Page 3 of Breath From the Sea
Chapter One
September 7, 1601
Greenwich Palace
Court of Queen Elizabeth
Lady Antónia was dressed in a most proper gown of emerald green, creamy lace at her cuffs and starched at her neck. Whalebone stays pinched her ribs. She’d not eaten since that morning and here it was now high noon. ’Twas hard to breathe and even harder to stand tall. She wasn’t used to wearing such formal clothing. Nay, indeed. She much preferred the loose pantaloons and doublet she wore aboard her ship. The ribbons and cap that kept her hair from her face instead of the tight knot and pins that held her fiery locks now.
If anyone had asked her the previous year when she’d be back in England, she’d not have guessed it would be this soon. Over a year had passed since she’d freed her men from certain death.
Greenwich Palace was unequivocally the most beautiful and ostentatious place she’d ever been. Her family’s castles in Ireland, where she sometimes graced them with her presence, were nothing compared to this. Terrifying towers truly. They were keeps, strongholds, meant for battle and to keep enemies from within. Greenwich looked as though it had been made for a sovereign’s comfort, for parties and plays.
Velvet draped every piece of furniture and even the walls. Gold rimmed every painting, mirror and candlestick. Where there was no gold, there was silver. As if the monarchs wished to impart a message to every bejeweled or bedraggled person to grace the halls that their wealth far outweighed any other. Richer than gods. No one in the place seemed concerned with anything other than pleasure.
Antónia scowled. ’Twas no wonder the English had not yet been able to beat back the Irish, her people. When they weren’t attempting to take over every corner of Christendom, they were dancing and playing boules in the courtyard, stroking their gold and silver.
As much as their opulence and frivolity disgusted her, Antónia had to maintain a pretense while here. Granuaille, her grandmother, had made it very clear what her purpose was in coming—to give the queen a birthday gift therefore ensuring that the English Queen believed their ties of friendship were still strong. Some years before, Granuaille had sought out Queen Elizabeth, and though their two countries were at war, they’d formed an alliance with each other. Elizabeth had even freed and pardoned Granuaille’s son, Antónia’s uncle, Tibbot, if Granuaille agreed to continue pirating the Spanish and not the English.
And now, Uncle Tibbot had just been named an viscount—while Antónia’s father had been secretly named by Tibbot as the rebel leader fighting against the English.
Antónia most certainly took after her grandmother in her intelligence, wit and ability to captain a ship, but she had her father’s dark temper. There was a reason he was called The Demon of Corraun. The English even called him Devil’s Hook. He was wild man and fierce in battle.
He didn’t scare Antónia one wit, though, even with the jagged scar on his face that made it look as though he had a permanent vicious smile.
“Lord Dalston,” called out Sir Robert Cecil, the Queen’s secretary, from the gallery leading from the Presence Chamber into the Queen’s privy chamber. The large wood-paneled door behind him remained closed to those waiting an audience.
Though he shared the same surname as the Secretary of State when Antónia’s grandmother had first journeyed to London in 1593, he was not the same man. A relation, perhaps. For it was William Cecil that Granuaille had dealings with.
Antónia cursed herself for not keeping up with the bloody English’s politics. She should know exactly who this man was.
She despised the English. They’d been tormenting her countrymen, her kin, for years, indeed, all of her own life.
At twenty-three summers this year, she’d seen much in the way of bloodshed from the English to her Irish countrymen.
She watched an older gentleman attempt to hurry toward Cecil, but his aged legs wouldn’t carry him as quickly as he must have wanted and he tripped several times. Only one of the nasty courtiers was kind enough to right him while the rest shied away as though aging were a disease.
Cecil greeted the man, calling him Baron Dalston. The aged courtier wore a dark gray cap with a feather in it, his clothes were rumpled. At least there was one more courtier in the crowd that seemed a little worse off than herself.
Antónia had to hide a smirk. She was probably wealthier than the lot of these puppets and none of them would ever know as her grandmother had begged the queen for money stating she was lacking, and the queen had agreed. If Her Haughty Majesty ever dared to visit Rockfleet Castle, and was allowed entrance into the treasury, she’d be blinded by the gold.
Behind Antónia was Sweeney, the only gallowglass guard she’d allowed off her ship. Any more and the English hypocrites would either shite their pants or think she was bringing a war to their queen. Antónia had grown up with the gallowglass warriors. Scotsmen bred with Norsemen. They were shunned by the Scots as half-breeds, but welcomed by Granuaille into her own personal army. The gallowglass men were well over six feet tall, nearing seven. Hugely muscular. There was wildness in their eyes and Antónia got a particular kick out of their permanent scowls.
While the English all crowded together, there was a notable space surrounding Antónia and Sweeney, as though the puffed up dunderheads thought they might catch something from the two them. Death perhaps?
Antónia bit her lip to keep from laughing.
She’d insisted Sweeney leave his double-headed axe on the ship, though he did not remove his six-foot long claymore attached to his back, which had been prompted an immediate request for removal upon their arrival. Lucky for the liveried men who’d asked it, Sweeney had obeyed her nod to part with the weapon, instead of lopping off their heads with one swing. And her, well, she had a dagger up both sleeves. The liveried ninnies had been staring too hard at Sweeney, afraid he’d bash their heads in, to even bother checking her for a weapon.
Imbeciles.
Another half-hour passed, with her feeling fainter by the minute and not yet called to the back, but many others—who had come into the presence after her—were summoned, piquing her irritation.
“I am going to speak with the footman,” she muttered to Sweeney.
Sweeney grunted. “I wouldna, my lady.”
“Of course you wouldn’t. You’d only bash him on the head and slam down the door.”
