A King's Betrayal
Page 37
Tomas saw that the paper had not yet caught. ‘Are you sure? It is not too late…’
‘Listen…’
From outside the door they heard the sound of a woman’s laughter, followed by the deeper tones of a man. As they stood in silence, watching the parchment turn brown and then burst into flames Elspeth came in. With her was Tomas’s young cousin Matthew, lately returned from the wars in France with a knighthood for his bravery. He was carrying Katharine in his arms and pretending to bite her fists as she screamed in delight and pounded him with her feet. The look of happiness on Elspeth’s face as she watched the man and child told her parents all they wished to know.
‘We have all we want,’ Beatrice whispered to Tomas. ‘Perhaps soon there will be a wedding and more children to light our lives. To me that is worth all the thrones in Christendom.’
‘God give us grace to see it,’ Tomas said and smiled at her. ‘We have been blessed, Beatrice – and I believe Elspeth has found her love at last.’
‘As have I,’ she whispered and touched his hand.’
Linda Sole has written more than a hundred and twenty books, some under the names of Anne Herries, Anne Ireland and Lynn Granville. She enjoys hearing from her readers and invites you to contact her through her website if you wish to comment on her books.
www.lindasole.co.uk
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Author’s note.
What glory might have been had Richard’s daughter come to the throne of England. With his high minded principles of kingly duty; his certainty that his was the right and the power; his dreams of peace and his love of architecture and learning combined with Beth’s sweet nature and generosity. Instead, England would be plunged into bloody civil war again and again as the War of the Roses began and did not end until Henry Tudor snatched the throne and made it safe by marriage. Yet Henry V111 gave us Elizabeth and all that came after…
As an author I may dream and what more dreams will my pen weave of England’s secret royal sons and daughters?