But what did I know of him as a man? Nothing. I knew nothing except that if I gave an order, it was carried out promptly and without fuss—and sometimes it seemed before I had even voiced my desire. I acknowledged that in all those years we had not exchanged more than a dozen words that did not deal with a request or the carrying out of it. I was mortified that I had so little knowledge of a man who had served me intimately.
Yet now I yearned for more than impeccable and aloof service from him.
How could I degrade myself so, following a servant with longing in my eyes, like a lovesick hound pining for its absent master? I turned away smartly, heading for the stair to my accommodations as he stretched to aid a young kitchen servant to replace candles in one of the sconces, laughing down at her when she fumbled and dropped one.
My throat was dry, as if parched by a long drought. Had I been dwelling in a desert all my life? Why had this fire been lit by something so basic as the deep note of male laughter that tripped along my skin?
But this was not like my falling into love with Edmund Beaufort at all. Edmund had set out to charm me, to win me with gifts and extravagances, to lure me with conversation and ridiculous exhibitions of high spirits that had made me forget my age and my rank so that I had thought I was a young girl again and free to indulge my senses. I had been tempted and enticed, bewitched. I had been captivated so that I had been unable to see the dross of raw ambition beneath the gilded surface.
Owen Tudor did not set out to charm me at all. Rather it seemed to me that his prime desire was to repel me. Whatever I said, whenever I found the need to speak with him, never had he been so reserved, never had his conversations been so clipped and brief. He must have seen my interest, I decided, and was now intent on destroying it, for his sake and mine. I must presume that he was more discerning than I, for his ability to keep me at arm’s length was truly comprehensive. Was every woman as driven to embrace misery as I, when faced with a man who had no desire for her?
And I knew in some strange manner, in a moment of blinding clarity one morning as I rose from my restless bed, what the fever was that persisted in tormenting me. Not physical desire with its raw urgency. Not a need for admiration and affection, or response to a courtly seduction. I had not wanted this, I had not sought this, but against all wisdom I had fallen disastrously in love. It was like falling down a shaft into a bottomless well.
How could I live like this? Loving but unloved for ever?
I shrank from it, from never seeing him again.
‘Is there a remedy to quench a woman’s ardour, Guille?’ I asked, not caring when her brows rose.
‘They do say that to rub an ointment of mouse droppings will do it.’
I turned my face away from her regard. I would live with the desire, unrequited as it would always be, and the pain of it. My rejection of men had been a sham, a mockery of the truth, for how could a woman of youth and hot blood think herself capable of living out her life without a man? I burned for him, but in the flames a tiny spark of rebellion was ignited.
I knew what I must do. My mother had given in to her lusts: her daughter would not. I would play out my role of Queen Dowager with all the sobriety and dignity expected of me. Master Tudor’s dismissal was not necessary because I would never seek out Owen Tudor, even if in my heart I loved him. On my knees, I vowed that it would be so.
And then he touched me.
I had noticed that he never did. Not that a servant would touch a Queen without her invitation, but on that one occasion, neither of his making or mine, he held me.
It was one of those impromptu, merry moments when Warwick decided that it was well past time that Young Henry was introduced to the art of dancing. We used the large chamber after supper; the trestles cleared, the servants, the minstrels, pages and my damsels all commandeered to produce an opportunity for dancing. Simple stuff within the limited skills of the youngest and most inexperienced present: processions and round dances, their rustic naïvety guaranteed to appeal to the young.
My pages applied themselves with energy, and Young Henry loved it, but I swear there was never a more ill-co-ordinated child than my eight-year-old son. How could he wield a pen with such skill, how could he learn his texts, yet find it impossible to plant his feet with any degree of care or exactitude? His enthusiasm knew no bounds but his ability to follow a beat or a set of simple steps was woeful.
‘He is very young,’ Warwick observed. ‘But he must learn.’
