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yellowmagicalgirl · 4 years

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Destiny’s Pawn

Douxie wants to never meet his soulmate. Krel isn't about to go searching for his own soulmate. Despite not realizing the meaning behind the names on their wrists, they meet anyways.

*slams a 38 page word document onto the nearest flat surface*

Here you go!

Content warning: This fic is rated M on AO3 and FFN for graphic depictions of bloody violence, dissociation, and panic attacks. In addition, this fic also contains dismemberment, mind control, suicidal ideation, minor character death, sleep deprivation, stress positions, and descriptions of poor medical practices.

AO3

FFN

Douxie is fourteen and sitting at his kitchen table, eating a bowl of instant ramen. This month has been going well. He’s been making new friends, one of whom is even a fellow wizard, he’s adjusting to the new time period, he hasn’t gone into any states of eerie numbness where he suddenly has no control of himself and commits violent acts, and it’s been a while since he has last had any flashbacks to Camlann. So, naturally, fate decides to make itself known once more and curse him with another prophecy.

Douxie is able to set his ramen down without spilling or burning himself when his right wrist explodes into light. Cyan light, to be specific, not the exact shade of blue that Douxie’s magic always seems to take.

Douxie doesn’t want this. He doesn’t want to look, and yet he does. He has a soulmate, and he doesn’t want one. He ran away from his kingdom (further than he had intended, admittedly) and changed his name because he was sick of being destiny’s pawn, and yet destiny is still deciding to use him. And he laughs, mirthlessly.

At least the name of his soulmate isn’t a name that Douxie can read. He’s not even sure if it’s a human language, and Douxie doubts that the Trollish script has changed so much since he learned it as a child. Douxie isn’t even sure if he believes that aliens exist, not when magic is real and everyone else thinks that magic isn’t real. However, if his soulmate is an alien then that’s a good thing. The chances of Douxie ever meeting his soulmate are impossibly low. Douxie won’t have to worry about one day meeting his soulmate and having to push the guy away so the two of them don’t get hurt.

Douxie gets up and walks from his kitchen table to his dresser. It takes a while to open his top drawer, but it always takes a while. The wood’s warped, which is probably why the original owners got rid of it. When he finally gets it open, it doesn’t take long for him to find the two leather bracelets he had worn when he was younger. They’re slightly small on him, now, and Douxie will want to find a better replacement if he wants to keep the blood flowing in his right hand, but they cover up the name of his soulmate quite well.

No one will have to know. Not his classmates, not the guys in the band who’s name they still can’t decide on, and not Zoe and her talking cat, who will probably ask three times as many questions as everyone else.

Krel’s not sure when he started being jealous of his older sister. Maybe it’s when they started using serrators and Aja took to them so easily, and Papa seemed to value Aja’s skill at fighting more than Krel’s engineering feats. Which, admittedly, weren’t that good at that age, but they were children back then. Krel was still a genius compared to everyone his age, and everyone who was Aja’s age. And yes, Aja isn’t that much older than him, but considering how much she tries to lord it over him it may as well count.

Krel will admit that in the past three delsons since his wrist exploded into pale blue light, he has gotten much more jealous of his sister.

Krel thinks that Aja is very lucky. Aja’s soulmate is an Akiridion, and that makes things easier for her. Sure, Aja’s soulmate isn’t an Akiridion from a royal house, and it would technically be a scandal if Aja married her soulmate, who would be an ordinary Akiridion. Or, it would be an even bigger scandal if Aja’s soulmate was a Taylon. That doesn’t matter to Krel.

Aja doesn’t have Mama and Papa talking behind her back in hushed tones that sometimes cut out the moment anyone comes near. Aja doesn’t have Mama and Papa talking behind her back, trying to find the planet where the strange symbols on Krel’s lower right wrist are actually a name. Aja doesn’t have Mama and Papa talking behind her back about how maybe Krel’s interplanetary soulmate can be a way that Akiridion-V and this mystery planet can have an alliance. Aja may be older than him and technically just as much the heir to the throne as Krel is, but Aja is less of a political pawn than Krel is.

Krel can’t help but wonder if Mama and Papa actually love each other, or at least, if they loved each other when they got married. He can’t help but wonder if their marriage is, or at least was, entirely political. His parents are soulmates, and their marriage ended the feud between House Ventis and House Akraohm.

Krel doesn’t want to have to marry his soulmate for power, or to put an end to a fight.

Douxie will readily admit, dubstep and dolphin noises aren’t his thing, when it comes to music. He prefers emo, alternative rock, alternative metal, electronic rock, hard rock, industrial rock, the occasional pop rock and emo pop, gothic rock, symphonic metal, and hardcore punk. And, of course, trying to recreate lute music from his childhood on an electric guitar.

But the guy on stage, the one making or at least DJ-ing the dubstep? He’s mesmerizing. And not just because Douxie knows that Ash Dispersal Pattern actually has competition for once. There’s the way his eyes light up, and the way his hair falls in waves all the way down to his chin. The way the lights bounce off the guy is beautiful.

Maybe, after the battle is over, Douxie can find the guy, and…

Right. Douxie’s never really known how to talk to people, and even though he’s been slowly trying to memorize the social cues of this century he still feels like he’s even worse at talking to people than he was as a child. And that’s all without factoring in the fact that Douxie is even worse at talking to cute guys. He’s been told that he apparently flirts with girls, which really isn’t how he wants to come off, and yet he doesn’t know how to flirt with guys. It’s frustrating.

Douxie tries to think of ways he can maybe talk to the guy. Talking about music will probably be his best chance. And talking about music will be even on topic, not just awkwardly rambling because classmates expect him to make small talk.

And then, a girl wearing purple armor walks onto the stage. It’s Claire. She looks better than Douxie can remember seeing her, though considering that their track record has put Claire as possessed, sick, or on the verge of a mental breakdown anything is better. But, while tense, she looks… assured. Powerful.

She looks like how a wizard should, which honestly makes a lot of sense in hindsight.

Douxie has never figured out how to use his magic to open a telepathic link, but as he whistles and gives Claire two thumbs up he tries to communicate as much as he silently can to her. He’s like her. He understands what she’s going through. He can help her to understand her powers. He can introduce her to people, well, a girl and a cat that are like Claire and Douxie.

Claire starts to speak, and Douxie realizes that Claire’s armor is familiar. Familiar, like the more important knights, knights whose armor was enchanted to be more protective. Familiar, like his aunt. Familiar, like Merlin.

Douxie can’t ruminate on what this could mean, because the sun goes dark and there are Gumm-Gumms.

When the battle (the real battle, not just the Battle of the Bands) is over, Douxie is aware of three things. His skills have deteriorated in the three years since he fought his – in the years since he last used his magic to fight anyone. He was also unable to talk to Claire or the guy who did the dubstep.

Well, Arcadia Oaks is a small enough town. Hopefully he’ll be able to talk to one or both of them over the summer.

Krel waits until his sister and the other Akiridions are gone. He waits until Steve and Toby and AAARRRGGHH!!! are doing… something else. He waits until he can be sure that Ricky and Lucy are so engrossed in unpacking that they won’t follow him down into his lab. And then, he lets himself cry. It’s stupid. Crying hurts, and it makes him feel weak.

Krel remembers what Mother had said about crying when it first happened to Aja, and he just cries harder. He misses his parents, and he misses Mother. He misses his sister, and Varvatos, and they’re not dead. They’ve just gone back to Akiridion-V, where Aja is actually attending her own coronation as queen. Krel knows that his parents would have wanted him to attend. They would have wanted a lot of things for him, and Krel isn’t sure if he’ll be able to fulfill any of them.

Krel wipes his eyes with his wrist. It’s funny. His human form doesn’t have a name on either of his wrists indicating a soulmate, even though Krel’s soulmate is human. Probably. His soulmate could be a changeling, but his soulmate being human is more likely. Krel’s almost sure that Mother thought that by not giving them soulmates, they’d be even closer to invisible on Earth, especially Aja and Varvatos.

Krel has a good feeling as to what the name on his lower right wrist sounds like, and he could probably hack into the various governments of Earth, searching until he found out just who Mordred Pendragon is. Krel doesn’t do that, though. He wasn’t in any rush to find his soulmate during the three keltons between receiving the name and coming to Earth, and he isn’t in any rush to do so now. He’s seen the way Aja and Steve act around each other, and he doesn’t think he wants that right now. He doesn’t know if he’ll ever want that.

“Hey Krel?” Ricky calls. “Ship’s no going to clean itself.”

“Not yet, anyways!” Lucy says.

Krel sighs and goes to help clean.

Douxie supposes that it was probably better to be safe than sorry when it comes to fighting off whatever great evil is going to attempt to end the world for the fourth time this summer. Still, he doesn’t like the idea of being involved in one of Archie’s prophecies. The only saving grace is that if he has to be caught between two different fates, then at least he can fight off the worse of the two. Still, it’s annoying. Toby keeps on pestering Douxie and Zoe, asking them about how magic works and why the two of them haven’t tried to help out more, as if they haven’t been busy at their own school.

Well, what is he supposed to say? “I helped make your friend’s amulet” may be true, but it’ll reveal too many things about Douxie’s past. Too many things that Douxie has been trying not to think about.

No matter how reluctantly, Douxie, Archie, and Zoe have been working with Steve, Toby, and AAARRRGGHH!!! for the better part of four hours. The past several minutes have been consumed by fighting the first of the many foes that Archie has foretold. Specifically, it’s a group of constructs, suits of armor made of wood, crystal, and metal.

The fight could be going much better. Zoe doesn’t seem to have much combat experience, or at least, she keeps on picking the wrong spells to use on the various constructs. Douxie himself has decided to just use simple shielding spells with his left hand and to manifest a sleek black dagger in his right hand.

Parry. Sidestep. Advance. Douxie scoffs as the wooden construct dodges out of the way. A part of him knows that using a sword like the ones he trained with as a child will have a better reach, but the mere thought of using one causes him to lose his footing. The construct lunges.

It is consumed by cyan light.

Douxie looks up, and his lips part slightly in a gasp. He, just like the rest of Arcadia Oaks, has been made aware that extraterrestrials exist. However, he hasn’t seen any of them up close. No one has told Douxie that they are so beautiful.

The boy jumps off the floating skateboard, and both it and the gun he is holding collapse into themselves.

“Sorry for being late, the Blanks wanted me to help clean and didn’t let me use my phone.”

“Just had to play the big hero, right?” Steve asks the Akiridion.

“No, without Mother the ship isn’t repairing itself the way it used to.”

Zoe gives Douxie a pointed look, and he stops staring at… honestly, Douxie isn’t sure what the Akiridon boy’s name is.

Something inside of him tells him he should be cautious. He ignores that feeling; it must be fear from the world being supposedly about to end.

Though, as he complains to Zoe, it’s really not fair that Krel is so beautiful in both forms.

“Hand me the ixvali,” Krel said. While they would never be able to replace Mother herself, the repairs on the mother ship were almost done after half a parson, give or take a couple delsons. Well, time and the unexpected outside help.

“That one’s the half-monkey wrench, half swage looking tool, right?” Krel looks over at Douxie. For the briefest of moments, they make eye contact, but Douxie looks slightly away before it can become uncomfortable. But he does not fully turn his head to look away like he often does. There is a soft smile on Douxie’s face as he looks at Krel. For some reason, this makes Krel’s digestive organs flutter in a way that is uncomfortable and confusing but not painful.

Douxie is holding out the correct tool. In his right hand, not through levitation like he often does when people who don’t know that Douxie is a wizard aren’t around. Douxie had once mentioned that certain textures make him tense, which Krel understands. He feels the same way around random sounds, sometimes, which is why he often uses headphones when working. But he isn’t using any today.

Though, Krel has no idea why Douxie thinks the ixvali looked like one of the less intelligent of Earth’s native species.

Krel takes the ixvali from Douxie, and his fingertips brush against Douxie’s skin as he does so. The places where Krel’s skin meets Douxie’s tingle even after Krel removes them, and as Krel turns away his face feels slightly warm.

“You’re pretty good at this. Engineering, that is,” Krel says, trying to distract himself from his thoughts. He watches Douxie from the corner of his eye. “Where’d you learn?”

Douxie’s smile falls into a scowl, and for some strange reason with it so does Krel’s core. “An old friend of my father’s taught me. I cut contact with him a long time ago, though. After he betrayed my aunt.”

“I’m sorry.”

Douxie blinks a couple times. “Like I said, it was a long time ago.”

Douxie doesn’t like fighting knights. Likewise, he doesn’t like that they’re fighting Merlin. It brings back way too many bad memories of death and betrayal. Then again, even the good memories are tainted by Camlann, so he tries not to think about his past in general. There are reasons why he goes by a false name, after all.

But, if he doesn’t fight Merlin’s knights then his friends will have to fight them without him. It could be hubris, but Douxie is pretty sure that without him his friends will be badly injured or worse. And they will wonder why he didn’t defend him, which will lead to suspicion and questions, and…

It’s better that he just swallows his bile and panic in order to stand at his friends’ sides and fight.

Advance. Parry. Lunge. Keep an eye out for Toby, who’s been slightly off his game ever since AAARRRGGHH!!! left to help the other trolls several days ago.

As he stabs his dagger between the knight’s rerebrace and pauldron, the knight swings his flail into Zoe’s unarmored stomach. Douxie winces as she goes flying; he twists his dagger so the knight’s pain will increase.

And a beam of water crashes into the knight. Douxie dismisses his dagger into the aether as the knight gets pushed back. Let the water stimulate blood flow, for all he cares.

Douxie looks towards the source of the water, and his jaw drops slightly. Zoe’s ears and fingers are webbed, and there are iridescent scales on her face and arms. She reminds him of someone he hasn’t seen in years. Technically over a millennium, if he counts the years he wasn’t around for.

The knight crushes an emerald between his armored fingers, allowing him to escape back to wherever Merlin is hiding.

“You’re not human, either?” Krel asks.

Zoe wraps her arms around herself, her shoulders drawing in like she’s trying to make herself smaller than she already is. Like she’s embarrassed about her appearance or scared of someone’s reaction. Except, this time she seems to be scared of Douxie and the others.

“No, I’m…” She looks at her feet. “Archie can probably explain it better. Shit, he’s gonna be so mad. I’m the Lady of the Lake. Well, the latest one, anyways.”

Douxie remembers the first Lady of the Lake. Personally, he likes Zoe better.

Now would be a good time to tell people about his past. To reassure Zoe that she’s not alone in having magic from a kingdom that no longer exists.

“Cool,” he says instead.

The stars are very different from home. It makes sense. It’s a different number of lightyears for each different type of starlight to reach Earth than it is for Akiridion-V. The two worlds also have different amounts of light pollution.

Krel and Douxie sit in a comfortable silence, staring at the stars and listening to the water in the pool lap against the walls. Not that talking to Douxie is uncomfortable. Quite the opposite. With both humans and Akiridions, there is always some barrier between Krel and communicating with them. While that barrier still exists with Douxie, it is so much lower than with most humans.

It has been three delsons since they and Toby and Steve learned the truth about Zoe and comforted her and told her cat that he could trust them, that unlike previous incarnations’ so-called friends they would protect her. It has been three weeks since Krel decided to stay on Earth and met Douxie. The only work left for the mothership is to wait for the new AI to install itself. It won’t be Mother. It’ll be less sapient, and it will take keltons for the AI to be anywhere near Mother’s level. But the ship has been rebuilt as it ever will be able to, in the aftermath of Morando’s attack.

Douxie inhales, sharp and loud, and grabs Krel’s hand. Douxie’s hand is calloused and slightly damp from sweat. The contact feels like when Krel has accidentally electrocuted himself, except for how it inspires no fear. If anything, it’s comforting.

Krel looks at Douxie. In the low light, Krel can barely make out that Douxie’s face is red.

“I, uh, I don’t know how to say this because even though I feel like I don’t have to adhere to a script and social cues as much around you both of those would be helpful right now because I have a crush on you and I understand if you don’t feel the same but I just wanted to tell you,” Douxie says quickly, glancing at Krel before looking around awkwardly, like he’s trying to find a way to escape.

Krel smiles and leans against Douxie, cherishing the way their arms brush together. He’s in his human form, so he can feel the blood rush to his own face, highlighting his cheeks in cyan. “I do. Feel the same the way, that is.”

It’s their first date. Or at least, Douxie thinks this might be their first date? Krel might not see it as a date, since his culture might have different rules for dating. He’s not even sure if he and Krel have technically been dating for the past less-than-forty-eight hours since they confessed their feelings for each other, or if dating starts with the first date. This is so different than what little he learned about courting when he was younger.

Last night he swiped a few mints from the bowl of them at the restaurant before leaving work. Really, it might’ve been more than a few, but the night was winding down anyways. He’s now crunching on one of them in apprehension as he waits for Krel to arrive. It’s a way to try and get rid of the nervous energy that fills his bones. Not for their intended purpose of making your mouth smell better and not taste like your last meal, for the purpose of talking or personal comfort or even kissing someone after the date ends.

Douxie feels himself blush at the idea of kissing Krel. Holding Krel’s hand is intense and Douxie isn’t ready for their relationship to go quickly. They haven’t even talked much about how they want this to progress, or if they’re going to do anything to make their relationship official – do Akiridions even have the concept of making a relationship official?

Douxie wipes his palms on his jeans again. It’s the end of July, and once more he is reconsidering his choice to have nothing in his modern wardrobe but the color black aside from three band shirts, one of which he uses for sleeping. At the very least, maybe he should have left his hoodie at home. He hates the cold, because the cold reminds him all too much of Camlann, but it’s almost never cold in July and August except for in air-conditioned buildings, and this one isn’t.

At the very least, if he wore less black, maybe his hands would be sweating less. Or maybe it’d be the same, because he’s nervous and Krel is running late. It’s only late by thirteen minutes, but Douxie is already anxious. At least no one is giving him a weird look for sitting here alone, not having ordered anything, like he knows that people

Douxie once more checks his phone. There’s nothing. No Krel changing his mind, and no frantic texts from friends who have been attacked and need backup. No magical notifications of knights or constructs, either. He sets his phone to sleep but doesn’t shove it in his pocket. He tries not to worry as he scans his surroundings.

The coffee shop is quiet. There are a couple other people, and some annoying pop song is playing, but other than that it’s quiet. It’s late morning on a weekday, and this coffee shop has never been as popular as the chain one a block away with a drive thru.

Douxie unlocks his phone again, and scowls down at it. Why did he make the pattern so complicated to draw when only using one hand to both hold and unlock his phone?

Someone taps Douxie’s shoulder, and he looks up.

It’s Krel. There’s a sheen of sweat on his face. His hair is pulled back into a ponytail at the nape of his neck, but strands all over have fallen out. He’s beautiful.

“Sorry I’m late,” Krel says, out of breath.

“It’s fine,” Douxie says, his scowl quickly fading into a smile. He rises from his seat, and the two of them go to stand in line to order drinks.

Seven minutes later, the two of the are sitting once more. Krel is telling a story from his childhood as he dumps his third and final sugar packet into his otherwise black coffee. “And then Luug came running in and tripped up Loth Saborian. Oh, uh, Luug’s mine and Aja’s pet soolian. Well, he’s more Aja’s than mine.”

“I thought he was her dog.” Douxie took a sip of his chai to try and cover up his awkward expression as he realized what he just said. “Though I guess that’s what your sister called him to blend in when he got loose?”

“Yeah, plus his transduction is a dog, though he wasn’t transducted when he swallowed my prototype. Um, that was when she was chasing him all over town. Did you ever have any pets?”

“My father had a dog when I was growing up; his name was Cavall. Which I found odd growing up, since his name meant horse. And, like, he was a hunting hound? Or at least he was before I was born, but he was getting old. But, I had thought it could get confusing. Maybe it was just me, though. So, anyways, what happened after Luug tripped your parents’ advisor?”

Twenty-seven horvaths after their date, Krel still feels oddly buoyant. He wonders if Douxie feels the same way.

Douxie is off working at his job at the bistro, and the rest of them are hanging out with Zoe as she works at the record store. She had poked him in the shoulder and told him not to shoplift, with a smile on her face. Krel had rolled his eyes, and now he is looking through the various albums while the others talk. If he finds an album with an interesting title, or even a song with an interesting title, he plays it on his phone, the volume low and muffled by his hand because he didn’t bring his headphones and earbuds feel so weird. It’s like research.

Toby sighs. “I hope I get my soulmate’s name soon. I’m pretty sure I’m, like, one out of the only three, maybe four, people in our year who doesn’t have one.”

“I mean, does Darci have her soulmate’s name yet?” Steve asks.

“No, she’s one of the other three to four people in our year,” Toby says, “but we also haven’t spoken much in the past week since she’s on vacation the other side of the planet right now. And she’s a couple months older than me.”

Krel glances at his oddly bare wrist as he looks up a band called Starset on his phone. He doesn’t want to meet Mordred Pendragon, whoever or wherever he is. Krel is very happy with Douxie, and he doesn’t want to meet his soulmate.

“Dude, I doubt she’ll break up with you even if it turns out that she has a soulmate who isn’t a huge furry.” Toby punches Steve in the arm.

“I mean, does it matter if you have a soulmate?” Zoe pipes up. “I mean, I don’t have one. Though, I’m not sure if it’s because I’m aro, or well, I’ve already got a mark on my arm stating my destiny.”

“Okay, but like, aren’t platonic soulmates a thing?” Toby asks. “And multiple?”

“Yeah, but studies have shown that aro-spec people have a higher tendency to not have soulmates than alloromantic people,” Zoe says. Krel wonders if this is true across species, or if he’s in the minority of demiromantics. “Also, multiple soulmates are, like really rare. Plus, I don’t want one anyways?”

“Hey, if you get your arm cut off above your tattoo thing, would you lose all your magic?” Steve asks, rubbing at where Eli’s name is on his wrist.

Zoe blinks a couple times, her voice lowering in volume. “Don’t know, don’t let Archie hear you say that; why do you ask?”

“Well, there’s the superstition that if you cut off the wrist that has your soulmate’s name, they’re no longer your soulmate,” Steve says in a low voice

“I mean, are we sure that wasn’t just something made up to dehumanize people who’d lost hands?” Toby asks.

Zoe shrugs. “Trust me, I don’t specialize in soul-based magic, and if I try Archie will never let me hear the end of it because it’s dark. But, yeah, I have no idea what magic goes on when it comes to lost hands and soulmates.”

Merlin has sent another knight after them along with a trio of constructs. This knight does not wear a helmet, so Douxie can see the knight’s identity. It’s Caradoc, but he seems strangely younger than how Douxie remembers. Maybe it’s the lack of stress from no longer having to run a kingdom. Maybe Camlann and everything that came after had been good for Caradoc and the kingdom of Gwent.

Douxie remembers being told when he was young that Camelot protected the other kingdoms from Gumm-Gumms and dark wizards, and yet despite that, many opposed it because its king had grown up under the care of a minor lord. Caradoc had been one of those in opposition, and Douxie had been told to remain cautious about him. Except, he hadn’t yet been Douxie then.

“Hand over Mordred,” Caradoc says, “and I’ll let most of you kids go.”

Douxie is keenly aware of the way sweat drips down the back of his neck as Toby and Steve give each other confused glances, Krel raises an eyebrow, and Zoe narrows her eyes.

“Who’s Mordred?” Steve asks. The sound of distant traffic covers Douxie’s relieved sigh as he realizes that none of them associate him with that name.

Krel shifts his serrator into its gun form, and Zoe sends a wall of water towards Caradoc. Douxie summons a dagger and a shield before he charges towards Caradoc.

Parry. Dodge. Parry. Lunge. Parry. Thrust. Adjust footing. Douxie focuses entirely on the fight in a way that would be dangerous if anyone else wanted to attack him.

Parry. Thrust. Adjust shielding spell. Douxie focuses on the fight, because if he allows himself to think about anything else his mind will focus on things that are dangerous to think about. Things like Camlann, and the three hazy days that followed where Merlin revealed the lengths he was willing to go to fight the Gumm-Gumms.

As Douxie’s dagger clashes against Caradoc’s sword, their eyes meet. Caradoc grabs Douxie’s shoulder, prolonging the painful eye contact.

“Should I tell them, or have you already told them, Mordred?” Caradoc says in a low voice. Douxie feels pressure wrap around his skull and numbness settle into his bone. “And should the Lady of the Lake find out before she dies?”

Mordred doesn’t think as he releases the shielding spell and flicks his fingers in the right way to summon a burst of bright blue light to distract Caradoc enough that Mordred can escape his grip. It’s muscle memory to change his dagger into a sword. Before either of them can recover, Mordred rams his sword up through Caradoc’s chest, using magic to bypass Caradoc’s armor.

Mordred dismisses the sword and lets Caradoc’s body fall. He has forgotten what it is like for another person’s blood to soak into his clothing. It is warm, too warm, warm enough that an icy coldness settles into the rest of his body. He was able to forget, to think that every time he woke up screaming and soaked in his own sweat that it was as bad as when he was covered in his father’s blood, but this is so. Much. Worse.

“First kill?” Toby asks, and Mordred can’t tell if his voice is suspicious or sympathetic. This is not Mordred’s first time killing another human being. This is the first time he has killed another human when he feels like his body and mind mostly belong to him.

Mordred hopes his trembling approximates to the proper kind of nod. He takes a few steps towards his friends, but he then turns away so he can violently expel the contents of his stomach into a nearby bush. He appreciates the way Krel grabs Mordred’s bangs and holds them away from Mordred’s face, even if his boyfriend looks disgusted. Hopefully by the vomit and not the fact that Mordred just killed someone. He isn’t even sure if it was entirely to save his best friend or to save himself from everyone else’s judgement. Maybe he didn’t have to kill Caradoc. He could have incapacitated him. Maybe.

Mordred stands up, wipes his mouth on his sleeve, and grimaces. “I’m going to go home and get ready for work,” he says quickly. Hopefully not too quickly. His friends give him what he hopes are sympathetic looks, and he runs off.

He locks himself in his apartment and rips off his soiled clothes. He brushes his teeth to get rid of the taste of vomit as he waits for the water to heat up; while he wants to be free from the feeling of blood on him he doesn’t want to be cold, because being cold means the memories of stabbing through his father’s chest will feel so much more real because Mordred had been cold when he killed his father.

Mordred removes his watch and his bracelets before he tests the water’s temperature with one hand. As he does so, the cyan writing that has been on the inside of his wrist for three years catches his eye. He has spent enough time with Krel to know that the script is Akiridion. Something between a maniacal laugh and a pitiful sob bursts from his lips. He loves Krel. Krel can’t be his soulmate, though, because a soulmate is another prophecy, and the last prophecy involving Mordred didn’t end well. It ended in him dissociating into a state of eerie numbness where he couldn’t control his body and he killed his father by stabbing him through the chest. Just like he stabbed Caradoc through the chest.

But, but Krel had mentioned that while the population of Akiridion-V is smaller than Earth, the amount of Akiridions in the universe is about four and a half times the number of humans. And Akiridions aren’t the only ones who used the Akiridion script. So, it is entirely possible that Krel isn’t Mordred’s soulmate. It’s possible that fate won’t make Mordred kill Krel.

Mordred finishes undressing and enters the shower, twisting his body to soak up as much heat as possible. Because he hasn’t stopped trembling, he can’t tell if he’s sobbing or if soap has just gotten in his eyes.

When Douxie finally exits the shower once more, his skin is raw from scrubbing, heat, and in some areas just how much he had scratched at it, trying to escape the phantom feeling of someone else’s blood.

“Are you alright?” Krel softly asks his boyfriend as the two of them meet up in front of Zoe’s house. “After everything that happened yesterday?”

“Yeah,” Douxie says as he stares at the sidewalk. “Well, I’ve been better, but I’m doing better than yesterday.”

Krel squeezes Douxie’s hand once before dropping it as they step through the door. The two of them are the last to arrive. Steve, Toby, and Zoe are talking in hushed voices, but they stop before Krel can hear what they’re saying. Archie bats at one of Douxie’s shoelaces, nearly tripping them. They take their seats at Zoe’s kitchen table. It’s cramped, and the chairs don’t match, like normally there are only three chairs.

“Okay, so, Mordred,” Zoe says. “A basic Wikipedia search will tell you he’s the son of King Arthur, and he grew up to kill Arthur at a place called Camlann. But that’s where things start to go awry. Mordred practically killed Arthur in cold blood, and he was also Merlin’s apprentice, which means that he should be an enemy of ours. Except, we don’t know where he is, and I don’t think Merlin knows where he is either.” She turns in her chair towards Archie. “Uh, am I missing any details?”

Douxie twists his skull pendant on its string.

Archie raises his head from his bowl of cat food and swallows before speaking. “Mordred did everything he’s infamous for prior to my birth, so it’s not like I can provide you with fine details. Oh, stop giving me that look, I’m not that ancient. But, your memories from the first Lady of the Lake are more accurate.” Archie walks over to the table and hops on top of it. “The one thing I can tell you is that soon after killing Arthur, Mordred disappeared. In fact, until you came to me with this information, I had thought he was dead. And if he’s alive, then why hasn’t he come out of hiding until now?”

Krel flips the clasp to his watch back and forth, trying not to cringe.

“Okay, but why would that knight have thought he was with us?” Steve asks.

Toby shrugs. “Maybe Merlin thinks Mordred turned against him and took refuge with us? I mean, about half of our oldest troll allies – in terms of being on our side, mind you – all tried to kill me and… and Jim, at one point or another.”

Douxie sits up straight. He stares very intently at where some dishes are drying. “I mean, maybe we can use this against Merlin? I mean, maybe Merlin did something that made, er, Mordred turn against him. And maybe Mordred is so against Merlin that, that he’d be willing to work with. Us.”

Everyone stares at Douxie before Zoe clears her throat. “Are you forgetting the whole ‘killed his dad in cold blood’ thing? We wouldn’t be able to trust Mordred not to kill us in the hypothetical scenario that he hates Merlin.”

Douxie slouches down into his chair, twisting one of the white strings of his hoodie between his fingers.

“Hey, what’s Mordred’s family name?” Krel asks slowly, using his right hand to twist the watch on his left hand.

“Pendragon,” Zoe says. “Why?”

Krel sighs. “Mordred Pendragon is my soulmate.”

Douxie inhales sharply.

Toby makes a disgusted face that quickly turns into confusion. “Wait, but you don’t have a name on your wrist. Or is it under your watch?”

Krel pulls out his serrator and changes back into his Akiridion form. “It’s just not on my human form.” He rolls up his lower right sleeve to expose his soulmate’s name. Zoe, Toby, Steve, and Archie all lean in to stare at it with morbid curiosity. Douxie stays sitting the exact same way he has been, but one of his eyelids twitches.

“Could we, I don’t know, track him through Krel?” Toby asks. Douxie pulls his phone out of his pocket and unlocks it. Krel finds it sweet that Douxie’s home screen is a picture of Krel.

“Dark. Magic,” Zoe and Archie say in unison. Douxie opens his texting app but does not exit from the groupchat that five teenagers sitting at this table use.

“Hey, uh, my manager wants me to come in early today, I need to go,” Douxie says. He leaves too quickly for Krel to call him out on his lie.

Krel finds him hours later, during Douxie’s actual shift at GDT Arcane Books.

Mordred sighs. He doesn’t want to do this. He has to do this to save Krel’s life. Behind the counter, he casts a quick illusory spell.

“You didn’t need to come in early,” Krel says. “I saw your phone.”

Mordred stays silent.

“Why’d you lie about it?” Krel asks. “Are you – is this because you’re not my soulmate?”

“Yes.” No, quite the opposite. He is Krel’s soulmate. While unrequited soulmates do exist, it is far more likely that Krel is Mordred’s soulmate. Which means that Krel is in danger. Prophecy and Mordred put together is dangerous.

“Look, I knew you weren’t my soulmate when we got together, so why does it matter?”

“It, it does.”

“You’re being really petty. And shallow.” Krel’s voice raises with each word.

“Okay. Are you done?”

“Well, do you have anything to say?”

“I made a mistake.” Krel’s face softens, and Mordred forces venom into his own voice even though he doesn’t want to hurt Krel. “I should have never fallen for you. And had I known the truth about you and, you and Mordred, I would have never let myself fall for you.”

Krel’s glare returns with a vengeance. “I can’t believe you. When Merlin’s defeated, I never want to speak to you again!”

As Krel storms out of the bookstore, Mordred releases the spell that he used to hide the tears in his eyes.

Krel wants to just lie on his bed and read through old blueprints with a recording of the common sounds of Akiridion-V playing in the background. He wants to lose himself in engineering, so he won’t have to think about Douxie and Mordred. Technically, he had just wanted to lay on his bed face-down when he had gotten home, but Krel has found that doing so doesn’t stimulate his brain enough and without stimulation all of his thoughts go to his now-ex-boyfriend.

But his phone gives him an alert. He’s getting a call from Akiridion-V. And so, with a groan, he drags himself out of his bed and into the lower portion of the Mothership, where the video call center is.

“Hi, Krel!” Aja says. She looks exhausted, but she is still so cheerful that some of Krel’s own misery fades away.

“Hi. How’s life as queen?”

“Busy. So, so, so very busy. I wish I had listened more to Mama and Papa.” She looks away from him, face falling.

“Me, too,” Krel says softly. It’s not hard for him to believe they’ve been dead for so long, though. Aside from the few short moments, they had been reduced to their cores. They had been practically dead, and the mourning wasn’t as hard. But Krel isn’t constantly surrounded by reminders of his parents. He has other things to worry about, like –

No, Krel is not thinking about his ex right now.

“It doesn’t help that some of the lesser royal houses think that I’m not ready, considering that I ran away from the first coronation.”

“Yeah, you kind of brought that on yourself.”

“But, anyways, enough about me,” Aja says, her smile returning. “You had some non-urgent but important good news a couple delsons ago? And I’m sorry I didn’t have time before, but I do now!”

Krel feels his own face fall. “I… I had wanted to tell you that I had a boyfriend, but, he broke up with me two horvaths ago.”

“Oh, Krel, I’m so sorry. Do you want me to come back and beat him up for you?”

“No, I handled it. I just… before today, he’s never been so shallow. He broke up with me because he found out I’m not his soulmate.”

“Are you sure you don’t want me to beat him up for you? Or send Varvatos to do so?”

“No, Aja. By the way, have you told Steve about your own soulmate? And speaking of him, how is Varvatos?”

Parry. Adjust footing. Advance. Shove phone back into hoodie pocket because that was a stupid place for Douxie to put his phone when he knew he was running towards a fight. Step out of the way for Zoe to get the finishing blow.

“Anyone else think that construct was oddly weak?” Steve asks. The five of them are crowded into one of Arcadia’s alleys, having gotten up relatively early to go fight it. Krel had given Douxie a murderous glare, and afterwards had just ignored Douxie.

Mordred is very tempted to beg for Krel’s forgiveness, but no. It’s safer this way. If they don’t spend time together, the likelihood of Mordred killing his soulmate goes down.

“Don’t you dare jinx us,” Toby says.

“I mean, Steve’s kind of –” Zoe starts before she gets blown back by a wave of magic. So do Krel, Steve, and Toby. Only Mordred is left standing.

Mordred, and Merlin, who drops the spell he was using to keep Mordred and the others from noticing him.

“Kneel,” Merlin commands.

A coldness spreads through Mordred’s limbs. He mindlessly walks forward, ready to follow this command and kneel in front of his master. Douxie shakes it off and breaks into a run. As he does so, his phone falls out of his hoodie pocket, but he pays it no mind.

Mordred attempts to stab Merlin with his dagger, but Merlin parries with the Staff of Avalon. Glowing green ropes force Mordred into a kneeling position.

Mordred looks behind himself. Scales are flickering on and off of Zoe’s skin, and the construct has come back to life and is trying to entrap her within it. Everyone else is trying to pry her out. Mordred fights against his bonds, trying to escape them so he can help Zoe.

“For all of his faults,” Merlin says, “your father never lost the humility that came with not having been raised a prince. Unlike you, Mordred.”

In the background, one of his friends – or at least, former friends, now that they know – gasps.

Upon hearing his name, Mordred tries to hang his head in shame. Merlin places the Staff of Avalon under Mordred’s chin and forces Mordred to look at Merlin. Mordred tries to avoid his former master’s gaze, but Merlin helped to raise Mordred. Merlin knows how Mordred will try to avoid eye contact by faking it, by looking at people’s eyebrows, forehead, cheeks, or nose. Merlin knows that Mordred finds prolonged eye contact painful, and so he’s using this against Mordred.

Mordred hears Toby exclaim something, and footsteps behind him, but he can’t make them out any further due to the ringing in his ears.

Merlin removes his staff from under Mordred’s chin and slams the butt of it into the ground, sending the two of them away from the battle.

They make their way to Zoe’s house. Krel gets the feeling that everyone else is also reeling from the battle, if for possibly different reasons.

“Are you alright?” Archie asks, curling his body around Zoe’s legs. She picks up her familiar. She looks like she wants to hug him, but she holds him in front of her instead.

“Did. You. Know?” Zoe asks.

Archie nods gravely. “Yes, I warned you years ago about how Merlin will try to bind you if he ever found you. He did so to… to far too many of your predecessors. I am so glad you’re not imprisoned.”

“I… no, did you know that Douxie is Mordred?” She then hugs Archie to her chest. Her arms shake as she does so.

“He’s what?” Archie climbs to her shoulder and looks around at the four of them. “Again, I wasn’t born yet. If what your saying is true, then you met him before I did. Then again, the two of you always did act like cousins, so it makes sense. But where is he?”

“Merlin took him,” Toby says, one of his hands curling into a fist. With the other he takes Douxie’s phone out of his pocket and places it on the table. “And it’s not like we’ll be able to contact him.”

“It doesn’t make sense, though,” Zoe says, not really looking at any of them. “Mordred’s supposed to be bloodthirsty and back during freshman year Douxie nearly had a panic attack while trying to take care of me because I accidentally sliced my finger open.”

“Well, maybe Douxie isn’t Mordred and Merlin made a mistake by calling him that?” Krel offers. Douxie can’t be Mordred, because Mordred is Krel’s soulmate and Douxie broke up with Krel because Douxie isn’t Krel’s soulmate.

“How did Douxie respond to being called Mordred?” Archie asks. “Did he try to refute this at all.”

“No, he just kind of collapsed in on himself,” Zoe says.

Toby smiles weakly at Krel. “Well, at least your soulmate isn’t some creepy old dude who likes killing people?”

“But, he can’t be. If Douxie is Mordred, and he’s known that he’s Mordred, then why did he break up with me yesterday?”

“Wait, he broke up with you?” Toby asks.

“I told you two that they had gotten together, pay up,” Steve says.

“We never actually made that bet,” Zoe says.

“You three bet on us?” Krel is in his human form and he isn’t sure if he wants to cross his arms or put them on his hips.

“We didn’t agree to it,” Toby and Zoe say almost in unison.

“But anyways, he broke up with you?” Toby says.

“Yeah. Douxie was mad that Mordred is my soulmate. And it doesn’t seem like him to be so mad that he’s not my soulmate, but it makes more sense than him being mad that he is my soulmate and lying about it.”

They teleport to a fort with stone walls and floors. Jim walks up to them, movements stilted like a puppet. His eyes are glowing green.

“Take him to the antimagic cell for now while I prepare,” Merlin says.

Jim grabs Mordred by the collar of his shirt, forcing him to his feet. Jim then pushes Mordred to start walking down the hall.

Mordred’s hands tremble with a nervous energy. He narrows his eyes and begins to try to do the hand movements inherent to the first spell he ever cast. It’s more difficult to cast it in a stealthy fashion, considering that the first time he ever cast the spell he hadn’t even been trying to cast spells. He hadn’t even known he was a wizard back then; he was just a three-year-old who would flap his hands whenever he got excited, and that day he had managed to flap them in such a way that caused his magic to ignite.

After slightly less than a minute, Mordred’s hands erupt into balls of blue fire. Unfortunately, Jim does not startle from this. Instead, he just pulls a dagger from his armor and hold it to Mordred’s throat. Mordred lets the fireballs dissipate into nothingness.

“Okay, I won’t do that,” Douxie says. “But seriously, Jim, you need to fight this. I know we don’t know each other that well, but surely you don’t want to be doing this?”

Jim remains mind controlled as he throws Mordred into the antimagic cell. Literally throws. Mordred knows he’s going to have bruises from the impact.

The cell door swings closed quickly, but an armored hand catches it. It’s not Jim. It’s the knight that had hit Zoe with a flail, forcing her to reveal the source of her magic. He’s not wearing his helmet.

“Agravaine?” Mordred says, forcing himself to sit up even though it will likely be more comfortable to continue lying on the floor. He wonders if he hit his head, because his cousin is apparently still alive after all these centuries. “You changed your armor.”

“You know, I thought you were finally starting to get smart, when you killed your father and all that,” Agravaine says. “Clearly you’re still a dumb kid.”

“Are Gawain, Gaheris, and Gareth still alive?” Mordred asks. Agravaine scowls, like it’s Mordred’s fault that he had found his other three Orkney cousins more interesting and fun to be around when he was growing up. Personally, Mordred had liked Agravaine better than their cousin Ywain le Fay, but if Agravaine is working for Merlin then Ywain is now his second-to-least favorite cousin on his father’s side.

“No,” Agravaine says. “Gareth and Gaheris were killed by Gumm-Gumms. Gawain, on the other hand, he made the mistake of opposing Merlin.” Agravaine lets go of the cell door, letting it continue swinging close. “But if it’s any help, I’m sure Merlin has a better use for you than death.”

“Just, why didn’t he tell us?” Zoe asks.

“I think he tried,” Steve says. Everyone looks towards him. “Yesterday, Douxie tried to get us to believe that maybe Mordred would be willing to help us.”

“He was stuttering a lot,” Archie says.

“Exactly!” Steve says. “I mean, without any proof his idea of Mordred being on our side sounded kind of crazy, but I think he was trying to, you know, test the waters? See if it was safe to reveal himself? Kind of like how Aja did with me. And we completely blew it. Now, him being weird and breaking up with you for being his soulmate while claiming the opposite, I’m getting a headache just thinking about it, but everything else? I think he was trying to get us to help and we didn’t help him.”

Zoe sighs. “Yeah, that makes sense.”

Krel nods in agreement.

“I’m going to call Claire,” Toby says. “Let her know what to look out for, see if she has any intel, see how she, Blinky, and my Wingman are doing when it comes to protecting the trolls from Merlin. See how she’s healing from Merlin cutting off her hand – I hope Merlin doesn’t try doing that to Douxie, especially since it might be harder to get his hand back than it was with Claire. By Deya, I want him to stop hurting my friends.”

And getting Claire’s hand had led to Merlin controlling Jim.

“We’ll save him,” Krel vows.

Douxie isn’t sure how long he’s been kept in the antimagic cell, alone with only his memories to plague him. Well, that, and one very stale piece of bread that Agravaine tossed at Mordred’s head.

Jim opens the door to the cell, and gestures for Mordred to come out. Jim never enters the cell. Douxie wonders if entering the cell will free Jim.

Maybe Mordred should feel guilty for having made the amulet. Sure, the amulet ensured that the Gumm-Gumms, the beings who killed two of Mordred’s parents and two of Mordred’s cousins, were finally defeated, but it’s also being used to control Jim. But he’s too exhausted to think about it. He’s exhausted from being completely cut off from his magic, so Mordred doesn’t fight back. He just goes to wear Jim leads him.

It’s a small room, but it’s larger than Douxie’s cell. Jim shuts the door behind Mordred, leaving him alone with Merlin. Merlin has his back to the entrance. A set of papers float in front of him. One set older, one set newer. Nearby, a sword is being sharpened with magic.

Mordred swallows down his bile. It’s Excalibur, out of its sheath. His father didn’t unsheathe Excalibur when he fought Mordred at Camlann.

In the center of the room is a stone pillar.

Merlin flicks a hand, and Mordred is dragged towards the pillar by magic. Ropes twist themselves around his arms, legs, and torso. His upper right arm is on the pillar. Mordred is able to twist his head to try and see the papers.

He’s seen the set of old papers before. He first saw them soon before he accidentally sent himself to the twenty-first century. Actually, they’re what truly inspired him to run away from Merlin. They’re the plans to the Amulet of Daylight.

The newer papers look like plans for an amulet.

Mordred remembers how Claire nearly lost a hand to Merlin, and how even now it’s still healing from the dismemberment.

“Please don’t do this,” Mordred pleads as he tries to force himself not to hyperventilate. “I can help you in other ways.”

Merlin grabs Excalibur. “You should have thought of that centuries ago. Besides, you’d be surprised by how hard it is to find wizard hands.”

Mordred glares at Merlin and tries to summon his magic. Lightning, fire, anything. But he hasn’t recovered from the antimagic cell, so he can’t fight back. He still strains against his bindings.

“Fine, have it your way and fight back,” Merlin says. “It’ll only hurt worse.”

As Merlin brings down Excalibur, Mordred’s last thought before painful oblivion takes him is that he can almost understand why Aunt Morgana turned on everyone.

But only almost.

It’s been a long two delsons since Merlin took Mordred. They’ve tried to cover up Douxie’s disappearance. Zoe with illusory magic, Krel with a hastily thrown together transduction, and Toby and Steve with a shared glamour mask. That, and the fact that Douxie’s phone got left behind. They’ve seen him unlock it enough times that it isn’t too hard to hack, though the pattern is annoyingly complicated.

Krel sighs. He’s supposed to meet up with Zoe in a few horvaths, to try and find a way to upgrade their weapons and armor. Well, everyone else’s weapons and armor, considering that Krel’s doesn’t need upgrading. They don’t know where Mordred, Jim, and Merlin are, but they’ll need to be stronger if they want to be able to ever fight Merlin to get their friends back. For now, though, he’s sitting in his room, sipping at a glass of juice that Lucy gave him.

An idea comes to him. It’s technically a violation of privacy, but Krel and the others have already been through Douxie’s phone. Krel’s desire to check Mordred’s wrist can’t be any worse. It’s just a selfish desire for Krel to see his own name on his ex’s wrist.

Krel activates the transduction that makes him look like Douxie. Krel’s name should be on Mordred’s right wrist, underneath the bracelets he always wears. The bracelets don’t budge.

Krel doesn’t get why he’s so disappointed when he returns to his Akiridion form. He should’ve known that the bracelets wouldn’t move. It’s a very basic transduction, only meant to fool people who won’t look too closely. People who don’t know Douxie’s mannerisms and won’t touch enough Douxie to notice that his clothes won’t move from his body. It’s meant to keep people from missing him.

It doesn’t stop Krel from missing Douxie. Krel frowns. He doesn’t want to miss Douxie. He isn’t fine with his ex being held captive by Merlin, but he also doesn’t want to miss him. He wants Douxie to be safe, and maybe a little miserable without Krel. He wants Mordred to be regretting his decision to break up with Krel. He wants an apology, and an explanation. But Krel doesn’t want to miss Douxie, he wants to try and ignore Douxie’s entire existence. Except, even when Krel and Douxie had just broken up, Krel hadn’t been able to ignore him. Krel isn’t sure if he’d be able to ignore Douxie like he wants to be able to, even if Douxie was safe and far from Merlin and not Mordred. Krel can’t stop thinking about Douxie, because…

Because…

“I love him,” Krel admits quietly to his empty room. Krel sits on his bed, one hand over his core. A single tear rolls down his cheek. Despite everything that Mordred has supposedly done, Krel loves him. Despite how much Douxie has hurt Krel by breaking up with him, Krel loves him. Or maybe that’s why he’s so hurt by the breakup, because Krel has never loved anyone the way he’s loves Douxie before.

Krel wipes his eyes with his lower right hand. He then rolls down the sleeve of that arm and presses his lips to where Mordred’s name has been on Krel’s wrist for three keltons.

Krel lowers his arm and chuckles a little, feeling silly for what he has just done.

He isn’t ready to forgive Douxie for how he hurt Krel, but maybe, just maybe, the two of them can go back to being on speaking terms after they rescue Mordred.

Mordred keeps his arms against his chest. Each time he hears footsteps pass by the dim cell that Merlin is keeping him in, Mordred finds himself switching which arm is crossed over the other even though doing so aggravates his injury. He can’t decide which arm he wants to be closer to any impending attack. His right arm feels useless, and it’d be better to use it to protect his left arm. However, he can’t bear the thought of his right arm getting any more hurt. He hasn’t been given painkillers, not pills, potions, spells, or even theriac, though the last of those might be hard to come by in this century. He certainly hasn’t been able to heal himself; an iron cuff has replaced his wristwatch and has locked away his ability to cast spells. The closest he has to a painkiller is the numbness that comes from having been locked in a small, dim cell for what feels like a very long time with nothing to distract himself with other than distant footsteps.

He supposes that the cuff better than the antimagic cell, because the inability to access his magic doesn’t feel as oppressive. Also, Jim has actually been handing the stale bread to him instead of just throwing it at him. But in the antimagic cell he wasn’t chained to a wall by his left arm. In the antimagic cell he could walk around more than two paces. In the antimagic cell he still had two hands.

Perhaps Mordred should consider himself lucky that he had been given bandages, not left to bleed out. Then again, luck is another form of fate, and fate is never on his side. Merlin probably has something planned for Mordred. Something horrible. Perhaps Merlin will harvest Mordred’s left hand as well, and then go on to harvest other parts of his body for spell components..

He can’t just be bait. Perhaps he thinks of himself as too important, but it doesn’t seem right. If Douxie is just bait, then Merlin wouldn’t have revealed Mordred’s identity to everyone else. Merlin would know that Zoe would hate Mordred and would lead the others in hating Mordred even if he had been their friend. If Douxie is bait, then he will fail at the role Merlin was forcing him to play. No one will come for him.

His friends hate him.

His soulmate is grateful that he doesn’t have to look at Douxie, if they’re even soulmates anymore.

His only living family are a cousin who’s never really liked him (and whom he’s never really liked back), and a genocidal aunt trapped in another dimension. Honestly, Aunt Morgana’s more likely to kill Mordred as she razes Merlin’s stronghold than she is to rescue Mordred. Never mind that once Mordred had found the list of ingredients Merlin had used for the amulet, Mordred had run away. He hadn’t been able to apologize to his aunt for everything involving her lost hand in a timely manner because he had accidentally sent himself forward in time about a millennium and a half, but she won’t take his excuses. Besides, she probably won’t recognize him; she hadn’t recognized him back when she had been possessing Claire. So why would she save him?

No one will save Douxie.

Mordred hears footsteps, and he recrosses his arms.

“I am so glad you’re finally taking an interest in your past,” Archie says as he half reads, half lies on top of the plans that Krel and Zoe have drawn up.

“I’ve ‘taken an interest’ in artificing work before,” Zoe says.

“You wanted to make a magical flamethrower. Honestly, given that three of your uncles are firefighters and both your father and grandfather worked in a chemical plant, I wouldn’t be surprised if a mild case of pyromania runs in your family,” Archie says. “Really, you’re the Lady of the Lake, not the Lady of the Bonfire.”

“Some planets have lakes of fire,” Krel provides. Archie glares at him, stands up, and walks to sit directly in the doorway. Zoe just rolls her eyes.

“By the way, why does your armor need to have pink and blue ribbons?” Krel asks. No one else is getting anything as fanciful. Toby’s armor is being upgraded to be more like Jim’s in that Toby will be able to put it on in a flash of light. Steve is going to be getting a helmet and breastplate, and also an axe, all of which will be collapsible. He has broken far too many baseball bats when fighting constructs; it’s time for him to get a real weapon.

“Because in combination with the armor being silver, it’s trans rights,” Zoe says. “Also, I probably watched way too many magical girl shows when I was a kid. I mean, that was one of things that was actually cool about getting the Lady of the Lake powers. I thought I was getting a cool, supportive black cat that would actually be a useful and effective guide.”

“I can hear you,” Archie says.

Zoe ignores him. “That, and just the gender affirming part. By the way, Krel, are you sure you don’t want to do any upgrades?”

“I’m fine with just my serrator. I mean, it’d be nice to work on my portable wormhole generator, but we need weapons and armor. Besides, I’m more durable than the rest of you.”

Zoe frowns. “Sure, I just don’t want you to get hurt when we go to save Doux… Mor… ugh, I don’t know what to call him.”

“I’m sure we can ask him when we rescue him.” Krel hopes they can do so soon.

For once, it’s Agravaine dragging Mordred out of his cell. Literally dragging. At least Jim had left Mordred with some dignity left by allowing him to walk. Agravaine had taken the chain binding Mordred to the wall and is using it to drag Mordred along at a demanding pace. Or perhaps it’s a normal pace, and Mordred’s limbs are just not used to being able to move this long. Mordred does not know how much time he has spent shackled to a wall. He does not know how long it has been since he lost his hand.

He doesn’t dare to ask. When he was a child, Merlin told Mordred that he asked too many questions. Mordred doesn’t dare ask any now, for fear of punishment.

Agravaine takes Mordred back to the room where he lost his hand. Mordred tries not to hyperventilate as he looks around for a source of escape. Agravaine attaches the chain to the wall and leaves the room.

Excalibur isn’t in the room, but that does not give Mordred any comfort. Merlin might keep it with him. He might also keep it in some sort of pocket dimension. Not that Mordred can remember Merlin ever using that sort of magic. It had always been Aunt Morgana using magic inherent to alternate dimensions.

Then again, according to Krel there were more than three spatial dimensions, so maybe shadow magic isn’t needed to access them. Mordred misses Krel and everyone else so much. He doesn’t deserve to miss them, though. Especially not Krel. He doubts they miss him. They think he’s a ruthless, bloodthirsty killer. They hate him. Mordred doesn’t blame them. He hates himself, too.

Merlin enters the room. One of Merlin’s hands is empty. The other is clasped around something.

Merlin releases the shackle around Mordred’s wrist. Immediately, Mordred can feel his magic begin to return to his body. Before Mordred can attempt to cast any spells, Merlin’s hand wraps around Mordred’s throat. Merlin then places something circular and cold against Mordred’s chest. As Merlin removes his hand from Mordred’s throat, there is a flash of green light.

Mordred feels a numbness wrap around his skull and armor wrap around his body.

He doesn’t feel like Mordred anymore.

He doesn’t feel like Douxie anymore.

He doesn’t feel like a person.

He feels cold.

This feeling is familiar, and he is terrified.

The construct they were sent to fight was incredibly weak. Or maybe the upgrades to their weapons and armor are just that strong. Either way, after Merlin’s ambush Krel is nervous about weak constructs. He gets the feeling that the others are as well. All four of them look around, making sure there is no other threat.

It’s rare that any of them have seen one of the knights or the constructs actually teleport in front of them, but it always starts the same way. Smoke begins to swirl in the floor. As it rises, it glows with green light, and when it clears the knight or construct is there.

Mordred is there. He wears black armor. His helmet has a dragon with outstretched wings on it, and his pauldrons, knee-guards, and elbow-guards all look like wings. There are wings on the armor’s tasset as well. Mordred’s hands are completely encased in armor, and the guards on his knuckles are similar to the ones on his other joints. An amulet glows on Mordred’s chest plate with a poisonous green light, and the brightness of the carvings in his armor seem to correspond to how close they are to the amulet. The amulet looks like Jim’s, but the hands resemble wings. In addition, the amulet is about a third of the size of Jim’s.

His eyes are black and green and glowing.

Krel moves to take a step towards Mordred, but Toby puts his arm out and steps to the front.

“So,” Toby says. “You’re still too much of a coward to actually face us, so you’re going to keep using my friends as a shield.”

“I’m sorry,” Mordred says. His voice sounds pained and so very tired.

Toby’s expression changes from determined to terrified. Mordred’s hands open from the fists they had been clenched into. He waves his left hand in an arc, and five floating daggers appear in the air. He reaches out his right arm, and a sword appears in his hand. The crosspiece of the sword and daggers all have the same wing motif.

He lunges forward, and everyone has to scatter from formation to avoid the daggers.

Krel has fought Douxie before in practice spars. So have the others. Douxie rarely won, because he was always cautious while fighting them. Like he was afraid of hurting them.

The way that Douxie fights now is far more ruthless. It’s not the exact way that Douxie fights knights and constructs, because Douxie would be precise with his dagger and shield. He’d have to be, without armor and the reach of a sword. Worse, it’s not just an improvement to Douxie’s weapons and armor. He casts spells that create light and fire.

What Mordred loses in accuracy he more than makes up for in precision. Every strike makes Krel thankful that he and Zoe upgraded everyone’s armor.

But armor can’t fully save them. Sure, Mordred can’t pierce into the armor’s gaps because he can’t see them, but the armor doesn’t fully cover any of them. And too late, Krel realizes that Steve should have some sort of guards on his arms.

Right before Steve’s arm can be reduced to a bleeding mass of ribbons, the daggers twist so that the flat end hits them. And yes, being hit by them probably still hurts, but not as much as it would have.

Mordred places his left hand on his sword’s hilt. His jaw shifts, like he’s gritting his teeth.

Like he’s fighting back against Merlin.

Afterwards, the fight is slightly easier. Yes, Mordred now has more power to the blows, but he has more control. The fight is not easy enough for any of them to try and ask Mordred how to save him.

A single tear rolls down Mordred’s face as he stops himself from slashing through Krel’s chest.

An emerald floats up from some unseen spot in Mordred’s armor and crushes itself above him, sending Mordred away.

Krel isn’t sure which of his soulmate’s names he screams in frustration.

The cold numbness doesn’t leave when Merlin once more chokes Douxie as Merlin replaces the amulet with the shackle. Merlin then walks away, probably to summon Jim or one of the knights to bring Mordred back to his cell. Douxie doesn’t feel like a person, but he forces his lips to move and sound to escape his throat because he needs to know.

“You…” Mordred says, trying to force out the accusatory anger that he feels in some distant place that all of his emotions and everything else that makes him a person have been sent to. “You killed my father, didn’t you?”

Merlin glances over at him. “We both know that you stabbed him through the chest. And given how you’ve been fighting back against my control for the past several days, I’d say that you were more than capable of fighting back then, especially if you had truly cared about him. So, no. You killed Arthur. I just gave you the needed push. Unfortunately, you lack the discipline that you had back then.”

Merlin steps away, and some of that distant anger and shock is replaced by fear. Fear that Mordred is going to lose his left hand as well. Merlin continues speaking. “It’s really too bad. If your parents had just listened to the false prophecy I had given them, I could have stolen you away with the promise to kill you and instead raised you as my weapon since I had always known your magic would be powerful. Then I wouldn’t have to worry about any of this. But no. Without doubting the prophecy’s validity, Arthur, Lancelot, and Guinevere all thought the best choice was to raise you themselves and hope that I had misinterpreted the idea of you killing Arthur. Funny, that. When I created the false prophecy, I didn’t yet even have any intention to have Arthur killed. He had still been useful, then.”

The numbness is so intense that the entire trek back to Mordred’s cell is a blur.

Toby’s house is the closest, this time, so that’s where they go when Douxie is gone. Toby very purposefully avoids looking towards Jim’s house as they do so.

“That was Douxie’s voice,” Toby says as the four of them climb the stairs to Toby’s room. It’s the longest sentence he’s said since they heard Douxie speak.

“So?” Steve asks.

“Possessed people don’t have their own voice, they have the voice of the person possessing them. Draal spoke in Gunmar’s voice. Claire spoke in Morgana’s voice. Douxie isn’t possessed.”

“But he’s not the one in control,” Zoe says.

“No, but he was fighting back,” Krel says.

“The point is, how do we get him back? I’d go to Strickler for possession stuff since he was somewhat helpful with Claire, but like I said,” Toby says, glancing behind himself towards the direction of Jim’s house.

“Well, what if we cut him off from his magic?” Steve asks. Zoe winces at the idea. “Uh, cut him off from Merlin’s magic, anyways?”

“Wait, cutting Douxie off from his own magic might work,” Toby says. Zoe cringes away from him.

“How?” she says in a horrified tone of voice.

“Merlin’s tomb,” Toby says.

“I thought the entire problem is that Merlin is alive and none of us know how to kill him,” Steve says.

“It’s where me and the others woke Merlin up from in the first place.” A guilty look forms on Toby’s face. “Big crystal cave, weird rooms, the point is, Douxie won’t be able to use his magic there. Only Merlin’s magic works there, which is why I didn’t mention this to any of you for Jim. Plus, even though only Merlin’s magic working, that’s not where Merlin’s home base is. Don’t get why, though. But the point is, Douxie will only be using a sword. Maybe sword and dagger, by dual wielding. But he’ll be at a disadvantage.”

“But if he can’t use magic, then isn’t there a chance that Douxie will have a harder time fighting back?” Krel says as he sits on Toby’s bed.

“Merlin summoned Douxie back because he was fighting back,” Zoe says. “I think. Maybe? But I get the feeling that no matter what, it’s going to be a lot harder for him to fight back against Merlin next time he’s forced to attack us, no matter what.”

“How would we get Douxie to the tomb, though?” Steve asks.

Toby smacks a hand to his forehead. “Right. Forgot about that. We had to break Jim’s amulet to turn on the ignition for a gyre. I mean, Claire’s checked that place out with her portals, but I don’t want to ask her to do any portals. She’s got enough on her plate with protecting the trolls; I swear she has more white hair each time I see her.”

“I’ve been working on a portable wormhole maker, as a side project,” Krel says. “I need a power source, but I think it could work. The person operating it would have to stay behind, though.”

“I might be able to provide power?” Zoe says. “I’d have to see the schematics, though. But I think I’d be able to.”

“And then the three of us can save Douxie!” Steve punches a fist into the air. He winces as he moves his arm wrong; a bruise is forming.

“No. I have to go alone,” Krel says.

“No. You’re. Not.” Toby stands up to his full height so that he’s almost eye-level with Krel.

“All your weapons are at least somewhat magical. Same with your armor. It won’t work in Merlin’s Tomb. I’m the only one who will be able to fight him.”

Toby sighs. “Fine. But if you don’t come out after four minutes, then we’re coming after you.”

“Okay. Hopefully, the fact that Mordred’s my soulmate will help me in this.”

Mordred doesn’t really sleep after the revelation about the prophecy being false. He had a hard time sleeping in his cell before, since his left wrist was always restrained and there was always some amount of pain from his right arm. But it’s worse now.

Knowing that Merlin has been using Mordred since before he was even conceived makes it hard to sleep, eat, or walk the limited range his chain allows him to. All Mordred wants to do is stare at a single point in the wall and try not to think about, well, anything really, because everything leads back to the fact that Mordred is a weapon and always has been. He is a weapon, but if he had tried harder not to be he wouldn’t have killed his father.

His wrists ache constantly. His left wrist is constantly restrained. He is not sure how often the bandages on his right wrist are supposed to be changed, but they’re changed rarely enough that they’ve become dirty.

When he is able to try to fall asleep, he does not sleep well. Nightmares attack him constantly. They aren’t just the nightmares that have plagued Mordred for the past three years, not when some of them feature his friends being the ones with gaping stab wounds in their chests.

He feels so cold all over. Almost all over; his head feels so unbearably hot.

He is so tired. He is too tired to fight back when Merlin forces the amulet upon him again.

After all, Mordred has always been a weapon. It’s useless for him to fight back.

In that distant place where everything that makes him a person is being kept, he hopes his friends will kill him before he can kill them.

Four delsons are barely enough to finish the portable wormhole generator. Four delsons pass between the last time they saw Mordred and now.

Mordred doesn’t wait to attack them like he did before. He is silent. He doesn’t seem to be fighting back against Merlin. His eyes glow a brighter green, as do the carvings. His blows are meant to cause as much harm as possible.

A cut forms on Steve’s arm and another on Toby’s face as they shield Zoe, who’s channeling her magic into the wormhole generator.

“Are you sure about this?” Steve asks.

“Stick to the plan!” Krel shifts his serrator to its shield form to avoid the barrage of daggers.

Mordred is suddenly backlit by the wormhole’s cyan glow. Krel shifts his serrator into its sword form and charges. Mordred sidesteps him, parrying the blow. A line of blue fire forms between the two of them and the wormhole.

“Hey, Douxdred!” Toby shouts. For the briefest of moments, confusion cuts through Douxie’s blank expression. This gives Toby enough of an opening to slam his warhammer into Douxie’s upper legs, sending Douxie and one of his daggers flying through the wormhole. The others fall to the ground. Krel pulls out his hoverboard and flies over the flames and through the wormhole. It closes behind him.

Mordred walks towards him. He throws a dagger at Krel. Krel jumps off the hoverboard in order to avoid it. Mordred breaks into a run, sword pointed at Krel.

Parry. Dodge. Parry. Lunge. Parry. Krel grits his teeth as he adjusts his grip on his serrator.

Parry. Dodge. Thrust. Parry. Krel glances downwards to see if he could try and trip Mordred. Krel has to jump out of the way to avoid Mordred stabbing directly through Krel’s core.

Parry. Advance. Parry. Krel’s serrator gets caught on one of the wings of Mordred’s helmet, and he has to shift it into a shield to avoid losing it. Mordred’s sword clashes into Krel’s shield once, twice, three times before Krel forms a sword again.

Thrust. Parry. Krel wonders how quickly this fight would be over if he just shot Mordred. But Krel isn’t sure how to shoot Mordred and not kill him.

Advance. Mordred’s sword slices into Krel’s jaw, tearing the fabric. Krel parries to avoid any actual damage but loses his serrator in the process.

Krel pushes away at Mordred’s right wrist. Mordred howls in pain and drops his sword. As Mordred attempts to pull away, Krel’s fingers reach around the amulet and pull it out of the armor. Mordred’s eyes close and he falls backwards. Krel reaches for Mordred’s right hand, but his fingers slip through empty air. Mordred’s head slams into the stone floor.

Krel kneels next to him. All four of his hands shake. One of them is about to touch the bandaged stump where Mordred’s right hand used to be, but he decides against it. He doesn’t want to cause any pain. With his lower pair of hands, Krel texts the group chat so they know he’s safe. At the same time, he grabs his serrator and the amulet from where they’ve fallen and sticks them in his pockets.

Krel’s fingers ghost over Mordred’s cheek as he tries to remember where to check a human’s pulse. Akiridions aren’t as sensitive to fluctuations in temperature as humans are, but Krel is pretty sure Mordred’s head shouldn’t be so hot. Mordred leans his head into Krel’s touch, and Krel sighs with relief. His soulmate is alive. Mordred opens his eyes, and Krel realizes that something is wrong.

Mordred’s eyes are no longer green; they are the same shade of gold that Krel has missed more than he had known. But they are hollow, like Merlin has reached into Mordred and taken out everything that makes Mordred a person.

“Krel?” Mordred asks. He sounds so tired. Tired, and scared, and pained. His hollow eyes focus on Krel’s jaw, where the suit is ripped. “I’m so sorry.”

“It’s not your fault, it was Merlin’s,” Krel says.

“Not just for that.” Douxie trembles as he sits up. Krel reluctantly removes his hand from Douxie’s cheek. He doesn’t want to put any pressure on his soulmate.

The wormhole opens behind them.

“Let’s go home,” Krel says. They stand up; Krel catches Douxie as he begins to collapse. Douxie cradles his right arm against his chest.

“Here, lean on me,” Krel says, his voice more frustrated than he intends. He’s not frustrated with his ex. Not too frustrated, anyways. He’s angry at Merlin. Krel had known that Mordred losing a hand was a possibility, but the reality hurts.

The selfish part of Krel wants to push Douxie away. Douxie is sticky with sweat and blood, and his gait is just different enough to throw Krel off. But the heartbroken part of Krel cherishes the way Douxie’s body presses against Krel’s own, the way Douxie leans into Krel’s touch. He knows it won’t last, but he wants it to.

They exit the wormhole into Krel’s house. Krel isn’t always the best at reading other people’s emotions, but it is easy to pinpoint when his friends realize that Douxie is missing a hand.

“I, uh, I’m gonna go call Dr. L,” Toby says, darting off as he pulls out his phone.

“What happened?” Zoe asks as the four of them follow Toby upstairs.

“Merlin happened,” Douxie mumbles.

“He hit his head when I got the armor off of him,” Krel says at almost the same time.

Krel deposits Mordred into a comfortable chair. Mordred’s hollow eyes follow Krel as he walks away, but then he just starts staring at a random empty point on Krel’s wall. His eyes start to flutter closed.

Steve pokes Mordred in the cheek.

Mordred opens his eyes. “Why?”

“Sorry, but you might have a concussion. If you fall asleep, you might fall asleep forever.” Steve turns to Zoe as he removes his finger. “He’s burning up.”

“Hey, Lucy, where do you keep your towels?” Zoe asks, running off as water begins to coalesce in her hands.

“I doubt it’ll be forever,” Mordred says. “Just another millennium and a half, like last time. Maybe then I can stop being Merlin’s weapon.”

Zoe comes back with a damp towel, using her magic to keep it from dripping on the floor. She unceremoniously lays it over Douxie’s forehead.

“Cold,” he complains. He reaches up with his left hand to move it, but Zoe presses the towel against his forehead.

“Yeah, well, suck it up, you’ve got a fever. Towel stays.” Zoe bites her lip as she steps away. Mordred sighs and continues staring at the blank wall, expression completely blank.

Quietly, she says, “I’ve never seen him this sick before. And his eyes. They’re…”

“Hollow?” Krel provides.

Zoe wraps her arms around herself. “I was going to say voids, but that works better.”

Toby walks over towards them. “Okay. So, Dr. L’s driving over. She’s going to pick him up and take him to the hospital.”

Krel takes the amulet out of his pocket and hands it to Zoe. “Do you think you or Archie could do something with this?” Zoe shrugs, but takes it anyways.

“Thanks for fighting back,” Mordred says, startling the four of them.

“Well, what else would we have done?” Steve asks.

Mordred sniffles. “My father didn’t when Merlin made me kill him. I wish he had.”

Toby, Zoe, Steve, and Krel all look at each other, not sure what to say after that. Mordred just continues staring at the empty wall.

Toby pulls out his phone. “Oh! Dr. L’s here.”

Steve takes Douxie out to the car. Krel looks down at his right hands and realizes that Mordred lost the wrist with Krel’s name on it.

A day later, Douxie is released from the hospital with instructions on how to keep his right arm clean, a list of legal instructions to handle with his employers considering that he’s lost a hand, medical results revealing that he doesn’t have a concussion, and several prescriptions. One is for the infection, one is for the fever, and another is for the pain. He isn’t sure how his health insurance will pay for any of it, not with how hard it is to try and get flu vaccinations covered, but Dr. Lake says not to worry about it and how the city is trying to set up a fund to help with defense. It’s hard for him to worry, but not because of her reassurement. He feels better than he did yesterday, but he still doesn’t feel like a person with actual, non-distant emotions.

Getting re-dressed is a frustrating endeavor. He drops his belt once before he gets the hang of using his forearm. He has no idea of how to tie his shoelaces with only one hand, so he stuffs them inside his shoes. He can’t figure out how to roll his hoodie sleeves up, so he lets them hang around his wrists. It feels wrong. For nearly as long as he can remember his sleeves have been cut short or rolled up. Long sleeves were a fire hazard around a toddler who would make fireballs, so Mother, Father, Da, and anyone else who cared about Mordred would make sure to roll up his sleeves if for some reason his were long. Mordred hasn’t accidentally set fire to anything in a long time, but rolled up sleeves are such a habit that the way they are now feels wrong.

And yes, he can technically use his magic to dress himself, but his magic feels tainted now. Tainted and distant, just like everything else about him as a person.

He walks into the hospital waiting room, arms pressed to his sides. It is mostly empty, aside from the receptionist and three other people. Specifically, three of Douxie’s friends.

Specifically, Zoe, Steve, and Toby. He is relieved to see them, to see that they care about him enough to come here. He doesn’t allow himself to be disappointed that Krel isn’t there, not with how Douxie hurt Krel. Krel should hate Douxie. Krel deserves to hate Mordred even more than everyone else does. Yesterday was just a fluke when Krel had handled Douxie so tenderly. It may have not even been truly tender, it may have been the aftereffects of possession, infection, betrayal, losing a hand, and otherwise poor living conditions causing Douxie to seek out any source of comfort even when there wasn’t one. It wasn’t tenderness, it was just wishful thinking.

The three of them are talking, but Toby notices Mordred first. He taps Zoe on the shoulder, and she looks up. She stands up from her chair and marches towards Mordred, anger radiating off of her.

Mordred tries not to flinch away. Of course. They hate him. They think he’s a bloodthirsty killer. Merlin forced Mordred to try and kill them and so they should hate him for their own safety.

“I can’t believe you,” Zoe says. “Seriously? Why am I listed as your next of kin? I have to get my parents to approve of my own, but somehow I have to make the medical decisions for you. Is that even legal? Why couldn’t you have found some adult to trust with this?”

She then hugs him with enough force that Mordred has to adjust his footing. His left arm shakes as he wraps it around Zoe.

“I can change it, if you want?” Mordred says. He doesn’t understand why it’s somewhat-legal paperwork that she’s mad about and not everything else.

Steve and Toby walk towards them. Steve pulls Douxie’s phone out of the pocket of his khakis.

“You dropped this,” Steve says. Zoe pulls away from Mordred so he can grab his phone. His hand shakes less now. Steve continues, “Oh yeah, you should probably change your password, since all four of us hacked into it so we could pretend to be you so your jobs didn’t think you’d just skipped town.”

“Yeah, also,” Zoe says, “we were wondering if you preferred to be called Douxie or Mordred?”

“I… it doesn’t matter,” Mordred says. He can’t hide from his past anymore, so there’s no reason to continue being Douxie, but Douxie is an identity he claimed for himself when everything else was ripped away from him. He can be both. Maybe he can find a way to change his name to legally incorporate the name he chose into the name his parents gave him. Considering how he was able to falsify his legal existence; it shouldn’t be too hard.

“Okay, Douxdred it is, then,” Toby says.

“One or the other; don’t call me that,” Douxie snaps, then cringes. He isn’t sure how he earned their forgiveness, but he can’t be threatening or else they’ll hate him. “I’m sorry.”

Toby shrugs. “Hey, I get it. I still hate that Claire’s nickname for me stuck.”

“You don’t hate me?” Mordred asks, glancing between his friends. “Not with everything I’ve done? You don’t think I’ll betray you?”

“Why would we?” Steve asks. “It wasn’t your fault. You literally told us that in a kind of depressing way. I know a therapist, she’s really nice.”

“But I didn’t know Merlin made, made me…” Douxie looks away, lowering his voice so it sounds less choked. “I thought I was dangerous, that I was a time bomb before I killed someone I cared about again. I thought it was something engrained into me by fate, not Merlin. And I didn’t tell any of you.”

“And I didn’t tell any of you that Merlin and the knights had a very specific vendetta against me and thus my very presence probably escalated at least one fight more than it needed to,” Zoe says as she rolls her eyes.

Douxie sighs, a very slight smile forming on his face. He doesn’t understand why his friends trust him, but he’s thankful that they do.

Krel’s phone buzzes right as he hangs up after talking to Eli about math and technology. Krel pulls it out of his pocket and unlocks it.

Oh. Right. Mordred got out of the hospital, and the others were going to check on him. There are updates from Zoe, Toby, and Steve. None of the updates ask why Krel wasn’t there. None of the updates are from Douxie. Which makes sense, considering that they aren’t on speaking terms. Krel hasn’t blocked Douxie’s number, not when Merlin is a threat.

According to Zoe, Mordred’s eyes are still just as hollow as they were yesterday. Krel wants to hug his soulmate, to hold him until the emptiness goes away. But Douxie had looked at Krel with a bored expression when Krel had claimed to never want to speak to Douxie again. Which means that Douxie doesn’t feel the same way about Krel. Yesterday was just a fluke. The aftereffects of possession, infection, losing a hand, and anything else that Merlin may have just caused Mordred to find a way to seek comfort out from any source, even if he normally wouldn’t want it. Mordred wasn’t actually taking comfort in Krel’s touch; it was just Krel’s wishful thinking.

Krel types out a quick question, one devoid of emotion but polite, the way his parents taught him to be with dignitaries. He then holds down the backspace button. As much as Krel wants to see if his soulmate is okay, he also wants an apology and an explanation from his ex.

Douxie has less than a day to recover when Merlin sends another enemy. An alert shows up on his phone. It takes far too many tries to unlock his phone; he really needs to change it to something that can be easily unlocked with one hand. When he finally unlocks it, he checks the location of the enemy. Afterwards Douxie shoves his phone in his pants pocket, grabs his keys, and runs out of his house.

He does technically know how to use a dagger with his left hand. But he’s never really liked doing so. He’s trained himself into ambidexterity, so he can cast spells with his left hand and wield a weapon with his right. But he can’t do that anymore. He has to make a choice.

Fire is out of the question, unless he wants to deal with a burning hoodie. Just using shielding spells isn’t going to be helpful.

Douxie stops, several feet away. It’s a swarm of small constructs. Zoe, Steve, and Toby are all trying to smack them. Krel is trying to shoot them with his serrator.

Zoe’s armor doesn’t contain a visor. She gets hit in the nose hard enough to bleed. Blood drips from her nose across her face and onto her armor. Onto her armored chest.

Mordred can’t breathe, not with the memories are overlaying themselves on top of the present. This is all his fault. They’re all going to die and it will be his fault just like it was Mordred’s fault when –

It hadn’t been Mordred’s fault, back then. It had been Merlin’s fault. Or at least, the only fault Mordred had was not fighting back hard enough. He has to fight back now.

Mordred exhales quietly before he bites his lip. He summons a dagger, and then summons four more. He inspects them, makes sure they have a soft blue glow and the crosspieces don’t resemble dragon wings at all. He then swings his left arm like he’s trying to throw something, and he sends his daggers into the fray. He is careful. He doesn’t want to hurt his friends.

Steve stumbles as a dagger takes down a construct about to attack him, but he smiles slightly as he turns towards Mordred. “Oh, huh, you can do that outside of being controlled.”

Douxie tries not to wince.

Parry. Weave. Misdirect. Trying to focus on five different daggers gives him a headache that still doesn’t make him feel real. It doesn’t matter though. His friends are getting hurt less. And he will make whatever needed sacrifice to protect him.

He can see a construct trying to sneak up on him of the corner of his eye. He ignores it. He needs to keep his friends safe. It jumps, ready to pounce, and he does not flinch away because he needs to protect his friends.

The construct is consumed by cyan light. Douxie looks up, and his lips part slightly in a gasp. For the briefest of moments, Krel looks concerned. He then catches Douxie staring and looks away.

Right. They’re in the middle of a fight. But despite everything, Krel might still care about Douxie, or at least, not hate Douxie enough to let him be injured.

Parry. Slash. Stab. The fight finishes more quickly than started. Zoe’s nose is finally starting to clot, and she uses her water magic to clean the blood off of herself. Removing the armor means there isn’t much blood on her clothes. It still looks gruesome. Steve offers her a ride to patch up her face at his house, which she accepts. Toby needs to help his Nana. Krel starts to slowly walk away without a word.

Douxie wants to go home, to avoid everyone. But guilt gnaws at him, and so he jogs over to Krel.

“Can we talk?” Mordred asks, trying to make sure he doesn’t sound pushy, because he doesn’t deserve this.

Krel gives him a long look before speaking. “Sure. Let’s go to my house.”

Krel unlocks the door and steps inside, holding the door open for Douxie while shooing off the Blanks. He does not need Lucy to sharpen her paring knives or Ricky to practice juggling objects heavy enough to crush a human skull while Krel talks to his ex.

They sit on opposite sides of the couch. Krel folds both pairs of hands in his lap. Douxie is about to wrap his arms around his torso, left arm protectively folded on top of his right, but he then presses them to his sides instead.

“So. Talk.” Krel’s voice comes out harsher than he intends. He really needs to get better at talking to people.

“I’m sorry for how I treated you, when I found out that you’re my soulmate,” Mordred says. “And this isn’t an excuse or a justification for how I treated you, because I shouldn’t have, but please let me explain myself.”

Krel nods slightly.

“I… ever since before I was born,” Mordred says shakily, “there was a prophecy where I would kill my father. I didn’t want to kill him, but one day I suddenly was forced to do so, and I didn’t know why. And so, I rationalized it as that for some reason, the forces of fate hated me and wanted me to kill everyone I love. And it was really Merlin manipulating me all along, but I didn’t know that. So, I assumed that fate would make me kill my soulmate. And I was thankful, when I realized that my soulmate wasn’t human, because I thought that the chances of me meeting him, well, you, were so low that I wouldn’t have to worry about pushing… you away to keep you safe. And then I met you, and up until you told us about your soulmate, I just hoped that my soulmate was literally any other Akiridion. But then I found out the truth, and I was so scared I was going to kill you. I didn’t want to hurt you, so I pushed you away.”

Wait… Douxie loves Krel? Mordred loves Krel back?

Douxie gives a wet chuckle. He blinks harshly, like that will stop the tears from forming in his hollow eyes. Like he doesn’t want Krel to pity him, or for his tears to influence Krel. “I really didn’t think that through. Pushing you away that is. Because yeah, I was avoiding killing you. Or at least, trying to. But I still hurt you. And I’m sorry. I was wrong, and not just because it was Merlin controlling me instead of pure fate, but because I should have told you why. And you don’t need to forgive me, and I completely understand. I’m, uh, I can go now, and we can continue not speaking to each other if you want. Thanks for hearing me out, though.”

Douxie rises from the couch.

Krel has wanted three things ever since he found out that Douxie is Mordred: an explanation, an apology, and his soulmate. He has two of them, and he doesn’t want to let the third go.

Krel inhales, sharp and loud, and grabs Douxie’s hand between both of his lower ones. Krel then cradles his soulmate’s face with his upper pair of hands, using his thumbs to brush away Mordred’s tears.

“I love you, too,” Krel says. “Never lie to me again.”

Mordred smiles a half-overjoyed, half-broken smile. “I can do that.”

Krel hugs Douxie as he starts sobbing into Krel’s chest. Krel might shed a couple relieved tears as well.

When Douxie shows his face again, his eyes seem just a little less hollow.

Krel loves Douxie, and mostly forgives him. This keeps Mordred feeling buoyant and more tethered to his own body than he has felt ever since Merlin forced the amulet upon him. That evening, Douxie still feels rather real as he walks into Zimue Records, where Zoe is finishing up her shift. She asked him to come around at the end. If he squints, he can see faint bruises on her nose.

She pulls an amulet out her pocket, and Douxie’s regained sense of reality fades away once more. It is the same amulet that Merlin created out of Douxie’s hand, but the crystal inside of it is utterly clear.

“You didn’t destroy it?” he asks. He digs his nails into his palm as a twofold task: not hyperventilating and maybe regaining a sense of reality. He manages the former.

“Archie showed me how to take Merlin’s magic out of it,” Zoe says. “It has your hand in it, doesn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“I was thinking that, well, since your hand’s in it, I could use both of our magic to turn it into a prosthetic. It won’t be able to summon the full armor, but hey, the armor made you look like you still had both hands.”

“Merlin could take control of me again!”

“I won’t let him.”

“How can you be sure?”

“I… look. I don’t want you hurt again, and if you don’t want me to do this then that’s fine, but you’re my best friend and I want to help you. And if something goes wrong and Merlin manages to control you again – and I’d take precautions to make sure he can’t – I will save you.”

“If you need to, you should kill me.”

Zoe’s eyes widen. “What? No!”

“Zoe, I don’t think I’ll be able to live with myself if I kill someone under Merlin’s control again. I’m not fully sure how I lived with myself after Camlann and coming to Arcadia.”

“Okay. But understand that killing you would be the last resort. And that we might have a hard time living with ourselves if we were to have killed you.”

“I understand. But, what are your plans for the prosthetic? And can you make it look a little less like armor I would’ve designed when I was eight?”

“So, after he lied to you, you got back together?” Aja scrunches her face as she says this.

“Yes, I’ve explained this to you multiple times.” Krel had almost immediately tried to call his sister and tell her the good news about him and his soulmate. She had called him back with surprising speed. He’s starting to regret it now.

“I don’t think you should.”

“Unlike you, my boyfriend has never caused an injury to my sibling, which means that you don’t get to lecture me.” She flinches slightly at his statement.

“I just don’t want you to get hurt again.”

“I… look, I gave him an ultimatum. I can handle myself. How have you been?”

“Um. Fine.”

“Aja, I know you’re lying. What’s wrong?”

Aja mumbles something.

“I couldn’t hear you,” Krel says.

“I met my soulmate today.” The words rush out of her. She doesn’t sound happy. “Or, well, I found her name.”

“And?”

“She’s a Taylon. Much better than average at shooting, slightly worse than average at hand-to-hand combat. Her name was on a list of Taylon soldiers in training who were vetted as loyal.”

“I mean, that’s good. Does she know about you?”

Aja rolls her eyes. “She has my name on her wrist, just like I have hers on mine. I think she knows that I’m her soulmate.”

“I mean, have you talked to her?”

“Krel, I can’t. You know, I was jealous of you, growing up. There was a chance that you might get to have a relationship with your soulmate – and obviously I didn’t think your relationship would be so complicated, but you’d still get to have one. Mama and Papa would have never let me. I think they’d approve more of me and Steve, and well… I’m not sure how they would’ve felt about him. I mean, you didn’t like him at first. Ugh, I’m not even sure how to tell Steve about my soulmate.”

“Again, Steve punched me! Plus, I hadn’t found anything that made Earth worthwhile yet. But, I don’t think Mama and Papa would want you to be unhappy.” Even if they probably would’ve wanted to uphold the caste system. “So, you should probably talk to her and Steve, without caring what others think.”

Aja sighs. “Since when are you smart?”

“I always have been!”

“I meant about emotions. But also, the offer is still open to beat up your boyfriend if he hurts you again.”

Krel rolls his eyes as Aja transitions into talking about something funny Luug did.

Mordred takes his sword, and he stabs it directly through Krel’s core. A grin forms on Mordred’s face as he twists the sword. He grabs Krel’s shoulder for leverage as he then rips the sword out of the wound. The sword disappears, and suddenly Mordred is made very aware of what he has done, what he has been forced to do. He holds Krel to his chest and presses a hand to the exit wound on Krel’s back, trying to stop the blood from flowing out of Krel’s body and soaking into Mordred’s clothes. Redness stains across Krel’s body as he becomes limper and heavier in Mordred’s arms. Mordred stammers out apologies and pleas for Krel to live. The scent of iron burns his nose. He doesn’t know how to heal Krel, he doesn’t know how to fix this, this is all Mordred’s fault and Krel didn’t deserve any of this.

Krel dies in his arms, and a mournful wail breaks free from Mordred’s lips.

With a scream that could shatter glass, Douxie wakes up in his own bed, tangled in his sheets and soaked in his own sweat. While it is too cool of a liquid and it doesn’t have the same scent, the sweat feels too much like blood, and he is tempted to go take a shower and scrub until his skin is raw, but he left a window open and for once, a cold night breeze is blowing. He doesn’t want to have to leave the warmth of his bed. He fumbles around his nightstand for his phone and unlocks it, thankful that he has changed the pattern to something more accessible. It’s 1:03 AM. Without thinking, he calls Krel.

Krel picks up on the second ring. “Douxie?”

“Sorry I woke you,” Douxie says, suddenly realizing that he had been hyperventilating. He tries to banish the image of Krel bleeding out from his mind.

“Bold of you to assume I even need sleep.” Douxie is pretty sure Krel does need sleep, but he is too panicked to state this. “Are you okay.”

“I…” Douxie wants to lie and say it’s nothing, but he needs to be honest with Krel. “I had a nightmare. I killed you, and there was so much blood, and I just wanted to hear your voice to make sure you were okay.”

In the background, Douxie can hear Krel drum his fingers on the table, like he’s trying to think of something to say. “In your dream, what color was my blood?”

“What? Um, it was red.”

“And what form was I in?”

“Akiridion.”

“I don’t have blood as an Akiridion, and as a human my blood is cyan. So, next time you dream about my red and bloody death, hopefully you’ll remember that and realize it’s not real.” The reminder isn’t that comforting; the fact that Krel is trying to be comforting is.

They end up talking until it’s around 3 AM and even Krel has to acknowledge that he needs sleep.

Their first date after they get back together ends up being at the same coffee shop as their first one was. It’s louder this time and there’s more people, which is annoying. Still, they’re able to tuck themselves into a corner, even if they end up having to press against each other. Which isn’t bad, but there is a slight electric feeling to it that distracts Krel. It’s less intense and more comforting than the first time they held hands, but there’s more surface area.

“Did you know that our friends made a bet over whether or not we would get together?” Krel says. Mordred nearly chokes on his chai.

“Technically,” Krel continues, “Toby and Zoe never agreed to it, but they did speculate about us with Steve.”

“Hmm,” Douxie says, having recovered. “I wonder if they’re speculating about whether or not we got back together.”

“Should we tell them?”

“Not our fault those three are oblivious at times.”

Everyone is crowded around Zoe’s kitchen table. Her idea of collaborating on the prosthetic really boiled down to Douxie pumping magic into the amulet and giving design tips, and then her shooing him off. He’s used to it, considering how she is every single time there’s a group project assigned by one of their teachers at the Academy. Mostly used to it, considering that ever since the two of them joined the independent study track at the start of their junior year they haven’t ever had a group project, just homework they’d work on and gripe about together.

Zoe brings out the reconstructed amulet. The stone is now two separate swirling shades of blue; Douxie’s pale blue and Zoe’s cerulean blue. The hands are now daggers instead of wings. The amulet is attached to a black glove.

“Uh, Zoe?” Douxie says. “If I’m not mistaken, if an ornament is attached to a glove, then it goes on the back of the hand. Which means that that’s a glove that goes on the right hand, which, well…”

Zoe and Archie narrow their eyes in unison.

“Just put it on your right arm and twist the amulet clockwise,” she says. Douxie does as told. The amulet glows, and the glove turns to blue light. Metal shoots out from the amulet and forms a gauntlet. It looks like the armor his father, mother, and da both wore, aside from the fact that there’s an amulet and Mordred’s is completely black.

“You’ll probably have to wear a sock under it, to keep your skin from being damaged when the weather gets extreme, like when it’s really hot or the rare occasion that it’s really cold,” Zoe says. Douxie cringes at the idea of another source of cold. “Anyways, can you do a hand gesture or something, to make sure you can use your fingers?”

He feels clumsy. There’s a slight strain on his magic as he tries to correct the clumsiness. Douxie sticks his tongue out as he sticks his thumb, index, and pinky fingers up while curling his middle and ring fingers inward, much to Steve and Toby’s frustration.

Douxie has started working at the bookstore once more, and Krel is hanging out with his boyfriend. It’s nice and quiet. Then again, Krel’s pretty sure the bookstore only gets a few more customers than Stuart’s Electronics. Douxie is sweeping while listening to music on his headphones; Krel is looking at books and rolling his eyes at what random humans think the mystical secrets of the universe are. According to Douxie, only a third of the books here hold actual magical truths and the rest are new age material. The book that Krel is reading almost certainly falls into the latter category.

Krel puts the book back, an idea coming to him. He clears his throat. “Can you kiss me?”

Douxie takes off one headphone; Krel can hear his boyfriend’s music blaring through it. Krel will readily admit, metal growls and yelling about death aren’t his thing, when it comes to music, and this song is doing precisely that. “Did you say something?”

“Can you kiss me?”

Douxie’s face turns a shade of red similar to Toby’s sweater. His voice comes out as a high-pitched squeak. “I mean, I can but why? Uh, that came out wrong. I just, you never really indicated that you wanted to and I’m going to shut up now.”

Krel walks up to him. Embarrassingly enough, his voice is almost as awkwardly squeaky. “Scientific research? On kissing that is? I mean, unless you don’t want to, I was just wondering.”

Douxie cups Krel’s cheek with his left hand and kisses him. It’s an awkward feeling, but it’s nice.

Douxie then pulls back and looks away. Apparently it is possible for Douxie’s face to get even redder. Krel glances towards one of the bookstore’s reflective surfaces and realizes that his own face has a heavy cyan blush.

“So, um, how was that?” Douxie asks.

“Okay,” Krel says, “but inconclusive. I think I’ll need to perform more research.”

Douxie rolls his eyes, his blush receding by a small fraction. “You know, if you want to kiss me more, you don’t have to frame it as scientific research.”

“If I carve something into the prosthetic, will it damage it?” Mordred asks. The two of them are on their lunch break from their respective jobs at the books store and the record store. Zoe raises her eyebrows.

“I made it scuff proof.”

“Oh. Well. Darn.”

“You know, if you wanted it to have carvings, you should’ve told me before I made it.”

“I didn’t think of it until late last night?” It had been really late, considering that Mordred had been kept up by his brain replaying the memories of yesterday’s kiss.

Zoe groans. “What do you want carved into your prosthetic?”

“Krel’s name. I know I hid it before, but I regret doing so now.”

“Oh.”

“And, like, if that’s not possible it’s fine. I can just use markers or something until I can save up for a tattoo.”

“I’m guessing you don’t know any embroidery?”

“I know some. Oh, don’t give me that surprised look. You were a literal blacksmith in your first life, so you should know that gender roles in Camelot weren’t as strict as most of Europe.”

“I’ve got some enchanted thread. You can embroider Krel’s name into the glove, and then it shouldn’t be hard to make it engraved in the gauntlet.”

Merlin sent constructs to two different areas, so Krel and Mordred are alone with a pair of constructs that look disturbingly like overgrown soolians with extra-long legs.

There’s something different about Douxie. Krel can’t figure out what, though. Granted, he’s using a different fighting style than usual. He’s holding a dagger in his right hand and manipulating a cloud of daggers with his left. But that doesn’t feel like it’s it.

Krel blinks and focuses on fighting the constructs. As he slices the head off of one, he tries not to wince as the other one bites down on Douxie’s right arm. The dagger cloud stabs into the other construct’s eyes, and it crumbles. Krel helps to pry apart the constructs jaws so that Mordred can get his arm out.

“I’ve got bandages at my apartment,” Douxie says through gritted teeth. He takes his hoodie off of his left arm and awkwardly wraps it around his right arm to stem the bleeding for now..

“Do you need any help?” Krel asks.

“I can take care of myself, but I’d appreciate it.”

The walk back is thankfully a short one. Douxie hisses as he pulls off his hoodie. “First aid kit’s under the bathroom sink.”

Douxie turns on the water as Krel reaches underneath. As Krel stands up and opens the kit, Douxie rolls up his sleeve and sticks his injured arm under the faucet.

“So, what do you want me to do?” Krel asks.

“See the tape?” Douxie says as he dries off his arm. “I’m going to put gauze on the bite holes; could you please tape them in place?”

Krel undoes the roll of tape and cringes at the stickiness. The two of them tape up Douxie’s injuries, starting with the upper arm and working down. Krel finishes taping up the last of the injuries when something on inside of the wrist of the gauntlet catches his eyes. It’s an engraving that softly glows with the same blue light of the amulet.

“You carved my name into it?” Krel says. Douxie smiles sheepishly.

“I, this isn’t how I wanted you to find out, but yeah. Is that okay? I can undo it if you’d rather me not have.”

“Yeah, just, I didn’t think you really wanted a soulmate?”

“I… no, I didn’t. But after Merlin told me the truth, I realized that having a soulmate wouldn’t have been so bad. And even if I got to choose who I wanted to be my soulmate; I think I still would’ve chosen you.”

Krel beams before kissing his soulmate on the forehead.

Author's note: If you liked this, please reblog and/or go to one of the links and leave a comment! I worked very hard on this so I hope you enjoyed reading it.

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