The Court of the Midnight King: A Dream of Richard III by Freda Warrington

not that. I can’t forgive him. He promised me the Earth to go with him. He couldn’t believe it when I said no, but I know what loyalty is and no reward under heaven would induce me to betray Edward. And I’m sick of thinking about it all.”
    Where her hand rested on him, she gave his arm a gentle squeeze. “Don’t, then. Forget everything a while. That’s why we met.”
    He smiled at her. “And you? Your face was like a storm when I first saw you. Shall we comfort each other?”
    She drew a breath. Strong instinct warned her not to spill her own troubles. “Nothing. A quarrel with my mother. I have no identity for you to guess.”
    “Good. As long as your name isn’t Woodville. The queen has dozens of sisters, and they lie in wait everywhere.”
    “It isn’t, I promise,” Kate answered, amused.
    His hand slid up and closed around hers. Her breathing grew quicker and deeper. The sun-warmed velvet of his doublet smelled delicious, fragrant like cedarwood. The scent was on his skin. Beneath the doublet, his linen shirt was white and crisp, like may-blossom.
    “I’m glad I met you, Kate. You’re so pretty.”
    He kissed her, his lips light and sweet on hers. His arms went around her and she pressed against him, certain he must feel her heartbeat shaking her whole body. Then she knew that her fear of marriage was not a fear of men. In the space of a day she’d discovered the difference between a man who repulsed her, and one who drew her like a bee to nectar.
    Kate hadn’t planned it, but she saw a new path in all its shining glory and ruin. A way to ensure that no marriage would be forced upon her. Drastic and wild, but that was the action she must take.
    She felt him exhale. “I ought to go,” he said, reluctantly. “This isn’t right. I didn’t mean to take advantage of you, Kate.” She felt him trembling, his young body taut against hers. There were too many layers of clothes between them. Her own hunger startled her, a sensation of dissolving heat. “I’ll ride with you back to your house.”
    He spoke without conviction, but he gave her a choice. He was a gentleman, a chivalrous knight. If she said, yes, escort me home, he would do so without argument. Her choice. She stood poised on the fork of the path and her heart was pounding.
    There was only this cocoon of time, suspended on the fringe of the hidden world. Nothing else existed. The world breathed around them, rich and iridescent.
    “No, don’t go,” she said, laying her hand along his cheek.
    He stared at her with intense eyes, torn. “Kate, if we stay here…”
    “I know.”
    “It isn’t right.”
    “Yes, it is,” she breathed, her mouth almost touching his. “It is.”
    “But I may never see you again.”
    “Yes, that’s it!” She kissed his neck, and he gasped. “We are never going to see each other again. This is our only chance.”
    “Oh, Kate.” He groaned, surrendering.
    She expected to be frightened, but she wasn’t. It was easy. Awkward, for they both suffered the clumsiness of inexperience. If he’d done this before, she was sure it wasn’t many times, if at all. They laughed at their ineptness, and then it didn’t matter. There was only slight pain, nothing she couldn’t bear, and soon the discomfort eased into a richer sensation. Yes, the easiest thing in the world. Coupling wasn’t terrible but sweet, as her mother had told her it could be, ineffably delicious, gentle and transporting, a flight through the mysteries of the hidden world.
    And forbidden. She could not possibly be doing this with someone she had met barely an hour ago, a stranger… but she was and exaltation filled her. They laughed together. The green world trembled.
    ###
    Kate went to refill the empty flask with water from a nearby spring and brought it to him. He unsaddled his horse; she watched the care with which he tended the animal. Then they quenched their thirst, twined their bodies together joyfully, naked now, and made love