In Honor Bound by DeAnna Julie Dodson Page B

voice gentle.
    Desperate, Philip turned to the Lord High Chamberlain. "Dunois, this is madness. How can they say this? Can you not see that this is Margaret's doing?"
    Dunois only shook his head sadly and turned back to the king. "I grieve with you, Your Majesty."
    "What proof?!" Philip cried, wondering if he were indeed mad or bewitched, or if the entire court were. "What have I done, I beseech you my lords tell me, that has convinced you of this?"
    "If you are your own master, as you say, then renounce this heresy this woman has led you into."
    Philip looked at Katherine. Her eyes pled with him and for a moment he wavered, then she dropped her head and shook it, a slow decisive gesture. Philip looked up hopelessly.
    "I cannot."
    Every face in the court was turned to him, every expression grieved and sympathetic.
    "Come away, my lord," Dunois suggested. "You should not be here now. It will only pain you to–"
    Philip shoved him aside and went to his father. "You'll not do this to her. Did you think to bring her here in the night and make away with her without my knowing? You'll not do this to her. You'll not do this to me."
    Robert was careful to keep his voice gentle. "Please, son, go with Dunois. Once you have been freed from her, you will understand why it must be so."
    "I shall never understand."
    Robert stood and tried to calm him. "Go with Dunois. Let us do what must be done."
    With a speed born of desperation, Philip threw his father aside and grabbed the girl's arm. He pulled her towards the door, but he was not halfway there before the king’s guard overpowered him.
    "Philip!" she shrieked as she was dragged away from him. "Philip, no!"
    "Kate! Do not touch her!" Philip's struggles became more violent, wild. "Let me go!"
    "Take him to the north tower," Robert commanded over his protests. "We need see no more of this to prove the witch guilty, and the sooner my son is away from her the better."
    "Philip! Philip, please!" the girl cried. "Speak them fair! Your ravings condemn me!"
    Abruptly, Philip stopped his struggling and only the heaving in his chest remained to testify to his earlier outburst. "I beg your pardon, Your Majesty, my lord chief justice, my lords all," he said with a controlled expression and a still-trembling voice, "but I cannot let such a terrible punishment be met out to the innocent. Mistress Fletcher is–"
    "See how he calms at her command," the lord chief justice said in an awed half-whisper, crossing himself, and the king was quick to press his sudden advantage.
    "Need you further proof?" he said into the court's dead silence, then he signaled the guard. "Do as I have bidden you."
    "Please, Philip," Katherine cried, "tell them. Tell them!"
    "I cannot. If you are to have any hope of mercy, I cannot." Philip turned desperate eyes to his father. "Please." Then he felt the strong hands on him tighten as he was pulled towards the door. "No, Your Majesty. My lord. Father! Please do not do this! Please! Kate! Kate, forgive me!"
    Suddenly her arms were around his neck, her lips on his. Moving to prevent her, the guards were forced to loosen their grasp on him and that was enough to allow him to hold her close one last time.
    "Kate, Kate," he sobbed.
    "Part them!" the king barked, and one of the guards pulled Katherine from Philip's arms. Philip lunged at him, but could not break his captors' hold.
    "Father," he pled again, the word choked, hardly intelligible. "I beg you, oh God, Father, on my knees. Don't. You take my life in taking hers."
    He tried to kneel, to give force to his plea, but he was denied even that.
    "The witch's power over him is strong," the justice said gravely. "Speak true, witch! Have you given him some token to bind him to you? Or taken aught of his?"
    The girl clutched her hands against her breast.
    "Nothing in sorcery, my lord."
    "See. She lies again." The justice pulled her hands away and seized the treasure she had sought to conceal against her heart. "Do you know this