This is a plot bunny that's hopped around my head for some time.
Vaguely inspired by Regan X's "Doubt".
Please forgive any spelling errors etc. I typed this up on my phone.
There will be further chapters
Chapter 1
19 May 1536
It didn't matter that she was to die. She was beyond fear. Beyond care.
Truly she had thought Henry would relent. Had thought he would revoke the convictions - knowing her innocent. Knowing that George and Mark Smeaton and Henry Norris and his groom Brereton were innocent.
She had expected him to storm into her cell, gloating at how low he had brought her. Lower even then she had been for his attentions. Before he had raised her to Marquess, then Queen.
Demanding her acquiescence to a divorce.
Perhaps she would've given it - so long as Elizabeth was safe.
Perhaps. But that hardly mattered now.
Now she knew the depths of his hatred. He had commuted her sentence from burning to beheading, but still he would see her dead.
Once he had told her that London would have to melt into the Thames before he would stop loving her, and like a fool she had swallowed his honeyed words.
By god, what a fool she was.
A fool who had fallen for her own charade. Had fallen in love with the king she was merely meant to seduce and bend her will. To her family's will. But slowly and yet all at once it had ceased to be a game.
"Like a moth to a flame," she whispered.
Her ladies looked to her.
"My Lady?" one asked, hesitantly. Not 'Majesty' now, never Majesty again. Was it not bad enough that Henry would see her labelled an adulteress, and worse yet, one guilty of incest! He would be free of her soon, free to marry the Seymour wench. Yet still his cruelty knew no bounds.
He had annulled their marriage. Made Elizabeth a bastard.
"Are you hungry, my lady?" The servant spoke again. Anne shook her head. These ladies were spies, she knew. There to attend, but more importantly to report her every word, every look, every gesture. She had despised them at first, but now hardly noticed their presence.
She recalled in almost fugue state, how she had seen her father from the window. She had smiled and waved; Glad to see a friendly, beloved face. He had glanced at her and then slowly turned his back on her.
Fool! She thought.
There were no friendly faces. No friends.
Now, too late, she realised that it was human nature to betray.
Had she not betrayed Catherine?
Had Suffolk not betrayed Woolsey?
Had not George (oh, sweet George!) betrayed her?
Even uncle Norfolk and Henry Percy had betrayed her, declaring her guilty.
So many betrayals.
How naive she had been. Dancing through life, thinking herself untouchable.
She was the Kings own heart... Until she was not.
Ha! She had worried for her crown. For her daughter's rights. For her heart... but never for her head.
There was a clank, and the door to her cell opened. In walked a servant with a tray of food.
She laughed, this time out loud, and again the ladies looked at her. Could they not see the humour? The irony of it all? Heaven forbid she should go to the headsman unfed!
And go to the headsman she would. She knew that now.
She had failed to give Henry a son, and she had loved the man and not the crown. She had loved him far too much. Again, such irony.
Perhaps, if she had played the game, but withheld her heart, this entire mess would not have come to pass.
If she had not loved him, she would not have minded his dalliances. He could have paraded a 1000 mistresses in front of her - an entire harem! And she would not have cared a jot.
If she had not loved him, then seeing the Seymour wench on his knee, in his arms, would not have distressed her.
She would have calmly turned and left. She would not have lost her boy. Would not have miscarried of her saviour.
Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps.
Still, such flights of fancy mattered little now.
What she knew was that her heart had broken and shattered into a 1000 irreparable pieces when she watched her brother die. She was certain she had felt it blacken and crack. Though she could still feel it beat. A staccato of mockery.
The pain had been unbearable. It had torn a cry from the very depths of her soul. She had wept and screamed and pulled at her hair, but nothing could spare her the horror of realisation: Henry hated her so much, wanted rid of her so badly, that he would murder innocent men. He would murder her.
The man who had loved her, adored her; the man who had broken with Rome to be with her; the man who once would've done anything to win a smile from her... He was naught but a figment of her imagination and girlish fancies.
He was a monster. A spoilt monster who simply could not bear to be denied a toy he wanted. Once he had had her, once she failed to give him the boy he craved... Well, she was no longer of any interest. So he moved onto a new toy, and then the next and the next. Until he found another toy he could not have.
Truly, she should have foreseen that one day another would come along and play the game she had. But Plain Jane Seymour? Who could have foreseen that!
The wench could scarcely write her own name. She had no talents to speak of. She was neither a beauty, nor a wit. Neither graceful, nor charming.
She was unremarkable in almost every way.
But the Seymour wench had learned from Anne. Learned that Henry wanted nothing so much as that which he could not have.
She could see it now: the appeal of Jane lay in her plainness. In her meekness, her mild manners and simplicity. She was the very opposite Anne.
Fair where Anne was dark. Calm where Anne was passionate. Meek where Anne was bold.
Too late, she saw it all.
How foolish she had been:
To underestimate Jane Seymour.
How foolish she had been to ever have loved Henry. More still, how foolish to believe he loved her.
She saw it now, but alas far, far too late.
It seemed forever, and yet no time at all had passed when Master Kingston appeared, flagged by guards.
Finally, it was time.