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that was worth?”
    I gawped at the ruined goblet in horror. “What will happen to me?”
    Ware turned back to me, every line of his body agitated. “You won’t be flogged, no matter how much you deserve it. I reprimand you harshly for your own good. It is vital for this enterprise that you charm the queen, and I have only days to teach you what the families of courtiers spend years drumming into their children’s heads.” Ware paced away. “His Grace is demanding the impossible of me. But when has he ever done anything different?”
    Seeking some brief respite from frustration, Ware delivered me to the man charged with fashioning the costume I was to wear when I was presented to the queen. I gave myself over to a new torment.
    My ears rang from the blows of hammer on iron as the armorer fitted the helmet and breastplate. Once the smith released me from the hot forge, the torture grew even grimmer. Tailors trussed me up in whalebone-stiffened doublets and boots that chafed. When they finished, Ware greeted me with a lump of cream-colored doeskin with sausage-shaped swells front and back and straps and buckles that hung about the middle. “It is a gift from the duke,” he said just as I noticed the child-size stirrups. “The king and queen spend hours upon horseback when hunting. You will have to ride with them.”
    “It is a lovely saddle,” I said. “But I prefer my own feet.”
    “On a horse, you will be swift as other men,” Ware said.
    “I’m sure it will be gratifying for the handful of minutes before the beast tramples me to death.”
    Ware almost smiled. “This is no ordinary saddle. Place your hand here.” He indicated what I assumed must be the front of the saddle. The doeskin had been pleated into diamond shapes fastened with metal studs. I did as he told me.
    “There is a slit where you will be able to conceal messages. Can you find it?”
    I felt wadded wool padding, then wiggled my fingers and was surprised when they slipped into a natural hollow formed by the saddle frame.
    “Even if you are searched, it is unlikely anyone would think to dismantle your saddle. I had the slit placed in front, so that if anyone notices you fiddling about there, they will believe you are adjusting your prick.”
    The idea of riding a horse was terrifying enough. But to fumble with a missive that might condemn me while the animal was prancing around was unthinkable. “What if I drop the message?”
    “If you are fortunate, I will kill you quickly. A necessity to spare you torture and to keep you from betraying His Grace. If I do not reach you first, you will suffer the rack and a traitor’s death. I suggest that you practice concealing the messages so neither of those possibilities come to pass.”
    I nodded, my throat dry.
    He escorted me to the duke’s stable yard and left me in the charge of the riding master who instructed His Grace’s children. A groom cinched the new saddle upon a horse whose nostrils looked like wet flame. The fellow plopped me astride the animal and strapped my legs into place with leather bands.
    “Cling to the beast with your knees,” the riding master ordered. But how was I to accomplish this with my legs sticking straight out on either side like fire pokers?
    Riding was difficult enough. But when I tried to get off of that mountain of equine muscle, only a groom stood between me and a horse eager to take vengeance for times my riding master had insisted I apply the crop. On my fifth day of lessons, I dragged my leg across the horse’s back, depending on the groom to catch me beneath the armpits to slow my drop to the ground. But just as I slid past the point of no return, the steadying hands vanished, and I was falling into a maze of stamping hooves.
    I struck the ground so hard, I couldn’t breathe as I tried to scramble out from under the horse.
    I heard an angry shout.”You fool! Help him!”
    The groom grabbed the tail of my coat, flinging me out of the way. I skidded