“Oh, it’s you,” Tedros grumped, rubbing his skull. He felt woozy, though he didn’t know whether it was because of the head bump or his hand, which was still spewing a profuse amount of blood. “How’d you even get in here?”
Before Agatha left, he’d told her to take her unholy cat with her, but she’d brushed him off. “Someone has to watch over you,” she’d quipped.
He’d assumed it was a joke. This was the cat that had bitten him, spat at him, peed in his shoes, and once carved heathen symbols into his bathroom mirror. But now that Agatha was gone, the heinous little imp had been following Tedros everywhere he went and even sleeping outside his chambers.
Reaper prowled closer and poked at Tedros’ injured hand with his paw, nudging it out of his pocket. Grunting ominously, the cat sniffed the blood-soaked bandage. Then he climbed on Tedros’ thigh and slashed the cloth open with his claw.
“Hey!” Tedros said.
But now Reaper seized Tedros’ hand in his mouth, tongue to his skin, teeth starting to sink in—
Tedros kicked him hard, sending the cat flying into the wall.
“You little cretin,” he gasped.
Reaper hobbled away whimpering and slunk under the bed in the corner.
Shaken, Tedros studied his hand to see the damage—
“Huh?”
He lit it up with his glow.
His hand wasn’t bleeding anymore. And the wound looked . . . smaller.
Slowly, he lifted his head and saw Reaper’s dim, wet pupils under the bed frame.
“You were trying to help me, weren’t you?” Tedros asked. “That’s why you’ve been following me all week. You’re watching over me. Just like Agatha said.”
Reaper hissed weakly and receded into darkness.
Tedros lay on his bare stomach at the foot of the bed and peeked underneath. “I’m sorry, little fella. I’m the cretin, not you. I can’t do anything these days without hurting someone. Not even a cat.”
He rolled onto his back. “I can’t do this anymore. I can’t be a half-king. My people don’t deserve a half-king. But how can there be order and progress when I can’t prove I’m fully king?” He roared in frustration and slung his keys at the ceiling, cracking the plaster. “I’m Arthur’s son! It doesn’t matter what Agatha finds in the Woods. It doesn’t matter what’s happening to my classmates. This is Camelot! The crown is mine. It’s always been mine. So why won’t that cursed sword move?”
“I never did think that girl was the homesick type,” a voice said.
Tedros sprung up to see Lady Gremlaine’s shadow in the open doorway.
“But then again, I never took you for a liar,” she said, glaring at him.
“I came here to be alone,” he retorted, eyeing his keys on the floor. “I thought the king had the only key.”
“He does,” Lady Gremlaine replied. “Only he forgot to lock the door.”
Tedros stared at her. “But I did lock it—”
“Shall we walk?” his steward said, holding open the door. “The Treasury Master wants to see you, you’re hardly dressed and bleeding, and to be honest . . . I’m not particularly fond of this room.”
“I don’t make it a habit of lying, but where Agatha went is between me, her, and Merlin,” Tedros asserted.
“So you met Merlin too?” frowned Lady Gremlaine, clacking ahead into a big, circular white hall.
“I told you. I don’t care who my father banished—”
“Your caring is irrelevant. Until your coronation is sealed, you cannot withdraw your father’s decrees. Not Merlin’s banishment, not the bounty on your mother’s head.”
“Look, there are things happening you wouldn’t understand,” said Tedros, shirtless and shoeless as he chased her lavender silhouette. “You’re my steward and here to help me with whatever I ask. Anything outside of that is my domain.”
“I see,” Lady Gremlaine said, facing him. “So what you’re telling me is even though I was your father’s right hand, even though you’ve asked me to supervise your every decision, and even though I’m the only reason this kingdom is in one piece . . . you still don’t trust me.”
Tedros couldn’t meet her eyes.
They were standing on a floor of cracked mosaic that depicted the Camelot seal. (Given his crap morning, Tedros found it fitting he was straddling Excalibur’s blade.) The circular walls were covered in dozens of framed paintings, reminding him of the Legends Obelisk at the School for Good, decorated with portraits of famous alumni. He’d been in this hall only a few times as a child, since the White Tower was far away from the others and used mostly for knights’ meetings, arms-making, and staff quarters. Tedros had never paid much attention to the walls back then, but now one of the paintings caught his attention, since unlike the others, it had no other paintings near it. He stepped towards it, eyes wide. . . .
“It’s me.”
He was wearing his father’s coronation robes, though most of the portrait was a close-up of his face. His hair was angelic blond, his eyes unnaturally blue, his skin as pure as gold dust. Everything about the Tedros in the painting seemed more Tedros than the real him, including his piercing, omniscient gaze. This Tedros was strong, mature, unflappable. . . . This Tedros looked like a king.
“Who drew it? I didn’t sit for a royal portrait—”
“That’s because it was painted sixteen years ago,” Lady Gremlaine answered, cinching her turban. “Your father commissioned it from a seer after you were born. In his will, he said it was to be put up on your coronation day in the Hall of Kings.”
Looking around, Tedros noticed the art was arranged in chronological columns, with each king’s coronation portrait surrounded by smaller paintings of triumphant moments.
“One day your wall will be complete too,” said Lady Gremlaine.
Tedros honed in on his father’s column. While Tedros’ coronation painting was beautiful and inspiring, Arthur’s portrayed him as a scrawny, timorous, red-faced teenager who didn’t look capable of brushing his own teeth, let alone running Camelot.
“This is Dad?” Tedros said.
“Painted by the Palace Artist on the morning of his coronation, per tradition,” Lady Gremlaine confirmed. “Given the result, your father fired the artist. And to ensure your coronation painting would be to his liking, he solicited the seer to imagine yours upon your birth. A portrait that would capture the essence of your soul and future.”
“But if Dad hated his so much, why would he leave it up?”
“Oh, he made us take it down again and again. But in time, it would always mysteriously return, most likely by his own hand. It became quite clear that though your father loathed the painting, he also couldn’t part with it. Perhaps it reminded him of the ‘real’ Arthur, before his time at the School for Good and Evil changed him.”
Tedros looked at her, puzzled. “He was crowned before he went to school? But he wouldn’t have been old enough—”
“How little you know of your father,” his steward said drolly. “Back then, Camelot was so in need of a leader that they crowned Arthur even though he wasn’t yet sixteen. Which meant he attended school as a legitimate king and an instant celebrity. No doubt you endured this yourself as a famous prince, with girls desperate to be your queen. . . .”