Chapter Ten: Lust and Lies

Lady Mary Tudor was talking to herself, muttering in a low, angry voice as she paced back and forth in her room. In her imagination she was the Queen of England, and she was doing all sorts of horrible things. Mary wanted to be cruel. She wanted to die drenched in the blood of her enemies. And when people asked her why she would say:

Before I die, I just want to tell the whole world how much I loved my father, and how he crushed my spirit by never returning that love.

I could have been a very different person if the king had ever told me that he cared about me. I might have been merciful, compassionate and understanding. But how can you learn those things without ever seeing them first hand?

I know I've had a bloody reign. I killed many lustful sinners. Sometimes I hear them screaming in my dreams. But I wake up crying for my mother, lost forever after my father separated us and married that no-good whore Anne Boleyn. I wish I could burn her at the stake like I burned all the others. They all deserved it, but she deserved it most of all.

You see, my father never figured out that my love was worth anything. He had to go looking for love in all the sewers of England before he could admit that his own wife and daughter had anything to give. He's the one who ought to feel guilty for all the people I killed. He drove me to it. He was the cause of everything bad I ever did . . .

"Bless you, my daughter." A soft, pain-wracked voice pulled Mary Tudor back to reality.

"Who are you? How did you get in here?" she demanded, whirling to face the unexpected intruder. But the moment she saw the brown robes and the round, kindly face she rushed to kneel at the feat of the traveling friar.

"Forgive me, father," she said, reverently kissing the wooden cross that hung from the rope belt at the holy man's waist. Mary bent down even lower, humbly abasing herself before the messenger of the Holy Church she adored. But then the kneeling princess got another shock.

"Riding boots!" Her dark brown eyes narrowed with suspicion. "You're not a friar – who are you? Are you some sort of spy, sent by my father the king? Or are you an assassin, sent by that heretic whore Anne Boleyn?"

The round-faced man gave a grimace of pain as he collapsed on a sturdy wooden stool. "Forgive me, princess. My name is Sir Humphrey Babcock, and I'm a loyal friend of your mother and the church. It was only to reach you safely that I adopted the robes of a holy man – and the bare feet as well. But that part of my disguise proved too difficult to maintain."

"Oh, you poor man! Let me help you!" Mary had no servants to do the nasty work for her. So she understood the moment she pulled off the traveler's muddy boots. Sir Humphrey's feet were a bloody mess, as though he'd been walking barefoot over sharp rocks for miles. Before the loyal knight could stop her she ran for hot water and soothing ointments to tend his wounds. Even if she had had proper servants, it was better that no one discover her secret visitor.

"Gracious lady, thank you." Sir Humphrey said simply, when the princess was finished nursing his hurts.

"Dear friend, did no one else try to help you along the way? Is everyone in England afraid of my tyrant father and his whore?"

"Only one kind soul tried to help me," the weary man sighed. "It was the false queen's friend, Jane Seymour."

"Jane Seymour?" Mary wrinkled her nose. "I've heard that name – people say the Seymour family is as greedy and ambitious as the Boleyn crew. I'll bet that Jane woman is already wiggling into my father's bed!"

"I don't know anything about that," Sir Humphrey said mildly. "But when I met her on the road Lady Jane protected me from attack and even gave me a token to give to your grace." And he handed over the plain gold ring hidden in his robes.

"This must go to my mother," Mary said, frowning at the costly ring. "She will need to keep warm this winter. As for Lady Jane, how do we know she isn't just being clever, trying to make sure she has friends on both sides?"

"Dear princess, if you could just see Lady Jane, talk to her, you'd know she is a lady like no other. She's almost like a golden angel come down to earth. So brave, so kind and generous . . . Lady Jane is truly good, and so very beautiful!"

"Yes, of course. I'm sure you're right, Sir Humphrey." Mary smiled, but she knew the score. Men were all alike. Show them a pretty face and they drooled like dogs over a bone. Life was all lust and lies. Angel-faced Lady Jane was just another scheming whore, she was sure of it.

Just then there was a loud banging on the door of her chamber.

"Hide, Sir Humphrey, hide!" Lady Mary quickly shooed her limping visitor into an empty closet, then turned to open the door to her private chamber.

"Lady Mary, your royal father commands you to attend him at Windsor Castle. There is to be a week-long tournament of jousting and feasting, to honor the beauty and virtue of Lady Jane Seymour."

"Really?" Lady Mary looked the well-dressed royal messenger up and down. She wasn't the type to show happiness openly, but in this case she couldn't resist a smile. She knew who this insolent, white-haired scoundrel was. "My noble Earl of Wiltshire, how is it that the king has taken to honoring Lady Jane with his valor, and not your daughter? Anne is still queen, is she not?"

"She is," the wretched Thomas Boleyn ground out, between clenched teeth. "Anne is even now carrying another child."

"Oh, well I hope it's a boy this time," Mary said lightly. "In the meantime, my good lord, please thank my royal father and tell him I shall certainly attend him at Windsor."

It was all lust and lies, Mary thought, when Anne's flunky father was gone. Yet she skipped around her chamber all the same, much to the amusement of Sir Humphrey Babcock. She would see her father again! That meant more to Mary than all her bloody fantasies of revenge. And though she would never admit it, part of her was secretly dying to meet the noble, brave and beautiful Lady Jane as well.