When Francis dies, Mary knows that she shouldn't break, but she does anyway.
You are a queen. Still a queen, Catherine tells her sternly, but to Mary it feels as Catherine is at the other end of a very long hallway and her words cannot reach her there.
Mary is a queen. She is Scotland. She is its ruler. Scotland cannot afford for her to fall to pieces even in the wake of such a loss, but in the weeks after Francis dies, Mary is not just a ruler. She is a girl as well, and she is small and she is broken and she is alone, and now she has a new title to add to the others. Widow.
Friend. Daughter. Queen. Scotland. Sister. Widow.
For two weeks after her husband's funeral, Mary is just a girl. She drifts, and she feels untouched, untouchable. A certain numbness has enveloped her very being, and she welcomes it. It is better than the pain. Mary is only in her mind, and barely even there. She only comes back to her body when someone touches her - bumping into her, a courteous touch of the hand, gentle fingers on her shoulder. Every conversation is tilted, her responses indifferent, and each expression on her face is brittle, strained, empty of any real feeling.
For a month after that, Mary is a queen. She returns to her duties. It doesn't matter. She is still the same inside - she follows the motions, but she does not care. Somehow, no one but Bash seems to notice a difference, and she brushes him off with ease and a soft, easily faked smile.
When her courtship with Don Carlos fails, Mary begins to drift again now that she no longer has it to occupy her attention and keep her in her body.
More often than not, she has conversations with Francis at night in her bedroom. She does not sleep anymore - walking dead girls don't need sleep. When Francis died, he had taken most of her with him. She hadn't minded then, and she doesn't mind now. It's easier this way.
Francis, somewhat transparent as he sits up in the bed beside her, tells her one night that the nobles have been whispering. They want to know if she intends to remain here in France with no station but that of a widow, or if she intends to return to Scotland. She has always been loved by the French people, but her presence has begun to cause unrest. He asks her what she is going to do, and she takes a moment because she had forgotten to try and process his words.
She asks him what she should do, and he tells her to return home. Mary begins making plans to return to Scotland the next day. Or at least, she watches from a distance as that other Mary, the one on the ground, does.
Bash tells Mary that he still loves her, and she nearly forgets to answer him. She manages a few tears for his benefit, but she doesn't give him a real answer, a solid one. She doesn't think Bash expects her to return the feeling, and she is glad. It has been a long time - nearly six months, Francis whispers in the back of her head, and she smiles at the sound of his voice - since she cared about anything. Dead girls don't feel, she thinks to herself, and almost laughs. She doesn't, because she doesn't think Bash would understand. (He would.)
Before Mary sets sail for Scotland, Bash gives her a letter from Francis and a sword he'd crafted for her before he died. It is the first time in a long time she feels anything at all, and she breaks again in an entirely different way. She cries into her hands and crumples the letter to her chest, and she wishes he hadn't given it to her at all.
She goes to save Catherine from the Red Knights, and this time what she feels is anger, or protectiveness. She holds her sword aloft, sits astride a beautiful white horse, and she has the force of her mercenaries behind her. She feels stronger than she has in months, but she isn't sure she is glad for it. She thinks about it, and about halfway through her speech, she decides she is.
When the men have been persuaded and turned away, Mary's eyes meet Catherine's through the gate. She smiles at her, and for the first time in six months, she thinks she means it.