Thomas, being a man, took longer to come to his senses.
She tried to explain. ‘But they had not, Thomas had not fully...’ She knew not how to describe something she had never experienced.
Nicholas coughed and cleared his throat. ‘And then what?’
She had wondered that, exactly, for years. But the Joan she knew always tried to please. First, perhaps, to please Anne’s mother. Then, to please Thomas Holland. ‘She apologised. She promised it would never happen again. But Mother said that Holland grabbed the girl’s hand, swore an oath that they were married and she matched it with her vow. “Wait for me,” he said. He said he would come for her. That they would be together.’
Nicholas scoffed. ‘A man still in heat who had not released his seed? He would have promised anything.’
She blushed. ‘My mother thought the same.’
‘And she told no one?’
‘Joan begged her not to, so Mother held her tongue. What else could she do? If she told the truth, it would only mean ruin for all.’ She lifted her eyes to his. ‘So, when Holland returned and Mother was asked, later, whether they had married, Joan gave her permission to tell.’
‘Why didn’t you tell me before?’ He looked...hurt. As if she had owed him the truth. ‘When you knew...?’
‘Knew what? I knew what my mother told me. I was not the witness. Yet I knew they were married. And that everything was as it had been said.’
‘Would you have told me if it weren’t?’
She should never have said even this much. She had raised suspicions safely laid to rest, but with him, it had always been hard to lie.
But she would. Even now, she would. All would be as it must. ‘Do you doubt it? You did what was asked. You are free to leave. To return to France, a man content.’
Yet he did not look content. ‘And suddenly, after a lifetime, Joan wants to forget all this by putting you out of sight?’
‘You must understand. Lady Joan will be the Queen. No Queen has ever had such a history. It is still a...difficult matter.’
‘Difficult!’ He raised his brows and his voice. ‘I travelled to Avignon and Canterbury and back for this marriage. Don’t tell me how difficult it is.’
She must throw him off. ‘What I mean is that some people... Memories are long...’ Did she look close to tears? Would he reach over and touch her, forgiving?
She had learned too much from the Lady Joan.
‘You do not want to go.’ It was not a question.
Too perceptive, Nicholas Lovayne. She looked away, too late, for he had already seen the truth. ‘No. I do not.’
And she would soak up as many memories as she could before they locked her behind the walls.
At the top of the stairs came a woman’s laughter, with a man’s. The sound of a kiss.
Nicholas coughed and the laughter disappeared, back into the courtyard and the night.
‘You don’t have to go,’ he said then. ‘You could...’
‘I could what?’ She glanced down at her leg, invisible beneath her skirt. Here was the choice her mother had faced. What could such a child do? What would become of her when her family was gone and there was no one to care for her? Her mother had made the choice she thought would protect Anne and, until now, it had.
She turned, lifting her face to his. ‘You must promise me something. You must do it for me. When you leave, when you go back to France and Italy and the rest of the world, look at it twice as hard. Look at it for yourself and then look at it for me. Look at every leaf and stone and bit of coloured glass and every wave. And know that I will think of you. That I am here, imagining all the wonders the world holds.’
And praying that God would forgive her ingratitude for the mercy he had shown her. Her ingratitude in wanting things she was never meant to have.
He reached for her hand. ‘Send a page when you are ready,’ he said. ‘I shall take the journey with you. I will see you safely there.’
Anne pulled away. ‘No. You are kind, but I do not want to hold you back.’ She waved a hand. ‘France, Italy, Spain await you.’
‘And a small, stone building on the windswept edge of the kingdom awaits you. Let me take you there. And on the way, we will see something...something you want to see before...’
Before she would see nothing more.
But Nicholas was not so blunt as to say it. ‘What would it be?’ His question was eager. ‘Where can I take you?’
She wanted to say nowhere. She wanted to say everywhere. She wanted to say the story had been a parting gift, even though she had lied to him.
She had lied all her life, the weight of it as heavy as the dead weight of the foot she dragged behind her. And even if she were foolish enough to tell the truth and he were foolish enough to forgive her, it would not lift the weight of all those years of lies.
And the more he did for her, the kinder he became, the heavier the weight of her lie.
She shook her head. ‘You have delayed already. I know you want to go.’
‘No one is waiting for me. A few weeks won’t matter.’
A few weeks. She had thought only tonight, but to have a few weeks... And so she succumbed to temptation. A few more weeks. A few more memories of Nicholas.
‘Pick something,’ he said, when she remained silent.
She closed her eyes, imagining the whole kingdom and not knowing which piece to pick. What even lay between here and Holystone? The joy would be the discovery.
‘A cathedral,’ she said, finally.
‘But you just saw a cathedral. In Canterbury.’
She smiled. Nicholas had not yet learned how to look at a cathedral. ‘Each one is different. Each is a miracle. Stone soaring to heaven. Coloured glass more beautiful than imaginings. Jewels. All created by man as a gift from the earth back to the God who created it.’
He studied her and for a moment, she feared he could see it all. ‘A cathedral, then. Any particular one?’
Oh, if she had the world and time, she would stop at each one. ‘Any one we find.’
A few weeks more and then...
She would not think beyond that.
Nor of how she would say goodbye.
* * *
Thinking about it the next morning, Nicholas didn’t know why he had insisted that he take Anne to Holystone. He had finished his work. She had even given him the answer to the final, troubling mystery of the witness to Lady Joan’s first marriage to Holland. All was answered. All was in order.
And if there had been kisses, they had been given freely. She had given him leave to go.
Yet, he didn’t. Something held him back in a way he did not recognise and did not particularly like.
Most of his life had been lived with his mind fully in control, guided by a clear purpose. Now, he found himself on a battlefield where body, heart and mind waged perpetual war.
She