Chapter Twenty-Five
Twenty-Five
“A sort of psychological warfare,” Gwen said.
“A metaphorical blow. Very interesting. And he said he’s going home, he’s had his fun and he can’t top dueling the king, plus his wife is very annoyed.
He’s a blacksmith, apparently, usually very ordinary, but he had some sort of epiphany and walked out of his house and wandered around until he found his bridge.
Said he lived off the land for a while and had visions of the fae telling him the meaning of life. ”
“Translation,” Bridget cut in. “He ate some suspect mushrooms. Mild hallucinatory poisoning.”
“Well, exactly. I think he probably just worked a bit too hard and needed some time off. And now of course we have the perfect story, because Gabe really did strike a blow against him, and it did defeat him, even if it was all a bit odd. I’m dying to know what question he asked him.”
It was early evening, and they were sitting by the fire in a private parlor, a luxury afforded to them because they were staying overnight with a baron who kept a country house nearby and seemed absolutely baffled by his good fortune at hosting the royal company.
He was surprisingly normal, for a baron, but he had made a point of providing separate rooms for men and ladies to relax in, which seemed more than pointless, considering the romantic inclinations of almost the entire round table.
Adah had gone to ask for mead instead of wine, and came back happy and laden.
When she saw how close Gwen and Bridget were sitting—both of them on cushions on the floor, Bridget with her back against a chair and Gwen lounging in a way that made her hair fall like licks of flame across the soft furnishings—she halted.
“I can just go … somewhere else,” she said. “If you want.”
Bridget said, “Stay,” and Gwen said, “No, no, not at all, please, sit down, have one of these cushions, would you like to be closer to the fire?” Which was effectively the same thing. Adah accepted the offer of a cushion and did sit.
There was a brief, uncomfortable pause, and Bridget realized she’d never encouraged cross-pollination between these two different sides of her life.
Adah and Elaine and other friends at Camelot, the knights she’d come to know better on the circuit—they existed completely apart from Gwen, Princess of England, the best and strangest summer fling of Bridget’s life, now over a year past due and still holding on.
There’d been no need, in Bridget’s mind, to plan for how their lives might continue onward, overlapping and intertwining, because she hadn’t expected they’d make it past last August.
Also … it had felt safer this way. Bridget couldn’t put her finger on exactly why.
“I was just wondering what the … the blacksmith knight might have asked my brother, to get him so worked up,” Gwen said, declining mead as Bridget accepted it.
“Um,” Adah said, glancing sideways at Gwen and then looking down at her cup. “No offense meant, but I’m not sure it’d take much to tip him over the edge. He seems stressed.”
“Oh, no, you’re right. He is.” Gwen frowned, and then said, “He’s actually been hiding sometimes when he’s supposed to be in council meetings.
He thinks I haven’t noticed. But I did once see Lord Das talking to him through the door of a cupboard.
” She looked to Adah, suddenly on guard. “This stays between us, yes?”
“Sworn to secrecy,” said Adah. “And sworn specifically to your brother, for that matter. I’m no oath breaker.”
“I believe you. Anyway, he’s all shaken up about something, and we’ve got to do this speech tomorrow. At least hopefully he’ll be coming off the back of a lot of Green Knight goodwill.”
“I could’ve taken him,” said Adah. “I get why he said no, but damn. Would’ve been fun. Been a knight for a month and I’ve seen absolutely no action. I’m bored!”
“He probably wouldn’t have fought you either,” Bridget pointed out. “Just asked you a question to mess with your head.”
“True,” Adah said. “But I am a perfect person, and therefore have an unassailable sense of self. No green giant can mess with me.”
“Same!” said Gwen, with just a hint of irony. Adah lifted her mead in Gwen’s direction, and Gwen groped around for her cup of lemon tea and did the same, smirking.
“Leclair, however,” Adah said, turning solemn. “Whooo, boy. She could have done with a blow to the brain. Lots to untangle in there.”
“Oh, I think she’s pretty perfect too,” said Gwen, tilting her head in Bridget’s direction. “In most of the ways that count.”
Adah laughed, quite uncontrollably, until she caught Bridget’s eye.
“Sorry.” She schooled her features. “Yeah, definitely. Totally. Truer words never spoken.”
There was a mood suffusing the town like a thick fog when they entered the square the next afternoon, and it wasn’t a pleasant one. There were far more people crammed into the space than Bridget had expected, and from the looks on Gwen’s and Gabriel’s faces, they were also surprised.
Sir Hurst looked ill. At an event this large in Camelot, there wouldn’t just have been small groups of guards flanking the king and princess, but guards scattered in the crowd, guards at the perimeter, a whole network of people intentionally placed at short intervals for maximum safety.
They had planned to troop up en masse onto the small makeshift stage, to impress the crowd with their order of the round table, but instead, after harried discussions with the Captain of the Guard, Bridget and the other knights dispersed in a wide semicircle at the front, a very visible barrier full of very noticeable holes.
Before Gabriel and the others were to speak, the friendly baron hosting them got up to address the crowd with a speech that was met with vague disinterest and a few gentle boos, and then introduced a local priest who had wanted to say something too—it was at this point that things went rapidly downhill.
Bridget had her back to the man speaking, watching the townspeople, the expressions of neutrality, interest, discontent—discontent, discontent, discontent—the press of the crowd mirroring the claustrophobia of battle, even while they all stood completely still.
It had started to drizzle, and the cloying smell of damp bodies, damp cloth, damp earth was already overwhelming.
“Honored as we are of course, it does beg the question—a king is to be God’s hand on earth, divine, and yet His Majesty forces laws unto us that seem to contravene God’s word.”
Someone shouted in agreement, and many in the crowd took up the cry. A woman right at the front, practically standing face-to-face with an uncharacteristically serious Sir Leonard, raised her hand and pointed.
“Send children to school to have their minds corrupted, and then what do we do when our fields need harvesting and our goats need herding?” she shouted. “We’ll starve, shall we? Long as my boy knows his letters?”
Bridget turned her head for just long enough to see that Sir Hurst was speaking urgently in Gabriel’s ear, while Gwen stood behind them, her eyes darting rapidly around the crowd.
The shouting woman tried to push past Leonard; he put a hand on her shoulder to stop her from going any farther, and the man next to her roared with outrage and tried to throw himself at Leonard too, the weak sun flashing off his belt buckle as he did.
Sir Bowen appeared, took the man’s arms, and pushed them carefully away.
The man spat at Bowen. Bridget didn’t see if he’d hit his target, but she did see Leonard reaching for his sword, and suddenly her concern for the level of anger in the crowd didn’t seem unreasonable at all.
It wasn’t just like a battle anymore; it was a battle, and she was surrounded by the enemy.
Her breath was coming in sharp bursts, like she was trying to gulp it down, and her knuckles were white and painful as she gripped the pommel of her sword, not wanting to draw it yet, but terrified she’d act too late.
The crowd pressed into her, and she took a step back—right into Sidney, who grasped her shoulder briefly and then let go.
“Leclair,” he said roughly. “It’s fine.”
Bridget looked to Leonard and Bowen, expecting to see bloodied sword, bloodied ground—but the angry man and woman were being escorted away by friends. Bridget watched as the man reached the edge of the crowd, his companion saying something in his ear as they walked away.
The priest on the stage had stopped speaking, so Arthur stepped forward, and said in a loud voice, “Well, if anyone’s planning on throwing fruit and veg, hurry up, because I’m starving,” and eventually the frantic energy fizzled out.
Sidney was right. It was fine. But Bridget felt shaken, ready to leap into action, counting down the seconds until the royal siblings were off that stage and they could all be escorted back to the manor.
Logically, she knew this wasn’t fair; the ordinary people in this crowd weren’t her enemies.
It didn’t matter. She rushed to the king the second Arthur’s speech was over, and kept her shoulder touching Gwen’s as they exited through the back of the town square and walked to the waiting carriage.
“They’re right,” Gabriel kept muttering to Gwen, in a voice quiet but slightly shrill with panic. “They’re right. Who am I to tell them how to live? What do I know? I don’t know anything. They’re right!”
Bridget could only breathe at a tempo approaching normality once they were back in the baron’s house, with quite a few lockable doors between them and the crowd.
It was dark inside as they walked through patches of smoky firelight from the wall sconces, accompanied by the soft crackling of the torches, the sound of many footsteps on stone floors echoing slightly.
Bridget counted tapestries and willed her heart to slow down.
Gwen was talking to her brother as they walked, her arm looped firmly around his, but she glanced back, saw Bridget, then gave Gabriel one final parting word and came to Bridget’s side.