A Secret Alchemy (14 page)

“Yes, sire.”

“Your Grace,” I murmured.

“Yes, Your Grace.”

The King laughed. “Well-bred indeed. I think you were playing a game, and I have interrupted it, as grown-ups will. What did you play at, Dickon?”

Dickon gaped at him for a moment, then spoke readily enough. “Please you, sire—Your Grace—we were playing Sir Ban and Sir Bors. Please you. Your Grace. Sire.”

The King laughed. “He adds every courtesy he knows, and would offer me his missing tooth as a gift, no doubt, if the fairies had not had it. I have a son too, but Arthur is a babe compared to your lads, mistress. You must have been little more than a child yourself at their getting.”

“A little more, sire.”

He looked me full in the eye and smiled as a man will who sees pleasure ahead. Then he half-turned to where my mother was several steps behind us. “Madam, I would speak to your daughter privily. You permit it?”

She curtsied. “My daughter is her own mistress, Your Grace.” Her French accent was very marked, and I knew that she was nervous. Margaret was gazing at us with a grin. “Margaret, take the boys.”

The King stopped them with an outstretched hand. “Here, one for each of you,” he said, and suddenly between his fingers were two pennies. “Buy a toy or something, and leave your mamma to me in exchange. I’ll have a care to her.” Round-eyed, my little boys took the coins with untidy bows, and pranced away from me to Margaret. Before she took their hands, she made a seizing gesture with her own to me, and grinned again. I thought, Oh, Margaret, even you?

The King walked beside me the length of the path and I could no more escape than a captive may a gaoler. At the gate he stood back, and I preceded him into the orchard.

“The blossom is very far forward this year” was all I could think of to say, when we had walked almost full across the or
chard and into the wood and he was still silent. “My mother fears that the frosts may catch it.”

He stopped and caught my hand so that I was pulled round to face him. “Thank God we are alone.” He seized my other hand and I had to stiffen my arms to keep him at their length. “Madam, I think you know why I have asked to be alone with you. I think your father has spoken of my love for you.”

“Love, Your Grace? I—I…He has not used that word.”

“Can you not see it in every part of me? In my eyes, my hands, my voice? Madam, I love you, and pray that you would be mine.”

I had dreaded this moment, but it was no easier for my dreading. “S-sire, you—you do me a great honor, but it is one that I do not deserve,” I managed to say, and felt him withdraw a little, though he still held both my hands. “I—I must say no. I cannot be yours.”

“Why not? I think you cannot pretend that we are not friends, can you?”

“A humble subject may not call a great king her friend, sire, though she owes him all duty and obedience.”

He laughed and the shock of the sound made my rigid grip tremble. “Then obey your father and your king in this, sweet Ysa—see? I know your true name. Be a dutiful daughter and subject and come to me, and we shall have such pleasure as no man and woman ever had, this day and for many a long day and night to come.”

My breath was short, as if he already crushed me in his grip. “Sire, I beg you not to ask this of me. I am an honest lady. I was an honorable wife. I must say no.”

Then he did snatch me to him, hard against his breast, his hands like a carpenter’s vise, gripping me to the bone. Even with
all my strength I could not push him off. So tall and broad was he and so much bigger than John that I was almost overwhelmed. He smelled of sweat and wine and scented linen stained with a buck’s blood. “I am the sun: Have they not told you? And you are the moon, with your silver-gilt hair that I could drown in if we lay together. Can you not see we were born to make merry together, as surely as the stars surround us both in the sky?”

I felt one arm tighten with a swell of muscle, and he brought his other hand around to raise my chin. I wrenched my head away so hard that my chin felt bruised from the grip of his fingers. He gripped harder, then shifted till his leg trapped mine. I began to be afraid, for there was that look in his eyes, that blind, blurred look that means a man can think no longer of his worship or his woman but must take her wholly and at once, whether she will or no. From the meanest to the greatest of womankind, this is what we all fear.

Suddenly he let go and I all but fell. “No, Ysa. I take no woman by force, though I desire them as I do you to the edge of madness. What can I offer you that would change your mind? You have my love already.”

I shook my head, still winded. But I did not run away, for the whole court would have known it, and I would not give them such food for gossip.

He looked down at me, frowning, for some few moments. “Ysa, I could say, ‘I can make you rich, I can make your boys noble,’ but I think you are not a woman to be won thus. Nor by my saying what is true: that I could ruin you and them and your whole family, if I chose. If you were such a woman, to be bought or blackmailed, perhaps I would love you less.”

I almost laughed. “My boys are dressed in rags and patches,
and I cannot pay my servants. But no, sire, even for them I cannot do it.”

“Other women can. And—forgive me, but perhaps you think of them—other women have. Gentlewomen such as you, noblewomen too.”

“I know. But I cannot follow their example though they be the highest in the land.” I took a deep breath. “I know you will not force me. You might offer me the whole world—a king’s ransom—and it would still not be enough for me to shame my honor so. I have little else that I may call my own, but my soul and my body are mine. I cannot and I will not defile them with such a sin.”

“Then wed me.”

“What?”

“Be my wife.”

“Your Grace teases me. I pray you excuse me, I must go to my mother.”

He grabbed my hand as I tried to pass him. “Ysa, I speak with all my heart, and all my mind. I love you with my whole soul and body, and I would be your husband.”

My mind was reeling, the ground beneath my feet seeming to fall away as if I were transported by Merlin to a strange land. I stared at him. At last I found some words. “But, sire…you have embassies abroad to find you a wife. A princess, allies for your realm, treaties for your greater safety and glory, and that of your subjects. My lord of Warwick is in Savoy even now…You cannot be
married
to a subject.”

“What better wife for an English king descended of King Arthur than an Englishwoman bred of Melusina’s line? The sun and moon conjoined?” He laughed, caught my hand and turned it
over to kiss the palm. “Besides, how could I treat of subsidies and armies and alliances when I can think only of you?”

I pulled my hand away. “What of my widowhood? My years? My boys?” I bit my tongue before I could say,
My family’s late-turned allegiance?
“How could such a one as I be married to a king?”

“Must I tell you how, Ysa? Very well, then, since you rate yourself so low.” He stepped back half a pace, as if to see me better, but I could no more have run now I had the chance than if I had truly been laid under Merlin’s spell. “You are virtuous as few other women, or you would not have denied me. You are beautiful beyond compare. You stand and walk and dance as one who already wears a crown. You are clever, and wise, and bear strong sons. How could I want for more? How may I do without you?”

I looked at him. Then he knelt, and uncovered his head. His hair had dried dark gold, and where his neck was bowed I could see the swell of muscles under his fine, fair skin, and the dark, puckered line of a sword-scratch, and the gleam of fresh sweat along the cords of his neck. The desire that I had long denied turned in my belly, so quick and hot that I thought he must feel it through the heavy air that lay between us.

“Madam, will you do me the honor of being my wife, and my queen?”

What should I have answered? I did not love him. I had not loved John, but we had been friends. This man—this King—I scarcely knew. As I had said to my father, to desire even so magnificent a man is not to love him, any more than one loves the sun, though we all turn our faces to its rays. If knowing that is wisdom, he was right to say I had it. But I had too the wisdom that said that here at my feet was a prize beyond all dreams, and that I could not—would not—refuse it.

“Ysa? What say you? You must not say me nay.”

His voice was urgent, shaking with hope and desire. Nonetheless, young men are foolish, and I would not be the victim of his folly. I put out my hand and raised him. “Sire, you cannot kneel to a subject. You do me more honor than is proper to either of our estates, and I am silenced. I know not what to say.”

“You need only say yes.”

“Are you—forgive me, sire—are you sure? If you wish to change your mind…We have no witnesses.”

“I would have the whole world as witness to our betrothal, if I could. Though what my cousin Warwick will say…If your parents are willing, I think it might be best if none know of it until we are man and wife. But when they see you as queen, my beautiful Melusina, married on May Day, they will understand. William Hastings most of all. Oh, to see his face at the news, for he would have bedded you himself, given the chance!”

I could not but smile, and desire gripped me once again. The King saw it, and smiled back as he took my hand. A strange sound began to ring in my ears, and through it I heard him say, “Ysa, this is no moment of madness. I have loved you long enough to know my mind. Will you consent to be married to me?”

I drew in a breath that was as deep as the hammering of my heart allowed.

“Your Grace, you do me more honor than I know how to refuse. I cannot say no.”

There were no stars or moon to guide us to Grafton church for Roodmas, only the light of Mal’s lantern catching the whitethorn glimmering in the hedges through the still, dank air that smelled of cows and rotting wood.

“Mistress, is this wise?” Mal whispered in my ear. “You will be so weary. You have been to confession, and you’ll have a blessing like no other in the morning. You should be abed.”

“Ssh!” I said, jerking my head behind us at Margaret and my father’s man that escorted us.

“Mistress Margaret talks too much to listen well. And Gregory’s deaf as a post. He’d not hear the Great Sabbath if he stood in the middle of the Bel-fire itself.”

A draught brushed my cheek and a silent shadow flew by, close enough to touch. Margaret gasped, and we crossed ourselves. In the mews one of the goshawks let out a shriek of rage.

“’Tis only an owl, Mistress Margaret,” said Gregory. “The tawny owl that lives in the Home Wood, like as not.”

“Witches can take an owl’s shape,” said Margaret, with a giggle made of fear. “Maybe it was that woman who lives in the ruined friary. She had a black cat with blue eyes that your boys stoned, do you remember? She’ll want her revenge.”

“Nonsense,” I said. “Hurry yourselves or we’ll be late. The cat lived, and I beat them both till you could hear them howling in Stony Stratford.” I caught my breath. Even the name of the town where Edward slept made my skin shiver. Or perhaps he slept not. Sure, I could not have slept this night any more than I could fly over the Home Wood, even at Roodmas, when the witches and warlocks are abroad. I had said I must go to church for the Roodmas ser vice, though none but Mal and my mother knew why I was so wakeful, or that I meant, too, to ask Our Lady for a private blessing.

From somewhere in the wood there came a squeal, cut off dead. We stepped into the blackness under the lych-gate roof. Ahead, the windows of the church were but dim gold against the dark,
and the singing seemed to creep through the still air. I thought it sounded like the chanting of a spell.

I asked a hurried pardon under my breath for my blasphemy.

But what of the ones buried in the ground beneath our feet: men and women, soldiers and maidservants, ancient dames and children, and newborn babes barely blessed before they cried their last? Their bodies lay there, it was said, awaiting Judgment Day. But perhaps some unquiet souls—unshriven, dead before their time, traduced…perhaps such souls did walk abroad on this darkest of dark nights that comes before the dawn of May.

No days of preparation, no gifts or guests or great feast for us, only the wedding at the door of our own chapel, hidden in the woods, and a hasty Mass within. No procession round the parish or piping to our marriage bed, for none must know that Edward and I were made man and wife until he had spoken to my lord Warwick. Nor had we snatched many hours together since we had been betrothed, for none must think more than that the King had a new mistress hidden somewhere. Besides, he had business that I would not have kept him from if I could, raising men and arming them, cozening enemies and setting friends to work, receiving envoys and dispatching embassies.

So when we were married, we did no more than drink wine and eat sweet cakes, there in the antechamber of the chapel; my mother, Margaret—told only that morning lest she chatter—a priest sworn to silence, a boy server brought to cense and sing; and, in the corner, Mal, with tears in her eyes.

Then the priest and his boy took themselves off, and we walked back through the woods with every thrush and linnet and skylark in the world tossing its song to the sunrise.

The Hall was silent, but we dared not linger for the usual ceremonies. In my chamber my mother helped me undress to my smock in silent haste, unbound my hair and looped it up again with a pin or two, kissed me formally, and left with a curtsy to the King where he waited on the landing as if he were no more than his own page.

He entered, thrusting the door to behind him, and took me in his arms, my smock rumpling under his eager hands, his breath hot on my face. One big hand in the small of my back, one fumbling with his points, and his mouth greedy upon mine.

Suddenly I knew that he was not a king but a man, and not even that. He was a boy still, hasty in his desire, driven by what his body spoke of his need, with no thought for the dull aftermath when that need was fulfilled. I was his elder by but five years; I had known one man, and he many women. They were perhaps dazzled into yielding by his height, his smile, his gilded skin, his crown. But I had not yielded back in the orchard, and I would not now, for I had learned in years of wedlock what it seemed he had not in his bachelorhood, not even from all those yielding women: how desire, held in check, feeds on itself and grows. If I could hold him back…