Philippa Gregory's Tudor Court 6-Book Boxed Set by Philippa Gregory Page A

from people all along the way has been very kind.”
    “Look, here’s your new horse,” Harry interrupted, as the groom led a beautiful black mare forwards. “You’ll be used to good horses, of course. D’you have Barbary horses all the time?”
    “My mother insists on them for the cavalry,” she said.
    “Oh,” he breathed. “Because they are so fast?”
    “They can be trained as fighting horses,” she said, going forwards and holding out her hand, palm upwards, for the mare to sniff at and nibble at her fingers with a soft, gentle mouth.
    “Fighting horses?” he pursued.
    “The Saracens have horses which can fight as their masters do, and the Barbary horses can be trained to do it too,” she said. “They rear up and strike down a soldier with their front hooves, and they will kick out behind, too. The Turks have horses that will pick up a sword from the ground and hand it back to the rider. My mother says that one good horse is worth ten men in battle.”
    “I should so like to have a horse like that,” Harry said longingly. “I wonder how I should ever get one?”
    He paused, but she did not rise to the bait. “If only someone would give me a horse like that, I could learn how to ride it,” he said transparently. “Perhaps for my birthday, or perhaps next week, since it is not me getting married, and I am not getting any wedding gifts. Since I am quite left out, and quite neglected.”
    “Perhaps,” said Catalina, who had once seen her own brother get his way with exactly the same wheedling.
    “I should be trained to ride properly,” he said. “Father has promised that though I am to go into the church I shall be allowed to ride at the quintain. But My Lady the King’s Mother says I may not joust. And it’s really unfair. I should be allowed to joust. If I had a proper horse, I could joust. I am sure I would beat everyone.”
    “I am sure you would,” she said.
    “Well, shall we go?” he asked, seeing that she would not give him a horse for asking.
    “I cannot ride. I do not have my riding clothes unpacked.”
    He hesitated. “Can’t you just go in that?”
    Catalina laughed. “This is velvet and silk. I can’t ride in it. And besides, I can’t gallop around England looking like a mummer.”
    “Oh,” he said. “Well, shall you go in your litter, then? Won’t it make us very slow?”
    “I am sorry for that, but I am ordered to travel in a litter,” she said. “With the curtains drawn. I can’t think that even your father would want me to charge around the country with my skirts tucked up.”
    “Of course the princess cannot ride today,” the Duke of Buckingham ruled. “As I told you. She has to go in her litter.”
    Harry shrugged. “Well, I didn’t know. Nobody told me what you were going to wear. Can I go ahead, then? My horses will be so much faster than the mules.”
    “You can ride ahead but not out of sight,” Catalina decided. “Since you are supposed to be escorting me, you should be with me.”
    “As I said,” the Duke of Buckingham observed quietly and exchanged a little smile with the princess.
    “I’ll wait at every crossroads,” Harry promised. “I am escorting you, remember. And on your wedding day I shall be escorting you again. I have a white suit with gold slashing.”
    “How handsome you will look,” she said, and saw him flush with pleasure.
    “Oh, I don’t know . . .”
    “I am sure everyone will remark what a handsome boy you are,” she said, as he looked pleased.
    “Everyone always cheers most loudly for me,” he confided. “And I like to know that the people love me. Father says that the only way to keep a throne is to be beloved by the people. That was King Richard’s mistake, Father says.”
    “My mother says that the way to keep the throne is to do God’s work.”
    “Oh,” he said, clearly unimpressed. “Well, different countries, I suppose.”
    “So we shall travel together,” she said. “I will tell my people that we