The Uncrowned Queen (55 page)

Unobserved, Margaret Cuttifer watched them go, standing with her husband in the gallery that looked down into the receiving hall. Every servant in the house had been banished to the kitchen so that the king might leave when he chose to. Alone, or accompanied.

“Did we do right to send her letter to the palace?” Anxiety bled from Mathew's words.

Margaret was helpless, just as he was. “She asked us to send it. How could we refuse?”

Below them, the great door of Blessing House opened and then closed. Anne and the king were gone.

Mathew sighed and did an unusual thing. Normally the most reserved of men, he drew his wife toward him and kissed her full
on the mouth. “I am grateful for you. Grateful that you are my wife. May the king and Anne find the happiness I have experienced with you.”

Margaret Cuttifer tenderly kissed her husband in return. “And I with you, husband. I with you.”

They both heard the hooves of an iron-shod horse on the cobbles outside Blessing House; heard the animal canter away.

“Lady Mary bless and keep them safe from harm; as God's mother has preserved us in our marriage, wife.”

Margaret leaned against her husband's shoulder, somber eyes on the great, closed door below.

“Amen to that, husband. Amen to that.”

Twilight splashed rose and silver
into the western sky as the light began to fade. Soon they would close the bridge and chain the streets, but not yet, not yet.

Anne de Bohun clung to Edward's waist as they rode through the streets of the village of Westminster. She could smell the warm wind as it touched the face of the moving river; she could hear men's and women's voices as they passed beneath houses, great and small; she saw people moving in the shadows of their upstairs rooms as lights were lit; but all of this meant nothing, had no meaning. The horse's hooves struck a rhythm from the cobbles and she was dreaming again, surely. Perhaps, in a moment, the wolf would spring and blood would spill out over the snow.

“What did you say, my darling? Snow?” Edward laughed and her arms, clasped around him, felt the vibration deep in his chest. “Too warm for snow. Unless…”

“Unless what?”

He shortened the reins and urged his horse faster. “Unless William has done his work even better than I expect him to.”

A dog barked suddenly, quite close, and the king's horse shied. Anne tightened her grip, her body pressed against his back as she tried not to slip off the animal's rump.

“Nearly there, my darling, never fear. Hold hard.” The king placed one hand over hers, their fingers knotted together on his
tight belly. His voice was suddenly husky. “I remember this. Your breasts against my body as we rode.” Anne said nothing; she remembered too. He spoke quietly as the horse settled beneath them. “I did not want that journey to end even though we were cold and hungry; I thought I'd lost everything but you.”

“And I wanted to ride on too, forever.” Anne's words were so low they were lost in the clatter of hooves as the king reined the animal to a stop. Anne had an impression of iron gates and flambeaux flaring in the dying light.

“Close your eyes. Please? Just to humor me.”

She heard the excitement in his voice. “Very well. I can't see anything, now. I promise.” With eyes closed, Anne's other senses were enhanced, particularly hearing and smell. She heard the creak of the king's leather jerkin as he reached out to bang on the gate, felt the vibration of his voice through her body as he called out, heard the gate open in answer—a metallic, discordant, scraping sound—and felt, too, the vibration of the horse's hooves as they struck the ground.

They were in a garden now, she was certain of it. She could smell wild woodbine and roses, the clove scent of gillyflowers and the last sweetness of late jasmine; in this warm night, the perfumes had lingered long after the sun had set. And there was no longer a clatter from the horse's hooves—they were riding on something soft. Turf?

Edward spoke softly. “Unclasp your hands, my darling, but keep your eyes closed. Can you do that?”

“What, and not fall off? Just because I can't see?” Anne was scornful. Of course she wouldn't fall!

The king gently disengaged Anne's hands from around his waist and stood in his stirrups. With some effort he leaned forward over the animal's neck and managed to dismount from the front. Anne experienced momentary panic; she was slipping sideways!

“Let go—I'll catch you.” Remove something you take for granted and the world becomes an odd place. Yet Anne did not hesitate—she allowed herself to fall and he was there to catch her. She felt his arms, one under her knees, one around her back just beneath
the shoulder blades. And then he had her against his chest, her head tucked into the space where neck meets shoulder.

“I will show you wonders…” She could hear his boots as he strode. Soft at first, on turf, then hard, on stone. A door creaked open and scented air embraced them both. She heard the door close, then he walked over something soft that rustled; the green scent of crushed, new-picked rushes came to her. He stopped. He put her down and one hand dropped to her waist, holding her close to his side.

“Open your eyes, sweet Anne. See what has been prepared for you.”

Anne blinked, adjusting to the low light, and then she gasped.

They were in a perfectly round room and in the center stood a massive table made entirely from gold. It glimmered in a pool of mellow light. And there were candles the height of small children, fixed to sconces fashioned like giant cupped hands at intervals around the walls. On the table were platters and silver bowls of simple foods: white cheeses, good bread, fruit, marchpane comfits, while beside these was a red marble basin in which lay flasks of wine.

“Is that snow cooling the wine? In summer?” Anne was awed.

The king nodded. “Yes. I must remember to congratulate my chamberlain.” He held out his hand to Anne. “Welcome, lady, to the enchanted bower that has been made for you.”

Anne gathered up the skirts of her dress in one hand and walked slowly around the room. Everything she saw, everything she smelled and touched—all was an equal delight, simple, exquisite, harmonious. Instead of arras, curtains of trembling silk graced the walls. Alternate falls of silver, falls of gold, they moved and billowed gently, in the breeze from the garden. There was little furniture aside from the gold table. Several backless stools made from black wood were clustered beneath its top—ebony?—and one great chest stood beside the door they had entered through. Monumental, it was fashioned from bronze and had a joyous frieze of tumbling cupids running around each one of its sides. They would chase each other for all eternity. And everywhere she looked there were flowers: swags of white roses and woodbine and peonies, all
woven together with ivy and late jasmine and hung in graceful garlands around the walls, beneath the rafters of the floor above.

Anne felt profoundly humbled. With this room Edward said he knew her better than she knew herself. “This is the most beautiful room that I have ever seen.”

Edward's joy was transparent. “But see, there is more…”

He strode to the bronze coffer and hauled up the lid with some difficulty; it was massively heavy, even for him. The king reached inside and withdrew something, something that glimmered in his hands. He shook it gently. Lustrous white cloth, fine as mist, slipped through his fingers. With a gasp, Anne saw the entire surface was embroidered with tiny pearls like so many drops of milk.

“I saw you wear a dress like this once, in Brugge. On the second night of my sister's marriage. Please me by wearing this tonight?”

Anne was dazzled. Silk was one thing, but a dress graced with hundreds and hundreds of pearls? It was a magnificent, a princely gift. “Your Majesty, pearls are the gems that reward a chaste wife.” She tried not to sound sad.

Reverently, the king of England carried the dress to his beloved and held it up against her body. He nodded. “You gave me pearls once. And you are chaste, I know that. Except with me.” He was looking into her eyes. “Except with me, my darling.”

He bent and kissed her, and after a moment, the precious dress slid down among the rushes.

Neither of them noticed.

He had never thought to see this place again with his mortal eyes, but now, if he turned his head, the distant spires of the abbey reached toward the first stars and there, the unwieldy mass of the palace crouched close by. Was it smoke that rose into the still air from those numberless chimneys, or the presence of sin made visible in this wicked place?

The monk shuddered and closed his eyes as he whispered the words of the ancient psalm. “I will lift up mine eyes to the hills from whence cometh my help…”

Help, strength, support. He would need them all if he was to avoid the mire of human transgression that awaited him at the palace and achieve the task he had been given by his brother, Louis—God's anointed servant. The king had asked him for information about Edward's court, but Agonistes knew the truth: what Louis really wanted was justice and revenge on the regicide earl of March. As a king, Louis had that right. God gave him the power to smite his enemies.

“Son of a blackamoor's whore!” A porter, with great heavy baskets of vegetables dangling from the yoke across his shoulders, yelled at the monk who, oblivious, had just cannoned into his back.

The courtier asleep inside the monk awoke and bellowed, “Hold your tongue or it shall be torn out!” The surging, pressing mass of people in earshot paused in surprise. He might be filthy and scrawny in his patched robes, but this monk had the voice of authority.
The porter, hearing the threat, tried to hurry past just as, weeping, Agonistes fell to his knees, desperate to atone.

“Ah, brother, brother, forgive me. It is this place… this accursed place that speaks and not I, the least, the most miserable of God's servants.”

The porter, frightened by such strange behavior, tried to back away but the weeping monk now had him by the legs and would not let go. He dragged himself along, attached like a welk, sobbing and calling out, “Penance, brother, give me penance to subdue such evil pride.”

Uproar grew as the crowd banked up behind the strange couple and then, in a further moment, scattered, screaming, as they snatched their children and their possessions back beneath the shelter of the house-jetties above their heads. A knot of soldiers was upon them out of the gathering gloom, with whips and curses, trying to clear a path for someone very important.

“Way! Way for the king's chamberlain. Get out of the way!”

The porter panicked. “Let me go, sir. Get up!” But Agonistes, a drowning man, did not hear him and clung to the man's legs yet more fiercely, begging, wailing for forgiveness.

“No!” With a mighty shove, the porter swung his baskets, knocking Agonistes away from his knees.

“Halt!”

William Hastings gazed at the monk, facedown in the filth-choked kennel on the crown of the road. And Agonistes raised his head to a dizzying vision of an armed and mounted man dressed in blue and red and gold, a last spear of light from the dying sun bounced off the metal helm, gracing the knight's head with a halo. It was a sign. The Lord had sent him a sign—and aid for the task at hand.

Scrambling to his feet, the ragged servant of God and Louis de Valois pointed his finger. This chance meeting had removed all doubt. “Lord William Hastings. I know you. The Lord knows you. And I have come to do his bidding. Sinner that I am, I can save the king from himself.” In that moment, Agonistes truly understood the mission he'd been given, and who had given it to him. His soul had spoken the truth. Whatever Louis had asked of him, he had a higher purpose.

William's eyes narrowed. There was something about the man he recognized; take away the filth, take away the rags, and something remained. The voice, it was distinctive. He had a good memory for voices. And faces.

“Moss? Is that you?”

The monk straightened his shoulders. “The man who was once Moss is dead. I stand in his place. I am the hammer of witches and I have returned to cleanse the court and save the soul of the king from sorcery.”

William raised his eyebrows, almost inclined to laugh at the solemn absurdity of the ragged specter in front of him. “Oh? And how will you do that?”

Moss smiled, exposing unpleasantly ragged gums. “A woman lives who should have burned for manifold sins. Her name is Anne de Bohun. While she breathes, the king's soul is not safe. The Lord has sent me here to tell him this.”

William's hands convulsed on his horse's reins. Anne de Bohun? “Sergeant!”

The sergeant of the guard fought his way through the press of disgruntled people, fed up with being held up on their way home, to his master's side. “Yes, Lord Chamberlain?”

“Bring this holy brother to the palace.”

William Hastings indicated the monk, then rode on without a backward glance as his servant gazed at the monk with distaste. He was filthy, and smelly, but that didn't matter. It was the strange look in the man's eye that made the sergeant uneasy.