Court of Traitors (Bridget Manning #2) Read Online Free PDF

been she who had refused to favour him with a single syllable. Indignation rose in her, and she quickened her step to fall in next to her husband. She folded her arm across his, as possessively as she could manage, and gave Will not another look or thought.
     
    They came quickly to the main body of the presence chamber, and Cromwell swept them forward without hesitation. The king was standing there surrounded on every side by a swarm of Seymours—his wife, and her two brothers and sister-in-law. The latter, Lady Hertford, perhaps out of nerves at being so close to the king, had adopted the approach of laughing rather loudly at everything he said. Henry, instead of being amused, regarded her quizzically, as if she were a curiosity at a village fair, and then he noticed Cromwell. He smiled vaguely toward him, and then with genuine warmth at Will, before his gaze shifted to the right and he beheld Bridget. He seemed to freeze; the light in his eyes dimmed, and he openly stared to the exclusion of all else in the room. Bridget sighed and tried to remain as outwardly unaffected as possible; she was causing dismay and agitation with every step she took today.
     
    Cromwell took charge. He made the necessary introductions, in his practised, smooth manner, as though he had been doing this forever. Sir Richard bowed deeply to his sovereign, his bones creaking in protest at the sudden, downward movement. Bridget, in her turn, curtseyed as low as she was able whilst keeping her eyes firmly anchored on the beautifully inlaid floor. She was determined to do so until the king deigned to speak to her. He already seemed to disapprove of her; she did not want him to think her forward as well. As she hoped, he addressed her husband first.
    “Sir Richard, I bid you a hearty welcome! It did not take you long to accept my invitation and I am glad of it! You have been absent from my court for entirely too long. Now then, how many years has it been? Ten, fifteen perhaps? My memory is not what it once was.”
    “Oh , nor mine, Your Majesty, but I believe it has been about ten years,” Sir Richard answered with an air of ambiguity that Bridget knew did not truly feel. He had told her often that it had been fifteen years since he had last attended court. Fifteen years since the Duke of Buckingham had made his end upon the block and the de Bretts had retreated into the shade, the taint of his treason transferred onto them. There was no need, and no point, to remind the king of that calamitous history. With any luck, the king had forgotten that Sir Richard’s second wife, Eleanor, had been a relative of the disgraced Duke’s. Neither Bridget nor her husband were going to jog his memory.
     
    The king completed his welcome of Sir Richard and there was a pause. Bridget held her breath. She could sense the king standing there, quietly contemplating her, but she dared not raise her eyes to him. He must be the first to break the impasse, the first to act. After a long minute had elapsed, he did so. “And this is, of course, your new wife. Her name is Bridget, is it not? Formerly known as Mistress Manning? I am quite certain I recall her presence, although very faintly, at court last year. Is that not correct?”
    Sir Richard answered for his wife in the affirmative and tapped her elbow to indicate she should react. But Bridget did not look up. Not until the king took her hand did she feel it was safe to shift her gaze and meet his.
     
    She rose and murmured, “Your Majesty, you do my husband and I great honour to invite us to your court.” The king did not reply; all he could do was gape at her, in much the same way Lady Rochford had, as if she were a spirit risen from the grave to haunt him. Bridget thought she knew the reason for his reaction. It was her eyes, her black, Boleyn eyes that both compelled and alarmed him. No doubt they made him think of the queen she had served who now lay mouldering in her elm chest at the Tower, unmarked and