Chapter twelve

     It took a little while to explain what had happened after Jules woke up, mainly because she kept muttering pixie dust over and over again and giggling like a crazy person as I was trying to speak, but eventually I finished telling her what had happened. By the time I had finished telling Jules the whole story and she stopped giggling like she was high on laughing gas, Morgana had finished whatever preparations she needed to make for our journey and she was ready to go. I saw no reason to delay any longer so we left the enchanted forest of the fay behind and headed towards our first destination, Camelot.

     I had created the same platform I had created before and the three of us, Jules, Morgana and myself, were now floating a few kilometers away from the sparkling white city. Morgana had a complex expression on her face as she stared at the city and asked, "What are we doing here?"

     "You wanted to help Merlin heal his fragmented soul, didn't you? Well that means we are going to have to take the old geezer along with us. Coercing a soul bender into doing what we want is going to be difficult enough, but abducting one and bringing it here? You can forget about it. So our only real option is to collect all of the fragments of Merlin's soul and bring it along with us."

     Morgana turned around and stared at me incredulously, "You said that there is a fragment of Merlin's soul in each of the people in Camelot. Are you suggesting that we kidnap the entire city?"

     "Oh, God no. We don't have the time or the luxury to herd Merlin's little soul puppets around like lost sheep. Thankfully there is a much better option. You see, when one of Merlin's creations is killed, the little fragment inside it isn't destroyed, instead it is once again absorbed into its parent body, aka Merlin."

     "Are you saying that if I killed all of these so called 'soul puppets' then I can heal Merlin's mind?"

     "I'm afraid not. When Merlin creates these soul puppets, they become truly separate entities with their own feelings and memories so if we do this, we will actually be making things worse. You can imagine what will happen when hundreds of minds occupy the same body so I am now giving you fair warning. This is the point of no return, if we do this but fail to make the soul benders do what we want, not only will we fail to save Merlin but he is going to be much worse off than he is now. So you are going to have to make a decision, do you want to move forward or go back to your forest and leave everything as it is?"

Stolen novel; please report.

     Morgana's pale face got even paler as she heard the risks involved,"You never said anything about this before."

     "I told you that our journey is going to be hard. This is actually going to be one of the easiest things we are going to do on our way to the soul benders so if you aren't even willing to do this little thing then you better give up now and go back before you get killed."

     Morgana simply stood on the platform, looking at the distant city and considering her options. I could see that she was actually considering abandoning this mad quest but eventually she grit her teeth and her purple eyes flashed an ominous light, "Alright, let's do this."

     "You misunderstand. You are going to do this, not us. I will be providing support but you will be doing all the heavy lifting. Jules is going to sit this one out."

     Two angry female voices immediately started to bombard me with complaints.

     ".... I am not made out glass you know! I can fight! You can't stop me!..."

     ".....Camelot has so many anti-fay wards on it that no fay can get in! Do you think we wouldn't have done something already if it was so easy? You always act so high and mighty but now you want me to do all the work, I'm starting to think that all you know how to do is to talk big!...."

     *sigh* Why did I suddenly feel like a father dealing with his teenage daughters?