At The King's Command

The baying of a dog caused her to open her eyes. One of the windhounds leaped out of the shadows and clamped its jaws around a booted leg. Juliana heard a muffled curse. “Be damned to hell!” As one man fell to the ground, she saw the stark outline of his cheek above a thick beard and felt a stab of awareness, but the feeling quickly dissolved into the eerie horror of blood and flame.

A blade flashed, met the animal’s shoulder. The dog sped yelping into the night.

Through a drumbeat of shock, Juliana heard male voices rolling across the lawn.

“…find the girl?”

“Not yet.”

“Devil take you. Look again. We can’t let a child of Gregor Romanov live.”

“I’m here,” Juliana called to them, but her voice was only a dry whisper. “Yes, I am here. Come for me!”

“Fool!” Laszlo covered her mouth again. “What will it serve to sacrifice yourself to these boyars, as well?”

Like the bitter winter wind, comprehension swept over Juliana. Boyars. Jealous, power-hungry nobles. They had killed her father, her family, her fiancé.

She remembered the whispered arguments between her parents. Over the fearful objections of her mother, Gregor had helped the grand prince draw up a new will on his deathbed, one that slashed the powers of the boyars. Now Juliana understood her mother’s fear. The nobles would murder even women and children to seize control of the realm.

“Search the outbuildings,” one of the soldiers called.

She turned her tortured gaze to Laszlo and whispered, “Help me.”

“We must hurry.” He dragged her from beneath the bush. “Keep low and to the shadows,” he said, taking her by the hand. They skirted the lawn, her neck prickling in anticipation of the sting of a razor-edged blade.

They reached the barn and slipped inside. Moonglow shone through gaps in the wood siding.

Zara, Chavula and the children were gone. Only the faint scent of burnt oil from the lamp lingered.

Yet in the crossties between the stalls stood Gregor’s two swiftest horses, bred for speed and endurance in the vast and distant steppes. The mounts had been saddled, and they stood with heads low, blowing softly into the chill air.

“Quickly, get on,” Laszlo said, cupping his linked hands to receive her booted foot.

A muffled explosion sounded. Juliana looked through the open door to see that part of the palace roof had caved in, shooting a plume of sparks into the night sky. The sudden rush of firelight outlined three figures jogging toward the barn.

“We’ll leave through the grazing pasture,” Laszlo said, shouldering open a door in the rear.

Juliana bent low over the neck of her mount and slapped the reins. Her mind retreated and cringed in agony. The winter darkness swallowed the two riders as they headed toward the river Volkhov. They skirted the earthwork ramparts and walls of the kremlin of Novgorod, its torchlit towers speeding past in a blur of light.

The snow-muffled thunder of hooves startled the sleepy tollman at the wooden Veliky Bridge, but Juliana and Laszlo had stormed across by the time he roused himself to demand payment.

They galloped through the small merchant district of the town. Dogs barked and someone shouted, but the riders paid no heed. Not until the road had diminished to a snow-covered track and the naked woods walled them on two sides did they slow their pace to a lope.

“Someone is following us,” Laszlo said.

Juliana whipped a glance over her shoulder. A narrow shadow slipped toward them.

Laszlo yanked a dagger from his sleeve.

“No!” Juliana said, dismounting in a billow of skirts and cloak. “It’s only Pavlo.” In moments the huge borzoya filled her arms. Pavlo was but a year old, her favorite and one she had been charged with training. She was not surprised the dog had caught up with them. The windhounds were bred to run with breathtaking speed, tirelessly, for miles, to exhaust a wolf so the hunters could bring it down.

“Pavlo.” She buried her face in the deep fur of the dog’s neck.

And smelled blood.

“He’s been hurt, Laszlo.” She plucked an image from the midst of her nightmare—a dog leaping, the slash of a blade, a forgotten curse followed by a pitiful animal yelp.

Laszlo was crouched in the path, examining something. “He’s left a trail of blood, Gaja. I am sorry, but we must leave him.”

Juliana struck away his sharp dagger. “Don’t you dare.” Her voice held a hardness, a note she had never heard before. It was the voice of a stranger, no longer a girl but a woman who had seen hell. “By God’s light, Laszlo, he’s all I have now.”

The gypsy muttered something in Romany. He found a strip of material and bound the wound in the dog’s shoulder. Moments later, they were on their way again.

Laszlo pushed ahead with unwavering purpose. Only when the silver thread of dawn glittered on the snowy horizon did Juliana ask the obvious question.

“Laszlo, where are we going?”

He hesitated, then cast his gaze west, away from the rising sun. “To a place I have heard of in the songs of my people. A place called England.”

England. It was but a vague idea in Juliana’s mind, a few words on the page of a book she had once read. A murky, misty land of barbarians. Her tutor, a glib and gifted man, had taught her the language so he could read her odd poems of adventure and virtue triumphant.

“But why so far?” she asked. “I should go to Alexei’s family in Moscow to tell them what befell their son.”

“No.” Laszlo spoke harshly, and the shadows hid his face. “It is too dangerous. The assassins could be neighbors, people you once trusted.”

Juliana shivered, thinking of Fyodor Glinsky and all her father’s rivals. “But…England,” she said in a dazed voice.

“If we stay here,” Laszlo said, “they will hunt you down and kill you. You heard them, little one. I dare not risk a journey to Moscow.”

Exhausted by loss, she closed her eyes and drew a deep breath. But in the darkness behind her eyelids she saw it again—death, blood, fire, all painted in the bright red hues of savagery.

Juliana forced her eyes open. The rising sun cast a ray of weak winter light on a dead snow-covered leaf that lay in the path.

Then she remembered the prophecy. Zara had whispered it to her only the night before, but an eternity had passed since then.

The first will travel far.

One

Richmond Palace, England

1538

Stephen de Lacey, baron of Wimberleigh, walked into the Royal Bedchamber to find his betrothed in bed with the king.

His face as cold and unflinching as a Holbein portrait, Stephen stared at the dark-eyed Welsh beauty all but hidden beneath the quilted silk counterpane. A hissing tide of resentment roiled deep inside him, threatening to drown him. Clenching his fists at his sides, Stephen conquered the turmoil within. Through deliberately blank eyes, he looked at King Henry VIII.

“My liege,” he said, blowing stiffly, inhaling the scent of dried lavender and bergamot from the sachets in the bed hangings. By the time he straightened up, the king’s attendants had arrived to groom their sovereign for the day.