“I am the heiress to a rather large holding,” Elizabeth told him. “I have not married yet, and I have been brought to court with an eye to finding a husband.”
“I would have thought a beautiful girl like yourself would have been wed long since,” Flynn Stewart said.
Elizabeth laughed. “Why?” she asked him mischievously, looking up into his face. “Just because I am considered beautiful and rich, though my sister would shudder to hear me express such sentiments? My mother believes in allowing her daughters to make their own choices in the matter of marriage. It is unusual, I know, but there it is.”
“And there is no one you would wed, so you have been sent to court in an effort to broaden your search,” he remarked. “Well, you will find plenty of young men here—and not so young men—more than willing to have a beautiful heiress to wife.”
“I will find no one,” Elizabeth said. “The man I marry must be willing to live at Friarsgate and help me manage the manor. I have had the responsibility of it since the day I turned fourteen, and I will not allow anyone to take that autonomy from me. I will share it with the right man, but I shall never relinquish it. Look about you, sir. Do you think any of these perfumed fellows will suit me?”
“Then why are you here if you think it is a waste of time?” he asked her.
“I have come to please my family, my mother in particular,” Elizabeth said.
“What will happen when you return without a mate then?”
“My mother will fret and be angry, I suspect. My stepfather, the laird of Claven’s Carn, will attempt to drag out a younger son of one of his friends. But eventually they will all calm themselves,” Elizabeth said. Then she sighed. “I know I must wed if I am to have an heir one day, but none of this seems right to me.” Then she looked up at him. “You ask many questions, sir, and I find myself answering when I really should not. We are strangers to each other.”
“No longer, Elizabeth Meredith,” he told her. “Now, would you like to meet some other young people? Your sister may not consider them entirely suitable, but if your stay at court is to be a short one, then you should have some fun.”
“Will we be out of Philippa’s sight if I say yes?” she asked him.
He nodded with a grin.
“Then lead on, sir,” she told him.
“You are not an easy girl, are you?” he teased her.
She laughed, and then to her surprise he led her to where Mistress Anne Boleyn sat surrounded by a group of gentlemen.
“Mistress Boleyn, may I present the Countess of Witton’s sister, newly come to court,” Flynn Stewart said.
Anne Boleyn looked at Elizabeth sharply. She was beautiful, and very fashionably attired in pale blue silk, the bodice of her gown and the turned-back cuffs of her sleeves embroidered in silver threads and pearls. Her underskirt was brocade. She wore a French cap on her head that was edged in pearls. She was just the sort of perfect English beauty that the king could be attracted to, and Anne was uneasy. She nodded slightly to Elizabeth in answer to the introduction, and the blond girl curtseyed to her.
“You are a Meredith then,” Sir Thomas Wyatt said.
“I am, my lord.”
“Was Sir Owein Meredith your father then?” Sir Thomas probed.
“He was, God assoil his soul,” Elizabeth replied.
“Are you husband hunting then, Mistress Meredith?” he questioned boldly.
“My family is, but I am not, my lord,” she answered him pertly.
Anne Boleyn laughed, as did the others about her. She could not help it. The girl was not the least intimidated by the high and mighty surrounding her. There was a freshness about her, but she was still too beautiful.
“Are you rich?” George Boleyn, Anne’s brother, demanded to know.
“I am,” Elizabeth said. “Are you interested in offering for my hand, sir, and coming north to Cumbria to wed me?” She was mocking him, and they all knew it.
“Cumbria?” George Boleyn looked horrified. “Is not that where all the sheep are raised, Mistress Meredith?”
“Indeed, sir. I raise Cheviots, Shropshires, Hampshires, and Merinos,” Elizabeth replied.
“Sheep have names?” he said, curious in spite of himself.
“They are breeds, sir,” Elizabeth responded.
