Read an excerpt from BRIGHT HELM The Byrhtnoth Chronicles: Book 4) by Christine Hancock @YoungByrhtnoth @maryanneyarde

 

BRIGHT HELM

(The Byrhtnoth Chronicles: Book 4)

By Christine Hancock

Separated by anger and unanswered questions, Byrhtnoth and Saewynn are brought together by a tragic death.

Re-united, they set out on an epic voyage to discover the final truth about his father. 

The journey takes them far to the north, to Orkney, swathed in the mists of treachery, and to Dublin’s slave markets where Byrhtnoth faces a fateful decision.

 How far will he go, to save those he cares for?

 

Publication Date: 15th October 2020

Publisher: Madder Press

Genre: Historical Fiction

EXCERPT

Last summer, I died. I remember it vividly. The exhaustion of a hard-fought battle, the despair as my axe slipped from my hand in the torrential rain. I can still feel the impact of my enemy’s weapon as it struck my helmet, but strangely no pain. I still taste the mud that filled my mouth as my body fell to the ground. I even hear the triumphant shout of victory and the screams as other men died. There is an overwhelming smell of blood, and if I close my eyes, I can see it, my blood, soaking into the sodden soil. And then? Nothing.

I woke up. Time had passed. When I died it was the height of summer; now it is the depths of winter, and I am home, lying in my own bed. How did I get here? They say I survived the battle, how? They have shown me my ruined helmet; how could anyone survive that blow? I raise my hand to my head; the hair is freshly grown, and beneath the stubble is a scar.

What happened in the time between my death and my awakening? They say that someone rescued me. Who? I entered the river which washed me far downstream. People not knowing who I was cared for me. Why? Who were they? Then my wife came with the others and rescued me, brought me back by ship. They thought I would die. I didn’t.

It is so difficult, not knowing what happened. Sometimes a memory floats just out of reach. When I try to catch it, it disappears. Was it even there?

Then there are the dreams: the dream in which I kill my father. I am there and yet I cannot see, blinded by a bright shining light. My hands are around a man’s neck. I know it is my father and that I hate him, hate him more than I have hated anyone. Because he lied to me? My hands tighten. I feel the brush of a beard and the heaving muscles of his neck. I smell his breath, sour and stinking of fish. I hate fish. Fingers tear at mine, but I am stronger. There are voices, shouting, I cannot hear the words. He fights for breath, horrible rasping gasps. I lift him, feet off the ground. He is smaller than me; I thought he would be taller. He kicks feebly and then it ceases. I drop the dead weight and wake, exhausted and sweating.

One night I woke to find my hands about my wife’s neck. Although too weak to cause harm, I have banished her from our bed. I am lonely, but I cannot risk her life. I tell them I can’t remember the dream, if it is a dream. They think it is a memory of the battle. Is it a memory? It can’t be, how could I meet my father? Why would I want to kill him? Is it a prophecy, a warning of what is to come? If I meet my father, am I fated to murder him? Always I have desired to find the truth about him; perhaps it is better not to take that risk.

I resist any talk of what will happen when I recover. I am afraid. What might I do when my strength returns? Perhaps the dream will have faded by then, and everything will be as it used to be.

Or it might get worse. There is another dream, a feeling. It comes at night and sometimes during the day. I cannot see, I cannot move. Something imprisons me, someone, and then he laughs.

Amazon UK • Amazon US

Christine Hancock

Christine Hancock was born in Essex and moved to Rugby, Warwickshire when she married. She a husband, two sons and two lovely grandchildren.

She is a long term family historian, leader of the local history group and town guide.

Christine had never thought of becoming an author - She just wanted to write about some her ancestors. In 2013 she joined a writing class. The class turned out to be about writing fiction. Before she knew it, she was writing a novel.

Byrhtnoth was a real warrior who died in the 991 Battle of Maldon, made famous by the Anglo-Saxon poem of that name. Growing up in Essex, Christine visited Maldon often, and attended the 1000 year anniversary of the battle in 1991.

She wanted to find out what made Byrhtnoth such a famous warrior.

She finished the book but discovered it had become a series - how long, she has yet to find out.

Connect with Christine: 

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My review of The Potential for Love: A Regency Novel by Catherine Kullmann @CKullmannAuthor @maryanneyarde #ThePotentialforLove #RegencyRomance #CoffeePotBookClub

The Potential for Love: A Regency Novel

By Catherine Kullmann

1816

 

For over six years, Thomas Ferraunt’s thoughts have been of war. Newly returned to England from occupied Paris, he must ask himself what his place is in this new world and what he wants from it. More and more, his thoughts turn to Arabella Malvin, but would Lord Malvin agree to such a mismatch for his daughter, especially when she is being courted by Lord Henry Danlow?

 

About to embark on her fourth Season, Arabella is tired of the life of a debutante, waiting in the wings for her real life to begin. She is ready to marry. But which of her suitors has the potential for love and who will agree to the type of marriage she wants?

 

As she struggles to make her choice, she is faced with danger from an unexpected quarter while Thomas is stunned by a new challenge. Will these events bring them together or drive them apart?

 

MY THOUGHTS

 

This is a story about following one's heart – especially when it comes to love. The Potential for Love is a novel that I instantly fell in love with. It has everything one would expect from a sweet Regency Romance — a brave heroine, a hero with a past, and of course a devilish antagonist who threatens everything!

 

Bella is the kind of heroine that one cannot help but adore. She sits very comfortably in the era that Catherine Kullmann has set her romantic story in. Bella understands the social expectations, but she is determined to at least like the man she is going to spend the rest of her life with. Therefore, achieving the seemingly hopeless dream of being with a man such as our dashing hero, Major Thomas Ferraunt is thwarted with difficulties.

 

There is a lot of story in this novel, and yet it did not feel overly long – in fact, I lost track of time while I was reading it. I thoroughly enjoyed this novel from beginning to end. If you are a fan of Regency Romance, then this book should be on your to-read list.

Where to buy.

 

We are celebrating the release of the special hardback edition of The Potential for Love during this tour. With a beautiful dust jacket over an elegant laminated cover, it will enhance any library and is the perfect gift for lovers of historical women’s fiction and historical romance.

 

Amazon

Waterstones

Barnes and Noble

 

The Potential for Love is also available in Paperback and as eBook and is free to read with Kindle Unlimited subscription.

 

Amazon Kindle

 

Waterstones (Paperback)

Barnes and Noble (Paperback)

 

Catherine Kullmann

 

I was born and brought up in Dublin and moved to Germany on my marriage in 1973. Before my marriage, I was an administrative officer at the Department of Finance in Dublin. I worked as attaché at the Irish Embassy in Bonn until my eldest son was born. Following a twelve-year stint as a full-time mother, I joined the New Zealand Embassy in Bonn, where I was administration officer. My husband and I returned to Ireland in 1999 and in 2009, following a year’s treatment for breast cancer, I took early retirement from my position as Director of Administration and Human Resources at a large Dublin law firm.

 

I have always enjoyed writing, I love the fall of words, the shaping of an expressive phrase, the satisfaction when a sentence conveys my meaning exactly. I enjoy plotting and revel in the challenge of evoking a historic era for characters who behave authentically in their period while making their actions and decisions plausible and sympathetic to a modern reader. In addition, I am fanatical about language, especially using the right language as it would have been used during the period about which I am writing. But rewarding as all this craft is, there is nothing to match the moment when a book takes flight, when your characters suddenly determine the route of their journey.

 

The first quarter of the nineteenth century was one of the most significant periods of European and American history, a period whose events still resonate two hundred years later The Act of Union between Great Britain and Ireland of 1800, the Anglo-American war of 1812 and the final defeat of Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815 all still shape our modern world. The aristocracy-led society that drove these events was already under attack from those who saw the need for social and political reform, while the industrial revolution saw the beginning of the transfer of wealth and ultimately power to those who knew how to exploit the new technologies.

 

I write historical fiction set against this background of off-stage wars, of women frequently left to fend for themselves in a patriarchal world where they have few or no rights but must make the best lives they can for themselves and their families. While real people sometimes have walk-on parts, the protagonists and their stories are pure fiction. As well as meeting their personal challenges, they must also cope with external events and the constraints imposed by society. The main story arc is romantic. I am particularly interested in what happens after the first happy end—how life goes on around the protagonists and sometimes catches up with them.

 

Website: https://www.catherinekullmann.com/

 

Twitter: https://twitter.com/CKullmannAuthor

 

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/15549457.Catherine_Kullmann

 

My review of Small Island by Andrea Levy

Small Island 

By Andrea Levy  

It is 1948, and England is recovering from a war. But at 21 Nevern Street, London, the conflict has only just begun. Queenie Bligh's neighbours do not approve when she agrees to take in Jamaican lodgers, but Queenie doesn't know when her husband will return, or if he will come back at all. What else can she do?

Gilbert Joseph was one of the several thousand Jamaican men who joined the RAF to fight against Hitler. Returning to England as a civilian he finds himself treated very differently. It's desperation that makes him remember a wartime friendship with Queenie and knock at her door.

Gilbert's wife Hortense, too, had longed to leave Jamaica and start a better life in England. But when she joins him she is shocked to find London shabby, decrepit, and far from the golden city of her dreams. Even Gilbert is not the man she thought he was...

MY THOUGHTS

It didn't matter if they had fought for England. It didn't matter if they had volunteered to put their lives on the line for their Mother Country. All that mattered was the colour of their skin.

Small Island by Andrea Levy is a tale of hummingbirds and meat pies, sweltering heat and the chill of an English winter. 

Unsurprisingly,  racism is a large part of this novel. Gilbert is a Jamaican man who joined the RAF, for what better honour was there than wearing the blue uniform and fighting for the Mother Country? And although he adjusts to the climate,  he soon realises that the uniform does not matter if he comes from Jamaica.

Hortense doesn't find adjusting to England as easy as Gilbert does. She despises where they are forced to live—the room is run down, cold, and dirty.  The differing perspectives of this novel have been navigated expertly, for when reading from Hortense's perspective. I sympathised with her. However, reading Gilbert's side of things changed everything. How could Hortense not see how hard he was working, how lucky she was?

Alongside the lives of the Jamaicans, this novel shows the other side of the coin.  The lives of Bernard and Gilbert are very similar; the only difference is the colour of their skin.  Although I understood Bernard's side of the story, I found it very hard to sympathise with him. 

Queenie, on the other hand, is wonderful. Queenie is a lovely woman and a gloriously crafted character. Her empathy and joy are infectious, and her friendship with Gilbert despite the views of the nation is beautiful.

I thought this book was brilliant from beginning to end.

Amazon

Read an excerpt from Anke: The Beginning By Anas Hamshari and Caroline Snodgress @ExoticReads @maryanneyarde

 

I am one again taking part in a virtual tour with The Coffee Pot Book Club. This time I have an excerpt to share with you, but first things first. Let's check out today's blog tour stop!

Anke: The Beginning

By Anas Hamshari and Caroline Snodgress

Living in the city of Mechelen, just south of once-prosperous Antwerp, in the aftermath of the Thirty Years’ War, Anke Verhaegen, an ambitious nineteen-year-old, is determined to make the most of her life.

When her brother Johan suggests crossing the Atlantic to New Netherland, Anke knows this is her destiny. Together, the two set about attempting to secure passage across the sea.

Before long, their plans are in motion, and hopes are high. Yet, with vengeful enemies, secrecy, and danger on the high sea waiting to be faced, will Anke really be able to secure a better life for herself?

Publication Date: September 16th 2020

Publisher: Exotic Reads

Page Length: 111 eBook / 170 paperback

Genre: Historical Fiction

EXCEPT

“She was glorious once,” the incumbent cloth merchants of Antwerp often said, “this flourishing city by the North Sea. Her glory may have faded, but her beauty remains.”

My grandfather used to say the same almost every time he told me a new bedtime story. He was my father’s father, who lived in our house before us with his wife and six other children. I remember him as a fixture of the household, along with my grandmother. Though, while she always seemed to be knitting or dusting or arranging flowers in vases, my grandfather was like the heavy wardrobe in the main bedroom upstairs, or the sturdy table in the dining room. He was unmoving, silent, always seated beside a roaring fire, with a cigar—a habit he had picked up from the Spaniards who returned from the New World—between his lips or his fingers. When the sun had gone down and the fire burned low, he would rise stiffly from his seat and make his way up to the nursery, where I lay awake waiting for him. Only then would he become animated, the words falling fast from his lips, supplanting the plain little room with images of grandeur. When he died, it felt like that world went with him.

Thankfully, he wasn’t the only one to tell me of our Golden Age. Even if there was no one left who had lived through those days, the splendor of it lived on in stories. Every merchant from every Flemish province couldn’t stop talking about Antwerp’s past grandiosity. Unfortunately, I wasn’t born during that golden era. Still, every story about the past gave people like me hope, and it made me believe that anything and anyone can rise from the ashes. I had faith that prosperity would return, but, more importantly, I knew that if it didn’t, I would not hesitate to seek it out myself.

You must be wondering, now, who I am and what my story is. We’ll come to that soon enough, but first, allow me to share one truth about life: every great story has a beginning. To understand mine, let me take you back to the golden days of Antwerp. Thousands of foreign merchants used to reside in the capital city. Though my generation was born a century too late to see this for ourselves, words from our grandfathers painted a vivid image in our minds of life here throughout the first half of the sixteenth century.

Each day, hundreds of ships passed by Antwerp’s port. There were English ships laden with fine wool, Portuguese caravels fraught with Indian pepper and Ceylonese cinnamon, and Baltic trade cogs bringing in musky, rich ambers from Muscovian tree resin. Ships took turns to unload their cargo. On land, thousands of trade carts went in and out of the city gates every week. Every merchant was eager to sell their wares and commodities in Antwerp’s market.

It was the wealthiest city in the continent, and one of the largest—the crown jewel among the countless European cities enriched by trade. The exploration had begun in Portugal, a century before, with their caravels and bold explorers. Soon everyone was vying for prosperous trade routes. Potential colonies became as alluring as gold or spices. The New World attracted men in droves, washing up on those shores in their hulking ships, while other entrepreneurs went east to trade in India and China. And, at the heart of this web, it seemed, lay Antwerp—the sugar capital, the banking hub, a cosmopolitan heaven.

Amazon

Anas Hamshari

Anas Hamshari is an established businessman residing in the State of Kuwait, and an author of one personal growth book and two historical fiction novels. Anas has been a lifelong writer and first began creating medieval fiction tales and short stories when he was seven years old. In June 2020, Anas formed Exotic Reads, a historical fiction self-publishing division in one of his main businesses, Exotic Flavor. Exotic Reads will be self-publishing a variety of historical fiction novels in the weeks, months, and years to come.

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Caroline Snodgress

Caroline Snodgress is a first-time author but a long-time writer and ghostwriter. As an Echols Scholar at the University of Virginia, she is planning to double major in English and History, and is thoroughly enjoying taking as many fiction writing classes as she can fit into her schedule. When not in Charlottesville, she lives with her family just outside of Richmond, reading eighteenth- and nineteenth-century literature and watching plenty of period dramas in her spare time.

Website •  Twitter • Instagram • Facebook 

Interview with historical fiction author, Tonya Mitchell @tremmitchell @maryanneyarde

I am very excited that historical fiction author, Tonya Mitchell, is dropping by on Candlelight Reading today for a chat about her debut novel, A Feigned Madness.

Beatrice:  A huge congratulations on your debut novel — A Feigned Madness. Your book follows Elizabeth Cochrane “Nellie Bly” as she goes undercover to investigate and expose the appalling treatment of the inmates at the asylum on Blackwell’s Island. What drew you towards Elizabeth’s story and why did you think it would make a good book?

Tonya Mitchell: I happened upon a short post about Nellie Bly and her stay in a madhouse.

I was fascinated. I couldn’t believe a sane person would elect to have herself shut away in an asylum, especially at a time when mental illness was so little understood. I was equally shocked I’d never heard of her, and so I did some digging. What I found was Nellie’s own account: Ten Days in a Mad-house, which is a compilation of the two installments she wrote for the New York World upon her release from the Blackwell’s Island insane asylum.

I read it from cover to cover and found it captivating. But it was only part of the story. Who was she? Why was she so desperate for a job? And why agree to be put away in an insane asylum of all places? So, I looked for the novel. Surely someone had written about this woman and her asylum stay over a hundred years ago. I found some biographies and plenty books about her around-the-world trip she did a few years after the asylum stint, but to my surprise, no one had written a fictionalized version of her asylum stay.

Blackwells Asylum illustration.

Blackwells Asylum illustration.

Blackwell Tower today.

This was the end of 2014. I’d abandoned a manuscript and was looking for the subject matter to start writing another. I had always gravitated to historical fiction, and now seemed like a good time to jump in. Toni Morrison said, “If there's a book that you want to read, but it hasn't been written yet, then you must write it.” It felt like an invitation from the universe. And so I plunged in. I got lost down the rabbit hole of research and found tons of stuff that really filled in the gaps for me: who Nellie really was, why she needed the reporting job so badly, and other personal things about her life I was able to bring to life again in her story. I thought that if I was interested in Bly and her story, others would be too.

 

Beatrice: What were the challenges you faced in researching this period of history and were there any unexpected surprises?

 

Tonya Mitchell: There wasn’t much, specifically, that challenged me in the way of research. Fortunately, there’s a lot of reference material that’s been written over the years about Bly. I was lucky to have at my fingertips an excellent biography written by Brooke Kroeger—Nellie Bly: Daredevil, Reporter, Feminist. It was extremely thorough, starting from Bly’s birth, to her fame, to her eventual death in 1922. I found it very immersive. I was able to use much of that book as a launching pad to other research sources. One of them turned out to be a map of New York City from 1885. Using that, I was able, for instance, to plot which elevated trains Bly would have taken to get to the newspaper from her furnished apartment, and the ferry route from Bellevue Hospital to Blackwell’s Island.

As for surprises, no one could be more astonished than me that A Feigned Madness became, in part, a love story. Based on some cryptic lines in Bly’s personal letters in the sealed archives at Carnegie Library, and a few odd little details in her own account in Ten Days, I was able to read between the lines regarding her and another reporter she’d known back in Pittsburgh before she came to New York. These ambiguities really stood out to me, and I filled in the blanks. So that’s in the book too. I’ll let the reader discover that for herself, however (but it’s juicy!).

 

Betrice: What do you hope the reader will take away from your novel?

 

Tonya Mitchell: It was steely pioneers like Bly who paved the way for the women’s movement. She refused to back down in the face of adversity. ‘No’ just wasn’t in her lexicon. She kept pushing until she got hired as a reporter, and she kept right on pushing to get a byline, to get a column, and so much more. She broke through barrier after barrier. She was also a strong supporter of the women’s vote. It’s easy to forget that the freedoms women enjoy today weren’t always freedoms. We’ve fought for every one, and we have Nellie Bly and so many others to thank for that. And the fight isn’t over. There are still women out there fighting the good fight for women’s equality.

 

Beatrice: What do you think is the most challenging aspect of writing Historical Fiction?

 

Tonya Mitchell: We owe it to our readers to get the era, the events, and the characters right. That means we have to do a lot of research. Some of it is fascinating, some of it is just plain dry. Either way, it’s got to be done. I don’t think you can write quality historical fiction by approaching research like it’s a hobby. Oftentimes, I would imagine Bly looking over my shoulder as I wrote, and I didn’t think a scene was truly done until I felt she was satisfied with what I’d written.

 

Beatrice: What advice do you have for aspiring Historical Fiction authors?

 

Tonya Mitchell: Start now and don’t quit! Keep plugging. These days, you need the tenacity of a bull terrier to keep going because it’s competitive out there. Give yourself permission to have bad days and make mistakes. Most of all, pat yourself on the back for every milestone you hit, no matter how small, because it’s those milestones that add up to a finished product you’ll be proud of one day.

 

A Feigned Madness

By Tonya Mitchell

The insane asylum on Blackwell’s Island is a human rat trap. It is easy to get in, but once there it is impossible to get out. —Nellie Bly

Elizabeth Cochrane has a secret.

She isn’t the madwoman with amnesia the doctors and inmates at Blackwell’s Asylum think she is.

In truth, she’s working undercover for the New York World. When the managing editor refuses to hire her because she’s a woman, Elizabeth strikes a deal: in exchange for a job, she’ll impersonate a lunatic to expose a local asylum’s abuses.

When she arrives at the asylum, Elizabeth realizes she must make a decision—is she there merely to bear witness, or to intervene on behalf of the abused inmates? Can she interfere without blowing her cover? As the superintendent of the asylum grows increasingly suspicious, Elizabeth knows her scheme—and her dream of becoming a journalist in New York—is in jeopardy.

A Feigned Madness is a meticulously researched, fictionalized account of the woman who would come to be known as daredevil reporter Nellie Bly. At a time of cutthroat journalism, when newspapers battled for readers at any cost, Bly emerged as one of the first to break through the gender barrier—a woman who would, through her daring exploits, forge a trail for women fighting for their place in the world.

 

Publication date: 6^th October 2020

Genre: Historical Fiction, Historical Thriller

Publisher: Cynren Press

Print Length: 392 pages

 

Amazon UK •Amazon US

 

Tonya Mitchell

Ever since reading Jane Eyre in high school, Tonya Mitchell has been drawn to dark stories of the gothic variety. Her influences include Mary Shelley, Edgar Allan Poe, and Bram Stoker. More contemporarily, she loves the work of Agatha Christie, Margaret Atwood, and Laura Purcell. When she landed on a story about a woman who feigned insanity in order to go undercover in an insane asylum, she knew she’d landed on something she was meant to write. Her short fiction has appeared in, among other publications, Glimmer and Other Stories and Poems, for which she won the Cinnamon Press award in fiction. She is a self-professed Anglophile and is obsessed with all things relating to the Victorian period. She is a member of the Historical Novel Society North America and resides in Cincinnati, Ohio with her husband and three wildly energetic sons. A Feigned Madness is her first novel.

Connect with Tonya:

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Read an excerpt from The Queen's Almoner by Tonya Ulynn Brown @MrsBrownee2U @maryanneyarde

 

The Queen's Almoner

By Tonya Ulynn Brown

Sometimes loyalty to the queen comes at a cost.

Thomas Broune is a Reformer and childhood friend of the young queen, Mary Stuart. When Mary embarks on a new life in her estranged homeland of Scotland, Thomas is there to greet her and offer his renewed friendship. But the long-time friends grow closer, and Thomas realizes his innocent friendship has grown into something more. Yet he is a man of the cloth. Mary is the queen of the Scots. Both of them have obligations of an overwhelming magnitude: he to his conscience and she to her throne. 

When he must choose between loyalty to his queen or his quiet life away from her court, he finds that the choice comes at a high price. Driven by a sense of obligation to protect those he loves, and crippled by his inability to do so, Thomas must come to terms with the choices he has made and find a peace that will finally lay his failures to rest.

Publication Date: June 30, 2020

Publisher: Late November Literary  

Print Length: 320 Pages

Genre: Historical Fiction

EXCEPT

Even on this winter morning, the sun stretched forth its dull fingers and lit the ample room with its bleak radiation. Mary sat, writing her daily correspondence. She usually performed this task in the sanctuary of her antechamber, and used this room for reading instead, but this morning she sat at the dark mahogany desk, with her head bent, yet her back stiffened in perfect posture. David Rizzio sat at another table close by, also writing correspondence and performing the tasks that Mary found too tedious to do herself. 

I cleared my throat so as not to startle them before stepping into the room. 

“Good morning, Thomas. I didn’t see you at supper last night, nor breakfast this morning. I do hope all is well. Are you ill?”

“No. I am fine. Just a little trouble sleeping last night. That is all.”

“Indeed! I know what you mean. I had a little trouble myself,” she said with a ruffled look.

“Yes. About that….I saw Chastelard being brought back to the palace this morning.”

She snuck a glance at Rizzio then proceeded. “I’ve already been scolded on that account, Thomas. No need to repeat the reprimand.”

“Nay. Not a reprimand. Just curiosity. The man did sneak into your bedchamber with who-knows-what intentions.”

“I admit, I was a little put off by his wanton behavior....”

“A little?” I scoffed.

“All right then, I was very put off by his behavior,” she acquiesced. “But, then I realized that I might have been partially to blame. I am much too familiar with him and must have led him to believe that there was more between us than just a mutual appreciation of poetry.”

I stared at her. Had we not just had this conversation a fortnight ago? I tried to warn her, to convince her to tell him outright that she had no feelings for him and to send him away. Then again, maybe there were feelings there. Feelings she did not…could not admit to. I glanced at Rizzio who was busy trying to look occupied with his work, but his hand had stopped, and a blob of ink had congealed on the page beneath the spot where his quill had come to a halt. It felt like someone had stuffed my mouth with a linen rag. My tongue grew thick and my mouth dry.  I licked my lips and then swallowed hard before continuing.

“Are you quite certain there isn’t more there than you want to admit?” I was out of line, I knew it, and her eyes narrowed toward me in confirmation of my offense. “Mary, I cannot tell you how to conduct yourself. Please understand that my only concern is for your safety and reputation. It is at my highest recommendation that you rid yourself of this rogue once and for all. Put a stop to this, I beg you, before it’s too late.”

In one instantaneous moment I saw hurt and choler flash in those striking green eyes. The gold flecks of fire that lied dormant on her melancholy days ignited and set her eyes aflame with defensive daggers. “Thomas, I know that you feel obligated to look out for my welfare as a brother would look after a sister. But I am not a child. I am free to make my own decisions, and I feel that I am quite capable of determining when my reputation is in danger.”

By this time color had flushed her cheeks and she was standing in an effort to level her eye contact with mine. A quick glance at Rizzio showed that he was hastily gathering his materials in order to make a swift exit from the room.

It was my turn to be wroth, and I did not wait for Rizzio to leave the room before speaking. “I don’t think you are. I am sorry that you are offended at my concern. But I have heard the rumors that fly about you while you are oblivious to their threats. You asked me to stay on here—to serve you. I gave up my living—a valued and highly sought-after position in service to God Almighty, to serve you. You wanted my advice, my insight. Mary, you do not think like a Scot. Your head is so full of French frivolities that you have crowded out all reason and good sense. You underestimate the power and control of the Lords of the Congregation. Any misstep, no matter how insignificant, could cost you everything.”

“Here you are. You and I are now alone in this room. Will not people chatter?”

“I am not under your bed and you in your night clothes!”

“But I am the queen.”

“It doesn’t matter. You are a foreigner in the eyes of the Scottish people, a woman, and a Catholic. For these you are already condemned.”

Her face showed injury and indignation concurrently. “But I am the queen!” she repeated.

I raised an eyebrow, unimpressed. “Not for long,” I countered, adding, “not if you continue in this vein of reckless behavior.”

She moved toward the door, but instead of walking out she shut it. 

“Are you telling me that I am not capable of controlling this land?” She stepped closer to me, her face so close I could feel the warmth of her sweet breath, a mixture of honey and spice.

“I’m confused. How did this conversation turn into a discussion about your ability to rule?” I stepped toward her, bracing myself for the ensuing battle of wits.

Her eyes still flaming and her cheeks still flushed enhanced her beauty so profoundly that I found myself swaying under her power to entice. She felt it too, for I watched the amulet that hung from a platinum chain around her neck, rise and fall in swift, jerky movements as the air moved in and out of her lungs in quick, short breaths. Her lips, soft and round drew my attention away from the bobbing amulet, its unearthly force attempting to pull me down into its devilish snare.  

“You are intoxicating,” I whispered. 

The color of her eyes changed from a striking green to soft amber with only traces of the earthy green substance remaining. Before I could say anything more, the dragon inside her subsided and she was the gentle queen again. She wrapped her arms around me and buried her face into my chest like a lost child, repeating over and over again how sorry she was for getting so angry. Had she heard what I said? Or had I merely thought the words? I had not received the response that I had hoped for, yet I took advantage of the proximity of her nearness anyway. I kissed her lightly on the head, drinking in the aroma of lavender and rosemary that so lightly bathed her hair.

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Tonya Ulynn Brown

Tonya Ulynn Brown was born and raised in Columbus, Ohio, USA, but now calls southeastern Ohio home. She spent her younger years right out of college, living in Europe and teaching English as a second language. She attributes her time in Eastern Europe as being one of great personal growth, where her love for history, the classics, and all things European was born. Tonya holds a Master’s degree in Teaching and is now an elementary school teacher where she uses her love of history and reading to try to inspire younger generations to learn, explore and grow. Along with all the historical characters that she entertains in her head, she lives with her husband, two sons and a very naughty Springer Spaniel. Her mother has also joined their home, making for a cozy and complete little family.

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