24 September 1540
Palace of Greenwich
"—and the second battle – if such a minor fracas can rightfully be referred to as such, naturally – was fought beneath the White Horse outside of Uffington. A decisive victory indeed for Your Highness's forces, I am most pleased to report, with the heretics falling back toward their boltholes in Wiltshire…"
Mary listened to her guest with one ear while she tackled the enormous breakfast Francis Weston had just set in front of her. Dr. Butts's orders that morning had been as clear as the ringing tones in which he'd lamented her recent weight loss; no fasting until she recovered, no skipped meals, and above all no more barley pottage. He'd permitted her a small filet of salmon that morning in remembrance of the general Friday observance but he'd also ordered her served with ham, eggs, quinces in honey, manchet bread and butter, and breast of swan, which he deemed 'a most healthful viand for a man in Your Highness's condition'.
As if there'd ever been a man in Mary Tudor's 'condition' before.
She returned her attention to her guest as he waved his fork to emphasize whatever point he was making about the Wiltshire rebellion. Reginald Pole – Bishop of Salisbury in this world, oddly enough, and Will's almoner – had arrived at her door while she was being shaved with greetings from the Privy Council and much avuncular tutting over her 'grievous and most worrisome injuries'. She'd invited him to breakfast despite lingering misgivings over his loyalty; in her world he'd been a solid King's man until the Great Matter had sent him scurrying to the relative safety of Rome, and she couldn't rule him out as one of her father's spies. But as they spoke of the Privy Council's concerns, his own family, Thomas More's 'sad condition', and now of the rebellion she consulted not her own memory but William Tudor's heart, an organ that had yet to let her down, and there she found respect and infinite trust for this good-hearted and brilliant if slightly pompous man.
She all but winced; if only Will could have found room in that heart for Renée.
Pole had by then moved on to Devizes. "Now that was a true battle," he was saying, "although by that time most of the veteran soldiers had either died in battle or fled to France, leaving the scholars in charge."
Her mouth dropped open. "Scholars! You don't mean priests?"
"Cambridge fellows for the most part, yes," he sighed, "who unlike their colleagues possessed no knowledge of military tactics or strategy. Your Highness was able to manoeuvre their forces onto a promontory overlooking Roundway Down and drive them over a precipice: a dreadful loss of life, I must confess, with only a few stragglers remaining for the magistrate. One rascal escaped only to hide among the ruins of Avebury Priory. He was a fellow of Jesus College but I don't recall his name…do you remember, Sir Francis? He was beheaded at Marlborough."
"Cranmer, I think – Your Highness!"
"I'm fine," she got out through the mouthful of food she'd almost swallowed whole, waving her hand to stop the page before he raised an alarum that woke the entire palace. "I – I overheard the name in Kent, but in a different context."
Luckily Pole didn't press the matter – she could hardly admit to knowing Thomas Cranmer as Archbishop of Canterbury! – and they soon moved to other matters; by the time they rose from table she'd recovered from her shock for the most part. "I understand Cardinal Wolsey's crayer will be arriving at some point this morning," she said as they cleaned their hands. "Please remind my Lord Marney to advise His Eminence of the Privy Council meeting and of this morning's audience, if he arrives in time."
His smile was little more than a show of teeth. "Of course, Highness – and I will begin the search for a new confessor for Your Highness immediately."
She accepted a goblet of well-watered wine as the door to her apartments closed behind the bishop. Why Pole had bared his fangs at the mere mention of the Cardinal she didn't know or much care at the moment; doubtless there were as many factions at this court as any other but her mind was drowning in an ocean of cares so deep she didn't have the strength to take them into account, especially with the memory of Dr. Butts's early morning examination making itself known all over her right shoulder blade. He'd shown up at her door at six to hem and haw and poke and prod, finally pronouncing her well on the way to a 'moderate recovery', whatever that meant: but his rules! Exercises to stretch the joint, meat and eggs at every meal, a 'strengthening tonic' that she suspected consisted of little more than chamomile and honey, and strict instructions not to drink unwatered wine or to practice defence for the time being. She could wear sword and dagger, he'd assured her, but she was not to draw them; sound advice given she had no idea how.
He had however cleared her to return to the virginals, an allowance made doubly sweet by the unexpected discovery that Will had played; in fact, she hadn't realized he'd kept a private closet for his treasures at Greenwich until Pieter mentioned it that morning. "Tom," she called, turning to one of the pages, "light the candles in my closet, if you would."
As he bowed and hastened to obey she smiled to herself. The last two weeks has taught her much, although some things – how to walk and climb stairs in a larger body, bowing, certain gestures – seemed to spring innate from the body she inhabited. One of the first things she'd learned after the fog of the poppy syrup had lifted was that it was easier to order a man to do something than to ask him about it; in this case she merely had to follow the boy to the right door and—
And she stepped through the doorway, and her heart almost skipped a beat.
Had ever there existed a room so lovely, so completely aligned to her own preferences in every possible way?
She cast her gaze around as the evidence of Will's exquisite taste emerged in the warm candlelight. The floor was covered with a lush turkey carpet, while the ceiling above the virginals boasted a glorious mural of a battle of some sort surrounded by flourishes of gold leaf. Stately portraits of her father, mother, stepmother, and an elderly lady – Anne's grandmother Lady Margaret Boleyn, according to the inscription – had been mounted above a pair of sinfully upholstered chairs, and the shelves along the far wall held a number of astronomical instruments, a jewelled Nuremberg dosenuhr, and books by the dozen.
She dismissed the boy, turning to the books with an inquisitive eye once she was alone. Amadis de Gaula, Aristotle in Greek and Latin, Novelle Natura Brevium, a collection of Erasmus, French adventures, saints' lives, Utopia…there wasn't a single title she hadn't read, not a book she wasn't intimately familiar with – but hold on: what was this? She picked up the unfamiliar if gorgeously bound little booklet sitting on the little table next to the shelves and awkwardly thumbed through the manuscript until she came to a poem she knew all too well.
The lively sparks that issue from those eyes,
Against the which there vaileth no defence,
Have pierced my heart
Thomas Wyatt, in his own hand – and from just last year, she noted with relief.
Mary continued through the book, smiling as she rediscovered old friends – The Lover Laments, The Lover Sendeth Sighs – but what she did not find in those pages was more telling. There was no Lover Despairing, no Veritas Viat Fides: nothing, in fact, about Anne Boleyn or his weeks of incarceration in the Tower.
Of course none of that had happened in this world. Cranmer was dead – and God forgive her, the news all but made her heart burst forth in song – and England was still Catholic, but two incomparable masterpieces had never been penned. How many great works of art had been lost to the old world due to her father's malice? How many had been lost to this one due to the Great Pestilence?
It was a question she would never be able to fully answer.
She returned the manuscript to the shelf with a sigh and took a seat at the virginals. Butts had encouraged her to play, telling her the gentle motions would be less jarring to the shoulder joint than writing or riding, but as she slipped her arm out of the sling and began on a slow version of My Lady Carey's Dompe (or whatever its name was here) she found the exertions – not painful, not exactly, but uncomfortable and more difficult than she had expected. If only Elizabeth could hear the mincemeat she was making of her favourite song! She would laugh—
Her fingers froze over the keys.
Elizabeth – an Elizabeth – was in that very palace at that very moment, but if Mary could be Will in this world her sister could be almost anyone; dark like Anne, blue-eyed like Father, slow like Harry Fitzroy, temperamental like Aunt Mary, or even graceless and ill-mannered like Nell Brandon. What if her brilliant little sister was lost to her forever? She tried to picture her face, so much like Father's: the black eyes, the hooked nose, the little freckle perched atop the corner of the small, thin-lipped mouth…
The door opened; she looked over her shoulder to find Pieter waiting patiently. "Yes?"
"It's half eight, Highness."
"And I'm expected at the Presence Chamber at nine," she said as she rose. "Lead on, then."
The raying room was nearly empty, the grooms having already packed away all of Will's vast wardrobe other than the gorgeous silk doublet and matching hose she was to wear to that morning's audience. "You must have known Philippe Maioris during your time in service with the Archbishop of Cambrai," she said to Pieter as Tom and Bartholomew unlaced the drab cypress outfit she'd donned that morning. "What can you tell me of him?"
"He is scholar of some note, sir, and a man of great diplomatic talents," he replied, "although I do not know him to have served as ambassador in his own right before. Perhaps it is for the best that the Emperor sent him from Cambrai and not Archbishop Chapuys."
Archbishop Chapuys! She would have gasped out loud if the boys hadn't been present. If Chapuys was Archbishop of Cambrai, if he'd been the one expelled from England… "Tell me about Dr. Maioris, if you would," she said, flicking a brief glance in the grooms' direction before returning her gaze to Pieter.
He gave her a quick nod. "The Dean is a man of sterling integrity and strict honesty who would never allow himself to be embroiled in scandal of any kind – although I must admit I once believed the same of my former master. He is also an avid conversationalist and a talented musician and in addition a composer of some note…"
Mary let him rattle on while her mind returned to the news he'd just imparted. She couldn't help but smile at the idea of Eustache Chapuys enthroned as a prince of the Church and entrusted with a diocese on the front lines of heresy, but she had to wonder why he'd been sent to England on embassy and, more to the point, what kind of scandal he'd got himself involved in. Chapuys was a mature man of fifty and father of an adult son, hardly the type of man one would expect to embroil himself in…
Henry Seymour's words came to her mind: his sister Jane had also found herself in a scandal, one that had ended with her removal to a convent—
No, it couldn't be.
Once the boys had finished lacing her into her doublet Pieter sent them off in search of something called the Great Chain of Estate. "I had anticipated Your Highness would wear the regalia of the Order of the Golden Fleece this morning," he explained, "but the Queen sent a note while you were at table offering use of the Great Chain. I assumed Your Highness would prefer to comply, as she would not have done so had the King not permitted it."
"No, that's fine. Returning to the Archbishop, you mentioned something about a scandal. What happened?"
His cheeks flushed. "One could call it a tale as old as time, Highness. Might I start from the beginning?"
"Please do."
He took a moment to marshal his thoughts. "His excellency was originally sent to England by the Archduchess Mary to negotiate a marriage between her niece Anna of Austria and the Duke of Somerset, a matter of some delicacy given Her Grace's betrothal to Albert of Bavaria and his subsequent apostasy."
"He's become a Lutheran?"
"And quite recently, yes," he confirmed. "We arrived at Windsor in October of last year and by the middle of November negotiations were complete, but conditions in the North Sea kept us in England through Advent and Christmastide. It was during the latter that my former master embarked upon a torrid amour, if one might use the term, with a lady of the court – a distant relation of the Queen, to crown the shame."
She would have given a great deal not to have been right. "You speak of Jane Seymour."
He nodded reluctantly. "Once the liaison was discovered His Excellency was expelled and Mistress Seymour was sent to a nunnery, although whether she is yet delivered—"
Delivered?! Oh, Jane…
"—I do not know; the lady's condition was discovered when she fainted in the Queen's Privy Chamber and the physician on duty summoned a midwife." He lowered his voice. "Your Highness was of the opinion that His Excellency's dismissal was due to his having felled a hind His Majesty had long stalked without success."
The grooms chose that moment to return with a heavy walnut box, a smirking Francis Weston following close behind. "What has you so pleased this morning?" she asked once she'd extricated her lower lip from between her teeth.
"His Grace of Norfolk has requested an audience with Your Highness on a matter of the most exquisite delicacy, or so he says," he replied. "If you'd rather I stalled him…"
She could have groaned out loud. "Doubtless it's about his daughter; I'll see him after dinner. Have the ambassadors arrived in the Great Hall?"
The smirk broadened into an outright grin. "Yes, sir, and His Grace is entertaining them as only he can."
Mary would have smiled had she not been dreading the conversation with Edmund Howard with every fibre of her soul, as there was now no doubt in her mind that Father had ordered Kathryn to rush to her bedside hoping to 'cure' his dazed son of lack of interest in love; in fact, she rather suspected Anne of inveigling Lady Langley to do the same thing the previous night. That the latter attempt had worked was due only to timing, as Mary's new body had been far too weak to respond to Kathryn…but she turned her mind away from that abhorrent notion with a shudder of disgust.
The Great Chain of Estate was nearly identical to the imaginary collar Holbein had painted into the Whitehall mural, an odd coincidence given that in this world the painter had never visited England. She examined herself in the mirror once Pieter had set it in place, marvelling not so much at how the chain had come into existence as at how utterly unnerving it still was to see an unfamiliar face looking back at her. It might have been the first chance she'd had to view herself in a proper mirror in good light but she really should have been comfortable with her new countenance by then, even if the chin was cleft and the jawline…
But what was that?
She pulled her hair back into a rough ponytail with her good hand and stepped closer to the mirror, turning her head to and fro as she examined the remnant of what must have been a spectacular bruise curling around the back of her head. "I don't remember anyone mentioning this bruise," she said to Francis's reflection as she let the hair go. "Did Dr. Phipps say anything about it, do you know?"
"Not to me, sir," he replied, "but Butts and Chambers did say they were surprised Your Highness survived the injury. Butts thought you'd broken your neck."
She frowned at him before returning to her reflection. If Will hadn't been plucked out of an injured body, if he had broken his neck and died…
It was a disturbing thought. God might write the story of every man's life but that story could be disrupted or changed for good or bad by man's free will. Had Prince William died before his time, and had she been brought here to live out his life? God might be able to repair a broken neck (another miracle, she thought) but he would never wrench a soul out of Heaven. No, He must have brought Mary here to complete whatever work Will had left unfinished that was necessary for His holy plan.
Which made no sense at all. Did God care less about her old world than this one, or had Mary simply not been needed once Edward had been born? It wasn't likely that she'd ever find out unless God's plan required another person to be brought here – but that possibility set her stomach to churning. No wonder Wolsey didn't want to hear of what had happened after he 'died', she thought; what man would wish to hear that he'd been forgotten or that his life's work had been for naught?
Her mind returned to the brother she'd left behind as the boys began to array her with the royal regalia. Edward would be a man one day, God willing, and would be the one admiring himself as servants arrayed him with collar and coronet, sword and poniard, rings and garter. Would his own crown sparkle more brightly without Mary's shadow to cast a pall? Would the more intransigent Catholics finally bow to the inevitable and bend the knee to him instead of continuing to insist that Father's excommunication had rendered his marriage to Jane untrue, and that she was the only legitimate heir?
The idea sickened her to her core. Jane had never known of the excommunication – nobody but the Holy Father had known of it – and had married her father and conceived Edward in good faith, just as her mother had conceived her in good faith that her marriage to Father was true. Edward was just as legitimate as her…if he were indeed Father's child and not—
She coughed to disguise the snort of laughter that almost caught her by surprise. No matter how unlikely the possibility, no matter how ridiculous the idea of a Queen of England breaking her marital vows, it would still serve Father right if the prince he'd destroyed Mary's world to sire was in truth the bastard son of a Savoyard priest.
But that brought to mind the child conceived in this world and, more to the point, the unrequitable debt she owed its parents in the other. "I'd like you to make discreet enquiries about Mistress Seymour and her child," she said to Pieter as the last buckle was tightened. "I don't trust her family to do right by it; if necessary I'll step in and have the infant raised properly. His Excellency will hardly thank us if we let his youngest child perish through lack of care."
"Aren't you afraid people will think the child is yours?" Francis asked.
"And if they do?" she retorted. "His Excellency will hardly complain if the fire under his feet scorches another man's soles."
Anne's apartments were located at the end of a long private corridor that ran behind the east wall of the Great Gallery. Mary was surprised to discover that walking with sword and dagger at her waist was easier than she'd expected, even with half a dozen men and boys watching her every move: easier, in fact, than the first time she'd worn a farthingale. How Lady Salisbury had fretted and fussed! She could only thank God that her old governess was still alive and well, if living in comfortable retirement in the country; too many of those she'd loved had died years before their time, and—
And the door opened to reveal Anne with her ladies, her crown perched on top of a head of iron grey hair.
It was a sight she'd never thought she'd see; Anne Boleyn had let herself grow old.
"Your Majesty, lady mother: I bid you a good morning," she said as Anne gestured for her to rise from her knees. "Might I have the honour of accompanying you this morning to His Majesty's Presence Chamber?"
She smiled. "Of course you may – and don't think I fail to appreciate your courage either," she said, turning to one of her ladies. "The first time Will and I received an envoy on our own he was so nervous he hid behind one of the marble statues in the gallery. It took George ten minutes to coax him out."
"Mother…"
Anne's eyes twinkled merrily. "Will, you were eight! Why don't we process through the Gallery ourselves this morning? That way the court can witness the – the unity of the royal family."
She held out her good arm. "A splendid idea, madam."
Of course there was no reason for anyone to doubt the unity of the royal family; Anne's true intention was to reassure the court that the Prince of Wales was on the mend and, more importantly, in full possession of his faculties. A prince could hardly sneeze without inciting a flurry of gossip, after all; an accident as catastrophic as Will's must have sent tongues wagging across the realm and beyond.
As they stepped out into the gallery Mary glanced at Anne again out of the corner of her eye. The Anne Boleyn she'd been acquainted with as her mother's maid of honour might have been a snake but her serpentine nature had been formed in the fashionable courts of Burgundy and France; that Anne would never have let her hair go grey, let alone appear in public with ragged brows and hairs sprouting on her chin. Had the six years she'd spent imprisoned with the French Queen in this world stripped her of her pride even as it preserved her humanity, or had marriage to her father worn her down? For a queen to—
"À BAS L'ANGLAIS! VIVE LE CAUVIN!"
A woman's horrified cry; the glimmer of candlelight against steel; Mary's poniard leaping into her hand as a tall, gaunt man in friar's robes bore down upon them, a fearsome knife clenched in his bony fingers; dodging, thrusting, a scream of pain; a savage twist upwards, blade scraping against vertebra and rib, blood spraying out; accusing eyes boring into her, lips moving wordlessly, a last gurgling gasp – and a body dropping to the ground in a pool of blood.
She'd killed a man. She'd taken a human life.
For the space of a single breath no one moved, no one spoke, the echoes of the assassin's knife clattering against the tiles the only sound that dared breach the silence, and then a woman let out a high-pitched shriek. "There's nothing to fear!" Mary shouted, desperate to forestall panic. "He's dead! The Queen and I are safe!"
At first she feared it wouldn't be enough – and it almost wasn't, she could see from the terrified faces surrounding her – but then old Lord Sandys harrumphed, a bishop to their right made the sign of the cross, and the crowd heaved a shared sigh of relief before breaking out in nervous chatter.
Sergeant-at-Arms Stonor was at her side almost before she'd resheathed the blade she didn't remember drawing. "Bloody hell!" he cried. "How did he get through—"
"We'll worry about that later," she barked. "First, secure the palace and clear the gallery, and send a detachment of guards – madam?"
"He – he almost killed you," Anne stammered as she clutched at Mary's arm, her eyes fixed on the assassin's twitching body. "If I hadn't suggested – if I – if we'd gone through the back corridors instead—"
Lady Sussex stepped forward. "Majesty, perhaps you should return to your rooms."
"But we're supposed to receive the ambassadors—"
"I'll meet with them myself as soon as I'm finished here, I promise you," Mary said as she detached herself and handed Anne over to the lady-in-waiting. "Thank you, Lady Sussex."
The gallery quickly emptied once the courtiers realized there was nothing more to see; Mary, her heart still pounding, would have followed their example but before she could return to her apartments she spotted Cardinal Wolsey at the top of the stairs with his men. "Eminence!" she cried, waving him over. "If you could—"
But he rushed past her and crouched beside the assassin's body. "Has he received the final offices, sir?"
She blinked. "His last words were 'à bas l'anglais, vive le Cauvin'."
"Le Cauvin!" he repeated, dropping the dead man's wrist. "In that case he won't thank me for helping him to Heaven, although he might have done with a French lesson or two. How did he die, if I might ask?"
"He charged us with a knife and I…I stabbed him."
He gave her a searching look before shaking his head and returning to the body. "Fresh tonsure," he murmured as he examined the top of the man's head, "too fresh, in fact, given the sunburnt forehead. Your Highness said he was carrying a knife?"
"A jointing knife," she replied. "The kind used in the kitchen to separate animal spines."
"Aye, and it would have done a fine job of separating human ones if Your Highness hadn't stopped him," Stonor interjected. "Mind you, it gives us a chance to trace his movements. He had to have stolen the knife from the kitchens; it's not like he'd bring it all the way from France."
Wolsey regarded him coolly. "I think you'll find our man either a homegrown heretic or a German, Sergeant; not even a Breton would make the mistake of using a definite article with a man's name. And there's this," he said, holding out the contents of the purse he'd fished out of the assassin's robes. "French silver, as bright as the day it left the Paris mint. A true French agent would have the sense to carry English farthings; he'd have to eat and sleep, and which inn or alehouse in England would take King Louis's coin?"
"But why would a heretic want us to think he was French?" Mary asked as one of Wolsey's men helped the Cardinal back to his feet. "Surely such a man wouldn't have wanted Cauvin and his ilk to take the blame."
"That, sir, I cannot say, but I do fear this matter bodes ill not just for Your Highness's safety and that of the Queen but also for the reputation of the Church. In that light, I would ask the sergeant if he would allow one of my clerks to assist in his investigation."
The grizzled veteran considered the offer while Mary, unable to listen to another word from either of them at the moment, returned to her attendants clustered near the door leading to the King's apartments. What did she care how the bastard got into the palace or where he came from? She hadn't chosen to kill him; her left hand had drawn the poniard and plunged it in his belly before she'd registered what was happening. If only she could forget the blood spurting out and soaking into Anne's skirts just like it must have when…
…when Father murdered her.
But that was going too far. A king could kill unfairly, that she knew, but he could never commit murder. Everything done lawfully was done in his name; everything done unlawfully was done against his personal majesty. Perhaps the distinction was sophistical but—
Wolsey's creaking baritone cut into her thoughts. "The envoys have returned to Westminster under guard at Lord Russell's suggestion. I wonder if Your Highness would wish to return to your apartments."
"I had wanted to speak to my sister…"
"Your Highness may do as you will, of course, but a change of attire would be advisable," he said in low, soothing tones that nevertheless held an undercurrent of something Mary couldn't quite place. "I would not wish Your Highness to cause Her Grace any unnecessary distress."
She frowned; why would he think— "If you believe it's for the best."
"I very much do, sir. Master Bowden, if you would?"
They followed the sergeant of her private guard back to the door of her apartments where an ashen-faced Pieter took over and wordlessly shepherded her into the raying room, but it wasn't until she caught sight of herself in the mirror that she understood why Wolsey had been so insistent. There was so much blood! Her hose was ruined, her doublet as well; even the collar of her shirt had caught an errant spray of some evil fluid. With a sigh she allowed Pieter to remove her regalia and strip her of the sodden clothing, but why she hadn't noticed…
Anne had bled just as much, her inner voice reminded her.
And she wasn't the only one, was she? Anne, Francis, Thomas More, and George Boleyn were only the tip of the iceberg; dozens of blameless Englishmen had lost their heads and thousands more had been hanged or burnt for no reason other than her father's malice. There had been so many of them – monks, priests, farmers, gentlemen, even women and children. Had he ever felt so much as a twinge of guilt over sending so many innocents to God? Did he have the capacity to comprehend the shock twisting her guts into knots simply from having killed an undeniably guilty man?
"Sir?"
She gave Pieter a feeble smile. "I was lost in my own thoughts. I only hope the rain hasn't washed out the Dover Road; Charles and Edmund are expected at any moment and given what just happened I'd rather they were safe behind palace walls than wandering the countryside."
"I don't believe the road is in danger of flooding, sir; Wednesday's rain was the first in almost a month. Shall I draw Your Highness a bath?"
She shook her head. "The Cardinal is waiting for me; a basin of hot water will have to do."
Fortunately her clothes had absorbed most of the blood and other liquids; once she'd scrubbed off the remnants and had been redressed in the drab cypress from earlier that morning she rejoined Wolsey, who was waiting in her closet with a tray of biscuits and a flagon of watered wine. "I thought Your Highness might wish to cleanse your palate," he said as she gestured for him to join her at the table. "I am, of course, at your command; if there's anything else you would like…"
"Thank you; just – just sit with me a while, if you would."
They sipped at their wine in silence, Mary trying to make sense of the morning's horror. "It isn't his death per se that bothers me," she finally said as she gazed into the depths of her goblet. "He was either a spy or a traitor and he deserved to die. I'm only glad my body knew what to do. But all that blood…I've never been witnessed an execution but I can't stop thinking of the innocent men and women Father sent to the scaffold. They must have felt the axe or the sword; how could they not? And yet everyone says it's an easy death."
"I doubt any man's death is easy, Highness."
She lifted her gaze to meet his. "Mine was. I didn't feel a thing, and now…and now I'm surrounded by ghosts; ghosts I mourned, ghosts I barely knew, ghosts whose deaths I exulted over. I even had masses of thanks sung when I was told of Anne's execu—" Her voice died off as Wolsey's face grew deathly pale. "Eminence?"
"He – he didn't – after all I did to smooth – he had her…God in Heaven with his saints," he cried, making the sign of the cross. "After all my…"
"Eminence, you couldn't have—"
"Yes, I could and I should have," he spat. "I should have realized what would happen. I know the King; I know how shallow his love runs. I always thought of him as Echo and Narcissus combined, but to discover he was in fact Nemesis…thank you, but you shouldn't."
She put down the flagon and pressed the goblet into his shaking hands. "My haughtiness is long broken, Eminence," she told him. "I also must remind you that you are a Prince of the Church and my godfather. Please, drink."
He dutifully obeyed, allowing Mary to refill the goblet before she returned to her seat. "I'm not sure what to say," he confessed. "I'd thought he'd never forsake the woman who gave him a son…or did she not?"
"That's why he killed her; Elizabeth was her only living child. I'm not sure how many miscarriages she suffered, but after the last one – but I'm sorry; you had said you didn't want to know."
He blew out a frustrated breath. "I most certainly do not, but if I am to be of any help to you in this I feel I must. Might I ask that you start with what you know of the situation at my supposed death?"
It had been a lifetime since she'd thought of those early days but she complied as best she could, taking him through the events of the past ten years starting with Cranmer's arrival at court through her father's pretended marriage to Anne, Elizabeth's birth, her own incarceration at Hatfield and the abuse she'd endured, the beheadings and burnings, her mother's abandonment and poisoning, the downfall of the Boleyns, the Pilgrimage of Grace, Edward's birth, the fallout of the supposed Exeter plot that saw most of her York cousins beheaded, Cromwell's elevation and execution, and the marriage to Kathryn Howard; once she was done he could only shake his head in disgust and amazement. "That he could execute an anointed Queen – wife or not," he added in response to her frown, "but Henry Norris, his closest and oldest friend? And a woman heavy with child? I do not rejoice at the news, I assure you, but if your father has that in him it does explain why he persuaded the Emperor to invade France in autumn."
She blinked. "You know about Queen Amalia's pregnancy."
"I'd heard rumours – although not for the first time," he clarified. "The French cardinals in residence at York Place are inveterate gossips but not necessarily accurate ones; this will be the fourth time news of a pregnancy's been bruited about. I take it your lord father intends to have her put to death?"
"If he reaches her before the birth," she said, marvelling at the quickness of his mind. "Will loathed the idea and refused to have anything to do with it, which is I believe why Father had me drugged for a good week and a half after the accident; he was afraid I'd remember and try to send word of his intentions to the Emperor." She barked a laugh. "Will wasn't the most obedient of sons, was he? I received a letter from Renée last night; ten pages of tear-stained pleas begging him to reconsider his refusal to bed her despite Father ordering it four months ago."
"In truth I'm not surprised. Are you aware…"
"Of his disinterest in love?" she said, nodding. "He came to me in a dream and showed me I had to – to join the rose with the lily, as it were. But can I? I'm not married to her myself; I've never entered into the sacrament."
He frowned in thought, his eyes unfocussed as the fingers of one hand tapped lightly against the leather armrest of his chair. "God would not have brought Your Highness here if he did not intend you to take the Prince's place both publicly and privately," he said after a moment's reflection. "He must intend you to live as the Prince, and as you possess a man's body you may enter into marriage with a woman. The issue is that, as you said, you are not – Mary is not – legally married to Princess Renée. Fortunately the benevolent hand of Providence has cleared the way, if you don't mind my waxing poetically, as in the normal course of events we would need to petition the Holy Father for dispensation—"
"Because Will was my brother."
He held out his hands. "Under canon law you could be nothing else. That said, the Holy Father just two months ago issued the bull Dum in partibus in which he authorized the papal legates a latere to dispense from canon law on various matters while he leads his troops into France. I therefore am capable of authorizing Your Highness and the Princess Renée to marry notwithstanding her prior unconsummated marriage to Prince William, and I hereby do so. May I escort Her Grace to Westminster tomorrow once I've completed the necessary paperwork?"
"Tomorrow?!" she squeaked. " I…yes, that would be for the best. You are certain this isn't fraud? If she thinks she's marrying William…"
But Wolsey was already shaking his head. "You aren't impersonating the Prince, sir; God has placed you in his body and you have not just the right but the solemn duty to take his place. As for the vows themselves, I will explain to the Princess that…that her husband has no memory of the original sacrament and in addition feels himself a completely different person than before, an excuse no less useful for being the unvarnished truth. William, after all, wouldn't have known a jointing knife from a cleaver."
At that she couldn't help but snort. "Hatfield taught me more than how to joint a lamb, Eminence. I may have bent when I swore the Oath of Supremacy but I have never broken."
"You could hardly do otherwise with the blood of Katherine of Aragon coursing in your veins," he said as they both rose. "I would also beg Your Highness's permission to investigate today's unfortunate incident with a free hand. If this is the result of a heretical conspiracy I feel it my duty as papal legate to see justice done."
"Only if you agree to be careful. I'm not ready to face this world alone, and I don't think it's your time to meet God either."
He bowed over her hand. "I am Your Highness's loyal servant."
Mary took a moment after his departure to swallow the lump of panic rising in her throat. Her mother's old Spanish crucifix, the one containing a sliver of the True Cross, hung against the far wall; she knelt before it and begged the Lord to soothe her mind, to give her peace amongst the multitude of fears pressing upon her soul. She was afraid of failure, afraid of letting England down, afraid of disappointing Renée, but all those fears shrank to nothing in the face of her greatest fear: heresy.
For a woman to lay with another woman was a sin so grievous that it was rarely if ever spoken of among ladies of quality, and in fact she wouldn't have known it possible had she not overheard two kitchenmaids whispering about it at Greenwich. But God had placed her in a man's body and given her a man's appetites; how could trusting in God and following His holy directions lead to sin? In this she must think of herself as a man, for if she remembered her sex…
No.
God had put her here; she had to trust in His wisdom and goodness. If this is your wish I will do it and gladly, she prayed, but please: guide me. Help me.
She returned to her sitting room to find Lord Russell in attendance. "The court will be following the Imperial envoys to Westminster this afternoon," she said with a brief nod to the captain of her guard. "I take it they didn't express any annoyance over the delay?"
"They wouldn't complain even under less dire circumstances, Highness," he replied. "The Emperor relies far too heavily on the King's good will in this enterprise."
"Our good will and our hackbutters, my lord. I do wish to meet with the Princess Elizabeth before we leave, however, so – yes, Bowden?"
"The Princess was brought to the Queen's apartments about ten minutes ago, Your Highness," he said as Pieter arrived with her hat and gloves. "I can also report that the royal barges will be ready to depart at two and that per the Queen's instructions Sergeant Stoner has sent men down the Dover Road to redirect the Princes' procession to Westminster."
She breathed a sigh of relief; she'd meant to give that order but in the confusion after the assassination attempt she'd forgotten. "Then if there's nothing else, my lord, we'll speak again at Westminster."
A cluster of ladies-in-waiting – and one religious sister, oddly enough – greeted her as she stepped through the door leading to Anne's Privy Chamber. "I've been told the Princess Elizabeth has been brought downstairs," she said once the usual courtesies had been exchanged. "How is the Queen?"
"As well as can be expected," Lady Rutland said, "although she is still unsettled, of course."
"And why wouldn't she be?" the nun snapped – and only then did Mary recognize the sharp-nosed face lost amid the folds of a Benedictine wimple.
It was her old friend Anne Stanhope.
"We weren't told of the attack, were we, Mistress Bray?" Nan asked the thin girl standing next to her, but before the child could make a reply she forged on, her gaze sending icy shivers up Mary's spine. "No more than we were told of Your Highness's dread injury. Might I be permitted to ask if my letter of the eighth has come into Your Highness's hands?"
"I received it last night but I haven't had time to read it."
Nan's upper lip curled into a fleeting sneer. "Then we will await Your Highness's instructions."
The South Gallery was as deserted as the Privy Chamber, with only Anne's personal guard in attendance; she nodded a greeting to the guard at the door and stepped into the brilliant sunshine streaming through the high windows, her gaze alighting on a group of riders gathering in the courtyard. But it wasn't the men below or even the faint sounds of a sprightly volta echoing through the door of Anne's closet that had her swallowing back bitter tears; it was the loathing, the disgust in Nan Stanhope's eyes.
She hates me. My closest friend hates me.
Logically she knew it was nothing of the kind; Nan had always been prickly and unfriendly, and if she hated anyone in this world it was Will. Unfair or not, though, the rejection stung her to her core. Will this never end? she asked her reflection. Will I never reach peace in this world? Will I constantly be thrown from stem to stern, from port to—
A burst of applause from behind the door interrupted her thoughts; after a pause the music resumed, this time in a stately pavane. She silently waved the guard away and reached for the door handle, taking a deep breath before entering the closet and silently pulling the door shut behind her.
At first she couldn't tell if the girl sitting at the virginals was anything like the sister she'd left behind; her head was covered by a voluminous hood that obscured not just her hair but the back of her neck as well, and although the set of her shoulders and her light touch on the keyboard were achingly reminiscent of Elizabeth she simply couldn't be certain. She tiptoed to the front of the room, dropping Anne and the nun sitting beside her a silent bow before squatting beside the bench—
How she kept herself from gasping aloud she would never know.
The girl's hands suddenly froze over the keys and she spun toward Mary. "Will!"
"Bess, I—"
But before Mary could get another word out Elizabeth flew into her arms, her raw, deeply scarred face burying itself in the crook of her neck. "Mama said – tell me you remember me…"
"I do, I promise," she assured her. "I'm here and I haven't forgotten you one bit – but here: let me take a look at you."
The girl drew back, her eyes brimming, and if Mary's were just as wet she didn't care one bit. Smallpox be damned: it was her sister to the last freckle! "I remembered you before anyone else," she said, cupping Elizabeth's chin and wiping away her tears with a thumb. "I remember you better than I do myself. How are you feeling?"
"A lot better. The scabs started to fall off on my birthday and Sister Dorothy finally let me look at the Ab Urbe Condita you gave me." She frowned down at Mary's sling. "Mama said you hit your head and lost your memory. She didn't say you broke your arm!"
"That's because it's only a dislocated shoulder; it'll be fine in a few weeks. I was so worried – I'm so glad you're still yourself. I prayed for you day and night, prayed for you even more than for your brothers or our lady mother or even our lord father the King. Have you dined yet? I'd love it if you could—"
"I thought we might dine en famille after we hear Mass," Anne cut in, smiling to soften the blow. "Bess, why don't you go upstairs and fetch your veil?"
She clearly didn't want to leave them so soon but she obeyed, curtseying prettily after giving Mary another hug and allowing herself to be shepherded out by the nun. "I wish they'd told me about the scarring," Anne said once they were alone. "Sister Dorothy is the most patient of women and an excellent governess but neither she nor Sister Anne have bothered to write me. Did one of them by any chance happen to contact you?"
"Sister Anne apparently did," Mary said, "but I…there was a letter from Renée as well, and…"
One eyebrow rose to the brim of her hood. "And?"
"And I've sent Cardinal Wolsey to Hampton Court to escort her to Westminster."
For a moment she thought Anne was going to make the sign of the cross but her hand froze in mid-air. "Then I will be pleased to receive Her Grace," she said. "Might I ask why you've – Lady Rutland, what is it?"
"Dr. Skypp has just arrived, Majesty," she said from the doorway, a lace veil in one hand. "I wondered if you wished – Purkoy! NO!"
But the little ball of fluff that had just darted out from behind her skirts had no intention of stopping; the dog made a beeline toward Mary, tail a-wag and eyes a-sparkle, but as it reached her it skidded to a halt and glared up at her angrily, its expression a mixture of uncertainty and wounded pride.
"He knows you've been injured," Anne said. "It's all right, boy; it's just Will."
But that's the problem, isn't it? she thought as the dog nervously approached her outstretched hand and gave it a tentative sniff. I'm not Will and, dumb beast or not, you know that.
Purkoy inspected her fingers carefully before permitting Mary to scratch him under the chin, although he still wasn't completely comfortable. "I suppose it's the sling," she said as Lady Rutland removed Anne's hood and replaced it with the veil. "Surely he can't smell Father's tonic on my breath."
Her eyes twinkled again. "You're still taking the cordial? No wonder he was so pleased with your recovery; it's the first time you've allowed him to physic you since you turned sixteen."
"Majesty, if I may?" Lady Rutland asked, waiting for permission before continuing. "Purkoy might be reacting to Your Highness's injury itself rather than the King's medicines – efficacious as they must naturally be," she quickly added, somehow evading even the slightest hint of sarcasm. "My lord husband often speaks of the day His Majesty visited Cardinal Wolsey at Hampton Court after his own grievous injury. Poor Ball…or was it Cut? At any rate, one of his spaniels almost bit the poor Cardinal and neither could be induced to stop growling until the King departed Windsor."
"And that just after His Eminence rededicated himself to God and turned over a new leaf in his life, as if he had been made anew…" but Anne's voice trailed away as her gaze rested on Mary's face for an instant and childish laughter in the hallway heralded Elizabeth's return. "I'm certain you're right, Eleanor," she finally said, "but let's not think of that right now. Would you accompany Bess and me to Mass, Will?"
"I – of course," she gabbled as her fears roared back. If Anne suspected, if she had any inkling…
But no: she couldn't borrow that trouble right now, not when her cupboard of cares was already overfull. She'd sent an assassin to Hell by her own hand, she'd faced terrors she'd never imagined, she'd lost her best friend, and within a day she would be married – and not as wife but as husband.
John Skypp had elected that day to celebrate an abbreviated Mass, likely at the instigation of the Queen; as the holy words of the Confiteor, the Gloria, and the Kyrie washed over the tiny congregation – spoken today, not sung – Mary turned her mind toward God, begging Him to hear her. I give myself over to you, she promised, the words bubbling up directly from her soul; I dedicate myself to your service and make myself an instrument of Your holy will. Fiat voluntas tua!
—and almost as the words left her mind a great peace descended upon her, a peace that cut through the anxiety and shame and uncertainty and grief, a peace that could only be God's doing – a holy miracle.
It was all she had, perhaps, but it was everything she needed.