Richard is on the steps leading up to the great hall, and people are gathering round him. He has a paper in his hand; I see the royal seal and my first leaping hope is that my prayers have been answered and the queen is dead. I run up the steps to stand beside him and he says, his voice choked with grief: ‘It is Edward. Edward, my brother.’
I gasp but wait as the bell slowly falls silent and the household looks to my husband. The three children come at a run from the stables and stand, as they should, on the steps before us. Edward has uncovered his head and Margaret takes Teddy’s cap from his curly hair.
‘Grave news from London,’ Richard says clearly, so that everyone, even the labourers who have come running in from their fields, can hear him. ‘His Grace the king, my beloved and noble brother, is dead.’ There is a tremendous stir among the crowd. Richard nods as if he understands their disbelief. He clears his throat. ‘He was taken ill some days ago and died. He received the last rites and we will pray for his immortal soul.’
Many people cross themselves, and one woman gives a little sob and puts her apron to her eyes. ‘His son Edward, Prince of Wales, will inherit his father’s crown,’ Richard says. He raises his voice: ‘The king is dead. God save the king!’
‘God save the king!’ we all repeat, and then Richard takes my arm and turns me in to the great hall, the children trailing behind us.
Richard sends the children to the chapel to pray for the soul of their uncle the king. He is fast and decisive, burning up with the vision of what must be done. This is a moment of destiny, and he is a Plantagenet – they are always at their best in a crisis or on the brink of an opportunity. A child of war, a soldier, commander, warden of the West Marches, he has worked his way up through the ranks of his brother’s men to be ready for the moment now – the moment that his brother is no more, and Richard must protect his brother’s legacy.
‘Beloved, I must leave you. I have to go to London. He will have named me as regent and I have to make sure that his kingdom is secure.’
‘Who should threaten it?’
He does not answer: ‘the woman who has threatened the peace of England every day since the cursed May-day that she seduced and enchanted him’. Instead he looks seriously at me and says: ‘As well as everything else, I fear a landing by Henry Tudor.’
‘Margaret Stanley’s son?’ I say incredulously. ‘A boy half-bred between the Houses of Beaufort and Tudor? You cannot fear him.’
‘Edward feared him, and he was treating with his mother to bring him home as a friend. He is an heir to the House of Lancaster, however obscure, and he has been in exile since Edward took the throne. He is an enemy and I don’t know what alliances he has. I don’t fear him; but I will get to London and secure the throne for York so that there can be no doubt.’
‘You will have to work with the queen,’ I caution him.
He smiles at me. ‘I don’t fear her either. She will neither enchant nor poison me. She doesn’t matter any more. At her worst she can speak against me; but no-one of importance will listen. The loss of my brother is her loss too, though she will only understand that when she sees she is thrown down. She is a dowager queen, no longer principal advisor to the king. I will have to work with her son, but he is Edward’s boy as well as hers, and I will see that he knows my authority as his uncle. My task must be to take him in hand, guard his birthright, see him to the throne as my brother wanted. I am his regent. I am his guardian. I am his uncle. I am protector of the country and of him too. I shall take him into my keeping.’
‘Shall I come too?’
He shakes his head. ‘No, I will ride fast with my closest friends. Robert Brackenbury has already left to provide horses for us on the road. You wait here until I have Elizabeth Woodville and all the cursed Rivers family in quiet mourning at Windsor and out of the way. I will send for you when I have the seal of office and England is mine to command.’ He smiles. ‘This is my moment of greatness, as well as my moment of grief. For a little while – until the boy is old enough – I will rule England as a king. I will resolve the wars with Scotland and negotiate with France. I will see that justice runs through the land and that good men can get places – men who are not Rivers kinsmen. I shall take the Rivers out of their offices and out of their great estates. I shall set my stamp on England in these years and they will know that I was a good protector and a good brother. And I shall take the boy Edward and teach him what a great man his father was – and what a greater man he could have been if it had not been for that woman.’
‘I’ll come to London as soon as you send for me,’ I promise. ‘And here we will pray for the soul of Edward. He was a great sinner, but a loveable one.’
Richard shakes his head. ‘He was betrayed by the woman that he put in the very highest place in the land,’ he says. ‘He was a fool for love. But I shall see that the finest parts of his legacy are passed on to his boy. I shall make the boy a true grandson to my father.’ He pauses for a moment. ‘And as for Her, I shall send her back to the village she came from,’ he swears, in an unusual moment of bitterness. ‘She shall go to an abbey and live in retirement. We have all seen enough of her and her endless brothers and sisters. The Rivers are finished in England, I shall throw them down.’
Richard rides out that very day. He pauses at York and he and all the city make an oath of loyalty to his nephew. He tells the city that they will honour the late king by their loyalty to his son, and he rides on to London.
Then I hear nothing from him. I am not surprised at the silence, he is on the road to London – what should he write to me about but the slowness of the going and the mud in these spring days? I know that he is meeting the Duke of Buckingham, young Henry Stafford, who was married against his will to the Woodville sister Catherine when they were both children, who passed down the death sentence on George, against his conscience, to oblige his wife and her sister. I know that William Hastings, the king’s true friend, has written to Richard to come at once, and warned him of the enmity of the queen. The great lords will be gathering to protect the boy Edward, the heir to his father’s throne. I know that the Rivers will be wanting to surround and protect their heir from anyone else – but who can refuse Richard, the king’s brother, the named Protector of England?
MIDDLEHAM CASTLE, YORKSHIRE, MAY 1483
Then in the middle of May I get a letter from my husband, written in his own hand and sealed with his private seal. I take it to my chamber away from the noise of the household and I read it by the bright light of the clear glass window.
You will hear that the coronation of my nephew will take place on 22 June, but do not come to London until I write in my own hand to tell you to do so. London is not safe for anyone who is not sworn or kin to the Rivers or their friends. Now she shows her true colours, and I am ready for the worst. She is refusing to be dowager queen, she hopes to make herself a king. I have to face her as an enemy, and I do not forget my brother George, your sister, or their baby.
I go to the kitchen where the great fire stays lit night and day and I crush the letter into a ball and push it under the glowing logs and wait till it has burned away. There is nothing to do but wait for news.
In the stable yard outside the children are watching the farrier shoe their ponies. Everything is safe and ordinary: the flare of the forge, the smoke billowing from the hoof in an acrid cloud. My son Edward is holding the halter rope of his new horse, a handsome cob, as the farrier grips the horse’s leg between his knees and taps in the nails. I cross my fingers in the old sign against witchcraft and I shudder as a cool draught blows in from the door to the dairy. If the queen is showing her true colours and my husband is ready for the worst, then her enmity to me and mine will be apparent for all to see. Perhaps even now she is whistling up a plague wind to blow against me. Perhaps even now she is laying a curse on my husband’s sword arm, weakening his strength, suborning his allies, poisoning the minds of men against him.
I turn and go to the chapel, drop to my
knees and pray that Richard is strong against Elizabeth Woodville and against all her kinsmen and women and the mighty affinity she has put together. I pray that he acts decisively and powerfully, I pray that he uses whatever weapons come to his hand, for certainly she will stop at nothing to get her son on the throne and see us thrown down. I think of Margaret of Anjou teaching me that there are times when you have to be ready to do anything to defend yourself or the position you deserve, and I hope that my husband is ready for anything. I cannot know what is happening in London, but I fear the start of a new war, and this time it will be the king’s true brother against the false-hearted queen. And we must, we have to triumph.
I wait. I send one of our guard with a letter to Richard begging for news. I warn him against the ill-will of the queen.
You know she has powers, so guard yourself against them. Do whatever you have to do to protect your brother’s legacy and our safety.
On my own at Middleham Castle, I spend every afternoon with the children as if only by constantly watching can I prevent a hot plague wind blowing towards them from London, stop the flight of a mistimed arrow, ensure that the new horse is well-trained and that Edward can manage it. If I could hold my son in my arms like the baby he once was, I would never let him go. There is no doubt in my mind that the queen’s grey eyes are turned towards us, that her mind is set against my husband, that she will be plotting and conjuring our deaths, that it is finally, clearly, us against her.
MIDDLEHAM CASTLE, YORKSHIRE, JUNE 1483
Every morning after chapel I go and stand on the top of the south tower, looking south down the road to London. And then I see the plume of dust that blows from the rough road after the passage of half a dozen horsemen. I call to my maid: ‘Fetch the children to my room, and turn out the guard. Someone is coming.’
Her look of alarm and her sudden scurry down the steps tells me that I am not the only person to know that my husband, far from securing a safe succession for his nephew, is in danger, and that danger could come even to us, in this, our safest home.
I hear the portcullis rattle down and the drawbridge creak up, and the running footsteps of men dashing to man the walls of the castle. When I go to the great hall the children are waiting for me. Margaret has tight hold of her brother’s hand; Edward is wearing his short sword and his pale face is determined. They all three kneel for my blessing and when I put my hand on their warm heads I could weep for fear for the three of them.
‘There are horsemen coming to the castle,’ I say as calmly as I can. ‘Perhaps they are messengers from your father, but with the country so unsettled I dare take no risks. That is why I sent for you.’
Edward rises to his feet. ‘I did not know the country was unsettled?’
I shake my head. ‘I spoke wrongly. The country is at peace, waiting for your father’s righteous rule as regent,’ I say. ‘It is the court which is unsettled for I think the queen will try to rule in the place of her son. She may try to make herself regent. I am anxious for your father, who is bound by his promise to the king to take Prince Edward into his keeping and teach him how to rule, and bring him to his throne. If the prince’s mother is an enemy then your father will have to judge and to act swiftly and powerfully.’
‘But what would the queen do?’ little Margaret asks me. ‘What could she do against us, against my lord uncle?’
‘I don’t know,’ I say. ‘That is why we are prepared for an attack in case one were to come. But we are safe here, the soldiers are strong and well-trained and the castle is loyal to us. The whole of the North of England would support your father as if he were king himself.’ I try to smile at them. ‘I am probably being anxious. But my own father was always ready in his own defence. My father always raised the drawbridge if he did not know the visitor.’
We wait, listening. Then I hear the shouted challenge from the captain of the guard and the indistinct reply. I hear the drawbridge rattle on its chains as they let it down and the thud as it hits the far side of the moat. The portcullis screeches as they haul it up.
‘We are safe,’ I say to the children. ‘They will be friends bringing a message.’
I hear feet on the stone stairs that lead up to the hall, and then my guard opens the door and Sir Robert Brackenbury, Richard’s childhood friend, comes in with a smile. ‘I am sorry if I alarmed you, my lady,’ he says, kneeling and proffering a letter. ‘We came quickly. I should perhaps have sent someone ahead to tell you that it was my troop.’
‘I thought it right to be careful,’ I say. I take the letter, and gesture to my lady in waiting that she shall pour a glass of small ale for Sir Robert. ‘You can go,’ I say to the children and to my ladies. ‘I will talk with Sir Robert.’
Edward hesitates. ‘May I ask Sir Robert if my father is safe and well?’
Sir Robert turns to him and bends down so that the ten-year-old boy and he are at the same height. He speaks gently to all three children. ‘When I left London your father was well and doing the very best he could,’ he says. ‘He has Prince Edward in his safe-keeping and he will make sure that he comes to his throne when the time is right.’
The children bow to me and leave the room. I wait until the door is closed behind them and I open the letter. Richard is brief as usual.
The Rivers are conspiring against us and against all of the old lords of England. They plan to replace the Plantagenet line with themselves. I have found hidden weapons and believe they are planning an uprising and all our deaths. I will defend us and my country against them. Come to London now, I need you to be seen here at my side, and I want your company. Leave a strong guard with the children.
I fold the letter carefully and tuck it inside my gown. Sir Robert is standing, waiting for me to speak to him.
‘Tell me what is happening,’ I command.
‘The queen was mustering a troop and planning to put her son on the throne. She would have excluded our lord from the protectorate and there would have been no regency. She was going to put her son on the throne and she and her brother Anthony Woodville would have ruled England through the boy.’
I nod, hardly daring to breathe.
‘Our lord captured Prince Edward, while he was being taken to London from Ludlow by the queen’s kinsmen. Our lord arrested the queen’s brother Anthony Woodville, and her son by her first marriage Richard Grey, and took the boy into his own keeping. When we got to London we found the queen had fled into sanctuary.’
I gasp. ‘She has gone into sanctuary?’
‘A clear admission of her guilt. She took her children with her. Our lord has the prince in the royal apartment in the Tower, preparing him for his coronation, and the council has declared our lord as Lord Protector – according to the wishes of his brother the king. The queen refuses to attend the coronation or release the royal prince and princesses out of sanctuary so that they can attend their brother.’
‘What is she doing in there?’
Sir Robert grimaces. ‘Without a doubt she is plotting to overthrow the protectorate under the shield of sanctuary. Her brother has commanded the fleet to sail and they are on the high seas; we are preparing for an attack from the river.’ He glances at me. ‘It is my lord’s belief that she is practising witchcraft – hidden in sanctuary.’
I cross myself and feel in my pocket for the amulet that George gave me against her enchantments.
‘He says his sword arm is giving him pain, tingling and aching. He thinks she is trying to weaken him.’
I find I am clenching my hands together. ‘What can he do to defend himself?’
‘I don’t know,’ Sir Robert says unhappily. ‘I don’t know what he can do. And the young prince constantly asks for his mother and for his governor, Anthony Woodville. Clearly, as soon as he is crowned he will command their presence, and they will rule England through him. My own view is that my lord will have to hold the prince as his ward, without a coronation, until he can make an agreement with the family. His own safety demands it. If the que
en’s son is on the throne then she takes power again. She is certain to act against our lord – and against you and your son. Once she seizes power through her son, my lord is as good as executed.’
At the thought of her secret silent malice against Richard and against me and the children my knees weaken and I lean against the stone of the chimney breast.
‘Be of good cheer,’ Sir Robert says encouragingly. ‘We know the danger, we are armed against her. Our lord is going to muster his faithful men from the North. He will summon them to London. He has the prince in his hands, and he is ready for anything she might do. He need not crown him until he has an agreement. He can hold him until she will make an agreement.’
‘He says I am to go to him.’
‘I am ordered to escort you,’ Sir Robert says. ‘Shall we leave tomorrow morning?’
‘Yes,’ I say. ‘At first light.’
The children come down to the stable yard to see me leave. I kiss each of them and they kneel for my blessing. Leaving them is the hardest thing to do, but to take them to London would be to lead them into unknown dangers. My son Edward stands straight and says to me: ‘I will take care of my cousins, Lady Mother. You needn’t fear for us. I will hold Middleham Castle for Father, come what may.’
I smile so that they can see I am proud of them but it is hard to turn away from them and get onto my horse. I brush the tears away with the back of my glove. ‘I shall send for you as soon as I can,’ I say. ‘I shall think of you all every day, and pray for you every night.’ Then Sir Robert gives the signal and our little company goes under the portcullis arch, over the drawbridge, and south down the road to London.
The Kingmaker's Daughter Page 33
