The Queen's Captive Read online

  Richard managed to ask, “May we see him?”

  Elizabeth frowned. “Are you sure? Now?”

  Oh God, Honor thought, is he so mutilated?

  “Now,” Richard said, a croak. “Please.”

  “Yes, of course. Come. I’ll take you myself.”

  She led them. A staircase. A long gallery gloomy with flickering rushlights in wall sconces. A harsh smell of lye soap. At the end of the gallery, a closed door. Elizabeth opened it and stepped inside. The room was stuffy, and dark but for a candle on the windowsill, its lonely flame standing as still as death. Richard stopped in the doorway. Honor saw a bed. On the bed, a body. She heard a breath dragged from Richard, a sound shuddering with pain. His face was white. She slid her arm around his waist for support. “My love,” she whispered.

  They shuffled forward in the unwilling steps of a funeral march. They reached the bed. Adam lay stretched out, eyes closed, lips blanched. A blanket covered him from his toes to his neck.

  Richard shocked Honor—he reached for the cover and flung it off his son. She understood, though. He needed to see. Adam lay shirtless in his breeches, a linen bandage wound around his chest. A massive bruise spread out from under the bandage. A small, bright spot of blood had wept through the cloth. Honor stared at the blood. It looked still wet. Fresh. How…?

  Richard suddenly turned to her as though unable to bear the sight. “Honor,” he whispered, “I think I’m going mad. I can see him…breathe.”

  Elizabeth said, apologizing, “I assure you, this dressing will be changed. I allowed the doctor to go and get some sleep, but he’ll be back at dawn.”

  They both stared at her. Doctor?

  “He’s alive!” Richard blurted.

  Honor gasped so hard it pinched her throat.

  Elizabeth said, perplexed, “You didn’t know?”

  “We were told—” Honor felt Richard grab her hand with such fierceness it was pain. They looked at each other, and her tears broke forth, a dam bursting. She leaned against him and wept in sheer joy. He threw his arm around her shoulders and squeezed so tightly she knew it was to keep himself from weeping, too.

  Elizabeth regarded them with a sad smile. She said gently, as though to prepare them, “Yes, good people, he is alive. But for how long, we know not.”

  Honor’s wild joy died. But cautious hope took its place. Richard was already studying Adam’s face for hopeful signs. Honor sat on the bed’s edge and touched the back of her hand to Adam’s forehead. He was burning up.

  Elizabeth, looking on, said, “The doctors fear his fever has lasted too long.”

  “He’s young. He’s strong,” said Richard.

  “I’ve had three doctors examine him, sir. They all agree. They also warn of the danger of infection.”

  They spoke in hushed tones, as though to keep Adam from hearing. If only he could, Honor thought. Don’t leave us, Adam. Please. “We are so grateful, my lady,” she said, “for the care you have given him, calling in your doctors.”

  She reached for the basin of water on the nightstand, dipped a fresh linen cloth into the water and squeezed it, then gently set the cool cloth on Adam’s brow. Richard took a stopper the doctor had left beside a pitcher of water and filled it, then came to the other side of the bed, sat on the edge and dripped water drops onto Adam’s parched lips.

  Elizabeth said, her voice tinged with wondering admiration, “I doubt not that kind parents will do him more good than ever doctors could.”

  Honor glanced up at her. Elizabeth’s remarkable parents had stamped her life, but she had never really known them. Her mother had been executed when Elizabeth was three. She had rarely seen her father, the King.

  “Doctor Rufus comes back at dawn. Until then I will leave your son in your care,” Elizabeth said. “I have had the room beside him prepared for you.” It showed a subtlety of understanding that Honor blessed her for. “Do not hesitate to call on the servants for anything you need.” She looked down at Adam and her voice, still low, rang with feeling. “God keep Master Adam with us.”

  They sat up all that night. Adam never moved.

  The next day the doctors came, one after another, shook their heads, then left. Elizabeth looked in every hour. Honor and Richard did not leave the room all day. They stoked the fire in the grate, opened the window a crack, closed the window, called for fresh water, fresh linen cloths, fresh pillows. The maids brought them meals. They took a few bites, then sat again at the bedside, dabbing Adam’s brow, coaxing him in low tones, holding his hand, reading to him from Elizabeth’s books. Aesop’s fables. Marcus Aurelius.

  All day, he never moved.

  When dusk came they took turns at naps in the chair by the fire, the chair turned to face the bed so they could see Adam.

  All evening, he never moved.

  A hand jostled Honor. She jerked awake. Bleary, blinking at the cold light of dawn, she saw Richard standing over her. His face was haggard. Tears glinted in his eye.

  She dragged her voice from the pit of her despair. “He’s gone.”

  He shook his head. And smiled. “No, my love. He’s awake.”

  12

  Allies and Enemies

  October 1555

  Hatfield, the house in which Elizabeth had grown up and which she now, once again, called home, was not just a fine country estate, it was also a working farm. Cattle and sheep grazed its pastures, yielding beef and mutton for the communal tables of Hatfield’s great hall and also for market. The life of the manor house and its scores of workers moved in rhythm with the seasons. Spring was for plowing, seeding, shearing, and felling timber. Summer, for cutting hay, harvesting the gardens and orchards, collecting honey. Autumn, which had settled on the woods around Hatfield like a tapestry of gold and orange and red, was the busiest season. In preparation for winter, the yeomen chopped logs for firewood and the kitchen staff laid up victuals, while the gardeners covered the strawberry beds and the sweeps scoured the chimneys.

  Despite their dawn-to-dusk tasks, the servants had been instructed to move quietly and keep their voices low as they cleaned the bedchambers, for the Princess wanted no one disturbing the man lying in the chamber next to hers, the hero who had saved her life. During the first days, when everyone was sure he would die, the maids had whispered in tones of grief as they worked. Then, when his fever broke, the chamberlain announced it to the household at dinner in the great hall and the news brought a cheer. After more days of rest, with the chambermaids cosseting him and the doctors bleeding him daily, he was proclaimed out of danger.

  Adam could have done without the bleeding. But he was very glad to be alive.

  “Sit, do sit, sir,” Doctor Rufus said, indicating a stool before the fire. “That’s enough exertion for this morning. You’re still weak as a newborn pup.” A portly, balding man, he was laying out his wares on a table beside the stool—scissors, a basin of warm water, a sponge, a jar of herbal ointment, fresh linen bandage strips.

  Adam eased himself down on the seat. “Feels good to be up, though,” he said. Awaiting the doctor’s ministrations, he looked across the room at the window. Though he sat bare-chested, the fire was warm, but outside cold-looking drizzle slid down the leaded windowpanes, and the sky was the color of a bruise.

  He had gotten quite familiar with his own huge bruise that spread out from under the bandage binding his chest. He looked down at it, a nasty greenish black with striations of angry red. The one on his back was even worse, the doctor had told him. He’d also gotten used to the dull pain that constantly grumbled in his chest, but it was definitely lessening with each passing day. He counted himself very lucky.

  He heard footsteps in the hallway, and women’s voices. Elizabeth? She was early. Usually she came after the household’s noonday dinner, and again last thing before she went to bed, but at this hour the hall could barely have finished breakfast. Then he realized: no hunting or hawking in this wet weather. He blessed the rain gods.

  The door opened and
in she came, followed by two maids. Adam quickly got to his feet to grab his shirt and greet her properly, but Elizabeth, her eyes darting over his bare chest, flicked her hand, a command to sit. He did, for the doctor was right, he was still weak. Jumping up like that left him a little light-headed. The maids bustled around them, collecting his empty breakfast dishes.

  “Today, Master Thornleigh, I shall be your nurse,” Elizabeth declared, all business. She shooed out the maids, then told Doctor Rufus he need not stay, either. He left, still issuing instructions as she closed the door after him. “It does not require a genius to change a bandage,” she said as she turned back to Adam. “Now, sir. Let us begin.”

  “Hold on,” he said sternly. “Where’s my news?”

  Her businesslike expression melted and they shared a smile. It had become their daily routine: news, first thing.

  “I humbly crave your pardon, my lord,” she said in mock submission, making a deep curtsy.

  It sent a thrill of arousal through him. He almost had to laugh at himself. On death’s door just days ago, and the pain still so harsh it hurt to laugh, but all she had to do was let her eyes meet his—those sparkling black eyes—and desire throbbed through him like he was fresh and strong.

  “Allow me to inform you of the doings of the great and the good,” she said, rising. “Item, the lord chancellor, Bishop Gardiner, lies very ill, like to die, they say. I say Gardiner’s a toad and his passing would be no loss to the realm.” Surveying the doctor’s paraphernalia, she dropped the sponge into the basin of warm water. “Item, my good friend Lady Cavendish comes to visit me on Thursday and brings my little godson Harry, who is not my favorite of her children, and baby Charles, who is.” She pulled the stopper from the jar of herbal ointment and sniffed, wrinkled her nose, and shoved the stopper back in. “Item, Parliament opens in six days. Your father has been telling me about the Queen’s proposed bills. He has been studying them diligently, readying to join the opposition.”

  “He’s green at it, but eager for the fight,” Adam said. He’d been surprised to see his parents sitting at his bedside when he surfaced from the fever. It was the first time he had ever seen his father shed tears. They were still here, Elizabeth’s guests.

  “What tigers you Thornleighs are,” she said. “Your father girding himself to combat the Queen. Your mother conniving to keep me from harm at her hands. And you…well, you…” She stopped, looking suddenly very serious. Her voice became soft. “To risk your life…” Emotion pinked her cheeks, but she did not look down in maidenly embarrassment. She looked straight into his eyes, her own eyes shining with wonder.

  Adam wanted to sweep her into his arms. Instead, he cleared his throat. “Any idea yet who was behind it?”

  She shook her head. They had already discussed this, and suspected an agent of Simon Renard, the imperial ambassador, a fierce friend of the Queen. Or even someone sent by the Queen herself.

  “Has St. Loe posted more guards?”

  “My purse, sir, only goes so far.”

  She said it lightly, but Adam sensed it was a mask to hide how deeply the assassination attempt had shaken her. Someone was bent on killing her.

  “Now, sir,” she said, holding up the doctor’s scissors, “may I begin?”

  He hesitated. It didn’t seem right for a princess to be doing this task. On the other hand, how could he refuse a princess? He nodded, and she bent to begin removing the bandage. She gently snipped the fabric at his breastbone, the scissor tips cold on his skin. Her head was lowered and he watched the firelight dance on her flame-colored hair. He took in the smell of her, some faint perfume, a scent of sandalwood.

  Her eyes flicked up to his. “This will not do for purchase,” she murmured, and went down on her knees between his legs. It made him catch a breath.

  She snipped through the remaining cloth. “Raise your arms.”

  He did, sending a jagged pain through his chest, but it was worth it just to feel her fingers’ light touch as she unwound the bandage. It fell to the floor. Her fingertip brushed his nipple. He swallowed hard.

  She went still, staring at the puckered wound in the center of the massive bruise. She raised her eyes to his and whispered in awe, “How you have suffered for my sake.”

  He could barely find his voice. “This is not suffering, my lady.”

  “Then, sir, you must be more than human.”

  “Not so. Believe me.” His body betrayed how very human.

  The faintest smile curved her lips. “Flesh and blood, then?” She lifted the sponge from the silver basin and squeezed water from it, the drops pinging into the basin. “Can you turn? I’ll start on your back.”

  Again, he hesitated. A king’s daughter, washing him? But he craved her touch, and the determined look in her eyes was all the persuasion he needed. He pivoted on the stool so that he was facing away from her. She gently laid the sponge against his wound. He sucked in a breath at it. The warm water. Her tender pressure.

  “All right?” she asked.

  He nodded. More than all right.

  Gently, she smoothed the sponge over the wound, washing away the dried blood. She patted his skin dry with a fresh cloth, then reached for the jar of ointment. He couldn’t see her face as she smoothed the balm on his back in slow, radiating circles, and he was glad she could not see his, his eyes closed, savoring her touch. The pleasure was almost excruciating. It made his heart pound so hard he was sure she could hear it. He couldn’t help his breathing getting ragged.

  “Turn back to me,” she said.

  He did, hoping and longing for her fingers to continue, though it was hellishly hard to keep still, not reach for her. He could not refuse a princess…but neither could he touch a princess.

  Still on her knees between his legs, she reached again for the ointment to apply to the wound on his chest, but then stopped. Her eyes met his. She raised her hand to her own white skin just above the swell of her breasts, and touched the thin scar on her breastbone, faint as a fingernail paring, carved by the arrow’s tip.

  She reached for his hand and lifted it to the spot, and when his fingers touched her skin he thought his heart might stop. He understood what she was silently telling him—that her scar was their bond.

  “When will he leave that cursed place?” Frances practically shouted it, making Dyer wince.

  “I understand he is recovering, my lady,” he said. “I imagine it will take some time.”

  She was pacing, feeling as trapped as the caged lion in the Tower’s royal menagerie. She had hurried from Colchester to her brother’s London house. It was that much closer to Hatfield, a day’s ride closer to news about Adam. But still not close enough. It was him she wanted to be close to. Every time she thought of that arrow piercing him, it felt like an arrow ripping through her. He was recovering, yes, and thanks be to God for that, but she was trapped here, waiting for every crumb of information that Dyer could glean from his spy in the Hatfield household. While the whore’s daughter was near Adam day and night, pampering him, petting him. It made Frances wild with frustration.

  “Does she touch him? Nursing him, you said. Do they say she touches him?”

  “I believe she changes his bandage, madam, so I presume she must. But as to any further—”

  “Stop. I don’t want to hear.” It was so unfair! She had not seen Adam’s face for months. First his ship had kept him away, the building of it taking forever, and then his quest for financial backing took him all the way to Hatfield, and now he was held hostage there by that red-haired shrew. How much longer until she could lay eyes on him? While the whore’s daughter laid hands on him.

  She went to the window and rested her forehead on the cool glass, trying to settle her fevered thoughts. She had suffered fitful sleep for days, had barely eaten. The news in church that he was dead had almost killed her. She had been so sick with grief, John had brought in Doctor Markham to examine her. Then, when word came that Adam had survived, her joy was so intense she had swoon
ed and John brought back the doctor. But Frances had dismissed the fool, for nothing mattered except being with Adam. If only he could get free of that harlot’s clutches and come to her. She kept this small, third-floor parlor for herself, removed from the household noise below, and she could make him so comfortable here. John was away on business all day, and Arabella was always out visiting friends. Adam could rest on a bed she would make up for him here by the fire. She would tenderly bathe his poor, hurt body and he would love her for it…

  Dyer cleared his throat. Frances set her dreams of Adam to the back of her mind. Business first. She turned. “Bring him in,” she said.

  When she heard Dyer’s footsteps clomping down the staircase, she turned back to the window and looked down at darkened Lombard Street, crowded with houses and shops. It was a chilly night, with only a scatter of people hurrying home before curfew, the shops mostly closed. A linkboy held his torch high to guide a pair of gentlemen on their way, and they passed a beggar standing on the steps of the church across the street, a scabby man wearing a filthy cloak. He scratched the back of his hand at the brand that was his license to beg. After the linkboy’s torch passed, the beggar was a mere shadow in the moonlight. A cat streaked into the alley beside the church and was swallowed up by the darkness. Frances went to her desk and opened a drawer and took out a purse of coins.

  Giles Sturridge, captain of the Grenville Archers, walked in and bowed low. When he had reported to her last week, caked with dusty sweat after his frantic ride from Hatfield, he had looked terrified of her fury at his failure, but Frances had told him to return to his troop and breathe not a word of what had happened and no one would be the wiser. She might still need his services, she’d said. He had been mightily relieved.

  Now, she handed him the purse of coins and made it clear that this time he must succeed. He was effusive in his thanks, bowing deeply again and assuring her that he would not fail her.