Ned and I still go past each other in silence, with our eyes averted, but he winks at me in chapel and he holds me deliciously close when he lifts me down from my horse. Now, when the movement of the dance brings us together, his hand is warm and he presses my fingers. When the dance takes us face-to-face, he comes so close that I can feel his warm breath at my ear, his hand at my waist is confident, drawing me against him. We are secret lovers as we were once secretly estranged, and when I turn away and pretend not to see him I want to giggle. I quite forget that I used to want to cry.

The court is at play in the summer weather and nothing seems to matter at all. It is as if all the stern rules of courtly behavior are suspended, all the grim restrictions of belief are lifted. There is no “learn you to die” anymore, there is no death. There is no fear of the future, nor who will be heir, nor will the queen conceive, or will there be war. There is nothing but sunny weather and pretty clothes and beautiful days. All of the dour misery of Queen Mary’s court is swept away like old strewing herbs, all the fearful suspicion of King Edward’s years is gone. All the men who plotted and planned and schemed against the throne and against each other are dead, and we their children are sworn to live for the joy of living. We have learned to live.

William Cecil has gone to Edinburgh to make peace between the Scots lords and their French-born regent. Elizabeth’s reluctant army has done enough to win us peace, and Elizabeth is reckless without Cecil’s supervision, as if she thinks that if he is not watching, no one can see her. She and Robert Dudley live openly as lovers. He comes to her room as if he were her husband, he laughs at her, he takes her in his arms, he is obeyed as if he were king consort.

Every day we ride out, the hounds running before us. Robert Dudley brings his mistress a string of horses, each one more spirited and beautiful than the last, and the two of them ride neck and neck as if they were invulnerable. Every day they outrun the court and then disappear into the woods, only emerging when it is time to dine in the beautiful tents that the servants have put up in the clearing, and the tables are laid and the wine and water poured. Openly, they ride off together; shamelessly they return, their faces bright with unspoken joy. Everyone else rides behind the hounds for a little while and then takes their horses to the river and lets them drink, or dismounts to idle in the shadows, or goes away to somewhere quiet and hidden to kiss and whisper.