The Virgin's Spy (Tudor Legacy #2)(32)
But there would be no disputes. If there was one thing the Courtenays knew how to do, it was behave properly.
Stephen took the first step, striding to his sister and lifting her hand for a light kiss. “I hope your journey was not too taxing.”
“The cold at least makes the roads easier to navigate. You look…” She could not bring herself to openly lie and say You look well, and settled instead for the ambiguous, “better…You have healed?”
“I can breathe without feeling my ribs piercing my insides. The arm is still a little weak—the arms master has ordered me to switch sword hands for a while in order to strengthen it.”
“I can help with that,” Julien offered. “It’s a handy skill, in any case, being able to use both hands.”
Before there could be any awkward silences, Stephen said smoothly, “I’ll leave you to rest and change. My cook is overjoyed to have visitors—no doubt the kitchens will provide enough food for twenty. I’ll see you then.”
He escaped to his own chamber, hands trembling. This was going to be harder than he’d thought. Just two minutes with his sister and part of his mind was shouting that he couldn’t do this, she would see right through him, how was he ever going to cope for a fortnight or more without drinking? His household might hold their peace, but Lucie would not be so circumspect. She would task him with it, and then, more likely than not, would go straight to their parents.
He forced himself to breathe in and out slowly, the chaos of his mind forced back into the shadowy corners where his memories usually lurked during the day. Then he poured himself a drink from the bottle of malmsey. He relished the sweet, sharp taste and told himself, I don’t have to stop drinking entirely. Just control it better.
Only at dinner did he realize he might not have struck quite the balance he’d meant to. He wasn’t drunk, but he wasn’t entirely sober, either. That was not a mistake he’d made before, as he’d previously confined drinking to nighttime. But it did help, otherwise he’d never have been able to sit through a meal with someone who knew him as well as Lucie did. She had always been, rather of necessity, the closest to him—for who could be expected to break into the charmed twinship of Kit and Pippa? And if her tone tonight was mild, her eyes were sharp.
Julien did much to carry the conversation, which tended to the general, such as the weather and the state of the roads and the scandalous behaviour of one of Elizabeth’s women who had been discovered six months pregnant with no husband in sight. Stephen gave a silent sigh of relief when they rose to disband. One evening down. Only thirteen more to go without giving something away.
But Lucette knew how to choose her moments. As Julien started up the stairs of the tower, she lingered near her brother. He braced himself for whatever she meant to say—but not well enough.
“You have not asked about Carrie.”
His vision swam and he swore he could hear the clash of arms and the screams of the dying, smell the copper tang of blood…
Lucette touched his arm, and Stephen flinched away as though she’d struck him. His voice was harsh. “What is there to ask? She has been left desolate because of my mistake. Because of me, Carrie is bereft. Because of me, Matthew has no father. If I thought asking after either of them would make it better, then I would ask. But the only service I can imagine they want from me is not to be reminded of my existence.”
He felt Lucie watching him as he stalked away, and prayed that she would not follow. He could not swear he would not strike her if she did.
—
As Christmas approached at Carlow Castle, Finian Kavanaugh’s splinter of the clan settled in to make winter bearable. Dampness made the cold go straight to the bones, but the imposing castle could at least keep out the harshest of the winds, and much could be mitigated with fires, braziers, tapestries to cover the walls, and layers of clothing. The castle had been bought by Finian from the English crown thirty years before, and its location gave it the now precarious position of being within reach of the Pale. But as the Kavanaughs had no plans for active lawbreaking or rebellion this winter, it was as well to be seen to be blameless in comfort.
Ailis Kavanaugh knew Carlow Castle as well as she knew any other place. Hers had been a peripatetic childhood; her most stable home had been the convent at which she’d been educated for several years in western Ireland (where the English policy of dissolution had encountered distinct opposition). She was glad enough to have been itinerant, if only because it meant she was free of that dangerous attachment to specific places that often clouded the judgment of men in staking their claims. As far as she was concerned, Ireland as a whole was her home, and it was for Ireland as a whole that she resented the invaders.
Four months into his third marriage, Finian Kavanaugh himself was newly sleek and satisfied, though Ailis suspected that had more to do with pride of possession than any overwhelming passion. No surprise—he was more than sixty and his new bride was not a figure to inspire rampant desire. Not that Ailis didn’t like Maisie. Frankly, she was glad not to have competition as the most desirable female in the clan, and however small and unremarkable Maisie might be physically, she had a keen mind and cynical humour that Ailis appreciated.
She’d never had a female friendship. It was a bit of a shock to realize she might have stumbled into one without meaning to.
Two days before Christmas, a nondescript rider on a sturdy pony of the kind often found in Ireland’s more mountainous regions rode into Carlow. Divesting himself of a muddy, well-patched woolen cloak, the upright, gray-haired figure of Father Byrne was revealed.