Lucianna (26 page)

“Take me to my sister,” Serena Pietro d’Angelo said. “And a bath, Balia. I have been traveling for days.”

Balia did not argue, but hurried the girl to Lucianna’s apartments, where she knew her mistress was sitting with Mali, sewing for her expected child. “My lady! My lady!” she managed to say before Serena pushed past her and flung herself at her sister’s feet.

“I ran away!” Serena Pietro d’Angelo said. “I will not be married to some French count who wants nothing more than my dower and to save his vile reputation,” she declared dramatically.

Lucianna burst out laughing. She could but imagine her mother’s chagrin. Poor Orianna. This last of her daughters was obviously proving more difficult than all the other three had. Well, they had decided their own futures in the end. Why shouldn’t Serena? “Welcome to Wye Court, Sister,” she said, with a smile.

T
he Countess of Lisle gave her husband his first son in April, with her husband and youngest sister by her side. There were several other children—three sons and two daughters—who followed over the years. Together, they lived a long and happy life.

Henry Tudor, known as King Henry VII, ruled in peace until his death in 1509. Lady Margaret died in the same year. The king was succeeded not by his firstborn son, Arthur, who died at sixteen, but by his second son, Henry VIII. The Tudor dynasty ended in 1603 with the death of Henry VII’s granddaughter, Elizabeth I. It had lasted but one hundred and eighteen years.

Bertrice Small
is the
New York Times
bestselling author of fifty-five novels and four novellas, as well as the recipient of numerous awards, including a Lifetime Achievement Award from
Romantic Times.
She lives on the North Fork of eastern Long Island in Southold, which was founded in 1640 and is the oldest English-speaking town in the state of New York. Now widowed, she is the mother of a son, Thomas, and grandmother to a tribe of wonderful grandchildren. Longtime readers will be saddened to learn of the passing of Finnegan, her long-haired black kitty. Sylvester, her eight-year-old black-and-white bed cat, has been joined by a white kitten with black markings who lives up to her name, Delilah. Readers can contact the author at www.bertricesmall.com, [email protected], or P.O. Box 765, Southold, NY 11971.