I would know him anywhere. I recognized him by the back of his head. The king has stumbled and is cursing the page for failing to support him, and I step back and grab Nan’s arm and grip it tightly as the dimly lit chapel swims around me and I think that I am going to faint.

“What is it?” she demands.

“A gripe,” I say at random. “In my belly. Just my monthly course.”

“Steady,” she says, watching me, so she does not notice Thomas and he has the sense to step back, out of sight. I take a few dizzy steps, blinking. I cannot see him but I can feel his eyes on me, I can feel his presence in the little chapel, I can almost smell the haunting scent of his clean sweat. I feel as if the print of his naked chest is on my cheek like a brand. I feel as if anyone looking at me could know that I am his lover, I am his whore. One night I lay beneath him and begged him to swive me all night, as if I were his field and he a plow.

I dig my fingernails into the palms of my hands as if I would draw blood. The king has commanded another page to help him and he has one on either side as we walk on. He jarred his leg and is fighting his pain and unsteadiness and not looking at me. No one has observed my moment of faintness. People are watching him, remarking that he is stronger than he was but still needs help. Henry glowers from right to left. He does not want to hear anyone suggest that he is still not well enough to ride at the head of his own army.

He nods for me to come beside him. “Fools,” he remarks.

I twist my face into a smile and I nod, but I don’t hear him.

The trumpets sound a great brassy shout as we come into the great hall, and I remember the taste of Thomas’s mouth, the way he bites my lips in a kiss. I have a sudden memory, as sharp as if it were happening right now, of his taking my lower lip in his teeth and nibbling it till my knees go weak and he has to lift me to the bed. Henry and I walk in state through the bowing court to the raised dais. I can see nothing but Thomas’s face in candlelight. Two men come either side of the king to heave his great bulk up the two shallow steps and then seat him on his throne, his leg propped. I take my seat beside him and turn and look over the heads of the court, through the wide-open entrance door to the inner courtyard, where the afternoon is shining rosy on the new red bricks.