On a wave of magic, her power carried her across the water to the lush green island the curtain of mist parted to reveal. She walked quickly to the graceful stone tower that was the only structure on the little isle the locals had long ago named Shalott. Surrounded by rowan trees and shrouded in her magic, she hardly needed the concealment of the mist, but the goddess automatically called it to her. For what she was about to do, she wanted there to be no chance of prying eyes.

She didn’t enter the cream-colored tower as she usually did, but instead paced back and forth along the gentle bank, letting her white samite robe trail through the wildflowers that carpeted this special island. Power swirled around her, causing the birds, newly awakened by dawn, to squawk in alarm and leave their perches in the rowan grove. She breathed in the scent of musky moss, the pungent odor of wild thyme that surrounded her as she disturbed the softness of it beneath her feet.

How could she have allowed this to happen? She’d recognized that Merlin had been damaged by the world from the moment she’d met him. He was a powerful Druid, yet he was filled with unusual gentleness and such a tender heart that even the wild creatures of the forest could be lured to eat from his hand. Viviane smiled through her tears. He’d lured her, drawn her from her lonely isle in the middle of her mystical lake. She’d willingly become his lover. As a goddess, she couldn’t conceive of not being able to heal that which the world had broken inside him.

“I could have healed him, had it not been for that wretched Arthur!” she cried. Her angry words made the usually placid waters of the lake begin to roil, and their cool blue depths darkened ominously as the morning light became veiled. Viviane frowned, lifted her hand and, bringing her temper under control, flicked her fingers out at the lake and commanded, “Darkness, be gone! Whether my anger is stirred or not, you are not welcome in my realm!”