Prologue (Cont'd)

   Morgan froze -- thinking, realizing, understanding. "You mean, now -- killing him now, didn't change anything," she said. "But if I had killed him when he was a boy, before he pulled the sword from the stone . . . before the Lady of the Lake gave him Excalibur . . . before he united the warlords against the Saxons . . . before he built Camelot --"
   "You cannot change the past, Morgan."
   "I can't?" her voice was quiet and sly. "Why not?"
   "Because I won't let you. I was Arthur's guardian from birth. I was his father's magician. I am present in every moment of your past."
   Morgan stared at Merlin for a long moment. "Then I'll just have to kill you -- when you were young. Before your magic was strong, before your meddling began!"
   Merlin smiled. This was the moment he'd been waiting for. He looked again at the little lights sparkling across the black stone. Morgan's understanding of their situation was no deeper than the rock into which she stared. The black glass, like Morgan's dark plan, had been conceived in haste. Obsidian, Merlin knew, was formed when lava cooled too quickly. He knew that Morgan's desire for revenge would spur her to act with similar impatience.
   Confident in her new plan, Morgan raised her hands, fingers aimed at Merlin's heart, "Without you, My father wouldn't have been murdered. Without you, my mother and I wouldn't have been driven from our home. Without you, I might have been a queen. Without you, Arthur would never have existed. Without you! All without you!" Morgan took a deep breath and closed her eyes.