“Don’t be impudent,” I said tartly. “I know how to keep myself safe and my belly empty.”
“Whores’ tricks, madam, and not to be trusted,” she said succinctly. “Leastways not with a man so potent as the king.”
I’ll admit that this litany of royal bastards did give me pause, and I did not question its veracity, having met His Majesty and felt for myself the blatant force of his virility. I hadn’t factored a misbegotten child into any of my happy, hazy schemes and plans, though I’d seen how other women had bound their lovers more closely to them by bearing children. And a royal bastard was not like the spawn of a Covent Garden whore. A child carrying half the king’s blood could be legitimized, favored, and granted titles and estates, advantages that no child I might conceive with Roger could ever claim.
Not that I’d confess such thoughts to Wilson. “I’ve never said I intended to lie with His Majesty, have I?”
“No, madam,” Wilson said dutifully, but the extra sniff she added said far more.
“Do not presume to know my mind, Wilson,” I warned. “Tell me instead more of the king’s past lovers.”
“Yes, madam,” she said, unperturbed by my chiding as she separated my hair into sections for braiding for the night. “I’ve told you all who were mentioned by name below stairs. There have been others, too, that were of no lasting note beyond a night or two. Yet they say, madam, that at present no single lady holds the king’s attention.”
I smiled slyly at my reflection in the glass in my hand. That would change.
“And of course they’ve all followed after the king’s first mistress, madam,” Wilson continued, “when he was still a prince. You recall her, madam: that Welsh creature Lucy Walters. She died last year in Paris, they say of drink and the French pox.”
“Lucy Walters,” I said, reflecting upon poor foolish Lucy’s fate. I’d heard the king had been her great love, yet she’d sadly neglected to make certain he felt the same for her. I’d not make the same mistake. “Once everyone knew of Lucy Walters, just as everyone’s forgotten her now.”
“You’re the one they’re speaking of tonight, madam,” Wilson said as she plaited my hair. “Even as I sat among them, they whispered of nothing else but your beauty, your grace, and how you’d fascinated the king on so short an acquaintance.”
I smiled with satisfaction, stroking the long braid between my fingers. I’d only another day before I must return to England, but when I recalled how the king had already shown his interest in me, I knew that would be enough to make a good beginning between us.
“Let them whisper, Wilson,” I said with fresh resolve. “I mean to give them plenty more to say, and soon.”
Chapter Seven
BRUSSELS, SPANISH NETHERLANDS
February 1 6 6 0
The letter was brought the following morning, before I’d risen from my bed. I’d been expecting such a missive, yet when Wilson drew back the bed-curtains to put it into my sleepy hand, I still felt a shiver of amazement when I recognized the king’s seal pressed into the wax that held the sheet closed. The message within was brief, more a command than any sweet-worded wooing.
Come to me tonight,
Carolus R.
Carolus R., Carolus Rex, Charles the King, King of England, Ireland, and Scotland: what woman wouldn’t tremble to be summoned by so mighty a person?
“Ha, Wilson, he’s asked me,” I said with a small huzzah of triumph. “The king’s invited me for tonight!”
“Congratulations, madam,” Wilson said. “That was your wish, wasn’t it?”
“Of course it was, you foolish creature, as you knew perfectly well.” I sank back against the pillow-bier, all thought of sleep now gone. “Ah, sweet tonight!”
Wilson sniffed and began to loop the bedstead’s curtains up for the day. “You would not stay with him last night, madam. How was I to guess that this night would be so very different?”
“Because you and I must leave Brussels for home tomorrow,” I explained, though any woman who understood the habits of licentious men would have found it most obvious. “This way, His Majesty can have my company for the single night and no more, and I’ll leave him with the wanting so keen he’ll not be able to put me from his mind.”
Wilson bent down, stuffing the mattress and trundle in which she’d slept at my feet beneath my taller bed.
“That’s a prideful bit of confidence,” she muttered into the bedclothes, “to think she’d so beguile a man such as the king.”
“I heard that, Wilson,” I said swiftly, rolling over in the bed to swat at her arm. “And if I weren’t so certain I would beguile His Majesty, as you said, I’d have you thrashed for it.”
Primly she folded her hands across her apron, as if she’d said nothing wrong. “What if the king never does come back to London, madam? What if Parliament refuses to bow down and send for him to rule again, and all your confidence and cunning come to naught?”
“Then I will have gambled and lost,” I said, stretching my hands over my head. “It won’t be the first time, nor the last. But if I am not willing to stake such a risk for the sake of my future, why, then I truly deserve to be no more than Monsieur’s drab. Did you bring chocolate with the letter?”
“Yes, madam.” Wilson went to the tray she’d set near the door and returned with my cup of chocolate.
“You’ll see, Wilson,” I said, stirring the milky skin from the chocolate’s surface. “As soon as the king returns, he’ll ask for me to come to him at Whitehall Palace, and again after that. And he will, Wilson. He will.”
Wilson considered this briefly. “Forgive me for speaking plain, madam, but if you wish that to be so, you must also consider Sir Edward.”
“That wretched old breakwind?” I fanned my hand back and forth over the steaming chocolate. “Hyde’s made it clear enough that he despises me. I’ll make short work of him.”
“Yes, madam.” Wilson’s mouth was set and stern, the way it always was when she meant to say something I’d no wish to hear. “I saw to it that the footman who brought this message was given a pot of ale and a slice of bread and ham in the kitchen.”
“How clever of you, my own Wilson,” I said with new admiration for her wiles. “What did this thirsty fellow tell you?”
“He said that Hyde heartily wishes you back in London, if not to Hell itself,” she answered. “He believes you could be an unfortunate influence upon the king.”
I sipped the chocolate. “Is that the worst he can say of me?”
“No, madam,” she said. “He called you an ‘evil low jade,’ too.”
“ ‘Evil low jade,’ is it?” I chuckled with amusement. “Hah, I’ve been called worse, and by my own mother at that. All that matters to me is what His Majesty thinks, not that querulous old rascal, puffed up like a pig’s bladder with his own importance.”
“Forgive me, madam, but you must be wary of him,” Wilson said with rare urgency. “They say Sir Edward’s like another father to His Majesty, having been at his side since he was still a prince. They say he’s the only one the king will ever turn to for counsel and guidance. If you test His Majesty by forcing him to choose between you, madam, he’ll choose Hyde.”
“Then I must make certain he’ll never have to choose.” I set my cup on the chair beside the bed with a clatter of porcelain against wood. Filled with fresh determination, I shoved back the covers, swung my legs over the side, and hopped down from the high bedstead. My smock fluttering around me, I went to the chair and bench that we’d contrived as a dressing table here in the inn, and began holding different earrings beside my cheek as I peered into my tiny glass, trying to decide which flattered me the more. I always took care with choosing my jewels, humble though they might be; often, at day’s end and in bed, they were the only part of my dress that remained upon my person.
“The garnets, Wilson, or the amethyst bobs?” I asked, frowning critically at my reflection. “The amethysts do flatter the color of my eyes, yet the g
arnets are the finer stones.”
“The amethysts, madam, if they please you,” Wilson said, coming forward to settle a woolen shawl over my bare shoulders against the chill of the room. “Madam, I must beg you, in regards to Sir Edward—”
“I know precisely what I must do in regards to Sir Edward, Wilson.” I turned on the chair to confront her, an earring in either hand. “Before I left London, Sir Alan warned me that Hyde was the king’s most trusted advisor, a dangerous man to cross, and thus one I’ve taken pains to understand. I learned that Sir Edward’s as great a friend to the Anglican faith as he is an enemy to the Romish one. He wishes the king restored to the throne through diplomacy rather than by force, so that he’ll not be indebted to his Catholic cousins for the show of an invading army. And I saw for myself last night that he links me still to Chesterfield, another he loathes, and fears somehow we’ll both waylay the king from his true path back to the throne.”
“Forgive me, madam,” Wilson said contritely, adding a small curtsey for good measure. “I should not have presumed.”
But I refused to be easily mollified. It was not so much Wilson’s anxious warning but how her words seemed an unpleasant echoing of Roger, and Philip, and my mother, together a derisive chorus of everything I shouldn’t or couldn’t do.
“What you presumed, Wilson,” I said, “was that I was a blathering, empty-headed idiot, fit for swiving and correction and nothing else, and I assure you that I am not. I know how carefully I must tread between Sir Edward and the king. I know. But I’ve also learned his weaknesses. He is proud and stubborn to a fault, and would rather falter than admit his errors. He is rigid in his beliefs, and won’t listen to any others. He longs for a magnificent match for his fat daughter, the one with popping eyes like an overfed dog. Those are the weaknesses of Sir Edward Hyde, Wilson, and if he dares cross me, I’ll prick every one.”
“As you wish, madam,” Wilson said, her eyes wide after such a tirade from me. “As you wish.”
“Aye, as I wish,” I said firmly, turning back to my glass. “For I’ll not do anything further in my life that I don’t.”
That night I was shown not into the parlor but directly to the king’s bedchamber. Once again I was struck by how small and mean his quarters were, half the size of the room Wilson and I shared in our own lodgings. It seemed neither fair nor proper, and shameful, too, that our country showed such little respect for our ruler, and I thought proudly of the gold I’d brought to him to help ease his situation.
When I entered, he was sitting alone at a table before the fire, writing letters, his pen scratching furiously across the paper. His dogs were asleep on the bed, curled up against one another for warmth. The page announced my name, and the king grunted in reply, but because he didn’t turn toward the door, I doubted he’d realized I stood behind him.
Yet I wasn’t offended. Such trust had an intimacy of its own. I’d a long moment to study him while he completed whatever thought he’d been wrestling; he wore a loose, dark red dressing gown over his shirt and breeches, the sleeves of his shirt rolled back from his wrists to spare his cuffs from the ink, his feet thrust into comfortably worn slippers that showed the darned heels of his stockings. His broad back and shoulders faced me, his black hair spilling over the red dressing gown, and just that much was sufficient to send a small frisson of excitement coursing through my blood.
“A moment, a moment,” he said absently, absorbed still by his composition. “Nearly done.”
“No haste on my account, Your Majesty,” I said softly, drawing off my gloves. “I shall wait.”
Swiftly he turned toward me, his hand with the pen resting across the spindled back of the chair. “Mistress Palmer!”
“The only lady by that name.” I sank low in my curtsey, never breaking my gaze from his. “Good evening, sir. Pray, finish your letter.”
“It’s nothing that cannot wait until morning.” He tossed down his pen and rose, then came toward me, capturing my hands in his to lift me up. “Come now, I told you. Let there be no ceremony between us. Now sit here with me and share my wine.”
I did as I was told, sitting in the only other chair, and I turned it so it was close enough beside his that my skirts trailed across his foot as if by accident. By the wavering light of the fire behind us, his face was planed with deep shadows to match his black hair and eyes. His shirt was open at the throat, carelessly, as men do after riding or hunting, and permitted me a glimpse of his chest beneath and the first tuft of black curls to be found there.
“I can write a fair hand, you know,” I said, glancing down at the unfinished letter while he filled the second goblet on the table—proof that he hadn’t entirely forgotten I’d been invited. “I’ll play your secretary if it will help your cause and bring you back to London the sooner.”
“I told you, sweeting, there’s nothing that can’t be put aside until tomorrow.” He raised his own goblet toward me in salute. “But I will drink to London, and a glorious future.”
“To London, and the future.” I drank deeply of the sweet wine, the kind favored in Brussels, and when I lowered the goblet, I left a little of the wine to glisten provocatively upon my lips as I smiled.
The king noticed, his gaze first lowering to my mouth, and then to my breasts. I’d worn the same blue velvet bodice—the only suitable one I’d brought, anyway—as the night before, though I’d asked Wilson to be sure the knot at the back was not so tight that it couldn’t be undone with ease. Given the king’s history, I doubted he’d be thwarted by any feature of a woman’s wardrobe, but there were few obstacles more frustrating to passion than a tangle of unyielding clothing.
I leaned my elbow on the arm of my chair, gracefully turning more toward him as I touched my fingers to the crystal heart around my throat. The cypher inside had been intended to honor his father, true, but the initials would be the same for this Charles as well. And the fact that the necklace had been my first lover’s gift from Roger— ah, that I put from my mind entirely.
“London will be much changed when you return, sir,” I said. “I’ve never known it other than under parliamentary rule, not in my life, but I’ve heard so many tales of the old days that paint it as the most magical place on earth.”
“For some it was, yes,” he said, and sadness darkened his face. None of us of our generation could escape that melancholy, I suppose. Everyone I knew had lost fathers, brothers, and uncles, great fortunes and long-held estates. The king was no different, having his father murdered by the executioner’s axe, his kingdom and crown stolen away, and his mother and brothers and sisters scattered like poor relations about the rest of Europe. Nine years he’d been wandering in exile himself, nearly a third of his life. But the greatest loss of all to us, I think, was how we’d been robbed not only of our place in this life but of our purpose. It would fall upon the broad shoulders of the man beside me to restore that to us.
I’d no doubt he could do it, too, and lah, how fervently I wished to be at his side when he did!
“I’ve been away from London so long I can recall only certain things with any clarity,” he said at last. “The sound of the church bells rolling across the city on a cold winter morning. Visiting the wild beasts at the Tower with my father and brother as a treat; the old lion was my favorite, even though he was so ancient he’d lost his teeth and most of his mane. The soldiers parading behind the palace, the drums and the pipes, people cheering and the dogs all barking. Foolish things, really, the stuff boys remember.”
“Not foolish, sir,” I said, laying my hand on his arm as a comfort. To hear so grand a gentleman as the king confess such humble delights touched me in a way I’d not anticipated possible. “Sometimes the memories are all we have until happier times come around again.”
He smiled wearily. “Jolly company I am for a beautiful lady.”
“My life’s not been lilies and roses, either, sir,” I said softly. “But I always try to place my hopes in the future, and not dwell upon the sorr
ows of the past.”
He took my hand in his, and raised it to his lips. “Spoken like a true angel.”
I chuckled, turning my hand in his to trace my finger lightly across his lips, below his mustache. “No ethereal angel, sir. Only a mortal woman of flesh and blood and bone.”
“A Villiers angel, then,” he said, his smile unfurling beneath my fingers. “Divine flesh and blood, coupled with a pragmatic heart.”
“Too true, sir.” It was easy enough to leave my chair to sit upon his lap. “Is it any wonder, then, that among the seraphim the Villiers sit so close to the Stuarts?”
“Clever seraphim.” He curled one arm around my waist to steady me and draw me closer, while with his other hand he turned my face toward his. “Kiss me, fair angel, and prove to me that we belong in the same celestial choir.”
“I’ll be the most obedient of seraphim for you, sir,” I whispered, chuckling to hear this wry rubbish from him even as I lowered my mouth to his. “All you must do is claim what I offer.”
By way of an answer he kissed me: not the public kisses he’d made to me before, kisses before witnesses for show, but to please himself, and me. Unlike many larger men for whom kissing is but one more way to overpower a poor lady by force and slobber, the king kissed without haste, yet with coaxing skill, and so artfully that my heart quickened and my desires stirred eagerly for more.
I slid my hand inside his dressing gown, inside his shirt. I’d heard he delighted in a vigorous life, enjoying the French game of tennis as well as riding to the hunt and swimming in both the river and the sea, and the proof showed in the hard muscles of his chest and arms. He pulled me closer, letting his hand stray to dip into my bodice. I arched into his caress with a happy sigh, and as his thigh shifted beneath my bottom, I could feel his interested cock rising strong against my hip.
“Will you stay, madam?” he asked, his eyes heavy-lidded, his embrace more possessive. He’d stopped smiling now, just as the bantering tone had left his voice. I’m not sure he’d have let me go even if I wished it—which in a wicked way only made me want him the more.
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