Relief caused her footsteps to falter for an instant. It was possible McConnell’s influence had been to some purpose. As long as Rand was treated as something above a common criminal, there was hope.
They walked on a few yards before she spoke again. “Did he—”
“Nay, milady. No messages.”
A wan smile twitched a corner of her mouth at his perceptiveness. “How did you guess what I would ask?”
“Sir Rand wanted to know the same thing.”
The knowledge sent a wave of pain over her. Rand had asked for a message and she had sent none. Her mind had been on other things, of course, but it would have been easy enough to offer a few words of encouragement.
“Did he ask anything else?”
“Nay, milady.”
No, he would not have, she thought. It was too early for there to be news. Glancing at the lad again, she saw that he strode beside her with all the grace of a courtier, also something of the same long and powerful stride Rand used, or as near as he could come to it. Mayhap it was time she began to look upon him as a young man instead of a lad, she thought with a peculiar tenderness around her heart. He must be nearly the same age as she was herself, after all.
“I know Sir Rand said you were to stay by me,” she continued after a moment, “but you need not spend all your hours on guard. If you have other tasks to perform, I will be perfectly fine on my own.”
Rand’s squire lifted a muscled shoulder gained, no doubt, from sword practice with his master. “I have nothing else to do, milady. I returned Shadow from the town to his palace stall. I also gave Sir Rand’s wet clothing to the laundress, the things he passed to me after changing.”
She was glad to know he had been allowed to use the fresh clothing she had arranged for him. It was a reminder, however, that she knew not where he had been the night before or exactly what he had been doing on his foray outside the palace.
How very cold he had been when he slid into bed beside her. She had meant to withhold her favors after his desertion and midnight absence, but it had been impossible in the face of his need. Moreover, she had ignited like black powder the instant he touched her, clinging to him in a fury of desire so strong she had shuddered with it, as he shivered with cold against her. The passion that leaped between them had been devouring, enflaming, so they grappled on the mattress, clinging, crying out like warriors in extremis. It had been extreme indeed, a fierce and pounding consummation, and she had the soreness this morning to prove it. Yet she could not believe the man who had held her, who had urged her to ride him like some creature of witchcraft, could have come to her directly from murdering Juliette d’Amboise.
She refused to believe it.
Clearing her throat of an unaccountable tightness, she spoke without looking at David. “Do you know where Sir Rand went last night?”
David sent her a flashing cobalt glance before looking away with a quick shake of his head.
“But you do know how. I assume taking Shadow to the blacksmith in town was a ruse, so Sir Rand might have use of him once he left the palace.”
A modicum of something that might have been respect for her perception shone in his eyes before he gave a reluctant nod.
“You must also know when he left and when he returned, as you supplied his means of travel. Do you also know why he went?”
“He had a message.”
“Of what kind, pray?”
David folded his lips and did not answer, but Isabel did not desist. In a short time she knew exactly what kind of message Rand had received and the fact that it was in a lady’s hand.
“So he went to meet this lady. Yes, and was seen near where Mademoiselle Juliette died. It seems obvious, then, that the message must have been from—”
“She was dead when he got there. This he swore.”
“Yes,” Isabel whispered. She believed it without question, oddly enough. To have it otherwise was simply unthinkable.
“It appears someone did not want him to speak to her.”
“Or didn’t want her to talk to him.”
“Isn’t that the same thing?” she asked with a frown.
“Nay, milady, not if she had something important to tell him.”
It was an excellent point. What might it have been if she had? “Was it…could it have been something about the baby?”
“I can’t say.”
The flat sound of his voice sent dread skittering through her. Holy Mother, what if the little one had been with her? She moistened her lips. “Please…please don’t tell me the child was killed, as well.”
A sheen of light slid over David’s bright head as he shook it. “She is safe, for now.”
Isabel sighed with relief at this corroboration that the baby had not died at Braesford, that Rand had not lied. It hovered on the tip of her tongue to ask how David knew the babe was safe, also where it was being held and by whom. Such questions were banished as he spoke again.
“There is one last reason why Sir Rand might have been summoned.”
“Yes?”
“Aye,” he said, his young face grim. “They could have wanted the lady dead, and thought it convenient to blame him for it, same as for the other.”
It seemed so likely there was no point in answering. The ache of it was too sharp to make words possible, in any case. They walked on in silence until David left her at the door of her chamber.
The king remained elusive. Isabel presented herself outside his audience chamber the next morning, and left that evening without being admitted. Henry could not spare her even a minute as he strode past between one chamber and another with his yeoman guard and his retinue. She might have been a stranger for all the attention he paid her.
Gossip was rife in the meantime, a growing whirlwind of conjecture, snide laughter and incredibly vicious accusations. Isabel was spared the worst, perhaps, as few cared to be seen speaking to her, but she heard enough from her sisters, from Gwynne and from David to guess the rest. What she could not avoid were the whispers and snickers behind her back. Within them lurked veiled hostility, or so it seemed, as if she shared the guilt credited to Rand.
It made no difference. She would not give up. She refused to slink away without being heard, without at least some plea for an explanation of the charges leveled at Rand. She needed someone to tell her what was going to happen to him, and to give her permission to visit him.
No audience was forthcoming. Her questions went unanswered. Early on the morning of the third day after Rand’s arrest, Henry prepared to leave on royal progression.
The great multitude who would travel with the king on his slow journey gathered in the courtyard outside the palace. Honored noblemen, men-at-arms with their great armored chargers, courtiers, minstrels, dancers, capering fools, priest and servants all milled around the baggage wagons in hopeless confusion. Finally, Henry’s guard appeared with the king walking among them. They mounted up. Order was established as the procession moved out. The noise and confusion faded into the distance. Westminster grew so quiet it was as if all life had drained from both town and palace.
The days slipped past, one after the other, with little purpose and less pattern. Isabel felt caught in a civilized purgatory, of the court yet outside its circle, wed but not a true wife in Rand’s absence, bereft of purpose and privilege. She slept but did not feel rested, ate though she was never hungry. It seemed she waited for something and feared both that it would never come and that it would come too soon.
At sunrise a week after Rand had been taken away, she stood at the window of her chamber. She shredded the bread that had been intended for her breakfast, dropping the crumbs onto the windowsill. A half-dozen small birds twittered and chirped as they accepted the bounty she spread before them. One, a sparrow, came close, regarding her with its head cocked to one side.
Isabel was assailed by the memory of Rand standing at the window, magnificently naked while he held a sparrow perched on his thumb. Wonder had been in his face f
or the trust of that small creature, and he had turned to share it with her. He had appeared so much younger then, as he might have before court intrigue and affairs of state had caught him in their toils.
“No, Sir Rand isn’t here to feed you this day,” she said quietly to the small winged creature that watched her with such bright eyes. “Yes, I’m sure you miss the way he whistles for you. Mayhap you might fly about the Tower later in the morning. I’m sure he would like to see…”
Tightness closed around her heart as if it was being squeezed by a giant fist. She breathed deep against the pain. She had not been married long enough to miss her groom—of course she had not. Why, then, did it hurt so much to think of him shut up in the old castle beside the Thames?
A knock sounded on the bedchamber door. Light as it was, it set the birds to flight. Isabel turned to bid whoever was outside to enter.
“You are up. Good,” Cate said, pushing the door open a crack and putting her head around the edge. Her gaze took in Isabel’s reddened eyes. “You aren’t sickening for something, are you?”
“Nothing so convenient,” she said with a wan smile. “Do come in, dear sister, for I have need of company. Have you breakfasted?”
“Long ago.” Cate, the early riser among the three sisters, spoke with a virtuous air as she whisked inside and closed the door firmly behind her. “And a good thing, too. I was taking a turn along the outside passageway just now when a boy came up to me. He asked was I not your sister, and when I said I was, he gave me this.”
From the string bag that hung at her waist, she took a parchment square sealed with wax. Dread seized Isabel at the sight of it. It was very like that which had bid her come to the abbey so many days ago.
“What kind of boy?” she asked, making no move to take the missive.
“Just a street urchin from the look of him. He had no connection to the palace, I dare swear. I gave him a shilling, though he said he had already been paid for the delivery.”
It did not have to be a communication from the same unseen man, need not be the instructions he had promised. Hundreds of messages were delivered about the palace every day by street boys eager to earn a coin or two. It was, in fact, the way Rand might contrive to send word, should he be allowed the opportunity.
Stepping forward in sudden decision, Isabel snatched the parchment and broke the seal. She shook off the pieces of wax into Cate’s outstretched hand, and her sister moved to the window to fling them out. Isabel unfolded the message.
There was no salutation. The few lines were brief and to the point.
To win free of your hateful marriage, as was promised, you have only to take courage. You will appear before the King’s Court where you will swear that Rand of Braesford was absent from the palace from before vespers till after the midnight bells on the date of Mademoiselle Juliette d’Amboise’s demise. The outcome will be more certain if you speak of the blood upon his hands when he returned to your bed.
No signature, title or seals marked the bottom of the page. The handwriting was precise, as if it might have been penned by a paid scribe. That precaution could have been because the writer feared his hand would be recognized, or simply to make certain whoever had commissioned it was never connected to its results.
The page crumpled under the shuddering force of her grip upon it. She wanted to tear the thing into a thousand pieces. Yes, or else to leave it conspicuously in the garderobe’s basket of hay kept there for cleansing, that someone might use it for a more proper purpose.
“What is it, Isabel? Are you all right? Is it bad news? Is it…is it Rand?”
“No, no,” she said, giving herself a quick shake. “It’s nothing.”
“Yes, and I suppose an announcement that the queen had been delivered of triplets, all male heirs, would also be nothing.”
That comment earned a brief smile. “It’s not that momentous, certainly, only a request that I help to hang my husband by testifying against him. And with false information, if you please.”
“You are reluctant?”
“Astounding, is it not?” At the edge of her mind hovered the intimation of an idea concerning that fact, though she could not quite grasp it.
“Hardly. You have ever had a tender heart, dear Isabel, though you try to hide it. What shall you do?”
She smoothed the paper and refolded it. “Nothing, as I know not where to send a refusal.”
Cate looked pitying. “That is your only thought, to refuse?”
“I could send a messenger to the king with the missive if I thought he would trouble to read it.”
“Which he has fairly well proven is not his pleasure. Too bad his mother is not here.”
“Lady Margaret?”
“She likes Rand, has made use of him for years. She is also the person who spun the scheme that put Henry on the throne, the one who holds her son’s heart in her tiny hands. She who comes closer than anyone to understanding him, though they did little other than write back and forth for years. She whose blood gives him the nearest claim he has to being of royal lineage and so—”
Isabel held up her hand to stop the persuasive flow of words. “I understand, thank you. But Lady Margaret is unlikely to return from Winchester until after the queen is delivered, even if it doesn’t turn out to be triplets.”
“I suppose.” Cate heaved a sigh.
“Unless…” Isabel said as hope began to rise inside her.
Her sister’s head came up. “Yes?”
“Unless she may be persuaded the crown, and Henry, are in danger.”
Alarm leaped into Cate’s face. “Isabel! You wouldn’t.”
“Would I not? She may deign to see me, though her son refuses. As for the danger…”
“It is two days of hard riding to Winchester, at the very least.”
“A mere nothing compared to the long journey to the north and back again. If Henry will listen to anyone, it will be his mother.” She began to construct a mental list of things she should pack, things she must do.
“This time I shall travel with you,” Cate declared.
“I think not. You will be required here. You will hover around my chamber, visiting often and reporting my decline into melancholy to all who may ask.”
“But you won’t be— Oh.”
“Or possibly an attack of the sweating sickness that has struck down so many, if you think that will better serve the purpose. Gwynne will assist you by bringing meals that the two of you may eat so the trencher doesn’t go back untouched to the kitchen. David will procure a mount for me, also one for himself since he must ride with me.”
“No, really, you will need more protection than—”
“Please, Cate, I would have you and Marguerite out of this business. I could not bear it if danger came to either of you because of it.”
“Yet you chance it. Suppose Rand learns of it. What will he say?”
He would be angry, Isabel thought, or more likely enraged that she meant to entice David into aiding her. And he would be wroth beyond bearing that they would set out minus a full complement of men-at-arms. “Nothing I need heed since he is safely shut away for now.”
“And Graydon?”
“Our dear stepbrother may never hear of the journey, with any luck,” she said in prompt reply. “If he does, what of it? I am a married woman, by His Majesty’s grace, so need no longer answer to a mere relative. No, do not go on putting obstacles in my way, sweet Cate, for I have no time for them. Go now and send David to me, and Gwynne, too, if you will. There is much to be done and no great time for it.”
Her sister did as she asked, though not without more objections and dire warnings. When Cate finally left her, Isabel stood in the center of the chamber with her hands clasped in front of her. She should be filled with dread for the ride ahead of her, imagining all manner of disasters. Her knees should be shaking at the thought of the audience with the king’s mother, for she was a severe and pious lady who did not suffer fools with good grace. Ins
tead, pure exhilaration ran in her veins.
She was free to do as she chose, to seize this, her own path. The truth of it was as intoxicating as unwatered wine. There was no one to gainsay her, none to demand or expect obedience to their rulings. She could come or go at her own behest, in response to her own desires and intelligence.
It would not last. If anything happened to Rand, either Graydon or the king would again control her person and whatever wealth she owned. If Rand survived, that right would return to him. But for now, no one governed her. No one.
She would take what pleasure she might from it for as long as it lasted.
15
Rand lay on his narrow bed set against one wall, the main piece of furniture in the small chamber allotted him. He propped his head on one fist while fixing his gaze on the coffered ceiling high overhead. From that time-blackened wood hung the silver-lace splendor of a fine new spiderweb. An industrious lady spider was busily expanding its width with another draped section. Now and again, she descended on a fine line of silk as if to test the danger from the prisoner who shared her domain, or else his edibility. Discovering little chance of either, she continued with her labor.
The mattress beneath Rand had been stuffed with careless handfuls of straw, so was comprised of lumps in various sizes. The sheet and thin blanket that covered it were neither of them particularly clean. He barely noticed. He was, in memory, in his bed at the palace with Isabel in his arms.
Amazing, how accommodating she was in his imagination, taking him into the hot, sweet hollow of her mouth, tasting him, pleasuring him, while smiling into his eyes. He flung his free arm across his eyes. He should think of something else, of anything else, other than his wife’s untutored yet deeply sensual beguilement.
It couldn’t be done. He was sick with need of her and pure, unbridled rage that he had been taken from her bed, her company, her solace. What else mattered compared to such a loss?
He had not meant to be so besotted. Once she was his, so he thought, he would have his fill of her and be troubled no longer by the hot lust of unrequited longing. Instead, his lust and longing had increased a thousand times over. He wanted her now, here beside him, close in his arms. He wanted her tenderly compliant, utterly naked and ready for him.
By His Majesty's Grace Page 22