Free Lancelot and the Wolf by Sarah Luddington

could get us through safely. But I fell under its spell as well. I lost track and it’s taken me so long to be strong again.” Else plucked at her gambeson with nervous fingers.
    I rose on shaking legs and approached my pack. I drew my sword for the first time in months. I turned back to her as fast as I could manage, Else gasped. “Who are you?” I demanded.
    The sword point rested at the nape of her neck. It trembled but I now felt something like myself, broken and weakened, but me nonetheless.
    Else raised her hands slowly, “I am nothing you can easily understand. Please put down the sword and I’ll explain. I swear. The time for lies and tricks is so far gone. Please, love,” she began.
    “ Don’t call me that,” I remembered my anger for the first time in months. I welcomed it and hoarded it close to my heart. Unfortunately, my body had other ideas. My stomach cramped, I jerked violently and my hand lost control of the sword. It clattered to the floor of the wood and I doubled over.
    Else flew to my side, “You can’t hurt me, Lancelot. Your body won’t allow you to threaten me. I know you are angry but please, be calm.”
    “ Just tell me,” I almost collapsed into her arms, forcing myself not to weep like a babe.
    Else held me, “I’ll have to begin with my conception or this isn’t going to make any sense,” she began. I held still, my head in her lap as I shivered. “I am a sister of the woman in the cave. Our mother is the same woman but I am half mortal, sort of, my father is Merlin.” She stopped.
    I groaned, “You aren’t human at all, he’s not human.”
    “ He likes people to think he’s not human but only one grandparent is fey, they just happened to be a very strong kind of fey. That’s what makes him powerful.”
    “ Okay, so you are Merlin’s daughter, what more lies are there, Else?” the bitterness hurt us both. She trembled against my exhausted body.
    “ There are many lies and tricks,” she said sadly. “I was raised in the wild wood until I was five. That’s how I found it this time. Then Merlin appeared and took me into the world. Your world. His magic eased my transition but I remember even now how much it hurt to leave my family. He took me to England and implanted me into a new family, the de Clare family.”
    She paused for a long time as my brain began to join up some hideous dots. “Shit,” I finally groaned. “You are Eleanor de Clare. The missing daughter.”
    “ I am.”
    She’d vanished before being presented to court. I remembered the chaos it caused. I had even joined the hunt for the girl. She’d been sent to court in order for Guinevere to finish her training before Arthur allowed her to marry the man her powerful father had chosen. That had been over five years before.
    I laughed and finally found the strength to leave her lap, but I couldn’t bring myself to release her hands. “I’ve been fucking Stephen de Clare’s sister. He’s going to love me for that. He’s the one who made Arthur give me these damned stripes.” I referenced the lash marks on my back. Else looked down.
    “ I didn’t know.”
    “ I didn’t think you needed to know. I thought you were my squire.”
    “ Do you want to hear the worst of it?” she asked.
    “ Of course it gets worse. This is my life. It has to be worse.” I did pull away from her at last and moved to the other side of the fire. The ground felt cold and damp but it kept my mind focused.
    “ Merlin helped me run. He hadn’t meant to leave me with the de Clare’s long enough to be married. He didn’t think they’d find me a husband when I was barely fifteen. He brought me to Europe.” Else rose and paced. Her unhappiness a living thing, the tension in her body obvious. “He told me I had to wait, I had to survive and wait for the man who would save my people and Arthur. A man would come and rescue me when I needed him most. That man would be the one to destroy our enemies.”
    “ What do you