“Sacre Vierge!” Constance mouthed, understanding the disaster at once. The Yorkist army would be hopelessly outnumbered and could not possibly hold the town against the king’s forces. She knew she ought to take Dickon to his bed, but instead she knelt down next to him and covered his shoulders with her shawl. “You should not be here, you know,” she admonished the boy, but she enveloped him warmly and let him stay to listen. It was his fate, too, she knew.

As the leaders huddled making a plan, Cecily went to sit on the steps of the dais, and Constance saw her eyelids droop and her body sag with exhaustion and worry. Aching to support her mistress but loath to leave Dickon, she coaxed him to go with her down to the hall, where they slipped in and joined Cecily. The duchess was too tired and unnerved to chastise either Constance or the boy for being there.

“Take my hand, Mother,” Dickon whispered, looking up into Cecily’s tear-stained face. “Constance and I are here to comfort you.” Cecily’s wan smile cheered him as she took his hand, drew him close and gave him a squeeze. Mother is trembling, Dickon thought, an odd protective feeling surprising him.

Richard of York suddenly lifted his head from the small group gathered in close conference around a table and pounded the top of it with his fist, making Dickon jump. “So we are agreed. Our cause is lost if we fight with such diminished numbers, and if we surrender we will surely be executed to a man and our names attainted.” He looked around slowly before deciding. “I say we should allow our troops to slip away as best they may—or join the king, like Trollope, and seek a pardon. Tell me we are agreed.”

“Aye.” The response was reluctant—more obedient than committed.

Dickon was aghast. Flight? Hadn’t he been told that was for cowards? Surely his father meant something else, or else York would be called traitor and coward. He had his answer soon enough when an indignant Edward shouted: “Flee, Father? Every knight disdains such cowardice. ’Twas not how I was trained to behave.”

All eyes swiveled to York.