A beating heart

Chapter 25

„We can't keep this up much longer." he was leaning against her bedroom wall.

She was pretty certain she knew what he was talking about but she kept silent all the same. Anne was in the other room with the nurse and she found her fingers oddly empty and unoccupied. She just stood there, next to the tall window, patiently waiting for him to continue.

„He's gaining leverage and we cannot let him take Cathrine." his voice was dripping with frustration and he half turned to face her.

She swallowed and slowly nodded. The Medici woman could not be allowed to go free, she knew that. Cathrine new of Bash's actions, his sins against his father and country. If word got out, it would topple everything and France could not be allowed to bee seen as weak right now.

„She knows too much, Mary." he forced her attention back to him.

She flinched ever so slightly at the mention of her name. It was all so absurd, how they talked like strangers, incapable of a true conversation. They had been best friends once, what had happened? Of course she knew the answer but didn't want to admit it.

He was looking at her so intently as if he expect her to say something. Her mind was reeling but she truly didn't know what he wanted to hear.

„What do we do?" she already feared his answer.

„I need your help, my darling." he took three steps towards her.

She swallowed hard, yet the forming lump in her throat remained. Whatever he was about to ask of her, she was sure she wouldn't like it. In her heart she knew where this conversation was going.

„You have to talk to him." he simply got straight to it and his directness baffled her.

Instinctively, she took a step back, feeling her shoulders collide with the wall behind her.

„No" was all she could bring herself to answer.

Her heart was thumping in her chest and she could sense the usual anxiety set in once more.

„Listen to me. I know you don't want to do this, but you must, Mary. We can't let him win." she could see him advert his eyes as to hide the pain behind the cool green.

„No" she couldn't do it.

„Mary, believe me, I like this no more than you. But you and I both know that you're the real reason he's still here." he wrang his hands and his mouth formed a thin line „You're the only person he will listen too. If you tell him to go, he will."

She knew he was right. Of course he was, no matter how she felt towards him at this time and how much she detested his pitiful pleas for her to talk to him, he was no stupid man. She didn't know if the two brothers had spoken at all since Francis' return and if they had, she could only guess to the content of their conversation. But surely, even without talking to his brother, Bash must have by now realized that Francis had made her his goal.

He had never been to open and public in his advances, as he had always seemed to have planned them out carefully. The encounter on the south lawn, the roses in her room, even when he had cried at her bedside, he knew just too well which strings he had to pull to make her heart anxious. He was a smart man, cunning even, a quality which she had much admired and which now came back to haunt her. At some point, if she wasn't careful and prepared for another attack, he would get her. And once he would open her heart, her mouth would follow, telling of truths better kept hidden.

But Bash knew, he had been so angry when she had moved from their chambers, so desperate for her to return. And the pain in his eyes, when he had realized that Francis was still the one in her heart, had cracked hers. Besides her ladies, Cathrine and Nostradamus of course, he was the one person that knew the truth, or as much of it as she had allowed herself to share. Bash was aware of the prophecy and it's catastrophic implications. He understood just too well why Mary had done what she had and why. But that also meant that he knew what Francis didn't. Why she had left him all so suddenly.