Just Beyond Tomorrow Read online

  Also by Bertrice Small:

  The Kadin

  Love Wild and Fair

  Adora

  Unconquered

  Beloved

  Enchantress Mine

  Blaze Wyndham

  The Spitfire

  A Moment in Time

  To Love Again

  Love, Remember Me

  The Love Slave

  Hellion

  Betrayed

  Deceived

  The Innocent

  A Memory of Love

  “The O’Malley Saga”

  Skye O’Malley

  All the Sweet Tomorrows

  A Love for All Time

  This Heart of Mine

  Lost Love Found

  Wild Jasmine

  “Skye’s Legacy”

  Darling Jasmine

  Bedazzled

  Beseiged

  Intrigued

  Anthologies

  Captivated

  Fascinated

  JUST BEYOND TOMORROW

  BERTRICE SMALL

  KENSINGTON PUBLISHING CORP.

  http://www.kensingtonbooks.com

  All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.

  Table of Contents

  Also by Bertrice Small:

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Prologue - GREAT BRITAIN, 1642–1650

  Part One - The Heiress of Brae

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Part Two - The Do-Naught Duchess

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Part Three - Flaming Flanna

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Epilogue - Queen’s Malvern, Late Summer 1663

  Copyright Page

  For Ethan Ellenberg, my agent, and Walter Zacharius, my publisher, and for Steven Zacharius, who could probably charm a duck into a roasting pan. Thank you, gentlemen.

  Prologue

  GREAT BRITAIN, 1642–1650

  In the summer of 1642 the king and the parliament began preparing for war, each raising an army of its own. The crisis had been coming for some time now. The parliament wanted Charles Stuart to consult with them in his choice of government ministers and other official appointments. They wanted complete control of the army put into their hands. They wanted to reform the English church, abolish all bishops, and allow the final authority in church affairs to rest with them. They wanted a say in the raising of the king’s children. They quoted from the Bible extensively in order to justify their demands, but like most politicians they forgot one of Christ’s strongest directives to “render unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s; and unto God that which is God’s.” A very clear warning to the human race to keep church and state separate, but parliament, believing they alone spoke for God, wasn’t listening.

  The king, however, firmly believed that his authority came directly from the celestial actuary. He held fast to the Divine Right of his Stuart and Tudor ancestors. Unfortunately the parliament also believed God was on their side. But, had the king given in to parliament’s wishes, they would have become the sole governing power of England. With all civil, military, and religious authority firmly in their hands, and backed by the landed wealth of certain of the nobility in the House of Lords, they sought to rule England. Had Charles Stuart yielded to the parliament, he would have found himself rendered little more than a figurehead. It was an intolerable position for the king to accept, but neither side was willing to compromise.

  The first English civil war was fought. When it was over in 1647, the queen and her children had fled England for France. The king found himself a prisoner, first of parliament, and then of the Roundheads of Oliver Cromwell. He managed to escape, fleeing to the Isle of Wight, where he attempted to bargain with the parliament and, at the same time, with his possible allies in Scotland. The king, who loved intrigue, also loved to barter. From the relative security of Carisbrooke Castle, he sat like a spider in the center of his web attempting to wheel and deal while his royal agents brought him the encouraging news of the people’s discontent with parliament’s army, which had grown overpowerful and abusive.

  Pleased with what appeared to be a growing discord among his enemies, the king played his usual game of delay, behaving as if all of England were still firmly in his royal grasp and under his personal control. Winter came. The Scots sent envoys to Carisbrooke. Their army would rise in support of Charles Stuart if he would but guarantee the safety of their Presbyterian church and take some of the Scots nobility into his government. Parliament, suddenly realizing that the king was not bargaining fairly with them, feared a Scots alliance would renew the civil war. So the moderates in parliament appealed to the Scots Presbyterians to form an alliance with them. The king thereupon signed an ill-advised treaty with the Scots.

  Parliament angrily voted to disenfranchise the king, refusing to offer him any more terms for compromise. Throughout England, however, the anger grew, and directed itself not toward the king, but toward parliament and its military, both of whom were ruling with too heavy an iron fist. Now it became parliament against the people. Many of the gentry who had originally supported reform grew hostile.

  In April there was a revolt in Wales. The king, in the meantime, had managed to stitch together an alliance between his English supporters and the Scots, both of whom objected strenuously to the military’s involvement in the civil government. A second civil war began. It consisted of small local uprisings as in Wales and an invasion of the Scots into England.

  The king and his adherents, however, had underestimated their opponents. In Scotland a separate confederation had to be worked out between royalists, Presbyterians, and the Convenanters, those Scots who supported the national covenant, which had been signed in 1643 with the English. By the time it had all been settled it was July. The Welsh uprising had been brutally quelled. Had the Scots moved faster, they could have obtained a great victory, for their forces outnumbered the English three to one. But disorganized and poorly provisioned, they gave the English time to regroup. A battle was finally fought at Preston in Lancashire, on August 17, 1648. The well-trained English troops decimated both the Scots foot soldiers and their cavalry. In a driving rain they doggedly chased after them until the Scots could run no farther. On that day General Oliver Cromwell took ten thousand prisoners, and many were killed.

  Outraged by King Charles I’s behavior, the fanatics in the English government and the army now took total control of the parliament. They immediately removed those men believed to be moderate in their thoughts. They ousted the entire House of Lords. Then they boldly brought the king to trial for his alleged crimes against the English people. Charles Stuart was quickly found guilty on all charges. He was beheaded on the thirtieth day of January in the year 1649. The heir to England’s throne learned of his father’s execution several days later while at his sister’s court in Holland, when his chaplain came forward to address him as “Your Majesty.” The second Charles Stuart promptly burst into tears and could not be consoled for several days. The new king was just eighteen years of age.

  Charles II was, however, almost immediately pronounced king of Scotland by the Scots parliament. While in sympathy with the English, the Scots Covenanters didn’t like the idea that a Scots king of England had been executed without their permission. They would take back their own Stuart king under certain conditions, none of which could be acceptable to the royalists. Almost eighteen months of haggling en
sued. Charles II landed in Scotland on June 23, 1650, barely escaping the English fleet sent to capture him and bring him home to face his own execution.

  The delay in his arrival had been caused by his reluctance to sign the National Covenant, a thing his father would not do. The Covenant called for, among other things, the imposition of the Presbyterian form of worship on all the king’s subjects in England, Ireland, and Scotland. It denied any other religious faiths, the Anglican and the Roman Catholic faiths in particular, legitimacy. It prohibited a church hierarchy, and enjoined the creation of all bishops, present or future. The king, an Anglican, signed with reluctance, having absolutely no intention of following through, something many suspected, but he needed a power base if he was to retake England.

  Charles II needed firm control of an army. He would do what he had to in order to obtain his goals. The members of the Scots parliament were extremely obdurate, and very short-sighted, but they were not stupid. They kept a tight rein on the young Stuart king. They went so far as to banish his personal chaplains and his personal friends. They kept four ministers of the kirk sermonizing at him almost round the clock. Only when Oliver Cromwell was foolish enough to attempt an invasion of Scotland that autumn in an effort to regain control over that land and custody of its king; only then did the Scots parliament act to raise an army of defense. Only then did Charles Stuart, the second of that name, see a tiny ray of hope. He was, unfortunately, to be doomed to disappointment.

  Part One

  The Heiress of Brae

  Chapter 1

  Scotland, 1650

  Late summer and autumn

  She remembered the argument well as she sat by the early afternoon fire, assailed by her memories. “Have you lost your wits entirely, old man?” the Duchess of Glenkirk demanded of her husband of thirty-five years. Jasmine Leslie could not remember ever having been so angry. Her turquoise blue eyes flashed with her indignation as she confronted James Leslie. “What the hell have we to do with the royal Stuarts? I cannot believe you would even consider such a venture as you now tell me you are planning.”

  “The young king needs the help of all loyal Scotsmen,” the duke replied stubbornly, but in truth she knew his conscience had troubled him over the matter.

  “We do not even know this king,” Jasmine recalled saying in an attempt to regain a firm grip over her emotions. Drawing her husband to the settle by the fireplace, she had sat beside him and affectionately ruffled his snow-white hair fondly. “Jemmie, be reasonable. It has been over thirty years since we had anything to do with the royal Stuarts or their court. King James ruled us then. There was peace. Then he died, and ever since poor Charles Stuart has made one mistake after another. He has plunged not only England, but Scotland as well, into wasteful fighting. How many innocent lives have been sacrificed in this battle over religion? If it could be settled, then perhaps it would have been worth it, but it will never be resolved. The Anglicans want it all their way. The Presbyterians want it all their way, and God save us from the more fanatical Covenanters among them! No one will win in this matter! Is it not better to follow the cardinal rule of the Leslies of Glenkirk, to not get involved? The survival of this clan is paramount. You are responsible for your people.”

  “But our parliament in Edinburgh has taken King Charles II as their own,” the duke told his wife.

  “Hah!” Jasmine said. “Listen to me, Jemmie Leslie, we knew King James well, both of us. You, since your birth. He was well named the wisest fool in Christendom, for he was a canny, clever man who knew how to play the various factions around him against one another and thereby guarantee his own comfort and survival. His son, our late King Charles, we have not seen since he was a young and untried youth, but I remember him well as a boy, standing in his older brother Henry’s shadow. That Charles was stubborn, stiff-necked, impressed with his own importance, and absolutely certain of his own rightness. This is the man who brought us to civil war.”

  “The Covenanters could nae compromise either,” James Leslie reminded his wife. “They were just as difficult as the king.”

  “Agreed,” Jasmine replied, “but it was up to the king to show them a way to compromise, but no, he would not. The Divine Right of the royal Stuarts once again overshadowed all common sense of the common good.”

  “But this king is a different Charles Stuart,” the duke said.

  “Aye, yet he is the first Charles’s son, with a French princess for a mother. I know that after the Duke of Buckingham’s death, the late king and his wife became quite a love match. Their devotion to each other has set a fine example for the kingdom, but the queen has not been noted for her intellect, or her cleverness, Jemmie. This second Charles is the child of their love, but I question his character.”

  “Why?” the duke asked.

  “Because he has signed the Covenant, and we both know he damned well has no intention of honoring that shameful document,” Jasmine said bluntly. “He wants a power base from which to reconquer England and thinks to get it in Scotland. He will not. Not now in this time. Not ever!”

  “But now,” the duke replied, “the English prepare to invade the sacred soil of Scotland. All loyal Scots are called upon to aid our king and country. God’s blood, Jasmine! I hae been called by my distant cousins to raise a troop of both cavalry and foot soldiers. How can I refuse them? It would bring dishonor upon the Leslies of Glenkirk, and that I willna do.”

  “Your distant cousins? Now, would that be Alexander Leslie, the Earl of Leven, and his brother, David? Those Leslies who turned King Charles I over to the English when he fled home to Scotland a few years back? ’Twas shamefully done, and you know it! Why would you even listen to such men? Besides, Glenkirk’s earldom is far older than Leven’s. If you seek an excuse, my lord, plead your years. You are, after all, seventy-two.”

  “Alexander Leslie is but two years my junior. Besides, he willnae lead the armies of the Covenant. It will be his brother, the lieutenant general, and David Leslie isnae much younger.”

  “You are mad!” she accused him. “Do you think I have not heard the rumors that the fanatics who hold sway in this land, who call themselves the Kirk Party, are purging the army of those they deem ungodly? They interfere with military affairs and weaken our defenses, all the while claiming it is in the name of God. Had they any sense they would put the ungodly in the front lines and rid themselves of them for all time, but no! They will have a godly army go to war. What nonsense! You cannot, must not, be a part of this, Jemmie Leslie. You are a white-haired old man, and I do not want to lose you, damnit!”

  “Do ye think my years hae rendered me incapable, madame?” he demanded, suddenly angry. “Ye didna think so last night in our bed!”

  The duchess flushed then, but she pressed onward with her case. “We have had no dealings with the royal Stuarts in years. We owe them nothing. This foolishness over religion is ridiculous. Bigotry only breeds more intolerance, my lord, and well you know it.”

  “The king is the king, and he hae asked for our help,” James Leslie answered his wife. “Yer own father would hae nae put up with such disrespect, and disloyalty, from his subjects.”

  “My father,” she replied evenly, “knew enough not to endanger himself or his family. May I remind you, my lord, that your first wife, her two sons, and her unborn child died at the hands of the Covenanters when they raided the convent she was visiting? They raped, tortured, murdered, and finally fired the buildings, killing all those innocent women and your children. And now, all these years later, you would pick up the Glenkirk banner and march out to war for them?”

  “It is nae for them. It is for Charles Stuart. The king is my kinsman,” the duke answered his wife implacably. “What of yer own Stuart son? Will he desert his cousin’s cause? I dinna think so, madame. We must all rally about the king so those men who are attempting to institute this so-called Commonwealth will see that we dinna want it. These rude republicans must be taught to gie way to their betters, darling Jasmine.
Besides, here at Glenkirk we hae accepted the Covenant for expediency’s sake. Let me show the government that the Leslies of Glenkirk are loyal. Then they will continue to leave us in peace. They will probably decide I am ungodly and send me home anyways,” he finished with a chuckle.

  “Don’t you darling Jasmine me, Jemmie Leslie,” she told him. “The king is a royal Stuart, not a Leslie of Glenkirk. You owe him naught! If you go, however, you go alone. I will not let you take Patrick to a certain death! Thank God Adam and Duncan are in Ireland, safe from this madness!”

  “Ireland is scarcely a place of great safety right now,” the duke remarked dryly. “Besides, both Adam and Duncan sincerely accepted the Covenant, although I will wager they are yet loyal to the king.”

  Jasmine shook her head wearily. There would be no dissuading her husband from his foolish course, she suspected. “Do you not remember,” she began in a final attempt to turn her husband’s heart, “that every time the Leslies of Glenkirk have become involved with the royal Stuarts disaster ensues?” Her eyes went to the portrait above the fireplace. It was a very beautiful young girl with red-gold hair. “Janet Leslie was lost to her family when her father was in the service of a Stuart king. Her father returned home to mourn her his whole life.”

  “Yet that Patrick Leslie gained us the earldom in service to King James IV,” the duke replied. “And when Janet Leslie returned home many years later, she obtained the Earldom of Sithean for her son.”

  “Her brother, his heir, and that same son along with many other members of the family, and the clan, died at Solway Moss in service of James V,” Jasmine answered him promptly. “The family would have been lost had not that same Janet lived into old age to protect them all. And what of your own mother? Driven from Scotland by a Stuart king’s lust! Never able to return, dying in Italy with little family about her. And have you forgotten the debacle the king made in our lives when, having betrothed me to you, he then promised me to his current favorite, Piers St. Denis? I did not enjoy having to hide my children from that madman and to keep on the run for months after Patrick was born. None of it would have happened but for a Stuart king’s meddling!” she concluded heatedly.