The Reckless Oath We Made

by Bryn Greenwood

  “Wilt thou come again?” he said. “Come again and lay thine hands upon the table, that thy champion may look upon thee and be content.”

  CHAPTER 62

  Charlene

  I swore I wasn’t going to be ashamed. Not of what Gentry had done, and not that he’d been in prison. I invited everyone I could think of to his welcome-home party. Everyone at church, all the neighbors, everyone I knew through the foster system.

  Well, I didn’t invite everyone. I didn’t invite Gentry’s biological family, and I didn’t invite Zhorzha. I assumed Gentry would invite her, but I hoped she would have the decency to stay away.

  Because it had been so long since we managed to have family photos, I hired a photographer my sister, Bernice, had recommended. After the photographer arrived, I sent Trang to round everyone up for pictures. When I went into the family room, there was Zhorzha, coming in from the backyard with Gentry.

  I must have stopped in my tracks a little too quickly, because Bernice said, “Oh, she did come,” like it was a good thing. “And she dressed up for him.”

  “In a dress that’s six inches too short,” I said.

  “It’s hard for us tall girls to find things that fit,” Janae said.

  “I’d like to douse her hair with a gallon of coconut oil.” Why had no one taught that girl about leave-in conditioner?

  “Aw, but look,” Bernice said.

  I looked. Zhorzha and Gentry had gone to stand at the kitchen bar, not any closer than casual acquaintances would have, but Zhorzha had her hand on the counter with Gentry’s on top of it. While I watched, Zhorzha laid her other hand on his, and he added his other to the pile. Then she pulled her hand out from the bottom and put it on the top. They laughed, the first time I’d heard Gentry laugh in a long while.

  “He sounds happy,” Bernice said.

  “Why can’t you two let me be aggrieved in peace?” I said.

  “Because it’s not who you are,” Janae said.

  “Oh, it’s who I am, make no mistake.”

  “Nothing good’s going to come from holding on to that anger,” Bernice said.

  “Do you blame me?”

  “Don’t play yourself. After all the things you’ve done for me, how can you—”

  “Now wait. The Lord knows I love you, but I have never done anything like that, and I never would. Not even for you,” I said.

  “Okay, everybody,” the photographer said and clapped his hands. “Let’s put the sisters on the love seat here. Then spouses behind and kids around.”

  Bernice tugged on my hand to lead me to the love seat. We did what we always did, smiled at each other to check for food in our teeth. Then she leaned in close and said, “What about the time you drove down to Tulsa to put the fear of God into Prester?”

  “That was different,” I said. “He’d hit you. And I didn’t get anyone else hurt.”

  “Seems to me you got lucky. If I remember right, your roommate was driving the getaway car that night.”

  “That isn’t the same,” I said.

  “Cheryl and David, on that side, next to Bernice. And Elana, on this end with your mom,” the photographer said.

  Once Elana got her chair situated, it was just a matter of fitting everyone else in. Bill and Carlees in back, because they were the tallest. Janae and her girlfriend filling in between Bill and my niece and her husband.

  “Trang, let’s put you—”

  “Will you get Gentry?” I said to Trang, because I didn’t want to end up shouting to get his attention. I’d wanted everyone dressed up for the pictures, but none of Gentry’s dress shirts fit him anymore. Too tight in the arms and shoulders. He was wearing what he liked best: a black T-shirt.

  Trang went to talk to Gentry, and then the two of them took up their places behind Elana. The rest of the party quieted down like civilized folks to let the pictures be taken.

  Zhorzha stayed at the kitchen counter, sitting on a bar stool with her hands on her knees, keeping her skirt pressed down. Obviously she was also uncomfortable with how short her dress was.

  “All right, everyone look at me,” the photographer said. Then, like he was playing the crowd for laughs: “I’m talking to you, Charlene.”

  Bernice squeezed my hand, so I looked, and the photographer snapped pictures.

  I was still annoyed that Zhorzha had come to the party, but I felt a little bad. It couldn’t be any fun for her, surrounded by strangers, and worse than strangers: people who knew all about her. It wasn’t as though I’d held my tongue when it came to my opinion of Zhorzha. Redhead was the nicest thing I’d called her.

  It would have been so much easier for her to walk away. Nobody had made her pay the mortgage on Bryn Carreg. Nobody had made her visit Gentry. Nobody had made her come to the party, but she showed up. Not because she wanted to be there, but for Gentry. Her loyalty to her sister had brought her nothing but grief, and yet there she was, taking another chance on loyalty, on trusting another person. She could have stayed home, but she came for Gentry, who also didn’t want to be there. He would be looking down like he did for every family picture.

  “Zhorzha,” I said, and then louder: “Zee, come be in the picture.”

  “No, it’s for family. I don’t—”

  “Yes, and I want you to be in it.”

  “Okay, let’s put you next to Carlees,” the photographer said. After all, she was taller than Gentry.

  Zee didn’t look happy, but she got down off the bar stool, still pressing her skirt to her thighs, and came to stand with us.

  “My lady,” Gentry said. When I looked over my shoulder at them, he’d put his hand into hers. I predicted they would both look awkward in the photos, but they would look awkward together.

  “You two don’t have to stay after the pictures,” I said to them. “I know you don’t want to be here.”

  “Aren’t we having this whole party for him?” Bill said.

  “Don’t be silly. This party is for me. He can celebrate any way he likes.”

  “Okay,” the photographer said. “Big smiles, everybody.”

  Bernice gave me a smug look and squeezed my hand again.

  CHAPTER 63

  Gentry

  Nigh three years to the day, Lady Zhorzha and I returned to Bryn Carreg. ’Twas bright April, with all things turning to green but the air still full of winter chill. Deep in the woods, rimes of snow clung to the ground, bedded on pine needles.

  “Are you sure you don’t want me to carry anything?” my lady said. She walked before me a few paces, but turned back to ask again.

  “My lady, knowest thou, if I need thee to carry aught, I will ask thee.”

  I would remind her that she carried things for me I could not. I would remind her that ’twas by her labor Bryn Carreg was still mine, but such words dis-eased her, so I spake them not.

  I raised the pavilion upon the hill beside the tower, tho ’twas not my custom, for there was no protection from the wind. Yet I desired we should sleep in sight of the work that lay before me. Soon enough I would have other work, the building of flying machines if my father could make it so. Some other thing if not. For the nonce, I longed to finish the eastern tower, and lay as many stones as I might upon the southern tower ere winter returned.

  While I began setting the scaffolding that would serve me to lay courses of stone, Lady Zhorzha swept out the leaves that had blown into the towers and bailey. Marcus and Leon weaved in and out, seeking rabbit nests and other matters of great import to boy and dog. Weren they inclined, I would train them together on the hunt. ’Twas a thought that called to mind Sir Edrard, and I longed to see him, knowing I could not.

  “What else can I do?” My lady’s shadow fell across where I worked upon the scaffolding. ’Twas work made easier with two, but if I looked upon her, I would be reminded that we two carried the blame of Edrard�
��s death.

  “Thou might clean also the bathing pond, for it will be choked with leaves. The net may be found with the other tools in the eastern tower.”

  “Okay.” She went away, calling for Marcus: “Come on, come help me!”

  “Leon!” Marcus shouted, and they three went down the hill. For some while I was alone with my labors and my grief. In such time the desire to be alone passed.

  “Thy moody countenance will send her from thee as surely as sharp words or a heavy hand,” Gawen said.

  “He would be better parted from her,” Hildegard said. Some days, methought to take once more the physic that silenced her, but it quieted also the black knight.

  “She cometh of her own will and might go of her own will,” I said, tho in truth I would not have her go.

  “So might thou. Go to her if it thee liketh,” the Witch said. “Thou art free.”

  I had not yet laid the planks upon the scaffold, but I climbed it that I might see Lady Zhorzha. Aside the ponds, she and her nephew had gathered a mound of leaves, branches, and other things that had fallen in the water over three winters. They two stood at the lip of the bathing pond, where she held the net braced upon the ground like a shepherd’s crook. At my lady’s bidding, Marcus ran up the hill toward the keep. When he departed, my lady lay down the net and took off her blouse. As I watched, she stepped out of her shoes and brought her hands to the clasp of her trousers.

  Two things stirred in my breast: a great longing to see her disrobed under the bright sun, and a great uncertainty. The water was too cold for bathing. What meant she do?

  I climbed down from the scaffolding and ran out of the bailey. As I went down the hill, I met Marcus.

  “Did thine aunt send for me?” I said, and turned him back to accompany me.

  “No. She told me to go up to the tower.”

  “Wherefore?”

  “I dunno. I was supposed to get something but I don’t remember what.”

  I made haste ahead of him, for my lady no longer stood at the edge of the pond. I saw her not, nor whither she had gone.

  When I reached the pond, my lady’s garments lay aside her shoes. Ere I called for her, Lady Zhorzha’s head broke the surface of the pond. She took a great gasp of air and coughed it out.

  “Oh, fuck, that’s cold!” she said, but to herself alone, for she knew not that I was there, until she drew her hair back from her face, and opened her eyes.

  She looked upon me and I upon her. I knew not what to say, for fear I broke some unspoken vow in spying her at her bath.

  “Aunt Zee, are we going swimming?” Marcus said.

  “Oh my god, no. I told you to get me a towel.” My lady’s teeth chattered together. “They’re in the basket in the tent.”

  At the center of the pond the water reached nigh her chin, but after Marcus went, she crossed to where I stood. As she stepped from the water, her hair lay in dripping strands upon her breasts and shoulders, and water-beaded leaves clung to her skin like faerie jewels, for she had gone into the pond all unclothed. Steam rose from her flesh like mist at sunrise. I drank her up from the crown of her head to the curve of her hip, til I saw what she bore in her hand.

  ’Twas my sword. The first true sword I owned that long hung above my bed in my father’s keep. When I returned from Malvern, the sword was gone, and Trang knew naught but that my mother it took. Just or unjust, I asked her not, for my mother had endured much by cause of my folly.

  Yet there was my sword, some rusted but whole. Lady Zhorzha grasped the hilt in both hands and lifted it clear of the steps, tho ’twas too heavy for her to hold it aloft. When she reached the top step, she brought the point to rest in the grass.

  I knelt to her, as I had knelt many years before when I was knighted. She laughed, I knew not why, but ’twas a glad sound. Her right hand remained upon the hilt, and with her left, she grasped the blade to lift it before her.

  “Your sword, Sir Gentry,” she said. When I raised my hands, she put it into them.

  Acknowledgments

  My sincere gratitude to the following people:

  Liberty Greenwood, my favorite traveling companion and my favorite stay-at-home companion.

  Robert Ozier—friends who keep showing up are the best friends.

  My agent, Jess Regel, who continues to take a chance on my weird ideas.

  My reckless but brave editor, Tara Singh Carlson, and the wonderful people at Putnam: Helen Richard, Sally Kim, Ivan Held, Alexis Welby, Ashley McClay, Meredith Dros, Maija Baldauf, Joel Breuklander, Anthony Ramondo, Monica Cordova, Nayon Cho, Katy Riegel, Brennin Cummings, Jordan Aaronson, Elena Hershey, Bonnie Rice.

  The early readers and supporters of this book: Kell Andrews, Liz Michalski, Barry Wynn, Lisa Brackmann, Colby Marshall, Jenna, Tracey Martin, Erin Mansur, Kelly Haas, David and Nick.

  Renee and Bogi Perelmutter, who have been readers, consultants, emotional support, and the source of my dinner on many occasions.

  Kris Herndon, my mermaid sister and the cofounder of my secret undersea volcano lair.

  Matt Hyde and the staff of 715, for the celebratory dinners and all the happy hours.

  V.K., Jo Nixon, and Tom, for their assistance in creating a version of Middle English that is accessible to modern readers. Any errors or anachronisms aren mine own.

  Robert T. Corum, Jr., professor emeritus of French at Kansas State University, who first introduced me to Yvain.

  The Consortium for the Teaching of the Middle Ages and the Early English Text Society for making Middle English texts more readily accessible.

  Ruth Harwood Cline for her beautiful English translation of Chrétien de Troyes’ Yvain.

  My Purgatorians and YNots, two of the most supportive writing groups a person could ask for.

  Clovia Shaw, a fellow daughter of a dragon, who always shows me the world from a slightly different angle.

  About the Author

  Bryn Greenwood is a fourth-generation Kansan, one of seven sisters, and the daughter of a mostly reformed drug dealer. She earned a MA in Creative Writing from Kansas State University and continues to work in academia as an administrator. She is the New York Times bestselling author of the novels All the Ugly and Wonderful Things, Last Will, and Lie Lay Lain. She lives in Lawrence, Kansas.

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