Secrets of the Tudor Court Boxed Set

7

I could assume my chemise without difficulty, but the remainder of my clothing required lacing. That made me wonder how great court ladies managed to take secret lovers. Their tiring maids, at the least, must know every intimate detail.

Struggling to keep from tripping on my skirts, I bundled my garments in front of me and crept out of the duke’s bedchamber. Young Ivo was stretched out on a pallet in front of the door. He woke with a start, stared at me in alarm, and scurried away before I could ask him to tie the points that held the back of my bodice together.

Stifling a sigh, I continued across the outer chamber. I had almost reached the door to the passageway when Guy appeared. We stood staring at each other for a long moment. Although I expected him to make some disparaging comment, he said only, “Turn around.”

With deft fingers, he laced me back into my clothes. I could sense his disapproval, but he did not utter a single word of reproach.

I bore myself proudly as I left the duke’s lodgings and made my way to my own small bedchamber, but halfway there a sob escaped me. It had begun so well. There had been such a fine building of excitement, of anticipation, and then…messy seemed to sum up the situation best.

That the duke had derived pleasure from the encounter, I knew. I suspected that I had missed out on something. I was not naive. I had heard married women talk about their lovers. The duke had taken his own release and given me none.

Resolved never to visit his bed again, I confessed my sin to the Lady Mary’s chaplain the next day and went about my duties to the princess with my head held high. It was early afternoon when young Ivo, bearing a small, ornate box, sought me out in the presence chamber.

“Gifts, Jane?” The Lady Mary appeared at my elbow, eager curiosity radiating from every pore.

“I do not know, Your Grace.”

“You will once you open that box.”

Inside was a brooch I had last seen pinned to the duc de Longueville’s bonnet. It was a pretty bauble made of three stones—peridot, garnet, and sapphire—framed in a gold border designed to resemble acanthus leaves. The Lady Mary’s eyes widened when she saw it, and a short time later she spirited me away into the privacy of her bedchamber and shut her other women out.

“Do you wish to rest?” I asked when she removed the Venetian cap she wore over her long, loose hair.

The scent of lavender wafted up from the coverlet as I pushed aside the bed curtains. I offered to unlace her outer garments, that she might lie down in comfort, but she waved me away. Her expression was as serious as I’d ever seen it.

“I wish to talk. I fear for you, Jane.” She kept her voice low even though we were alone.

“For me, Your Grace?” I stared at her, amazed. “Why, what have I done to displease you?” I did not see how she could possibly know what had transpired the previous night. No one save Guy Dunois had seen me leave his master’s lodgings, and I had told no one save my confessor.

“Only God and your conscience know,” said the Lady Mary, “and mayhap the duc de Longueville.”

I felt my face blanch.

“He has bedded you, has he not?” The Lady Mary held my gaze with an uncompromising stare that put me uneasily in mind of her brother.

“Say rather that we have bedded each other.” It had been my choice to lie with him. He had not coerced me.

Although she frowned, a gleam of curiosity appeared in her light blue eyes. After a moment’s struggle, she gave in to it. “What does it feel like to have a man’s yard inside you?”

Heat rose into my cheeks. “It is not my place to tell Your Grace such things.”

“If you do not, who will?”

She was a royal princess, but I had been her friend and companion and sometime bedfellow, as well as her servant, for many long years. When her first woman’s courses came, it had been to me she turned, not her lady governess, for sympathy and a distillation of poppy to ease the pains. When she’d had questions about what passed between a man and a woman, she had likewise come to me. In the past, I had been able to tell her only what I’d heard at secondhand.

“It hurts the first time,” I blurted out.

“Was there pleasure after?”

I looked at the brooch I still held tightly clutched in one hand. Was this payment for my services? Or did he mean his gift as an invitation to spend more time in his company? I could not say for certain, but my foolish heart fluttered with hope. “There can be.”

“Is the pain very bad?” the Lady Mary asked.

I shook my head. “And what leads up to that moment is most pleasurable.” Remembering made my breasts ache and my loins soften. My breath soughed out, full of longing.

Still curious, the Lady Mary settled herself in the middle of the feather bed, curling her legs beneath her. She patted the coverlet next to her. “Come and tell me more.”

“It is not meet.”

“I command it!”

Moments later I sat facing her, my knees folded tailor fashion. Accompanied by a good deal of giggling and several exclamations of disbelief, I told her everything.

“You left him?” she exclaimed. “After he had promised there was more?”

I nodded. Perhaps that had been foolish, but I had not known what else to do.

The princess’s soft sigh echoed mine. “It must be a wondrous thing, to be with a man after the first time, else why would women do it so often? But, Jane, he is a Frenchman.” She named his nationality as if the word was synonymous with “devil.”

A snort of laughter escaped me as an image of Longueville in horns and a long tail—and naught else—flashed through my mind. “He is a man like any other. Better than many.” Most of King Henry’s courtiers did not bother to send love tokens to their conquests.

“Most women at court who acquire lovers take the precaution of first finding husbands,” the Lady Mary ventured. “If you should conceive, if you bear the duke’s child, it will be a bastard.”

“In the duc de Longueville’s family, bastard children are well treated. You have only to look at Guy Dunois to see that it is possible for a by-blow to find success.”

“He is his half brother’s steward,” Mary agreed, “and the duke mentioned once that Guy had been able to amass a respectable fortune of his own.” She giggled. “He should not have said that. I might tell Henry, and then he’ll set their ransom higher.”

I smiled, but my thoughts had already circled back to my own dilemma. If the duke should get me with a child, I would be banished from court. That was a risk I was reluctant to take. Until Longueville’s ransom was paid and he was free to return to France, he lacked the power to protect me. He did not even have the funds to support me.

Had he really meant his offer to take me with him to France? I avoided looking at the Lady Mary. It felt disloyal to consider leaving her and yet that possibility, more than any words of love, more than the promise of physical pleasure, was the lure that tempted me most strongly to return to the duke’s bed. The answers to my questions about my mother were in France, but that was not the only reason I wanted to go there. I wanted to know why she’d left, but I also had a vision of what my life might be like separate from the English court, free of obligation to princess or king. It danced like a will-o’-the-wisp, just out of reach, a fanciful notion impossible to ignore.

I sighed. It would be months yet before any ransom was paid. In the meantime, England was still at war with France, and I was still dependent upon my mistress and her brother for everything I had. If I went to the duke’s bed again, I must take measures to protect myself.

There are ways to deter conception. I’d heard married women talk of them. I did not speak of such things to the princess. It was her duty to produce children when she wed. She had no need to know she had a choice, but my case was different. I resolved then and there to make another trip into London to procure a bit of sponge and some lemons. That was the combination reputed to be most effective.

“It must be a wondrous thing to have a lover.” The Lady Mary leaned closer to me and placed one hand over mine. “But have you given thought to what my brother will say when he returns? For all that Henry may lie with whatever woman he chooses, he does not approve of lewd behavior at court any more than our father did. You must take great care, Jane. The king could banish you for wantonness, and I do not want to lose you.”

“I will be careful. And circumspect.”

She was right about King Henry. He had no objection to tupping a willing woman in private, especially when the queen was great with child and unavailable to him. But under that same queen’s influence, he’d come around to the point of view that courtiers should behave with great propriety in public.

“It makes matters more difficult that your lover is our enemy. No matter how gallant or courtly he is, he is still a Frenchman.”

“Now you sound like the queen.” I struggled to keep my tone light, but I took her point. To consort with an enemy of the Crown could all too easily be misconstrued as treason.

ENEMY OR NOT, when the duke danced with me that evening, my desire for him returned tenfold. As he took my hand to lead me away from the crowd, I went willingly.

The second time was much more pleasurable.

The third was even better.

Soon, coupling with the duke became so passionate and intense I found myself slipping away to his bed every moment I could spare from my duties with the princess. He was always glad to see me. In truth, we were finding it hard to be apart.

With the king still in France and Queen Catherine occupied first with repelling the Scots invaders and then recovering from her miscarriage, no one troubled to inquire how one of the princess’s ladies passed her time. The prisoners of war were all but forgotten by the outside world.

The intensity of my dear Coriander’s attentions made me happier than I had ever been. In spite of my best efforts to remain heart-whole, I fell under his spell, enthralled by how he made me feel and what he seemed to feel for me in return.

A picture of our future together began to emerge. I would travel with him to France as his beloved mistress, accepted even by the wife who had already given him four children. Since their alliance had been arranged by their families, it had nothing to do with either liking or passion. He convinced me that she would have no objection to my presence in their lives.

Then, on a crisp October afternoon, just as I was contemplating slipping away to the duke’s lodgings for an assignation, a messenger arrived. The Lady Mary read the letter he brought, then gave us all orders to pack our belongings.

“Queen Catherine is in residence at Richmond Palace. She has sufficiently recovered from her miscarriage to desire my company.”

Excited chatter broke out among the princess’s ladies. We had been living in the Tower of London since early September and were ready for a change. It was rare we stayed in any one place so long. It was best to move every few weeks so that the buildings we vacated could be thoroughly cleaned before our next visit.

“What of the prisoners of war?” I asked, already suspecting what this summons would mean.

The princess’s gaze was rife with pity when she looked up from the queen’s letter. “They must remain in the Tower.”

ONCE WE WERE settled at Richmond Palace, I seized the opportunity to resume my search for answers about my mother. Queen Catherine had no objection when I offered to lend my hand at embroidering an altar cloth, and I managed to position myself in the sewing circle between Lady Pechey and Lady Verney, two of the women Goose had named as former members of Queen Elizabeth of York’s household. I knew who they were, even though I had rarely spoken to either, and then just pleas-antries.

Lady Pechey, like Lady Marzen, had not married until after my mother’s death, but unlike Lady Marzen, she had been at court before she wed. Nervously, I cleared my throat. “I wonder, Lady Pechey, if you knew my mother?”

She looked down her high-bridged nose at me, sniffed, and continued stitching—tiny, perfect stitches that would never need to be redone. Honing that skill had left her with a marked squint. “Why would you think so?”

“Her name was Joan Popyncourt. You were at court when she entered Queen Elizabeth’s service.”

“I do not recall.” Back stiff, demeanor unfriendly, she avoided looking at me.

“Joan Popyncourt,” Lady Verney mused on my other side. She had been listening to the conversation, as I’d hoped she would. An older woman, in her fiftieth year with a deeply lined countenance and hands disfigured with age, she had reportedly been one of Queen Elizabeth’s favorites.

“Perhaps you remember my mother, Lady Verney?” I could not keep the eagerness out of my voice.

“She died soon after she joined us,” Lady Verney said. Deep in thought, she stared up at the ceiling studded with Tudor emblems: gold roses, portcullises, the red dragon of Wales, and the greyhound of Richmond. After a few moments, she shook her head. “No, I do not believe I recall more than that.”

“I had hoped she might have had time to make friends with some of the other ladies in the queen’s court.”

Lady Verney did not know anything about that either.

On subsequent days, I asked the same questions of the others Goose had named. Lady Weston could tell me nothing. Mistress Denys said it was a great pity I could not ask her husband.

“He was King Henry’s groom of the stole,” she reminded me with a wink. “He had an intimate knowledge of everything that affected His Grace.”

I had to smile at that. The groom of the stole attended the king when he used the royal close stool—a glorified chamber pot!

Lady Lovell was my last hope. A buxom woman with blunt features and a round face, she had a brusque manner but she heard me out. “You wish to know about your mother’s days at the English court?” she said when I had stuttered out my questions. “Why?”

“Because I never saw her again after I was sent to Eltham. No one even told me she was ill.”

“You were a child.”

“I am not a child now. I should like to know if she had friends, if she was well cared for, if—”

“Queen Elizabeth would not have let a dog suffer. She was all that was good and kind. I am certain everything possible was done for your mother.”

Walking together in the great hall at Richmond, we passed under the eyes of kings. A series of large portraits had been painted in the wall spaces between the high windows by Maynard the Fleming in old King Henry’s reign. Two lines of these, showing Brutus, Hengist, King William Rufus, King Arthur, and others—all depicted wearing golden robes and brandishing mighty swords—led up to the dais and a similar portrait of King Henry VII.

“He sent my mother to the queen,” I said, indicating the painted monarch. “Maman knew no one else in England save her twin brother, Sir Rowland Velville.”

“Yes. I remember hearing that she was his sister. A ferocious jouster, Sir Rowland, but that’s the best I can say for him.” My uncle’s short temper was almost as legendary as the king’s.

Lady Lovell stopped in front of one of the big bay windows that overlooked a courtyard. Beyond the turrets and pinnacles and a profusion of gilt weather vanes and bell-shaped domes, I could just glimpse a part of the deer park that completely surrounded Richmond. Everything had been built to old King Henry’s specifications after the old palace on this site, a place called Sheen, had burned to the ground the Christmas before I arrived in England.

“There was one person who befriended her,” Lady Lovell said. “Or, rather, they befriended each other. She is no longer at court.”

“Is she still living?”

“Oh, yes. She’s plain Mistress Strangeways now, but she and her husband own considerable property in Berkshire.”

I felt my eyes widen as I realized whom she meant: Lady Catherine Gordon, the daughter of a Scottish earl, who had once been married to Perkin Warbeck, the notorious pretender to the throne. She’d been captured along with her husband when Warbeck invaded England. He’d been executed, after making a second attempt to escape, but she had remained at court as one of Queen Elizabeth’s ladies. A few years ago, I’d heard that she had remarried. Her second husband, James Strangeways, was one of King Henry’s gentlemen ushers.

That she and my mother should have been friendly made perfect sense. What more natural than that two newcomers, two foreigners, be drawn to each other? When I left Lady Lovell’s company I felt more optimistic than I had since I’d begun asking questions about my mother. Berkshire was not close enough to reach on my own, but eventually the court would travel to Windsor Castle. I should be able to slip away and visit Lady Strangeways then.

My high spirits were short lived. I’d no sooner reached the Lady Mary’s lodgings than she declared herself in need of exercise and swept me off with her to the timber-framed, two-story galleried walks built around Richmond’s gardens. They gave a splendid view of knots, wide paths, statues of the king’s beasts, and fountains, but the princess was intent on speaking privily with me and paid no attention to her surroundings.

“Why do you ask so many questions?” she demanded.

“I wish to know more about my mother.” She knew this already.

“She has been dead almost as long as I have known you. What can you possibly expect to learn now?”

There was no simple answer to her question. I did not know myself. I only knew that there had been something secretive about our coming to England, and about the way we had been treated once we arrived. Why had we left? Had the gens d’armes been looking for Maman, or only for the governess they’d taken away with them? But most of all I wanted to know why the king should have shown us favor. My uncle was only one of many knights at court. He was expert in the lists and in falconry, but beyond those skills he had nothing special to recommend him.

I could scarce explain all that to the Lady Mary, even if I possessed a greater understanding of events than I did. Instead, I offered the only crumb I had. “I have been thinking a great deal of late about my early days here as well as my years in France.”

“That was all very well when we were on our own in the Tower,” the Lady Mary said, “but here, showing an interest in anything French, even your own mother, is not at all wise. We are still at war.”

“But my mother was a Breton,” I reminded her.

“That hardly matters. When you ask these questions, you remind everyone that you are not English. If people should also learn that you have become close to the duke, you risk being branded a traitor.”

A little silence fell. I knew she was right. I silently cursed all rumor-mongering, small-minded courtiers.

“You must cease badgering the queen’s ladies with your questions,” the Lady Mary said.

I sighed. “Next you will say I must give up the duc de Longueville. I miss being in his bed more than I ever imagined I could.”

The princess gave me a curious look. “Do you think that perhaps it is not him you miss. Oh, do not look so shocked, Jane. Answer me this: If the king and his favorites were here at court, could you be tempted by any of them?”

My smile was rueful. “They are well favored to a man, and lusty, too, but I have known most of them too long and too well. I was never tempted before.”

“Mayhap it will be different now that you have discovered the joys of being with a man.”

I could not help but be amused by her naive logic. “But, Your Grace,” I said lightly, “would that not be far worse, not to mention much more difficult to keep secret?”

I expected her to laugh, but of a sudden she looked very serious. “It would be better for you, Jane. At least then your cater-cousin would be an Englishman!”

ON THE TWENTY-SECOND day of October, the king rode hard from Dover to surprise his wife at Richmond Palace. He burst into her privy chamber, followed by his closest companions, all noise and laughter. They were cock-a-hoop about their first venture into war, even though the battle they had won had been far less significant than the one fought at home at Flodden in their absence.

Henry Tudor was the largest man at his own court, well over six feet in height, with proportions to match. There was not an ounce of fat on him, for he kept trim with jousting and wrestling and other manly exercises. He was well favored, with pleasant facial features—not always the case with royalty—and broad shoulders and long, muscular legs. Those who had long memories always said he had the look of his mother’s father, King Edward. Edward himself had been big and blond and lusty.

After greeting his queen, King Henry moved into the crowd of courtiers, demanding kisses from every gentlewoman and lady in lieu of the bows he received from the men. When he reached his sister, he lifted her right off her feet and swung her around in a great circle, to the delight of everyone watching.

“By St. George, it is good to be home!”

The cheers and applause that greeted this sentiment were so loud that I did not hear the Lady Mary’s reply even though I stood right next to her. The king set her back on her feet and turned to me.

“And we are most pleased to have you back, Your Grace,” I said, prepared to greet him with a kiss.

The next moment, I gave a squeak of surprise as he swept me into the same embrace he had given the princess. Holding me with my feet still dangling a foot above the floor, he kissed me soundly, full on the lips.

Laughing, he set me on my feet again a moment later. I smiled up at him and said the first thing that popped into my head. “Your Grace has acquired some new finery at the Burgundian court.”

The king beamed at me. He had no modesty when it came to his apparel. He was garbed in the newest knee-length bases from Italy, heavily embroidered with vines and flowers. His brocade doublet had puffed and slashed sleeves. A dagger, purse, and gloves hung suspended by golden laces from a cloth-of-gold belt, and, following the current fashion, he had padded his codpiece and decorated it with jewel-encrusted points. It thrust out from the center opening of the bases, impossible to ignore.

Before becoming intimate with Longueville, I had never given much thought to that part of a man’s body, save when I came across some gentleman urinating in the corner of a courtyard and was forcibly reminded that men and women are differently made. Now I caught myself staring at the gaudy, ornate covering. Like everything else about the king, his yard was both oversized—or at least overstuffed—and blatant.

His Grace moved on, indiscriminately dispensing kisses until he came to young Bessie Blount. The maid of honor Queen Catherine had sent to fetch me to her on the day the French prisoners first arrived at court had gone north with the queen, but I had spoken with her several times since I had been at Richmond. She was a sweet-natured girl still growing accustomed to life at court.

The terrified expression on her face reminded me that she had not previously met King Henry. She had arrived after he left for France. She froze, uncertain whether to make an obeisance or go up on her tiptoes to kiss him in greeting.

His voice boomed out, audible in every corner of the presence chamber. “Here’s a pretty new flower since I went away to war! What is your name, sweeting?”

“Elizabeth Blount, if it please Your Majesty.”

“It does indeed!” He picked her up, as he had his sister and me, and kissed her soundly.

Bessie stared after him in bemusement as he moved on to another of the queen’s damsels. Had I looked like that, I wondered, the first time I beheld the duc de Longueville?

By the time the king resumed his place by the queen’s side, busy servants had the royal furniture in place. The king’s cushion had been placed upon the chair of estate and a canopy had hurriedly been erected over it. Queen Catherine, having lost her status as regent from the moment of her husband’s return, was relegated to a smaller chair with a lower canopy.

“Your Grace,” she greeted him in her low, throaty voice. And then, in tones even lower and more husky, she murmured, “My Henry.”

In spite of all the flirtation and the indiscriminate kissing, Henry Tudor had eyes only for his Catherine. She glowed, basking in his undivided attention. Their desire for each other was a palpable force in the presence chamber and no one doubted that the king would visit his wife’s bed come nightfall.

At court, however, ceremony surrounds every royal action. Music and dancing and games would come first, for the king rarely retired before midnight. After that, if he wished to lie with the queen, he would summon his grooms of the bedchamber. They would bring his night-robe, help him into it, and escort him through the private connecting stair or gallery—which one it was depended upon the palace—to the door of the queen’s bedchamber. The grooms would then wait outside that door until the king was ready to return to his own bed.

On this evening, however, King Henry departed from protocol. Halfway through the festivities, he abruptly rose, took Queen Catherine’s hand in his, and led her from the room. The attendants on duty scurried after, more than one of them aghast at the breech in etiquette. I hid a smile behind my hand as I heard a distant door close. Ceremony, it seemed, would for once take second place to desire.

I wondered if the king would understand my longing for my Coriander. I sighed deeply. Understanding and acceptance were two different matters. In spite of his obvious affection for his wife, His Grace no doubt shared the Lady Mary’s conviction that any partner would do to provide physical release. The king was quick enough to turn to other women when he could not go to the queen.

To give and receive pleasure was a marvelous thing. In his own way, I thought, Longueville had come to care for me. In spite of the princess’s warnings, I had no intention of giving him up.

To take my mind off missing the duke, I surveyed the chamber, in search of familiar faces. Everywhere I looked, courtiers and ladies were exchanging pleased and knowing glances. The queen’s miscarriage had been a blow, but it had taken place almost a month earlier. Another attempt to beget an heir was not only desirable, it was necessary.

With the king and queen occupied, we were granted an additional boon. We were left to our own devices. It was at that moment that I belatedly recalled there was someone with whom I had been anxious to speak. I scanned the crowded room, looking for my uncle, sure that he must be somewhere in the sea of bright colors and noisy chatter. At last I would have the opportunity to ask him about his twin sister. I would insist he tell me all he knew of my mother’s last days in France and of her brief life in England.

Sir Rowland Velville, however, was nowhere to be found.

Harry Guildford was there. So were Will Compton and Ned Neville from our old band of children of honor. Will had completely recovered from his tiltyard accident three years earlier, except for a small bump on the bridge of his nose to remind him of the place where it had been broken.

Charles Brandon was also present. The Lady Mary had already made her way to his side, heedless of the speculation that might arise from her obvious preference for his company. I had to admit he looked exceedingly fine, even in boots and a cloak that were mud spattered from hours of rapid travel over bad roads.

In contrast with the energy that seemed to radiate from Brandon, Harry Guildford lounged with one shoulder propped against a window casement. The bored and slightly melancholy look on his face reminded me that, although his mother-in-law, Lady Bryan, had remained with the queen, his wife had been sent to Staffordshire to visit friends. After all, neither Meg nor her sister, Elizabeth, had any official post at court. That meant it would be some days yet before Harry could retire to his marital bed.

I brushed a kiss of greeting across his lips. No sparks flew. I hadn’t expected any. I would have linked my arm companionably with his had I not noticed the condition of his doublet. The fabric was so stiff from the ill effects of traveling that it would have abraded my skin right through my sleeve. He carried the faint stench of the road, too. I took a small step away from him.

“Have you seen my uncle?” I asked.

“Sir Rowland is still in Calais.”

“Why?”

“He’ll sail from there direct to Anglesey. At long last he’s to take up his post as constable of Beaumaris Castle.”

“He is going to Wales?”

Harry laughed at my expression of disbelief. “It is not exile, although given Velville’s uncertain temper, there are some who’d think that a fine idea. He was appointed constable just before the old king died, but he did not receive a grant of denization until last year. Then the war came. This is the first chance he’s had to claim his prize.”

I frowned. I was surprised that King Henry—both of them—had waited so long to grant my uncle the same rights as an Englishman born and bred. He had, after all, lived in this country since he was a boy of eleven.

“Come, Jane,” Harry chided me. “Forget Velville. You never liked him anyway. We are home. We have won. I’ve pageants to plan, masques to prepare. Will you assist me?”

Glad to see him more cheerful, I agreed.

“The king intends to bring his French prisoners to court,” Harry informed me, unaware of how much pleasure his news gave me. “We must devise an entertainment suitable to welcome them.”

Linking my arm through his, I assured him that I would be able to help him with that.

MY REUNION WITH my lover did not take place for some time. The king fell ill only a few days after his arrival at Richmond, delaying matters. Then the queen, who had nursed her husband herself, objected to the idea of the French prisoners living at court. To make matters worse, an outbreak of the plague in London prevented us from moving closer to the city. I was too far away to make clandestine visits to the Tower.

It was late November before the king fully recovered and at last persuaded the queen that the noble duc de Longueville must be invited to live at court until his ransom was paid. Resigned to the inevitable, Queen Catherine changed tactics. She would personally welcome the duke by inviting him to her own manor of Havering-atte-Bower. As soon as the court took up residence at this huge, rambling estate in Essex, she commandeered the services of the king’s master of revels, Harry Guildford, to produce a disguising to entertain the duke.

I was assisting him with his preparations—supervising the decoration of a miniature castle—when word reached me that my lover had arrived at Havering. I abandoned my task without a backward glance, unable to wait another moment to see him again. We had been separated for nearly six weeks.

I caught a glimpse of Longueville as soon as I left the barn Harry had appropriated for the construction of pageant wagons. The duke was walking with Guy toward the bower that had given the manor its name. It was a beautiful spot, a garden atop a hill that boasted a stunning view of the valley of the Thames.

I took a secondary path, climbing rapidly. My heart raced as much from anticipation as from the exertion. It had been so long since I had seen my lover, touched him, pleasured him, and had him pleasure me. It seemed an eternity.

A deep, booming laugh—the king’s laugh—brought me to an abrupt halt just before I crested the hill. Longueville had not gone to the bower for the view. He had gone there to meet in private with King Henry.

I knew I should retreat but I feared to step on a twig or dislodge a stone, attracting their attention. No good could come of that! I hesitated, unable to decide what to do.

“You are good company, Longueville,” I heard the king say. “Did I not tell you that when we met in France?”

“You did, Your Grace, just before you set my ransom at an exorbitant sum.”

The king chuckled. “I would be inclined to pay half of it myself, save that would more quickly deprive me of your presence.”

“You flatter me, Your Grace.”

“You must consider yourself my honored guest while you are in England. A member of my family. Have all your needs been seen to?”

“All, Your Grace.” Longueville lowered his voice so that I could hear nothing of what seemed to be a lengthy speech…except my name.

Still as a deer scenting danger, I waited, barely daring to breathe. The king might not object to the duke’s acquisition of a mistress, but he had always been adamant that not the slightest taint of corruption come in contact with his sister, not even at secondhand.

I heard only the low murmur of the king’s voice, his words too faint for me to catch. I crept closer, sheltered by an evergreen hedge, until I could see the king and the duke sitting companionably together on the long stone bench in the bower. Guy stood nearby, within earshot, as did the courtier who had accompanied the king to this rendezvous—Charles Brandon.

The king’s amused chuckle drew my attention quickly back to him. Even seated, King Henry was a giant among men. The top of Longueville’s head only came to the level of His Grace’s broad shoulders. The midday sun had made a halo of the king’s bright hair, picking out both the red and the gold. He wore his locks trimmed short, in the French fashion. The same barber who kept him clean shaven regularly used curling tongs to make the ends curve under all along the line of his strong jaw.

I squinted to see more clearly—the reflection from the jewels sewn onto the collar of the royal cloak glittered in the sunlight—and stretched my ears to hear better. The two men appeared to be engaged in friendly conversation. If the king was angry that I had become Longueville’s mistress, he gave no sign of it.

“Indeed, she is most delightful,” I heard the duke say, “and an excellent diversion for a poor captive.”

I felt my skin grow hot.

“She is a pretty piece,” the king agreed. “I wonder how it is that I never noticed she had grown into such a beauty.”

“If you want her for yourself,” Longueville said, “it would please me greatly to cede her to Your Grace.”

Shock rocked me back a step, hands pressed to my lips to prevent me from crying out in protest. The chill that went through me had naught to do with the cold of that late November day.

The lover of my imagination, the one who cared deeply for me, would never offer my favors to another man, not even a king.

“Keep her for the present, my friend,” King Henry said. “Enjoy her as part of our good English hospitality. Time enough for me to take another look at her after you return to France.”