“Stop,” Johana says, taking hold of her reins and tugging her horse to halt. He dismounts his own steed, and waits for her to do the same. Their horses wander to the side of the road to graze as Johana takes both her hands in his. She looks up at him and sees a rare sadness in his brown eyes.
“Iklehafor hi lada ganasz, perigord,” he says. It is a line from an old Ezzonidian lullaby, one she has not heard in many years.The gods owe you nothing but happiness, heart child.
“What if the ecstasy is not as I remember it?” she whispers.
He pulls her into his chest, holding her tightly.
“What if it is better?” he asks.
She cannot think of anything she wants more. She cannot think of anything more frightening, or more impossible.
They reach Gnottel Lodge long after luncheon.
“Cousin,” she says, as she and Johana dismount their horses once more. “Would you be so kind as to keep our visitor out of the way? There is a private matter I must attend to with Queen Seymour, and not in the way you previously suggested.”
Johana’s mouth twitches, but he nods and enters the lodge without another word.
She meets Seymour in a bower on the east side of the lodge’s gardens, secluded enough that they will not be overheard, and open enough that they will see anyone approaching. Cleves cannot meet Seymour’s eyes; she is still raw from her conversation with Johana. Besides, there is more urgent business to attend to. She pulls hersunscínafrom its place upon her bodice.
“I left mine in my chamber,” Seymour says. “I fear Cecilia spying it.”
“Very wise,” Cleves says. Seymour looks sideways at her. “No jest? Are you feeling well, Queen Cleves?”
“Last time we met you complained that I find everything too amusing. I am merely trying to make you happy,” Cleves says. Her twisting stomach settles. This dance of wit and flirtation is safe, known.
Together they press Cleves’ssunscína, waiting for the birdsong around them to fade as the other queens appear. It does not take long for Cleves to explain what she and Howard discovered about the binding cloths.
“So they are beyond our reach,” Parr says.
“I could have told you that Henry would be far too clever to allow you to simply take the cloths,” Aragon says.
“Then what would you have us do, beyond waiting and praying?” Cleves says.
“That is not—” Aragon begins.
But Cleves can only see Howard, and the way she shakes her head slightly, as if she could foretell Cleves’s reaction. Cleves has never cared about disappointing anyone before; not since her little sister Sybil would chide her for being too boisterous, or too merry.
“My apologies, Queen Aragon,” Cleves says.
The women stare. Aragon pauses, mid-aggrandisement. Cleves takes a deep breath. “My apologies,” she says again. “I recognise that you are gathering all the knowledge you can from your extensive connections abroad and in Elben. My frustration stems from the fact that all the knowledge in the known world will not help us if we cannot seize those binding cloths and rid ourselves of this tie to our husband. And I cannot see a way through by myself, much though I have tried.”
Somewhere during her speech, Seymour has taken her hand. Cleves wonders that she did not notice; that her heart did not leap at the contact. She looks down at Seymour’s fingers, cocooning her own, and Seymour withdraws them quickly, as if she herself did not realise what she was doing.
“It seems to me that if we cannot get to the cloths, we must make Henry bring them to us,” Seymour says.
“But he will recognise a trick,” Howard says, her voice timid. “Boleyn tricked him. Have the last few days not proven that he will not stand to be tricked again?”
They lapse into silence. Cleves watches their pensive faces, and something unfurls in her chest. She can still feel the warmth from Seymour’s hand.
“We do have one advantage,” Cleves says. “We know him. Truly know him. He has shown each of us shards of himself. We have never before been able to comprehend him because we have never spoken honestly to each other. It is surely one of the reasons the Kings of Elben have fostered our dislike of each other.”
“But he knows us,” Aragon says. Cleves wants to say,does he?But Howard speaks first.
“He knows my body, but he does not know me,” she says, quiet but fierce.
Parr nods and addresses Aragon. “It is true, sister. Henry sees your dedication, he sees your stateliness and your maternal instinct, but he does not perceive all of you, I think?”
Aragon’s expression twists then, almost imperceptibly. Cleves’s interest is piqued: which part of Parr’s speech did she take issue with, and why not contradict her if she disagrees?
