‘It’s all my fault.’

And I slid from his hands to flee. The door was unlocked. Two more steps and I would be there and out of this room that contained all I desired but all I could not have. I could be back in my chamber where I could wipe out my memory of what I had almost done. I could forget how I had almost fallen at his feet in longing—but before I had managed one step, Owen captured my wrist.

‘Don’t go like this.’

As his fingers closed, fear built irrationally. I pushed hard against him but to no avail.

‘Katherine. Don’t struggle. I’ll do nothing that you don’t wish.’

‘I can’t do this.’ I was beyond sense, shot through with guilt that I might bring judgement against him. ‘I have behaved outrageously. You should know that there is bad blood in my veins. My mother…no handsome man was safe with her. I have to ask your forgiveness.’

‘No. No forgiveness is necessary between us.’ He tried to gather me into his arms. I wanted it more than life itself and for a moment allowed myself to be drawn close, before self-reproach re-ignited in an agony of despair.

‘I can’t stay…’ I struggled, overbalanced, so that he clamped me to his chest. ‘Oh!’ The sting of pain along my cheekbone shocked me into silence.

‘What is it?’

I shook my head. ‘Let me go!’

And now his voice was all ice, all understanding having fled. ‘So you do despise me as a servant, too lowly for you to lie with. You can lust after my body but my birth isn’t good enough for you.’

‘No! That’s not it.’

‘That is what it looks like to me.’

‘Please,’ I begged. ‘Please understand. You must let me go.’

‘Then go if you wish, my lady. There is no compulsion. I would not endanger your mortal soul by forcing you to share a bed with a man who is not fit to remove your shoes.’

The heavy formality, the harsh judgement, was my undoing.

‘You cannot possibly love me,’ I cried out in my anguish. ‘No man has ever loved me.’

And when Owen stood aside, I flung the door wide, hurrying down the corridors, through the rooms to my own, my hair loose, my face undisguised, praying helplessly that I would meet no one. I did not, but it was no relief. Despair drenched me from head to foot at what I had almost allowed myself to do.

And what I had thrown away.

Closing my door, I leaned back against it, willing my emotions to settle. Shame was a living entity, nasty and cruel, mocking my every breath with jeering contempt in every comment. Overcome with physical need, I had invited the intimacy. I had called him by his given name and agreed to the assignation, compromising my honour. I had drunk his wine, kissed him, and then I had fled for my life like a frightened child rather than a woman of almost thirty years. I had left my hood. I had run through the corridors like a court whore escaping from an importunate lover. Yet now, forced to accept my dishonour, I wished I was back in his room, sitting on his bed, allowing him to lead me in whatever path he chose.

You fool. You utter fool. You allowed desire to rule and look what happened. Have you learnt nothing from your life? How will you face him ever again?

And still my need for him would not release its hold on me. If he had come to my door at that moment, I would have opened it to him and bid him come in. I would have fallen at his feet in gratitude.

He won’t come. He thinks you have damned him as inferior, unfit to consort with a queen.

I sobbed. Why? Why had I run away?

Because I was afraid. Afraid of putting my life into the hands of a man I barely knew, who might not have care with it. Afraid that the line between servant and mistress was impossibly blurred and, in the end, I had not been able to take my fortitude in both hands and leap over that line. What would Beatrice say if she knew that I contemplated removing my shift for Owen Tudor? Or Madam Joanna? I don’t care, I had once said. But I did. I shivered at the thought of their reproof.

And what of Owen Tudor? I had denied him, rejected him, allowing him to believe that I thought him too far below me. A man of such self-esteem as he was would never forgive me for that. I was without honour: the blame was all mine.

Forcing myself to walk across the room, I picked up my reflecting glass. What would I see? Would I see the face of a slut? Would I recognise the woman who stared back at me? I looked, a quick glance. And was surprised. There was no imprint of the sin I had contemplated.

Then I looked again, carrying the glass to a candle. An unhappy woman stared back, a woman who had stood on the edge of grasping what she most wanted in life. There, enticingly before her, was the bridge over the chasm, there the helping hand stretched out, there the man who would give her her heart’s desire—and she had stepped back. She had leapt away, destroying any chance of taking that step again. He would despise her, her lack of valour, her lack of courtesy. It was hopeless.

I relived the moments again in all their glory and all their pain. He had called me Katherine. He had kissed me and I had pushed him away, when all I had wanted was to say, ‘Kiss me again!’ and make use of the bed with the bright woven cover.

You can lust after my body but my birth isn’t good enough for you…

Owen Tudor would despise me, but not as much as I despised myself.

I took a comb to my tangled hair, pulling on the knots as if the pain would dissolve my grief. I could not weep. The guilt was mine, choosing to go to the room of a passionate man then fleeing when he had kissed me.

I looked again, turning my head as I saw the abrasion on my cheek. It was red, with the slightest breaking of skin. Of course. His chain of office had marked me. How appallingly apt.

A terrible memento of a disastrous evening.

Guille drew back the heavy bed-curtains that had been witness to my lack of sleep, and halted with a hiss of consternation.

‘My lady!’

‘What is it?’ My reactions, both of mind and body, were slow.

‘What have you done?’ She disappeared, returned and held out my reflecting glass.

And I looked. The abrasion, a minor blemish the night before, was angry and red with the purple-blue of bruising flaring across my cheekbone.

‘Who did this to you?’

I touched the tender spot, flinching at the pain. Here was truth I could not admit to.

‘It was my own fault,’ I managed smoothly. ‘I fell against the bed foot. I had spent too long on my knees at my prie-dieu.’ It was horribly noticeable. I closed my eyes: the last thing I needed was to draw attention to my reprehensible behaviour. ‘Can we remedy it?’ I asked.

‘A day for some clever disguise, I think.’ And Guille, rummaging, lifted a chest of cosmetics from the depths of my coffer.

I rarely used them. My skin was fashionably pale and close textured, but today I needed subterfuge. Guille and I knew enough from my mother, who had been expert in applying glamour to win the eye of a man. My need was to hide from him. Owen Tudor must not suspect that our meeting had left its mark on me.

We spent a useful hour opening packets and phials, finally applying powdered root of the Madonna lily to whiten my face and hide the abrasion. Ground leaves of angelica added a glow to my cheeks and drew the eye from the bruising.

‘It’s better,’ Guille ventured, a frown between her brows. ‘I suppose.’

‘But not good.’ I cast my looking glass on the bed in despair.

‘We can’t hide it completely.’

‘No.’ I sighed. It was the best we could do. I broke my fast in my chamber and absented myself from Mass, but I would have to join my household for dinner, or my empty chair would cause comment. I would have to scrape up what I could of my poor fortitude and pretend that nothing was amiss.

And I would have to face Owen Tudor.

When I took my place on the dais, with no thought of what was on my plate, and no ear for Father Benedict’s blessings, all I could see in my mind was Owen Tudor’s gaze sweep over me, then return, as I had first walked defiantly into the room. The gaze became a stare, his whole stance taut, until he remembered his duties and stalked away to summon the pages to bring in the serving platters. All I was left with was a memory of his stunned expression, for the much-vaunted cosmetics were not concealing the livid bruise to any degree.

I already knew this. My damsels, meeting with me in my solar, had been sympathetic with my plight and full of suggestions from their own remedies, but nothing could conceal the discolouring. Or my remorse when I saw Owen Tudor’s reaction.

Not Master Owen. He would never be Master Owen again. How could I think of him as a man in a position of subservience to me when he had held me in his arms? When his kisses had turned my blood to molten gold? Unfortunately, such was my nature that the gold had turned to lead and I had dealt him the worst of blows. I had encouraged him, only to repulse him.

Throughout the whole length of that meal contrition stalked me, for what had I seen, for that one breath-stopping moment, before he had masked all thoughts? Shock certainly, for he would not have known. But then a sudden blaze of furious anger. It had made my blood run cold, and added to the muddle of my thoughts.

How dared he be angry with me?

And yet why should he not? I admitted as I picked at the plums in syrup and sweet pastry set before me. Did I not deserve it? I had given him to believe that I was willing, kissing him with a wanton fervour previously unknown to me. I had pressed my body to his in silent demand that he could not have misinterpreted. And then, when his embrace had grown too powerful, I had run away, when I should have had enough confidence to conduct an affair with a man with some self-possession.