It ached to imagine their soft-souled Gawain in that sort of agony, and at the hands of a villain whose name would survive the next millennium. “Is Gawain dead?” she whispered.
“I don’t think so. They took him,” he said slowly. “Mordred and whoever helped him. No one came for me after that. They weren’t interested in me. It got very foggy for a while. And then you showed up.”
Arthur’s mouth lifted in a smile, his fingers rubbing the back of her neck. They hadn’t reckoned with the tenderness of what they thought would be his final moments, of the honest adoration that spilt from them before Vera … well, before Vera found her power.
But the way she’d pushed it so hard until there was nothing left to give … she suspected she’d scraped her depths and given it all to him, and that would have been fine. But as soon as the fear rose, she knew the gift was there, humming in her blood. Vera wouldn’t be able to use it right now, not on an injury like Arthur’s. She felt like she’d carried a heavy weight as far as she could before being forced to drop it. Her strength was sapped. She’d need more rest before she could use the gift again.
The sound of a chair’s leg scraping against the stone floor reminded Vera that there was someone else in the room, blocked by Arthur. She peeked around his shoulder at the man who was politely absorbed in whittling a palm-sized block of wood with a short knife.
Arthur turned to open the conversation with the man. “This is my father.”
“Otto,” the man supplied, rising to join them with that same warm smile. Of course, she’d recognized it. He’d passed that expression on to his son, a perfect match of effusiveness. Otto was a full head shorter than Arthur.
“I’m so glad to meet you. I’m …” She paused, unsure how to introduce herself. Should she say Vera or Guinevere?
“Vera, love, it’s my pleasure,” he said. Her eyes flashed to Arthur, who looked down as he smiled.
Vera defaulted to greeting Otto as she would have in the twenty-first century. She shook his hand and was already releasing it before she realized the gesture would be eccentric to him. But he wasn’t fazed. He smiled with crinkling eyes that reminded Vera of Martin.
“He knew Guinevere. He knew you before,” Arthur corrected himself. “I told him everything.”
“I owe you the world, Vera. You brought my son back to me.” She blushed at his kindness. “I was mighty worried when you lot showed up drenched in blood yesterday afternoon and you sleeping as soundly as the dead.”
That had all happened yesterday. “What time is it?” Vera asked.
“Midafternoon,” Arthur said. “You’ve been out for more than a day.”
As if on cue, her stomach growled.
“Let’s get you something to eat.” Otto turned back and pulled a seat out for her at the table. “You must be starving.”
She was. Arthur and Otto sat with her while she ate. She was on her second bowl of soup when Lancelot charged in, loudly complaining before his foot crossed the threshold.
“Do you know your barn door is half off its hinges?” He was sweaty enough that his shirt clung to him, and dirt streaked his arms and down his cheek. He knocked the dirt from his boots, completely at home here, and started to pull them off his feet. His eyes finally fell on Vera with a shoe half off. Lancelot forgot the bawdy show he’d been putting on as he was swept with relief.
“Oh, Guinna,” he said. He stumbled over and fell into the chair next to her, wrapping her in a sweaty hug that was much more than relief. She could feel the pain that he was barely keeping at bay. Her darling friend who was terrified, who was enraged, whose heart was shattered because there wasn’t a damn thing he could do to help the one he loved.
She didn’t say anything. She didn’t need to. They clutched one another, his face tucked into her neck. When he pulled away, he’d wrangled his expression to one of wonder. “You’ve got quite a power.”
It had been nagging at Vera, too. She could feel now that it wasn’t a new part of her, but had Guinevere known about it before? And …
“Do you think Viviane knew about my power?” She asked it aloud.
A drawn hesitance came over Lancelot’s expression.
“I think,” Arthur said, staring intently at Lancelot, “that we should ask her.”
“What?” Vera reeled back in her seat.
Lancelot nodded grimly. “How long have you known?”
“Since last week,” Arthur said. “When they were hanging lights for the festival, and Vera asked about yours. I don’t know why I didn’t realize it before. Have you known all the while?” There was an edge in his voice, a hint of accusation.
Lancelot didn’t directly answer. He pulled his orb from his pocket and lit it in his hand. “I kept waiting for it to go out. She was so powerful, though. If anyone’s magic could sustain beyond the grave, it would have been hers. But, for about a month now, it’s been getting brighter. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner. I didn’t know what to make of it.”
Vera gawped at the both of them. She spared a glance at Otto, too, who seemed keenly interested but not at all confused.
“But you said your mother made your light,” she said.
