In a Treacherous Court

by Michelle Diener

  “No, no, no.” Norris was so close she could hear him panting the words, almost moaning them, as she reached the large door.

  It was closed, and she wasted precious seconds pushing down the catch, pulling the heavy oak toward her.

  Norris was on her. As his arm came up to strike, she threw herself forward, and though his fist connected with the back of her head, she was through. With a wild cry, arms flailing, she pitched headfirst into the room, her forehead hitting the floor with a sickening crack.

  She lay panting like a wounded animal, and all about her she saw the black-slippered feet of small children dressed in long red and white robes. Then the much larger slippers and robes of a clergyman blocked her view.

  “What is this?” The voice that spoke was strong and authoritative.

  Susanna felt her grip on the world slipping away. Her hand lay beside her face, just next to her cheek, and it seemed to waver, even though it was pressed flat against the floor.

  She closed her eyes to stop the dizziness, and was sucked into oblivion.

  Parker came upon Fielder faster than he’d anticipated. He was up ahead, his back turned, limping as if injured.

  He must have heard Parker because he glanced over his shoulder, and his eyes widened with shock.

  Parker was moving fast. As long as he focused on something the ground stayed where it should, and Fielder made an excellent focal point.

  Fielder stumbled to a halt and turned, his hand tightening on his sword hilt.

  So he wanted to fight it out? Without hesitation, Parker drew back his arm and threw the knife he’d taken off Fielder’s friend. It flew straight, and buried itself between Fielder’s heart and his shoulder, bringing him down like a stag taking a bolt.

  Fielder made a keening sound and scrabbled across the floor to lean against the wall, legs spread-eagled in front of him. He looked at Parker with hopeless eyes.

  “Where is she?” Parker knelt beside him and closed his hand around the knife handle. He eased the knife out a fraction.

  “No,” Fielder choked, gasping and blinking away tears. “Don’t. I’ll bleed to death if you take it out.”

  “I don’t care whether you live or die, Fielder, so tell me where she is.”

  “Escaped.” Fielder’s hand fluttered around the knife, wanting to hit Parker’s hand away.

  “And the bastard who was with you?”

  “Norris went after her.”

  Parker tightened his grip on the knife, ready to pull.

  “No. Take mine.” Gasping like a fish, Fielder scrabbled at his belt, then held up a good knife.

  “If I see you again, I’ll kill you.” Hearing the faint cry of a woman farther along the rabbits’ warren of passages, Parker broke into a run.

  27

  The Chiefe Conditions and Qualities in a Courtier: Not to covett to presse into the Chambre or other secrete part where his Prince is withdrawen at any time.

  Of the Chief Conditions and Qualityes in a Waytyng Gentylwoman: To be wittie and foreseing, not heady and of a renning witt.

  Parker!” John Rightwise was so pleased to see him, Parker took a step back to avoid an embrace.

  “There has been a strange incident.” Rightwise wrung his hands. “A woman fell into the room, and a man snatched her up and ran off. I cannot go after them; the King expects my choir to sing for him in ten minutes.”

  “Snatched her up? You let him—” Parker closed his eyes to get control. When he opened them, his gaze fixed on Rightwise’s throat, and the deviser of court revels backed away, nervously.

  “She leaped into the room, wild-eyed. Hit her head on the floor—”

  “Not before that cove hit her on the head first,” a choirboy said in a clear, carrying pitch.

  “What?” Rightwise turned. “Why didn’t you say something?”

  The boy shrugged. “My da hits my ma like that all the time.”

  “Was she badly injured?” Parker demanded of the boy, and he edged away, glancing left and right for support.

  “She was senseless when he took her.” Rightwise straightened his robes.

  Parker watched him readying himself for his performance incredulously. “For your sake, I hope she’s still alive, or I’ll interrupt your entertainment by coming in to strike you down.” He turned to the boys. “Which way did they go?”

  “Left out the door,” a boy called out.

  Parker touched his forehead in thanks, and grabbed one of the candles from a choirboy’s hand as he strode back into the passageway. He was sick with fear; it threatened to overwhelm him.

  A new wave of dizziness hit him and he was forced to lean back against the wall and lower his head toward his knees.

  The world was a jumble of colored lights and shifting perspective, and he made a sound in his throat, almost animal, as he tried to overcome the confusion. The place above his ear where he had been struck throbbed as if it were the size of his fist.

  A searing pain scored his hand, and Parker’s focus snapped back in place. He looked down and saw that wax from the candle was dripping onto his knuckles.

  He needed strength and clarity. Susanna was dead if he couldn’t find them within himself. If she wasn’t dead already.

  He straightened and broke into a shambling run, his hand trailing the wall again for support. To his left, a servants’ staircase wound up to the floors above and he hesitated a moment at the foot of them, but the sound of voices around the next corner drew him forward.

  He turned and stopped short. The far end of the passageway was a thoroughfare between the hall and the kitchens. Servants ran one way with empty trays, while others walked the opposite way with trays loaded high with food. A man sat watching him from a bench halfway down the corridor.

  Parker went to him. “Did a man carrying a woman pass here?”

  The man nodded. “He didn’t pass. He turned the corner, saw the crowds, and went back the way he’d come.” He frowned. “But he should have passed you, then.”

  Parker frowned. Where could Norris have gone? Then it came to him.

  The stairs.

  Norris was tiring. He began gasping for breath and stopped more frequently on the stairs. Susanna wondered how high he intended to go.

  Her left arm was so painful, she had to bite her bottom lip to stop herself from screaming with every lurching step Norris took. It was caught between her body and his shoulder in an agony of pins and needles.

  She should be grateful. The pain of it had brought her back to herself, along with the blade of Parker’s knife as it scraped more skin off her inner arm with every jolt. But gratitude was the last of her feelings.

  Instead, she felt a primal urge to lift her body, betray her wakefulness to Norris, just to get the blade out. This must be how prisoners felt in a torture chamber. Vulnerable and helpless against the pain.

  Whenever Norris stumbled or lurched, the tip of the blade pierced her skin, and she could feel the terrible tickle of blood moving down her arm, pooling in her armpit.

  Norris paused on a landing, swaying and gasping. “I’m finished.”

  It was all the warning she had. Before she could prepare, Norris canted to one side and she slid off his shoulder. She struck the wooden floorboards and rolled onto her side, facing away from him. The shadows were deep and she used them to ease Parker’s knife from her sleeve. The relief was excruciating.

  Norris was muttering, so low she could not make out his words. She heard the rustle of his clothes as if he were searching for something.

  The squeak of a board from the stairs below made him still immediately. Susanna’s heart lurched, then set off at a gallop. This might be her only chance.

  “Help!” As she called out, she rolled away from Norris until her hip struck the stairs on the other side of the landing. But Norris was on her before she could even get to her knees, hauling her up by the back of her dress. She heard a rip, felt the fabric give as it took her full weight.

  The sound on the stairs was
no longer furtive. Someone was making no secret that they were running up, and Norris was panic-stricken, his movements wild and jerky as he half-flung her ahead of him to the head of the stairs.

  “I hope this kills you,” he shouted as he grabbed her under the arms.

  She scrabbled for purchase, terrified. He was going to pick her up and throw her at whoever was running up to them, she realized. She got a better grip on the knife clutched in her sweat-slicked right fist, lifted her elbow, and scored down hard. The feel of the knife tip biting into flesh made her shudder.

  Norris screamed, his hand dropping to cover his side, releasing her right arm. Susanna pushed against him, trying to unbalance him as she pivoted to find a little room for herself at the top of the landing, but he pushed right back.

  “Oh no, you don’t.” He spoke through gritted teeth, then shoved her as hard as he could.

  There were no handholds.

  Susanna pitched down the steep, narrow stairs, her scream tearing at her throat, Parker’s knife flying from her grasp.

  But instead of the hard edges of the stairs, she slammed into warm, living flesh.

  She heard a grunt as Parker took the hit, felt him stagger back and fall with her in his arms.

  They landed, sprawled and tangled together, on the landing below.

  “I wish you both to the devil.” Norris had his sword out, and he ran down the stairs, menacing and focused. As he reached the last stair, he lifted the sword.

  Parker pushed her off him, scrabbling for a weapon, but there was no time, no chance. …

  Despair paralyzed her. To end this way—

  Norris stopped, his sword still raised, a dark bloom of blood spreading across his doublet. And she saw the knife buried in his chest.

  The sword dropped from Norris’s hand and clattered to the floor. Body shuddering, eyes glazed, he fumbled like an old man, then sank down onto the steps.

  Susanna wrenched her gaze from him and turned to look down the stairs. Harry stood one step below the landing, his hand still extended from his throw.

  “I wished for a weapon, and there it was, flying down the stairs to me. It landed at my feet.” His words were hushed.

  “Oh, Harry.” Susanna’s breath hitched in her throat. He shouldn’t have had to do this. Shouldn’t have had to make such a choice.

  He lifted his gaze from her to Norris, his face a cold mask worthy of Parker himself. “I hope I’ve sent him to the devil.”

  28

  The Chiefe Conditions and Qualities in a Courtier: To cast the stone well.

  Of the Chief Conditions and Qualityes in a Waytyng Gentylwoman: To love one that she may marye withall, beeinge a mayden and mindinge to love.

  You can’t let Harry guard me.” Susanna stood irresolute, arms crossed under her breasts, and Parker felt desire flicker to life, despite the circumstances. Her hair was loose, her dress ripped and slipping from her shoulders.

  Only the bruise on her right temple and the shadows in her eyes indicated this was not a woman recently well-tumbled. She looked for a chair, and Parker winced as she limped to it.

  “I need to question the man you attacked with your pomander. I don’t want to take you with me.” He held up his palms in appeal. “You will be behind a locked door. If anyone should try to get in, they will have to hack their way through solid oak.”

  “He is too young for the responsibility. He seriously injured a man tonight. For me.” She dropped her gaze to her hands in her lap. “I have been forced to commit violence since this began, but for Harry to have had to …” He saw the tears on her cheeks and the tremble of her shoulders.

  He had avoided touching her since Harry had come to their rescue. Afraid, desperately afraid, that once he had her in his arms, he might give in to the temptation to walk away from all this with her. To leave the lot of them to sort it out amongst themselves; to kill, torture, and maim each other until the most vicious man won.

  He walked to her, still hesitant, and dropped to his knees beside her. She turned to him blindly and he was lost. He pulled her from the chair and held her to him, and let her cry tears for them both.

  “Harry didn’t stop Norris just for you.” Parker smoothed her hair back, and tangled his fingers in its softness.

  She stopped crying on a hiccup. “I know he did it for you as well—”

  “No.” Parker set her back a little so she could see his face. “He did it for himself.”

  She used the back of her hand to wipe the tears away. “Himself?”

  “Harry has been at the mercy of more than one Norris in his life. That look on his face when he threw the knife …” Parker’s lips twisted. “I know that look.”

  She leaned into him and sighed. “I don’t want to do any more damage to him.”

  “My trusting him to watch you will not damage him. I swear it.” He pressed his lips to her temple and closed his eyes, breathing in the perfume of her hair.

  A loud knock at the door snapped him from the only moment of peace he’d had since they’d arrived at Greenwich. He rose, taking Susanna with him, and pushed her behind him as he moved to the door. He didn’t know when he’d drawn his sword, but it was already in his hand. He almost stumbled as he walked, light-headed with tension. Exhaustion made him feel completely detached.

  “Aye?”

  “It’s Denny.”

  Parker opened the door and let Denny in.

  “Bad news, Parker.” Denny wasted no time. “That rogue we took to the Knight Marshal, he’s been murdered.”

  Parker swore and slid his sword back into its scabbard. “By whom?”

  Denny shrugged. “A man dressed as a Yeoman of the Guard.”

  “What?” Parker looked at him in disbelief.

  Denny hunched his shoulders. “Seems a message came there was a drunken brawl in the great hall, but when the provost marshals got there, they discovered they’d been tricked.”

  “And they returned to find the body?” Parker blew out a breath in disgust.

  “They left our man in a locked room, but one of the off-duty marshals said he saw someone in a green and white tunic coming out of the room.”

  Parker massaged his temples. Was it an impostor, or could one of the guards themselves be involved? If so, when Norfolk realized his plot with the de la Pole letters was uncovered, the King could be in danger of assassination.

  “Have you found Fielder?”

  “No.” Denny clenched his fists. “He’d cleared out his room and was gone by the time you got word to us to find him. If it’s any consolation, he left a trail of blood behind him.”

  With Norris insensible, on the edge of death, they had no collaborators who could link Norfolk to the plot.

  They had nothing.

  Parker lowered his hands from his forehead and realized they were shaking. Fatigue and shock had finally caught up with him.

  “You look like you need sleep, Parker.” Denny made an elegant bow to Susanna. “I am pleased to see you well, mistress. I was worried for you.”

  She smiled at him, a strained, tight smile that told Parker she was as exhausted as he was. “Thank you, my lord. And for your aid to Parker when he was wounded.”

  Denny held out something to her, and Parker saw it was her gold chain and pomander. She reached out and took it, cradling it in her palm. Denny bowed again, and Parker walked him out.

  “Things are getting worse, aren’t they?” Susanna said when he closed the door. “We are going around in circles.”

  He shrugged. “We are whittling down Norfolk’s henchmen, at the very least.”

  “He seems to have an endless supply.” She sounded beyond tired.

  Parker shook himself to keep focused and awake. “I will still need Harry to guard you.”

  “Why? Your suspect is dead.”

  “That’s what bothers me. The most likely killer was a Yeoman of the Guard. I need to see the King. One of his own guards is probably in Norfolk’s pocket.”

  Parker pus
hed open the door to the great hall, and saw he had arrived just in time.

  The King stood beside his chair, watching the festivities. His eyes tracked one dancer in particular. Elizabeth Carew.

  There was lust and anticipation on his face, and Parker wondered for the hundredth time how Henry and Nicholas Carew broke bread together, joked and tourneyed together, with Elizabeth between them. William Carey had received an estate, payment for services rendered by his wife, now that those services were no longer required.

  Parker thought of his own reaction should the King wish to bed his woman, and found dark thoughts of murder and violence close to the surface. Both Carey and Carew had married women not of their own choosing. Perhaps that was the key. They did not care. Or they cared more for the advancement their wives’ liaisons would bring them than the betrayal of marriage vows. If he were forced to marry against his own inclinations, perhaps he would feel the same.

  But he thought not.

  He pushed through the crowds before the King could act on his obvious desire for his mistress and disappear.

  “Your Majesty.”

  The King turned to him, and Parker saw irritation and impatience in his eyes. His expression changed at the sight of Parker’s face.

  “What is it?” He came down the dais steps.

  “Not here,” Parker said.

  Henry sent a lingering look across the room to where Elizabeth Carew stood, laughing with a few other ladies of the court. His mouth formed a stubborn line. “Yes, here. That corner over there.”

  Parker nodded. In truth, it was probably as secure a place to talk as any. “There is a deep plot afoot, Your Majesty. The tentacles reach … everywhere.”

  The King turned his head at that, and gave him his full attention. “Everywhere?”

  “A man died tonight. He’d tried to kill me but was overcome, and I had Denny take him to the knight marshal to be watched.”

  “Indeed?” The King’s nostrils flared and his eyes were wide, eager for the tale.