CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
-ARTHUR-
I had sworn never to return to this part of the Whispering Wilds, but Blodeuwyn had left me no choice.
If I wanted information, I would have to come in person to claim it. So, here I was.
The trees leaned inward like eavesdroppers, their twisted limbs heavy with moss.
The ground shifted beneath each step I took, never quite solid, as if the earth itself resented the intrusion.
Silence ruled here—not peace, but the charged stillness before a blade strikes.
And sometimes, the silence broke… with whispers.
Not from mouths, but from the forest itself.
From nowhere. From everywhere.
It repulsed me.
We should not be here. The dragon disliked the Whispering Wilds almost as much as I did.
Yet here I was—Arthur Pendragon, King of Logres—reduced to seeking counsel from the very creatures I'd exiled and worse.
A witch.
The irony didn’t escape me. I, who had outlawed magic in every corner of the realm, now stalked through cursed woods in search of it.
“Pride makes fools of us all,” I muttered, pushing aside a curtain of moss that dripped cold despite the absence of rain.
Cabal had refused to go further nearly an hour ago. He had frozen mid-step, snorting and trembling until I was forced to dismount and continue this treacherous trip on foot. Perhaps he was wiser than I.
The path—if it could be called that—wound deeper into the heart of the Whispering Wilds, where even my most seasoned hunters refused to tread.
These were elder woods. Primeval. Untouched by axe or flame.
The trees here had stood since before men walked upright.
Some trunks were wider than three men with arms outstretched.
Some bled when cut.
I paused, suddenly aware I’d lost all sense of direction. The canopy above had closed in entirely, choking off the sun. Yet an eerie green light filtered through, throwing the undergrowth into a sickly glow. It meant she knew I was here.
“Blodeuwyn!” I called out, my voice thin and brittle in the oppressive air. “I seek your counsel!”
Nothing.
Return to the castle! the dragon ordered. I would do no such thing.
Only the forest whispered in reply—rustling leaves without wind, words without mouths. She was playing with me, toying with me.
I pressed on, drawn by instinct or something more sinister, until I reached a massive oak whose trunk had split wide open, forming what resembled a doorway into shadow.
“I know you're here, witch,” I said, resting my hand on the hilt of my sword. It was a gesture of habit, not threat. Steel meant nothing here. “I wouldn’t have come if the need weren’t dire.”
A dry, rasping chuckle echoed from within the tree. The sound was brittle, like dead leaves crushed beneath boot heels.
“The great Arthur Pendragon,” came a voice stitched from bone and rot. “Come to beg what he once condemned.”
Laughter erupted—not from one direction, but from all. The forest itself seemed to mock me.
I steeled myself and pushed forward, following the voice until the trees began to thin, the path widening like a throat preparing to swallow.
And then—there it was.
The clearing lay before me, untouched by time.
The hovel stood at its center, just as I remembered from seven years ago when I first came to her—when my father lay dying and I feared what might occur should death free the dragon from his control.
I hadn't been alone that day. Merlin had been at my side.
And he had made a promise, just as I had.
A promise to never speak of the dragon, lest it awaken.
That promise was witnessed in blood and magic.
It was a promise sealed. And one that Merlin had broken.
It was the only reason the dragon was stirring.
We do not trust her!
The shack looked less like a dwelling and more like something the forest had grown around and forgotten.
The thatched roof sagged under the weight of years, nearly caving in the middle.
Windows—dark and hollow—stared like blind eyes, revealing nothing of what waited within.
Brambles twisted around the foundation, their thorns gleaming silver, as if warning me to keep away.
I moved toward it slowly. Every step I took stirred ghosts I’d attempted to bury deep.
The last time I’d stood here, seven years ago, I’d been half the man I was now—idealistic, na?ve, still believing power could fix things. That justice could be enforced like law.
The crown had long since disabused me of those illusions.
The door hung askew on rusted hinges, swollen with rot and time. I raised a hand to knock—then hesitated. Something ancient stirred beneath the threshold, something that told me not to wake it.
“I know why you’ve come,” she rasped from within.
The voice was rougher in person—gravel in the throat, dry leaves underfoot—but unmistakably hers.
My hand froze midair.
“Then you have the advantage of me, Bloduewyn,” I said, steadying my tone. “For I’m no longer certain myself.”
She laughed—dry and brittle. Then came the sound of something heavy dragging across the floor.
“You want answers about the white-haired woman,” she said. “The one who drew your precious sword from the stone.”
My heart thudded.
Of course she knew.
Blodeuwyn always knew.
"But that is not all," she continued. "You want to know if you are doomed to the same fate as your father—if the dragon will ultimately defeat you just as it defeated him."
"I want you to remove the dragon from me altogether," I admitted.
We are one. We cannot be removed.
She cackled at that. "And what makes you believe I could do such a thing?"
I felt my jaw tighten of its own accord. "The dragon is your creation. You gifted it to my father when he wanted absolute power."
"As I have told you before, you silly boy, I cannot create something from nothing."
"If you didn't create it, who did?"
"The dragon existed long before any of us did." She breathed in deeply, a rattling and wet sound. “Come inside, King of Logres, and let us speak of destinies stolen… and bloodlines revealed.”
I swallowed hard and pushed open the rotting door. It groaned like something in pain.
The stench hit me instantly, a nauseating wave that clawed at my throat and made my eyes water.
It was a putrid cocktail of pungent herbs—some familiar, others reeking of dark purposes I didn't want to contemplate—mingled with the cloying sweetness of things long dead and rotting.
But beneath it all lurked something sharper, something metallic that made the dragon in my chest stir restlessly.
Blood, I suspected, though whether old and dried or wet and fresh, I couldn't tell.
I couldn't bring myself to continue forward and instead stood there at the threshold.
"The essence of the dragon has long lived within your bloodline," Blodeuwyn continued. "Hence the name of Pendragon."
"I know of no other kings in my line who have had the dragonmark, save my father and me."
"No others desired to awaken the dragon's power, yet that doesn't mean the beast's spirit wasn't already present."
"This sounds like yet another game of words."
"Everything is a game of words."
“I haven't come for games; I’ve come for truth,” I said as I finally forced myself forward, across the threshold of the door and into her hovel.
The door creaked shut behind me without a hand to move it.
“No,” Blodeuwyn said, her eyes gleaming from the shadows like a predator’s. “You’ve come for comfort. But I have only truth to offer—and you will find it anything but comforting.”
I took another step before glancing down at the dirt floor, which was littered with what looked suspiciously like bone fragments and withered flower petals.
The acrid smoke from her countless braziers made my throat burn, and suddenly I found myself questioning every decision that had led me to this godforsaken hovel.
What in all the bloody hells had I been thinking, seeking answers from this creature?
Blodeuwyn never gave anything without strings attached; that much I knew with absolute certainty.
Her bargains were legendary throughout the darker corners of Logres, whispered about in taverns when men drank too much and their tongues loosened with liquid courage.
The offers she extended to desperate souls usually saw one owing much more than they'd ever bargained for, their debts compounding like interest on a loan from the devil herself.
“Still handsome,” her voice floated from the darkness, oily and amused. “Still foolish.”
A flame guttered to life. Its flicker revealed her face in grotesque relief: skin like melting wax, blotched with liver spots and arcane markings. But the eyes—the eyes—burned with something older than cruelty. Far older than me. Older than my eldest ancestor. Ancient. And hungry.
She is death.
“The white-haired woman haunts you,” she said. Not a question. “You see her in dreams, in reflections, in the edge of your vision when you least expect it.”
“Yes,” I answered quietly.
Blodeuwyn shuffled toward a warped table, its surface littered with bones, dried herbs, and vials thick with sludge. “And yet, your interest in her… is not merely carnal, is it?”
"She drew the blade from the stone." I faltered. "I must know whether that was genuine truth or deception meant to pass as truth."
That made her laugh—a low, wheezing sound like wind dragging through a crypt.
“The sword never makes mistakes, Arthur Pendragon. It chose you once because you were worthy. It chooses her now—for the same reason.”
My fists clenched.
“Then it truly happened? I am not delirious?"
That awful rasping laugh again. "Of course it truly happened."
I swallowed hard. "Tell me who she is.”
The witch ignored me. Her gnarled hands dropped herbs into a cracked clay bowl. “The greater question is: what will you do after you learn her name? Kill her? Rut her? Both?”
Her words struck deeper than I liked.