“Blasphemy,” Vivian hissed. “Giving our superior blood to a human such as him.”
Merlin glanced side-long at her. “I have my orders.” He turned back to Uther with the sedation mask in his white hand. “You will fully resemble Galois by the time the Avalonian healing is complete. In the meantime, may I suggest you stay out of eyesight of others.”
Uther relaxed now. He gazed up into the white lights above him. “I will fight this war now. I will be in Excalibur. No one will see me.”
Nodding, Merlin slipped the mask onto Uther’s face and watched as his eyes immediately began to glaze over.
“What will you do when you have won this war?” he asked cautiously.
A dark smile spread Uther’s face. “Go home to my new wife, of course.”
In just a few heartbeats, Uther was unconscious. Merlin gave a sigh of relief and dropped his face into his hands. Vivian scowled at him and turned to leave.
“An Avalonian gone so low.” Her voice was just over a whisper. “I see much, Merlin, and for you all I see is a human god’s slave. You have turned your back on your people to aid this beast?” She flicked her hand at the sleeping Uther as the D.R.U.I.Ds went to work on him. “Have you no honor?”
Merlin didn’t stop her as she left with the soft swishing of her robes and the lab doors. She could never know that what he did, he did for every D.R.U.I.D and Avalonian. And every human.
8
Family
Far above Camelot, on the glowing moon of ever-evening Lothian, Galois stood in his floating manor above the wild bioluminescent forest below him. Lothian shared in Camelot’s gravitational pull and when the moon waxed new, the gravity became light and his keep hovered above the rest as well as large masses of loose earth where some had built their homes. Below, a strange creature cried its howl to the sky above blazing with stars. He had left Camelot. He felt like a coward hiding on the moon, but his daughter had welcomed him warmly.
Igrain watched him from her station where she had been sorting through the census that had just finished for Lothian. The eco system thrived, beautiful and perfectly in balance. The D.R.U.I.Ds still resided close by even though they were supposed to evacuate. After talking with Galois, they decided there was no reason to make them move. They seemed peaceful enough.
“Everything is coming along,” she said quietly to not disturb her husband. Standing up, she moved to her wardrobe and changed in to soft evening clothes. Her black skin and red hair made her look like a goddess in the glowing Lothian night. Galois continued to watch the distant orb in the sky, Camelot, as Igrain tried to distract him with her sensuality. From the balcony, Camelot appeared as a soft radiant blue planet. No sounds of war could be heard.
“In the morning, Uther will march against Vortigern and extract his revenge,” Galois sighed. “This is not how our lives were supposed to begin.”
Igrain knew it too. In a matter of hours, her husband, once bright and mischievous, had turned dark and serious. He hadn’t smiled or made a joke in days it seemed.
“We could warn him,” she suggested. Immediately she wished she hadn’t said that. That would mean betraying Uther and possibly aiding his death. Vortigern was older and wiser in the ways of battle. He thought Uther would never kill his father’s friend. He counted on Uther to be inexperienced and frightened.
“I cannot,” Galois said just as she knew he would. “He would kill Uther.” He stopped and cleared his throat as it tightened with tension. “I cannot do that to my friend. For Constans…” But his voice caught in his throat.
“Our friend,” Igrain reminded him gently. She stood next to him now, her military uniform and boots gone for the night. Now she dressed elegantly and simple in her white gown and long hair.
“Why can’t you be like this more often?” Galois asked as she slipped into his arms. “Why can’t I? Why do we have to be the military couple?”
Igrain tried to smile, but the memories were heavy on her lips. “Because we always have been. I never wanted to be this strong when I was girl. I loved our lives before the Project began.”
Galois scoffed. “Living on a simulated planet and not knowing how you got there? Not knowing what happened to our ancestors or where they went? I almost prefer the years of cryosleep.”
“And many years it was,” Igrain reminded him in a stern voice. “We had good lives on that ship.”
“But false lives.”
She exhaled exasperatedly and pushed away from him. “Why are you like this now? I cannot be the way you were: all smiles and jokes. I am tactical and cunning. It is your job to be clever and inappropriate.”
“When am I inappropriate?” he asked.
Her eyebrows went far up her head as she dared him to remember the incident.
“Alright, alright, so I told your mother she was comparable to a Meldorian ox, so what?”
“She was pregnant!”
“At least she was.” A smile almost played into his face. “Imagine if she wasn’t and I said that?”
Igrain tried to hold a stern face but it cracked into a modest grin. “Still, you never liked her.”
“That’s fine. I married her daughter; I don’t have to like her.” He cupped her chin in his hands and she sighed gratefully as he kissed her. For a brief moment, they forgot about Camelot and Vortigern and held each other in the sparkly luminescence of a moon all their own.
“We must warn Vortigern,” Igrain said quietly into his shoulder. “Uther will bring a greater civil war
