Blood Between Queens (16 page)

Everything in him yearned for her. He reached out and pulled her to him. She wrapped her arms around him and pressed her cheek against his shoulder. The scent of warm skin rose from her bare neck and he kissed it. He held her tightly, hungry for more of her, wanting her, body and soul, as he had wanted her for ten years. Ten long years of feasting on the memory of one night, a snowy night in a farmer’s hut, an incandescent memory that still held heat for him. Ten years of cold nights with Frances, and never again with this woman he loved. He moaned her name, “Elizabeth . . . Elizabeth,” holding her tightly against him, her warmth a balm to his aching body. Suddenly he remembered the bloody cloth wound around his hand. He must not leave the stain of blood on her. He pulled away, indicating his hand.

She looked at the blood. Then up at him. A darkness swept over her face and her dark eyes flashed. She raised her hand and slapped him. “How dare you brawl in my presence!”

The slap was like icy sea spray knocking him back to reality. She was a queen, the monarch of a great realm, and he could never have her. He had always known that. He didn’t even belong in her world, a place of courtiers and politics, of talk and show. He belonged on board a ship. There, he was in command. He took command now. “Very well. Next time I’ll hit him outside your presence.”

“What did he
do
to you?”

“He was born.”

“This is no answer! Do you even know who he is?”

“Spanish, and therefore cursed.”

“A cousin of Ambassador de Spes. A count! A relation of King Philip’s
wife
. Bah, I should have let de Spes take you away. He would teach you a lesson about brawling that you would not soon forget.”

“But you didn’t. And you know why. Because you stand for Englishmen.”

He saw how it startled her. And moved her. He knew her well: England’s heartbeat was her heartbeat. He had seen her mobbed on her progresses, people crowding round her, shopkeepers, housewives, servants. She enjoyed it, often stopping to talk to them. Adam doubted that any other monarch in Europe took such a warm interest in her people. They loved her for it.

“I brought you something,” he said, digging inside a pocket in his doublet. “They sank our treasure, but not all of it.” He pulled out a wad of paper the size of an egg, the paper grimy with gun grease. He unwrapped it and held it out to show her. A flawless pearl, big as an eye, tear shaped, tinged with pink like a girl’s blush. Candlelight burnished its smoothness like skin aglow.

She looked at him with wonder. “You starved . . . but saved this treasure for me?”

“It kept me alive, dreaming of this moment.” Lifting the pearl, he crumpled the grimy paper, about to toss it away.

She caught his hand and took the paper. “This is just as precious.” Lovingly, she rewrapped the pearl and tucked it away in a small gold satin pouch at her waist. Tears glinted in her eyes. She ran a fingertip over Adam’s lips. The softness of her touch aroused a fierce desire in him to kiss her. He fought it. “How thin you are,” she murmured. “You have suffered.”

“Not as much as my men.”

“What happened? Is it true the Spaniards attacked you with no provocation? Is Hawkins dead?”

Before he could answer, a hubbub sounded on the wharf. Feet pounding, men shouting. Adam looked through a crack between the curtains. Courtiers were running to their boats, jumping into them while calling orders to their oarsmen. He knew why—they were all keen to stay close to Elizabeth, to be
seen
close to her. He felt the barge slide away from the wharf, saw the wharf torches recede as the barge surged into the river’s chop. Elizabeth’s oarsmen were expert, and the barge glided like a blade through a mill pond. The raucous din of the lords in their boats followed them abeam and astern, while ahead music struck up. The royal musicians in a boat ahead of Elizabeth, Adam realized. The little flotilla was heading upriver. To Hampton Court? He needed time to get what he wanted from her. “Where are we bound?” he asked.

“Whitehall. Where a hill of paperwork awaits me.” She gave him a cross look. “I haven’t yet decided what awaits you. The ambassador wants to eat your liver.”

Not if I rip out his first,
Adam thought grimly. So, to Whitehall. It didn’t give him much time. “Elizabeth, I have much to report.”

“Yes,” she said, ringing a little silver bell. Her steward opened the door and she asked for a basin of water. “Sit down,” she told Adam, pointing to the canopied divan. “I want to hear it all.”

He sat, and when the steward brought the water she took it and dismissed him and sat down on a cushioned stool in front of Adam, the basin on her lap. She took his hand and unwound the bloodied kerchief. He took in a breath of surprise. She was going to clean his hand? “You don’t need to do that.”

She ignored him, examining his raw knuckles. She pulled from her sleeve a white silk square embroidered with flowers—Adam caught its rosemary scent—and dipped it in the water. It was wonderful to feel her long smooth fingers slip over his wrist, feel her pat the cool water on his burning knuckles. He felt the thrill of being alone with her, their knees touching, while outside a jovial din came from the boats of the court hangers-on around them, and shouts came from on shore of Londoners cheering the barge as it passed, and strains of music from the boat ahead rolled back like the barge’s bow wave. Elizabeth ignored it all as she dripped water on his hand. “Tell me everything.”

He did. How the hurricane had damaged the
Jesus of Lubeck,
forcing Hawkins to order their fleet of seven into San Juan de Ulúa for repairs. How the Spanish
flota
arrived, thirteen ships with the new Mexican governor aboard. How Hawkins met with the governor, who agreed to let the English complete their repairs and then get under way. How they had traded gentlemen hostages as insurance that neither side would fire their cannon. Elizabeth listened intently as she worked at cleaning his hand.

“They lied,” he said. “We sent them gentlemen—Richard Temple, John Varney, Thomas Fowler—but they sent us sailors got up in gentlemen’s clothes. Then they sent fire ships to burn us as we stood at anchor.” He told her about the battle. The blood and fire and smoke. The dying. The sunk
Angel
and
Swallow
and
Jesus,
going down with all the expedition’s treasure and most of their victuals. The vanished
Judith
. Told her how the Spanish had captured scores of men who by now would have been tortured by the Mexican Inquisition. How he had taken on survivors from the crippled English ships. How, in escaping, he was separated from Hawkins on the
Minion.
How, aboard the
Elizabeth
as he sailed her home with only the mizzenmast and ruptured canvas, his men had suffered famine and thirst and festering wounds, and had died in the dozens.

When he was finished, he saw horror in her eyes. And something harder. Steelier. It fired him with fresh energy. This was why he had come. “Elizabeth, you hate them as much as I do.”

She let out a scoffing breath. “Much good that does us.” She squeezed blood-tinged water out of the white silk, which she then wrapped loosely around his palm, finished.

“I know you,” he said. “You won’t let them get away with this.”

She raised an eyebrow coolly. “Will I not?” Getting up, she took the bowl of water and set it on a table and picked up a towel to dry her hands. “Much happened while you were in the Indies. You do not know how badly things stand between us and Philip.”

“Why? What’s happened?”

“It started in Spain, with the people at my embassy. Over religion—always religion,” she said with wearily. “It was one of the church processions through the streets that Spaniards are so obsessively fond of. My people, being Protestant, refused to doff their caps as the religious relics passed. They were arrested. I objected, pointing out to Philip that I allow the people of
his
embassy to celebrate mass. He answered that it was the Inquisition who arrested my people, so there was nothing he could do.” She tossed the towel on the table in disgust. “Then my foolish ambassador, Dr. Man, made matters worse when he was heard grumbling an insult about the pope, called him a canting little monk. Philip put him under house arrest.”

“I heard about this. You brought Man home, and quite rightly, and you’ve sent no replacement.”

Her look was pained. “My claws are as a mouse’s against the beast of the Inquisition. And in the Netherlands things are even more dire since Philip invaded. He has given the Duke of Alva a free hand over the Dutch, and a cruel hand it is. He is butchering Protestants. That so infuriated some of my councilors they raised money to send arms to the Dutch rebels. Philip was apoplectic, and de Spes even more so. I tried to calm the waters, made a proclamation that no munitions could be shipped to the rebels.”

“Ah, but I heard you held off announcing it for several days, giving Leicester time to ship the arms before your proclamation came into force. I have kept myself informed, Elizabeth. And I know your ways. You’ve done your sly best to stand up to Philip, just as you should. And now it’s time to do more.”

“You know nothing of what I should do,” she snapped. “I need Spain.
England
needs Spain. Our lifeblood is trade with the Netherlands, and if Philip cuts that he can strangle England. And Spain isn’t the only danger, Adam. There’s France. Charles massacring Protestants, calling me a heretic.” She rubbed her temples as if the worry made her head ache. “The Catholic realms aligning against me . . . that’s my worst fear. A Catholic League sending troops across the Narrow Sea to turn our green pastures red with English blood. So no, do not vex me with foolish talk about standing up to Philip. I dare not openly defy him.”

It sent a knife of dread into him. Had he misjudged her? He got up and came to her. “The Spaniards have
already
massacred Englishmen.
My
men. Being timid with them just invites more assault. Philip responds only to strength. Show him you are a force to be reckoned with.”

“Don’t talk nonsense. I have no such force.”

“You do. You have me. Let me go after them.”

“Go after—?”

“Attack them, as they did us. Hit their next treasure fleet bound from the Indies for Spain.”

She stared at him in disbelief. “The
flota?
They sail with enough cannon to blast apart a mountain. An attack would be lunacy.”

“Not if you supply me well. I’d need fast ships, seasoned men, and plenty of gun power. I can do it, Elizabeth. You know I can.”

A door seemed to close in her eyes. “I know this much—the Spanish call you a pirate. You were in their territory. You had no right to be there.”

“I told you, the hurricane blew us off course.”

“Hawkins knew the risk of encroaching on Spain’s New World territory. So did you. It’s a criminal trespass in Philip’s eyes.”

“Philip is not God. He made a law, that’s all. You can make laws, too. Let’s make these devils pay. Give me justice.”

“No. He is already furious about English piracy in the Channel. If I were to condone it in his New World possessions, it could push us to the brink of war.”

“We’re already at war. Elizabeth, they slaughtered my men, sank our treasure. If that’s not an act of war, what is?”

She glared at him. “Attacking Philip’s kinsman tonight, that’s what. They tell me the count has a broken nose and three broken ribs, and his heart is weak. If he dies, Adam, God knows what price I’ll have to pay.”

“Pay nothing. It’s
Spain
who must pay. Let me take their treasure fleet and I’ll fill your coffers with gold and silver, enough to buy an army to match his and to build the finest navy in the world.”

“Stop! You are fevered. Or drunk. Or just mad for revenge. Whatever, this scheme is not rational. A rupture with Philip would be disastrous for England. I will not give you license to ruin my realm!”

She turned her back on him, leaving him smarting at her rebuke. She heaved a troubled sigh and muttered, “Mad for revenge, like Mary. You’re as irrational as she is.”

“Who?”

She threw him a wry look. “You have been away too long.” She sat down wearily on the divan and rattled off a tale about the Scottish queen: her imprisonment, escape, defeat on the battlefield by the Earl of Moray, her flight into England. “She has asked me to raise an army for her. Great heaven, she actually expected I would let her lead English troops against her enemies. Revenge, that’s what drives Mary.”

Adam was only half listening. Scotland meant nothing to him, but he saw Elizabeth’s deep concern, which worried him. Caught in a web of Scottish politics, she would not focus on the
real
enemy. “The Scots are an inconsequential nation and their queen is a froth-headed fool. Dispatch her back to her own land and turn to face the true threat. The guns of Spain.”

“Mary has more power than you know. A power that swords and cannonballs cannot match.”

“What power?”

“The succession.”

The pain in her voice caught him off guard. He knew about this burr in her heart. Childless, she had no heir. After her coronation nine years ago she had told him she would never marry, because her choice would have to be a foreign prince, and such a king-consort would draw power to himself, eclipsing hers. Adam had heartily approved her decision, glad that if he could not have her, no other man would either. Gossip abounded, of course, mostly about her and the Earl of Leicester. Some said they were lovers. Adam didn’t believe it. He bridled at the lurid court whisperings, but he knew Elizabeth’s heart was his.

But the succession was a matter he knew she took very seriously. He sat down beside her. “Mary Stuart is nothing but a French marionette. A woman with so sense.”

“She stands next in line to my throne, that I cannot dispute. And who else can I name?” She gave him a sad smile. “I envy you your family. You have a wife, children—” She held up a hand to stop him interrupting, a gesture that acknowledged she understood how joyless his marriage was. “The children are worth it all, Adam. And your splendid parents—you know the love I bear Lord and Lady Thornleigh. I have lost father and mother, sister and brother. I shall never have a husband. Nor children.” There was a catch in her voice. She got control of it. “The people of England are my family. I ask for nothing more. Shall I endanger them by leaving no one to guide and protect them? Shall I invite civil war? Already the succession has dangerously split my council. Half of them hound me to name Mary my heir, the other half to marry and
produce
one.”