by Saga Hillbom
‘Be glad I’m not telling your mother what you’ve been saying, love.’
I dig my nails into my palms, leaving bright red imprints. ‘Mother thinks we can oppose this and be successful. I have no intention of waiting to see if she is right.’
To me, it is at once plain and simple: I am a daughter of York and we still have a Yorkist king. One cannot betray one’s own kindred when the war is internal.
Come the morrow I deem Mother sufficiently recovered from the recent shocks for me to investigate further in the matter of Father’s alleged connection to Eleanor Butler.
‘Well, was he?’
‘Cecily!’ she snaps like a bowstring.
I was wrong regarding her recovery, it seems, but there is no turning back now. ‘You have not denied it, Lady Mother. Please…please say something of it.’
‘Your father had a dalliance with that Butler woman when he first became king, but he was wed to none but me.’
I hesitate. ‘I know that. But I asked about a plight-troth, not a wedding ceremony—’
‘Hush now! You shall have to take either my word, sweet, or the word of your wicked uncle. If your father was still with us, he would tell you himself.’
I frown but dare not insist she elaborate. To her, this last statement is apparently of obvious clarity; she does not seem to realise that I take a different meaning from it than she intended. Yes, I do have to trust either her or my uncle’s word, but the choice is not all that obvious to me. Yes, if Father was still with us, he could tell, but what would he say, and would he not be inclined to lie? A consummated plight-troth may not be the same as a proper wedding ceremony, but it would have been as binding as one in cannon law.
I knew Father’s character well enough. All the nights I have lain sleepless in the nursery, hoping he might come to kiss us goodnight, only to remember that he was surely with Jane Shore or another one of his strumpets. All the times I have watched Mother turn a blind eye to his scattered affections. That was his most charming and most agonizing quality: each of his affections was intense and indulgent by any man’s standards, yet there were so many of them, too many. It sometimes felt as if he gave me the moon, until I discovered he gave Elizabeth the sun, and our brothers even brighter burning stars. It was thus with his amorous side, also, not just with us children. I doubt not he desired Mother above all others, at least when she was still budding beautiful, just as he desired Jane Shore ten years later. But there were so many others, so many… Some were his for a single night, others for a fortnight. Though I dare not say as much to Mother, I do not find it improbable that Father would have beguiled a lady with promises of marriage to get her in bed, nor is it difficult to fathom that Bishop Stillington did not want to come forward with this knowledge until Father could no longer give him a rough silencing.
Judging by the pinched look on Mother’s face and the way her hands are trembling in the shadows of her voluminous sleeves, she knows precisely this. What she might not know is whether there was indeed a plight-troth—she simply wants to believe there was not, wants it desperately. A tinge of shame sweeps through me, for I share this wish. The more I think about the matter, the more the rational part of me is inclined to trust Uncle Richard in his discovery, and the more the rest of me screams no, no, I cannot be baseborn! I must not think about it, then. There is a possibility we are as legitimate as we were brought up to believe. If Mother can cling onto that possibility, then so can I, and spare myself suffering I know would take a toll on the little sanity I have managed to maintain in this prison of ours.
I have made the Chapel of Pyx my place of refuge. It is safe enough, close enough, and certainly holy enough that no one can object to my daily visits there. I do not dance the saltarello. Not even I can muster enough mirth to perform the steps at a time like this, at least not without music, and the nasty memory of last time I tried keeps picking at me like the sharp little beak of a blackbird.
One day, the first day of July, when the sweltering heat seeps through the abbey’s thick stone walls and invades every room through the cloisters’ open windows, I find an intruder in my place of refuge.
Sir Thomas is sitting on the upper of the two steps leading to the altar, legs pulled up to his chest, back hunched over a something resting on his knees. When I take a few steps into the room, treading carefully on my toes, I see it is a piece of paper, yellow with age. He moves a withered goose pen across it with utmost concentration, the scratching sounds like thunder in my ears. He is not supposed to be here. This is my place. I despised him for a good hour or two after the things he said to me about power-hungry nobles—after that, I became preoccupied with the hailstorm of news.
I quickly search through my emotions. No, no hatred there, unfortunately. He never said ‘I told you so’ when he heard about the executions or about my uncle claiming the throne, which redeems him to me. Elizabeth did not either, but her face was shouting it from the spires of Westminster.
I decide to be as amiable to him as I can. ‘What are you doing here?’
Thomas’ head snaps up from the drawing at the sound of my voice, his hand jolting so that a plump ink stain bleeds over the paper. ‘Sweet baby Jesus!’ He composes himself and puts down the pen on the step. ‘Drawing. Nothing special.’
‘I can see that much. I just cannot see why you do not draw someplace else. The abbot has given you a chamber of your own, surely?’
‘He did, but with all due respect, Lady, I have as much right to be here as yourself.’
He has not addressed any of us as ‘Royal Highness’ since we were declared illegitimate, and I would be furious, were it not for the fact that he barely used the title before the declaration either. This is not contempt for us as possible bastards but merely another aspect to his awkward nature.
I take another step towards him. ‘Well, then. What are you drawing?’
‘Promiscuous pictures of the Virgin Mary.’
My eyes widen in disbelief. ‘Really?’
‘No, but I made you smile again.’
My lips curve farther. It is as I suspected: I have found myself a person, apart from Agnes, whose bluntness surpasses my own. ‘Can I see?’
The shadow of a blush grazes his cheeks. ‘I guess. The paper is brittle—I borrowed it from one of the abbot’s old scrolls.’
He hands me the sheet and I sink down on the step next to him, the stone pressing against my skin through my layers of skirts. The sketch is exceptional, although I only have Kate’s hideous doodle-cats to compare it to. The ink is swept in light strokes, crafted in the black contours of a dramatic landscape. A grassy plain upon sharp-cropped rocks with waves crushing against the stone below; I can almost taste the sea salt on my tongue.
‘I do not recognise it.’
‘I would not expect you to, Lady. It’s the Isle of Wight, where my father lives. We come from Friskney in Lincolnshire originally, but the isle is where I was born and raised.’ He traces a line with a finger seeming to move at its own volition.
‘You miss it?’
‘Quite.’
I frown. ‘Then why are you here? I cannot imagine anyone willingly spending their days shut up in Westminster Abbey, except mayhap for Margaret Beaufort.’
Thomas’ moss-green eyes flash in brief recognition of the name before he snatches the drawing from me again. ‘Because my father is a pious man, and his father knew the abbot when they were younger. He thought I could make something of myself in London. My family has a tad of noble blood, but you know what that’s like. It won’t bring any magic money just because you brag about it.’
I almost cannot believe it. Noble blood? He?
Thomas puts my mind at rest before I get a chance to answer. ‘Only a drop, really. My father is an esquire; my grandfather was a knight during the reign of King Henry.’
‘Henry of Lancaster was never the way a king ought to be.’
He shrugs. ‘Hardly matters now, does it?’
>
We sit in torturous silence for one, two, seven eternal heartbeats, before I decide what to say. ‘Pardon, but you should not become a cleric or a servant. I think you should become an artist. It sounds like something from an old fairy tale.’
‘Maybe you can tell my father that.’ He tucks his hair behind his ear and grins; I have struck the right chord.
‘Why not? I think he might heed my command. Will you do something for me, then?’
‘That sounds ominous.’
‘I would very much like to have my portrait painted. Father said he’d commission it but he never had the chance.’
Thomas shakes his head. ‘I don’t have any paint or coal.’
‘And I don’t have my most precious gown or my favourite jewels. Mother was too caught up in bringing her own coffers. Ink and plain clothes will have to do.’
We remain in the chapel for almost two hours that afternoon. I am warm and stuffy in my many layers, the summer air tempting me to kick off my shoes and remove the two-parted caul that keeps my hair in place under the modest gauze veil. I strike one ridiculous pose after the other, until Thomas lashes out and begs me to ‘Just sit still like a normal human being, by Saint Edward’s toes!’ However, he promises to continue with the portrait the following day, and somehow, it is never quite finished, hence we keep returning to the chapel. Mother must think I have a newfound piety—but she does not mention it.
My sisters and I sit huddled up around Mother like we used to do when she would summon us to her gilded chambers, except no one speaks. We listen instead, using every sound from the nave of the abbey to craft images in our minds of what it must be like. Is the coronation well-attended? It sounds like it. Are they being anointed with holy oil? Of course. Are they wearing imperial purple and ermine? We need no more than the common sense of hens to know this much.
Mother’s face is a mask of granite, and though she clutches Elizabeth’s and Anne’s hands, one on each side, she does not move an inch. Elizabeth’s mask is decidedly softer, docile, her gaze fixed on one of the candlesticks on the table. Anne is turning the rustling pages of a book with her free hand; Kate is wiggling on the spot with one thumb in her mouth; Bridget sits doe-eyed as usual. I swear we will never fully learn the machinations of her serious little head. Agnes has managed to fall asleep, staying true to her routine of naps.
At last, I fail to resist the urge of speaking. ‘Do you think Ed and Dickie are there, Lady Mother?’
She draws a quivering breath at the mention of her youngest sons. ‘I dearly hope so, my sweet. God only knows what will become of them—God and Gloucester, that is. It makes my heart quake with fear.’
‘I wish you’d let me go with them. I could have kept an eye on them and—’
‘And spend your days clapped in the Tower?’ Elizabeth says. ‘You are not talking sense, Cecily.’
‘The Tower has rooms that are much fancier than this.’
I stay quiet after that. No one else appears to be in the mood to discuss who’s carrying whose train on the other side of the two walls separating us from the ceremony, nor speculate in what the prominent Londoners and nobles are thinking.
Uncle Richard uses his increased authority to invest his friend, the insolent Duke of Buckingham, as Constable of England, and the new prince, my ten-year-old cousin Edward of Middleham, as Lieutenant of Ireland. Shortly thereafter, the new King and Queen—it is odd to refer to my uncle and second cousin as such, when I had barely grown accustomed to my brother holding the regal title and not my father—embark on their royal progress through England. The people will emerge from their houses in every town and village, flocking to the streets and roads to see their monarchs pass by. What will they think? The north will assuredly give a warmer welcome than the south, not only because of the northerners’ adulation for their new liege lord, but because they once owed affinity to Queen Anne’s father the Kingmaker.
While this is happening, no one hears a word from my brothers in the Tower—and a lack of words is as ill-boding as can be. We used to receive vague reports of how they practiced archery outside, or how they were spotted in the window, but as July wears on there is nothing. Nothing.
August fades into a mild, rusty-red September. Our life in sanctuary drags on: half-hearted studies, dining on Londoners’ gifts of eatables, on occasion praying with the abbot, playing cards with Agnes or teaching Anne a rhyme, stealing away to the chapel to chat with Thomas. Despite the isolation from the lively world I so long to return to, it would be endurable but for one fact: nothing.
There are whispers on the street, Thomas tells us after venturing outside, whispers that the princes have been smothered in their sleep, starved to death, or the key to their room simply thrown down a well to rid the new King of his foremost rivals for the throne. Cold claws reach inside my chest, breaking my ribcage, closing around my heart. If the rumours hold even a grain of truth, if my Dickie has drawn his last breath without so much as letting me place a final kiss on his velvety forehead… I believe that is the one grievance I could never completely forget, the one sorrow I could barely survive, come hellfire. Uncle Richard would never harm them; this I know just as I know the sun will rise in the east, not merely because of his personal bond to them but because of the political disaster their deaths would assuredly bring on him. Still, others might act rashly, others in whose interest it is to remove them from the face of the earth.
I am more restless than ever, unable to focus on even the simplest thing without the image of my angel brother nudging me, urging me to do something, help them, find out the truth.
It is when I wake up sweating and kicking one night that Mother at last shares her secrets. She will not stand by idly and allow the suspect fate of her boys go unpunished. No, she has already taken action.
Chapter VI
MARGARET BEAUFORT?’
I nod, livid. ‘That’s what she told me. They share a physician—that Welshman who has been coming and going, the tall one with the tawny beard and white hose.’
‘But he started visiting…a month ago.’ Thomas knits his brows, propping his chin in his palm and his elbows on his knees. We are sitting on the altar steps with two plain cups of cold wine between us.
‘I know. I did not pay it much attention.’ My cheeks heat. ‘I would rather not pry in Mother’s private health.’
‘I see. You have not told me what this plan involves yet.’
I draw a deep breath, preparing to unleash the beast. ‘To marry Elizabeth—or if she dies, to marry me—to Henry Tudor and assist him in an invasion. My uncle, Ned, will contribute ten thousand pounds, and they believe the Duke of Brittany is also willing to support the endeavour. Then, the throne will be returned to my brother, and Tudor will be returned his own lands as Earl of Richmond as repayment.’
‘Who on earth is Henry Tudor?’
‘Her son—Beaufort’s son. But you are missing the important part. If…if my brothers are dead, though they cannot be, then Tudor may take the crown for himself. A Lancastrian with no credible claim!’ I have to pinch myself at the thought.
Thomas shakes his head so that his hair swirls around his ears like a dark cloud. ‘You’re crazy, the whole lot of you. Sorry, but you really are, Lady. What does it matter who sits on that throne when ordinary people will not get a scrap more regardless?’
‘It matters because the foremost enmity lies not between York and Woodville but between York and Lancaster, or so I have been taught my whole life. It matters because my Lady Mother and her family have turned in a direction I cannot follow, not truly.’
‘And I thought you wanted your brother restored.’
‘Of course I do. It is what I want most of all. But if he is already…you know, then I would much rather have Uncle Richard than a Lancastrian upstart without real blood royal in his veins. What do you take my loyalties for?’
‘God save your sister then.’ He raises his cup in a toast and drinks hungrily.
/>
‘What?’
‘God save her, so you won’t have to wed that Tudor lad.’
I pout. ‘Don’t give me nightmares.’
To tell the truth, I am a little embarrassed that I did not grasp what was in the making earlier. I have barely noticed the physician arriving more frequently than my mother’s health could require. I have been too absorbed in lamenting my brothers’ unknown fate, blind to Mother’s revived determination now shining in her eyes as if she was a hungry cat on the hunt. Elizabeth and Anne both knew before I did, while Kate and Bridget are too young to be involved. I hope Agnes was oblivious, too, else she ought to have told me.
It is such a gamble—it gives me the chills. We might rise to our former fortune, providing Tudor succeeds and the princes are alive, or we might be plunged into an abyss if the invasion is crushed or if my brothers are dead and we are left under the rule of a Lancastrian king. My kinswomen act as though they would be perfectly happy with a minor nobleman on the throne and Elizabeth as the Queen. Elizabeth for Queen! The idea prompts a sour taste on my tongue. I always expected her to wed one of Europe’s great princes, just like myself, but this is not the same thing as to have her presiding over a foreign court far away. I would have to dip into a curtsey before her every time she swept into a room; I would be forced to look upon her as she sits on the gilded throne once occupied by our mother. I would have to seek her permission to move my little finger, and I would be forced to watch her prance under a royal canopy to the accolades of the people. Then I would indeed have to marry abroad, to escape.
Do they not understand? We have everything to gain, yet we also have everything to lose. I shall rejoice if my brother is restored to the throne. I shall despair if a Lancastrian stranger with Elizabeth at his side takes it instead. And if the invasion fails altogether… Then I will curse Mother’s endeavour, regardless of my love for her. Uncle Richard will still look kindly upon us, at least on me and my sisters, if we bide our time and blend into the new regime. He might not have the option to be lenient if we become rebels in the rawest sense of the word. I would not be if I were in his shoes.
