The guard made a snarling sound and deliberately spat on the toe of Brand’s boot, but a moment later he pulled hard on the reins and retreated several feet.
“Brand,” Carey whispered shakily after several minutes, sidling a step closer to him. “Are you hurt?”
“No,” he replied, forcing a reassuring smile. “Just in desperate need of one of my betrothed’s special sponge baths.”
She blushed scarlet, and his smile widened to a genuine grin. But before he could say another word, a trumpet blast sounded ahead of them and all humor vanished. On the steps of St. James’s Palace his father stood next to the Duke of Norfolk and the Archbishop of Canterbury. The three most powerful men in the country, all devout Catholics and loyal to the queen. All cold-eyed, cold-hearted and unsmiling.
Norfolk stepped forward, a roll of crisp parchment open in his hands.
“Sir Brandon FitzAlan, Mistress Catherine Linwood, you stand accused of high treason, blasphemy, heresy, witchcraft, and fornication. On behalf of her most gracious majesty Queen Mary, it is the desire of the council to hear this matter personally and pass judgment upon it. Due to the nature of the charges, it is also the desire of the council to begin with all haste. Therefore, your trial shall commence at noon, three days hence. Guards, escort them to the dungeon.”
“No,” Carey cried, frantically trying to twist out of the guards’ hold as they began to roughly haul her away. “Brand. Brand!”
He ran several steps before his back arched and legs buckled under the brutal strike of wooden staffs, the agonizing burn of the heavy blows a sickening contrast to the chills roiling his gut. Once again in his wretched life, he was reduced to utter powerlessness by the whims and desires of noble-blooded Catholics.
There would be no justice here. Mary wanted them both dead.
They would take her secrets to the grave.
Three days.
Three endless days she had spent confined to this shadowed, damp, sparsely furnished chamber in a forgotten corner of St. James’s Palace, her only indication of time passing a small ledged window that allowed a few weak rays when the sun rose to its highest point in the sky. Three days of forced contemplation, as she was permitted no books, quill and parchment, embroidery, or even rosary beads for solace.
Three days of near-silence. The silver-haired maid who delivered trays of bread, fruit, and a bowl of thin broth twice daily and emptied her chamber pot never spoke a word. Another who left a change of clean clothing—linen chemise and petticoat, plain white cloth hood, and gray wool gown—refused to meet her gaze. In fact the only person she’d conversed with since the start of her imprisonment was a wizened old man named Parsons who visited each morning, and when not dozing, called himself her legal representative.
But by far the worst punishment, three days of not seeing Brand. Not hearing his voice, touching him, feeling the warmth and strength of his arms around her. Was he nearby? Badly injured from his beating? Longing for her the way she did him?
He cared for her. Perhaps he might not have said the words, but so many times he had shown her in deeds, putting his own life at risk for her again and again. Yet now that they were both arrested and imprisoned, the stakes were so much higher. What if Brand had been broken on the rack and forced to a devil’s bargain—his life entirely restored in exchange for a damning witness?
Certain she’d never be warm again, Catherine huddled under a thin blanket on the narrow pallet-bed, her tears long run dry. Abruptly the clank and grind of a lock needing oil echoed through the chamber, and the heavy oak door scraped open to reveal Master Parsons and two armed soldiers.
“It is…it is time?” she croaked through the boulder lodged in her throat.
“Aye, mistress. You must come with us to face the council and answer the charges against you.”
Bracing one hand on the cold stone wall, she climbed off the unsteady pallet and smoothed her gown. “Yes, sir. I am ready.”
Such was the size of St. James’s Palace, they rounded many corners and marched countless hallways, and still she could not see so much as a familiar tapestry. Eventually they reached a set of five wide steps set under a great archway—the entrance to what looked like a disused great hall.
Weapons thumped on the floor.
“Mistress Catherine Linwood!”
It was a familiar call, but today there were no respectful bows or cheerful hails. She faltered, until a firm shove to the back forced her through the door of the room deemed fit to be her and Brand’s place of judgment. Shockingly, a sea of people sat on cushioned chairs either side of a narrow aisle. All chatter ceased, only emphasizing the drag and clatter of her ill-fitting shoes on the polished wooden floor, the wheezing breaths from Master Parsons shuffling behind her.
A clerk darted forward and gestured for her to sit atop a stool resting on a raised platform, the square surrounded by a thin metal railing. Taking several deep breaths, she lifted her head and faced the council. Today just five of the extraordinarily powerful men would decide her fate: Thomas Howard, Duke of Norfolk; Henry FitzAlan, Earl of Arundel; Reginald Pole, Archbishop of Canterbury; Francis Talbot, Earl of Shrewsbury; and Thomas Percy, Earl of Northumberland.
Norfolk stood. Today he wasn’t Jane’s brother, the man who had distributed coins for hair ribbons and taught them cards, but an ice-cold, utterly aloof stranger looking every inch England’s premier nobleman.
“Please state your name for the court, madam.”
“Catherine Mary Linwood. Daughter of the late Arthur Linwood, physician.”
“You know why you are here?”
“Yes, your grace. To answer charges against me.”
“High treason,” he snapped, his voice the crack of a whip. “Heresy. Witchcraft. Fornication. The fifth charge of blasphemy has already been found wanting and
