Free The Irish Princess by Karen Harper Page B

too much of being shuffled off to the Maynooth cellars while horrible things happened. Someone had called in the street earlier, Remember the Pardon of Maynooth , and that was no pardon at all.
    My blood hammered in my head, and I could hear my heartbeat. Breaking into a sweat, I darted back to the table and seized a fruit knife. Once Gerald and I had put one of his pet snakes in Cecily’s sewing box in retribution for her telling Mother we had stuffed ourselves with pilfered yuletide comfits. And we had gotten into the pantry where Cecily had locked her box and books by sticking a knife point in the lock, then twisting and jiggling it.
    I worked like one possessed to move the mechanism and free the lock. Finally, something clicked. The latch lifted. Would they have a guard at the door? I poked my head out and saw no one. Again, a female, and a young one at that, was of no concern to them, even if she be a Fitzgerald, fearful but spitting angry.
    It seemed the nightmare of Maynooth again. Men’s raised voices, the clank of sword on armor. Cries of protest: “Deceit! The worst sort of betrayal!”
    I tore down the corridor toward the banquet room as Uncle James’s voice rang out: “We came in trust and faith! Can you not honor family ties, or is there no honor left in England?”
    And my English uncle’s distinct voice cutting through it all: “Put them in irons! Their cells are prepared. The king has ordered you to London to face charges and—”
    I had silently cursed Thomas, Earl of Kildare, for losing control and not biding his time and reining in his hatred, but now a raving fury took over my body and voice. Holding up my skirts, I ran into the hall where guards were dragging out my uncles. James and Walter were already manacled behind their backs.
    “No!” I shrieked, and launched myself into Lord Leonard from behind. He did not go down but was thrown forward, nearly to his knees. A guard grabbed me about the waist and yanked me back, twisting my wrist until I dropped the knife I realized only then I still held.
    But I wasn’t to be cowed. “We came to you in peace at your invitation!” I screamed at him. “We are related by marriage and blood! Stop it! Let them go!”
    My English uncle did not even deign to answer but, with a jerk of his head, had me carried away, thrashing and shouting. I was shoved back into the room where I was to have feasted—or be poisoned, I knew not—while the male Fitzgeralds were as doomed as my father had been—no doubt as Thomas would be. When the guard seized the other two knives from the table and slammed the door on me, I could not help myself. Cursing with every vile word I had ever heard my father or Thomas use, I threw dish after dish of food and Venetian glass against the door, then beat my fists upon the walls and fell to sobbing so hard I could barely breathe.
    Later, much later, the guard opened the door and stepped in, nearly slipping in the mess I’d made on the floor. “Aye, milord, she seems ready to listen now,” the man announced, and Uncle Leonard stepped past him into the room. His boots gritted through broken glass as he entered. I sat in the far corner from the door, a heavy pewter candlestick in my hand like a battle mace.
    “Put that down and grow up, girl,” he said. “Some things are not fair, but it’s the way of the world.”
    “The way of the king of England and those who serve him, perhaps.”
    “Judas priest, do you not think your father and uncles fought underhanded when they had to? Do you think Gearoid Og Kildare or Silken Thomas just asked for power and it was given them—or that whoreson foster brother of yours who gave Maynooth over to Lord Skeffington? But I am sorry that you had to see all that—and act like a strumpet when you must learn from your mother to be a lady. It will take you much farther in life.”
    “I don’t want to go to a land where your king rules.”
    He snorted and sat down, both warily and wearily, I