Page 104 of American King (New Camelot Trilogy 3)
After three days, Gawayne’s team turns up nothing, no evidence for any attack happening at the debate at all. Kay and I argue about the message increasing the Secret Service presence sends.
Embry won’t return my calls.
We manage to get the venue switched and the extra agents, but everything else has gone to shit, and I’m worried Embry’s just as exposed as ever; Merlin asks me about doing the debate remotely, and I call Embry and ask if he’d be willing to do that in a voice message.
No response.
I decide it’s better if I’m with him anyway, not sequestered away in some remote location. I want him close, near to me, so I can intervene if need be.
I ask Merlin if I should tell Embry and Greer about it all. The other memories. What Merlin sees in our futures. He doesn’t give me a real answer, and I don’t have one for myself. Do I tell them this insane story and hope it somehow keeps Embry safe? Or if I tell them, will that make Embry less inclined to believe me about the debate threat?
Do I even really believe the debate threat? Or any of it? Am I fighting for nothing?
Or is this the beginning of the end? A week of stupid mistakes and pointless errors, when everything that could go wrong did go wrong, until the only thing left to offer the universe is my own tiny life?
I don’t know.
I don’t know anymore.
And the entire week I have the dream, the same dream always—water and fog, a waiting boat. Four waiting queens. In the dream, I know there’s someplace to go.
A better place, over the water.
ABILENE’S FUNERAL is a somber affair. There had been some fretting at her church about the seemliness of a suicide funeral, but as it isn’t against church doctrine, and also as I had Kay call them on my behalf, the fuss was quickly stamped out.
The bleak reality, however, is another story.
Galahad in particular is difficult to see in his little suit, holding tight to Embry’s hand and asking There, Mah-mee? There Mah-mee? every time he glimpses the large portrait of Abilene near the casket at the front. Greer stands slim and regal through it all, her head up and her gaze clear. Only the smudges under her eyes reveal her sleepless nights, only the clench of her hands folded together show how deeply this has ripped through her. I hold her close when I can. I wish I could do the same for Embry. For Galahad. Just gather my prince and his little son into my arms and shield them from anything hard or difficult ever ever ever.
I stare at the casket during the service, as I hold my wife’s hand and go through the motions of a mourner, and I think of the debate tomorrow. Of the danger I’ve done everything I can to avert.
There is one last thing to try, and I’ll try it tonight.
The truth.
When Greer and I go through the receiving line, Embry looks like a ghost, shaking hands mechanically with the mourners, nodding and presenting a facsimile of a smile when required. But when Greer steps in front of him, a shock passes over his face.
She leans in, kisses a spot that could charitably be called his cheek but is really the corner of his mouth. He closes his eyes, exhaling slowly as she pulls away.
“Tonight,” I say quietly. “Where will you be?”
He opens his eyes and stares at me, his lips parted. For a moment I think he’s not going to answer, but then he says, “My townhouse. I’ll be alone by midnight.”
And I give him my own kiss, not caring who’s watching, only wanting to the feel the clean-shaven velvet of his cheek on my lips before I leave.
“We’ll be there.”
SEVEN HOURS LATER, Embry’s neighborhood is dark and silent as our car rolls up to the front of his house. A hard frost has gathered in the cracks and edges of the sidewalks and streets, a veined spread of white under the streetlights.
Before an agent comes around to open Greer’s door, I say, “I think you should go in first. Alone.”
She turns to me, pretty eyebrows drawn together. “Alone?”
I turn so that I can face her, take her hands, watch her eyes as I speak. All through this last week, I’ve been thinking about tonight, about the debate tomorrow, and two things grew very clear to me. First, I would not let anyone harm a hair on Embry’s head, and second…that means, if Merlin is right, that I must be harmed in turn. It means I will have to lay down my own life for his.
Which means a host of other things I can barely look at, but primarily it means I need to make sure both my prince and my queen are taken care of if all my other contingencies fail, and I am asked to die tomorrow. Part of that care starts tonight.
“You and Embry share a connection through Abilene,” I tell Greer gently. “There should be time for the two of you to feel this together. To mourn together.”
