The Tournament Read Online Free

(‘Godless heathens who will burn in Hell’). At times I thought Mrs Ponsonby actually liked being offended.
    Elsie couldn’t stand her. ‘Sanctimonious prude,’ she muttered when Mrs Ponsonby yet again told Elsie to cover her décolletage with a shawl. ‘We’d have more fun with Pope Paul himself as our chaperone.’
    Mrs Ponsonby’s husband, Llewellyn—a short, ruddy-faced man, as pious as his wife but from what I saw, more her servant than her equal—rode on a donkey beside our wagon. He was ever scurrying about doing her bidding, tripping over himself in his haste to effect commands that always began with the shrill call of: ‘Llewellyn Ponsonby!’
    I sighed. They were not exactly a winning example of the benefits of marriage and as chaperones, well, I feared that Elsie was right.
    We had to pass through London on our way to Dover. There Mr Ascham and Mr Giles stopped briefly at Whitehall to collect something from my father: a gorgeous scarlet envelope with gilt edges similar to those of the Sultan’s original invitation. This envelope was sealed with a dollop of wax that bore the imprint of my father’s ring in its centre. A private note from king to king. My teacher would carry this envelope on his person for the duration of our journey.
    I did not know what message or messages it contained. As I would discover later, neither did my teacher.
    While I would have liked to, I did not accompany my teacher into the palace at Whitehall. I rarely saw my father and never in the harsh light of court. He loomed at the fringes of my world, a godlike figure whom I glimpsed occasionally but rarely saw in full.
    Of course, he was spoken about every day. He was loved and feared, admired and feared, respected and feared. It was said by many that my father had executed more people than any English monarch before him. But he was also known for his keen, educated mind, his prowess at any kind of sport, his ability to write music and his fondness for any pretty thing in a skirt, even if she was married to another.
    His interactions with me were usually perfunctory, businesslike affairs. I was a by-product of kinghood and a bothersome one at that: a daughter. He had been tender toward me on perhaps three occasions and on each of those occasions I’d adored him. His recent observation about me being ‘old enough to bleed’ was more the rule: my ability to marry and breed for England suddenly made me useful.
    Elsie and I lingered outside the palace under the watchful gaze of our two chaperones, our six guardsmen and seven recently beheaded traitors mounted on spikes above the gates.
    The angry roars of a bear being baited rose from a nearby alley, followed by the cheers of a crowd. I peered into the alley and saw the poor animal: it was a mighty beast chained by the neck to a stake lodged in the ground and it bellowed with impotent rage as two mastiffs attacked it, drawing chunks from its hide. The bear managed to hit one of the dogs with a lusty swipe, and the dog went flying with a yelp into a wall, where it collapsed in a heap, mortally wounded. As it lay dying, another mastiff was released to take its place. The crowd cheered even more loudly.
    Mrs Ponsonby was predictably appalled. ‘I thought Englishmen were made of better stuff than this. Come, girls. Avert your eyes.’
    On this rare occasion, I found myself agreeing with her.
    After our short stop at Whitehall, we proceeded apace to Dover and thence across the Channel to Calais.
    From there, at Mr Ascham’s suggestion, we all changed into garments that were decidedly less colourful than the attire we had worn across southern England. Elsie and I wore plain cassocks and skirts without farthingales (which I must say made movement considerably easier). With her graceful neck, blonde hair and nubile body, Elsie still managed to look angelic even in that crude smock.
    Mrs Ponsonby puckered her lips in outrage when Mr Ascham made her don a plain brown travelling cloak.