“One must keep one’s rivals closer than one’s friends, Kate,” the queen had told her one morning, frowning as she watched Lady Catherine dance with her friends. “Always remember that.”
Yet Lady Catherine only seemed to grow sadder and paler as the summer days passed, smiling only with Lady Jane, and, more worryingly, with the new Spanish ambassador. Was it because the handsome Edward Seymour, Lord Hertford, was not yet at court, and in her boredom she played with political schemes? Kate was sure of it, and so was Elizabeth.
Kate turned and made her way along the empty corridor. Nonsuch was small for a palace, pretty but compact around its courtyards and gardens, forcing much of the court to lodge in those picturesque tents on the grounds. This tower was set aside for the queen’s state apartments during her visit, and thus was quiet, with all her ladies outside attending her and the servants snatching rest. Only a few people loitered in the privy chamber, whispering near the open windows.
Yet Kate could hear the echo of noise from other parts of the house, the laughter from belowstairs, the bellow of Lord Arundel as he found something not quite perfect for the sight of the queen. She knew Elizabeth would grow restless sitting in the rose arbor idyll and would soon be leaping up to dash through the gardens or come inside to demand that everyone dance or play cards. She would forget then that she even wanted the book she’d sent Kate to fetch. But if she did remember and Kate had failed to return . . .
Kate laughed ruefully to think of the storm that would ensue. The queen had thrown a shoe at Lady Clinton just that morning. But such flashes of temper passed as quickly as they came.
Her steps quickened, and she was near racing when she reached the end of the corridor and swung around a doorway. She was so distracted by her errand, she almost tripped over a man standing there. His black robes blended into the shadows of the tapestry-draped walls.
Kate’s heart beat a little faster with the startlement, and she knew she had not yet recovered from what had happened on the frozen river. The man reached out to steady her, and his hand was freezing cold even through her silk sleeve. She stumbled back a step and looked up to see that it was Master Constable, Dr. Dee’s apprentice, who lurked there.
She barely knew Master Constable, but she had seen him trailing after Dr. Dee around the court, his arms filled with scrolls and books. He was said to be a naturally gifted astrologer and mathematician in his own right, and some allowed him to cast their horoscopes when Dr. Dee was occupied with the queen’s business.
But Kate remembered how he had declared Violet Roland of “melancholic” disposition, when Violet was one of the most lighthearted people she had ever met. So Kate had her doubts about his skills.
Especially now, as she peered up at him in the dim light. His round, pale face, still marred with youthful pimples, looked even more ghostly with his sparse fair hair tucked into a black cap. She had heard tell he had left Cambridge to study with Dr. Dee at the completion of his studies, which would put him in his early twenties, but he seemed younger. His eyes looked wide and startled as he squinted down at her, and she wondered what he was doing there. Surely he could not be on the queen’s business himself?
“Master Constable,” she said. “I am sorry, but I did not see you there. I thought everyone was outside enjoying the fine day.”
He swallowed audibly. “Mistress Haywood. The fault is entirely mine. I was sent on an errand by my master.”
“Dr. Dee?” Kate peered past him, as if she could find a clue to his task there, but she saw only the empty room. The queen’s throne sat on its dais, draped in a scarlet cloth of estate. Two guards in the royal livery of green and white stood at the doorway to her bedchamber, their halberds at the ready, so he could not have slipped in there. Yet it seemed strange that he was lurking about at all. Kate did not like the glint in his eyes, the way he kept shifting on his feet and would not quite look at her.
People who lived and made their way at a royal court were usually most adept at hiding their true feelings and motives behind merry smiles and flattering words. A few, like Catherine Grey, never seemed to gain the ability for playacting all the time, but most had learned that keeping their heads attached meant never revealing what was inside them. And most would sometimes let their masks drop when only a lowly female musician was nearby.
She thought of Lady Anne’s tale of murder and disappearance, here at this very palace, involving Dr. Dee so many years ago, and it made her feel suddenly cold. She wanted to back away from Master Constable, but something told her he was hiding something.
He seemed to be more of the Catherine Grey sort of courtier, unable to completely hide his feelings. But that seemed most odd for someone who was meant to be studying the deepest secrets of the universe.
“Aye, I must return to him immediately,” Master Constable said all in a rush, sidling around her. “If you will pardon me . . .”
He scurried away in a rustle of stiff black robes, a whiff of some strange chemical from no doubt fathomless experiments. Kate looked after him, puzzled.
“Ned,” she said to one of the guards at the bedchamber door, a young man who enjoyed music and was always ready for an idle chat, despite his stern face. Guards, much like musicians, could become invisible when needed and heard many interesting things. “Was that man here very long?”
Ned gave a snort and shifted his halberd to his other hand so she could slip past. “Not long. I think you frightened him. He was tiptoeing around the dais, as if we couldn’t even see him, but he didn’t touch anything.”
“Most odd,” Kate murmured. She studied the dais, which was grand and gilded, draped in swaths of brocade and cloth of gold, but it held no concealed secrets that she could see. “If he perchance comes back, would you let me know?”
Ned’s eyes narrowed. Like everyone else at court, he did enjoy an intrigue. “In trouble, is he?”
“Not that I am aware of. But one never knows.” Kate gave him a quick smile and hurried into the royal bedchamber to find the queen’s book. She, like Master Constable, had an errand to perform, and she had already been too long at it.
The bedchamber, like the privy chamber outside, was grand and beautiful, but also small and intimate, perfectly designed to appeal to Elizabeth. The four-poster bed, with its massive carved headboard, had been carried from palace to palace and was draped in purple velvet and gold tassels, piled high with lace-edged pillows. These matched the cushions scattered across the floor for her ladies. Tapestry frames with half-finished work were propped up along the walls, among clothes chests and locked boxes of state documents waiting for the queen’s changeable attention. Lapdogs snored among the pillows, and the scent of flowery perfumes and the smoke of beeswax candles hung in the air.
Queen Elizabeth’s desk was placed near the open window, and the soft breeze from outside rustled the documents held down with a carved crystal weight. The books were stacked beside them, and Kate hurried over to find the one she sought, a slim volume of poems lately arrived from Milan. No sermons or philosophy to be read today, not here at golden Nonsuch.
As Kate took up the leather-bound volume, her glance fell on the papers waiting for the queen’s fleeting attention before she was distracted by a dance or a song. The one on top appeared to be written in some code, a mix of strange letters and numbers, but the tiny seal at the top showed it came from the queen’s embassy in Paris. Curious, she took it up and read it. Master Cecil had given her a few lessons of late, but her skills were still very elementary. All she could make out was Queen Mary Stuart’s name.
A sudden loud noise from below the open window snatched her attention from the document. A burst of trumpets, like a royal fanfare. She quickly slid the paper back into place and leaned over the casement to peer outside.
The view below the bedchamber faced away from the rose garden, toward the long, winding drive that led from the road, past the elaborate confection
of the gatehouse to Nonsuch. The gilded gates were thrown open, and a crowd of curious onlookers gathered along the graveled lane. Satin-and-velvet-clad courtiers jostled together like children at a market fair. Even the most jaded among them needed some excitement now and then.
Kate shielded her eyes from the glitter of the sun and saw a most intriguing sight indeed. A caravan of brilliantly painted carts, drawn by black horses caparisoned in gold, wheeled by musicians who walked alongside, clad in more black and gold, with their drums, tambours, and trumpets. Bright flags flew from every corner of every vehicle. Banners snapped in the breeze. It was like a market fair on the move.
“Kate! Kate, are you here?” someone cried, and Kate turned to see Violet Roland rushing through the door. Her pale blue skirts swirled and shimmered, and her pretty face was flushed pink with excitement.
“I’m here, just fetching the queen’s book,” Kate said, holding up the volume of poetry. The music grew louder outside the window, an alluring, winding tune that was strangely—familiar.
Kate suddenly realized it was one of her songs, a merry tune she had written for the queen’s favorite dance, an Italian volta. She started to spin back to the window, but Violet grabbed her hand.
“Her Majesty says you must come at once,” Violet said breathlessly. “There is ever such a marvelous sight to be seen!”
“A company of players?” Kate gestured to the window behind her. ’Twas true that she was not so jaded as to fail to be excited at the prospect of a new play. Long years of quiet exile in the countryside were not so far behind her that she didn’t long for every bit of color, of music, of loveliness.
But the months since the queen’s coronation had been filled with pageants, banquets, and masques. What made this one different? Why did the queen need her there now?
And why were they playing her song?
Before she could peer out the window again, Violet tightened her grip on Kate’s hand and pulled her along for a mad dash along the corridors and down the stairs. Kate held tight to the book with her other hand, laughing. Violet’s sense of fun always reached out and grabbed everyone else around her.
They tumbled out into the garden, where Violet’s brother, Thomas Roland, secretary to Lord Arundel, waited with his friend the lovely Master Green. Master Roland was as handsome and golden as his sister, and the three of them looked like an image out of a poem as they linked arms, laughing together.
The music was louder there, the notes she’d written winding and twisting to a glorious crescendo. She had never heard it played thus, and it was quite thrilling.
Violet drew her right up to where the queen waited, on the marble steps leading to the open doors of the palace. Elizabeth looked like a goddess in a beam of sunlight, with her bright hair and green gown, the gleam of her pearls and emeralds. She was framed by the marble statues flanking the doors, of Athena and Hera and Aphrodite, and by her ladies in their flowerlike gowns.
“Ah, Kate. Good, there you are,” Elizabeth said. “I need you to help us welcome an old friend to Nonsuch.”
Elizabeth held out her hand to beckon Kate closer, the ruby-and-pearl ring that had once belonged to Anne Boleyn sparkling beside the large coronation ring. Some of the courtiers closest to the queen edged back and threw Kate puzzled glances as she hurried past them, as if they wondered at this mark of favor. But Catherine Carey, Lady Knollys, Elizabeth’s Boleyn cousin, who stood just behind the queen, gave Kate a nod and a small smile.
Kate stopped on the marble step below the queen and curtsied. “A friend, Your Majesty?”
“Aye, someone who has come to amuse us in these long summer days.” Elizabeth leaned closer and whispered with a teasing smile, “Or mayhap especially to amuse you.”
Kate turned to see that the bright, noisy procession had wound its way to a halt on the graveled drive. The horses tossed their ribbon-braided manes, and the trumpets gave one last fanfare. And, at the procession’s head, mounted on a pure white horse clad in green and gold, was a figure surely designed to make all the ladies sigh. Tall, strongly muscled under close-fitting green-and-white silk, sparkling with gem-scattered sleeves.
He swept off his plumed cap, and the sunlight shimmered on pale golden hair. He looked up, laughing, and gracefully leaped from the saddle to fall to one knee before the queen. It was Rob Cartman.
Kate pressed her hand to her lips to hold back a startled gasp. When last she had seen him, he had been thin and drawn tight with fury, gray faced from days in Clink Gaol and burning for revenge for the murderer of his mistress. That was right after the queen’s coronation, when a murderer was loose in the queen’s court. Now . . .
Now he looked like a golden god, a phoenix rising from the cold ashes of last winter’s tragedy to new heights of beauty.
“Rob,” she whispered.
He tossed back a shining wave of hair and grinned up at her, and she saw he was indeed the Rob he had been when they first met at Hatfield House and his troupe appeared to lighten their dull days of exile. Young and eager, shining with ambition.
The queen held out her hand for him to kiss. “Master Cartman, we are happy to welcome you back to our court at last. You and your company amused us much at Hatfield last year. We trust you have a new play for us now?”
Rob bowed over her hand in an elaborate salute that made her laugh. “We have a farce to make Your Majesty laugh—or a romantical tragedy to make her weep, whichever she may prefer. Our talents are always at your complete disposal.”
“Most excellent. A comedy, I think. Nothing to make us cry in these warm days. You must consult our musician, then. Mistress Haywood will help you anon.” With one last smile, Elizabeth took Robert Dudley’s arm and swept into the house in a flurry of grass-green skirts. Everyone scurried to follow, Lord Arundel practically tumbling over himself to try to wrest her from Dudley and claim his rights as host.
Kate was left with Rob Cartman. His company still moved around the drive, led by the queen’s footmen, and some of them waved at her and called greetings. Harry, the company’s tall, gangly apprentice, whom Kate had forced to lead her through Southwark to find Rob last winter, gave her a low bow and a wincing expression that made her laugh.
It was hard to tear her gaze from Rob, though. His golden glow was almost blinding.
“Greetings, fair Kate,” he said. “You are looking very well indeed.” He took her hand from where it rested against her pink silk skirt and kissed her fingers, callused from her lute strings. It was different from the salute he had made to the queen, simple and lingering, no theatrical flourishes. His touch was warm through his gloves.
“And you, Rob,” she managed to answer. She was much too flustered by his touch, remembering a long-ago kiss by the frozen river. Did he remember it, too? “You are looking—very well indeed.”
CHAPTER THREE
“What has brought you to Nonsuch, then, Rob?” Kate asked as they strolled around the decorative lake near the palace. Swans glided serenely on the placid blue waters, the white marble follies reflected in their paths. Across the water, set off by itself like a jewel, was a small, round classical temple with a domed roof and covered walkway. The towers of the house rose above the trees planted in shady groves along the banks, and purple and white flowers tumbled underfoot in a fragrant carpet. Like everything else there, it was designed to enchant and beguile.
Just like Rob himself, Kate feared.
“Would you believe me if I said you brought me here, Kate?” he answered.
She turned to look up at him, startled. His expression in that one unguarded instant was solemn, his pale blue eyes shadowed. Then he laughed and gave her one of his theatrical bows.
“Nay, not a bit,” Kate said, making herself laugh, too. She knew all too well the dangers of taking a man like Rob at all seriously. He was much too handsome and charming, and he knew how to use those assets to get his own way. She s
aw it with the men of the court every day. “I would not believe it.”
Rob shook his head and pressed his hand over his heart. A gold ring on his smallest finger gleamed next to the fine silk and the silver embroidery. Whatever he had been up to of late, it seemed profitable.
“Your doubts wound me, fair Kate,” he said with a deep sigh. “It has been much too long since we met, and I have thought of you often.”
“But it was not me who summoned you to Nonsuch.”
“Nay. ’Twas Master Benger, the queen’s Master of the Revels, who wrote and asked if we would present a masque for Her Majesty’s summer progress. It seems the queen expressed a wish to see us perform again herself.”
“And how did this letter find you?”
“Surely the queen has eyes everywhere. A troupe of players cannot make themselves obscure.” His gaze shifted away, over the lake, and Kate studied him carefully.
It was true Rob was a fine actor, a practiced player since his childhood, and he was adept at donning a merry mask whenever needed. But Kate was a player, too, a musician making her way through the thorny thicket of the nobility, and she had learned a thing or two since she and Rob had last met. She had learned much from him as well. The dangers of a fiery temper. The pain of losing what one loved. The importance of always moving forward.
And she could see in his eyes that he was hiding something.
“What have you been doing since the coronation?” she asked. She sat down on one of the carved stone benches overlooking the water and carefully arranged her pink-and-white silk skirts. She pretended to be not much interested in his answer, one way or another. Another thing she had learned of late at court.
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