The Phantom Tree

by Nicola Cornick

  It was as I lay tossing and turning, trying to block out the sounds of debauchery from below that the first whisper came through to me.

  ‘Cat…’

  It was very distant but I caught it immediately. I had been waiting for him, longing for him. The joy burst from me.

  ‘Darrell…’

  What came back were patterns of relief and joy, and immediately I felt more hopeful and whole again.

  ‘Where are you?’ I asked.

  ‘Close. Soon…’

  The promise comforted me. I drowsed, ignoring the raucous shouts and laughter from below until some unidentified time later he woke me from my dreams.

  ‘I am here. Outside.’

  I ran to the window and peered out. The night was clear but the new moon cast very little light. It was a winter night, cold and dark. I could see nothing and no one.

  ‘You are not’.

  ‘I am.’

  A shadow moved beneath the bare branches of the oak on the lawn. I grabbed my cloak and ran, along the corridor, down the stairs, past the half-open door, where Will entertained, the noise loud, the air thick with drink… Someone caught a glimpse of me, shouted. I did not stop. I pushed the startled hall boy aside and whirled out of the door, down the steps, tripping, tumbling, across the grass.

  Thomas caught me to him and spun me around and I felt lighter than thistledown, lighter than the air, and I laughed aloud. I put my arms about his neck and slid down and pressed myself against him as I kissed him. It did not matter that my feet were bare and cold. I did not feel it.

  ‘I have missed you so much…’

  We were speaking some of the time, our thoughts sliding into one another the rest, and kissing in between. He drew me away from the house, to the corner of the knot garden where the arbour cast its shadow. It was not the easiest or most comfortable of bridal beds but I did not care. When Thomas kissed me again it was gentle but I sensed the heat running deep beneath. I clung to him, alive to him in every way, and when we came together it felt easy and right and the most natural thing in the world. This time I had no thought of holding back, no sense of modesty or convention, and I gave myself to him wholly and took him to me as completely in return.

  ‘Mary…’ He buried his face in my neck. I felt the press of his lips against my skin. He was breathing hard.

  ‘Thomas.’ I was smiling.

  ‘That was…’ He sounded dazed.

  ‘Delightful?’ I offered.

  I felt his chest moved as he laughed. ‘I do love your lack of artifice, Mary. Was it delightful for you?’

  I stretched. I felt different. My body felt more rounded somehow, fuller, knowing. It made me feel wicked and excited. Gone were the constraints of my position and my upbringing, scattered like chaff in the wind.

  ‘It was lovely,’ I said.

  A frown touched his eyes. I felt as though I had said the wrong thing.

  ‘You were a virgin.’

  ‘Of course I was.’ I rolled onto my side to look at him. The air was cold on my bare skin. Goosebumps prickled me uncomfortably. It was odd how I noticed these things now when before I had thought of nothing but him. I pulled my nightgown towards me, covering my nakedness.

  ‘You thought I had slept with Will,’ I said, and it came out as an accusation. I sat up, started to dress quickly, throwing on my clothes haphazard to protect myself.

  ‘It would not have been so surprising.’ He was watching me steadily and he did not sound defensive. ‘You were in love with him.’

  ‘But I…’ Despite my indignation that he should believe such a thing of me, I stopped. There was no point in protesting that I was a lady born and bred. Alison had been that too and she had fallen. If it came to that, Thomas’s mother had been no whore and the Lady Anne Hungerford the same, at least not by profession. Such matters were not simple. If I were even more painfully honest, I would admit that there had been a time when I would have given myself to Will with gladness, believing myself so deep in love with him.

  Even so I felt hurt that Thomas would believe it.

  ‘We should wed.’ He spoke abruptly, following a line of thought of his own.

  All the remaining pleasure drained from my mind as swiftly as a snuffed candle.

  ‘Because I was a virgin?’ I spoke coldly. ‘Don’t be ridiculous.’

  He looked annoyed now. ‘You might be with child.’

  ‘That could be the case whether I was a virgin or not.’ I sat up, hugging my knees to my chest. It was odd and confusing that in some ways I felt so close to him, so intimate with him, body as well as soul now, and yet we were still so capable of saying completely the wrong thing to one another. ‘Are you feeling guilty, Thomas?’ I asked. ‘You should not.’

  He made a noise of exasperation and pulled me down into his arms. I struggled with genuine resentment. ‘Let me go!’

  ‘No.’ He kissed me. ‘Never. You’re mine, Mary. Why do you think I was so angry when I discovered you loved Will?’

  I pushed ineffectually against his chest. ‘Because you are a man and so you think with your c—’

  He silenced me with another kiss. ‘You are my soul’s star,’ he whispered against my lips. ‘You know it. Since the beginning of time and beyond the end of it.’

  It was pretty enough to steal my breath and the heat and longing I saw in his eyes even more so. Nevertheless, I was not going to give in so easily.

  ‘I belong to no one,’ I said haughtily.

  ‘No.’ He smiled. ‘You are your own person. But Cat and Darrell have loved each other a very long time.’

  I placed a hand against his bare chest. ‘Not like this,’ I said.

  ‘Not until now.’ He was solemn. ‘Yet in all ways and for all time, I think.’

  I did not answer. Instead, I allowed myself to relax into his embrace, my head against his shoulder.

  ‘Can I come away with you?’ I asked. ‘Now?’

  He smiled and pressed his mouth to my hair. ‘Of course,’ he said, as though it were the most natural thing for me to run away with him, barefoot and half-clad. ‘For now and for ever.’

  *

  I took very little with me from Middlecote, only the clothes I stood up in and Alison’s box with my meagre dowry stored within. I was happy to forget the place, at least for a short while, and indeed the first night I spent with Thomas in the tumbledown manor at Kingston Parva we did not speak of Will and I told Thomas nothing of what had happened in his absence. In truth, we were too happy to let the shadow of murder besmirch us. We were cosy enough curled up together in his bed, talking, making love, thinking nothing of the future but only of the joy of the present. At some point, Thomas went to fetch us some food, apples and bread and cheese, and I wrapped my cloak about me as I ate and finally remembered all the questions I had for him.

  ‘Did you see the Queen?’ I asked eagerly, and felt my spirits plummet when he shook his head.

  ‘No,’ He said, ‘but Mistress Aiglonby carried your letter to her and, as a result, I spoke to William Cecil. He has the Queen’s ear and will help us. Once upon a time he had some fondness for your father’s family.’

  ‘He ingratiated himself quickly enough with our enemies,’ I said hotly, for Cecil had abandoned my godfather the Protector when he fell, as a rat would desert a house on fire.

  Thomas laughed. ‘That is what politicians do,’ he said. ‘Trust me, he has your interests at heart, but it will take time.’ He sighed. ‘We do need money, that’s true.’ He was talking half to himself. ‘I must see what I can do.’ He propped himself on one elbow to look at me. In the half-light I could see that his dark gaze was very earnest. ‘Would you trust me enough to come with me anywhere, Mary?’

  ‘Of course.’ I was astonished he would doubt it. ‘To the ends of the earth itself,’ I said. ‘But you have no need to provide for me. You know that I have a small dowry—’

  ‘You’re to be my wife.’ He said firmly, ‘and I will find a way. I don’t want your money.
’

  I grumbled a little at his pride but he was soon able to turn me to good humour with his kisses and eventually, some considerable time later, I lay in his arms and looked up at the gaps in the manor’s roof and felt a warm contentment that one day soon we might be able to restore Thomas’s manors as well as regain my own. I pressed closer to his warmth and turned my head against his bare shoulder.

  ‘What of my other commission?’ I asked.

  Thomas was playing with my hair, running it through his fingers, and seemed disinclined to talk. He started to kiss the curve of my neck, my bare shoulder, his lips trailing lower towards my breast. I was astonished that he seemed to want to touch me all the time, that he took pleasure in looking at me, plain little Mary Seymour. Yet with him I did feel beautiful on the inside and it did not matter how I looked on the outside.

  ‘Alison,’ I persisted. In my happiness I felt a sudden sharp desire to see Alison happy too. ‘Mistress Banestre. What news was there of her?’

  Thomas sighed and drew away from me a little. ‘No news. No one knows anything of her except that she was once Lord Seymour’s mistress. No one has heard of her in years.’

  ‘Lord Seymour,’ I repeated. Something clicked in my mind then and I felt an absolute fool. Alison had never told me the identity of her lover and I had never seen him in the light. I thought of their clandestine meetings, her misery when she had told me he could not wed her, the secrecy that had forced her to keep quiet. Who better placed than Edward to seduce and manipulate. The first time she had gone away it must have been to be with him; then he had discarded her, planned to marry her off.

  He had taken their son.

  My heart bled for her.

  ‘You did not know?’ Thomas asked idly.

  I shook my head. ‘No I did not. Lecher!’ I thumped the pillow with force. ‘Vile, horrible man! To pretend so!’

  Thomas soothed me. ‘Perhaps she is his pensioner now,’ he suggested. ‘Perhaps he has provided for her and she lives retired. That may be why I could find no word of her.’

  But I knew better than that. I knew Edward, weak and manipulative, would never have shown generosity to Alison once he was done with her. He had shown no kindness to me either. I wondered then how Alison had persuaded him to send us away from Wolf Hall in safety, what persuasion she had used.

  So I was no further on in finding her. I supposed it was not surprising; Alison had said that she was going to disappear, go to a better place. My dreams had suggested that the place she had chosen was a long way away both in time and space. Yet she had always planned to come back, to find Arthur, to take him away with her. That was why she still troubled my dreams. She was waiting. She needed my help.

  ‘There was a baby,’ I said to Thomas. ‘Arthur. I suppose there was no news of him either?’

  ‘I must find the priest this afternoon.’ Thomas was following a train of thought of his own. His hand swept over my belly and I knew he was imagining that I too might already be with child.

  ‘Thomas…’ My protest was already half-hearted, for his fingers had moved to stroke the inside of my thigh, rising higher still.

  ‘There was nothing,’ he said. ‘No mention of a child. You will need to draw on the Sight to find the truth,’ he whispered in my ear. ‘For, believe me, Mary Seymour, you possess powerful magic.’

  He was scattering little kisses across my breasts now and I could feel my body rising to his touch. I knew he was teasing me but I did feel powerful then. Something had changed in me; perhaps it was belief in myself. I do not know. I thought about the visions I had had before and whether in future I would be able to summon them and bend them to my will. Thomas’s lips brushed the skin of my belly and I shivered. His tongue was tracing patterns lower, then lower still, to the soft inside of my thigh.

  I thought about how, if I did see the future, I might leave word for Alison, carefully, secretly, so that neither Edward Seymour nor anyone else would ever know. I would do it with cunning and skill, I thought, using the box to hold the clues…

  ‘Mary?’ Thomas sounded amused. ‘I do believe you are thinking of something else.’

  The tip of his tongue touched the very core of me, stroked in sly caress, and my entire body sang in response.

  ‘Thomas!’

  I heard him laugh to hold me so completely in his thrall. There was pure masculine triumph and satisfaction in it. I wanted to smack him for it yet at the same time the ache in my body demanded more.

  ‘Beautiful Mary,’ he said. ‘I love you.’

  ‘I love you too.’ I arched as he slid up me and entered me in one hard thrust, claiming me as his now, before, and for all time.

  And I thought no more.

  *

  Thomas left early the next morning. I sulked to be parted from him so soon but he kissed me into a better humour.

  ‘Next time I go, you are to come with me,’ he said. ‘There is a great adventure ahead. I go only to make everything ready for us.’

  It sounded exciting so I forgave him and kissed him again.

  ‘Stay within the protection of the manor,’ he told me. ‘Will does not know I am here, still less that you are too, but should you need to hide there is a cellar beneath the buttery.’ He frowned and touched my cheek. ‘I don’t like to leave you, Mary, but I will be back soon and you should be safe enough. Promise me you will not wander far, though.’

  I promised and kissed him back but then, at the last moment, when he would have gone, I drew him back to me.

  ‘You are not going to find Will are you?’ I asked anxiously. ‘Promise me you will not hurt him, Thomas. I know you hate each other but you must never act upon it. I could not bear to see you hang.’

  Thomas’s expression lightened and he laughed. ‘Sweetheart,’ he said, cupping my face tenderly, ‘don’t fear for me. Will Fenner will never be my death, even if one day I am his.’

  That was not good enough for me. I shook him. There was a shadow on me and I wanted to lift it. ‘Promise me,’ I repeated and saw him smile with resignation.

  ‘I promise,’ he said.

  I watched him ride away down the road to Marlborough and then I went down the orchard to the river where we had first eaten the stolen chicken together. It was a cold day and the frost lay sharp on the grass and the mist rose from the water.

  I had no idea how to summon a vision, for I had never tried other than on the night at Wolf Hall when I pretended to scry for Alison. I sat down in the spot beneath the trees where I had sat with Thomas and closed my eyes, concentrating on the sound of the water and the wind in the trees. I tried to clear my mind and think about Alison and her son, but other thoughts kept intruding and, finally, when I was able to banish them, my mind remained obstinately empty of all but the sensation of cold and damp.

  With a sigh, I rose to my feet and smoothed my wet and crumpled skirts. This was hopeless. I saw visions when I did not wish to and when I tried to call them up I saw nothing. I walked back up the orchard thinking of Arthur Seymour. He would be six years old now and I hoped he was growing into a fine and strong boy though it made me sad to think he did not know his mother. It was odd how my feelings about Alison had changed. It felt to me now that in all the time I had known her she had never been a child. She had had to learn too young how to protect herself because there was no one else to help her. Her beauty, that luscious fairness that I had so envied, had been more of a curse to her than a blessing. I hoped that, wherever she was, she had found some measure of happiness. Then too, I tried to imagine what it might feel like to bear a child and have it taken from me. Here my imagination failed me though. I only knew, in the revelation of my new-found love for Thomas, that if I bore his child I would fight for it to the death, and for him too.

  It was then that I remembered the dream I had had of Alison that night at Middlecote, of the peregrine falcon flying from her wrist, and the ruined hall. I stopped dead with the cold of the hoar frost chilling my feet to numbness. Had I held the key al
l this time but been too slow to realise? Did I already know where Edward had sent Arthur?

  I hurried up the slope towards the house, dodging between the apple trees, making for the library. I had only set foot in it for the first time that morning and it was a sorry place—the plaster crumbled from the walls and the remaining books were mildewed and damp. Thomas said that there had once been a fine collection of manuscripts there for his mother’s family, the De Morvens, had been great scholars. All I found was a broken desk, more suitable for firewood than for writing, and a pile of elaborate lineages. These had been popular in the days of the Queen’s grandfather, when the new Tudor dynasty had sought to excuse its taking of the throne through demonstrating its legitimate claim, or so Liz Aiglonby had told me once in one of her more astringent and less discreet moods. As a child, I had loved all the brightly coloured lines and decorations on the manuscripts, the shields and roses, the lions and lilies.

  The book I drew towards me was a poor specimen of the craft but it had what I needed, a list of all the noble families of England and their connection to one another. It made me smile that when this list had been compiled the eminent family of Seymour were no more than gentry. They were included only because Sir John Seymour’s wife Margaret Wentworth was a connection of the Howard Dukes of Norfolk. On the Wentworth side of the family though, I found what I was looking for. Lady Seymour had cousins called Tercel and their main estates lay in Northamptonshire, at a place called Harper’s Green. Just as Edward had lodged me with the Fenners when he needed to call on his cousins for a favour, had he lodged his illegitimate son with the Tercels?

  I closed the book carefully. I had no notion of whether I was following a true vision or my own imagination but it was all I could devise. The peregrine, the tercel, had been so fierce and vivid in the dream, clinging to Alison’s wrist. As for the ruined hall, I tried to recall the details, the date stone above the door, but all I could see were holly trees pressing close.