In Honor Bound by DeAnna Julie Dodson Read Free Book Online Page A

believe her, Father," Philip said glowering, then he knit his brow, remembering her grief. "She put the child in the shroud herself and wept as she told me of it. Why should she lie?"
    His father looked more past him than at him. "Was it a boy?"
    Philip nodded.
    "A boy," Robert repeated almost inaudibly.
    "Speak to the princess, Your Majesty, before passing judgment," Dunois suggested. "It may be that this girl my lord spoke to was mistaken."
    "Very true," Robert said, recovering himself. "I will speak to her. This thing will be sounded to the very bottom and we shall have justice."
    ***
    At dawn, the king went to Margaret's bedside, ready to answer with a vengeance the murder of his dead son's child. He almost wavered at the sight of her before him, her eyes sunken and ringed with black, her thin lips colorless and chapped. It was difficult for him to discern the much-toasted beauty in the haggard woman who had to be supported even to sit up.
    "Madame, there have been grievous wrongs laid to your charge."
    "Wrongs, my lord?" Weary puzzlement was on her face and she leaned more heavily upon her ladies. "In what have I offended Your Majesty?"
    "Come, come, lady. Taking the innocent life of a babe unborn is offense enough, but to kill the next king of Lynaleigh, my Richard's only child–"
    Margaret seemed to wilt at the harsh words and her tears flowed freely. "Kill? My lord, you cannot think I purposed to lose my child. It is too cruel to say so to me now."
    "I was told you had engineered the babe's death. Is it not so?"
    "Who could so abuse Your Majesty and me to make you believe such a lie? I have just lost my lord and husband. Could you truly believe that I would kill all that was left of him, my only consolation in his death? The child was mine as well as his, made from my flesh, nurtured with my blood. What could make me destroy it?" The tears welled up again. "Yet it may be that I am to blame. I did so grieve for Richard that it may be I caused the child to be born too soon."
    "Let us speak plain, lady, for I am not so easily trifled with as I have been. I know there was no great love between you and my son, unless it was love for the throne he would have had."
    "Perhaps that is so," she said, growing suddenly cool, "but if my love was all for the throne, why would I destroy my only link to it, the child that had next claim? Put my motives at their basest and you will see I had every reason to safeguard the child. What gain has its loss brought me?"
    "None," he said finally, and she lay back against her pillows.
    "I am tired, my lord."
    His face was still stern, but there was resignation in it now. "You must forgive me, lady. It was sorrow and not reason that spoke in me before."
    He left her to her women and returned wearily to his chamber, grateful for the cup of wine Dunois brought him.
    "How do we punish ill-fortune for her crimes?"
    He did not expect an answer, but the chamberlain came closer.
    "When ill-fortune effects her own designs, we can do nothing, but when she sets them to another's doing, then it is in our power to punish."
    Robert shook his head. "There was no murder here, the child simply miscarried. This Fletcher woman was merely mistaken, hysterical with the suddenness of it all."
    "Or had a greater purpose in making such an accusation."
    "How do you mean?"
    "Suppose it was Katherine Fletcher who gave her the potion that killed that child, not Merryn as my lord Philip was told."
    "But what cause could she have for it?"
    There was a knowing significance in Dunois' glance. "There is many an ambitious woman will use any means to gain power."
    "But what could she hope to gain by this?"
    Dunois hesitated for a moment.
    "I know, my liege, she has been Lord Philip's mistress some time now. The child's death makes him your heir."
    "Then you accuse Philip–"
    "Of nothing, Majesty, except of perhaps being deceived. He is smitten with the wench and will not even spare a glance to any of the others. She has