What was I looking for? What had driven me to resort to my mirror? Not the symmetry of my features, but to discover the woman behind them. I tilted my chin, considering what I might see.

Honesty, I hoped. Courage, to seize the opportunity to make more of my life. Not least a determination to live as I had been raised, with integrity and good judgement. That was what I hoped to see.

And perhaps I did see it, as well as the duty to my family name and honour to the Blessed Virgin that had marked every step of my life.

So I would go to The Savoy. I would petition the Duke in the name of my previous service to Duchess Blanche, accepting that I must relinquish my pride for I had a goodly measure of it—but I would do it, for my own sake as well as that of my children. If honesty was strong in me, I must accept that life in a desolate fastness, stretching out changelessly to the end of my days, filled me with dismay, whereas life within the royal court and ducal household with friends from the past beckoned with seductive fingers.

I smiled at the prospect, yet felt my pleasure fade. Replacing the mirror in my coffer, sifting through the words that had slipped through my mind, my heart fell a little at the sheer weight of them. Integrity. Restraint. Respectability. That was to be my life. That was what I knew. I would conduct myself as a respectable widow, unless I was fortunate, one day, to wed again. Queen Philippa would be proud of my strength of will to accomplish it.

My hands, in the act of closing my coffer, paused on the open lid of it, as if reluctant to shut away that reflection of the woman behind the familiar features. How dull, how colourless my chosen life sounded, as even-textured and familiarly unexciting as a line of plainchant. And how prim and prudish the woman who would live it. Was this me? Was this really what I wanted? It was as if I had decided to exist in shades of black and grey and religious observance, when energy, with sly enthusiasm, was surging though my whole body, opening up pictures in my mind of how it would be to sing and dance again, to be courted, to flirt, to exchange kisses in the company of a handsome man who desired me.

Perhaps this was the real Katherine de Swynford, lively and frivolous, thoroughly pleasure-loving, rather than a staid widow who looked for nothing in life but allowing the beads of her rosary to slide through her fingers as she petitioned the Virgin’s grace for herself and her children. The sheer thrill of returning to The Savoy, to a position in the Lancaster household, glowed even brighter in my mind.

And then, as if summoned by my delight, there was the image of the Duke of Lancaster himself, standing in my chamber with the light behind him, as clear as if he were really there, as the sun creates a fantasy when shining through raindrops.

Impressively tall. Impressively proud. Impressively everything.

I considered him in my mind’s eye: Duke John of Lancaster, a man I had known all my life, a man whom I admired. Admired. Yes—that was it, for was it not admiration? A man of wealth and power and striking appearance, the Duke attracted high regard and vilification in equal measure from those who crossed his path. Would I wish to live once again within his forceful presence? Well, why should I not? I might be overawed, overwhelmed by the extent of his authority and the sheer magnetism of his charisma, but I knew him for a man of unfailing chivalry too. He would not cast me adrift. Returning to The Savoy held no fears for me.

Opening my eyes, finding the bright image dispelled, I closed the coffer and locked it, before walking to my open door with a light heart despite my wet stockings, and called down the stairs to my steward.

‘Master Ingoldsby! A moment of your time, if you will.’

And enjoyed a shiver of excitement, such as I had not experienced for too long. I had more important tasks for my steward to supervise than sweeping up after my doves. I was going to The Savoy.

I realised that I was smiling again.




Chapter One

His voice was impeccably courteous, but the words he uttered sliced through all the bother that had occupied my mind for the past two months with the precision of a rapier. I could not believe what he had just said to me. This Plantagenet prince, so unconsciously dramatic on this winter’s morning, had just carelessly shaken the ground on which I stood.

Yet was he carelessly unthinking? I looked at his face, to find his gaze direct and deliberate, enough to cause an awareness to run along my spine. No, he was not thoughtless at all. He had uttered exactly the notion that had come into his mind.

For my part, I had not foreseen any outcome of this nature. How would I?

And no, it was not like a rapier thrust at all, which would be clean and sharp and precise. This was more like a blast of hellfire. All my previous worries, trivial and domestic as they were now presented to me, all my confidence in my ability to cloak my thoughts in careful restraint, paled into insignificance beside the inherent danger in those chosen words, cast at my feet like a handful of baleful gems.

Cast there by John Plantagenet, royal prince, Duke of Lancaster.

My audience with the Duke, until this verbal cataclysm, had been much as I expected, as I had hoped. He welcomed me with all his customary grace. Had we not been acquainted for many years, since I had been raised from my days as a very youthful Katherine de Roet in the household of Queen Philippa, his lady mother? Our paths had crossed; we had shared meals and festivities. I had been a member of the royal household, held in high regard and affection, both as a child and as damsel to the Duke’s wife, Duchess Blanche. I was assured that whatever the outcome of my plea, the Duke would put me at my ease.

I rose from that first deeply formal curtsy when he had entered his audience chamber. Eyes downcast, breath shallow with nerves—for however well regarded I might be, if he refused I did not know where I would apply for succour—I made my request. It was hard to ask for charity, however gracious and generous the reputation of the benefactor.

‘Lady Katherine.’

‘Yes, my lord. I am grateful.’

His soft boots, the edge, gold-embroidered and exquisitely dagged, of his thigh-length robe, appropriate for some court function in heavily figured damask, came within the range of my vision, and I glanced up, momentarily alerted by a rough timbre in his speaking my name. Nor was the Duke’s expression any more encouraging. His straight brows were level, hinting at a frown, his lips tight-pressed, causing my heart to flutter against my ribs. He was going to refuse me after all. There was no position for me here. By tomorrow I would be back on the road to the fasts of Lincolnshire with nothing to show for my long journey. He would tell me kindly, but he would refuse me.

But then, as he caught some anxiety in my expression, he was smiling.

‘Don’t look so anxious, Lady Katherine. You never used to. Did you think I would turn you from my door?’