“Nothing!”

“Show me.”

“Toby!”

He came and sat beside her on the bed. “Hello, Lady Lazender.”

“Hello, Sir Toby.”

“It’s time we got married in God’s eyes.”

“I thought we already were.”

“That was just practice.” He pulled the bedclothes from her, bent to kiss her, and Campion, at last, was married.

Oxford was unbearable by late October. The King’s army had returned, King Charles with it, and the city was crammed beyond endurance. Lady Margaret hated the crowded, stinking streets. It was decided that all of them would move north to Woodstock, close to the city and with its own small garrison of Royalist troops. Toby never forgot the danger Campion was in. If Sir Grenville could engineer her death, then the Covenant would be his forever, yet Toby believed she might be safer in the small, guarded village than among the crowded anonymity of the city’s streets.

They had one duty to perform before they left. They were summoned to an audience at court and the three of them went one windy, wet day to the crowded quadrangles of Christ Church. The crowd was bad-tempered, the soldiers who had to keep order frustrated, and it was with slow difficulty that Toby led his wife and mother through to the great hall and to the end of the long, shuffling queue of people summoned to greet the King.

Campion was curious rather than nervous. The babble of voices and the patent irritation of the courtiers had turned this public audience into something quite undignified and not at all awesome, yet when she caught her first sight of the King she was surprised by her sudden fear. He was, after all, a king, anointed of God, apart from the common ruck of men who stank in the press about him.

King Charles was much smaller than she expected, despite his high-heeled shoes and plumed hat. He was neatly bearded and stood strangely quiet and diffident in the center of the busy throng. His eyebrows seemed raised in a perpetual expression of quizzical surprise, and if he had been anything other than the King, Campion might have taken him for one of the university doctors who still walked Oxford’s streets and pretended their community had not been invaded by a court and an army.

A man carrying a tall, gold-topped staff beckoned the Lazenders forward. Sir Toby bowed, while Lady Margaret and Lady Campion curtseyed. The King nodded primly, apparently uninterested, and then the courtier who had summoned them forward gestured that they could back away from the august presence.

A gloved, royal hand was raised. Campion saw that the King wore jewelled rings on the outside of his glove. He looked at Campion and his voice was precise and clear. “You are the daughter of Christopher Aretine?”

“Yes, your Majesty.”

He blinked at her twice and she thought no more was to be said. Then his precise, mincing voice sounded again. “We are glad to find you more loyal than he.”