Chapter Twenty-One
Twenty-One
Then Sir Bridget and Sir Arthur were sore wounded, for their quests had demanded great feats and grave danger, and so they passed the night in love and friendship, each afeared of the other’s passing, but much brave in the face of death.
—FROM AN EARLY DRAFT OF THE QUESTS OF KING GAbrIEL AND HIS ROUND TABLE BY SIR FLORIAN ARDEN
Sir Hurst and the others found them in the end. They’d been turned around by the dense woodland, the captain clearly regretting ever letting the king out of his sight and determined never to do so again.
Once they’d regrouped, the party had to make camp under the stars rather than seeking out more comfortable lodgings.
There were too many of them to impose on the tiny nearby village, and it was too far to travel to the next viable option.
Of course, because life was cruelly on schedule, Bridget got her monthly bleed the second she dismounted from her horse.
No bathtub by the hearth to ease into, no featherbed.
Just the tinctures she’d carefully packed away in her bag and whatever comfort could be eked out from a cot by a campfire.
She’d dealt with this before on the road, but she and Neil had become quite the experts at carefully planning their infrequent stays at inns so that she could avoid discomfort as much as possible.
It hadn’t felt appropriate to say “Might we schedule this series of quests of national political importance so that I can cramp in a bath in peace?” but she was kicking herself now for not engineering some way to avoid this fate.
Master Buchanan came across her standing with one hand on a tree, breathing deeply through the waves of pain, and took charge.
He disappeared for a short while, and then came back to guide her into the first tent that had been pitched, directing her toward a surprisingly comfy cot stacked with blankets.
They must have lit a fire at some point, because he sent for an attendant with a flask of wine and a pan full of hot coals to warm her before leaving her to suffer in peace.
It was a particularly bad month. She felt sharply nauseated by the pain, which radiated up her back, down her legs, until it felt like her kneecaps were being ground to powder.
It didn’t help that she was already bruised from her encounter with the boar.
Gwen came to visit her, sat next to her for a while talking softly to her about Arthur’s kitten.
She’d done this for Bridget before, and Bridget had never grown used to it—being taken care of by the very person she felt bound to protect.
Cool fingers on her forehead, an arm around her back as she was helped into bed, like she was something delicate and important; Gwen reading aloud to her from whichever book she was halfway through.
Kisses on her temple and raspberry leaf tea left within arm’s reach.
Eventually Gwen had to leave, called to a meeting to discuss their next stop. Bridget drank some wine far too quickly, almost vomited it back up, and then managed to fall into an uneasy sleep.
When she awoke, Arthur was lying on a cot on the other side of the tent, a wet rag draped over his forehead.
“Hello,” he said hoarsely. “Don’t mind me. I’ll just be over here suffering differently. Parallel dying.”
“What’s wrong with you?” Bridget said, turning over onto her side and then regretting the movement.
“Oh, where do I start, how long do you have, et cetera, et cetera.”
“Funny.”
Arthur moved the rag so that one eye was peeking out.
“Just the usual. Inexplicable feverishness, lungs hurt, legs tired. Happens every now and then since my head-bashing, for seemingly no reason. The Wizard thinks it’s because I had those infections.
Messed up something in me, permanently. Physician says my humors are too soggy. What’s wrong with you?”
“The usual,” Bridget said.
“And what’s that?”
“Womb’s trying to kill me.”
“That’s nice of it.” Arthur pulled the rag back over his eyes. “Doesn’t seem like good design, does it?”
Bridget winced through a stab of pain, and then unclenched her fingers with great and conscious effort. “Nope.”
“I mean, why do we even feel pain at all? I suppose it’s so we don’t constantly run into sharp objects, but there must be a better way.” He sighed. “Anyway. I’ll leave you to sleep.”
Suddenly desperate for distraction, Bridget said, “Physicians tell me the womb wanders around causing problems unless you fall pregnant. A baby pins it in one place.”
“Well, obviously, that’s the only rational explanation. Which genius thought of that?”
“Hippocrates. And Plato, I think.”
Arthur waved his hand half-heartedly. “They’ll say anything for attention.”
She was surprised to find him easy company these days.
He’d been like an excitable puppy when Bridget had first met him, constantly on the move, practically bursting out of his skin; she hadn’t really known how to talk to him then, other than to weather his constant barrage of jokes and too-friendly asides with stoicism, but he was easier to coexist with now.
Not that she’d tell him that. I like you better now that life has beaten you down a little.
Not the sort of thing people liked to hear.
“What have you got?” Arthur said, gesturing toward the flask in her hand.
“Wine.”
“Oh, wine. We go way back. What sort of wine? Describe it to me. I’ll live vicariously through you.”
“Tastes like … alcohol.”
Arthur’s gesturing hand flopped sadly, its life force extinguished. “They put alcohol in absolutely everything that’s meant to be good for you. All the medicines. And you know, I really do think sometimes that I could try it again one of these days and it would be … fine.”
“Right.”
“But then,” Arthur said, debating with himself, “when you’ve figured out how to crack on without something, why risk it?
It was never the wine I needed anyway. It was …
escape. Escape from all the feelings. An excuse to be my worst and grandest self.
Do stop me anytime, or I’ll just keep going forever. ”
“You can talk,” Bridget said, turning onto her back and taking another sip of the aforementioned wine. Yep. Tasted just like alcohol. “Can’t promise I’ll have anything to say back.”
“No. We’re both pretty dependable on that front.
” Arthur was quiet for longer than Bridget had thought him capable.
“You know, I think I’m finally working out that I can still be the person I always was, it just doesn’t have to be so hard.
Sometimes I think I’ve changed, but actually I’m the same person, it’s just the way I deal with things that’s changed. Does that make sense?”
Bridget considered. “No. Doesn’t mean you’re wrong though.”
“That’s because you have perfect control over all of your emotions at all times,” Arthur lamented, “and only twice a year, on special occasions, can you be harried to a frown.”
Beset by cramps, Bridget didn’t answer for a while, and when she did, she did so without thinking. “That’s … not true.”
She didn’t have to look at him to know that Arthur was smiling triumphantly. “I know. That was a trick. Go on then—what’s wrong with you?”
That was, indeed, the question.
“I don’t know.”
She shifted, and the nice warm pan with the lovely coals was dislodged, and she was overcome with misery for a moment before she heard Arthur making to get up.
“You don’t have to—”
“I’ll crawl there,” he said magnanimously, “to rescue you. It will make me feel excitingly chivalrous and masculine.”
“Okay.”
Bridget didn’t know if he actually crawled.
She just waited with her eyes closed, and eventually heard Arthur’s shuffling approach, and then the pan was back on the cot with her.
When she opened her eyes, he had only managed to get halfway back across the room, and was sitting on the slightly muddied rug with his back braced against the pole keeping the tent aloft.
“I can tell you what’s wrong with you, if you like,” he said, out of breath, a sheen of sweat on his neck and brow.
“No thanks.”
“Go on, let me take a stab at it.”
Bridget sighed. “If it’ll make you happy.”
“I think you’re an addict.”
This annoyed Bridget enough that she sat up slightly, propping herself on some pillows. “Oh, this should be good.”
“It shall. Heartbreak has been very revealing for me,” Arthur said loftily.
“Plus … having a lot of time to think, last summer, when I was ill. I am a whole new man. You too can begin to understand the depths of your own psyche with this one simple trick—getting beaten almost to death by your father’s men in an alleyway. ”
Bridget raised her eyebrows, and Arthur laughed humorlessly.
“Well, at least now I know I deflect with humor. Anyway, I was supposed to be bullying you. I think…” He steepled his hands, pressing his fingertips to his mouth, appearing to be genuinely deep in thought.
“I think you’re chasing something. I think you need it.
Or at least, you think you do. Is it to do with Gwen? ”
Bridget shook her head vehemently. “No.”
“Hmmm …What are your parents like?”
“Good,” Bridget said.
Arthur rotated a finger to encourage her to go on, the turning of a tiny wheel. “Not enough, I need more juice.”
“That’s it. They support me. Always have. They’re proud of me—I try to repay the favor.”
“Repay it how?” Arthur said, quick as a lash. “Untold riches?”
“Mmm … No. By making them proud.”
“But they’re proud of you already,” Arthur said, starting to annoy her now. “So, job done. You can lay down your arms and spend the rest of your days in repose.”
“Arthur.”
“What? I’m serious. If they’re as great as you say they are, they’re already happy. Are you happy?”
“Yes,” Bridget said. She wasn’t, obviously, but that was nobody’s concern, including her own.
“But you’d be happier if you … what? Won, at a tournament?”
“It’s not about winning. It’s about knowing you’ve been the best you can be. Doesn’t matter if you’re the one who takes home the prizes.”
“Do your parents care if you take home the prizes?”