“No, I have to get back, but thank you,” I said hoarsely, standing up. I opened my palm in a request for her to return the ring to me.
She slid the gold band down her middle finger, sending panic quaking through me. Before I could react, she’d slipped it off again and passed it to me. “’Tis losing its power,” she said again. “The ring was not meant to carryeth two persons, and for so many journeys, as thee hast done. My lady, this ring was enchanted for one use: to sendeth the King of England so far from here that his person would be safe from harm, but of nay more threat to that vile Mary Stuart.” Her wide-set eyes leveled with me. “The ring shall work nay longer soon, if not already. The ring will stop soon. I hope thee hast chosen well, Your Highness.”
Her last two words were pointed, reinforcing that I’d taken my time-travel fortunes a little too far and written myself into sixteenth-century history as its queen. Yup, that whole thing, Emmie.
I psyched myself up to face the wintry night and fished out the two coins from my cloak.
“Thank you so much for this,” I said, leaving the gleaming discs stamped with the king’s insignia on the wooden beam beside her. She drew in a sharp breath before sinking to her knees in a deep bow.
I said goodbye and stepped outside into the bone-chilling blackness.
When I was a few paces away from the cottage, the girl called after me, her voice a faint line beneath the rising wind. “’Twas thee, Your Highness.”
“I’m sorry?” I called back, lifting my fur collar over my mouth.
“Thee wanteth to know why the ring would ‘ave brought the king to thy time,” she said from the door. “‘Tis because of thee. It mattered not where the king went, as long as the place was far and as long as his heart was full and merry. The king would hast been most merry there, with thee, mistress.” A smile of encouragement unfolded across her face before she swung the door closed.
He would have been most merry there…with you.
The meaning of the sentence replayed in my mind as I began the grueling climb through slushy snow back to Robin House. The reason why the ring was cursed to send Nick to my time—bringing Susanna Grey instead by accident—was because the witch Joanie wanted to send the king somewhere he’d be truly happy…which was with me.
It sounded side-splittingly bonkers, and yet, amid a myriad of unfathomable experiences this past year, something about it felt spot-on, like everything had finally fallen into place.
“Lex talionis,” the girl’s singsong voice whispered on the curve of the wind. I still had to find out what that meant.
I rounded the final bend to Robin House—thirsting for the warmth of my bed—when I spotted a shiver of candlelight from the upstairs window. Crap, I’ve been found out! I rushed up the pathway that clung to the side of the manor. In the front yard, a huddle of guards clutching lanterns hovered around one of the watchmen who sat on a tree log beside the stables.
“The queen is here!” Alice yelped from behind me, and a guard separated himself from the pack to escort me to where she waited on the manor’s front step.
“I’m so sorry,” I said to Alice, who asked, “Where did you go?” at the same time.
“I–I just popped outside for a few minutes because I couldn’t sleep, and I was so sweaty inside and couldn’t get away from the heat of the fires,” I said.
Her palm hit her open mouth. “Heavens, no…not you, Emmie.”
“Not me, what?”
Alice’s alarmed eyes darted to where the guards had gathered.
“What’s happening over here?” I called, striding back to them, my boots crunching the dense snow. “It’s the dead of night.” Their lanterns bounced flickers of light as I approached.
“Step back, Your Highness!” snapped the young guard, blocking me from getting any closer. I could see that the seated guard was Joseph Blackburn. Why was his face covered with bees?
I gasped, nauseated, as the truth broke over me. They weren’t bees: they were hundreds of pus-filled welts.
“He has smallpox,” I said, clutching my sickened stomach. That’s why he had been suffering from those awful headaches.
“You must take leave inside, Your Grace,” said the guard. “We shall keep Mister Blackburn here for now.”
“Outside? In this freezing weather—are you mad?”
“We cannot chance spreading the pox to your person, your highness. The servants’ attic is above your chamber. Mister Blackburn may sleep in the stables.”
I was so stunned that I couldn’t speak properly. “Don’t be insane! Alice and I will stay downstairs…or in the cabin outside.”
Alice had appeared beside me, snow flurries landing on her cheeks. “Be calm, Emmie. I have sent word to my coachman to come for us in haste. The pox is terribly contagious, and it is no longer safe here. The guard is already riding to Hampton Court, and the coachman should be here by morning.” She gently urged me toward the house.
“He is not staying out here,” I said through worried tears. Joseph Blackburn hunched forward, his head hanging into his knees. Inflamed blisters speckled the back of his neck. I’d learned enough about smallpox to know that the lesions didn’t appear until the person had been exposed to the virus for weeks. He’d most likely caught it when I took him down to the infected village. It was my fault that he was sick.
Alice huffed at me, her face torn with distress. I didn’t want to be difficult, and I was the queen now and had to be protected, even if I hated being put on a special pedestal above everyone else.
“Mistress Grey and I will sleep in the guest lodging this night,” I said loudly enough for everyone to hear. “It’s not likely to be contaminated, and there’s a small fireplace in there. Mister Blackburn can come inside the house at once. If Alice and I are leaving the manor anyway, he can use my bedchamber.”
“Clemence and I will make ready the guest lodging,” said Alice. She scurried back into the manor.
“Please, somebody help him with food and water, or I’ll do it myself,” I ordered the guards. “If you wash your hands constantly and thoroughly—and stay well clear of any coughs or sneezes—I can’t see why you wouldn’t be fine. I’ll send a doctor back here as soon as I can.”
I hurried upstairs to scrub my hands and the blue-diamond ring in a pail of soapy water before changing into a fresh nightgown. I tossed every piece of fabric I’d worn to the village into the fireplace to be safe.
The moment I met Alice in the cabin out the back, she pressed a hand to my forehead. “Do you feel the heat even now?” she said with a pinched brow.
“I’m not sick,” I said in a reassuring tone. “I swear that it was just a hot flush. I get them sometimes.”
You mean you were in the smallpox village, chatting with a witch about time travel and curses on the king. Things they kill people for around here.
I secured the blue-diamond ring inside the toe of one of my riding boots. Once Alice and I had built a fire, we both stretched out on the single mattress after I refused to let her sleep on the floor. There had been so much commotion that I hadn’t really taken in that we were returning to Hampton Court Palace in the morning. It was hard to lie still and not disturb Alice through my overwhelming relief. I didn’t give a toss that some of the men who wanted me dead might be at the palace, lying in wait. I was ready to go home, where I could call for doctors to help Mister Blackburn and I could be among the first to receive news about King Nick.
Nick, who wasn’t meant to be in the north of England in the dead of winter, putting his life on the line for a twenty-first-century girl who’d muscled her way into his world. The witch had studied the ring and said it herself: Nick was supposed to be living in my time, with me—that was the point of the blue-diamond ring coming into his life.
The problem was that we’d already made our decision to stay in the sixteenth century, where we’d been in near-constant danger. The enchanted ring was nearly out of juice, Nick was at war with a murderous former duke, and the peacefu
l happiness that the witch Joanie had tried to bring Nick—and me—had slipped right through our fingers.
18
Given that the king was away battling a violent uprising, I braced myself for a spiritless and somber court. The moment we arrived back at Hampton Court Palace, however, it was clear I was way off the mark. A merry clash of lutes and oboes bled jubilantly from the stained-glass windows of the Great Hall as Alice Grey and I climbed the stairs in our traveling cloaks. With trestle tables stretching through the hall and into the neighboring Great Watching Chamber, men and ladies of the court sat giggling and chattering over jugs of ale and steaming platters of roasted halibut and turbot—as lively as I’d ever seen them.
That was until they saw me.
Lord and Lady Snell spied us first, followed by the Earl of Dorset, the sneering Ascots, and the remaining courtiers as a wave of awkward silence devoured the space. Nobody rose to bow to me—their new queen—and there was a severe shortage of smiles. I hadn’t missed the glacial temperatures of the Tudor court, and I wasn’t talking about the weather.
“It appears our arrival has made good time for supper,” Alice said. “I could eat a swine.”
Her comment barely registered over the ocean of accusing eyes still glaring at us. Alice made an unsettled murmur about the queen dining in private, and we continued through the Great Watching Chamber, nearly colliding with a servant boy grappling with a platter of fish from the servants’ stairs.
We made our way down the stone stairwell in our bulky farthingales. “Such merriment while the king is at war,” Alice castigated. “It would not please His Majesty.”
I wanted to reply, but the words wouldn’t form. In my eagerness to return to Hampton Court, I hadn’t considered how the courtiers felt about my role in their king’s troubles. The looks of hatred on their faces made their meaning plain: they blamed me for it. All at once, any excitement I had about returning to the palace evaporated.
Alice heaved open the doors to my chambers and shrieked with delight, nearly sending me out of my skin. Bridget and Lucinda glanced up from their shared platter of turbot, salmon, and pickled herrings with melted butter, yelping at the unexpected sight of us.
“We missed Your Highness above all things,” Lucinda cried, leaping from her chair to curtsy at me.
“Oh, thank heavens, you are safe. We received no word of your person,” said Bridget, dropping to her knees. She kissed both my hands.
“Alice and I were in hiding and couldn’t write,” I said apologetically.
Alice frowned, gripping her hip. “When I took my leave from court, I cautioned Mistresses Nightingale and Parker that I would be unable to write with news of the queen.” She shook her head at Bridget’s escaped memory, but her eyes shone with gladness that we were all back together.
“Well, we are surely pleased to see you both back and free from harm,” Lucinda said, her cheeks glowing.
I’d actually missed Lucinda’s bright company, and Bridget’s hilarious sagas over the single guys at court, which she was already beginning as we sat down to eat. Their hair was plaited so intricately that they must’ve been bored senseless in our absence.
Their warm reaction to our arrival was enough to restore my appetite and distract me from my dark thoughts about Nick’s safety—at least for a few hours. His upper council chamber was visible from my courtyard, but the gilded window shutters remained fastened shut, intercepting any signs of life up there. I could’ve skewered Henry Howard myself for making so much trouble and putting my husband in danger. I wasn’t sure I’d sleep again until Nick arrived home in one piece.
January continued to shroud the palace in clouds of chimney smoke, and the girls resumed my dance and music lessons to cheer me up. We received no status updates about Nick or Francis, but word reached me that the guard Joseph Blackburn had survived the smallpox virus—just not the unsightly scars. I could’ve screamed with relief. It’d be difficult to face him one day and see the cost of that in person, but I hoped I could apologize to him for my part in it.
The calendar welcomed February with a fresh dumping of snow, and claustrophobic courtiers had begun tattling on each other about petty things to keep themselves amused. Likely fearful of what might be said about him, the Earl of Dorset arranged a public swordfight between two renowned fencers in the Great Hall.
My ladies and I rushed in to the performance a few minutes late, my cheeks hot with embarrassment as we searched for seats at the rear. Four vacant stools sat beside the dreamy Earl of Surrey, and Bridget snorted into her fist with glee. The rest of us swallowed giggles as we settled in beside him. Sour-faced nobles twisted to glare at us from the front rows where the swashbucklers were already dueling. Lord Dorset scowled at me with those sugar-spoiled teeth of his that he was so proud of. He whispered to his neighbors, who curved around to shoot me death stares, before—one by one—the men rose to their feet. They tipped their hats to the swordsmen in apology before striding right past me and out of the hall. The exodus continued—row by row—until the only people left inside the Great Hall were me and my ladies, the swordfighters, the Earl of Surrey, and a handful of nobles who were permanently paranoid about the king’s temper.
“Emmie, let us take our leave,” Alice said quietly, her slender fingers touching my wrist.
“Did they all just walk out because I’m here?” I said.
“Heavens no, there must be some other cause,” said Lucinda, but Alice’s ashen face confirmed that I’d hit the bullseye on this one. The walkout was a public demonstration against me, the troublesome new Queen Emmeline.
“I bid you excuse me, my ladies,” muttered the Earl of Surrey as he squeezed past us as modestly as possible. His athletic form sailed past our noses, but none of us were laughing now.
Alice gathered her skirts. “Come, let us take leave to Your Highness’s chambers. We may make a note for the king and record the names of all who took part in this act of treason.”
“His Majesty will be sorely vexed,” added Bridget, but she could hardly look at me. I felt bad for her. It wasn’t her fault she’d been aligned with a dud queen.
Feeling like the excluded kid at school again, I trailed the girls downstairs to my chambers, where nothing but embroidery hoops and sewing needles awaited me. A swell of dread erupted in my chest where it’d been festering since the coronation attack.
“I’m going to go over to my jewelry workshop,” I said, halting. The swishing satin of our dresses fell silent beside a giant mural depicting the Battle of Bosworth. “Provided it’s still there.”
“Why would it be not there?” said Alice with a forced chuckle, moving closer to me. “We shall come with you.”
“No, thank you…I just need a bit of alone time.” I managed a reassuring smile, turning away as I blinked through the pressure of tears.
Three concerned faces watched me go. Alice, Bridget—and even Lucinda in recent months—had been nothing but loyal to a queen who was clearly going down and who’d dragged Alice’s fiancé into a civil war. Had Henry the Eighth’s ill-fated wives Anne Boleyn or Catherine Howard had such faithful friends when they were slated for the executioner’s block?
With that grisly thought, I kept my head bowed so I wouldn’t have to meet any more reproachful eyes and made a beeline for the workshop where I could fall apart in private.
I hung around the studio until suppertime, putting the finishing touches on the hammered thumb ring for Nick. I’d just lit the candles when Alice, Bridget, and Lucinda arrived with a beef pie, a fragrant bowl of herby soup, and a generous slice of ginger cheesecake. I reassured them that I was doing okay and picked at the meal after they left, keen to polish the silver ring one more time.
The dimly lit palace courtyards were desolate by the time I slung on my cloak and headed back to my rooms, passing the stairwell leading to the king’s Privy Chambers. It was unguarded—a sad reminder that the king was away from court. The square heels of my pumps scraped the hand-painted tiles a
s my feet turned right instead of left, scaling the stone staircase.
A chamber attendant spotted me inside the Withdrawing Chamber, tripping over his gangly feet. “Your Highness,” he said with a bow, his cheeks colored scarlet. “May I be of help?”
“The king is away from court,” I said, like Captain Obvious, “but I’d like to lodge in his chambers this night. I’d also appreciate it if you could get a message to my ladies that I am here and safely lodging alone.”
The boy’s bow was hesitant, but he led me through Nick’s series of ornate rooms until we reached the king’s private bedchamber. The sight of Nick’s four-poster bed with its black quilted canopy was instantly pacifying. Despite every terror that had come our way, my love for Nick Tudor still felt absolute. I couldn’t imagine that ever changing.
Tension began withdrawing from my bones as servants scampered through the space, lighting the fire and fluffing the silk pillows. The lanky attendant offered me food and wine, but I declined, thanking them all for their help. When the paneled doors finally closed, I stripped down to my smock and slunk beneath the fur-lined blankets. A glimpse of a smile touched my cheeks, and I rolled over, breathing in any traces of Nick’s scent. I said my bedtime prayers like an exemplary Tudor wife, asking in earnest for my husband to be kept safe.
From that night on, I slept only in Nick’s bed. The invaluable company of my ladies still filled my days, and Alice was the only one brave enough to bring up my change of sleeping habits. I could tell that it was more out of concern than anything else, and I explained that being in Nick’s chambers was my only respite. There, I could still feel him all around me.
“I am certain our dear men shall return in haste,” she reassured me for the zillionth time while stitching a serpent into the cuff of one of Francis’s shirts. As she reached for more thread, her shoulder caught the corner of the hard-backed chair and she hissed through her teeth.
Emmie and the Tudor Queen Page 23
