Three Sisters, Three Queens by Philippa Gregory

Author:Philippa Gregory
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Touchstone

The day that we are about to leave York there is a tap at the door of my privy chamber and it swings open, without my consent. I look up to see who comes in without announcement to the private rooms of the Dowager Queen of Scotland, and there before me, bonnet in his hand, smiling and heartbreakingly handsome, is my husband, Archibald.

I get to my feet—I can stand now without pain—I reach for him and he is across the room and on his knees at my feet in a moment. “Go,” I whisper to my ladies, and they scurry out of the room and close the door behind them as he rises up and wraps me in a tight, hot embrace. He kisses my wet eyelids, my lips, my throat, his hands are warm through my tight stomacher. He bends his head and kisses the top of my breasts, and I feel him untie my laces.

“Come,” is all I say, and I lead him into my bedroom and let him strip me as if I were a peasant girl in a hay barn, push my rich skirts and my fine lace-trimmed linen to one side and enter me with as much desire as when we were first married and thought we would rule Scotland together.

It is blissful. We lie together in a tumble of clothes and bedding as the sun shines in through the window and I hear the church bells of York toll one after another for the afternoon service of None. “My love,” I say sleepily.

“My queen,” he replies.

I take his tanned smiling face in my hands and I kiss him on the lips. “You came to me,” I say. “I thought I had lost you forever.”

“I couldn’t let you go like that,” he says. “I couldn’t let you go without knowing that my love is with you, as faithful as I always am, as much in love with you as I ever have been.”

“I am so glad,” I say quietly. I rest my head on his shoulder and I feel, through the thin linen of his shirt, the beat of his steady heart.

“And you are treated well?” he murmurs. “I see you have beautiful gowns and ladies in attendance and a fine household around you?”

“I am cared for like the Tudor princess I was born to be, and the Scots queen I am,” I say. “Dacre is a most loyal servant.”

“As he should be,” Ard says irritably. “And has he given you money from your brother?”

“I am rich again,” I confirm. “And everyone tells me that I will get my jewels and goods back from Albany. You need not fear for me, my darling. I am well provisioned.”

“Thank God,” he says. “And when do they plan that you shall come back to Scotland?”

“Nobody knows yet. They will have to deal with Albany. But Harry says he will speak with nobody until he has first heard from me. And Dacre and I have compiled a great book of my grievances.

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