What happened in Once & Future by Amy Rose Capetta & Cori McCarthy

The basics

Title: Once & Future

Author: Amy Rose Capetta and Cori McCarthy

Series: Once & Future #1

- Once & Future (2019)
- Sword in the Stars (2020)

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Goodreads Summary:

When Ari crash-lands on Old Earth and pulls a magic sword from its ancient resting place, she is revealed to be the newest reincarnation of King Arthur. Then she meets Merlin, who has aged backward over the centuries into a teenager, and together they must break the curse that keeps Arthur coming back. Their quest? Defeat the cruel, oppressive government and bring peace and equality to all humankind.

No pressure.

Read a full summary of Once & Future by Amy Rose Capetta and Cori McCarthy below. If you can’t remember what happened in Once & Future and you need a refresher, then you’re in the right place.

What happened in Once & Future?

• Ari and Kay are searching for information on their missing parents. Ari uses someone’s device to find out if they’re alive.
• The Mercer Company, which is basically the dark side and is ruling the galaxy, finds out and starts searching for whoever searched for the Helix parents.
• Ari and Kay escape and crash land on Old Earth. Ari finds Excalibar in an old oak tree.
• Merlin wake sup and thinks about how he’s aging in reverse. This will be his 42nd Arthur to train.
• Ari and Kay are on the moon. Ari is dancing in a club when the Mercer Company, Merlin, and Morgana all show up. Morgana was the old oak tree. Merlin helps Ari escape.
• On the spaceship, the siblings’ friend Lam is there. Lam lets slip that their parents turned Kay and Ari and their family in. Ari learns this as she’s disguised as Kay.
• The team heads to Lionel where Gwen is queen.
• Ari, in order to hide from Mercer, gets involved with the tournament and fights against Jordan (aka Lancelot).
• Gwen and Ari get married to protect her from Mercer (which doesn’t seem like the best plan but it’s fine, whatever).
• They now all head to Troy and the Administrator from Mercer is there. He tells Ari her full name – Ara Azar – and says he’ll give Lionel water if they don’t tell everyone that Mercer is destroying Old Earth.
• Morgana tortures Merlin and Ari by putting them in their most painful memories. Ari sees her parents die, and Merlin sees the first King Arthur die.
• Merlin gets himself arrested and sent to Urite, the prison planet where they think the Helix parents are. He catches the bubonic plague and breaks out of prison. He finds the Helix’s and briefly turns them into stone to protect them.
• Gwen and Ari argue about keeping secrets.
• The team gets everyone off Urite except Ari because Morgana intervenes.
• Merlin wakes up to find Ari dead. Kay asks him to resurrect her but he refuses. They hold a small funeral.
• Merlin and Val almost kiss.
• The team heads back to Lionel. Mercer are trying to take over the planet due to Gwen’s connection with Ari.
• We, along with Morgana, get inside Ari’s head where the two of them are fighting. Morgana blames Merlin for destroying her brother.
• Ari breaks the Ketch barrier but finds her planet silent. It turns out that Mercer killed the planet years ago.
• Ari asks Mogana to show her everything.
• One year passes.
• Merlin has created energy lines to protect Lionel from Mercer. Merlin gets distracted by Val and Mercer ships attack.
• In order to escape the team has to fly Gwen’s castle out of there. They plan to lead the evacuees from Error.
• Jordan finds that Error has been sent over four thousand messages from Ketch.
• Ari is playing with dragons when Merlin calls. They’re unable to land anywhere.
• Ari tells the universe about what Mercer did to Ketch.
• The team is reunited with Ari. They believe she’s an impostor for a time but then it’s all okay. Morgana admits to tricking them because Arthur wanted Ari to see Ketch.
• Ari is now determined to unseat the Administrator and defeat Mercer.
• Ari learns that Gwen and Kay are together.
• Merlin gives Morgana a body. He then shares memories of Arthur with her.
• Gwen and Kay reveal that Gwen is pregnant with Kay’s baby. Gwen admits that she chose Kay because he’s the closest she could get to Ari.
• The Administrator shows them murdered dragons from Ketch. He captures Morgana and Merlin.
• He plans to make Ari Mercer’s king and Lionel’s ruler. Kay finds it hilarious that he wants Ari to lie for him because Ari has trouble lying.
• The Administrator stabs and kills Kay.
• Mama Dragon shows up alive and Ari is to fight her.
• Nin shows Merlin what is happening to Ari. She says she can stop Merlin from aging backwards. She says she can return Merlin to his parents but she won’t tell him who they are. Merlin uses his magic to escape.
• Merlin is reunited with Morgana, who no longer has a body. They go to find Ari.
• Mercer is making Ari fight the starving, grieving dragon. She tells the dragon to play dead. Ari is crowned.
• Ari and Gwen kiss.
• The team starts to fight back. Ari fights while riding the dragon.
• The Administrator has Gwen. Ari stabs and kills him.
• Everyone escapes and they have time to mourn Kay.
• Ari shows off the round table she made.
• Terra, from the Mercer Family, hacks into the meeting room and says they are offering food and medical supplies in exchange for Gwen’s baby. The team has until the morning to decide.
• Arthur sends Ari a message about a chalice that makes people see the truth. Ari plans to steal it from the past. Morgana finds it hilarious that Merlin was unable to find the chalice back in the day because his future self helped Ari to steal it.
• Merlin kills Morgana to open a portal to the past.

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