Chapter Twenty-Nine
Twenty-Nine
Bridget was sitting by the fire with Leonard and Bowen, who were forcing her to try to recreate the magic of the cards with a simple set of playing cards they’d brought in their luggage, when the Lady of the Lake turned up with a large flagon of wine.
She was wearing a functionally identical but much less floury dress, and she’d braided her hair too, working shells and stones and pearls into it, staining her lips with something startlingly red.
“Good evening,” she said. “You are having a party practically in my garden and you did not invite me.”
“Oh my God,” gasped Sir Leonard. “Are you the witch? I have so many questions.”
“Drink now,” said the Lady. “Questions later.”
She handed him the wine and floated off, probably in search of Sir Hurst.
They hadn’t actually been throwing any sort of party, but her arrival precipitated a complete change in atmosphere, like they were hosting an honored guest. Wine was poured; outfits were changed, from drab traveling clothes to something more appropriate for a noble banquet.
Sir Leonard started following the Lady around like a puppy, begging her to tell him his future, while she smiled and told him he was “too beautiful, like a sculpture with nothing behind the eyes.” He didn’t even seem particularly insulted.
“He’s going to talk about this for months,” Bowen said glumly. “And he’ll decide to dedicate his life to the study of this magic, spend a ridiculous amount of money on some cards, then never look at them again.”
“You could spend time with other people, Bowen,” said Bridget. “You’re very popular.”
“No,” Bowen replied, sighing. “Unfortunately, I don’t care to. Excuse me.”
He went to intercede on the Lady’s behalf, and Bridget went to find Gwen.
She was sitting next to Arthur, who looked somewhat morose. “Look, here’s Bridget. She’ll say something encouraging. Go on, Bridget.”
“Um,” said Bridget. “Your hair is long again.”
“Thanks,” said Arthur. “No, that was good actually. It’s taken forever.”
“Arthur had weird cards,” Gwen whispered behind his back, as he leaned forward to pick up a cup of tea.
“I can hear you,” he snapped. “They weren’t weird cards. Three of Swords. Grief and hurt, apparently, in all its lovely forms. My mother died. My father was … bilge. What’s new.”
“And then he got The World,” said Gwen. “Which is apparently bad, for some reason.”
“She said it means completion. A full circle. A full circle of what? I don’t want to go back to where I started. I’m trying to move on. I don’t want circles. Fie, circles!”
“Maybe it was about your hair,” Bridget offered, wondering if this would work a second time.
“Shut up, Leclair. I wanted something good. The day is ruined.”
“Stop being a bastard,” said Gwen. “You’ve been moping for days.”
“I’ve been riding around on a horse following your brother all over the place for nearly a month. I’m allowed!”
“You wanted to be a knight.”
“Oh, great, take his side.”
“I’m not taking anyone’s side,” Gwen said, with such volume that some nearby guards looked over, then pretended they hadn’t.
“Has it ever occurred to you that it might be quite difficult for me to be in the middle of all this? I have my own problems, Arthur! I don’t need to be constantly dealing with both you and him, because you’re both too foolish to—”
“Whoa,” Bridget said quickly. “Hey. Come on.”
Gwen twisted to look at her, incandescent. “But he’s being—”
“What?” Arthur hissed. “I’m being what?”
“You— You’re—”
“I know,” Bridget said. “But let’s take a walk.”
She took Gwen by the arm, gently pulling her away and across the camp, only stopping to nudge Sidney and tilt her head in Arthur’s direction.
When she and Gwen were alone, standing by one of the lone trees scattered across the hillside, Bridget said, “You were right, but he looked like he might be about to cry.”
“Ugh.” Gwen leaned against the tree and immediately began to strip bark from it as viciously as she’d once attacked her own fingernails. She looked thinner than she had when they set out from Camelot, last vestiges of softness worn away.
She’d been doing too much. Helping to run the country, this tour, dealing with her own grief, supporting Gabriel and Arthur, and … whatever was going on with Bridget. That wasn’t what Bridget wanted to be—another problem, a burden. A spinning plate. She wanted to be relief. Lightness. Unburdening.
“Hey,” she said. “When this is over, why don’t you come to Drakesease?”
Gwen had visited once, back in April. Bridget’s parents hadn’t known the precise nature of their relationship, but she suspected they had long guessed her general inclinations, and decided to say nothing about it.
The summer Bridget had spent pursuing, courting, and then sulking over a neighboring lord’s daughter—Freya, blond, funny, and sharp-tongued, married too young to a man she’d barely met—probably hadn’t gone unnoticed.
Her father had been too quiet, verging on silent, but had listened intently to everything Gwen said at the dinner table while she daintily devoured fish grilled on a bed of jasmine rice and fragrant lemongrass soup.
After Gwen complimented Bridget’s mother on her necklace, she’d taken it off and immediately given it to her, leading to lots of embarrassing refusals and insisting—but on the whole, it had gone rather well, as long as they all ignored the strangeness of the Princess of England visiting the household of a minor lord alone and on an apparent whim.
The next day they’d ridden down to Brighthelmstone disguised by heavy cloaks to eat sugary doucets and drink spiced cider at the market, Bridget kissing the sweetness from Gwen’s lips when nobody was watching, and then continued farther down the coast. Gwen had already been stressed, and Bridget thought the sea might do her some good.
It had. In the small, coved beach Bridget had visited with her father as a child, peppered with rocks as tall as people but empty of any other human company, Gwen had stripped down to her chemise, tied the skirt up out of the way, and gone to paddle in the sea.
“It’s so cold,” she’d said, frowning down at her own pale feet, and then a crab had scuttled too close for comfort, making her slip and gasp—so Bridget had picked her up and carried her back to dry land, Gwen protesting and laughing the entire way.
“Funny. He doesn’t know he just scuttled over a princess,” Bridget said as she eased Gwen down onto the shore, and Gwen snorted, wringing seawater from the hem of her slip.
“Why should he care? He might be king of the crabs, for all we know.”
“Right. So he outranks you.” Bridget paused, then picked Gwen up again, ignoring her shrieks. “Back in you go, then. His Majesty hungers.”
Later, when Bridget had swum until her fingers were numb and Gwen’s hair was wild and wavy from the salted air, they’d mounted up and ridden back to Drakesease, washed the ocean off in the bath, and then met to sit by the fire in quiet contentment.
Gwen liked to ask Bridget about her childhood, stories from her squiring days, and to her surprise, Bridget found she liked telling her.
“You know I kept trying to catch your eye at Camelot,” Bridget said, watching the flames dance in the hearth. “Even back then. I’d stand where I thought you’d be looking.”
“Did you really?” Gwen smiled. “Every time I saw you, I thought it was just very good luck.”
After Bridget’s parents had gone to bed, Gwen had moved to sit next to Bridget, tucked her face into Bridget’s shoulder, and said, “Thanks. I needed this.”
Now Gwen’s expression slackened, her fingers pausing on the tree, looking lighter at just the thought. “I’d love that.”
“Good,” said Bridget. “I love having you there.”
Their eyes met in a moment of bright intensity, and then Gwen sighed, and said, “I suppose I should go and check on Gabe. He’s been acting very odd today.”
There it was. Something tangible Bridget could do. The unburdening. “I’ll do it.”
Gwen shook her head. “That’s very nice of you, but I’m not sure he’d—”
“Let me try.”
Gwen shrugged, a motion that conveyed Be my guest, and walked with Bridget as far as the entrance to Gabriel’s tent before kissing her briefly on the cheek and parting ways.
When Gabriel admitted her, looking slightly confused, he did not seem to be having a better night than Arthur. Worse, perhaps, because there was a manic glint in his eye, like he was having fifty thoughts at once and none of them were good.
“I’ve come to see if you’re all right.”
“Oh. That’s nice. Um. All right?” Gabriel scrubbed at his hair, his curls achieving new and improbable heights. “No, I don’t think so. But are any of us, really?”
“Hmm,” Bridget said. This was painful, even if it was for the best. Talking about feelings.
Still a nightmare. Do it for Gwen. “No. Guess not. I’ve been having some …
trouble, since the anniversary this summer.
Get sort of shaky and weird. We think maybe it’s stuff like …
smells, that remind me of the battlefield. Mud, maybe.”
“Really?” Gabriel said, looking as if she’d caught him completely off guard. “What’s it like? Do you … by any chance feel like your heart is going to explode?”
“Not really. But it’s like I’m back there, for a second. Not great.”
“Not great,” Gabriel repeated faintly. “Well, that’s not what I have. Mine is just some kind of acute panic.”
Bridget nodded, her lips pressed together. “Want to trade?”
Gabriel laughed, surprised, and Bridget smiled painfully back at him. “No, thank you. I don’t particularly like my burden, but at least I know precisely how heavy it is.” He paused, the levity gone from his face. “I told Arthur.”
“That you’re still in love with him?”
“What?” Gabriel looked aghast. “No. No! About the panicking. What makes you think I’m still in love with him?”
“Oh, nothing,” Bridget said quickly. “But also, sort of … everything.” When he seemed even more anguished, she said, “But what do I know? I’m no love expert.”