So Arthur didn’t blame his father for wanting to keep a close eye on Yurien. The trouble with this plan lay squarely on Arthur’s shoulders.

If he were a better swordsman, he’d have no trouble flashing around Excalibur, then picking up an ordinary sword and trouncing his opponents. It all fell apart because he was no great talent with a blade. And he had no one to blame but himself.

The skill had never seemed important.

Perhaps his father’s advisors had been right when they had declared him utterly lacking. Yet instead of doing something about it, he had stewed, and wasted time in the wizard’s workshop, and sulked in the library.

No wonder Guinevere saw him as such a disappointment. No wonder everyone did.

Arthur paused on the staircase, wondering how he had been so shortsighted. It was so obvious now what he should have done, not that there was much chance to remedy it in the coming weeks.

Perhaps, if he practiced morning and night, he could avoid the humiliation of coming last. It wasn’t as though he needed to win the competition. And if he did, he was fairly certain there’d be whispers that he had cheated.

So he didn’t have to be the best swordsman. Just . . . a better one.

He glanced out the window, where the guard was training on the lawn, as they always did in the mornings. Captain Lam stood to the side, watching critically as the men crossed swords, and barking corrections.

Lancelot’s words floated back to him then, from weeks ago in the armory, before the rest of the castle was awake.

You should come train with the guard. That’ll whip you into shape.

Well, Arthur decided, better late than never.

CHAPTER 27

Emry was still fuming the next morning. She sat at the battered wooden table in the wizard’s workshop, by all appearances working on a poison antidote. But in truth, she was waiting for Arthur to walk through the door so she could tell him exactly what a spoiled, entitled ass he was.

She couldn’t believe he’d made her apologize to Guinevere, yet had insisted she was the one being ridiculous.

You forget your place, apprentice.

Ugh. The way he’d said it. Like he could be her friend one moment, and her prince the next, and she was somehow supposed to know the difference.

She heard a noise and glanced up, hoping it was Arthur. But the sound was simply Master Ambrosius adjusting his chair by the fire.

“Have you managed it already?” he asked, raising a bushy eyebrow.

Emry made a face, glancing down at the eight—no, nine—dead snails scattered across the table. She was supposed to be changing a tincture of monkshood into an antidote for the deadly poison. But no matter how many times she tried, she couldn’t get the spell to work.

She was running out of snails. And patience.