Taste of Treason Read Online Free PDF

thereby gaining the power and influence the perpetrator sought. He put this premise to Queen Anne.
    “It is not as straightforward as that. By some miracle, my son and daughter-in-law are deep in love with each other, mirroring the love that I shared with the late King. If Madeleine were to die now, I do not doubt that Henry would marry again, but it would be a long time in the future. Any who tried to persuade him into a speedy new marriage would be suspect. That, however, is not my primary concern.”
    “Then mayhap Your Grace should tell me what is.” His smile robbed the words of any hint of disrespect.
    “There was one more thing scrawled under the quotation from Exodus. Something I do not understand. A strange-looking drawing in the shape of a spider.” She stopped, one hand to her throat when Luke sprang to his feet, the goblet dropping to the floor.
    “Madam, please, if I give you pen and paper, could you draw it for me?”
    Her eyes blinked more rapidly than usual, but she merely nodded.
    “I will try. It is clear this means something to you.”
    Luke rifled through a pile of papers on the counter looking for a clean piece, swearing when the stack tipped onto the floor. His anxious fingers grasped at the inkhorn, spilling half the contents on his sleeve. Cursing under his breath, he brought pen, ink and paper over to the Queen Mother.
    He hovered over her, watching as her hand moved over the paper, his breathing growing more ragged. Had she not been who she was, he would have screamed when she made two false starts. She looked up at him and he stepped away, his fingernails picking at the cuticles of his other hand. The wait seemed endless, but when she had finished, she held out the paper and he took it in trembling hands.
    “Well, Dominus?”
    “Your Grace, forgive me, but are you certain the legs resembled arrows?”
    “Of course.” She paused for a moment. “You recognize this? What is it?”
    Now that his worst fears had been confirmed, Luke found his mind becoming calmer and his thoughts more measured.
    “Indeed, Madam. Your fears are vindicated. The spider is an ancient symbol for treachery and death. The arrow-like legs denote the impending descent of chaos.” He gave a shaky laugh. “I do not know why I am so affected. After all, we have already deduced that we are once more facing the
malus nocte.
In fact, this is the device of an inner sect of the sunderers. Custodes Tenebris. Few survive an encounter with one of their number.”

Chapter Four
    Queen Madeleine reclined on her cushioned daybed. The hour grew late and Henry was meeting with Archbishop Cranmer. Again. Surely they had already sorted out details for the revision of the new prayer book? It was not as if Protestantism were the true faith. Why did her husband have to spend so much time away from her?
    Madeleine winced and shifted a little. The heir was doing his usual somersault routine. In fact she had said to Henry that had the child not been intended for the throne, he would make a wonderful tumbler. Her husband had roared with laughter, putting one hand under her chin and his other hand on her belly, jumping back as his unborn son kicked out. It had been her turn to laugh.
    Tired of sewing she brightened when her usher declared that her confessor craved admittance. She concluded that she must indeed be bored if the prospect of a visit from Father Reynard was pleasing.
    Olivier Reynard, tall, black-haired, with arresting eyes and a mouth Madeleine had once thought irreverently as very kissable, bowed and smiled. He had been sent by her uncle, the French king, to replace old Father Laurent. She believed him to be a good-natured man, if a little too conscious of his appearance, but did not yet feel at ease with him. His manner caused her occasional disquiet but she had to admit that he had a winning way about him, something that Father Laurent had never possessed.
    Reynard wore his priest’s robes with a style few could emulate and