Chapter Twenty-Nine #2
“Oh, I don’t know,” Gabriel said, back to messing with his hair with a near-hysterical level of distraction. “Gwen seems happy.”
The glow of that was better than winning straight runs at the tiltyard; Bridget let the feeling sit for a moment, and then said, “I think you should talk to her about this. Your … panicking.”
“Suppose I should, seeing as I’m apparently telling everybody.” He paused, and then said desperately, “Is it difficult, sometimes? With Gwen?”
Bridget nodded solemnly. “Yep.”
“But you still want to be together?”
Bridget thought for a moment before she spoke; Gabriel’s mental well-being seemed to hinge on what she said next. “Yeah. Nobody’s made up entirely of good days, but the good ones count for a hell of a lot.”
Gabriel didn’t seem to know what to say to that, so Bridget went to fetch Gwen, and waited on a nearby rock as she spoke to Gabriel for a long time. When she finally emerged from the tent, she looked even more tired, but smiled wanly at Bridget.
“Bridget,” she said slowly. “Did you talk to him about your feelings?”
“Ugh. A bit.”
“And nobody was even holding you at swordpoint.”
“Yeah,” said Bridget, “I wanted to do it for … you, and also, I guess, for me. Plus … my cards said that I needed to let go of things so that I could have new beginnings.”
“Oh?” said Gwen. “And what are you going to let go of?”
Bridget reached for her hand, feeling for the first time in a while that she had done something utterly and completely right. “Not you, if I can help it.”
Back by the fire, someone had lit torches to illuminate the rest of the camp, and one of the pages had produced a lyre and was playing it quite well.
Sir Leonard had finally cornered the Lady, and she was chatting merrily away with him, a large cup of wine in her hand.
Bridget couldn’t tell if the air was actually a few degrees warmer, or if it just felt that way, with spirits so high.
She and Gwen sat with Adah for a while, tossing bits of detritus into the fire, listening to her talk about a trip she’d taken to Wales with her family and a broken cart wheel on a mountainside that had resulted in the breakdown of two marriages.
Then Sir Bowen initiated a sort of sporting drinking game, which involved throwing pebbles into a makeshift goal he had fashioned out of a basket; Bridget joined in for a while, and Gwen arbitrated, and then was accused by a quite drunk Sir Leonard of cheating in Bridget’s favor, which was horse shit.
Bridget was just really good at pebbles.
“You know,” Leonard said, putting his arm around Gwen, who gamely shoved him back off, “she had all sorts of offers, when we were out on the road. Very famous, our Bridge, and very popular with the ladies. And it wasn’t just that she said no.
She wasn’t even interested! So, you know.
She’s a good one. You’ve got a good one, there. Or … where is she? There.”
“Thanks,” Gwen said. “You’ve got wine in your hair, Sir Leonard, and if you don’t rinse it out it’ll stain pink.”
“Verily,” slurred Leonard. “She speaks the truth.”
The Lady of the Lake(s) clapped her hands together over by the fire. “Come here, all,” she said. “You have had your fun, and now I will bring down the mood and make you maudlin and pensive.”
Whatever power she had, be it magic or just a bit of mysterious charisma, it worked; everyone came floating over to gather by the fire. Even Gabriel came to the door of his tent and stood watching, holding his left elbow in his hand reflexively, massaging his scars.
“I do not call myself the Lady of the Lake, or whatever it is people say about me,” said the Lady.
Or, not the Lady, as the case seemed to be.
“I am a lady who lives by the lakes, that is all. And people like to tell stories about the things they do not understand, to make them feel familiar. We are all guilty of this.” She looked around at all of them, her expression fierce.
“In stories, we know what it means to be a squire, a page, a knight, a princess, a king. Good, bad. But we are not in a story. We are people. It is not a test of character when we lose somebody. It is not romantic when we hurt. It is just pain. And we all find our ways to cope with that pain, and if we are lucky, to grow from it, and to know ourselves and each other better.”
She was right about ruining the mood, but nobody looked sad.
Engrossed, perhaps. In Sir Leonard’s case, enchanted.
Gwen was nodding, probably without even realizing it; Arthur, on the other side of the fire, set slightly apart from the others, was gazing into the flames, Sidney’s arm around his back.
“Some of you are young, but life will already have broken you in a dozen different ways. And there will be more to come! But guess what—that is life. We are not babes—nobody is shiny and new. We all have our luggage to heft around with us wherever we go, and we all have to learn to get along with each other anyway. Acceptance. That is how you will find peace, and become who you are meant to be.” Bridget wasn’t sure if she was imagining that her gaze lingered on Gabriel as she said this.
She clapped her hands again, and everybody startled.
“Now you may go back to your fun, if you can. And somebody bring me some more wine, because you have drunk all of mine. Also—stop calling me my lady, because my name is Viv. That is all.”
She made a beeline for Sir Hurst, who didn’t try to run away this time, and simply handed her a cup of wine with a kind of amused resignation. Bridget wondered if he ever had any fun. She supposed they were about to find out.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Gabriel crossing to the fire, gait stiff but determined. She nudged Gwen, and they both watched as Gabriel leaned down and tapped Arthur twice, gently, on the shoulder, and then walked quickly away.