The King's Concubine

Chapter Nine

The royal castle of Windsor, with its massive walls and towers, was a magical place. Mirrored rooms glittered with reflected light or, under Wykeham’s flamboyant hand, allowed roses to riot from floor to ceiling in blue and green and vermilion. It was too garish for my taste but much admired, and with enough gold leaf to cover Edward’s warship, the Christopher, from prow to stern. The summer lay softly on this sumptuous statement of royal power, but the Queen of England lay immobile on her bed. Even the smallest movement of head or hand racked her with pain. I could do nothing for her. The willow bark now had little effect against such corruption of the body. It had not soothed her for many months, and the frequency of the drafts she was taking was a nagging concern to me. But Philippa begged for the cup of bitter wine and sank gratefully into sleep when she could tolerate her waking hours no more. I sat with her as she moved between delirium and a keen awareness that demanded the truth and gave no room for lies. The damsels were not slow to leave me the duties of the sickroom.

I was not sorry. Did I not owe everything to this generous woman who had so much love in her heart, who had a spirit strong as a mighty oak, as soft as the feathers on a dove’s breast? She had seen enough in me to lift me from obscurity to my strange life in the royal household. I owed her everything. No, I was not sorry to sit with her as her life ebbed.

“Is Isabella here?” she asked.

“No, my lady. She is in France with her husband.”

“Of course.” Philippa’s lips tried ineffectually to smile. “I’m astonished she hasn’t washed her hands of him.” She managed a breath of a laugh. Then: “Where is Lionel…? Ah, no…I remember now.…” Tears sprang to her eyes, for her beloved Lionel was dead. In the wine-fueled aftermath of a glorious marriage in Italy to the Visconti heiress, Lionel had succumbed to some nameless fever. Philippa sighed. “I am so weary, Alice.…”

I bathed her face and lips, my mind gripped with fear.

“Read to me from my missal. The prayer to the Virgin…”

So I did, and it gave her comfort.

“Am I dying, Alice?” The assent stuck in my throat. “I see it in your face. Tell me this, if the first reply is too hard. Will it be long now?”

“No, Majesty. It will not be long.”

“Bless you. You have always been honest. Is the King still in England?”

“Yes, my lady. He is in London—at the Tower.”

“I need him.” Her breath barely stirred the air. “Send for him. Tell him…tell him not to delay.”

“I will, Your Majesty. Immediately.”

“Will Edward blame me?” she wept. “For diverting him from his duties in France?”

“No, my lady.” I wiped away the tears from her cheeks, a task that she was unable to do for herself. How could I not weep with her? “The King will never blame you. He loves you more than life. The King would never forgive you if you did not tell him how you suffered.”

I thought about Edward’s sense of duty. It was what I admired in him. When the French had marched into Ponthieu and threatened the security of Gascony itself, Edward had abandoned his policy of peaceful coexistence and begun to plan for a new war, reclaiming his relinquished title of King of France. Some might whisper that he was too old to plan such a sustained invasion—not like the old days—but what choice did a man of such pride have? The Prince, still laid low, remained too weak to lead an army, so therefore Edward must resume the mantle of command. He was King. All that he had achieved in his lifetime must not be thrown away. So in that very month, he had sent John of Gaunt to Calais. Edward and an army would follow. Even now he was at the Tower, organizing the invasion.

But now he would not. He would come to Philippa’s side, whatever the cost. England’s power in France would weigh lightly in the balance if the Queen was in need. I prayed he would be in time. The shade of death squatted in the shadows in the corner of the room, obscene in its presence, growing stronger as the days passed.

Edward arrived by royal barge that beat its way against the tide along the Thames, and I went down to the landing stage with others of the household to greet him. Perhaps to warn him a little. I had not seen him for six weeks, and the change in him was unmistakable.

Oh, I doubt it was noticeable to a subject who simply saw the outer glory of the King of England. Still fair and upright, still handsome with regal presence, he had a smile and a word for those who had rowed him from the Tower. His tunic flattered his broad shoulders. The golden lions stitched against the red were truly resplendent, and the sun gilded his hair as the barge was maneuvered into the river landing.

But I was aware of the change from the moment he stood up from his seat at the stern. Once, he would have stood for the whole journey, dignified but approachable, the leader of his people, to see and be seen. Now he sat. Furthermore—I saw it even if no one else did—he took his page’s arm as he stepped from barge to land, not heavily but enough to give him stability. He stretched as if his limbs were stiff, and his first strides were uneven. The lines around eyes and mouth were more deeply engraved than when I had kissed him farewell. Oh, Edward! How grief and the passage of years can leave their mark. How the burden of duty can wear away the body’s resilience. My first thought was to go to him, to kiss away the sorrow that darkened his eyes, but I kept my distance. This was no time for greetings from the King’s lover. I had no place in this homecoming, and I knew nothing I could do would assuage Edward’s suffering. For a moment I wished I had not come, but stayed at the Queen’s side, where I had an acknowledged role. And I felt a cold foreboding for the coming days.

No Queen. No place. No position. No reason for Alice Perrers to remain at Court.

I pushed away the bleak thought as fast as it assaulted me. Nothing new here, merely the imminent inevitability of it. Now, in this moment, all that mattered was Edward’s reunion with his stricken wife.

The steward bowed. I curtsied. Edward acknowledged the waiting group of courtiers. I actually took a step backward, but the King’s eyes sought me out.

“Mistress Perrers.”

“Your Majesty.”

“Speak to me of my wife.” His voice was low and harsh with unshed tears. “She is dying?”

“Yes, Sire.”

“Does she know?”

“She is aware. She regretted asking you to come.”

“I could not leave her. How could I? She is everything to me.”

“Yes, Sire.”

I swallowed hard. The heartrending affirmation could not have made my situation clearer. I stepped back again as the King turned to stride up the steps toward the castle, his vigor restored with the urgency to get to Philippa’s side before it was too late. But he halted with his foot on the bottom step and looked back.

“Come with me. She will need you.”

And although I shrank from the task, I obeyed.

So I was witness to their reunion. It hit me harder than I could have imagined, illuminating as it did the lack in my own life. The love shone between them, undiminished by death. Briefly the image of William de Windsor stole into my mind, whether I wished it or not—typical of the man himself. There was something between us, but nothing like this. I could not imagine love like this, beyond the physical, beyond the passage of time. Philippa raised her hand from the bed linen and placed it into the hand of the King, her lord and her love. Edward fell to his knees at her side.

“Dear Edward. You came.” The words were slurred but I heard the pleasure in them.

“Did you ever doubt that I would?”

“No—Alice said you would come.” She glanced momentarily to where I stood beside the door, but I had no importance for her. All her focus was on the man at her side. “What a marriage we have had. All these years.”

“I would wed you again. Tomorrow. This very minute.” Edward smoothed the thinning, matted hair back from her brow.

“And you have as much charm as ever.” The gasp might have been a laugh.

“You are all I ever wanted.”

The words struck me with such force that I stepped back against the tapestry—I could feel the stitching and the underlying stone solid against my back—to give them space. You should not be here! My conscience was implacable.

“When we are separated…” I heard the Queen whisper.

“No!”

“When we are separated,” she repeated, “will you grant me three requests, my dear lord?”

Edward inhaled. “Lady. Whatever you ask, it will be done.”

“Then—settle my debts. I can’t bear that they be left unpaid.”

“You always were extravagant.”

The gentleness in Edward’s reply caused my tears to overflow.

“I know. Will you do it? And then fulfill the gifts and bequests I’ve made.”

“I will.”

“And at the last—Edward, my love, will you lie beside me in Westminster Abbey when your time on earth is finished?”

“Yes. I will.”

Edward bent his brow to her hand. They remained like that, the room still about them, and I left them to their solitude, closing the door quietly. They did not notice. They did not need me.

I walked unseeing through the antechambers, making my way to climb to the deserted wall walk. My thoughts were appallingly self-absorbed, but I could not redirect them. I wept for the two I had just left, but where would I lie when I was dead? Who would lie beside me, at his or my request? I was as alone and friendless as I had always been, except for this fast-fading woman and her broken husband. Who could I call friend in the royal household? No one. Who would even have a thought for me? William de Windsor might—but his was a self-interest as strong as mine. Wykeham would condemn me.

So I wept out of grief for Philippa and Edward and myself. And out of fear of a future I could no longer see.

Her last moments came on the fifteenth day of August, when Wykeham gave the Queen the last sacrament. We were with her, Edward and young Thomas of Woodstock, and all her damsels, who wept bitter tears, as did the household, from falconer to meanest scullion. Philippa had left her mark on the lives of everyone who served her. I prayed for her comfort and her soul, touching for the final time her foot beneath the sumptuous bedcover with its embroidered sprawl of Plantagenet lions. Near the end, she raised her hand to beckon me, and whispered, her words barely stirring the air between us.

“Promise me!” she begged.

“I promise.”

Did she know what she had asked of me? Did she understand how heavy the burden would become? I think she did not, yet I would do it. I would continue to repay the debt I owed her.

The King held the Queen’s hand as she drew her final breaths, and kissed her forehead.

“Edward. My love. What a family we made together…”

Edward bowed his head and wept unashamedly. I might own his affection, his respect, the demands of his body. Philippa owned his heart and always would, even to her grave. Edward had lost his lodestar. His rock. His clear place in the firmament.

So passed the Queen from this life. It was as if the great castle had been hollowed out, robbed of its entity. Windsor became a dark place. Edward walked the rooms and corridors like a ghost, all his vigor and Plantagenet spirit eclipsed by grief. He did what he must, what was necessary, but it was as if a husk of a man issued orders. And he did it alone. I, his mistress, had no role in these preparations for his wife’s final resting place. His dear Philippa’s embalmed body would be transported to the Tower by royal barge along the Thames, and from there in procession through the streets before reaching Westminster, so that all might witness and mourn her passing. She would be buried in the chapel of Edward the Confessor, as she had wished, in the tomb long prepared for her, with an effigy that showed her as she was, a plain woman with an abundance of love in her heart.

In a voice devoid of emotion, Edward acknowledged all the Queen’s gifts: The Exchequer would pay me—and the other damsels—the sum of ten marks twice yearly at Easter and Michaelmas for services to the Queen. We were given a length of black cloth for mourning garments. I was not singled out in any way.

So it was finished.

What now?

You are the King’s lover. That will not change.

But Edward did not want me in his bed. He never sent for me, not once in all those endless days when I could see his suffering. My heart reached out to him, but it was as if he were shrouded in an impenetrable mist from which he was unable or unwilling to break free. He did not want me, did not need me, and so I must wait to see my fate.

The damsels had a final task to complete, and I took my place amongst them. At the King’s command, we packed away all the Queen’s possessions. The hangings and covers of her magnificent bed were cut and stitched into vestments for the clergy of York Minster in memory of that exultant day when Edward and Philippa were wed there. It kept our hands busy if not our minds, and I could not join in the mindless twitterings of the young women, who would go home to their families unless another Court position opened up for them.

And then it was Christmas, a festivity that we did not celebrate. The dancing chambers remained silent. In concern for the King, John of Gaunt returned from Calais to spend the doleful season with his father, shut away at the hunting lodge at Kings Langley, but Edward did not hunt. Chancellor Wykeham, who traveled frequently on royal business between Windsor and Kings Langley, wore a troubled expression. I did not see Edward again until I accompanied Philippa’s embalmed body to the Tower in the first days of the New Year. When Edward stood beside Philippa’s coffin as it was placed in the tomb, there seemed to be as little life in his still, silent figure as there was in the body they finally laid to rest. His face was gray and worn, head bowed, fingers flexing convulsively on the hilt of his sword. Age had placed its hand on him with cruel precision.

As the solemn words came to an end, I watched Wykeham at the King’s side make the sign of the cross. His eyes moved slowly from Edward’s ashen face to mine, then dropped when he saw me watching him, as if it had been a mere chance meeting of our eyes.

I did not think it was.

At Edward’s orders the solemnities were to last for six days. I thought, in despair, that for Edward they would never end. He returned to the Tower and shut himself away from everyone.

What was I to Edward in these dark days? That was simple enough to describe. I was nothing. I did not exist. I saw him only once, and that a chance passing in an antechamber.

Edward walked through with Wykeham, the same easy stride, but there the similarity ended. There was no appreciation of his surroundings, no ready word for those who came within his recognition. I think he recognized no one.

I curtsied.

Without even a glance, Edward continued to stride ahead with some grim intent.

“Mistress Perrers is here, Sire,” Wykeham murmured to the King, surprising me. He actually touched the King’s arm to claim his attention.

The King stopped, bowed. “Mistress Perrers.”

His eyes slid over my face but they did not linger, did not hold my gaze. His bow had been perfunctory, such as he might make to the lowliest of his servants who performed some menial task for him.

“Sire!” I smiled, struggling to mask my concern. “I trust you are well.”

There was no answering smile. Was this the man whose ready laughter had echoed from the roof in the Great Hall at Havering? Somber black had replaced the crimson and gold of his tunic. Giving no reply, he proceeded toward the door, presenting me with a good solid view of his back. The lover who had stripped the gown from my body and wrapped me in furs was far removed from this man who passed me by without a second thought. I rose to my full height, watching him in astonishment and despair. Wykeham shrugged helplessly and followed. I was left standing alone.

It seemed that Philippa was not the only one to be interred in Edward the Confessor’s chapel. It was as if a hand had been slapped down to still the vibrating strings of a lute.

“Where’s the King? It is imperative that I see him.”

“The King is in his private chamber. He will not see you.” If I heard such conversations once in those weeks after Philippa was laid to rest, I heard them a dozen times, and the answer, delivered in the bleakest of tones by William Latimer, steward to the royal household, was always the same, whether the petitioner was noble or commoner.

“His Majesty will see no one.”

A light had been extinguished in Edward’s heart. Abandoning London, he shut himself away in his rooms at Havering, where Philippa had loved to stay, letting matters of government slide. The problems in France, where the Prince was increasingly under attack and still not restored to health, might not have existed for all the interest he took. The country shivered under ice and snow as the rooms of the palace echoed in a weird desolation. The Court whispered, uncertain, in a grip of gloom. A country without its head, without its King. Without leadership.

The whispers intensified. The King was as good as dead.

Philippa’s ladies had dispersed to their families or to other noble households where their skills were in demand as confidante or companion. Not I. The pattern of my life hung on the decision of this king who shut himself away in his chamber. I had never felt so alone, not even when standing in the street, a new widow. At least Greseley came to find me then. No one saw my need at Havering.

I wrote to William de Windsor, perversely, since I had hedged on the promise to do so, informing him of the lack of policy toward Ireland and the reason for it, and perhaps to tell someone of my own insecurity.

The King gives no direction to government. I doubt he thinks of Ireland at all. You are your own man, free to administer affairs as you wish. I think you may expect no more information from me. I fear my days at Court are numbered.

And then, on a whim—perhaps an ill-considered one:

I miss your forthright conversation, Sir William. Sometimes I wish you were recalled again to London to answer for your sins. I think I might give you a hearing. At the risk of sounding weak and destroying your expressed admiration of me, I have no one to talk to here.

Such was my isolation. I sent the letter but had no knowledge of its arrival.

We were a Court in waiting for Edward to emerge from his mourning and take up his sword once more. Did not King Arthur sleep, to return to England in her hour of need? Surely Edward would do the same.

He did not.

I tried to reach him, of course, only to find a guard on his door. I was not even announced. The King did not wish to see me. I wrote to Edward, persuading Latimer to ensure my plea was delivered.

Don’t shut me out, my lord. Let me talk to you. Let me give you solace. We both suffer from the loss of your dear wife. We can mourn together.

Remember what we have been to each other.

Allow me to return to your side.

My pen hovered over the page as I considered whether to tell him of the child that grew in my belly. I did not. Latimer took the note but there was no reply.

“Did he read it?” I asked.

“I don’t think he did.” Latimer’s face was stark with furrows of concern. “It is impossible to reach him.”

Almost I admitted defeat. Short of running the guard through with his own sword and battering down the door, I could achieve nothing.

But it broke my heart to leave Edward in this trough of despondency. Who would talk to him? Who would read or play chess with him? Who would entice him out of the black pit that he had fallen into? “Get him to see me!” I ordered, even though I had no authority of my own to order anything. I almost laughed at the expression on Latimer’s face. He was unsure whether I was an abomination in the sight of God and man or a heavenly courier sent to release the King from his travails. I closed my hand on his forearm, gripping hard. “Tell the King I carry his child, if you have to. And if you can’t, get Wykeham to do it. But do whatever it takes to get me into the King’s presence!”

Latimer eyed me.

“Do it, Latimer.”

Do it! For all our sakes!

Well, my vehemence had some effect. We were walking, Wykeham and I, Braveheart pattering after us, through the antechambers into the old section of the palace that was now rarely used. At last the Chancellor had come to my room to summon me. Except that this was not the way to the royal apartments.

“Where are we going?”

He did not reply, striding so rapidly, robes billowing, that I could barely keep up. His expression was stormy, his features tight with displeasure.

“Is it Edward?” I asked. “Has he asked for me?”

“No.”

Hope died. “Then where…?”

“Just shut up and wait, woman.…”

He marched on in a surly mood, with me beside him. In truth I was intrigued. This part of the palace was empty and silent, the walls stripped of their tapestries, the floors unswept. I noticed with interest that others had walked this way before us, and recently, their boot prints and scuff marks plain in the dust. The prints stopped at a door that Wykeham pushed open, and I was directed with a brusque nod into a chamber I did not know, my wolfhound shut out to whine and scratch in the antechamber. Much like many others, it was a small room built into the curve of a wall, bright with bars of sunshine angling through the narrow window slits. A fireplace was built into the wall, but there was no fire, and the room was as cold as an unused room could be. A standing table occupied most of the space, with stools set around it, but they were unoccupied. The men in occupation stood in a little group by one of the windows. The room seemed crowded with a heavy presence. It looked, I thought, like a war council.

I glanced across to Wykeham for an explanation, and did not get it.

“Mistress Perrers. Allow me to introduce you.”

His tone was clipped, hard with distaste—but with me or the body of men, or with the whole situation, I could not tell. Nor did I need the introductions. Had I not lived cheek by jowl with them in the various palaces since the day I had come into Philippa’s employ?

I curtsied, my mind working furiously as Wykeham made the introductions. First was William Latimer, Edward’s steward. Then John Neville, lord of Raby. A surprise: Richard Lyons—not a courtier, but a man of finance, a merchant and master of the royal mint. The others: Nicholas Carew, Richard le Scrope, Robert Thorp. All, I realized in that first greeting, united by one common factor: ambition. Their eyes were avid with it, young men who hoped to further their careers in service to the Crown. I did not know whether they were men of talent, but I thought that perhaps they were. As Wykeham closed the door behind me, I saw them more as a feral pack of wolves, ready to pounce on any opportunity to step up the ladder to high office and destroy any fool who dared to stand in their way. But how did I fit into their schemes…?

And then there was one more. A royal son, no less. John of Gaunt.

They bowed.

“Please sit,” Wykeham invited.

I did. So did the conspirators—for surely that was what they were—except for Gaunt, who stood against the wall, arms folded.

“Why am I here?” I asked. I saw no point in adopting innocence or good manners. This meeting was not for public consumption, and I doubted that most of these fine gentlemen, except for Wykeham and perhaps Latimer, would give me the time of day in normal circumstances.

They exchanged glances. Who, I wondered, would be the spokesman?

It was Latimer. “Can we trust you?”

Well, that was forthright enough. I replied in kind. “Unless you are plotting rebellion, or the King’s death, then I expect you can.” There they all sat, faces shuttered. Wary. “Perhaps you are? Is this a plot?”

“Not quite.” The twist of Latimer’s lips in acknowledgment was bleak. “The King has…” He hitched a shoulder under the rich damask bearing Edward’s heraldic device as he searched for a word. “…withdrawn.”

“Withdrawn? A milksop judgment, by God!” I responded. “He has incarcerated himself in his rooms and refuses to come out!”

Latimer cleared his throat. “We must bring him back.”

I looked ’round at the gloomy expressions. “And you cannot?”

I knew they couldn’t. I caught the eye of Gaunt, who had paid a visit to his father less than a week ago, leaving again within an hour with a furious face and spurs used viciously against his horse’s flanks. Now I thought he might reply, but the royal Prince deliberately turned his head to look out of the window, leaving it to Latimer to commit them to whatever devious policy had brought them—and me—here.

“The King sinks further into melancholy. His physicians despair,” Latimer said, and looked at Wykeham, who nodded. “We want you to speak to him.”

“He will not see me. I have tried.” They must know of my failure.

“We can arrange that you do.”

“And what do you want me to say to him?” I played the innocent, enjoying Latimer’s discomfort.

“We want you to…to give him solace…to encourage him to…”

“Say it, Latimer!” Wykeham growled.

Latimer huffed out a breath. “We want you to give him physical comfort.”

“In effect, you want me to play the whore.”

“Yes.” Suddenly Gaunt was there, stepping up to the table, dominating it. He was a vitally handsome man, with his father’s height and fine features, but none of his ease of manner, a man notorious for enjoying the value of women in his own life. He waved Latimer aside and spoke bluntly. “The King is not incapable. He still has the ability to fuck a woman and reap the pleasure of it. It might bring him back to his senses.”

I was shocked to hear the proposal stated so coarsely, and I was not inclined to be compliant when every one of them would have condemned me for daring to take that role.

“Then if that’s what’s needed, pay a palace whore,” I replied with a tight smile.

“Unsatisfactory.” Gaunt brushed the idea away like an annoying fly, with an openhanded swipe. “I hope for a more subtle solution.”

“And you think I can be subtle.”

“I think you have a whole range of talents, discretion being one of them. And you were well liked by the Queen. You could be the answer to our prayers.”

I laughed, surprising them. What a turnabout from these men who viewed me as some form of pond life, dwelling in the filth of unspeakable sin. I had taken Philippa’s place in Edward’s bed; did they now want me to play the role of the loving, maternal Philippa too?

“He needs a confidante as much as he needs a whore.” Gaunt confirmed it.

“A concubine, then.”

He bowed. “Exactly.”

“A wife but not a wife.”

“In so many words…”

“Openly acknowledged by the Court?”

“If we must.”

I looked ’round at them. Not one of them approved. Not one of them wanted this.

“Why me, my lords?” I would make them admit it. I would make them say what had been unsaid through all the years since I had lifted my shift in Edward’s bed.

“Because he has enjoyed your body often enough in the past,” Gaunt snapped.

Of course they knew. All the Court had known, even if it was not spoken of except in murmurings over wine cups or in whispers between lovers, in their efforts to protect Philippa. Even when she was the instigator of the scandal. The sheer hypocrisy of it beat against the walls that hemmed us in, stirring into rampant life my determination to be cowed by no one.

“So I return to Edward as his lover,” I remarked conversationally. “What then?”

“Make him return to government. Make him pick up the reins of authority again. We can’t continue as we are now with the King shut away and the Prince taken to his bed in Gascony.” Gaunt’s fist thumped the board.

“I don’t know that I can.” Gaunt would get no bloodless victory over me.

Wykeham sighed. “You can. You’re a clever woman, Alice.”

I tilted my head and looked at him, noting his use of my name.

“And you’re our last hope.” Latimer flushed at what he had admitted.

I stood as if I might refuse. As if I might leave. How exhilarating was power, knowing that I held them all in the palm of my hand. I took a step.…

“Needs must when the devil’s in control!” Gaunt snapped. “Enough! Here’s the truth of it, Mistress Perrers. We are in mortal danger. The days of England’s greatness appear to be draining away, and I smell rebellion in the air. We need my father at the helm. He’s not young, but he’s still capable of wearing the crown and ruling, if only we can…” He lifted his hands in near despair. “If only we can catch his interest and bring him back to life.”

We. We were in collusion. We were a circle of plotters, taut with expectation, all driven, all concerned for the future, our own and England’s, but their repugnace for this negotiation with me smeared the air like the miasma of pestilence. A quick anger shook me, and I turned my stare on Gaunt. By God! I would make them beg.

He turned away to drive his fist into the stone lintel at the window. It was Wykeham, generous Wykeham, who spoke the words.

“Will you do it?” he asked. “Will you rescue our King?”

Again, a beat of hesitation, as I luxuriated in making these men of power and breeding wait on my decision.

Then: “Yes. I will.” And I saw the relief sweep through them, muscles relaxing, smiles appearing. The business was done—or so they thought. But it was not—not to any degree. “And what, my lords, did it take for you to trample over your damned morality and ask me, the King’s whore, for help?”

To do him justice, it was Gaunt who replied. “It will be worth the price if we can restore the King to his powers.” Walking ’round the table, he took and kissed my hand. “We are grateful.”

“How can I refuse so gracious an admission,” I murmured.

There was a concerted sigh. And in that exhalation I realized the truth of what had been done here. The power of these courtiers—excepting Gaunt—their future preferment, their wealth and place in government might rest on the King’s pleasure, but now their ambitions were dependent on me. We all had everything to lose if the King were allowed to fade into obscurity. We were indeed in collusion. But I would not let them off the hook quite yet.

“What’s in it for me?” I asked, distressingly frank.

“What do you want, lady?” Latimer asked, amusing me with the form of address. Much had changed in the last hour. I took a little time, pretending the ideas were new to me.

“Nothing much, my lords.” I smiled at their palpable relief. “A servant. A bedchamber and a parlor with an outlook over the gardens. Clothing and jewels befitting my new position. An income, so that I am not penniless. Am I not worthy of all of that?” And then—what I desired most of all to expunge my memories of past humiliations. “I want recognition, my lords. I want acknowledgment that I am the King’s Concubine. I refuse to live any longer under the shadow of embittered silence and rancorous rumor. There is no one to hurt now by stripping the covers from my relationship with the King.”

Their gratitude was risible; they thought that I had made an easy bargain. What fools they were, as were most men. Did they not know that I would have gone to Edward freely? My compliance did not need to be bought. But a woman must seize her opportunities, as Windsor would have said.

“Furthermore,” I added, “if I am to be involved in the running of the royal household, I need access to the royal Treasury for funds.…”

There was an exchange of glances, an uncomfortable lift of shoulders, but what choice had they? “It can be arranged.” And Gaunt led me to the door, his hand light on mine. I knew little of him other than that Edward had a high regard for him, knew nothing of his ambitions. He was not the heir to the throne. What did he hope for from this agreement? He did not have the look of a man satisfied with life. A premonition touched my nape with chill fingers: that one day I would find out.

At the open door, I smiled and curtsied again.

“I will do it, my lords. I will be Edward’s concubine, openly in the full knowledge of the Court. I will, if it is in my power, restore your King to life.”

So much settled in a dusty room in the old palace. But was it? Now I must turn my mind and all my persuasive powers to the one obstacle to the success of our venture. It was in my mind that it might not be an easy task.

“Will he respond to me?” I asked Braveheart, retrieving her from her unhappy vigil outside the plotters’ door.

She sneezed as she stood and stretched. She foresaw the future as unclearly as I.

Not wishing to let grass grow under my feet, for I could not afford to be squeamish about such matters, I wrote immediately to Greseley.

I anticipate having considerable funds at my disposal, sir. Buy or lease whatever you can for my future comfort.

Greseley acted with exemplary speed. Within the month I was the leaseholder of the Orby lands, with the control of the wardship and marriage of the young heir. Ten manors all told. I was becoming a woman of means.

I had been Edward’s lover for six years, but in all that time I had never been the one to take the initiative. Edward had always sent for me. Yes, I had challenged him on the day of the hunt, but never again. I knew how difficult a proud man could be, how his pride must be allowed to dominate. Edward demanded and I obeyed. A Plantagenet never asked for favors. I had never removed my garments without his invitation or without his participation. I was his minion, and I would not have had it any other way. A strong woman needs a willful man to match her. If not, respect flies out of the window or is crushed underfoot.

Now I stood outside Edward’s apartments, my limbs trembling, and not with the cold air that shivered the tapestries. My belly lurched at what I must do. Tactics, I decided. It must be like planning a battle campaign, knowing when to attack and when to retreat. What, I wondered, would William de Windsor advise this time?

Attack the weakest element in the fortifications and give no quarter until the battle is won. In fact, never give quarter, or the opponent gains ground.

That was no help to me. I must simply use my instincts as a woman and pray that Edward would respond. Holy Virgin, let him not turn me away! I stepped over the threshold, closing the door softly behind me.

First an antechamber, empty and uncannily still. Then an audience chamber in a similar state of abandonment. Finally the Halidon Hill Chamber, a private room, where a man could take his ease with books and music. I knew the room well, with its magnificent tapestry of Edward’s first great military victory, when, still a young man, he had demonstrated to the Scots who was master. On a low stool was a chess game, set up but unplayed. A fire burned low, gleaming on the polished wood of a coffer and a settle and a cupboard. A great chair was set beside the hearth, next to it a coffer set with a flagon and cup, a neglected dish of sweet pasties. Someone had left a candle bracket that was in danger of burning out.

And there was Edward. Every inch the King, bejeweled and clothed in costly fabrics, the mighty Plantagenet, Edward, the third of that name, who had made England a great power for all of forty years, stood as if carved from stone. He did not even turn his head.

I waited, neither speaking nor moving.

“Leave the food and go.” Edward’s voice was rough.

He stared out over the gardens and enclosing walls to the distant meadows and encroaching forest. Or perhaps he stared at nothing at all. He stood straight, legs braced, shoulders firm, head raised. There was nothing amiss with his health, I decided. My heart lifted a little. But the room, apart from the neglected chess game, was curiously impersonal. No books. No documents on the table. No habitual hawk on its roosting pole. Only the magnificent battle scene on the walls, its colors stark, even brutal in their vibrancy as the golden sun glinted on blade and armor sewn in silver thread. It seemed to me that the stitched battlefield dwarfed the King with its splendor. He could not have chosen more apt surroundings in which to sink into oblivion.

Edward did not turn to see whether his order had been obeyed. I did not think he cared.

I would have to make the first move after all.

“A cup of wine, Sire?”

My request dropped into the heavy silence. His body tensed. Slowly, very slowly, he turned, one hand resting on the stone ledge against which I now saw that he leaned. Perhaps he was more fragile than I had first thought.

Then, as the light fell fully on him, I saw what had previously been hidden.

Oh, Edward! What have you done to yourself? And as it hit home: Did you love her so very much?

What weight could my scribbled notes possibly have against this evidence of abject loss? Edward’s face had thinned, the lines between nose and mouth deeply gouged, cheeks hollowed. His throat and neck showed a deterioration of flesh that he could not afford. Worse—far worse—was the dimness of his eye, the blue faded almost to gray, and the pale transparency of his skin. His mouth had not smiled, I thought, for weeks. The hand on the window frame was almost translucent. It looked incapable of wielding a sword.

First compassion. It flooded through me, almost to reduce me to tears. Then came fury as bright as the King’s gold-crowned helm in the tapestry.

What was he doing to himself? How could the victor at Crécy wallow in miserable self-pity! Almost I spoke the words aloud, but then forced my anger to drain away. Ungoverned emotion would achieve nothing. The air around me was stuffed full of it, like goose feathers in a cushion. Smothering. All-enveloping. Edward had allowed it to gain the upper hand. But I knew: Emotion would not serve to accomplish my quest, but female cunning might. It might just save this man from himself and restore him to his uneasy realm. Perhaps in the end Fair Joan’s conclusions on a woman’s need for guile and duplicity were not incomprehensible.

So be it. I trod into his direct line of sight. “My lord.”

“Alice.” His eyes were unfocused; his voice, without its impressive power, grated from disuse.

I walked slowly forward, halting within an arm’s length, interested in Edward’s reaction. He seemed uncertain. And so he would be. I had dressed most conservatively, quiet and discreet as a nun. As a wife! I had laughed as I had donned the somber dark-hued gown and cotehardie more fitting to a housewife than a royal mistress. And so I played out my allotted role: I neither curtsied nor lowered my eyes in dutiful respect. I certainly did not kiss him in greeting, as I might have in the past.

“Yes, Sire,” I stated in a cool manner, hands folded demurely at my waist. “As you see. It is Alice.”

He frowned. “Who let you in?”

“Wykeham.”

“I don’t want to talk to you.”

This was not good!

“As I am aware. You don’t have to. I’ll talk to you.”

There was quick surprise in his eyes. Perhaps irritation. “I didn’t send for you.”

“No. I gave up waiting.”

Edward’s initial response was now overlaid by disquiet. Not quite disapproval, but not far off. Good! That was what I wanted. Would he order me to go?

“I would rather you weren’t here. I would be alone.” Not quite an order to leave, although I doubted he would see the difference.…

My reply was as flat as Wykeham’s new paving in the great Court at Kings Langley. “Time for reflection is good, my lord. And I have reflected much.” I put a hint of bite into the words. “Over the two months I have reflected—since you last spoke with me.”

“Two months?”

“It is more than two months since you buried Philippa and shut yourself up here.”

The vertical line dug between his brows. “I had not realized.…”

“Then you should. It’s far too long for a king to shut himself away from his subjects.”

I waited to see whether the Plantagenet temper would surface, and was disappointed when it didn’t. My success was not a certain thing, even though I had thought long over this, as I unpacked my clothes in the new rooms that had been immediately set aside for me—Latimer was nothing if not an efficient steward. If Edward rejected me now, how should I force him to take note of me? Sexual allure? Not that. He was too solitary, too worn down with grief. Later, perhaps, but seduction was not yet the path forward. Stern admonitions—not that either. Plantagenets did not react well to stern admonitions from their subjects, even their lovers. Compassion? No—he would see that as pity.

I was here to draw Edward back from the brink of whatever hell he had made for himself, with cold logic. Had I a view to my place at Court? My own financial security? Of course I had. But my future and Edward’s healing need not be entirely separate. I had no guilt as I poured the two cups of spiced wine—no longer warm but still palatable—and held one out. He took it automatically.

“I’m leaving Havering tomorrow. Drink with me to my safe journey.” I did not smile. I was brisk.

“Leaving…?”

“There’s nothing to keep me here now.”

“Where…?”

“Ardington. I have a mind to see if it suits me to live there permanently.”

Edward did not reply. So I would stir the pot a little more. I sat, even when he did not—such a breach of royal etiquette!—sipped the wine, inspected one of the cherry tarts on the plate, and bit into it. “This is delicious. Come, Edward.” I made deliberate use of his name. “I can’t eat all these myself.”

He sat, but not close, regarding me as if I had transformed into a hunting cat that had just unsheathed it claws. “Why are you going?”

“I am no longer a royal damsel. I am not needed.”

I let the silence play out, finishing the tart, licking my fingers, but in a businesslike manner. And then: “Have you thought about me at all through the past weeks, Edward?”

He shook his head.

“What have you been doing?”

“I have been thinking.…” His voice trailed off.

“I expect you’ve been thinking of all you’ve achieved,” I observed. “All that you’ve done since the day you cast off your mother’s authority and seized the ruling of England in your own hands. I imagine that took a lot of courage for a young man who’d barely reached maturity.”

“I have thought of that.…”

“Philippa helped you, didn’t she?”

For the first time, Edward smiled, a strained affair. “She was my strength.”

“Tell me about it.”

“I don’t think I could have done it without her. My mother was a ruthless woman, and I was of an age to need a regent.…”

It was as if a wall had been breached, allowing the pent-up waters to escape. First a trickle, but fast becoming a flood. The old tale of the beautiful but vicious Queen Isabella, who would have ruled England with her notorious lover, Roger Mortimer, at her side, keeping the young Edward as close as a prisoner. Until Edward arranged a coup to bring Mortimer down, to strip his mother of her regency. He was all of eighteen years old, but the memories of that night in Nottingham when he took back his power were as vivid as if they had happened yesterday.

I nodded. “And Philippa helped you to stand firm, claim your birthright.”

Edward’s face was alight with it. “She was magnificent.”

“She must have been very proud of you.”

The light vanished. The rush of words dried up in a summer drought. Edward frowned, staring down into the cup, and I saw his jaw clench at some unpalatable truth. I knew what it was. I would say it.

“Philippa would not be proud of you now, Edward.”

“No…”

“She would be horrified. She would berate you! Philippa would order you to look forward, not back.”

At last his eyes lifted from whatever images he saw in his wine and slid to mine, and I saw true recognition there, and a flash of resistance. Good. Excellent.

“Have you come to berate me too?” he asked. “It is not your place.”

“No. How should I? I am the lowest of your subjects and no longer have a claim on you or the Queen. I have come to say good-bye.”

“I suppose you wish to be reunited with your sons.”

“Yes. Our sons. Sons are very important. They are the only family I have. So, will you drink to my safe journey?”

He sipped the wine absentmindedly, his thoughts still far distant.

“Edward…!” How difficult this was. Was the only way to get his attention to empty my cup over the royal head?

“My son. My heir, the Prince. He is so ill.…” His words were spoken with difficulty as if he had to search for each one. “When I was his age I rode at the head of my army. What a sight we were.…But my son cannot ride. He is carried into battle in a litter. All I have achieved, destroyed…”

Panic fluttered, rapid wings beneath my heart. I was losing him again between the victorious past and the unpalatable present. I stood up, placed the cup on the coffer. I had to throw the dice with callous disregard, and risk the outcome.

“It seems I must leave without your good wishes after all.” I walked to the door. My hand reached for the latch, and still there was no response. I would have to admit my failure. To Wykeham and Gaunt and the rest. I would have to leave my king, even though every sense urged me to stay.…

“Don’t go.”

It was quietly spoken, yet firmly. I exhaled slowly, but still I addressed my question to the smooth grain of the wood under my hand. “Give me one good reason why I should not.”

“I want you to stay.”

I held my breath.

“I need you, Alice.”

I held still, eyes closed tight. I heard the brush of his tunic as he stood, the click of metal on wood as he placed the cup beside mine, his soft footsteps. I felt his body fill the space behind me, but he did not touch me.

“I was wrong, Alice. Don’t go.”

Against all my inner compassion, I kept my back to him.

“God’s Blood! Look at me! I would rather not be addressing the back of that excessively unattractive hood you’ve chosen to wear!”

There it was. The command was back. But I would not succumb too quickly. I was not a fortress driven into surrender by a light threat and a call to parley.

“Two months—and you haven’t once asked to see me. You feel lost without Philippa—I understand that”—I resented the quick flame of old jealousies—“but you must know how unloved and unwanted I have felt,” I said. “I see no future for myself here if you don’t need me.” His hands were on my shoulders, turning me around so that I must face him. He was really looking at me, seeing me. At last!

And Edward tilted his chin. “Is that why you’ve clothed yourself as a drab? Like some penurious widow about to enclose herself into a convent and fill her life with prayers and good works? Perhaps I should send you off with some new gowns. How will you catch a man’s eye otherwise?”

And there was the humor I had missed, a glint of it as the sun struck obliquely across his features.

“The only eye I wish to catch is yours!” I remarked with the slightest lift of my chin to match his, some would say with arrogance. I would not smile yet.

Edward bent his head and kissed me, my brow, then my lips, at first as if it were a difficult thing for him to do, to make this contact with a woman, like revisiting an old memory, uncertain of what he would discover on the half-forgotten journey. But then his mouth warmed against mine as his hands slid from my shoulders and closed around mine.

“Why is it that you make me feel renewed?” he asked.

I could feel the growing strength of his intellect as he sought my face for the answer. And as if he had found it, he raised my hands, still cupped in his, and pressed his lips to each palm, to the tip of each of my fingers, reacquainting himself with me after a long absence. Yet still we had a way to travel.

“How I have missed you, Alice. Why did I not realize it?”

“Because you closed yourself off to all but grief.”

“Will you change your mind and stay here?”

“You too might change your mind. Tomorrow you might banish me!”

Temper flashed in Edward’s face. “I order you to stay! Your King orders you! I need you to remain here.”

The temper. The possession. The authority. They were all returned in good measure. I hid my smile but stood on my toes to kiss Edward’s cheek.

He was already stripping the maligned hood from me so that my hair, unbraided beneath it, fell over my shoulders. He clenched his hand in it, into a fist.

“What lovely hair you have. Why do I feel that I have been outmaneuvered? You have never worn anything half so ugly as this.” He dropped the hood to the floor.

“I have not needed to,” I replied. “I had to do something to catch your attention.”

And Edward laughed softly. At last he laughed. I led him over to the settle against the wall and pulled him down beside me. I would not let him go quite yet. I didn’t trust his mood sufficiently. Reaching for the platter on the tray, I offered it.

“Eat one of these. You must be hungry.”

“I suppose I must. If you eat them all, you’ll lose your figure.”

The final attack, the lethal thrust against which I prayed he would be helpless.

“I will anyway, my lord, with or without the sweetmeats.” His stare was instant and knowing, on my face, my waistline. “I am carrying your child. Are you pleased?”

The King abandoned the sweet delicacy and turned his face into my hair. “I didn’t know. You have to stay with me. I’ll not have a child of mine raised without my knowledge. Stay, Alice. In God’s name, stay.”

I kept my incipient victory close as I unraveled another skein of my plotting. Edward must return to his people too. “Only if you’ll take me hunting tomorrow. Please do,” I invited, leaning against his shoulder. “I have no one to ride with who does not damn me as a daughter of Satan. Wykeham has taken to praying over me. And my mare needs exercise. She’s eating her head off in the stables.”

“You have been lonely.” How clever he was at reading between my words. “I’ve neglected you, haven’t I?”

He was mine. Color stained his cheeks; the years dropped away. Inwardly I rejoiced as I saw that the Plantagenet had returned. “Yes, you have,” I said solemnly. “And now you must make recompense.”

He stood and pulled me to my feet. “As I will. What is it my lady wishes?”

“Call a hunt, Edward. Let your Court see you. Let them know that the King is come again. Promise me.” Still the slightest hesitation. “Promise me! Soon it will be too late—I will be too large to climb onto a horse!”

“I promise. Stay, Alice. I have missed you.”

So I did. His kiss was long and deep with relief and an awakening of passion. “Come to bed, Alice. It’s been a long time.”

And so we returned to the vigor and heat of past days in the royal bed, where we could pretend that all was well. Edward took me with mutual satisfaction, confirming Gaunt’s crude assessment of his male powers, and I could make the King forget the encroachment of age.

“You are a pearl of great price, my beloved Alice.”

“And you are King of England. The country needs you.”

“I shall rule.” The self-regard was restored. “With you at my side.”

Triumph surged through my blood as I gave my body to him once more. I will look after him, Philippa, I vowed. I will care for him, nurture him, and love him. And I kissed his mouth for my own pleasure, even as I acknowledged within my heart: Edward was no longer the man who had first taken me to his bed, the man who had first commanded me to his bed. But for now I had pushed back the shadows.

The hunt met in the courtyard, the denizens of the Court clad in velvet and furs. Horses stamped in the cold and sidestepped at the delay. The huntsmen swore as the hounds swarmed under everyone’s feet. There was a sense of anticipation in the air that had been missing for a long time.

We waited. Would the King come?

We shuffled and puffed clouds of mist into the icy air. Squires brought ’round cups of spiced ale. We began to shiver at the delay.

Dark and saturnine in the middle was Gaunt, astride a glossy bay that resented the lack of action more than most. Beside him in the hands of a groom was the rangy gray that Edward loved. Deliberately Gaunt’s eye found me in the crowd. No need for him to voice his concern, his blame at what he obviously saw as my failure. I returned his stare with a stony expression. I had done all I could.

Time passed.

Expressionless, Gaunt motioned to the groom to lead the gray stallion away. He drew on his gauntlets. “We’ll go.”

He raised his hand to draw the attention of the crowd, for the huntsman to blow the stirring note to move off. I sighed and admitted defeat, turning my mare’s head toward the stables. I had no belly for the hunt without Edward.

“You’ll wait for me, Gaunt.”

He always was the master of surprise, of display and self-aggrandizement. The King strode down the steps and across the courtyard, taking the reins from the groom and swinging into the saddle with all the agility expected of him. By chance—or was it royal command!—a shaft of sunlight broke through to gild his leather and fur, sparking glints off the ruby that pinned the peacock feather to his cap and the jeweled chain on his breast. He smiled at the expectant crowd.

“An excellent morning. My thanks for waiting for your King—and my apologies. You need wait no longer.” He was self-deprecating, with the same formidable charm that had won him more friends than enemies during his long reign. There were murmured greetings from all sides.

The huntsmen began to move from the courtyard, Edward riding beside his falconer, taking a hawk onto his wrist as if he had never been absent, except perhaps for the first moments of stiffness in his posture as he settled into the saddle. The air of melancholy had vanished with the donning of the handsome wolfskin cloak against the cold. As I hung back to take my habitual place at the rear with the women, I felt a warmth spread through my chest and my belly where the child lay. And I heard what I had prayed I might hear as Edward turned his head to address his son.

“After the hunt, come and see me. We must make plans—for our armies in France. It’s more than time.”

“Yes, Sire.”

Gaunt, in his swaggering arrogance, which was as much a part of him as his raptor’s face, gave me no recognition, but I could see the depth of his gratification as the brisk wind whipped color into his cheeks. Father and son exchanged a handclasp, reunited and set to enjoy the occasion. I tucked my skirts securely beneath my legs and nudged my mare forward to follow the rest. I too would enjoy the hunt. When the huntsman lifted his horn to blow the gone-away, I gathered up my reins.

The huntsman did not blow, his action arrested by Edward’s hand on his arm.

“Mistress Perrers…”

All eyes fastened on the King, who had called the halt, and then shifted to discover me in the crowd. My hands closed sharply on the reins, causing my animal to jib. Never had the King addressed me so openly in public.

“Sire.” I sounded breathless even to my own ears.

“Ride with me.”

I hesitated, but only for a moment before I pushed my horse through the brightly clad melee to Edward’s side.

“Sire…”

“You said you wanted to hunt. So you shall.” He grasped my bridle to pull my mare closer, took my hand in his, then leaned over and kissed my temple. “You were right. It’s good to hunt, and I have been remiss.” His voice fell to an intimate whisper. “You will not be lonely today.”

Around me there was a general intake of breath. To single me out in so obvious a fashion! The Court was astounded. Hot blood rushed to my face so that my cheeks flamed with it. To be kissed so wantonly in public…! But was this not what I wanted, this acknowledgment in the face of lords and commons alike?

“Will you ride with me?” he prompted, forcing me to make a statement of our relationship. No one was to be allowed to fail to understand its meaning.

“I will, Sire.”

As I fell in beside him, my hand still in his, the courtiers streaming out into the water meadow, the huntsman blowing the gone-away at last, I could do nothing but smile as brightly as the fitful sun that chose that moment to bathe us in gold. Edward had given me recognition in public. I was the acknowledged royal favorite.

I suppose my enemies multiplied that day. Did I care? I did not, for the flame of my ambition burned fiercely. It was a momentous day. The hounds ran to ground a particularly fine and royally tined buck. Edward’s features sharpened and glowed with the exercise as his body relaxed into the familiar demands of the saddle. His laughter rang out, and the Court breathed a concerted sigh of renewed confidence. Even Gaunt looked content, despite my having replaced him at the King’s side.

I rode beside Edward for the whole of the hunt. When the hounds picked up the scent and the riders spurred into a gallop, he restrained his mount to stay beside me, conscious of my state of health. He could not have made his choice plainer if he had ordered the Chester Herald to announce the news with a blast of his trumpet.

Alice Perrers was the King’s Concubine.

I had to ponder this reversal of my fortunes, and did so in my room, where I stripped off my hunting finery and ordered my maid to fill the copper-bound tub with hot water. I sank into it with a sigh. I had not hunted for some weeks; my muscles complained, but not beyond what was tolerable. In the herb-scented water I inspected my belly that was rounded with the growing child: It would not be possible for me to hide it, and nor did I need to. For the first time I could display my increasing girth brazenly.

My name, in one form or another, had been on every pair of lips that day. Edward’s very public showing of what all the Court knew, but pretended not to, had seen to that. No longer secret, no longer hidden, no longer a source of shame for the Queen, my position was exposed naked for all to speak of. It was Edward’s gift to me, his recognition before the whole of the Court, with a generosity I could never have imagined. Made public and acknowledged by all, I was secure under the King’s protection.

I repeated the epithets I had heard as the hunt pursued the hapless deer.

Alice the whore: not one I would choose.

La Perrers: better—but it had been said with a sneer.

Royal mistress, royal paramour: a ring of authority here, perhaps.

But this one I liked much better: King’s Concubine. Official. Untouchable. Powerful. My sharing of the King’s rooms and the King’s bed was an undeniable fact; it lacked legal sanction, but the King’s stated preference gave me status. No one, no one, would dare slight me, the King’s chosen companion. Even Gaunt had managed to honor me with a deep obeisance as the hunt dismounted. I had never dreamed of such a gift, made in the face of the great and good, of which I was neither.

“Thank you, Edward,” I whispered, my hands protective over my belly.

I let my head fall back on the rim of the tub and closed my eyes, enjoying my achievement.