“Find out what?What do others call him?” Michael asked. He could feel Charlotte’s eyes on him. He felt as if something life-altering were about to take place. Something even more life altering than traveling back in time. He took Charlotte’s hand under the table. He felt calmer with her near. What did Charles Lancaster have to do with anything?
“I only know how he signed the letter and he bid me to tell you never,nevermention this to anyone. It could mean everyone’s lives.”
“How did he sign it?” Michael asked. His heart was pounding in his ears. Why? Why did he feel sick…dizzy…
“He signed it exactly as Arthur Pendragon, King of Briton, King of Avalon, father of Micajah Pendragon.”
“My—no.” No way! He began to rise from his seat but Charlotte’s hand tethered him to sanity. Now, he was supposed to be King Arthur’s son? He laughed. He had to. This had to be a dream. He was in a coma. He was dead. Something, but this couldn’t really be happening to him. He couldn’t be King Arthur’s son! He shook his head. Why couldn’t he be? He didn’t know his true parents, only that they gave him his name. They were Pendridges. Pendragons.
“John, get him some wine!” he heard Charlotte cry.
“No.” He shook his head. “No wine. I’m all right.”
It was a grand delusion, this. King Arthur’s son, eh? He looked deep into his wife’s eyes as she leaned into him. “Charlotte, you aren’t real. You’re the perfect woman in my imagination.”
She glared at her father. “What you’re telling him is madness.”
“Why didn’t you tell me before?” Michael asked him.
The duke shook his head. “I have said too much already. You asked me why I believed you and now you know.”
“Detective?”
Michael and Charlotte turned to look behind them and saw Mr. Roldan Simeon, the time traveler, stepping into the hall with poor Old John looking around behind him.
“Who are you?’ the duke demanded, standing. “How did you get in? John!”
“’Tis all right, Father,” Charlotte calmed him. “He is a friend of Michael’s.”
“And, I would hope yours, as well,” Mr. Simeon said with a wide smile to Charlotte.
“I would hope so as well,” she agreed and invited him to sit for some breakfast.
He thanked her, bowed to the duke when Charlotte introduced them, then asked to speak privately to Michael.
“Charlotte and I were married yesterday, Simeon. You can speak in front of her. Come, we will go outside.”
He excused them to the duke and led the way to the front doors.
“Are you ill?” the time traveler asked him.
“Yes, Simeon. Tell me the truth. Am I dying? Was I hit by a car? Shot by someone with a grudge?”
“No, as I told you,” Simeon said, “this is real.”
“Am I Arthur’s son?”
Simeon laughed. Charlotte went pale and shook her head at him. He remembered her father saying never to tell anyone else. That included Roldan Simeon.
“Who told you such a thing?” Simeon asked and then looked around for anyone else. “Arthur’s son?” he repeated. “As far as I know, King Arthur’s sons are all dead. All except…” He gave Michael a grave look. “Mordred.”
Michael laughed. “Okay, now I’m Mordred?”
“If Arthur didn’t die in Avalon, then mayhap Mordred didn’t either.”
It was too preposterous to consider. Michael knew a little about Mordred from books. He was the one who dealt King Arthur the fatal blow, but not before Arthur killed him.
“Charlotte!” Another man’s voice called out as he stepped into the house, shattering the images in Michael’s head of a battlefield and men lying dead on it. “Did I miss the festivities?”
