“How?”
“Cleansing. I have only ever done it on myself, and only on the outside of my body. But if I focus it on his wound, I might be able to burn out the parts that are not him. The parts that are killing him.”
Arthur looked down at his knight. He stroked a hand down Sir Tristan’s cheek. Then he stood. “No.”
“I have to try! It might not work, but—”
“It is not about that. You cannot do magic here, in the middle of my men. You could be discovered.”
“But Sir Tristan—”
“Sir Tristan knew the risks of fighting at my side.”
“As do I!”
“Guinevere. Please. If what you are were known within the kingdom, at best you would be banished. At worst? It would disrupt everything I have built. People would suspect that I knew, that I allowed it. How could I justify all the people who have been banished or killed for using magic? Sir Tristan lived with honor. If he dies, it will be the same way, and he will always be remembered. I will not lose both of you.”
“Arthur, I—”
“No.”
She shrank from his voice. This was the first time he had spoken to her not as Arthur, but as a king. The power and weight of his command had a physical aspect to it that left her cowed.
“I have to keep you safe,” he whispered, Arthur once again.
“King Arthur!” one of the knights shouted. “Wolf!”
“Form a circle around the clearing!” Arthur strode away, picking up his sword from the ground and unsheathing it. Guinevere shuddered. “Face out! Let nothing through!”
Mist was curling around the clearing, sending tendrils in as though probing for weaknesses. There was no howling, no noise. Which made it worse, in a way. Then Sir Gawain shouted, and there was a snarling yelp. Guinevere could do nothing.
But…no one was watching her. They were all occupied with staying alive.
She hurried to the fire and took a single twig from the edge. The tip of it glowed with a spark. Back at Sir Tristan’s side, she knelt and closed her eyes. She needed to change the way the magic flowed, change what she wanted it to do. She risked the fire taking control and burning Sir Tristan from the inside out. Either way she would be responsible for his death. She would not let it happen without a fight.
She put her finger against the spark, let it jump to her. Fed it her breath. Then she held it in front of Sir Tristan’s mouth and let it taste his breath. She brought it to his wound and coaxed it from her finger to his skin. Sir Tristan flinched, but did not wake up.
“Burn all that is not him,” she whispered, focusing on the flame, focusing on bending it to her will. It danced, a shimmering light, along the marks of the wolf’s teeth. And then it disappeared.
Sir Tristan twitched. Sweat broke out on his skin and then evaporated as quickly as it appeared. She kept her hand on his arm, kept herself attuned to the spark running through him. It was greedy, starving. She commanded it to only feed on what was not Sir Tristan. There was so much there. She could feel the infection, a creeping darkness trying to take him. It felt menacing and angry and…sentient.
She pushed the fire harder. It ate, and ate, and just when she thought it would not work fast enough to save Sir Tristan, the fire paused. There was nothing left for it. Nothing that it had been commanded to eat. It turned outward, ready to devour Sir Tristan.
She called it back. It hesitated. She was going to lose control. Panic flared, but she met it with determination and instinctive desperation.
She would not lose him.
Something inside her, something unknown in the midst of all the knots and spells, surrounded the fire, drawing it back. Chasing it and channeling it away from Sir Tristan. It rushed back to her hand, burning her. She cried out in pain, smothering the flames with her hood. Her fingers were blistere
d. But the fire was out.
She looked up to search for a canteen but froze like a deer before a hunter. Mordred was watching her. He was half-turned to the forest, but his eyes, ever attuned to her, had seen everything.
She was caught.
It was over.
Then Mordred looked back toward the forest without a word.