The Tudor Secret - C. W. Gortner [71]
I ignored her threat. “Why have you done this?”
She arched one thin eyebrow. “I’m surprised you have to ask.” She motioned. “Move away from the bed. Oh, and drop that … sword, is it?” She smiled. “My son Henry and our retainers are outside, eager for better sport than toasting Guilford’s fortune between Jane Grey’s thighs. One word from me and they’ll flay you alive.”
I threw the sword onto the rug between us. I didn’t deign Master Shelton a glance. The steward stood in front of the door, in the same stance Barnaby had affected, powerful arms folded across his barrel chest.
Bastard. I hated him as I’d never hated anyone in my life, as if it were venom in my blood. I wanted to kill him with my bare hands.
Lady Dudley said, “Mistress Alice, please mix His Majesty’s draught now.”
From the chest, Mistress Alice removed a pouch and sprinkled white powder into a goblet.
I found it almost impossible to maintain my stance. She had done this, all of it. She had mutilated Mistress Alice, set her to poison the king. She’d always been efficient, whether she was organizing her household or ordering the autumn slaughter of the pigs. Why should this have been any different? Understanding now what had been hidden from me all these years, I marveled at how I’d missed it, how I had failed to sense the deception.
It had been Lady Dudley who had plotted to provide an alternative heir to the two princesses. Implacable, she had aimed at exalting her favorite son, used everything she had at her disposal. She’d even divined a weakness in the duchess of Suffolk’s past and made a devil’s pact to one end and one end only—preserving the family power.
But her husband the duke had repaid her in false coin. He’d gone along with her plans, even as he contrived to take Elizabeth for himself. Somehow, Lady Dudley had found out. She had discovered the truth.
What else did she know? What else had she kept secret?
As if she could read my thoughts, her bloodless lips curved. “Twenty years. That’s how long it’s been since you came into our lives. You were always clever, too clever by far. Alice used to say she’d never seen a child so eager to grasp the world. Perhaps I should keep you alive a bit longer, in case our angry duchess reneges on her promise. She thinks you’re dead, but I still need her compliance until we have Jane declared queen. I could use you again.”
I felt sweat on my brow and in my fist clutching the cloth. Without betraying my spiraling fear, I replied, “I might prove more useful if your ladyship told me everything.”
“Everything?” She regarded me with a hint of mirth in her cold gray eyes.
“Yes.” My chest tightened, as if I were short of breath. “I was brought here for a purpose, wasn’t I? At Whitehall, your ladyship told the duchess about my … my birthmark.”
“So, you understood that. I wondered if you counted a fluency in French among your many hidden talents. How fascinating; you certainly have been busy.”
The sweat trickled down my face, pooled in the hollow of my throat. The salt stung the bruises on my cheeks. “I taught myself,” I said. “I am clever, yes. And if I knew who it is the duchess thinks I am, I could help you. I’m amenable to an arrangement that will serve us both.”
It was a pathetic deceit, born of desperation, and she responded with startling laughter.
“Would you, indeed? Then you’re not as clever as I’d supposed. Do you think I’d be stupid enough to trust you, now that I know you protect that Boleyn whore? However, you have solved my dilemma. Shelton, watch him while I see to His Majesty.”
She glided to the bed. I stealthily tucked the cloth into my jerkin pocket, pushing it down against the inside seam as I braved a glance at Master Shelton. He avoided all eye contact, his gaze fixed ahead, but I knew that if I made any move to escape he would leap into action. He had the reflexes of a soldier—which is why I found it disconcerting that he didn’t seem to notice Sidney shifting away from