A Crystal of Time (The School for Good and Evil The Camelot Years #2) - Soman Chainani Page 0,178

said the Lady. “I smell it. The blood of Arthur’s eldest son.”

“A son still alive thanks to your protection,” said the Snake. “The usurper’s knight is dead.”

“A usurper your father believed would be king,” the Lady remarked. “Arthur never spoke of you to me. And yet, Excalibur remains trapped in stone. A coronation test unfulfilled. Waiting for you, it seems. Arthur had his secrets. . . .”

The Snake moved closer, stepping into the Lady’s waters.

“As do you,” he said. “The kind of secrets only a king could know.”

“Oh? Then why wear a mask, King of Secrets?” the Lady asked him. “I smell the blood of a Good soul, the blood of a Lion. Why wear the guise of a Snake and attack your fellow kingdoms? Kingdoms you are meant to rule?”

“For the same reason you wish to be a queen instead of the Lady,” the Snake replied. “For love.”

“You know nothing of my wishes,” the Lady scoffed.

The Snake removed his mask, revealing Japeth’s ice-blue eyes and smooth, sculpted face. The Lady gazed at him, transfixed.

Watching from the shore, Tedros’ blood boiled, his body ready to attack, unable to discern Present from Past.

“Come with me,” Japeth said to the Lady. “Come to Camelot. Leave this lonely cave behind.”

“Precious boy,” she cooed. “Many a king has flattered me with promises of love. Your father included. Perhaps to make me even more devoted and passionate in my service. But none ever meant it. How could they? None could accept the costs. To love me means I must relinquish my powers. No king would abide that. I’m more valuable here. Good’s greatest weapon.”

“I can protect myself,” said Japeth.

“Says the boy who just admitted he’s alive because of my protection,” the Lady replied, glancing at Chaddick’s corpse on the shore.

“And yet here I remain,” said Japeth. “Why? I don’t need anything more from you. I can walk away right now. But I sense a kindred heart, imprisoned by magic. A heart that can give us both what we want.”

He stepped deeper into her water, his breath misting towards her, their bodies so close. The Lady leaned in, inhaling him. “Sweet, sweet blood of Arthur . . . ,” she sighed softly. “And what of my duties to Good? My duties to defend Camelot beyond your reign?”

“Good has grown arrogant and weak,” said Japeth. “You’ve defended it for too long. At the expense of your soul.”

“My soul,” the Lady bantered, touching his cheek. “A boy claims to see my soul. . . .”

“I know you are lonely,” said the Snake. “So lonely you’ve started to feel bitterness over your place here. You feel yourself changing. No longer do you hold the purity of Good within your heart. You dip into darkness and desolation, the fuels of Evil. All because you won’t give yourself what you want. Stay here any longer and you’ll begin to make mistakes. Instead of protecting Good, you’ll come to harm it. Evil will stake its seed in your heart. If it hasn’t already.”

The Lady looked at him. All playfulness was gone.

“You yearn for love as much as I,” said the Snake. “And yet, neither of us can attain that love without another’s help. Someone who can bring that love to life. Otherwise, that love will remain a ghost, a phantom, beyond the rules of the living. I will do anything to find that love. Anything. As will you.”

The Lady’s skin flushed. “How do you know? How do you know I would do anything for love?”

The Snake met her eyes. “Because you already have.”

He kissed her, his hands pulling her down, as the Lady fell into the Snake’s embrace, the lake’s waters curling up around them like the petals of a flower in full bloom.

But then something in the Lady’s face changed. Her body went rigid, resisting her new love’s. Her mouth pulled away, the veils of water collapsing. She stared at the boy who’d kissed her, her big black pupils jolting with surprise, panic . . . fear.

Japeth grinned.

Instantly, the Lady began to dwindle, her body blighting, desiccating. Her hair fell out in clumps; her spine contorted and crackled . . .

All as the Snake calmly walked away.

Tedros felt Agatha’s hands on him, pulling him back into the portal.

The instant the glass of Dovey’s ball appeared beneath Tedros, he was on his feet, pointing at the old crone—

“Your face . . . I saw your face . . . ,” he panted. “You knew something was wrong. . . . You knew