Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“I’m going to kill you, you whelp.”

“Is that so?” Emrys pocketed the apple and bent his knees. His gaze swept downward, weighing the risk. A broken bone would certainly be painful. But the realm’s punishment for theft—the sundering of wrist from palm—even more so. “You’ll have to catch me first,” he added, and then he jumped. 

The cobblestone path was unyielding as his boots met with it. Jolts of pain shot up his legs before fading beneath the deeper ache of frustration and bitter disappointment. 

It had all been for nothing . . . it had not worked. 

Cursing underneath his breath, Emrys glanced back over his shoulder. A breeze of kelp and brine cut through the homespun fabric of his cloak. He traced the path he had taken, over the towering wall to the noble’s estate beyond. He listened carefully for any sounds of pursuit. 

Hearing none, Emrys set off. 

At the end of the alleyway, he checked that his face was still concealed beneath the hood of his cloak, and then he stepped into a crowded marketplace. A kaleidoscope of colour burst into view. He passed stalls heaped with produce of every conceivable size and shape, painted ceramic pots, and bolts of richly dyed fabric. 

On the surface, the seaside village appeared both warm and inviting. But during his time in Ealdor, Emrys had learned otherwise. Like fruit left too long to ripen, what lay beneath its skin was soft, spoiled and steeped with rot. He could hardly wait to put the village and all of its miserable inhabitants behind him. And in less than twenty-four hours, that was precisely what he would be doing. 

“Is that you, Emrys?” came a familiar voice. 

Emrys quickened his pace, yet his efforts proved in vain. The next moment, a hand seized his hood and wrenched it back, exposing his scowling face to the open air.

“I thought so,” the girl said. To his annoyance, she slipped into step beside him. “Careful, Princess. If the wind changes, your face might stay like that . . . and then everyone will see that you do have feelings after all.”

“Don’t call me that,” Emrys said coolly. He levelled the girl a glacial look before letting his expression settle back into its usual mask of indifference.

The girl smirked. 

Kelira was the nearest thing Emrys had to a friend in the village. Theirs was an accidental alliance, forged not by choice, but by the suspicion and dislike with which the rest of the villagers regarded them.

“But it suits you,” Kelira teased. “With your icy stares and your frosty silences. Do not pretend it is otherwise.”

Ice Princess. 

It was not only a slight against Emrys’s cold demeanour, but also a comment on his rumoured preference towards men, as well as his appearance. With his dark hair and slate-grey eyes, Emrys bore the unmistakable look of one from the South, a region remembered not for its snowbound beauty, but for the traitors, deviants and demons which it bred. 

Emrys cringed inwardly at the thought of what Nimueh would do with the nickname if she ever caught wind of it. 

“You’re not nearly as funny as you think you are, you know,” Emrys said coolly. 

“And yet, I make you laugh.”  

“Not on purpose.”  

They parted briefly to allow a portly man bearing a tray of toffee-coated apples to pass between them. As they drew together once more, Emrys found Kelira’s gaze to be fixed upon his face. 

“I suppose that you haven’t heard the news?” she asked. 

When Emrys did not respond, Kelira continued, “Kara has opened the Between. They say she travelled from the high street clear to the docks in but a blink.”

At the words, Emrys felt a dead weight sink right through his chest down to the bottom of his stomach. He had attended classes with Kara at the village’s school, and of all his peers, none had been more tiresome. The girl’s constant need to prove herself the cleverest in the room was about as admirable as it was deeply exhausting.

“You cannot be serious,” he said. 

“I am. Her mother paid two gold coins to send word ahead to the Sanctum Arcanum. They want her in this year’s intake. It seems you won’t be the only one departing for Camalot tomorrow . . . nor the only one with intentions of joining the Druithar.”

“How wonderful,” said Emrys in a hollow voice. “I’m happy for her.”

Kelira let out a mirthless laugh. “Do try to appear a little more sincere, won’t you? Pull the edges of your lips upward a little, towards your cheeks . . . it’s called a smile.” 

“I’d not begrudge anyone the chance to leave this forsaken place.”

A small smile played on Kelira’s lips. “I’m going to miss you, you know.” 

She slipped back through the crowd before he could respond. Emrys felt glad for it. He did not know what to do with such unexpected sentimentality.

As he walked, Emrys retrieved the stolen apple from his pocket and bit into it. His shoulders brushed against hurried passersby, the press of bodies gently ebbing and flowing, all of them oblivious to the maelstrom of feelings that were building inside him, threatening to spill out. 

Though he could sense it—could at times hear the whispers from beyond, soft as a caress that raised the hair upon his arms—Emrys had yet to open the Between himself. Nimueh would have his hide if a mere villager outshone her own apprentice at the Sanctum Arcanum, crown jewel of the realm’s universities. 

Not to mention, if Kara happened to get in the way of their plans . . . 

Everybody knew that Emrys had spent his life preparing to join the realm’s revered warrior-druids, those sworn to protect Camelot from the demons of the Between. What they didn’t know was that Emrys had no intention of fighting alongside them. Rather, he sought to destroy them from within.

A toothless old woman rattled a box of amulets beneath his nose. “One for you, pretty?” the woman called out as he passed. “Times such as these, one can never be too careful.”

Emrys did not break stride. 

A narrow laneway opened ahead, half hidden by shadow. He turned into it, making his way past the rows of crooked townhouses toward a black-painted door marked with the pale outline of an eye. As Emrys approached, the door creaked open.

Although some afternoon light filtered through the grimy windows, the interior of the house was dark and dreary. Emrys followed the hallway to the kitchen.

“Nimueh?” Emrys called softly, though he suspected the warlock was out. More and more, Nimueh had taken to leaving him on his own. Sometimes Nimueh was gone for days at a time, always returning without a word of explanation.

A soft caw answered from the rafters. A moment later, a large black crow swooped down, circling the room once before settling upon the back of a chair.

“Hungry?” Emrys asked. He placed the apple core onto the table. “Don’t tell Nimueh . . . it can be our secret.” 

The crow cocked its head, watching him intently with a single beady eye. In a sing-song voice, the crow replied, “Yous be cunning, yous be quick. But yous get caught, yer blood spills thick.”

Emrys’s expression thawed just a little. “I’ll be careful, on quick feet. My blood is my own to keep.” 

The crow made a soft noise of approval. “Cut them down, slit them throats.”

“Sew their skins to make a coat,” Emrys finished. 

“Yous be careful, yous promise?”

“Always.”

The crow let out a trill sound that might have been a snort. Then it seized the apple core between its beak, and it swooped back to the rafters.

Emrys shook his head and pulled off his cloak. He hung it by the door before crossing to the hearth. Jars of pickled frog and tails of newt sat in a neat line across the mantle above a simmering potion. Tendrils of fragrant steam rose from its surface. Kneeling by the fire, Emrys set another log onto the embers.

Warmth slowly seeped into his bones, dulling the aches of the day.

He tried not to think about Kara.

He failed immediately.

So, the girl had really done it—a feat which had eluded Emrys time and again. 

Only the most gifted could command the Between, opening portals to the mirror-realm of the demons—a place where time moved so slowly that one might seem to vanish from their own realm, only to return the next instant in another location. It was a very rare and powerful ability. Those who exhibited signs of the gift were always sent to the Sanctum Arcanum in Camalot, where they underwent years of rigorous training in the hope of one day becoming one of the Druithar.

It was a life of discipline, prestige and honour. 

The Sanctum Arcanum admitted new initiates only once per year, drawn either from those who excelled in the entrance examinations like Emrys, demonstrating potential in sensing the Between, or from the rarer few who managed to open a portal by their own hand, like Kara. 

If Emrys stood any chance of taking the Druithar down, he would have to become the very best of them. 

Recklessly, he had hoped that the petty theft—and subsequent threat of punishment—might stir whatever lay dormant inside him, that the need to get away might finally draw it out.

Still, it had not worked. 

A state of growing unease followed Emrys through his afternoon chores and late into the evening. Behind the drapes of his bed, Emrys settled himself beneath the coarse sheets and stared moodily at the ceiling.  

Nimueh had yet to return. 

Perhaps it had been naive to imagine they might spend his last evening in Ealdor together. He was not so foolish as to expect well-wishes or tender reflections on the past—that was not like Nimueh at all. The warlock was cruel, manipulative, and at times even sadistic. And yet, in her own way, she had cared for Emrys as best she could. Nimueh was the closest thing to a parental figure Emrys had ever known. 

With a click of his fingers, the candlestick on his bedside table was extinguished. Wax splattered violently across the wooden surface. Like every little bit of magic Emrys attempted, even this minor feat betrayed his lack of control and subtlety.

Emrys scrubbed a hand across his face, peering through the gaps between his fingers, the nails of which were bitten down to nothing, before closing his eyes.

He had spent so long in anticipation of this moment. Yet now that it was finally upon him, he could not shake the feeling that he was woefully unprepared for what lay ahead—that the Druithar would see straight through him, see him at once for what he truly was. And once they did, there would be no coming back from it. 

Chapter Text

Emrys awoke early the next morning. A sliver of pale sky was just visible through the drapes around his bed, indicating that it was close to dawn. Faint sounds drifted through the floorboards from the level below. He assumed that it was Nimueh, returned at last from whatever business had called her away. 

To part ways with the warlock, to leave behind everything familiar, filled Emrys with a confusing blend of feelings. Steeling himself, he rolled out of bed and readied for the day. 

His bedroom was a veritable disaster, and a fitting metaphor for the state of his nerves. He collected the books which lay strewn across the floor, remnants of the previous evening’s restlessness, and returned them carefully to his bag. He would take with him only that which he could carry. 

Picking his way between the stacks of half-packed boxes, Emrys opened the door and descended the stairs.

Nimueh stood in the kitchen. Long, spidery fingers worked over the bench top, decanting a potion into slender glass vials. Beads of wood and shards of bone threaded through her matted hair, framing a face of indefinable age. Tattooed upon either eyelid was an image of an eye, the same symbol painted on the front door. Other markings adorned her hands and wrists; runes, sigils, the eight phases of the moon. 

Even after all these years, Emrys still found the warlock’s presence unnerving. It was something in the way Nimueh carried herself, in the velvet softness of her speech, in the dark and malevolent aura that bled from her every pore.

“I trust that you are well rested?” Nimueh asked softly.  

Emrys wondered whether it was a trick question. Admitting he was rested might suggest he’d gone to bed early and neglected his chores, but claiming he wasn’t could imply he’d stayed up later than was sensible.

“I am,” Emrys answered cautiously before turning his attention to breakfast. 

“Good,” Nimueh murmured. The crow swooped down from the rafters, beating its wings before settling on Nimueh’s shoulder. “You seem distracted this morning,” Nimueh continued without so much as a glance at her familiar. “What is on your mind?” 

Emrys fixed his eyes upon the dish of butter. “It’s nothing.”

Nimueh smirked knowingly. “You need not worry. If you cannot trust in yourself, then trust in me—I am always right. There are plenty who have graduated from the Sanctum Arcanum with far less skill than you.”

“Knights and nobles, perhaps,” said Emrys, still speaking to the butter, “but nobody ever accused them of having any talent.”

“This pretence of humility does not suit you,” said Nimueh impatiently. “You are more than ready for this. Do not forget your true purpose, Emrys . . . do not forget what lies beyond the Great Divide.” 

Nimueh secured the last vial into a velvet-lined case, then fixed the full force of her gaze upon her apprentice. “I know that you visited Upper East yesterday,” she said. There was no mistaking the anger and contempt in her tone. “Have you learned nothing at all from the butcher’s son?”

Heat rose traitorously in Emrys’s cheeks as he glowered at the crow.

“Well?” Nimueh paused, as if to savour the pleasure of Emrys’s embarrassment, “Do not give them another reason to prosecute your character, Emrys. I have invested much into your training. It would be most inconvenient to me, if you met your end on the gallows before you’d even reached Camelot.” 

“When they draw the noose around my neck, I’m sure that your inconvenience will be the first thing on my mind.”

“Watch your tongue,” Nimueh warned. “Have you moved your things to the attic?”

“Yes.”

Nimueh’s dark eyes narrowed dangerously. 

“Just about,” Emrys amended quickly. 

There was a short pause, in which Emrys understood he had crossed over some invisible line. 

“Well?” said Nimueh. She spoke so softly that her voice was almost inaudible. “Whatever are you wasting time for? Away with you, now. Shoo!”

Emrys hastened to gather up his toast. He was almost through the door when Nimueh spoke again. “One more thing, Emrys.”

Emrys glanced back over his shoulder. 

Nimueh’s face had twisted into something truly sinister. “Do not ever let me catch you lying to me again. You can be certain that the consequences will be most unpleasant.” 

“I won’t,” said Emrys, moving quickly into the corridor. “Let you catch me,” he added underneath his breath. 

Hour by hour the attic filled, each box sealing away another piece of the past.

At noon, Emrys bid a hurried farewell to Nimueh and lugged his bag toward the village square. If he happened to pass the butcher’s on Lower West along the way, if a glass vial happened to slip from his hand, hissing as the curse it contained spilt upon the doorstep, then it was just as well that nobody paid any notice. 

A broad space opened before him, the cobblestoned path worn smooth beneath his boots. Horse-drawn carriages stood along one edge. Fragments of ocean peeked between the surrounding rooftops, carrying a breeze of salt and brine across the square.

As he neared the carriages, Emrys caught sight of a wispy, dark skinned girl holding a battered valise. Even from a distance, there was an unmistakable air of superiority about her, a feline poise in the way she held herself, and a keen intelligence in her wide brown eyes.

“Hello, Emrys,” the girl said, tucking a curl behind her ear. 

“Kara,” Emrys greeted coolly. 

An awkward silence passed between them. 

“Seems a waste to send two carriages when one might serve us both,” said Kara. “Don’t you agree?”

Emrys hesitated. The journey to Camelot was two days ride, and in his opinion, that was two days too many to be confined together in a small space.

Kara hurried to add, “I can cover half the fee.” 

Emrys’s grey eyes danced from the girl’s proud expression to her well-worn cloak, settling finally on her luggage, which appeared to be in even worse condition than Emrys’s own. Nimueh was hardly wealthy, but the services of a warlock were always in demand, and they had never wanted for necessities . . . unlike many others.

Realising Kara’s true motive, Emrys sighed heavily. 

“I’d be happy for the company,” he lied. 

As the coachman hoisted their luggage onto the rack at the back of a carriage, Emrys stole a final glance across the square. He took in the crooked eaves, the press of the cobblestones beneath his feet, the glimmer of the ocean in the distance. Then he climbed aboard the carriage, and the doors slammed shut behind him. 

With a sudden lurch, they rolled forward.

Kara drew a book from her pocket, though she did not open it. Her fingers drummed restlessly against the cover.

Emrys stared at his own pale reflection in the carriage window and let out a long, slow breath. He counted to five . . . still, he felt her gaze upon him. Finally, he said, “Out with it, Kara.” 

Kara bit her lip. “What do you suppose they’ll make of someone like you in the capital?”

Emrys levelled the girl a look cold enough to freeze the air between them. “Hopefully a better opinion than the one I’ve made of you,” he said. 

“I don’t imagine that I’ll be well liked,” Kara admitted. She cast a pointed look from the hoop which dangled from Emrys’s earlobe, to the little runes inked upon his fingers, to the dark hair which fell artlessly across his forehead. “But you they will despise.”

Emrys did not think she meant the comment to be rude, though that did not excuse the fact that it was. If Kara had ever owned a sense of tact, she had long ago misplaced it.

Irritatingly, he thought that she was probably right.

Emrys smiled coldly. “Let them hate me. I’m not trying to win a place in their hearts.”

There was a short pause. 

“A word of advice, Emrys,” said Kara. Her expression was conflicted. “Don’t make this harder than it needs to be. Given the chance, people may surprise you. Something tells me that you’ll need every ally you can find.”

“Surprises tend to be unpleasant in my experience,” said Emrys.

Kara offered no response. 

Emrys turned back to the window, watching with unfocused eyes as the carriage pulled them through the outskirts of the village, moving steadily northward. 

“How did you do it?” he whispered. 

“Pardon?” 

“How did you open the Between?”

Kara took a moment to gather her thoughts. “I’ve tried to replicate the conditions since, but it’s difficult to account for every variable.”

Emrys raised his eyebrows. “D’you mean to say that you don’t know how you did it? That it was an accident?” 

“It was no accident,” said Kara slowly. “The gods have blessed me with this gift. I must have faith that this was always their intention for me.” 

Emrys wanted to scoff. 

Where had the gods been when the line of the Great Divide had been drawn? Where had the gods been when the butcher had dragged his son to the town square, had delivered him to the Oracles, knowing well what cruelty would follow?

No. Emrys had no faith in the gods. 

Tempering his response to what was expected of him, he said, “Of course. And so you will follow the path the gods have chosen for you, and you will join the Druithar. It’s not a life many would choose for themself.” 

“It’s a great honour.”

“Yes. And a death sentence, more often than not.”

Kara opened her book and lowered her eyes to the page. Silence stretched between them, and Emrys thought the conversation over. He was unprepared, then, when she said, “It doesn't matter how I feel. It’s what I have to do.”

Emrys thought he understood her meaning. 

The opportunity would not only raise her family’s social standing, but also secure them with a steady income. She had a duty to her family to accept it, to make the most of it, to live as long as she could . . . for the coin would flow only while Kara drew breath.

Still, it was an opportunity. 

There were not many chances to become something other than what their parents were, to improve their lot in life. 

The fields outside the carriage gave way to drier earth, the trees grew taller and the air grew warmer, and the land rose in a gentle slope to curve around the base of a mountain.

Upon reaching Camalot, Emrys would face his first test: a vow of fealty. Each initiate would swear a pledge to the realm, to devote themselves wholly to its service, forgoing all other bonds of flesh and desire, surrendering mind, body and soul, a promise to lay down their lives in the realm’s defence.

The vow was magical, binding, and utterly unbreakable.

If anything went wrong . . . if the countermeasures did not take . . . Emrys did not want to consider where that would leave him. 

His thoughts drifted back to what Kara had said. Perhaps she was right, that life at the Sanctum Arcanum might be easier with a friend by his side. But a friend would only complicate things in the end, and solitude had long been Emrys’s companion. The icy barriers he had built around himself ensured no one dared come too close. And he preferred it that way, he thought. It was far simpler, far safer.

After all, expectations were a kind of trap. Set them, and people would invariably fail you.