Gilt by Katherine Longshore Read Free Book Online Page A

of the chest. “I just want to
be
somebody.”
    “You will be.”
    “I don’t want to marry some lame old fat man and die in secluded anonymity in the country. I’ve lived in the shadow of the Duke of Norfolk my entire life, just as my father did. Father was a nobody, and so am I, but when I go to court I could become a countess or at least a lady. Not plain Catherine Howard.”
    “You’d never be plain.”
    “Oh, Kitty, they shan’t know what hit them. I will dance more than anyone and laugh more than anyone and eat the best foods and drink the best wines and make everyone laugh and love me. I will exhaust them.”
    “You certainly will,” I said with a grin. I could picture it.
    “I will be queen!” she cried.
    My shock stifled any reply.
    “Oh, Kitty,” she said, whisking at me with her hand, “I mean the Queen of Misrule. I wouldn’t
poison
her for pity’s sake.”
    I looked over my shoulder to see if anyone was listening, but the maidens’ chamber was empty. Everyone else was off performing the duchess’s daily tasks—simpering, sewing, tending to imaginary aches and misgivings. Even speaking of poisoning royalty could lose Cat her head. And me mine, for hearing it. Keeping treason secret is treason itself.
    “Cat,” I warned. “You can’t say things like that. Especially not at court.”
    “Then I shall have to come over every day and tell them to you. I shall have to tell you all about the horrible old lecherous men and the wonderful
young
lecherous men, and the bitchy girls who hate me because all the men lust after me.”
    I laughed. But her humor didn’t dispel the creeping disquiet her other words had instilled in me.
    “But Kitty,” she said, her eyes widening with a sudden anxiety. “What will I do when we are at Hampton Court? Or Windsor? And too far away? Oh, Kitty, whom will I talk to then?”
    Her eyes brimmed, and I wondered for a flash if the tears were real or conjured for my benefit. But I quelled the thought.
    “You will just have to send me a letter.”
    Cat made a face and sat on the chest, arms crossed and pouting.
    “Ugh,” she said. “Writing is so tedious. Besides, if there’s one thing I do know about court gossip, it’s that you never, ever put anything on paper. At least nothing you don’t want everyone else to know.”
    “You’ll just have to save it all up, then.” I sat beside her. “And tell me everything when you come back to visit.” I reached out to stroke her hair. I knew she wouldn’t come back. She knew I knew.
    “Oh, Kitty,” she cried. “Who will brush my hair?”
    And in that sentence, she summed it all up. It’s not everyone you let touch your hair. You can’t trust just anyone to make you look your best when you have no mirror.
    “You’ll just have to wear a gable hood.”
    Cat mumbled a laugh and leaned into me. Just for a moment. Then she stood and walked quickly to the door.
    “Come, Kitty,” she said. “You must help me. Before anything else I have to do this one thing.”
    I followed her down the stairs, but paused before leaving the house. At sunset, the topiary animals cast leering shadows across the paths and the knot garden appeared to harbor wraiths and specters. Cat grabbed my hand and pulled me forward, marching like a nurse with a recalcitrant child.
    A dark shape twisted from behind a tree. It moved swiftly, silently, and before I could scream, it reached for Cat. Wicked panic slashed through me, visions converging of men in black. I wrenched my hand from Cat’s grip and she let out a little shriek. Then she scowled and twitched her shoulder from the grasp of Francis Dereham. I pressed my lower lip against my teeth with my knuckles, the pain sharper than the fear that burned my throat.
    “Why didn’t you tell me?” Francis asked, twisting hisempty hands together. I had never seen him so pitiful before. Cat liked her men confident and a little arrogant. Francis normally fit the bill perfectly, from his