George was standing with the Stanley brothers, for Thomas, Lord Stanley, had made haste to submit himself to Edward at Coventry, to disavow any allegiance to Warwick and to vouchsafe his rather tattered loyalties to York. As Will moved toward them, he nearly bumped into John Howard, who was making haste to put distance between himself and the very men Will was intent upon seeking out.
“There’s an unholy trinity for you, Jack,” he murmured wryly, and Howard grimaced, looking back at the Stanleys and George with distaste.
“As a dog returneth to his vomit, so a fool returneth to his folly,” he said quietly, but no less scathingly for all that. “Any other man would thank Almighty God fasting for his good fortune in having a brother willing to forgive his treason. But not that one…. He does seem Hell-bent upon his own destruction.”
“I do most fervently hope so!” Will grinned, and with a wink at Howard, moved discreetly within hearing range.
“By the Mass, if she sits any closer, she’ll be in his lap…or worse!” George hissed.
Will’s eyes strayed from George to the couple in the recessed oriel window seat. He heard Richard laugh, oblivious of his brother’s rage. None who saw them together could doubt that Gloucester was smitten by Warwick’s daughter. And with Gloucester to plead for her, Will thought, Ned might not be so inclined to let Clarence strip her of her inheritance.
William Stanley guffawed, but Thomas Stanley nodded, said something soothing about my lord of Clarence’s commendable concern for the honor of his sister-by-marriage.
“Precisely, my lord Stanley.” George suddenly seemed to see an acceptable outlet for his anger, for he said indignantly, “The girl is my wife’s sister, after all. It is my duty to see that she not be taken advantage of, that her name not be sullied. I’ll let no man, be it my own brother, make a slut out of her!”
Will let out a whoop of laughter, and as they spun around to seek the source, he hastily backed away, out into the great hall, where he could indulge his mirth at length. It was, he decided, going to be an interesting summer.
Coventry’s Lord Mayor was explaining at length to Edward how it was that the city had happened to cast its lot with Warwick. As he told it, it began to sound more and more like a vast misunderstanding, the too-trusting citizens gulled by the power-hungry Earl.
Richard soon lost interest, found his eyes wandering toward the window, where the sky was reddening in a dying blaze of light, in as beautiful a sunset as he could recall. He sighed, reluctantly sat up straighter in his chair as Edward gave him a look that was both admonitory and amused. What a waste of time suddenly precious! If the man would only get on with it, he might still be able to escape out into the gardens with Anne, watch together the passing of day.
Glancing around for a servant to refill his wine cup, Richard saw with surprise that Rob Percy was hovering in the open doorway, seeking anxiously to catch his eye. Richard slipped unobtrusively from his chair, crossed quickly to his friend.
Rob at once grabbed his arm, pulled him aside, and blurted out in an urgent undertone, “Get you to the great hall, and fast! Anne be in much need of you, and so, too, is Francis!”
As they hastened down the winding stairwell, Rob elaborated upon his breathless summons. They’d been talking with Anne, he panted, when the Duke of Clarence did stride up and, without so much as a by-your-leave, told Anne that she was to depart for London within the hour. When she objected, he’d grabbed her arm and seemed about to take her from the great hall by force if need be. It was then that Francis tried to stop him. There was fear in Rob’s voice, fear Richard could understand. George was a dangerous man to defy; Francis’s foolhardy heroics might cost him dear.
The same thought had obviously occurred to Francis. He was saying in a low conciliatory voice, “It’s not my intent, Your Grace, to intrude into your affairs. It’s only that I think your brother of Gloucester would wish to speak with the Lady Anne ere she…”
Unlike Francis, who had no more color in his face than new-fallen snow, Anne was so flushed she looked feverish. Seeing Richard now, she gave a glad little cry, let go of Francis’s arm, and started toward him. Richard had reached her before George even realized he was in the hall, and as he looked down into her face, he was suddenly swept by a protective urge so strong it blotted all else from his brain.
“Oh, Richard, thank God you’ve come! Your brother…He says I must go to London, says I have no choice but to do what he commands!”
“Hush, sweetheart. It be all right. No one is going to make you do anything you don’t want to do, not ever again. That I do promise you, Anne.”
“Don’t make promises you cannot keep, Dickon!”
Anne had an instant of instinctive recoil before remembering that she now had no need to fear George’s threats. She raised her head, stared defiantly at George.
Richard, too, was staring at his brother. But he was aware, as well, of the others. Will Hastings was watching with alert interest; his eyes gave him away, however, glinted with suppressed laughter. John Howard, less urbane, showed only disapproval. Beyond Howard, Richard saw both Stanleys, and in the doorway, the Earl of Northumberland, looking on with the rather distant disdain of a Percy for the lower orders of mankind.
“I would suggest we discuss this in private, George,” Richard said, very low, and jerked his head toward the presence chamber.
“There is nothing to discuss. Anne is my sister-in-law, and if I choose to send her to my wife, it be none of your concern.”
“Anne is very much my concern,” Richard said evenly, “and she does not want to go to London.”
A queer greenish light had begun to flicker in George’s eyes. “I tell you she goes to London tonight and you have nothing to say about it!”
“No? You’d best think again, George!”
Richard’s voice had changed, betrayed his rising anger. Why George should have gotten it into his head to make a scene like this before a chamberful of avid witnesses, he didn’t know, no longer much cared. All that mattered to him at the moment was the troubled look on Anne’s face, the way she clutched his arm. He shifted slightly so that he stood between her and George.
“I warn you, Dickon, keep out of this!”
At that, Richard lost all patience. “I take no orders from you, George!”
He turned toward Anne, intending to take her from the hall. As he did, George grabbed his arm, wrenched brutally to swing him around, and suddenly Richard was aware only of physical pain, a searing surge of raw sensation unlike anything he’d ever experienced in his life. It took his breath, sent a sickening wave of queasiness up to lodge in his throat, and for several shuddering seconds there was only pain in his world, to the exclusion of all else. Through the roaring in his ears, he heard Francis’s heated protest.
“That be his bad arm!”
George’s grip had already begun to ease. Even through the red mists of an anger bordering beyond control, part of his brain recognized that something was wrong, took note that Richard had gone white as chalk, that sweat suddenly stood out on his forehead, his upper lip. He turned his head sharply as what Francis said registered with him, jerked his hand back as if burned.
There was disbelief on his face, but the first flickerings of uncertainty, too. “His arm was healing. Barnet was more than three weeks ago!”
Francis was momentarily too outraged to remember he addressed a Prince of the blood, and one, moreover, of a particularly unforgiving nature.
“It was healing!” he snapped. “But he did lay it open again last week at Tewkesbury!” He looked toward Richard then, said with concern, “Be you all right?”
Richard had managed to fight back the nausèa, had managed to draw air back into his lungs. Not yet sure what control he exercised over his voice, he nodded and then looked at his brother. George was the first to look away, and was the first, too, to exit the hall. Men moved hastily aside to let him pass.
Nothing was the same after that for Anne. She knew she could
never face a second meal in that hall, and she begged Richard to let her miss supper. Much to her relief, he agreed at once, said he wasn’t hungry either, and as Vespers sounded, he led her, instead, out into the twilight dusk of the garden arbor that stretched north toward the River Sherbourne.
Anne’s nerves were so taut that it was some time before she could appreciate just how beautiful an evening it was. He’d found for them a secluded retreat within a wall of willow and whitethorn; the sky was darkening into a delicately tinted violet and a crescent moon silvered the circling clouds over their heads. It was very quiet. She heard only the soft trilling of night birds, was becoming aware of the heavy honeysuckle scents of spring. She should have been able to draw comfort from such surroundings; somehow, it didn’t help at all.
Richard didn’t seem to be deriving much pleasure from the garden, either. Tense and edgy, he suddenly seemed to have little to say. She didn’t believe his denials, knew his arm was paining him a great deal; she could see it in his face. She could see, too, that he’d been shaken by the quarrel, and with a pang of remorse, she remembered that he’d always been on fairly good terms with George. Until now.
For the first time that day, she was unwilling to have a silence fall between them, felt driven to link them with words, any words, and she began to talk at random about events that had happened long ago at Middleham, when the world was still a safe place and she’d been as sure of her tomorrows as she was of her yesterdays.
Richard, leaning against the trunk of a nearby birch, listened to her in silence, his dark head tilted to the left in a gesture long since burned into her memory. So often she’d seen him stand that way. She’d seen him do, too, what he now did—break off a sprig of thyme from the surrounding shrubbery. He was twirling the narrow leaves around nimble restless fingers, absently chewing on the mint-flavored stem, and she smiled sadly, thinking that in all the years she’d known him, he could never be still. He had always to be in motion, even while attending morning Mass in Middleham’s chapel. She could see him even now, never able to kneel sedately for long, shifting impatiently on his prayer cushion, fidgeting with the ornate belt at his hip or with a ring, leafing through his Book of Hours until a frowning rebuke from her mother would propel him upright…briefly. She sighed softly, not sure why the memory should make her sad, but it did. It was such a long time ago…and so much had changed, changed forever, even if he did still seem so heartbreakingly familiar to her, as if they might have been parted only yesterday.
Reaching over, Richard lightly stroked her cheek with the last of the thyme flowerlets.
“If it is George who brings such shadows to your face, Anne, try to put your mind at ease. He’ll not trouble you again. I’ll see to that, ma belle. I do promise you.”
She shook her head, took the flower, and let her fingers linger on his. “No, it wasn’t George. I was…remembering.”
His hand tightened on hers, and suddenly she was saying with breathless urgency, “I never wanted to marry Lancaster, Richard. Never. I did try to resist. But I wasn’t strong enough. I couldn’t gainsay my father, not for long….”
So many subjects had gone unmentioned that day. By tacit consent, they’d drawn only upon the brightest splashes of color, clung to the illusory security of Middleham memories. No explanations, just “Do you remember?” And now she’d conjured up the most dangerous spirit of all, summoned Édouard of Lancaster into the garden to reclaim her as his wife, his would-be Queen.
Richard seemed no happier than she with this sudden intrusion of Lancaster into their refuge. She saw he was frowning, and before he could speak, she touched her fingers to his lips.
“No, Richard…. Can we not forget I did say that? I didn’t mean to, truly. I don’t want to talk of Lancaster…. Not now, not ever. I want only to forget….”
He was so close to her now that she knew he could have but one intent in mind. She waited, breathless, and then felt his fingers on her throat, caressing, tilting her face up to his. She let him kiss her, and rather timidly, put her arms around him as he drew her into a closer embrace.
He was not as gentle as he’d been that morning. His mouth was more insistent, until, without wanting to, she parted her lips for him. Of all she’d had to endure as Édouard of Lancaster’s wife, she’d hated his kisses the most, hated the penetration of her mouth even more than of her body. During the act of coupling itself, she could at least try to separate her mind from what he was doing to her, but there had been no escaping the violation of her mouth, and only by swallowing convulsively could she keep from gagging at the feel and thrust of his tongue. She tensed as Richard kissed her, and then felt a sweet surge of relief when the familiar revulsion didn’t come. How foolish she’d been! How could she have imagined it might be the same with Richard? Richard, whom she’d known and loved all her life. His mouth was warm and tasted pleasantly of mint. She relaxed, and accepted the first kisses of her life that had not been forced upon her.
She closed her eyes, felt his mouth against her lashes, her eyelids, and then her throat. She drew a deep breath fragrant with lilac and clover, rested her cheek against his chest. Her tension was ebbing, already seemed to be part of another girl’s past. She was finding it surprisingly pleasant to be here alone with him in the warm dark of the garden, to be held and touched and stroked, to hear her name whispered into her hair.
When it began to change for her, she couldn’t say for sure. Perhaps when his kisses began to change; they were hotter now, more demanding. His body was hard against hers, suddenly unfamiliar. His breathing had quickened considerably; hers came swift and shallow as she tried to overcome it, this sudden smothering sensation, unpleasantly akin to the dreadful trapped feeling Lancaster had sparked each time he’d pulled her to him.
She was no longer holding on to Richard, had brought her hands up to rest against his chest, but she didn’t know how to tell him of her reluctance, of her returning fear. He was murmuring endearments she couldn’t hear, for she couldn’t seem to slow down her senses long enough to take in what he was saying, heard only his voice against her ear, low, coaxing.
He was caressing her breasts now; his hands were warm, like his mouth and his voice. He was far more gentle than Lancaster, seemed to be as intent upon learning her body as claiming it. But she knew it wouldn’t last, this easy unhurried tenderness of his. She knew what would inevitably follow. Lancaster had taught her that. His kisses would grow wetter, deeper. Like Lancaster’s. He would fondle her with increasing impatience, abrupt, eager, intent only upon taking his own pleasures, those urgent male pleasures she could neither comprehend nor share…like Lancaster. And afterward, he’d watch her with puzzled dissatisfied eyes. He’d not reproach her for her lack of response, not call her “cold” as Lancaster had done. He’d not have to; his eyes would say it all.
Twisting suddenly against him, she tore her mouth from his. “No, Richard, don’t! Let me go!”
Richard released her at once, so abruptly that she had to reach for an overhanging branch to keep her balance. He was stunned by her rebuff, by the violence of her rejection, his senses still reeling from the taste and touch and feel of her. His past passions had not prepared him for this intense and intoxicating need he had for Anne. He’d never wanted anything in his life as he now wanted this girl, wanted to make her soft fragrant body his own, to see that wealth of chestnut hair spread out on his pillow, to find her beside him when he awoke. A hunger she alone could fill. A hunger she didn’t share.
“I’m sorry,” he said stiffly. “It was not my intent to…to take advantage of you in any way.”
“Oh, Richard…don’t!” Her voice was trembling; she seemed on the verge of tears. “You owe me no apologies. You did nothing wrong. And I…I was not rejecting you. It wasn’t that. It was…”
She turned away, retreated into the protective shadow of a white ash. “I was afraid,” she said, very low. “If you do want the truth, there it is. I was afraid.”
Anne’s face
was burning, and she rested her cheek against the spongy damp moss that crept like a patchy grey-green carpet up the side of the tree. Its coolness didn’t help; she still felt as if her blood had been scalded, her skin blistered from within.
“Anne…” Richard was beside her now under the ash, but he made no move to touch her, was unsure what to say. His own emotions were in such a state of confusion that he doubted he’d ever be able to sort them out. Relief, relief infinite and overwhelming that he’d so misread her reluctance. Jealousy, and an embittered futile anger, futile in that the object of his rage was beyond all retribution, could never be called to account for the hurt he’d done Anne. Above all, a sudden surge of tenderness such as he’d never before felt for anyone, not even Kate.
“Anne, I…I’m sorry I didn’t understand. I know you don’t want to talk of Lancaster, and in truth, neither do I. I just want to say…to say that I’d never cause you hurt. Never, love.” He touched her cheek, in a caress as uncertain as it was gentle, and was much relieved when she turned her head, brushed her lips against his fingers.
“I know that, Richard,” she whispered. “Truly I do.”
“Anne…. There be this I must tell you. We’ve got to be able to be honest with each other, and I want you to know that I’ll understand if…if it does upset you.”
Her eyes were enormous, looked suddenly frightened, and he said hastily, “You know I did command the vanguard at Tewkesbury for Ned, and he was most generous afterward, told me to name my own reward. Anne…I’ve asked him for Middleham.”
“And you thought that might upset me?” Anne was staring at him in unfeigned astonishment. “Oh, Richard, how could you think so? I did know Middleham would be forfeit; there was never any question of that. And there is no one I would rather see have it than you. No one! I know how you love it; Middleham was home to you.”
The Sunne in Splendour Page 53
