Morgain's Revenge - Laura Anne Gilman [69]
“Are you all right?” Newt, his hands gentle and comforting on her shoulder, urged her to respond.
“I think so,” she told him. “Help me up.”
It took both boys to get Ailis to a standing position. Where they had merely been knocked to the ground by the shadow-figure’s last attack, she had been literally blasted by its magic. Once on her feet, although unsteady, Ailis opened her palm and let the spell-light glow more strongly, lighting her way to the worktable.
“So…tired.”
“Draw on me.” Newt, still supporting her, whispered in her ear. “Draw on us both. You know how. Don’t think—do. Do what you need to do.”
He was right. The knowledge rose from deep within her. She felt strength flow from where their skin met hers, giving her the ability to focus on the task at hand.
The pot still simmered. It was still a threat, however abandoned and contained. Ailis raised her palm over the smoke. Flinching a little from the fumes, she concentrated, and sent the spell back down into the green liquid. The scrap of fumes she had originally stolen met and merged with the source, taking with it the spell she had created.
“It is like cooking,” Morgain had said. Sometimes, adding a single spice changed the entire complexion of the dish. Sometimes, you had to improvise.
“It’s safe now. I think.” Morgain had only shown her the basics of spell-making; everything else she had guessed at. All she could do was her best, and hope Merlin would be able to protect them against anything else.
Merlin.
Merlin?
Child? Ailis?
She caught at that distant voice, anchored herself, then raised her eyes to the far wall where a faint glimmer was forming.
Ropes, under her fingers. Pulleys. Open here, close there, send one way and not the other…
“What is that?” Newt asked, not having seen the transport portal before.
“A way home,” Ailis said, even as Gerard instinctively averted his eyes, anticipating the blast of light that had occurred back in Camelot. She reached out a hand, her fingers flexing and stretching as though manipulating something the others could not see. “Come on.”
“Are you sure? Did you make that? Or was it…” and Newt scanned around as though expecting Morgain to pop out at them again.
“Look!” Gerard said, pointing. Through the green glow, all three could see the familiar stone corridors of Camelot, the leg of a chair, and…yes, glimpses of Merlin’s robes, as he floated back and forth!
“Hurry,” Ailis said as the vision shimmered. “It won’t last long. We have to go!”
TWENTY-THREE
“Gahhhh!” Merlin glared at the three of them, then carefully pried himself off the ceiling, and lowered himself slowly back down to the floor. He took a moment to brush himself off and adjust his robes. Then and only then did he look up to meet their carefully straight-faced expressions.
“So nice of you to come by to see me, however unexpectedly. Ailis, child, it’s good to see you.” Merlin looked at them carefully, and didn’t ask where Sir Caedor was, or what had happened to their horses or supplies. Or how they had managed to suddenly appear in the middle of his private rooms.
“You’ve been away for some time,” was all he said. “Arthur’s been gone and back with his Marcher Lords already. I was beginning to become somewhat worried.”
“The Quest?” Gerard asked, focusing on the thing that had been all-important to him not so long ago.
“Is about to ride out, if not the next morning, then the day after that. They have been waiting only for better weather—something stirred up a nasty storm in the north, and we’ve been feeling the effects of it even down here. But come, sit, tell me everything. Ailis, you fairly glow of magic. What have you been up to?”
She opened up her hand, where a trace of her spell still lingered. “Morgain wants the Grail,” she started. “For her own glory, but also because she believes that it’s the only way to protect her beliefs, her way of life, against Arthur. Something about the land, the Old