“You run?” he said.
“Yes.” Vera bit her lip. Was that an extraordinarily odd thing to say?
He fixed her with a delighted smile. “I shouldn’t be surprised after that bit back near the stables. You looked comfortable running.”
She hadn’t thought about it, but Lancelot had seemed at ease, too. His stride and posture … Vera gaped at him. “Do you run? I didn’t think people ran in this time.”
“Soldiers do,” he explained. “We were at war for the better part of a decade and ran every day to stay battle ready. Most soldiers have scattered to their corners of the country and lead much slower lives—and well deserved, I might add. I train the local forces and the king’s guard, and I still run to keep fit. And I like it.” He shrugged. “It calms my mind.”
“Yes!” Vera nearly shouted it. “That’s exactly it. Actually …” She remembered her trainers stowed in the saddle bag behind her and made a quick decision to show him. He positively gushed, twirling the teal laces between his fingers, and his eyes widened as he felt the cushion on the inner sole.
“Guinevere,” his voice was hushed and reverent, “this has got to be the greatest invention of all time.”
She laughed. “It’s pretty high on the list.”
There was hardly a breath’s space of silence after that. Dark had fallen in earnest, and the velvety black night was bespattered with stars before it dawned on Vera that this was the easiest it had ever been to talk to someone other than her parents. This budding friendship was a pleasant surprise, but the more Vera warmed to Lancelot, the more her stomach churned. He watched her with a knowing look, his eyes kind.
“You thought I was Arthur when we first met, didn’t you?”
She hoped the darkness could cover the heat that rose in her cheeks. “Yes,” she said. “Why didn’t he come?”
Lancelot searched Vera’s face. “I’m sorry. This must be impossibly difficult for you.”
Vera refused to fill the silence. He hadn’t answered her question.
“I don’t want to mislead you. We didn’t know today was going to be the day that Merlin brought you back. He only sent word by messenger this afternoon, and Arthur had reservations about Merlin trying to …” Lancelot paused, his mouth in a tight line. “Well, about Merlin taking such extreme measures to bring you back.”
He seemed to choose his words so deliberately. Vera might as well come right out and ask the direct question. “Does Arthur hate Guinevere?”
“No.” This Lancelot said with certainty. “It’s been … a difficult time.” He shot Vera a heavy glance. “It’s nothing to what you’ve been through, though.”
She tensed, and the memory of Vincent bloody and dying flashed in her mind. How could he know that?
But he saw her reaction and clarified, his tone gentler. “You left your whole life.”
“Oh.” Of course. Funny she hadn’t considered that, but it was true. And her ability to go home, to get her life back, to get herself back was contingent upon a task far more complicated than Vera had naively imagined. “What if I can’t do what Merlin needs?”
Lancelot eyed her for a moment. “Merlin is single-minded in his commitment to the kingdom—to a fault, frankly. I’m not sure his expectations for you are reasonable.”
Vera scoffed. “And I’m not sure he’d trust your assessment of the situation.”
“Ah.” Lancelot flashed a crooked smile, reigniting his spark of levity. “You’ve already noticed that I’m not exactly Merlin’s favorite.”
“You’re about the only thing that broke his—” Vera searched for the right words to describe Merlin’s powerful calm.
“Stick-up-the-ass demeanor?” Lancelot offered. Vera laughed. “Go on, then. What did he say about me?”
“He said that you were Arthur’s dearest friend. And that you’re very loyal,” Vera said.
“Oh, that’s quite nice. And?”
“And … that you’re loud and foolish.”
“That’s—hmm.” At first, she thought Lancelot was indignant, but he was grinning. “He’s really coming around to me. Loud and foolish. That’s probably the nicest way he’s ever described me. Granted, he might have been edging it a bit trying to, you know, convince you to leave everything behind … but I’m calling this progress in the Merlin-Lancelot relationship.”
They’d been riding for nearly two hours before an amicable silence fell, with Vera’s eyelids close behind. They may as well have weighed a hundred pounds for the difficulty of keeping them open.
She woke with a start to a firm grip on her arm, holding her upright.
