Marissa Day (5 page)

“My true knight.” Smiling, the queen leaned forward and touched Thomas’s shoulder in blessing and welcome. “Tell me, is there news?”

“There is, Your Majesty.” Thomas could not keep the trace of pride from his voice. “I have met Jane DeWitte and gained her assent to an assignation in the flesh.”

“Excellent.” The queen’s hand cupped his chin, lifting it until he looked into her unearthly eyes of silver and violet. “But then it is only as I expected. What mortal woman could resist you, Thomas?”

“My queen flatters me,” Thomas murmured. As he gazed into the queen’s eyes, wonder took hold of him. He could see clearly all her beauty and her power. She was the center of all things here. Even the warm light of the grove flowed entirely from her. As the light cradled him, she cradled him, warming his skin and blood with her caress. She was all love, all desire. There was nothing in the world he needed so much as to be in her presence.

The queen’s laugh rang through the grove and she broke her gaze, leaving Thomas suddenly bereft.

“Come, Sir Thomas, and sit beside me,” Queen Tatiana commanded lightly. She clapped her white hands and two of her nymphs scampered to fetch a wooden chair for him. Thomas bowed as he stood and took the seat as best he was able, for his straining member did not permit for easy movement. The queen’s sparkling gaze caressed his erection, but she only smiled as if it were a shared joke between them.

“So, Thomas,” she said. “Is the hook well baited?”

“I would take an oath on it, Majesty. Lady Jane DeWitte’s a bold wench, for all her downcast eyes and aloof manners. The dreams I have sent her have thoroughly roused her, even more so than I would have initially thought.” Memory of Jane’s blushes touched him, and Thomas felt himself smile. He had enjoyed their little flirtation. Seeing her yield to a woman’s natural desire for love and warmth had been an unanticipated delight. He was looking forward to bringing her many others.

“You must not linger over your task, however pleasant you may find it,” said the queen. Thomas bowed his head, startled and ashamed to find his thoughts had wandered. The queen’s gaze touched his erection once more. Thomas fought to hold his tongue. He could not offer himself to her, however much he wanted to. It was for her majesty to choose when and how he would serve, and she had other uses for him tonight. “We have very little time left to us to put paid to the prophecy.”

The prophecy. As the queen spoke those two words, a fresh wind laden with frost stirred in the summer grove, and the ones gathered there—both Fae and human—shivered.

Generations ago, the druids of Britain had sought after the hidden wisdom of the world. In this quest, they accidentally opened the gates to the realm of the Fae, and the Fae had poured through into the mortal realms. Tatiana had been queen of the day then, as well as the night. But then, Arthur rose from the ranks of men, and his mortal queen Guinevere with him. Both had sacrificed much for their power and knowledge, she even more than he, and together, the upstarts had driven back the armies of Oberon and Tatiana, allowing their Sorcerer Merlin to shut the gates the druids had opened.

Those gates did not close entirely, however. In time, another Fae army had forced its way through. It was Queen Elizabeth and her Sorcerer John Dee who beat back that second invasion.

Determined not to risk another defeat, Queen Tatiana had sought the wisdom of powers older and more terrible than she. Alone, she ventured to the daemon realms. In exchange for a price of blood and treasure, the daemons worked their own foul magics to grant her a prophecy. That prophecy warned that a third queen would arise from among the Britons. If allowed to ascend the throne, this third queen would chain the gate to fairyland shut forever. But if her rise could be prevented, the Isle of the Britons would stand defenseless, and the Fae might again claim its rich, green lands.

Armed with this knowledge, the queen determined that, this time, the Fae should move by stealth. Instead of gathering an army, she patiently slipped her servants through the cracks between the worlds in ones and twos. Once established in the mortal realms, the Fae agents set about to two tasks. The first was to recruit human magic workers to their cause. The second was to spoil as much as they could the ruling family of Britain.

At the latter, they had succeeded beyond their wildest hopes. The old king was now both blind and mad. Jealousy and fear had driven him to lock up his daughters. As for his sons, a more foolish pack of mortal men did not exist. Each one of them had been induced to fall for the charms of women they could not or would not marry, and their indulgences had left the royal pricks scarcely able to even twitch for the women to which they did become legally espoused. The one daughter of the house who had lived to adulthood lay dead along with her stillborn child. As matters stood, the only legitimate child of the House of Hanover grew within the belly of the Duchess of Kent.

Queen Tatiana needed to know if the child was male or female. She needed to know what move to make next, and for that she needed access to Kensington House, which, like all the royal residences, was guarded with barriers of human magic and the deadly cold iron. It was to breech those wardings that Thomas had been sent to seduce one of the princess’s waiting women.

“I live only to serve my queen.” Thomas laid his hand over his heart. “All will be done as speedily as I can contrive.”

“Good.” The sharp edge of the Fae queen’s gaze slid across Thomas’s perception and he nearly winced with the pain of it. But in the next heartbeat, his queen smiled and all was unclouded summer again. “After all,” she said merrily, “you would not wish me to think you preferred this lady’s company over mine.”

“Impossible, Majesty!” Thomas cried. “She is pleasant, I’ll grant you. Teaching her the arts of love will be no hardship, but there is none I esteem above you, nor could there ever be.”

“I do know it, my Thomas.” Queen Tatiana reached out and ruffled his hair as if he was nothing more than a stripling boy. For a moment, Thomas’s pride stung. She had often enjoyed his manhood, why did she feel the need to treat him so?

“Tumble the lady thoroughly.” She laughed and her eyes sparkled so that Thomas forgot his fleeting discomfort. “Teach her all she is able to learn of pleasure. But one of my servants must be able to gain free entry to the house before the next full moon.” The winter frost crept back into her regard. “That is all that matters.”

“I swear, Majesty,” said Sir Thomas evenly. “It will be done.”

The queen gazed deeply into the eyes of her servant, and smiled.

T
hankfully, the strains of his recent journey caused the Duke of Kent to leave Lord Darnley’s house at the relatively early hour of one o’clock in the morning. Although fairly weighed down by exhaustion, Jane reported to her mistress’s chamber. There she was informed by her attendant Frau Seibold that the duchess had retired and now slept soundly. Grateful beyond words, Jane crept to her adjoining room. Her maid, Tilly, waited there to help her off with her gown. As soon as they’d gotten Jane into her night attire, Jane dismissed Tilly to her own bed in the servant’s quarters. She did not want any company tonight, or any witness to . . . to whatever might happen next. Assuming that anything did happen.

But as soon as Tilly bid her good-night and closed the door, Jane began berating herself. What a fool she was! How on earth could she expect Sir Thomas to be able to arrange an assignation for them? Even if he could somehow get a message to her before the morning, she could not leave the house. He must know that. He had been playing with her, building upon her fantasies, thinking of ways to take advantage of this loose and unstable woman. And she had let him.

Although these thoughts ran riot through her, Jane made no move toward her narrow bed. Her mind might not believe what Sir Thomas said was possible, but her body did. Clad in nightdress, cap and dressing gown, her fire banked for the night, Jane’s skin prickled from the room’s chill. Her blood, however, burned hot from the memory of Sir Thomas’s eyes upon her. Any attempt at sleep now would be useless. Besides, what if she did sleep? She would only dream again, and the desires those dreams raised would be worse than the regrets and uncertainties that tormented her now.

Jane rested her fingers on the windowsill and looked out at the night beyond her pale reflection. The sky was dark with clouds and rain pattered steadily against the roof and windowpane, muting all other sounds. The great house slept. Rain and dark blocked out any view of the gardens, let alone the wall or the gate. Jane felt as if she had already fallen into a dream where no one and nothing existed beyond her small room.

Jane laid her brow against the cold glass.
I must get over this,
she told herself.
I must forget this. Forget him.
She closed her eyes and drew in a long, shuddering breath.

Jane’s head snapped up.

It was Sir Thomas’s voice. She heard it plainly, just as she had in all her dreams. For a moment, Jane wondered if she was dozing. But no. She could feel the chill in the air distinctly, as well as the grain of painted wood under her hand. Scents of candle wax, smoke and perfume lingered from the day. Frau Seibold’s inelegant snores reverberated through the connecting door.

Jane’s heart fluttered against her ribs. This could not be happening, and yet she yearned with all her being that it might be. She remembered the light in Sir Thomas’s brilliant green eyes as he bent to kiss her fingers, and her palm. She remembered the fire and passion of her dreams, of his hands caressing and possessing her body, and his hot, demanding mouth . . .

Jane steeled her nerves. She took her cap from her head and slid it under her pillow. Her heavy braid hung down to the small of her back. She considered loosening it to let her curls tumble free, but that would take time, and she felt certain time was short.

She held a taper to the remaining coals of her fire and used it to light a small oil lamp, turning down the wick until it barely flickered. The door hinges were well tended and made no noise as Jane slipped into the long corridor. Her unsteady lamp light fell faintly against the scarlet carpet and gold-trimmed doorways. Jane hesitated. In which direction should she go? It was one thing to imagine one heard a lover’s call in one’s mind. It was quite another to go chasing after it.

The words filled her with instinctive certainty. Jane started down the corridor toward the back stairs. She did not run. She wanted to, desperately. She had run in each of her dreams. But, as she reminded herself with each step, this was not a dream. If any other person came upon her roaming about in the dark, she would have enough to explain without being caught racing down the hallway like a giddy girl. So, she put one slippered foot decorously in front of the other in ladylike steps with her head erect, but eyes modestly lowered, holding her hems out of the way in her free hand so she could move with the dignity to which she had been trained.

The journey through the darkened palace took so long that her patience strained against her resolve. Indeed, it felt as if she passed through too many chambers. Some she recognized, like the princess Sophia’s sitting room, or the cupola room with its great clock. Others, though, seemed strange and vague, as if they were stage sets rather than real places. Jane tried not to think about it. If she thought, she might stop before she reached her destination, and she did not want to stop. She told herself the palace was huge, and she had not even been in residence a full day yet. That was surely the reason it felt so large and strange.

At last, Jane came to a side corridor she had not previously noticed. Four doors were set in its walls, two on each side. Golden light slipped from under the farthest left-hand door. Jane’s breath hitched in her throat, and she stepped into the corridor. It seemed the air stirred as she moved forward, bringing the scents of rain and growing things.

The left-hand door was unpainted wood, simply carved. Its gilded knob had been worked into the shape of a summer rose. Jane heard no sound from within. In fact, she heard no sound at all beyond the pounding of her heart. She stood on the brink and she knew it. No matter how much or how little happened afterward, once she entered the room beyond this plain-seeming door, something fundamental would change. Now was her very last chance to turn back.

Jane raised her hand, and softly knocked.

“Come in, Jane,” said Sir Thomas from the other side.

Her heart in her mouth, Jane pushed the door open and stepped across the threshold.

And caught her breath.

The chamber was like no guest room she had yet seen in Kensington House. Her slippered feet sank into plush Turkish carpets. Figured emerald silk covered the walls and green velvet drapes fringed with silver covered the windows, muffling sound and rendering the light from the many candelabras lush and cool with reflected color. The room was mostly furnished with sofas and chaise longues of various heights and widths, just as the chamber in her dreams had been. Against the back wall, however, waited a massive bed, canopied and curtained in more splendid summer green. Elsewhere, deep pillows covered with damask and velvet had been scattered about. A black and gold Japanned sideboard and matching massive wardrobe flanked the bed.