Read Online Knight of Pleasure by Margaret Mallory - Free Book Online

would never stoop to being one of his many women. Someone he forgot as soon as he dressed and left the room.
    Never. Never. Never.
    Carleton attempted to engage her in conversation, but she ignored him. Idle chatter was well beyond her now.
    They were passing the Exchequer, nearly to the keep. Escape was within her reach.
    “Good morning, Robert,” Carleton called out beside her.
    She turned to see Robert bounding down the steps. Damnation! Robert’s eyebrow went up a bare fraction as he looked from her
     to Carleton and back again. It took an act of will not to check her clothes again for bits of dirt and straw.
    “I was just coming for you, Isobel,” he said. “The king wishes you to serve attendance upon him.”
    The king? Although she saw King Henry every day in the hall, she’d yet to have a private audience with him.
    “When shall I come?”
Please, please, not today.
    “He awaits you now.”
    “Now?” This time, she did look down at herself. Her cloak was clean, but God knew what her gown looked like underneath.
    “You haven’t time to change,” Robert said, interrupting her harried thoughts, “and you look lovely as you are.”
    She colored, almost certain Robert guessed the cause of her dishevelment. Yet his eyes showed nothing but kind concern as
     he reached up and gave her headdress a firm tug to the left.
    “There, now you are perfect.”
    Robert, of course, was as practiced as Carleton at helping a lady with her headdress.
    “I very much enjoyed our walk,” Carleton said and turned so Robert would not see his wink. “I look forward to the next time.”
    If Robert were not there, she would have kicked him.
    “The king wishes to see you alone,” Robert said.
    “Alone? But I thought you would—”
    “Believe me, this will be no more difficult than your meeting with Bishop Beaufort.” Robert took her arm and turned her toward
     the steps. “You do know Beaufort was his tutor?”
    No comfort there! She wanted to protest, but she could hardly tell Robert she was not yet recovered from an early-morning
     fit of madness.
    “Best not keep the king waiting,” Robert said, his hand at her back.
    Above her, a guard held the door open. She took a deep breath and went up the steps to face the lion. Before going through
     the door, she glanced back just as Carleton turned to leave. She gaped in astonishment as Robert grabbed Carleton’s arm and
     spun him back around. With no trace of his usual bonhomie, Robert poked a finger into Carleton’s chest.
    “Lady Hume?”
    She dragged her gaze from the scene below and nodded to the guard. God help her, but she hoped Stephen Carleton was a good
     liar. Very likely, he was exceptional.
    She had no time to dwell on it. After passing through a second set of doors, she was in the hall where King Henry held court
     in Normandy. A man in a simple brown cloak stood looking out one of the tall windows that faced the Old Palace. A monk?
    She expected to find the hall full of people, with the king on the dais, dressed in his bright gold, red, and blue tunic emblazoned
     with row upon row of lions and fleurs-de-lis. She glanced up and down the enormous room. Not a soul was here, save for her
     and this monk.
    Her breath caught. This was no monk, but the king himself.
    Her hands shook as she sank into her curtsy. Only thirty years old, and he was legend. At thirteen he led men into battle.
     At sixteen he commanded entire armies. After being crowned at twenty-six, he unified the nobles and brought an end to the
     years of chaos and rebellion.
    He created a common link among the classes by making English the language of his court in England. For the first time since
     before the Conqueror, royal edicts were in the language of the common people.
    All of England lauded Henry for his skill at governing and admired him for his piety. But what they loved him for were his
     victories. He was their young warrior king. England was strong again and ready to face her