AN: And so the drama, the intrigue continues. Everyone has an agenda. Who do you trust?

Part 10

A fortnight gone and the world surrounding her were rending silence and still noise. Many a night she had looked out into the window at the thick wall of rain that ever poured outside, blocking from her sight London and the Thames, hiding even the hope that she could see a land so far up north where it was cold and wet and safe from harm. He had forgotten her, she told herself. She wished he had forgotten her. So far that she remained wordless, a passive suspect in this crime, he was far enough away from what fate awaited him.

The groaning sound accompanied the heavy bolts pushed to the side. And then the darkened figure strode towards her, in a heavy dark cape that plastered to his thighs as he charged towards her. He hunkered over her, and she gasped, wide-eyed, staring into the stranger's intent face.

"Come with me," he commanded, in a strange, mumbled accent she could not place.

She shook her head. "I cannot leave this place," she said.

"They would sooner sever your pretty little neck than listen to your pleas," he told her. And then his hand wrapped around her wrist, and he pulled her up against his wet form. "I know a place where you shall be safe."

The cold metal keys hit her arm as he pulled her. Blair glared at the keys in the ring, then demanded, "Who are you? What have you done to Leon?"

"Your guard lays asleep outside, in comfort."

"Of his own will?" she asked.

"Of mine," he proudly claimed. "I felled him to reach you."

Leon had been kindly, and despite that she was a prisoner of the crown had laid not one hand on her. In the past week had even brought her a book of sketches, and in charcoal likenesses she reminisced about her beloved moors.

"Such a fragile little thing, my lady," her guard said to her, when he had spied her looking at the sketch of a tiny Highland flower.

"And yet," she said, remembering Bartholomew's words as she laid her horse away from the clump of the dainty blossoms, "strong and wild that it grows where even the thorniest, hardiest bushes wither."

Because where the strongest withered, a pretty flower could prove that she could weather the world.

"Like you, my lady," her guard had told her. "I have seen grown men curse at their fates for days on end. In truth, and begging your pardon, once I saw a noble knight fall upon his own dagger for the shame of having been so accused.

Take her own life? It was preposterous. Ridiculous. Utterly impossible.

Leon had been kindly, and brought her another coarse blanket when hers had been too thin for the night's chill.

And this man, with his large eyes and full lips, with his pale skin and near fearsome frown, brought her old Leon down for her sake.

"Who are you?" she demanded.

"I am come to save you," he stated. "I am come to take you to your sanctuary, where your queen cannot touch you."

It was a test, she swore. Her queen had sent her this temptation to measure her devotion. She pulled away from him, extricated herself. But the sound of the night guards marching the hall down below pierced through her walls and he slapped a hand over her mouth.

She struggled, and he said low into her ear, "Lady Blair, I do not wish you harm. I will lay my life down for you." And the quiet assurance gentled her resistance. "My name is unimportant, but I have seen you in court. I have been watching, and waiting." And then, "If I take my hand away, will you swear you will not scream?"

She nodded. If she screamed it was she who would be buried deeper in suspicion, for he would only swear to her service. He freed her, and she turned around. Blair gasped, and the blinders fell from her memory as she recalled, "I had seen you. You were in the Romanian party."

"For a time," he admitted.

"What is it you want from me?" she asked.

And then, he bowed in front of her, and for a moment she felt a deep thrill run through her. Because the greatest ambition she remembered was an audience, and a year of service, to the queen of England. And here he was, paying his deep respect. Slowly, to her utter awe, he lowered himself to one knee. "Forgive your humble servant," he said. "I dared touch you for your own sake."

"What are you doing?" she breathed.

"When I learned that you had been taken prisoner, I failed you. And I failed your mother."

Her entire breath released from her body. Blair stepped back. "My mother."

"Your mother searches for you, Lady Blair. I am but a humble servant of Lady Rose."

Her heart drew deep, slow, large pumps. And she met his eyes, as if they were in slow, persistent, outlined motions. "My mother is gone," she whispered. She had asked Dorota, because Dorota should have known it all. "Lady Rose—who is Lady Rose?" She shook her head. "My mother is Eleanor Waldorf, and she had gone when I was but little—"

"She remains in the French court, my lady."

Summers in France, she thought, dancing and laughing in Queen Catarina's gay court. They spend her young court life with the Florentine queen of France, who had held her like she was her own dear child.

"With her cousins, where you shall be safe."

Queen Elizabeth could not dare brand her a traitor in the French court. The keys in the man's hand glinted, throwing back a shine to her eyes.

"Say aye, and hold your breath." He stepped close to her, placed a hand on her hip. She stepped back, because until then despite her earlier betrothal to another man it had only ever been Chuck Bass who had touched her so intimately. "Say aye and I vow to you before a hundred breaths you shall be free."

"You seek to work miracles, ambassador?" she said.

"Nay," he answered. "But I am a master at this field."

"Say aye," he said, more urgently now, as the sound of the marching drew nearer.

It would be Walsingham. She knew well enough the time he came. The spymaster grew more impatient by the day, and still she held her queen behind little wooden soldiers, posed beside her vulnerable king. "What would they say if I should vanish from my cell?" she asked. "That I were guilty of these charges, that I had planned to kill the queen of England."

"It matters not when you are safe across the channel."

She wished, with all her heart, he spoke the truth. And somewhere out there her mother thrived, and loved her enough to send a man for her. But should she sail, she would be leaving with this threat that hung over Chuck Bass' head. And he had only ever been good to her.

So she answered, "No. I would not cause a man to die."

The ambassador—although she knew he was not that she could think of no other way to address him—drew back with alarm. "They are almost here. Tell me."

"No!" she declared.

He took a small piece from inside his pocket, and then held it up between them. It appeared like a coin, with a crude carving of a rose. When he pinned it to her dress she realized it was a brooch.

"Drop this down your window when you are prepared to leave," he instructed.

And then, even before she could nod, he was gone. The door slammed shut, and she heard the jangling of the keys grow faint, imagined his hooking the metal ring back into Leon's hand. She sat on the edge of the bed and waited, heard the slight scuffle outside and knew it was a reprimand on Leon. They had thought him asleep within the hours of his watch.

The ambassador worked clean, she thought.

Finally, her door opened once again. She started when she saw Walsingham enter. The spymaster stepped closer to her, then smiled.

"Think you I am a terrific monster?" Walsingham said gently.

"I hardly think of you, my lord," she answered coldly.

The man nodded, then told her, "You think to wound me. But I am old, thick-skinned, and care not of my manners any longer." He shook his head. "I had thought you have begun to take pleasure in our visits."

"Each time you come, you take a day from my life."

He shook his head. "Are you so unused to a man who is unaffected by your charms, Lady Blair? Are you so opposed to one you cannot manipulate?" Before she spoke, he chuckled. "My visit is not to torment you. Not today," he informed her. "I am come to take you to Beauchamp."

He nodded at the two guardsmen he had brought with him.

"You are fortunate, my lady. Beauchamp has finer accommodations than the Bloody Tower." Walsingham scratched his beard. "A queen of England once was imprisoned there."

"You think a gilded cage is better, but it is still a cage."

The spymaster folded his arms across his chest. "Northumberland descends upon us," he said.

Blair's lips parted. He had not forgotten. A fortnight and she dared not hope, yet here was the magnificent changes. Her guardian, despite his hatred of London and the court, went south of his beloved moors. For her. Chuck Bass had written to his father. For her.

"The duke," she said.

"How else does a nameless girl, accused of treachery, move from the Bloody Tower to Beauchamp?" Walsingham sighed. "The duke, I suspect, and his blasted association with William Cecil."

"You speak, my lord," Blair said, as she fell into step beside Walsingham as they crossed the Tower Green, "as if another prison is a blessing."

"At times, I wonder how one such as he can have such power to take this all for yourself," Walsingham said, as he deposited her to the entrance of Beauchamp Tower, her new prison.

It was the tower a mere walk from the old, and they had, under the rain, passed another building on the way.

"Until tomorrow," he said to her. "Your chambers are up the stairs, the second door to your left." He paused. "Take caution," he told her. "Beware the Basses."

And then, surprising to her, Walsingham and his guardsmen departed. Blair stared in open-mouthed shock. She looked around her, where there were no walls surrounding her. She glanced at the yeoman at the door. She entered the tower, then stepped back outside. When the yeoman did not move, her eyebrows drew together.

"Once, my ancestor was imprisoned here, tainted his name until he regained his honor and he was set free."

She almost sobbed aloud at the sound of his voice. Her breath hitched in her throat, and she whirled around.

Beware the Basses, she had been told, but her heart knew well who it was and leapt in joy.

Chuck Bass stood there, under the rain, with sad triumph in his eyes. "From that day they named this tower after him."

And the first thing she could say, as she wiped at her tears, was, "He said one as lowly as I did not deserve a prison as fine."

"Walsingham," he pronounced, as succinctly as he could, "is an ass."

And the words brought soft laughter from her lips. She had gone on too long without laughter.

"My father remains in court, with Cecil and the queen, and we will not rest until you are free." And then, he stepped close to her. "For now, I will remain in the queen's lodgings," he said. She eyed the structure right by her prison. "You are afforded the rights of the prisoners within. You are not locked into your chambers. You may roam the tower if you wish. With a guard, you may step outside and walk under the sun."

"Should there be sun," she said.

"Of course there would be," he answered.

She stepped out of the cover of the tower and ran across the rain, muddying her only pair of shoes. Blair threw her arms around his neck and pulled him down, and she sighed when his lips caressed hers.

"You had done all this," she said.

"Did you truly believe I would have wished for you to spend a moment longer in that vile place?"

She smiled at him, vibrant, and for once she felt hopeful that perhaps they would come through this trial together. "The queen—how does the queen?"

"The queen does not know I am here," he answered. "She had asked her council to gather in the morning."

She pulled away, a frown on her brow. "Chuck—"

"It was a choice that I made," he said easily. She remembered Walsingham's dire warning, and his reason for Chuck being suspect of the crime. "Why should the queen," he said, and Blair held her breath, because as he looked down at her, with his face above her shielding her from the rain, she thought he was more beautiful now than he had ever been in court, "begrudge a man a moment to see his wife?"

"My lord, what are you saying?"

"Here I am, drenched, cold, exiled myself into the queen's lodgings with nary another soul in sight," he told her. "I cannot bear to lose you."

"You wish to wed me," she repeated.

When she paused, he added, "You will be a countess. None of Elizabeth's women has a title far nobler than mine. And when we prove that you are innocent—"

A triumphant return to court.

"The queen abhors you for Essex," he told her. "Let us take away the stain of Robert Devereaux from your name."

She shook her head. "You cannot think he is the reason for my misfortune. The queen is not so vile."

"When the queen discovered that Essex's stepfather—her favorite courtier Dudley—had married one of her ladies—"

She placed a finger over his lips. "Shush. They are rumors. We were hardly old enough to remember. The queen and the earl of Leicester—"

He took her hand and raised it to his lips. "Marry me. We shall go to the chapel under the cloak of the night. And I swear to you, Blair, the queen will relent."

"You would do this for me?" she asked. And he nodded. A title, freedom, ease of mind. "Why?"

He took it as an answer in the affirmative. "Why ever not?" he responded. "Now you shall have all of mine."

"And you, all of mine," she said gently. "Be it that I have not much to offer you."

Blair turned around as he jogged through the drizzle and handed a hefty purse to the yeoman, who upon weighing the pouch in his hand turned his back on the two.

His hand was warm around hers. When he looked back at her, Blair marveled at the look on his face. Her heart raced with the thrill. They crossed the greenery and ran towards the White Tower. At their approach, Blair hesitated, then tugged at Chuck's hand. He looked back at her and raised his brows, then gently urged her by pulling her along.

They entered the austere chapel, with its high ceiling and large round pillars. It was stark white, undecorated, cold.

"It is not the wedding you had planned."

"The only wedding I knew to think of was the ceremony I would have had with Nathaniel Archibald," she said. She glanced back at the chapel, with none of the glory of the court. "Countless prisoners took their last rites here, and even then this is superior to wedding him."

He chuckled, drew her forward. His boots sounded on the cement floor as he walked to the minister who knelt before the altar.

"And the banns?" the minister asked.

To which Chuck replied easily, "Read."

"Three times?"

"Three and a hundred," he swore. "More perhaps. My father's had them read back home since we can remember."

It was a lie, and it exhilarated her. Her lips curved as he leaned forward and said quietly, "The goal is to marry tonight. The lie with which we do reach it does not matter."

She was wed quickly, without pomp. It was a secret affair and over soon. She thought her heart would sink, just because it was never what she had imagined when she wed. But as the minister spoke and he held her gaze, she could think of nothing she would choose over the dank austerity of that night.

Chuck Bass—her husband Chuck—walked with her to Beauchamp Tower, then released her hand. "Good night," he said to her. "Countess."

And it was she who stepped close and kissed his cheek. Between the two, she stood to gain more from what he had proposed than she. With gratitude, she said, "Good night, my lord." She placed a hand on his vest. "Tomorrow, will I see you? Will you walk with me?"

"Give me a day. And I will tell the court I have taken you to wife. Will you give me a day?"

"A day," she agreed. "And not a moment more."

He smiled for her, then leaned and captured her lips. "I cannot bear to be apart for longer," he swore.

tbc