Kat Ashley planted her big bottom against the wooden door and leaned back.

"Would you see better if Hannah were to help you?" Elizabeth demanded of John Dee.

"I cannot see without her," he said frankly. "I don't have the gift. I was only going to prepare the astrological tables for you; that is all I can do without a seer. I did not know that Hannah would be here today."

"If she would look for you, what might we see?"

He shrugged. "Everything. Nothing. How would I know? But we might be able to tell the date of the birth of the queen's baby. We might be able to know if it is a boy or a girl, and how healthy, and what its future might hold."

Elizabeth came toward me, her eyes very bright. "Do this for us, Hannah," she whispered, almost pleading with me. "We all want to know. You, as much as anybody."

I said nothing. My knowledge of the queen's growing despair in that darkened room was not one that I wanted to share with her flirtatious half sister.

"I dare not do it," I said flatly. "Mr. Dee, I am afraid. These are forbidden studies."

"It is all forbidden now," he said simply. "The world is forming into two bands of people. Those who ask questions and need answers, and those who think the answers are given to us. Her ladyship is one who asks questions, the queen is one who thinks that everything is already known. I am in the world of those who ask: ask about everything. You too. Lord Robert as well. It is breath of life to question, it is like being dead when one has to accept an answer which comes with the dust of the tomb on it and one cannot even ask *why?' You like to ask, don't you, Hannah?"

"I was brought up to it," I said, as if excusing a sin. "But I have learned the price. I have seen the price that scholars sometimes have to pay."

"You will pay no price for asking questions in my rooms," Elizabeth a.s.sured me. "I am under the protection of the king. We can do as we wish. I am safe now."

"But I am never safe!" burst from me.

"Come, child," John Dee urged me. "You are among friends. Do you not have the courage to exercise your G.o.d-given gift, in the sight of your Maker and in the company of your friends, child?"

"No," I said frankly. I was thinking of the f.a.ggots of wood that had been piled up in the town square of Aragon, of the stakes at Smithfield, of the determination of the Inquisition to know only what it feared and see only what it suspected.

"And yet you live here, in the very heart of the court," he observed.

"I am here to serve the queen because I love her, and because I can't leave her now, not while she is waiting for her baby to be born. And I serve the Princess Elizabeth because... because she is like no other woman I have ever met."

Elizabeth laughed. "You study me as if I were your book," she said. "I have seen you do it. I know you do. You watch me as if you would learn how to be a woman."

I nodded, granting her nothing. "Perhaps."

She smiled. "You love my sister, don't you?"

I faced her without fear. "I do. Who could not?"

"Then would you not ease her burden by telling her when this slow baby will come? It is a month late, Hannah. People are laughing at her. If she has mistaken her dates, would you not want to tell her that the baby in her belly is growing well and due this very week, or the next?"

I hesitated. "How could I tell her I knew such a thing?"

"Your gift! Your gift!" she exclaimed irritably. "You can tell her you just saw it in a vision. You don't have to say the vision was conjured in my rooms."

I thought for a moment.

"And when you go to see Lord Robert again you could advise him," Elizabeth said quietly. "You could tell him that he must make his peace with her for she will put her son on the throne of England, and England will be a Catholic and Spanish power forever. You could tell him to give up waiting and hoping for anything else. You could tell him that the cause is lost and he must convert, plead for clemency and set himself free. That news would mean that he could plead for his freedom. You could set him free."

I said nothing but she understood the rise of color in my cheeks. "I don't know how he can bear it," she said, her voice low, weaving a spell around me. "Poor Robert, waiting and waiting in the Tower and never knowing what the future will bring. If he knew that Mary would be on the throne for the next twenty years and her son after her, don't you think he would sue for his freedom and set himself at liberty again? His lands want him, his people need him, he's a man that needs the earth under his boots and the wind in his face. He's not a man to be mewed up like a hooded hawk for half of his life."

"If he knew for certain that the queen would have a son, would he be able to get free?"

"If a prince was born to her she would release most of them in the Tower for she would know that she was safe on the throne. We would all give up."

I hesitated no longer. "I'll do it," I said.

Elizabeth nodded calmly. "You need an inner room, don't you?" she asked John Dee.

"Lit with candles," he said. "And a mirror, and a table covered with a linen cloth. There should be more, but we'll do what we can."

Elizabeth went into her privy chamber beyond the audience room and we heard her drawing the curtains and pulling a table before the fireplace. John Dee set out his astronomical charts on her desk; when she came back he had drawn a line through the queen's date of birth and the date of birth of the king.

"Their marriage was in Libra," he said. "It is a partnership of deep love."

I looked quickly at Elizabeth's face but she was not scoffing, thinking of her triumph over her sister in her flirtation with Philip, she was too serious for her petty triumphs now.

"Will it be fruitful?" she asked.

He drew a line across the thin columns of dizzying numbers. He drew another downward, and where the lines intersected he leaned forward to read the number.

"I don't think so," he said. "But I can't be sure. There will be two pregnancies."

Elizabeth drew a little gasp like the hiss of a cat. "Two? Live births?"

John Dee consulted the number again and then another set of numbers at the foot of the scroll. "It is very obscure."

Elizabeth held herself very still, there was no outward sign of her desperation to know.

"So who will inherit the throne?" she asked tightly.

John Dee drew another line, this time horizontally, across the columns. "It should be you," he said.

"Yes, I know it should be me," Elizabeth said, reining in her impatience. "I am the heir now, if I am not overthrown. But will it be me?"

He leaned back, away from the pages. "I am sorry, Princess. It is too unclear. The love that she bears him and her desire for a child obscures everything. I have never seen a woman love a man more, I have never seen a woman long more intensely for a child. Her desire is in every symbol of the table, it is almost as if she could wish a child into being."

Elizabeth, her face like a beautiful mask, nodded. "I see. Would you be able to see more if Hannah would scry for you?"

John Dee turned to me. "Will you try, Hannah? And see what we can learn? It is G.o.d's work, remember, we will be seeking the advice of angels."

"I'll try," I said. I was not very eager to enter the darkened room, and look in the shadowy mirror. But the thought of bringing Lord Robert the news that might release him, of bringing the queen the news that might give her the greatest joy since her coming to the throne, was a great temptation for me.

I went into the room. The candle flames were bobbing either side of a golden mirror. The table was covered with a white linen cloth. As I watched, John Dee drew a five-sided star on the linen with a dark spluttery pen, and then symbols of power at each corner.

"Keep the door shut," he said to Elizabeth. "I don't know how long we will be."

"Can't I be inside?" she said. "I won't speak."

He shook his head. "Princess, you don't have to speak, you have all the presence of a queen. This has to be just Hannah and me, and the angels if they will come to us."

"But you will tell me everything," she urged him. "Not just the things you think I should know. You will tell me all that there is?"

He nodded and shut the door on her eager face and then turned back to me. He pulled a stool before the mirror and seated me gently, looking over my head to my reflection in the mirror. "You are willing?" he confirmed.

"I am," I said seriously.

"It is a great gift that you have," he said quietly. "I would give all my learning to be able to do it."

"I just wish there could be a resolution," I said. "I wish Elizabeth might have her throne and yet the queen keep it. I wish the queen might have her son and Elizabeth not be disinherited. I wish with all my heart that Lord Robert might be free and yet not plot against the queen. I wish I could be here and yet be with my father."

He smiled. "You and I are the most unhelpful of conspirators," he said gently. "For I don't mind which queen is on the throne as long as she will allow the people to follow their faith. And I want the libraries restored and learning allowed, and for this country to explore the seas and spread outward and outward to the new lands to the west."

"But how will this work bring it about?" I asked.

"We will know what the angels advise," he said quietly. "There could be no better guide for us."

John Dee stepped back from the mirror and I heard his quiet voice pray in Latin that we should do the work of G.o.d and that the angels would come to us. I said "Amen," heartfelt, and then waited.

It seemed to take a very long time. I saw the candles reflected in the mirror, the darkness around them became darker and they seemed to grow more bright. Then I saw that at the core of every candle there was a halo of darkness, and inside the halo of darkness there was the black wick of the candle and a little haze around it. I grew so fascinated with this anatomy of flame that I could not remember what I should be doing, I just stared and stared into the moving lights until I felt that I had fallen asleep, and then John Dee's hand was gentle on my shoulder and I heard his voice in my ear saying: "Drink this, child."

It was a cup of warm ale and I sat back on my stool and sipped it, conscious of a heaviness behind my eyes and weariness, as if I were ill.

"I am sorry," I said. "I must have fallen asleep."

"D'you remember nothing?" he asked curiously.

I shook my head. "I just watched the flame and then fell asleep."

"You spoke," he said quietly. "You spoke in a language I could not understand, but I think it was the language of angels. G.o.d be praised, I think you spoke to them in their language. I copied it down as best I could, I will try to translate it... if it is the key to speaking to G.o.d!" He broke off.

"Did I say nothing that you could understand now?" I asked, still bemused.

"I questioned you in English and you answered in Spanish," he said. He saw the alarm in my face. "It's all right," he said. "Whatever secrets you have, they are safe. You said nothing that could not be heard by anyone. But you told me about the queen and the princess."

"What did I say?" I demanded.

He hesitated. "Child, if the angel who guides you wanted you to know what words were spoken then he would have let you speak them in your waking state."

I nodded.

"He did not. Perhaps it is better that you do not know."

"But what am I to tell Lord Robert when I see him?" I demanded. "And what can I say to the queen about her baby?"

"You can tell Lord Robert that he will be free within two years," John Dee said firmly. "And there will be a moment when he thinks everything is lost, once more, at the very moment everything is just starting for him. He must not despair then. And you must bid the queen to hope. If any woman in the world could be granted a baby because she would be a good mother, because she loved the father, and because she desired a child, it would be this queen. But whether she will have a son in her womb as well as her heart, I cannot tell you. Whether she will have a child from this birth or not, I cannot tell you."

I got to my feet. "I shall go then," I said. "I have to take the horse back. But, Mr. Dee-"

"Yes?"

"What about the Princess Elizabeth? Will she inherit the throne as her own?"

He smiled at me. "Do you remember what we saw when we first scried?"

I nodded.

"You said that there will be a child but no child, I think that is the queen's first baby which should have been born but still has not come. You said that there will be a king, but no king - I think that is this Philip of Spain whom we call king but who is not and never will be king of England. Then you said there will be a virgin queen all-forgotten, and a queen but no virgin."

"Is that Queen Jane, who was a virgin queen and now everyone has forgotten her, and now Mary who called herself a virgin and is now a married queen?" I asked.

He nodded. "Perhaps. I think the princess's hour will come. There was more, but I cannot reveal it to you. Go now."

I nodded and went from the room. As I closed the door behind me I saw his dark absorbed face in the mirror as he leaned forward to blow out the candles and I wondered what else he had heard me say when I had been in my tranced sleep.

"What did you see?" Elizabeth demanded impatiently the moment I closed the door.

"Nothing!" I said. I could almost have laughed at the expression on her face. "You will have to ask Mr. Dee. I saw nothing, it was just like falling asleep."

"But did you speak, or did he see anything?"

"Princess, I cannot tell," I said, moving toward the door and pausing only to drop her a little bow. "I have to take my horse back to the stable or they will miss her, and start to look for me."

Elizabeth nodded my dismissal and just as I was about to open the door there was a knock on it from the outside, in the same rhythm that Kat Ashley had used earlier. In a moment Kat was at the door and had opened it. A man swung into the room and she shut the door smartly behind him. I shrank back as I recognized Sir William Pickering, Elizabeth's friend of old, and fellow-conspirator from the time of the Wyatt rebellion. I had not even known that Sir William was forgiven and back at court - then I realized that he was probably neither forgiven, nor allowed at court. This was a secret visit.

"My lady, I must go," I said firmly.

Kat Ashley stopped me. "You will be asked to take some books to Mr. Dee. He will have some papers for you to take to Sir William at a house I will tell you," she said. "Take a look at him now so that he remembers you again. Sir William, this is the queen's fool, she will bring you the papers you need."

If it had not come from Kat Ashley, I might not have remembered Lord Robert's warning; but my lord had been very clear with me, and his words confirmed my own sense of terror at whatever they were brewing here.

"I am sorry," I said simply to Kat Ashley, avoiding even looking at Sir William, and wishing that he had never seen me. "But my Lord Robert told me to take no messages for anyone. It was his order. I was to tell you about the ribbons and to run no errands after that. You must excuse me, Princess, sir, Mrs. Ashley, I cannot a.s.sist you."

I went quickly to the door and let myself out before they could protest. When I was safely away and down the corridor I drew breath and realized then that my heart was pounding as if I had run from some danger. When I saw that the door stayed shut and I heard the quiet shooting of the well-oiled bolt and the thud of Kat Ashley's bottom on the wooden panels, I knew that there was danger there indeed.

It was June and Queen Mary's baby was more than a month overdue, a time when anyone might start to worry; and the petals falling from the hawthorn in the hedgerows blew across the roads like snow. The meadows were rich with flowers, their perfume heady in the warm air. Still we lingered at Hampton Court, though usually the royal court would have moved on by now to another palace. We waited though the roses came into bloom in the gardens, and every bird in England had a baby in the nest but the queen.

The king went around with a face like thunder, exposed to sharp wit in the English court and to danger in the English countryside. He had guards posted night and day on the roads to the palace, and soldiers at every pier on the river. It was thought that if the queen died in childbirth there would be a thousand men at the gate of the palace to tear the Spanish apart. The only thing that could keep him safe then would be the goodwill of the new queen, Elizabeth. No wonder the princess swished around the court in her dark gown as if she were a black cat, the favored resident of a dairy, overfed on cream.

The Spanish n.o.blemen of the king's court grew more irritable, as if their own manhood had been impugned by the slowness of this baby. They were frightened of the ill will of the people of England. They were a small band under siege with no hope of relief. Only the arrival of the baby would have guaranteed their safety, and the baby was dangerously late in coming.

The ladies in the queen's train became sulky; they felt as if they were being made to look like fools, sitting around with little pieces of sewing in their hands, making napkins and bibs and gowns for a baby that did not come. The younger girls, who had been hoping for a merry spring at court with May b.a.l.l.s and picnics and masques and hunting, begrudged sitting with the queen in the stuffiness of a darkened room while she prayed for long hours in silence. They emerged from her confinement chamber with faces like spoiled children to say that nothing had happened again today, all day; and the queen seemed no nearer to her time than when she had entered her confinement two months ago.

Only Elizabeth seemed unaffected by the anxious atmosphere of the palace as she walked briskly around the gardens with her long stride, her copper hair flying behind her, a book in her hands. No one walked with her, no one publicly befriended her, no one risked being closely identified with this most problematic princess, but everyone was more aware than ever that as matters now stood, she was the heir to the throne. The birth of a son, would mean that Elizabeth was again unwanted, a threat to everyone's peace. But while there was no son, then she was the next queen. And whether she was the next monarch, or whether she was an unwanted princess, the king could not take his eyes off her.

At dinner every night, King Philip bowed his head to her before he closed his eyes for grace, in the morning he smiled at her and wished her good day. Sometimes, when there was dancing, she took to the floor with the young ladies of the court, and he sat back in his chair and watched her, his eyes veiled, his face revealing nothing of his thoughts. She never returned his look directly these days, she shot him a cool dark gaze from under lowered eyelids and moved carefully in the paces of the dance, her neck poised, her slim waist shifting from side to side, in time to the music. When she curtsied toward the empty throne of her sister at the end of the dance she kept her face down but her smile was one of absolute triumph. Elizabeth knew that Philip could not take his eyes from her, however guarded his expression. She knew that Mary, tired, despairing of her son, was hardly a rival worth vanquishing; but Elizabeth's young glad pride leaped up to the challenge of humiliating her older sister by filling her brother-in-law with baffled desire.

I was going to my dinner in the great hall on a cool evening in the first days of June when I felt a touch on my hand. It was a little pageboy, servant to Sir William Pickering, and I threw a quick glance up the stairway to see who else might have seen him before I bent my head to his whisper.