In a Treacherous Court (16 page)

A
lthough he could not be trusted, Susanna liked Francis Bryan. He would not lack for the company of women, nor the company of friends to drink with.

There was something about him. It was in the way he looked at a person, as if he was truly interested in them. If she were to paint him, she would have to find a way to capture the intensity of his gaze.

But Parker had disrupted his equilibrium. And he had done it like the master he was.

“The King is thinking of ending his marriage to the Queen.” Bryan spoke quickly, as if saying it fast would make it sound better somehow. His eyes went nervously to Susanna. “I don’t say this lightly, especially not with someone unknown to me in the room, but it’s the truth.”

Parker’s gaze sharpened, but he did not look as surprised as Susanna was. He must have had an inkling of this himself.

“At present, it is but something he turns over in his mind. He needs a son, a legitimate son, and the Queen … well, her age, her fasting, and her kneeling in prayer in cold chapels for hours have made her courses erratic. There will be no more heirs from her, even if His Majesty slept regularly in her bed, which he does not.”

Bryan looked from Susanna to Parker, and when they made no move or word to interrupt, he took a deep breath. “It seems he has no choice but to advance his illegitimate heir. And you can guess how the Queen will take her own daughter being usurped by His Majesty’s bastard.”

“It will not be pretty,” Parker conceded. He looked as if he wished himself very far from here.

“It will not. And while he will ignore her anger, the King knows she is not the only one who will feel so. There are
plenty of powerful men who would begin to ask themselves, if the bastard son of the King can take the throne, why should not they? There are some who claim a better title to the throne than the King himself.”

“De la Pole.” Parker’s voice was flat.

“Aye.” Bryan looked defiantly at him. “De la Pole.”

“You side with him?” Parker seemed to be gathering himself as if to spring.

“I am not siding with de la Pole.” Bryan’s voice was a trembling whisper of fear. “Never say that, Parker. Never say that again.”

Parker cocked his head. The silence stretched out. Bryan’s face crumpled.

“I did go to the docks and receive a letter from de la Pole, but until I opened it, I had no idea who had sent it. I swear.” He began to breathe heavily. “If I had known what that dog was getting me into …”

“And which dog would that be?”

Susanna felt Parker tense beside her.

Then the front door slammed open so hard, it sounded like a crack of lightning.

Bryan gave a cry of fear and ran for a door Susanna had not noticed, set in the wooden paneling on the far side of the room. He threw it open and disappeared into the dark passage beyond.

Parker stood poised, weighing whether to chase down Bryan or confront whoever had come through the front door. Like her, his need to know who continued to torment them
won out. She saw the moment his focus narrowed on the closed door leading to the main hallway.

Silence stretched out, ominous and frightening. She felt tight as a spring, and Parker drew his sword and let his knife drop from his sleeve into his left palm.

“Hide behind the chair,” he whispered to her, and walked toward the door. He seemed intent but unafraid, whereas she felt like climbing out of her skin.

She stepped behind the high-backed chair and sank down, peerking out from the side.

Parker reached for the handle, listened for any sound beyond, and pushed the door open.

He swore.

“What is it?” Susanna rose and peered over the top of the chair.

“No one here.”

Parker moved deeper into the hallway, almost disappearing from her sight in the gloom, and Susanna cried out, “Careful! They could be hiding.”

He returned to the threshold, and his eyes gleamed wickedly as the lamplight caught them. He grinned as if her concern amused and delighted him.

“There is no one here.” With a hiss, his sword found its scabbard again, and his knife disappeared from his hand. “Can you swim, my lady?”

“Swim?” Susanna looked at him, dumbfounded.

“It seems the game grows deeper still.”

The Chiefe Conditions and Qualities in a Courtier:
To swimme well.

Of the Chief Conditions and Qualityes in a Waytyng Gentylwoman:
To be circumspect that she offend no man in her jesting and tauntynge, to appeere therby of a readye witt.

D
usk had fallen and the gloom closed in on all sides. Parker felt the prick of adrenaline along the back of his neck as he drove the cart home as fast as the road and the weather would allow.

It had started snowing again while they were at Bryan’s rooms, swiftly covering everything in a crisp layer of white. Susanna was nestled deep into his side, her face turned against his shoulder, away from the wind.

He was in the grip of some lunacy. Because in the midst of their troubles, he felt a euphoria at the easy way she leaned against him. His heart wanted to burst from his chest and escape to the glorious heights, to shout out a victory cry.

Even worse, he had no will to put his feelings aside. He
wanted to savor them, enjoy them. He must be mad, yet he could not bring himself to care.

“Do you know where Bryan will go?” Susanna’s question was a warm puff of air against his cold ear.

“No.” He wondered whether Bryan was even alive. If the intruder had known of the secret passage, he need only have slammed open the door and then run to the exit to wait for Bryan.

That there was no sign of Bryan’s body near his building meant only that he hadn’t been killed as he’d fled. It did not rule out abduction and murder elsewhere. Or torture to find out what Bryan had said to Parker.

“This has been a long day.”

Susanna’s words echoed his own sentiments. It was time for a tactical retreat.

The spire of St. Michael’s and the entrance to Crooked Lane had never looked so good. But just in case, Parker palmed his knife. If there was to be another attack today, it would be near or at his house.

He turned into his yard.

“Ho, Parker.”

Susanna cried out and Parker blocked her body with his own, his knife coming up as he faced the direction of the call.

“Easy. ’Tis Simon.” Their cart driver from Dover stepped closer, raising a lantern to illuminate his face.

“Sorry.” Parker leaped down from the cart and turned to help Susanna.

“You are not still dodging arrows, mistress?” Simon bowed to Susanna, and she gave him a brilliant smile back.

“Not arrows anymore. A few knives.”

Simon looked uneasily at Parker, as if hoping to find it was a joke, but Parker nodded confirmation.

“But I thought after I delivered you at Bridewell, you were able to see the King?” Simon looked from one to the other.

“We were. It doesn’t seem to have made much difference.” Parker turned to lead the horse into the stable, but Simon shook his head.

“Don’t do that. You are summoned by the King. They sent me to fetch you.”

“Let us go in for a bowl of stew and a cup of wine first,” Parker said. “We have been chasing conspiracies around the city all day.”

Simon shrugged. “I was told you must come immediately.”

“Immediately, and then we will wait for hours at the King’s pleasure.” Parker shook his head. “We need food if we are to go to the King tonight. I cannot fight on an empty stomach.”

“You shouldn’t need to fight at the palace.” Simon followed them to the kitchen door.

Parker laughed. “The palace is where most of my enemies lurk, Simon. My wits need to be doubly sharp to enter that hornets’ nest. To say nothing of my sword.”

He held the door open for Susanna. As she stepped across the threshold, he could not resist putting a hand on her shoulder.

She turned to look at him, her eyes bright and warm. He wanted nothing more than to tuck her up safe, but instead he must drag her across the city again.

“Gather your strength, my lady. This endless day looks set to go on longer.”

She lifted a hand and touched his where it rested on her shoulder. “We would not have rested well tonight anyway, with so much unresolved.”

Ah, but he had planned that they would. That he would have Mistress Horenbout alone again in his study beside the fire, and he had planned to take more than just one kiss this time.

She must have read his thoughts in his eyes, because the flush on her cheeks from the cold air deepened, and she lowered her gaze, then raised it again, hot with promise.

If the King or his enemies didn’t kill him, the lady before him surely would.

But for once he’d go gladly, and without a fight.

P
arker left her so reluctantly, she thought he would refuse the King’s call to come in alone. He stood just outside the door to the inner sanctum looking so painfully conflicted, it was as though he were leaving her in a den of wolves rather than the privy chamber.

“Call out loudly, should you need me,” he told her, and then murmured in the ears of the guards at the door. With a final, hard look around the room, he stepped into the passageway beyond.

Susanna sank back down on the chair that had been brought for her when they arrived. Despite the laughter
around her, the conversations of the courtiers making merry after their evening meal, every eye had lighted upon her at least once since she’d arrived.

She was too tired to care, and she looked down at her lap, not even regretting her lack of charcoal and paper. If she ignored them, she knew they would lose interest.

“I know you.”

The man who addressed her, coming right up to her chair, was drunk. His face was flushed with too much wine and he looked pleased with himself, as if he carried a most satisfying secret.

Susanna felt the sudden freeze of fear. A stone had lodged in her throat, all but choking her. She could do nothing but stare up at him and hope Parker would not be long.

Because she knew only too well who he was. George Boleyn. Womanizer, rapist, pig. The last time she’d seen him, he’d tried to rape her in a dark corner of the great hall of Margaret of Austria’s court.

She would never forget his face. It seemed he had not forgotten hers, either, despite the years that had passed since then.

“My lord.” She did not rise from her chair but she merely inclined her head, uncaring of the rudeness.

“You’re speaking English now. If I recall, you pretended otherwise last time we met.”

Talking to him at all was a mistake, but antagonizing him would be even worse.

“I am here at the King’s request, sir, and I took instruction
in English before I came, to better serve His Majesty.” Perhaps knowing she was here for the King would penetrate his drink-fogged brain and restrain him.

“And what use has the King for you, little Lowlander?” He spoke loudly, and there were a few titters of laughter from courtiers nearby, but they were subdued. She was an unknown entity, and no one wanted to risk an offense that would reach the King’s ears.

She did not respond. He had never asked her reason for being at Margaret’s court, in the short conversation they’d had before he’d turned on her all those years ago. She had let him strike up a conversation because she had not heard the rumors that he took whichever woman he wanted. That women should take care never to be alone with him.