to protect you, to keep that—that sweetness in your eyes.’
Alys swallowed hard and leaned away from his touch. She feared if she stayed there, looking into those eyes of his, she would lean into him instead and kiss him. She ached to know what his lips might feel like on her own and that was one thing she should never try. She turned away to unroll a pile of bandages and then roll them again. ‘Even Dunboyton can be filled with cruelty, as we saw all too clearly only days ago. If I knew more of the world—of how to shield myself—’ She broke off, overcome by the memory of those poor men on the beach. By how easily Juan could have been one of them.
He laid his hand against her arm, lightly, as if he feared she would break away. She did not. ‘Of course. It was most hideous. I didn’t mean to imply you were some sort of swooning maiden in a tower. You are obviously very brave, as well as kind. See how you help a stranger, at peril to yourself.’
Ah, but Juan was not just any stranger. Alys came to see that, fear that, more and more as she knew him. ‘You said you grew up in an English abbey.’
He looked surprised at the sudden change in topic, but he recovered quickly and smiled. She thought she glimpsed something in his eyes behind that smile, a flash of wariness. ‘So I did. My father’s estate. His grandfather bought it from King Henry.’
‘But you did not stay there.’
‘Nay, I left to study at Cambridge and then went to the Netherlands in a company of soldiers with my godfather.’
He fought for the English in the Netherlands? Alys wondered if her suspicions were right and he was a spy. But for whom? ‘And from there you went to Spain? To find your mother’s family, mayhap?’
He looked down, hiding those eyes from her as he crumbled the remains of the bread. ‘I have never known anything about my Spanish family. My understanding is that I have no living Spanish kin.’
It sounded unbearably sad, a tiny child left without his mother, without even a sense of where she came from or what kind of person she was. At least Alys had known and loved her mother, known something of Spain. ‘I am sorry. I am glad I did know my mother and stories about her family. I could imagine what it was like, even here in Ireland, though I will never see it for myself.’ She laughed. ‘I will probably never even see London, let alone Madrid! You are lucky in your travels.’
He flashed her a smile, but it looked sad. ‘I have never felt so fortunate. Always being in a different place is a very lonely life indeed.’
‘But an endlessly fascinating one, I am sure.’
‘I did say I would tell you some tales of my travels.’ He stared up at the painted ceiling for a moment. ‘Amsterdam, for instance. It is a city built on water, as Venice is, but the two are very different despite their canals. Venice is old, full of crumbling stones and ancient bridges, of mysterious eyes peering from behind shuttered windows. Amsterdam is clean and orderly, with barges going about their marketing business and tall, painted houses along every walkway. And Portugal...’
‘Is it as sunny as everyone says?’
‘It might be, but it’s hard to know, since the houses are built so close together. Their roofs almost touch on the streets overhead, blocking the light, until one comes to the river. Then, all the lanes open up on to wide wharfs and ships bound for every port wait at anchor to set sail for the New World, or mayhap for India.’
‘India.’ Alys sighed, thinking of silks and spices, and warm sunshine. She did have dreams of the royal court at London, which sometimes seemed as distant as India could be, but she thought there were more worlds to be seen than anyone could ever dream of. Amsterdam, Venice, Paris...
‘How many adventures you must have had,’ she said sadly.
He knelt down beside her next to the fire, watching her closely. He seemed to hide nothing from her now, his eyes clear, speaking of a sadness she could barely fathom.
‘Lady Alys,’ he said softly. ‘There were many reasons I was on that ship, but I am bound by my honour not to speak of them. I only want you to know that you and your father’s household have naught to fear from me. I will do nothing to harm you and never would have.’
Alys studied him very closely for a long, tensely silent moment. For that time, they seemed bound close together with shimmering, invisible cords that could not break. Their breath, their very heartbeats, seemed as one. ‘I—I think I always did know that. We do live in such a world of secrets, and as I said I know little of the lands beyond Dunboyton. But I do know that the Queen’s throne is not a steady one and she needs help from the shadows.’
He suddenly leaned back, away from her, and she glimpsed the surprise and suspicion on his face. Had she found out something, then? Guessed correctly about his work?
She quickly turned away. He still needed his bandages changed and she mixed up her herbal poultice with trembling hands. ‘How will you find your way to where you are going? After you have recovered your strength, of course.’
‘I will find some way, Lady Alys, never fear. And I will not burden you with my presence here long at all, I promise. I think I am strong enough to move now, thanks to you.’
She glanced back at him and saw that even sitting there talking to her, holding tight to his secrets, had tired him. His skin was pale again, his eyes dark-shadowed. ‘I vow you are not! You need more rest and good food. Here, sit here and let me look at your bandages, then you must have some of this spiced wine. It does strengthen the blood.’ Alys busied herself with those familiar tasks, the herbs and the bandages, to try to force away one desolate thought—Dunboyton would be even lonelier, even more dull, when he was gone.
He sat down on the stool near the fire and went very still as she eased back the laces of his borrowed shirt and unwound the old dressings. He was warm now, but from the fire and not fever, and his skin was so deliciously golden she longed to touch it, to feel the silken heat of him under her fingers. If she closed her eyes, she could picture exactly what it would be like to do, to breathe in the scent of him, and lean closer and closer until...
Nay! She had to focus on her tasks, not on things that were impossible.
‘Tell me of your days here,’ he said quietly.
Alys smiled. His wound was healing well, no streaks of reddened infection at all. She smoothed on the new poultice, trying not to linger. ‘They are dull indeed, especially compared to what you must have known in your travels. Sometimes, when my father has visitors, I must play hostess to them in the great hall, but that is not often. I go to market in the village, I oversee the laundry and the kitchens, I work in my stillroom...’
‘Where you learned your great knowledge of healing herbs?’
‘My mother taught me. The stillroom is my little sanctuary.’
‘Your sanctuary from what?’
Alys shook her head. ‘I should have not said that. Dunboyton is not so terrible as all that. But sometimes I have to escape the quarrels of the maidservants. They do find an extraordinary number of things to disagree about. Or escape from doing the same things every day. The stillroom is always quiet and it smells lovely...’
‘So that is where you get it.’
She looked up at him, confused, and found him smiling down at her. ‘Get...what?’
‘You smell so lovely, Lady Alys. Like a meadow in the summertime.’ He caught up her loosened strand of hair and lifted it to his nose to smell it. It was as if he inhaled all of her, all she was and knew.
She felt her cheeks turn warm and pulled away. Her hair slid between his fingers. ‘ʼTis lavender and rosewater.’
‘Is that what you are using to heal me, too?’ he said, gesturing to the herbs in her basket.
Alys was most glad of the change of subject. ‘I doubt rosewater would help you, though a rosehip syrup couldn’t hurt. This is feverfew and yarrow, to bring down your fever. And I will give