House Of Shadows: Discover the thrilling untold story of the Winter Queen

There was a distant ringing sound in Holly’s ears. She struggled awake to find the room full of daylight. Her body felt relaxed for the first time in days and her mind was as clear and sharp as a cut in a piece of glass. She could remember every detail of the night. They hadn’t slept much. They hadn’t talked at all.

She turned over. Mark lay beside her, curled on his side, sleeping peacefully. The lines of his face were softened. Something pierced Holly’s detachment and made her breath catch in her throat. She looked at him for a moment, then got out of bed and tiptoed over to the wardrobe. She almost tripped over the clothes piled on the floor. Turning the key in the door she took out an old paisley robe of Ben’s she had borrowed the last time she had come down.

Light was streaming into the long living room and her phone was full of messages. She ignored them. It was the doorbell that was ringing, on and on. Bonnie was agitated, waiting by the door, tail waving. All Holly could think was that if Ben had timed his arrival back now it would be difficult to work out which of them had the more explaining to do.

She opened the door and found Fran on the step, shivering inside her jacket. It was another sunny morning but they were standing in the shade of the building and the shadows were cold.

‘Holly!’ Fran’s eyes were puzzled, her voice full of concern. ‘Thank goodness! I thought you’d disappeared too. Are you ill or something? I heard about Ben—’

‘You already know?’ Holly blinked in shock.

‘The whole village knows,’ Fran said. ‘You can’t keep secrets around here.’ She bit her lip. ‘Look, I’m sorry if I caused a problem for you but when I couldn’t get you last night I called your grandparents. I thought perhaps you might have gone over to Oxford. Oh, and I rang Guy as well. What the hell happened there? He told me you had broken your engagement—’

Normally Holly could cope with Fran’s ramblings but this morning her head hurt. ‘You rang Gran?’ She felt a sick, swooping sensation in her chest. She could not imagine how Hester and John had felt to hear that Ben had vanished and that Fran couldn’t get hold of Holly either. No wonder she had hundreds of messages on her phone. She was surprised they weren’t there, hammering on the door.

Fran’s gaze dropped to her note, still resting on the mat at the bottom of the steps. She frowned. ‘Didn’t you see my message? We’ve been worried about you.’

Holly drew her robe more closely about her throat. ‘I’m sorry. I’ll ring Gran straight away and let her know I’m OK.’

Fran was watching her as though she knew there was something wrong but could not quite work it out. ‘Are you feeling ill? Has it all been too much for you? I’m so, so sorry about Ben. Has there been no word? I just don’t understand it. It’s not like him.’

There was a sound upstairs. Fran started to say something else but Holly spoke quickly.

‘I’d better go and get dressed. I’m really sorry, Fran. I’m feeling a bit weird about it all to be honest. I’ll come and seem you later.’

Fran huddled deeper in her jacket. ‘You poor thing! No wonder you haven’t got up yet. Look, do you want me to come in and make you a cup of coffee? We could talk—’

There was another sound from upstairs, too loud to ignore. Fran frowned. ‘Holly, is somebody here already? What’s going on?’

Holly shivered. ‘Sorry, Fran, it’s not really convenient to talk right now.’

‘Has Ben come back?’ Fran demanded.

‘No,’ Holly said.

‘Then did Guy come down after all? Because last night he said—’

‘No,’ Holly said again.

She saw the moment that the penny dropped in Fran’s mind, the widening of her eyes, the look of comical shock on her face. Fran clapped a hand to her mouth. Her gaze roved over Holly’s tumbled hair, her bare feet. ‘Oh Holly,’ she said, ‘What have you done – Oh my God, you haven’t … Say you haven’t. What’s happened to you? You never do things like that!’

Holly caught her arm urgently. ‘I can’t talk now. Please, Fran, it’s a bit complicated.’

Fran looked torn between stunned horror and concern. ‘Holly, you’re in shock. I’ve read about this. When people go missing their relatives can suffer from something called suspended grief, not knowing whether someone is dead or not—’

‘Thanks, Fran,’ Holly said. Despite herself she could feel a flicker of a smile starting and some sense of normality returning. Fran’s monumental lack of tact had always been cheering rather than anything else. ‘I’ll talk to you later,’ she said. ‘Really, I will. I’ve got things to sort out.’

‘I can imagine,’ Fran said dryly. Then she looked past Holly’s shoulder. Holly saw her expression freeze before Fran rearranged her face into ultra-casual indifference.

‘Mark,’ she said brightly. ‘Hi. How are you?’

Holly spun around. Mark, fully dressed, was standing in the doorway. He nodded to Fran.

‘Hi, Fran.’

Holly felt her stomach dip as though she were on a roller coaster. The previous day she hadn’t spared a single thought for who Mark was or what he was doing at Ashdown. Now, though, she realised that far from being a random tourist who would disappear in the morning, he must live there and would be going precisely nowhere. Her stomach tightened and panic fluttered in her throat.

‘You’ve heard about Ben?’ Fran had waited for Holly to speak and then, when she hadn’t, had rushed in to fill the awkward silence as best she could.

‘Just now,’ Mark said. His gaze was on Holly’s face, dark and inscrutable. ‘What happened?’

‘He’s missing,’ Holly said. ‘He vanished a couple of nights ago.’ It felt ridiculous, surreal, to be standing here like this politely discussing her brother’s disappearance when she had neglected to mention it before.

‘Holly didn’t tell you—’ Fran began, then saw the expression on Holly’s face and gulped. ‘Well, anyway, I’d better …’ She waved her hands about in mute confusion. ‘I’ll be at home later so give me a ring, Holly … Or call round. Whatever.’ She was edging away down the path as she spoke. ‘Take care.’

She hurried off towards the gate and Holly went back inside. Mark stepped back to allow her to pass him. She could feel his gaze on her face and she felt the heat burn beneath her skin. Suddenly the paisley robe felt far too flimsy and she felt far too vulnerable.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said quickly, before Mark had the chance to say anything and the situation became even more excruciating. ‘I should have told you, but …’ She stopped. She had no excuses. She couldn’t even connect with how she had felt the day before, how isolated, how desperate she had been not to be alone.

‘That’s OK,’ Mark said. His tone was level but she had an unnerving conviction that he was angry. ‘I knew you were upset, I just didn’t realise—’ He ran a hand through his hair. ‘I’m sorry to hear about Ben,’ he added. ‘Are the police looking for him?’

‘No,’ Holly said. ‘They think he’s just gone off somewhere and that he’ll turn up.’ Her eyes were burning and it felt as though something sharp was wedged in her throat. She could not believe how right everything had felt whilst she had been with Mark and how wrong it all felt again now. That was the trouble with forgetting, she thought. It didn’t last long before everything crowded back in worse than before. She should have realised; realised she couldn’t lose herself, realised she couldn’t escape her fears about Ben.

‘I wouldn’t want you to think …’ She stopped. Mark waited. She felt a spurt of anger that he wasn’t making it easy for her.

‘I didn’t mean to use you,’ she said. ‘I don’t usually do this sort of thing.’

Mark shrugged. ‘I heard what Fran said.’ He picked up his jacket off the back of the sofa. ‘Just for the record, neither do I. Except that we both did.’

There was another sharp silence then Mark sighed.

‘I don’t want to leave you if you’re upset,’ he said. ‘Holly, please, talk to me.’

The look in his eyes was gentle and it made Holly feel more angry. She remembered his tenderness the previous night and how she had driven it out with need. She didn’t want it now, either. She couldn’t deal with it.

‘I’m fine,’ she said. She drew the robe tight about her throat. ‘Thanks.’

‘Right,’ Mark said. He reached for the latch pausing for a second as he was about to open the door. ‘It might help to know,’ he said, ‘who you are …’

‘Oh!’ Holly jumped, the colour flooding her face again. ‘Holly Ansell. Ben’s sister.’

‘And who is Guy?’

Holly hesitated a second. ‘Guy is … was … my fiancé.’

She saw Mark’s expression harden. ‘Okay. I get it. Well, I’ll go then.’

Holly didn’t try to stop him. She heard the door slam behind him and felt the silence of the house press in on her. She fumbled on the dresser for her phone. She needed to ring her grandmother. Guilt swamped her. Everything else could wait. She didn’t need to think about it now.

She pressed the button to call her grandparents’ number. Hester answered on the second ring.

‘Gran,’ Holly said. ‘I’m so sorry not to have called before—’ And submitted quietly to her grandmother’s scolding, hearing the fear beneath her words of reproach.

Chapter 5

Wassenaer Hof, The Hague, February 1632

The palace was in chaos. Light spilled across the cobbles, torches flared, men hurrying, women calling with an edge of panic to their voices. As William Craven rode through the arched gateway into the courtyard, Dr Rumph, the Queen’s chief physician, loomed up out of the dark and caught his reins, causing the horse to shy. Cursing, Craven brought it under control and Rumph stepped back, his long face growing even longer.

‘Your pardon.’ He spoke stiffly.

‘It’s no matter,’ Craven said. He jumped down and handed the reins over to a groom. It had been a long ride from Frederick’s campaign lodgings at Hanau and he had letters for the Queen but what he wanted most was a meal and some hot water. Judging by the disquiet in Rumph’s face, however, he seemed destined to have neither.

‘What can I do for you, doctor?’ he said.

‘We have lost the Queen!’ Rumph said.

For one shocking moment Craven thought Rumph meant that Elizabeth was dead. It would not be so surprising. The winter had been notably wet and mild, encouraging all manner of fevers, and the Queen had been taken with an ague that had confined her to her bed for several weeks. But then he realised what the doctor meant. The chaos, the men milling around, the air of panicked confusion …

‘Her Majesty has disappeared?’ he said.

‘That is what I’m telling you,’ Rumph snapped.

‘You have searched the palace?’

‘Of course.’ Rumph fell into step beside him, his long black robe flapping agitatedly as he walked. ‘She was last seen in her chamber several hours ago. Her ladies say she was in a melancholy frame of mind. We were afraid …’ He hesitated. No one would articulate it but they feared that the Queen, borne down by fear and loneliness whilst her husband was on campaign, might commit the heinous sin of taking her own life.

‘Nonsense,’ Craven said. It was easy in such a febrile atmosphere to imagine the worst. Rumour spread panic like a contagion. Yet he knew that the Queen would never abandon her cause.

He had left The Hague with Frederick six weeks before and they had made slow progress towards a meeting with the Swedish King Gustavus Adolphus at Hochst. During that time Craven had taken a number of letters back and forth between the king and his wife. It had not taken him long to see which of them had the greater heart, spirit and stomach for the fight. Frederick would always be a broken reed. Elizabeth would always be the stronger.

‘Have you searched the gardens?’ he said.

‘Yes.’ Rumph sounded offended to be asked so obvious a question.

‘Stables? Outbuildings?’

Rumph’s look said quite clearly what he thought of the idea of the Queen of Bohemia hiding in an outbuilding.

‘Our Lord took refuge in a stable,’ Craven said mildly, and was rewarded with a glare.

‘You mock the scriptures, my lord?’

‘Of course not,’ Craven said. ‘What about the water tower? Have you looked there?’

There was a pause, a minute hesitation. Craven glanced at the physician. Rumph knew full well what ceremonies had been held in the water tower and disapproved of them. Or perhaps, Craven thought, he was superstitious, scared. Physicians sometimes were. Rumph would not like to think that the Queen would dabble in dangerous occult practices. If it came to it, Craven felt much the same himself, although for different reasons. He deplored the use of magic.

‘The tower is locked,’ the physician said.

‘But the queen would have access to a key.’

Silence.

‘We have not looked there,’ Rumph admitted.

‘Then let us waste no more time.’

By the time they had crossed the garden to the tower they had gained a motley retinue; pages with lanterns, ladies holding up their skirts in order not to dirty them on the gravel, gentlemen with hunting dogs. Craven put his hand to the door of the tower and it swung open silently. He took a torch from one of the servants.

‘I’ll go down alone,’ he said.

The faces around him swam in the flare of light; avid, speculative, malicious. Craven felt a wave of disgust. God protect Her Majesty from such ghoulish curiosity. It was no wonder she sought solitude, surrounded every moment by such a crowd.

Rumph blocked his way. ‘It would not be seemly for you to be alone with the Queen, my lord.’

‘Forgive me, doctor, but His Majesty the King insists no layman should enter the tower that holds the secrets of the Order of the Rosy Cross,’ Craven said, an edge of steel to his tone now. ‘Does anyone wish to gainsay him?’ He let the question hang.

It was enough. A ripple of disquiet went through the crowd like wind through corn. No one wanted to incur the wrath of the Knights of the Rosy Cross. Only Rumph’s face bore indecision.

‘I must insist—’

‘Be assured, sir—’ Craven laid a hand lightly on his arm, ‘that I will call for you at once should Her Majesty be in need of medical assistance.’

He started down the stone stair. There was absolute silence below and darkness that fell about him like a shroud. The air was still and musty. It made him want to sneeze. He could almost feel the layers of dust tightening his chest. This was an unwholesome place. Even if a man did not believe in necromancy and its secrets it was impossible not to feel a shudder of repulsion.

‘Your Majesty!’ His voice sounded loud, met by nothing but the muffling darkness. He reached the bottom of the stairs and carefully opened the door into the water chamber.

There were no knights in black and gold tonight. At first Craven thought the room was completely empty and he felt a rush of relief mingled with respect for Elizabeth that she should not cheapen herself with foolish superstition. Then he saw the torchlight falling on the quiet waters of the pool in banners of orange and black. It glanced off the arched spans of the roof and the tall pillars of stone. Shadows rippled, then one of them formed into a figure, small, slight, kneeling at the side of the pool.

Craven’s heart jumped. He almost dropped the lantern in his haste to reach her side. ‘Your Majesty!’

She made no response, no movement.

‘Madam!’ He dropped down on one knee beside her. He had never thought her a small woman before, yet she seemed as insubstantial as air tonight, a ghost in a white gown, huddled over the water as she wove her spell.

He saw it then, the pearl shimmering on a ledge at the edge of the pool. He felt a deep visceral coldness, as though the marrow were freezing in his bones. It was not fear he felt but anger. Frederick was weak and needed the magic of soothsaying to prop him up. He was its puppet. But Elizabeth should have been too strong to require the comfort of such illusions.

He snatched the pearl from the water and threw it aside. He heard the clatter as it bounced off the stone pillar and wondered if it was lost. He hoped so.

Elizabeth jumped to her feet and spun to confront him. ‘You forget yourself, Craven.’ Her voice cracked like a whip. Her skirts were soaked. Water gleamed on her bare arms. She looked like a creature of magic herself, all light and fire, her hair flowing loose about her shoulders. He had never seen her like this, never expected to see her like this.

‘Who are you to interrupt the mysteries of the Knights of the Rosy Cross?’ Elizabeth demanded.

‘One who would not see you bend to superstition,’ Craven said grimly, adding a perfunctory ‘madam.’ It sounded more derisive than he had intended and he saw her expression harden. For a moment he thought she might strike him.

‘Be careful that you do not trip over your own self-importance,’ Elizabeth snapped. ‘Why should I care about your judgement, milord? You have no education. You are no more than a soldier. I do not need your permission or your approval for what I do.’

‘All men’s opinions matter when a kingdom is at stake,’ Craven said. ‘Do you want the world to think that you cast spells like a witch because you do not believe you will regain your patrimony any other way?’ He straightened up. A glimmer of iridescence caught his eye; in the corner of the chamber the pearl gleamed mockingly. Elizabeth made a rush for it but Craven was before her, grabbing it, holding it out of her reach. As soon as he touched it all colour seemed to leach from it. It looked a dull grey, sulky and malevolent. It was a toy, a chimera. He detested it.

He raised his gaze to Elizabeth’s face. ‘If you call on the pearl they will think you weak,’ he said softly. ‘They will dismiss you as a tool in the hands of the magicians. Or they will seek to burn you for witchcraft.’

Shock flared in her eyes. He had spoken harshly on purpose because he wanted her to understand. The Holy Roman Emperor and his allies would use every means available to discredit her. She was putting herself in danger and suddenly he was fearful for her.

He could feel the tension wrapping about them, thick as cobwebs, and then Elizabeth gave a sigh and her shoulders slumped. She looked so young and vulnerable all of a sudden, fragile in the white gown. The torchlight cast its slanting shade across her cheek and deepened the warm curve of her mouth. Her blue eyes were shadowed and dark. In that instant Craven could see why hard-headed soldiers and romantic fools alike dedicated themselves and their swords to her service. She was both gallant and beautiful.

Craven remembered Ralph Hopton telling him once of how he had carried the pregnant Queen ahead of him on his horse during the retreat from Prague after the Battle of White Mountain, of how she had ridden mile after mile without complaint whilst her husband had shed bitter tears over the loss of his kingdom. Such courage commanded men’s respect as well as their love.

‘Don’t you see – I need certainty?’ He could hear the plea for reassurance beneath Elizabeth’s defiant words. ‘I need to know if Frederick will win,’ she said. ‘I need to know if our lands will be restored or whether …’ She let the words trail away before she betrayed herself too far.

‘You will not find truth in magic, only deception.’ Impatience made him short. Frederick would not win. Craven needed no soothsaying to tell him that. He wanted to be honest with her, to state the facts baldly:

‘Your husband is no soldier and men will die because of him.’

But that was needlessly cruel, and in making her face up to her lack of belief in her husband he would commit an unforgivable act of treachery. Besides, he had chosen his loyalty. He had pledged himself to Frederick’s cause. The least he could do was honour that pledge until he was released from it.

‘Frederick took the mirror with him.’ She spoke softly so that Craven had to draw nearer to hear her words. A fold of her gown brushed his leg. For a moment he smelled the scent of the orange flower perfume she wore. She glanced up at him, almost shy. ‘We agreed; he would have the mirror and I the pearl. Two halves of a whole.’ Her voice dropped still further. ‘They do not work so well apart. The pearl would not reveal itself tonight without the mirror as its foil.’

Craven knew the Winter King had taken the mirror. Barely a day passed without him peering into its depths for some pointer to his future fortunes. It was pitiful. He clenched his fists and, in doing so, realised that he still held the pearl. He resisted the urge to throw it into the pool and let the waters of the Bosbeek wash it away.

There were sounds from above now, footsteps on the stone stairs and the flaring of torches. Clearly Rumph had decided he had been absent long enough and had come to find out what was happening.

‘They are looking for me.’ He saw Elizabeth straighten. She reached for her cloak, smothering the white gown in darkness. Her tone had changed. The doubt, the desolation had gone. She had shown her weakness to him but now she was a queen again.

Her gaze fixed on him, formal now. ‘I did not ask what you were doing here, Lord Craven. I suppose you are come from Hanau with letters from His Majesty?’

‘I am.’ He was put neatly back in his place, a messenger boy.

‘Then present them to me in an hour in the Great Chamber.’

She held out her hand for the jewel.

Craven looked at it again. It was instinctive, that glance downwards. He expected to see nothing but a big fat pearl that should have been locked away, or reduced to what it truly was; no more than an insignificant part of a royal collection of jewels. Yet in that second, as he stared at it, the pearl was transformed. It glowed, radiating a soft light that should have been warm and yet felt as cold as the winter sea. The surface shifted like clouds covering the moon and then he saw. A bedchamber cloaked in death, the royal standard of the lion rampant hanging limp and still. He could feel the heat of the room and smell the stench of sickness. He could hear the voices of the attendants and the murmurings of a priest.

‘Craven?’ Elizabeth’s voice called him back. He shuddered, a cold sweat breaking out on his brow. The pearl burned his palm. He handed it gently to her.

‘What did you see?’ she asked. As she took it from him their fingers touched.

‘I saw nothing,’ Craven lied. ‘Nothing at all.’

Chapter 6

When Holly reached the Ashmolean Museum that evening she found huge posters flanking the entrance, proclaiming the forthcoming exhibition of artefacts from the Court of Elizabeth Stuart, the Winter Queen. It was, the poster proclaimed, an extraordinary showcase for an outstanding collection of the finest seventeenth-century glass, china, and portraiture.

The curator on duty at the door was reluctant to let Holly in until she mentioned her name and that she was meeting Mr Shurmer, whereupon he stood back with what was almost a bow and directed her to the second floor. The door of the lecture room stood wide; Holly could see the detritus of canapés and empty wine glasses strewn about. The guests were still chatting, however, and the roar of conversation was like a wall of noise.

She didn’t want to go in, to engage in conversation, to try to find Espen Shurmer in the crowd. Instead she turned away and immediately felt the shock of quietness fall about her. The roar of voices faded. There was nothing but the faint tap of her footsteps and beyond the floor to ceiling windows at the end of the corridor, the tumble of Oxford roofs, spires and towers and the glitter of the city lights.