“Nothing passed between us.”
“Now that is an open lie. Under your hand are the depositions of your servants who have confessed to a great deal that passed between you and Seymour—his invading your very bedchamber and his treasonous behavior—”
“There was no treason!” Elizabeth cut him off, her voice high and indignant. “Nor could there have been. You seek to prove that he planned marriage with me and thus committed treason … while his wife was in the chamber with us? You make a lie of what may well have been foolish but was also innocent as Queen Catherine’s presence proves. And as I have said, and my servants have said, I have never seen Sir Thomas since Queen Catherine died.”
“You have sent Seymour messages since the queen died.”
“Yes, and you have seen my copies of the letters sent and seen his replies. All of them were about a house in London for me.”
“Seymour made proposals that you exchange the lands your father willed for your upkeep for lands that adjoined his.”
“And I thought it a foolish notion and told Parry so. You must know that I have not requested any change in the properties assigned to me.”
“But Parry did tell you that he believed Seymour to be leaning toward a proposal of marriage.”
“Yes, and he asked me if the Council and the king would approve it whether I would agree. You know that. We all told you about it. Never. Never have Mistress Ashley or Master Parry suggested that I marry anyone without the full consent of the king and the Council. It is not treason to talk of possibilities so long as all are agreed that nothing is possible outside of my father’s last will.”
That was not the end of the questioning, but the sharper and more accusatory Tyrwhitt’s statements, the calmer and more sure were Elizabeth’s replies. Indeed, Tyrwhitt’s anger and frustration brought assurance that her Da had understood the case. What Parry and Kat confessed was not treasonous. She and Tyrwhitt were both weary and scarcely civil by the time Sir Robert rose to his feet.
“You are to write your own confession,” he snarled. “It is to be complete. Very complete. This is your last chance to clear your conscience and escape the consequences of your folly.”
Elizabeth doubted that; she was certain that Sir Robert would continue his persecution until the Council recalled him or she confessed to treason, but she had been distracted from that depressing idea. She had noticed a curious circumstance during the long questioning. It seemed to her that before each strong accusation or demand a ruby ring on Tyrwhitt’s hand flashed brighter.
She told herself that the change in light might well be owing to a movement of Sir Robert’s hand. Perhaps he had a tremor so slight she could not see it, but it was the hand about which she sensed the faint aura of magic. She remembered the amulet she had touched which had brought her near death and swallowed to ease a suddenly dry throat. Had he ever touched her with that ring?
Although she thought about it all through the evening meal, which made her very silent and seemed to give Tyrwhitt much satisfaction, she could not remember his ever touching her at all. What could she do to protect herself? The iron cross she wore protected her from being seized by the Unseleighe, but it had done her no good against the evil amulet. For now, she resolved, she would stay well away from Tyrwhitt so he could not touch her.
On the sixth of February, Elizabeth obediently confirmed in writing the evidence Kat and Parry had given, but not in a way that could give Tyrwhitt any satisfaction. As concerning Mistress Ashley, she wrote, she never advised me unto it, but said always (when any talked of my marriage) that she would never have me marry, neither in England or out of England, without the consent of the King’s Majesty, Your Grace’s, and the Council’s. Nor did she forget to take the chance to complain again about the malicious rumors of her pregnancy and to ask that the rumors be publicly denied.
Needless to say Tyrwhitt was infuriated. He wrote his own letter, pointing out that They all sing one song. And so I think they would not do unless they set the note before. The one situation he did not consider was that what they said happened to be the truth, but he could not really contemplate that while Chancellor Rich’s diamond shone so brightly on his finger.
Two more weeks passed in fruitless attempts to break Elizabeth’s resistance, and then Tyrwhitt announced that the Council had decided Mistress Ashley had shown herself unfit to be Elizabeth’s governess. Lady Tyrwhitt, Sir Robert’s wife, would supply that place. If he hoped that in her loneliness Elizabeth would transfer her affection from Kat to his wife, he showed he had learned nothing about Elizabeth’s nature.
Elizabeth Tyrwhitt was herself not at all happy with the appointment and it soon seemed to be a foretaste of hell. Not only would Elizabeth scarcely speak to her—in fact Elizabeth addressed all her remarks to her maids of honor, whom Tyrwhitt had restored to her in an effort to pave his wife’s way with favor—but poor Lady Tyrwhitt seemed to be reduced to bumbling adolescence in Elizabeth’s presence. She constantly tripped over her own feet, caught her shoes in the rug so that she nearly pitched forward on her face, and most destructive to her dignity, exploded into and out of rooms as if she were being pushed or pulled through the doors.
Elizabeth kept her mischief a secret because she knew how opposed Denno was to any use of magic except in dire emergency. But this was, in her opinion, a dire emergency; if she did not have some way to express her frustration and rage, she felt she would have yielded to despair despite Denno’s love and support and confessed to anything, hoping to die and be free of torment.
First she had intended to tell him, thinking how he would laugh at her cleverness in providing relief and revenge for herself, but then she had second thoughts. He was her one great comfort, and might not think tripping poor Lady Tyrwhitt was funny. She did not want him to scold her for being petty and mean to someone who was helpless against her.
Each time she thought of Denno, she let Lady Tyrwhitt walk in peace, but thinking about spells brought her mind back to the ring on Tyrwhitt’s finger. Was he also a helpless victim of the hatred the Unseleighe bore her? It was significant, Elizabeth thought, that he was efficient and fair about running her household; he did not persecute her servants. For example when his wife was foisted on her to replace Kat she had begged him not to appoint anyone in Parry’s place, and he had sighed but assigned one of his own clerks to keep her accounts. An honest clerk, too, who saved her a hundred pounds a year.
But if Sir Robert was under an Unseleighe spell, what could she do? She knew no spells for breaking other spells, aside from the one-word commands that reversed spells she herself had cast. She did try all of those, staring at the ring while Tyrwhitt lectured her on the benefits of confession. To stare was safe enough. Sir Robert doubtless thought she had lowered her eyes in shame or to hide her thoughts.
None of the commands she gave worked. Perhaps it would be necessary to touch the ring … but she was afraid to do that. And Denno would murder her for taking such a chance, even if no harm came of it. Yet she could not ask his advice. He knew she could see through illusion, yet she could not see any real evidence of a spell on the ring. She remembered the crawling lights on the evil amulet; she had seen that clearly enough though she did not then know what it meant.
Thus she was reluctant to tell Denno about the faint aura and the possible flashes of light in the ring. She did not want him to take away the possibly foolish hope that the enmity came from the Dark Sidhe rather than from people she knew and thought liked her. Also from what she had heard from Denno and Lady Alana it was far more difficult to remove a spell cast by another. That was work for a healer or a magus.
Still as Tyrwhitt continued to nag at her to confess when she knew any sane man would have accepted that there was nothing to confess, she became more desperate. On the twenty-first of February, she wrote to the Protector again, gritting her teeth as Tyrwhitt sat opposite her urging phrasing that would make her sound shamed and guilty. The ring was very bright. She did not dare touch
it with her own hand, but was there not something else she could use? Something that would carry her essence but protect her.
Later when Elizabeth was changing her morning gown for one more suitable for dinner, she by habit touched her iron cross to be sure the black chain was hidden and the cross lay flat and would not be seen. The metal was warm from her body. Surely, she thought, that warmth carried her essence, and the black cross protected her from the creatures from Underhill, even the Sidhe. She could touch the ring with the cross. Maybe the iron would break the spell.
How? What excuse could she give for taking Sir Robert’s hand? What excuse could she have for pressing a black iron cross to his ring? Elizabeth had an active and inventive mind but even she could not think of any rational reasons for such actions. She was quiet and thoughtful during dinner until a swinging door caught a servant unaware. The servant cried out in alarm and a tray of serving dishes, all of them fortunately metal and not breakable, crashed to the floor.
The ear-splitting crash and the servant’s scream shocked everyone into a momentary paralysis. Elizabeth recovered a heartbeat before the others and revelation swept through her. She didn’t need to explain why she wanted to touch Tyrwhitt’s hand and there was no reason that he needed to know she had touched his ring with her cross. All she needed was to be alone with Sir Robert, except for Blanche, for five minutes.
Usually that was no problem. Almost every day in the past, Tyrwhitt sent her maidens away so there would be no witnesses to complain that he pressed her too hard. As soon as her maidens had withdrawn to the other end of the room, Elizabeth intended to use bod oergeulo on him. While he was frozen, she could pull out her cross and press it against the ring. Elizabeth trembled with expectation, one moment with hope and the next with fear that it would not work.
For spite it seemed Tyrwhitt did not come near her all the next day. He was waiting, in fact, for news that the Council had formally accused Seymour of high treason. There were thirty-three Articles, one of which included plotting to marry “the Lady Elizabeth by secret and crafty means, to the danger of the King’s person.” If Seymour confessed that he had done so and that Elizabeth had agreed, Tyrwhitt would have evidence against her at last and force a confession from her.
Sir Robert licked his lips, but he was aware of a kind of discomfort within his triumph. On the twenty-third, the charges were read aloud to Seymour but he refused to answer them, demanding that his accusers come before him and that he be given an open trial where he might make his declaration before all the world. But Seymour was to have no trial. Parliament passed an Act of Attainder against him.
On the third of March, Seymour was informed there was to be no trial, and he did speak out. He denied that he had ever meant to usurp his brother’s position as Protector or abduct the king. He denied all the serious charges, only confessing to sending the king pocket money. And he never once mentioned Lady Elizabeth, as if she was not part of his plans.
That news came to Hatfield in the evening. It was a disappointment. Tyrwhitt’s finger itched and he rubbed the ruby ring. Well, but only he knew that Seymour had denied everything. He swallowed down a slight queasiness, for in general he was an honest man and decided to try one last time to wring a confession from Elizabeth. It was for her own good after all. He would tell her that Seymour had confessed he intended to marry her so she need no longer lie to protect him. To save herself she should speak the truth.
She had been reading when he came in. To his surprise, she laid the book down on a small table and waved away the attendant maidens. Lady Tyrwhitt sighed but went with them to be sure that their conversation would cover any words between her husband and Elizabeth.
“I bring you sad news about the Lord High Admiral. The Council has evidence of many crimes and has brought against him thirty-three Articles—”
Elizabeth lifted her head. “Bod oergeulo.”
Her voice was just above a murmur. If any sound carried to the women across the room, it would seem that she answered something Tyrwhitt had said. Hurriedly, trembling with hope, she brought out the cross that she had been carrying in her pocket for days and touched it to the ruby ring.
Nothing seemed to happen. Tears rose in Elizabeth’s eyes and she swallowed hard and muttered, “Dihuno” because she did not dare keep Sir Robert frozen. Someone might notice.
“—of which the Admiral denied all except that of giving pocket money to the king,” Tyrwhitt continued, with no sign he knew a few minutes had been carved out of his life. “This gives you one more chance to state your own case to the Protector before any confession by Sir Thomas involves you.”
Elizabeth blinked away her tears of disappointment. “I have told you a thousand times that there is nothing on my part to confess, no matter what Sir Thomas says. Yes, there were rumors in my household that the Admiral wished to marry me, but I did not agree, and no one urged me to accept him unless the offer was made with the permission of the king and Council.”
Tyrwhitt stared at her with a rather puzzled expression. “So you have,” he said. “So you have.”
Chapter 36
Thomas Seymour was executed on the twentieth of March but he made no confession and he never mentioned Elizabeth’s name. Vidal exploded and killed every weak creature that was not well shielded for half a day. Nothing he had done had saved his tool or damaged the red-haired bitch. However, Vidal had learned several frustrating lessons about working with humans between the time the accusations against Seymour were first made and his death. He learned that Chancellor Rich’s self-interest was strong enough to override the subtle compulsions Vidal had set upon him to save Seymour.
First Vidal hoped to prevent the Council from acting against Seymour by having Rich convince the young king that he should show mercy. However when Rich came with the rest of the Council to request permission to go forward with the proceedings, he saw from Edward’s expression that an appeal would be useless. Rich remembered the tale told by the guardsman and thought Seymour should have shot the guard instead of the dog. Edward had loved the dog.
In the face of the hard evidence about Seymour’s crimes, Rich fought the urges he felt to defend Seymour. He did once speak to the Protector, implying that Seymour’s ambition had been fed by favorable suggestions from Lady Elizabeth, but the earl of Warwick challenged his implication of Elizabeth. Warwick pointed out that after more than a month of questioning, Rich’s own choice of investigator had failed to find a single sign of Elizabeth’s favor toward Seymour.
Rich suppressed Vidal’s subtle compulsions, which he thought of as a stupid sentimentality toward Seymour, and withdrew to neutrality. About the only effect Vidal’s yellow diamond had was that Rich did make sure the plan to marry Elizabeth was one of the Articles charged against Sir Thomas. Vidal growled and spat, but Rich was simply so intent on his own self-interest that subtle magic could not influence him. Well, Vidal decided, if Rich would not serve his purpose willingly, he would do so unwillingly.
Vidal drew Rich to Otstargi’s house a week before the Bill of Attainder had been presented in Parliament and set a compulsion that would force Rich to speak against the bill. Rich’s knowledge of the Parliament and what was politically possible fought so hard against the spell that the result was a waxwork figure. Even Vidal recognized no one could for a moment believe the bespelled creature was natural. It would be clear to every man in the Parliament either that the person speaking was not Rich or that Rich was under a spell.
So furious that his hands dripped power and burn spots appeared on the floor of Otstargi’s chamber, Vidal suddenly began to tremble with weakness. The power he had expended in calling Rich to him, bespelling Rich, and then expended in his futile rage was not being renewed in the mortal world.
Vidal drew back everything he could as he removed the compulsion from Rich, but he saved no power because he then had to wipe out Rich’s memory of his visit to Otstargi. Barely restraining himself from killing the man—he knew Rich would be useful in
the future—Vidal sent Rich on his way.
Then he sat down and gathered his rage-scattered wits to plan his next move. The door to disgracing Elizabeth and thus removing her from the succession quietly in a way that would not incur vengeance from Oberon was closed and would not open again. Even if Elizabeth was too stupid to learn and Vidal could find another man to tempt her, Denoriel and Aleneil would make sure she had no more chances to misbehave.
Time was growing short, too. Vidal knew from looking into Rich’s mind that the first signs of Edward’s illness were appearing. The king’s human physicians had not yet noticed, but Vidal knew what that look of health and blooming cheeks presaged. In a year or two the boy would begin to cough and have trouble with his breathing. Then he would die.
Vidal hissed with irritation. That poisoned thorn had been meant for Elizabeth. Curse her. That it touched Edward had been her fault. Curse Denoriel and Aleneil, and Rhoslyn and Pasgen, too, for being traitors. Once Edward was known to be failing, Elizabeth would be Mary’s heir presumptive.
The whole Bright Court would have its eyes on the red-haired monster in eager anticipation of the feast of joy and song and art her reign would bring to them. Vidal ground his teeth. She would be watched and guarded both in the mortal world and Underhill. He had no more time to waste on elaborate schemes that he could not control in the mortal world. Elizabeth must die before she gained greater importance, before anyone realized that Edward would not reign long.
By the beginning of March, Elizabeth had high hopes that her cross had broken the evil spell on Tyrwhitt’s ruby ring. The ruby was still very beautiful, but it only caught the light from beams of sunlight or from a flickering candle. And what she had felt, faint as it had been, was now gone completely.
Certainly Sir Robert no longer pressed her to confess her plans to marry Seymour. He even remarked to his wife in their bedchamber that he wondered why he had been so certain of her guilt.
By Slanderous Tongues Page 55
