Me.
I couldn’t breathe. I couldn't even think.
I just—I didn't understand.
And yet, I did understand. All too well.
I was their child.
Merlin. The Lady of the Lake. Their blood. Their magic.
The implications struck me like a bolt of lightning. My parents—the dairy farmers from the borderlands—weren’t my parents at all. Even if they had raised me, they weren’t my blood.
Even though I wanted to argue against the thoughts that were now plaguing my mind, I couldn't. Because this was the truth.
I felt dizzy. The mirror hadn’t just revealed my ancestral connection; it had torn the veil from my identity. I wasn't just a woman in disguise. Not just a spy. Not just someone with untamed water magic who’d learned to survive.
I was the daughter of two of the most powerful magical beings in history. I was legacy itself.
More images flashed. Battles. Incantations. A hidden cradle. A whisper of names not meant to be spoken aloud. A farewell. A promise.
The Lady’s eyes shimmered with sorrow as she kissed the child’s,my, forehead. And then I felt the weight of the spell that transferred to me as soon as her lips touched my face. A binding—something that ensured my magic would not manifest until my twentieth year.
Merlin was suddenly nowhere to be seen. As I watched the visions unfold before me, the Lady placed the infant in the care of a childless couple—my parents. There were tears in her eyes when she left me.
Something flickered.
A new vision emerged.
Merlin stood at the borders of a realm veiled in mist—desperate, searching. His storm-gray eyes scanned the shifting fog beyond the ancient Standing Stones. Arms outstretched, fingers splayed, as if he could reach across the veil and pull me back to him. His midnight-blue robes whipped around him in aninvisible wind, the constellations stitched into the fabric shifting restlessly—as if echoing his anguish.
And suddenly, it all made sense.
The moment I'd arrived at Caer Gwyll, Merlin had said he'd been expecting me. His odd questions, the way his eyes lingered on me, the unspoken weight behind every lesson, the way he'd secreted me away from everyone else in Annwyn—how he'd placed Corvin as my constant chaperone, my shadow.He'd known. Merlin had always known.
I was his. His daughter.
And yet Merlin had never said a word to me. Never even a hint at the truth. And neither had Corvin. Did that mean Corvin didn't know? Or had they both been keeping this truth from me?
The realization struck like a hammer blow.
I wasn’t sure how to feel—my mind reeled as three and twenty years of belief collided with a hidden truth. I'd lived a life built on love, yes—but also on lies. The kindly couple who had raised me, who had loved me, were not my parents. Not truly. They were protectors. Caretakers. Pieces in a greater game I hadn’t even known I was playing.
As the vision settled into stillness, a glowing family tree manifested before me—two radiant bloodlines converging at my name, forming a starburst of light so bright it nearly blinded me.
I wasn’t just magical.
I wasn’t just gifted.
I was a living legacy. A vessel of twilight and water, of light and shadow. The child of the most powerful sorcerers—and perhaps the greatest magical force born in generations.
The vision dissolved into the air with a faint hum. The blood stilled on the altar. Magic withdrew, like the tide retreating from shore. And I stood at the center of it all, my heart thundering, my secret unraveling with every breath I took.
Had anyone seen it? Or had the Caliope worked? Had the Veilwood covered my truths?
I didn’t dare turn around to look—not at Arthur, not at Lance, not at Mordred.
I simply stood there, still and silent, with a single truth echoing through every inch of me:
