A malevolent smile played around Becket’s mouth. “I’m sorry you were disturbed, good madam,” he said to the servant. “I’ll see these young ladies returned to their rightful place.”
“Father Thomas.” Wilifred’s age-spotted hand rose to her chest at the sight of the priest. Blotches of red spread across her withered cheeks, and I swear she fluttered her drooping old eyelids at him. “You know I would do anything for you. It is so nice to see a decent English face among all these . . . foreigners.”
With a last glance over her shoulder, the aged servant mounted the steps. Thomas Becket turned to us with a triumphant sneer.
Ignoring Phoebe, Becket reached forward and grasped my chin in a pinching grip. His malicious eyes bored into mine. His breath stank of old meat. “Lady Celia claims that besides being a spy for the loathsome French, you seek the stone as well. I guarantee, however, that I shall learn your secrets before this night is over.” His long fingers squashed my cheeks against my teeth so hard, I tasted blood. “You silly, stupid little girl.”
“And yet,” a vibrant voice spoke from a darkened doorway, “you seem somehow afraid of her, Thomas. Why is that?”
With a wrench, Becket released me. I spun, then sank to my knees as a round, magnificent figure glided toward us.
“Y-Your Grace,” he stuttered, bowing. “What are you doing here? I had thought you abed in the Tower.”
Eleanor of Aquitaine ignored the question. She brushed by Becket and waved a pale hand to Phoebe and me. “Get up, get up.”
Inserting herself between us and the priest, Eleanor turned to Becket. “The better question, I think,” she said, “is why are you here, Thomas? Henry was bellowing for you earlier. Why is it that you are not stuck to his side?”
A shadow rippled over Becket’s face. He glanced over at a set of steps. From the damp, fishy smell that wafted from that direction, I thought they must lead down to the river landing, where boats could transport people quicker from one castle to another.
“I wouldn’t tarry, Thomas.” Eleanor’s voice stabbed at the next word. “My Henry is not a patient man.”
With a fierce exhalation and whirl of black robes, Becket lunged down the steps. As Eleanor watched him go, I released a breath that flapped the jewel-encrusted ribbons sewn onto the queen’s sleeve.
“Hectare took to her bed earlier this evening.” Eleanor turned to us. I could see worry flit across her face before she began to ascend the steps toward the upper chambers of the castle, where Rachel and I’d been the day before. “I summoned the Jewish apothecary and his granddaughter to tend her. She . . . She is dear to me.”
Fatigue carved faint lines in the queen’s face. She grasped the rail and hauled herself up.
When we didn’t immediately follow, she snapped over her shoulder, “Well, come on, then. Hectare insisted the two of you would appear here this night and that I must bring you to her at once.”
Phoebe and I exchanged a look.
How? Phoebe mouthed.
I shrugged in answer as we followed Eleanor’s train up the marble steps.
Chapter 32
SISTER HECTARE LAY BENEATH A MOUNTAIN OF FURS, her small form dwarfed by the huge four-poster bed in a chamber that rivaled Eleanor’s own. She shivered, despite the heat from two enormous copper braziers and a crackling fire in the small open fireplace, the first I’d seen in this time.
Papery eyelids closed, the little nun’s cracked voice whispered for Rachel to add more coal. An elderly man brewed a pot of medicine over the fire as Rachel dumped more coal into one of the braziers. The moment we entered, Eleanor rushed to Hectare’s bedside. Rachel’s tired face transformed with delight at the sight of us.
I breathed in the scent of simmering herbs and camphor as we watched the queen take one gnarled hand in hers and kiss it. “The girls were below, just as you said they would be.”
Without opening her eyes, Hectare smiled. “Thank you, my child. Now, please, go back to the Tower. Your babe needs a rested mother. And you have much to do on the morrow.”
“And how many nights did you and Amaria sit at my bedside, nursing me through childhood illnesses? How many nightmares did you soothe after my father died and left my sister and me all alone? How many times did you stand at my side when everyone else in Louis’s court turned on me?”
“Yes, child.” Hectare’s eyes opened. She turned her head on the pillow and fixed her rheumy eyes on the queen. “But you are precious. Your name will last through the ages as a queen of legend, though there is yet great sorrow in your path. You’ll bear Henry more children. Too many, I think,” she said with a chuckle. “Mayhap you’ll want to bolt your door from time to time, eh?”
Phoebe and I exchanged a startled glance. How could she know all those things?