“Cease and desist.” The king’s booming voice pummeled the air. “You are all relieved. Make for your beds.”
Every manservant and chambermaid dropped whatever lay in their hands, and took themselves off without thought or question. The small gathering of courtiers drew closer to the king, put on guard at once by the abrupt change in his tone and demeanor.
“Speak,” Henry barked the instant the last servant had quit the chamber.
With a twitch and an Adam’s apple–bobbing swallow, the young man made his report.
“Your fears have been confirmed, Your Highness. The man in question has indeed been seen in clandestine conversations with members of the French contingent.”
“Bastard!” spat the king, pounding a fist on the arm of the chair and spewing upon the floor, as if the word and gesture were not enough to rid him of his venomous rage.
The messenger quaked in his worn leather boots, bulging insect eyes once more protruding from his long face. Only Suffolk remembered him.
“You may leave us, good sir. You have done well. Have no fear.” With a calming hand upon the youngster’s shoulder, the duke turned him toward the door, helping him away with a firm yet gentle nudge. Turning back, Suffolk met with the king’s blazing stare.
“You know what to do?” Henry moved not a bit, his voice low and quiet, yet his rage was there for any to see did they know what to look for.
Suffolk’s full lips thinned in a grimace, but he bowed, spun on his heel with determination, and left; not a one questioned his compliance with whatever the king demanded of him.
The screams of human and animal mixed in a grotesque chorus, filling the predawn hours with their horror and revulsion. The monstrous flames rose into the black sky, roaring like cannon blasts in the day’s most hushed hours. Men, women, and children fled from the orangey blaze in fright while soldier and guard ran toward it. But it was too powerful, too repulsive, and it was impossible to break through to its heart, to penetrate the barrier and save those trapped within. They stood at the aperture of the tent now fully ablaze in the apex of the English camp, waiting to catch those fortunate enough to escape from the fiery cataclysm.
The pandemonium swirled about the inferno like the oxygen that fed it so splendidly. For within every neighboring tent, the brilliance of the flame appeared alive upon the walls, the nexus of its glow indistinguishable through the pale canvas. In terror they ran out of their tents, into the fray; haphazard, undirected commotion. No matter how removed from danger, they ran and screamed, the sickening scent of burning flesh fueling their fear.
“Help us, please,” one foot soldier yelled to a passing nobleman, a young man of strong arm and back, capable of hoisting a bucket of water as well as any. But the pampered gent continued his furious retreat, sparing not a glance at the soldier begging his aid.
Coughing and sputtering, survivors staggered from within, but the child emerged without a sound—without a scratch—as if oblivious to the danger she escaped, her long, curly blond hair wafting upward in the rushing air of the blaze at her back. From behind the soldiers, a woman clad in a silk nightgown flung herself forward, as if waiting for this very moment. Snatching the child in her arms she ran, a silent angel intent on her mission.
“How many billeted here, do you know?” one guard called to another as they stood together before the blaze. Few of them remained, so many of them had already rushed toward the physician’s tent, the wounded leaning on their shoulders or cradled in their arms.
“No idea,” his companion struggled to answer, the flames devouring all the air in and around the tent. “Can’t be many. So many … already out.”
The first soldier acknowledged him with a squinty-eyed nod, holding up a hand in a vain attempt to block the heat from his face, feeling his eyebrows singeing upon his skin. With a hue and cry, both jumped back. The tent, devoured by fire, pitched toward them, collapsing forward with nothing but ash left at its base. Within the crumbling of the remaining wood frame and disintegrating canvas, a whoosh of flames rose higher as one wrenching, agonizing scream roared above the din.
For one suspended moment, the men stood motionless. In the next instant, they moved. Without word or gesture, each bent his head down and charged.
“Could we not have devised a less overt manner in which to deal with this matter?” Henry hissed into Suffolk’s ear.
Outside, the smell of burning rubble clung to the air like the desperate grasp of a scorned lover. Dawn’s pale gray light tickled at the edge of the earth. In this broken place, physicians and surgeons attended to the wounded while soldiers and servants tread warily through the charred ruins in hopes of finding other survivors. Inside the king’s pavilion, the tension clung to every tendril of smoke that slithered in.
“Be gone.” Henry dismissed his attendants and guards with an angry flick of his hand, those who had rushed in at the first burst of flames, and threw himself into the embroidered crimson and wood chair in the corner. Head bent, shoulders curled, Henry pierced Suffolk with a potent stare.
“I do not believe it was intentional, Sire—the fire, I mean.” Suffolk shook his head, unsure at this moment of the debacle’s details. He rubbed roughly at his forehead, as if to clear the jumble of thoughts in his mind. “He was wounded as well. Certainly it is not in an assassin’s plans to be injured while carrying out his duties.”
“Not a proficient one, at any rate.” Henry bit off the snide words. “Was he at least successful? Did any others perish in this debacle?”
“The initial reports confirm the target has been eliminated. His wife and daughter as well. One other died—no one of conse-quence—but many are grievously wounded.”
Henry shook his head of red and gold curls. “Well, there is something in that, I suppose.”
“I will find out more.”
“Yes, you will.” With agitated impatience, Henry tapped his foot on the wood below his feet as Suffolk hovered by his side. “Now.”
“I … of course, Your Majesty.” With a quick bow, the duke took his leave, fairly running as his sovereign’s ire pushed at his back. He stopped short at the door, halted by the apparitions standing in the aperture.
Wrapped in a silk shift and dressing gown, the woman looked no less haughty; her soot-stained chin rose from her chest and she walked toward them with shoulders squared. The child at her feet was nothing less than a saintly specter, dressed in white, blond curls forming a halo about her small face.
“I must speak with the king, s’il vous plâit,” the woman decreed, the English words lyrical in her heavy French accent.
“I’m sorry, my lady,” Suffolk began, “but I’m afraid …”
“Let her pass,” Henry barked.
Stepping around a bowing Suffolk—perplexity emblazoned on his handsome face—the woman brought the child with her.
Henry rose from his chair, walking forward to greet her, and the confusion crinkling Suffolk’s ruddy face fell to slack-jawed shock.
“Madame de Montlhéry.” Henry leaned over her hand as she made her obeisance. “Are you all right?”
“I am well, Your Majesty, merci.”
“I am most grateful for all your efforts on our behalf this night,” Henry said with a small shake of his head. “I am only sorry it has been botched so atrociously. But I am confident no aspersions will be thrown your way.”
The woman’s pale eyes strayed not a whit from his face. “I owe you my life. There is nothing you could not ask of me.”
Henry smiled benevolently, looking down at the child at their feet.
“And who is this adorable creature you have brought to visit me?” he asked, and began to lower his large frame.
“She is my cousin’s daughter.”
The king straightened as though struck, head snapping toward Suffolk, accusation sharp in his blue eyes. “His daughter? Are you sure?”
“Yes, Your Majesty,” Madame de Montlhéry murmured, shuddering at the blast of her sovereign’s fury
.
“I thought you said they had all perished?” the king snapped at the man hovering by the door.
“It is what I was guaranteed, Your Majesty,” Suffolk defended.
“Well, your assurances are meaningless, as is your control of this situation.”
“His wife lives, as well,” the woman put forth. “She is … her face has been … no one will recognize her, I assure you. Nor do I believe, with the extent of her injuries, she will last much longer.”
Henry clasped his hands across his muscular chest, his knuckles turning white, the skin straining across the bone, clamping down upon his irritation, though sorely tested.
“Suffolk,” the king hissed through bared teeth. “Take thee off and see for yourself that the man is dead. I trust nothing this day.”
“Your Majesty.” The duke bowed, rushing off, no doubt, with thanks to be gone from his incensed ruler’s presence, no longer certain his lifelong friendship could protect him further.
“Mum? See mum?” The tiny voice was no more than a squeak, the tug upon Madame de Montlhéry’s gown timid yet insistent.
They looked down upon the child as if seeing her for the first time, her presence all but forgotten in the turmoil of the past few moments.
Madame de Montlhéry looked at Henry expectantly, lips parting with elusive words.
Henry lowered himself on bended knees, making himself as small and unmenacing as possible. His smile spread wide, and it chased away any vestiges of annoyance left upon his features. The little girl shrank back, clutching the woman’s legs, taking refuge behind the folds of her gown.
“Would you like a treat, my dear? Are you hungry?”
“She loves plum tarts, Your Highness,” Montlhéry informed him.
“Is that true? Would you like a sugary plum tart?” Henry asked the wide-eyed urchin.
Though she offered a halfhearted nod, the child remained in the wake of the woman’s skirts, her large eyes growing moist and full with tears.
“Goodness, she is a sweet poppet, isn’t she?” Henry’s voice eased with tenderness.
“She is that, Sire,” Montlhéry responded.
“How old is she?”
“A bit more than two.”
Henry stared at the child, the pixie nose that spoke of her English heritage, the exquisitely shaped mouth of her French blood, the rosy cheeks, and the pale yellow ringlets.
Henry squinted. “Her eyes. Are her eyes … violet?”
The woman smiled with pride, a smile edged sharply with bitterness. “They are, Sire, like those of her grand-mère.”
“Do you know what I have learned in my few years as king, madame?” Henry straightened, his gaze anchored on the child at their feet.
“No, Your Majesty, but I long for you to tell me.”
“I have learned that weapons take on all forms. I have learned that beauty can be such a weapon.”
The woman stared down at the child, a different light glinting in her eye. Where she had looked at the girl as a burden, she now gazed upon her as a blessing.
Henry began to pace, his slipper-shod feet plucking out a soft rhythm as he trod a circle around the woman and the child in the otherwise silent chamber, his hands once more clasped together, the steepled index fingers tapping lightly upon pursed lips.
“With your help, madame, I will make her my most powerful weapon.”
Madame de Montlhéry lowered her head of fading blond curls, and made her pledge. “I am yours to command, Your Highness, as always.”
Henry stopped before her, smiling with satisfaction. “Take her to your home, madame. Raise her as a proper French woman and as your niece, but teach her to honor me above all, above God. Teach her not only to read and write, but languages as well, especially Italian.” Henry grew more and more inspired, moving again, spurred by dawning insights, striding to his chair and back again. The light behind his eyes glowed as his thoughts coalesced. “Teach her to cipher, and to shoot.”
Montlhéry’s head tilted. “To cipher and … and shoot?”
“Yes, my dear, to cipher and shoot.” Henry jumped to stand before her, grabbing the woman by her shoulders and leaning in, bringing his face within inches of her own. “We will make her the greatest spy there ever was, madame—not a person who became one in adulthood, but one reared as a spy. Is it not brilliant?”
“B … brilliant, oui,” Madame de Montlhéry responded, but with little confidence. She stared at the king with ill-disguised confusion.
“And most important of all, madame”—he lowered his voice to a scheming whisper, conspirators bent over their cauldron of plans—“we must teach her to kill.”
The heavy, dreadful words hung in the air between them; the silence hummed with their evil intent.
The child stared up at them, comprehending little of what passed between them, mesmerized by it all nonetheless.
“Can you do this for me, Elaine? Can you?”
She swayed at the sound of her name upon his lips. How well she remembered him speaking it as he saved her from the marauding French soldiers who violated her beside the lifeless body of her dead English husband; and months later, as he took her in the night with tenderness and passion.
“Certes, oui, Henry. For you I can do anything.”
He pulled her hard against him for a quick moment, only to thrust her back. Eager, he lowered himself again to the child. The small girl stared at the man before her, stepping out of the shadow of the woman, as if longing to bask in the magnetic man’s light.
“What is her name?”
Elaine drew in a long draught of air, desperate to gain control, to breathe normally once more. “Geneviève, Geneviève de Hain-aut.”
“No, she cannot carry her father’s name.” He spoke with a soothing tone of comfort and kindness, knowing the child would understand this better than any words. With care he reached out a hand to Geneviève, watching for any sign that she might pull away from him.
“Come to me, child,” he cajoled, his voice as seductive as if he coaxed a lover to his bed. Their eyes met and he felt the thrill of capture. “You are mine now, and always will be.”
The tiny bud-shaped mouth twitched with the slightest of smiles and Geneviève took a step forward, and then another. Henry reached out both hands to take her in his arms, and she surrendered as though capitulating to a beloved parent.
Looking up at the woman he had once known as a lover, Henry beamed, victorious. “Let her be known as Gravois, Geneviève Gravois, for it is indeed from out of the grave I have pulled her.”
Elaine curtsied low, knowing she had secured the protection and loyalty of this king forever, yet feeling a tear of heartbreak and jealousy, as if she had lost him as well, lost him eternally to this child.
“As you wish, Your Majesty.”
As Henry rose, child firmly in his embrace, curled around his powerful form with head resting upon his shoulder, a squire rushed in, stopping short at the sight before him.
“Yes, what is it?” Henry demanded of the silent page.
“The French king, Your Highness. He is here and wishes to see you.”
“Of course. Give me but a moment and send him in.” Henry nodded with complete composure and turned to Elaine. “Quickly, madame, behind the screen.”
Elaine needed no further prodding; fear had gripped her at the thought of François I finding her in the chamber of Henry VIII. She scampered to the screen and its hidden chamber pot, her heels clicking out a frightened percussion. No sooner had the clacking faded away, than it was replaced by the clanging of armor and swords. Into the room François swept, contingent of fellows, as always, in his shadow.
“Majesté.” He rushed to Henry’s side, no smile of greeting in his eyes or upon his lips, purposeful with sincere concern. “Comment allez-vous? Are you all right? We could see the blaze from our camp. I came as soon as I could.”
“Have no fear, I am quite well. Many thanks.”
François shrugged off his gratitu
de. “What has happened here? Do you know?”
“I am looking into it, but already I have been assured it was nothing more than an accident—an overturned andiron, it would seem.”
“How dreadful. Have many perished?”
Henry chose his words with great care. “Four are dead, and many more injured.”
Henry hefted the child, slipping in his arms, a little higher. Though she grew heavier, she appeared wide awake, watching and listening to the two men with great intent. Henry smiled at her and her attentiveness.
“I have brought my physician and my surgeons.” François gestured toward the group behind him. “They are at your disposal.”
“Quite generous of you, but there is no need. My people have everything under control, I assure you.”
The penetrating eyes of the French king scanned his rival’s face with blatant suspicion. In the moment of any catastrophe, a helping hand should be accepted with grace.
Henry recognized the mask of displeasure but cared little. His goal was to keep François from learning much, not to acknowledge his magnanimity.
“But I am deeply grateful, nonetheless,” Henry placated. “And I will alert you at once should the need for aid arise. You have my solemn promise.”
“Très bien. As you wish, of course. You will keep me apprised of the situation, I am sure.” François gave a small bow of acquiescence. For the first time, he noticed the child cleaving comfortably to the king’s shoulder. “And who is this beauty?”
“This? This is my cousin’s child. She seems to have wandered from her family in the ruckus,” Henry said.
As if she knew they spoke of her, the little girl plucked her head off her pillow and looked the French king in the eye. François laughed at her charm.
“You will take good care of her, yes?” François gently patted the little girl’s slipper-clad foot.
“Rest assured, Your Majesty. It is my greatest mission.”
“Bon, bon,” François nodded. “We will talk soon, Henry.”
“Of course, François.”
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