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Chapter Sixteen She was very much accustomed to people looking at her like they didn’t understand what was happening and wanted it all to

stop

The movement of Achilles’s haunches was hypnotic, if you watched it long enough.

Isobelle had been gazing at the back of Gwen’s

horse—and, if she was honest, the back of Gwen—for hours.

Achilles wasn’t the sort of horse you saw down in the village, but

Gwen rode him as if she’d been born to it, swaying slightly to match his movements, her touch light.

Isobelle herself was

mounted on a friendly silver mare with whom she was getting along passably.

She’d tied one of her green ribbons around her

bridle to give them a little cohesion in their look.

They rode along the top of a ridgeline.

To their left, the land dropped away to open farmland, fields neatly laid out and

combed into rows.

With summer nearing its end, the wheat and barley fields were a bright, coppery gold, and they swayed in

the breeze, whispering secrets.

To their right lay the real secrets—there, the open grass gave way to the tangled dark of the great forest, which in turn

gave way to the craggy base of the mountains that housed Whimsitt’s mine.

There had not been a nice place to stop for morning tea, and Isobelle was now certain there would not be a nice spot to stop for a bite of lunch, either.

There had been a hurried snack under a tree during their one break, which Isobelle suspected they only took so they could water the horses.

There had also not been a single moment alone with Gwen.

Up ahead, Madame Dupont was still talking about jousting.

“The qualifiers have cut the number of challengers down to sixteen,” she was saying, “but though the path to victory is shorter

now, the greatest difficulties still lie ahead.” None of them were willing to name those difficulties—the old hands who’d

done this for years, the veterans Gwen would have to make her way through before she ran up against the favorites, like Sir

Ralph.

“You will need to win four more times,” Madame continued.

“And a loss in any match will mean the end of your tournament.”

“And the rules are the same?” Gwen asked.

“Oui. Zero points if you do not connect with your opponent. One point if you hit his shield. Three points if you unhorse him.

An instant win if your opponent is... ah... unable to continue. If you are both still upright and equal in points at

the end of three rounds—possible, if you each score once, or you each unhorse the other, or you miss every time—then we move

on to the sword. Now, let me explain a few of the jousting styles you will encounter...”

Isobelle’s attention drifted.

The only time she remembered watching a tournament was more than a decade earlier—a patchwork

quilt of memories, a piece snipped from each and all sewn together.

The bright, fluttering flags.

Her fingers sticky from

the iced currant bun her father had bought her.

The thunder of the horses’ hooves.

The warmth of her parents sitting on either

side of her to protect her from the breeze blowing through the grandstands.

She could barely remember the knights themselves

at all.

She returned to the present as Dupont guided them off the main road and up toward a farmhouse on a hill.

It was a small, humble home, flanked by a pair of larger outbuildings, but it had a commanding lookout over the approach.

Fruit trees lined the path as they grew closer, and a flock of geese came waddling up, honking a loud commentary on the newcomers.

Isobelle suspected it was not complimentary.

She saw Gwen turn her head as if to exchange a glance with her, and then check the movement.

Curses.

As they drew closer, more details emerged.

There were wide beds planted with neat rows of vegetables, and pens holding pigs

and chickens.

A pair of soft-eyed cows chewed moodily at them from behind a fence.

“One could live entirely off this farm,” Isobelle marveled as they reached the yard in front of the stone building to find

lines strung with bunches of drying herbs.

“That’s the point,” growled a voice from behind them, and the trio wheeled their horses around to find a short, wiry old man

stomping out to meet them.

He had a grizzled gray beard that reached halfway down his chest and wore an eyepatch to great

effect.

His skin was the same light brown as the thatched roof behind him, and almost as covered in ridges and wrinkles.

“When you’ve seen what I’ve seen,” he continued, looking them over, “you’re always prepared. Might be the day comes, you can

only rely on yourself. Now, who are you?”

“I’m Lady Isobelle of Avington.” Isobelle slid down from her saddle, biting her lip against a yelp as her thighs and.

.. upper thighs screamed a protest after the long ride.

“These are my companions, Madame Dupont and Lady Céline. May I say, sir, your farm is a delight—very well prepared for the fall of civilization.”

The man squinted at her, but Isobelle was on solid ground and waited with a bright smile.

She was very much accustomed to

people looking at her like they didn’t understand what was happening and wanted it all to stop.

“What is it you wanted?” he asked eventually.

“We were told you might be able to assist us in the creation of some documents,” Isobelle said, with her best dimples yet.

His expression cleared.

“Me? No. I can’t even read, much less write. Who told you that nonsense?”

Isobelle dug in the purse at her belt, pulling out the small metal token Olivia had given her.

“My maid, Olivia,” she said.

The man took it from her, inspecting its owl engraving and turning it over in his callused fingers.

He barked a laugh. “So

she’s calling herself Olivia now?” he asked, glancing up.

“Indeed,” Isobelle agreed, intrigued by the news that Olivia hadn’t always been Olivia.

“All right then,” he said, handing back the coin.

“You’d better come in.”

The inside of the house was crammed tighter than Isobelle’s wardrobe.

Bales of cloth were tied with string, crates were stacked

to the rafters, barrels jammed into corners.

A series of large cupboards ran down one side of the room, their doors ajar,

probably because they couldn’t be closed.

Oddities and canvases and jars and boxes and scrolls covered every surface, including

the floor.

A couple were marked with stamps or seals bearing the mark of the owl that had been on Olivia’s token.

Madame Dupont

took one look and announced that she’d go tend to the horses, and made a hasty retreat from the chaos.

The man, who introduced himself as Archer, peppered Gwen with questions, taking notes in some kind of shorthand that didn’t resemble any language Isobelle knew.

Gwen scrambled to keep up, explaining the need for patents of nobility for her “brother,” showing him the pennant on the Sir Gawain figurine, and then—so easily and quickly that Isobelle could only stare—rattling off an entire imagined lineage for Archer to note down on the patents.

Was that what Gwen had been doing on the ride here?

Inventing Gawain’s backstory, while Isobelle was mentally composing and

discarding whole speeches that sought to explain what had happened between them, and apologize for it?

Archer continued to interview Gwen, and Isobelle found her attention drawn to the taxidermied head of a black-and-white-striped

horse above a little hand-scrawled label that read “Hippotigris.” Isobelle had been taught Latin from an early age, and her

mind supplied the translation: horse-tiger.

She’d just begun to lose herself in a glorious fantasy of making a grand entrance mounted on such a creature—she’d be in black

and white, too, with a red lip and feathers in her hair—when, abruptly, reality came crashing back in as her ears caught up

to her.

“That should be enough for me to get to work,” Archer was saying.

“The papers should be ready in three or four hours.”

Isobelle stopped in her tracks, and finally, finally , Gwen glanced across at her, eyes wide.

“Hours?” Gwen echoed.

“We’d never make it back to the castle before dark.”

“You’ll stay here,” Archer replied.

“E—er—Olivia can cover for you, I have no doubt.”

“But...” Gwen’s eyes were still on Isobelle, unwilling to mention that Isobelle was meant to be confined to the castle, and every moment they spent away increased the odds that her absence would be discovered.

Archer sighed and dismissed their doubts with a wave of his hand.

“It’ll take the time it takes, kids. Go outside and play,

and let me do my thing.”

Gwen gave a little shrug, finally dropping her gaze from Isobelle’s, and they emerged once more from Archer’s house into the

afternoon sunlight.

Dupont was just coming out of the stable, and though her lips tightened at the news that the papers would take hours, she

nodded.

“We must not waste the time—this is the perfect place to practice the joust, away from the prying eyes of the castle.

Come!”

Isobelle opened her mouth to protest—it had been a long day, they were tired, Gwen needed rest—but Gwen was already striding

after Dupont.

And none of those excuses were the real reason Isobelle wanted just a moment’s pause.

She sighed and turned to trail along in their wake, trying not to think about how desperately she needed to talk to Gwen and

make things right between them.

Lucky Gwen, able to drown out her feelings by hitting things.