The Curse of Avalon

The scroll of Lanas-Pirith is the oldest surviving telling of the Curse of Avalon. A protective spell concealed it through the dark ages and the inquisition, turning its words into a euphemistic retelling, guarding it from those who wanted to burn any evidence of the truth: that the world was once ruled by mages.
Julie Evans read it when she was 19, one late evening. A year after she’d given up her powers to save her family. She hoped that here, she could finally find the answer to a question deep in her heart: was there a way to know who her Charge would be? Because meeting him would bring her powers back and put her family in danger again.
She knew exactly what to look for on the Harvard online archive of medieval scrolls. And the words of the Lanas-Pirith, brought to life Ivan of Camelot: a mage from a humble peasant family, who was forced to serve the tyrant mage Harthenon, king of Avalon. And the only one with the courage to challenge him.

Ivan was an optimist. He believed that by joining Harthenon’s forces he wouldn’t just save his village, but he would one day be able to change the King’s ways.
He was wrong. Harthenon’s tyranny grew worse with time. And when other mages wanted to unite against him, he put a curse on the world, the Curse of Avalon: in the event of his death, mages would lose dominion; to humans. 
Harthenon sacrificed mighty dragons to produce such a spell, and used their flame to diminish the great fire of Avalon—so nobody could ever reverse the Curse.
All mages feared him now. Feared to challenge him. Except one: Ivan. When Harthenon burned down his village, killing the woman he loved, Ivan had a vision that the Curse would create a destined-love bond between mages and humans, that she would be his Charge-a person he was bound to love and protect for centuries-a woman he could bring back to life!
So he faced Harthenon, took him by surprise and overthrew him. With Harthenon’s final heartbeat, the Curse of Avalon was triggered.

And that was the end of the scroll. Nothing more!
But when Julie closed the computer, she suddenly noticed a strange mark on her hand. She tried to rub it off, and a vision flashed through her mind. She saw a young man, dressed plainly, standing in a street. Someone who lived simply-like Ivan. Humble, she thought. It was over too fast and she didn’t see his face clearly. When she looked back at her hand, the mark had vanished.
Still it was comforting. He seemed to live a simple life. She wouldn’t be tied to anything that could risk her family. Comforted, she closed her eyes and slept soundly.

But the image was misleading. And being bound to someone like Mark Ralston was anything but safe. And to protect him—like Ivan—Julie would be facing an adversary at impossible odds.