She felt too humiliated by the way the conversation had ended to want to risk starting it again. She’d made herself utterly vulnerable, and had been answered with a blank stare. She would not beg for Owain Tudor’s affection, she told herself stiffly. She was a Queen.She couldn’t avoid letting him serve her food at table, in front of all the children and servants. There would have been too much explaining to do if she’d changed that ritual. But there were points of hot colour in her cheeks and a tightness about her mouth that discouraged him from speaking. She let her eyes slide past him as if he wasn’t there. There was no more table talk.For days, he tried other strategies. He followed her down corridors. He followed her into chapel. He brought Harry to her. He pleaded, ‘Could we speak?’ or, ‘Could we take a walk?’ But she just smiled coldly and shook her head, and let her eyes slide past him again. She refused to take in the bewilderment in his eyes; the hurt. She knew herself to be alone now.
