Leon bowed his curly head.
“As for you, Sir Rand,” the king went on as he turned to him, “we are in your debt yet again. When next we are at Westminster and you with us, we will invest you with the honors and privileges of the Order of the Garter given to you before. Then we shall discuss a barony to properly reward one whose strong arm, and stronger heart, is most prized by us.”
Baron Braesford. It had an appropriate, noble sound to it, Isabel thought, even as she watched her husband flush to the roots of his hair, saw his bow of graceful acceptance and homage to his king.
Henry raised a hand in a gesture of farewell. He covered Elizabeth’s hand with his own where it lay on his arm. The king and queen, heads held high, quitted the room. The nursemaid, summoned by a terse word, scurried after them with young Prince Arthur in her arms. They walked away down the dim passage beyond the door until finally even their shadows were gone.
The incident, beginning to end, had taken much less time than seemed possible. No sooner had Their Majesties left the room than the king’s steward, drawn by the noise, appeared with a half-dozen men-at-arms at his back. In the confusion of explanations, Leon came to Isabel, kissed little Madeleine’s soft cheek, handed her over and made his escape. Rand raised his voice to bring order to the chaos of questions and threats, recommending that the steward apply to the king for explanation for the dead, the blood and the ruined carpets. Offering his arm to Isabel then, he led her from the solar with David, pale and grim of face after his first kill, trailing behind them.
When they had retrieved Gwynne and passed from the great pile of stone that was the palace, emerging into the fresh night air, Isabel tugged on Rand’s arm to bring him to a halt. “Where are we going?” she asked, keeping her voice low to avoid disturbing small Madeleine, who had quieted as she was held against her. “We have no place here.”
“To find a wet nurse or a goat,” he said. “Either will do. Then I thought we might set out for Braesford.”
“Braesford?”
“You object, my lady?”
“It is night, and the journey is far. And you are no longer a nobody, nor yet a mere knight who may go where he wills without thought.”
“No?” he asked, tipping his head.
“You are my Lord Baron Braesford of Braesford, or soon shall be, a man of rapidly increasing responsibilities that include a wife. Yes, and a growing family.”
He watched her for long moments, there in the dimness lit only by flickering torchlight that fell upon them from some distance away. The strain eased from his features then, and a smile curved the firmly molded lines of his mouth. “You are increasing?” he asked in quiet inquiry.
“Just so.”
“You are…?”
“With child, or so it appears. Gwynne declares it so and she is never wrong.” She waited with a hard knot of apprehension in her chest to see what he would say. He had been away from her for so long, so long.
A soft sound left him, as if he had been struck. Swooping down upon her, he caught her and Madeleine up together in his arms and whirled them in long steps down the corridor while laughter rumbled in his chest.
Abruptly, he stopped, carefully set Isabel on her feet. Steadying her with a hand at her waist, he reached to touch her face. “You are all right? You aren’t sick? I didn’t…”
The fullness in her heart forced tears into her eyes. “No, no. I’m perfectly well.”
“A father. I’m to be a father.”
“And a baron.”
He inclined his head. “With a new device, so my son need never carry the bend sinister on his shield, need never be a nobody.”
The child might yet be a girl, but Isabel would not remind him and so spoil his vision. It would come true in time, God willing, for there would be more children. For now, she honored him that his thought was for their child’s future rather than the riches and estates that would come with his new title.
“It has been some time,” she said in soft sincerity, “since you were a nobody to me.”
His chest swelled with the depth of the breath he drew and his hold upon her tightened. “I believe resting here for the night may be a wise move, my lady.” He swung toward David, who had followed after them, though remaining some few paces away. “You heard? We require space in an inn as well as a goat.”
“Or a wet nurse. I did hear,” David answered. “Though with so many here for the queen’s lying-in and the christening, we may be lucky to find a room anywhere.” Stepping around them, the lad went to carry out his errand. Still, he turned to look back at them with a smile tugging at his lips.
“I’d rather have the goat,” Rand muttered as they began to walk again, “if we are all forced to share a single chamber.”
So would she, if it came to that, Isabel thought, though she could foresee other problems. “Have you ever milked a she-goat?”
“No more than have you,” he answered. “Mayhap David…”
“Or Gwynne.” She glanced back at the serving woman, who followed after them with a resigned look on her face. An instant later, a frown pleated her brow. “But it could be your good squire will bring back a wet nurse who likes swift travel. He is really…really most efficient.”
“You are concerned for him.” He gazed down at her, studying her features with care.
“Concerned, yes, but that is all. Is that what you wished to hear? I believe he requires to be told I don’t hold him accountable in the death of my stepbrother, will never blame him for it.”
“I’ll see to it.”
She looked deep into his eyes, her own steady as she braved the silvery darkness there. He not only understood her misgivings and unspoken apologies, she thought, but also her remorse that David must have Graydon’s death upon his conscience, her regret that her stepbrother had not been a better man, that matters could not have been resolved with less hatred and greed for power. “I knew you would,” she said quietly.
“You know a good deal too much about me, I think, including the fact that I loved you before I took you to wife.”
“Did you?” she asked, the words not quite steady.
“Oh, aye. I wanted only you from the moment I saw you in Westminster’s great hall, dancing with firelight in your hair and such passionate joy in your eyes that I longed to share it.”
“So you never feared the curse of the Graces, as you had fulfilled its requirement? Or is it that you never believed there to be one?”
“I had no fear.”
He would not mock her fabrication, for that might be to remove whatever protection remained in it for Cate and Marguerite. This further evidence of his care for the concerns of her heart brought the rise of tears behind her eyes. “My sisters…” she began.
“Will be sent for at once, to come to Braesford. Henry will not forbid it, I think, not while his gratitude lasts. They will be safe there. Well, as safe as they want to be.”
She allowed her gaze to move over the strong angles and planes of his face while a smile trembled across her lips. “Thank you, Rand. You are kindness itself.”
His gaze on the liquid that rimmed her eyes, he allowed a scowl to narrow his eyes, shielding their softness. “And is that all you have to say to a declaration from your husband for how he broke this curse of yours? Have you no interest in my affection, my lady, nothing you would say to it in return?”
“If you want my love, you have it,” she said, her tone lilting as wild joy beat up inside her, engulfing her heart, her chest, her whole body.
He halted again, turned toward her. “Oh, I want it, Lady Isabel of Braesford, and would show you how much if you were not encumbered at the moment by a baby in swaddling. Yes, and with the likely addition soon of a wet nurse, a goat, an opinionated serving woman, two sisters still accursed and a knight in training who looks like an angel and worships the ground on which you tread. As do I, my lady. Aye, as do I.”
She reached to catch the strip of ragged white silk tied still to his arm,
wrapping its length slowly around her hand to draw him to her while gladness blazed in her eyes. “Show me, anyway, my brave and most favored lord of a husband,” she murmured against his lips, “for I would see exactly how broken is this curse.”
Thoroughly, merrily, it was shattered then, for the eldest Grace of Graydon.
Merrily, and forever.
Author’s Note
For those who may be curious about where history ends and fiction begins, the incident of the murdered newborn depicted in By His Majesty’s Grace was never connected with Henry VII. This story from the sixteenth century, recorded as the “Littlecote Scandal,” was taken from Albion, A Guide to Legendary Britain by Jennifer Westwood. Nevertheless, it is a fact that Henry VII brought a mistress with him from France when he arrived in England for the invasion of 1485. What became of the woman afterward is lost in time. Nothing more is heard of her after Henry’s marriage to Elizabeth of York on January 18, 1486.
The disappearance of the two young sons of Edward IV from the Tower of London is a mystery that has never been satisfactorily explained. In the past few decades, it has become popular to second-guess the histories compiled in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, which indict Richard III, uncle to the boys, in their deaths. Many modern writers absolve him of ordering the deed, despite the fact that the princes were last seen in public shortly after he declared them illegitimate in order to seize the throne, and that rumors of their deaths were extant at that time. The confession to the crime by Sir James Tyrell fifteen years later, during the reign of Henry VII, has been dismissed as a political move to prevent false claims to the throne in the boys’ names. My own conviction concerning this tragedy, developed after studying a multitude of both ancient and modern histories and numerous biographies of the principal players, is that Shakespeare got it right: Richard III was indeed the villain in the crime.
Arthur, the eldest son of Henry VII and Elizabeth of York, was born as described, at Winchester Priory on September 19, 1486. A studious and conscientious youth, he was betrothed to Catherine of Aragon as a child and married her at age fifteen on November 14, 1501. He was in Ludlow Castle on the Welsh border with his bride five months later when he apparently contracted a fever and died on April 2, 1502, at age sixteen. Had he lived to take the throne, Britain and the world would be far different today. Instead, it was Henry, third son of Henry VII, who put his own spin on history after becoming the infamous Henry VIII.
Jennifer Blake
November 24, 2010
Acknowledgments
First, thanks beyond thanks to Bertrice Small, Roberta Gellis and the other authors and romance readers who greeted the beginning pages of this story with such enthusiasm when they were read for a workshop at the Romantic Times Convention in 2008. Without that grand reception, I might never have embarked upon this medieval tale.
My sincere appreciation to my editor, Susan Swinwood, for her attention to detail, unfailing support and lovely tact. To all the great people at MIRA Books, many thanks for wonderful covers and book expertise in the past, and especially for the inspired suggestion that I make the transition from my usual Victorian-era United States to medieval England.
Many thanks, as well, to my agent, Richard Curtis, for his faith in my ability, his support for this project and his constant effort to make my career the best it can be.
A thousand expressions of appreciation to all those online entities that were sources for special research books and historical details, including free Google eBooks, Project Gutenberg, Amazon.com, the Sony eBook Store, Melissa Snell at About.com: Medieval History, http://tudorhistory.org, Wikipedia, http://englishhistory.net/tudor.html and many others.
Finally, a special thank-you to my daughters Delinda Corbin and Katharine Faucheux, for acting as my first readers and making super suggestions that provided story enrichment, to my husband, Jerry, for unflagging interest and patience, and to all the rest of my grand family for simply being there.
ISBN: 978-1-4592-0886-5
BY HIS MAJESTY’S GRACE
Copyright © 2011 by Patricia Maxwell
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