Disclaimer: Really? If I did I would be Goddess Supreme wouldn't I?

Nope I don't own anything except my OCs, Annie, Ligo, the four Royal twins, Diana, and others.

Thanks for everyone who's reviewed, favorited or put this fic on their alert systems. Your reviews keep this baby going.

As for last chapter, I added a new facet of Philip II with the burnings which historically happened, we must remember these were other times, religious persecution although done differently were done on both sides.

I am not sure if I will update as frequent as I used to during my winter vacations due to my History seminar and the amount of classes I am taking, but I promise to get back to you at all your PMs, if I don't reply to your reviews its not because I am not aware of them but because I don't get enough time :) that being said enjoy this chapter!

Chapter #42: Don't want to lock me up

"Lithium
Don't want to lock me up inside Lithium
Don't want to forget how it feels without Lithium
I want to stay in love with my sorrow
Oh but God, I want to let it go
Come to bed, don't make me sleep alone
Couldn't hide the emptiness you let it show
Never wanted it to be so cold
Just didn't drink enough to say you love me
I can't hold on to me
Wonder what's wrong with me
Lithium, don't want to lock me up inside
Lithium, don't want to forget how it feels without
Lithium, I want to stay in love with my sorrow
Don't want to let it lay me down this time
Drown my will to fly
Here in the darkness I know myself
Can't break free until I let it go
Let me go
Darling, I forgive you after all
Anything is better than to be alone
And in the end I guess I had to fall
Always find my place among the ashes
I can't hold on to me
Wonder what's wrong with me
Lithium, don't want to lock me up inside
Lithium, don't want to forget how it feels without
Lithium, stay in love with you
Oh I'm gonna let it go."

~"Lithium" by Evanescence

1559, February 1st

England
[Flashback **]

Mary arranged Princess' Margaret's wardrobe. Jane had spotted among the Princess' new ladies was her own sister but she would not last long into her service. In a matter of days Jane was sure she would be gone and moved back to Suffolk to look for a more profitable marriage. If she believed this was the place to goof around and look for suitable friends who would provide suitable husbands she was very wrong. Lady Mary was very strict with all of her ladies.

The Duchess of Bavaria made it clear that while she was governess of the Princess Margaret there would be no indiscretions, gossip, or foul language and if anyone discovered engaging in such activities would be dismissed immediately with a stain on her records forever.

She could do it, she was the King's grandmother after all and the former Dowager Queen's mother.

Of the ladies Jane was the one who watched her the former Princess closely, how she held her charge, sang to her and (personally) nursed her.

Jane was fascinated by the Duchess of Bavaria's strong feelings towards her charge. But in those eyes she could spot ambitions. She rarely spied on people but the Lady Mary fascinated her. Ambition, a trait forbidden for good, God-fearing women but despite her religious convictions, Mary Tudor did not let the boundaries of her gender stop her.

That is where she and her mother, Frances Grey nee Brandon were so alike. Frances did not let anything come between her and her family's ambition. She felt sorry for her father sometimes. Poor man. He was just a puppet of her mother's. Like the crucified Christ, Jane would pray for her father's soul (she used for her mother's, but her mother made it clear she did not consider Jane especial so Jane did not bother anymore) and say "Forgive him Lord for he does not know what he does" in English, much to her Aunt, Mary Tudor's ire. There was little she could do, England was strongly protestant, although her daughter had done everything possible to bring harmony, Jane prayed that it would not be so with their King. Once he grew, she hoped that he would stamp papist opposition and realize that there was only room for one truth and one truth only.

But for now "In nomine Deus, et filli …" she would pray in Latin.

She wheeled herself and walked to the Princess Margaret's cradle. There was nobody attending her. Jane was surprised. She, who'd watched her Aunt do the same, snatched Princess Margaret from the cradle and started to cradle her herself and sang to her, an old English song.

Their moment of happiness was cut shortly after her song ended and much to her delight, the baby Princess gave her a wide smile.

"Lady Jane!" Mary Tudor scolded her niece "What do you think you are doing?"

Jane Grey turned around to face her angry aunt, baring the same dignity and pose her aunt's namesake was known for "She was left unattended" she said calmly.

"Give me the child, return to your duties" She commanded. Jane passed the child to Mary who put her back in the cradle. Lady Catherine, her sister, Jane watched from her room, ran to the Princess' rooms excusing herself but their Lady Aunt would not hear it. She grabbed the girl's arms and began boxing her ears.

Catherine was returned home as everyone predicted days later.

Jane thoughts were brought to the present. It had been less than a year since her sister had returned to one of their parents' manors. They had been angry but it was Catherine, their anger had not lasted.

She smiled as she looked at the Princess. "You are very lucky to have a mother to love you Your Highness" she said. If her mother's ambitions had been fulfilled this Princess would have been her daughter. But did Jane really want to be married to a King who had put to death his two brothers and married his niece against what everyone said and left the country in her hands while he was away in France?

No, she thanked God that nothing had come out of her mother's ambitions.

1559, November 23rd

Mary had nursed all of her children, except Annie of course but that was understandable -given that she was a child, impossible to tame, to health. She nursed her goddaughter and granddaughter Margaret all with the same affection, tenderness, and love she'd had for Henry and Katherine. Poor Isabella, she reflected. She could not say the same for her eldest daughter –since Annie had stopped being her child the moment she and Edward had stolen her birthright –in her mind she would always be THE Princess and the rightful heir to the throne but being as she was a woman in a no woman's land, she passed on her birthright to Henry only to see it being squashed by a dreadful fall. She had never been the same after that- Isabella was for the lack of a better word … weak and useless.

The only good thing she was good for was ensnaring the Duke and giving him three sons, two of which only survived. Even in that she had failed, to ensnare the Duke and keep his attentions on her prolonged. Sure they had danced, they had complimented each other but they never loved each other. Isabella cared for him with a crazed passion like her mother, but her daughter never fully understood Alexei or his needs. She was always complaining and complaining about his love affairs.

"That is not how a lady behaves" She had told Isabella but the painful wretch did not want to listen to her.

Well good riddance, she was well rid of her. She was much happier, for one Katherine –or Catalina as she insisted Mary she call her now- did not have to deal with her sister's tiresome grunts and wailing.

How Katherine hated wailing! Now there was a warrior child, a proud child for any parent to be proud. How beautiful, how smart is she! She thought beaming with pride as she looked at her portrait. There was a child who was worthy of a mother's love!

Philip adored her, Diana never stopped bragging about her "favorite Auntie" with all her playmates when she'd been in England.

Diana … how she missed her beautiful huntress. She was the epitome of everything good and right in this world. She was like her grandmother and the namesake of her appearance, Jane Seymour, beautiful inside even if she was not in the outside.

There was not a day that passed by that Mary was not frightful or worried about her, she missed her, she utterly felt alone without her. "She would have made a good Queen of England" She said, to no one in particular.

One of the servants peered her eyes up at her mistress' governess and asked her "What's the matter?"

Mary turned a scowl in Jane's direction. Troublesome child, Frances Grey nee Brandon and Henry Grey, the Marchioness, Duchess and Marques and Duke of Dorset and Suffolk respectively, daughter. How dreadful she was, in soul and appearance. Not only she found her faith repellent, Mary still had an aversion for everything related to heresy but she had to put her feelings aside for the sake of her husband and family, but her appearance! If she did not know gossipy Anne Stanhope, late Edward Seymour's wife, any better she would think Jane to be a fay's child! Her sisters were fair, even humpy Mary who'd been named after her –or so her cousin claimed- was fairer and more beautiful in face and smile.

Jane hardly smiled. And she does not have the red Tudor hair or the other Tudor traits. And she was so thin, so pale, like a Princess made of glass, Mary was afraid she would break her at touch.

Mary hated them with every fiber of her being. Her parents were naught but ambitious leeches living off the prestige of their Tudor name. Without it they were nothing just another noble family!
Mary decided to keep her eye on this one, lest she decided to take the throne for herself. Mary was hardly close to her leeching daughter Annie, but she supported her when she and her sister, Bess, tried to convince her late brother Edward, to withdraw from his will the Brandons, especially Frances Brandon who was only looking to figure through her skin and bones daughter, Jane. She already knew, she and Gardiner –the man she deposited her trust the most in- had spies everywhere and they informed her, that her cousin Frances planned to marry her insignificant daughter to one of Northumbelands' younger boys. Not so insignificant anymore if she married Dudley's boy! She thought. Then again, she had seen that though enemies the only way they could keep Jane's family influence away from court was to cement an alliance through a marriage to one of their own.

But since her son was dead and even if he wasn't he had been married and Mary had no more male children to give … that left her sister Bess' eldest boy, her nephew Anthony. Anthony was a womanizer like her father but he had the common sense that his younger brother lacked.

Perhaps … Mary Tudor thought … If I were to talk to Bess about these two, we would rid ourselves from the Dudley influence.

The enemy of my enemy is my friend.

"My niece Jane, tell me have you and Guilford set a date for your wedding?"

"What?"

Mary caught the girl by surprise. She and Dudley? No, just no! Never, she had met the boy on several occasions when her mother and father invited the Earl of Northumbeland to dine. The boy was a brat, spoiled and arrogant and above all abusive to everyone including his own mistresses. No! How could the Duchess even think she could be married to such a person.

Then again … it didn't depend on her did it? She guessed.

Mary saw the confusion turning to appalling expression on the girl and beckoned to sit next to her, just in between her and the basinet where Princess Margaret lay asleep. "Tell me do you like books? I heard you like books, we have a name for you, you know in court. Bookie Jane, I bet you must not like it, people talking around you all the time don't you?"

"No Your Grace"

"Oh come" she hit her shoulder playfully "you do not need to be so formal with me, we are family after all, call me Auntie as you call your Auntie Eleanor, I have seen you very closer with her. It is a shame you and I, niece, we never had the opportunity to be close"

"Yes Auntie Mary" Jane said becoming more comfortable as the minutes passed and they talked about mundane things. She never knew her Aunt Mary could be so heartwarming to someone like her … Bookie Jane.

She knew what they called her when she turned her back. But she never said anything. It was better this way, she'd told her sisters, pretty Cathy and hunchback Mary –the one whom she always felt more sorry for, for their mother always gave painful reminder of her appearance hitting her on her back and making crude remarks about her grotesque appearance. Poor Mary she thought, but she was brought to the present by the baby's gurgles, Princess Margaret had just awoken.

"Oh there, there my sweet, sweet, little girl. Yes that is it, aren't you my sweet? The most beautiful Princess in all Christendom. Yes you are, yes you are, you are so more beautiful than your sister, so much more beautiful" Mary said. She felt awful that she was bashing Diana behind her back but she had decided to abandon her for her mother and new stepfather. Margaret was all she had since Eustace hardly let her watch after the boy King.

"Precious Margaret, beautiful Maggie!" She coed over her granddaughter making silly noises as she tickled her belly, earning giggles from Maggie.

It was so strange watching the Duchess of Bavaria and Lady Mary act like this. She never thought the woman was capable of giving love to another human not herself or her Henry whom she remembered very vaguely. Her mother had never let her travel to court or large distances. She was always under the tight surveillance of her family and of course her mother's lightning rod –that is what she called her mother's slap.

Edward, she thought she could entice him, her mother thought so too but Edward had been stolen by Annie whom he seemed to have loved since childhood. And why would he be interested in someone like her? Bookie Jane.

"You want to hold her?" Mary said softening her tone even more as she glanced at her niece. It was a perfect way to soothe things between them and grain the little mousy girl's trust.

Jane pointed her finger to herself "Me?" She asked. Mary nodded. She thought after that little episode her Aunt would never let her hold her again! Now she pretended as if this was her first time. Might as well try, she thought gloomily.

"Of course you silly thing who else? Come Jane it does not take a bookie to know how to hold this child. Isn't she beautiful?"

Jane nodded. The Princess is every bit of beautiful as her mother –she thought as she held her.

The baby looked at Jane curiously, upon noticing her red hair which was the same as hers she extended her arms out to her, she wanted to play with that hair. It was curious hair, she had never seen hair so bright before.

Jane laughed and Mary shared her laughter. "She likes me" Jane said bringing the girl up to her. Maggie grabbed hold of her hair, for a moment Mary grew alarmed thinking she would pull strong like Diana. That girl she was a rogue when she wanted to be, but she had a gentle heart unlike her, Mary.

Maggie however conscious of being under her grandmother's watchful gaze did not pull hard, she did not need to for there was barely any of the strength or revelry for which her siblings, full and not, were known for in her bones and mind.

She grew tired of playing with her strands of loose hair and looked left to her grandmother.

"I think she wants to return to you" Jane said handing Princess Margaret back to her grandmother, who was also her wet nurse and recognized the wanton look in the Princess' eyes. It was time to feed her.

Between her duties, Mary explained to Jane who saw wide eyed as she nursed the Princess Margaret, that she shared this responsibility with the Princess' appointed wet nurse since Mary could not do it always herself and she was no longer young and her breasts lacked the milk she had when she was young.

"You look great for a woman your age Aunt" Jane remarked, it was true. Mary Tudor it seemed age had done little to screw up her face, except when she scowled or she was displeased then she looked like a total witch out to do harm. But her face kept itself fair and there were hardly any lines on her forehead, eyes, or neck where they usually grew on women as a testament of their mortal enemy –time.

Mary did not need compliments from a silly wretch but she smiled for her granddaughter's sake. The Princess seemed to know when her grandmother was displeased and began crying. She gave a short smile to Jane and pushed her dress back up covering her swollen breast. This child had grown addicted to her milk, she refused to drink from someone else. Martha, her official wet nurse practically had to cry and sing her many songs before getting Maggie to drink from her.

"Little Maggie, my Maggie" she said emphasizing on the 'my'. You are more beautiful than Diana … but who was she trying to deceive? Maggie for all her attributes and her beauty … she was not her Diana.

Nobody would ever be her Diana. Maggie only reminded her of her fairer self, of Annie while Diana reminded her of the kind woman, her father's last wife who'd done the impossible to return her and Bess to the line of succession. The only kind soul that ever lived in her father's court after her saintly mother's death.

Yet, for her own sake and her ambitions she would treat this child and raise her as her own.

Maggie did not see through her mother's kind smile her real motives, she kept on smiling, giggling like the true blank slate she was.

Poor child, you have no idea what is in store for you and your brother. The poor little chit, Mary thought, at least this Jane here was not a vain chit like her daughter or her granddaughter for that matter.

Jane's parents had raised her well.

"Tell me Jane" she said excluding all airs of formality from the young maiden, "Would you like to spend more time with your cousins? It gets very lonely here in New Hall palace I am sure, and Windsor I know it will be dreadful when we move there" she said as a matter of fact.

"Well …" she wasn't so sure what to respond, she bit her lip. "I am not sure my mother will agree Auntie"

"Leave that to me dear, we will make her agree."

I am sure Bess will agree as well. She thought. Surely a Tudor boy with direct descent from Henry VIII was better than anything Dudley and his boy had to offer, and it was a great way to unite all factions and keep all family under one roof.

Jane felt more comfortable now that Her Grace, or her Auntie, was talking about convincing her parents, especially her mother, to get acquainted with the rest of their family.

"I will meditate on it" She said. However much she wanted to see Anthony Chapuys, the boy she grew around with as well as with the late King Edward when they would share his lessons and called "Andrew" instead of by his first name, would surely not want to be associated with a pitiful girl like her.

Just the thought of Andrew thinking she had grown more ugly and seeing her sallow eyes brought immense sadness.

Mary saw this and gave her niece a reassuring squeeze and rose to help Jane up and join her for supper. "My husband is coming from our state in Hundson, he will be bringing Alexei as you know he is our son in law yet for his children, my grandchildren blood connection with us." And gave her a kiss on the cheeks as they sat next to each other "Do not worry Jane, Tony will love the idea of spending time with someone his age. It has been incredibly dreadful you know for your other Auntie Bess putting up with all his scandals. I am afraid his father does not see way we Tudor girls would see" She said with a chuckle "What he needs is a firm hand that only a wife can provide"

Jane's eyes went wide and her mouth open as big as forming a big 'o'. She didn't think Mary Tudor wanted to take it this far! Bess Tudor would NEVER for the life in her agree to give her eldest son and heir to a Grey, not when her mother had ambitions to take her family to the throne. If ANYTHING, Frances would rather give a child borne of Jane and her husband to either Margaret or the young King –if he reached adulthood- to control.

She shook her head and started to tremble, Mary touched her niece's cheeks drawing away all bad spirits and humors that plagued her. "Your cousin has spoken a lot about you, I know, you are practically everything he talks about" She whispered in her ear.

"D-does?" She stammered.

Mary gave a young maiden's giggle "Yes, you are the subject of our conversation, his axis mundi if you will. Your mother would not deny her eldest daughter and her heir her happiness, surely?"

"No" She answered.

"Next time" Mary said in a commanding tone "dress more gay and wear a smile, yes just like that! Men like when women smile, and remember my nephew is very selective of his women, he likes a good debate. You are not dumb, I have seen you read an entire book in less than an hour, you are a walking encyclopedia dear, so give it to him, be his match!"

Jane nodded, excited suddenly at the prospect of seeing Andrew after so many years.

She heard about the rumors, him and women. She refused to believe them. That was not the Andrew she remembered, Andrew was respectful and pious and well learned lad, he would never disrespect a woman's virtue or do things that would displease God.