Tudor Rose
Hannah walked around a corner in the flat, her mind on something else, and almost ran into John. He was standing in front of the bathroom mirror wearing only a pair of jeans, shaving, and the sight hit her right in the – gut. "Oh, GOD!" she cried, squeezing her eyes shut and whirling around.
"What?" he cried, alarmed.
She took a deep breath, then forced herself to walk across the bedroom to look out the window. "Nothing. I just really wish you wouldn't do that sometimes."
"What?" he asked again, more calmly this time, albeit no less confused.
Feeling she was wading in emotional quicksand, she blurted out, "Stand around half-naked like that."
Silence for a moment. Then she caught a hint of movement in the reflection of the glass – he'd eased the bathroom door partly shut behind him, a true gentleman, then asked around it, "Why? I thought it was all right in this century." She didn't answer right away. "Hannah?"
"It is, culturally. But I still wish you wouldn't."
Another long pause. "Why?"
She sighed, and let out the truth. "Because you're sexy as hell. And you're my husband, even. And I can't have you. Because I'm 'not your type'," she explained, her voice supplying the air quotes.
"Oh," came the quiet response. There was a long silence. "Hannah?" he said softly. "Or... actually... Belle. Can I ask you a question?"
The use of the old name startled her. She'd confessed her former profession to him a few weeks ago, forced by a chance meeting with a former client that she never wanted to recall, let alone relive, and it had been an "interesting" conversation, to say the least. But he'd finally calmed down, and things had returned to normal. Well, normal for them. "OK," she said now, a bit wary, but keeping her promise to always be honest.
"Have you ever... been with... someone like me?"
That threw her. She wished she could see his face. "A gay man? Just gay? No, because he wouldn't be interested. But bi? I'm sure there must have been." She'd also taught him the terminology.
The splashing water told her he had returned to shaving, slowly, obviously thinking at the same time. "But... how would you know? I don't mean you... I mean... how does anybody know what they are? If they've never..."
This conversation was definitely getting odder by the minute. "Orientation isn't about experience, John. It's about attraction."
The water went gurgling down the sink drain. "It's not as clear cut as all that, either," came his cryptic reply.
She'd had enough, and turned around at last to look at the half-closed door. "John? Is that an invitation? Because I will take you up on it." She tried to make it light, but it came out a bit forcefully.
She could have sworn she heard him chuckle. He flicked off the light and came out of the bathroom, then prowled over to loom in front of her, gazing intently into her eyes, positively oozing sex appeal. "No, Madame," he replied, mock-formally. "It's a declaration of intent."
And with that, his mouth claimed hers, and there was no more talking for a very long time.
Well, not in complete sentences, anyway.
^..^
Some time later, they were lying spoon-fashion, Hannah barely aware of her surroundings, sated and glowing. John's lips were a scant inch from her ear. "Satisfied?" he inquired.
"Mrrrowrrr," purred the tigress, and he lifted his head up, startled, then started laughing.
"I take it that means yes?"
"Mrrrressss."
He laid back down, still chuckling. "You make the most interesting sounds..." He was quiet for a moment, then put his mouth right next to her ear to whisper again, "Better than Henry?"
She instantly burst into helpless, almost hysterical laughter. He propped himself all the way up on one elbow at that, and when she glanced back she could see he wasn't smiling, his eyebrows knotted in concern, not at all sure how to take her reaction. She couldn't speak, but she nodded exaggeratedly, and a relieved smile broke out on his handsome face.
Finally getting herself under control again, she told him, breathless, "No comparison. You are so far out of his league, you're not even in the same sport." She started to roll back over to her side again, but then stopped, shooting him an amused sideways look. "You had it pegged way back on the very first day we met." That confounded him, and she quoted his words from their first meeting in the chapel. " 'Henry, think of somebody else? I thought you knew him.' "
She didn't expect him to shoot instantly back with her own response from that long-ago day. " 'I thought you loved him.' "
She rolled back over and put her arms around his neck, pulling him close.
"Never. You know that."
^..^
The next day she came home from work to find him leaning back on the couch in his now-fading blue jeans, once again shirtless, bare feet stretched out on the coffee table, arms crossed behind his head, staring off into space. She groaned theatrically. "There you go again, being all sexy and stuff."
He grinned at her, and held out one hand. "Come here." His voice was low and throaty.
She went to sit on the couch beside him, but he grabbed her hand and pulled her onto his lap, instead, and began kissing her soundly. She melted into him for a moment, then stiffened and straightened up. "Don't tease me," she implored.
"I'm not," he replied earnestly. But instead of pulling her head back down to his, he went on, seemingly non sequitur. "Can you guess what I've been doing all day?"
She shook her head, bewildered, and he waved a hand towards the laptop computer she'd bought him a few weeks ago, sitting on the coffee table. "Looking at dirty pictures, of all sorts." He gave her a tiny smirk. "Testing myself, and my reactions. And... I think I've figured out what I am."
"And that is?"
"I'm ninety-five percent gay. And the other five percent... is all you."
"You're attracted to me?"
"Very much. But you're apparently the only woman I'm much attracted to." She wasn't sure if this was reassuring or not, and he noticed her discomfort. "What's wrong?"
She chewed her lip for a moment, a thousand stories of gay men leaving their wives after years of supposedly-happy marriage flashing through her mind. "What about everybody else you're attracted to? What if that gets to be too much to resist?"
He shook his head. "Isn't everybody attracted to other people besides the one they're married to? But isn't that the point of being married? To not act on that attraction?" He grimaced, and she could almost see the name Henry behind his eyes. "Well, for us common folk, anyway."
"Is that what we have? A marriage?"
"Don't we? I admit, it took over a year to consummate it, but..." All the humor dropped from his eyes, and he added with frank simplicity, "I love you, Hannah."
She was breathless. She hadn't ever expected to hear him say that. "I love you, too," she whispered, unable to speak any louder.
"Then come here," he repeated, his voice husky again. Snaking a hand behind her neck, he pulled her back down, where no words were needed.
^..^
Five months of their agreed trial six had passed. Hannah figured out early on the best way to fill in the now-existing gaps of John's excellent education – excellent for the sixteenth century, that is – had been to get him his own laptop, teach him how to use it, and then enroll him in an informal online GED prep course. He took to it gleefully, his lively intelligence both absorbing the knowledge contained in the various subjects and quickly going far afield on the internet, searching out supplemental information whenever and wherever his fancy took him. His online education was augmented every weekend with trips to museums, libraries, and concerts of all types. (He'd discovered a surprising affinity for jazz, although classic rock and current pop were OK, too – once he got used to the sheer volume level.)
Came the Friday she returned from work to find him in his usual location at the kitchen table, but leaning back in his chair, gazing thoughtfully out the window. She smooched him hello, then settled into the chair opposite, noticing as she did a map displayed on his laptop. "Have you decided on the weekend's adventure?" she asked with a wide grin.
"Mm-hmm. We're going to need to borrow your friend's car again."
"Why? Where are we going?"
He studied her for a moment, seriously. "Mauvais Loup."
She was startled. "I thought it was in ruins." That discovery had been the result of one of their first joint internet explorations, after which his desire to see what had become of his old estate had evaporated.
John nodded, then abruptly changed the subject, leaning forward to take her hand in his. "Hannah," he began earnestly, "I'm well aware that you've been supporting both of us financially. I haven't been doing my part, and it isn't fair to you. Though at this point there doesn't seem to be much I could do – other than wait tables," he added with a grimace. They'd both agreed that this wasn't a good career choice for him. "But I've come up with an idea, that will change that situation, and let me contribute in some way." He nodded towards his laptop. "I've been searching everywhere, all over the internet, for the past few days. And as far as I can determine, nobody has ever found... " A sly grin slowly crossed his face as he paused, drawing it out. "... my uncle's treasure."
Hannah gaped and spluttered. "Treasure? You mean... treasure treasure? Like gold?"
He nodded again. "Gold, silver... and even more importantly – and what I've been mostly searching for, and why I'm certain it's never been found – a particular cache of documents from the Wars of the Roses, before I was born. They could be worth a fortune to historical societies or a university, just by themselves."
"But could we claim it, legally?"
"Mauvais Loup is now on public land. I looked that up, too. Treasure found on public land is – ah – 'finders keepers'." His voice made amused air quotes around the modern phrase.
"But the place is in ruins!"
Ever the dramatic, he again drew it out just long enough, as he tapped a button on the laptop to change the window, then turned it towards her. "But the chapel isn't." The photograph now splashed across the screen showed that the tiny stone church where they'd buried the baby, ancient now and covered in moss and vines, still stood. John waited till her wide eyes came back to his. "It's buried under the floor, behind the altar."
^..^
Early next morning, she borrowed the car and they loaded it up with a picnic, then stopped at a home store for a pick and a shovel. The drive out to the old estate, while infinitely shorter than by horse-drawn carriage, and passing by jarringly modern sights, was still full of memory for both of them.
John grinned when he caught sight of the time jumper on her wrist. "Why are you bringing that?" It was the first time she'd taken it out of the dresser since their return.
She shrugged, touching it briefly like a talisman before returning her hand to the steering wheel. "Just in case we need to go searching back in history for the treasure," she replied. Truthfully, she'd put it on purely on a wild impulse, because it simply felt right.
He watched her profile for a moment, a smile teasing the corners of his mouth, and she wondered if he somehow sniffed the truth. But then he just shook his head, and returned to watching the countryside flow by.
The overgrown, tumbled ruins of the house were tucked into a large public "wilderness area", encompassing all of the old estate and more, hundreds of acres of wild green nature outside the city, crisscrossed by horse and hiking trails. The tiny car park nearest the ruins was empty, and no one was in sight. Hannah and John stood for a time silently gazing at the scattered, low piles of brick and stone, all that remained of their stately former home, then turned wordlessly towards the woods.
Those woods had overgrown the margin long ago; the chapel was now deep inside the gloom. A faint footpath led past the old oaks and elms, circled the chapel, and then meandered through the scattered remaining gravestones before wandering off to meet the main hiking trail.
John dropped the tools softly on the ground near the door and turned aside, heading unerringly to the spot etched deeply into both their hearts. The wording on the tiny stone had long been eroded away, but they knew its shape. He stared down at it for a long, long moment of stillness. Then, without looking up at her beside him, he asked, his voice low and hesitant. "Hannah… Tell me the truth. Which baby is buried here?"
Her breath caught. That had been the one part of her story that she'd never been able to confess to him, stopping at the now-known virtues of her breast milk, instead. When she was finally able to speak, her voice came out in a hoarse whisper.
"Catherine's."
He nodded, as if he'd expected it after all.
"I didn't... I didn't plan it, John. God knows, I never wanted that to happen. And I certainly didn't cause it to happen. He – the Prince – just... died, without any warning at all, lying beside me on the bed after I'd nursed him, just minutes before they left for London. I was feeding little Johnny. I just... switched their clothes. I wasn't even thinking. I just did it automatically." The words which, once started, had tumbled out over themselves came to an abrupt halt, and she bit her lip, waiting for his judgment.
Which was a long time coming. John lifted his head, studying the sunbeams slanting down through the green. "Well," he finally said, his voice straining faintly to be matter-of-fact, the essence of letting things go, "he wasn't really mine, anyway – not by blood. He was Henry's. And he sat on the throne, didn't he?"
"Yes." Hannah was still whispering, not trusting her voice. "Henry the Ninth." She'd checked on the internet their second day back, while John was sleeping, staring with a wistful, tearful smile at the familiar brown eyes – her eyes – smiling at the viewer from the official portrait of that next king.
"Do you think Henry knew?" he wondered. "Or Catherine?"
She took a deep breath, staring out over the grave, back into memory, at the scene etched there of the two monarchs sitting on their makeshift thrones at their joint "trial", Henry's hand clutching his wife's arm tightly, preventing her from saying a word. "Yes. I think they both knew."
"So that's what it was all about, after all? The baby?"
Hannah thought a moment, then shrugged. "I think it was about getting rid of two people who had become... inconvenient." Her voice trailed off into silence again. Beside her, John slowly nodded agreement, then himself took a deep, deep, cleansing breath, again letting the past go.
But that past was five hundred years ago, and they were both here and now, with each other. Hannah bit her lip, then bit the bullet. "John?" she quavered. Her voice stopped abruptly, then she made herself go on, asking the most important question of her life. "Can you forgive me?"
He turned at last to stare at her, his expression at first unreadable. Then, finally, a smiling wonder spread across his handsome face. "Forgive you? Madame..." Grinning widely, he threw his arms out to the side, encompassing all. "I'm here, alive, and free – thanks to you – and with an incredible, fantastic, shining future... with the woman I love." His shook his head, his expression unutterably kind and joyful. "There's nothing to forgive."
Her heart singing, she turned and went into his arms, and they folded around her, and at last she knew peace.
^..^
Finally, they turned back towards the old chapel and scooped up the tools. The wooden door had long ago rotted away; they gingerly stepped across the threshold into the mossy shadows and made their way up towards the altar.
"I wonder if the ghosts are still here?" Hannah said suddenly, stopping in the middle of the floor, as his old tales of hauntings flooded back into memory.
John chuckled, halting beside her. "According to the internet, they're still seen occasionally. Maybe they've been guarding the treasure for us." His voice turned mock-solemn, and he intoned towards the altar where the phantoms had always been reportedly sighted, "I am John Wolfram, the last Viscount Pendleton, known to you of old, and I have come to retrieve my rightful property. Will you let us pass, o Spirits of the Chapel Green?"
They listened hard, their hearts pounding, but no reply was heard – unless the wind in the trees outside was the answer. Glancing at each other at the same moment, they burst into slightly hysterical giggles at their foolish whimsey, then proceeded around the ancient carved stone altar.
John handed her the pick, and bent with the shovel to scrape away the inches of dirt and moss that had accumulated on the floor, searching for the edges of the stone he knew wasn't mortared in place. The treasure, he'd told her, was in a wooden box in the hole beneath it.
Suddenly Hannah jumped. "Ouch!" The time jumper had sent a piercing electric shock through her skin! She flipped up the leather cover and peered at it. It seemed to have turned on of its own accord, a dim light skittering across the display. The tiny screen was clouded over as if fogged. She used her forefinger to try to wipe it off – jumping a little as another tiny electric shock sparked between device and finger, like static electricity.
And then, without warning, a brilliant, unearthly white light hit her face.