CHAPTER TEN
-ARTHUR-
I walked through the silent corridors, grateful for the solitude.
The revelry behind me dulled into a distant hum, muffled by stone and space. Guards along the passage straightened as I passed, their eyes carefully averted. They knew better than to acknowledge my midnight wanderings.
The day's trial replayed in my mind like a tournament—each knight parading their power, each performance a veiled audition for war. Some had impressed me, yes. But whether any of them were truly ready to face Merlin... that remained to be seen.
One knight lingered in my thoughts: Sir Lioran, the water mage.
His display hadn't impressed me—not truly.
Others had conjured more spectacle. Lance hadn't been impressed either.
He'd remarked that Lioran was too slight in build, too small to stand among Camelot's knights.
He believed that Camelot's best knights needed to appear as intimidating as possible.
But I wasn't looking for brawn.
I was looking for power.
And power didn't always come in broad shoulders and heavy swords—it came in control, precision, and the ability to wield magic like a scalpel instead of a hammer.
Regardless, Lioran remained on my mind.
His name had come from nowhere.
I'd made it my business to know every capable knight within Logres—some of whom had served me in the past, before I'd taken the dragonmark.
Yet no records mentioned a Sir Lioran before the trials. No land claim, no ancestral ties, no mention in the genealogical records I kept meticulously updated. It was as if he'd materialized from thin air the moment he walked through Camelot's gates.
Yes, the same was true regarding Sir Tristan (whose necromancy I found off-putting at best but powerful), but Tristan did not lay claim to Logres. He came from far-off Eastern lands, so, of course, it made sense I wouldn't know much about his background.
But Lioran… there should have been more information available about him.
I understood he had a minor noble's sponsorship—a Dame someone or other.
But I'd never heard of her either. That wasn't completely surprising, considering the northlands were a sprawling and untamed wilderness of scattered settlements, isolated keeps, and vast stretches of territory where a man could live his entire life without attracting notice from the crown.
The region bred hardy, independent folk who kept to themselves and viewed royal authority with the same suspicion they reserved for wolves prowling too close to their livestock.
So, I supposed that was reason enough for Lioran's background to be so hazy.
Still, even in the North, names travel. Stories spread. And yet this man appeared without one.
I could only wonder if he had any ties to The Rebellion.
It was certainly possible, as intelligence reports from the North had grown increasingly troubling over recent months.
There were whispers of dissent, and beneath those whispers ran darker currents—talk of an organized resistance, of leaders gathering followers, of weapons being stockpiled in preparation for something larger than scattered acts of defiance.
The North had always been wild, difficult to govern. But this felt different.
And Lord Carlisle's presence at court only deepened my suspicion.
Carlisle had always been a thorn in my side, and as such, I'd expected him to be at the forefront of any and all rebellions against me.
The man had the pedigree, the charisma, and the tactical mind to lead a successful uprising.
Yet, his appearance here—smiling, loyal, offering gifts and pledging fealty—didn't seem to fit.
It's precisely what a clever rebel would do, I thought. Hide in plain sight. Maintain the facade while building an army behind the crown's back.
Perhaps he'd come to scout my defenses, to measure the strength of my knights, and report back to whichever lords had joined his cause.
Or perhaps I was seeing shadows where none existed.
Burn them all before they burn us, the dragon insisted.
I forced the feeling down, jaw clenched.
Lioran's connection to the North troubled me for exactly this reason. If Carlisle was involved in rebellion, and Lioran came from the same region...
I didn't want to finish that thought.
Because despite myself, I wanted the boy to be innocent.
Something about him reminded me of my younger self—the scrawny prince no one took seriously, dismissed by seasoned warriors who saw only my gangly frame and assumed I'd amount to nothing.
They'd sneered when I'd approached the sword in the stone.
They'd laughed when I'd wrapped my fingers around the hilt.
They'd laughed until I'd pulled it free.
Lioran carried that same quality: underestimated, overlooked, yet quietly determined. I wanted to believe that he was here for the right reasons—that he wanted to serve his crown. But trust didn't come easily to me, and I needed to know whose side he was on.
Of course, I'd already made inquiries. Quiet ones.
No one knew him.
Now that The Fox had returned to my kingdom, I would put him on Lioran's trail. If anyone could uncover the truth of this knight's beginnings, it was my foremost spy.
Otherwise, it seemed as if the mist had simply spat Lioran out. And, at the end of the day, predictability mattered more than loyalty in men with gifts like his.
Of all the knights, the one I was least excited to be acquainted with once more was Kay.
I wasn't surprised to see him at the trials.
He'd avoided me for years, but ambition always brings men back to Camelot.
Becoming a knight of the Round Table meant influence, wealth, prestige, proximity to royalty, relevance, and it meant fame.
Such was why most knights were attracted to the Shadow Trials, I was certain.
Still, Kay's presence sat poorly with me.
Kay had always possessed magic. Even as a child, he could see the flaw in anything—a weakness in armor, a lie behind a smile. His sight was ruthless, and it never spared me.
"You'll never be half the king your father was," he’d said the night before my coronation. "I see the weakness in you, Arthur. Everyone does."
But he didn't know what had truly happened to Uther. He didn't know about the dragonmark. And he certainly didn't know I'd taken the mark to save the kingdom.
Perhaps Kay had been right back then—perhaps I had been weak. But I was not that boy any longer. Whatever softness remained had been stripped away by years of war and treachery.
Still, I kept Kay close—not from love, but calculation. A sword sharp enough to cut the king is best kept sheathed at his side.
His display today was as unsettling as I expected. He'd pointed out a fracture in one of the great hall's columns—hairline, invisible to every other eye. How many other weaknesses had he catalogued? In the walls. In the court. In me?
More than once, I caught him watching me. Not with hatred—just that same old scrutiny. As if he were still keeping tally. Still waiting for proof he’d always been right.
I stepped beneath the final archway of stone, my boots striking stone worn smooth by centuries of passage. Above me, the carved dragon loomed—marking the boundary between Camelot's manicured splendor and the wilder lands beyond.
Here, order gave way to something older.
The grove stretched ahead: a sanctuary of towering oaks, their gnarled limbs weaving a cathedral of branches overhead.
Moonlight poured through in silver shafts, softening the darkness.
The air shifted—cleaner somehow, untouched by the politics and suspicion that tainted every breath within the castle walls.
The Lake of Aeloria shimmered under the moon—still and silver as a mirror, the stars caught in its surface like a second sky. I drew in a slow breath.
I took another step—and froze.
A figure stood at the water's edge.
A girl. Slender. Alone.
Her back was to me.
A servant girl, by the look of her plain dress and the tattered cloak around her shoulders. White hair spilled down her back like liquid moonlight.
Servants didn't come here—they weren't permitted past the boundary of Camelot's walls. And they especially didn't come here at this hour, this far from the castle.
And yet she stood there with quiet purpose, her shoulders square, her chin lifted—as if the lake belonged to her.
I should have called out to her, demanded to know what business she had here. But I didn't.
Instead, I watched.
For reasons I couldn't name, I held my breath.
And waited.
-GUIN-
I couldn’t explain the pull that drew me to the water’s edge.
Something about this lake felt hauntingly familiar—like a half-remembered dream or a melody I’d once known but had since forgotten.
My feet moved seemingly on their own, carrying me closer.
A rational voice screamed from within: You're exposed here—vulnerable, out of place. What servant girl wanders this far from the castle at night without drawing suspicion?
There’s no one here, Guin, I reminded myself. Only you.
Still, the lake called—silent, seductive, as irresistible as a siren’s song to a doomed sailor.
Touch me, it whispered, though the air remained perfectly still.
I heard the distant sound of an owl hooting in one of the trees—I wasn't certain if the sound was a warning or encouragement to drop to my knees and touch the water.
Regardless, I knelt and let my fingers skim the water.
In response, the lake suddenly erupted in brilliant light—not the golden warmth of sun or flame, but a cool, blue-silver glow that pulsed outward from where my fingers touched the surface.
I gasped and immediately backed away, nearly tripping over my own feet.