Free The Queen's Governess by Karen Harper

monthly menses and had taken her coterie of ladies with her.
    Today I saw Tom standing back on the opposite side of the bowling green, as if he felt not quite part of things either. Before I knew it, as the king and some of his favorites took turns casting the round bowl or jack, Tom appeared at my side.
    “Would you pleasure me with a stroll in the maze while they are all at their own play?” he whispered and shot me a hopeful grin. He was as charming and well favored as I remembered him; my pulse pounded.
    “I am busy, attached to the Lady Anne,” I told him, hoping he did not see me as an easy conquest.
    “I’d like for us to be attached—very.”
    “You are a rogue, Tom Seymour.”
    “So, if not now, will you dare to slip away tonight? Meanwhile, we shall watch this rogues’ gallery of gallants, eh?” he asked and pinched my bum right through my layers of skirts. I jumped. I still had my old wardrobe, which made me stand out like an unshorn sheep among those with fine, clipped coats. But I was waiting for my allotted three kirtles, four sets of sleeves, two bodices and other items made through the Lady Anne’s—actually, His Majesty’s—bottomless purse.
    Tom and I could almost talk full voice now, for the laughter and wild bets—the courtiers wagered at everything—rent the air. “Rub! Rub! I’ll place half a crown on my next cast!” Henry Percy shouted as his bowl headed for the wooden mark. But he was eliminated, so that left only the king and a man I did not know. Courtiers pressed closer, cheering, urging them on. His Majesty’s opponent was classically handsome with a Roman nose, close-clipped beard and curly hair. He reminded me of the stone carvings of the emperors’ heads which adorned the outer walls of this palace.
    “No cutting out!” someone shouted. “I’ll wager my inheritance on His Grace’s cast!”
    “And I’ll wager my poems and masques on myself!” a clarion voice called out. I saw it was the man who opposed the king.
    “Who is that?” I asked Tom.
    “Handsome, isn’t he? Thomas Wyatt, and he’s wed, so don’t get your hopes up.”
    “I would not presume.”
    “But I believe you do presume, my sweet—at least as much as the rest of us just waiting for our chance, eh? Wyatt’s an old friend of the Lady Anne from way back—farther back than Percy. First loves are oft not forgotten, and Wyatt’s much enamored of her still.”
    “How unwise of him. But then—why would His Grace allow him here?”
    “He’s useful. Poet, playwright, lutenist, deviser of masques—and, if he knows what’s good for him, loser at bowls. But he has a stubborn streak, a man after my own heart. See that thin gold ring His Grace wears on his little finger?”
    “He took it from Lady Anne in jest as a love token yesterday—as if he needed such, but I think it was so romantic.”
    “Romantic? Hell’s gates, you sound as silly as the rest of them,” he muttered, frowning. “But see that locket on the chain Wyatt’s wearing? It was Anne’s too. He’s had it for years, dares to wear it about his neck, the lackbrain. And, what the deuce,” he said with a snicker and shake of his head, “but it looks as if he’s actually out to best the king. If he can’t have the lady, at least he’ll have this little victory.”
    I, too, stared at the position where both bowls had landed.
    “I win,” the king declared, hands on hips. “Mine’s slightly closer to the mark.”
    “I’m not so certain,” Wyatt declared. “Here, let me measure to be sure.” He unclasped the very locket Tom had just mentioned and, stretching it out end to end, measured that his bowl was nearer to the mark than the king’s. His Majesty’s snort and dour look threw a damper on all the noise and movement. It was as if everyone had frozen in position in a game of statue like Sir Philip’s children used to play. Even the impeccably controlled Lady Anne looked as if she’d swallowed something