Cibalto said, “Or perhaps Latin, although singing in Latin wouldn’t be very soothing.”
Grayson nodded. “Good questions, we’ll see what he remembers.”
George said, “If we accept Mary’s spirit somehow became aware of Pip, recognized something in him that drew her to him, and whisked him to her onetime royal bedchamber and sang to him as a mother would to her child, then it follows she must have either come to realize Pip wasn’t the child she wanted or she knew she had to send him back.” He paused, shrugged. “So she sent him to the storeroom and somehow made Miranda know where to find him.” He threw up his hands. “It boggles the imagination.”
“Or perhaps,” Lise Marie said, “Mary was lonely and thought of her twins she never saw again when she fled Scotland.”
George said, “Miranda, how did you know where to find Pip?”
Miranda said, “All I can say is from one moment to the next, I simply knew where he was and I knew how to get there.”
Cibalto suddenly bounded to his feet. “I just remembered an old book in my library. That is, I didn’t really remember it, it just came to me what it looks like and where it is. I don’t understand this, but I know I must leave now and go home and read it.” He paused a moment, shook his head in wonderment. “In her note, Mary wrote of her captivity. Can you imagine, this poor prisoner had as many as sixty retainers. The Earl of Shrewsbury had to pay her bills. I must go see that book. Thank you, everyone, most enlightening, the evening.” And Cibalto gave a jerky bow to everyone in the drawing room and strode out, Grayson walking after him.
When Grayson came back, George said, “I wonder what the book is that so excited him?”
“I’ll find out tomorrow,” Grayson said.
George sat forward, clasped his hands between his knees. “Given what happened at Ravenstone with the Red Witch, I can now accept the spirit or ghost of Queen Mary of Scotland is here, for whatever reason. And now there is the mention of a demon and something else with the demon. His familiar? I wonder if the Red Witch has more power than this demon.” He gave Grayson a lopsided grin. “I must say, since knowing you my life has been powerfully interesting.” He picked up Lise Marie’s white hand, kissed her fingers. “I’m blessed not only to have my son returned to me but to also have the luck to gain a wife who would welcome a benevolent spirit to our home without hesitation.”
Lisa Marie said, “I wonder if Rose Hill Manor is old enough to house a ghost or two? If so, they have yet to come my way. It is disappointing.” She brightened. “Perhaps you could bring a diverting spirit with you one evening when you come to dinner, Grayson.”
Miranda said, “Lise Marie, I did not experience the Red Witch with the rest of you, but Grayson and I did battle a demon from long-ago Egypt, so I have no difficulty accepting ghosts and spirits and the mayhem they can bring. The questions we must answer are: What is this demon and its familiar that have spurred Mary to action? Did Mary’s twins really exist? And what is this curse Cibalto fears?”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Edinburgh, Scotland
The Palace of Holyroodhouse
Thursday morning
Grayson and Cibalto stood in the beautifully refurbished supper room where David Rizzio was murdered on March 9, 1566. Cibalto said after a moment, “I do not feel Rizzio’s ghost.”
Grayson remained silent, his hand resting on the back of Mary’s chair. It felt smooth, solid. And he thought it was amazing ghosts and spirits didn’t fill every house in the world, there had been so much violence and human greed throughout the centuries.
Cibalto nodded at Grayson’s hand. “Do you feel anything unusual from touching Mary’s chair? Perhaps cold?”
“No, but when I climbed the main stairs I felt extraordinary cold where Rizzio breathed his last. Let’s sit down. I awoke this morning with the feeling I should come to this chamber.”
They sat in the surprisingly comfortable high-backed wooden chairs. Grayson settled in, opened his mind, Cibalto’s voice fading into the background. Nothing. After several minutes had passed, he said, “Tell me what you found in the book that sent you flying from the house last night.”
“Makes me fair spineless to think of it, Grayson, but when I got home the book was sitting in the middle of my desk. After I managed not to faint, I picked it up. There was only the author’s name on the cover—John Culver. He wrote in the beginning his patron was the fourth Earl of Lennox, Darnley’s father. What I found amazing is Culver didn’t lick Lennox’s boots as one would expect. No, he didn’t spare him when he wrote about all the constant political machinations, how religion was used to drive wedges, make bitter enemies, and bring forth unlikely alliances—all of them temporary, of course. He wrote of how Mary’s initial mad love for Darnley quickly died when she saw how vicious and weak he was, how she suffered his deceit and treachery. Culver believed Darnley wanted to kill Mary and take her throne, but he was struck again with syphilitic eruptions, pustules all over his face and body, and so he moved with his servant to the old provost’s house at Kirk o’ Field, very close to Holyroodhouse, because he didn’t wish to be seen.
“Culver agrees Darnley survived the explosion only to be murdered and found the next day. History judges his murderer was James Hepburn, fourth Earl of Bothwell and Mary’s soon-to-be third husband, probably with Mary’s agreement, but Culver didn’t believe that. He claimed there was no shortage of nobles who hated Darnley and believed he was an ungoverned lout and a danger to the throne, which he indeed was.
“Whereas history again believes Bothwell kidnapped Mary, raped her, and forced her to marry him, but not Culver. He even cites eyewitness reports that Bothwell and Mary’s was a love match. But it hardly matters. After only a number of days they were separated when Mary was forced to surrender at the Battle of Carberry Hill in 1567. She had only one condition—Bothwell be allowed to escape.” Cibalto shrugged. “Mary ran to England and Bothwell to Denmark.
“Historians have written Bothwell was imprisoned in appalling conditions, chained to a pillar, tortured and starved. However, Culver states again, from witness accounts, that Bothwell lived in great comfort at Dragsholm Castle in Zealand, Denmark, that he and the king became friends, drank together, played draughts and tennis together, until Bothwell’s death at age forty-four in 1578. Culver states, again from witness reports, that Bothwell’s death was from poison in his belly, probably food poisoning.
“When I turned the page, there were but a few words,‘King Frederick said their miens were of a perfect counterpoint,’and then there was nothing more. So it seems Mary did indeed have twins. Identical twins. I believe what Culver wrote—Bothwell was well treated indeed by Frederick II of Denmark.”
Grayson started to speak, then in the next moment warmth touched his face, a soft breath feathered his skin. He smelled lemons, faint, far away, yet he breathed in the tart sweetness. He didn’t move, merely thought her name and welcomed her. He felt her presence next to him, then gently covering him, and strangely, the essence of her spirit moved through him like a whisper of air, pure and soft.
Why did you take Pip?
I wanted to touch him, kiss him, let his innocence fill me, but I knew he was yours and I made certain Miranda would find him.
What do you want me to do, Mary?
