Crossing Over - Anna Kendall [79]
“Where ...?”
She rose, looked me over, and said a single word: “Wait.” She left the room.
I sat up. I felt light-headed, but the pain in my arm was gone. It had been bandaged, and the bandages smelled of some faintly vinegary ointment. Carefully I got to my feet, trying to puzzle out where I was. A second door, ajar, led to a bedchamber. I glimpsed a narrow bed and a plain, highly polished chest. Three books were stacked neatly on top, beside some needlework. The other door opened.
“Roger! ”
The serving woman had returned, and with her was Lady Margaret. Some part of my mind realized that this was the first time she had ever used my name instead of calling me “Fool.” Clumsily I fell to my knees.
“Rise,” she said impatiently. “How do you feel?”
“Better, my lady. Did you bring me here and—”
Lady Margaret interrupted me to speak to the serving woman. “Leave us, Martha.”
“Yes, my lady.”
When she had gone, Lady Margaret said, “Eat first. You’ve had nothing for two days. Sit there, and eat that.”
As soon as she said this, I was ravenous. Nothing existed except the bread, cheese, and wine on the table. I gobbled like a boar. Then, when my belly was full, Lady Margaret existed again, looking haggard. She was ten or fifteen years older than the other ladies, and still in the queen’s service because no one had married her, and she had never been a beauty. Still, I had not thought it possible that her long face could look this gaunt and drawn, and there were violet shadows beneath her eyes. I said, “The queen ...”
“Knows where you are. I told her that you had fallen ill from being locked all night outside on the tower during a fit, and that I would have you cared for. She sends her good wishes.”
But no regrets for having locked me out during my “fit.” Nor any reasons for having left me there, where I might have died. I said dryly, “The queen is well?”
“Don’t be insolent, Roger.”
Lady Margaret was much shrewder than Cecilia; I needed to remember that. I bowed my head in repentance. Also to hide my anger. But her next words made my head jerk upward to stare at her.
“I did not tell the queen that you were injured as well as ill, nor that the injury came from a savage’s gun. Fortunately, it was but a flesh wound. But how did that happen while you were locked on top of the tower, Roger the Fool?”
We gazed at each other. I chose honesty, partly because I didn’t think I could get away with anything else. Not with her. “I cannot tell you, my lady. On the queen’s orders.”
“There is much that cannot be told, these days.”
“Yes.”
She leaned close to me and lowered her voice to a whisper. “You have been ill for two days,” she said, “and so you don’t know what has happened. I’m going to tell you, Roger, but only because I think it important that you know the truth and not the rumors swirling around the palace. And because I think you already know more about the truth of Lady Cecilia than does anyone else.”
“Lady Cecilia?” Now I was truly bewildered. I thought we had been talking about the queen.
“You were on the tower roof helping the queen look for the messenger from Queen Isabelle, weren’t you?”
“Yes.”
“He arrived while you were in your fit.”
“He arrived? He’s here?” Not among the Dead.
“He was here, but no longer. Nor is Isabelle’s army, which will never come to the queen’s aid.”
I was staggered. Queen Isabelle must come to the aid of her sister-in-law; that’s what queens did. There was a marriage pact. And any daughter of Isabelle and Rupert would be second in line for the Crown of Glory. Queen Isabelle could not have refused to send her army.
“Why?” The word burst from me like the explosion from a savage’s gun. And Lady Margaret had mentioned Cecilia. . . .
All at once I knew, and the world turned sick around me.
“Yes,” Lady Margaret said, looking at my face. “Queen Isabelle had a bout of the crawls. Her physicians say it has scarred her inside, so that she may never bear a child. She caught