Read Online Avalon Rising by Kathryn Rose - Free Book Online Page A

quickly, like her magic might give her the flight of a demonic hummingbird. Her finely arched brows draw together through her fury.
    “Don’t let pride claim you, girl. You don’t know what sort of world exists beyond the shores of Britannia. I told you that your place in this plan was to bring the knights to Avalon after the war against the Spanish rogues was won. And yet the Black Knight still walks the earth. He’ll find the coordinates unless you stay in Camelot.”
    She doesn’t say it’s to protect me, and perhaps the demigods don’t care about such things. Not when something as important as the Holy Grail is at stake. Are we pawns to them?
    She peels back and resets herself in a strong, confident stance. “Perhaps you were the wrong choice for this. Perhaps I made a mistake.”
    I feel like my heart might explode with anger. “Let me do this.”
    “You do this, and you change the future in a way I cannot know!” Her voice is loud enough to shatter dead branches back to life, and I’m terrified of what wrath she could unleash upon me. For a long moment, she stills, eyes white and motionless. “In fact, you already have. Stubborn girl! By seeking Arthur’s Norwegian steel today, you’ve completely changed the fate of the world!”
    “How? How have I done that? I’ve been to the safe in the mountains many times since the summer. I’ve built my aeroship outside the walls to avoid my father. How is this any different?”
    “You did what was needed to complete the task I gave you. But now your actions dictate another plan. It’s no longer to build your aeroship; it’s to disobey the order I gave. Now, it’s uncertain whether Camelot can claim the Grail, and, oh!” Her eyes widen, and a flash of dread passes through them.
    My fingers clutch the icy ground at seeing an entity of power and might harboring such terror. For what?
    She blinks away whatever vision came over her and shoots a look of pure anger at me. “Sir Marcus.” The way she speaks his name is akin to a blackness settling over a world already full of desolation. “His fate has changed, too. A great loss is looming. One of betrayal or death—I can’t see which.”
    My blood is chilled, but not by the wind or the snow under my knees and palms. “I don’t understand.”
    Her eyes are two pools of lake water staring into mine. “If only you’d listened, girl, his fate would be that much surer. And now … ” She looks elsewhere, and I catch a hint of worry I’ve never seen her employ. “Death or betrayal. I’m not sure which. One path is certain.”
    My lip quivers. Death is nothing new to me. Not since Morgan’s war, where I killed not one man, but several— fathers, sons, brothers, perhaps some who were but boys in their iron armor, chained by Morgan’s magic.
    If that isn’t enough, the memory of Morgan’s dying eyes still haunts me as I sleep.
    But betrayal . The meaning is vague, and I have to know more. “What sort of betrayal?”
    She glances over her shoulder at me. “Unknown. But each of these paths is equally possible.”
    Marcus would never betray Camelot. He didn’t want to be a knight, but he knows the Grail cannot fall into the wrong hands. If for no other reason than to avenge his mother’s death he wouldn’t.
    “Yes, I chose the wrong person.” The Lady of the Lake stares at me as one would study blueprints: objectively, curiously. “I should confine you to where you are. Keep you locked until your destiny can be fulfilled while I fix all this.” Inch by inch, she moves closer, and I feel myself grow smaller and smaller. I struggle to free myself, but it’s useless—
    A slam against the earth forces a scream out of me, and I curl over the ground as much as I can. A slow thump and then another passes me by, and I lift my head to look. A wistful spirit drifts across the snowy land, a fog dropped from the sky. But this spirit is in the shape of a man, and it takes solid form before blitzing back, like a