‘Not until recently. No,’ said Lord Jon. ‘I thought your duties with the queen would keep you at Whitehall for most of the time.’
‘And with the king?’ she said.
‘That was always a possibility. Now I think there might be more advantages in living here than I’d thought, even if you’d not brought Etta to London. We’ll see.’
‘I shall enjoy setting up her nursery, my lord. Large enough for more than one, do you think?’ She peeped sideways at him through her lashes.
‘You’re not...?’
‘No, not yet. But we should not discount the possibility, should we?’
‘Your lady mother managed four, so I see no reason why you should not do the same. It runs in families.’
‘And is that one of the reasons why you agreed to marry me?’
‘It was a consideration, I suppose, but not the deciding factor.’
‘And am I allowed to ask what the deciding factor was? Clearly the new title was earned for reasons other than marriage to me, so if not for stepmother duties and as a breeder, what else is there? You were never short of bedmates, I believe.’
‘You’ve been listening to the wrong people again, Lady Raemon. If you want to know more about why I married you, then you may have to wait a while longer.’
‘Until...?’
‘Until you’ve learned to trust me better,’ he said, looking straight ahead.
She thought he might have said more, but a squealing pig ran across in front of them, followed by a yapping terrier and its owner, making the horses swerve dangerously and back into each other, and the thread of their fragile discussion was lost in quieting the mounts and resuming their short progress to Whitehall. The talk of trusting him, however, stirred some pangs of guilt, for she had not thought it was so obvious. It also did not explain why a man with a talent for encrypting cyphers and codes should be so obtuse when it came to explaining to his wife what was on his mind and finding out what was on hers.
* * *
The following weeks were filled with comings and goings to their new home, with the hiring of servants, and filling the rooms with homely things, with beautiful wares from Cheap Street and the merchants’ warehouses clustering around the wharves. Her husband gave her permission to buy whatever they needed and, with Maeve to guide her, the experience was typically exhilarating and rewarding. Afterwards, when she had spent time with the children, Ginny would return to Whitehall to be with the queen, who, increasingly abandoned by her royal husband, was still optimistic of a happier outcome. Why else, she asked, would Sir Thomas Cromwell have been created Earl of Essex if not because he had found the king a loving wife? Sadly, it did not occur to her that it might be because Cromwell had suggested to the king a legal way to dispose of his loving wife and to take to his bed a woman who made him feel younger. Lord Raemon hinted at this to Ginny, but swore her to secrecy without realising that the knowledge made her even more uncertain of her own future. Would the king need her more during the lengthy negotiations? Or less? And what would happen to her dear friend Anna?
Although Ginny could sympathise, her own situation was being blessed by having daily access to little Etta, who soaked up the attention like a plant in sunshine. Not only that, but the relationship between the child and her father began to thrive in a way that no one could have foreseen only a few weeks ago as they watched the boats on the river, visited the horses and the litter of puppies in the stables. Taking each change of location in her stride, Etta seemed to revel in her new surroundings, the daily contact with her stepcousins teaching her new words and skills.
About her father’s ‘little fling’ mentioned so ruthlessly by Lady Seymour, Ginny could find no evidence, for Maeve knew nothing. That she and George knew about Etta being Henry’s child, however, was apparent, for as Hampshire neighbours of Sir Jon and Lady Raemon, they had seen that a copper-haired child was hardly likely to be the product of two dark-haired parents, though ginger-haired throwbacks were known now and then. They had not been surprised, but that was all Maeve would say, and Ginny stopped asking for more. When she confided that she had feelings of guilt about wanting a man she could not fully trust, and that neither of them had ever spoken of love, she was advised not to be concerned, to wait, be patient, and to let it grow naturally out of what had been a traumatic situation, none of her doing. And if she thought her sister’s happy marriage to Sir George was typical, then she was mistaken. It was not. It was quite exceptional.
From Tyburn House, Ginny had seen the lights of the royal barge as it crossed the river to Lambeth under cover of darkness and knew that Anna would not see Henry again until the next day, if then. If she had been the queen, Ginny told her husband, she would have sighed with relief rather than with longing.
‘And now?’ he said, bending over her on one elbow. ‘Tell me about these coded sighs. What do they mean? What, for instance, does this one say?’ His hand drew from her a deep gasp of delight as it slid between her thighs into the warmth, caressing the soft folds contained there with the tenderest of fingertips, like a harpist.
‘I don’t know,’ she whispered. ‘Can you not decode it, my lord?’
‘Give me time and I think I might,’ he said, exploring further.
‘Don’t take too long.’ She sighed.
‘One should not hurry these things,’ he said, purposely tantalising and teasing her body while stopping her protests with kisses too deeply satisfying to interrupt. There was, as it happened, no code that he did not know how to interpret, and soon her cries became sweet moans as she forgot the problems of the past few days and the trust that was not quite there. There, under him, claiming every moment of his attention, Ginny stopped thinking, stopped wondering and worrying, giving herself entirely to his pleasure and hers, for him to take into his heart and remember as her gift, not as a bribe. One day, she knew he would be convinced of her love, just as she would be able to trust him completely.
So she revelled in the closeness of his magnificent body, in the power of his hard, muscular arms as he lifted her closer to him, in the great shoulders and strong neck, the short black hair that capped his head, shaping it like a helmet. She recalled how she had watched him during her first month at court, wondering about him, about the women he pleasured and danced with, but rarely with her. Now she was where so many of them had hoped to be, receiving his kisses and attentions, learning how to please him after the misunderstandings that still lay so close to the surface. There would be times, she was sure, when she would need all her reserves of patience to help him through those days when his work with Cromwell weighed him down, for life in royal circles took a heavy toll.
* * *
As the May Day festivities drew closer, Lord Raemon spent his days practising at the rings in the new tilt yard at Whitehall, perfecting his jousting skills for the tournament. Whenever he was free from the king’s duties, he would return to the house by the river with more bruises and contusions to be salved, more aches to be massaged, and with a hunger for victory that men possessed before a contest. Their infrequent nights together often dwindled into sleep too soon for loving, which Ginny accepted as part of the build-up that conserved her husband’s energy in some way, and though he spoke laughingly of the friendly rivalry between him and his friends, she suspected that there was more to it in the case of Thomas Culpeper, whose admirers were mostly female.
A masque was being planned on the same evening as the jousting, for which Ginny was helping to design costumes for herself and seven maids. Unfortunately, Mistress Howard was often absent in the evenings when she could have been helping and, told that her costume was to represent desire, took offence, stamping her feet in annoyance. ‘I am not desire!’ she scolded. ‘And I do not wear that dreadful mulberry colour, either. I shall have virtue. The green one. It goes better with my hair.’
‘That’s Ginny’s,’ said Anne Basset. ‘It’s been
made to fit her figure, not yours.’
‘Then have it altered,’ said the Howard girl. ‘Where’s the headdress?’
The masks, like the costumes, were elaborate affairs made of stiffened canvas painted and stuck with sequins, completely covering the face and rising high above the heads of the wearers, the floating streamers partly disguising the hair and leaving only the figure to give any clue about identity. Yet even the figure was partly concealed by the rich ornament, and the swathes of flimsy fabric were intended to both conceal and reveal tantalising glimpses of body, all young, and recognisable only to intimates. Ginny had made sure that hers conformed to her own personal requirements, nothing too revealing, while that she had designed for Kat Howard was rather more exposed, the bodice lower, the rippling mulberry tissue transparently violet and gold. The colour would have been perfect for Kat’s auburn hair, which would be seen later and, given the girl’s boldness, Ginny had assumed she would like the style, too. But now her choice had backfired and it looked as if Ginny herself would have to wear it, leaving the pale green ‘Virtue’ to the Howard girl and the blue to Anne Basset and ‘Gentleness’. They both said, when she’d gone, that she was behaving as if she were queen, with her demanding ways. Much more so than Anna.
On May Day, the whole court flocked in their finery to the purpose-built Whitehall tilt yard to sit cheek by jowl in the stands overlooking the sand-covered lists. Superb specimens of manhood would ride against their opponents wearing specially made jousting armour, one against one, while their horses were identified by gaudy caparisons that billowed like sails in the wind, the colours competing with those of the heralds in scarlet and gold, green, and white. Ginny had had very little time to wish Lord Jon anything more lengthy than good fortune in his contest that morning. He was good, she knew that, but so were the others. She had given him her favour, her best red silk scarf to tie round his arm with a prayer that he would emerge unscathed as well as victorious, and he had hurried off with his grooms, still briefing them on the details of how to pass him his next lance, where to stand to make the horse turn properly, to check every buckle and strap, how to decipher his instructions through the heavy metal helm with its narrow slit.
Ginny felt sick. She had seen the practice bruises, the reddened skin. She wished men would not do this, as Henry had not since his terrifying accident four years ago, but this was all for shows of bravery in front of the women who sat on the stands as deeply caring as she was, but better at hiding it. It served also as a useful tool for settling old scores, to reinforce the pecking order, and to establish the respect of one’s peers. And Ginny had no doubts about her husband’s target on this occasion. There was no choice, unless you were the king, about who would fight against whom, so it was fortunate for Lord Jon Raemon that he was drawn against Master Thomas Culpeper, who needed to learn his place as never before.
Seated near the royals in an open window of the gallery overlooking the tilt yard, Ginny had a perfect view of the proceedings, so was able to see how Kat Howard laid her green favour on the tip of Culpeper’s lance while the king and his queen looked on, laughing at the harmless, chivalric fun between friends. Anna wore her newest gown of ivory silk threaded with gold that shimmered in the bright sunshine. Ginny, wearing tawny velvet and brocade to complement her creamy skin, blew her husband a kiss, wondering with dread how she would live if he were killed in this pointless fashion. Or any fashion.
* * *
Used to the limited view through the narrow slit in his helm, Jon knew to within an inch what to aim for, how to position the heavy lance and lock it under his arm, to lower the point at exactly the right moment and angle it across the four-foot-high barrier towards the target that came thundering towards him. It was time for Culpeper to be knocked off his high horse, but that, he was sure, was what he had in mind, too. Jon was under no illusions about Culpeper’s skills.
The first shuddering crash was taken upon the small shield on Jon’s left arm, and he heard the crack as his opponent’s lance splintered, wrenching his shoulder. His own lance had done the same, and now he tossed the broken haft to his squire and received from him another as his horse pranced and reared from the shock. The noise inside his helm grew fainter as the crowd settled back to watch the next charge, and he could see Culpeper at the far end making his turn, the flash of green on his arm fluttering as he saluted towards the stands. So his mind was not on the job. What a conceited fool the man was.
The end of the contest came only after six lances had been broken, the last one hard enough to lift Culpeper out of his high saddle and fling him backwards as his horse fell, screaming with fright, landing in a tangle of flying legs and a cloud of dust. It had taken every last ounce of Jon’s considerable strength to bring down both horse and rider, and now, as he galloped past, he rose in his stirrups to salute his waving wife with the broken haft of his lance. His body was numbed by the constant buffeting, but through the roar of blood in his ears, he heard the blare of the herald’s trumpet and knew that, up in the stands, she would be weeping for him.
She came to his tent and he knew he’d been right about the weeping, for her smile blinked dewdrops from her lashes. Rubbing water from his head with a towel, his squire stopped to let him speak. ‘Well, lass?’ he said. ‘Have I your favour at last? Will that pay him back for his nasty tricks, d’ye think?’ Her red scarf had been used as a temporary bandage around his shoulder and he hoped she would not notice the dark patches, still wet.
‘Oh, my Jon,’ she said, half crying still, ‘you were magnificent.’ She placed her lips carefully on his grazed cheek that was already turning into a swollen bruise. ‘But you are hurt. You must have been hurt by that. Let me...’
‘No,’ he said, catching her hand. ‘The chirurgeon is here. It’s nothing. He’ll fix it. You must return to the stand.’
‘You’ve sent for the chirurgeon? You are wounded. Do let me see it.’
His head swam and her voice came from far away. ‘I’d rather you didn’t,’ he said weakly. His squire caught him as he swayed, laying him down like a child. ‘Bring water,’ somebody said, before he lost consciousness.
* * *
Determined not to allow Culpeper to know how bad the injury was to his shoulder, Jon would not be persuaded to let someone else take his place in the masque that night. His victory in the lists would be hollow indeed if he showed how much the effort had cost him, and Culpeper would gloat in spite of his defeat. Pride was at stake here and Jon felt it keenly. Consequently, in the rooms he and Ginny had recently vacated at Whitehall, he allowed himself to be strapped up tightly to staunch the flow of blood, then to be dressed in padded white satin with silver linings, in braids of gold, with dyed plumes in his extravagant cap. He was one of eight of the king’s men, all similarly rigged out, meant to rescue and partner the female masked virtues after the mock-siege. Days ago, Ginny had told him that she would be wearing green as Virtue itself, a name he had promised to divest her of before the night was out.
‘If you catch me, my lord,’ Ginny had said.
‘Oh, I shall catch you, my lady.’
Now his shoulder throbbed like a drum and, instead of food, he had relied on half a jug of wine to keep him upright until suppertime. Even from this distance, he could hear the musicians’ pipes and the thud of tabors coming from the great hall, and he steeled himself for what was to come.
The lofty hall heaved with colour, with glitter, the rise and fall of laughter, the clatter of dishes, the aroma of spiced food, and the pungent smell of warm overdressed bodies. Still in her tawny velvet, Ginny was relieved to see Jon enter behind the king and she moved along the bench so that he could sit with her, smiling her concern. ‘My lord,’ she whispered. ‘Are you recovered now? Is your wound paining you?’
‘I’m perfectly well, my lady, I thank you. The wound is nothing.’ He cast an eye admiringly over her, taking his place proudly by her
side. ‘You look ravishing. Don’t let Henry see you.’
‘He doesn’t see anyone these days except the Howard girl. I’m quite safe now.’
‘None of us is safe around Henry,’ he whispered. ‘Take care in the masque.’
‘What...?’ But her query was snatched away in the general conversation that allowed no topic to continue for long, and by the time the last course had been served, Ginny had quite forgotten to tell him that, in the masque, he must look for the woman in mulberry, not green. It was only when she began to don her costume that she remembered, but by then it was too late.
* * *
Jon saw her at once as she and the other maidens climbed up into the mock castle, ready for the siege to begin with the throwing of sweetmeats and flowers from the white-clad attackers and shouts to surrender. Screams of encouragement and laughter accompanied the nonsense as maidens were hit, yelling defiance and refusing to budge, the maid in the green gown, which Jon knew to be his wife, doing more than her fair share to attract the support of the onlookers. Dancing lights from the hundreds of candles created shadows that cavorted amongst the brilliant colours and jewels, deluding and confusing those who watched, and yet in the medley of disguises and the press of flimsily clad bodies, Jon’s attention was drawn to the maid in the mulberry gauze whose gown was so diaphanous as to be almost transparent, low-cut over her bosom, barely covering the luscious curves of her beautiful body. No wonder, Jon thought, that Culpeper and Henry were both besotted with her if this was what she looked like underneath, though he had not thought the Howard girl to be so slender.
At last, breathless with shouting, the Virtues surrendered and came down, still disguised, to be claimed by the knights in white. Ginny made sure Jon was close enough to find her, but was dismayed when she saw him grab the arm of the girl in green and lead her into the dance. Then, before she could resist, her own arm was taken in a firm grip and she, too, was taken into a partnership she had no wish for. ‘Master Culpeper,’ she said, ‘you have the wrong maiden, I fear. You must have meant to...’
Betrayed, Betrothed and Bedded Page 18