Against a background of political intrigue and Tudor violence, love is not easy to find or sustain. The Queen Dowager of Scotland repudiates it and for both Matho and Meg the struggle is made more difficult by an outbreak of war between England and Scotland. Disaster looms for them all.....
While it continues the story of Matho, Meg and the Queen Dowager of Scotland, it isn't a sequel in the sense that you need to read Abduction of the Scots Queen, or Fair Border Bride, where Matho first appears.
In Queen's Courier Matho undertakes his first solo mission for Sir Thomas Wharton and sees an opportunity to complete his business and then bring his chosen Scots bride south to his home. The complicated feuds of the Scots entangle him in the siege of Lord Lennox where he is recognised and imprisonment awaiting an interview with the Queen Dowager follows; she sees an opportunity to use him to her advantage.
Meg rides south to the court of Henry Tudor in expectation of Lord Lennox joining her. As the weeks roll by without him, she begins to wonder if she will ever marry, or if she will bear a bastard child and face Henry's wrath alone.
EXCERPT:
“Harbottle? What in God’s name d’ ye
want to go there for?” A goblet of wine half-way to his mouth, Archibald
Douglas, sixth Earl of Angus, stared at his daughter as if she were an
imbecile.
“I want to see where I was born.” Meg
took her place at table beside her father. “Why is that so silly?”
“The place is stuck in the middle of
nowhere, lass, that’s why. There’s a sad excuse for a castle perched above a
rocky burn and a hell of a long ride to
anywhere. It’ll be raining,” he added morosely. “It was ever raining when I was
there.”
Meg chose to ignore the steadily
increasing flesh that had all but buried the handsome bones of his face. Loving
him did not mean, however, that she agreed with everything he said and did. “As
I understand it, you weren’t there very long.”
Angus banged the goblet on the table, anger
in his drawn brows, but before he could speak, Meg followed up her attack. “You
can’t deny you left your wife there to bear a child and rode off to further
your own concerns.”
“Your mother was as hare-brained then
as ye are today. Who do ye think had to safeguard what property we had and talk
sweetly to Henry of England?” Angus roared his displeasure. “Not your mother,
even though Henry was her brother.
She expected everything to happen as she wished.”
“Well, why not?” Meg lifted her chin.
“Och, aye.” His eyebrows rose, causing
furrows in his forehead. “I didna notice ye an’ James were on such good terms.
It’s no’ that simple, Meg. Use your head for a change.”
He had a point. Her half-brother Jamie
had never truly accepted her, no matter how much she tried to win his
friendship. She softened her tone. “I don’t see what harm it can do, to visit
the place where I was born. I’m curious, that’s all.”
“Ye’ll put yersel’ on a platter for
the rabble that infests the Borders.” Angus waggled a warning finger under her
nose. “If they snatch ye, a demand for ransom won’t be the worst thing ye face.
Most sensible folk would take an escort and head for Berwick.”
“I shall be perfectly safe, Father.
When you join the Dowager’s train tomorrow, I shall also leave. The English
Warden will meet me at the border and escort me south. A courier has gone on
ahead. It is all arranged.” She leant forward, and laid her hand on the velvet
of his sleeve. “Don’t worry about me. After all, I am half-English and the king’s
niece.”
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