Page 124 of Six Wild Crowns

There’s a deathly silence as Howard stares at the man. Then the man says, “Fine, you can go.”

The cart moves forward, and Howard, arms still folded, flicks her hair as she turns, and winks towards Boleyn’s crate.

“Angel,” Boleyn whispers.

Boleyn watches High Hall emerge through her peepholes, from plain stone slabs to its full majestic glory, and then recede to a toy. She thinks of her rooms. For a brief moment in time, an entire wing of that palace was hers to command. She had everything that a young girl raised on the idea of wifehood might hope for from her adult life. She discovered it was gilt on a rusted sword.

Her mind turns to her plan. The Moon Ball was a gamble, certainly, but she feels sure it has paid off. Cleves and Howard declared themselves for her. She has Seymour’s loyalty. That leaves only Parr or Aragon, and then she will have her five queens. Surely Seymour will be able to persuade Parr at thesunscínameeting at noon. And if not, Boleyn will send her such letters, such persuasions, once she is safely ensconced in Capetia, that Parr will be won over. It will be a temporary exile, and then Boleyn will return. The leader of an army of queens, set on taking back the power that was once theirs. She ignores the small voice telling her that there is another force at work here; one that betrayed her secrets to Henry and that may yet stymy her. She has got this far, when she should have been dead by now. Surely the goddess is watching over her.

The road rolls on and on, and Boleyn finds herself yearning forFauvel. How they will gallop, Elizabeth tied to her chest, when they arrive at Brynd. As they enter the Holtwode, her appetite returns, and she gnaws hungrily at the bread and cheese.

By the time they leave the forest, both her calves and feet have cramped up. She massages them, knowing she must be ready to move quickly as soon as they pass the road to Brynd. Still, when the time comes, she is clumsier than normal. She is certain the driver will hear her sliding back the wooden panel. As loud as the horses’ hooves are, she is sure he will hear her edging her way out of the crate and thethumpas she lands on the road. Nursing her ankle, she hobbles as quickly as she can into the cover of the hedgerows, hiding there until the cart has trundled out of sight.

The back road to Brynd, the one that bypasses Pilvreen, runs up one of the steep hills that perforate Boleyn’s territory. One of the other hills is the site of the folly. Another is home to a watchtower. This hill is mercifully uninhabited, but it affords spectacular views over the valley and the Holtwode behind, and of Brynd and the sea ahead. Boleyn climbs it, relishing the stretch in her muscles, and then pauses to take in her land for the last time. There is Brynd, the lightning tower calm under an empty sky. And beyond the castle, up the coast, she glimpses the port of Garclyffe, busy with ships that move like snails across a sun-sprayed ocean. She turns around, and spies a cloud of dust rising from the midst of the Holtwode, just where the road should be. She moans. Those kind of dust clouds usually herald only one thing: an army.

Boleyn races down the hill towards Brynd, tearing through brambles and scattering dust and mud behind her. By the time she reaches the castle gates, she looks utterly wild. The guards peer at her suspiciously.

“Please,” she pants.

“Don’t you recognise your queen?” a familiar voice cries. The guards spring to attention, pulling the gates open for Boleyn. Syndony, stolid and severe, is waiting.

“Elizabeth is safe,” she says as Boleyn approaches. “I told the king’s advisors she’d do better staying here with her nurses. I knew you’d get back to her somehow.”

“I think I’ve brought more than just myself.”

“I know. My little squirrels darted along the Holtwode before you. The king is coming at the head of a battalion.”

Bless Syndony’s network of spies and their quick-footedness.

“I only intend to fetch Elizabeth and take her down to the jetty. We can pretend I bewitched you…”

“I’m afraid that won’t work. The bordweal here is swarming with the king’s ships. Nothing’s getting past them.”

Boleyn swings round wildly, looking towards the orchards, back through the gates and up the road to Pilvreen. People begin to reach out of the windows of Brynd, pointing and calling to each other. And in the distance, just beneath the hum of conversation, is the sound of horses and armour, marching ever closer. There must be another way out. There must be.

“Your Majesty. Boleyn.”

She realises that Syndony has been trying to get her attention for some time. She grasps her arm, forcing Boleyn to look at her.

“No one else is going to die for me,” Boleyn says.

“Oh, I think they are, my lady,” Syndony says. “You’ve set something in motion here. Besides, death isn’t the worst thing that can happen to a person. Now, we’re about to be besieged. So let’s work out a plan.”

It’s as if her strength is flowing into Boleyn through her grip, and suddenly, Boleyn understands exactly how it is going to go. Exactly how it was always meant to go, from the moment she heard the oracle’s prophecy. From the moment she opened More’s book and saw a single circled word. Perhaps, even, from the moment she took the lead in a race against the King of Elben. Syndony is right about many things, but she is not right about this. No one else is going to die for Boleyn today.

“Close the gates and pull up the drawbridge,” she instructs the guards.

Syndony strides beside her into Brynd. Elizabeth’s nurse is waiting there, Urial at her feet. Boleyn plucks the child from the woman’s grasp, burying her face in the squirming body for an instant and no more. She rocks her as she issues instructions – which doors areto be blocked, which horses to be saddled and which provisions to be packed.

With that done, she takes one last inhale of Elizabeth’s scent and hands her back to her nurse.

“You’re to go with Syndony through the tunnels to Pilvreen, do you understand?” she tells the woman. “Take whatever wealth you need from the vaults and my rooms to purchase yourselves transport.”

“Where are we to take her?” Syndony asks.

“In the first instance, get to your family. Then if it is safe to do so, take her to Queen Howard or Queen Cleves.”

“Not Queen Seymour?”

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