Page 27 of Gwen and Art Are Not in Love

‘Stop this at once,’ Gabriel said again, his voice heavy with disgust. Sir Woolcott deflated, his grin faltering, and threw his sword to the ground. The Grand Marshal hadfinally returned; he was looking from Gabriel to Bridget with naked panic on his face.Good, thought Gwen, pressing her shaking hands to her chest.You useless bastard. I hope you’re dismissed without reference or pay.

Bridget got to her feet with only a hint of difficulty, dusting herself off as calmly as if she’d been sitting down for a brief rest rather than moments away from abruptly and dramatically exiting this life; even injured as she was, she turned to offer a hand to Sir Marlin, who had finally managed to disentangle himself from his horse. The Knife squinted up at her proffered hand, barked a laugh and then spat loudly and deliberately at her feet.

Murmurs and mocking guffaws rippled through the stands. Bridget looked down at the Knife, and the Knife glared up at her, and then she gave the slightest of shrugs – as if to say,Have it your way– and sheathed her sword, before ducking under the rail and walking away towards the Grand Marshal.

Gwen was so preoccupied with the white-hot rage that had flooded every inch of her at the Knife’s insolence that it took her a moment to realise that Gabriel had reached her.

‘God, Gabe, thank you,’ she said, putting a hand on his elbow. ‘I don’t know what would have happened if you hadn’t …Thankyou.’

‘How did it get that far?’ he said. Now that he was closer, she could see that his hands were shaking. ‘Gwendoline. Why didn’t yousaysomething?’

‘I – I was going to, but … I couldn’t think, and they wouldn’t havelistenedto me anyway.’

Gabriel took a few steadying breaths. ‘If all I had to do was shout,’ he said quietly, ‘then allyouhad to do was shout.’

Gwen felt shame blooming darkly in her gut as he sighed and patted her on the shoulder, looking mildly apologetic, as if it were his fault for burdening her with his unrealistic expectations.

As if he knew, like she did, that at the end of the day – she just didn’t have it in her.

Upon waking, Arthur immediately knew that it was going to be another Very Bad Day. Sometimes the bad days came out of nowhere, hitting him with the force of a battering ram halfway through some inane morning task, and sometimes they were easily predicted. A night of drinking, for example, usually precipitated an extremely gloomy morning, punctuated by roiling nausea and waves of self-hatred that left him dour and sullen and utterly useless to absolutely everybody, himself included. Since all that had happened last summer, his lowest lows had somehow intensified, as if he’d unlocked the door to new realms of misery.

Arthur hadn’t gone to meet Gwendoline for the joust earlier in the week – he’d awoken late that morning and not bothered to mark the time, as he had absolutely no intention of being friendlyoruseful – and had instead spent the rest of the day in bed. And most of the day after. He’d received an extremely snippy note the next morning, delivered to Sidney by a blushing Agnes, but no amount of blackmail could make him a convincing suitor when he was feeling so dire.

Eventually he had decided that the best solution wouldbe to open another bottle of wine, and he and Sidney had stayed up late the previous evening playing cards until Arthur couldn’t distinguish a queen of hearts from a six of clubs. Sidney had left some food this morning, but the sight of fruit and cheese turned Arthur’s stomach; he wanted lovely, reliable bread, and Sidney had clearly already eaten through their supply. It was selfish, really; the man had an iron stomach, and Arthur’s was famously delicate.

He dreaded the idea of leaving the room, but he dreaded life without bread more; he reluctantly slunk from his chambers and made his way down to the kitchens, keeping his eyes firmly on the floor. He refused to acknowledge anybody at all until he had to attempt a smile to barter with the cook, who handed over half a loaf with a suspicious look as if he might be about to do some dark, yeasty ritual with it. He tore into it as he walked, leaving a trail of crumbs in his wake. He was almost at the stairs when he felt something small and insistent bump against his legs with purpose.

‘Hello, Lucifer,’ Arthur said, bending down to stroke him and receiving overenthusiastic headbutts in return. ‘I assume it was you who vomited next to the bed last night. Could have been me, I suppose, but I don’t remember eating anything with a rat’s head in it.’

‘Arthur?’ said a politely bemused voice from down the corridor; he glanced up to see Gabriel approaching, holding a stack of parchment and peering down at him. His curls were sticking up haphazardly, as if he’d been running his hand through them, and he had a smudge of ink on his chin. The general effect wasn’t particularly regal.

When the cat, suddenly neglected, gave a scandalisedmiaow, it occurred to Arthur that it probably wasn’t the done thing to play with grimy strays on the castle landing. ‘You needn’t look so horrified, Gabriel,’ he said, scratching the cat defiantly behind the ears. ‘Ididn’t let the damn thing in. He’s been following me around for days making sad eyes at me – pitiful, really. I named him Lucifer.’

‘Right,’ said Gabriel. At the sound of his voice, Lucifer’s ears twitched; he ducked underneath Arthur’s hand and ran straight for the prince, rubbing himself against his boots and making little trilling sounds.

‘Well. Why did he do that?’ Arthur said, suddenly feeling ridiculous without a cat to stroke and straightening up from his squat.

‘Probably because he’s my cat,’ Gabriel said mildly, bending down to scratch him and losing half the stack of papers as he did so. ‘He’s called Merlin.’

‘Merlin?’ said Arthur, equal parts miffed that the cat had already been claimed and horrified that it had such an awful name. ‘Bet your Wizardlovesthat.’

‘I think he does, actually,’ Gabriel said, as the cat almost climbed up on to his shoulders in its attempts to get closer to him. The role of court Wizard was an ancient tradition reintroduced when Gabriel’s father took the throne, and was entirely ceremonial. While cultists believed wholeheartedly inrealmagic – the type that could turn back armies, transform people into birds and heal the sick – even they had to admit that nobody had exhibited that sort of power since the days of Merlin and Morgana (and that was if you believed the legends, which Arthur decidedly did not). As a result, the Wizard took on an informal spiritualand advisory role on the council, and was never asked to produce so much as a spark of true sorcery.

‘Little bit rough around the edges for a royal pet, don’t you think?’ Arthur said, watching Lucifer – herefusedto call him Merlin – drop to the ground and then flop over so that he could writhe shamelessly around on his back.

‘He’s a free spirit,’ said Gabriel, more to the cat than to Arthur. ‘I found him when he was a kitten, looking rather lost, and he never really took to a life of leisure. Too wild, I suppose. You’re a man of action, aren’t you, Merlin? He scraps with father’s hounds all the time, and they’re about eight times his size. I just feed him and try to clean up his war wounds, when he lets me.’

This was without a doubt the most Arthur had ever heard Gabriel talk. It stood to reason that it was about a cat. Arthur scrubbed a hand across his face, and looked up to see Gabriel watching him.

‘Are you all right?’ he said, surprising Arthur again; the prince was looking at him closely, probably taking in his dark circles and the general air of despondence he wasn’t alive enough to disguise today. He was frowning again. Arthur would have frowned back, but his face hurt.

‘Not really,’ he said, which was also a surprise. This was why he shouldn’t have left his room; it was dangerous to be let loose like this, to be alarmingly honest to anybody who happened to stumble across his path and express a modicum of interest. He had a reputation to uphold, after all.

‘You look … tired,’ Gabriel ventured.

‘So do you,’ said Arthur.

It was true, but it was almost his default state. Gabriel hadalways been a serious, quiet child – Gwen was the only one Arthur had ever seen get a smile out of him – and it didn’t seem like much had changed.