The Huntress (40 page)

“It is Margaret. Margaret Elizabeth Wolfe,” Meg replied in a voice scarce above a whisper.

“Well, Mistress Wolfe. What would you have of your sovereign?”

Heartened by the kindness she detected in the queen’s voice, Meg was emboldened to speak a little louder.

“God save Your Grace. I crave your ear…” Meg glanced upward and the rest of her carefully prepared speech fled from her mind.

Her jaw falling open, she studied Elizabeth, the queen at once so much more and so much less than Meg had expected.

Elizabeth carried herself with a regal bearing, a ruff circling her slender neck. She had an intelligent face, long and thin with a hooked nose and pointed chin. Her red curly hair was obviously a wig, her complexion layered beneath cosmetics to conceal the ravages of smallpox and time.

This Elizabeth appeared so much older and far more a mere mortal than the queen of Meg’s imaginings. Except for her eyes.

Set beneath fine arched brows, Elizabeth’s eyes seemed ageless, so bright and piercing that Meg blinked. It was like staring straight into the sun.

“Gloriana,” Meg breathed, sending a ripple of laughter through the chamber.

Even the queen looked amused, but her smile bathed Meg in all the warmth of a summer’s day.

“You may dispense with the flattery and come to the point, Mistress Wolfe,” Elizabeth said. “To what end do you crave our ear?”

Meg moistened her lips and blurted out, “I came to beg you to free Lady Danvers.”

The queen’s smile fled. It was like watching the sun vanish behind the clouds. A murmur of unease circulated about the room.

“What is her ladyship’s fate to do with you, girl?” the queen demanded.

“May it please Your Grace, I—I know she is innocent.”

“And how would you know that?”

Meg’s heart beat so hard with fear she felt she would faint. She swallowed hard and managed to tip up her chin bravely as she replied, “Because I am the one who should have been arrested. I am the Silver Rose.”

M
EG SAT UPON THE STOOL AS THE QUEEN COMMANDED HER
, not daring to move, but her eyes darted about the room. She had fully expected to be arrested by this time and taken under guard to the Tower.

Instead she was bemused to find herself ensconced in a part of the palace where only a privileged few were accorded admittance—the queen’s private apartments.

Despite the peril of her situation, Meg could not help but eagerly study her surroundings, the imposing bed designed with different colored woods and hung with draperies of painted silk, a silver-topped table, a jewelry chest ornamented with pearls.

With its tapestry-adorned walls and gilded ceiling, it was indeed a chamber fitted out for a queen. But it was a trifle gloomy because there was only one window.

How strange and sad, Meg thought, for a queen to only have one window that opened out onto the world. It was as though Elizabeth was a prisoner of sorts herself.

That impression only deepened as the gentleman ushers closed the doors, shutting out the uproar Meg’s announcement had produced.

The queen’s ministers had been prepared to immediately drag Meg from Elizabeth’s presence. Her courtiers had begged the queen to keep a safe distance until it could be determined if Meg were merely mad or something far more sinister.

The queen had imperiously ignored them all. Even commanding her maids of honor to leave her, Elizabeth had closeted herself alone with Meg.

Settling herself in a cushioned chair opposite, the queen studied Meg as curiously as Meg regarded her. Folding her elegant slender hands in her lap, Elizabeth abandoned the more formal tone she had employed in the Presence Chamber.

“Well, Mistress Silver Rose,” she said. “It has been a long time since I received a magus at my court. Not since my unfortunate friend Dr. Dee was accused of sorcery and obliged to flee abroad. He was a most gifted mathematician and astrologer. One of the services he performed for me was determining the most auspicious day for my coronation.”

“He chose well, Your Grace,” Meg replied timidly. “Your reign has been a great success thus far.”

“Humph, I see you know how to flatter as well as my courtiers.”

“Oh, no! I am not always as honest as I would wish to be. But I would never lie to a queen.”

“Why not? Everyone else does,” Elizabeth said wryly. “All might have gone well with Dr. Dee if he had limited himself to astrology. But he is believed to have delved into necromancy, attempting to communicate with spirits and demons from the great beyond. Have you ever succumbed to such temptation?”

“Not yet.”

Meg’s frankness surprised a bark of laughter from the queen. “You strike me as being rather young to claim to be such a powerful sorceress. So tell me, where have you gained all your knowledge?”

Meg reluctantly told her, opening herself up as she seldom had to anyone, not even Cat. She told the queen all she had learned from the
Book of Shadows,
her days in France, the attempted uprising orchestrated by her mother.

The queen listened in fascination.

She exclaimed, “Your mother actually thought to make you the queen of France?”

“Yes, Your Majesty. But I never wanted to be.”

“Such a wise child,” Elizabeth said. “To be a queen and wear a crown is more glorious to them who see it than it is a pleasure to them who bear it.”

“Everyone believes my mother was evil and perhaps she was. She was a witch. She would have torn an entire kingdom apart.”

“Mine did,” the queen said, so softly Meg scarce heard her.

Elizabeth was swift to turn the subject. “So you have come here to surrender yourself to save Lady Danvers. How very brave of you.”

“I don’t feel very brave at all,” Meg confessed. “But it seems the only honorable thing to do. I pray that you will release her now that you know the truth.”

Elizabeth slowly shook her head. “Lady Danvers may be innocent of witchcraft, but there seems little doubt her ladyship conspired with this Father Ballard in a plot against my life.”

“No, Lady Danvers is loyal to you. I am sure of it. When I looked inside her purse, she carried with her two treasures. One was her ave beads. The other was this.” Meg delved inside her own purse to produce the small scrap of blue carpet.

“This was part of—”

“I know what that is. A segment of my coronation carpet.” Elizabeth took the scrap from Meg. She fingered it for a moment, her eyes misting with memories while Meg continued to plead for Jane Danvers.

“Her ladyship is a devout Catholic, but she is your true subject. She may be disappointed that you were not able to do more to protect the Catholics in your realm, but she would never seek to harm Your Grace.”

The queen returned the cloth to Meg. “How can you be so sure of that?”

“Because I did more than look in her purse. I—I looked into her mind.”

“You can read minds?” Elizabeth asked incredulously.

“It is one of the first things I learned as a child from my first nurse, Mistress Waters. I am quite skilled at reading eyes. Usually.” Meg flinched, remembering Sander.

“Can you read mine?” the queen challenged.

Meg felt that she hardly dared. But when the queen persisted, Meg peered into Elizabeth’s eyes.

She frowned. It was not easy penetrating the queen’s piercing gaze. Elizabeth’s mind was like a labyrinth of chambers, rooms laden down with the thoughts, hopes, and dreams of an entire country. It was as though the real Elizabeth was lost somewhere down those twisting corridors.

Meg’s brow furrowed as she delved deeper until at last she found the woman behind the queen. She shivered, overwhelmed by the suppressed emotions that poured into her.

“Oh! You—you are so strong and brave like my friend, Cat. But you are tired, and worn down as well. All you want is peace and neither your councillors nor your enemies will allow you to have it. You fear that soon you will be forced to take harsh, even cruel measures against—against your own cousin.”

The queen drew back, looking startled. “You begin to convince me, Mistress Margaret. You are a witch.”

“I am sorry, Your Grace.” Meg faltered. “If I was too bold—”

“No, I asked you to do it.” Elizabeth appeared unnerved, but intrigued as well. “Is that the full measure of your sorcery or can you do other things as well? Can you divine the future?”

“I have attempted to use a scrying ball, but—”

“Show me,” the queen interrupted eagerly. Before Meg could protest, Elizabeth whisked over to her writing cabinet and produced a small glass globe.

But when she attempted to hand the scrying ball to Meg, Meg whipped her hands behind her back.

“Oh, n-no, Your Grace. I have never had much success in foretelling the future.”

“Try,” Elizabeth insisted. “At my behest, Dr. Dee often attempted to consult the ball and reveal to me my destiny. If you could accomplish this, I might be persuaded to grant your request and release Lady Danvers.”

Meg accepted the ball reluctantly. “I am not very good at it. But I will try.”

Not very good? She had never succeeded in using the ball before. Meg turned the globe in her hands, remembering Sander’s shameless boasts of how he had tricked people into believing he could do magic. Meg wondered if she dared do the same. But she did not believe she could deceive Elizabeth, not even to save Lady Danvers.

She sucked in a deep breath, staring into the crystal orb, straining harder to focus than she ever had before. She imagined her eyes as curved lenses like those she had fitted into the spyglass, probing the vast reaches of the heavens, drawing the stars ever closer, closer.

Pinpricks of light danced before eyes and then seemed to explode in an array of dizzying images, one after the other. But it was the last that caused Meg to shriek and fling the ball away from her.

She cowered back on her stool, trembling as the queen bent to retrieve the scrying glass. She placed it on the silver-topped table and asked, “What did you see, child?”

Nothing, Meg wanted to shriek.

“I—I saw that you will have a long and glorious reign. Your enemies will not triumph over you. You—”

“Don’t lie to me, girl. Tell me the truth. It was no vision of my glory that caused you to blanch and tremble as though you’d seen your mother’s ghost.”

Cassandra’s ghost…if the queen only knew. Meg sought to blot the last terrifying vision from her mind. She thought sorrowfully of the other one she’d had, the one that pertained directly to Elizabeth, and wished she could keep it to herself. But she saw that the queen was not to be denied.

She swallowed and then admitted, “I saw what you dread the most. A—a woman about to be executed. Not Lady Danvers. An older woman in an old castle so far from here. She had a little spaniel hidden under her skirt when she laid her head upon the block. When the executioner swung his ax, the first time, he missed and—”

“Enough.” Elizabeth leaped up from her chair. “You need tell me no more.”

She strode away from Meg, her face averted as she stared out her lone window. A heavy silence fell.

“I—I am sorry, Your Grace,” Meg said at last. “What I saw—it might not mean anything. My friend Cat always tells me the future is not written down anywhere. We make our own decisions.”

“And sometimes those choices are forced upon us.” When Elizabeth swung back to face Meg, something had shut down in her eyes.

It was not Elizabeth but the queen who spoke. “Well, Margaret Wolfe, you have convinced us. Lady Danvers shall be freed, but we must deliver you up to the person in our realm best suited to take charge of such a dangerous witch.”

Meg’s heart sank. She had experienced such an inexplicably strong connection with Elizabeth, she had hoped the queen might sense it and be induced to pardon her.

But she gave a brave nod. As she followed the queen from her apartments, Meg held her shoulders erect, trying not to quail as she wondered what sort of dread dungeon master or executioner she was about to be handed over to.

When they entered the antechamber and Meg saw the man awaiting her, she blinked in disbelief.

Martin le Loup had been pacing the small room like a caged wolf. He came to an abrupt halt as the queen entered with Meg trailing in her wake.

Never had Meg received such a stern look from her father. She cringed, feeling she might have preferred the dungeon master.

Martin sank to his knees before the queen, not giving Elizabeth a chance to speak.

“Your Majesty, I crave your pardon for my daughter. I know naught what Margaret may have said to you, but—”

“She has favored us with a most extraordinary tale, Monsieur le Loup.”

Her father winced. “Meg possesses far too much imagination for her own good. The child—”

“Is one of the most remarkable young women we have ever chanced to meet,” the queen cut in. “She has convinced us to set Lady Danvers at liberty.”

Martin cast an anxious glance up at the queen. “And Meg herself?”

“We have decided to release her into your custody. We would strongly advise you to convey her to this Faire Isle as soon as possible.”

The queen added wryly, “Besides being a remarkable girl, Margaret is also one of the most unnerving we have met. Therefore we think our English climate might not prove at all suitable for, er, such a rare French rose.”