Shalott: End Play

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER ONE

‘Listen, El, I want to apologise. That thing with Josie was all a big mistake.’

Callie broke her stride, but El didn’t. She shot out her hand to grip Callie’s arm and marched on with determined steps, dragging her twin sister along with her.

Greg hurried to keep pace with them. ‘I’ve got tickets for the Brazza gig tonight. Will you come with me?’

‘No.’ El kept on walking.

‘It’s your favourite band. That’s why I got a ticket for you.’

‘Take Josie.’

‘I told you. It’s all off between us.’

‘Does Josie know that?’ El stopped and looked at Greg, her face stony with contempt. ‘Or are you hoping I’m going to tell her, just like you left it to her to tell me you didn’t want to go out with me anymore?’

‘No! She knows it’s all off between us, I swear she does.’

‘Drop dead, Greg.’ El swung on her heel and marched on, leaving Callie to run after her.

‘What was that all about?’ Callie asked as she caught up with her sister. ‘I thought you were still rapt in Greg?’

‘He’s a weasel.’ El pushed through the students clogging the doorway into the classroom and flopped down at her desk. ‘But I’m glad that’s over,’ she admitted, with a grin. ‘I was dreading seeing him again in case I made a total fool of myself. But you know what? I feel good about it. It was dead easy telling the creep what I thought of him.’ She cast a glance at a blonde girl who was leaning out the door, checking the corridor and stairs beyond. ‘Maybe I should warn Josie?’

‘She wouldn’t believe you.’ Privately, Callie felt like cheering her sister for standing up to her one-time boyfriend and the girl who’d taken El’s place while she was in hospital. They’d all thought El was dying, but that hadn’t stopped Greg from dumping her and getting together with Josie.

‘Who wouldn’t believe what?’ Meg asked. She dropped her backpack on the floor and plonked herself down at a desk beside them.

‘Greg just asked me out.’

Meg gave a long, slow whistle. ‘And?’ She exchanged a glance with Callie. Both of them knew how devastated El had been when she found out Greg had dumped her.

‘I told him to drop dead.’ El smiled as Meg gave her a high five.

‘Does that mean you’ll go out with Stephen now?’ she asked.

‘No! Anyway, he hasn’t asked me.’

‘I bet he will,’ Meg predicted confidently.

‘Why should he? We usually argue whenever we meet.’

‘That’s cos you’re so similar. That’s why you should be friends at least,’ Meg urged.

‘It’s not going to happen,’ Callie said. ‘Even if you can’t see it, and even if Stephen won’t admit it yet, I reckon he and Hal might …’

‘No!’ El gave a grunting laugh. ‘Actually,’ she said, ‘I think you may be right.’ She looked at Callie. ‘I wish we could sort out your problems with Lancelot as easily. Be honest, there must be someone living in this century you’d like to go out with?’

Callie didn’t answer. She pulled out a notebook and started to flip through it.

‘Lancelot escaped with Guinevere. You know that, Callie,’ El said impatiently. ‘We were there when it happened. And you know what happens next. Even I know what happens next, cos you kept me awake half the night grumbling about it.’

‘Yeah. Ms Hope’s rapt in our sudden interest in Tennyson’s poetry, and how much we know about the legend of King Arthur. This is one subject we’re going to pass for sure.’ Meg grinned at the thought.

Callie sniffed, and blinked back her tears. Not only had she not succeeded in changing the legend, she couldn’t shake the growing sense that she’d left something undone, that something was desperately wrong.

Guinevere’s words came back to her: You have to survive this! And so must I. We have not yet ... Callie was filled with a fear that had no form and no name, and was all the more frightening because of it. She kept her head bowed as she continued trying to hide her tears.

‘It’s over. You know it’s all over,’ said El. ‘After Lancelot rescues Guinevere from being burnt at the stake, he takes her to Joyous Gard, but a messenger from the Pope persuades her to go back to Camelot to heal the kingdom. Meanwhile Gawain persuades Arthur to make war against Lancelot in revenge for the death of his brother, Gareth.’

‘And while Arthur’s out of the way, Mordred tells everyone he’s dead and seizes the throne,’ said Meg, quoting their English teacher.

‘And tries to seize Guinevere too,’ El added. ‘So Arthur comes rushing back, and he and Mordred fight a battle at Camlann and kill each other. And that was the end of Camelot.’ El draped an arm around Callie’s shoulders and gave her a sympathetic hug. ‘It’s all over, and you have to forget him,’ she advised. ‘It’s time to come back to the real world.’

‘How do we know those old chronicles got all the details right?’ Callie asked. ‘They don’t even mention us when Arthur condemned Guinevere to burn, but we were right there!’

‘That’s probably cos we disappeared from the scene when we zapped back here. I expect the witnesses didn’t know what to say about us, so they didn’t say anything at all.’

‘You’re not planning to go back there again, are you?’ Meg asked.

Callie shook her head. ‘What’s the point? It’s all too late.’

‘So it’s time to deal with the here and now,’ El said crisply, as she waved an airy hand towards the guys congregated at the back. ‘Pick someone. Anyone. And I’ll see if I can fix up a date for you.’

‘No, thanks.’ Callie shook her head. ‘I love Lancelot. I always will.’

Despite her good intentions, El gave a snort of laughter. ‘I agree he’s a legend, but he’s not real in our world!’ she spluttered.

Not real? Callie felt a surge of grief. Lancelot seemed far more real to her than anyone right here in the classroom.

There was a ripple of movement as everyone scattered to their desks.

‘Callie?’ Ms Hope’s voice rang through the quietened classroom.

Callie looked up. Their English teacher had come through the door and was walking towards her, looking worried.

‘You’re very pale. I hope you haven’t caught what El was suffering from?’

‘I’m fine, thanks.’ But Callie didn’t feel fine. She felt utterly miserable and frightened. She couldn’t shake the feeling that she’d failed both herself and Guinevere.

Ms Hope was still talking to her. ‘I meant to ask you if you know what’s happened to that student you brought into class a few weeks ago. Lev? I haven’t seen him again. Do you know where he is? Do you have any idea what’s become of him?’

Callie didn’t feel up to trying to explain that Lev was now in Camelot, so she kept mute.

‘I’ve spoken to the school counsellor about him and she says she’s definitely able to help. I think I’m right in saying that Lev has no home?’ Ms Hope continued.

‘He has now,’ El muttered under her breath.

‘What was that?’ The teacher shifted her bright gaze to El.

‘Lev’s moved away. He’s found somewhere else to live,’ said El. ‘A long way from here,’ she added quickly, forestalling Ms Hope’s next question.

‘I’m very glad to hear that.’ She gave Callie a last frown of concern before turning to the rest of the class. ‘Today we move from Tennyson to Oodgeroo Noonuccal, the first Aboriginal woman to publish a book of verse in Australia,’ she announced.

Callie exhaled a silent breath of relief that they’d no longer be discussing Camelot in class. It was over. She knew, with a terrifying certainty, that she’d never again go to Camelot for there was nothing left for her there. She had loved Lancelot and lost him not once but twice, and now she had to deal with life in the twenty-first century.

Callie snatched up her poetry book to hide her bitter tears. It made it so much worse to know that Lancelot believed she’d sold the diamond he’d given her rather than cherishing it as she’d wanted to do. If only she could have seen him one more time, just to explain what had really happened. Instead, Lancelot had rescued the queen and they’d fled to Joyous Gard where no doubt they were blissfully happy. By now, Lancelot might well have forgotten she’d ever existed.

The thought shrivelled Callie’s soul. She felt sick with the knowledge, sick and fearful. The last days of Camelot might already have played out to their inevitable and tragic conclusion. Arthur and Mordred both dead; Guinevere in an abbey in Amesbury and Lancelot in a hermitage, where they would spend the rest of their days stricken with grief and remorse over their role in Arthur’s downfall.

Callie blinked as a sudden thought struck her. Guinevere in an abbey? That didn’t sound right. Guinevere was no Christian. That had been part of the trouble between her and Arthur — that she and her acolytes still paid homage to the Great Mother, the Mother Goddess. So what had really become of Guinevere and Lancelot? Had she conceived a child with him? Would they live happily ever after at Joyous Gard, just like in a fairy tale? And would Lance ever think about the Lady Charlotte, who’d loved him more than life itself, or was his heart now so filled with Guinevere that he wouldn’t spare her even a moment’s thought?

Callie gave up all pretence of listening to Ms Hope. She rested her elbows on her desk and shielded her face with her hands to hide the tears sliding down her cheeks.

‘I think you should take Callie home, El. She’s obviously not well.’

Callie felt the light touch of Ms Hope’s hand on her shoulder. Embarrassed, she hunched down into her seat, trying to become invisible.

‘Okay.’ El hooked her arm through Callie’s, and hauled her to her feet. ‘I told Callie she was too sick to come to school today,’ she said in a loud voice as she hurried her towards the door.

Callie felt a flicker of gratitude that El was still looking out for her, even if she couldn’t understand her sister’s misery.

‘Shall I call an Uber?’ El asked, once they were outside. She pulled her phone out of her backpack.

Callie shook her head. ‘I’d rather walk.’ She wiped her eyes on the back of her hand and blew her nose. ‘I’m fine really, apart from the fact I’ve just made a total i***t of myself,’ she mumbled.

‘Who cares?’ El tucked her phone into her pocket and fell into step beside Callie. As they kicked through drifts of crisp autumn leaves, she said, ‘You really did love old Lancelot, didn’t you?’

‘Yeah. I really thought I’d be able to seduce him, and take him away from the queen. I never expected to fall in love with him instead.’ Lancelot. It hurt even to hear his name. Callie tilted her head to study the fiery red and gold liquidambars blazing a line down the street. ‘I wonder what season it is in Camelot now? I put in a date before we went the first time, but their days seem to pass far more quickly than ours in real time.’

‘So Camelot might have come to an end already?’

Callie shrugged, trying to ignore the cold fear that lay like lead in her belly. ‘Dad’s tried to explain how his own program at work is designed to intersect time and space so that participants can observe other times and other countries. At least that’s the theory of it; he hasn’t got it to work yet. And he doesn’t have the right equipment to make it work at home. So we still don’t have any idea how the five of us managed to get to Camelot.’

‘What I don’t get is why only you could remember what happened there the first time, but we could all remember the second time we went?’

‘I think it might be because I erased all of you from my scenario because I didn’t want you to interfere. But I didn’t have time to delete you from the program itself before the accident that sent us there the first time. It’s the only reason I can think of, because last time we went, you were all in the program and I saved it.’

‘All except Meg.’

‘No, I deleted her image when I thought we were going to Tintagel. Lev was already in Camelot — and so was Magrit. It’s just so, so lucky that Meg didn’t come with us.’ Callie sighed. ‘Dad’s been experimenting; he’s desperate to do what we did. Even though he’s imported maps covering all of Europe, he hasn’t been able to time-travel anywhere at all. He’s so cranky he can’t do it!’

‘It’s good the maps are there now. They’ll keep Lev safe from leaving your program by mistake.’

‘Yeah, because he does move around,’ Callie agreed. ‘According to the legend, Sir Lavaine followed Lancelot to Brittany. Lance gave him land there, and all sorts of other privileges.’ She pulled a face. ‘Malory also says that he married Sir Urre’s sister, Dame Felelolie.’

‘Not Magrit? I really thought they had something going between them.’

Callie shook her head. ‘I don’t know what became of her. There’s no mention of her at all. But it was all so long ago, and in another realm, that it’s amazing those old annals got to tell any part of the story at all.’ She paused for a moment. ‘Although I sometimes wonder if we were actually creating some of it just by being there,’ she added.

El tipped her head to the side. ‘You may well be right,’ she acknowledged. ‘Or maybe it wasn’t you at all; maybe it was all to do with magic?’

‘Are you suggesting we had no control over what happened there, or even any choice about going?’ Callie frowned at her sister.

‘I don’t know. I’m just saying.’

Magic? Certainly both Nimue and Morgan were capable of working magic, Callie thought.

‘When you set up the scenario, maybe you were opening a portal through to Camelot. But it was actually Morgan, or Vivien, or that other high priestess, Nimue, who brought us through?’ El continued.

Callie’s eyes widened. ‘That could be why Dad’s not getting anywhere with it!’ She clicked her tongue. ‘He’ll be so disappointed if that’s what really happened.’

‘So are you going to forget about old Lancelot now and get on with your life, or are you going to keep trying to go back there?’ El asked.

‘No, I’m not ever going back. I’ve had enough. Besides, the Camelot I created was wiped.’ Callie shivered with the memory. With an effort she dragged her thoughts back to the present. ‘After you contracted the plague the first time, and then I came back with scorched feet and ankles next time, Dad made me promise not to try any more experiments on my own.’ She heaved a gusty sigh. ‘I just wish I knew the real reason why we managed to get to Camelot — or maybe were summoned to Camelot.’

‘Do you think we went back for some other reason than saving Camelot?’

‘I’m beginning to think so. That didn’t work, but …’ Callie hesitated, wondering if she could put her anxiety into words.

El voiced it for her. ‘Maybe your quest isn’t over yet? Maybe we do need to go back one more time?’

Icy needles prickled down Callie’s back. Danger. Darkness. An overwhelming sense of evil. She shuddered and briefly closed her eyes. Now she could hear a cat crying. Or a baby? She opened her eyes and looked around. No cats; no baby either. Yet she’d heard these sounds before, in Camelot. A child crying. What did it mean?

She stopped dead as the wails increased in volume. The infant sounded terrified. Alarmed, Callie scanned the busy street more carefully, but she couldn’t see any babies, crying or otherwise.

A truck roared past, grinding its gears and drowning out all other sounds.

‘You may be right,’ Callie admitted, with a shudder. ‘Maybe we were taken there for some other reason. But I really don’t want to go back again and risk seeing Guinevere and Lancelot together.’

‘The last time we were there we were lucky to escape with our lives,’ El said thoughtfully.

‘And that’s why I’ve promised Dad I won’t try to go there or anywhere else again.’

‘If you’re worried about it, why don’t you ask Dad to stay in the studio and monitor us? He’d be able to act instantly to get us out of trouble if necessary.’ El’s eyes lit up. ‘Or we could try going somewhere fun instead — like a Roman orgy, for instance!’

Callie gave a reluctant grin. ‘It’s a thought,’ she admitted, ‘but I can’t see Dad agreeing to that, can you?’

‘He’d probably want to come too!’

‘Nah.’ Callie shook her head. ‘He’s much too involved with Veronica.’

‘I don’t suppose it’s easy facing two teenage girls who don’t want their father to get married again.’

‘She’s such a try-hard!’ Callie was silent for a moment. ‘I can’t believe he just let Mum go away like that!’ she burst out.

‘It was Mum’s decision to go back north. You heard her. That’s where her life is now, and her friends and everything.’

‘Yeah, but she can paint just as well here as she can there. She’s got some old friends here too.’

‘Face it, Callie. She came to see us when I was sick, but she could have visited us long before then if she’d really wanted to see us. Dad couldn’t have stopped her. She only came back because Gran told her about me.’

‘She didn’t come before because she thought we didn’t want to see her.’

‘Pfft!’ El snapped impatiently. ‘If I loved my kids, I’d make every effort to see them, even if just to explain why I had to go in the first place. Mum didn’t even phone us, never mind coming to see us.’

Callie was silent for a moment, digesting the truth of El’s words. Although she’d tried to harden her heart against her mother after she’d returned so unexpectedly, Callie had loved having her home again. But, just when she began to hope her parents might be reconciled, her mother announced she was going back to Queensland. Because of Veronica? Callie didn’t know, but she bore a grudge against their father’s new partner because of it. She kicked at a pile of leaves, sending them scattering in a shower of red and gold.

‘So you don’t think we should go back to Camelot — or even try for a Roman orgy?’ El asked, with a sidelong glance at Callie.

‘No. I don’t want to go anywhere. Dad’s right — it’s dangerous to interfere with the past. It has all sorts of unforeseen consequences. I’m happy to leave him to experiment on his own now.’

‘I’m glad to hear it.’ El grinned at her. ‘How shall we spend our free afternoon,’ she asked. ‘Should we go to the movies, maybe see that new romcom everyone’s raving about?’

Callie gave a mournful sniff. ‘No romance, thanks. I couldn’t stand it.’

‘What about shopping for some trendy new gear?’ El sidestepped a woman pushing a stroller.

Callie gave a wan smile. Suddenly, she stopped dead. She could hear the terrified wails of a baby again. Her face went white as she peered after the young mother and her sleeping child.

‘Callie?’ El grasped hold of her arm and gave her a shake.

Callie didn’t respond. She stared past El, her eyes haunted and wild as she listened to the baby’s cries. Where was the sound coming from? She closed her eyes and reached deep into her mind, her heart thudding with terror as the screams increased in volume. Then, just as suddenly as they’d started, they stopped. It seemed to Callie that the silence was even more unnerving than the baby’s terrified howls. What was going on? Was she losing her mind — or had something really awful happened, not here but in that other time and place?