The King's Agent

by Donna Russo Morin

  With a devilish smile upon his plump, freckled face, Henry accepted the hand thus offered. “And you, Your Highness.”

  Cardinal Wolsey, rotund form looming in red cassock and mozzetta, hovered by Henry’s side as always, as did the dukes of Suffolk and Norfolk.

  These two rivals politely embraced, between them a pull of genuine affection, more potent after the last few days together, yet sharp with the edge of competition, like two loving brothers forever bent on besting the other.

  “A worthy match indeed,” François conceded. “One deserving of a hearty toast.”

  “More than one, I should think,” Henry agreed. “I will see you at table?”

  “It will be my honor.” François accepted the invitation with a sweeping bow.

  As the men separated and made to quit the field, the crowd erupted into another burst of applause, colorful banners flourishing. With magnanimity, each sovereign acknowledged the accolades with a wave, a nod, and a smile as they quit the field.

  A young man standing along the front rail took his pretty wife by the arm, hoisting his daughter higher in his grasp, and began to lead them through the departing congested throng. “Come, mes amours, I must prepare to attend the king at table.”

  “Of course, my dear,” replied the delicate woman at his side, skin flushed from a day in the sun.

  The toddler in her father’s arms put her head down onto his strong shoulder, blond curls falling on her face as her eyes grew heavy, then closed. Exhausted from the excitement of the long day, she would sleep peacefully tonight.

  The royal combatants retired from the tourney field, entourages in tow, each to his own opulent encampment. These men of power and privilege endured no discomforts; though ensconced in makeshift, temporary lodgings, each camp contrived astounding accommodations for this auspicious meeting.

  Months in the making, the summit was unlike any conducted before. Leaders who had been overlooked waited with equal amounts of wonder and fear, because any accord between France and England could only spell trouble. The possibility of orchestrating a great peace enticed the English king. The opportunity to bring another to his cause against his rivalry with Charles V of Spain, newly appointed Holy Roman Emperor—chosen by the new pope over François himself—had inveigled the French king forth. A grand meeting, an opportunity to talk; diplomacy and deal making decorated by a grand festival. And yet the undercurrent of competition between the two young and brash chevaliers, the constant quibbling for any modicum of superiority over the other, no matter how miniscule, permeated every facet of this audacious assembly.

  In the shallow Val d’Or at the very edge of English-occupied France, near Calais, halfway between the castle ruins of Guînes and Ardres, they had met on an early June afternoon.

  Henry would have a castle no matter where he laid his head. In the shadow of the Château de Guînes, the Palace of Illusions had been erected with sections brought from England already assembled. Covering an area of more than two acres, it was a convoluted construction of wood and earth covered with a painted canvas to resemble stone and formed with turrets, parapets, and windows. Within its vast rectangular interior lay a courtyard boasting two magnificent fountains fed by three pipes—one for water, one for hippocras, and one for wine.

  In a meadow on the outskirts of Ardres, the French had pitched their tents, almost four hundred of them, some as large as any castle’s great hall. Many of the nobles in attendance had forfeited all property, selling their fields, their mills, their forests to attend the event with appropriate honor. Surmounted by pennants of golden apples and emblazoned with their owners’ coats of arms, the tents of velvet and cloth of gold spread out across the countryside like wild flowers. The field shimmered as if the gold grew from its earth. But no pavilion rivaled the splendor of François’s tent.

  Taller than any other and sixty feet on a side, two ship masts lashed together supported the mammoth cloth of gold. Blue velvet lined the interior, decorated with fleurs-de-lis and gold embroideries from Cyprus.

  Beyond splendid, yet the kings’ accommodations paled in comparison to the events conducted over the course of the summit.

  Banquets, dances, and mummings filled the nights; a feat of arms—jousting at the tilt, an open field tournament, a foot combat at the barriers with puncheon spears, swords, and two-handed swords—filled the days. The kings were the most rowdy and jubilant attendants of all. In their company were their nobles, their friends, and their women. François had brought his mother; his wife, Queen Claude; and his mistress, the Comtesse de Chateaubriant. Regal and silent by Henry VIII’s side stood Catherine of Aragon, with countless fair maidens waiting to warm his bed. As the kings made merry, their ambassadors and delegates made diplomacy, Wolsey speaking foremost for England, while the Queen Mother, Louise de Savoy, spoke for France. Many words passed between these two equally keen minds, but little of lasting consequence was said.

  Henry rubbed at his midsection, a replete, resounding belch coaxed forth from the embroidered brocade–covered protuberance. Attendants scurried around him, cleaning the remnants of the evening’s festivities like ants upon an abandoned picnic ground. He watched them from his elevated perch on the velvet chair in the corner of the vast room; watched, but cared little about their performance. The last of the guests had retreated in the early hours of the morning, leaving the king in the company of his most reliant confidants.

  “Have we found out who the young women are?” Henry spoke to his men, but his unfocused, bloodshot eyes never strayed from the buzzing workers before him, mesmerized, in his hazy stupor, by their tedious, repetitive movements.

  The bearded Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, stepped forward, if a bit unsteadily, wine sloshing in a tightly gripped chalice. “They are Thomas Boleyn’s daughters, my lord, Mary and ... and Anne.”

  Henry pulled himself up from his slump and whipped round, all at once full of eager attention. “Certainly not?”

  “ ’Tis true, Your Highness, they have been in the French queen’s company for some years and are quite soon preparing to return to our homeland.”

  With sensual, languid movements at odds with his rugged physique, the king reclined once more. “Be sure to send them a personal invitation to court.”

  “Of course, Your Highness. As you wish,” Suffolk assured him, but not without a roll of his eyes and a salacious smile at the small group of men gathered in duty and imbibing.

  “Are we done here, Wolsey? I tire of these games.” Sounding like nothing so much as a spoiled, petulant child, Henry’s bulbous bottom lip stuck out in a pout.

  “I believe we have done all we can here, Your Majesty,” the cardinal said with neither enthusiasm nor disappointment. “You have done well to sign the treaty.”

  Henry snarled at him. To make peace with the posturing François rankled; the hand that wielded the quill itched.

  “You will see great results from this, I assure you,” Wolsey pacified.

  It was the slightest of changes, but the king’s pout reformed, a devilish grin blossoming in its stead. In that moment, Henry found the joy of the situation in which he found himself: As the lesser of the three world powers, both France and Spain courted him. A master manipulator, he intended to exploit the state of affairs for all it was worth.

  “Send a message then, would you, Wolsey? Tell the emperor I would like to talk. He should know of the ostentatious display we have witnessed here. A man with so much to prove as our François, putting on such a show, must have something to hide.”

  “Of course, Majesty, but per—”

  When the hand of his king flicked in his face, the cardinal’s thoughts froze on his tongue. Henry leaned forward, resting his free hand upon one knee, eyes fixed upon the young man rushing toward him. The pale, snaggletoothed youth approached his sovereign, lips forming words aching to launch from his mouth. Henry’s quieting hand flicked from Wolsey to the approaching squire, who clamped his mouth shut, eyes bulging in fear at the abrupt co
mmand.

  “Cease and desist.” The king’s booming voice pummeled the air. “You are all relieved. Make for your beds.”

  Every manservant and chambermaid dropped whatever lay in their hands, and took themselves off without thought or question. The small gathering of courtiers drew closer to the king, put on guard at once by the abrupt change in his tone and demeanor.

  “Speak,” Henry barked the instant the last servant had quit the chamber.

  With a twitch and an Adam’s apple–bobbing swallow, the young man made his report.

  “Your fears have been confirmed, Your Highness. The man in question has indeed been seen in clandestine conversations with members of the French contingent.”

  “Bastard!” spat the king, pounding a fist on the arm of the chair and spewing upon the floor, as if the word and gesture were not enough to rid him of his venomous rage.

  The messenger quaked in his worn leather boots, bulging insect eyes once more protruding from his long face. Only Suffolk remembered him.

  “You may leave us, good sir. You have done well. Have no fear.” With a calming hand upon the youngster’s shoulder, the duke turned him toward the door, helping him away with a firm yet gentle nudge. Turning back, Suffolk met with the king’s blazing stare.

  “You know what to do?” Henry moved not a bit, his voice low and quiet, yet his rage was there for any to see did they know what to look for.

  Suffolk’s full lips thinned in a grimace, but he bowed, spun on his heel with determination, and left; not a one questioned his compliance with whatever the king demanded of him.

  The screams of human and animal mixed in a grotesque chorus, filling the predawn hours with their horror and revulsion. The monstrous flames rose into the black sky, roaring like cannon blasts in the day’s most hushed hours. Men, women, and children fled from the orangey blaze in fright while soldier and guard ran toward it. But it was too powerful, too repulsive, and it was impossible to break through to its heart, to penetrate the barrier and save those trapped within. They stood at the aperture of the tent now fully ablaze in the apex of the English camp, waiting to catch those fortunate enough to escape from the fiery cataclysm.

  The pandemonium swirled about the inferno like the oxygen that fed it so splendidly. For within every neighboring tent, the brilliance of the flame appeared alive upon the walls, the nexus of its glow indistinguishable through the pale canvas. In terror they ran out of their tents, into the fray; haphazard, undirected commotion. No matter how removed from danger, they ran and screamed, the sickening scent of burning flesh fueling their fear.

  “Help us, please,” one foot soldier yelled to a passing nobleman, a young man of strong arm and back, capable of hoisting a bucket of water as well as any. But the pampered gent continued his furious retreat, sparing not a glance at the soldier begging his aid.

  Coughing and sputtering, survivors staggered from within, but the child emerged without a sound—without a scratch—as if oblivious to the danger she escaped, her long, curly blond hair wafting upward in the rushing air of the blaze at her back. From behind the soldiers, a woman clad in a silk nightgown flung herself forward, as if waiting for this very moment. Snatching the child in her arms she ran, a silent angel intent on her mission.

  “How many billeted here, do you know?” one guard called to another as they stood together before the blaze. Few of them remained, so many of them had already rushed toward the physician’s tent, the wounded leaning on their shoulders or cradled in their arms.

  “No idea,” his companion struggled to answer, the flames devouring all the air in and around the tent. “Can’t be many. So many ... already out.”

  The first soldier acknowledged him with a squinty-eyed nod, holding up a hand in a vain attempt to block the heat from his face, feeling his eyebrows singeing upon his skin. With a hue and cry, both jumped back. The tent, devoured by fire, pitched toward them, collapsing forward with nothing but ash left at its base. Within the crumbling of the remaining wood frame and disintegrating canvas, a whoosh of flames rose higher as one wrenching, agonizing scream roared above the din.

  For one suspended moment, the men stood motionless. In the next instant, they moved. Without word or gesture, each bent his head down and charged.

  “Could we not have devised a less overt manner in which to deal with this matter?” Henry hissed into Suffolk’s ear.

  Outside, the smell of burning rubble clung to the air like the desperate grasp of a scorned lover. Dawn’s pale gray light tickled at the edge of the earth. In this broken place, physicians and surgeons attended to the wounded while soldiers and servants trod warily through the charred ruins in hopes of finding other survivors. Inside the king’s pavilion, the tension clung to every tendril of smoke that slithered in.

  “Be gone.” Henry dismissed his attendants and guards with an angry flick of his hand, those who had rushed in at the first burst of flames, and threw himself into the embroidered crimson and wood chair in the corner. Head bent, shoulders curled, Henry pierced Suffolk with a potent stare.

  “I do not believe it was intentional, Sire—the fire, I mean.” Suffolk shook his head, unsure at this moment of the debacle’s details. He rubbed roughly at his forehead, as if to clear the jumble of thoughts in his mind. “He was wounded as well. Certainly it is not in an assassin’s plans to be injured while carrying out his duties.”

  “Not a proficient one, at any rate.” Henry bit off the snide words. “Was he at least successful? Did any others perish in this debacle?”

  “The initial reports confirm the target has been eliminated. His wife and daughter as well. One other died—no one of consequence—but many are grievously wounded.”

  Henry shook his head of red and gold curls. “Well, there is something in that, I suppose.”

  “I will find out more.”

  “Yes, you will.” With agitated impatience, Henry tapped his foot on the wood below his feet as Suffolk hovered by his side. “Now.”

  “I ... of course, Your Majesty.” With a quick bow, the duke took his leave, fairly running as his sovereign’s ire pushed at his back. He stopped short at the door, halted by the apparitions standing in the aperture.

  Wrapped in a silk shift and dressing gown, the woman looked no less haughty; her soot-stained chin rose from her chest and she walked toward them with shoulders squared. The child at her feet was nothing less than a saintly specter, dressed in white, blond curls forming a halo about her small face.

  “I must speak with the king, s’il vous plaît,” the woman decreed, the English words lyrical in her heavy French accent.

  “I’m sorry, my lady,” Suffolk began, “but I’m afraid ...”

  “Let her pass,” Henry barked.

  Stepping around a bowing Suffolk—perplexity emblazoned on his handsome face—the woman brought the child with her.

  Henry rose from his chair, walking forward to greet her, and the confusion crinkling Suffolk’s ruddy face fell to slack-jawed shock.

  “Madame de Montlhéry.” Henry leaned over her hand as she made her obeisance. “Are you all right?”

  “I am well, Your Majesty, merci.”

  “I am most grateful for all your efforts on our behalf this night,” Henry said with a small shake of his head. “I am only sorry it has been botched so atrociously. But I am confident no aspersions will be thrown your way.”

  The woman’s pale eyes strayed not a whit from his face. “I owe you my life. There is nothing you could not ask of me.”

  Henry smiled benevolently, looking down at the child at their feet.

  “And who is this adorable creature you have brought to visit me?” he asked, and began to lower his large frame.

  “She is my cousin’s daughter.”

  The king straightened as though struck, head snapping toward Suffolk, accusation sharp in his blue eyes. “His daughter? Are you sure?”

  “Yes, Your Majesty,” Madame de Montlhéry murmured, shuddering at the blast of her sovereign’s
fury.

  “I thought you said they had all perished?” the king snapped at the man hovering by the door.

  “It is what I was guaranteed, Your Majesty,” Suffolk defended.

  “Well, your assurances are meaningless, as is your control of this situation.”

  “His wife lives, as well,” the woman put forth. “She is ... her face has been ... no one will recognize her, I assure you. Nor do I believe, with the extent of her injuries, she will last much longer.”

  Henry clasped his hands across his muscular chest, his knuckles turning white, the skin straining across the bone, clamping down upon his irritation, though sorely tested.

  “Suffolk,” the king hissed through bared teeth. “Take thee off and see for yourself that the man is dead. I trust nothing this day.”

  “Your Majesty.” The duke bowed, rushing off, no doubt, with thanks to be gone from his incensed ruler’s presence, no longer certain his lifelong friendship could protect him further.

  “Mum? See mum?” The tiny voice was no more than a squeak, the tug upon Madame de Montlhéry’s gown timid yet insistent.

  They looked down upon the child as if seeing her for the first time, her presence all but forgotten in the turmoil of the past few moments.

  Madame de Montlhéry looked at Henry expectantly, lips parting with elusive words.

  Henry lowered himself on bended knees, making himself as small and unmenacing as possible. His smile spread wide, and it chased away any vestiges of annoyance left upon his features. The little girl shrank back, clutching the woman’s legs, taking refuge behind the folds of her gown.

  “Would you like a treat, my dear? Are you hungry?”

  “She loves plum tarts, Your Highness,” Montlhéry informed him.

  “Is that true? Would you like a sugary plum tart?” Henry asked the wide-eyed urchin.

  Though she offered a halfhearted nod, the child remained in the wake of the woman’s skirts, her large eyes growing moist and full with tears.