The Forbidden Queen. Anne O'Brien

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СКАЧАТЬ perched on the edge of a stool, perfectly still so that I did not crease the intricacies of the embroidered panels, head lifted to catch any sound outside. Would he send for me? Or perhaps he would come himself to escort me down.

      The time slid past.

      ‘Will he come for me?’ Trying to quell the little ripple of anxiety, I forced my fingers flat against my thighs.

      ‘I expect he will, my lady.’

      ‘Yes. I am valuable to him. He said so.’

      I sipped a cup of ale, picked at the platter of bread and meat placed before me, but with no real interest. My mind was already running with the heralds and banners and brave knights. And with Henry.

      ‘It will be on the meadows beside the river,’ I said as I brushed crumbs from my fingers. ‘They’ll be erecting the pavilions—or perhaps they’ve already done that. I’ll have a gallery to sit in, so that I might see. I’ve never been to a tournament before,’ I confided. Another feather of latent concern brushed the nape of my neck. ‘When will he come? But listen…’ I was conscious of the growing tumult of noise, enough to carry through the walls and glazed windows.

      I could sit no longer but crossed the room to look down into the entrance court below. It was full of people and wagons and horses, of banners stitched with vivid heraldic devices, a scene of feverish activity.

      ‘There he is!’

      My heart was thudding. Standing at the top of a flight to steps leading from the great door down to the gathering masses, tall, lithe, with his head bent as he conversed with Bedford and with Warwick and the rest of his English friends, Henry was everything I could ever have hoped for in a husband. In a lover. He swept a wide gesture with one arm, at the same time as he laughed at some response from Warwick. His face was alight with the same fierce concentration I had seen when planning the attack against the fortress of Sens. Captivated, I pressed my forehead against the glass, and at my movement, snatching at his attention, he looked up. I raised my hand. He looked back at me, as I thought, then gave his attention back to his brother.

      Slowly I lowered my hand.

      ‘He did not acknowledge me,’ I said.

      ‘Perhaps he did not see. He is very busy, my lady.’

      ‘Of course.’

      I turned back to look again. A shaft of sunlight illuminated the scene, striking silvered fire from his armour. And it came to me that the crowds below were not milling at all. It was a scene of organised and disciplined activity: a force of soldiers with horses, weapons being loaded onto carts. More men mustering every minute.

      My mouth dried with the implication.

      ‘It doesn’t look like a tournament to me,’ I said softly. ‘It looks like war.’ This was no formal passage of arms. Henry was going to war. I snatched up the fullness of my skirts and I ran.

      ‘My lady…’

      ‘He’s leaving me!’ was all I could say. And then I was pushing my way through the crowd, refusing to be deterred by the crush, with Guille still remonstrating at my heels, until finally I came to where Henry stood. I climbed the steps out of the crush, pushing aside a rangy alaunt trying to claim his master’s attention. I needed Henry’s attention more.

      ‘My lord.’ I tried for a little restraint. His back was to me as he replied to some comment by my lord of Warwick. ‘My lord.’ I touched him lightly on his arm.

      Henry spun round, and I saw the moment when the laughter was gone.

      ‘What are you doing here?’ he asked. ‘This is no place for you.’

      It was a blow that chilled my blood. How peremptory his command. He did not want to be interrupted. He didn’t even address me by my name.

      ‘Are you leaving, my lord?’ My voice was amazingly calm. At least he could not see my heart thudding against my ribs, like the insistent tuck of a military drum.

      ‘Yes. Go back and wait in the hall. I will come and take my leave of you shortly.’

       Take my leave…!

      ‘But I wanted to—’

      ‘Not now.’ He drew in a breath. I knew it was to temper his impatience, but I would not be cowed. A strange boldness took hold of me, born out of panic that he was abandoning me.

      ‘I wish to know what is happening.’

      He must have seen the turmoil in me, for his voice became infinitesimally less abrasive, the habitual veneer of courtesy restored to a degree. ‘You should not be here, my lady. I’ll come to you when I can.’ He caught Bedford’s attention with a lift of his hand. ‘John—escort my wife back to the hall.’

      He was already snatching up a document from a squire who’d arrived with labouring breath and a covering of dust from head to foot. Tearing the seal, he scanned it, his mouth clamped like a steel trap as he read, entirely oblivious to me. I felt a flush of shame heat my cheeks, for I had been put in my place so thoroughly. It hurt me to know that he had grounds for his irritation. I should not have been there: a mustering army was no place for a woman on foot. I could hear Isabeau’s words ringing in my head. I had acted foolishly, without restraint. It was not becoming in a wife, in a queen.

      Without waiting for Bedford’s escort, I made my way blindly. I must hold up my head. I must not show anyone interested enough to single me out that I felt slighted, humiliated, and, more importantly to my mind, I must not show that I was ignorant of this change of plan. Why had he not talked to me of this? Surely Henry could have told me, instead of leaving me to believe that the tournament would go ahead as planned? I swallowed hard against an unexpected threat of tears, as angry with myself as with Henry. I must learn to have more pride. I must learn to have composure.

      In the hall, skirting the walls and thus keeping out of the way of the comings and goings, I turned into a window embrasure where I sat. Guille hovered.

      ‘You could return to your chamber, my lady. That might be best.’

      But I would not. I would make my own decision, no matter how small, no matter how unused I was to doing so. And so I remained there, in all my useless, festive glory, as if carved from marble, my heart a solid lump of it. Cold and uncertain, all my earlier happiness no more than a faded memory, the one question that beat in my head, with the familiar flutter of painful anxiety was: why did he not tell me? This preparation for war had been no instant decision. He had known. He had known when I had confessed my naïve pleasure in the tournament. Why had he not told me the truth then, that the celebration would never take place?

      Because he does not care enough about you to be honest with you. It was easier for him, so that he need not explain that he would leave you on the first day of your married life.

      It was the only answer that made any sense. He did not care for me, for Katherine. Any wife with my blood and my name and my dowry would have sufficed. Why should he have to explain himself to me if he did not wish to? I mattered to him because, by a signature on a document, I had brought him a crown, and that was all.

      And then I saw him approaching, followed by a squire and a brace of hounds. By the time he reached me his brow was smooth, but I had СКАЧАТЬ