A Marriage Made in Secret Read online

  “Do you promise to come back?”

  Henry looked down at their hands. They were still twined together. “I don’t know how long I’ll be away, but I’ll find you again, Mathilde, wherever you are.”

  “And will you meet with me then, or will you still avoid me for being a lady?” Her eyes narrowed slightly.

  “I shouldn’t meet with you. It would be better for you that way.”

  “Shouldn’t that be my decision?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “It’s not as if we’d be doing anything wrong. Neither of us is married nor promised to anyone else.”

  “Your father still wouldn’t approve.”

  “I know.”

  “There’s your reputation to consider.”

  “I know that, too.” She pressed her lips together in a line. “The queen might not like there to be rumors about one of her ladies, but...so long as we are discreet, like the queen and Mortimer, then nobody else would ever need to know.”

  He slid his free arm around her waist, drawing her close against him. “So here we are, the queen’s lady and the traitor’s bastard.”

  She laid her head on his shoulder. “You shouldn’t call yourself that.”

  “It’s the truth.”

  “But not the whole truth. You’re a lot more than that.”

  Author Note

  I knew I had to write a medieval romance at some point during 2020, but like a lot of people, I found it difficult to find inspiration and concentrate this year. Because of that, I went back to a story idea I’d been experimenting with for a few years after reading a biography of Edward II’s queen, Isabella of France. I’d never been quite sure about how to balance the romance and history, but finding a way became my lockdown challenge.

  It was a relief to throw myself into research, a large amount of which went into home-schooling (at the expense of long division and fractions—sorry, school), and to find a happily-ever-after for my characters. It wasn’t the easiest book to write, but it’s now probably the one closest to my heart. I’m also especially grateful to my editor Linda Fildew and Hannah and Bryony at Harlequin Historical for their support with this project.

  JENNI FLETCHER

  A Marriage Made in Secret

  Jenni Fletcher was born in the north of Scotland and now lives in Yorkshire with her husband and two children. She wanted to be a writer as a child but became distracted by reading instead, finally getting past her first paragraph thirty years later. She’s had more jobs than she can remember but has finally found one she loves. She can be contacted on Twitter, @jenniauthor, or via her Facebook author page.

  Books by Jenni Fletcher

  Harlequin Historical

  The Warrior’s Bride Prize

  Reclaimed by Her Rebel Knight

  Tudor Christmas Tidings

  “Secrets of the Queen’s Lady”

  A Marriage Made in Secret

  Regency Belles of Bath

  An Unconventional Countess

  Unexpectedly Wed to the Officer

  The Duke’s Runaway Bride

  Sons of Sigurd

  Redeeming Her Viking Warrior

  Secrets of a Victorian Household

  Miss Amelia’s Mistletoe Marquess

  Whitby Weddings

  The Convenient Felstone Marriage

  Captain Amberton’s Inherited Bride

  The Viscount’s Veiled Lady

  Visit the Author Profile page

  at Harlequin.com for more titles.

  To the best trio of lockdown buddies I could ever have wanted.

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Epilogue

  Historical Note

  Excerpt from The Return of Her Lost Knight by Melissa Oliver

  Chapter One

  Palace of Vincennes, France

  —summer 1325

  ‘Your Grace!’

  Mathilde jumped to her feet in alarm as a boy burst like a small, grinning assassin into the Queen’s withdrawing chamber, provoking a chorus of muffled screams from the gathered ladies. If they’d been in London, she thought, he would have been dragged straight to the Tower for causing such a commotion, but fortunately for him, they were a long way from England, in a palace to the east of Paris on a rainy and uneventful afternoon.

  The boy’s cheeks were red and he was panting, but his face was alive with excitement, as if he knew that his intrusion would be a welcome one. To the surprise of almost everyone in the room, he was right. He didn’t say another word, simply dropped down on to one knee, yet Queen Isabella lifted her gaze from the gilt-edged book of Arthurian tales she was reading and smiled.

  Isabella, born a Princess of France and now the crowned Queen of England, smiled. Not a slight regal curve of her lips for once either, but a real, rare smile that transformed her whole face and sparked a fiery light in her usually impenetrable blue eyes.

  Mathilde watched, enthralled. The first time she’d set eyes on the Queen, she’d thought her the most beautiful woman in the world, but at that moment she surpassed even herself, like a lily opening its petals in sunshine, emerging from a bud of passive prettiness into confident, blazing beauty. As Isabella rose imperiously to her feet, the effect seemed to become even more pronounced, the folds of her pale yellow surcoat catching the light from the dozens of candles around her so that they shone like molten gold. It was impossible not to stare at someone so dazzling.

  ‘Madame Baudin has arrived?’ Isabella arched one slender eyebrow and the messenger nodded, still panting from his exertions. ‘Good.’ She waved her fingers in a gesture of dismissal. ‘You may wait outside.’

  The boy backed out of the room and the Queen’s eyes turned speculatively in Mathilde’s direction, narrowing slightly. ‘You. Your name is Mathilde, is it not?’

  ‘Yes, Your Grace.’ Nervously, she dipped into a curtsy, dropping her embroidery in the process. In two months, the Queen had barely acknowledged her presence, let alone used her name, treating her with the same resentful disdain she reserved for all her newer attendants. Mathilde couldn’t entirely blame her. They were only there because the King had locked up her loyal French ladies-in-waiting and replaced them with his English spies, but she at least wasn’t a spy. She was a nobody, the daughter of a man to whom the King had owed a favour, that was all, a last-minute addition to Isabella’s retinue before she’d embarked upon her diplomatic mission to France. She was new and young, as the other ladies never ceased to remind her. Obscure and impoverished, too, their tone suggested, which was true even if she couldn’t help it. Her family weren’t important or rich or even particularly noble, but her f
ather’s past loyalty had been enough to secure her a position at court. It was a great honour, one she wished every day had been bestowed upon somebody else.

  ‘Come closer.’ The Queen lifted one elegantly manicured hand, beckoning her forward, and she obeyed at once. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Lady Berthe, chief of the spies, move as if to join them, before Isabella stilled her with a sharp look.

  ‘Cecily?’ The sharpness softened as the Queen called out to one of her older English attendants, the ones who’d joined her household when she’d first arrived in London as a young bride seventeen years earlier. There were only two of them remaining, Lady Cecily d’Abernon and Katharine Sykes, and both were fiercely protective.

  ‘Yes, Your Grace?’ Lady Cecily bobbed into a curtsy.

  ‘I want to wear my lilac gown tonight, the one with the silver trim, but I’m afraid there’s a tear in one of the sleeves.’

  ‘I believe you are right, Your Grace.’ Whether it was right or wrong, Lady Cecily’s face was a picture of innocence. ‘In fact, there are several items in your wardrobe that require attention. We have time to do some mending now, if Your Grace would excuse us?’

  ‘Of course.’ Isabella inclined her head as if she were conferring some great favour. ‘Mathilde here will stay and keep me company. Kat, too.’

  Lady Cecily curtsied again, bustling the spies out of the chamber before they had a chance to think up excuses to stay.

  ‘That’s better.’ The Queen waited until the door was completely closed before letting out a long sigh, as if she’d been holding her breath. ‘How old are you, Mathilde?’

  ‘Seventeen, Your Grace.’

  ‘So old? And with such pretty eyes. Yet still unmarried?’

  ‘Yes, Your Grace.’ She blushed, pleased with the compliment despite the sting in its tail. Her sister Hawise had always said that her eyes were her best feature, a deep, dark brown like their mother’s had been, though as for the rest of her, she knew that she was ordinary. Pretty enough, but no great beauty and without any dowry. That was why she remained unmarried. Why she’d been sent to court, too, or one of the reasons anyway. At home she’d been surplus to requirements whereas here she could earn her own keep.

  ‘You need not look so embarrassed. There are worse things than remaining unmarried, is that not so, Kat?’ Isabella exchanged a knowing look with the widowed Katharine, who only grunted. ‘Tell me, which would you prefer, a bad husband or no husband at all?’

  Mathilde hesitated, baulking at the question. It wasn’t one she’d ever had cause to consider before, but the Queen was waiting expectantly, the full penetrating force of her blue gaze focused upon her. ‘I think no husband at all, Your Grace.’

  ‘Then you may be just the girl I’m looking for.’ Isabella’s expression warmed. ‘You hail from the north of England, as I recall?’

  ‘Yes, Your Grace. From Rudstone Manor near Scarborough.’

  ‘Ah, now I remember. Your father helped my husband during the rebellion.’

  ‘He did.’ She nodded eagerly. After fourteen years, her father still seized any opportunity to talk about the day the second King Edward had ridden into their courtyard, fleeing from Thomas of Lancaster’s forces. ‘He gave him food and fresh horses and then rode to York beside him. He always says it was the greatest honour of his life.’

  ‘As it was...at the time.’ A shadow of some emotion crossed the Queen’s face, so fleetingly it was impossible to identify. Impatience? Annoyance? Mathilde dropped her gaze to the rug, afraid that she’d said something displeasing. ‘So now my husband has repaid him by giving you a place in my household?’

  ‘Yes, Your Grace. My father brought me to London to ask it.’ And then abandoned her there, she thought bitterly, biting her tongue to stop herself from saying the words out loud.

  ‘So you have no other connection to the King...or his friends?’

  ‘None, Your Grace,’ she answered with complete honesty. She’d only glimpsed the King from a distance and she knew nothing of his friends.

  ‘Good. What do you think, Kat? Is she trustworthy?’

  ‘If she’s not, then she’ll answer to me.’

  ‘I am, Your Grace,’ Mathilde countered at once, indignant at any suggestion otherwise.

  ‘I believe you, girl.’

  Isabella’s tone was soothing and for the first time since leaving her family, Mathilde felt a sense of kinship with someone. No, she corrected herself quickly, that was the wrong word. She could never be kin with the Queen, but somehow the words made her feel less isolated.

  ‘Come over here.’ Isabella sat down in a window seat, as far away from the door as possible, laying a hand on the maroon velvet cushion beside her.

  ‘Thank you, Your Grace.’ Mathilde threw a quick glance at Katharine, who had her arms folded across her chest like a sentinel, before obeying, her heart thumping with excitement even as her knees shook with nerves. She was glad to sit down before they gave way altogether, although it felt strange to sit so close to someone as extraordinary as the Queen. As women, they were only thirteen years apart, but Isabella was everything she knew that she would never, could never, be.

  ‘I have a request to make of you, Mathilde, one that must remain a secret between us.’ Isabella paused significantly. ‘I need someone like you to carry messages for me. Cecily has been unwell of late and Kat cannot walk as far or fast as she once did.’ She pressed her lips together as Katharine made a loud tsking sound from across the room. ‘Do you think you could help me, Mathilde?’

  ‘I would be honoured, Your Grace.’

  ‘I thought so.’ Isabella pulled a ruby and gold ring from her finger. ‘I knew that you weren’t like the rest of them. Here, hold out your hand.’

  Mathilde gasped as the Queen placed the sparkling band in the centre of her palm. It looked valuable, probably equivalent to several years’ worth of harvests at home.

  ‘Now, the boy will take you to someone, a guest. Show him this ring and tell him to meet me in the French King’s private apartments at once.’

  ‘Yes, Your Grace, but...’ Mathilde drew her brows together. The boy had spoken of a Madame Baudin...

  ‘A necessary deception.’ Isabella seemed to understand her confusion, throwing a telling glance in the direction of her dressing chamber. ‘When the others ask, which they will, tell them that an old nurse from my childhood has come to visit me. It doesn’t matter whether or not they believe it. All that matters is that they do not discover the truth. This must be our secret, do you understand?’

  ‘Yes, Your Grace.’

  ‘Thank you.’ The Queen touched a hand to her cheek. There was something almost maternal about the gesture, Mathilde thought, a tenderness that made her heart glow. ‘Remember to trust no one except myself, Katharine or Lady Cecily.’

  Mathilde nodded and stood, dipping into another curtsy without asking for any more details. The identity of the guest was none of her business and the dour expression on Katharine’s face warned her not to pry. In truth, she didn’t care who it was. Isabella, her Queen, had touched her cheek and asked for her help. That was all that mattered now.

  Chapter Two

  ‘Show him this ring...’ Mathilde repeated the instructions under her breath as she followed the boy down a winding staircase and along a series of dimly lit corridors, then through a courtyard and along even more corridors. They were almost running, but her feet still felt too slow, unable to keep up with her whirling emotions. She had a suspicion that something important was happening, something momentous and clandestine. She had no idea what it was, but more than anything at that moment she wanted the Queen to approve of her. If she couldn’t prove her worth through beauty or fortune, then she would prove it through steadfastness and loyalty instead.

  The spies would pay her a fortune to tell them about this, she thought with a twinge of smugness. Not that she i
ntended to. She wasn’t included in their hushed conversations, but she knew they sent regular letters back to England, reporting on all of the Queen’s dealings: whom she met, whom she spent time with, what they talked about and for how long. Personally, she couldn’t see what her mistress had done to deserve such treatment, but they seemed to take pride in being thorough. It wasn’t something that she wanted to be a part of.

  Her steps slowed as they ventured into an area of the castle she’d never visited before, part of the original building judging by the aged look of the stone, far away from the splendour of the great hall and royal apartments. Whoever the Queen’s guest was, it was becoming increasingly obvious that they wished to remain unnoticed. It was quieter and darker here, too, with few windows and fewer attendants, none at all after a few minutes, so that, despite her resolve, Mathilde couldn’t repress a shiver of unease.

  The boy passed her a lantern he must have put aside ready and she gripped the handle tightly, her anxiety growing the further along the corridor they went, as if she’d started along a dangerous road and had no idea how to find her way back. For a moment, her nerves faltered and she wished herself back in the safety of the Queen’s rooms and beneath her notice again, but it was only briefly before she berated herself for cowardice. She wasn’t going to fail in her mission when it had barely begun.

  At last they stopped outside an oak door so thick and solid looking she thought it might require a battering ram to open. It would certainly be impossible to hear through it if anyone were tempted to eavesdrop. The boy knocked and then, before she could tell him to wait, before she even had a moment to gather her wits, he scampered off, running back the way that they’d come. Panicking, Mathilde opened her mouth to recall him, but it was already too late. There was a harsh, scraping sound as a bolt was drawn back and the door swung halfway open.

  ‘Yes?’ The shadowy outline of a man appeared in the doorway.

  ‘I...’ She faltered, the strangeness of the situation making her tongue-tied as she lifted her lantern to get a better look at the speaker. He was tall and lean and appeared to be no more than a couple of years older than she was, but the severity of his expression made her feel younger and more insignificant than ever. Even frowning, however, he was arrestingly handsome, with sharp cheekbones, a square jaw covered in bristles, and features that appeared to have been chiselled out of granite. He held himself with an air of confidence, too, though his clothes were crumpled and mud-spattered as if he’d been travelling, and his hair was ruffled, tumbling over his forehead in dark curls. It was almost black, she noticed, a deeper shade of brown than her own, but whereas her eyes were a similar colour, his were a glacial shade of blue, pale and piercing even in the gloom of the corridor.