There’s a small alcove over to our right with window seat shelves. Instead of floor to ceiling bookcases, there’s a series of low tables and chests scattered throughout the room with stacked papers and books.
We’re half-finished clearing when a heavy thud echoes from the next room. We move quickly in the direction of the sound, and hear distinct footsteps walking toward the entrance. Nico sweeps his right arm behind him, catching my shoulder. Together, we side-step toward the wall so that when the door swings open toward us, we have brief cover behind it. As long as whoever is in the other room doesn’t look behind the door.
My breathing thins into shallow inhales and exhales. Nico’s jaw tightens, his body’s automatic response to the adrenaline that must be pumping through his veins as it does through mine. There’s a thick, phlegmy cough as a man clears this throat.
Nico holds up his right hand. Wait.
Balancing on the balls of my feet, ready to move on Nico’s word, I redirect the energy coiling in my belly into taking slow, easy, inaudible breaths. We wait for whatever is going to happen next.
The room feels stagnant, like nothing is going to move for years to come. There’s a moment where the silence is almost too much to bear. Finally, a man with an athletic build ambles through the door, a book tucked under one arm. He doesn’t turn around. If he had paused for even a second to glance behind him, he would’ve spotted us in a second.
Nico gives the signal and again we follow our established pattern. We’ve worked together so long, our rhythm is anchored in muscle-memory: He moves left, I go right.
Sensing too late that he’s not alone, the man spins toward Nico. Before he can speak, I push the hypo against the back of his neck. His muscles stiffen and there’s a whimper before his legs give out. He falls into Nico, who catches him under the arms. The man is out cold before he hits the floor.
“Meet Sir Henry Norris,” I say. “The Groom of King Henry’s Stool.”
“What’s the guy who hands the king his toilet paper doing up here in the library? Shouldn’t he be turning down the king’s bed and leaving little mints on his pillows?”
I pick up the leather-bound volume lying beside Norris. The Divine Comedy. “Reading the classics. Apparently, he’s a big Dante fan. What do we do? Leave him here or drag him downstairs?”
“He stays where he is. We’ve got to clear the downstairs rooms. Once we’re sure there’s nobody else in here, you can get to work.”
We move down the stairs—noting the door to the page’s chamber is still closed—and into the king’s inner sanctum: the suite of rooms that comprise the king’s study, bedchamber, and private bath.
Nico motions toward the door just to our left, the one leading into the outer most room of the king’s private apartments. Tudor palaces are a maze of public rooms. A courtier’s station in life determines whether or not entry into the king’s private domain will be granted. The higher up in the food chain, the more access you have to the seat of power.
These rooms are heavily guarded when the king is in residence. During a grand occasion such as tonight, there’s less traffic, but it doesn’t mean we won’t have more company. Given that Henry Norris was perusing the upstairs library instead of the king’s bedchamber, it could mean he already prepared the room for the king to retire for the night. Or it could mean Norris is slacking in his duties and has someone else performing that task. Maybe we’ll get lucky and it’s the former and not the latter.
The door is ajar and Nico nudges it farther open with his foot and scoots just to the edge of the door frame. I come in right behind him.
The Withdrawing Room is a personal study used by the king to entertain the most favored courtiers in a more casual environment. I’d had a few training sessions in the Sim lab set in what was supposed to be a replica of Henry’s apartments, but it seems the historical holograms aren’t completely accurate. Since very few other Observers have been granted entry to the king’s inner sanctum, the reality of the room setup differs from the imagined furnishings of the simulation.
I’ll bet Nico and I are the first Observers to get this far inside to explore in more detail. There’s no time to take a historical inventory. Instead, we sweep through the rooms—including the bath and a much smaller room that looks like a personal religious chapel—as we did upstairs: moving as one synchronized, cohesive unit.
All clear.
“It’s all you now, Dodger,” Nico says, squeezing my forearm. “The king could come back any minute, so be careful and be quick.” He considers me for a moment and then takes my face in his hands, pulling me into a mind-melting kiss filled with longing and feral heat. My breath catches in my chest at the feel of his lips and the lingering taste of the wine on him. He pulls back, smiles a lopsided grin, and says, “That’s for luck.”
“Damn. How am I supposed to concentrate now?”
“I have every confidence in you,” he says, heading toward the exit. “I can keep a better eye on things for you back on the ship. Besides, I have to check on our dear lieutenant to see where she is. Hopefully, Fagan still has her contained in the Great Hall.”
He gives me a wink and takes his leave. One side of my brain wants to stay inside that beautiful kiss and drag him to the king’s bed for a little more. The other side pulls me back to the task at hand. Damn it.
Once Nico is gone, I get to work analyzing where the king might keep his most precious things.
He’s a romantic.
Obsessed with Anne.
The locket is a piece of her, so
