A Love Departed: Mary's Ladies, #4

By Belle McInnes

A Queen held captive. A midnight flight. A relationship in tatters
When Mary Queen of Scots is imprisoned by villainous plotters with designs on her throne, only a daring—and dangerous—escape will save her from their evil schemes.

Accompanied by her favourite lady-in-waiting, a young page, and a king whose loyalties are questionable, to say the least, they flee her palace in the dead of night. But have they risked their lives to run from one set of lawless felons, only to be captured by another?

:: A Love Departed tells the story of a pivotal event in Mary Queen of Scots' life - one that changed the course of her reign, and of history... It sets the context for the rest of the Mary's Ladies series.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Eden Press
• Release date: Jun 2, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201820732

Book preview

A Love Departed

A Love Departed

Mary’s Ladies ~ Prequel

Belle McInnes

Eden Press

Copyright © 2020 Belle McInnes

All rights reserved.

This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. You must not circulate this book in any format.

The characters, places and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, or to actual events or locales is entirely coincidental.

This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only.

Printed in the United Kingdom

First published, 2020

Cover by Alba Covers

Contents

About this book

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Epilogue

From the author

An Excerpt from A Love Divided

Also By Belle McInnes

About the Author

About this book

A Queen held captive. A midnight flight. A relationship in tatters

When Mary Queen of Scots is imprisoned by villainous plotters with designs on her throne, only a daring—and dangerous—escape will save her from their evil schemes.

Accompanied by her favourite lady-in-waiting, a young page, and a king whose loyalties are questionable, to say the least, they flee her palace in the dead of night. But have they risked their lives to run from one set of lawless felons, only to be captured by another?

Chapter 1

Monday 11 March 1566

Grey moonlight filtered through a tiny window set high in the deep stone walls of Holyrood Palace in Edinburgh, barely illuminating the grey flagstone steps leading down, ever downwards into inky blackness.

Her breath shallow, Margaret Carwood blinked hard, willing her eyes to penetrate the musty shadows that lay below. If only we could light a lantern. But they dared not, lest it alert their captors that the queen and her party were escaping.

Ahead of Margaret, her mistress, Mary Stuart, Queen of Scots, tiptoed behind her husband, Henry Stewart, Lord Darnley.

As they disappeared into the darkness, the barest glimmer of light from Darnley’s drawn sword was extinguished, and the muted gleam of the pearls adorning Mary’s velvet cap winked out like stars disappearing behind a cloud.

Bunching her skirts in one hand, the other touching the cold masonry to her right, Margaret began her careful descent of the spiral stairwell, toes feeling for each tread of the uneven stairs before she committed her weight to the step. To fall here would be suicidal, for the noise would alert the plotters, and she, a mere chamber woman, would be an