Maid of Deception

by Jennifer McGowan

  “And since when have you become an expert on men?” I asked archly, but there was far less sting in my words than there used to be. If I was losing my taste for sparring with Meg, then perhaps there was reason to worry.

  Meg, for her part, shook her head. “Men, not much at all. But the roles men played in the Golden Rose, I know well. There seemed to be no end to the outrage they would express over quite the most minor of slights—and if it was the woman whom they’d set upon to claim as their own who was doing the slighting, well. Heaven and earth could not stand in their way until they’d meted out punishment.”

  That pronouncement caught us all up a little short. It was Jane who broke the silence. “I can, ah, see why you might not be interested in marriage, Meg,” she observed dryly.

  Sophia’s laugh was a tinkle of amusement, but it jarred us anew just the same. “Meg, she will marry, and she’ll have us all to apologize to.” Then she blinked, the color rising swiftly in her cheeks. “Oh!” she said. “That thought just came to me, Meg. I’ve no way of knowing, truly—”

  “Be at peace, be at peace,” Meg said, raising her hands to forestall Sophia’s continued apologies. “I cannot marry while I’m serving the Queen, and I have easily another year of that before Cecil or Walsingham will set me loose. Whole lives can change in that time. We can talk of marriage another day.”

  The clock struck nine bells then, and we hastened to get into our court finery. Though an assembly was nowhere near as stiff as a formal event, there still were protocols to be followed and laces to be drawn. It seemed we spent most of our days tying up our gowns or unlacing them, and our sleeves and collars and skirts besides. Ordinarily I found the process relaxing, but not this day. I doubt I’d felt a moment’s peace since I’d stepped foot inside Saint George’s Chapel mere days before, prepared to become a bride.

  Within the hour we were at our appointed places in the Queen’s retinue, looking on with fervent interest at anything Her Royal Drama felt inclined to do. The Queen was circulating among her cherished nobles, being fawned over and flattered, and thanked ever and anon for her gracious feasting of the three nights past. The whole of the court swelled the Presence Chamber, it seemed, though I knew better. Lord Cavanaugh had not made an appearance.

  I’d received my share of idle looks and not so idle speculation as well. Still, I remained fairly certain that my unmasking of Cavanaugh and his skirt had not been judged to be mine own doing. I too had spies throughout the castle, and they’d reported to me that I was mostly pitied and occasionally the recipient of someone’s knowing nod about how brazen girls never got their man. But both of these reactions were preferable to having the court know the truth.

  A steward rang a bell, and the Queen turned, her eyes alight with mischief. For just a moment they rested upon me before sliding away, and I felt every muscle in my body tense, every nerve go as taut as a bowstring. That look had spoken volumes in its brief touch. I told you I was stronger than you, it seemed to say. And now you will pay for your impertinence.

  Elizabeth mounted the few short steps that led to her dais, and then caused a brief flurry of laughter when she spun around, glistening in her gown of sunshine yellow, which was shot through with amber embroidery and ribbons the color of cinnamon. “What, ho, but we have had a merry time of it, have we not these past few weeks?” she declared, her voice overloud in the crowded space, as if anyone dared whisper in her presence.

  A smattering of cheers broke out, and she put her fists into her skirts, playfully tilting her head beneath her diamond-studded crown. “I say, but have we not?” she challenged again. This time the crowd responded far better, giving out lusty “huzzah”s and applauding Elizabeth wildly.

  “But!” she cried, and raised her hand to further command the attention of the room. “I am here to tell you that our delight is not at an end. We have yet another surprise for your delectation, which I am exceedingly happy to share.”

  Beside me Jane’s groan was so heartfelt that I could practically hear it vibrating the rushes, but the Queen was not yet finished.

  “We—the whole of the court, whoever can ride or be carried, shall depart the confines of Windsor for a very special progress! Now, what do you think of that!”

  The cheers came again, but some were more forced now, though the applause was loud and long. I could understand the hesitation of some of the savvier members of court. The Queen went on progress several times a year to allow her castles’ armies of servants to turn her royal residences upside down, ridding their halls of fouled rushes, the scraps of feasts, stained tapestries, and every manner of garbage that was constantly piling up in corners and cabinets and undercrofts. But while her castle was getting cleaned, some poor soul of a nobleman was forced to feed and entertain Her Royal Exactitude in the manner to which she had quickly become accustomed.

  I immediately began making lists in my head. She doubtless expected her Maids of Honor to go with her, which meant traveling clothes and lesser gowns that could be worn in various ways to cut down on the packing. Meg and Jane were barely civilized as it was, so I’d need to offer them additional castoffs in time for them to try them on and resew as needed. Travel always was a bother, but at least it wasn’t wintertide. We could still get by with only a few trunks of clothing for the lot of us.

  “Where? Where, do you say?” The Queen trilled in triumph, laughing at the palpable excitement of her court. I wonder if she had any idea how devastating her progresses could be upon the households on whom she descended. The great cloud of dust that accompanied a Queen’s progress was as fell as the harbinger of doom. I glanced idly up then, my mind still working, and was transfixed to see the Queen’s gaze upon me once more.

  No! I thought, but a scream was already starting within me, dancing along my blood, battering my bones. No, no, no, no, NO!

  “We shall go to the home of my dearest of maids, Lady Beatrice Knowles!” the Queen shouted out in counterpoint to my unspoken wail, as all of the blood in my body rushed to my ears. She can’t do this. She won’t do this! She had to know that my homestead was a falling-down relic of a castle, and a heavy day’s ride—or more likely two, all the way to Northampton. She had to know that we had barely enough coin to fill our own tables with food, both for ourselves and our retainers. She had to know that the harvest was just now upon us and the servants would need to be working the fields and orchards, not playing host to a brawl of overstuffed courtiers and spoon-pinching ladies. She had to know!

  But the Queen only stared at me, her smile broad and damning.

  Oh, she knew, all right.

  “Make ready, one and all of you,” she cried. “We depart in two days’ time for Marion Hall!”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  And it would have been only one long, hard, miserable day of travel too, once we’d finally gotten on the road. Except for the rain. Which made it two.

  After a truly remarkable run of sunshine and warm breezes at summer’s end in Windsor, we seemed to race toward the chill grey censure of winter the closer to Marion Hall we rode.

  The two days Elizabeth had originally predicted it would take the court to assemble its collective self for the great lurch north had mercifully turned into five. And as I had sent both my father and a brace of riders galloping off within three hours of her pronouncement, I had relatively high hopes that my ancestral home would at least be swept out by the time the Queen arrived.

  Father, for his part, had seemed blithely unconcerned about the progress, until I’d shown him the household accounts that I’d received just two weeks past from our manager. Then he’d understood. The Queen would be bringing fully fifty people with her, including servants, ladies, courtiers, and guards. All fifty had to be fed. All fifty had to be housed. All fifty had to be given free run of our stores of ale and spirits. Father had blustered, then ranted, then eventually had come round to the same realization that I’d had there in the Presence Chamber, as Elizabeth had sung out her gloating command: There was n
othing we could do but open our coffers for the Queen.

  After that, he’d left without another word.

  Now we five Maids of Honor plodded on in the pouring rain atop steaming, bedraggled steeds, having gained Elizabeth’s permission to range ahead of the court proper to ensure the hall was presentable for her. At first she’d seemed against this idea, but after several hours of steady rain she’d seen the right of it. Better to be certain that there would be a warm fire and a full table of food at the end of your journey than to needle your fellow travelers. Elizabeth herself would have preferred to race ahead with us, I was certain. For all her legions of flaws, the woman did love fast horses.

  I lifted my head, peering out from beneath the rim of my cloak. “Anna, except for the smell”—which was deadly—“these cloaks are a work of genius.”

  “The smell almost makes them not worth it.” Anna’s laugh was rueful. “But it is good to be dry, and to have a chance to test them on horseback.” A month ago and more, now, she’d coated plain woolen cloaks with a thick salve of lanolin, reasoning that if it kept the sheep dry, it should keep us dry as well. She’d been right, but there was a price for such success. Dry, the cloaks looked like any other woolen covering. But once they got well and truly soaked, they not only kept us protected from the rain. They also smelled like wet sheep.

  Fortunately, we’d been far away from the court before we’d discovered this.

  “Dry trumps everything,” Jane said from her post at the back of our small group. She alone of us was dressed as a man, offering up the very fair reasoning that one of us needed to be astride and give the appearance of being a guard. But in truth Jane just hated the sidesaddle; she’d learned to ride with the boys in her village, and she refused to give up control of her steed no matter how indecent it looked. “One last rise, Beatrice, and we’ll have lost the farthest outriders.”

  We’d been told to stay within view of the Queen’s guard, but their loyalty was to the Queen, not her women. So gradually we’d moved faster and faster along the roads, trotting and cantering. I needed all the time I could at Marion Hall before Elizabeth descended.

  “Good,” I said, surveying the forest as it stretched before us. “We’re almost to the break—”

  “What ho! What’s this?” Meg danced her pony around, peering hard into the driving rain. “Beatrice, is that—”

  “Of course it is.” I frowned and rode to the fore of our group, but I’d recognized the rider immediately, resting exactly where the trees parted and the path into the forest could be found. “How in God’s name did Alasdair MacLeod gain permission to join the Queen’s progress? What could he possibly be doing here?”

  And why did my heart give a little leap to see him? He’d been at every turn and corner in the castle in the days following my public reveal of Lord Cavanaugh’s indiscretion. Not approaching me, exactly, but not staying away either. He’d lurked in the shadows like a dark-eyed god, watching me and those around me. I hadn’t known whether to be flattered or annoyed, but annoyed had seemed smarter.

  Seeing him here, however, so close to my home, inspired a whole raft of different emotions. Had he seen where I lived? Surely he had to have done so. And what had he thought? Was he planning to heap yet more humiliation upon me? Was that why he’d ridden so far into the woods, away from Marion Hall to greet us?

  “Well, be glad we’ve the company, no matter who it is.” Jane’s words cut into my increasingly darker thoughts. “We could use the protection. I’m not a fan of woodlands. There is too much that can be hidden.”

  “In this forest in particular,” Sophia said, and I glanced at her, startled to hear her voice. She’d ridden silently for much of our travels, her gaze intent and her expression rapt. I always forgot how constrained her life must have been, as niece to the Queen’s astrologer. Even though he was only a few years older than the Queen, John Dee already seemed to be an old man, buried in his books and muttering over his charts. He was not often at court—and he never asked after Sophia, at least not since her betrothal to Lord Brighton. I thought on that now. Was John Dee complicit in the apparent plot that had been perpetrated to separate Sophia from her father? Was it because of this rumored Sight that she had? But surely he couldn’t have known about that. Sophia had been a little girl when her mother had died and she’d been kidnapped, according to the papers Jane and Meg had found in Lord Brighton’s study. How could she have demonstrated any powers at all, when she could barely speak?

  In any event, now Sophia was looking around with solemn eyes. “Who lives here, in these woods?” she asked as we headed into the hidden swale.

  “It’s the southernmost tip of Salcey Forest,” I said. “No one lives in it.” Not exactly true, but I was in no mood to slice the point more finely. “We’ll go quite a ways through it before we reach our holding. But the main road would take an age.” I paused, scowling ahead at Alasdair. At least he would make the girl feel more comfortable. “Do you not feel safe, Sophia?”

  “Oh no, that isn’t it. . . .” Sophia’s words petered out as she peered into the forest, but she didn’t turn her horse into the wood, at least. I had no time for an enchanted woodland experience.

  “Well, I for one will be glad to get under cover,” Anna huffed, shaking out her cloak and sending water flying. “I’m not sure how much longer our cloaks will last.”

  Then we were trotting into the break of trees, with Alasdair riding toward us on his magnificent horse. It certainly hadn’t come from the Marion Hall stables, I could see at a glance. Too big.

  “Well met!” he boomed, then touched his hand to the reins, turning his horse just slightly. “God’s bones, but you smell like a herd of—”

  “Enough!” I raised my hand sharply. “What are you doing here? I did not realize you were part of the Queen’s progress.” It was not unheard of for Elizabeth to bring foreign courtiers on her jaunts, but really? Scotsmen?

  Alasdair grinned at me through the rain. “As lovely as ever, my lady, and scented like a rose.”

  “You’re not answering my question.”

  “Because it’s not a necessary one.” Alasdair lifted the edge of my cloak. “So that’s why,” he mused, turning the flap of cloth over and inspecting both sides. “Ingenious, and if that’s why the smell is so strong, I’m thinking an herb concoction of vinegar and heather—”

  “What’s this? What’s this?” Anna nosed her horse forward as I yanked my cloak out of Alasdair’s hands.

  “We do not have time for this discussion!” I protested. “We need to get—”

  “Aye, aye, to Marion Hall,” Alasdair said over my words. He turned his horse in earnest and faced north once more. “And so get there we will. Your father mentioned ye might try to break away from the group, and he sent me to escort you.”

  “My father?” I asked, my eyes going narrow even as we moved into the wood. “Pray tell, what occasion had you to speak with my father?”

  “I helped him saddle his nag to make haste for his home, and one thing led to another, as oft it does. He invited me and a few of my men to help with the rabble about to descend on Marion Hall, and here we are.” We were moving at a reasonable clip through the woods now, and Anna had been right. The thickly wooded Salcey Forest provided just enough space for two horses to move abreast, once you got out away from the main road, but the canopy of trees allowed a swift and welcome respite from the rain.

  Jane was already out of her cloak, and for just a moment I envied her breeches and jacket. “I’ve got the bigger horse,” she said. “I’ll carry the cloaks. The smell doesn’t bother me.”

  What does? I wondered uncharitably, but I allowed Alasdair to help me out of my cloak, trying to mask my irritation as he and Anna fell into an immediate discussion on Scottish cures for foul-smelling sheep. Instead I forged ahead. I knew this woodland well. For all of our financial straits, Marion Hall had been blessed with a thriving stable of horses, and gentry from all over the county would trade with us for
foals and mares. We’d staged races and festivals when times were better, and as a result I’d ridden more than my share through the overarching canopies of Salcey Forest.

  Now I peered through the wood, forcing myself to glance only once at Sophia. She was sitting straight and prettily, her skin flushed and her eyes shining, as if she were a princess herself on procession. But she no longer looked about with worry, and I allowed myself to relax the tiniest bit. If she couldn’t sense that others roamed this wood, then perhaps it was currently empty. Lord knew that Alasdair tromping along on his great warhorse would have been loud enough to scare even the hardiest of souls away.

  We traveled on for a few hours more, not so fast to lather the horses but at a clip that suffered no delay. Anna chatted with Alasdair and even drew Sophia out in conversation, while Meg and Jane seemed caught in a thorny discussion of what truly rested under the Round Tower of Windsor.

  For myself, I just wanted to press on, press on. A thousand and one catastrophes awaited me in the tottering wreck of my home, and I’d need a dozen lifetimes to fix them. Instead I had but three hours.

  Finally the trees began to dwindle, and I urged my mount faster, coming up the small rise just as the clouds finally parted and the sun peaked out to brighten the last scatter of rain.

  There, nestled in the valley, lay Marion Hall.

  Built to withstand both weather and woe, the folly of a mule-brained twelfth-century baron who’d fancied a castle when merely a house would have done, the imposing stone edifice of turreted rose granite sprawled out in ungainly fashion across the lawn. The estate encompassed dozens of rooms, courtyards, and sheds, all of them now bustling with activity, with servants and children and grooms and cooks racing about in panicked flight. And as the wind picked up its measure and skated toward us up the hillside, swirling and whirling with playful abandon, I could hear the unmistakable sounds . . . of screaming.