“Where’s Sylvie?” Jane whispered, leaning in close.
“I wish I knew,” Isobelle muttered, twisting to glance back at the gate keeping the crowd at bay.
“Perhaps she is with Sir Ralph,” Hilde suggested, wrinkling her nose as if trying to speak the man’s name without letting it touch her lips.
“No,” Jane replied, tilting her chin. “He’s over there with some of the visiting nobles.”
Then wherewasSylvie? Why had she stayed away? There was an uneasiness knotted inside Isobelle’s chest no matter how she tried to tell herself that there was some explanation for it—that the apprehension winding its way through her veins was guilt, that Sylvie had simply chosen not to come, having bigger things to worry about. But even facing down her doom, Sylvie was a master at the twisted game that was life in this castle. If she wasn’t here, there was somereasonbehind it. Isobelle just didn’t know what.
“Is that meant to be Gawain?” Hilde murmured, pointing at a sort of giant scarecrow a group of spectators were trying to hoist above their section of the grandstand.
Isobelle knew it was an attempt at distraction, but she barely heard her friend. Her own words from the night before kept ringing in her head, far too loudly for anything else to stand a chance.
You don’t get to make my choices for me.
But hadn’t she been trying to do the same for Gwen?
You’re no better than they are.
It had been the last thing she’d said to Gwen.
Please,pleaselet it not be the last thing sheeversaid to Gwen.
She should be in Sir Gawain’s tent right now, apologizing, arguing all over again, trying to make Gwen see she was right, that itwashorribly unfair, but that nobody who mattered would see it,and nobody would save her just because she deserved it.
Isobelle would rather fade away into nothing than lose Gwen—she ought to be down there now, convincing Gwen to see it.
“Isobelle.” It was Jane, leaning in with a worried expression. “Does Gw—Gawain truly plan to try to win today?”
“Yes,” Isobelle managed, shaping the words with her lips.
“But then what will—”
“I don’t know,” Isobelle snapped, her hands squeezing together so tightly her fingers ached.
You’re no better than they are.
She would have given anything for one more minute to speak to Gwen, but the last of Gwen’s minutes were trickling away through her fingers, vanishing no matter how Isobelle grasped at them.
The audience was starting to stir, rippling with that special knowledge crowds have when the moment they’ve waited for is imminent. In the grandstand on the other side of the open jousting field, a huge banner readGAWAYNin uneven letters, and most of the crowd had sprigs of lavender pinned to their coats—there couldn’t have been a flower left on a plant for leagues in any direction.
In the center of it all, in the middle of the lists—it would have to be carried to one side for the match to begin—was the prize pot. Isobelle’s own dowry, converted to glimmering gold and glittering gems, piled into chests until they spilled out and tumbled to the ground. The effect was extremely dramatic. And the sight of the wealth that had put her in this situation in the first place made her feel sick.
The herald took his place, raising the metal cone that allowed him to speak so loudly to his lips, puffing out his chest, and bellowing to be heard over the hubbub.
“Lords and laymen, this is the moment you’ve all been waiting for... the culmination of a month-long tournament of champions, the must-see finale of the year. Never before has there been a Tournament of Dragonslayers with so many upsets, so many surprises, such mystery...”
The crowd knew exactly which knight the herald was referring to, the background noise rising to a roar that drowned out the herald’s amplified voice for some time. The herald stopped trying to be heard and finally waved his arms in silent agreement with the energy of the crowd.
When they finally started to calm down again, he lifted the cone back to his lips. “Now, it is my great honor to present the gent from Kent, the Englishman with a winning plan, it’s Darkhaven’s very own... Sir Orson the Awesome!”
Orson came cantering out onto the lists, past the chests of gold and jewels, raising a hand to the crowd’s somewhat perfunctory cheers, one hand grasping his reins as his horse sidestepped nervously at the hubbub all around them.
Isobelle gazed down at him, picturing his familiar face behind the helmet. He wouldn’t have been a bad husband. He wouldn’t have loved her and brought her to life, as Gwen did. But Isobelle wouldn’t have put him in danger, either.
“And now, lords and laymen, one and all, prepare yourselves!” A hush fell over the crowd, like the heavy, tense silence before a gale strikes. “Mysterious and charming, he’s taken Darkhaven by storm.... Can he go the distance and claim his prize? He’s the one that you want: The knight from Toussaint! The newcomer from France who’s here to take his chance, it’s Sirrrrrr Gawain!”
Gwen rode out, and the crowd wentwild.
