The Harlot’s Daughter. Blythe Gifford

the crowd fanned out across the inner ward toward the residential apartments, she wondered where she might pass the night. Lagging behind the others, she slipped around the Round Tower and over to the twin-towered gate her father had built before she was born. Perhaps it would shelter her tonight.

      She slipped inside and started up the stairs, but, halfway up, she heard a noise in the darkness below. She climbed faster. Another set of footsteps echoed hers.

      Who could it be? Even the guards had been given a Christmas respite.

      The man was gaining on her.

      Holding her skirts out of the way, she tried to run, but he was faster. As the scent of cedar touched her, her heart beat faster, the fear replaced with something even more dangerous.

      ‘Lady Solay, you must be lost.’

      She turned, holding back a laugh at the very idea. ‘I cannot be lost, Lord Justin. I was born here.’ The castle had been her playground when she was near a princess. At the memory, her chest ached with loss long suppressed.

      ‘Born here, yet you can’t seem to remember the day and you don’t know the difference between the gate tower and the residential wing.’ He took her arm. ‘I’ll take you to your room.’

      ‘No!’ She pulled her arm free, and turned gingerly on the narrow stair. He was still too close. ‘Sleep is difficult for me,’ she said. That, strangely, was true. She wondered why she had shared it with him.

      ‘So you wander the castle like a spectre?’

      She grabbed an excuse. ‘I was going to study the stars to prepare for the King’s reading.’ He would not know that a horoscope came from charts and not from the sky.

      He moved closer. ‘Then I will accompany you.’

      She released a breath, not caring whether he believed her. At least Agnes was safe.

      Their steps found the same rhythm as they climbed to the top of the Tower. Cold air rushed into her lungs as they emerged from the dark stairway on to the battlements. After the darkness of the Tower, the night, lit by stars, seemed almost bright, although the half-moon shed only enough light to polish the strong curve of his jaw.

      He waved his hand towards the sky, a gesture as much of dismissal as of presentation. ‘So, milady, look out on the stars and make what sense of them you will.’

      She looked up and her heart soared, as it always did. How many sleepless nights had she spent trying to discern their secrets? Now, like familiar friends, their patterns kept her company when sleep would not come.

      She hugged herself, trying to warm her upper arms. He moved behind her, his broad back cutting the wind, suddenly making her feel sheltered, though his voice turned cold. ‘Strange method of study. In the dark. Without notes or instruments.’

      ‘I only need to watch them to learn their meaning.’

      He snorted. ‘Then all soldiers should be experts on the stars.’ Behind her, he took her by the shoulders, his breath intimate as he whispered in her ear, ‘Do you know any more of the stars than you do of your birth date?’

      She swallowed. Was it his question or his nearness that caused her to tremble? ‘I know more than most.’

      Yet of the stars, like many things, she knew only the surface. By memorising the list of ascendants in her mother’s Book of Hours, she had gleaned enough to impress most people, but only enough to tantalise herself.

      Thankfully, he let her go and leaned against the wall next to her. ‘You could not know what takes the University men years to learn.’

      His dismissal rankled. ‘I had years.’ Years after they left court and her mother was busy with suits and counter-suits.

      His dark eyes, lost in shadow, gave her no clue to his thoughts. ‘And did the stars give you the answers you sought?’

      His question surprised her. She had studied the heavens because she had nothing else to do. She had studied hoping they might explain her life and give her hope for the future. ‘I am still searching for my answers, Lord Justin. Did you find yours in the law?’

      He turned away from her question, so silent she could hear the lap of the river out of sight below the walls.

      ‘I was looking for justice,’ he said, finally.

      ‘On earth?’ She felt a moment’s sympathy for him. How disappointing his life must be. ‘You’d do better to look to the stars.’ The stars surely had given her this time alone with him. She should be speaking of light, charming things that might turn him into an ally. ‘Let me read yours. When were you born, Lord Justin?’

      He frowned. ‘Do you think your feeble learning can discover the truth about me?’

      She touched his unyielding arm with a playful hand. ‘My learning is good enough for the King.’

      Her fingers burned on his sleeve. She swayed towards him.

      He picked up her hand. All the heat between them flowed from his fingers and into her core. He held her a moment too long, then dropped her hand away from his arm.

      ‘The King cares more for flattery than truth.’ His voice was rough. ‘I would not believe a word you say.’

      She waved her hand in the air, as if she had not wanted to touch him at all. As if his dismissal had not hurt her. ‘Yet you believe in justice on earth.’

      ‘Of course. That’s what the law is for.’

      Was anyone so naïve? ‘And when the judges are wrong? What then?’

      ‘The condemned always claim they’ve been unjustly convicted.’

      Fury warmed her blood. Parliament had given her mother no justice. ‘Even if the judgement is right, is there never forgiveness? Is there never mercy?’

      ‘Those are for God to dispense.’

      ‘Oh, so justice lives on earth, mercy in Heaven, and you happily sit in judgement confident that you are never wrong.’ She laughed without mirth.

      ‘You believe your mother should be exonerated.’

      Surprised he recognised a meaning she had missed, she was silent. Better not to even acknowledge such a hope. Better not to picture her mother back at court and revered for the good she had done. ‘She was brought back to court before the year was out.’ Restored to her position beside the King for his last, painful year.

      ‘Not by Parliament.’

      ‘No, by the King himself. The Commons never had the right to judge her. And neither do you.’

      ‘It is you I judge. You’ve lied about your birth date. I suspect you are lying about why you are not abed. It seems truth means nothing to you.’

      ‘Truth?’ He talked of truth as if it were more valuable than bread. She held her tongue. She had already been too candid. If she angered him further, he would never keep her secret. ‘Perhaps each of us knows a different truth.’

      ‘There is only one truth, Lady Solay, but should you ever choose to speak it, I would scarce recognise it.’ His voice brimmed with disgust.

      ‘You do not recognise it now. My mother was a great helpmate to the King.’

      He shook his head. ‘Even you can’t believe that.’ A yawn overtook him. ‘I’m going to bed. I leave you to your stars and your lies.’

      ‘Some day when I tell you the truth, you will believe it,’ she whispered to his fading footsteps.

      Shivering and alone under a sky that seemed darker than before, she crossed her arms to keep from reaching for him as he descended the stairs.

      Chapter Three

      Solay snatched only an hour of sleep after Mass, then spent the feast day watching Justin and wondering