Scowling, he released me, but he did not apologize.
“I lost the same friends you did to the French,” I reminded him, remembering that before Lord Edward, there had been Tom Knyvett.
“And yet you do not hesitate to spread your legs for the enemy.”
Fighting the instinct to shrink back and cower, I stood up straighter. “At the king’s command! Since the night of the masque at Havering-atte-Bowe, I have been King Henry’s creature and you, above all men, know it.”
“You have taken pleasure from your duty.”
“Mayhap I consider it my due, as I have had little other recompense!”
But Will Compton was no longer listening. He stood silent for a moment, and then began to laugh. Of a sudden, he picked me up and whirled me around, kissing me soundly on the lips before he set me back on my feet. “Ah, Jane! You are an inspiration.”
“I—I am what?”
Still grinning, he seized me by the shoulders, bringing his face close to mine. His eyes danced with excitement. “Do you not see? By quarreling with you, my anger at the French was diverted into a safer channel. I exploded, but with fireworks instead of cannon fire. That is what the entire court needs—a means to vent their anger and frustration without doing any real harm.”
I thought him mad. “I can scarce pick fights with each and every courtier.”
“But the king, at my prompting, can invite the duc de Longueville and his bastard brother to compete in the May Day tournament.”
With one last kiss, this one a resounding smack in the middle of my forehead, he left to set things in motion.
BY THE DAY of the tournament, I was almost ill with worry. No one would dare harm the duke, but Guy would be fair game. Nervous jitters attacked my belly and I felt an incessant dull pounding at my temples. Both were made worse by the noise and smell of the crowd of spectators.
From the purpose-built, covered grandstand that was the royal gallery, I had a clear view of the double tier of bare wooden benches, solidly but plainly constructed, that occupied the far side of the field. They could be had, for a price, by anyone who wished to attend the tournament. They were full to bursting with spectators gaping and pointing at the splendors of the king’s new tiltyard.
Even in my troubled state, I could understand why they so admired the construction, which had been completed only a few days earlier. Inside the high wall that enclosed the whole were not only the lists with their wooden barriers and the tents of the competitors, but the gallery itself. At each end was a high octagonal tower—an octagonal stair turret, in truth—surmounted by pointed pinnacles of fanciful design. At their center the queen sat under her canopy of estate and in front of rich blue hangings embellished with gold designs. Cushions of cloth-of-gold padded even the lesser seats in her vicinity.
“Is it not splendid?” Bessie Blount whispered as the grand procession began. She’d chosen to sit beside me when others shunned my company. In spite of my jangled nerves, I could not help but smile at her simple delight in the spectacle.
“This is but a poor echo of the pageantry in old King Henry’s time,” I told her. “In those days, all the participants entered in fancy costumes and riding in pageant cars. They placed their names on a ‘tree of chivalry’ located near the head of the tilt. The tree was painted with leaves, flowers, and fruit, and beneath it, hung upon rails, were the shields of all the knights.”
Once every jouster had been in costume, acting the role of Amadas or Lancelot or some other knight of olden times. The tournaments had been presented as allegories as elaborate as those in any masque. There was still pomp and ceremony, color and spectacle, but that element was missing. It was considered old-fashioned.
Footmen, drummers, and at least a dozen trumpeters came onto the field, along with forty mounted members of the king’s spears and all the king’s pages. The sun glinted off the gold chains the spears wore and the silver in their horses’ trappings. The jousters, fully armed and with visors down, came next, challengers and answerers, each surrounded by gentlemen on foot who were dressed in satin and velvet. Tawny, scarlet, crimson, even silver and gold blossomed among the greater mass of gray and russet and servants’ blue.
“I cannot tell one knight from the other,” Bessie complained.
The gaily caparisoned mounts lacked heraldic devices, nor were there any to be seen on spear or helmet or breastplate. I could only pick out the duc de Longueville by the fluttering scarf he wore wound around his forearm. It was the one I had given to him as my favor only a few hours earlier. I had given Guy my little dragon pendant. I hoped it would serve as a good luck charm, a protection against injury.
“Mayhap it was deemed safest not to identify each knight,” I murmured. During a mock battle, it would be far too easy to exact private vengeance on an opponent, to maim or even to kill.
“I have never attended a tournament before,” Bessie confided. She’d been bouncing up and down with excitement since the moment she arrived and kept swiveling her head in order to see everything at once. “This is called a tiltyard. Is there an event called the tilt?”
“A tilt is any fight between a pair of competitors using lances.”
I had to raise my voice to be heard above the noise. Interspersed with cheers and shouts were derisive catcalls aimed at the French jousters. Spirited wagering on the outcome of various matches also accounted for a good deal of racket.
“There will be four parts of the tournament,” I continued. “First, opponents fighting on foot at the barriers, using swords across a waist-high wooden fence. Then hand-to-hand combat with a variety of weapons—two-handed swords and pikes and axes. The tourney is next, fought by small teams on horseback, with swords. And finally there is the joust between mounted knights with lances. Each knight will run several courses and dozens of lances will be broken before they are done.” I could only pray no heads would be splintered in the process.
A sudden hush fell as two men dressed as hermits suddenly appeared from the area underneath the grandstand, an area closed in to provide storage for jousting equipment between tournaments. The hermits bowed before the queen and waited for her to acknowledge them.
“Mayhap the fashion in pageantry has not passed away after all,” I murmured, recognizing the king and Charles Brandon.
In truth, everyone knew who they were. And everyone pretended not to know. King Henry wore a white velvet habit with a hat of cloth-of-silver and a long silver beard made of damask. His companion, all in black velvet, sported false hair of similar color and design.
When enough time had passed for the crowd to admire his disguise and speculate about who he might be, the king threw off habit, beard, and hat to reveal shining black armor beneath. He tossed the garments to the queen, who caught them with apparent delight. Brandon did the same, gifting the Lady Mary. Her cheeks pink with pleasure, she accepted the robe and gave him a length of green ribbon. He kissed the bit of fabric and tucked it into the breastplate of the pure white armor revealed when he removed the black habit.
“The king looks very grand,” Bessie whispered, “but does he not risk injury to participate?”
“He does, a lesson he learned early. The Earl of Kent, who was charged with teaching the young prince to joust, broke an arm just demonstrating the sport.” Bessie’s face paled and I hastened to reassure her. “His Grace is very good. He has trained in the lists since he was a boy of sixteen and he excels at breaking lances. There was a time when he would practice every day.”
I had gone to watch him sometimes, with the Lady Mary. When they lacked real opponents, he and those companions his father approved—Harry Guildford, Will Compton, Ned Neville, Charles Brandon, and the rest—had charged at detachable rings set on posts and tilted at the quintain, an effigy on a revolving bar.