Deven admitted it with a nod. Political difficulties with the Cour du Lys meant Lune received no voluntary information from the French fae, but she had a spy of her own on the other side of the Channel—not to mention ears at the keyholes of Buckingham and the King. “But I wanted to hear what you knew.”
“That is almost the sum of it.” Henry dropped abruptly into a chair. “Except that there’s also the Huguenots at La Rochelle, and at court they say James will help Louis put them down, even though they’re Protestants.”
They were rebels against their anointed sovereign; to James, that mattered before religion. Letting a smile quirk one corner of his mouth, Deven said, “The Devil himself could not make a worse mess of Europe than mortal men have done these past few years, but you have grasped it well. Tell me—which lady in Lune’s train did you seduce to gain this information?”
Henry flushed far redder than the words merited. Was he truly so shy of such questions? Not Carline; she had her own mortal in tow, still hoping for the chance to produce the next Prince of the Stone. Nianna? Far too brainless, that one; she paid attention to politics only insofar as complete ignorance was displeasing to her Queen. Ailis? Yfaen?
“Who says I must learn it from a faerie?” Henry asked, his tone halfway between plaintive and demanding. “There are mortals who care about these things too, you know.”
A desire for James to open hostilities against Spain, and a concern for the Protestants at La Rochelle. “Robin Penshaw?”
Another flush. “You needn’t say his name with such surprise.”
Deven wasn’t surprised; he was disappointed. Penshaw might care about these things, but his vision was far too narrow. He had proven that at Christmas-time, when the Gentlemen Pensioners assembled to attend upon the King: one drunken rant after another, all upon the twin themes of Spain and Catholicism. “Let me guess. He would prefer James to sail to the support of La Rochelle—even if that cost us Henrietta Maria.”
“Well, what use is a French princess, if neither James nor Louis will commit to war?”
“They will commit—but not if La Rochelle flares into full rebellion. Does Penshaw know Louis has plans to fight the Spanish in northern Italy? No, I thought not. But no king is foolish enough to send his soldiers away if they might be needed at home. The Habsburgs would like nothing better than for the English and the French to be at each others’ throats over those Huguenots. And that is exactly what Penshaw would have us charge into.”
Henry’s sources for information might still be too limited, but despite that, Deven was pleased. The young man who had sworn the Gentlemen Pensioners’ oath would not have known a tenth of what Henry just recited to him. His progress was encouraging.
Without warning, Henry asked, “How do you do it?”
“Do what?”
“Keep all these things in mind, all these factors and complications. James does one thing regarding the French in La Rochelle, and it means something else happens for the Spanish in northern Italy. When you told me England was your concern, I thought to myself, I understand that. But it isn’t just England, is it? France, and Spain, and Holland, and the Germanies, and onward without end.”
Honest bewilderment tinged his voice. “Not without end,” Deven said, trying to make light of it. “We have no dealings with Cathay.”
“Perhaps I should go there, then,” Henry said, with a melancholy sort of violence.
Deven crossed the chamber and laid his hand on the young man’s shoulder. “’Tis not always so fraught. Ten years ago, Europe was a calmer place, and no doubt in ten more years it will be so again.”
“But one cannot always depend upon calm.”
“No, one cannot.” Deven sighed, and pressed his fingers into his own brow. “In truth, I think Lune spreads her net too far. She makes no attempt to affect events in those other lands—” Mostly. “But she tries to understand what goes on in them, and it is too much. James follows it all, but he has ministers for such things: the lords of his council, and all their gentlemen and agents and so on. He does not do it alone, or with a bare handful to aid.”
Henry straightened from his slump. “What happens in France, though, or Spain, or all the rest, can affect what happens here. How can she ignore it, if she wishes to keep England stable?”
A dry chuckle escaped Deven. “You have just parroted her own words, when I tried to persuade her to a less ambitious course.”
“And what did you tell her then?”
“That she might be the first to answer the question of whether a faerie can work herself to death.”
It both delighted and alarmed the young man. “To say such a thing to a Queen! But if it deters her from answering that question, then so much the better, for all of us.”
“She has promised to keep to England’s shores,” Deven said, “as much as she can. I have no doubt that here she will find enough to occupy even an immortal life.”
And a series of mortal ones. Watching Henry stoke the fire, Deven wondered if the time had come to explain to his young friend the purpose of all this tutoring. Henry had likely guessed already, but neither of them had spoken the words. As if, by doing so, they would make real Deven’s age, and the inevitability of his death.
Deven tried to pretend that was not his own reason for delaying, and failed.
He must do it soon. It would be easier once he let go of his position as Prince, and lived only as the Queen’s love. But the letting go would be hard.
I will do it soon, he promised himself. Lune still needed him, not just for herself, but for her court; however much Henry had learned, Deven still knew more. But once this French match was settled…
Then he would step down, and be Prince no more.
The Onyx Hall, London: 10 June, 1625
“Quijada.” Lune pronounced the name thoughtfully, her accent far better than Mungle’s. “Until recently, he was in the retinue of the Marqués de la Inojosa, but he was dismissed months ago—I cannot recollect the cause. Don Eyague watched him for a time, having some interest in any Spanish mortals wandering about London.”
“The faerie envoy from Spain,” Deven said to Antony. “Though more like an immigrant to this court, after so many years. The Marqués—”
“Is the resident ambassador from King Philip,” the young man said. He added defensively, “My father sits in the Guildhall, you know, and Parliament. And I pay attention.”
Deven bowed to take away the sting of any insult he might have offered. “I think ’tis fair to say Henry was not in charity with Penshaw the night he set Nithen to follow him. Shortly thereafter, Henry turns up dead, not far from the room Quijada rents. Someone has made an effort to make it seem a robbery, but with little success.”
Lune said, “Quijada. Inojosa used him for underhanded matters, murder included. Unless this Penshaw is the sort to slit a man’s throat in a back alley?”
“He was genuinely startled when I told him Henry was found in Coldharbour,” Deven said, remembering. “Or so it seemed. I would wager Quijada performed the deed, and didn’t tell his master, lest Penshaw fault him for their discovery.”