The Virgin's War Read Online Free Page A

best of his ability. It is your queen’s loss if it is not to be in England.”
    “That sounds rather cold.”
    “You asked for honesty, not comfort.”
    Lady Philippa smiled, but there was something sad to it. And piercing. She seemed to be looking deep into Maisie’s own cold comforts as she said, “You are not wrong, but I do not think you see the whole of my brother. There is more to Stephen than duty, and a heart with room for more than one love. I do not think passion has finished with him quite yet.”
    In defiance of protocol, Maisie stood up first. She had no experience with passion and no desire to discuss it with this self-possessed young woman who also happened to be Stephen’s sister. “My business is with numbers,” she said with finality. “I shall leave passion and penance to those better equipped to recognize it.”
    Lady Philippa rose with a grace Maisie envied and her smile grew mischievous. “Thank you for your honesty, Mistress Sinclair. I will not forget it. Or you.”
    A promise, or a threat? Maisie couldn’t decide which.

17 November 1584
    Kit,
    What have you been writing to Anabel lately? She is entirely too cheerful. It’s making the household nervous. When Anabel is cheerful, she is apt to be doing something reckless. I can only hope the recklessness is confined to her letters. And yes, I know, I sound like a fidgety old maid. It’s because you’re not here and Stephen’s not here and Lucie and Julien have hardly stirred from Compton Wynyates in a year. Her last miscarriage was so far along that she had begun to hope. And when that hope was dashed yet again…I am so worried about her and yet I cannot do anything!
    We did have an interesting visitor while in York. Matthew has been doing business on Anabel’s behalf with Maisie Sinclair, the Scots widow who was in the Kavanaugh household with Stephen. Her brother nominally runs the Sinclair family’s main concerns out of Edinburgh, but she, I suspect, is the true inheritor of her grandfather’s genius. When she agreed to meet with Matthew on her way back to Scotland, I persuaded Anabel to go along because I wanted to ask the girl about Stephen.
    Maisie Sinclair was very defensive—not on her own behalf, but on Stephen’s. I find that intriguing. She seems to think he is choosing to lose himself in duty in order to bury his unrequited love for Ailis Kavanaugh. What do you think? Does he talk about Ireland? Does he talk about the letters he sends and receives from Maisie? Does he ever say anything at all beyond work?
    Write to me soon, and rather more fully than you are wont. It is not fair that Anabel gets all your words and I so few.
    Your rather disgruntled sister,
    Pippa
    Kit couldn’t decide whether to grin or grimace while reading Pippa’s latest letter. He had never spent such a long time away from England and the many women who had formed the backbone of his home life. Although he missed much of it, he could not deny that life here at Chateau Blanclair was a particular kind of restful.
    It was a household of men—Renaud, nearly sixty, had been widowed for some years and showed no interest in remarrying. His only daughter was married well, with three daughters of her own, but spent most of her time in Paris or on her husband’s estates. And since the death of Renaud’s eldest son and the departure of his second son to marriage in England, the only other resident family member was twelve-year-old Felix. Felix was his grandfather’s heir and, between intensive tutoring, spent time learning the fine art of war. All in all, Blanclair was run rather like a soldiers’ camp. In that atmosphere, Pippa’s letters occasionally jarred on Kit.
    But only for a moment. Then he was swept by a rush of bitter longing so strong his eyes stung and he had to breathe against it. What he wouldn’t give to be with Pippa at this moment—because if he was with his twin, he would also be with Anabel.
    Longing was abruptly cut off by a slap