The King's Damsel (32 page)

“Stay, my dear. We will forgo the formalities if you will tell me what it is you are up to.”

“Your Grace is most kind. It is but a small project of my own
devising. Perhaps Your Grace will recall that I have some ability as a storyteller?”

He nodded, which was gratifying in itself. I was surprised that he remembered. I had not often been called upon to recount my tales since leaving Princess Mary’s household.

“I thought to collect some of the best stories by writing them down for others to read. I have heard that there are some here at court who collect poems in this way, adding to a collection housed in a single manuscript.”

“It is an excellent notion,” the king said, beaming his approval. “You must let me read some of these tales.” His smile broadened. “Better yet, you must tell them to me directly, especially any that bear a resemblance to the tales of Master Boccaccio.”

I blinked at him in confusion. “I do not know the gentleman, sire.”

“No, you would not.” He laughed at a joke I did not understand, but I was too relieved to find him in such good humor to worry about such trivialities. “We will speak more of this anon,” the king promised. Then he lifted my hand to his lips, kissed the back of my knuckles, rose, and went on his way, still chuckling.

I sent a rueful look toward the maze. I had been hoping His Grace might take advantage of its proximity to walk with me there, leaving his entourage behind. Perhaps it was better that he had not. I did not intend to yield too easily to his advances. Indeed, I held out some small hope that I might simply play at the “game of love” with His Grace, as I had once before, and still achieve my end.

Taking my time, since I had decided that it was, in fact, a worthwhile project to write down my stories, I did not return to the queen’s lodgings for some time. I was still a considerable distance away when I heard Her Grace’s screams of rage.

“What is it?” I demanded of Jane Seymour upon joining the cluster of maids of honor outside the queen’s bedroom door.

“Lady Mary Rochford has returned to court,” Bess Holland said, speaking up before Jane could utter a word.

Another shriek silenced us. Queen Anne’s voice rose to a pitch so shrill it hurt my ears, but this close to the source, I could at last make out Her Grace’s words.

“How dare you, Mary?” she demanded. “How dare you wed without my permission? And to a nobody!”

Lady Mary Rochford’s voice was calm and firm. “He is not a nobody. He is a Stafford, a member of one of the greatest families in the realm.”

“A cadet branch!”

“I love him, Anne.”

“Love? Love!” If a screech could sound incredulous, the queen’s did.

“Love,” Lady Mary repeated. “And the proof of that love is already growing in my belly, so do not think that you can annul our marriage.”

Jane Seymour stifled a gasp. The rest of us looked at each other with frightened eyes. Queen Anne gave an incoherent cry of rage. It was followed by a crash, as if she had thrown something breakable against a wall.

“Get you gone from my sight!” the queen screamed at her sister. “Get you gone from court! You are no longer welcome here!”

A moment later, the door opened and Lady Mary Rochford emerged. Her lips were curved into a secretive little smile that said she was well content with this outcome. By the queen’s command, she was free to return to the “nobody” she had married—to the man she loved. She could bear his child far away from the turmoil and trouble of the royal court.

I envied her.

A
ll the while we remained at Woodstock, King Henry lavished attention on me, offering me “knightly service” as his “mistress” and calling me his “lady to serve.” Queen Anne, having made the uncomfortable three-day journey from Guildford to Woodstock when she had not yet fully recovered from her miscarriage, was in no fit state to welcome her husband back into her bed, but she did not like seeing him court another. She was quick to snap at everyone—not just her servants, but the king, too.

Rather than quarrel with his wife, His Grace took to stalking out of the chamber in search of more genial company. He seemed to find my presence soothing. One day we explored the maze together, but only after His Grace convinced me that he knew the way out.

“Tell me one of your tales, Tamsin,” he commanded as we sat on the stone bench at the center. “I am in need of a cheerful story.”

I was happy to oblige. I had begun to enjoy these private moments with the king, although it was rare that we were truly alone. There were almost always courtiers about, since the king was never supposed to be left unattended. But his minions knew to stay well in
the background when His Grace wished to be private. I soon learned to ignore their presence.

King Henry was pleasant company, witty and charming. Once, he played the lute and sang to me. It was a composition of his own making and he had a fine voice. He did not press me to lie with him, although he did steal a kiss or two, and liked me to sit upon his lap while we talked. We were a man and a woman delighting in one another’s company, aware of the physical attraction between us but not yet ready to act upon it.

I told myself I was biding my time, waiting for an opportune moment to mention Princess Mary’s plight. I dared not risk falling out of the king’s favor by being overbold. It would never do to come right out and ask him to change his mind about Mary’s place in the succession, but I was certain
something
could be done to make the princess’s life easier. I never forgot, no matter how much I enjoyed the king’s company, that the reason I was encouraging His Grace’s interest was to advocate for his daughter.

One afternoon, King Henry took me to visit his library, a high, brightly lit room filled with books. He had been talking about that fellow Boccaccio again, and someone called Ariosto. Laughing, His Grace thrust a book into my hands.

“But this is not written in English,” I protested. “I cannot read Latin. Or Italian. Or whatever this language is.”

His grin widened. “You do not need to read words. Just look at the pictures.”

Suspicious of the twinkle in his eyes, I turned the pages carefully until I came to the first illustration. My mouth dropped open and I quickly slammed the volume shut. I could feel the heat rising into my face. “Those people have no clothes on,” I whispered, truly shocked.

The king roared with laughter.

It was a precious moment, and what would have happened next I cannot say, for we were interrupted by Dr. Butts, who had just returned to Woodstock. He had spent most of the month of September looking after the health of the king’s eldest daughter.

I started to leave, but King Henry gestured for me to stay where I was. I settled back onto a padded bench.

“Well?” the king demanded, when Dr. Butts straightened from his bow. “How does the Lady Mary fare? Is she malingering again?”

“Your Grace, your daughter has been most desperately ill.”

My audible gasp drew both the physician’s attention and the king’s. His Grace frowned and sent me a narrow-eyed look, but still he did not banish me. Alarmed to see that my hands were shaking, I tried to make myself as small and insignificant as a little mouse. I needed to stay and hear what Dr. Butts had to say about the princess.

“What is wrong with her?” King Henry demanded.

“It is a complicated tale, Your Grace. At first I believed that the Lady Mary suffered no more than a recurrence of her old difficulties—severe headaches and stomach cramps preceding the start of her monthly courses. But Lady Shelton, her lady governess, in seeking to help assuage her suffering, sent for an apothecary, Master Michael. The apothecary, in good faith, dosed the Lady Mary with pills of his own making, but these pills did not agree with her and she became even more ill.”

Poison,
I thought, and fumbled for the rosary the princess had given me so many years ago.

“I’ll have the villain’s head!” the king bellowed. Hands on his hips, legs apart, he loomed over the much smaller physician with the look of a bull about to charge.

“No, no.” Dr. Butts made little soothing motions with both hands as he hastily backed up a few steps. “There was no real harm
done and the Lady Mary is recovering. But she
was
very ill. Her suffering, Your Majesty, is compounded by sorrow. Had she not been so deeply troubled, she would have mended faster and there would have been no need for the apothecary’s pills in the first place.”

The king turned his back on the physician, striding across the small room to stare out the window. As he passed me I could see that his brow was deeply furrowed. He
did
care about his daughter. He just did not know what to do about her.

After a long silence spent contemplating the gardens below, His Grace spoke. “What do you mean by
troubled
? What troubles her?”

“May I speak freely, Your Grace?”

“As you will.”

“The Lady Mary would recover in a trice were she to be set free to come and go as she pleases.”

King Henry heaved a deep sigh but did not turn around. “It is a great misfortune, then, that she remains so obstinate. She deprives me of any occasion to treat her as well as I would like.”

Dr. Butts glanced at me. Our gazes met with perfect understanding, but I was not brave enough to make the obvious suggestion. I left it to the physician. After all, the king had given him leave to speak without fear of reprisal.

“Send her to her mother,” said Dr. Butts.

I held my breath. Had he gone too far? It was not a simple request. If the king allowed his daughter the one thing she most desired, she might never renounce her claim to the throne.

I could hear the regret in the king’s voice when he replied. “It is a great pity my daughter is so distressed, but it is entirely up to Mary herself how long she remains in her present circumstances.”

Accepting his failure to sway His Grace, Dr. Butts bowed himself out of the library.

Boldly, I left my seat and insinuated myself beside King Henry in the window alcove. I dared to touch my hand to his.

“Perhaps,” I suggested in a soft voice, “a small show of kindness might be enough to turn the tide. Your daughter loves you very much, Your Grace.”

He did not look at me, but continued to stare out at the Oxfordshire countryside beyond the panes of glass. “Why will she not take the oath? It is a simple enough thing to do. Do you think I do not know that many of those who swear it are perjuring themselves? But I must have the words. I cannot back down about that.”

“Let her come to court,” I urged him. “Then make staying here conditional upon her agreement.” I felt certain that if I could talk to the princess myself, uninterrupted, I could persuade her to cooperate.

The king’s answer was a derisive snort and a muttered, “The queen would have my head!”

I sighed.

King Henry looked down at me. “Anne does not have a say in all that I do.”

Clasping me tightly in his embrace, the king began to kiss me. From that point onward, everything happened very fast, but it never occurred to me to protest.

His Grace swept me up into his strong arms and carried me from the library into a private passage that led to his bedchamber and the “secret lodgings” beyond. The rooms we passed through were a blur, as were the voices of the king’s gentlemen. I clung tightly, my arms around his neck and my face buried in the plush velvet of his doublet. One of the jewels that decorated it scratched my cheek, but I scarcely noticed. If it had not been necessary, I think I would have forgotten how to breathe.

What breath I had came out in an explosion of air when the king
tossed me onto the top of a feather mattress so soft that I sank into it by at least an inch. With a rattle of golden rings, he closed the curtains around the bed, shutting me into a small, opulent tent. I heard him call for a servant to divest him of his clothing.

Heart racing, I sat up, but that was all I could manage. I did not know what to do next. I could not run screaming from the room. I had never given His Grace any reason to believe I would not welcome him as a lover.

Neither had I thought this far ahead. I suppose I assumed that our flirtation would follow the same pattern it had when Queen Anne was pregnant with her daughter, but this was no longer a game of courtly love and I was no longer safe upon a pedestal, worshipped from afar.

I looked down at my trembling hands, wondering a trifle wildly if I was supposed to remove my own garments or wait for His Grace’s minions to help me. I jumped when I heard the chamber door close with a thud. The servants had departed. I did not know whether to feel relief or panic. Before I could decide, the curtains parted.

King Henry wore a night robe over his nakedness, a gorgeous thing of red velvet furred with ermine. He clambered up onto the bed, showing a flash of skin as one strongly muscled leg revealed itself. He smiled broadly at my reaction and then bade me turn my back to him so that he could undo my laces.

He seemed pleased to perform this service for me, and was not unfamiliar with the workings of female garments. He had me down to my shift before I could think of anything to say to him. Then that last item of clothing was also gone. A moment later, I was on my back with the weight of his body on top of me. I felt his nakedness against mine and was on the verge of panic when he began to whisper.

“Sweeting,” he murmured. “Sweet, sweet Tamsin.”

He calmed me the way he would a fractious horse, running one hand over my flanks and speaking softly. Only when he was satisfied that I would not bolt did he begin showering kisses on me.

I returned them, tentatively at first and then with more enthusiasm. I had known from the start that there was no way to retreat and the last thing I wanted was to turn the king against me by failing to respond to his lovemaking. I was prepared to pretend to like whatever he did to me. I had learned enough from listening to the other ladies talk to realize that I could not just lie there like a corpse. If His Grace was disappointed in me, I would be of no further use to anyone, not even myself.