Destiny Lies Waiting (21 page)

"So what is your next step?" he asked, though he already knew the answer.

"I am going to Malmesbury on the morrow to find this Foxley Manor. If indeed I run into a dead end, I shall try another way. But I shall not stop until I find my true family."

He nodded, then offered, "Dove, let me go with you. I shall guide you every step of the way and be there when you need to talk, should your search not prove fruitful."

"I appreciate your concern, Valentine, but you need not hold my hand all the way. I've hired a knowledgeable guide, and you have so many duties to the council now."

"I could take a few days—"

She shook her head. "Nay, it is kind of you, but Uncle Ned needs you more, especially now that Richard is leaving for Yorkshire. Just..." She hesitated just as the words were about to spill from her lips.

"Just what? Ask. I shall do whatever you wish of me." His glorious eyes blazed.

"Just be here when I get back, so I'll have someone to talk to?"

He placed his hands lightly on her shoulders and she rose from her seat and sat on his lap of her own volition.

"Of course I shall be here when you get back. I've nowhere else I can possibly go. For I know you will return to me, and what you discover will matter not a jot to me."

"Oh, Valentine, I wish I could be sure—"

"I am."

He lowered his face to hers, those brilliant eyes closed and their lips met, quenching an unfulfilled hunger that he'd only known since meeting her.

Slowly her lips parted to welcome his gentle but probing tongue as it explored the recesses of her mouth. A soft moan escaped from deep within his throat as he stroked her cheek with feathery touches.

She pulled away abruptly, rubbing her lips as if to wipe away any trace of his kiss.

"Do not take any further advantage of me, Valentine. I have had enough of that," she said, struggling to leave his lap.

"How can sharing a kiss be taking advantage? I would be safe in assuming you were enjoying it as much as I," he said softly.

"Nay, I've enough on my mind now and can't— Just, just let me go."

She broke their embrace and left the chamber quickly, as if the hounds of hell were after her.

"I shall be right here," he called after her, not bothering to pursue her given the mood she was in.

"Waiting," he whispered under his breath, "to know you much better. No matter who you are, Dove."

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

Mounted atop Chera, escorted by her guide Hugh Corey, her maid, a pair of royal guardsmen and one of King Edward's grooms upon a pack horse carrying clothes and provisions, all unbeknownst to the Queen, Denys passed through the palace gates.

Handing out coins and sweets to gaping townsfolk, she led her retinue along the ancient Roman city wall. Masons were hard at work repairing a section of it as they passed by, and she tried not to think about the dangers that might await her outside the safety of the royal household she had become a part of.

They clip-clopped through London's busy streets, trying to get their horses to sidestep the refuse. Crows cawed, swooping down into the streams, tearing at discarded carcasses with their beaks.

Merchants and street sellers peddled their wares from their stalls, shouting to passers-by: "Come, eat, come! Hot pies, pies of goose, beef, mutton, hot pies, hot!"

Their dwellings were framed with black oak against white plaster or carved woodwork, with colorful shields representing their trades.

A wealthy merchant's house, glittering with stained glass windows, stood among the craftsmen's dwellings.

The folks were draped in robes of bright reds, blues, and greens, their pointy shoes just as colorful. Barefoot children darted in and out of the crowd. Carts rumbled and church bells clanged in the distance. Denys had never felt more alive as she watched, or more alone.

They crossed the bridge over the town ditch floating with waste, blowing a rancid odor their way. On the rutted road over the open moor, farm buildings, barns and almshouses surrounded them.

The church bells faded and the barking of dogs grew louder as they rode along a stream next to a kennel. Houses, driven into the land with piles, were clustered over the marsh. The party followed worn tracks as the clouds began to thicken, and once free from the city's confines, Denys welcomed the cold drizzle that began to douse her face and hands.

"Malmesbury in five days, and by then I shall know who I am, God willing," she sighed.

Mother Nature answered her with rain that felt so refreshing, she threw off her head-dress and let her hair tumble down her back to soak up the moisture.

As Denys was journeying to Malmesbury to find her beginnings, Valentine thought he could be just as helpful by staying at the palace.

The Court was on progress in East Anglia, making a show of power there. Dove had gone west, and Richard was on his way north with his bride to ready Pomfret Castle as his official residence.

Only some servers remained at the palace, washing linens, beating the hangings, covering the floor with fresh rushes, and scrubbing the privies.

Valentine decided to catch up with Richard later. He had something to do first.

The palace's north wall was covered with vines so thick they could support a man twice his size, and as such, it was as easy to climb as the grand staircase.

The window was thrown open to air out Queen Elizabeth's dressing room. He scaled the vine, climbed in as nimbly as if mounting a destrier, and landed squarely on his feet.

A row of wardrobe chests stood against one wall. Head-dresses were hung from hooks. Each pair of shoes had its own wooden box. Satin undergarments were folded neatly, one atop the other, on a shelf along the opposite wall. A dressing table was draped with a frilly cloth. Jars of creams and lotions stood atop the table in perfect columns like toy knights. A pile of ivory combs and jeweled hair ornaments lay beside them.

In the Queen's privy closet were stacks of padlocked trunks. Their contents had to be cataloged somehow. He had to find what he was looking for, even if it meant staying her all night pawing through every one of Elizabeth's tawdry chemises.

No one, not even the creator of the heavens, could challenge the organizational skills of Elizabeth Woodville. Her compunction for methodical organization unsettled him almost as much as her diabolical personality.

He recalled that when she dined with the King in the great hall, each meal had to be served her orderly way, with every last plate cleared away and each goblet rinsed before another course began. Every server had to check in and out upon entering and departing the palace. Each horse had its name etched on its stall. Every bale of hay and slop bucket had to be accounted for. Each expense had to be recorded, and only by the fastidious Queen herself. She drove the poor Lord Steward round the bend with her constant inventorying of the bake house, buttery, and saucery to make sure there was no waste or peculation.

She sat with the controllers every Wednesday to balance the accounts. Not a groat was spent without her approval, and God help the auditor who added up a column wrong or forgot to carry a digit, for he was dismissed immediately.

Torches blazed in the window of the Queen's chambers until the dark hours of many a night, as she scrutinized the account books with those hawk's eye of hers.

So why would she not file away any documents pertaining to her beautiful silver-haired charge? He knew the information had to be somewhere. He just hoped he could find something of use in case her journey to Malmesbury turned out to be a fool's errand.

He flipped through a leather-bound ledger on her writing table, neatly penned in straight columns. He thumbed through another ledger, and another.

Finally he found a book that did not deal with finances. It listed her brothers, sisters, their spouses and children, and their birth dates and places.

Each name had a number next to it—what did that mean?

Undoubtedly it was a code of some sort, an index to her elaborate filing system.

His finger ran down the list of names, turned the page and skimmed another list.

The Plantagenets: Edward; the departed Edmund; George; Richard, and their sisters, with their dates and places of birth. Some had numbers next to them, some did not.

He turned another page. The Woodvilles were a huge clan. The listing went back to the early 1300s, before Edward III. She certainly knew where she'd come from.

Then he saw it, on his way back, retracing all the names. It had no birthplace or date next to it, just the number 5. The name he'd been looking for. Denys Woodville.

So what was this 5 anyway? Other names had 5s next to them, and he checked them—the names of Elizabeth's aunts, uncles and cousins.

As it grew dark, he grabbed a torch from the bedchamber and retraced his steps into the private close-room, settling among the trunks.

Then he noticed a Roman numeral on the front of each trunk. The trunk embossed with the numeral "I" was at the very bottom. "V" was at the top.

Using a night stool for a stepladder, he swung the trunk out over his head and let it drop. Dust billowed out as it hit the floor. He climbed down, twisted the flimsy lock until it broke and flipped the lid open.

It was crammed with letters, their musty odors mingling with the scent of the wax that had once sealed them.

They all had one thing in common: they'd been written by people with a '5' next to their names in the book.

Now, which letters pertained to Denys Woodville?

The torch was down to an orange glow as he reached the last letter.

Straining his eyes to see, he stood and stretched his legs.

He found what he'd been looking for.

A short letter with flowery script covering one side of the page, it was signed Margaret Holland, Countess of Somerset. Now who the devil was she?

Its significance lay in the body of the letter, where 'the babe' was referred to several times.

It was dated "Monday next after Martinmas, 1457," adhering to the tradition of using saints' days to date letters.
Martinmas...

Running through all the saints' names and dates he could recall, he remembered it was on 11 November, the feast of the plowman, when the great slaughtering of the animals took place.

He'd done all he could for one night; it was pitch dark and the torch had dwindled down to almost nothing. Shoving the trunk back into its place, he groped his way out of Elizabeth's closet and into the antechamber.

The torches glowed in the distant corridor. He thought about returning with another torch, but he was tired, hungry, and felt choked with dust.

He would take his ease, and tomorrow morn he would be back to look more thoroughly through trunk 'V.'

As he was passing through the outer chamber, he heard footsteps. Flattening himself against the wall, he glimpsed a white apron as a server lumbered down the hall. She was corpulent, her dress was filthy, and she exuded a stench he could detect from ten feet away. It was Kat, the cooking wench who was always stuffing her gob with food and licking her greasy fingers.

The only female cook in the court's employ, by virtue of her bulk and strength, she was how he had pictured Dove as per Richard's guileless description. If anyone could give bat guano a run for its money, it was this slag.

Mayhap she would just waddle by and not notice him.

Suddenly the footsteps stopped, and he knew she'd caught him. He had to think—and fast. "Good eve, my kind lass. And what brings you to the Queen's chambers at this late hour?"

"What brings ye 'ere?" Her sharp accusing tone betrayed a crude East London accent. She stood, arms akimbo, and he slowly crept back along the wall.

She entered the antechamber and slammed the door shut. Now they were confined, one-on-one, in this suddenly too-close space.

"I was on a clandestine royal mission. 'Tis frightfully dark in this labyrinthine palace," he said breezily as he shoved the letter down the back of his hose. He casually wiped his forehead.

The only time he'd ever stuttered had been that day in the chapel when he realized who Dove was, and he'd certainly had reason to be stunned.