[fic] [Tales of Arcadia] Your Future Hasn't Been Written Yet 173/?
Your Future Hasn’t Been Written Yet
by K. Stonham
released 10th May, 2024
Morgana hummed, contemplative, as the trapped troll bowed deeply and introduced himself. His name was unfamiliar, but--
"You reek of the Darklands," she observed.
Dictatious' six eyes widened. "Indeed, I must," he said. A small, cruel smile turned up his mouth. "Having gone from one prison to another, as you might say, I am, of course, in your debt, my lady."
"Is Gunmar freed, then?" Perhaps that was why all the trolls in this cave system were stirred up.
The green face fell. "Freed, and slain," Dictatious said. His fists clenched, all four of them, convulsively. As though he was kneading dough. Or, given that he was a troll, cooling lava.
If Gunmar is dead, that must change my plans, thought Morgana. Gunmar, the fate of her clever changeling children... there was so much she didn't know.
"Tell me," she demanded.
"Ahh--" Dictatious' gaze darted right and left, clearly seeking an escape.
She stepped up close to him. "Tell me," Morgana repeated silkily, the clawed caps of her finger armor tapping rhythmically against the stone of his chin, "everything."
"Krel!" The shout echoed in Toby's ears even as the knife slipped from Krel's grasp, tumbling to clatter against the broken heartstone below them.
"I may have... miscalculated," Krel admitted, clutching his injured hand with all three of his others. His eyes were wide. "Ow."
Douxie was there, crowding in. "Krel, are you okay?"
"Not really," the Akiridion prince wheezed. A drop of bright blue liquid fell from his mutilated finger, splattering on the heartstone.
"Injuring yourself is most foolish," Varvatos harrumphed, having abandoned his and Jim's chess game. His expression was drawn, though. He looked worried. Jim was right behind him. Jim looked worried too.
"Well, in order to heal an injured Akiridion, it was either you or me," Krel pointed out to Varvatos. "And I do not want to be the kind of person who would ask someone else to get hurt just to test a theory."
"Most foolish," Varvatos repeated. But his shoulders relaxed just a bit. He nodded in understanding.
"Okay. Okay." Douxie's hands fluttered aimlessly around Krel's, like a wounded bird. "We can do this. We can fix this."
Krel snorted. "I can fix this."
Douxie stopped moving. His eyes met Krel's. "We can fix this," he repeated. There was a touch of challenge in his voice. Like he was the boss of Krel.
"Hey," Toby butted in before anybody could come to loggerheads, "that's the point of us, right?" He gestured around them, at all the friends who had gathered in close by. "No one has to do things alone," he said, mostly to Krel.
It took a second, but then the prince backed down. "All right," he said, nodding slowly. "Other people can help clean up my mistakes."
Claire, by Douxie's side, snorted. "Deliberately injuring yourself to figure out how to fix a heartstone hardly counts as a mistake," she pointed out.
"Experimental science," Eli agreed.
"Idiocy," muttered Mary. Darci rolled her eyes and elbowed her in the side.
"Okay." Douxie's hand ran through his hair. Tugged at his dyed wisps. His gaze darted around their circle, lingering longest on Jim, but ending again on Krel. "Okay," he repeated, his tone firmer now. Certain. "A wizard doesn't make mistakes." A smirk curved up Douxie's mouth. "He makes unexpected possibilities." His fingers prised Krel's extra hands away from the injured one. He left alone the one cradling the injured hand from below. "Everyone's hands on mine," Douxie instructed.
"But our magic doesn't work yet!" Eli complained, even as he obeyed.
Douxie gave him a smile. "Yet," he said, waiting until everyone was ready. Even Varvatos' hand was in the pile. Even Callista's, uncertain as she looked about it. Jim's was on top. "Concentrate on the feeling you have when something's broken and you're gluing it back together," he said. "That... that feeling of fixing something. That moment of small triumph. Concentrate on that really hard."
Toby thought about working on some of the dollhouse furniture with Chompsky. Thought about the stash of painkillers, neosporin, and bandaids he'd carried in his backpack for years, fixing up himself, Eli, and Jim. Thought about how it was a damned good thing Merlin's amulet had fixed up Jim, and now him, because even that minimal first aid kit wouldn't have been enough once Trollhunting had come into the equation.
Thought about fixing the world. About saving it from Gunmar and Morgana, General Morando, and the Arcane Order.
"Now breathe," Douxie's voice said, softly, as if from far away.
And under their hands, light combined to brightest white, blinding.
Healing the world.
Arthur had, as Aja had suspected he would, taken a step back from her and pulled out a sword. Not Excalibur, at least, since it was broken and presumably had been taken by Merlin to be mended. Aja had seen Jim do great and wondrous things with that sword. She had no desire to face down a different divine king wielding that self-same blade. In Arthur's hands she suspected the blade's deeds would tend toward great and terrible.
Though she would face Excalibur if she had to.
"So," she said softly, "truth alters your stance. How curious, when you claim to be righteous." Prodding gently. There must be something in this king worth saving. Both Jim and Douxie had described how he had changed in order to fight as a hero at the Battle of Killahead Bridge, which was yet to happen.
Lancelot, who Zadra had efficiently disarmed, hogtied, and gagged, made a muffled sound of protest. Aja ignored him.
Arthur's face tightened. "You come to my lands, lying and deceiving," he growled.
"You seek magical aid," Aja returned mildly, "yet reject it when it is too magical for your taste." She and Krel had yet to have their seemingly inevitable argument over whether Akiridions were inherently magical. But she found she trusted Douxie's statement, backed up as it was by Blinky's word, that life itself was magical. And therefore, by logical fiat, Akiridions also had to be innately magical.
I should mention life being magical to Stuart. He was far more widely traveled than herself, but had said that Earth was the only place he'd seen actual magic. Were there wizards in hiding on other planets? Or was there something special about this planet that made it a focal point of magic?
Krel had magic, but then, their distant ancestors had come from this world--
Her musings were interrupted by Arthur. "I granted you my court's hospitality and you lied. To me, and to all my court."
Aja blinked. "About what have I lied?"
His eyes narrowed. "To begin with the smallest example, your humanity."
She snorted. "I never said I was human. You assumed, because I looked like you, that I was the same species."
"Uh, question?" Steve raised his hand. "I thought a different species was when two people couldn't have kids together, and you and Krel said--"
Aja raised a hand, cutting her darling idiot off. He had a very good point, but right now was not the time to address it. "I am Akiridion," she told Arthur carefully. "The crown princess of my people. My ancestors were the beings you know as Atlanteans. Their world was lost in a day, yet they survived elsewhere, in new forms, stronger than before. None of that is a lie. When we choose to look more like you when we walk among you, it is for our own safety. For reasons you have just very well demonstrated."
His expression, suspicious and defensive, did not soften an iota. "Why come to my kingdom?"
Zadra winced.
I cannot mention the time travel, Aja knew. Nor the shards of the dead god that had caused it. That would not be helpful, on so very many levels.
Yet... perhaps there was a way she could speak of the future, after all.
"A reckoning draws near," she said. "Those who know magic well," meaning Douxie, "have spoken of it. We have come to lend aid and change the tide of battle."
Arthur paused. "A great battle?" he asked.
Aja nodded. "Against the dark one called Gunmar. It is foretold."
"Merlin said nothing of this," Arthur muttered. His sword lowered. Just a little
"Perhaps he is too close to see it?" Aja suggested, shrugging. "I know little of magic, save that it is a powerful tool. But I also know that it is not an infallible one."
Arthur raised his sword again, but not at her. Instead the blade stood straight and tall, pointing skyward. His eyes were fast on it. "Without Excalibur..." he murmured, "I cannot defeat Gunmar."
Excalibur, so far as Aja knew, had done precisely nothing to defeat Gunmar when he had truly been killed, in her own time. That had entirely been Toby, having collected what he referred to as "Gunmar's horcruxes", with a little bit of help from Merlin. But it did not seem wise to tell that to Arthur, who clearly had some of his self-worth tied up with his sword.
Jim, for a while, had been likewise.
Men, thought Aja exasperatedly. But she did not let that show on her face. "Then," she said, "we must hope that Merlin can repair the blade."
Merlin fired another fireball into Nimue's gullet. "I am only here to get the blade repaired!"
Her deep voice came from all around him, rumbling, unstabilizing his precarious footing. "And I am only here for my vengeance."
It was, he realized, going to be a long negotiation.
"Oh," said Claire, blinking. "Oh wow." She felt floaty, lightheaded.
"Hey," said Jim, hands on her shoulders, steadying her. He looked a bit starstruck himself.
"That's healing?" Eli demanded.
Douxie, Mary, and Krel all nodded.
"Woof, that takes it out of you." Toby plumped down onto the Heart of Avalon and rummaged around in his backpack. "I got, um, four Nougat Nummies and one Three Caballeros bar. You guys wanna split?"
"Gimme," said Mary, swiping one from his hand and sharing it with Darci.
"All right," said Douxie, accepting his own bar and passing half over to Krel, who looked as wobbly as the rest of them. "It seems like healing Akiridions is about the same as healing humans, only a lot harder."
"Well, Gaylen did design us to be tougher than humans," Krel said thoughtfully, reactivating his transduction before taking a bite.
"Tougher to heal, that's sure," Toby quipped. "Here," he told Callista, giving her half a bar and the wrapper. "Try these, they're good."
She took the items, looking dubious, but popped the wrapper into her mouth nonetheless. She chewed for a second, then her entire face lit up.
Varvatos laughed, slapping his knee. "My future grandson makes a good point!"
"So," said Jim, breaking another candy bar in half and handing the larger part over to Claire. She would have glared at him, but she needed the sugar. "What does this mean for healing the Heart?"
"Ugh." Mary tossed her hair dramatically. "It's gonna be a bitch," she said, an expert of five minutes.
Claire noticed something. "Uh. Guys?" She pointed to the center of their ring, where several drops of Krel's alien Akiridion blood had landed on the heartstone.
"Whoa." Callista leaned in close, looking. "What's that?"
"It looks... healed," Eli said, narrowing his eyes. "At least, I assume it's supposed to be that green?" he asked, looking up at Douxie.
Douxie nodded. "Green as an emerald, or a summer's day," he confirmed. And it wasn't just exactly where the splatter had landed, but a radius of a good foot outward from that point.
"Hmm." Varvatos leaned back. "Varvatos does not like the implications of how much Akiridion blood must be shed to heal this heart-stone."
"Does it have to be Akiridion blood, though?" Douxie asked. His knife suddenly lit up blue and flew to him. Before anyone could stop him, he had sliced open his finger again and let his own blood fall onto the stone.
Jim snatched the knife away from him. "Stop. Doing. That!" he hissed.
Douxie's blood, however, did not seem to have the same effect on the heartstone that Krel's had. "Alas," said Douxie, "blood magic doesn't seem the easy answer. Fortunately, I suppose." He waved a hand over his injury, healing it. The healing process, Claire noticed, seemed to go slower than it had before.
Jim glared and shoved the remaining bite of his half of the Nougat Nummy at Douxie.
Ignoring the tussling brothers, Krel drummed his fingers on the stone. "To my knowledge, heartstones are not sentient, but perhaps they regardless recognize a kinship," he said.
"Ooh, because Gaylen made your people into miniature heartstones?" asked Eli.
Krel nodded. "It is certainly one possibility." He frowned. "If only I had Mother here and a regeneration chamber I could recalibrate...."
"Both the mothership and her regeneration chambers are nine hundred years in the future," Varvatos pointed out.
Krel made a sound that was half a huff, half a snarl. "I know," he complained. "How am I supposed to do science while stuck in these, these dark ages?!"
Douxie blinked. There was a thought tickling at the back of his brain.
"Doux--"
He held his hand up to forestall whatever it was Jim was about to say. His brother and king fell obediently silent as Douxie's eyes narrowed, trying to chase down what felt like a hint of illumination.
It didn't come.
Breathing out through his nose, Douxie slung the lute off his back and laid down backward, lowering himself onto the cool Heart of Avalon, his arms spread out to either side. He could feel Jim's gaze follow him. Around them, the dark cavern beneath Camelot extended seemingly endlessly into the dark. The only points of light were Krel's bioluminesence, and the witchlights Douxie and Claire had conjured.
His orbs glowed steadily, like blue-frosted LED bulbs, while Claire's flickered like torches. Turning his head, Douxie could see faint glimmers here and there in the damaged heartstone, like the illumination was trying to breach the surface of the crystal.
Crystal.
Light.
A flawless gem would reflect light. Depending on how it was cut, it would focus it or amplify it. That was the simple physics that was at the heart of the crystal in a master wizard's staff.
If only I had my staff, I could do this, Douxie knew. His staff would take not-nearly-enough and multiply it into more-than-enough.
His staff, and its crystal....
Like if his staff was in its guitar form, plugged into an amplifier. The staff was its own amplifier.
Douxie's eyes widened.
Was that what Gaylen had intended? In turning the Atlanteans into living, walking, thinking heartstones, had he been trying to make them their own amplifiers?
"Krel!" Douxie jolted upright, nearly knocking heads with Jim.
"What?"
"I've got an idea."
"This is not going to work."
"Mary, you are such a pessimist."
She turned her head to glare at Claire. "I'm not. I'm a realist! And this?" She gestured at Douxie and Krel, who were practically holding hands and planning a wedding given how close their heads were together. "This is a bad idea."
"Have to say, I'm not entirely sure you're wrong," Jim added, giving the duo a wary glance. "In that, if anyone in our group is going to go off the deep end and become mad scientists, it's those two."
Toby shook his head. "Nah, beg to differ, Jimbo. Douxie'd totally be a grand vizier."
"Oh no," said Darci. "There's only one evil wizard in our group, and that's Claire here."
Which stung. More than Claire had expected. She bit her bottom lip and breathed through her nose, trying to fight down the feelings that welled up in her. That Darci thought she could ever be like Morgana--
Darci didn't remember the Eternal Night, she had to remind herself. Had never lived in a world where Morgana was free. Had never been possessed by her, tainted by her. Had never had nightmares of what she could become....
Jim saw her distress. Took Claire's hand in his. Squeezed gently, trying to help ground her. "You okay?" he asked softly.
Looking up into endlessly blue eyes, Claire forced herself to nod. She was okay. She would be okay. She would make it so.
Looking back and forth between them, Callista raised an eyebrow. "What's going on?"
"Bad memories," Toby informed her.
"Hey," Mary protested to Darci. "I could totally be an evil wizard!"
"Yeah, no," said Darci, looking her up and down. "I mean, evil queen, maybe. I could buy those vibes. Like, whispering into cursed mirrors and growing thorn hedges around the school."
Mary paused, arrested by the mental image. "I could maybe hit it with lightning...?"
"Can we please not hit the school with lightning?" Eli begged. "I want to graduate on time!"
"Okay." Douxie broke away from talking with Krel. "We both think this might work."
"Might," Krel emphasized. "There are many unknown variables here."
"If it doesn't work," asked Jim, eyes narrowing, "how likely are either of you to get hurt?"
Douxie shrugged. "Tiny odds?" he offered with his fingers pinched narrowly together. "Practically infinitesimal?"
Judging by the way Jim's gaze narrowed further, Douxie's assurance on that matter wasn't comforting. "Walk the rest of us through this first."
Douxie rolled his eyes but obeyed. "My theory is, in turning the Atlanteans into Akiridions and changing them into, essentially, living miniature heartstones, what Gaylen was trying to do was allow them to be their own amplifiers."
"To make their magic stronger?" asked Mary.
"Mmm, sort of?" Douxie waggled his hand.
"Akiridion-5 is what is known as a hostile planet," Krel explained. "After millennia of our people's work on our floating cities, it is possible for other species to visit and even live there. But when it was formed? By Gaylen?" He shook his head. "A crystalline body has many advantages in such an adverse environment. We do not need to eat, or drink, or breathe as humans do."
"So Gaylen made them tough and durable," Douxie continued his half of the explanation. "But perhaps more important from my point of view... crystals resonate. Heartstones resonate with magic. Thus, magic and Akiridion tech fitting together so well."
"Douxie thinks that if he can use his other self's lute to tap into his bardic magic, he will be able to boost his power. I, as an Akiridion and a wizard, will somehow be able to amplify that energy like the gem on a wizard's staff. And together, maybe we will be able to use that bardic magic to heal the heartstone," Krel finished.
"I dunno," said Toby. "This plan seems like it has lots of holes and ifs and maybes to me."
Douxie spread his hands wide. "You have a better plan?"
Toby shook his head. "Nah, dude, I've got nothing. Just wanted to let it be known that this is much less of a plan than you usually go with."
Douxie shrugged. "I'm pretty good at winging it."
"Advanced lessons in magical theory?" Claire asked him dubiously. It was, after all, how he'd once described training with Merlin.
"That I don't remember half of," the wizard cheerfully agreed. "Don't worry, if I'm going to break the known laws of the universe, at least it's for a good cause!"
Jim sighed. "Just don't break the universe itself," he said, which was tacit approval.
"If I do I'll just find a different way to fix it," Douxie said cheekily, scooping up his lute from the floor. "The rest of you, back up onto the platform. Krel and I have a heartstone to mend."
When King Arthur and the foreign... princess... seemed to have come to an accord, Lancelot found himself released from his bondage.
Massaging his sore jaw, he stood and eyed the lady Zadra. "May I assume," said Lancelot, trying not to sound bitter at being defeated so easily, "that you, too, are... of an inhuman nature?"
Zadra met his gaze, not giving an inch. "I am Akiridion," she replied, which was as good as an affirmative.
Lancelot looked next at Squire Steven. "And you?"
"One hundred percent human!" the youth reported gladly, giving that odd hand-at-forehead salute that seemed to be his default.
Akiridions, shapeshifters, humans, and who knew what else.... "Your envoy is a most motley crew indeed," Lancelot mused.
To his surprise, Zadra chuckled. "You have little idea."
Steven, meanwhile, sighed happily, looking at Princess Aja where she stood beside the king at the crenelations. She was blue, four-armed, and nearly as tall as he. Were she human, Lancelot would take her thin form as a sign of agility and whip-like speed. As she was not human, he did not know what to expect of her, and that concerned him. Her guardian had taken him down easily; without Excalibur in his hand, the king... might well be bested by an Akiridion foe.
Though the princess did not seem inclined to violence toward the king of Camelot, for which Lancelot was grateful.
"Isn't she beautiful?" Squire Steven asked the air, a dreamy expression on his face. "So amazing...."
Lady Zadra rolled her eyes.
The squire's infatuation with his lady was perhaps worse than Lancelot had imagined. On the other hand, he comforted himself, given that the king was almost certainly not going to make a match with the princess, given her inhuman nature, at least Lancelot no longer needed to worry about love triangles, or the king becoming a cuckold.
That, after all, was the last thing Camelot needed.
The plan was simple, on the surface of it. It even seemed like it had a decent chance of working. But Douxie had lived too long, seen too many disasters (and, he admitted, caused some of them), and had to adapt to changes too often to have any real faith in things going according to plan.
Merlin might spit like a cat in water at the thought of changing plans once they were made, but Douxie was as much a musician as he was a magician, and music was fluid. Adaptation was part of its heart.
He suspected that was the difference between bardic magery and the stiffer confines of Merlin's magic, which didn't fit easily into any one discipline.
And that was something for him to consider very closely later. Did Douxie want to abandon structure and discipline entirely for something as innate and easy as making music? Should he? It had worked for the Atlanteans, after all. But though he was a throwback and sideways descendant, Douxie wasn't an Atlantean, and neither was Krel. Perhaps they both needed to forge their own path, somewhere between the structure and stricture of the formal discipline Merlin espoused, and the easy flow of notes.
A wizard makes unexpected opportunities, Douxie thought, checking and adjusting the lute's tuning. And like stars, we shine brightest when we rise.
Between Merlin and Taliesin, there had to be a path which was simply Hisirdoux.
"So," said Krel, who had healed fuzzing crystal, not at all amazing, oh no, "you feed the magic to me, I use it to heal the Heart of Avalon."
"I try to feed the magic into your core," Douxie corrected, as Krel knelt and shifted back to Akiridion form, all four of his hands coming into contact with the surface of the heartstone in question. "If I'm right, that should amplify the power enough for this to work."
"If you are right," Krel repeated, smirking.
At least they were on the same page about this.
"Well," said Douxie, "here's to disaster." And he started to play.
No particular tune, but warm up fingering exercises led swiftly into increasingly complex chords and riffs. Some of them borrowed from his current favorite tunes that Ash Dispersal Pattern had been working on, but sounding utterly different played on a lute instead of an electric guitar. Those familiar notes repeated, repeated, repeated as Douxie modified them on the fly, trying to chase down the feeling he'd had so briefly earlier. That breathless sense of joy, of amazement, of listen to this! that had bridged magic and music.
That sense of showmanship, he realized, closing his eyes and beginning to smile. Of elation. His fingers felt warm, and so did that place in his chest. His core, if humans could be said to have one. This was magic, was music, was life. And while an unexamined life was not worth living, neither was one without this sense of light--
Of wonder--
Of magic.
Douxie opened his eyes again, utterly unsurprised to find that he'd found it again, that place of balance. The feeling inside him was bubbling up, an artesian well of magic effortlessly painting the air around him, lighting up the Heart's cavern to its farthest expanses even as the music echoed, filling the space with layers and layers of sound and echo that he yearned to play with--
Douxie locked eyes with Krel. "Coming your way, DJ Kleb," he said, and with a gesture of will, since both his hands were occupied at the moment, sent all that light, all that love, all that power, funneling into Krel.
The humans had a saying, "like being kicked in the chest by a mule." Krel did not know what a mule was, and inferred that he did not want to know. But he had been kicked in the chest by no less than Varvatos Vex during a training session, and he was fairly sure there was a reasonable parallel to be made.
Being hit by Douxie's magic felt like that, though Krel did not go flying back. Did not, in fact, move an inch. But he did feel burning hot, and like a balloon stretched too far around the gas inside. Filled up with too much power. About to burst--
But part of being a wizard, Krel knew, was being in control, and he would not let his friend's magic explode him. Instead, he concentrated on channeling that energy. Human flesh wanted to heal itself, wanted to knit back together and grow whole. Crystal, at least in his one foray so far, was different. Stubborner. It could not simply be persuaded or commanded.
No, crystal had to be forced.
His hands, pressed against the ground, grew hot. White hot. He could feel the heat batting against his face. It was like directing one of Akiridion-5's great surface tornadoes, all that swirling blue-glowing power coursing through him, wild and turbulent.
Power that was far, far greater going out than it was going in, he noted. So it seemed that Douxie's theory that the two of them could work in tandem to produce greater results was correct.
But the heartstone resisted change. Crystals, locked into elegant lattice structures, were stable in a way wet meat was not. They required force.
And still Douxie played on, high and rapid refrains. His fingers had to be burning nearly as much as Krel's were, but Krel, gritting his teeth, could not risk a look. Could not spare even that small amount of attention.
Heal, damn you! he thought at the heartstone, trying desperately to reach all of it, to yank the damage into a proper crystalline lattice. We are not doing this for looks and fun!
Suddenly, something in the music resonated. Both with Krel's core and the Heart of Avalon.
It was like the cyclone paused, listening.
Douxie must have seen it too, because he kept playing that one refrain, high and rapid. The notes, the rhythm, formed a pattern, formed a lattice--
Krel grabbed at that pattern and shoved it into the heartstone.
The damage gave way. He could feel, could hear, the fissures closing up. Chips of fractures rattled back into place, the entire ground beneath him vibrating to the tempo of Douxie's music. Blackness turned to dark green. And then, something deep within the heartstone ignited.
Emerald light welled up in a rush beneath them, shining brightly, like the Earth's sun come to life through a green filter.
With one final flourish, Douxie's playing left off.
The power flowing into Krel, flowing through Krel, eased, tapered away. Vanished, with a final flicker, into the stone beneath his fingertips.
"Holy shit," came the words from their gallery. Toby, Krel knew. He couldn't look up. He was too busy panting, trying to get the heat of his body to dissipate.
Like a dam had been broken, their friends came rushing down the stairs, voices layering over one another until any individual words were impossible to distinguish. Hands pulled Krel up from the surface, patted him, hugged him - all breaking away quickly with hisses of "Ow! Hot! Hot!" Except Varvatos, who pounded Krel enthusiastically on the back and actually lifted him up, despite Varvatos' old man form, all the while yelling "Glorious!"
Krel was glad for the support, because his bipedal locomotion seemed a bit unstable at the moment.
Douxie was in the middle of his own cluster of enthusiastic teenagers. He didn't seem to be all there, either, as the saying went. His gaze was a thousand miles distant and he was swaying, gleaming with sweat. His breathing pattern was as unsteady as Krel's own.
"No passing out!" Toby warned. "I'm out of candy bars."
"No passing out," Douxie agreed. Though Krel was not sure how the wizard was going to manage the feat. Passing out sounded good to him. Douxie rubbed his fingertips together. Douxie's eyes refocused. His gaze met Krel's. "Not bad for our first joint concert?" he offered weakly.
Krel snorted, heat still radiating off him in waves. "Next time I want my equipment."
Around and below them all, the great Heart of Avalon shone truest brightest green, restored as if it had never been broken to begin with.