Ari’s hands found the baby again, that hard, impossible place that felt both unreal and everything all at once. “We should get home before the time comes.”
“And put the baby in Mercer’s crosshairs?” Gwen hissed. Ari hadn’t forgotten that the corporation had demanded their child as a price for the rebellion, and the rest of the damn galaxy had acted like that was a perfectly reasonable cost. “Not happening. I’m giving birth here.”
“You can’t, Gwen. Think of all the ways it could go wrong… even if Camelot doesn’t get wind of the wedlock issue. You shouldn’t have given me that first aid pill.”
“I had to!” Gwen started to cry. Ari suddenly felt brittle. Powerless. Ari held Gwen close, apologizing until Gwen seized her feelings, smearing tears from her face with her knuckles. “We’ll do what we always do, Ari.”
“The impossible?”
Gwen’s small smile was another miracle. “I never doubted you’d come back. Not once.”
“That’s progress for us.” Ari kissed her, mentally reorganizing her to-do list. If Gwen needed to have the baby here, Ari would make sure it would happen. “Only two weeks until Arthur’s midsummer birthday celebration. Then the enchantresses will come bearing the chalice, I’ll steal it, you’ll give birth, and we’ll all return home to the same night we left. My moms will be waiting to help. We’ll hide the baby from Mercer easily. They’ll still be expecting you to be newly pregnant.”
Gwen didn’t say anything, and Ari could tell that she had her own plans. Her own doubts or fears or all three. For once, Ari didn’t press her. She gave Gwen space, which ached with distance. “First you have to get Merlin and Jordan out of the dungeons, Ari.”
“I have a plan for that, too. You’ll see at the melee. Do you think you could convince Arthur to fight on my team?”
“That’s a hard no. He’s not a fighter.”
“But don’t you see? That’s a problem. Arthur needs help, that much is obvious.”
“We should be protecting him, not throwing him in front of swords.”
Ari grew aggravated fast, tilting toward one of their infamous rows. “He has to toughen up, Gwen.”
“Ari, he’s afraid of everyone because people keep trying to assassinate him,” Gwen said. “I wish we could tell Arthur the truth, but we came out of a time portal to steal from you because your ancient, trapped spirit inside my wife told us to doesn’t really roll off the tongue. He might be young and inexperienced, but Arthur wants to be a good ruler in a desperate time, and even if Lionel is light-years away and Mercer repossessed my throne, I haven’t forgotten what that feels like.”
“So are we working with Arthur or around him, Gwen?”
“With him, as much as possible.”
“And you think he can keep up with us?” Ari’s voice slid over those words much like her body longed to slide over Gwen’s.
“Ari,” Gwen sighed, feeling it, too, pulling her close.
Footsteps echoed, and Gwen ducked from behind the tapestry, poised at the window. Ari peered out as the footsteps grew louder and then—pop—Gwen froze. Old Merlin hobbled by, sneering. By the time he’d turned the corner, another pop released Gwen from her statuelike state. She glanced around. “Did someone come by?”
Ari slipped out from behind the tapestry. “That old magical bastard! He froze you so he wouldn’t have to talk to you. What a damn—”
“Don’t forget he’s our Merlin, too, or he will be someday. It’s impossible to see most of the time, and it doesn’t excuse anything, but… our Merlin’s having a hard enough time with his body changing so rapidly. He doesn’t need to suffer a literal split personality.”
“You’re right.” Ari kissed Gwen’s fingers. “You’re going to be the best mom, lady.”
Gwen glowed, stars shining in her brown eyes from the narrow window. “I’m scared. The good kind of scared, I think.”
“I’m pretty sure that, at least, is the way it’s supposed to be.” Ari leaned in for a kiss, not caring that they were no longer behind a tapestry, but Gwen turned away.
“Merlin’s right. You shouldn’t have named yourself Lancelot. Jordan showed me the pages of her book… how they disappeared and reappeared. This is a dangerous game.”
“Lancelot is the knight who loves Gweneviere. Who else could I be, Gwen?” Ari’s pulse quickened. “I have to lie about who I am to survive here. My gender. My time. My planet. Being Lancelot was the only way I could keep up this damn charade without completely losing my—”
“They don’t get to be together, Ari! Not in a single one of the stories. Arthur stands between them. Their love is… thwarted. It’s a tragedy.” Gwen rested her head on Ari’s breastplate, but Ari couldn’t feel her through the armor. “And this? This is going to hurt.”
Ari’s sword clashed with Lamarack’s outside the stables. They’d left their side open for Ari’s short dagger again. She tapped Lam on their—rather striking—red leather armor with the blade’s handle. “Dead. Again. Your kidneys are important, Lam.”
“Remember while you’ve been practicing swordplay every day in this medieval paradise, I’ve been mucking stables.” Lam hunched on a hitching post, lifting the snarling dragon of their helmet to reveal a face stained with sweat and dirt. She missed Lam’s makeup and piercings. She missed their near-constant flirtations. It had always been her favorite distraction.
“Wouldn’t say it’s been a paradise. I killed a kid barely older than Merlin.”
Lam studied her, waiting for more. “Is this Hector?”
Ari nodded. “We joined up on the road. He was a runaway. Never stopped singing but he knew all the edible vegetation and how to skin dinner.” She let the rest out fast. “He saw my breasts, freaked out, went to report me for impersonating a knight. We fought and I knocked his head against a rock by accident. He died slowly.” She left off the part about digging his shallow grave with her bare hands. Ari started cleaning her sword.
“The young here are never young. And the old are dead.”
“What?”
Lam