The Virgin's Spy (Tudor Legacy #2)(28)
When in doubt, apologize. That was the first rule one learned dealing with royalty, so he supposed it would do for sisters. “Forgive me, Philippa,” he said finally, reverting to formality to cover the awkwardness. “I suppose we all do that to you, looking to you to sort our problems. You just do it so well…” he hesitated, then barked a brief laugh. “So much like Mother. Do you suppose she ever loses her temper when people expect her to know everything?”
That wrung a small smile from his twin. “Undoubtedly.”
“I suppose Anabel is anxious for you to return.” For the first time in his life, Kit considered that Pippa’s life must be even more circumscribed than his own. He, as she had caustically noted, could at the very least take his sword and his body and offer them for the use of whoever might pay at home or abroad. His sisters had not even that option. Pippa served at the pleasure of a temperamental Tudor royal. Was that enough for her?
Pippa said soberly, “I do not plan to return to Anabel just now. I shall stay at Wynfield Mote, and then spend the winter with the family at Tiverton.”
“I’m sure Mother will appreciate having you home.”
“I’m not doing it for Mother.”
They locked eyes and, in that ineffable manner of twins, he felt a breath of words across his mind. He could never explain it—not so simple or straightforward as silent talking—but he knew now why she was staying.
For Matthew Harrington.
He should have guessed. Matthew had always been Pippa’s friend, far more than either his or Stephen’s. It wasn’t that Matthew was awed or even much impressed by the Courtenay boys—Matthew was the one with the Oxford education, and birth would never be an impediment where Harrington and Carrie’s son was concerned. It was simply that Pippa alone attracted him. In the manner of a magnet, as though he instinctively turned in whichever direction she did.
Kit had known Pippa cared about Matthew, but he hadn’t guessed until this moment the nature and depth of that caring. The revelation left him feeling oddly lonely as they approached Compton Wynyates, the red-brick house as dark as raspberries, the castellated and turreted roofline jagged against the pale blue sky.
If he didn’t have Pippa and couldn’t have Anabel—what was left for him?
A week later he received a royal messenger commanding his presence in London as soon as possible to meet with Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth.
—
In mid-October, Mary Stuart, Queen of Spain, retired to a lavishly appointed chamber in the Royal Alcazar of Madrid to await her confinement. Given her history, it was not an entire surprise when, just ten days later, she was delivered of twins. Not a stillborn boy and girl, as so long ago in Scotland, but two lusty boys.
Philip surveyed his sons with a pleased delight he had not expected to feel. An heir he needed, yes—and two sons was a luxury he had not looked for—but this marriage had been far more a political calculation than even his marriage to Elizabeth two decades ago. He had considered Mary’s pregnancy in the light of a calculated risk. But what he felt now was more than the simple satisfaction of a risk paid off.
They were baptized two days later. Prince Charles, the elder by ten minutes, and Prince Alexander, a Scots name that gave the Spanish bishop difficulty. Afterward, Philip and Mary had a private interview.
“Are you well, Maria?” he asked with real solicitude. Her age, which had been such a real concern through the pregnancy, continued to keep the physicians watchful. Soon to be thirty-nine, but still with a luster to her fair skin and a light to her eyes. And a mind as dogged and certain as ever about what she wanted.
“I would be better without the slaughter wrought in Carrigafoyle. It haunts my dreams—the atrocities of the English to your soldiers.”
“You should not be considering such things now. Think rather on your sons.”
“I am thinking of my sons…of all my sons. And of your daughter, as well.”
Her stubbornness was that of a limited viewpoint and self-righteous certainty. Not like Elizabeth’s stubbornness, but irritating. And often successful, if only to keep from being worn down one frustrating drop at a time.
“I am sure both James and Anne will be pleased to hear of their new siblings.”
“I am sure both James and Anne will be horrified. As will Elizabeth. They will guess what will follow from this.”
Philip rubbed his face, an unusual sign of agitation. “Not now, Maria.”
“You must avenge what was done to your soldiers in Ireland.”
“I will discuss it later. With my council, as I should.”
Her face flushed, not unattractively. “What more do you need from me to do what is right? You required a son—I have given you two. While you sit in your kingdom and count the earthly riches God has granted you, others of our faith are starving and dying beneath the hands of heretics!”
Philip had heard it all before. He knew the intensity of Mary’s faith was equaled only by the intensity of her resentment of the English and Scots Protestants who had harried her from her kingdom and held her captive for years. But he also knew the practical realities of a fight in Ireland, details that Mary always brushed off.
So different from Elizabeth.
Despite Mary’s complaints, Philip had not been idle since word of Carrigafoyle arrived. And he knew things his wife did not—for instance, the general location of the one hundred Spanish soldiers who had not been amidst the slaughter in Carrigafoyle.