"Youwereplaying Merlin's game." My voice dropped to a low murmur as I reached out to trace the line of her jaw with my finger. Her skin was soft beneath my touch, warm despite the cool night air. I felt her pulse quicken where my thumb brushedagainst her throat, a rapid flutter that betrayed her composure. "Now you're playingmine."
She stepped back from my touch, her eyes flashing dangerously. "And if I refuse?"
"Then you die as a traitor." I shrugged, as if her fate meant nothing to me. "Your choice is simple: serve me and live, or remain loyal to Merlin and die."
"There's nothing simple about betraying one's blood." Though she said the words, I could see the lie in her eyes. As far as I understood, from what I had gleaned from her conversation with Nimue, she didn't appear to have any love for Merlin.
"Merlin used you as a pawn," I pressed, sensing the storm of conflicting emotions that raged behind her eyes regarding the man she'd only recently discovered was her father—perhaps this was an avenue I could exploit, a crack in her armor that I could widen to serve my own purposes. The dragon stirred within me, recognizing opportunity like the predator it was. "He kept you ignorant of your own heritage, your own power, your own worth."
"I am certain—"
I found it curious that she would come to Merlin's defense and interrupted her by taking a step closer, watching as her jaw tightened almost imperceptibly. "What loyalty could you possibly owe to a father who treats his own flesh and blood as merely another weapon to be drawn from his arsenal? A tool to be sharpened and wielded against his enemies, then discarded when no longer needed?" My voice grew softer, more persuasive, as I continued my assault on her fractured allegiances. "He had your entire life to claim you as his daughter, yet he chose to let you live as a peasant. Only when he needed a spy did he suddenly remember your existence."
My words hung heavy in the air between us, and I could see them landing like physical blows against her already woundedheart. Merlin's deception had cut her deeply; that much was clear. Indeed, I could absolutely exploit this vulnerability for my own advantage.
"Consider my offer carefully," I continued, the words carrying the weight of both promise and threat as I turned away from her to face the tall windows overlooking the courtyard. A storm had moved in, and the rain had begun in earnest now, fat droplets striking the glass, creating rivulets that trailed down the window like so many rivers.
I let the silence stretch between us before speaking again without turning back to meet her gaze. "By dawn, I'll demand your answer." The words fell with the finality of a blade striking stone, each syllable carefully measured to convey that this was not merely a request but a royal decree. Time was a luxury she no longer possessed.
When I finally pivoted to face her once more, I found her still standing there, though something in her posture had shifted—a subtle straightening of her shoulders, a barely perceptible lift of her chin that spoke of internal resolve being tested against insurmountable odds. Her eyes met mine with a mixture of anger and calculation. It stirred something within me, something dangerously close to admiration.
"Do you understand?"
She nodded, the movement sharp and decisive despite the tremor I caught in her hands before she clasped them. "I do."
"Choose wisely, Guinevere." Her true name rolled off my tongue like a caress wrapped in steel. "Your life depends on it."
CHAPTER SIXTY-THREE
-CORVIN-
The Standing Stones rose before me like giant teeth, their surfaces slick with rain, pale in the moonlight.
I'd crossed this threshold from Annwyn to Logres many times before, but tonight the familiar ritual felt different. Heavier. Maybe it was the urgency that was driving me. Or the worry.
My blood sang as I passed between the markers—not with pain, but with recognition. Years of blood injections had seen to that, Merlin's essence woven into my veins like thread through cloth until the stones knew me as intimately as they knew their creator.
It was the only way I could travel through them as often as I did, disguised as The Fox—otherwise, the magic trigger would have destroyed me the second I stepped foot across the threshold.
The boundary between realms shimmered around me, that peculiar sensation of stepping through a waterfall made of starlight. My skin prickled as Logres fell away and Annwyn's twilight embraced me. The air changed immediately—thicker,charged with power that made my teeth ache if I breathed too deeply. Luminescent flowers opened along the path ahead, their soft blue glow illuminating my way forward.
But I couldn't say I noticed them. Instead, my mind was a battlefield of warring emotions—anger towards Merlin battling with bone-deep fear for Guin, both tangled up with the familiar, bitter ire I felt towards Arthur. Each thought crashed against the others like storm waves against stone, leaving me dizzy with the force of conflicting loyalties.
Arthur believed The Fox served him. That his most trusted spy in the borderlands kept watch over Annwyn's movements, reporting any threat that might leak from Merlin's realm into Logres proper. The irony would have been amusing if it weren't so pathetic. Every piece of intelligence I'd fed Arthur over the years had been carefully curated by Merlin himself—just enough truth to maintain credibility, never enough to matter.
I was Arthur's spy the way a dagger was a friend. Only useful when aimed at someone else's back.
But recently, my loyalties had shifted in ways Merlin hadn't anticipated. I'd spent more and more time in Camelot these past months than I had in years, haunting the castle like a restless spirit. Not that anyone had seen me—there was a reason I'd earned the nickname the "ghost of Blackhollow." The reason I'd spent so much time in Camelot went by the name of Guinevere.
I'd watched her from the shadows, followed her through torch-lit corridors at a distance that would keep me invisible but close enough to act, should I need to. Of course, I couldn't be there always, even if I wanted to be. But I had never been far.
When Arthur had sent me north to find the white-haired woman, I’d ridden as far as Thornwash—close enough to claim I’d searched thoroughly, far enough to avoid unnecessary distance from Camelot. I’d questioned innkeepersand merchants, made a show of tracking phantom leads through muddy villages and forgotten hamlets.
All performance. All lies.
I already knew exactly where the white-haired woman was. She stood in Camelot’s training yard each morning, disguised as Sir Lioran, swinging a practice sword with water magic flowing through her as if winter itself had claimed her bloodline.
Arthur’s obsession with finding the white-haired woman had concerned me from the start. It had been an absolute mistake on Guin’s part—that she’d allowed him to see her as her true self. She should have known her beauty was enough to make any man completely out of his mind for her. With a face that belonged in legend, not reality, she was easily the most beautiful woman in any room.
