The Virgin's War (Tudor Legacy #3)(88)

Clearly, neither was Navarro. He gave in grudgingly, and next thing Pippa knew, Madalena and Matthew had replaced Arundel around her. As lightly as though she were a child, her husband lifted her in his arms and followed Arundel into the castle.

—

In five years of fighting and commanding in various countries, Stephen had lived through many difficult days and nights. This mission was different. It had the same furious intensity as the summer of 1580, when he and Kit had ridden with Mary Stuart in order to secure Lucette’s release as a hostage. Now it was Pippa, deliberately placing herself in peril, trusting to a belief in fate that Stephen himself rejected. He saw Kit and Anabel on their way with two dozen of his best men, then moved the rest of the company east. They rode fast and light, and because they had trained for such things, covered the ground with ease.

In under three hours Hull came into view, with three Spanish ships in harbor. Stephen drew up his company a mile from the town. He did not intend to make an assault unless pushed to it, so he gave his orders and rode alone and anonymously into the city.

There was a small contingent of Spanish guards at the city gate, but Stephen had experience in lying smoothly and got himself admitted with little trouble. They even directed him to the castle, where he had seen the standard of the Earl of Arundel flying. Best to start at the top. Besides his openly displayed sword and the dagger at his belt, Stephen had a smaller knife concealed in his jerkin. He would use it if he had to, even against an Englishman.

He surrendered his horse into the care of a castle groom, who sent a messenger ahead for the earl that an Englishman with information to sell wished to see him. That would at least get Stephen into Arundel’s presence without revealing his identity beforehand. Stephen crossed the courtyard, the usual bustle of castle life passing around him, but stopped dead when a conversation caught his attention.

“Mad he is, that Spaniard…”

“Never saw a priest whip a girl like that…”

“Thought her man would rip out someone’s arms to get to her…”

“Brave thing, she is, for all the priest’s talk of witchcraft…”



Stephen strode into the knot of three men talking, and irritation quickly gave way to wariness as they looked at his face. “What are you talking about?” he demanded.

The oldest of the three, a tough-looking Yorkshireman in his thirties, said gruffly, “What’s it to you?”

Stephen tried hard to remember that he was posing as a Catholic sympathizer at the moment. “If Tomás Navarro has been reduced to venting his frustrations against a mere girl, that doesn’t argue well for our ability to convince the country that we wish only to secure our rights.”

The eyes of the quiet two flickered between themselves as the same man replied. “It was all the Spanish, we had nothing to do with it. His lordship himself stopped it and took her away.”

“Stopped what?” He prayed that he had overheard that single word wrongly.

He hadn’t. “The priest whipped her, here in the yard. Claimed she was a witch. I couldn’t see it, myself. Just a woman, and I reckon that priest doesn’t think much of women.”

Stephen had turned on his heel while the man was still speaking, and he had to flex his hands at his sides to keep from drawing his weapons as he grabbed the first boy he could find inside to take him to Lord Arundel. If he let himself think…let their words conjure up a picture…

Stephen had seen men whipped before. It was sometimes necessary in a military company. But the thought of his little sister—lovely, mischievous, generous Pippa—beneath the lash of a whip made him want to put his hands around Navarro’s throat and choke the life out of him.

Instead, he channeled that fury inward, and by the time he was admitted to Arundel’s presence, Stephen had enough control of his temper not to begin yelling immediately.

Arundel looked up sharply at the interruption, clearly prepared to snap at the intruder. But it took only a moment for him to recognize Stephen, and his irritation gave way to alarm. “Leave us,” he commanded the boy, who scampered away gratefully.

Philip Howard was a few years older than Stephen, the son of oft-rebel and executed traitor Thomas, Duke of Norfolk. Once a somewhat wild youth, he had been firmly converted to Catholicism in 1581 and had held on to his beliefs in the face of increasing pressure from his second cousin, Queen Elizabeth. His title, inherited from his mother, made him a significant power amongst the recusants.

“By your attire,” Lord Arundel said drily, “I assume you did not announce your name. Where did you leave your Scottish company?”

“Where did you leave my sister?” Stephen shot back.

“You’ve heard.” Arundel sighed. “I’m truly sorry, Courtenay. Navarro is…unreasonable. With soldiers to back him, he thinks himself invulnerable.”

“Where. Is. Philippa?”

“I don’t know.”

“You gave her back to Navarro?” Stephen ground out, and rested his hand on the hilt of his sword. He could see red at the edges of his vision.

“I did not,” Arundel snapped. “She is gone, Courtenay, no one knows where. I took her out of that courtyard and put her in a comfortable chamber here with her husband and the Spanish woman. Three hours later they were gone. I assure you, if you don’t believe me, ask Navarro. You’ll have to find him, though. The priest is on their trail.”