This Scepter'd Isle (63 page)

Nor was replacing some of the attendants so easy as Prince Vidal implied. Yes, if the labor was very long, they would have time to detain and replace some of those assisting in the birth, but what if it were not?

So when Pasgen arrived with the news that Queen Anne was in labor before even the first changeling had been prepared, Vidal Dhu shrugged. Perhaps another chance to steal the child would present itself or they would simply wait until the queen was disgraced and the child discarded.

In fact the labor was not long. Even had the changeling been ready there would scarcely have been enough time to make the substitution of attendants. And the changeling would have been the wrong sex. Because of the strong influence the FarSeers had predicted the child would have, it was assumed it would be male . . . and it was not.

King Henry had excitedly summoned the greatest nobles who were available as soon as he heard that Anne was truly in labor. Among those able to answer the summons was FitzRoy. He as well as the king and the rest of the court were disappointed that Anne's child was female. All the soothsayers had predicted a boy.

However, as the powerful shrieks of a very strong, healthy, and enraged baby spilled out into the outer chamber where the most important members of the court waited to see the child, a quick recovery was made. The king was so relieved that his precious Anne had been spared and that the babe was alive and, very obviously, strong, that the sex became less important.

Anne had conceived quickly and would doubtless do so again; there was time enough. The next child would be a boy. So, when the chief nurse emerged with the wrapped child in her arms, Henry received her with good grace and held her up for all to see.

Forward in the crowd as befitted his status as first duke in the kingdom, FitzRoy looked up. Both mouth and eyes opened wide and he stared, utterly transfixed. He was seeing in life exactly the image from the great lens Underhill. A full head of brilliant red hair—far more hair than was usual for a newborn—crowned a little red face wearing a ferocious scowl. FitzRoy closed his mouth and swallowed hard. Lady Aleneil was absolutely right. He knew what he had to do.

FitzRoy needed to exert all his willpower to prevent himself from rushing out of the chamber. He was swept by the most violent need to go home at once to get the iron cross that had lain for years now among his most precious jewels. He needed to bring that cross and hang it around the neck of this most precious child. He could almost feel the powers of darkness gathering around her.

Naturally he did not dare rush away. He could imagine the ugly interpretation that would be put upon such behavior. The king would be appalled, and the entire court would say that he was angry because a girl—a legitimate girl—would replace him in the royal line. However, he had not spent a year in the French court where the English were regarded
very
suspiciously without learning how to control his expression. He stood still, smiling at the baby—actually, that was very easy—as long as the king displayed her.

That scowl. With a leaping heart FitzRoy realized it was not bad temper—although the child had been furious enough at her undignified expulsion from her mother's womb. Clearly she had a strong will of her own, but that scowl marked a characteristic far more important than that. This red-haired babe was already trying to see, trying to understand what was happening.

Then the king handed her back to her nurse, but still FitzRoy could not leave. He had to congratulate his father and say all the right things, that he was sorry the child had not been male as prophesied but that she was clearly a strong and healthy babe. A boy would follow. Henry nodded and smiled, clasped his son around the shoulders, smiled even more broadly when FitzRoy expressed his hopes for Anne's and the child's continued well-being. And still he could not leave. He had to show his smiling face, his true gladness about the child to all those assembled.

Dawn was breaking by the time FitzRoy left Greenwich. He had an apartment in the palace and could have stayed, but the iron cross was in Baynard's Castle. He had only one guard with him—the close watch that had been kept on him for so long was no longer necessary—but he had kept the four men in his service. They were by now utterly devoted and much more useful than silly pages. Now he told Gerrit to see if he could hire a boat to take them back to London.

"Never mind." Denoriel's voice came out of the shadows. "I've a boat at the water stairs. Tell me!"

"It is she!"

"She? She?"

"The red-haired babe. She. Yes. Oh, Denno, I could sense the greatness in her."

The Sidhe was silent as they made their way to the water stair and then down to where the boat waited. FitzRoy was too excited to notice that the boatmen were very odd-looking, and Denno led him to the stern of the small vessel and bade him sit.

"You are sure?" he asked FitzRoy intently. "You are sure this is the red-haired babe? Is there some way you can bring me to look at her?"

"Not at once, no. But sure? Of course I am sure. Why do you think I did not even stop to piss after waiting all those hours? I must get back to Baynard's Castle to get the iron cross for her. Do you not think whoever tried to seize me will try to seize her?"

Denoriel blinked at him. "Yes, of course, but . . . but what am I to do? You were a little boy and I could find reasons to be near you. How am I to protect a little girl?"

FitzRoy turned toward him, his face alight. "Do you remember that Lady Aleneil said I would know what part I had to play in the saving of Logres? She was right. It is true. I knew the moment I saw the child. My part is to do for her what you did for me. She is my sister. I am her older brother. She is an enchanting child. What more natural than that I should be enamored of her and wish to watch by her and, when she is a little older, play with her?"

A cold wash of fear passed over Denoriel. It was mad for a fourteen-year-old mortal boy to try to stand between Vidal Dhu and a child whom the dark Sidhe was determined to take. Danger . . . death lay that way. He leaned forward and took FitzRoy's hand.

"Harry, have a care to yourself, too. I . . . I feel you are right and that you, the only one who knows of the kind of enemies who threaten the child, the only one with status enough in the court to come close to her, must watch over her. But do not be so proud that you refuse me a part in your duties. There are helpers I can obtain for you and, if necessary, spells."

FitzRoy gripped Denoriel's hand. "Thank God for that, Denno. I know I will need all the help I can get."

"Indeed you will," Denoriel sighed, "and this I suspect will be no short task. She is a
female
. That means if Queen Anne bears a boy, he will come first in the succession. Even if she does not, there will be many who insist that the elder princess, Mary, should come first to the throne . . . and with Mary come the fires of Inquisition." He shuddered.

FitzRoy hardly heard him. The gentle rocking of the boat as they moved upriver was reminding him that he had no sleep at all the previous night and his eyes were beginning to close. He sighed and his head sagged back against the cushions of the seat in the stern. He still held Denno's hand, trying to think of a way to present the iron cross to those who cared for the baby. He knew that any gift he offered would be accepted, but the chances were that the iron cross would be relegated to the bottom of some chest and immediately forgotten. It was only iron, plain cold iron.

The trip downriver back to Greenwich the next day, with the cross where he could easily reach it in his sleeve, was much quicker than that the previous night upriver to London. It made no difference; he still had not thought of a way to arrange for the baby to wear the iron cross. Beside that, he had conceived the fear that the child had already been snatched. She was a princess and would have every attention, but no one but he could realize how precious, in how much danger she was.

He tried on three separate occasions that afternoon to get in to see the child. He would know at once if any exchange had been made, whereas her attendants might only think she was sickening, as several of the king's children had before. But he could not say that to anyone. Who would believe him? They would say he was mad.

Lady Margaret Bryan, who had been nurse to Princess Mary and was now appointed to care for the new princess, had come out to speak to him herself on his third visit. He smiled at her and asked eagerly, "I . . . is she well? Does she cry lustily? Is her color good?"

A dying changeling had no lusty voice; it made faint mewling sounds and its skin was like potter's clay, gray and moist. There was a moment of silence while Lady Bryan stared at him, and then FitzRoy blushed hotly, realizing that her gaze held a kind of horrified suspicion. Her charge was only a girl and had bumped him off the line of succession. Could he be hoping the same fate would overtake this child as those of Queen Catherine and the king?

Finally she said, "Those are very particular questions, Your Grace. How is it that you are so intent on the princess's health?"

FitzRoy swallowed and then, hurt and flustered, made everything worse. "I would not hurt her," he said. "I love her. I think she is the most adorable baby I have ever seen—"

Lady Bryan's lips thinned. "Yes? A quick-found love. And how many newborn babies have you seen, Your Grace?" She looked him up and down, sniffed, and turned away.

Appalled at what he had done, FitzRoy stood looking after her, biting his lip. He knew he would make things worse if he pursued her, and he nervously ran a hand through his hair, pushing it off his forehead. A maid who had followed Lady Bryan through the hangings that separated the inner and outer chamber but had stopped near the entrance when she saw Lady Bryan engaged, uttered a small gasp.

FitzRoy jerked his eyes away from the spot where Lady Bryan had passed through the hangings and looked at the maid. He saw that she was carrying an armful of cloths that must be for diapering or swaddling. She would be one of the women who actually tended to the child physically and a hope rose in him.

"Should I know you?" he asked, beckoning to her.

She was of an age to have attended him when he was an infant. She might be one who was regularly employed in the king's household for such a purpose. If only it were so . . . he almost held his breath. She shook her head, but a little to his surprise, she came toward him, her eyes still fixed on his face.

"I do not know how you could, Your Grace," she said very softly. "I was a nursemaid to Her Grace the queen when she was an infant, and she remembered me and did me the great honor of offering me a place in Her Grace the princess's household."

Made uneasy by the woman's stare, still fixed on his forehead, FitzRoy raised a hand to pull his bangs down. He knew there must be some mark there that could not be discerned by mortals because when his hair became disarranged Underhill, everyone stared at him just as this woman was doing. To his astonishment, the maid put out one hand and caught at his wrist.

"Who are you?" she asked in a murmur.

"I am the duke of Richmond, the child's half-brother."

The maid nodded. "I heard Lady Bryan call you 'Your Grace' but I didn't know . . . It was true what you said to her? That you love the baby and would not hurt her?"

Her eyes did not meet his; they were fixed on his forehead. FitzRoy wondered what she saw there, but he would not ask her. He was cold as ice with fear. If she were Unseleighe Sidhe, he might be too late to save the princess. His free hand slipped into the sleeve of his gown and he gripped the cross. At least he would have some revenge.

"Yes, it is true. I love her. I would gladly give my life to protect her, but Lady Bryan suspects that I wish her harm because she is now the king's heir. It is not true. I fear for her and would offer her what little protection I have to give, this good-luck charm."

He pulled the cross from his sleeve and slapped it into the hand that still lightly touched his wrist. The maid started slightly, but did not cry out and instinctively closed her hand instead of flinging the cross away.
Not Sidhe, then
, FitzRoy thought. So how could she see whatever marked him? A witch?

She was looking down at the cross, then raised her eyes again to look at his forehead. "Iron," she breathed. "You want the babe to wear cold iron?"

FitzRoy nodded. He could not speak of anything pertaining to Underhill, which meant he could not warn against the Unseleighe Sidhe. And what if she were their agent? She could be a mortal enslaved to the Unseleighe. She would take his cross and throw it into the deepest, darkest privy she could find.

He almost snatched the cross back from her hand and then remembered what she had said about being Anne's nursemaid. And Anne, Denoriel had told him, was a witch herself—untrained and utterly rejecting of her Talent, but still a witch. The maid had swiftly secreted the cross within the bundle of cloths she carried. Now she curtsied and smiled at him.

"It will be done," she said. "And you are in time with it. The child is strong. She suckles well; the wet nurse complained of the grip of her jaws, young as she is. She is rosy and warm."

FitzRoy sighed with relief. "If you need anything or if you see anything that is alarming to you, send for me. I will be staying in Greenwich as long as the child is here, but my home is in Baynard's Castle in London, hard by the river Thames. I . . . I have friends who might help if there is a threat."

"My name is Blanche Parry," the maid said, "and if you want news of the child, you had better ask for me. Also you had better not come here again, at least not until there are other visitors, or Lady Bryan may mark you down as suspicious and unwelcome."

FitzRoy had been feeling better, not quite such a fool for giving away his precious cross, until that last sentence. His heart sank. Who knew what the maid was. He should have brought Denno—somehow he would have to arrange for Denno to see her, but he knew that would be very difficult.

He left Anne's apartment and went to find Denno near the stables where men came and went constantly. He told Denoriel his fears and suspicions, but did not receive the reproaches he expected. Instead Denno said, "Queen Anne's nursemaid, was she? Very interesting. No, I don't think she could be an Unseleighe slave. That would mean the Unseleighe FarSeers had Visions almost thirty years before ours and arranged to place one of their own in the Boleyn household. Unlikely. I'll ask Aleneil, but I don't think the FarSeeing works that way when it affects both the Seleighe and Unseleighe Courts. How come she spoke to you?"