The Reckless Oath We Made(110)

The first two days of Tague’s trial, I had to work.

The third day, I stayed in bed with Leon and a pile of books.

I made myself read farther into Yvain. A noble lady found him wandering in the woods and helped him get better. For a second I thought he was going to cheat on his wife, but no, he just helped the noble lady and went on his way. Then halfway through the story, the lion finally showed up! Reading that, I understood what Gentry meant about being worthy of a dog’s devotion, because Yvain’s lion was so loyal that he went into battle with him. When he thought Yvain had died, the lion tried to kill himself.

Yvain was trying to get home, but on the way he volunteered to be a champion for a woman who was getting screwed by her sister over some land. Next thing I knew, Yvain and Gawain were planning to joust to settle the argument between the two sisters. They were best friends, but they were really going to fight each other to the death. I wonder how a Love so great can coexist with mortal Hate? That was how I felt about LaReigne. As much as I loved her, I hated her that much, too.

The fourth day of Tague’s trial, I had to go, or admit I wasn’t going. Honestly, I’d hoped it would be over on the third day. They had surveillance footage of him murdering a corrections officer, and Kansas doesn’t even have the death penalty. How hard could it be to send him back to prison for the rest of his life?

I went, and I spent the morning watching the back of Tague’s head. Every once in a while he would turn to look at his lawyer, but he didn’t take notes, because he couldn’t. That was part of the defense’s argument: he wasn’t a threat to society anymore. They had medical testimony about exactly where his spine had been severed by Gentry’s sword, but the end result was that he was paralyzed from the chest down.

The closer we got to lunch, the more nervous I got. I’d decided that at the recess, I would get up, walk to the railing behind the defense table, and hand LaReigne’s letter to one of Tague’s lawyers.

By the time the judge called the recess, my foot was asleep and my hip was locked up. When I stood up, I could barely walk. I shuffled out into the aisle, but before I could take two steps, I saw her.

Rosalinda.

She was wearing a baggy blue sweater, a long denim skirt, and tennis shoes. Instead of a medieval head scarf, she had her hair pulled back into a braid. Her eyes were red from crying. I turned around, I hoped, before she saw me. Using the rows of benches for support, I limped out of the courtroom and pushed through the crowd outside.

Down the hall on the left was the bathroom. I went into the first stall and pulled the letter out of my purse. Whenever I’d thought about getting rid of it, I’d imagined I would read it first, to see if there was some truth in it that LaReigne was keeping from me, but I didn’t. I left it in the envelope when I tore it up. Half and half and half and half until I had a stack of torn squares too small to tear again. I dropped them into the toilet and flushed.

After a couple of minutes, I pulled off a piece of toilet paper to blow my nose. I flushed that, too, sending LaReigne’s letter a little further on its journey to the sewer. Right as I stepped out of the stall, the bathroom door opened and Rosalinda walked in.





CHAPTER 55





Rosalinda



I wondered if Zee thought I followed her to the restroom to fight her. I’d never so much as slapped someone, and I definitely couldn’t imagine doing it to her. She was a foot taller than me and she looked like a girl who knew how to fight. Except when I walked into the restroom, she looked scared.

“I didn’t think I would see you here,” she said.

“He’s the only one who’s going to stand trial. He and your sister.”

In some ways that was the hardest part. The man who killed Edrard was dead. Edrard had killed him, but I still had an empty place in my soul. I’d convinced myself that seeing Tague Barnwell’s trial would fill it up, which wasn’t very Christian of me.

Another woman came into the restroom, and I had to step aside to let her in, but after she went into a stall, I stepped back to make sure Zee didn’t escape.

“I’m sorry. When they went, I didn’t know what—I should have stopped them.” Zee put her hand over her mouth. “I’m so sorry.”

“I bet you are, since your sister’s going to prison,” I said. Whenever I thought about it, I got angry. I knew I needed to forgive, but no matter how much my father prayed over me, I couldn’t let go of it. I didn’t know how to let go.

“She sent me here today. To pass him a note. But I couldn’t do it.”

“Is that supposed to make me feel better? That your conscience is bothering you? Because it doesn’t. It doesn’t do me any good for you to feel guilty.”

Zee nodded.

Other women went in and out of stalls, flushing, and washing their hands, while Zee stared at my feet. Almost like Gentry, except it was shame that kept her from looking at me.

“I need you to take me out to Bryn Carreg. Gentry’s place,” I said. “I need someone to take me, and I don’t have a car.”

“Do you—like right now? You want to go right now?”

“No. I have to go back in when the recess ends.”

“When do you want to go?” she said.

“I’ll call you.”

When I handed my prayer journal to Zee, she stared at it like she didn’t know what to do.