodding, though a sad smile touched his bearded face. “Before the Knights of the Round Table thinned their numbers, they were a force to be reckoned with.”

  Arthur stared. “You’re not suggesting—”

  “I am not suggesting that what we did in the past is wrong, but you will find the dragons unequipped to handle the Titans now. According to records and information, I gathered from the elders among them, three Titans turned the tide. Hyperion, Themis, and even the great water guardian Styx with all of her children fought against their own kind.”

  “Then we need to find them.”

  “They are deceased.”

  “Fuck.”

  He’d thought coming back to the past would provide an edge against the Titans, but all the same barriers existed. No help. No power.

  “Tell me, why did your efforts in the future fail?”

  “The dragons weren’t enough on their own. Titans came and picked them off individually when the war began. They went after the big guys first—Ares, Thor, Freyja, and Zeus.”

  “Freyja has already deflected one attack.”

  “Not the next one. They…” Sudden understanding dawned over Arthur. The Titans had learned the location of the most powerful great wyrms then separated them from their brethren to destroy them. “They let her go, Merlin. We need to warn them. We need to warn them right away that it’s a trap. Freyja’s escape occurred for one reason—to lead the Titans to the rest of the dragons.”

  Merlin rose from his seat, staff held in a gnarled, white-knuckled hand. “Then we had better begin warning them.”

  Deciding the pair could cover more ground if Arthur explained the circumstances to his family while Merlin sought the draconic leaders, the wizard sent him through a portal that opened into a sunlit street in the middle of west coast suburbia.

  No one noticed.

  Arthur had to wonder if the neighbors were so accustomed to supernatural hijinks that they no longer cared or if Merlin had disguised his arrival with sorcery.

  Wonder soon faded as he took in the sight of his childhood home, highlighted by the sun and framed by colorful flowers along the modest home’s brick trim.

  Can they feel my presence? Arthur wondered, standing at the foot of the driveway to the two-story home that dominated his earliest memories. The Californian sun burned hot against his neck, though sunset was less than two hours away. In the world he knew, humans rarely traveled by daylight. They hid underground and in remote areas out of the Titans’ path of destruction.

  It stunned him that life could be so ordinary and mundane. It shook him that none of these people knew that within the year, if not within a few months, their lives would be forever changed as the world careened down the path to destruction.

  Children played ball in the driveway of a home three lots down, and the distant hum of a lawnmower filled the air with the sweet scent of cut grass. Their neighbor knelt in her yard with her hands wrist-deep in soil.

  At the current hour, his mother would be serving dinner, then his father would read to him and put him in bed. Because Arthur had more human blood running through his veins than half-dragons like his mother, he’d aged closer to their rate than that of a dragon who passed several years as a toddler.

  The future had robbed Arthur of his parents years ago. His father died while protecting him, a younger sister, and their mother, urging his family to flee to safety and for Astrid to protect their children. Later, she’d fallen alone, leaving Arthur to guard Elaine.

  And he’d failed.

  He’d failed so many people, failed a nation, failed their entire realm, and in the end, he’d even failed his parents and his dear younger sister.

  How could he possibly shatter a happy past unstained by the ravages of his timeline? Of course, neither of them would make it through the future unscathed if he didn’t change their fate now when it mattered most.

  He tried to summon memories of sitting on his father’s knee or playing ball with them in the yard. Some surfaced, intertwined with pain.

  He couldn’t let them die again, not now when he was old enough to make a difference.

  You can do this.

  Knuckles cracked as he clenched one fist. What if the future was bound to happen regardless of whatever actions he took, and by his very presence alone, he condemned both to another death?

  An oblivious pack of children on bicycles rode by as Arthur conquered his indecision and took one step forward.

  Then the door opened, and any opportunity he’d had of knocking on it flitted away in the grass-scented breeze. Nathaniel Drakenstone stepped onto the brick and mortar front porch, both the tall and powerful father of Arthur’s childhood memories and his best friend from a time before paved streets and neighborhoods. The coincidence had never escaped him that the man he’d loved most among his knights had been the one to rescue his lost soul and end their feud.

  Because of Nathaniel, they’d broken the endless cycle of hunting dragons. Once, he’d been Sir Galahad, proud Knight of the Round Table. Now in this lifetime, he’d become known as Nathaniel, savior of their order who released Arthur’s captured soul and facilitated his reincarnation once more. Arthur had grown up on those stories, and they were burned into his mind long before he came of age and the memories slowly returned to him on their own.

  What do I even call him? A century of captivity as a lost soul had dulled his connection to the past as Galahad’s king and superior. Or his equal, rather, given his dimmed memories of declaring no man would be greater than his brother.

  Those years felt more of a dream than anything.

  “Nate?” A flood of emotion overtook Arthur when a small blonde woman squeezed onto the crowded porch beside her husband. “What are you doing out—?” She paused, her nostrils flared, and he knew that she knew he was there. Her head turned toward him, and her blue eyes widene
d.

  “This can’t be possible,” she whispered.

  “Astrid,” Nathaniel said carefully, reaching with one hand for a sword that wasn’t there but would manifest at a thought. “Tell me that you see what I see.”

  Time after time, he’d wondered what he would say if he’d had one more moment with his father or one more embrace from his mother. The prospect of receiving both wishes anchored him to the spot.

  Gotta find your balls now, man.

  In his mind, it was nineteen years after he’d last seen his mother alive. She hadn’t aged a day, eternally young due to the draconic blood in her veins. The blood he shared. Torn between elation and trepidation, Arthur strode up the driveway to meet the two people he’d loved most in all the world.

  “Dad,” he said, testing a word he’d never spoken as an adult, uttered during the last days of childhood before the apocalypse initiated by the Titans changed the world forever. “Mom. It’s me.”

  “I know it’s you, silly, but how?”

  When Astrid took a step forward, Nate grabbed her by the shoulder and held her back. “Are you sure? Astrid, are you sure?”

  “I’m positive, Nate. That’s our—” She froze and whirled on the spot to stare at the house, where the younger Arthur no doubt remained wherever his parents last set him.

  “He’s still there,” Arthur said gently, “but I am me. I’m not the same child you put to bed. I mean, I am but—different—I’m….” He struggled to find words he’d rehearsed for hours but found nothing sufficient. “Merlin sent me from the future. He said it was our only chance of stopping the Titans.”

  He had to find his nerve. Had to be the king he’d always been meant to be, and that meant putting aside emotion for the moment, no matter how much he wanted to sink into his mother’s arms and soak in every moment of comfort fate had denied him.

  He’d seen her die. Now she was there before him again.

  “All right,” Nate said. “If you’re truly Arthur, tell me something only he would know.”

  Or I’ll gut you where you stand, lingered unspoken between them. Arthur knew his friend. During the aftermath of Lancelot’s betrayal and Guinevere’s adulterous actions, Galahad put together the pieces of his broken heart and encouraged him to make amends. He’d been the best of them at all times.