Russ takes over. “Full-corp hellhound. Not full-grown, but big enough. We dusted it easily, were on our way back, and wham, Sel senses another one on South campus, so we head that way.”
“Russ was wounded,” Felicity adds. For the first time I notice the smear of dried blood on her glowing chestplate. Russ’s blood, by the rattled look on her face. I realize his weight leans more heavily than usual on his left side. “I carried him back. Just as William got started on him, Sel sensed another demon. This time on mid-campus. He went back out right away with Sar and Tor.” My stomach sinks at her next words. “We’ve been calling Nick since the first attack, and he and Lord Davis aren’t answering. And now, Sel and Sar and Tor aren’t back.”
“It’s happening,” Fitz says harshly. “It’s just like Lord Davis said, this is how it starts. We can’t wait until we’re all in agreement to do something. This is what we’re trained to do. The shadows are rising. This is Camlann!”
“No,” I say. “It’s not.”
“Help!” Sarah’s frantic scream tears through the hallway. “Help!”
William and Whitty are through the door before anyone else has even moved. The rest of us crowd into the hallway to see the two boys take Tor’s still form from Sarah and rush her down to the infirmary.
“Move!” William barks as he runs. Tor’s head lolls back in his arms, supported by Whitty’s steady fingers. Blood, deep crimson in the fluorescent hall lighting, trickles in a line down the side of her mouth and pools in her straw-colored hair. Her chainmail, light and thin for an archer, but strong, has been rent into shreds. Chunks of aether metal links drop from what remains of it, falling to the floor and exploding back into nothing as William passes by.
I tell Alice to hang back and follow William into the infirmary. Felicity and Russ join me, pushing the doors open after I enter. Sarah has already sped past both of us. I didn’t even see her move.
Sel must have already bonded the Scion and Squire, because William and Whitty work in unspoken concert over the archer’s body on the table, William hovering his hands over Tor’s head and Whitty moving his fingers like he’s playing a piano inches above her chest and stomach. They speak without looking at each other, without looking at anyone. Their eyes are closed.
“Broken ribs, internal bleeding. Punctured left lung. Spleen and left kidney sliced right down the middle. Damn.”
“Explains the blood in her oral cavity. No injuries to her brain or cervical spine.”
Whitty hesitates. “I don’t know how to—”
“I’ll do it.” William wordlessly moves into Whitty’s space, calling aether into his fingers until it encases Tor’s torso like a shining shell. He seems to pull away from us and into another world inside his head. His mouth moves soundlessly, speaking Welsh again, I think, and his eyes move rapidly under his lids like he’s in REM sleep.
“What happened?” Felicity asks Sarah, who is hovering over Tor’s still form with trembling hands at her mouth.
“I should have been there,” Sarah says, her voice quivering. “It should have been me. That’s my job. This is my job.”
“Sarah, honey.” Felicity grasps the smaller girl’s shoulder. Sarah flinches, but her lost eyes find Felicity and slowly focus. “Tell us what happened.”
Sarah tries several times before words come out. “A… a… fox, I think? Something that stole Sel’s aether and weakened our armor. We—we had it cornered, but then a cougar showed up.”
“A hellcougar?” Russ exclaims. “What in the f—”
Felicity silences him with a look. “What happened then?”
Sarah blinks. “Tor heard it before we did. She went to pull an arrow, but it was too fast. Fast as us. It… it just jumped, and it—I thought it was going to open her up right in front of me…” Sarah sobs. Her face has gone white as fresh snow, and her shoulders start to shake uncontrollably.
“Get her on the table,” Whitty orders, already moving to the other table in the room. Russ lifts her like she’s made of shredded paper and sets her gently on the table. Whitty grasps her hand, and her body goes limp, but her eyes and face stay alert. A calming injection of aether, right from his hand to her system.
“Where’s Sel?” Russ asks carefully, the tension suppressed in his voice.
“He sent me back with Tor. He said he could handle them himself.”
Felicity gasps beside me, but I can’t breathe at all. Sel is good. He’s better than good, but if he’s bonded Whitty and William, and maybe even Greer and Pete? He could be too intoxicated to fight.
“Sel said…” Sarah moans quietly. She tries to sit up, but Whitty presses gently against her shoulder. Her eyes scan the room wildly until they land on mine. “He said he thinks Lord Davis is trying to force Arthur’s hand.”
Russ’s head jerks up. “What the hell does that mean?”
“Davis wants Arthur to Call Nick,” I tell them. “But maybe it isn’t working.”
I gather everyone who’s still standing in the room down the hall, along with Alice, and tell them why I came here and what I know. What Sel and I found, what Lord Davis did to me. And what he said he’d do if his son refused to claim his throne.
I worry that they won’t believe the parts of the story that Sel and I uncovered at Davis’s home, with Sel’s title in the balance as it is, but the Legendborn trust him more than he thinks. It helps that Sarah shared his message and that there were so many witnesses to Nick’s argument with his father.
And some of them, I think, have come to trust me, too.
Russ speaks first, the frustration in his voice barely under control. “But how is Lord Davis breaking his Oaths? He’s taken the First Oath, the Oath of Service, who knows what else.”
William grimaces. “Every Oath comes back to the same common commitment—to be in service to the Order’s mission. If Lord Davis’s logic is that warped, it could be that, from his perspective, his intentions are in service to the mission. Or maybe his Kingsmage has protected him somehow from the Oaths’ effects. A Master mage would know more.”
“But how would Nick be Called?” Felicity says. “The Scion of Lancelot is at Northern, and he’s still dormant.”
“As far as we know,” Fitz interjects. “Maybe Davis fixed that, too, or he’s working with allies. Maybe that Regents’ meeting at Northern last week was just a cover.”
William runs a hand over his face. “Or the kid at Northern is still dormant, and threatening Arthur’s Scion will somehow force Lancelot to Call his.”
“It doesn’t matter!” Russ throws his hands up in the air. “It doesn’t matter if Davis is trying to force the Callings if the demons he’s letting cross over are real. Why is Arthur waiting?”
“Could Nick hold Arthur off?” I ask William, thinking of Nick’s confession about trying not to be Called and his desire to prevent Camlann at all costs. “Is that possible?”
William blinks. “No. There have been Scions who wanted to resist the Call before, but they’ve all failed.” He scratches his head. “I mean, I could see it for the other knights, maybe, but the strength of will—and life force—it would take to stop the Call of Arthur…”