Lights, warmth. Flickering candles and laughter. The borrowed pearls roped about her neck made her feel charmed. Her chest rose and fell with excitement. Someone was taking her arm, bare to the elbow. She felt that charge, skin upon skin. The strains of music. The yearning, the longing, a pair of dark, dark eyes. The turn of his head, the caress of his voice. His hand, twining behind her head, so that her headdress was knocked to the floor and her long dark hair came tumbling out. And all the time, she was there, leading them. The woman in red, lithe, sinuous, playful, addictive…
“Awake! Awake, ladies! The king is on his way!”
Thomasin sat up, rubbing her eyes. Her dream faded, like sunbeams at the end of the day. Her mind tried to clutch at them, hold on to those memories: those feelings of last autumn, at Anne’s court, in Rafe’s arms, but they were already vanishing, leaving a sense of loss. She was back in the cold chamber, smelling rosemary, stone and cold ashes.
Dawn had barely taken hold. Weak spring light filtered through the carved screen and exposed the sleepy forms. The women stirred reluctantly, slowly, stretching their stiff limbs.
“The king?”
“Yes, the king! He has ordered a banquet to be prepared ahead of his arrival. He will be here by noon. Arise and make haste to the queen, to the queen! Spread the word.”
Thomasin swung her legs from under her blanket and put her stockinged feet down on the bare floor.
“Hurry, hurry, the king is on his way!”
The candles kindled into light, one after the other. She hurried to light the fire.
Catherine’s breath came short with impatience. Her round back with its ample flesh heaved up and down with a kind of creak inside. Thomasin’s fingers fumbled with the laces at her waist, making a mess as she teased out the loops. Then, in haste, she pulled them too tight, making Catherine gasp.
“Sorry, My Lady.” She picked them out of the holes to loosen them again, then tied the knot. “Sorry, My Lady, all done now.” She anticipated a reproach, but Catherine’s mind was elsewhere.
Ellen carried forward Catherine’s doublet, stiff with embroidery in raised silver thread and spangles. Catherine raised her arms with a catch of pain. Behind her, they waited. Slowly, with caution, she eased her arms into it, one at a time, then Ellen settled it on her shoulders.
“I am stiff,” Catherine said. “My shoulders ache, my arms are weak; I feel age creep upon me.”
Thomasin and Ellen exchanged a look, but Maria Willoughby was there first, holding out Catherine’s jewels.
“Oh, My Lady, you are but young still — no such talk, or else you shall age me!”
Thomasin stood back to let Maria’s deft hands place the string of pearls and rubies about Catherine’s broad neck. There was so much love and tenderness in the gesture between the two friends, who had come to England in their teens. Such an adventure it had been, then.
“My mirror?”
Ellen was there with the burnished glass. Its pale ellipse shone dully in the morning light. Catherine winced into it then turned away.
“No, no, the red one, the red one.”
“You are sure?” asked Maria.
“As I said. Change me.”
Ellen and Thomasin carefully lifted away the green doublet and Gertrude hurried forward with the deep red one, sewn with gold and pearls. Ellen’s deft hands plucked it into place. Catherine nodded approvingly at the glass. “Yes, that is better.”
Catherine was looking at herself with satisfaction as there was a knock on the door.
“Enter.”
Baron Mountjoy appeared, his face the picture of composure. “Would My Lady check the list of dishes before they are sent out for the banquet? The king has requested it specially.”
“What were his exact words?”
“He requested a banquet to be set in the little lodge, in the park.”
“In the park? Not in the castle?”
“No, My Lady.”
“But we expect him here afterwards?”
