“Tell me everything,” Branford said through clenched teeth.
Nelle’s gaze flashed from the charred corpse on the field back to Branford.
“Will you burn me, too?”
“I have not yet decided,” Branford said with a sneer. “It depends on what you reveal.”
I reached out and placed my hand against his arm, but he shook me away.
“Tell me everything. Now.”
Nelle sobbed and placed her hands over her face.
“It was Kimberly’s idea!” she moaned between sobs. “Kimberly and Whitney planned it all!”
“Planned what?” Branford yelled. He took a step toward her and kicked her with his boot as she tried to protect herself with her arms. “Tell me!”
Through her sobs, Nelle told us how she and Kimberly went to Hadebrand after their exile. There they spoke with Princess Whitney and a young man who apparently wished to win her favor—Sir Leland. He had a young cousin who knew the ways of witches.
“She knew,” Nelle whispered. “Kimberly knew what happened to your mother. She thought if the same thing was happening to another, you would be more likely take pity on her and accept her into the castle.”
“Janet…allowed those men…?” I couldn’t fathom such a thing.
“She did,” Nelle said. “They knew how you cared for others around you and hoped you would try to help her and ask Branford to help her as well. You believed her story and fell right into their plan.”
“Sir Leland planned to set it up as a wager between you with his slave as your prize. He never intended to win. That is why he opted for your second horse when you first refused to wager your stallion. Once you had won, his cousin-slave was yours and would be allowed into Silverhelm. She was to begin making the tea immediately to prevent your heirs.”
“Why would she do this?” I whispered.
“Sir Leland was to be placed as the head of Silverhelm’s army once Whitney was on the throne. Janet was promised Sterling Castle for her part in it all.”
Branford looked to Sir Rylan for a moment, then back at Nelle.
“You knew of this all these months,” Branford said. His voice was cold, and when I looked at his eyes, they were equally frigid.
Sir Rylan tilted his head to the side as Lady Suzette emerged from the castle walls, carrying something in her hands. She approached us slowly as Nelle continued to speak.
“Kimberly said once Princess Whitney was on the throne with you, we would be brought back into Silverhelm as nobles again. But I heard Princess Whitney telling Prince Gage that there would be no reason to keep us around after she was wed to Branford—that we would be a liability. Kimberly did not believe me, so I ran. I knew I could not come back here. You said you would have us killed if we returned to Silverhelm. I did not know what else to do! I had just enough to pay my passage to Seacrest.”
“Is that all?” Branford asked. “It never occurred to you to send me a message?”
“I…I did not know what I should do!” Nelle cried as she threw herself at Branford’s feet.
“You had many options,” Branford said. He stared down at her for a moment. “Get up.”
Nelle slowly brought herself back onto her feet.
“Will you burn me?” Nelle whispered softly. Her eyes dared glance up at Branford for only a moment before she looked back down to the ground.
“No,” Branford said quickly.
Before Nelle could utter a sigh of relief, the sound of a sword leaving its sheath rang out across the field, and Branford took a single step forward. He grabbed Nelle by her long tresses, pulled her head backwards, and slid the sharp blade across her throat, opening her vessels and spilling her blood over her chest and down to the dirt.
“But you will still die for it,” Branford said softly as the light dimmed from Nelle’s eyes, and he released her hair, allowing her lifeless body to fall sideways to the ground.
“I want Lady Kimberly and Sir Leland,” Branford said to Rylan as he wiped the edge of his blade across the thigh of his trousers. “I’m willing to offer a bounty to any mercenary who can bring them to me, preferably alive, so I may kill them myself.”
“I will put out the word.”
Branford placed his hand on Rylan’s shoulder for a moment and looked into his eyes.
“Where do we stand now?”
“Where we always should have been,” Sir Rylan said with a nod. “Allies.”
They clasped forearms.
“Forgive me for ever doubting you,” Rylan said.
“There is nothing to forgive,” Branford replied. “You see the light now—that is all that is important. Edgar has shown his true colors. He will lose followers who had always supported him before. To interfere with a royal bloodline…”
Branford glanced at me and then at Lady Suzette.
“Did you find it?” he asked. Lady Suzette nodded. “What was in it?”
Lady Suzette held a small pouch in her hands, and I recognized it as the herb bag Janet used when making tea for me.
“There is willow bark and ginger,” Suzette said, “which would likely not cause any issue by themselves and would help with any pain Queen Alexandra might have felt in the Women’s Room. But this”—she held up a small, feathery, dried set of leaves—“this is hemlock and quite deadly in large amounts. In smaller doses, it will kill a child before it can begin to grow inside of its mother.”
Branford stepped out behind me as I felt myself begin to swoon. His arms pulled me against his chest.
“She was killing our…our children?” I whispered.
“Yes,” Branford replied.
“She knew she was doing this?”
“Yes,” he said again.
My stomach churned again as I tried to understand what had happened during this day. At first, I had thought my worst fear was going to come to pass—that Branford would renounce me to take Whitney’s hand. Now I had discovered my own handmaid had been part of the plot to make it happen. I could not focus enough on the thoughts inside my head to know what to make of them.
“I will never allow anything like this to happen again,” Branford said softly. He turned my face toward him and crouched down to be eye level with me. “Never again. I am truly sorry you saw any of this.”
Branford stood tall as he spoke to Sir Rylan with words that I did not hear. I could only nod, my mind still trying to understand what was happening around me. One of my only friends had betrayed me—willingly and knowingly—for years. I had been letting her destroy Branford’s children with every cup from her hand I drank.
I felt quite sick.
“Come, my queen,” I heard Branford say softly against my cheek. “Let us retire to our rooms. You need your rest.”
“She was…she was my friend…”
Branford wrapped his arms around my waist as he pulled me backwards against him.
“She lied to you,” he replied.
I looked into his eyes, and they were still solid green gems.
“I believed her.”
“I know.” He touched the edge of my jaw. “I did not see her for what she was either. She slipped past my senses and got close to you.”
Branford turned me toward him, and he cupped my face.
“That will not happen again,” he said.
The words were not unfamiliar. How many times had Branford made a similar promise? Though I knew he endeavored to keep such oaths, there were possibilities that were simply too far beyond his control, and his own desires could not keep up with the world around him or his duty to his kingdom. However familiar the words, his look and tone were completely different than they had been before. Gone was the desperation I had often seen in his eyes, and gone was the sense of urgency in his voice. His eyes were calm and intense and his voice laced with collected determination.
One of his hands went to the back of my head, and he leaned closer to put his forehead against mine.
“Never again,” he said.
We returned to our rooms, leaving the guard to spread the word about Hadebrand’s deception and the bounty on the heads of those involved. Sir Rylan was to ride back toward Seacrest and return with the soldiers we would need to protect Silverhelm from Edgar’s army. The betrayal of Nelle and Janet was enough to convince him that Silverhelm deserved protection from an unscrupulous neighbor.
With few words spoken between us, Branford called for our supper, and we ate in our rooms. Afterwards, I offered to make Branford his tea, but he refused it with a raised eyebrow and pulled me close to him instead.
“I may ban tea from the kingdom,” he said, and I wasn’t sure if he meant it in jest or not. He collected me into his lap sideways, with my legs across the arm of the chair and my head against his shoulder. “When I think that she could have used more of that…that plant…enough to harm you…Alexandra, it makes me want to find every person she ever touched—relative, ally, friend, or enemy—and destroy them. I want to remove all evidence that she ever existed.”
“She is gone now,” I said though my words brought me no comfort. They did nothing to soothe Branford, either.
“And you,” he said suddenly as he pointed his finger at my face, “you drank something she made for you every day and never told me of it?”
I tucked my head into the crook of his neck, but he would not allow me to hide my face.
“I did not think it important,” I finally whispered as I felt a hot tear escape from my eye. Branford wiped it away with this thumb. “It was…only tea.”
“Only tea,” he repeated and then looked up toward the heavens with a sigh. “Only tea, indeed.”
“I am sorry, my king,” I said softly.
“Do not apologize, Alexandra,” he said. “It was not of your own doing, and I find no fault with you. I just wish…wish I had realized…been more observant…”
He stopped and took my chin with his thumb and forefinger.
“Never again,” he said, and his eyes and tone matched how he had spoken on the practice field. “I will not miss anything again. I will always be at your side, and I will know exactly who is near you, what is said to you, and what is given to you. I will not be so careless again. You belong with me and I with you.”
“You have always cared for me,” I said, reminding him.
“It has not been enough.”
“You cannot always be near me.”
“Really?” he responded with a raised eyebrow. “Watch me.”
“What if I am in the Women’s Room?”
“Then my mother will be in there with you,” Branford said, “and I will be standing outside the door until you emerge again.”
“You cannot watch me always.” I scoffed.
“I most certainly can,” Branford said, his words insistent. “I will not leave your presence. If there is distance between us, I will always keep my eye on you to make sure you are safe.”
“You do not have to do that, Branford.”
“But I do,” he responded softly. He stood slowly with me still wrapped up in his strong arms. “Everything I have done has been inadequate. All I ever wanted was to keep you safe from harm. I told you to trust no one but did not abide by my own words. I allowed vulnerabilities and left wide-open gaps within my defenses. Part of that was allowing others to be responsible for your safety. I will not allow that again.”
He dropped me to my feet near the changing area and helped me into a nightdress.
“Nelle was right; I did think of my mother when you found Janet,” Branford admitted. “I had told Kimberly many years ago what had happened to her. It never occurred to me she would use it against me. Again, I trusted too much.”
“There are some you trust,” I said quietly. “Parnell and Ida.”
“Yes, some,” Branford said. He changed into the soft linen sleep pants he wore and then took my hand to lead me to our bed. “I trust you, my immediate family, Dunstan, and I may build some trust with Sir Rylan—it remains to be seen.”
“He seems genuine,” I said.
“Does he?” Branford looked over to me. “Did Janet?”
I looked down at my hands as I sat on the edge of the bed. I felt Branford’s lips touch the top of my head.
“I do love you,” he whispered against my hair. “I do not know if you still believe it or not, but I do love you. I’ve never been the trusting or the loving sort, but with you I can be someone else—someone worthy of you—if only I would stop making such grave mistakes.”
“You could not have known,” I told him. “None of us could have guessed at their plan. I still do not understand how they could have arranged it all—how they could have known we would bring Janet back with us.”
“They took a calculated risk,” Branford said. “If we had not brought her back with us at that time, she would have found another way, no doubt. We just made it easier for her to infiltrate our home. She was quite believable, I must say.”
He growled out the last words.
“I do not think anyone could have seen through her ruse.”
“I should have anyway,” Branford said. “I will not let such a thing happen again.”
I pushed myself up against the pillows of our bed, and Branford crawled after me. He did not lie beside me but hovered over my body, using one of his arms for support while the other traced my exposed skin with light fingertips.
He leaned down to kiss me softly, his warm mouth molding against mine as his tongue moistened my lips. I opened to him, taking in the taste of him as he wrapped his hands around my body and pulled me up against him. I felt his heart pounding in his chest as he broke away from me, his eyes wild and urgent.
“I want you now.”
“Yes,” I responded, and he pulled me tighter against his chest.
He pushed my nightdress up and slid his fingers slowly up my legs. He gripped my hips once, holding me against his hardness for a moment before he yanked at the dress and removed it from me. His sleep trousers followed my dress to the floor, and he was atop me, his hands in my hair and the heat from his excitement pushing against my stomach.
“You are beyond beautiful,” he said as his hand stroked from my hair, down my arms, and then back up to cup my breasts. He kissed the tips of each as my hands explored his back and the muscles of his arms and shoulders. I reached down to his hip, then skimmed around front until I could grip him with my fingers.
I let my fingers trail up the length of him until I reached the tip, then ran my fingers around and back down again as Branford’s breaths left wet, warm spots on my skin.
“That feels so good,” he told me as his hand covered mine. He led me in my touches for a moment only. “But I need more. I need to be inside of you.”
He shifted himself lower and groaned loudly as he pushed himself inside of me, burying his length completely within my body with a single stroke that left me crying out his name.
“Every time I am inside of you,” he whispered, “it feels like I am exactly where I am supposed to be. It is like no one else exists except us when I am here. I belong here.”
For a long moment, he held himself tight against me and did not move. He slipped his hand down my back, resting his fingers just above my backside as his mouth began tasting my neck and jaw. I stroked the curve at the base of his back, down the top of his thigh and back again. I tilted my head to capture his mouth with mine, leading the kiss to deepen it as I wrapped my legs around his waist. I felt his hand sneak between our bodies and gasped when his fingers found their goal.
“Please…please…” I heard myself begging as Branford rocked slowly against me, allowing the tension to build up gradually and maddeningly.
“You feel so glorious,” he whispered into my ear. “I love feeling you come apart around me. Do my fingers please you, my wife?”
The tip of his finger circled that sensitive area right above where we connected. Branford’s hips bucked slowly against me as his finger probed and touched. His lips went back to my jaw, then captured m
y cries as I tilted my hips against his and felt my body shudder around him. I gripped his shoulders and pulled him to me as his movements hastened. He reached down and slipped one arm under my leg, holding it high against his shoulder as he moaned with each thrust into me. His pace quickened, and his hips met mine in quick, forceful strokes. Only a moment later, he was crying out for me as I felt his release deep inside my body.
He kissed me again.
“I love you,” he murmured against my lips, “so much…my wife…”
“My husband,” I whispered back. “My king…my Branford…I love you…”
He rolled to his side and brought me with him. With our arms wrapped around each other, I watched Branford’s face as his breathing slowed and his heart began to beat a more regular rhythm. I traced over his jaw with my fingertips, feeling the rough stubble that had grown there since morning.
With a long, deep sigh, Branford closed his eyes and pulled my head to his chest.
“I love you, Alexandra,” he said quietly. “I have failed you regardless but no more. I will be at your side, making sure you do not come to harm. I will not entrust my most prized possession to anyone else to guard. Never again.”
His arms tightened around my shoulders for a moment.
“There are times and places where I am not welcome,” I reminded him. “There are traditions…”
“To hell with those traditions,” Branford said simply. “I will not be parted from you.”
I thought about this for a minute.
“What if I go to the chapel to speak with Father Tucker?”
Branford cupped my cheeks and tilted my face to his.
“You have something you must confess?” he asked. I could see the wry humor in his eyes.
“Perhaps,” I said, and I smiled through my blush. “I do sometimes have…lustful thoughts.”
“Do you now?”
I nodded.
“Who is in your lustful thoughts?” Branford’s hot breath danced around my ear. “For if it is anyone other than me, I will have him drawn and quartered immediately.”
“Branford!” I cried out. “What a horrible thing to say!”