The Forbidden Queen (81 page)

My hair free and released, it now tumbled over my shoulders to lie on my breast, and his, allowing him to curl his hand within it so that it wound round his wrist like a living shackle. My breath shuddered out between my lips in a sound of pure wordless pleasure.

‘Call me by my name. Call me Owen.’ There was the urgency.

‘Owen.’ A breath of delight.

‘You are the most beautiful woman I have ever seen. The most desirable. And I should know better than to have you here—but what man can stand aloof from a woman who fires his blood? I have wanted you for years. I can no longer resist you.’

His arms anchored me against him, and his fervent avowals slid through my blood like wine as he kissed me and I clung, my senses cast adrift, robbed of all will, all thought, only knowledge that here was a man who said he desired me and always had. An explosion of heady feeling swept through me. Owen Tudor wanted me, and I wanted him beyond all reason. I would let him take me. His hands moved to the lacing of my gown—

No!

Suddenly the desire was shot through with pure panic.

‘No,’ I said.

I pushed against his chest, and when he released me I buried my burning face in my hands. What was I doing? Horror bubbled through my blood, and a capering terror that tripped and hopped to its own rhythm. I looked at the man I would have taken as my lover, distraught, suddenly seeing Edmund’s laughing face before me. Edmund had seduced me with laughter and song and carefree youth, making me think that I was a girl again without responsibilities, before abandoning me when he could not use me to climb his particular ladder of power.

This was no light-hearted seduction, but an explosion of passion that swept me along, dragging me down into a whirlpool of longing. I wanted it—but could not allow it, for it would bring nothing but humiliation for me, ignominy and dismissal for Owen. If Gloucester discovered…if the Council knew. A liaison with a servant? But
I wanted him. I wanted him to touch me again. I wanted his mouth on mine.

Ah, no. It must not be!

And in that moment I was swamped by past hurts. Owen Tudor could never want me. Did I not have proof? No one else, neither Henry nor Edmund, had wanted me, except for what the Valois name or my position of Queen Dowager could bring them. Owen Tudor could not love me. Perhaps it was pity in his heart. Yes, that was it. All my confidence was undermined by terrible uncertainty…

I became aware that Owen was frowning as if trying, and failing, to read the morass of thoughts chasing through my mind. His hands fell away from my shoulders, yet he smoothed the backs of his fingers down my cheek, and my fears were almost overthrown.

‘Are you afraid of me?’ he asked.

‘No.’ I must not give in. I must not. ‘It’s not that. I should not be here.’

And I saw justifiable exasperation glitter in his eye as he sighed. ‘It’s a bit late for that.’

‘It’s all my fault.’

And I slid from his hands to flee. The door was unlocked. Two more steps and I would be there and out of this room that contained all I desired but all I could not have. I could be back in my chamber where I could wipe out my memory of what I had almost done. I could forget how I had almost fallen at his feet in longing—but before I had managed one step, Owen captured my wrist.

‘Don’t go like this.’

As his fingers closed, fear built irrationally. I pushed hard against him but to no avail.

‘Katherine. Don’t struggle. I’ll do nothing that you don’t wish.’

‘I can’t do this.’ I was beyond sense, shot through with guilt that I might bring judgement against him. ‘I have behaved outrageously. You should know that there is bad blood in my veins. My mother…no handsome man was safe with her. I have to ask your forgiveness.’

‘No. No forgiveness is necessary between us.’ He tried to gather me into his arms. I wanted it more than life itself and for a moment allowed myself to be drawn close, before self-reproach re-ignited in an agony of despair.

‘I can’t stay…’ I struggled, overbalanced, so that he clamped me to his chest. ‘Oh!’ The sting of pain along my cheekbone shocked me into silence.

‘What is it?’

I shook my head. ‘Let me go!’

And now his voice was all ice, all understanding having fled. ‘So you do despise me as a servant, too lowly for you to lie with. You can lust after my body but my birth isn’t good enough for you.’

‘No! That’s not it.’

‘That is what it looks like to me.’

‘Please,’ I begged. ‘Please understand. You must let me go.’

‘Then go if you wish, my lady. There is no compulsion.
I would not endanger your mortal soul by forcing you to share a bed with a man who is not fit to remove your shoes.’

The heavy formality, the harsh judgement, was my undoing.

‘You cannot possibly love me,’ I cried out in my anguish. ‘No man has ever loved me.’

And when Owen stood aside, I flung the door wide, hurrying down the corridors, through the rooms to my own, my hair loose, my face undisguised, praying helplessly that I would meet no one. I did not, but it was no relief. Despair drenched me from head to foot at what I had almost allowed myself to do.

And what I had thrown away.

Closing my door, I leaned back against it, willing my emotions to settle. Shame was a living entity, nasty and cruel, mocking my every breath with jeering contempt in every comment. Overcome with physical need, I had invited the intimacy. I had called him by his given name and agreed to the assignation, compromising my honour. I had drunk his wine, kissed him, and then I had fled for my life like a frightened child rather than a woman of almost thirty years. I had left my hood. I had run through the corridors like a court whore escaping from an importunate lover. Yet now, forced to accept my dishonour, I wished I was back in his room, sitting on his bed, allowing him to lead me in whatever path he chose.

You fool. You utter fool. You allowed desire to rule and look what happened. Have you learnt nothing from your life? How will you face him ever again?

And still my need for him would not release its hold on me. If he had come to my door at that moment, I would have opened it to him and bid him come in. I would have fallen at his feet in gratitude.

He won’t come. He thinks you have damned him as inferior, unfit to consort with a queen
.

I sobbed. Why? Why had I run away?

Because I was afraid. Afraid of putting my life into the hands of a man I barely knew, who might not have care with it. Afraid that the line between servant and mistress was impossibly blurred and, in the end, I had not been able to take my fortitude in both hands and leap over that line. What would Beatrice say if she knew that I contemplated removing my shift for Owen Tudor? Or Madam Joanna? I don’t care, I had once said. But I did. I shivered at the thought of their reproof.

And what of Owen Tudor? I had denied him, rejected him, allowing him to believe that I thought him too far below me. A man of such self-esteem as he was would never forgive me for that. I was without honour: the blame was all mine.

Forcing myself to walk across the room, I picked up my reflecting glass. What would I see? Would I see the face of a slut? Would I recognise the woman who stared
back at me? I looked, a quick glance. And was surprised. There was no imprint of the sin I had contemplated.

Then I looked again, carrying the glass to a candle. An unhappy woman stared back, a woman who had stood on the edge of grasping what she most wanted in life. There, enticingly before her, was the bridge over the chasm, there the helping hand stretched out, there the man who would give her her heart’s desire—and she had stepped back. She had leapt away, destroying any chance of taking that step again. He would despise her, her lack of valour, her lack of courtesy. It was hopeless.

I relived the moments again in all their glory and all their pain. He had called me Katherine. He had kissed me and I had pushed him away, when all I had wanted was to say, ‘Kiss me again!’ and make use of the bed with the bright woven cover.

You can lust after my body but my birth isn’t good enough for you…

Owen Tudor would despise me, but not as much as I despised myself.

I took a comb to my tangled hair, pulling on the knots as if the pain would dissolve my grief. I could not weep. The guilt was mine, choosing to go to the room of a passionate man then fleeing when he had kissed me.

I looked again, turning my head as I saw the abrasion on my cheek. It was red, with the slightest breaking of
skin. Of course. His chain of office had marked me. How appallingly apt.

A terrible memento of a disastrous evening.

Guille drew back the heavy bed-curtains that had been witness to my lack of sleep, and halted with a hiss of consternation.

‘My lady!’

‘What is it?’ My reactions, both of mind and body, were slow.

‘What have you done?’ She disappeared, returned and held out my reflecting glass.

And I looked. The abrasion, a minor blemish the night before, was angry and red with the purple-blue of bruising flaring across my cheekbone.

‘Who did this to you?’

I touched the tender spot, flinching at the pain. Here was truth I could not admit to.

‘It was my own fault,’ I managed smoothly. ‘I fell against the bed foot. I had spent too long on my knees at my
prie-dieu
.’ It was horribly noticeable. I closed my eyes: the last thing I needed was to draw attention to my reprehensible behaviour. ‘Can we remedy it?’ I asked.

‘A day for some clever disguise, I think.’ And Guille, rummaging, lifted a chest of cosmetics from the depths of my coffer.

I rarely used them. My skin was fashionably pale and close textured, but today I needed subterfuge. Guille and
I knew enough from my mother, who had been expert in applying glamour to win the eye of a man. My need was to hide from him. Owen Tudor must not suspect that our meeting had left its mark on me.

We spent a useful hour opening packets and phials, finally applying powdered root of the Madonna lily to whiten my face and hide the abrasion. Ground leaves of angelica added a glow to my cheeks and drew the eye from the bruising.

‘It’s better,’ Guille ventured, a frown between her brows. ‘I suppose.’

‘But not good.’ I cast my looking glass on the bed in despair.

‘We can’t hide it completely.’

‘No.’ I sighed. It was the best we could do. I broke my fast in my chamber and absented myself from Mass, but I would have to join my household for dinner, or my empty chair would cause comment. I would have to scrape up what I could of my poor fortitude and pretend that nothing was amiss.

And I would have to face Owen Tudor.

When I took my place on the dais, with no thought of what was on my plate, and no ear for Father Benedict’s blessings, all I could see in my mind was Owen Tudor’s gaze sweep over me, then return, as I had first walked defiantly into the room. The gaze became a stare, his whole stance taut, until he remembered his duties and
stalked away to summon the pages to bring in the serving platters. All I was left with was a memory of his stunned expression, for the much-vaunted cosmetics were not concealing the livid bruise to any degree.

I already knew this. My damsels, meeting with me in my solar, had been sympathetic with my plight and full of suggestions from their own remedies, but nothing could conceal the discolouring. Or my remorse when I saw Owen Tudor’s reaction.

Not Master Owen. He would never be Master Owen again. How could I think of him as a man in a position of subservience to me when he had held me in his arms? When his kisses had turned my blood to molten gold? Unfortunately, such was my nature that the gold had turned to lead and I had dealt him the worst of blows. I had encouraged him, only to repulse him.

Throughout the whole length of that meal contrition stalked me, for what had I seen, for that one breath-stopping moment, before he had masked all thoughts? Shock certainly, for he would not have known. But then a sudden blaze of furious anger. It had made my blood run cold, and added to the muddle of my thoughts.

How dared he be angry with me?

And yet why should he not? I admitted as I picked at the plums in syrup and sweet pastry set before me. Did I not deserve it? I had given him to believe that I was willing, kissing him with a wanton fervour previously unknown to me. I had pressed my body to his in
silent demand that he could not have misinterpreted. And then, when his embrace had grown too powerful, I had run away, when I should have had enough confidence to conduct an affair with a man with some self-possession.

If that was what I wanted. Even if he was a servant.

And if I did not want it, I should not have responded to him in the first place. Had he not given me the space to withdraw after my first foolish admission?

You need fear no gossip from my tongue
.

The fault was undoubtedly mine, and I deserved his ire.

The meal proceeded. We ate, we drank. We gossiped—or my damsels did. The pages, well-born boys learning their tasks in a noble household under Owen’s direction, served us with silent concentration. Owen’s demeanour was exactly as it should be, a quiet, watchful competence. But he did not eat with us, taking his seat along the board as was his wont. Instead, he stood behind my chair in austere silence, a personal and reproachful statement to me, as if to broadcast the difference in our ranks.

I deserved that too.

I had no requests of him. My whole awareness was centred on the power of his stare between my shoulder blades. It was as if I was pierced by a knife.

I put my spoon down on the table. The pastry sat heavily in my belly, and I breathed a silent prayer that the meal would be soon over and I could escape back to my room. Except that when the puddings were finished and the board cleared, I had no choice but to walk past him
since he had not moved. His eyes were rich with what I read as censure, when I risked a glance.

‘Was the food not to your satisfaction, my lady?’ he asked. He had noticed that I had eaten little.

‘It was satisfactory. As always.’ I made no excuse but my reply was brusque.