‘My duties are complete, my lady. I merely ensured that the herald had all he needed for his return to Westminster. Now my concern is for you.’

‘There is no need.’ I was already putting distance between us.

‘I think there is every need, lady.’

‘I have no needs.’

‘You do, lady, if you will admit it.’

He did not move. It was I who came to a halt and looked back. Suddenly our exchange had taken an unsettling turn, everything around me leaping into sharp focus. The carved panelling, the intricate stonework, the tapestries, all glowed with brighter colour. It was as if the quality of the air itself had changed, taking on a chill far deeper than the cold rising from the floor tiles. My skin felt sensitive, tight-drawn over my cheekbones, the texture of the manuscript brittle beneath my fingertips.

Neither could I take my eyes from Owen Tudor’s face, as if I might read something of significance in the flat planes and sculpted mouth that I had missed in the inflexion of his reply.

Without a word, Owen Tudor approached. He unfastened the brooch at his neck, swung the cloak from his shoulder and with a smooth gesture, without asking permission, he placed the heavy fall of fabric around me and fastened the simple pin at my throat. All very deft, thoroughly impersonal, but I knew it was not.

Only then, when it was done, did he say, ‘Permit me, my lady. It will keep out the cold.’

He had—quite cleverly, I decided—not given me the opportunity to refuse.

The thick wool was warm with the heat of his own body, its folds settling around me, the over-wrap of its collar snug against my neck. But I shivered, for in the doing of it, the fastening of the pin, Owen Tudor’s hands had brushed my shoulders and rested lightly at the base of my throat. I shivered even more when he readjusted the cloth against my neck, causing me to raise my eyes to his.

‘You are very kind.’ I said.

‘It is my position, as Master of Household, to do all that I can to smooth your path in life, my lady. That is why you employ me.’

How formal he was, his voice as solemn as his face—but at the same time how generous. And I understood in that moment that his gentleness had nothing to do with the terms of his employment or the duty expected of him. It was far more personal than that. To my horror, tears gathered in my eyes, in my throat. And to my disquiet, he took a square of linen from the breast of his tunic and without more ado blotted the tears on my cheeks. At first I flinched, then stood unmoving to allow it. My heart was beating so hard I thought he must surely feel its vibration.

‘I would do anything to spare you grief,’ he murmured softly as he finished his task, using the edge of the linen to dry my lashes.

‘Why would you? I am nothing to you.’ When had anyone ever dried my tears, simply because they cared or wished to guard me from grief?

‘I would because you are my mistress. My Queen.’

And I laughed, a little harshly, lifting my chin, refusing to acknowledge my disappointment at his denial of anything more particular. I had been mistaken in my reading of the tension between us: it existed only in my tortured mind. ‘My thanks for your loyalty, Master Tudor. Wiping her tears away is only what any servant might be expected to do for his lady.’

‘And because,’ he continued as if I had not spoken, at the same time taking one of my hands lightly in his, ‘because, my lady, you matter to me.’

My breath vanished.

‘Master Tudor…’

‘My lady?’

We stared at each other.

‘I don’t understand…’

‘What is there not to understand? That I have a care for you? That your well-being is a concern to me? How could it be otherwise?’

I took an unsteady breath. ‘This should not be,’ I managed.

‘No, of course it should not,’ he replied, the lines that bracketed his mouth deepening, his voice unexpectedly raw. ‘The Master of Household must never step beyond the line of what is proper in his dealings with his mistress, on pain of instant dismissal. He must be the epitome of discretion and prudence.’

What was this? I hesitated, considering so disquieting a statement, before falling without difficulty into the same role.

‘Whereas the Queen Dowager must be aloof and reserved at all times,’ I observed cautiously, not taking my regard from his face.

‘The servant’s role is to serve.’ If I had been embittered over the value of my Valois blood, it was nothing to the scathing tone Owen Tudor applied to the word ‘servant’. There was pride in him, I realised, and loathing of his servitude that I could never have guessed at.

‘The Queen Dowager must ask only what is appropriate from her servant,’ I replied. ‘She must be just and fair and impersonal.’

Our eyes were locked. His fingers tightened around mine.

‘The Master must feel no affection for his mistress.’

‘The Queen Dowager must not encourage her servant to have any personal regard for her.’

‘Neither must the servant ever allow it.’

‘To do so would be quite wrong.’

‘Yes.’ For a moment I thought he would say no more. And then: ‘It would, my lady. It would be unutterably wrong,’ he said gently, the passion controlled.

How perturbing this conversation, how unsettling, and yet with a strange glamour that made me breathless. We had dropped into this observation of what was proper and improper, exchanging opinions in a carefully constructed distance from reality, as if it had no connection to us, to the world in which we lived. And indeed, as I realised, it had freed us to say some things we would never have spoken directly to each other. Had I been lured into this dangerous exchange? Owen Tudor had a way with words, it seemed, but I felt no lure. He was bound under the same intoxicating power as I. Imprisoned and helpless, mistress and servant, we were drawn together.

I must have moved involuntarily, for he let my hand slip from his and retreated one step. Then another. He no longer looked at me, but bowed low.

‘You should return to your chamber, my lady.’

His voice had lost all its immediacy, but I could not leave it like that. I could not walk out of that chamber without another word being spoken between us, and not know…

‘Master Tudor, it would be wrong in a perfect world…to have a personal regard, as we both agree. But…’ I sought again for the words I wanted. ‘In this imperfect world, what does this hapless servant feel for his mistress?’

And his reply was destructively abrupt. ‘It would be unwise for him to tell her, my lady. Her blood is sacrosanct, whilst his is declared forfeit because of past misdemeanours of his race. It could be more than dangerous for the lady—and for him.’

Danger. It gave me pause, but we had come so far…

‘And if the mistress orders her servant to speak out, danger or no?’ I held out my hand, but he would not take it. ‘If she commands him to tell her, Master Tudor?’ I whispered.

And at last his eyes lifted again to mine, wide and dark. ‘If she commands him, then he must, my lady, whatever the shame or disgrace. He is under her dominance, and so he must obey.’

Deep within me a well of such longing stirred. My scalp prickled with heightened awareness. It was as if the whole room held its breath, even the figures in the tapestries seeming to stand on tiptoe to watch and listen.

‘So it shall be.’ I spoke from the calm certainty of that centre of that turbulent longing. ‘The mistress orders her servant to say what is in his mind.’

For a moment he turned, to look out at the grey skies and scudding clouds, the wheeling rooks beyond the walls of Windsor. I thought he would not reply.

‘And would the lady wish to know what is in his heart also?’ he asked.

What an astonishing question. Although the tension in that freezing room was wound as tight as a bowstring, I pursued what I must know.

‘Yes, Master Tudor. Both in his mind and in his heart. The mistress would wish to know that.’

I saw him take a breath before speaking. ‘The mistress has her servant’s loyalty.’

‘That is what she would expect.’

‘And his service.’

‘Because that is why she appointed him.’ I held my breath.

He bowed, gravely. ‘And she has his admiration.’

‘That too could be acceptable for a servant to his mistress.’ Breathing was suddenly so difficult, my chest constricted by an iron band. ‘Is that all?’

‘She has his adoration.’

I had no reply to that. ‘Adoration.’ I floundered helplessly, frowning. ‘It makes the mistress sound like a holy relic.’

‘So she might be to some. But the servant sees his mistress as a woman in the flesh, living and breathing, not as a marble statue or a phial of royal blood. His adoration is for her, body and soul. He worships her.’

‘Stop!’ Shocked, my reply, the single word, lifted up to the rafters, only to be absorbed and made nothing by the tapestries. ‘I had no idea. This cannot be.’

‘No, it cannot.’

‘You should not have said those things to me.’

‘Then the mistress should not have asked. She should have foreseen the consequences. She should not have ordered her servant to be honest.’

His face, still in profile, could have been carved from granite, the formidable brow, the exquisitely carved cheekbones, but I saw his jaw tighten at my denial of what he had offered me. The formality of servant and mistress dropped back between us, as heavy as one of those watchful tapestries, whilst I was still struggling in a mire of my own making. I had asked for the truth, and then had not discovered the courage to accept it. But I had been weak and timid for far too long. I spoke out.

‘Yes. Yes, the mistress should have known. She should not have put her servant at a disadvantage.’ I slid helplessly back into the previous heavy formality, because it was the only way in which I could express what was in my mind. ‘And because she should have been considerate of her servant, it is imperative that the mistress be honest too.’

‘No, my lady.’ Owen Tudor took a step back from me, all expression shuttered, but I followed, astonished at the audacity that directed my steps.

‘But yes. The mistress values her servant. She is appreciative of his skills.’ And before I could regret it, I went on, ‘She wishes he would touch her. She wishes that he would show her that she is made of flesh and blood, not unyielding marble. She wishes he would show her the meaning of his adoration.’

And I held out my hand, a regal command, even as I knew that he could refuse it, and I could take no measure against him for disobedience. It would be the most sensible thing in the world for him to spurn my gesture.

I waited, my hand trembling slightly, almost touching the enamelled links of his chain of office, but not quite. It must be his decision. And then, when it seemed that he would not, he took my hand in his, to lift it to his lips in the briefest of courtly gestures. His lips were cool and fleeting on my fingers but I felt as if they had branded their image on my soul.

‘The servant is wilfully bold,’ he observed. The salute may have been perfunctory, but he had not let go.

I ran my tongue over dry lips. ‘And what, in the circumstances,’ I asked, ‘would this bold servant desire most?’

The reply was immediate and harsh. ‘To be alone, in a room of his choosing, with his mistress. The whole world shut out behind a locked door. For as long as he and the lady desired it.’

If breathing had been difficult before, now it was impossible. I stared at him, and he stared at me.

‘That cannot be…’ I repeated.

‘No.’ My hand was instantly released. ‘It is not appropriate, as you say.’

‘I should never have asked you.’

His eyes, blazing with impatience—or perhaps it was anger—were instantly hooded, his hands fallen to his sides, his reply ugly in its flatness. ‘No. Neither should I have offered you what you thought you wished to know, but had not, after all, the courage to accept. Too much has been said here today, my lady, but who is to know? The stitched figures are silent witnesses, and you need fear no gossip from my tongue. Forgive me if I have discomfited you. It was not my intent, nor will I repeat what I have said today. I have to accept that being Welsh and in a position of dependence rob me of the power to make my own choices. If you will excuse me, my lady.’

Owen Tudor strode from the room, leaving me with all my senses compromised, trying to piece together the breathtaking conversation of the past minutes. What had been said here? That he wanted to be with me. That he adored and desired me. I had opened my heart and thoughts to him—and then, through my lamentable spinelessness, I had retreated and thrust him away. He had accused me of lacking courage, but I did have the courage. I would prove that I did.