“But you did not find the child, though he was there all the time.”
Triumph colored her voice. “Oh, I found him.”
For a moment, I was too stunned to speak. Then I breathed: “The box of gloves—you sent it to rouse my suspicion, using the same poison that killed my squire. You taunted me.”
“As I said, you passed every test. You suspected from the start, did you not? How it must have tormented you, the fear I might still be alive. You must have thought you were going mad.”
Without answering, I passed my gaze over her. A pulse beat at the base of her throat, visible under the lacings of her collar. I also noticed something else: The tips of her boots were shiny in the torchlight. Wet. She had been outside.
“Let the child go,” I said. “He is not to blame for our sins.”
“Do you think I ever cared about him? He is the bastard son of a bastard queen: He means nothing to me. Had you not tried to save him, he would still be mucking out stables. I only took Lady Parry to ensure Elizabeth would send you to investigate; I knew she would, for whom else could she trust with her misdeeds? You were always her most loyal creature.”
“You lie.” I clenched my sword in my fist, resisting the urge to ram it into her. “You left a letter in that box telling her who I was. You wanted me dead.”
“It was a test, another part of the game! My letter was in her own cipher; it was a challenge to see how long it would take before she realized it, but I never doubted you would find her secret first. She was never as clever as you. Now, you are revealed for who you are and as soon as you deliver her bastard to her, she will see you to your death.” Her voice drove at me, harsh and unrelenting. “Do you know how many believe she is the by-blow of an incestuous whore, with no right to wear the crown? Her own sister Mary believed it. Yes, Mary thought Elizabeth was not her sister at all. But you—you are the son of a Tudor princess. Mary believed your claim, as did Renard. You will come with me to Spain, where King Philip can exalt you as this realm’s rightful sovereign. He will build an armada for you, take this land by force, and set you in her place. You will be king.” She paused. “If you refuse, the boy dies.”
I held on to every shred of will to contain the fury cresting inside me, the savage need to rent her apart, to bathe myself in her blood. I had told Elizabeth the truth; Philip had indeed sought to use a secret against her, but I had been wrong in my assumption that it was Raff.
I was the secret. I was the weapon.
“And if I do not accept?” I said. “No matter what Philip does, he cannot force me.”
“Now, who is the one who lies? You cannot deny your fate. I have seen how much you hunger for it; I have tasted it. It is the very reason you survive.” Anticipation turned her features taut. “Follow your destiny, Brendan,” she said, and time swirled, collapsing, returning me to that night when she appeared in my chamber at Whitehall, ensorceling me with her touch, with her mesmerizing beauty. I had thought lust had been my downfall, but now I understood it was more ominous: Sybilla embodied the very self I fought against, the temptation of what I could become if I surrendered to my own desires. “Follow me,” she said, “and take what is yours.”
I let her promise seep within me, as remorseless as it was intoxicating. She was right. I was a Tudor. How could I resist, with a kingdom within my grasp, an untried queen to depose, and Spain’s might at my back? I would be king. I would rule.
Then the moment began to unspool, and as her eyes turned black and I realized she had suspected all along what my choice would be, I whispered: “You must see me dead first,” and she flung up her arm, smashing her cane into my face.
Blood sprayed from my nose. Pain shot through my cheeks, blinding me as I thrust my sword. Swerving with astonishing speed despite her leg, she evaded my blade, which sliced past her, shredding her doublet. With a snarl in her throat, she rushed at me and I saw in her hand the blade she had concealed—a thin rapier yanked from within the cane. As I pivoted, lifting my sword, our blades struck, the impact shuddering through me. She had not lost her skill; the time spent healing her shattered body had lent her extraordinary virtuosity, so that she came at me with ease, her mouth parted, barely a labored breath escaping her as I rallied to defend myself.
Around us, the clang of our blades sparked echoes against the stone vaults. She was maneuvering me to a wall, where she could entrap me. Ducking around a pilaster, I slashed back and forth, keeping her at bay as I raced to the small postern door behind her, through which she had entered the crypt. She was at my heels; as I felt her rapier slash into my shoulder, she said through her teeth, “Loyalty was always your fatal weakness,” and I yanked at the door, releasing the roar of the river beyond, its spume and soaking damp.
My sword slipped from my grip. Agony lanced from my shoulder to my wrist. I vaguely heard my sword clatter behind me as I staggered from her advance onto the slippery waterlogged sterling, struggling to stay upright. Out of the corner of my eye, I caught sight of a small vessel moored to the chapel’s quay; within it, a bundled sack of cloth writhed as the current raged past, setting the small boat to tugging at its tether. Soon, the rope holding it would snap and the vessel with Raff inside it would be swept to its doom in the voracious whirlpools under the bridge.
I spun around to face her, my blood-drenched sword hand whipping my poniard from my belt. With an inchoate roar, I flung myself at her to ram my blade into her gut, even if it meant I would in turn impale myself on her sword. We would die together, locked in hatred.
A sudden hiss punctuated the air. She went still. A gasp escaped her lips.
Everything slowed to a crawl: her figure immobile, my poniard still in my hand as her eyes flared wide. Crimson bubbled from her lips. Her blade clattered to her feet as she began to keel, her twisted leg splaying. In a haze, I saw the fletched bolt protruding from between her shoulders and looked past her to a figure behind her in the doorway, crossbow lifted.
Meeting my stare, Dudley pulled back the mechanism and fit another bolt into it.
I was next. Before me, Sybilla crumpled to her knees. Dudley fired again. The bolt slammed into her, blood gushing from her mouth. She collapsed facedown, a dark pool spreading around her as her body twitched and went still.
The world capsized. Voices echoed; there was a clamor of footsteps, hands hauling me up. The searing pain in my shoulder numbed my senses. I could feel blood soaking my doublet, streaming down my chest; as Dudley shouted at someone behind him, “Quick, he needs a physician!” I struggled to resist, clutching at his sleeve to whisper, “The boy is in the boat…”
It was the last thing I remembered saying before oblivion engulfed me.
Chapter Twenty-Three
“Will he live?” The queen’s voice reached me as if from across a great distance. Something cold nuzzled my hand. Slowly, I opened my eyes. A burst of light blinded me. I groaned, shifting my head on the pillows. A cool hand touched my brow, pressing upon it.
“The fever is gone,” I heard Kate say. “I think the worst of it has passed.”
“Thank God.” A rustle of skirts approached. Turning my head, I saw Elizabeth’s face wavering above me, pallid and hollowed, but quiet fortitude in her eyes. “You are like a cat, my friend. But I fear you have used up the last of your nine lives.”
I tried to speak, untangling my knotted voice from my throat. “Raff … is he…?”
She nodded. “He is safe. No”—she held up her hand as I struggled to rise—“you must rest. There will be plenty of time for questions later.” She moved away, murmuring to Kate. The queen’s hound Urian whined, stuck his muzzle into my hand again. I stroked him with my fingertips, feeling the burning ache in my shoulder. My nose felt twice its normal size, too, and throbbed like a tiny anvil striking a forge. I could not keep my eyes open. As I let them close once more, sleep sneaking upon me even as I tried to resist, Kate set a warm compress on my nose and I heard her say softly, “You’re going to look like your father.”
* * *
A few days later, I could finally sit upright. I was in a chamber in the palace, with walnut-paneled walls and a mullioned bay. Kate came and went, tending to me, sitting on a stool at my side and patiently unwinding the soiled bandages on my shoulder to check the tender wound. I winced as she applied her homemade herbal salve, less at its acrid smell than the burn it caused.
“I know it hurts,” she said. “But you narrowly escaped corruption setting in. The wound cut almost to the bone. We thought you would die from the fever. You must let it heal, Brendan. You have to endure it. You want to keep use of your sword arm, don’t you?”
I had to chuckle, though any movement made me want to shout in pain. She went quiet, replacing the bandage with her eyes averted.
“Kate,” I said.
She paused. When she eventually lifted her gaze, it was somber. “No,” she said. “I don’t need to hear it. I … I do not want to know. It is over. You saved the queen once again.”
“But I must tell you.” I reached for her hand, holding it fast. “I made a mistake. I … I am the reason this happened. But I never loved her, not as I love you. Something else drove me; desire, yes, but also hatred. So much hatred. She showed me a vision of who I might be, if I ever allowed myself. She made me almost think that I…” My voice faded into silence. “I would have sooner died than hurt you,” I whispered. “You must know that.”
She did not speak, looking down at our entwined fingers.
“I should have told you,” I went on. “I lied to you. I know you can never forgive me, but I … I regret it. All of it. I love you. I always will, no matter what.”
When she finally looked up, her eyes shone with tears. In a quavering voice, she said, “I know that.” She withdrew her hand, stood, and took the pile of reeking bandages heaped in a basin by the bedside. “I forgive you,” she said and she turned heel, before I could speak again.
It took weeks before I could stand, and when I did, I swayed like a newborn foal, weak and ungainly, struggling to get my bearings. I persisted nevertheless, walking a little more each day, and soon I managed to tread across the room and back, albeit with a stiffness that Elizabeth’s personal physician, Dr. Butts, assured me would ebb in time.
“You look as if you’d been in battle,” he sniffed, examining the lattice of contusions from my struggle in the Thames, which covered most of my body in yellowed welts. “I’ve never seen a man take such a beating. And this cut on your brow: I fear you will have a scar.”
I looked over his head to where Kate stood. We had not spoken again of my betrayal. She had said she did not want to know more, and I must respect it. Yet I had the sense she had known from the start that my withdrawal from her and decision to remain abroad, without word, had been prompted as much by guilt as the peril we faced. I resigned myself to our estrangement; I did not deserve her, and though she came to tend me every day, she remained aloof.
But as I now let her assist me to dress—she had seen me naked before and I was in no position to insist on modesty—tying up my hose and tugging on my boots, as I couldn’t yet find much strength in my shoulder, I wanted to implore her forgiveness once more.
She let me clumsily haul myself upright before she said, “Her Majesty wants you to attend her coronation. She delayed it until January, so you would have sufficient time to recover. Cecil tried to dissuade her, but she would not hear of it.”
“Then I must attend,” I said.
Kate nodded, offering me her arm. “Before you do, she wishes to see you.”
It felt strange moving through court, passing courtiers who stopped to stare and then, as we moved past, to whisper. I had always lived my life in the background, avoiding notice. Now, it seemed as if everyone knew me, though of course it was not so. My assignment had been clandestine, like my previous ones; the courtiers simply remarked on the sight of a man grown thin from enforced seclusion, his doublet hanging like someone else’s on his frame as he leaned on the arm of a lady in waiting. The novelty of it was the only thing that attracted their attention. Within days, if not hours, they would forget it when another novelty arose.
At the entrance to her apartments, I found Cecil waiting. He glowered at the sight of me. Before he could remonstrate, I said, “I had no choice. She asked me. How could I refuse?”
“No one said you had to refuse,” he replied, his pale blue eyes sparking. “But you might have at least left word. Walsingham searched London from attic to cellar for you.”
Naturally, I wanted to say, no doubt with a warrant for my arrest; but Cecil preempted me with unexpected deference: “You served her well, indeed,” and he led us into Elizabeth’s rooms.
She stood by the window, clad in azure velvet, regal in her poise as she turned at my approach, her red-gold hair coiled at her nape, her long, slim fingers speckled with rings. She looked better, I noted, still too lean, but then she never did seem to put on flesh, her appetite subsumed by restlessness. As I made to bow, she said, “No ceremony.” She flicked her hand at Cecil and Kate, who retreated to leave us alone.
“Does he know?” I asked.
“Do you think me a fool?” She stepped to me. “Cecil believes you helped bring down a Spanish assassin intent on my demise. He may suspect more, but he will never ask. To do so would compromise him beyond his abilities.”
She did not need to elaborate. Cecil was busy rounding up royal suitors for a virgin queen; the revelation that she was not would indeed complicate his task.
“Robert does, though,” she added, “as I believe he told you. He took Hugh from the boat and brought him here to me.” She motioned to a chair. “You grow pale. You may sit.”
“By your leave, I would prefer to stand. I’ve been resting long enough.”
She frowned. “Is this the time to question me?”
“Not anymore. I think we confided all that needed to be said in the Tower.”
“So you will ask nothing more?” She sounded doubtful. “You intend to let this matter between us rest?”
“I also hid a secret,” I replied. “I believe that entitles you to have yours.”
A small laugh escaped her. It lit up her face, reminding me of the fallible young woman she still was, only twenty-five, with a divided realm she must make her own. She moved to the door to her bedchamber, rapped on it with her knuckles. When it opened, Lady Parry emerged. Clinging to her hand was a sturdy figure with fresh-cropped, dark red-gold hair.
I staggered to one knee. He let out a cry, running into my arms. I did not feel the pain, then, ignoring the sharp stab in my shoulder and throbbing of my bruises as he clung to me.
“I knew you would come,” he said, his voice muffled against my doublet. “You are my friend.”
“Yes, I am.” A lump formed in my chest. I gazed up at Elizabeth. She stood silent but her expression filled with a gratitude that told me more than any words. With a smile, Lady Parry nodded at me. She was still pale and thin from her trials but also clearly on the mend.
“He must be kept from court,” Elizabeth said. “I never had a childhood or youth; he must not suffer the same.” She bit her lower lip, watching her son in my arms. “I want you and Kate to raise him at Hatfield.”
“Hatfield,” echoed Raff brightly. “The pretty lady says Hatfield is my home.”
I met Elizabeth’s eyes. “It would mean…”
She nodded. “It would, but his safety is everything. Besides, I have Cecil and Walsingham to protect me now. You have done enough—more than enough, some might say.”
“And Kate…?” I was having trouble speaking, every word sticking to the roof of my mouth. She offered me the one thing I never expected: the choice to leave the court, to retire and care for her child, to enjoy as much of an ordinary life as a man like me could hope for. I would never have imagined it; I had thought instead to request her leave to return abroad, an agent in Cecil’s service, far from the memory of what I had lost.
“I should think you will need to
ask her,” said Elizabeth. “But if I know Kate, I am certain of her answer.” She tugged one of her ruby rings from her fingers. “You will need this,” she added, with a wry smile. “Maidens like to be properly enticed.”
I bent my face, kissing Raff’s forehead. He beamed at me. “I’ll see you very soon,” I promised, and he nodded, returning to Lady Parry, who led him away.
After I took the ring from her, Elizabeth regarded me with unvoiced sadness.
This time, I bowed low. She was, after all, my queen.
* * *
I found Kate alone in the anteroom, waiting. She rose quickly from her stool in a soft fall of skirts. “Cecil left to attend to plans for the coronation,” she said, clasping her hands before her stomacher. “He told me he would speak with you later. Did she…?” Her voice faltered; I knew in that instant that Elizabeth had confided in her about the child.
“She did.” I stepped to her. “Kate, can you forgive me?”
“I told you that I already have.” She tried to remain composed, as if the fragility between us might crumble anew. “I must ask your forgiveness, too. The way I treated you when you arrived at court … I had no right.”
I laughed, startling her. “Oh, you had every right.” I withdrew Elizabeth’s ring from my doublet. “Kate Stafford, though I am surely the most undeserving of men, will you be my wife? Will you come away with me and never look back?”
She looked down at the ring, tears starting in her eyes. Then, with a trembling breath, she whispered, “Yes. I will, Brendan Prescott, most undeserving of men that you are.”
I gathered her in my arms, setting my lips on hers with a sigh.
The Tudor Vendetta Page 24