Queenbreaker: Perseverance (The Queenbreaker Trilogy Book 1) (3 page)

Shelton
House, London

March
1533

London
welcomed us with dark, roiling skies and cold, driving rain. It proved a boon
as it cleared the rabbit warren streets of traffic around Blackfriars. Our
departure last September had not been nearly so smooth.

The
instant Mother had learned that one of the kitchen boys had caught the sweat a
regulated panic swept the household. All of the Sheltons in residence were
thrown on horses and out the gate. The last outbreak five years before had
killed thousands in London with no respect for rank or godliness—Anne
herself had almost succumbed.

By
the time we’d reached Norfolk, three servants, including that kitchen boy, had
died. So said Mother’s letter. Doctor Shaxton gave it over to Ralph, whose
close-set eyes tore the parchment, seeking an answer to the question we all
shared. When could we return? When could Gabrielle resume her flirtatious
parades in the garden? When could Emma resume her spying? When would I see Tom
Clere again?

My
answer had come, and it was never.

I swore before God never to speak his
name again. I must swear the same for thinking it!

I
flung back the tears warming my eyes. I was home. It was no moment for grief. I
was back in London with an honest chance to go to court.

God bless cousin Anne! Queen Anne. I
cannot make that mistake. We are not familiars.

There
never was a chance for it. Anne was twelve years my senior. She had been sent
to live in the Low Countries at seven. A year later, when our King Henry’s
youngest sister wed old King Louis Capet, she’d joined the French court. After
Louis died and François became the new king, Anne had remained another seven
years.

Anne
was raised amongst royalty.

My
stomach juices curdled. Why hadn’t my parents done more for me? Neither of us
was the eldest, but Anne’s parents had not stinted on her upbringing.

Would
we have gotten our Semmonet without Uncle Wiltshire? Not likely. Many of our
tutors too came to us from the Wiltshire household. Would Father have gotten
the office of Sheriff back in Norfolk without Uncle Wiltshire’s patronage? No.
Would we have this fashionable house on the river, a stone’s throw from
Bridewell Palace and Blackfriars, except for Uncle Wiltshire’s move to a
grander seat, courtesy of the King? Never.

And,
of course, the greatest impediment to my ever coming to know Anne was Mother
herself. An enmity existed that could not be wholly laid to Mother’s
disapproval for the King’s divorcing Spanish Katherine.

Once
the King had finally exiled Katherine from court two years ago, Mother shed the
last of her scruples and bent her head to the new order of things. She sent
Anne many messages of goodwill. Anne’s replies were courteous, but not
friendly. And an invitation to join Anne’s ever-growing retinue at court had
never come.
Until now.

“Ho,
porter!” Tom’s shout killed my next broody thought in the cradle. We were just
outside our gate. The stout walls of Blackfriars loomed on our right. Our
house—leased from Blackfriars—stood at the corner of the Thames and
the Fleet River. Bridewell Palace faced us directly across the river.

The
gatehouse’s metal studded oak doors swung open without our having to pause. We
rode under the archway into the courtyard well before the appointed hour. None
of us had complained at the withering pace our brother had set from Norfolk.
We’d all shared the same jubilation at the cause of our return, and the same
delight watching Ralph’s face fall when Tom told him he was not to come.

“But—but
what am I to do here?” he’d demanded. “Watch the snow melt?”

Tom,
who loved Ralph as a good brother should, and loathed him, as a sensible person
ought, clapped his shoulder so hard Ralph swayed.

“Be
of good cheer, brother,” Tom declared, smile winsome with lies. “You’re not
forgotten. Father bids you visit Sir Roger and explain how the question of his
betrothal must wait a while.”

Ralph
blanched. “But Sir Ralph—h-he expects it. He won’t agree my betrothal
with Mistress Amy til his is accomplished.”

A
soft feather of pity tickled my chest. I squashed it with a fulsome laugh.

“Best
look another way for a bride, brother. For I will never return to Norfolk.”

Ralph’s
mouth twisted. “You’ll come back a disgrace or in a box, you hag!”

Tom
grabbed Ralph’s ear. “You’re such a charming fellow, Ralph. It’s not a wonder
you’re so favored by the girls of quality. Like Thomasine.” Tom sighed as he
bent the top of Ralph’s ear down til we all heard a fleshy pop. Ralph bit his
lower lip instead of screaming. “Mind your manners and wish your sisters well
or I’ll wed Amy Wodehouse myself.”

Tom’s
threat struck tears in Ralph’s eyes.

If
Amy Wodehouse had ever had a say in the matter, and if our brother Tom had ever
looked her way, Ralph’s hopes would never have been born.

The
next morning Ralph saw us off with proper wishes for our good health and
success at court.

As
we rode out the gatehouse, I looked back. Semmonet stood at an upper window,
wrapped in a thick rug. There’d been no question that she would stay behind;
she would not bear up under the weather and rapid pace we must set. Her tired
face receded as we rode across the moat, but I saw her cross herself as my
horse set its first hoof on the bridge across the water as she always did for
me. Though I’d outgrown my strange childhood terror of water years ago,
Semmonet remembered my screams and tears so well she feared they might
resurface anytime I faced it. I sighed and waved to show her all was well.

God
had done me a disservice in giving me Ralph for brother, but he’d blessed me in
Tom and Semmonet so I could abide him.

We
halted our horses near the door. Grooms ran from the stables to hold their
heads. Brother Tom helped Gabrielle down from her palfrey. Emma waited for his
aid. I shifted for myself, and so was the first one under a dry roof.

I
recognized none of the servants circling us, relieving us of sodden cloaks and
gloves. Not even Mrs. Clyde who had been our London housekeeper since I was
eight. Mrs. Clyde who had nursed me through the
sweat
when I was nine, and my own mother fled back to Norfolk with
everyone else.

“Where
are our people?” I whispered to Tom as he shed his waterlogged fustian cloak.

“Sacked,”
he whispered back. “They didn’t want any taint of the
sweat
lingering in the air, let alone the kitchen.”

“Why
not burn down the house then?” I muttered.

Tom
tugged my damp braid. “Keep your temper, little sister. Sir John and Lady
Shelton are in no mood.”

“They
never are,” I said and hurried upstairs to change into a dry gown.

I
found our room unchanged at least. Gabrielle’s bed still commanded the warmest
corner beside the fireplace. Her cast-off yellow wool bed curtains still hung
from the other, smaller bed I shared with Emma. The empty dressing table still
looked out over the courtyard and not the more desirable river.

“You
are new.”

A
stolid looking girl, in the plain brown homespun Mother favored for our
servants, stood beside the fireplace. She bobbed a respectful curtsey, hands
primly clasped at her waist.

“I
am Janet de Walle, mistress.”

Her
accent startled me. “You are Flemish?”

“Yes,
mistress.”

We’d
never had a foreign house servant. Mother considered their habits too strange
and ingrained to train away.

“What
happened to Dulce Hopwood?”

“I
do not know, mistress.”

Her
empty expression seemed honest.

“Well,
what do you know?” I finally asked as she continued staring at me.

“I
was engaged to serve the daughters of Lady Shelton by Mrs. Margaret Shelton.”

“Madge
hired you?” I studied her more closely. She was no older than Dulce—so
maybe nineteen. She had the pale yellow hair and watery blue eyes of a
Lowlander. Freckles marred an otherwise enviable complexion. She had very
pretty hands, delicate knuckles,
perfect
oval nail
beds. Not like poor Dulce Hopwood’s lye roughened lumps. That’s what comes of
making a laundress a lady’s maid, Mother had said.

“Whom
did you serve before us?”

“I
was in the household of Lord Lisle in Calais, mistress. I served his daughter,
Lady Grace.”

My
eyebrows climbed my forehead. Lord Lisle was the King’s own uncle. Lady Grace
was his first cousin.

How in God’s name did Madge wriggle her
away from the Lisles? There must be something wrong with her.

I
didn’t try to temper my suspicion. “Were you dismissed?”

Janet
de Walle looked me square in the eye. “No, mistress. I have family in London I
wished to be near.”

I
detected no hint of deception and I knew every one a girl possessed.

“Very
well,” I said and turned my back to her. Janet didn’t hesitate. She tugged at
my bodice laces.

“You’d
best have quick fingers,” I said. “Gabrielle will pinch you if you do not.

Minutes
later, Emma and Gabrielle found me already out of my bedraggled dress, standing
in a fresh white kirtle before the fire. Janet pulled a brown skirt and gray
sleeves from the chest at the foot of our bed. They were the only things I’d
left behind, owing to their threadbare ugliness, but they were dry and would
do. Unwilling to fall further behind, Gabrielle drafted Emma as her tiring
woman.

“Faster,”
she bade Emma. “You don’t want to be last downstairs.”

“You
will be, if you help Gabrielle,” I said.

Emma’s
fingers faltered then stopped altogether on the laces of Gabrielle’s sleeve.

“Come
over here and I’ll help you,” I offered Emma a sweet toothy smile she might
believe.

“She’s
a liar, Emma. Keep working,” Gabrielle commanded.

Emma’s
bright blue eyes thinned, sensing we both meant her undoing.

“Truly,
I’ll help you,” I assured her. “Gabrielle always comes first in everything.
Didn’t we ride behind her all the way from Norfolk? Aren’t we wearing her mud?
‘Tis only fair she be last today.”

“Fine.”
Gabrielle snapped her fingers at Janet. “I’ll have the new girl to help me.”

I
grabbed Janet’s wrist. “Janet’s wanted in the kitchen. Aren’t you Janet?”

Simple-faced
Janet proved she had no simple mind when she ducked a curtsey in Gabrielle’s
direction and ran out the door. Gabrielle’s mouth dropped.

“You
bribed her!”

“I didn’t have to,” I said
,
honey sugaring my
voice
. “I told her you were the one used to slap poor Dulce Hopwood
whenever she tied you too tight or too loose or whichever way your belly felt
inclined.”

Gabrielle’s
fair skin flared scarlet. “You evil cow!”

“You’re
the cow,” sniffed Emma. “’Twasn’t Dulce’s fault you like the sugar plums too
much.”

“Nor
the sweetmeat,” I added.

“The
sweetbreads too.” Emma scowled. “Sweetbreads are foul.”

Gabrielle’s
lips peeled away from her gleaming teeth. I opened my mouth ready with another
favorite item of her gluttony when she struck. Her flat hand caught my jaw.
Just as swift, my fist collided with her cheekbone. Gabrielle staggered.

“My
God!” Emma gasped. “You’ve ruined Gabrielle’s looks!”

Gabrielle
dashed to the small mirror on our dressing table.

“You
wicked bitch!” She whirled around, displaying the damage. “I cannot be seen
like this!”

It
was going to be true. The delicate skin beneath her eye already swelled. Mother
would keep her in the house until the bruising completely faded—a seven
day at least.

“There’s
naught there,” I scoffed. “I barely touched you.”

“I
look like I’ve been kicked by a horse!”

I
rolled my eyes. “Best leave the dramatics to the King’s players.”

“This
is better than the King’s players!” Emma squealed and skipped to my side of the
chamber.

“You
nasty, jealous, God-cursed, goggle-eyed harpies,” Gabrielle spat, tears
flashing at the corners of her eyes.

“Yes,
they are. But you are goggle-eyed too, mistress.”

We
all spun toward the open door. Mother filled the space like the subject of a
portrait. Her matchless black velvet gown and yellow kirtle upbraided our
dishevelment. Seed pearls and garnets winked from her gabled hood. Her clasped
hands rested against her waist.

“It’s
got from your Boleyn blood.” Her familiar, chilly voice was an octave cooler. A
clammy sweat broke between my shoulder blades. Mother’s anger was never warm;
it was ice, and we all feared it more than Father’s belt.