A mage who has wandered the shores of Avalon for a thousand years
finally sees the king lifted from the water.
When they meet again, every sense collides at once—
until it all dissolves into an embrace so tight
it feels like trying to press the other into one’s own body.
Familiar teasing returns, softening the weight of it.
“If you need proof I’m well,” he says, half-laughing,
“I could flip you over myself.”
“If you want to prove you still have that heroic vigor,” you answer,
“then go light a fire and dry your royal backside.”
You don’t really mean it.
You already know what he’ll say—
about the dragonfire you once breathed a thousand years ago,
about how you should try it again.
So instead, you turn your palm upward,
and softly speak the spell—
calling upon those familiar, unfamiliar elements
like the names of old friends long unseen.
It takes the shape of a dragon,
brushing past his cheek, his hair—
before slipping into the wood
and rising into a steady flame.
The scent of burning wood brings back
the scorched bodies at Camlann—
you set the world alight,
yet could never burn away what was fated.
If he is a river that never stops moving forward,
then you are a fire that never stops rising.
And fire does only one thing:
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