The Tudor Secret (15 page)

I plunged feetfirst into the river. I had kept my body pointed like a blade, knowing that if I hit the surface any other way I would certainly die. Still, it was like falling into slate, the impact yanking all air from my lungs with terrifying suddenness. I gasped, flailed to the surface. The brackish taste of salt mixed with dregs and mud clogged my nostrils, my throat, my ears. I coughed it out, trying to gain control of my floundering body.

The river flowed all around me, a swift current flooded by the tidal influx, its inky back littered with branches and leaves. A bloated corpse of something bobbed nearby, sank briefly, and resurfaced. Caught in the current, the corpse and I were like flotsam, dragged along while I, at least, struggled to stay above water.

My left shoulder had gone numb, as had my arm. Gazing back toward the dwindling palace, I envisioned my would-be assassin staring down in disbelief. I also understood just how far a jump it had been. It was amazing I had survived at all.

And once again I was going to drown.

I struggled to swim sideways against the current, toward a distant cluster of trees on a shore, evading the putrid corpse. I couldn’t ignore how dire my situation had become. I’d been shot, or at least skimmed by a ball, and must be losing blood. The cold had also begun to affect my lungs, making it difficult to breathe and move at the same time. Even while my heart and head roared, somewhere deep within, in that dark place where nothing has consequence, I wanted to stop, go still, drift, and let it all pass.

The shore wavered like a desert mirage. Submerged in an icy, suffocating cocoon, I stared toward it with faltering eyes, my arms inexorably ceasing their futile movements. In a rush of panic, I thrashed my legs, seeking to quicken my blood. Nothing moved. Or I didn’t feel anything move. I kicked again, in desperation. There was something twined about my ankles.

“No,” I heard myself whisper. “Not like this. Please, God. No.”

An eternity passed. I tried to bring my legs up to my unfeeling hands and untangle whatever had wrapped about me. I was feeling better. Strange warmth welled under my skin. The cold had ceased its stinging assault.

I sighed. It was just a skein of riverweed or an old rope.…

That was the last thing I thought before the water closed over my head.

*   *   *

Rain, intermixed with what sounded like fistfuls of gravel being flung against a rooftop, was the first thing I heard, the first sound that told me I was miraculously still alive.

Cracking open a grit-sealed eye, I tried to raise my head. The pounding in my temples and a wave of nausea told me I’d best stay put.

After the spinning in my head waned, I tentatively lifted the sheet covering me. I appeared intact, though my torso was a mass of contusions. I wore a linen undergarment—not my own—and my bruised chest was bare. When I tried to move my left arm, sharp pain coursed through my bandaged shoulder. I looked up. The room was unfamiliar; sprawled in slumber across the rushes near the door was a silver dog.

“Some watchdog,” I muttered.

As I drifted back to sleep I thought the dog looked remarkably like Elizabeth’s.

*   *   *

When I next awoke, delicate sunlight drifted in shafts throughout the room. The dog was gone. I also found, to my relief, that I was both less stiff and less sensitive, and I could sit up, albeit with much clumsy maneuvering. Easing a pillow under my head, I reclined against the daub wall and prodded my wounded shoulder. It was tender to the touch. Oily salve seeped through the bandage. In addition to tending to my obvious bodily functions, someone had taken the time to dress and treat my injury.

Lying on the bed as afternoon faded into dusk, I glanced from the door to the half-shuttered window. I heard water dripping from gutters. The slant in the ceiling led me to deduce I was lodged in a garret. I wondered when whoever had brought me here would make his or her appearance. I could still remember plummeting through seemingly endless abyss, crashing into black water. I even had a faint recollection of trying to stay afloat, swimming for a time against a sweeping current. After that, nothing. I had no idea how I had been rescued or ended up here.

My eyelids started to droop. I blinked. I couldn’t be certain what I’d find upon awakening. Despite my efforts, I slipped off again, only to be jolted awake by the creaking of the door. I struggled upright. When I saw her walk in, bearing a tray, I stared in disbelief.

“I’m pleased to see you awake.” She pulled up a stool by the bed and set the tray beside it. She wore a russet gown laced over a chemise. Tendrils of lustrous hair curled about her face. I couldn’t believe how, given my state, my loins could react to her proximity. But they did.

She uncovered the tray, releasing the aroma of hot bread and soup.

Water flooded my mouth. “God,” I said, in a hoarse voice I didn’t recognize, “I’m starving.”

“You should be.” Kate unfolded a napkin, leaned over to tie it about my neck. “You’ve been lying here for four days. We were afraid you might never wake up.”

Four days …

I averted my eyes. I wasn’t ready to remember everything.

“And you’ve been here,” I ventured, “all this time … caring for me?”

She broke the bread in chunks over the soup, ladled a spoon, and cooled it with her breath before lifting it to my lips. “Yes, but don’t worry. You look like any other naked man.”

Was I so bruised that the birthmark on my hip had gone unnoticed? Or was she being tactful? A closer look at her didn’t reveal anything, and I was too flustered at the moment to ask.

“This soup is delicious,” I said.

“Don’t change the subject.” She narrowed her eyes. “What on earth possessed you to stay behind in that room, when you should have followed Her Grace and Barnaby? I’ll have you know, we risked our lives waiting for you at the gate. Her Grace refused to budge. She kept saying you’d arrive at any moment, that you knew the woman attending His Majesty and had tarried to question her. It was only when we heard gunshots and saw the duke’s retainers coming out from every doorway that she agreed to leave. She wasn’t happy about it, though. She said it was nothing less than cowardly of us to abandon you.”

“But she did go? She’s safe now, at her manor?”

Kate refilled the spoon. “Safe is a relative term. Yes, it’s been given out that she’s at Hatfield, where she’s taken to her bed with fever. Illness can be a useful deterrent at times like these, as she well knows. Of course, so can the cellars of numerous neighboring houses in Hatfield’s vicinity, any one of which would gladly shelter a princess should the duke’s men be spotted on the road.”

“And you?” I asked. “Why are you not with her?”

“I stayed with Peregrine, of course. He insisted that we look for you.”

“Peregrine found me?”

“He did, on the riverbank. He told us he used to fish the Thames for bodies.” She paused. A slight tremor crept into her voice. “He said we had to keep searching, that in the end everything washes up. He was right. You’d been swept upstream by the tide and appeared near where the river bends. You were soaked through, wounded and delirious. But alive.”

“And you nursed me back to health.” I heard the sullen gratitude in my voice. It had become second nature for me to doubt even my good fortune. “Why? You lied to me about not working for Cecil. Why care if I lived or died, as long as you did your master’s bidding?”

She set down the spoon, dabbed my mouth and chin clean with the napkin. When she finally spoke, her voice was composed.

“I apologize that I didn’t tell you the entire truth. I never meant to put you in danger. My loyalty has always been to Her Grace, though she can be too headstrong and often needs protection from herself, whether or not she cares to admit it. When Walsingham told me that Master Cecil felt it best if we got her away from Greenwich, I agreed to help. I didn’t tell you because he said you had your own orders. He said you had been hired and paid.”

She paused. “I didn’t expect you. But I am glad of it. I … I am glad you are here.”

I observed her face as she talked. I saw what she meant. But as the events of the past days began to seep in, pain and anger arose in me. I didn’t want complications; I didn’t want vulnerabilities or heartache. Feeling something for her would bring me all those things.

“Walsingham gave me instructions, yes,” I replied. “And I was paid. But I also knew that allowing Her Grace to go ahead with her plan to meet with Lord Robert would put her in more danger than she’d incurred already. I’m surprised no one else shared my concern.”

“What would you have had us do?” If she’d detected the deliberate harshness in my manner, she didn’t let it show. “She insisted on questioning Robert about her brother and wouldn’t hear anything to the contrary. None of us could have known that the duke intended to woo her himself or put Jane Grey on the throne if she refused him.”

That made sense. I should rest my suspicions, at least as far as Kate was concerned. She’d not been involved in any plot against Elizabeth.

As if she had read my thoughts, she smiled gently. She knew how to pluck a chord in me, much as a hand knows a lute. In my inept attempt to hide my discomfort, I said the first thing that came into my head: “It’s not fair to test a man who doesn’t have his clothes on.”

She laughed. “You’ve managed well enough thus far.”

I wanted to weep. In some indefinable way, she reminded me of Mistress Alice, of the garnet-cheeked honest girl that Alice must have been in her youth. And as I thought of this, I saw again the triumphant look in Alice’s eyes when she turned to me by the king’s bed. She had been trying to tell me something, but I would never know now.

I met Kate’s gaze. “I thought I was going to die.…” I faltered. Conflict surged again in me, without warning, inundating me in darkness. “Where are we?” I asked in a taut whisper.

“In a manor not far from Greenwich town. Why?”

“Whose manor? Who is here with us?”

She frowned. “Her Grace owns the deed, privately; the house is leased to a friend. Besides Peregrine, you, and me, Walsingham comes and goes. He was here earlier in fact, wanting to know how you— Brendan, what is it? What is wrong?”

I hadn’t realized I had recoiled until I saw the alarm on her face. “That’s who I saw on the leads. Walsingham. He had a dagger. It’s why I jumped. I remember now. Cecil arranged Her Grace’s escape, but he wanted me dead. He sent Walsingham to kill me.”

“No,” she said quietly. “You have it wrong. Walsingham was there to help you. We would never have known where to look had he not told us he’d seen you leap into the river. He even fetched your sword from where it had fallen into the courtyard.”

“Maybe he had no other choice! The sword was evidence I’d been in Edward’s presence. I might survive the fall, as I did.”

“But you still wouldn’t have been found, not in that current. You had a wounded shoulder. There were rope and riverweeds wrapped about your legs. By all rights, you should have drowned.” She paused. “Cecil entrusted Walsingham with your welfare. He’s been watching over you the entire time. That’s why he was on those leads. When we failed to show up at the postern gate, he followed our trail.”

I let out a harsh chuckle. “I wonder where he was when the duchess of Suffolk and her henchman locked me in an underground cell and left me to drown.” Yet even as I spoke I thought of my jerkin, which I’d left by the pavilion and which had inexplicably materialized near the ruined cloister entrance, where Peregrine found it. What had the boy said?

If we hadn’t happened to find your jerkin, we’d never have thought to look …

“Peregrine told us about that,” said Kate. “At the time you were taken, Walsingham was readying the horses we never took. Surely, you can’t fault him?”

“Not unless you take into account that everyone I’ve met at court, not to mention everyone I’ve known since childhood, has proven false,” I retorted. The instant the words were out, I regretted it. Kate bit her lip. “I’m sorry,” she murmured. She stood.

I caught hold of her hand. “No. I’m the one who must apologize. I … I didn’t mean it.”

She looked down at our twined hands, lifted her gaze to me. “Yes, you did.” She unhooked her fingers. “I understand. That woman … Barnaby said she was an herbalist brought by the Dudleys to poison His Majesty. He said you knew her, that they lied to you about her death. How could you not be angry?”

My throat knotted. I looked away, tears burning in my eyes. I didn’t see Kate reach into her pocket, only felt her set something in my hand. When I saw what it was, I went still.

“I found this in your jerkin pocket. I took the liberty of polishing it. It’s a strange thing, but pretty.” She took up the tray, went to the door. “I’ll be back in a few hours with your supper. Try to get some rest.”

The door clicked shut.

I gazed at the gift that Alice had given me. It was a delicate gold petal, its jagged edge indicating it had once formed part of a larger jewel. On its tip, like a perfect dewdrop, was a ruby. I had never seen anything like it. It was the last thing I’d have expected her to possess.

I enclosed it in my hand as dusk faded into night.

When grief finally came to claim me, I did not fight it.

The Tudor Secret

Kate returned with a bundle of clothes and her tray heaped with meat on trenchers and sauced vegetables. Peregrine was with her, grinning. He carried a folded table. After he set it up, he returned with my saddlebag, and, to my surprise, the king’s sheathed sword, which I’d last seen clattering off the leads at Greenwich. I opened the bag to examine its jumbled contents. I sighed in relief when I found the stolen psalm book, still wrapped in its protective cloth.

I turned to Kate. She’d changed into a rose velvet gown that enhanced the muted gold in her hair. As she busied herself lighting candles about the room, I acknowledged my desire to draw her into my arms and caress away the last of my mistrust. But Peregrine demanded my attention, dancing about like a precocious imp, Elizabeth’s silver hound at his heels.

“You look rather pleased with yourself,” I said as he helped me to my feet and into a robe. “And isn’t that Her Grace’s hound? Have you been thieving again?”

“I have not,” he replied. “Her Grace left Urian here with us, so we could track you. He’s the best tracker in her kennels, she said. She knows her beasts. He was the first to smell you on the riverbank.” He paused, his nose crimping. “What is it with you and water? You’ve done nothing but get wet since we met.”

I burst out laughing. It felt wonderful. I took Peregrine’s hand, made my slow but steady way to the dinner table. “Unrepentant as always,” I said, easing onto a stool. “I’m glad of you, my friend.” I looked at Kate. “And you. I thank God for both of you. You saved my life. It’s a debt I can never repay.”

The sheen in Kate’s eyes might have been tears. She brushed them aside with her sleeve, and Peregrine perched next to me as she started to serve.

“I’m not helpless,” I said, as Peregrine handed me my plate. “I can feed myself.”

Kate wagged her finger. “He’s not here to feed you. You’ve had quite enough pampering. Peregrine, either you tell that dog to get its paws off the table or you can both go eat in the kitchen.”

Amid laughter and candlelight, we dined and spoke of innocuous matters. Only after we’d wiped up the last of the sauce with our bread and Peregrine had recounted for the hundredth time how he and Barnaby employed Urian’s olfactory skills to track me did I breach our camaraderie. Leaning back in my chair, I said as casually as I could, “And where is Fitzpatrick?”

The rustle of Kate’s skirts as she stood broke the sudden silence. She began stacking the empty platters. Peregrine reached down to caress Urian.

“The king is dead, isn’t he?” I said.

Kate paused. Peregrine nodded sadly. “It’s not been officially announced, but Master Walsingham told us he died yesterday. Barnaby returned to court as soon as we found you, to be at his side. It’s said that at the hour of Edward’s death, heaven wept.”

The rain. I had heard it.

As the memory of that youth rotting away in a fetid room surfaced in me, my gaze went to the sword on the bed. My voice tightened. “And the herbalist? Did Walsingham say anything about her?”

Kate said quickly, “Brendan, please, let it be. It’s too soon. You’re still weak.”

“No. I want to know. I … I need to know.”

“Then I will tell you.” She sat at my side. “She is dead. Sidney told Walsingham. Someone took her body away. No one knows where. The Dudleys threatened to kill Sidney for helping you, but by then word had gotten out that Elizabeth had escaped and the palace was in an uproar. Brendan, no. Sit down. You cannot—”

I came to my feet. Resisting the dizziness that came over me, I paced to the window to stare into the night. My stalwart Alice was dead. She was gone forever this time. Lady Dudley had slashed her throat as if she’d been some barnyard beast, and left her to bleed to death.

I couldn’t think of it. I couldn’t. It would drive me insane.

“What about Jane Grey?” I said quietly. “Has she been declared queen?”

“Not yet. But the duke removed her and Guilford to London. And there are rumors he will send men after the Lady Mary.”

“I thought he already had. I thought he sent Lord Robert after her.”

“It seems he had to delay. We think that after he discovered Elizabeth had fled Greenwich, he wanted to first get Lady Jane somewhere safe. She is all he has now.”

I nodded. “Peregrine,” I said. “Can you leave us, please?”

The boy rose and left, Urian padding behind. Kate and I faced each other from across the room. Then she stood and turned to pick up the tray. “We can talk tomorrow.”

I stepped to her. “I agree. Only … don’t leave.” My voice broke. “Please.”

She came to where I stood helpless and put her hand on my bearded cheek. “It’s so red,” she said. “And thick. I wouldn’t have thought you’d have such a thick beard.”

“And I,” I whispered, “never thought you’d care.”

She regarded me steadily. “Neither did I. But there you have it.”

I brought her to me, held her close, as though I might meld her to me forever.

“I’ve never done this before,” I said.

“Never?” She raised her eyes to me in genuine surprise.

“No,” I said. “I only ever loved one woman.…” I stroked her cheek. “And you?”

She smiled. “Suitors have been begging for my hand since I was a babe, of course.”

“Then add my name to the list.” The words did not disconcert me as much as I had supposed. I had never fallen in love before; now it seemed the most natural thing in the world.

She looked into my eyes. “Must we wait that long?” She took my hands, guided them to her bodice. I undid the laces. The bodice slipped from her shoulders. Moments later, she was stepping out of her skirts, shrugging off her chemise until she stood naked, patterned in candlelight and slivers of moon, desirable as no woman I’d ever seen.

I gathered her up, burying my face in her breasts. She gasped involuntarily as I carried her to the bed, where she reclined and watched me cast off my robe before she sat up on her knees to help me pull my shift over my head. My shoulder ached. She frowned at the fresh spotting of blood on the bandage. “I should change that,” she said.

“It can wait,” I replied against her lips. As I drew back, her gaze traveled down my torso, resting for a moment on the blemish on my hip. Then she brought her gaze lower.

I lay down beside her. Her experienced air did not deceive me. Under my hand I could feel her pulse racing, and I knew that if she had explored the ways of the flesh to a certain extent, in the end, like so many girls of breeding, she’d remained shy of the consummation.

But I soon discovered that I too was innocent, in every way a man can be. As I pressed her length against me and we tasted each other with fervor, I realized I could not hope to compare this luxury to my rambunctious couplings with the castle maids and damsels at the fairs. I worshipped as I might at a temple, until the desire in Kate’s eyes turned to flame and she was shuddering beneath me, rising to meet my ardor. Only once did she cry out, but softly.

After we were spent and she cradled in my arms, I whispered, “Did I hurt you?”

She laughed shakily. “If that was pain, I never want to know anything else.” She spread her hands over my chest, resting her fingers on my heart. “All I want is here.”

I smiled. “Be that as it may, I would still make an honest woman of you.”

“For your information,” she said, “I am eighteen. I can make my own decisions. And I’m not sure I want to be an honest woman quite yet.”

I chuckled. “Well, when you do decide, let me know. I should at least request Her Grace’s blessing; you are her lady. And your mother, I’m sure she too will want to be asked.”

She sighed. “My mother is dead. But I think she would have liked you.”

I detected an old pain in her voice. “I’m sorry. When did she pass away?”

“When I was five.” She smiled. “She was so young when she bore me: just fourteen.”

“And your father … was he also young?”

She gave me a curious look. “I’m a bastard. And no, he wasn’t. Not as young as her.”

“I see.” I did not look away. “Do you want to tell me?”

She was quiet for a moment. Then she said, “It wasn’t a love affair. My mother was born of servants who served the Carey household; they died in the sweating sickness outbreak that killed Mary Boleyn’s first husband. When she remarried and became Mistress Stafford, my mother served her. Mistress Stafford wasn’t rich; her new husband Will Stafford was a common soldier but she had two children by her first marriage, a stipend, and her late husband had left her a house. She also liked my mother, so she offered her a post as her maid.”

“This Mary Stafford,” I said, “is she the same who was sister to Anne Boleyn?”

“Yes, but she had none of her sister’s pride, God rest her soul. When my mother became pregnant, the morning sickness gave her away. She was terrified; but Mistress Stafford did not utter a word of reproach. She knew the hardship women can suffer, so she bundled my mother up and sent her to live under Lady Mildred Cecil’s care. I was born in the Cecil household.”

So, this explained Kate’s connection to Cecil. She had lived under his roof.

“Did Mistress Stafford know who your father was?” I asked.

“She must have suspected. My mother never said his name aloud, but there weren’t that many men of age in her household who would have taken the liberty. It must have hurt her deeply. Mary had been married to him less than a year, risked her family’s displeasure and exile from court to be with him.” Kate sat up, pushing her hair aside. “He’s still alive. I saw him at Mistress Stafford’s funeral. We have the same eyes.”

I was quiet, struck by the similarities—and crucial differences—between us.

“Of course, Mistress Stafford would have understood,” she added. “After all, she’d been Henry the Eighth’s mistress before her sister Anne caught his eye; she knew fidelity is not a man’s best asset, and no woman invites misfortune willingly. But she let my mother keep her secret and raise me herself, without interference. She also left us with the Cecils. I think she wanted to keep my mother safe and away from her husband.”

She paused. “I owe her everything. Because of her kindness, my mother wasn’t turned out to beg. We lived well; I had a good childhood. I received an education. Lady Mildred saw to it, being an educated woman herself. I’m one of the few ladies in Her Grace’s service who is literate. That’s why she trusts me. If a message needs to be destroyed, I can memorize it.”

“I can see why she would trust you,” I said. “How did your mother die?”

“She caught a fever. It was quick, painless. I saw Mistress Stafford a few times after my mother passed; she was always gracious. She died three years later.”

“And the man you believe is your father…?” I ventured.

“He has remarried. He has children. I don’t fault him. I think he took my mother as men do, in a moment of lust, without thought for the consequences. If he knows about me, he’s never shown it. I’ve lived all of my life without him. But I use his surname. It’s the least he can do,” she said, with a mischievous smile. “It’s not as if there aren’t hundreds of Staffords in England.”

She poked my chest with her finger. “Your turn. I want to make an honest man out of you.” It was out before she even realized what she’d said. She took one look at my face and flinched. “Forgive me. I sometimes speak before I think. If you don’t want to talk, I understand.”

I cupped her chin. “No, I don’t want secrets between us.” I paused. “The truth is I don’t know who my mother is. I was abandoned as a babe. Mistress Alice raised me.”

“You were abandoned?” she echoed. I nodded, waiting for her to collect her thoughts. “Then Mistress Alice … she was the woman in the king’s room?”

“Yes. She saved me.” As I uttered these words, I felt an overpowering need to tell someone, to leave the memory in someone other than myself, so she’d never be forgotten. “I was left in the priest’s cottage near Dudley Castle, presumably to die. I was later told it happens more than we think—unwanted babies dropped off on noble thresholds—in the hope the rich will take pity on what the poor can’t afford. I would have none of it; according to Mistress Alice, I made enough fuss to wake the dead. She heard me wailing all the way from the slop pit, where she was dumping leavings, so she went to investigate.”

My voice caught. I steadied it, focusing on Kate’s eyes for strength. “She was like the mother I never knew. When she died—or rather, when I was told she died—I couldn’t forgive her for leaving me without saying good-bye.”

“That is why you agreed to help Her Grace. You knew she needed to say good-bye.”

“Yes. I couldn’t let her suffer what I had. I know what it is like to lose someone unexpectedly. I believed Mistress Alice was dead. Peregrine mentioned a woman caring for the king when I first met him, and for a moment I felt … But I never truly thought it was her. I couldn’t. Even when I saw her…” I paused again. My voice trembled. “They cut out her tongue, did something to her legs to hobble her. Master Shelton, their steward, whom I’d looked up to, who had told me of her death—he stood there and did nothing when Lady Dudley stabbed her. She bled to death and he did nothing.”

The recollection was like shards in my gut. I had been a fool to ever think Master Shelton would choose me over duty. To be a loyal servant, in everything it entailed, was what he knew. I might have pitied him for his stolid, meaningless life, had I not burned for vengeance.

There was a long silence. Kate’s hair draped like a curtain about her. She lifted tear-filled eyes. “Forgive me for how I spoke of her death. It was selfish. I … I didn’t want you to hurt.”

I kissed her. “My brave Kate, you couldn’t have prevented my pain. It happened long before I met you. I lost Alice on that day they took her from me. The woman I met in His Majesty’s chamber wasn’t the woman I knew. Now I know the truth. I know she didn’t abandon me. Lady Dudley must have ordered her taken on the road, and Shelton was her accomplice.”

“But why would they do such a terrible thing? It happened long before the King fell ill, yes? Why did they want you to believe she was dead?”

I smiled grimly. “I’ve been asking myself the same thing. I think it’s because of what she knew. I’m certain of it. Mistress Alice knew who I am.”