"Ahem," the dragon coughed.

"Why are you still here?" I asked.

"The headmistress wants to see you." His jewel claws clacked on the floor. "This way."

I could have argued, but I doubt I would have won. So I wrapped the dragon in a blanket and shoved him in the closet.

"Shut that door and you declare war," he threatened.

"Sorry, but I have other plans. It could be worse. At least I didn't knock a chunk off your scales."

He sighed petulantly. "But I don't like the dark."

Yeah, I wasn't too worried. I ran to the lake as fast as I could in the heels. Getting around had gotten easier. With Dorthea's memories and feelings, I must've acquired her useless talent for high-heeled hiking. Well, it wasn't so useless now.

"What took you so long?" the Lady of the Lake asked. The jellyfish dotted the water, but the lady was still out of sight.

"Complications. I need to leave."

"Then you have the sword?"

"No," I said slowly. "Mordred has the sword."

"Mordred. It makes sense he would find his way to it. But even if he has the sword, I can sense that Excalibur is still sleeping. It hasn't recognized him as the rightful heir to Camelot. Mordred and I have a great deal of history. Bring him to me and I will procure the sword."

"Kato is sticking to him like fish breath to the Little Mermaid. Where's my dad? We know where the sword is now; he can finish the job."

"No," the Lady of the Lake said with a ripple of waves. "Robin Hood is still a day away, and I-you don't have the time. I can feel the evil one growing stronger, and she will soon come out of hiding. You must bring Mordred alone."

Blanc getting stronger was not good news, but neither was being told that I had to trick Kato into leaving his post. So far, I'd figured that as long as I was keeping the sword away from Blanc, I wasn't betraying anyone. But actively deceiving Kato crossed a line.

"Can't do it." I put my head in my hands. "I just can't be here anymore."

A whip of seaweed flew from the water and wrapped around my waist. I screamed for a half second before I was dragged underwater, traveling through a whirlpool until I was spit out into the lady's cave.

"Tell me what changed," she demanded, her heated voice echoing through the cold chamber. "You are dying, being destroyed and devoured from the inside by two forces that care not a whit for what happens to you. Whatever could be keeping you from saving yourself?"

Each time I went through the whirlpool, it felt like an eternity of being alone. Maybe I needed to tell someone how I felt before I exploded-or worse, broke down in tears. "Everything's messed up. I've got all these feelings. But they're for someone I can't have. So being in Camelot, close to him, is like chugging poison-apple cider."

"Rex." DumBeau stumbled around a stalagmite, tripping a few times over his Rapunzel hair-length ears. When he finally got to me, he threw his arms around me and patted the back of my head.

A sigh whipped through the chamber like a breeze. "You remind me far too much of myself for my own good," the lady said, a nearby pool of water growing into the shape of a see-through woman. "I too once loved a man who I wasn't supposed to have. He loved me as well. And that angered the supposed heroine of the story."

I squirmed to get out of DumBeau's well-meaning but crushing embrace. A few minutes ago, I would have said the lady was lying about someone falling in love with her, but the woman made of water was a far cry better to look at than the jellyfish, kelp, and eel swamp thing. Still, her story didn't add up.

"Wait. I was raised on the legends of Camelot. And that wasn't in any of the stories."

The liquid sculpted more, further defining the woman's details.

"Haven't you learned by now that every story has more than one version?" The nearest pool of water shimmered, showing an image of my friends and my outlaw posters in succession. There was a new line at the bottom of the poster: Dead or Alive. Great.

"So what's the unauthorized version?"

"I tried to be nice and follow the rules. I thought that love would conquer all. I was wrong. The heroine decided if she couldn't have him, then no one should. So she ordered Morgana La Fey to create a death curse."

"Is that what happened to Mordred? Or was it Arthur?" I racked my swiss cheese memory. "Who was he, and what happened to him?"

Water beads formed on the rocks overhead. Drip. Drop. It was as if the cave were crying. "My dearest love died in my waters, and that is why he is known in all the versions of the story as Lancelot de Lac. Lancelot of the Lake."

Drip. Drip.

After all these centuries, the Lady of the Lake still mourned Lancelot. And if I put her story alongside the "official" legend, it wasn't hard to figure out who the other woman, the heroine, was-Gwenevere.

"And then there is your story, an echo of my own," the lady started.

There was a distant splash, and DumBeau perked up.

"It's Kato," the Lady of the Lake said.

I sighed. "Yes, I know. It's complicated and I couldn't have picked a worse person to fall for, but it's not like I could help it."

"No, I meant it's Kato in my lake, looking for you." The drips slowed. "He cares for you, so perhaps your situation is less complicated than you think. Take the sword and fight. No one, no matter their story, is unworthy of being loved. You deserve this happiness."

"I can't. Betraying him would kill me faster than Dorthea or Morte or any of Gwennie's self-empowerment therapies. I just can't go back to Camelot again."

Every puddle and pool of standing water boiled. "Gwenevere. She's alive? And holds Camelot?"

"Well, sort of. I mean her head does. Not sure where the rest of her went."

"It's ash. Her body was burned at the stake after Arthur beheaded her for treason and what she did to me." The lady's body exploded into millions of droplets and whipped through the cavern like a squall. "If Gwenevere is in Camelot, Mic must have succ.u.mbed to her charms. She will try to seduce Mordred next and claim Excalibur. We have to be ready."

"Mic...as in the Mimicman? Whoa." The seaweed struck out at me again, this time grabbing my heels and snapping off their golden arrows.

"I need these, but I give you this pearl in exchange." A glistening orb floated up out of the water. "Magic can create but a pale imitation of love. However, it can give you a fair shot. Put this in Kato's mouth and he will forget all before him except you. Beyond that, securing his love is something only you can do. But if you don't go now, I believe he will drown searching for you."

"Stay, Rex." DumBeau plucked the pearl from the pool and laid it in my hand, then threw me in the whirlpool. "Away."

The watery cyclone tossed and turned me before spitting me back out. Kato was not on the sh.o.r.e. I looked to the lake. I could see a black shape splashing, then sinking.

Without a thought, I dove back in. What was he thinking? Jumping into a lake in a full suit of armor? The whirlpool had disappeared, meaning Kato was sinking to the bottom of the lake. He couldn't breathe underwater like I could.

I grabbed Kato and furiously kicked my way back to the surface.

"You moron," I cursed, dragging him to sh.o.r.e and pulling off his armor so I could get to his chest. No heartbeat. "You can't have him, Morte!" I pushed on Kato's chest again and again. He wasn't breathing. I was about to blow air into his lungs when he started coughing up water like a fountain.

I pushed him onto this side so that he could breathe. Then I thumped his back, perhaps a smidge harder than necessary. "What were you thinking?"

"From the castle. Saw you. Fall into lake." He sputtered and hacked more.

"I'm immortal, you big beast. You, on the other hand, are not."

"I don't like it when you suffer or die. You come back different, and I don't want you to go through that. I can't watch the embers of your life's hearth fade." He huffed and closed his eyes. "You are important to me, so I'm going to take care of you. Deal with it."

The pearl in my fist grew hot.

I could use the enchantment. Just a quick pop, like a pill. It would be so easy. Why shouldn't I get a chance? Maybe he could love me if he didn't have Dorthea on his mind.

As soon as the thought came, I pushed it away. I was ashamed I'd even considered it. I knew what it was like to be controlled, to lose a piece of myself. I would never wish that upon anyone. Let alone someone I- I felt her a split second before the strike of lightning cracked the ground. A dust cloud formed from the damage, but the outline of a figure was plainly there.

Kato eased himself up and squinted to see what was going on. "Who's that?"

"The lightning was green."

We both gulped as the dust filtered away.

Dorthea's hair was fully alight and crackling as she walked toward us slowly, purposefully placing each step. Every time her foot hit the ground, the gra.s.s would wither and die, leaving a yellow road of destruction in her wake.

"I warned you," she said.

We have come for you. We have come for you all, the curse added louder than ever. The chorus of voices had grown in number.

I pushed Kato away just before the flames consumed me.

"There's nothing more awkward than going steady with a new princess and realizing you used to date her uglier stepsister."

-Prince C., Gla.s.s Shoe Diaries.

28.

The Ex-Factor.

All is one and one is all.

The curse's fire seared my veins, coursing through me. All the while, the chorus spoke to me, whispering of what used to be. Of what is. Of what will be. The fire showed me visions. They didn't feel like memories, just images that made no sense. A baby. A weeping red tree. A twin-tailed black beast. A mirror with Blanc's reflection. A flower. A white room filled with boxes that beeped. A sleeping girl. A book. A headstone.

When I opened my eyes, the flames were gone. So was the lake. And Kato. And Dorthea. Somehow I was sitting in Camelot's library. Gwen and Merlin were bickering about how to formally set tea upon a triangular table. The silver teapot mocked me. My reflection showed a hollow-eyed girl with short, blond spikes. It was me and not me. Rexi. I didn't recognize her anymore.

Before I forgot, I grabbed the pen from my coat pocket and rolled up my sleeve. The black marks slashed across my skin told me a story I didn't want to believe. Thirteen. I searched my memories, but they skipped and jumped between past and present, between my experiences and Dorthea's. I didn't remember dying the last three times. I remembered being murdered by Crow. After that, there was a memory of death, but neither the recollection nor fatality were mine.

If I recalled the chorus of the d.a.m.ned, I'm positive I heard the scarred chimera, Griff, hissing at me. I spoke my suspicions out loud. "Dorthea used the curse to kill the chimera traitors."

"Yes. After we left the forest, we took refuge with Bobbledandrophous to finish training. Blanc's rogue chimeras ambushed us, and Dorthea lost control," Verte said, settling herself down beside me. "What happened to you? You look like plankton that Monstro the whale spit out."

"Thanks."

"And there's only one way you would know about those nasty beasts." Getting far too close, she opened my mouth and breathed in. She clucked, her green, crooked nose crinkling. "You didn't take your medicine like I told you to. Sure, I've lived a few hundred years, but no, of course you know better than me. What was it? Couldn't find a spoonful of sugar to make the medicine go down?"

"A handshake with Captain Hook went horribly wrong." I shrugged. "So what are we doing here? Is this a tea intervention or something?"

"Or domething," Gwen said. No, not Gwen. Hydra. She had a clamp on her nose and had even grown an age spot. She pointed to clamp. "G.o.doo keep from dneezing. Gwen cand be allowed oud near Dordea."

"And where is her royal roastiness?"

"In the other room. We are trying to use Kato's frost powers to chill her the spell out." Verte sighed. "Out of all the boys in Story... I knew you were likely to end up here, but I didn't foresee this bippidy backfire."

"It is exactly what it should be," Merlin said, taking a seat at the apex of the triangle. "I will take charge of the Girl of Emerald from now on."

Verte and Hydra both started talking at the same time.

"Wasdn' dis dable round? I apifically rebeber id being round."

"What sort of newt-brained idea is that?"

The three of them bickered about what to do next. I wanted no part of it. I had enough internal bickering going on. The longer I was awake, the more I got a handle on the situation. The library had stacks and stacks of musty books and scrolls. There was a cauldron in the corner and an owl sitting on a perch. Upon seeing the little gold hat the owl wore, I remembered something the Lady of the Lake had said.

"That's not Merlin."

The three kept arguing over me. I slapped my palm on the table. It crackled and sizzled, leaving a charred palm imprint on the wooden surface. Everyone stilled. "I said, that is not Merlin. That is the Mimicman."

"Pish," Verte dismissed. "You've been tapping into Dot's madness and paranoia. There's not a speck of that gaudy gold on him. And look." She grabbed him by the beard and shoved his face toward the teapot. "Same reflection."

She was right. About those two points at least. "How do we know that rule didn't mend itself? You recognized me as a girl while everyone a.s.sumed I was a boy," I said to Merlin.

"That's easily explained, as I am a simply a great lover of women." He swatted at Verte. "Get your gangrenous hands off me, you bitter old hag," he said, then coughed, straightening up with a pleasant face. "Think about this logically. I came to you for help once Blanc took over Camelot with the villains. Would this Magnificent Mimicman do that?"

I was right. I had to be. Everything added up. I looked at my hand, the slight green smoke wafting off it, and felt the smile on my face.

"What are you doing?" he asked, standing and tripping over his chair as he retreated a few steps.

If I focused, I could see the lines of power running through everything-magical essence that fueled all living and enchanted beings and items. So far I'd gotten the crispy end of the curse, but perhaps that was just because I'd been running away and hadn't been willing to embrace it. I narrowed my eyes and honed in on the trail of power around him. And I tugged on one of the lines I could see while I borrowed Dorthea's magic.

I could feel the Emerald curse waking, a grumble thinking of its next meal.

Merlin's face went slack. "What are you doing? Stop."

"Blast it all. Now we've got two of 'em." Verte grabbed the teapot and held it like a weapon.

I looked her straight in the eye. "Trust me."

She hesitated, then lowered it.

"Are you mad?" Merlin turned to Hydra and tried to pull the clamp off her nose. "Help me, Gwenevere."

"Dope."