Artemis Hexley and the Return to the Riddles

Chapter 20: Ghosts of the Past

The following morning, Artemis went straight to the library after breakfast, finding it already busy with students revising for their exams. Artemis was there for other reasons than schoolwork, however. After her conversation with Merlin's portrait before, there were things she wanted to discuss with Corey Hayden.

"I got it all wrong," she told him as soon as she approached him. "Morgan le Fay wasn't trying to destroy the Vaults at all. She was the one who made the Vaults in the first place!"

She had expected Corey to be shocked by her announcement, or at the very least surprised, but Corey simply nodded his head.

"Yes," he said. "I know."

"You know? What do you mean you know? How did you find that out?"

Corey picked up a book and held it up so that Artemis could read its title: The Secret Life of Morgana.

"It was all in here. Sort of, anyway." He sighed and put the book back down. "Artemis, did Rowan ever tell you how much research she had done into the Vaults? Or when she stopped researching them?"

"No, I... Maybe in fifth year? She was upset about not being a prefect and then there was that time we all had that fight in the library and she got cursed by Rakepick. I stopped asking her to help out with Vaults stuff after all that," Artemis swallowed hard. "Why?"

"Because it doesn't look like she ever stopped."

"What?"

"The book itself is pretty shoddy. Speculative history, you know?" Artemis didn't know, but she nodded her head anyway, and Corey continued, "However, there was all this tucked inside it."

He picked up a small pile of folded sheets of parchment. Artemis frowned.

"What are those?"

"Notes. Rowan's notes. Some of them look like more stuff that's been decoded from your brother's research, some of it looks like it might even be Rakepick's - Godric knows where she found that - but the really interesting thing... Well, you know how I was looking into the original leader of the Ronde? The one who thought she was descended from the creator of the Vaults?"

"Yeah. Fortinbras, right?"

"Right. And you remember how I was trying to trace back her family tree to find the creator of the Vaults, but parts of it were missing?" Artemis nodded, and Corey bit his lip. "Well, the bits I needed were tucked into this book. Fortinbras was right, she was descended from the Vaults' creator - or, at least, it looks like she was. If you go back in the tree far enough, you reach one of her ancestors from the Middle Ages, whose name was Avalon le Fay."

"Avalon..." Artemis frowned. "Badeea said that Avalon was the name of Morgana's greatest secret and legacy. She said it was a place, an island, but... You mean Avalon was a person?"

"Her daughter. Maybe, anyway. I tried to look back from Avalon le Fay, but she has no recorded heritage of her own. Then again, if her existence was meant to be a secret, that would make sense, and the dates in which she lived would definitely make it plausible."

"So that's why Fortinbras thought she was the 'heir' mentioned in the prophecy," said Artemis. "Because she thought she really was descended from Morgana, that it meant an actual heir."

"I think that's what makes my theory more likely to be true, actually," said Corey.

"But Fortinbras had it wrong, remember? She wasn't the heir at all."

"No, but she wasn't completely wrong," said Corey. Artemis tilted her head at him, and and he grimaced slightly. "Okay. So, there was another part of the family tree tucked into the book."