A/N: Right, so the 27 October goal didn't work out. This chapter proved so difficult to write for some reason. I was just uninterested in writing my scenes. AKA I didn't plan exciting enough scenes, apparently, ha! But I hope they come off well for all of you =)
****Note – I drop a fairly important bomb in this chapter. I have hinted at this in the past but no one seems to have zeroed in on it (at least, no one has communicated their cognizance of it to me). I've tried to maintain subtlety in revealing it but it is an important plot point and will determine a lot in the remainder of the story, so please, in your review, indicate whether I've written it clearly to communicate what's happening.
Alyson, so wonderful to have you back! I'm very happy to hear positive feedback on Edward/Lissie from you. This plotline came out of absolute nowhere for me and I was stunned when I realized where I was going with it… I should join Can't-Control-My-Characters Anonymous lol. Which pattern do you mean that you'd like to see them break? (Plotline suggestions never hurt!) I have lots of plans for them but also want to avoid the story becoming about them. It's about so many characters now lol! I agree – it's wonderful to fantasize about Cromwell's vision coming true, but so much easier thought of than done. My heart is already breaking for the end of this story – it's been my project for four years and I don't know how I'll get through writing it =(
LeCreationist, thank you for your feedback about Norfolk! I do get bothered when the people around Anne are portrayed in such a single-faceted way. I think their relationships were all very complex as any family would be. Poor Cromwell indeed, I am trying to write him as very human so hopefully I'm getting better at it. Looking forward to hearing your thoughts as we continue!
Hi Rae! Sadly, there WILL be more fallings-out! Oh boy they are tricky to write without being cliché. Lol. Norfolk " :o" I agree. Don't worry, in The Borgias Cesare/Lucrezia just become more and more delicious. Have you finished the series yet? Yes – it does seem Cromwell has a little too much of Anne on his mind. And I love writing the Seymour family, their dynamic was just too much fun with Edward being like "girls seriously wtf" and the girls like "omg dresses!" Jane and Henry did not sit together waiting for the canon, but that's a very poignant vision, isn't it? And not altogether at odds with what I believe about Jane Seymour personally (which is a characterization that is slowly, slowly taking shape). Oh, btw, I have re-worked my prospectus for the remaining chapters (I am always planning and re-planning as things shift) and there's basically no chance of this being done by my birthday in February, which means we will have more time with these plots! =D Let me know how you are doing, my dear. And how college apps are coming.
i.
14 May
Morning
"Do you know, when Elizabeth was born, she had the most beautiful red hair?"
In a familiar gesture, the quiet little maid looked around to be sure that she was the one her queen was addressing. She concealed a sigh, poorly, but Anne ignored it. "No, madam. Your daughter was born with red hair, you say?"
Anne's eyes lit up and she raised both hands in a grasping gesture. "Mounds of it. I could have braided and plaited it that very day. She was blessed with a true mane; she'll be a great beauty for it one day."
The maid, whose name might have been Kat or Kit, or something else, smiled timidly. "I've never had the pleasure of making Her Grace's acquaintance, my lady. But I can hardly imagine that your child would be any other."
"She was small – she was smaller than I'd thought she would be. My belly was so great in holding her," Anne continued as though the maid had not spoken. She looked at the spot where, on her lower belly, both hands had rested to cradle. "You should have seen how large I was for carrying her. I … Henry and I thought I must be carrying some titan of a son."
Kat or Kit hesitated. "And what joy to find that you were carrying a beautiful little flame-haired girl," she tried.
Anne tilted her head at the girl. "Come now. You know that isn't true." There was a little silence while the maid busied herself with collecting Anne's discarded bed linens, a bland smile fixed on her face. Her hands shook with anxiety at having possibly offended her mistress.
And so it was that the girl missed how the queen rubbed both hands over her lower belly, a small, sad smile on her lips. Not a smirk, but a true smile. How she bit down on her quivering lip and tipped her head backward to stop tears from leaking from her eyes.
The queen turned a bright smile back on the maid. "It did amaze me," she continued as though they were old acquaintances reminiscing about common experience, "how small she was. The physician placed her into my arms, this tiny little bundle with twitching limbs and making perplexed noises, everything about her so tiny, and I looked at her and looked down at my belly and thought, dear God, what's the rest of this mess then?"
"My sister recently had her first child," Kat or Kit nodded. "She wondered the same. The following morning, she looked down in dismay and asked the midwife where her waist had gone." She chuckled.
"The body does change, for certain. I've…" Anne sniffled. "I've had three miscarriages, three dead births after Elizabeth. Each of them large enough that it was a labour to bring forth. And my shape altered with each."
The girl swallowed and deposited the lump of blankets and sheets on the floor in front of Anne's great bed. She separated the first sheet from the rest and brought it to the naked mattress covered only in a bottom sheet of fresh linen. Holding the first sheet in both hands, she let it fly above the bed and settle itself, then went about the task of tucking its corners and smoothing its wrinkles. "I am sorry to hear of your misfortune, my lady."
"I'll wager you've heard of it before – and probably a worse version at that. That I birthed a dead demon, or even a live one. But no one can question my daughter's perfection." Anne spoke more to herself than anyone else. "No one can."
"No, Your Majesty." Kat or Kit was locating the second, thicker, covering sheet from the mountain of linens.
"Children really are," the dark-haired lady went on as she curled her knees closer to her chest and adjusted in the window seat, "all the perfection that exists in the world. They are really the only perfection that can exist. Before they're much grown, we sully them, with our expectations, our hopes for them… in spite of them."
The girl finished smoothing one side of the middle sheet and flitted to the other side of the bed, nodding silently as she went.
"We expect that they will be little adults, reasoning, calculating, thinking little politicians and courtiers when they should still be allowed to be children. We see in them our own advantage – our own legacies. Rather than treating them as having their own lives, we impose upon them our visions for their adulthood while they are still small. While they are still tiny, sometimes." Anne shivered a little. The maid looked over at her, unsure if she was supposed to contribute to these musings, and saw tears running down the queen's cheeks.
The queen licked her lips. "Our expectations for them begin mounting as soon as they are born, in many cases. The truths associated with their parents' unions, and their goals – they doom our regard for children in many instances. As soon as we hold them in our arms, the battle is over. They are either great triumphs or great disappointments."
Plucking up the thick-woven wool blanket that was next, Kat or Kit averted her eyes from Anne.
"Sometimes a child is doomed," Anne continued, and with a glance over to be sure the maid was not looking, held that area in her lower abdomen again. "Before it is even born. Sometimes it's resigned to its fate before its mother even gets to hold it. Before its father even gets to feel it kicking."
The queen broke off and wiped her cheeks with one palm, keeping the other wrapped across her body. She and her maid looked at one another, and then mutually, delicately, away. A quavering smile appeared through Anne's tears.
"It's the greatest tragedy, I feel. What we do to our children. What we would do, sometimes, to beget our children; and then how quickly we ruin them. How desperately…" Anne broke off, her words having become strangled. She took a deep breath through her tears and composed herself, though her eyes continued to rain sorrow over her pale cheeks. "We want them, how fervently we beg God to send them to us. And when He does, we are not always grateful. We do not always appreciate His blessings, His children that He gives to us. We do not always give them the love that they deserve, because we are so preoccupied with what they mean to us, what they can do for us, or how their existence can be used to our advantage. In the meantime, they are only children… children who want to run and play and laugh."
The maid's movements were quick and deliberate as she pulled the last covering onto the bed, a tear leaking out of one of her eyes as well.
"Or even babies," Anne said again, "only able to grab onto our fists. Or even…" she trailed off, her voice soft, as she stared out the window, "even, when they are not yet babies. Before their father gets to hear that blessed bellowing of a newborn child, and before their mother gets to say to them, Hello, sweetheart; before their parents can sit together, hands clasped over the round swelling of a quickened womb, to feel the kicking from within; before their child even greets them. Sometimes all the world is against them before any of that can even come to pass. Sometimes a child has no merciful chance. It is truly," she whispered, her voice barely audible, far beyond the maid's ears, "the greatest of tragedies."
An array of plumped pillows greeted her eyes when she looked over toward her bed, and Kat or Kit dropped a little curtsy. "My lady."
Anne nodded, giving her leave. She really must, she chided herself idly, stop all this musing aloud. But what matter? It could make no difference now. Nothing could.
She rested her tearstained cheek against the windowpane. It was gray outside; she could almost feel the wetness in the air. A shame, for mid-May.
"Don't you think it's the greatest of tragedies?" she asked the outside world. Or so it looked – yet she still clasped her belly, gently, lovingly. Her eyes dropped from the unremarkable scene outside to the indistinguishable part of her lower abdomen, which was swathed, as had become her custom lately, in thick layers of loose fabric. She tried again to smile. "The greatest of tragedies? Hello, sweetheart."
ii.
Nan Saville's fingers twitched the folded letter back and forth as the door to Master Secretary Cromwell's apartments swung open before her. The score of young men in Cromwell's employ swiveled to look at her, and each one nodded his deference as the queen's chief lady entered their workspace. She forced herself not to clutch the letter tighter, not to crinkle it, as she crossed the floor and headed for the corridor that led to Cromwell's private office.
Footsteps approached her in the hall, and soon two figures appeared: one was Solicitor Richard Riche, looking as sick and strained as Nan felt. He looked genuinely surprised to see her, as if he had forgotten that she existed. "Mistress Saville. Good morning," he greeted her with a bow.
"My lord," she murmured back.
Beside him was one of Cromwell's boys – Mark, his name was. "My lady," he said. He didn't bow. He didn't take his eyes from her face.
She nodded in greeting and stepped around them as gracefully as she could manage to. "Excuse me." She had to make it into Cromwell's office before she lost her nerve.
Cromwell also looked surprised to see her. "Mistress Saville. What prompts this pleasure?"
"Master Cromwell," she said crisply, "I hereby tender my resignation from my post at court." She brandished the letter, its crease having been sharpened by her fingernail to a potentially hazardous blade, and dropped it lightly on his desk.
He made no move to reach for the letter; like Mark, Cromwell kept his eyes trained on her. "Mistress Saville –"
"With your permission, I will leave forthwith."
"Where will you go?"
She bristled. "I will find a place."
"My lady, I would not feel comfortable releasing you from court and potentially into harm's way. You are the queen's chief lady. Surely more pleasing arrangements can be made for you."
"Such as?" She held the words on her tongue. "I won't be invited into Jane Seymour's household."
Cromwell's eyes flicked to and fro. A few men were in his office, but she hardly spoke out of turn. The whole of court, indeed probably the whole of the realm, would be aware of the impending queen. They could dispose of decorum at this point, he supposed. "There really has not been any discussion about the personnel for Mistress Seymour."
"With or without, what I say is true. You know it to be true. I have no quarrel with Mistress Seymour, of course," she added quickly, also looking at the others in the room – who, to their credit, kept their eyes dutifully on their books and parchments. "But since I foresee no employment opportunity, I think I would do well to anticipate my future with care."
Nan's eyes widened with horror when Cromwell suddenly cleared his throat. "Give us a moment," he said into the air. Each of the men in the room rose from their desks and made their way out. The last one closed the door quietly.
"There is no need…" Nan began.
Cromwell sat back in his chair with a sigh. "Mistress Saville, you must not think that your best option right now is to run from the court. In time, adequate arrangements will be found for you, whether it's a suitable marriage, a post at court, or a stipend that would allow you to set up some sort of life for yourself."
"Adequacy at this juncture," she replied evenly, "would be separating myself from the court. I want no gestures borne of guilt: no pay-off, no consolatory betrothal. I want to move on. I need to move on. That is why I am informing you of my resignation, Master Cromwell."
"Your release from court would require the approval of me and of His Majesty, don't forget," he informed her just as curtly. "It would be a mistake to attempt to defy that requirement."
Nan's nostrils flared. He had never seen her angry, and he didn't want to. "I want to be free of this place, and these people," she told him, moving forward so he could understand her lower tone. "They're all poison, the lot of them."
"All?"
"Every last one." She enunciated each word.
"Surely you don't wish to leave the Sheltons alone," he tried. "Surely you see that they need you to manage them."
Her face wrinkled in incredulity. "Am I to be their keeper for life, then?"
"For life, no. In this period of tumult, my lady, it would be cruel to abandon them."
"I suppose, given that the betrothed of one, and the lover of the other, are both held in prison under threat of execution." Her eyes were green like his, but a lighter, more vibrant green. She met his gaze.
He stared her down. "I would watch my words more carefully, Mistress."
A moment later, he wished he had chosen his own words with more consideration, for with that sentence he watched Nan Saville transform into something he had never seen in her before: a passionate woman. He had seen her fierce loyalty, and he had observed her intense grief and guilt. But, in keeping with the example of the mistress she revered, Nan had always exhibited the perfect control of a courtier. She stood before him now, anger and hatred permeating from her skin. The air around her seemed to shimmer as it might around a fire.
She took a deep breath as if trying to contain herself. Then her hands were on his desk and she scooped piles of paper, leaflets, even a book or two, off to one side and onto the floor with a fluttering sound and a series of thuds. "I don't want to watch my words," she told him, loud and clear, in what he suspected would be a shout if she let go entirely of her manners. "I don't want to be careful of my behaviour. Why should I observe the niceties of court etiquette," she pounded on, shoving at the materials on the other side of his desk and clearing it almost entirely with one great push, "while my innocent mistress awaits her death?"
Cromwell held perfectly still, watching this outburst. He hoped that he looked stern, but in truth, he was largely in awe of her and slightly in fear of her.
"We all bow to one another, 'Good morning my lord,' 'Good day my lady,' and chatter about the weather and gossip about who's taken a mistress and who's been seen dallying with whom, and for what?" Nan leaned over his desk, now largely bare. No tears quivered in her eyes. She was as hard as stone. She was ruined, he saw. There was no innocence left in this girl, barely more than a child, and she was right to blame the court for that. This place was, for sure, full of poison. It had ruined Anne; it had ruined Nan Saville; it would ruin Jane Seymour; it was even slowly ruining him.
The green eyes narrowed as they surveyed his face, and for one awful moment Cromwell was certain she was about to either inquire about the bruise on his jaw that marked where Norfolk had struck him, or else strike at him herself.
Instead she stepped back. "For what, Master Secretary?"
He leaned forward, placing both elbows and forearms flat on his now empty desk. "For the sakes of our lives and our fortunes. For survival." His answer was low and honest. He didn't trust his voice enough to raise it.
"And sometimes, as in the case of my mistress, it does not even avail us that."
Their green eyes held each other in mutual weariness. "What would you have me say?" Cromwell finally asked her.
"I…" Her nostrils flared again, and her mouth twitched as she visibly fought to keep her emotions in check. "I would have you release me. I would have you tell me something that will ease the burden to have to go on living. I would have you explain to me how you are able to enact such horrors without collapsing under the weight on your own sins." She clamped her mouth shut then, realizing the risk of her statements.
Cromwell looked down, wishing his armor was not so broken and weathered that her words bit through it like an axe through hammered tin. His jaw slackened and his mind ached. Nan Saville remained, rooted before him, trying to look imperious even though her slight form now trembled a little bit. He swallowed, looked up, and extended his palm wordlessly.
After a few moments' hesitation, Nan placed her hand in his, keeping her shoulders and neck pulled back. She did not even trust him enough to put her hand in his, he saw.
He was still hunched over his desk. He squeezed her fingers gently, and brushed his lips over the back of her hand. "All I can say to you, Mistress Saville, is that I am sorry."
Although he expected to be answered with a demand of what he was sorry for, Cromwell felt a tremor run through Anne's chief lady, her friend. Her only friend. Nan's lips quivered, then it moved to her jaw, and then she steadied herself, nodding. To his eternal shock, she returned the soft squeeze of her hand. There was a practised grace in the way she slid her fingers from his and returned it to her side. He did not have to guess who she had observed and imitated to learn that elegance.
What are you sorry for? For murdering her? For spreading filthy lies about her? For ruining innocent men and those who loved her on the wayside? He could hear her firing these demands at him, echoing loathing through his ears.
Braced for the onslaught, Cromwell almost flinched when Nan took a breath. She licked her lips. "Forgive me for mussing your papers, sir." He watched in muted shock as she turned and walked slowly out of his office, the only echo coming from her clicking heels.
People came into and out of his office like clients – they told them what they wanted, they told him what they needed. They relied on him to provide for them. There was no one into whose office he could go for that same service. He could retreat into a conversation with God, yes; but he was not a man made of stone. There was no one, he thought as he staggered to his feet and began gathering the papers on the left side of his desk, against whom he could rail and who could give him any sort of absolution or closure. Or even counsel. He dusted off one of the books Nan had shoved to the floor, set the disorganized pile down, and moved to the right of his desk. He closed his eyes for half a moment when he crouched, remembering the way he had stepped on the heel of Anne's shoe and slipped her foot out of it that day, on their way to his desk.
Everyone carried their guilt and their anger with them; he was not alone in that. None of them could stop this now. None of them could stop what was happening to Anne. He straightened with an armful of parchments, sniffling to keep his running nose in check. The resistance to Anne's fate, and the support of her downfall, it all fell on him. He was the dam in the ocean of her death, he alone, holding back all the inertia of the rest of the world. And yet no one knew the extent of his role. Only she shared the knowledge.
He sat down with a sigh, shuffling the papers back into their original spots and piles. Nan Saville's resignation letter sat in the middle of his desk, having survived her tantrum. He picked it up between his second and third fingers and without opening it held it over the open flame at the front of his desk. The orange tongues lapped sensually at Nan's hidden indignations, her righteousness never to be seen by earthly eyes. He watched as they neared his fingertips, and seared on contact. After a few unbearable moments he withdrew his fingers from the candle and tossed Nan's letter, a limp rag engulfed in an already dying flame, to the floor. The pain of his burnt fingers soothed him in an unsettling way. He placed the smarting flesh against his tongue to cool them, glancing at the floor to see that the letter had extinguished itself, a pile of defeated ash.
Satisfied, Cromwell turned back to his freshly organized papers and picked up his quill. Thankfully, Nan had not spilled his ink. He dipped the pen and began to write, ignoring the stinging of his flesh. He steeled himself inwardly, vowing that he would not falter now. He would burn all resistance to what was happening to Anne Boleyn. Even his own.
iii.
Noon
Anne Stanhope sank down beside them with a sigh.
"What's the matter?" Lissie asked her.
"Nothing," her sister-in-law replied. She raised her eyes toward the altar, not looking at Lissie. "Nothing at all."
No one pressed further because the sound of footsteps reached their ears then: Sir Nicholas Carew joining them in the chapel for mass.
"Ladies." He greeted them with a bow. "Good morrow."
Jane, at Lissie's right elbow, smiled up at him through her veil. "Good morrow, Sir Nicholas. I trust you slept well?"
"I did," he confirmed, and the younger Seymour sister swore he cast a glance in her direction. She trained her gaze forward, on the straining figure of Christ. "And you, Mistress Seymour? You are well-rested and content?"
"Indeed." She nodded at their host, who bowed again and retreated to his seat a few pews behind them. His chapel was of middling size but beautifully decorated and Lissie took in the stained-glass windows that lined the outer wall. When the chaplain entered and began the mass, she dared a glance behind her and met the steady gaze of Sir Nicholas, who gave her a lazy smile before lowering his head to his clasped hands.
iv.
Twilight
"Majesty." Cromwell stood and gave a little bow.
Henry faced him, feet planted wider than his shoulders, which were squared. "Cromwell. How are you today?" The king's mouth twitched a little, and his foot tapped once, twice, before he caught it and stilled the movement.
"I am well, Your Grace. And I hope you are in good health?"
The foot tapped again. "Yes," Henry said dismissively. "I wanted – well, I wondered whether you'd had any updates about…" he cleared his throat and looked about. Cromwell swallowed, realizing why the king was here, why he'd traversed the length of Greenwich to stand impatiently and uncomfortably before his secretary like a supplicant, cap in hand. He wanted to know about Anne.
"About the queen, Majesty?" Cromwell supplied, reaching for the stack of reports Kingston had sent in the past day or so. The stack was not tall, but that it was a stack at all was impressive; the gaoler was diligent indeed.
Henry made that low noise in his throat again. "Well. Have you?"
"Indeed, my lord. She remains in good health and has been made aware of her trial arrangements for tomorrow."
"Yes. Good." The king nodded.
A beat of uncomfortable silence, and Cromwell held out the letters. "Would you care to see the reports, Majesty?"
"No, no…" Henry held up a palm against the letters as if warding off a beast. "No. I would, however, know what Kingston has said. If you would care to summarize for me?"
Cromwell blinked. He tried not to look surprised. "Yes, my lord, of course. Would you have me write out a summary, or…?"
The king shifted his weight. "Perhaps. But perhaps you might simply read through them, now? I mean not to interrupt if you're about some other pressing business…"
The secretary stifled a grim chuckle. More pressing than a personal request from the king? "Not at all, sire. Would you care to sit down? I am afraid there are no particularly comfortable chairs here; I could have one brought from my personal rooms..."
"Anything will do," Henry said quietly. He shuffled forward and sat down in the chair before the secretary's desk. Cromwell took in the sight for a moment. The king had never sat there before, but dozens of others had: some who were now dead or awaiting death; some who hated this court and all that it represented; and one who would shortly be its queen.
"Let us start…" Cromwell thumbed through the stack, looking for the bottommost sheet. "These span the previous days, Majesty, and depending upon what sort of information interests you –"
"All of it. I want to," Henry cleared his throat again and averted his eyes. Cromwell felt a mild spike of alarm, but just a mild one. It was only natural that the king's curiosity would have gotten the best of him. And perhaps, Cromwell thought, his own ability to feel the intense emotion of alarm, shock, fear, or guilt was weakening. He felt himself growing numb. "I want to be sure that she's being well cared for. That no one could accuse of mistreatment or the like. You understand." The king's sharp blue eyes bored into Cromwell's. They said to him, I cannot disentangle from her completely. I am possessed with thoughts of her. I hate her for it, and I hate myself for it. I must know about her, without being seen to need to know about her, not by anyone – even by you. My mind aches for knowledge of her.
Cromwell nodded. "I understand, Your Grace." He smoothed the first report on his desk and looked away from the king's twitching countenance. "Most days she's risen early, but today she slept later, nearly til eight o'clock. As usual she declined to break her fast upon rising, and spent much of the morning in prayer and reading. Near the hour of two in the afternoon, she was obliged to take some refreshment and was witnessed to eat an early apple, cut into pieces, half a slice of bread, and a small amount of mutton. She has drunk warmed spiced wine as she finds herself chilled throughout the day."
"Any signs of catching a chill?" Henry broke in.
"None, sire. The royal apartments at the Tower are well-insulated; it may just be that the queen is unaccustomed to the cool air that comes off the river."
Henry sat back in his chair and held out one hand, a gesture one might make in an academic conversation. "And if she isn't eating enough, she won't be warming her blood adequately."
"True, indeed – yet she complains not at all about the cold, according to these reports; merely mentions the chill as a circumstance. Shall I have Kingston investigate?"
"No. No." The king shook his head. "Read on."
Cromwell picked up another sheet. "She is asleep long before midnight on most days and her maids wait until she has retired to do so. They are housed in an adjoining chamber, that the queen may have privacy, but of course the keys remain in the hands of Kingston. Her new household was assembled last week and she has not resisted their overtures, although they claim she has not yet learnt their names."
"That's not like her," Henry murmured.
"She is pleasant but quiet and gives no one any difficulty. She does, however, tend to ramble about certain topics. Among them: her childhood," he flipped through the sheets, seeking the notes that Kingston wrote on Anne's conversational trends from day to day, "her immediate family members, ravens –"
"Birds?"
"Yes, it would appear so. Perhaps she's seen them through the windows and has become preoccupied with their folklore. Her mind has ample time for wandering," Cromwell pointed out. He flipped to the report from this morning; the dispatches from the latter half of the day had not yet arrived. It was just past twilight.
"And has she mentioned her brother?"
"Not of note, my lord. Master Kingston has not noted it." Now was not the moment to tell Henry that he had allowed Anne and George a final meeting. He was not sure the moment would ever come. Kingston would never discuss it with anyone else, since Kingston never wanted to discuss anything with anyone, so if Cromwell wished it a secret, it would be one that they took to their own graves. "I believe it's mostly been about her mother, her poor mother who will die of grief, and her sister Mary…"
Henry snorted. "Who will die of happiness."
Cromwell set his jaw. Mary Boleyn was hardly resentful or bitter. Of all the free, loving spirits Cromwell had encountered, the sister of Henry's queen ranked among the top few. He kept her in small luxuries as they came to him from friends on the Continent, having maintained a polite correspondence with her for years. She had inquired about her sister's health but never begged to be restored at court. And he heard, through a few men who had passed through her shire, that her formerly delicate beauty was now sun-kissed and robust. If any Boleyn stood to gain from Anne's fall, it would be Mary; yet, Cromwell secretly suspected that she would not take it well. "But about their childhood and the queen's regrets regarding their relationship now, my lord."
"Well." Henry sniffed and sat up straighter, a perfect peacock. "What did Mary expect, wedding a commoner without her father's permission?"
"Indeed, Majesty." The page ruffled again as Cromwell brought their attention back to the task at hand. "She's… most recently, this morning, she was discussing Elizabeth."
The royal blue eyes ticked up. A slight wrinkle of consternation appeared in Henry's forehead at the mention of his child. "Oh?"
"Well – all children, it seems. One of the maids was involved in a fairly lengthy conversation and reported it back to Kingston, who sent it up this afternoon."
"What else did she say about Elizabeth?"
Now Cromwell cleared his throat. He looked at the page, wishing he had just lied and concealed this. He had gone over this missive earlier and had felt a twinge of discomfort reading about how Anne had discussed her daughter. These reports, these letters, were Cromwell's last link to her. He would wager he had less than a week of them left. Just a handful of days, in all, to remain linked to this woman before she would be gone forever. These verbal musings that she made, so deliciously, as if totally unaware that her words were noted – but Anne could not possibly fail to understand that – were more intimate a connection than most people had ever had with the queen. When Cromwell had read about Anne's waxing poetic about children, and expectations, and failure, his heart had pounded and sunk in his chest as though he was having the conversation with her himself. He had imagined himself as her friend, palming her hand, lacing his fingers through hers, pressing a kiss to her forehead or her red-tipped nose. It was a closeness he would never achieve in life – not with her or with anyone else. And he did not want to share this intimacy, this vulnerability of Anne, with Henry. It felt akin to baring her body before him, the irony of which was certainly not lost on Cromwell. "She said that Elizabeth had a surprising mane of red hair when she was first born – and that Anne herself was great and heavy in carrying her."
Both men were quiet, with Cromwell hoping that Henry would accept this as enough and end this exchange. Instead Henry said softly, "She was very large with Elizabeth in her belly. And Elizabeth's hair… she's right. A great amount for such a tiny child. That's how…" the king shuddered and took a deep breath. "That's how we said she was the perfect mix of us both. Anne's long, beautiful face… and the red hair of my father's family." Henry gazed at Cromwell until the secretary bent his head and read on.
"The queen went on to talk about children and how too much pressure on them can ruin them and turn them from being what they should be, which is simple, innocent beings. She…" Cromwell glanced up and quickly back down, avoiding the king's intense stare which he could not quite read. "She said that expectations, she feels, often spoil a child's chance at a happy life, as the advent of that life can be fraught with joy or despair based on circumstances beyond the child's control. And because the child's life can be so impacted thus, their race might be run before they even take their first breath in our world."
The king was still staring, but his gaze had turned inward. Cromwell glanced at the sheet before him, finding the last note Kingston had made.
"The queen called it 'the greatest tragedy.'"
He placed the report back onto the desk, silently begging the king to be satisfied with these revelations and not to make him go digging through past days' reports. Cromwell did not want to share any more of Anne with the king. These days in the Tower, these final days at which they had arrived together, where he had sent her on her way and where she would be an accessory to her own political murder, her words were for him only. It mattered not to him that this was merely his own fancy. As far as he was concerned, she spoke and acted and moved in a pageant before his mind's eye, and in his mind's eye he not only listened and watched, but cared, held, protected. He would not relinquish access to his world, his private world with her that was coming rapidly to an end, to apocalypse – not to Henry, not to anyone else.
He glanced up and met the king's gaze. Henry shut his eyes and to Cromwell's surprise, a dulled shock in keeping with his growing numbness, tears spilled down Henry's cheeks.
"She's right," Henry murmured.
The secretary's mouth opened and closed. He licked his lips. "Majesty, I apologize ever deeply for having upset you –"
"No, no, Cromwell. You've done what I asked. Thank you." The king braced one hand on the arm of his chair, the chair where, in the past fortnight, had sat Mark Smeaton, Jane Seymour, Jane Rochford, and Richard Riche, among others. Henry paused halfway off the seat. "It really is – the greatest tragedy."
Cromwell rose in deference. "May I help with anything else at the moment, Majesty?"
"No," Henry murmured over his shoulder, trying to conceal the hand that he brought up to wipe his eyes. "You've done enough."
One hand on the parchment with Anne's words, her deepest thoughts and sorrows, Cromwell watched the king go. The door clanked shut behind the king and Cromwell sank into his chair, then slowly lowered his head to his desk until his cheek rested on those words: the greatest tragedy.
iv.
Late Evening
Riche wondered whether he was drunk again, but at this point, he supposed, it was less a question of being drunk and more which varying degree of drunkenness he currently possessed. He had been sipping wine constantly for above a week, both to fend off the desire to sleep and to dull his senses against the realities of being awake.
But he was nearly finished with his tasks for the trial, which were all that stood between him and the freedom of his bed. However, even his bed these days provided little in the way of freedom. He wiped a hand over the unkempt beard that waggled from his chin. He badly needed a shave, and a good night's rest, and a purging of the soul.
The firelight flickered then, insistently, as if saying, come along Master Riche, let's finish this then, and he refocused on his list. He had been making a summary of the charges against the queen for her trial on the morrow; a few copies of it would be made, for those who were attending but not sitting on the jury. He would finish the copy and hand it off to one of Cromwell's boys to scribe out a dozen or so copies, of which he would be the keeper. The members of the jury had been delivered a full account of the indictment and the charges in all their details, but this list was to be shorter, a summary for those who already knew the information well enough that they required no full listing. Unfortunately, he himself fell into that category.
His wine was getting cool in the goblet. He drained it and filled the cup from the jug which warmed by the fire. He took a sip and sighed: "ahhhhh" as he skimmed over the indictment again to choose which information to include.
"'She, despising her marriage, and entertaining malice against the king, followed daily her frail and carnal lust,'" Riche muttered into the rim of his goblet. "Well, all those attending will be aware of that piece of fiction. '… did falsely and traitorously procure by base conversations and kisses, touching… divers of the King's daily and familiar men to be her adulterers, so that several of the King's servants yielded to her provocations.' Aye. What man could refuse her thus?" He chuckled, the darkness of his bedchamber enveloping him in safety, in truth. He could say here and feel here and think here, the base truths that he could never dare admit in the broad daylight. "Kisses and touches from that woman would turn any man to be her adulterer. Were she so inclined."
But this was not the information for the summary, he knew. He flipped the page to find the listing of the queen's alleged trysts:
"Ah. 'On 6th October 1533, and divers days before and after, she procured, by those sweet words and touches' – damn them – 'Henry Norris of Westminster, a gentleman of the Privy Chamber…'" Riche snorted into his wine and choked a little. He coughed to clear his throat and gave himself a silly smile. Oh, if only Master Secretary could see him now. "Gentleman, indeed. '…To violate her, by reason whereof he did so at Westminster on the 12th October, and they had illicit intercourse at various other times, both before and after.' Well, of course. Who could have her just once?" he mumbled, scratching out: Incited 6 October 1533: adultery 12th October 1533, &before &after.
"Not to worry," he assured the list that he had just started as he sprinkled sand on that entry and moved to the next, "about the fact that Her Majesty still laid abed at that date in recovery after the birth of her daughter, the Princess Elizabeth. She was not churched until the eve of St. Edward's. But no trouble. No trouble at all." He blew on the sand and the candle next to it flickered. He turned back to the indictment.
"'On 3 December 1533, and divers days before and after, procured one Will Brereton of the Privy Chamber, to violate her, which he did so on 8 December at Hampton Court, and on several other days before and after.' So then: Incited 3 December 1533: adultery 8 December 1533, and before, and after. Yet, were we not at Westminster for the entirety of the Christmas season that year? Well." He threw back the rest of his wine – he had lost count of how many goblets tonight, but his fingers felt thick as he reached for the jug again – and shook his head, still with that grin on his face. "No matter. If the paper says so, so it must have been. Perhaps I'm wrong. Perhaps we all are wrong. Who's to say any of us have functioning memories, or minds? Absorb we must, the knowledge we are fed. Why let us think or remember on our own when our truths can be manufactured by those who govern us, and served to us on a silver tray? Or in this case, a thoroughly detailed indictment."
Riche stopped and rubbed his temple. He swayed a little in his place before lowering himself to his chair. Vaguely the thought came that he was not well and perhaps should stop drinking wine now, but he had been having a lot of irritating thoughts lately, so he pushed this one from his mind as he had the others.
"8 May 1534!" he announced to no one, reading over the next charge on the indictment. "And, naturally, at other times before and since, she procured Sir Francis Weston – whereby he did so, of course, on 20th May, and so forth. In the spring air. The lucky cur." For a moment the image actually flashed through his mind, of the queen underneath the strong body of Weston, and his heart pulsed quickly over two beats. Of course none of it was true, but by the light of the Saviour; if it were, he would be splintered with jealousy at that thought. He scratched out this entry, careful not to note the lucky cur in the margin.
"Oh, 12 April? Out of order," Riche clucked his tongue at the indictment. "Perhaps it's difficult to keep track of so much delicious carnality. '12 April 1534, procured Mark Smeaton to violate her, whereby he did so 26 April. And divers other times…"
His hand shook as he sprinkled the next pinch of sand, and blew it with a shudder. "And we've arrived at last at the incest; 'having procured and incited her own natural brother George Boleyn, Lord Rochford, alluring him with her tongue in his mouth, and his tongue in hers…' Have mercy. 'Whereby he, despising the commands of God, violated and carnally knew the said queen his sister… 5 November 1535, and divers other days before and after at the same place and others.' Or," Riche said lightly as he jotted that date, "perhaps we are disposing of Rochford for other purposes, and this seems an adequate stratagem. Perhaps. And what else have we here…?
"Ah. Entertaining malice against and plotting with men to kill the king. Yet is that not what the king has done to her? And orocuring her servants to be her lovers – well, I think we've covered that." But he noted it anyway, even as the page shimmered and swam a little before his eyes. He blinked rapidly, suddenly wishing for water to drink or something to eat. He looked about but only found his wine. Shrugging, he took a long sip.
"Being damningly, sinfully alluring… but I won't write that one," Riche murmured as he slumped over, checking the indictment to be sure he had covered all but the last page before he flipped to it.
"'Divers acts of treason resulting from her crude and adulterous nature.' 'Wishing and planning harm upon the King's Majesty.' 'Agreeing to marry a man of base pedigree after the King's death.'" Riche snickered as he summarized these sweeping charges, amused at their ridiculousness. But of course it made sense that they should be ridiculous. No mild betrayal would do for the political murder of the king's wife; no ordinary crime would be strong enough to topple a queen. In a way, he could understand Cromwell's thought process. He could almost see the Secretary, bent over his desk in the dead of the night, dreaming up absurdities by the light of a single candle. Treason, adultery?, he might propose; no, it'll have to be more than that. Her downfall would have to be a spectacle, so stunningly sordid that no one could question it.
Suddenly Riche was laughing, really laughing, his belly shaking with each hysterical peal. "God," he tried to say, but it came out as little more than a gasp. It was so ridiculous, all of it. So blatantly false. If anything, Anne was far too imperious, far too regal. She was protective of herself and her position, having maintained a defensive stance for so many years while waiting to be queen that she was in many ways guarded to a fault. She would not commit adultery with a courtier; everyone knew that. Therefore any charge of that genre had to be so overblown that anyone who heard it would be awed by its filth. Anything so unimaginable to the mind, so unbelievable to the sense of reason, must be true. Riche could see, in his mind's eye, Cromwell concocting these charges. Cromwell was made of stone. He wondered, had the man sweated, had his pulse picked up, as he wrote out the allegations? It was enough to make any normal man prick up in shameful curiosity. But Cromwell was no normal man. He had probably jotted out the scenarios between holding performance reviews for his staff, authorizing capital transfers to the king's agents in Rome and proofreading some new piece of legislation. Cromwell had probably never visualized these titillating scenarios. He was not slave to the guilt and addiction of this whole process. He was a man, Riche noted as his laughter subsided to a bubble, of true substance. He could not only stomach, not only stand for, but create and process things that an ordinary man could barely imagine. A true visionary.
A true, unapologetic murderer. Riche shook his head, sadness and disgust at himself, at Cromwell, quelling his laughter at last.
Never having loved the king. Riche completed his summary in silence, this last line an afterthought on the indictment. Never having loved the king. On the contrary, she had loved the king. She'd waited for him, soothed him, challenged him, argued with him; she'd born his child and broken her own heart trying to bear him another. She'd struggled desperately to keep him. She had loved him indeed. And that truth was the only fact, the only error in judgment, missing from this list of her mistakes.
A/N: So, was the big twist clear?
Up next, THE TRIALS!