Tarnish by Katherine Longshore Read Free Book Online Page B

and lack of courtly protocol. The Boleyns are like that. It remains to be seen if we are forgiven for it. Norris tips a bow to me and stalks out.
    “Jesus, George,” I hiss, “what do you think you’re doing?”
    “I just thought you should know that Father’s going to be recalled. He’s coming back.” George heaves himself up from the doorframe as if his melancholy has weighted him down.
    I feel as if the earth has shifted beneath my feet. We eye each other warily, the rustle of wings around us. Fortune flaps awkwardly on her post. Tethered to it.
    Then George turns and walks stiffly through the door and into the wide, open courtyard beyond. I follow, leaving Fortune behind.
    “When?” I call, trying to catch up to him, stumbling over the cobblestones.
    “Soon. Summer.” George waves a hand bleakly, as if trying to brush me away.
    “He’s coming here?”
    George spins. “Of course he’s coming here. Or Windsor. Or wherever the court happens to be located. To wherever he can keep me under his eye. And his thumb.”
    His r ’s and s ’s are overlong. His articulation is blurry, the music of his voice down tempo.
    “Not just you.” I offer an ironic smile that feels more like a grimace. “There’s room beneath that thumb for both of us. Because we stick together, George, remember?”
    My voice is from my childhood. The one where silence reigned at the dinner table, Father’s palpable disappointment an unwanted guest. A childhood where George could creep into my room at night and I would pretend not to notice when the pillow was wet in the morning. A childhood where we could escape to the orchards and climb the trees and make a pact: that we would always stick together. We would always be friends.
    A pact Father broke by sending me to the Low Countries and then to France. By turning George into a stranger.
    “Do we, Anne?” George looks at me, his eyes dark with agony or anger—I can’t tell behind the red-rimmed haze of the wine.
    “We’re Boleyns. Boleyns always stick together.” I reach for him, but he twists away from me.
    “We just present a united front. Unless it suits us otherwise.”
    “No, George,” I tell him, wanting desperately to believe it myself.
    “You are set to steal my inheritance from under my nose. Wolsey and our Howard uncle are pushing for a resolution of the Ormond inheritance. Their problems will be solved, and Father can’t complain if Boleyn blood inherits the earldom eventually. So they want to give it to Butler—to you.” He spits. “And you flaunt your unworthiness by throwing yourself at every married man at court.” He flings his arm in the direction Norris traveled.
    “I don’t want your inheritance, George! I want nothing to do with James Butler or the earldom of Ormond.”
    “Well, Father will make sure you have it,” George snarls. “To keep it in the family one way or another. Whether or not he finds you in Henry Norris’s bed.”
    I bristle. “I’m not—”
    “Or Thomas Wyatt’s.” George actually leers at me. “So I suppose you had better enjoy him while you can. I hear his tastes run a little . . . wild.”
    “I don’t think I know you anymore, George Boleyn.” I struggle to keep my voice from shaking. Rage and humiliation burn in my throat.
    George sags and lifts the empty goblet—turning it entirely upside down—and peers into the void, trying to catch a drop. Then he levels his gaze at me, unswaying, and when he speaks, his words are unslurred.
    “When Father returns, Anne, you will be the one who disappoints him. You will be the one who suffers his displeasure. Not me, this time.” His face twists into a horrific smile that doesn’t meet his eyes. “Not me. You’re the one with the court chasing your tail. You’re the one everyone’s talking about. You’re the one who called Mary a whore, Anne. To her face.”
    I step back—slapped by my own words.
    “One day”—George pursues me and whispers closely, his breath