William - actually, the reincarnation of William, but whatever - once said that he doesn't think I know what the word busy means. That's bullshit. When I want to avoid something, I can be unbelievably preoccupied with a million and one urgent chores I've somehow forgotten to do. Polishing things, for example, within an inch of their lives. Or re-arranging things in draws. When I want to be busy, I can be busy.

It just happens I very rarely want to be busy.

The day after Rob left, however, I wanted to be busy more than I wanted to be alive. Not so much in a suicidal way, so much as waking up and realising that everything is pretty much vacant and meaningless, and the only thing you can do is carry on like nothing has happened, otherwise you'll suffocate. I've always been perky.

So I made wedding plans, scrapped them, did needlework, kept it, wandered down to the market to buy a new broach, thinking that something shiny would cheer me up. Actually, it did a bit, this sparkly emerald set in gold, which I couldn't afford even if I didn't eat for a month (my plan for paying for it was to sell my mother's candlesticks, which I hardly ever used). Still, it lifted my ennui a little, and all was well with the world.

The gossip was still there, bubbling away beneath my spending addiction and appreciation of all things shiny, although by then I'd mastered the stare, a penetrating ice-look that manages to shut anybody up, although did throw up some accusations of witchcraft back in the day, but I cunningly avoided any serious trouble by accusing - jokingly, might I add - that Prince John was a werewolf. Which as a rumour got a bit out of hand and well...the rest of the anecdote is available on Wikipedia.

In my experience, it's always been the people who know there's nothing interesting about them that might one day be exploited who have to gossip. I'm not saying that in a holier-than-thou kind of way, because pretty much everyone gossips, to one extent or another, but I mean to actually make up and spread a rumour. That takes a special kind of rejectedness rarely seen outside of a certain ex-queen who will remain nameless (Guin, if you're reading, and let's face it, it's not like you have much better to do, don't get angry, I just called you special and kind. Hmmm. It's comments like this that make you think I'm a spoilt bitch, isn't it?).

The thing about gossip, though, is that it's not true what people say: if you ignore it, it's doesn't go away. It gets bigger, and bigger, until the world, its wife and the peasants next door know more about the intimate details of your life than you do - and what they don't know can easily be made up. Which is how I went from being the barely-visible youngest daughter of That Drunk Man to being That Girl Who Wrangled A Betrothal Out Of William (and we all know how of course!) But Doesn't Know He's Cheating On Her With, Well, Everyone.

At first, that kind of thing is easy to ignore, and turning the other cheek is pretty much a given in stupidly theocratic society, but eventually half-hearing whispers behind your back every time you turn around is quite emotionally draining.

Needless to say, by the time William came home, I was a mess, all borderline-agoraphobic, although we didn't have a word for a psychological condition that prevented you from leaving the house, in those days, except boring. Anyway, seeing him again was like the sun coming out after a storm. Or, more accurately, an invitation to an extremely exclusive party after being held hostage at a Dungeons And Dragons themed holiday camp. I remember thinking, "People can say what they like. I'm marrying the richest man in the city."

I want to point out here, that although thus far I've only expressed the worst traits of the female stereotype - vanity, bitchiness and over-emotionalism - screw you, misogynist, I was about to marry the medieval equivalent of Bill Gates. I think it's fair to say I was smarter than your average airhead.

Or at least, you'd think that, if not for the next exciting episode in my ill-advised career as a gold-digger. William had been home for just over three days, and although I was supposed to have gone to a feast he was holding the night of his arrival, I'd thrown a sicky by sending Ann (my maid/accomplice) to apologise for my absence, but I had a slight head-cold (the sexiest illness I could argue her down to: she wanted to say stomach flu), so it was the first time I'd seem him since the incident with Rob.

He was wearing, as ever, black, this time a simple tunic with a gold chain, and on seeing me flung is arms around my waist and squeezed hard. A little out of protocol for the era, but I said nothing, grateful to finally have an ally in a city that had written me off as a stupid money-grabbing skank: he told me he loved me, and I said it back, thinking I meant it. I think I think I meant it, anyway. Everything had gone wrong. Rob had left, my friends were turning out to be backstabbers (oh the dramatic irony) and my family were all miles away. So I suppose I cupboard loved him. Like a cat.

It started with polite conversation, how his trip had gone, the people currently at court, the weather and the work that had greeted him on his arrival. But, inevitability, it came up. Rob's trial that would never occur.

You can fool some of the people all of the time, or you can fool all of the people some of the time, but you can't fool all of the people all of the time. Unless you're me. Unfortunately, I didn't know it then, and poor Wills is still under the illusion I'm too honest for my own good. So I told him the truth.

Or at least, a version of it. "He left. He stole a horse, and left in the middle of the night, without saying anything." Real tears pricked my eyes. "He's gone, forever."

"You two were close, weren't you?" It's not like William to be sensitive, not even in this age of metro-sexuality, but he was when he said that, and it didn't occur to me to be suspicious.

"I loved him, once. And he loved me." Slight exaggeration, but I didn't want to look like a stalker.

"Tell me about him?"

So I did. God. Why did I do that? I suppose it was that for the last forever I'd been so secretive, it felt liberating to finally let it spill out, that I didn't worry about why he wanted to know about Rob, or why he was suddenly so sensitive, and I let words that would later come back to bite me in the tits spill out like water. It wasn't until after I'd finished speaking that I realised that I'd said too much.