Page 43 of Six Wild Crowns

It’s an olive branch, but Seymour doesn’t acknowledge it. Boleyn’s maid helps them both into thick, red robes to hide their nakedness as they pass from the antechamber into the steam-filled suffocation of the font. A tiled path runs around the edges of the room. In the middle, a jagged-edged pool is formed from a crater. The waters are murky, bubbling with the perfumed air from deep within the mountain.

Murals on the walls tell the story of the font. The first King of Elben, Aethelred, praying to Cernunnos, beset by enemies. Aethelred answering Cernunnos’s summons and coming to him on the Hyfostelle mountains – these mountains. Cernunnos rising from the ground in a whirlwind of lava and smoke. The king’s amazement as Cernunnos fashions the six castles of Daven, Brynd, Hyde, Cnothan, Plythe and Mathmas, and sends them flying to the coasts of Elben. They show Aethelred with his six chosen wives, who would become the first vessels for the king’s power. And the ice-ridden mountain and the font, left behind once Cernunnos returned to the fabric of Elben, the water turned in the ensuing years into a kind of royal bath, still containing the blessing of the god. The weight of that history, of her great purpose, settles on Boleyn. Settles in her stomach. She covers the swell with a hand, feeling how hard the flesh is, where it was once supple.

Her maid removes her robe and two nuns support her as she moves down the uneven steps into the water. They settle her on a smooth ledge at the far end of the pool. A moment later, Lady Seymour is placed next to her. The nuns disappear, although theymight still be within touching distance – it’s hard to tell through the steam. Boleyn takes deep lungfuls of hot, heady air – a touch of chilli, enough to tickle the throat pleasantly.

The water is deep, and Boleyn is short. As her toes scrabble for purchase on one of the many narrow ledges, they accidentally touch Seymour’s foot. Seymour blushes and pulls away.

“You are very proper, aren’t you, Lady Seymour?” Boleyn says.

“It’s what I’ve been taught,” Seymour says.

“What else have you been taught?” Boleyn says. Maybe it’s the spice in the air, or the crone earlier, but she wants nothing more than to needle Seymour until she cracks. How dare this woman act the prude when she has worked so hard to catch Henry’s attention?

Moving closer to her, almost pinning her into her corner, Boleyn takes hold of Seymour’s bandaged hands.

“What are you…?”

“The waters of the font are healing,” Boleyn says, unwinding the fabric. The apothecary has done an excellent job. The flayed skin is tender and raw, like plucked chicken, but already beginning to heal.

“Your brother’s work?” she asks. Seymour’s breath is short, like a frightened deer. Boleyn is so close she can see the flecks of volcanic ash clinging to the woman’s eyelashes.

“No.”

Boleyn lowers Seymour’s hands beneath the water and she lets out a shivery exhale that eddies the steam across Boleyn’s cheek.

“Does it hurt?” she asks.

“I don’t mind it,” Seymour says. Her eyes flick to Boleyn and away again.

“You act very timid for someone who approached the king by herself. For someone who seems to have so many enemies,” Boleyn says.

Seymour remains silent.

“Do you really think you could ever match me?” Boleyn says. Heat courses through her that has nothing to do with the warmth of the water. It is fury, the like of which she has spent most of her life trying to temper. She wants to find the chink in Seymour’s armour and stick a knife right through it.

“No,” Seymour whispers.

“You arenothingand he ismine.”

“Is he?” Seymour says. Her question is placid, but it hits Boleyn in the chest.

“I’m carrying his child.”

Seymour’s mouth twists, not unpleasantly.

“What?” Boleyn says.

“It is not for me to say.”

“I will decide that.” She’s still holding Seymour’s hands beneath the clouded water, and she pulls them now so that she’s nose to nose with her lady-in-waiting, her cuckoo.

“I used to be Queen Aragon’s attendant,” Seymour says. “He used to adore her once too.”

Boleyn flicks the comment away. “And you think he’ll adore you? For long enough to get you into Hyde?”

“No.”

“Don’t lie to me.”

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