Someday they will write about him in the history texts as a great leader, daring to defy custom and usher in a modern, enlightened age. A man universally loved by the little people and admired by his peers.

Respected by all.

I ought to pause here and ask you, reader: Are you familiar with the term “unreliable narrator”?

Chapter Nine
Don’t try to fight it, you’ll only hurt yourself

By the time the sun cleared the horizon the next day, Gwen was waiting in the shade of an oak tree outside the castle walls, holding Achilles’s reins somewhat more tightly than she needed to. The stallion was far more at ease than she felt—he stood calmly, head swinging occasionally to track a passerby, whereas Gwen was fighting the urge to fidget wildly. She needed to vent the buildup of nervous energy buzzing through her body, but she was all too aware she had to avoid drawing attention.

There were so many risks and logic holes in Isobelle’s plan that Gwen couldn’t bear to look at them all head on for fear she’d talk herself out of the whole thing, so she’d settled for focusing on the challenges directly in front of her. Today, she had to slip into the castle unnoticed so Isobelle could transform her into Sir Gawain’s sister without anyone making the connection between that fictitious lady and the somewhat hollow-eyed and hungover blacksmith’s daughter standing outside the gate.

Somewhere ahead of her lay challenges like “somehow look like a lady” and “don’t fall off my horse while men twice my size try to knock me off with sticks,” but she decided not to think about that.

Gwen was good at not thinking about things.

She’d very nearly not come at all this morning, trying to convince herself that the night before had been a dream. Or some drunken fantasy. That Isobelle herself, flighty and flirty and so expert at hiding what was going on behind her smile that it often seemed nothing was going on there, would forget the scheme she’d proposed. Or that she’d rethink the wisdom of the idea after seeing what had happened to Jinna.

The woman’s arrest had certainly shaken Gwen. Fear and anger both had kept her tossing and turning most of the night. But something had made her dress and saddle Achilles and ride out into the still morning air. Gwen had spent every step of the journey to the castle trying not to think about the sheer insanity of what she was doing.

Too late to turn back, now she was here.

Or was it?

A trio of young men, attired like vendors or performers here for the festival, emerged from the castle gates and began making their way down toward the chaos of the festival grounds. One of them, a curly-haired, dark-eyed beauty, glanced at Gwen and flashed her a charming smile.