Ill Met by Moonlight by Mercedes Lackey & Roberta Gellis

Author:Mercedes Lackey & Roberta Gellis [Lackey, Mercedes & Gellis, Roberta]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: fantasy
ISBN: 0743498909
Goodreads: 13989
Publisher: Baen
Published: 2005-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

He said as much, when next they met out riding. She was delighted with his news, her eyes gleaming gold in the brightening sun of what had begun as a cloudy day. “Shall I write to her?” she asked. “A scholar,” she breathed then. “Shall I write to her in Latin and show—”

“You will not write to her at all!” he replied with alarm. “Elizabeth, that too-ready pen of yours will get you into trouble. Remember when you almost wrote to Queen Anne when the king was about to divorce her? You are not supposed to know that your father is about to take another wife. You will get Mistress Champernowne in trouble. Everyone will believe she gave you the news.”

“Oh.”

She was so crestfallen that he went out of his way to cheer her up. How could he help it? The one treasure she held most dear—regardless of her fondness for bright jewels and beautiful gowns—was her learning and scholarship. He hated to quash one of her rare opportunities to display it to someone who would appreciate it.

But though the bright eyes had dimmed with disappointment, fortunately Elizabeth was not doomed to live with that disappointment for long. On the twelfth of July, Henry did marry Catherine Parr and Elizabeth was able to write to her, wishing her happy and stating her own joy in gaining a stepmother. Unfortunately the letter did not have the effect she desired; Mary was invited to join the king and the new queen on their honeymoon progress, but not the younger children.

Denoriel soothed her by pointing out that Edward, the most important to the king, had not been invited either. Whereupon Elizabeth rather scornfully said that Edward did not ride well enough to go on a progress, and Denoriel riposted by saying that the king could not know how well she rode either, since most of her riding had been done in his company and was kept secret.

To his relief, Elizabeth did not say she would expose their clandestine meetings in order to prove how well she rode. That she valued his company more than the chance to join the court on progress made him ridiculously happy. Becoming aware of the unsuitable rush of satisfaction, Denoriel reminded himself that she was only a child, a little girl of ten. But sometimes the way she looked at him sidelong under her thick golden lashes …

However, the conversation about her dissatisfaction at not being invited to court was repeated so often through the end of the summer and the autumn, that when the invitation finally came in December Denoriel was almost glad to see her leave Hertford.

His feeling did not last long. He was shaken by the reports from Blanche Parry, transmitted by Ladbroke, of how strongly Elizabeth had responded to the warmth with which Catherine greeted her and Edward.

Denoriel, carefully not thinking about why, promptly wrote to Kat Champernowne and asked when he could hope to be placed on a visitor’s list. All he received

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