Lady Knight Missione: Avalon

Part I

"I cannot stay here." I tell him adamantly as I pace around the stone room. Everything here is so bare and inhuman. Where there should be the creativeness of cravings in wooden chairs and furniture, there is only the cold slab of steel. Where there should be bedrooms that have been lived in and used there is only a bed and four stone walls surrounding it. There are no doors here, something I learned the first few hours I got here. Everything is like a desert, caked in yellow as we are in the yellow part of this world. Colors mean so much here, I remember Pryoca telling me that when I first got here. It's funny, but everything that seemed like a dream down here when I was on earth is now as clear as cut glass; and the opposite now occurs. Everything about earth feels like a dream. One thing I know for certain, there may be color but it is a dull world. Who knew the birthplace of magic itself, the heart of Avalon would be like this?

"You must." Pryoca says with a concerned look in his eyes. "You are destined to stay here with me."

Destiny. Fate. Prophecies. I've witnessed and experienced my fair share. I close my eyes briefly as the images of my brother's blood enter my mind. It's fuzzy, the picture, being down here everything is fuzzy from up there, but I still remember the pain like it was a second ago. Not the pain of the sword piercing me, but the pain of betrayal and loss. I defied that prophecy, well almost. They do not scare me anymore. Destiny is nothing but a weight pulling you down, or perhaps a clue of what to do next, but I will not bow down to it. I will not follow it blindly as Pryoca clearly does. If I am stuck here, than there must be a way out. After all I was here once before and I...

"Pryoca." I say suddenly and with what I'm sure is a fierce look in my eye as he looks concerned to what I'm about to say. "I got out of here once before, I was suddenly up there again. How do I do that? How did I get out before? You were there, you must know."

He looks uncomfortable now as his eyes shift down. "It was not my doing. It was the High Priestesses."

"They have the power to send me back?" Hope flares up in my chest. If I can get out of here, then I can go home, to Camelot. To Gwaine.

"Aye." He confirms, but still unsure and hesitant.

"What is it?"

"They will not send you back, not until it's your time."

"And who determines that? Destiny? Fate? A prophecy? I defied all of those, and I will do it again if I must."

"The High Priestesses are followers of the Old Religon, as you would call it, they do not take orders from the likes of you or I." Pryoca explains.

"They can't just keep me down here, Pryoca, they can't. I am a human being, not some creature of magic. I don't belong here." I tell him sincerely. He doesn't seem to be convinced so I step closer and takes his hands in mine. They're lukewarm, unnatural and inhuman, the way I remember them when I first met him. He looks up at me when I do this, some shock and wonderment in his eyes for what I do not know, but it is of no consequence to me. "I can't stay here. Look around, there is nothing here for me. My heart- I belong in Camelot, or if I am to die I belong in the afterlife. Not in Avalon, not in a place of magic."

A look of hurt crosses his yellow eyes, he does not hide their true color from me now, and says, "But it is said..."

"Look at me." I say getting a little closer. He does as I ask and a look of sadness is clear on his face and then I understand. "You are my friend, and I do not want to leave you either. I know that you are lonely here, maybe you could come with me?"

"I can't." Pryoca says struggling out of my hands in his, taking a step back. He turns away from me and I see his shoulders move up and down before it looks as though he takes a deep breath. I can't help but think that there is something more going on with him, something I don't know about, but it is not my place to judge or ask questions. I barely know him after all, and with his back still to me he says, "Alright. I will help you get out of Avalon."