A/N Sorry it took so long to get this up. I've been focusing my energy on my A-Levels and Target Protection. I actually had no intention at all of carrying this on, but as many of you have pointed out, I couldn't just leave it. So, we re-join the forbidden romance of Bella and Lord Carlisle (hands up all those who secretly want to be Bella in this story) and we join them as they struggle to come up with a solution.
Oh, and just to be clear: Bella did NOT get pregnant with King Henry because…err… she'd just had a period, and so it didn't happen. It just didn't, OK? She is NOT going to have the King's baby.
CPOV
We wake up to the sunrise. She turns her face towards it, smiling as the rays hit her face. I brush a lock of hair away from her face, and she turns back to me and snuggles close. I put my arms around her, and she lays her head on my chest.
We watch the sunrise together.
"What are we going to do?" she asks, quietly, focusing her attention on my face, looking into my eyes.
"I don't know. I don't know Bella."
"I don't want to leave you," she whispers.
"We will be together Bella. Somehow, we will be together."
She doesn't leave my side that day. We don't even leave the room. I take her back to bed at noon, make sweet and gentle love to her. I stroke her face, she kisses me softly.
A lone rider clatters into the courtyard a few weeks later. Bella is outside, sweeping the steps. She opted to continue with her duties, until we can find a solution. She goes up to the rider, who throws back his hood. She nearly falls over as she runs up the steps.
"My Lord! My Lord Carlisle!"
"Isabella!"
"The king is coming!" She's very pale.
"Are you feeling sick again?"
"Yes…"
"Then go, quickly. Down to the kitchens, and stay there until I come for you."
A retinue gallops into the yard with a great clattering of horses hooves. The tallest man detaches himself from the group, and walks towards me.
"Carlisle!"
"Your Majesty. I must say it is a pleasure to see you again - if entirely unexpected."
"Sorry, old fellow. I'm on my way to a great hunt. Would you join me?"
"I would."
Mounted and riding fast, we gallop to the Great Park. The king stops us under a tree, and he motions for me to walk from the group with him. I rein in the horse a little way from the edge of the slope.
"Your Majesty, if you will pardon my forwardness - what is happening here? You appear in my courtyard, virtually unannounced, and you barely say a word. And although you say we are on a hunt, you are accompanied by no dogs."
"You were always extraordinarily observant, Carlisle. Even as a boy, you spotted things nobody else could see. But I digress." He pauses, and looks towards the Tower of London. "She betrayed me Carlisle. The Great Whore - she is a witch Carlisle."
"The Queen -"
"She stole that crown! It belonged to Catherine, and I threw it away on a whore in a moment of desire." His shoulders slump, and he seems to crumple in the saddle. "And at the cannon, she will die for her crime." I gape at him. The woman he tore England to pieces for, the woman he divorced a Catholic for, the woman almost the entire country hated - is the woman he is about to execute for treason.
"Your Majesty -"
"Any moment, and I shall be free, Carlisle." He gazes at the Tower. The boom echoes across the expanses, and reaches even our ears. The king wrenches his horses head around. I make my decision on the spur of the moment. But before I can ask permission to leave the hunt, he turns back to me. "That serving girl of yours - how is she?" I nearly hit him. So he's worried now, is he? Didn't get in contact for months, but now he's asking about her health.
"She's fine, Your Majesty."
"No complications?"
"No. Your Majesty, I must crave your pardon, but I must return to the house. I have… business that cannot wait."
"Of course, Carlisle, of course. Oh, and old friend?"
"Your Majesty?"
"You must come to stay at court very soon. And you'll have to bring your serving girl. I don't need to be told that she is yours now." He smiles at me. "I'll expect you at the end of the month."
I hand the reins of my horse to the first stable boy I see, and run into the house.
"Edward! Emmett! Jasper!" I shout into the entrance hall. All three men appear at once, and hastily take my cloak. "Fetch Bella, and get up to my room as soon as possible!"
The four join me, the three men flustered and worried, Bella pale but very happy looking.
"The King demands my presence at Court. He wants Bella to accompany me. We will move in at the end of the month. You three will come with us."
"The King," Bella whispers, her face paler than ever.
"You men may leave. Begin preparing for the journey. I will take a carriage. You men will ride." The three bow and exit. Bella stares at me.
"I can't go back to him, Carlisle," she whispers fiercely. "Not now."
"You won't have to. He knows - god knows how - that we are together. He'll not touch you."
"That's good - because there is something you must know." She looks right at me, biting her bottom lip gently. "I'm going to have a baby." I check to see how I feel about that.
"No mistake?
"No mistake." I run at her and sweep her up into my arms. She giggles happily as I kiss her smile. "You're going to be a father."
"We'll go away together," I promise her, setting her back on her feet. "We'll go to the country. We can have a little farm somewhere, and we can have children, and we'll never have to worry about status, or Court life or propriety again. We could have some cows, and a few horses, some sheep, some hens."
"Do you know how to be a farmer?" she giggles.
"I could learn."
"It takes money to be a farmer."
"I've got money. And we could easily sell eggs and butter and cheese and milk at market."
"You're mad."
"Mad with love," I say, kissing her again. In that moment, I can see it: me, coming in from the fields, muddy from the work, tired but happy, a toddler running towards me, our son, whilst Bella waits in the door of our little cottage, cradling our baby daughter. Safe, happy, secure.
She steps from the carriage, assisted by Emmett lifting her down, wearing a new dress. I will have her here as a lady, not as some poor serving wench. I plan to get the Kings permission to wed here in London very soon. And then I will take Bella away, and we will be happy somewhere together.
She walked into the King's presence chamber with her head held high. Her brown curls tumbled down her back like a virgins. She was on my arm, radiant, and more lady-like than most of the women in that chamber. Only the increased pressure on my arm as the King looked up and saw us told me that she was nervous.
"Carlisle!" The King boomed, advancing towards us from his throne. I bowed. Bella swept him a perfect curtsey, and came back up with her head held high and her dark eyes downcast. A gasp rings round the room, and the whispers start.
"She looks like her."
"The old Queen."
"She looks like the Princess Catherine." I look properly at the woman by my side. And I see it too. The tumbling curls, the olive skin, the liquid eyes. I see that the King sees it too, and he stares at Bella as if he'd never seen her before.
"Carlisle, you must meet Queen Jane - my new bride." I focus upon the pale, blonde, tiny woman on the throne at the head of the hall. She gets up, and walks towards us. She gives us a smile that makes pale blue eyes sparkle.
"Lord Cullen. My husband, the King, he speaks very highly of you."
"Your Majesty," I say, bowing to her. I can't take it in. Divorced, beheaded - I wonder what fate awaits this woman. She'd best give the King a son, for her sake.
"And you, you must be Isabella."
"Yes, your Majesty." The murmurs begin again. I focus in on her accent - the Spanish accentuation.
"The King said Carlisle would be accompanied by a young girl, but I see a woman here, not a girl. Come, we shall leave the men to their chatter, and we shall go to my apartments." The King smiles indulgently at the slight young woman as she leads Bella off.
"Your Majesty, I come to Court for more than one reason - no, that's no good."
"You need to just come straight out and ask him," Edward says, folding my breeches and shirt. I glare at him from the bathtub.
"Oh, I can see that going brilliantly well."
"You can but try," he says, practically. "And however you ask him, it must be soon, because Bella will soon start to show the baby. Oh, and what's this utter rubbish I heard some of the servants gossiping about - that Bella is the spirit of the dead Queen Catherine?"
"They think she looks like the old Queen when she was a Princess and Arthur's bride."
"And you want to ask the King permission to wed her?"
"If he doesn't give it, we - there is another plan Edward."
"Of course."
"We'd go away together."
We've been at Court for a week when it is announced that the Queen expects a baby. I approach the King and Queen, with Bella holding my arm tightly, to ask him for his permission.
"Ah, Carlisle, I was wondering when you'd come and talk to me! What do you make of the good news?"
"It is wonderful, Your Majesty. But we ask for your blessing, Your Majesty."
"Blessing?"
"We wish to wed, Your Majesty. We want very much to be married, and be able to live together as social equals. I don't want to hide our love." Bella is breathing steadily beside me, her dark eyes on his face, watching him closely.
"So this is why you've been so pre-occupied all week." He looks very thoughtful. "Carlisle, my friend, we shall take a walk in the grounds. Perhaps Jane will take Bella to her own chambers to talk for awhile."
BPOV
The Queen directs me to a cushion in front of the fireplace, and I curl up.
"So, then, my Bella, you want to wed Carlisle?"
"I would like nothing more, Your Majesty."
"You know, of course, that the King will refuse Carlisle the permission."
"I knew it, Your Majesty." I gaze at the crackling flames, feeling the tears sting my eyes. "And yet he may have to let it happen regardless."
"Why, my Bella?"
"I am due to have a child in seven months. His child."
"If Carlisle tells the King this, then permission will be hard to refuse. But you both would be banished from Court. Carlisle would be lucky to keep his lands, title and wealth."
"Why does he do this to us?"
"You remind him, and indeed everyone, of the young Princess Catherine. He would struggle greatly to see you wedded."
"But I am not her! I will never be her!"
"The King is very superstitious. He believes that Catherine has been reborn in you, back to punish him for his sin. His guilt tortures him greatly. He thinks if he allows you to wed Carlisle, then your children will threaten his throne when they are older."
"We wouldn't stay at Court if he refuses his permission. We would leave, be wedded privately, and by the time he caught up with us, the pregnancy would be too advanced to deny, and there would be nothing he could do to stop us."
CPOV
I know he will refuse even before he opens his mouth. But his reason for refusal shocks me silent.
"I cannot give you the permission you seek."
"May I venture to ask you why?"
"You must be able to see it Carlisle! The Princess Catherine, she lives again in her! She is back to punish me with new love! Catherine lives in her, and I must make amends to her."
"Your Majesty, you cannot refuse us permission to wed. I am sorry, but she is already pregnant!" His face pales to the extent where I think he will faint.
"She will have your child?"
"Within the year - before the winter arrives, Bella will bear my child." He rounds on me, and I take a step back.
"And the child of this woman - the child of Catherine's spirit - how can I be guaranteed that the child will not come for vengeance upon me?"
"Your Majesty, forgive me, but I think you know that that is ridiculous! I will raise the child to be loyal to their King. I would do it well away from Court, well away from you and your family. And forgive me, but the Princesses Mary and Elizabeth are the people who have the most reason to wreck vengeance upon you, and they are both at Court!"
"Carlisle, I will grant you permission to wed, if you will give me your word that you and she will never return to Court! Promise me that I will never see either of you again, and I will give you the permission you seek."
"I promise, Your Majesty, that neither Bella nor myself will return to your Court."
"You leave tomorrow morning, and you will never return."
I had left him by the riverbank, and raced into my suite of rooms.
"Edward!" He pokes his head out from my bedroom. "Find Emmett and Jasper. Pack everything up. We are leaving tomorrow morning."
"Tomorrow?"
"Don't ask me questions, Edward, I'll explain everything once we are back at Forks Hall. I don't care if it takes all night - we leave at dawn tomorrow."
As the sun rises, we leave Hampton Court. I don't let go of Bella's hand until we draw up at Forks Hall.
"Home," I whisper to her, lifting her down.
"Forever?"
"Yes, forever."
A/N: And I think we all know that this isn't done yet. Anyway, please review, and I'll start working one part 2 ASAP.