by H. M. Castor
“You need peace at home before you can think of conquest,” my mother says, still turning pages. “Though your father did lead an army to France the year you were born. He got good money out of that, I remember – the French paid a lot to secure a truce. But it’s taken all his effort, all his resources, to establish himself as king here, and to make sure there is a secure realm to hand on to you.” She looks up. “I’ve been meaning to ask – what do you think of Catherine?”
“What do you mean ‘think of her’?” I write a couple more words, chewing my lip. “I don’t think of her. Isn’t she back in Spain now?”
“Well, no, actually,” my mother says, her eyes on her book. “Your father doesn’t want to have to pay back the dowry – he and the Spanish are wrangling about it. I’ve been thinking perhaps there’s no need to pay it back. The alliance would still be useful.”
My knee stops juddering.
“Though—” She frowns into the middle distance, one finger marking her place. “I suppose marrying your brother’s widow is not…”
“Allowed?” I suggest, staring at her. “In the eyes of the Church she’s my sister. No one’s allowed to marry their sister, surely?”
My mother smiles. “Not ideal, I was going to say. But there’d be no problem as long as the Pope granted you a dispensation – which I expect he would. Do you like her?” She raises her eyebrows in mild enquiry. It’s as if we’re discussing a bolt of cloth I might buy. Or a horse. “We could contract it now, hold the marriage ceremony – but it needn’t become binding until you turn fourteen.”
Quite what the expression on my face is, I can’t imagine. I’m reeling. Do I like Catherine? Me? Like her? As my wife?
My mother waggles her long fingers at me. “No hurry, sweetheart,” she says. “Have a think about it.” She closes her book and, hauling herself up, moves closer to the fire. One of her ladies – who has been sitting sewing in the shadows all this time – comes over to help her settle and then leaves the room on an errand.
My mother places the toes of her slippers neatly together on the edge of a footstool and rests her head back against the chair, her eyes on me. She says, “I regret that you and Arthur didn’t know one another better. I would like to do things differently this time.” One hand is resting on the curve of her belly.
“I will bring him up alongside you, this baby. In the same household. I hope the two of you will be close. It is important to have love in a family. Even a family such as ours. I think so, anyway.”
I look down at my work again, turning back the pages, murmuring some sort of agreement. But I don’t know what my father’s view will be of raising loving brothers. After all, by his reckoning, this child she’s carrying could become a dangerous rival; I might have to kill him one day, just as I was told Arthur might have to kill me. Certain phrases catch my eye as I scan the text: a knight who rebels against Henry V is called “this son of darkness… this raven of treachery”.
My mother’s woman returns with a small dish and a napkin and, bobbing a curtsey, places them within my mother’s reach. I know what is inside. For the whole week she’s been here at Eltham, my mother has suffered a craving for – of all things – eggs.
Today’s is hard-boiled. I watch as she peels off the shell, picking at it with her fingernails, dropping the pieces into the dish at her side.
I think of ravens’ nests – black-feathered chicks hatching.
“Where will the baby be born?” I ask.
“At the Tower.”
I yelp. “Why there?”
“Your father chose the place. It has a symbolic strength. The ancient fortress.”
“But…” They say that a woman’s thoughts and dreams affect the nature of the child growing in her belly. I saw my mother sleepwalk, once, at the Tower.
“But what?” She looks at me blankly. Is she pretending to have forgotten that her brothers were murdered there – or instructing me to forget?
The glossy white egg is peeled now: smooth and perfectly rounded, like a miniature version of her belly. She flicks off the last traces of shell.
“Nothing,” I say. “I can’t imagine it’s very comfortable there, that’s all.”
“On the contrary – wonderful preparations are being made. I’ve visited already to check on progress. I’m to have a bed embroidered with clouds and red and white roses. Everything will be just as I want it.”
As she lifts the egg and bites clean into it with her sharp teeth, I suppress a shudder. The Tower, I think, is a place where a woman might give birth to – what? Something monstrous. A serpent. A son of darkness.
♦ ♦ ♦ XII ♦ ♦ ♦
January, Greenwich: the light across the wide expanse of water is bright and cold as we emerge from the palace gateway and make our way towards the river. Barges bob and tug gently on their mooring ropes; water slaps against the landing stairs. A cutting wind whips veils out sideways and ruffles the grey surface of the Thames.
At the head of the procession, my mother stops and turns. Courtiers hang back, while family members fan out around her to say their goodbyes, one by one.
This elaborate occasion – a procession through the palace and now this formal farewell at the waterside – marks my mother’s departure for the Tower. There, the chambers specially prepared for her lying-in are ready to receive her. She will be alone with her attendants – the rooms are a secluded and exclusively female domain. And once my mother enters them, she will not emerge again until the child is born: it could be weeks from now.
My grandmother, dressed for once not in black but in cloth-of-gold, grasps my mother’s elbows and presents each papery cheek to receive my mother’s kiss. Then my mother turns to Meg and me and kisses us too.
She smiles cheerfully. I smile back, wearing a perfect shell. But inside I am nursing a sullen fury, which sits in my stomach like a stone. I think: My mother believes she knows me, but she doesn’t. She has no idea what it’s like to be in here, looking out through my eyes.
On the jetty, my father is waiting; he will accompany her as far as the entrance to her chambers, though even he is not allowed inside. Behind him, musicians on the escort barges saw thinly at their instruments, battling the wind. A huge red wooden dragon at the prow of the royal barge dips as my father steps stiffly down into the hull. He turns back to offer my mother his hand, to steady her as she steps aboard, and then leads her to her seat under the royal canopy.
Somewhere beneath my mother’s gown, Meg told me, is a holy relic: a girdle that belonged to the Virgin Mary and has miraculous powers for relieving the travails of childbirth. And somewhere beneath that girdle, lying smug in his place of safety: the child.
I don’t want to see the boat leave. I turn away, and find my grandmother watching me oddly. Walking past, I snarl at her; just a sound in my throat, like a dog.
♦ ♦ ♦ XIII ♦ ♦ ♦
Our shoes squeak on the floor as we circle one another, breathing hard.
Guildford lunges and grabs my shirt-front. I seize his hand, twist, and ram his elbow-joint the wrong way.
“Jesus!” shrieks Guildford.
“Headbutt him Guildford, go on!” yells Simpson, my swordmaster.
“Am I allowed to?” Guildford pants, his eyes watering at the pain.
“Yes!” shouts Simpson.
“No!” I yell at the same time.
Guildford does it anyway. But I dodge and send him sprawling onto the floor. He rolls to his feet, wiping his mouth and laughing. Guildford’s tough. Blows bounce off him like hailstones off a roof.
He goes for me again, a fist aiming at my face.
“Wait!” Simpson steps forward. He’s a bald, red-cheeked man with calves that bulge like the fat legs of a fine table. He fought in my father’s army at Bosworth and at Deptford Bridge. He knows all the elegant moves – and all the rough and mean ones, too.
“Now look, sir,” he says to me, “when he’s approached you side-on like this, just step in behind him – pas
s your arm in front – and heave him backwards over your leg.”
I try it. Guildford hits the painted plaster floor with an almighty thump.
“Yes! And now he’s down, stamp on his knee!”
“Hey, sir!” Guildford protests.
I put my foot on Guildford, and bounce a little of my weight on it, taunting. He grabs my leg, tries to sweep me off balance…
“Aargh!”
I hop, flounder, and fall heavily on top of him. We disentangle ourselves, laughing again, and when I get up I find Compton’s standing by the rack that holds the quarterstaffs, waiting to speak to me.
“Sir. A messenger’s come from the Tower.” He’s holding a paper – I suppose it’ll be my mother’s official announcement. The wording’s the same every time – the clerks write it out beforehand: It has pleased Almighty God, in His infinite mercy and grace, to send unto us good speed in the deliverance and bringing forth of…
I say, “Is he born, then?”
“She is born, sir. See, here – it says the Queen has been delivered of a princess.”
A princess – a girl! I grab the paper. This is wonderful news. Girls count for nothing – useful for a marriage alliance, that’s all. This little scrap of flesh will be no threat to me.
I hook my arm round Guildford’s neck – show him the paper. “We must celebrate!” I say. “Simpson, come and have a cup of wine with us—”
Compton puts his hand on my shirtsleeve. “But I need to tell you: your mother is unwell.”
“Seriously?”
He dips his head towards me and says in a low voice, “Don’t worry unduly. I’m told it’s happened before, other times she’s given birth. I just thought you should know.”
I release Guildford and say to Compton, “I want to see her.”
“You know the rules, Hal. They won’t let you in.”
He’s right. I’m silent for a moment. “What can I do, then?”
“Beat Guildford to a pulp? It passes the time.” Compton grins, hoping to cheer me. When he sees it won’t work, he adds soberly, “I don’t know, sir. Wait. Pray?”
♦ ♦ ♦ XIV ♦ ♦ ♦
I do pray – for hours. Here at Greenwich, where I’ve been since my mother left for the Tower (my father, for once, has not immediately sent me back to Eltham), there is a church adjacent to the palace, belonging to a community of Franciscan friars.
I daren’t go to the palace chapel for fear of meeting my father, so I spend the evening in the friary church, my old picture of the three nails of the crucifixion clutched in my hand.
I am God’s Chosen. The one who has been prophesied will come, full of power, full of good devotion…
Surely, then, I only have to pray – to demonstrate my good devotion, my faith as sublime as the conqueror Henry V’s – and it will follow that no misfortune can befall me.
The church is as cold as a vault. The candle flames flicker and bow to the swirling draughts. When it is time for evening prayers a single bell starts to toll, and around me the black-robed friars glide in, silent as spectres. No one speaks to me; no one questions my presence. When the service is done they disperse again through drifting clouds of incense, their hoods raised against the cold.
In bed that night I dream of the black-hooded figures, but now they are mourners at a funeral, following a coffin across snowy ground. I wake in a panic.
“Get up.”
Compton stirs on his pallet as I dig at his blanketed bulk with my foot. He tries to pull the covers higher.
I crouch down and shake him. “Get up. I must go to the Tower.”
I’ve only lit one candle; it throws our shadows, hugely magnified, onto the arras-covered wall. I look like a hunched monster grasping my sleeping victim. My victim swears blearily, and rolls out of bed.
Ten minutes later we’re both dressed. Compton is pulling on his boots while I buckle my sword-belt.
He says, “They won’t let you in.”
“That’s the third time you’ve said that.”
“Because you’re taking no notice. And it’s true.”
“Look.” I catch his wrist. “One day I will be king, and when I am king it may count for something that you have served me now. Or it may not.”
Compton understands. He stops arguing and hurries to the door. But, with his hand on the latch, he turns back.
“You must have a guard.”
“I can’t. At this time of night? The captain will want it agreed with my father. All hell will break loose.”
Compton passes a hand over his face – imagining, no doubt, a whole range of possible calamities. “We’ll get into trouble, going without one.”
“We’ll get into trouble anyway. Just get me a boat, will you? Stop wasting time.”
He closes the door carefully behind him. He has a few delicate negotiations ahead – to get me out of the palace past the guards, and then into a boat with some plausible excuse for going to the Tower. But I will leave that to his ingenuity – what is he for, after all?
I snuff the candle and grope my way to the window, where I pull back the curtain and look out into the night.
The moon is high and almost full. Its light skitters across the surface of the Thames. Beneath the window, flaming torches mark the landing stairs and the gatehouse, where guards remain on duty through the night. Across the dark water, marshy fields and woods on the far bank are invisible against the distant higher ground – a mass of black against midnight blue.
Compton comes back, holding a candle. His face, lit from below, looks ghoulish.
“We can go.”
“What did you tell them?”
“That my Lord Prince is still awake and has ordered some clothes to be brought from the Great Wardrobe at Baynard’s Castle for the morning. You’re a servant, coming to assist me.” He sets the candleholder on a stool and throws open the lid of a trunk. “You’d better borrow one of my cloaks, they’re plainer than yours.” He pulls a grey woollen cloak from the trunk and slings it to me. “I suppose we’ll have to come back with something that passes for a chest of clothes.”
“But we’re not going to Baynard’s Castle.”
“I’ll break that to the boatmen once we’re on the water. It’s the guards that are the bigger problem. Come on.”
Compton has done his work well; the guards inside the palace let us through without question. We emerge into a courtyard half-bathed in milky light, and turn left to the gatehouse where another guard unlocks the small wicket door within the big gate. We step through.
We’re not far from the water’s edge – a dank wind flaps at us like wet washing. Underfoot, the flagstones of the path to the landing stairs are black and glassy.
Ahead, a mountainous boatman waits for us, his young apprentice at his side, both standing in a gently rocking skiff. They’ve been roused from their rough beds by the look of them.
It’s not the type of vessel I’d expected; the barges I usually travel in have a covered section at one end to provide shelter. “No luxuries for servants,” mutters Compton, nudging me on.
I step aboard, the hood of my cloak well down over my face, and sit with my back to the boatmen. Even wrapped up like this, I can’t quite believe that I pass for a servant.
We cast off. Out on the open water, it is cold. Cold – after the first few bracing minutes – beyond imagining, the chill reaching inside your clothes like a freezing pickpocket, reaching inside your flesh, frisking your bones.
As we slide through the darkness, the boatmen steer us along one side of the river, as close to the bank as is safe. The strongest pull of the tide is in the central section of water and it’s running against us. I face away from our direction of travel; by the lantern’s light I watch the water: rushing, rushing the other way, as if fleeing the very place we’re heading for.
My mind is filled with indistinct pictures of a sickroom, shadowy figures stooping over my mother. I want to go faster. It takes strong men to row us against the tide at an
y decent speed, and our boatmen are strong – no doubt Compton has given them enough of my money for it to be worth their while making the effort, too. But I wish I could row with them, to speed us on, to get warm and to stop myself from thinking.
Near Limehouse, as we pass the massive hulks of ships at anchor, Compton tells the boatmen about our change of destination and indicates that there will be further payment.
“Secret visitor for one of the prisoners, is it?” the older man says. I turn to look at him and catch an unpleasant wink. “Don’t worry, gentlemen, I won’t ask questions. Safer for me not to know, eh?”
We pass lighters, barges and cranes moored at wharves and jetties, but no other travellers awake like us and moving on the water.
Until, that is, glancing over my shoulder to try to make out what is ahead in the blackness, I see a boat approaching from the other direction, further over towards the centre of the river. It is a skiff like ours, travelling smoothly with the tide, its lamp illuminating three figures: two boatmen and a single passenger: a hunched figure in a grey hooded cloak like mine, the face obscured in shadow.
Without reason, I am gripped by a sudden terror of this figure. My eyes are pinned to it, as if it is something monstrous – my mother’s corpse, already stiff, propped up in a sitting position and shrouded by a cloak, being rowed to the underworld on the river of death.
Since the two boats are moving in opposite directions, there is a tiny instant when we come precisely level, some thirty feet apart, and I see the figure side-on, just a profile view of a hunched cloak and hood, sitting exactly as I am sitting, facing the same way as me, wearing a cloak like mine, the only difference being that it has not turned its head.
But as the two boats pull away from one another, the figure does turn, shocking me as badly as if a corpse moved. The figure looks at me as if it’s felt my gaze, and the hood falls halfway from its head as it does so. In the swaying lamplight I see a youth, his hair the colour of straw, his eyes so deep-set they’re just two bone-edged shapes of black shadow.
