I look at her, wide-eyed, and she continues. ‘Your sisters and I never stopped searching for you. We were there on the night you reincarnated. We wanted you to grow up knowing the truth of your identity, but then Merlin sent his demons.’

I gaze at the unfamiliar red mark on my wrist and an unwelcome thought washes up on the shore of my mind, one that has been sailing towards me through the mist for days.

You’re not who you think you are.

Realisation drops anchor deep inside me. The girl I read about in the book and saw in my vision, the face I glimpsed in the bathroom mirror, is me. That’s why the mark on my skin suddenly appeared. I’m seeing it because it once belonged to her. She’s inside me, her thoughts and memories affecting my mind.

‘You’re telling me I died over a thousand years ago?’

‘When we found your body, we tried to revive you but your spirit had already slipped into the portal. If you had died anywhere else, we could have brought you back. We knew that your soul would seek out an unborn child, but time exists differently in the portal and we didn’t know when you might emerge into the earthly realm. At first, we had no idea it was Merlin who had killed you. As soon as we left Avalon, he enchanted the portal so that we couldn’t return.’

I think back to my vision. I know Merlin tried to kiss the girl – tried to kiss me – and that he killed her, but something doesn’t make sense.

‘Why does he want to stop you going back?’

‘To prevent us from avenging your death, and because he wants Avalon for himself.’

She stands up and pulls her shoulders back, her wings opening and then resettling. ‘Merlin became obsessed with you and used demonic magic to try and make you love him. He had no interest in taking Avalon before, but I fear that working with demons has set him on a dark path – one of greed and reckless pursuit of power.’

Morgan paces to the window on bare feet then turns to face me. Her voice is quiet and fraught with guilt. ‘I am the eldest. I am responsible for you all. I should have known what was happening. I failed you and I am sorry.’