The Queen's Rival (5 page)

“That is the king’s merriment, not the queen’s. When Her Highness is with child, as she is now, we must put aside all fun. So we sit silently, murmuring prayers for a living son this time, and we sew flag after flag to be sent for the men to take into battle,” Elizabeth calmly replied.

It seemed a dangerous way for her to speak in the queen’s chamber, and yet it felt deliciously brave as well. Clearly, Elizabeth Bryan was not in the least intimidated by her royal mistress. Nor was Jane Poppincourt, who stifled another soft giggle with the back of her hand. In spite of herself, Bess smiled, too, and the homesick sensation began to wane just a bit in the glow of the first small spark of excitement at making friends.

“So, how is it that Lady Hastings can scold you if your father is so powerful?” Bess asked.

“’ Tis not power my father wields so much as a subtle influence,” Elizabeth corrected. “The king wisely leaves the maintenance of the queen’s household to the queen. Doña de Salinas worries after Her Grace, and Lady Hastings worries after all the rest of us.”

“Because the king fancied her,” Jane said in her soft voice.

“And because the Duke of Buckingham, her brother, is his most powerful minister?” Bess asked.

“Power wound and knotted like a fine skein of yarn,” Elizabeth replied in agreement. “Lady Hastings played the game particularly well, and at the end kept a wealthy husband along with the admiration of her former royal lover. We all could learn from her.”

Bess did not hide her surprise. “So the gossip was true about her and the king?”

Elizabeth leaned forward across the table, lowering her voice to a gossipy tone. “Well, naturally we cannot say for certain.” She glanced furtively around the room. “But what I
can
say is that after spending a great deal of time in the king’s company, Buckingham gained enough power to have his sister sent to a nunnery over the rumors. But she was quickly and quietly returned to court, to his dismay, and her position is even greater now. So naturally the rumors continue.”

“Surely the queen has heard them; yet she tolerates a rival in her own household?” Bess asked.

“That, Mistress Blount, is the importance of power
and
influence. By some means or other she has won the king’s favor, and no one, not even the queen, dares go against that.”

Bess had never considered that a woman might be more influential than the queen, and it surprised her to imagine the prospect now. She picked up two pieces of fabric and began to sew them skillfully together, but her mind was far from the task. It seemed to her a dangerous thing to go against the very person in whose household one lived. But Lady Hastings certainly had a haughty-enough spirit for Bess to believe she was doing just that, and gaining power, riches, and influence along the way.

Admiration for her spirit and ambition mixed with pity inside Bess for Katherine of Aragon as she contemplated the poor pregnant young queen who had to tolerate the daily presence of a beautiful rival. Just as the thought moved across her mind, everyone in the chamber stood suddenly and fell into deep, silent curtsies to the swish of stiff silk and heavy petticoats near the door. As Bess mirrored their movements, she saw entering the room a young pregnant woman dressed in dun-colored satin, with a heavy gold cross ornamenting her square neckline bordered in gold thread. Doña de Salinas was on one side of her; a pretty, fashionably dressed young woman on the other.

The queen was not what Bess had expected. Although her Spanish olive skin was smooth, her face was plain and square, and her dark eyes were wide and bulging, especially with her hair entirely hidden beneath her tight, stiffly gabled hood. As she approached, Bess properly lowered her eyes and remained in her curtsy.

“You are Mistress Blount,” the young queen said in English deeply laced with a Spanish accent.

Slowly, Bess rose and faced the woman whom two English kings had taken as their queen. She seemed to Bess an uninspiring choice. “I am, Your Royal Highness.”

“I see by your expression that I am not what you expected.”

“Your Highness is far more than I expected.”

“You lie like Mountjoy.” The queen sniffed. “While it is less difficult to tolerate in one so young and obviously inexperienced, see that you do not make a habit of it. I do not suffer falseness gladly.”

“I shall, Your Highness.”

“Now then, are you suitably settled in?”

“Very well, thank you, Your Highness.”

The queen had a small mole on her chin and hairs growing out of it, and she smelled thickly of musk. It was the scent of a man, not of a woman, and least of all of a queen. She was not at all like Guinevere in the romance
Lancelot
, which most powerfully had guided her to this place. Bess tried her best not to stare, but the mole was distracting.

“Then you shall attend me now at prayer.”

It was four o’clock in the afternoon. Bess had been told that the queen attended matins each day upon rising, then returned to the chapel at midday. Did she truly mean to pray a third time in one day?

“Yes, Your Highness,” she responded as dutifully as she could manage for every other thought swirling around in her mind.

Silent sewing. Repeated prayer. An absence of gaiety. Duty without pleasure. This was not at all the court Bess had envisioned, or the life. Perhaps things would be different once the king returned to England.
Please let them be different
, Bess found herself praying.

Anne, Lady Hastings watched the Blount girl follow the queen and the other young maids back to the chapel.
Good
, she thought as she asked for a cup of wine and received it from one of the queen’s esquires.
A few blissful moments to myself without having to fawn over Henry’s bland wife
, she thought as she lowered herself onto a carved oak armchair at one of the unoccupied tables heaped with flag fabric, as yet unsewn, left beneath a window. It was only a moment more before her sister joined her. The chatter that always rose up when the queen was gone now made their conversation inaudible to others.

“She is a pretty little thing, is she not?” Elizabeth, Lady Fitzwalter observed as she picked up a half-sewn banner and absently examined it with no intention of sewing any longer.

“If one values doe-eyed youth, I suppose she is.”

“Half of the king’s men do value just that, if not King Henry himself.”

“His Highness seemed fairly pleased with my skills before he left for Calais.”

“Brother always says beauty is power. When mixed with youth, it is generally a far more lethal combination than any that maturity could provide.”

Anne frowned at her. “On whose side precisely are you, Sister?”

“The winning side,
Sister
. As any good courtier would be. You taught me that.”

“Then you would do well not to antagonize me. His Highness shall return to court soon, and, when he does, I fully plan to return to his heart, my maturity not withstanding.”

Lady Fitzwalter chuckled. “I do not think his heart was the part of him you captivated.”

“Well, whatever it was, it gained Sir George and me a lovely country house, and this ruby that is the envy of all.”

She proudly touched the huge stone in the center of a medallion accented with four shimmering pearls that lay against her tight silk plastron.

“Payment for your body makes you no better than a Smithfield whore,” Elizabeth parried.

“You are only jealous the king never wanted you,” Anne sniped.

“Are you so certain he will still want
you
? They say King Henry values most the thrill of the chase. You were hunted and caught long ago,” her sister tauntingly reminded her.

“Your analogy bores me.”

“Did you not see how many times his eyes rested upon pretty, virginal Lady Bryan at that final banquet before he left for France?”

“She is a child, and dull as dirt.”

“Youth and beauty.” Elizabeth smiled, reminding her sister. “Our dear older brother, the Duke of Buckingham, truly does understand a great deal more of our king than the one part of him you were allowed to know.”

“You are poisoned by envy,” Anne scoffed, and turned away.

“Rather, I have a realistic nature, Sister. And I am looking to keep my own fortunes sound when yours begin predictably to wane.”

Anne stiffened. “I’ll not share the king with a chit like Mistress Bryan, or Mistress Blount, for that matter.”

“Will you have much of a choice?”

“There is always a choice when one knows how to play the game,” Anne countered.

Elizabeth leaned toward her sister, then lowered her voice. “You would not do anything to either of them, would you? I mean, truly, Sister, they are only silly little girls.”

Anne touched the ruby at her chest once again, then glanced up, her eyes narrowing. “Did our good brother not also say that all is fair in love and war?”

“Well, he certainly did not say anything about carnal relations.”

“He well should have,” Anne quickly countered. “After all, is it not all one and the same? And like all good warriors, I, too, protect what is mine. I tell you, no one is taking away what I captured for myself. Certainly not without a fight.”

There had been a bland and quiet supper with the other maids of honor in a small, private dining hall, then a fourth journey to the chapel for evening prayer with the queen and her attendants before Her Highness at last retired. As the young queen read her dispatches and news from Calais, her servants were finally excused.

Bess lay exhausted in the small bed in the plain little room above the queen’s apartments. The whirling thoughts in her mind had finally begun to slow, and she felt the heavy pull of sleep just as she heard a click of the latch at her door. The sound startled her, and, disoriented, Bess sat upright in the dark, her heart racing in fear. “Who’s there?” she called out in a whisper.

Footsteps, breathing, and the faint scent of roses filled the cool, dark room. It was a feminine presence, though Bess could not see anyone in the dark. Suddenly, a candle flame ushered in a second person, the glow revealing a sweet-faced boy with a mop of dark curls that hung down onto his forehead. In the candlelight she could see that the girl beside him was Elizabeth Bryan.

“Are you prepared for your initiation?” she asked.

“I do not understand,” Bess murmured.

“Mistress Poppincourt is standing guard just outside. We must see if you are one of us before we trust you with our friendship. Thus, the initiation,” Elizabeth explained.

Bess now recognized the dark-haired boy as the one called Gilbert Tailbois. He was modestly handsome by this light, she thought; tall and lanky, his bearing as straight as a small tree. His face was long and narrow and dominated by his eyes, which were round and as black as his hair, framed by remarkably long, dark lashes.

“What precisely would you have me do?” Bess asked warily.

“Only as much as the three of us have done. You shall steal into the king’s bedchamber by way of the secret staircase to which we shall lead you, then report back to us some detail of the room that will prove you were there.”

“By my lord, I cannot!” she gasped.

“Of course you can. We will show you,” Elizabeth said with a laugh. “It is an ancient staircase, which no one but the king ever uses; and he is away, so it will not be difficult.”

“Then why do it?” Bess asked, still clutching the bedcovers and trying frantically to think of a way to dissuade them.

“Why do anything? Because you can get away with it,” Elizabeth answered with a beguiling little grin. “And because it is a bit of fun in this dreary old place, which is far too dull with most of the men away at war.”

Gil gave a little huff of indignation at the slight that was buried in her response, and Elizabeth tossed him a carefree glance. “No offense to you, of course, Gilly,” she added, still smiling in a way that seemed capable of winning her just about anything she desired. “So, will you join us then?”