She went back to her horse’s side to remove her armor. When she heard the movement behind her, Vera assumed it was Arthur, so she was surprised when it was Gawain who spoke. “Guinna?”
Some of the others had picked up Lancelot’s nickname for her, but it sounded bizarre coming from Gawain. “May I check you for injuries?” he asked.
Vera looked past him, noticing Lancelot ten steps behind him, chewing at his thumbnail and pretending not to notice them. “Is this Lancelot’s idea?”
“Yes,” Gawain said, very matter of fact.
“Oh, all right,” she relented. “I might have a cut on my hand.” Vera worked the metal glove free, and sure enough, a rivulet of blood ran out of it. The cut on the back of her hand smarted, but the gauntlet must have helped the blood coagulate and slow the bleeding. It wasn’t gushing the way she’d expect from being impaled by a six-inch splinter.
Gawain ran his fingers over the cut, back and forth, with increasing pressure as he examined it. The last time, he pressed so hard that Vera yelped in pain.
“Sorry.” Gawain’s fingers stopped, but his brow remained furrowed. “This is shallower than I anticipated.”
Vera expected the dreamy fog to come as he lay his right hand over the injury and closed his eyes in concentration. But her mind stayed clear. “Ishau mar domibaru,” he mumbled.
Her body hummed with a sense of release. Gawain inhaled deeply, audibly, and exhaled the same way. It was akin to how she’d been instructed to breathe by a doctor holding a cold stethoscope to her back, but Gawain did it with control and intention—as if it were the most valuable breath in his body.
“I know those words,” Vera breathed as Gawain’s hand lifted from hers.
He drew back, fixing her with his piercing stare. “You do?”
“I think I’ve dreamed them.” Already, though, Vera couldn’t remember what he’d said. She couldn’t find the words in her mind either. “Can you repeat them?”
He shook his head. “Some secrets of the mages are so important to keep that we are bound to them by magic. Most people forget those words immediately.” He surveyed Vera carefully. “But I’m sure Merlin would have used them when he saved you.”
“What are they?”
“Words of power. Passed down to the mages over generations. Most often spoken aloud when doing magic that pertains to lifeforce. There’s power in words,” he told her. “I can’t repeat them, but I can tell you about the end.” Gawain patted her hand in a funny, grandmotherly sort of way. He paused before he breathed in that audible, intentional way once more.
“The breath of life,” he explained. “It is the name for the source of all things.”
It reminded Vera of something she thought came from Hebrew scripture. “God?” she asked. Was that right? That the name of God was the breath of life?
Gawain shrugged. “That’s what some will say. Creator. God. It’s all the same, but the mages simply say ‘Source.’”
“The mages are religious?”
“Oh yes. The Magesary is its own religious order. We believe our power, our gifts, come from our Source. Whether that is a sentient being is up for personal interpretation. In any case, we all agree that magic is a gift to humanity, and it is our highest duty to continue the ongoing work of creation.”
“I can tell you take that seriously,” Vera said. If there was anyone who embodied that, it was Gawain. He alone had trained the gifted folks of town and had used magic to help revitalize Camelot in countless ways.
She peered over his shoulder and found Lancelot looking up at her at the exact same moment. He averted his eyes quickly. Vera scoffed.
“I’m fine,” she yelled at him. She expected him to relax and laugh, to come jogging over with some smart remark. Instead, he turned on his heel and joined Arthur and Percival.
“What is wrong with him?” Vera mused in exasperation.
“He couldn’t protect you. And it’s driving him mad.”
“What? That’s not it. We’ve done loads of dangerous things together. In fact, he’s usually the one encouraging it.”
Gawain raised his eyebrows. “Yes, but I’d guess he was also directly involved in those things. If something went wrong, he could intervene. That’s not the case in a joust. You were on your own.”
“I—” Shit. He was right. She glanced at Arthur, who carried on in his conversation. He seemed fine. Pleased even. She felt a pang. “You would think that’s how the king would react.”
“Of course not,” Gawain said, as if it were obvious.
“Why would you say that?”
Of the hundreds of ways Vera might have guessed the mage would respond, she’d have never gotten it right.
“Because he knew you didn’t need protecting.”
Vera had never believed that falling in love happened in an instant. It came about over time, as bonds were formed like a thread between two souls, a simple tether with affection that slowly thickened into a golden cable with love.
But it was in this exact moment when Gawain’s simple proclamation lodged in Vera as truth, and as Arthur smiled over at her (pride and ease and care—how was it she could see all that in one expression?) that Vera knew.
She loved him.
She’d done it.
She’d forgotten to shove her feelings out of reach. Instead, Vera had crowded in on them and ended up cradling her love until she couldn’t deny it. And now? Now, it was inescapable. In the days leading up to the festival, the words were right there, tempting her tongue every time she looked at Arthur.
But she kept swallowing them.
There was the rancid uncertainty of the love’s origin. Was it what she’d had for Vincent, mapped via magic onto a new source?
And if the whole kingdom was thriving like Camelot, they had to be close to breaking the curse. They had to. Which brought her to the simpler matter of reality: there and back again. Vera’s tale. She’d be leaving in late spring. That left … what? Two months? Maybe less?
So she wouldn’t breathe the words, but she would spend every possible moment with him. On the day of the festival’s welcome feast, Vera’s morning was chock-filled with helping ready the castle while Arthur took audiences with travelers and knights who had been pouring into town all week.
But they were both to have a midday break, and when the clock’s chime tolled, Vera made a beeline across the castle grounds, nearly charging in when she reached the throne room—the door was left ajar, after all, but she stopped short at the sound of voices. Arthur must not have been finished yet.
She inclined her ear toward the opening, trying to make out whether the conversation had the polite sounds of ending, but nearly jumped out of her skin when the next sound wasn’t that of a voice but of something (a fist?) slamming down on the table.
“It will work, Your Majesty.” She recognized that voice with a jolt. It was Merlin. Vera hadn’t realized he’d returned from his travels.
“I won’t allow it!”
She recoiled from the door. Arthur had … shouted. He was furious.
“You haven’t traveled since Yule.” Merlin countered Arthur’s volume with an agitated whisper. “You haven’t seen the ways infrastructure is failing. We have over one hundred mages, and magic is breaking down at a rate we cannot keep up with. Your kingdom is suffering. If you think word of our weakness has not reached the Saxon—”