Disclaimer: Characters contained within do not belong to me.

Author's Notes: Having always wondered what the Doctor did to anger Queen Elizabeth, I was grateful that my curiosity was satisfied in "The End of Time." And yet...it wasn't. I wanted to know more. So...I decided to write the story. Enjoy!

The Doctor and the Queen

by Kristen Elizabeth

1599

"Did you hear that?" Back inside the TARDIS, Martha struggled to catch her breath, an understandable consequence of having to unexpectedly run for her life. "Did you hear what she said?"

The Doctor was already pulling levers and switching controls, taking his ship as far away from 16th century London as possible. "Oh, I heard her all right."

"'Off with his head,'" Martha crowed. "Can you believe it? She actually said 'off with his head!' Queen Elizabeth! The first Queen Elizabeth!"

"That she did."

His subdued tone effectively wiped away a bit of her elation. "I suppose this sort of thing happens to you all the time."

The Doctor jerked his head to one side. "Well...more than it does to most people, yeah."

Martha glanced back at the TARDIS doors. "You've really got no idea why Queen Elizabeth has it out for you?"

"Not a clue."

"And..." She took a tentative step towards him. "You're okay with that?"

He grinned. "Honestly...it's more fun this way, isn't it?"

"Running about time and space, never knowing who might be out to get you for something you haven't even done yet?" Martha snorted softly. "Don't know that I'd call that fun."

"Then it's a good thing you've only signed on for one trip."

The Doctor pulled a lever and the TARDIS wrenched to one side, almost knocking them both off their feet. With the ship on course for the 21st century, he planted his hands on the control panel, his intense eyes focused on Martha.

"I'm used to living things out of order," he went on. "It's all part and parcel of the Time Lord life. Wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey." He paused and smiled. "That's good. I should remember that one."

"Doesn't that drive you mad, though?" Martha pressed on as she climbed up onto the pilot's seat. "I know it would make me positively barmy!"

"Suppose it did drive me mad." The Doctor leveled her with a look. "How would you ever know the difference?"

It took Martha a second to shake her head. "Someday. Promise me that someday...if you ever do discover why Queen Elizabeth wants your head...you'll find me and tell me."

Instead of replying, the Doctor changed the subject once again. "Just one trip, that's what I said. One trip in the TARDIS and then home..."

"Stop that pernicious Doctor!"

While Shakespeare laughed and her guards chased the Doctor and his dark-skinned companion, the Queen took several deep breaths to calm her racing heart. It was little wonder that seeing him again in the Globe Theatre, least likely of places, had unbalanced her senses, but she wasn't a young woman anymore.

Although he hadn't changed a bit. He was exactly the same, from his clothing to his hairstyle. Time had stood still for the Doctor, the man she had sworn she would see punished one day.

The man who, after forty years, made her feel like no time at all had passed since the last time they'd met. She'd been practically a girl then, a queen just starting her reign, unable to trust anyone, not even her own court.

Except for him. She'd trusted him, hadn't she?

Oh, she wanted the guards to catch her Doctor, but deep down, she knew they'd come back empty-handed. Perhaps it was best that they did, better that he got away.

Because, really, what did a woman, even a queen, say to the man...the husband who had stolen her maidenhead and broken her heart?

1559

It had been raining for two weeks without stop, long enough so that whispered rumors had begun to circulate the palace.

God was angry that a Protestant had taken the throne and he was sending a second flood to deal with the heretic whore who now ruled England.

Heretic whore. As her lady-in-waiting tightened her corset, the new queen bit back a bitter laugh. Why should it matter what was said about her in dark corners and locked chambers? Her own mother had been called far worse in her time and just as Anne had withstood the insults and gossip as the King's consort, so would Elizabeth as her country's sovereign.

But it wouldn't hurt her feelings at all, she decided, if the rain were to stop.

As soon as she was dressed, Elizabeth dismissed her ladies with a wave of her hand. "I wish to be alone." The women all exchanged nervous glances. "Honestly," Elizabeth sighed. "What on earth do you think will happen to me in my own wardrobe?"

Any number of things, she supposed, given the way they reluctantly slipped out of the room, each one dipping into an unenthusiastic curtsey before disappearing. They wouldn't go far; they'd stand in the hallway if necessary, ready to dash to her side at a moment's notice. It seemed as though every second of her life had been spent under someone's watchful eye. Apparently even a crown couldn't bring an end to that.

She was loathe to admit it, but she might never be allowed true privacy until the day she became some man's wife, a distasteful thought if ever there was one. As if a woman could ever feel safe in the company of a man who had biblical rights over her body. As if any man was worthy of a queen's virginity.

Armed with her silver comb, Elizabeth seated herself in front of her Venetian looking glass. But she'd barely passed the comb once through her long red locks before she caught sight of something in the mirror. Someone was standing behind her. Watching her.

"Who's there?" she shouted, her comb clattering to the wooden dressing table as she whipped around to face the intruder.

There was nothing.

"Show yourself!" she demanded. Silence greeted her command although the tapestry that covered the far wall rippled in an entirely unnatural way. "I order you to show yourself to me!"

This time, her command was met with a low growl that chilled her very bones. Her hand drifted to her mouth. Whatever was hiding behind the tapestry…it didn't sound like a person at all

Elizabeth wanted to call for her guards, but her voice wouldn't work. She was mute with fear, a sudden and all-consuming terror that no monarch should ever have to sustain within her own palace. She had no idea why, but suddenly she wondered if her guards or her ladies or even a thousand of her subjects, armed and ready, would have been able to help her at all.

An assassination plot had to be underway. She'd survived her father's abandonment, her mother's beheading, her brother's untimely death and her sister's Catholic tyranny only to be killed by some fanatic who believed he was doing God's work?

Not on her life.

Elizabeth grabbed the first sharp object she could find on her dressing table, a jeweled hair pin that had belonged to her mother. It wasn't much, but if applied properly, it could do great harm to an attacker's more vulnerable parts.

"This is your last chance," she said, hoping her voice didn't waver as she addressed the thing behind the tapestry. "I have a dagger…" A lie, but how were they to know? "…and I am not afraid to use it."

Another bone-chilling snarl filled the room and Elizabeth's heart leapt into her throat. The tapestry rippled again, as if the thing was moving behind it along the length of the wall…coming towards her.

She gave herself no chance to lose her courage. Her skirts flew as she dashed across the room and stabbed at the bulge in the heavy brocaded cloth with the sharp end of the pin.

"Oy!"

It wasn't at all the response she had expected to her attack. Stumbling backwards, Elizabeth's chest rose and fell as a man fought his way out of the tapestry. When he was finally free, he raised his arm to examine it, allowing her a chance to do the same to him.

He was tall and thin, but hardly weak. His clothes were strange-long pants and a vest with sleeves down to his wrists, both brown with stripes. His hair was long in the front, seeming to stand up on its own in style she'd never seen before. Was he handsome? She supposed some women might agree to that, if they were so inclined.

But she wasn't. He was an intruder in the Queen's private chamber and would be punished accordingly.

"Who are you?" she demanded. "And how dare you enter my wardrobe without invitation!"

The man ignored her for a second in favor of rubbing the spot where she'd stabbed him through the tapestry. "Blimey, that hurt!" He looked up and their eyes met. "So much for gratitude!"

"Gratitude?" Elizabeth blinked. "I should be grateful that you've breeched my guards in order to do me harm?"

"No…" He drew the word out as he shifted his stare to a spot behind her. "But you might be grateful that I arrived in time to stop something that has." Without blinking, he began to speak in a language she didn't understand, and considering that she was fluent in several tongues, that was saying something.

"What are you talking about?" Elizabeth demanded.

"If I were you, I'd be more concerned about who I'm talking to." The man gestured to her. "If you would step this way, Your Majesty."

She had every intention of telling this impertinent man exactly what her guards would do to him once she called for them, but before she could, she felt something come up behind her. The same, deep growl reverberated in her ear, only now she could tell that it hadn't come from the tapestry, but from the opposite side of the room. She gasped as she felt hot, moist breath on the back of her neck.

"Keep very still," the man said in a tone that was too calm for Elizabeth's mounting panic. "I can talk to it, but you need to remain calm."

"It?" she whispered, her body frozen. "What is it? Who are you?"

"I'm the Doctor." He flashed a quick smile. "Nice to meet you. Again."

"Again? What do you...?" Elizabeth's question died when the thing…the invisible creature behind her suddenly touched her hair, lifting the long, red strands. "Oh, dear God in heaven…"

The Doctor's smile melted into a dark glare that he fixed on the same spot over her shoulder. He spoke again in the same, strange language, biting off each word in obvious anger. Whatever he said didn't seem to work; she felt fingers in her hair, twisting and tugging with a gentleness that was terrifying.

Elizabeth blinked back hot tears. "What is behind me, Doctor? I order you to tell me."

He quirked an eyebrow, but acquiesced to her command. "Verviforn. That's what it's called."

"What does it want?"

The Doctor minced no words. "Your blood."

To Be Continued