Rosamund (38 page)

Within the house again, and upstairs, she found Annie, but the house had been deserted otherwise as Tom had given his servants the evening off. Annie, however, had declined to go with Doll.

“She’s a bit fast, and I wouldn’t want the men thinking I was like her,” Annie explained to her mistress.

A bath had been set up in the dayroom before the fire at the very last before the servants had left. It was still warm, though not as hot as Rosamund liked it. Still, divested of her clothing and in the tub, she decided that the warm, scented water felt good. She did not linger, however, climbing out, drying herself, and putting on a clean smock. Annie undid her elegant hairdo and brushed the long auburn hair out.

“Leave it loose,” Rosamund instructed her.

“You do have such lovely tresses,” Annie admired, giving the hair a final swipe with the pearwood brush.

Rosamund climbed into her bed as Annie added a bit more fuel to the bedroom fire, saying as she did so, “Master says Doll and me is to sleep in the attics with the other servants for now, m’lady.”

“It would be best,” Rosamund agreed quietly.

“If I do, everyone will know you have taken a lover, m’lady,” the servant told her mistress bluntly. “At least that is what Doll says, m’lady.”

“Doll says too much,” Rosamund responded sharply. She tied the pink ribbons on her nightcap with a snap. “And what do you say, Annie, in reply to Doll’s slander?”

“I says you ain’t hardly got time for yourself when you are in the queen’s service, so how would you have time to lure a man and make him your lover? Doll laughs and says all women have time for a lover. That men will be like dogs, sniffing around, and that a bitch will always wag and then lift her tail for him.”

Rosamund sighed. “Doll is too worldly for her own good,” she said. “Where is she now? Do you know, Annie?”

“Aye,” Annie said slowly. “She be celebrating the May with menservants from Greenwich Palace. She’ll not be back till the sunrise. At least that’s what she told me, m’lady.”

Rosamund nodded. “I want you to wait up for Lord Cambridge, Annie. Then you are to tell him what you have told me.”

“Oh, m’lady, I couldn’t! I only told you because we are both Friarsgate folk. I would not have your reputation tarnished by the likes of Doll. Her heart is sometimes good, but her tongue is very bad. She would scratch out my eyes if she knew I told on her.”

“Which is precisely why you must tell my cousin. Doll is one of his people from his home estate of Bolton Park. I’m sure the Bolton Park folk are like those at Friarsgate. Doll is young and has been in London with his lordship’s household perhaps a bit too long. She needs to be back home where she will regain her values. I want you to tell his lordship that I told you to report her behavior to him, and suggest that she be sent home so she will not get into trouble over her behavior.”

“Well,” Annie hesitated nervously.

“My cousin is a good master, Annie. You know that. Perhaps it is even time for Doll to be married, and he can arrange that for her. If Doll’s behavior is getting out of hand, it might be best for her that he did so before she disgraces herself and ruins her chances of a good marriage.” Then she looked sharply at her servant. “What are you not telling me?”

“Oh, m’lady!” Annie began to cry.

There was a rapping on the apartment door at that moment, and Rosamund instructed her servant to answer it. Lord Cambridge entered.

“Excellent,” he said. “You are still up. Annie, dear lass, bring us some wine, and you, cousin, shall exchange the gossip you have obtained this day with me.” He plopped himself down on the edge of the bed with a grin. “You look as fresh as a daisy even at this hour.”

Annie hurried to bring Lord Cambridge and her mistress small crystal goblets of sweet Madeira. As she handed the goblets to them, Rosamund spoke. “Annie has something to tell you, Tom. Annie.”

“Oh, m’lady, do I have to?” Annie sobbed, her blue eyes overflowing with her tears. When Rosamund nodded solemnly, Annie said in a small voice, “ ’Tis about Doll, m’lord,” and she told him what she had previously reported to her mistress.

When she had finished her brief recitation Lord Cambridge said, “It is all right, Annie. I know you are no telltale and spoke only to protect your mistress. However, I have already prepared to send Doll back to Bolton Park in the morning. Other word of her behavior has been brought to my ears by Mistress Greenleaf, and tonight I had the misfortune to see Doll’s misbehavior firsthand. Her fate was sealed then and there. Now run along, lass, and seek your own bed. You are not responsible for Doll’s adversity. Mistress Greenleaf always thought her a bit young to be sent down from Bolton Park. It is possible it is time for her to be married and settled. Mistress Greenleaf has a nephew, my blacksmith. He is widowed, and strong enough to handle a spirited girl like Doll. She would have no time for mischief as his wife, I assure you. The man has seven children all under the age of ten, and expects a meal in his smithy each day at noon, plus a big supper at day’s end. Aye, given what I saw tonight that might be the best solution,” he chuckled.

“What did you see?” Rosamund asked him, now very curious.

“Do you know, Annie?” Lord Cambridge asked the girl.

“Aye, m’lord,” Annie nodded.

“Well, tell us then,” he pressed her.

“Doll lifts her skirts for the lads,” Annie began. “She don’t do it for naught, though. ’Tis a ha-pennie a peep to look at it, a whole penny if they wants to touch it and feel up her titties.” And having said it, Annie blushed beet red with embarrassment.

Lord Cambridge roared with laughter at Annie’s explanation. “Aye, that is what I saw. She’s an enterprising lass, our Doll. Well, the smithy is a lusty fellow and should keep her more than busy both in and out of the bed. Run along, Annie. And if Doll should confide her woes to you in the morning before she is sent home, say I saw her and was simply shocked.” He chuckled again.

Annie curtsied and went from the room. They heard the door to the
dayroom close as she departed her mistress’ apartment. Still, Lord Cambridge got up and looked outside to make certain the young servant was gone from their hearing. Then he came back in and sat down on the edge of the bed again.

“The king spoke briefly with me tonight,” Lord Cambridge began. “He said I was to leave the garden door to the house open and a small lit lantern outside that door. Do you understand, Rosamund?”

She nodded. “Aye, I do. God’s blood, Tom, he is visiting the queen tonight! And then he will come to me?”

“The king is a dutiful man, Rosamund,” her cousin said dryly. “He will do his duty first, and then seek his pleasure afterward.” He stood up. “Remember, dear girl, that you must be discreet for everyone’s sake, but mostly for your own. You are not the first woman the king has futtered after having taken the solemn vows of matrimony. You will not be the last by any means. This king is a very sensual man. What a pity he is not of another persuasion as well. It should save him much difficulty,” Lord Cambridge finished with a droll wink.

“Tom, I should laugh, but I do believe that you are serious,” Rosamund said, surprising even herself with the observation.

“Good night, dear girl,” he told her with a grin, and then he was gone from the bedchamber.

Should I sleep?
Rosamund wondered to herself.
Can I sleep?
She closed her eyes. Discretion. She must practice that very fine art. And she could remain awake all night waiting for the king to put in an appearance. What if something prevented his coming? Come the morning she would be exhausted with lack of sleep and her own nervousness. Yet she would still be required to get up and serve the queen. Katherine had gotten into the comfortable habit of dictating personal correspondence to Rosamund rather than to one of her official secretaries. Rosamund knew that the queen was becoming too easy with the arrangement, but she could not continue on with it. She needed to go home, and Tom’s suggestion about leaving the progress in the summer was really a good one. She would seek Inez’s advice on a replacement. Surely among the queen’s many women there was one other who had a legible hand that would suit.

Aye, she had been ready to go home since she had come, and yet now she was willing to admit that it had been a most interesting time for simple Rosamund Bolton of Friarsgate. Far more exciting than when she had first been at court as a royal ward. She would have such stories to tell her girls! And the connections she had made here could prove valuable in the future. She did not intend to have her daughters marrying Bolton cousins, or the like. She wanted fresh blood brought into the line to keep the Friarsgate inheritance a strong one. And she should never have thought about life in such terms but for her exposure to the court. And to her cousin Tom Bolton. Tom had already hinted in the broadest terms possible that she and her daughters would be his heirs one day. What an amazing turn of events, she thought. A year ago she hadn’t even known that Thomas Bolton existed. She had been content to be Sir Owein Meredith’s wife and the mother of his bairns.

But Owein was gone.
Why?
she asked silently as she had asked a thousand times over these past months. But there had been no answer forthcoming. She knew there never would be. Her eyes finally closed, and Rosamund fell into sleep.

T
he king had done his duty by his queen. He had joined Katherine in her bed for a second time that day. She was garbed as always in a plain long garment tied tightly at the neck, an embroidered nightcap on her lovely red-gold hair. Her hair, he thought, was her best feature. She lay dutifully upon her back, her blue eyes tightly shut. For all the time they had been wed, he could still not get her to open her eyes when he entered their bedchamber. He had always heard that the Spanish were hot-blooded, but while his Kate was sweet, and while she was dutiful, he could not ever in his wildest imagination call her hot-blooded.

He did what he always did with her, first untying the ribbons at her neckline and opening the all-enveloping garment to display her breasts and belly. She had pretty breasts. Small, but fuller since the birth of their son. He could see the marks on her stomach from where the skin had been stretched during her confinements. Kate did not have good skin. Not like an Englishwoman.

Not like Rosamund Bolton. And at the thought of
her,
he felt a tingling in his manhood. Rosamund Bolton of the auburn hair and the clear amber eyes and the sweetly rounded breasts. His member began to harden and swell as he thought of the delicious little widow of Friarsgate, of how he would enjoy futtering her later on this evening. But for Sir Owein all those years back he believed he would have had her, and he did not think that she would have been merely dutiful and acquiescent.

“Draw up your gown, Kate,” the king ordered his wife as he pulled off his nightshirt. She complied immediately. He pushed her legs open and mounted her, sinking himself deep into the fecund flesh, pumping, pumping, pumping slowly until he could release his seed. “May God and His Blessed Mother grant us a son,” he intoned as he withdrew from her.

“Amen!” the queen replied, pulling her night garment back down again, but never once opening her eyes to look at him.

Henry Tudor climbed from his wife’s bed, and bending down, kissed her forehead. “Good night, Kate. Sleep well.”

“Good night, my lord,” she responded as he departed her bedchamber through a small private door that permitted him to avoid being seen by her women.

The king hurried through the narrow privy hallway back into his own bedroom. He bathed his private parts with the water in the basin that had been left for just that purpose. His body servant brought him a fresh nightshirt, and when the king had put it on, the man silently wrapped his master in a green brocade robe and knelt to slip a pair of leather house shoes on his feet.

“I will be gone two to three hours, Walter,” he told the man. “Where is the dark lantern?”

“By the outside door, your majesty,” the servant said, and then he added, “My lord Henry, I understand your need for discretion given the incident of several months back, but if there is some sort of emergency in the night—” He stopped and looked questioningly at the king. “What am I to say?”

The king laughed softly. “You have always kept my secrets, Walter,” he said. “I shall not be far. At Lord Cambridge’s house next door to the palace. You will, of course, tell no one, but should an emergency arise in the next two to three hours, you will run through the park to fetch me, eh?”

Walter bowed, smiling. “Yes, my lord Henry,” he said, and ushered the king out of his bedchamber through another small private corridor, down a flight of stairs, and to an outside door. Bending down, he picked up the dark lantern and handed it to the king with a bow, then closed the door behind his master.

Using the light of the dark lantern, which only fell on the path at his feet, the king hurried across his gardens and into the wooded park beyond. There was no moon this night, which made his passage through the trees a slow and cautious one, but finally the garden wall belonging to Lord Cambridge loomed up before him. He could see the little door in the wall, faintly shadowed, and putting his hand on the latch, he lifted it, opened it, and stepped through into Tom Bolton’s garden. Within, even in the darkness, he could see that all was orderly. He made his way along the carefully raked garden paths until he reached the house. His blue eyes moved to find his landmark, and there it was. A small lantern burning brightly by another small door. He set down his own dark lamp, and taking up the small light, he entered the house. Following exactly the directions given him by Lord Cambridge, he made his way upstairs to Rosamund’s apartment. He entered and went through the dayroom into the bedchamber.
There she lay!

The king blew out the small lamp and set it down upon a table. He pulled off his brocaded robe and laid it aside. Then he moved to the bedside, and bending, he kissed her face with a half-dozen kisses until her eyes opened and she smiled at him.

“Hal,” she said softly.

He thought it a sweet welcome. “Will you remove your smock for me?” he asked her. “I want to see all of you, fair Rosamund.”

“If you will remove your nightshirt,” she told him. My God! Rosamund thought. Was she a born whore that she was falling so easily into this shameful affair? But she didn’t feel shameful. He wanted her. He had wanted her as a lad, and he still wanted her. He was the king of England, and it was damned flattering. What did it matter as long as the queen wasn’t harmed by it? A brief liaison, and she would be gone back to Friarsgate never to see him again. Sitting up, she pulled off the white linen smock, tossing it aside, and undid her nightcap so that her hair flowed freely. Then she threw back the coverlet, displaying herself to him. “Do I please you, my lord?”

“Aye, fair Rosamund, you please me mightily!” the king said. He reached out for her and drew her from the bed.

How very tall he was. She knew it, of course, but standing before him it seemed even more so. Reaching up, she undid the ties of his nightshirt, opening it wide, her small hands slipping beneath the fabric to smooth across his chest, which was furred with the same reddish gold of his hair. His chest was broader than any she had seen, even clothed. His shoulders were wider. “You are a giant, my lord,” she told him softly. She pushed the nightshirt from him, and it fell to the floor at his feet. He stepped from it, and she saw that his feet, while big, were narrow and almost delicate.

“No woman but my nurse has ever seen me as God made me, fair Rosamund, until you,” he told her.

“The queen?” How she had even dared to utter the word under these circumstances she did not know.

“Prefers my dutiful attentions in darkness and as clothed as possible—
and
I have never seen her as I have now seen you,” he said.

“Oh,” she replied, surprised and perhaps a little embarrassed to learn such an intimate fact about their marriage. She had not thought the queen would be so prudish with her husband. Particularly with such a handsome, young, and lusty mate.

His big hands clasped about her waist. He lifted her up in order to bury his face between her breasts. “Ummm, what is that delicious fragrance that seems to cling to your skin?” he asked her, nuzzling deeper in the shadowed valley of her bosom.

“White heather,” she told him, steadying herself with her hands on his shoulders. God’s nightshirt, she had missed a man’s tender attentions. She could feel a wonderful warmth beginning to suffuse her body as he began to kiss her flesh.

“It suits you,” he told her. “I shall always think of you, my fair Rosamund, when I smell the scent of white heather.” He lowered her back to the floor, making certain that her ripe, soft body slid the length of him.

She felt his chest, his belly, his hairy thighs. He was hard all over, having the body of a warrior. When he wrapped his arms about her and kissed her, Rosamund thought that she would swoon with the pleasure his lips gave her. His tongue plunged deep into her mouth, seeking her tongue,
finding it, demanding immediate homage from her. Her head was absolutely spinning, and she swayed in his embrace.

He held her close and murmured in her ear, “How sweet, how compliant you are with me, my fair Rosamund. You are the perfect female, my darling. You are experienced and passionate, and yet there is an innocence about you that I must possess!” He set her back from him and took one of her breasts into his hand, cupping it so that it rested in his palm like a small white dove. With the fingers of his other hand he delicately caressed the smooth firm flesh. He bent his head and teased the nipple with his hot tongue; then, his hungry mouth fastened over that sentient nub, and he sucked hard on it.

A small cry escaped her. He was the most damnably sensuous man! Owein had certainly loved her, but never like this! He lay her down now upon her bed, and she saw his male member for the first time. It was surely of a goodly size, and obviously most ready for pleasure. She held out her arms to him, and he smiled.

“Such a charming welcome, fair Rosamund. Are you as eager for me as I am for you, my darling?”

“Oh, yes, Hal!” she assured him.
“Yes!”

“I must be careful not to crush you, my sweet,” he said.

“I am stronger than I appear,” she said.

“But have you ever taken such a weapon within you as the one now before you?” His hand wrapped itself about his manhood, and he displayed it for her proudly.

“I have known only my husband, Hal. He was surely not as well-endowed as your majesty is, but I am no virgin.”

Carefully the king straddled her, but his eagerness overcame him, and he was unable to refrain from thrusting immediately into her. “God’s nightshirt! Ah, what bliss!” he groaned. “Is there no end to your sweet welcome, my fair Rosamund?”

She had been ready for him, much to her astonishment. She was wet, and he slid easily and deeply into her love sheath. Rosamund wrapped her arms and legs about the king, her little mewling cries of delight spurring him on and increasing his passion.
“Oh! Ahhh!”
she cried as he stoked her
fires with his skilled love lance.
“Oh, your majesty! Oh, yes!”
She was reeling out of control, but she did not care. She soared, and she flew higher than she ever had. His passion overcame her, and finally as the crisis peaked, she actually swooned away in his hungry embrace.

When Rosamund began to finally come to herself again she realized two things. She was lying atop the king, her cheek against his chest, and he was still deep and hard within her. “Oh, God!” she half-whispered. “Did I not please you, Hal?”

“Very much, and there is so much more to come,” he promised her, and she heard laughter in his deep voice.

“You are . . . you are still . . .” She couldn’t find the words.

“Aye,” he said in a nonchalant manner, “I am.” Then he laughed as he understood her confusion. He rolled her over again so that they were now face-to-face. His blue eyes met her amber eyes, and he said, “You have known only one man. An old man, your husband. I am not quite twenty, fair Rosamund. My appetite for female flesh is great. I can do this all night, and I am certainly not yet satisfied by you, my darling, but by the dawn we will be both well-pleasured.” Then he began to move on her again, and she was almost weeping with the delights that he offered her.

His lust seemed to go on forever. To her surprise she was every bit as lustful as he was. She had never known anything like this, but she knew that she craved more of it. She didn’t remember his leaving her, but when Annie came to awaken her just before sunrise she was alone amid a tangle of bedding, and she was still naked. That was careless of her, she realized at her servant’s shocked look.

“Was Doll right, m’lady?” Annie whispered, handing her the goblet of Maybel’s strengthening potion.

“You have seen nothing, Annie,” Rosamund replied, taking the goblet and drinking it down. She would need to be strengthened if the king was as vigorous each time he visited her. “Hand me my smock.”

Annie complied. “I don’t understand,” she told her mistress.

“It is better that you don’t, but your silence is most necessary. If it will make you feel any better, Annie, and I tell you this because you are my
loyal servant and I trust you, Lord Cambridge is aware of all that goes on beneath his roof. Even this.”

“You will have to bathe before you can go to the palace,” Annie said, her equilibrium slowly being restored as she began to consider the entire situation. “The scent of coupling is strong about you.”

“Quickly then, for I must be at the palace in time for the mass. The queen is most unhappy with her ladies when they do not attend the mass, Annie,” Rosamund explained.

Annie nodded, and exited the bedchamber.

Rosamund lay beneath the coverlet now and considered the night past. She had had no idea that a man could be so enthusiastic in his lovemaking, but the king certainly was. She had also not realized that young lovers were different than older ones. Owein had been almost forty when he died, twice the king’s age, but she had been quite content with his attentions. Now, upon reflection, she even thought she liked them better than the king’s. Her husband had shared himself with her. The king took all she would give and gave little in return, while demanding more. The night had been a time to satisfy his desires and his lusts, not hers, although she had certainly been satisfied herself. But he had been kind, she had to admit. However, she had learned more about the royal marriage than she really wanted to know. The queen truly believed that the only purpose of coupling with her husband was the getting of children. That was sad, but that the king believed it too was even sadder. She and Owein had enjoyed their coupling and yet had healthy children, but for their unfortunate little son. There would have been other sons had not Owein fallen from that damned tree, and they would have enjoyed making them. She had been tempted at the time Owein died to fell every murdering tree in the orchard, but that her uncle Edmund had prevailed upon her not to be so foolish in her grief.