Elsabet’s mouth hung open. Rosamund and Jonathan dead? The words made no sense. “You lie.”
Francesca walked farther into the room, inspecting the trappings, the fine royal pieces that the queen’s chambers had been furnished with. She ran her hand across the dark wood table and touched the embroidered hanging on the wall. She even put her palm to the fire and inquired if it was hot enough or if it smoked.
“You lie, I said,” Elsabet hissed. “Get out!”
“I do not lie,” Francesca said gently. Her expression could change in the space of a moment. How had Elsabet ever thought she could be trusted on the council? “You are still upset. It was a monstrous thing, after all. I am not surprised if you don’t remember . . . giving the order.”
“What order?”
“The order to execute Catherine and your captain of the queensguard. You were so convinced of their treachery. And the soldiers could do nothing but obey. You are a queen of the sight gift, and their faith in you was absolute.” Francesca clapped her hands free of soot and smiled her prettiest smile. “Of course the people are aghast that you would order such brutal executions without reason or investigation.”
“No one will believe you,” Elsabet growled. “I did none of these things. Bring me Rosamund Antere! I don’t believe you that she is dead. If no one would stand against me, they would never dare stand against her.”
“She is dead, my queen. She and her entire house. A whole house dead, and the Howes met a similar fate. And the Dentons, poor poisoner folk. They were perhaps the most innocent in this, simply in the wrong place at the wrong time, caught up in a queen’s misguided wrath.”
Elsabet’s head spun with the falseness of the accusations. This could not be. None of it could stand that she, the queen, would be imprisoned in her own castle, her loyal friends murdered, her enemies left to rule in her place.
“You will not get away with this! I will see you on trial. I will see you hang.”
Francesca laughed. “You will have a difficult time seeing much of anything from up here in your tower.” She smiled cruelly. “Elsabet, queen you will remain, but you will never come down from here again.”
“What?”
“It is for your own safety as much as ours. I fear that, enraged as the people have become with you, they might tear you apart on sight.”
Elsabet clenched her fists to keep from crying. She would not cry in front of Francesca. She would spit in her eye. She would scratch her face. “You can’t keep me here, as a prisoner. I am your queen! I am the one who will bear the triplets!”
“Of course you are! I would not dream of keeping your king-consort from you. He will visit you regularly. When he is not with me.”
Elsabet’s face burned. “You are small and foolish indeed if you think I care about his fate after all this.”
“Do not forsake what friends you have. Or you will be very lonely here.”
“I will not be here. I will get out.”
The poisoner sighed and clasped her hands in front of her skirt. “It will be easier on everyone if you accept your loss.” She turned to leave, slipping out, and Elsabet charged the door and hammered against it with her hands and elbows.
“It will never be easy! I will never stop trying to get out of here, do you hear me? Never!”
Gilbert stared across the table at Catherine Howe’s empty seat as the Black Council met to take stock of the ruin that had befallen the crown and the capital. Without Catherine, and without Elsabet, without Rosamund outside the door, the council chamber felt so empty. Sonia Beaulin was still there, of course. And for some reason the king-consort. And Francesca Arron had seated herself at the head.
He wanted to speak against that. As the queen’s foster brother, the head of the Black Council should have fallen to him. But who could he speak to? He had let himself be surrounded by snakes.
“What is he doing here?” Gilbert asked, and gestured to the king-consort.
William smiled. “The kingdom is short on advisers, brother. You should count yourself lucky that I am here and ready to serve.”
“The kingdom is not a kingdom at all,” Gilbert said. “It is a queendom, and you will not forget it.”
“Of course none of us will forget it.” Francesca Arron cleared her throat. “Not even with the unfortunate madness that has taken over our queen.”
“So unfortunate,” Sonia echoed, and shifted her weight. She seemed to be having some discomfort, and Gilbert noticed she had walked into the room with a bad limp. Good Rosamund must have done that before she . . . He closed his eyes and shuddered.
“The people will not accept this,” Gilbert ventured. “And it is dangerous. They will want their queen, or they will want to kill her, and—”
“They will never want to kill her.” Francesca looked at him sharply. “The queen is sacred. The queen’s line is sacred, as it always has been. She will be kept and cared for, safe in her West Tower until the triplets come.”
“Some will question—”
“They question her. They have heard the rumors of her jealousy. They know she has been secretly seeking out those she thought were betraying her.”
“So Elsabet ordered the execution of Catherine Howe, whom she branded a traitor, and her own head of queensguard? What reason did she have to execute the Dentons? The house of her new favorite?”
Francesca pursed her lips. “The same reason she had to kill the maid. She saw the maid sneaking from the Denton boy’s apartments and ordered the Denton boy killed when he fled.”
Gilbert stared at her. “This is your plan? Your explanation? Your punishment of the queen, and for what? What great crime had she committed?” He narrowed his eyes at William. “That she sought to possess an unworthy consort?” He turned to Sonia. “That she did not appoint you Commander of Queensguard?” He glared at Francesca. “That she did not do as she was told?”
He pushed his chair back and stood. “I’ll have no part in this,” he said, and walked out. It was not long before he heard Francesca’s soft, catlike footsteps behind him in the corridor.
“We both know you will return,” she said. “When you have had enough of sorrow and come back to your senses.” She placed gentle fingers on his shoulder and touched his face. “It is over. Elsabet lost. But the island still has need of you, Gilbert. And she will like it if you stay nearby.”
“How could you do this?”
“I had no choice.”
“No choice?”
“All I wanted was for her to listen. To be a good queen and rule properly, through my—our—advice. But what could I do after she sent her spies for me? Let myself be cornered? Let myself be hanged? I told you before: there are few merciful ways to put a poisoner to death. And so I fought instead.” She patted his forearm and turned to go.
“Did you poison me, too?” he called after her. “Did you mute my gift as well as hers, without my knowing? Is that why I foresaw none of this?”
Francesca paused as if trying to decide whether to lie. Then she sighed.
“No, Gilbert, I did not poison you. In fact, I choose to think it was a sign from the Goddess that she sent you no warning. Perhaps this is”—she cocked her head—“what she meant to happen.”
THE WEST TOWER
The maid set down the tray of bread and boiled eggs. She poured the water and a steaming cup of tea. “There you are, Queen Elsabet,” she said as if the queen were a child. She set the cloth on Elsabet’s lap and even tucked her hair behind her ear. “You’re looking very pretty today. After you break your fast, we’ll brush your hair and put on a new gown.”
She began to hum, and Elsabet looked up at her as she ate. She had no appetite, but if she did not eat, then they would make her, and she lacked the energy to fight.
“You look a little bit like her,” she said, and the maid barely looked up.
“Like who?”