"I believe his lordship does not dare risk it," I replied, "lest word of it gets to your sister and prompts her to flee the country. It would explain why he ordered my master Lord Robert to capture her first. Someone at court, they say, is feeding her information."

"I'm sure someone is," said Elizabeth. "We're talking about John Dudley, after all. By now he's made more enemies than Mary ever could."

"Then we mustn't press your luck further. I've friends nearby who can help us get you away. Even His Majesty's close companion Master Fitzpatrick is-"

"No."

For a moment, the last of the fireworks popping in the distance seemed to pause.

"No?" I echoed, thinking I must have heard wrong.

"No." Her face set. "I'm not leaving Greenwich. Not yet."

Kate said quickly, "Your Grace cannot mean to stay after what we've just heard. It would be madness. We promised Master Cecil you would-"

"I know what we promised. I said I would consider his advice. Consider, Kate, not comply. Now, I must see this through. I couldn't live with myself if I did not."

"My lady," I ventured and I received the full force of her stare. "I beg you to reconsider. You cannot change the duke's course, no matter what you do, nor can you hope to save His Majesty. Under the circ.u.mstances, you must now save yourself, for England."

Her mouth pursed. "That's Cecil speaking and I like it not. Be yourself, Prescott. I prefer you that way-impudent, rash, and determined to do whatever it takes."

I might have smiled, had the matter not been so serious. "Then, impudent as I am, I must emphasize how dangerous it would be to keep your appointment with my master. Lord Robert aims higher than Your Grace knows. He will deceive you in any way he can. He has refused to go after your sister because he believes you will accept his proposal of marriage."

Her expression underwent a change. It was almost imperceptible, but I saw it, the tightening of the sensitive skin about her mouth, a flash of something livid in her eyes.

"And I," she said softly, "know best how to deal with him." She raised her chin. "Besides, it's too late. Here he comes now."

I spun about. Kate grabbed me, pulled me back. "Go," she hissed. "Hide!"

I scrambled over the bal.u.s.trade, dropping with what sounded like a deafening crash into the hawthorn bushes. "Graceful," muttered Peregrine. He and Barnaby had crept up unheard, each armed with daggers. Peregrine handed me one. I remembered my old dagger, which Master Shelton had given me. Stokes owed me, if only for stealing my knife. As for my cap, it seemed I had finally lost it for good.

Through the leaves, I watched Robert swagger down the pathway. He had asked me to make sure to return to help him dress tonight. Despite my absence, he'd done well enough, resplendent in a doublet of gold brocade studded with opals that must have cost an estate. He paused, removing his jeweled and feathered cap as he stepped up the stairs into the pavilion, his legs sheathed to his thighs in cordovan boots with gold spurs.

He dropped to one knee before Elizabeth. "I'm overwhelmed to find Your Grace safe and in good health." Even in the openness of the pavilion, his musk perfume was overpowering, like the breath of a magnificent beast in its prime.

She did not extend her hand to him, nor give him leave to rise. Slipping her handkerchief into her cuff she said, "I can't complain about my health. As for my safety, that remains to be seen. This court was never a place of refuge for me."

He glanced up. She'd spoken lightly, almost offhandedly, but even he could not have mistaken her tone. He reacted as if he had, however, replying huskily, "If you let me, I will make this court and all the realm places of refuge and glory for you."

"Yes." She smiled. "You would do so much for me, wouldn't you, my sweet Robin? Since we were children, you have always promised me the sun and the stars."

"I still do. You can have anything you desire. Ask for it and it shall be yours."

"Very well." She stared at him. "I wish to see my brother before he dies, without fearing for my life."

Robert stiffened. Still relegated to his knees, he took longer than expected before he managed to say, "I... I dare not speak of that. And neither must you."

"Oh?" She tilted her head. "Why? Surely friends have nothing to hide?"

"We do not," he said. "But it is treason to speculate on such a matter, as you know."

Her laughter rang out. "I'm relieved to hear someone in your family still has a conscience! And that, apparently, my brother still lives. It would no longer be treason to speculate if he did not." She paused. "I thought you said I could have anything I desired. Would you fail me now in my hour of need?"

"You toy with me." He sprang to his feet, overpoweringly robust against her slimness. "I did not come to play games. I came to warn you that your right to the throne is in danger."

"I have no right," she retorted swiftly, but I detected a weakening in her voice, a supple yielding. "My sister Mary is heir, not I. Thus, if you must warn someone, let it be her."

Robert reached for her hand. "Come now. We're not children anymore. We needn't see who can outwit whom. You know as well as I that the people will not have your sister for their queen. She represents Rome and the past, everything they've come to detest."

"And yet she is their rightful-their only only-heir," said Elizabeth. She yanked her hand from him. "Besides, who's to say? Mary could change her faith, as so many these days are apt to do. She's a Tudor, when all is said and done, and we're not ones to let religion stand in our way."

Robert regarded her with a discomfiting familiarity. I hadn't thought about how much history can be collected in a mere twenty years, how much two children reared on a diet of intrigue and deception can come to rely upon each other.

"Do you take me for a fool?" he said. "You know Mary would defend her faith to the grave if need be. You know it, the council knows it, your brother the king knows it, and-"

"Your father knows it best of all," said Elizabeth. "You might say, he antic.i.p.ates it." She eyed him with calculating intimacy that made him look like an amateur. "Is that why you wished to see me? Have we danced around each other these past two days for you to tell me that my sister mustn't take the throne because she reveres the faith in which she was raised?"

"G.o.d's blood! I came to tell you that in the eyes of the people, you-and only you-have the right to be queen. You are the princess they revere; you are the one they await. They would rise in arms to uphold you, if you would say the word. They'd die in your defense."

"Would they?" Her voice was a cruel caress. "There was a time when they would have done the same for Mary's mother. At that time, it was Katherine of Aragon who was the rightful queen and my mother the hated usurper. Would you have me step into a dead woman's shoes?"

The air between them was charged, the tension so palpable it set my teeth on edge. There was indeed history between them, and far too much emotion. It was my first glimpse into a pa.s.sion so deep, so volatile, that were it unleashed it would destroy everything before it.

"Why must you always banter with me?" Robert's voice quavered. "You fear Mary taking the throne as much I do. You know it would mean the end of the Church your father built so he could wed your mother; the ruin of any hope for peace or prosperity. She'll set the Inquisition upon us within the year. But not you; you have no desire to persecute. That is why you have the people on your side and most of the n.o.bility. And me. Anyone who dared question your right will suffer my sword."

She regarded him in silence. From my hiding place I could see her hesitation, her terrified understanding of all that was at stake and all she might gain by it. My legs tensed like an animal's about to spring, imagining her struggle to justify a past smeared by her mother's spilt blood. Then she spoke. "My right, you say? Is it my right, truly? Or do you mean, ours ours?"

"It's one and the same," he said quickly. "I live to serve you."

"Inspiring words. They might stir me, had I not heard similar ones before."

It was the first time in my life I had seen Robert Dudley struck speechless.

"Do you want to know from whom?" Elizabeth added. "It was your father. Yes, my sweet Robin-your father offered me much the same this afternoon. He even used the same arguments, offered the same enticement."

Robert stood petrified to his spot.

"You can ask Mistress Stafford if you don't believe me," said Elizabeth. "She saw him leave my rooms. He barged in-while I was abed-to declare he would make me queen if I consented to marry him. He promised to get rid of his wife, your mother, for me-or rather, for my crown. For of course I would have to make him king. Not king-consort, but king in his own right, so that should I die before him, say in childbed, as so many do, he could continue to rule after me and bequeath the throne to his heirs, regardless of whether they are my issue or not."

She smiled, graceful and unforgiving. "So you must excuse me if I don't react with the enthusiasm you hoped for. I'm fresh out of enthusiasm where Dudleys are concerned."

Her performance was mesmerizing. She hadn't breathed a word of this, though it explained why Northumberland had chosen to set Jane Grey on the throne. An experienced courtier, he had a contingency plan, in case his first choice fell through. His declaration at Whitehall on the night of Elizabeth's arrival-it had been his warning that he was willing to proceed against her if she stood in his way. And she had done just that, refusing him and everything he contrived to obtain for her and in return issuing her own declaration of war.

As Cecil surmised, the duke had underestimated her.

The disbelief on Robert's face drained his sun-bronzed skin to a chalky hue. I actually felt sorry for him as he said in a faltering voice, "My father... he offered... to marry you?"

"You sound surprised. I don't see why. The seed is the same as the apple it came from, or so they tell me."

He stepped to her with such fury that without thinking, I started to lunge. Barnaby's viselike grasp on my shoulder detained me, coupled with a lightning warning glance from the otherwise motionless Kate. I closed my fist about my dagger hilt. As I did, I saw Kate slip a hand into her cloak, for something no doubt equally sharp. It rea.s.sured me that in this instance, at least, she demonstrated her loyalty.

Robert gripped Elizabeth by the arm with such brutality her hair unraveled and cascaded like flame over her shoulders, pearls scattering across the pavilion floor.

"You lie! You lie and play with me, like a b.i.t.c.h in heat-and still, G.o.d help me, I want you." He crushed her mouth against his. She reared back; with a stinging retort that echoed in the electrified air, she raised her hand and struck him hard across the face. Her rings cut into his skin, lacerating his lip.

"Unhand me this instant," she said, "or by G.o.d I'll never let you near me again."

Her words were more blistering than her blow. Robert stood stunned, his cut lip bleeding, before he backed away. They faced each other like combatants, their breath audible, heavy. Then the aggression crumbled from his face and he gazed at her with something akin to grief.

"You're not considering it? You'd not wed him to spite me?"

"If you think that, you are more deluded than he is," she said, but her voice was trembling now, as though she fought back uncertainty that threatened to undo her. "As if I, a princess born and bred, would ever let some lowborn Dudley rut in my bed. I'd die first."

He flinched. His face set like stone. It was a terrible moment, sounding the death knell on years of childhood trust. No woman had humiliated Robert Dudley; any woman he'd wanted, he'd had. But despite all his guile, all his vanity and pretense, he desired only one woman, and she had just rejected him with a callous resolve aimed like a spear at his heart.

He drew himself erect. "Is that your final word?"

"It is my only word. King or commoner, I will be no man's victim."

"What if that man should declare his love for you?"

She let out a chuckle. "If this is a man's love, I pray G.o.d to spare me any more of it."

He exploded. "So be it! You will lose it all-country, crown: everything! They'll take it all from you and leave you with nothing but your infernal pride. I love you. I have always loved you, but seeing as you'll have nothing to do with it, you leave me with no other choice but to do as my father commands. I will go and arrest your sister, see her to the Tower. And as G.o.d is my witness, Elizabeth, when he next sends me out at the head of soldiers, I cannot promise it will not be to come knocking at your door in Hatfield."

She lifted her chin. "Should that come to pa.s.s, then I'll be grateful for a familiar face."

Robert bowed furiously and stormed back down the steps toward the palace. The night swallowed him. The moment he was gone, Elizabeth swayed. Kate hurried to her.

"G.o.d help me," I heard her whisper. "What have I done?"

"What you had to," Kate said. "What Your Grace's dignity required."

Elizabeth stared at her. A quivering laugh escaped her. "Squire Prescott!"

I rose, brushing dead leaves from my damp breeches as I came before her. In her eyes I glimpsed an anguish she'd never admit to. "You told me I was in danger of my life. It seems you were right. What shall we do now?"

"Leave, Your Grace," I said, "before Lord Robert confesses to his father. Once he does, they will have to take you. You already know too much."

"Strange," she replied, as Kate removed her cloak from the bal.u.s.trade and draped it about her thin shoulders. "It seems you do not know him as much as you should, for boys that were raised together. Robert will never go to his father with this. I've hurt him in the one place he'll not forgive or forget, but he'll not seek revenge through the duke. No, he hates Northumberland now even more than me. He may do as he's bid and take Mary down like a prize doe, for his pride of manhood demands it, but he'll never set his father's hounds on me willingly."

"Whatever the case, we can't wait to find out." I turned to Kate. A lesser woman might have flinched at the tone in my voice. "Any instructions from Cecil we should know about?"

She met my stare. "I am to take Her Grace through the postern gate. There is transport waiting for us on the road. But, you aren't supposed to be here."

Elizabeth said, "I am overwhelmed by the concern, and the effort expended on my behalf, but I've no desire to leave my Arabian, Cantila, here for the duke's use. He's too valuable a friend." Her lips curled. "Speaking of which, didn't you say you had friends nearby?"

In answer to her query, Peregrine bounded up out of hiding. "I'll fetch Your Grace's horse!" Behind him Barnaby offered stiff genuflection, shreds of leaves in his hair. "My lady," he said with the warmth of years of familiarity.

"Barnaby Fitzpatrick," she breathed, "I am glad of you." She leaned to Peregrine with a wry smile. "Don't you work in the stables at Whitehall? Where is my dog?"

Peregrine gazed at her in unabashed adoration. "Urian is safe. He is here, stabled with Cantila. I'll fetch him, too, if you like. Anything you need. It would be my honor."

"He means it," I added. I glanced at Peregrine. "My horse Cinnabar is also here, my friend, in case you'd forgotten. And my saddlebag is under the straw."

Peregrine nodded, fl.u.s.tered. Elizabeth said briskly, "Then it's settled. Our friend here will fetch my dog and the horses, and meet us at the gate. I've a friend of my own outside Greenwich, where we can seek refuge lest the duke sends troops after us. I don't think it wise to return to Hatfield quite yet." She paused. A chill went through me as I saw her tense. Even though I antic.i.p.ated her words, they still took me off guard.

"But before we go anywhere, I must see Edward."

Chapter Eighteen.

A deafening hush followed her declaration. I marveled that I should feel any shock; it wasn't as if she behaved in an unexpected fashion. I also wondered why I tried to convince her otherwise, even as I said: "That's impossible. We can't get inside. And even if we could, His Majesty's rooms are too well guarded. We'll never get out again."

Elizabeth regarded me stonily. "Perhaps before we give up, we should ask Master Fitzpatrick, who's slept at the foot of my brother's bed these many years. He will know how impossible it is." She turned to Barnaby. "Is there a way for us to get into Edward's apartments without being caught?"

To my disbelief, Barnaby a.s.sented. "There's a secret pa.s.sage to the bedchamber. In times past, His Majesty your late father used it. Last time I checked, the duke hadn't set a guard there. But I must warn you, if he does, the only way out is through the apartments, and they're infested with his minions."

"I'll take my chances." Elizabeth returned her gaze to me. "Don't try to detain me. If you wish to help me, do so. If not, you can meet me at the gatehouse. But I must do this. I must see my brother before it is too late." She paused. "I... I have to say good-bye."

Her words tugged at my soul. This, I understood.

Barnaby stepped forth. "I will take Your Grace." He shot me a look. "I'll see her to His Majesty and back to the gatehouse safely."

"Thank you, Barnaby." She didn't take her eyes from me. I finally conceded defeat with a sigh, lifting my own gaze past her to the palace and rows of glowing windows. The fireworks display had ended. Furtive storm clouds leaked fragrant humidity. The festivities would reach their apex soon, with the court imbuing free wine and dancing in feverish delight in front of the morose couple ensconced on the dais. The duke would be obligated to stand attendance, keep close watch on the n.o.bles, seeing as the king had not made his promised appearance to bless the nuptials. If ever there was a time to sneak into royal apartments, this was it. Why, then, did I feel a terrible presentiment?

"Ash Kat has sent word to the hall that I'm indisposed," said Elizabeth, misinterpreting the reason for my silence. "My a.s.sorted stomach complaints and headaches are notorious, as is my temper when disturbed. In addition, the duke knows what he said to me this afternoon and he'll not wish to push his luck. I didn't tell Robert as much, naturally, but I did not refuse Northumberland completely. I merely said I needed some time to contemplate his offer."

She smiled coldly. "Of course, that time will soon run out, but unless they decide to break down my bedchamber door, for now, no one will dare intrude on me."

"Or not while His Majesty lives," I said. "Once he is gone, you can't expect mercy."

"I never would," she replied. "You are bold, nonetheless, to remind me."

I looked to Barnaby. "Are you sure it's safe to use that pa.s.sage?"

"Providing it isn't guarded and someone stands watch while we're inside, yes. Only the king's favorite, Harry Sidney, is with Edward now. He'll not raise warning against us."

"I'll stand guard." Kate withdrew a dagger from her cloak. I repressed immediate protest. We weren't so many that I could afford to disdain help; and we did need someone to watch.

"Fine. Peregrine will come with us. If it looks safe, he can go to the stables. Your Grace does realize your visit with your brother must be brief?"

She pulled up her hood. "Yes."