Ellen shrugged. “So there are some good Galles.”

Blanche frowned. “Some? These are a blight. Galles is lovely folk, Ellen. Think of the Count D’Eu!”

Ellen smiled. Both girls admired him. “Well, if you’ll not tell me how to walk and suck eggs, I’ll not twit you with your Galles.”

Blanche grinned. “Sorry, sweet.”

“You be careful,” Ellen said.

Blanche kissed her on the cheek. “Always careful, my honey.”

She was out the door of the laundry, under full sail as Ellen, a shipwright’s daughter, liked to say. Blanche did not generally enter or leave the palace in broad daylight. She came so early in the morning that the squires weren’t up, and she left when they started drinking. But she’d hurt one of the Galles—and she knew that they had her marked.

Past the water-gate corridor.

But the main hall corridor up the stairs was crowded with gentles. She knew from the bottom of the steps, just from their shoes—mostly long-toed poulains—that she was looking at Rohan’s crowd; a dozen Gallish knights and squires. The worst.

She froze, her foot on the third step.

“There’s a pretty slut,” someone said above her.

“Thighs as white as her name, I’ll bet,” said another.

She knew them all, even if they didn’t know her. Rohan was the very worst—the centre of the poison, so to speak. His eyes crossed hers.

She dropped her eyes and passed back a step.

“The king!” someone shouted, and all the courtiers stiffened. That would mean that the King was passing from his apartments to the great hall. Courtiers lined the corridor, hoping to be recognized and spoken to.

“Jeffries! Malquil!” Rohan said quietly, his voice calm and even. “See the bitch on the steps? She’s the queen’s lap-dog. Maybe her she-whore. Take her and give her a dose of manhood, eh bien?”

The two men he’d named turned and started down the steps. Neither was a Galle. Both were Alban squires dressed as Galles, in skin-tight hose and very short doublets. The taller of the two came down two steps at a time and cut her off from the right hand turn.

Blanche didn’t panic, although two strong men scared her. She turned left, into the water-gate corridor, hoping for some loitering staff, but the corridor was empty.

She moved.

They were almost at her shoulders. She screamed—loud and long—hoisted her skirts and ran.

Everyone north of Cheapside knew how fast Blanche Gold was. Her legs were very long, and she knew how to use them, and the straight corridor offered no hindrance. It was almost completely dark, but she knew it intimately, at least for the first twenty yards.