Weldon's Arc

Chapter 4 of 9

The applause was still in Weldon's ears when Mercury stepped beside him and touched his sleeve. She did not smile. She said one word: "Now." Weldon followed her off the dais, through a side arch, down a corridor that emptied into the back garden. The pen in his pocket still felt warm. He knew what she was about to say before she said it. Mercury stopped at a stone pillar half hidden by hedges. Blue runes ran down its face and pulled at the air. She turned and held out a staff he had not seen her carry before — silver prongs around a crystal core that pulsed violet and pale blue. "You owe me," she said. "I am calling it." She set the staff upright between them. "Refuse, and I walk back into that court and tell the Queen exactly how your binding was made. Your alliance ends before the torches are lit. Your kingdom waits another year it does not have." Weldon did not argue. He had known the price when he took her hand. "What do you want." "Go home," Mercury said. "Tonight. Tell your father what you are now. Tell him the alliance is signed. Tell him Silver Millennium has a witch among its Guardians and that the witch answers to me as much as to the Queen." She paused. "Bring back his answer by morning." From the shadow of the hedge, Sailor Pluto stepped forward. Her staff was already lit. "I will carry you," Pluto said. "The Gate does not ask questions I do not put to it. You will be back before the Queen misses you." She looked at Weldon plainly. "I am not doing this for her. I am doing it because someone should see his father before the news does." Weldon stepped onto the pillar. The runes climbed his boots in cold blue lines. Pluto set her hand on his shoulder. The garden folded sideways. Wind pulled at his coat, then stopped. He stood in his father's hall. The fire was low. His father rose from the long chair, thinner than two weeks ago, and stared at the silver seams on Weldon's coat. Weldon did not kneel. He said, "The alliance is signed. Queen Serenity named me among her Guardians." He lifted one hand. Green witchlight curled from his fingers, then silver light braided up through it and lit the rafters. His father sat down slowly. "Sailor Avalon," Weldon said. "That is the name she gave me." His father looked at him for a long time. Then he said, "Then we cancel the other plan." He reached out and took Weldon's wrist, not the hand with the light. "Tell her we accept her terms. Whatever they are." Weldon nodded. He did not tell his father about Mercury. Pluto was waiting at the threshold, her staff dim now, her eyes on the floor. Weldon walked back to her. The debt was paid. A new one had taken its place, and it was heavier.