Courting Darkness

by Robin LaFevers

  He smooths my hair back from my face. “Do not be so modest, my dear.”

  “I am not being modest, so much as practical.”

  His laughter feels like an invisible velvet rope looping about my neck.

  I push to a sitting position. “Truly, I have no wish for such things. Knowing that I brought you pleasure is reward enough.” Risky words to utter, in case he takes them to heart.

  “Well, as my mistress you may lead as simple a life as you wish. No one will dare comment upon it.”

  Tiny wings of desperation begin to beat inside my breast. “Your Majesty,” I whisper, “I cannot be your court favorite.”

  For the first time in hours, he frowns, and a faint note of arrogance colors his voice. “Why not?”

  “You are newly married to a young queen. A queen who is soon to be crowned in front of all your subjects. They will be hoping for an heir, and soon. To have a court favorite so early on feels as if it risks their goodwill.”

  He, too, sits up. “I am the king. I do not need their goodwill.”

  “Of course not, but the new queen does. And even kings can benefit by the goodwill of their people.”

  He says nothing, but I see the truth of my words reach him. He takes my hand, holding—​trapping—​it in his own. “I will have you by my side, official court favorite or no, and I will give you something to show my deep appreciation and regard, whether you choose it or I.”

  “A gift, a true gift,” I tell him, “is to be given freely, with no thought of receiving something in exchange.”

  “I know, and you are one of the few who has done precisely that—​given to me of yourself freely and without expectation.” It is all I can do not to squirm at this lie. “And now I wish to do the same for you.”

  “Very well.” I fold my hands, place them on my stomach, and stare at the ceiling.

  He watches me a moment, then leans forward. “What are you doing?” he whispers.

  “I am praying, Your Majesty. Praying to see what gift I should ask you for.” It is not—​quite—​a lie, for I am praying, but I am praying that I do not overstep again. After a few more minutes pass, I turn on my side and prop my head on my elbow. “The gift I would ask is not for me, but for those whom I care about.”

  His face softens. “Who are these that you care about, and what can I do to help them?”

  I close my eyes and steady my breath. “It is a convent, Your Majesty. The convent where I was raised.”

  “But of course I will help a convent!”

  I grimace faintly. “I have heard this is not a convent that you care for, and I fear in asking for them that you will think less of me.”

  “My dear, Gen! How can I think less of you when you have shown such nobility of spirit and generosity toward others? Please, name your convent and how I can help them.”

  “It is the convent of Saint Mortain. I would ask that you not disband them, but allow them to continue their worship.”

  He manner cools, his body easing away from mine. “The convent of Saint Mortain?”

  “Yes, Your Majesty.”

  “And what is your connection to them?” He is vexed, even though he said he would not be.

  “It is the convent where I was raised before my father had me sent to court.”

  My stomach dips as he abruptly rises from the bed. When he shrugs into a chamber robe of deep blue velvet, I become painfully aware of my own nakedness. “A convent that serves the patron saint of death seems an odd place to send a young girl to be raised. One can only question your father’s judgment.”

  The ice beneath my feet is thin; one miscalculation, and it will crack. “It was the tradition in his family. They sent their daughters there for generations. He thought only to continue that tradition.”

  He is quiet as he pours himself some wine. He does not offer me any. “What does one learn at the convent that serves the patron saint of death?”

  His words sow further seeds of misgiving. “Your Majesty, surely you know, else you would not have made the decision to disband it.”

  “Surely I do know, but I wish to hear it from one who was raised there. I will confess that I have not spoken directly with one of his novitiates before.”

  What—​or how much—​to tell him? Mayhap, hearing directly from one of us will help change his mind. But how much did he know of our practices before he closed the convent door? Giving myself time to choose my words carefully, I scoot up so that I am sitting against the bolster at the head of the bed and drag the thick coverlet up around my shoulders, more to ward off the chill than to cover my nakedness. Even so, the king’s gaze dips down to my breasts. “We learned many things, Your Majesty. We learned of the complex nature of death, how it is not simply something that sneaks into our lives unwelcome, but can serve as justice or mercy or simply a passing.” I must be honest enough with him that if he is testing me, I will not fail. “We learned of the ways death can be delivered—​through illness and weapons, disease and poison.”

  At the word poison, he gaze drops to the goblet in his hand. I hurry to add. “We also learned of antidotes and means of protection, but mostly that all death comes through Him.”

  His fingers on the stem of the goblet tighten. “The Church says such things come from God.” His voice is expressionless, telling me nothing.

  “Of course they do. But once God has decided, it is Mortain to whom the task falls. Just as while it is God who grants us protection or safe crossing, it is Saint Peter or Saint Christopher who carries out our deliverance.”

  “Ah.” He takes another sip of wine. “Now tell me why you think I’ve disbanded them.”

  “Your Majesty, I am in no position to question your judgment. I am only asking for an act of mercy for those that I care about.”

  He smiles again, fleeting but genuine. “No. I mean, tell me why you think the convent has been disbanded. I did not even know of its existence until you told me of it just now.”

  It feels as if someone has grabbed my stomach and hurled it down six flights of stairs. Cold dread seeps into my limbs. “Then I am sorry to have bothered you with such a trifling problem. Clearly the information I received was wrong.” Angoulême lied to me! But why?

  I remember how closely I checked the letter, and I would still swear it was not a forgery.

  “Clearly, and I would like to know who gave you this information.”

  “It was Count Angoulême who told me, although he did so after receiving a letter from the abbess.”

  His eyebrows shoot up into his hairline. “Count Angoulême was in communication with the abbess?”

  Rutting goats! This ditch I had no intention of digging is now threatening to swallow me whole. “But of course, Your Majesty. She would occasionally inquire after my welfare. She was fond of all her pupils and would ask after me upon occasion. But again, I fear I must have misunderstood the message the count conveyed on her behalf.”

  The king studies me with hooded eyes. “I wonder . . .” he says, tapping his finger on the stem of his wineglass. After a moment, he abruptly sets it down, then walks away from the bed. “Tell me,” he says, his voice drifting over his shoulder, “do you know why I was raised so far away from the court, stuck in a lesser castle like a prisoner?”

  As he turns around, I see that he is carrying my gown. When he reaches the bed, he tosses it to me. “You may get dressed.”

  Afraid to take my eyes off him, I move out from under the covers, to the side of the bed, and pull my chemise over my head. It feels good to be covered, as if somehow the fine cotton fabric can protect me from whatever is brewing between us.

  “Do you know?” he prompts.

  “No, Your Majesty.” I grab my skirt and step into it, donning my clothes like a knight his armor.

  “You have seen how well guarded Plessis-lès-Tours is, yes? The traps, the snares, the cunning passageways one must navigate to reach the castle itself.”

  “They are most elaborate.” I slip my arm
s into my sleeves, then begin lacing the bodice of my gown.

  Slowly, he pushes my hands aside and laces my gown himself. “And deadly.”

  “And deadly,” I agree, my heart racing. When my gown is laced, he takes my shoulder and pulls me around so that I face him.

  “It is because, more than anything, my father feared for his safety. He feared for my safety. Some thought him crazed with it, a fearful old man fretting at the dark. But others, Generals Trémoille and Cassel among them, swore his fears were well-founded.

  “Do you know what he feared most, dear Genevieve?”

  My mouth is so dry that I can scarce get the words out. “No, Your Majesty.”

  “Assassins.” He studies me carefully, but I have long practice at this and am able to keep my face impassive.

  “And it’s odd, when you were explaining what you did at the convent, once you said the word poison, that was all that I could think about—​my father’s fear of assassins.”

  His eyes are guarded now, but not so very guarded that in addition to his ire and anger, I can also see that I have hurt him with this admission. He lifts a finger to trace the rapidly beating pulse at my neck. “I have half a mind to fashion a thick silver chain and drape it around your lovely neck and fasten it to my bed.”

  “But why, Your Majesty?” My heart beats even faster, but I do not so much as blink. “I have told you nothing but the truth.” My voice comes out calm and cool.

  “I know.”

  “Indeed, I would not have said anything, had you not pressed me. I was content to leave things as they were.”

  His hands drop from my shoulder. “You were. That is one point in your favor.”

  Is there only one?

  “Does the queen know of this convent?”

  Wishing to somehow contain the damage I have just inflicted, I lie. “I don’t know, Your Majesty. In generations past, the dukes of Brittany have used the novitiates of Mortain for protection, much as your father used the snares at Plessis, but whether her father passed that knowledge on to her before his death, I do not know.”

  A look of understanding, as if he has just figured out some piece of a puzzle, crosses his face, then he shakes his head.

  “They told me Bretons clung to old superstitions and beliefs that should have been discarded long ago, but I thought them to be simply folktales. Now you tell me that they are actively worshiping the patron saint of death and that he has novitiates who serve him. Novitiates who have studied all the ways that death can be delivered. Can you see, dear Genevieve, why I must express some dismay, if not outright anger, to learn of such things? And from my mistress, who I now learn is one of them?”

  It does not seem a good time to point out that I am not his mistress.

  “Have you been sent to kill me, Genevieve?”

  His question is so unexpected that I blurt out, “No! Your Majesty, I have not been sent at all. Not since five years ago when I was came here as a child to serve Madame Regent.”

  “Ah, but now I must question such things, mustn’t I?”

  That is when I understand what I have truly done. He did not know, never knew. It was my own eagerness to save the convent that led me to expose its existence.

  He taps his finger on his chin. “Well, I will not chain you to my bed. But you will be confined to the palace for the time being, and you will make yourself available when I send for you. I will have many, many questions you will need to answer. As will my wife,” he adds, under his breath.

  “But of course, Your Majesty.”

  He looks at me one last time. It is a look full of longing and crushed hopes, of disappointment and the inevitability of betrayal. Then he crosses to the chamber door and calls for his chamberlain to escort me back to my room.

   Chapter 95

  s I leave the king’s chambers, I move slowly, carefully, afraid that one wrong move and I will shatter into a thousand pieces.

  I do not even know what to believe anymore. Did the convent send me a letter to cut me loose from their service? Or did Count Angoulême lie to me? The choices are equally breathtaking.

  I remember so clearly being called into the abbess’s office prior to being sent to France. She explained precisely what would be required of me. If she thought I would balk, she was mistaken. The daughter of a whore does not have many reservations about the nature or value her body can provide, the doors it can unlock, or the secrets it can shake loose. Even so, I asked her what my other options were, for only fools do not weigh all their options before committing to a course.

  She told me that if I did not wish to serve Mortain, she would find me a husband, one suited to my station in life, with whom to spend the rest of my days. She pointed out that while most girls opted for serving the convent, not all did, and some had gone on to have quite normal lives.

  As if that were a good thing. Surely it is to escape such normal lives that we end up at the doorstep of the convent to begin with.

  And yet, after my swearing to follow Mortain’s path, wherever it led, after being isolated with no guidance or so much as a note asking if I was still alive, she has suddenly decided that I should live a normal life after all.

  Or has she?

  The other possibility is that Angoulême lied, but to what end? He cannot be so determined to bed me that he would betray his relationship with the convent. What other purpose could he have for destroying my ties with them? It makes no sense. Unless he is trying to ingratiate himself with the king or regent, but then, surely he would have been the one to tell them of the convent’s existence.

  I finally reach my room, no closer to anything resembling understanding. When I let myself in, I sense immediately that someone else has been there. I pause, but hear no sound of movement or breathing. I close the door behind me and take a cautious step into the room. When nothing happens, I hurry to the cupboard where my knives are hidden in my saddlebag. I snag one before turning back around to face the room. “Show yourself!”

  The only answer is silence. Keeping my eyes on the darkness in the corners, I light the candles, relieved when the soft yellow glow of their flames chases away the thick shadows. Truly, no one is here. But someone was.

  I return to the door and lock it before studying the room more closely. There. Something is on my pillow that was not there when I left. As I approach the bed, I am consumed by an impending sense of dread, as if some deeply hidden part of me recognizes the object before my eyes do.

  It is long and black, like a knife blade. My knees weaken, and my heart races as I reach out and lift the crow feather from my pillow.

  After five long years, it has finally come.

  Author’s Note

  As with the original His Fair Assassin trilogy, the broad political brushstrokes and people in Courting Darkness are based on historical events and personages. Near the end of the final conflict in the French-Breton War, France held nearly all of Brittany and had besieged the city of Rennes, where the duchess had fallen back behind the city walls. Full-scale war was averted by the Treaty of Rennes, in which King Charles VIII of France and Anne of Brittany agreed to marry. (Though history has no record of Arduinna’s arrow!) In order to do so, both Anne’s proxy marriage to Maximilian, the Holy Roman emperor, and the king’s betrothal to Maximilian’s eleven-year-old daughter had to be annulled by the Church. By all accounts, this troubled both participants greatly, although both were assured by their advisors and bishops that it was not only necessary, but morally acceptable.

  One of the greatest liberties I have taken is compressing the timeline of the historical events that occurred. In reality, the major events in the His Fair Assassin trilogy and Courting Darkness occurred over the course of two and a half years, during which there was a great deal of tedious waiting while messengers were dispatched back and forth. I pulled most of the major events of 1490 and 1491 into 1489, the year in which the story takes place. The wedding that occurs in Courting Darkness did not actually happen until the end of 1491.<
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  An unfortunate result of this compressed timeline is that in Courting Darkness, Anne is only fourteen when she marries, rather than her actual sixteen years of age. Despite popular misconceptions, marriages at fourteen were not commonplace. When they did occur, it was most often between royal families and noble houses eager to seal alliances and treaties. Commoners, as well as second sons and daughters who were not heiresses, often married much later in life, needing to establish some economic security for themselves first.

  Even when these earlier marriages took place, families often allowed for time to pass between the marriage and the consummation. Sadly, however, the records indicate that there were a number of royal marriages consummated when the wife was fourteen. To not do so was to leave an avenue for annulment—and too much was at stake. While fully public consummations had receded in popularity, semipublic consummations such as Anne of Brittany’s were still conducted.

  It can be hard to fully grasp how a society as obsessed with the Church and getting into heaven as fifteenth-century western Europe was could also have had such a laissez-faire attitude toward sex. They were far earthier than we are, the Puritans not having come along yet. During the late Middle Ages especially, sex and prostitution flourished.

  Louise of Savoy did indeed live side by side with her husband’s mistress, and they were by all accounts good friends. She raised his illegitimate children alongside her own and even provided for them once she came into power in her own right. Anne of Brittany also grew up in a household that included her father’s mistress and her half siblings.

  Prostitution was viewed as a necessity, often regulated by cities, states, or town municipalities and having a guild, like many of the medieval trades. Prostitution establishments were by and large run by women, and many sex workers were daughters, widows, or wives of poor craftsmen.