Authors: Laura Andersen
“Any idea with whom?”
She shook her head and smiled ruefully. “I could have sworn that she didn’t look twice at any man. But then, I could have sworn that I would never again be in the same room with Giles Howard.”
“Minuette—”
“And when shall we be dancing at your wedding, Dominic?”
The abrupt change of subject left him floundering. “What wedding?”
“I hear the women talking. You have only to look around you to find any number of willing brides.”
Unable to bear her direct and unsuspicious gaze, he looked over her head to the painting of Henry VII hanging behind her. The miserly face of William’s grandfather helped him speak sparingly. “I’m sure you’re wrong. I’ve nothing to recommend me but the rather precarious gift of royal favor. No title, no land, nothing but the king’s goodwill.”
Her voice was untroubled. “I think the recommendation of your person is quite enough for any lady. And if marriage isn’t to your liking, it isn’t necessarily required.”
Startled into looking at her again, he saw that she was staring at Giles Howard. “Never mind me.” She waved a hand and turned toward him. “You are a favorite amongst the ladies. That is all I meant.”
Dominic smiled slightly. “It’s kind of you to say. However, with the treaty in shambles, I expect at any moment to be sent off and who knows when I’ll return. Now is not the time to begin an affair of the heart.”
It was an eminently practical and reasonable answer and Minuette accepted it with a nod. As Dominic watched the rise and fall of her breathing beneath the star pendant she wore almost continually, he repeated it silently to himself.
Now is not the time
.
The morning after Eleanor’s wedding, Elizabeth summoned Dominic to attend her and Minuette riding. Though there were also grooms in attendance, the three of them could converse with much less chance of being overheard while on horseback.
Once they were well away into the fields, Dominic asked, “Is this simply checking in or do you have something definite to report?”
“Nothing definite, just hints of provocation. Mary has increased her letters to the emperor—sometimes three a week. And her household is seeing an increase in visitors.”
“I’ve heard,” Dominic said. “Rochford keeps telling Will he should tighten his control of her household. But I’m not convinced Lady Mary has anything to do with Alyce and the broadsheet. It was a man who fathered Alyce’s child and wrote those letters.”
“But a man working for whom? This was not an idle game. You said yourself there was purpose behind it. And I doubt that purpose was so inconsequential as ruining Alyce.”
“She’s not ruined,” Minuette said sharply. “She is dead.”
“I know,” Elizabeth sighed. “But that broadside and its slogan argue a political purpose. There is only one group who wants my brother gone—the Catholics. And the Catholics look to Mary. She may not have known particulars, but wherever there is smoke, there is Mary as the tinder.”
Minuette interrupted. “Dominic, why don’t you have Lord Rochford send you to question Mary? Surely he would do it if you asked.”
“And if I asked, he would want to know why I am suspicious. Aren’t we meant to keep this secret?”
“So we are, which makes my next move all the better. No one could ever suspect an ulterior motive.”
“An ulterior motive to what?” Elizabeth asked warily.
“I’ve been writing to Alyce’s sister. Emma de Clare married a gentleman farmer named Hadley about the time Alyce came to court. It was Emma that Alyce would visit whenever she had leave.”
“Do you think Emma knew her secrets?” Elizabeth asked.
“It’s not the sort of thing one can ask in letter without rousing suspicion: ‘Do you know whom your sister was sleeping with? And might it be the same person who asked her to spy on the queen? Oh, and are you secret Catholic sympathizers, by the way?’ ”
Dominic pulled his horse to a halt, and Elizabeth followed suit. Minuette kept going for a dozen paces before she swung Winterfall’s head round and walked the horse back to them. “What?”
“What,” Elizabeth enunciated carefully, “is your plan?”
“Didn’t I say? Emma has extended an invitation to her home. She would like to speak in person to ‘one who knew my sister well’ these last years. William has given me leave to go.”
“William has given you leave?” Elizabeth let her annoyance leak out. “You are a member of my household.”
“And you would never say no to me.” Minuette smiled triumphantly, then heeled Winterfall round and gave the horse her head. “Try and catch me,” she called over her shoulder.
Elizabeth grumbled, “Why does this feel so familiar—Minuette and Will doing whatever comes into their heads while you and I pick up the pieces afterward? I’m going to have to learn to say no to her before she does something irredeemably reckless.”
“She’s not reckless. Just … willful,” Dominic said. “And you’re not the one who needs to say no to her.”
He kicked his horse into motion and Elizabeth followed suit, foreboding playing along her nerves.
Two days after Eleanor’s wedding, William sat in his privy chamber with his grim-faced uncle waiting for Dominic to arrive. He had been pulled out of the most private of his bedchambers at midnight—from Eleanor’s arms—straight to an emergency session of the regency council.
The treaty with France was indeed lost. Earlier this evening, the French ambassador had finally deigned to wait upon the Lord Protector and inform him that King Henri’s brother, lately betrothed to Elizabeth, had married the niece of the Holy Roman Emperor. England’s greatest fear had come true—France was allying itself with Spain.
Rochford had proposed sending a delegation straight to the Netherlands in response. If the Catholics were aligning themselves against England, then it was in England’s best interest to come out in open alliance with the Protestant nations of Europe. The Duke of Norfolk debated the idea—more for form’s sake than because he really disagreed, William thought—but in the end, the vote was unanimous. Not that it mattered. Rochford’s vote was the one that counted.
But William was king, and it was his voice that had given the order for Lord Sussex to head a delegation to the Queen of the Netherlands and open negotiations for a formal treaty.
William had risen with relief as the council departed, anxious to return to Eleanor.
But his uncle had stayed him and sent a page to summon Dominic. As Rochford seemed disinclined to explain himself, William sat in silence and let his mind wander away from the tangle of European politics.
Eleanor was everything he’d hoped for. She had proven that she could read his moods and knew instinctively how to meet each one—soothing when he was angry, sympathetic when he was tired, and playful when he was eager. And he had not misremembered her skill in bed. What more could he want?
When Dominic entered the room, he looked straight at his king and William had the disconcerting sense that Dom could see right into his thoughts. He didn’t know why that bothered him. Dominic was five years older and had certainly enjoyed any number of women.
Rochford was terse even for him. “Courtenay, I need you ready to ride in an hour. There’s a ship at Dover ready to weigh anchor on tomorrow’s tides. You are to tell no one where you are going.”
“Where am I going?”
“France.”
Dominic didn’t look particularly surprised. “Shouldn’t you be sending a larger delegation?”
“I’m not hoping for a treaty from this. I’m hoping for … insight.”
“You want a spy.”
“I want an envoy.”
The two men stared at each other until William grew impatient and broke in. “For heaven’s sake, sit down, Dom.”
He took over the explaining, trusting his uncle to interrupt him if he got any of it wrong. He knew he wouldn’t. “A delegation will leave within the week for the Netherlands. We can’t afford to overlook obvious avenues of alliance. And I don’t mind putting pressure on Henri. He thinks he can overawe me because I’m young. This is a bluff—Henri doesn’t want war. All we have to do is show him that his best interests lie in a treaty with England.”
“And how am I supposed to accomplish that?” Dominic asked with pardonable skepticism.
Rochford took over. “You aren’t. I am. I need you at Henri’s court to give me eyes and ears into the situation so that I will know where and when to apply pressure.”
“He will suspect that.”
“Of course he will. It doesn’t matter. This is a game, Courtenay, and you’re a pawn at the moment. Go where you’re told and leave matters requiring intelligence to the masters.”
Dominic nodded and rose. “Within the hour? I’d better pack.”
William said, “Wait.”
Both men stopped, his uncle looking impatient. It gave William pleasure to say, “I agree that Dominic will be of great use in France, but I have work for him this week. There is no need to send him off tonight.”
“There is a need,” Rochford said. William could almost hear what he wanted to add:
Because I said so
.
He stared his uncle down. “I require Dominic’s service. He will be available to you six days from now. Make whatever plans you like, but Dom does not sail until then.”
It wasn’t often he made his uncle this angry. But there was, as always, calculation to it. And tonight his uncle’s calculation decided that this was not a point worth fighting over. Icily Rochford bowed and said, “As you wish, Your Majesty.”
“I’ll speak with you in the morning,” William said, dismissing him.
If Dominic resented being fought over like a woman, he didn’t show it. But he did ask, once Rochford had left, “Am I truly required, or was that a convenient excuse to spread your wings?”
“I do require your service … or at least, Minuette does.”
Dominic’s expression sharpened. “For what?”
“She told you of the invitation to visit Alyce de Clare’s sister?” When Dominic nodded, William said, “The woman lives only five miles from Minuette’s estate, Wynfield Mote. Now that I have reclaimed it from the Howards, I thought it would be convenient for her to visit and see how things are in hand. I want you to go with her.”
“You do not trust her?”
“Her intentions? Absolutely. Her good sense …”
At last Dominic relaxed. With a laugh, he said, “Are you really the one to criticize her good sense?”
“And that is why you are the perfect escort for her, as you are the perfect counselor for me.”
“I’ll do my best.” He bowed and turned for the door.
“Dom?”
But when Dominic looked at him, William found that he didn’t know what he wanted to say. He settled for, “I wish I didn’t have to let you go to France. But if my uncle is going to use someone, I’d like it to be someone I trust.”
“Don’t do anything rash while I’m gone.”
Disarmed by the familiar banter, William said, “You think I still need a nursemaid?”
“I think you’re likely to get yourself into trouble without me around to stop you.” Dominic paused. “Don’t marry anyone else off without letting me know.”
“I promise, if any of my sister’s ladies are asked for, I’ll check with you first.”
And then Dominic was gone and William felt momentarily as empty as the chamber in which he stood. There was an element of truth to Dom’s teasing—he had always been the one to steady William in both his anger and his enthusiasm. William wondered how long it would be until he saw Dominic again.
Thoughts of Eleanor broke through his melancholy, and desire returned with a rush as William pictured her, warm and eager. He set off for his bed, where nothing need be debated or measured or calculated.
CHAPTER SIX
26 September 1553
Wynfield Mote
I have been at Wynfield only one day, and already I feel myself home. The house is unchanged and I find in every room and corner a memory of earliest childhood, both bitter and sweet, for I have not felt the presence of my parents so strongly since their deaths
.
I was worried about my reception from my father’s steward. I thought Asherton old and forbidding when I was six, and I expected him to resent my presence after all this time running the estate by himself. But when I met with him last night, I found a man who cannot be above fifty. And though he is taciturn, he is not unkind. In all, a man whose good opinion I should like to earn. I am determined to learn everything about running an estate this size, and I shall defer to his judgment and knowledge wherever it exceeds mine. Which is everywhere
.
27 September 1553
Wynfield Mote
I have been busy from morning till night. I never could have imagined I’d find such pleasure in simple domestic tasks. I begin each day in consultation with Mrs. Holly, who has kept the interior of Wynfield spotless all these long years. She is almost giddy now that she has someone to actually serve. Even court banquets pale next to the ceremony with which Dominic and I are served our meals. I would prefer to dine in a smaller room, but Mrs. Holly insists we use the hall, where the long table is set, somewhat pathetically, for two
.
In the afternoons I have ridden out with Asherton. I have now visited every tenant farm and cottage on the estate. It is only twelve in all, but I quite delight in the pretty households and the healthy faces of my people. My father was born at Wynfield, and I can judge the respect in which he was held by the reverent manner in which he is spoken of to me. Though my mother’s tenure here was short, she was also loved. I have been told numerous times how much I resemble her. I wonder if they know there is nothing I would rather hear
.
Mrs. Holly delights in telling me stories of my early years. And not all the stories are flattering. She claims that I once screamed three hours straight because my father rode off without me. Not for me the ladylike tears of a broken heart, she said, but full-throated shouts of pure rage
.
I think her memory is not as good as she claims
.
She said she has one or two of my mother’s personal belongings that she will search out for me. Most of her things, naturally, are in Howard hands, as that is where she died. I shall be interested to see what she left behind when she remarried
.
Tomorrow is our last day at Wynfield, before Dominic must return me to court and take himself to France. I shall spend the morning with Emma Hadley, prying out her sister’s secrets. I can only hope they are useful
.
Within five minutes of meeting Alyce de Clare’s sister, Minuette was desperate to get away. Emma Hadley had the same rich brown hair as her younger sister, but her figure had grown stout with childbearing and her expression was all discontent and greedy curiosity about the court.
“Alyce was always so sparing in her stories,” Emma said, eyeing Minuette with an unnerving hunger. Though they were seated across from each other in a shabby parlour, it felt far too close.
“One learns to be discreet, especially in the queen’s household,” Minuette said politely. She had come here to pry secrets from Emma, but how much would she have to give in return?
“Oh, yes,” Emma sniffed. “Naturally. But still, I was her sister and all I could get from her was the most general of information. What the queen wore for Christmas mass or the weather when she went riding. Never anything about the king himself. Is he as handsome as we hear? What sort of women does he like?”
Repressing her revulsion, Minuette said, “The king is very handsome.” Not for any amount of secrets could she bring herself to talk about William and women. Not when he was probably with Eleanor at this very hour.
“Alyce told me you were raised with Princess Elizabeth, that you were only in the queen’s household to be trained for her service. What is the princess like?”
A woman who would reduce you to silence with a single blazing look
, Minuette thought. “She is her father’s daughter and noble in everything she does.”
Before Emma could launch another inappropriate question at her, Minuette noted, “I know how much Alyce enjoyed her visits to you. If she did not speak much about court, surely she spoke about her own life away from you.”
Emma harrumphed. “Oh, she enjoyed coming here, right enough. To lord it over me, show off her fine dresses, and look down her nose at us. No country gentleman for her, she said. She had her sights set on marrying well and staying at court.”
Minuette could not dispute that picture—Alyce had always had a self-contained manner that just missed being superior. “Did she ever mention anyone in particular?”
“Got herself in trouble, did she?” Emma’s eyes sharpened. “They didn’t say, when they told us she’d died, but it only makes sense. No, she never said a word to me about any particular gentleman. But then, I hadn’t seen her for more than a year.”
Minuette stopped in midquestion when she realized what Emma had said. “Not for more than a year? Are you certain?”
“I’m certain. We saw her August last year, and then not again. Said the queen wouldn’t release her. She said maybe Christmas this year. But of course—”
Emma stopped talking suddenly, and for the first time Minuette saw grief in her eyes as she realized she would never see her sister again.
But even as Minuette murmured the appropriate words of comfort, her mind was spinning. Alyce had claimed the queen would not release her in this last year—but twice in that twelve months Alyce had left court. November last, for two weeks. And for the whole of March this year. A month when she had told Minuette she was going to her sister’s …
Wherever Alyce had been in March, simple arithmetic made it likely that she had been with the father of her child.
Excited by the news, Minuette stood abruptly. “Thank you for seeing me. I liked Alyce very much. I miss her.”
And those are the truest words either of us has spoken yet
, she thought.
Emma talked all the way to the door, and this time her conversation was more than just inappropriate—it was incredibly rude. “I suppose you will marry well,” she said enviously. “Not likely to see you around your farm in future. You’ll be like your mother—off like a shot the day she was free to marry a duke’s brother.”
“I beg your pardon?”
It was a mistake, for Emma’s instincts sharpened to the question. “Didn’t you know? Everyone round here knows the story. Your mother only married Wyatt because she fell pregnant with you. It was the younger Howard she’d always had her eye on. But he was married at the time, so she did what she had to. By the time your father was dead, so was Howard’s wife. From queen’s household to country gentleman to the nobility … she planned it as sure as anything.”
“My mother married because she wished to,” Minuette managed to say.
“Easy to indulge your wishes when you have royalty as friends,” Emma muttered. “You’re as spoiled as she was.”
Minuette arranged her features into an expression of contempt that would have done Queen Anne proud. “A word of advice, Mistress Hadley—it is not wise to speak so freely of those in power, or their friends. The royal temper can so easily be excited.”
From the moment they’d arrived at Wynfield Mote, Dominic had seen Minuette bloom like an exotic flower returned to its native soil. The manor house sat in a hollow of land edged by the remnants of great woods, with a stone bridge that crossed the moat into a cobbled courtyard. Newer timbered wings added by Minuette’s father nestled comfortably next to the fourteenth-century great hall; orchards and gardens ringed the outside of the moat; and everything from dovecote to stables to kitchens was neat and pleasant.
Despite William’s warning, Minuette’s good sense had been very much in evidence as she negotiated her way with a wary steward and a smothering housekeeper. She had visited her tenants, addressed them by name, listened to endless memories of her parents. Dominic had been impressed—not by her kindness, which he knew well, but by her patience and astuteness. She was more herself here than he had ever known her, and it made him almost sorry to return her to court.
Not that he had been idly watching her all this time, for even in the country he had work to do. Dispatches from Rochford arrived daily—leaving Dominic to marvel at the cost in time and money expended on lecturing him—and he always had a stack of recommended reading.
On their last day at Wynfield, Dominic sent Minuette off with Asherton and then shut himself up in what had been her father’s study to puzzle out the latest reports from Rochford’s spies in the emperor’s court. It would be useful to know what was being said in Spain about their new alliance with France.
But after several hours, it was almost a relief to turn from Continental politics to the more personal kind. Amongst the latest dispatches from Rochford was a letter from Queen Anne complaining that not enough money was being allocated to the college she had founded at Oxford with funds from the dispossessed monasteries.
Deal with this
, Rochford wrote him. Dominic knew he did not mean
Find the money
or
Give her a precise accounting of funds
but rather
Flatter her out of her temper
.
Dominic had known the queen all his life, and yet she still made him uncomfortable. This hadn’t always been the case. He had once been in and out of her presence without a second thought except to mind his manners. But around the time he turned sixteen and gained his full height, growing into something more than just a boy with too-large feet and hands, the queen had begun to speak to him differently. She drew his name out, letting it linger in the air while she studied him. She would touch him briefly, lightly, on the arm. It was never any one thing that made him nervous, but an awareness that she reflected back at him—that he was young and attractive and she knew exactly how to play him.
But she was his best friend’s mother, and he would not play that game with her. Instead he avoided her when possible and spoke (or, as in this case, wrote) as formally as though he were a priest and she were an importunate child. He very much doubted that anything he sent back to her by this letter would flatter her out of her temper—more likely it would only increase it.