Legendborn

Bree is the first-person narrator of Legendborn. She’s Black, “beautiful” (69), “stunning” (411), and as tall as many men—like UNC’s Dean of Students—at 16 years old. The novel begins with the death of her mother, Faye, in a car accident, which gives Bree Sight: the ability to see magical energy (aether or root). Once she starts classes at UNC Chapel Hill’s Early College, she begins to seek answers about her mom and her mother’s family. At the end of the novel, Bree learns she is a Medium and possessed by King Arthur: the heir of two magical traditions.

However, Bree’s character arc is atypical because she is a young Black woman who inherited Arthur’s Bloodcraft-bound spirit through the peculiar institution of slavery. Bree says, “I’m not some chosen one. I am the product of violence, and I am the Scion of Arthur, and I don’t want to be either” (479). Her family line is not well-known in the (white) magical world, like that of Harry Potter (a series directly alluded to in Legendborn); rather, she and the magic users of her direct maternal line are outcast from both magical worlds, white Bloodcraft and Black Rootcraft, due to an heir of Arthur raping one of his slaves.