The Sunne in Splendour

by Sharon Kay Penman

  “Because it never once did cross his mind that I might,” Edward said ruefully. “Dickon does take it for granted that it would never even occur to me to do so, not knowing as I do how much Anne means to him.” There was irritated affection upon his face as he looked up at Will. “And the damnable thing about faith like that, Will, is that you do find yourself forced to live up to it!”

  “So there it is, George. Dickon’s not willing to wait any longer. He does mean to wed Anne, whether you do agree to it or not, and I suspect there’s little I can do about it.”

  “You could forbid him!” George snapped, and Edward smiled faintly.

  “The way I forbade you to marry Isabel?” he suggested, and George flushed.

  “I did love Bella,” he said defensively, and at once regretted it, for his brother was quick to point out,

  “And Dickon does love Anne.”

  “I don’t doubt Dickon loves the lands she’d bring him!”

  “As it happens, George, Dickon indicated to me that he felt sure an accommodation could be worked out about the lands. I fully expect a compromise of sorts could be reached if—”

  “No!”

  “I rather suspected you’d say that. A pity…I’d have preferred to settle this amicably, but settle it I mean to do. Frankly, George, I’ve no more patience. For three months now, you and Dickon have given me little peace over this and I’m heartily sick of it.”

  George’s eyes had narrowed, the pupils contracting as if adjusting to a sudden blinding surge of sun. “Just what have you in mind to do?”

  “It be very simple, George.” Edward sorted through the papers before him, lifted one for George’s inspection. “I had another letter from your mother-in-law at Beaulieu. I’m sure you can guess what she does ask of me. She wants to leave sanctuary and she wants her lands restored to her.”

  George was suddenly rigid in his chair. Edward balanced the letter between his thumb and forefinger, sent it winging across the marble-top table; it struck the edge, fluttered to the floor. He watched George’s eyes lock onto it, follow its downward drift.

  “I’ve been giving it a great deal of thought, George, and the more I think on it, the more inclined I am to grant her request. If I do return the Countess’s lands to her, I do most effectively end all squabbles between you and Dickon over what Anne is or is not entitled to have. If there are no lands to claim, there be no problem, either.”

  George rose abruptly to his feet, only to stand irresolute. He should have known, should have seen this coming. Ned always had his way in the end. He’d take it all in the guise of fairness, give the Beauchamp estates back to Bella’s mother. Warwick Castle, the manors in the southwest, the Herber. All would go to Warwick’s widow. But not Middleham. Dickon and Anne would still have the lands Ned had given him last June, but he and Bella…They’d have nothing.

  “I don’t want you to do that, Ned,” he said thickly.

  Edward said nothing, merely watched him with unhurried, expectant eyes. George sucked in a ragged breath, sat down again.

  The winter weather unexpectedly thawed, the skies clearing to a bright brittle blue, the winds subsiding and the lingering chill in the air more bracing than brutal.

  Richard soothed the taut creature upon his wrist. The hooded head was turned toward the unseen yet beckoning expanse of sky; the talons tightened upon his leather gauntlet, and a sound rose eagerly in its throat, low yet harsh.

  He’d never had a Greenland falcon until now, preferring the smaller, less mettlesome peregrine. But this one had been a gift from the Earl of Northumberland, not so much an act of generosity as one of accommodation to the man with whom Northunberland would be sharing power north of the Trent. Whatever Northumberland’s motivation, Richard was much taken with the falcon; it was a beautiful bird, snow-white in color and awesome in flight. He’d seen it kill before, swift, silent, and lethal.

  He unsnapped its lead now and then removed the hood. It exploded into the air as if launched from a crossbow, beating white wings taking it up into the bright blindness that haloed the sun. Higher and higher it rose, and then as suddenly it was hurtling toward the earth, and Richard swore, seeing the prey that had broken cover, that was making a twisting, terrified attempt at flight across the snow-glazed field. There was nothing he could do but watch in disgust as the rabbit raced the down-plunging falcon. The end came with predictable swiftness, in a sudden swirl of snow and fur and striking talons.

  Richard swore again and gestured toward a waiting attendant. The man moved obediently into the brush to attempt to retrieve the errant falcon. But by the time he found it, Richard knew, the bird would be too well gorged to take interest in its proper prey. For all practical purposes, the hunt had just ended. Richard turned his attention then to quieting his palfrey; it shied and then snorted, nostrils flaring as the wind brought to it the unnerving scent of warm blood.

  Looking about him, Richard saw that his brother was having better luck than he. As he guided his mount nearer to watch the circling stalk overhead, Edward turned in the saddle, motioned him closer.

  “Did you see? A fine kill,” he enthused. “Did I not say she was a prime hunter?” He signaled approvingly to the man who’d flushed the peregrine’s quarry. “I knew she could be reclaimed, given time!”

  “A right fair showing,” Richard agreed politely. This was the first time he’d been alone with Edward since they’d quarreled so upon his arrival at Shene. But if he felt some constraint, Edward apparently didn’t; he said, as naturally as if the quarrel had never been,

  “What befell that big gerfalcon of yours, the one you’ve been bragging on?” And laughed when Richard had to confess its fall from grace.

  “I do want to talk to you, Dickon.”

  Richard stroked his stallion’s neck. “I haven’t changed my mind, Ned.” He gestured vaguely, said, “I should see to my falcon.”

  “As you wish. I just thought you might be interested to know that Brother George has had a change of heart.”

  He laughed again then, for Richard had swung his mount around so sharply that he almost unseated himself.

  “You mean he’s actually agreed to the marriage?”

  “Well, ‘agree’ isn’t precisely the right word. Let’s say rather, that he’s now inclined to see your marriage as the lesser of evils!” Still laughing, Edward raised a hand to flick wind-whipped bright hair from his eyes. “I did tell you I’d bring him around in time, didn’t I? And I’ve never yet broken my word to you, at least not when it counted!”

  Richard was laughing, too. “I never doubted you’d act on it, Ned. I just feared that by the time you did, I’d be too old to care!”

  “Mind you, we’re not out of the woods yet. The terms he’s offering are too outrageous, too outlandish, to be taken seriously. But the important thing is that he’s resigned himself to the inevitability of the marriage. It won’t take long now for me to squeeze a more equitable settlement out of him. I’d say a month at most; well, maybe a whit longer.”

  Some of Richard’s excitement began to ebb. So it wasn’t quite as clear-cut as Ned had first made him think. With George a month could well become three, then four.

  “What is he asking?”

  “Demanding is more like it; if he practiced a like trade upon the roads, he’d be hanged as a highwayman! He’s willing that you should have Middleham, Sheriff Hutton, and Penrith, and willing, too, to overlook the fact that they be yours whether you do marry Anne or not! But he claims most all else, Dickon, the whole of his mother-in-law’s lands, and the Beauchamp holdings must total a good one hundred and fifty manors. He does want the earldom of Warwick and Warwick Castle, of course. Also the earldom of Salisbury. Ah, yes, the Herber, too!” Edward grinned in spite of himself, said, “Such gall is almost admirable! Ah, yes, and lest I forget, there’s one thing more. Be you ready for this? He also demands that you yield up to him your office as Great Chamberlain! If it be true as I once charged that his brains are maggot-ridden,
his greed is well nigh intact and thriving!”

  “Tell him,” Richard said, “that his terms are acceptable to me.”

  Edward’s jaw dropped. “Dickon, you cannot be serious! Christ, man, he’s robbing you blind!”

  “How large a dowry did Elizabeth Woodville bring you, Ned?”

  That drew a reluctant laugh from Edward. “Little wonder you handle yourself so well upon the field; you do have a feel for the vitals!” But in truth, he was not at all displeased by Richard’s choice; it would, he thought, simplify matters considerably.

  14

  Westminster

  April 1472

  Richard would have made Anne his wife at once, but the Church calendar seemed to be conspiring with George; by the time he’d given his grudging consent, it was Lent. As the Marriage Mass was prohibited from Ash Wednesday until the Sunday after Easter, the banns could not be proclaimed until early April. Three weeks later, Richard and Anne were married in St Stephen’s Chapel at Westminster. It was a ceremony most notable for its simplicity. They had chosen not to be married by Anne’s uncle, the Archbishop of York, and had chosen, too, to be wed quietly and quickly, forgoing any of the lavish festivities that would normally have heralded a royal wedding.

  Edward, who would quite happily have feasted their nuptials into the following day, reluctantly concurred once he saw that they were both stubbornly set upon having their way in this. He was disappointed but not all that surprised by their choice; his court could hold few happy memories for the daughter of the Earl of Warwick. Perhaps it was just as well, he mused, that Dickon would be taking her North.

  Anne was now no more than four or five feet from where Edward stood, her skirts spreading about her in a froth of sea-green silk and creamy Mantua lace as she paid homage to his wife. He grinned, noting how even then her eyes strayed across the chamber, seeking Richard. She was prettier than he remembered, but so slender that he found himself wondering how good a breeder she’d be. For a moment, his eyes lingered fondly upon his wife, who’d given birth to their fourth daughter only a fortnight ago, and then shifted back to Anne, to find she was once again staring past Elizabeth, toward Richard. He laughed; at least Dickon need never doubt that she loved him!

  He was mistaken, however, as to Anne’s motivation. She was not watching Richard with yearning; she was seeking to reassure herself that he was out of earshot, for Elizabeth seemed intent upon drawing blood, and Anne wanted to spare Richard if she could.

  “To wed without the papal dispensation…. How eager my brother-in-law of Gloucester must have been!”

  “We both were, Madame,” Anne said, as politely as her resentment would permit.

  Elizabeth was idly fingering Edward’s latest gift, an Italian necklace of topaz and gold. “Richard has ever been impetuous,” she observed, so patronizingly that Anne seethed with suppressed rage. She saw, too, the way Elizabeth’s eyes were measuring her waistline, suddenly realized what Elizabeth suspected, and thanked God Richard was not nearby.

  “You must admit it’s rather irregular and would make your marriage quite easy to dissolve, I daresay. But I gather that doesn’t distress you?”

  “No, Madame, it does not bother me in the least.”

  “Your faith in him is touching. I expect you’ll make a most dutiful wife,” Elizabeth said negligently. She was losing interest in this conversation. On balance, she’d been mildly pleased by Gloucester’s marriage; it wasn’t often she had the opportunity to see Clarence so openly thwarted. But she had no liking for this simpering child with Warwick’s dark eyes, Warwick’s blood, and an instinctive feel for what it took to convince men, even men as knowing as Ned, that she was much in need of male protection. It was Elizabeth’s considered opinion that any girl able to get herself from Lancaster’s bed to Gloucester’s in less than a twelve-month was no more in need of protection than Eleanor of Aquitaine.

  “I wish you well, my lady of Gloucester,” she said in a careless dismissal that Anne didn’t mind in the least, so happy was she to escape this barbed conversation and so pleased to be addressed for the first time as the Duchess of Gloucester. She was tasting it upon her tongue, silently savoring the sound of it, when Elizabeth added, “I wish you, too, more success in this marriage than you had in your first.”

  In the minstrels’ galley, they’d begun a slanderous Yorkist ballad, “The Banished Duke,” which purported to be an account of the illicit love affair between Marguerite d’Anjou and a Lancastrian Duke.

  Now he lies betwixt two towers,

  He lies in cold clay,

  And the royal Queen of England

  Goes aweeping away.

  There were other verses, scarcely audible above the laughter. Anne alone was truly listening to the words. What a strange fate was hers, to have been Princess of Wales and Duchess of Gloucester in less than a twelve-month.

  She shook her head, somewhat impatiently. This was no time to let Édouard of Lancaster lay claim to her mind or memories. She should rather be thanking Almighty God for the incredible luck that was hers, to have been given back all she’d ever wanted in this life and thought forever lost to her, Richard and Middleham.

  Richard reached for Anne’s hand, linked it in his upon the tablecloth. He was far more sober than Francis or Rob or Dick Ratcliffe, and Anne was grateful for his restraint—grateful, too, for his willingness to indulge her, to spare her the spectacle a court wedding would inevitably have become.

  “You’ve been so sweet to me,” she said softly.

  Richard pulled his wine cup toward them, shared it with her. She slid her fingers along his wrist, and he turned her hand over, pressed a kiss into her palm. Rob saw the look that passed between them and said loudly, “I’d say we’re long overdue to escort the bridal couple to the marriage bed!”

  Anne tensed and then reached again for their wine cup. She was among friends, could not be further in time or place from the French court. Francis was like a brother; she’d known Rob all her life, and Dick Ratcliffe, too, was someone she knew and liked. His wife Agnes was a friend of long standing; she was Lord Scrope’s eldest daughter, and although she was several years older than Anne, they shared many common memories of a Yorkshire childhood. Anna Fitz-Hugh Lovell was her cousin and Véronique the dearest of friends. So why then, was she of a sudden so nervous, so ill at ease? This wouldn’t, she sought to reassure herself, be at all like the bedside revelries of her wedding night to Édouard of Lancaster.

  That was a memory so painful that, even after more than sixteen months, she’d done her best to bury it beyond recall. Now, however, she was haunted by faces from her past. The wine-flushed faces of strangers encircling the marriage bed. The white tense fury upon the face of Marguerite d’Anjou, who’d bitterly opposed the consummation of the marriage but was overruled by the French King, who’d promised his friend the Earl of Warwick that he’d see Anne securely wedded and properly bedded. The relief upon her own mother’s face, the subdued sympathy upon Isabel’s. The sullen handsome face of her bridegroom, sensing her antipathy and resenting her for it, for the reluctance she could not hide from him.

  The laughter had been overly loud, the jests bawdy enough to make her blush, and, overlaying all, such tension that their initial coupling was so traumatizing to her and so unsatisfactory to him that whatever chance they might ever have had of reaching some sort of accommodation ended that first night. They awoke in the morning as enemies, and by the time he died, Anne knew that he hated her fully as much as she did him.

  “Anne?” Leaning over, Richard kissed her softly and then whispered, “Would you rather I put a halt to this?”

  Her eyes widened in grateful surprise. It would never even have occurred to her to ask that of him; the bedside revelries were so much a part of the wedding festivities that she’d taken it for granted there was naught to be done but endure it as best she could.

  “Would you truly do that for me?” she asked wonderingly, and he nodded, then set off a storm of protest by say
ing to the room at large,

  “Rob always did think I couldn’t make my way from the keep to the gatehouse without a guide! But I assure you that Anne and I can find our bedchamber without his generous offer of assistance…and I’d not have it on my conscience that you did disrupt the festivities on my behalf!”

  The objections flew fast and furious, but the jests were good-natured if rather rowdy, the laughter friendly and, by tacit consent, all acted as if they truly believed Richard and not Anne to be the reluctant one. It was Anna Lovell who unfortunately if inadvertently marred the humor of the moment by striking a sudden sour note. Rob had persisted long after both Francis and Dick conceded defeat, but he, too, was now compelled to surrender, saying with a wry regretful shrug, “Well, if you are so set upon spitting on tradition, Dickon, so be it then. But how you can in good conscience so disappoint your guests…”

  “Far better his guests, Rob, than his bride,” Anna Lovell observed artlessly, and then looked genuinely surprised when Anne flushed and Francis glared at her. There was very little malice in her makeup; she simply said whatever came into her head, however ill advised or injudicious. She blushed herself now, disconcerted by the sudden silence. She’d said no more than what they all knew, after all—that Anne’s shyness was the true reason for Dickon’s stubbornness. Why, then, should Francis be giving her yet another of his disapproving frowns and the others suddenly become so engrossed in the music?

  She sighed, began to fiddle with her rings. She was not all that comfortable with these people. They were Francis’s friends, not hers, and she could not rid herself of the suspicion that they scorned her for her family’s Lancastrian loyalties. Francis insisted that wasn’t so, but then, he’d have to say that, wouldn’t he? And now he’d be sure to scold her for causing embarrassment to Cousin Anne. She gave her young husband a sidelong glance that was half resentful, half appealing, and sighed again. He was so hard to please sometimes.