The Prince of Lies (Night's Masque, #3)(88)

CHAPTER XXIII



The Queen’s household was moved back to Saint Thomas’ Tower as soon as the causeway had been cleared. Juliana had protested to the guardsmen that she should be by her husband’s side in this time of crisis, but to no avail. The Privy Council had decreed, in the name of the King, that Robert’s wife and children must stay in the Tower for their own safety until all the conspirators behind the assassination attempt had been arrested. And so they had returned to what had been intended as temporary quarters, feeling more like prisoners than guests under protection.

Coby tried to busy herself about the Queen’s apartments but there was little to do apart from sewing, listening to one of the ladies-in-waiting read, or watching the skrayling ships depart the city. She spent far too much of her time on the latter, wondering where she and Mal would take Kit if the skraylings never returned. Of course she had to get Kit out of here first, the sooner the better.

A wail came from the bedchamber. The Queen. Coby rushed up the short flight of steps.

“Your Majesty?”

Queen Juliana had sunk to the floor in a puddle of silks, and would have fallen entirely if two of her ladies had not knelt and held her up. Coby noticed the door to the Wakefield Tower stood open, and a white-faced page hovered near it, twisting his black velvet bonnet in his hands. She left the Queen to her companions and crossed to him.

“What news?” she asked in a low voice, taking him by the elbow.

“P-P-Prince Edward, madam. He’s taken sick. Naught but a summer fever, the doctor says, but–”

But the prince’s great-uncle, after whom he had been named, had likewise fallen ill and died on the cusp of adulthood. Coby glanced back at the Queen. Poor woman, to have two beloved lives hanging in the thread and no means to save either.

“Take me to my son,” she told the page.

“But–”

“Now!” she muttered, steering him across the bedchamber. “You and I can do nothing here.”

She followed him through the parlour and dining room and down the steps to the outer ward, through the gateway under the Bloody Tower and up to the green. In truth there were few easy routes from one tower to the next, as was no doubt intentional; back when the castle was an important fortress, its strength lay in making it as difficult as possible to pass from the outer curtain wall to the inner.

At the foot of the steps up to the Bloody Tower’s entrance stood a grey-haired yeoman warder. The scarlet tassels on his partizan swung wildly as he moved it to block her entrance. Odd, the little details that stood out in these moments.

“Name and business?”

Coby drew herself up to her full height, which was a good inch taller than the guard. “I am Lady Jacomina Catlyn, and I am here to see my son Christopher.”

“Sorry, madam, no one is admitted to the princes’ presence at the moment, not with fever running riot.”

“Tush, man, there is naught wrong with me, I will not infect anyone.”

The warder shrugged. “Those is my orders, madam, from the Prince of Wales hisself.”

“The prince is but a child, and sick with fever,” she said. “Besides, if everyone is so worried about him, surely he should be removed from here for his own safety?”

“Not my place to decide, madam.”

“No, of course not.” She paused. “But no doubt his uncle has been informed?”

“Couldn’t say, madam.”

Coby gave up. She was getting nowhere with this man, and if no one was allowed in or out, Kit might be safe for a while.



Kit sat in the window seat, pretending to read the opening verses of the Iliad but really gazing across the inner ward at the Beauchamp Tower. Prince Henry’s grandfather, Robert Dudley, had been imprisoned there after plotting treason, and died there too.

“What are you staring at?” asked Robin Sidney, who was sitting opposite.

“Nothing,” Kit replied.

He glanced at Prince Henry, who was playing chess with Master Weston. De Vere, who had joined them in the Bloody Tower when Edward first fell sick, put out his tongue. Kit resisted the urge to do the same back, in case Master Weston looked up and saw him.

Sidney leant forward across his book.

“Do you think Edward will haunt his tower when he dies, like the other two princes do here?”

“He’s not dead yet.” Kit whispered back. “Anyway, I don’t believe in ghosts.”

“You don’t?” Sidney’s eyes widened.

“Well, not apart from the Holy Ghost, and he’s special because he’s really God in disguise.”

“But… what about all the stories? Luke the guardsman swears he’s seen the princes at the windows, and heard them weeping.”

“Why are you two boys talking?” Master Weston snapped. “I told you to read in silence. Open your mouths again and you’ll feel my cane.”

“Etiam, magister,” they chorused.

Sidney shot Kit a sulky look, as if it had been his fault. Kit glowered back. Thankfully Master Weston was distracted from observing them by the arrival of Prince Henry’s physician, Doctor Renardi.

“Come, Your Highness, it is time for your morning treatment.”

“Do I have to?” the prince asked, looking up from the chess board.