#foa:carys

[lorweaver]

Frost of Avalon WIP Page

Keywords: King Arthur, Fantasy, Young Adult, Slow Burn, Strong Female Expected CW: Fantasy Violence Content: excerpts, characters, content

“Please, my lady,” someone rasped behind her. “It would hurt my king to lose you!”

Carys locked her lips and swallowed a frightened sob. She couldn’t throw herself into the lake. Centuries underwater hadn’t ebbed a second of her life. A banshee could be killed one way. A magical weapon—like the one she held now.

She climbed onto the railing and looked down. The lake would hide her corpse long enough for it to fade away. Only one such as Merlin would have the intuition to find her, and she doubted he would bother. She whimpered but stood steady and ready.

“Do something brave for once in your life,” she whispered.

She nestled the dagger point between her breasts where the sword in the stone once lay and, with a soft cry, plunged it down.

An arm speckled in decaying armor caught her wrist. Carys shouted, the tip of the dagger slicing through her clothes and severing flesh, but it did not sweep deep enough to end her existence.

“Please, my lady,” someone rasped behind her. “It would hurt my king to lose you!”

Carys’s eyes widened. She knew that voice. Then her rescuer stumbled, and in her attempt to steady him, pitched them off the bridge.

Needles of cold shot into Carys’s side. The ice sheet she landed on snapped under her, and a gush of water lurched up. Carys clamped her eyes shut and swept her arms overhead. She broke the surface screaming, the cold slicing into her wound over and over. She threw herself onto a thicker berg and whimpered in pain.

“B-bed-bedev—Bedevere!” Carys whipped her head around, but the one-armed knight had not resurfaced. She heaved, tempted to search for him, but her senses told her he had gone. “Sir Bedevere... I don’t know how else to save him,” she cried.Tags below the cut. Ask to be added/removed.

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[lorweaver]

Frost of Avalon WIP Page

Keywords: King Arthur, Fantasy, Young Adult, Slow Burn, Strong Female Expected CW: Fantasy Violence Content: excerpts, characters, content

“This,” she gestured at the lake, “is your life hanging betwixt my fingers.“

It was time to force a little flow into her magic.

Her next breath released the spell disguising her, and she emerged in the form given to her when becoming a frost.

Her reflection shone like an eerie light through the mirror. She hadn’t had one as a banshee, but a frost was meant to be seen.

The mourning fairy’s hair lay in dusty silver and blue strands to her waist, her skin shone like porcelain, and a round sunburst mark glittered silver on her brow. Below it, her eyes pierced as if mirrors and her lips darkened to the color of a black cherry’s skin. Her emerald, silk dress pooled around her, and the sheer cape on her shoulders billowed as if a shadow.

The intruder gawked at the form in the glass, her fierce beauty rattling him as he slowly turned around. Dismay crowned his face when he saw the cruel presence occupied his reality. Foolish, Carys thought, to hope she lay beyond the mirror.

She lifted her palm and waved her fingers. Their surroundings changed, and the intruder found himself balancing on the ice of the mansion’s lake, a gray sky above and grand evergreens watching in anticipation. His eyes rolled around his skull, the precariousness of his situation making him pale.

He flinched when Carys laid a hand on his cheek.

“This,” she gestured at the lake, “is your life hanging betwixt my fingers. As an exile, there is nothing stopping me from doing what I wish with you. So answer me. Why have you infiltrated this mansion?”

Her prisoner attempted a reply, but stutters made him unclear until he forced his voice. “He sent me to find it!”

“It?” Carys tilted her head.

“The sword. The sword from the stone maiden. He wants it. He says it belongs to him.”

Carys’s eyes narrowed. “He?” She didn’t care for his ambiguity.

“Lord Lot. He wanted me to find the sword and bring it to him.”

Carys’s chin dipped, and she glared at him through her brow as a bitter wind threw her cape and latched onto his limbs. “I did not take in that sword for it to go to another. Nor would I have released it into the hands of he who was not the Once and Future King.” She stepped away, he cowering under her displeasure, and she lifted her hand. “Sleep.”

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[lorweaver]

Frost of Avalon WIP Page

Keywords: King Arthur, Fantasy, Young Adult, Slow Burn, Strong Female Expected CW: Fantasy Violence Content: excerpts, characters, content

“Wailer? Why? Because banshees wailed?”

Mr. McKay arrived next. He waved for everyone to sit then cleared his throat. “We have a new student.” The others perked up.

Carys’s upper lip lifted as she realized he meant to introduce her. So much for being inconspicuous.

“Car-ees Wailer.”

Carys winced at his pronunciation and the surname Mel had picked for her. Wailer? Why? Because banshees wailed? If that didn’t implicate her like a waving red flag, she couldn't figure what would. Her scowl rested on Mel, who giggled into her hand.

Carys stood and met Mr. McKay’s stare. “Care-iss,” she started through clenched teeth, “Wailer. My ancestors were mourners. Hence the terrible surname. Please don’t use it."

“Ah, right.” Mr. McKay nodded, and she sat. “Please welcome her and treat her kindly. Now.”

He sounded nervous, but Carys couldn’t think why and wondered at Mel massaging her temples across the room.

“The school will host a tournament in honor of the Kingdom of Light’s knights,” Mr. McKay went on.

A murmur of excitement rolled through the room, and girls tittered over getting to see handsome knights. Carys frowned at the collective reaction. Even Mel looked interested, and she hated violence.

“Though students won’t participate in the events, clubs will host…”

Carys’s fingers curled against her cold desk as she tuned out the rest of Mr. McKay’s speech. Were tournaments different than she remembered them? Her attention fell on the silvery threads of Arthur’s hair. Could she keep him safe? Several knights had lost their lives in the first tournament she remembered, and the first she’d sung to death.

Carys clenched her teeth. That was the night Arthur pulled the sword from the stone, and the night she died.

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[lorweaver]

Frost of Avalon WIP Page

Keywords: King Arthur, Fantasy, Young Adult, Slow Burn, Strong Female Expected CW: Fantasy Violence Content: excerpts, characters, content

The school grounds flourished with all sorts of winter foliage, but she hadn’t expected to find blue roses in winter.

Carys coughed and clutched her chest. She couldn’t breathe. Her eyes darted in search of someone, but she was as alone now as when the other banshees threw her into the lake. She bent, desperate for the air to move. It hurt! She clamped her eyes shut and hit her chest. Then, a white snake sped from the snow and flicked across her foot. Carys stumbled back, and the air spun free. She gasped, her eyes trembling, and she glanced around for the creature that had snapped her out of it. Gone. She took a deep breath, her shoulders slumping, and pressed her forehead against a chilly post.

It’d felt like the first time she’d sucked in all that water. She forced slow inhales and let the air out even slower. It didn’t stop the shaking.

Arthur and Merlin weren’t the only ones she hid from. What if the other banshees found her? She shut her eyes, not ready for that.

Carys left the breezeway and wandered into a garden. The school grounds flourished with all sorts of winter foliage, but she hadn’t expected to find blue roses in winter. She sat among them and let her posture crumple as she touched a frost-covered rose. Its soft petal brought a relaxed sigh from her lips, and she caressed it a little longer. Magic must have made their color and helped them bloom in such conditions.

“Do you like roses?”

Carys glanced sideways. Mel had found her. Tension Carys didn’t know she carried melted off her shoulders, and she shrugged. “I don’t think I have an opinion on them.”

Mel chuckled wryly and sat beside her on the bench. “Sure. Banshees aren’t supposed to feel, so you didn't allow yourself an opinion on anything.”

“Then what does that make me?” Carys wondered as she studied the crisp bushes and the snow that donned them.

“Cold,” Mel whispered. She wrapped her arms around one of Carys’s.

Carys's pink knees peeked out from the hem of her skirt. “Then why did I cry?”

“Maybe not caring became too much to bear.” Carys’s brow twitched, and Mel patted her back. “There’s something I want you to do with me. Will you?”

“You’re the one who called Arthur and Merlin to fetch me from the snow, traitor,” Carys said. She couldn’t dismiss the convenience of the arrangement. A fact Mel surely took into account when she orchestrated Carys’s abduction, but it was Carys's trust in her that saved Mel.

Mel’s charming smile radiated bogus innocence. “Come with me,” she sang and dragged Carys away before she could protest.

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[lorweaver]

Frost of Avalon WIP Page

Keywords: King Arthur, Fantasy, Young Adult, Slow Burn, Strong Female Expected CW: Fantasy Violence Content: excerpts, characters, content

Arthur could see her. Because he made that known, others did too.

She left Mel looking after her and floated through the crowd. A pain she couldn’t identify stung her chest and then she stopped, her eyes wide. People walked around her––not seeing her––as if she were a ghost again. She examined her hand, wondering if she’d disappeared. Flesh, bone. Her breath came choppy and tears stung her eyes. She was solid, so why didn’t anyone look at her?

Fear coiled in her stomach. Would she go unnoticed like before? She clamped her eyes shut. She wouldn’t cry. Pain climbed up her throat, scratched the back of her nose, and burned her eyes, but she refused to cry. The capability should be beyond her! What happened to the ice that protected her heart?

“Carys…”

Carys’s eyes flew open. Arthur stood before her a few steps out of reach. The only one, it seemed, who could see her. His thoughts did not show, but his eyes were intense. They read her like an open book and decided on a course of action.

“I was just on my way back.” She wished her voice sounded stronger, but she couldn’t make it obey her.

He offered a hand. “Come along then.”

Carys stared, wanting to take it but hesitant. What was he doing to her? She bit her lip and lifted trembling fingers. Arthur curled his around them and drew her to his side. He guided her through the crowd, and people noticed at her again. Relief washed over Carys like a wall of wind through the trees. That’s right. Arthur could see her. Because he made that known, others did too.

Carys squeezed Arthur’s hand but didn’t catch his solemn glance at her. His grip on her tightened, and something wonderful and painful burst through her heart, but a cold clamp snuffed it out as soon as it came. She must have imagined it.

“Thank you, Arthur,” Carys whispered.

He paused outside of the Battle Divide booth, not releasing her hand. “Tell me what you want, Carys.”

A flicker of determination lightened the gloom off her face. “You don’t have to keep worrying about everyone, Arthur. Least of all me. I’m here to help you.”

“Help me, hm?” A sad though amused look rose on his face. “If only you could.”

Carys lifted her head, and his eyes softened. “Mel taught me this one," she said. "Challenge accepted.”

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[lorweaver]

Frost of Avalon WIP Page

Keywords: King Arthur, Fantasy, Young Adult, Slow Burn, Strong Female Expected CW: Fantasy Violence Content: excerpts, characters, content

“Why did I cry?”

Carys clutched the wound in her chest. Yet to adjust to her flesh, she struggled to navigate the dark. As for her injury… she winced. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d bled. The king's sword hadn’t harmed her since her captor drove it through by magic. That knight's dagger, though...

Her breathing haggard, Carys stopped and lifted her hand from the lesion. Her sigh turned into a groan. Humans were as injudicious as she remembered.

She couldn’t let Arthur and Merlin find her like this. The throes of death had embraced Arthur when she sang to him at Avalon, but Merlin knew her. She’d let him punish her someday, but not yet. She needed to save Arthur first.

Why did I cry?

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[lorweaver]

Frost of Avalon WIP Page

Keywords: King Arthur, Fantasy, Young Adult, Slow Burn, Strong Female Expected CW: Fantasy Violence Content: excerpts, characters, content

“Unavoidable. Father locked me in.”

Carys stretched her arms and slid her cheek across a rabbit-soft blanket. The fox she’d saved yawned beside her, and she pet his head before hugging a pillow against her face. The scent of fennel and spice wafted from the fibers, and her muscles unraveled like a sigh.

Wait…

A man’s chuckle made her shoot upright, and her eyes opened on Arthur. He drank tea at a small table near her, its steam rolling off his face before he greeted her shock with a smile.

The obvious struck Carys like a club, but she deflected it with indifference—until she discovered herself in a white nightgown and not the uniform she fell asleep in. She drew the sheets atop her head like a hood and teetered to her feet, the fox shuffling off the bed before she stepped on him.

“What am I doing in this place?” Carys asked while looking down her nose at Arthur.

“Merlin and I happened upon you last night. It’s against my policy to let a lady sleep in the snow.” Arthur acted nonchalant, but he looked way too satisfied with himself. He went on as if she wasn’t trying to burn a hole between his eyes, “We have many rooms to accommodate guests—none of them prepared. That is my bed you’re in.” He nodded toward the pillow she had cuddled.

Carys snorted. “Who gave you permission to steal me away? I chose that place.” She had grasped a feeble ounce of control over her circumstances at the pond. How dare he snatch it away by spiriting her to his home! She didn’t care about good intentions, and she definitely didn’t believe his reasoning the whole truth. Carys remembered Arthur being kind, but she also remembered him considering his every action with meticulous calculation.

“Perhaps. But if the school had found you, you would be at a workhouse instead of resting in a borrowed bed.”

“Do you think that frightens me?” Carys snarled.

Arthur tilted his head, interested that it didn’t. And with nothing else to offer, he said no more.

“Why are you with me?” she asked.

“Unavoidable. Father locked me in,” Arthur replied in anticipation. “We debated on the appropriateness, but he decided it mattered more your questions received answers upon awakening.”

“Than my privacy?” she asked.

He offered her a strained smile, seeming uncomfortable with the idea himself.

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[lorweaver]

Frost of Avalon WIP Page

Keywords: King Arthur, Fantasy, Young Adult, Slow Burn, Strong Female Expected CW: Fantasy Violence Content: excerpts, characters, content

“I can’t take that sword. I can’t go through it all anew.”

“Why would they do this? You struggled all alone in a terrible war. You served as they said. Is this how they reward you?” She bunched the snow in both fists and rose. Daunting, like a harrowing enchantress, she glowered at the statue. “You stubborn fool! I’ll find the fairy that did this to you. I’ll make her pay. I know you can hear me. Tell me who it is!”

The maiden remained silent, looking more determined than before. Mel put a hand on the statue’s head and trembled.

“Did you even miss me?” she asked. A self-deprecating laugh puffed white air from her lips. “I missed you. I thought of you every day, wondering where you’d gone. Why you left me…” Her words cut off when movement caught her eye.

Arthur saw it too. Small glittering flowers grew on the maiden’s skirts and climbed into her hair. Mel’s stunned expression dissolved into mad laughter, and she raised a hand to her lips.

“You’re terrible. Answering me like that. You promised.” Her voice broke. “You promised…” Then she bit her lip and faced Arthur. “I must be making you uncomfortable. I’ll go,” she said. Crunching snow marking her retreat, and she faded away. A pink form standing out amongst the white as Arthur contemplated his situation.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered at last. “I can’t take that sword. I can’t go through it all anew.” He was proud of how he’d lived. Of all the obstacles he once overcame, but taking the sword would trigger a repeat. For all his determination to beat the curse, he was reluctant to re-experience that sadness.

He stepped back but paused. “If I can. I will free you. I just need some time,” he said, pleading for her to understand. With a sigh, he forged into the snow while wondering how to keep such a promise.

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