“If you have all finished shouting, and posturing, and cross-examining each other, I will be happy to tell you how I came to be married to this gentleman,” Nyssa said.
“Philip!” roared his father. “Where the hell were you in the midst of all of this? Could you not have protected your sister?”
“I knew nothing until it was an accomplished fact, my lord,” Philip told his father bluntly.
“We were married in the Chapel Royal on April twentieth by the Archbishop of Canterbury and Bishop Gardiner,” Nyssa said quietly. “The king was there. Indeed it was he who ordered my marriage to Varian.”
“Why?” Blaze asked her daughter.
“I must start at the beginning,” Nyssa told her mother. “You have heard the rumors that the king did not like his new wife, the Princess of Cleves? They are true, though why he felt this way no one can really understand. The lady Anne is a kind and good woman. Still, nothing would do but that the king escape this marriage. He was granted an annulment on the ninth day of the month on the grounds of nonconsummation.”
“Nonconsummation?” the Earl of Langford snorted. “That damned satyr will flourish his lance in any convenient sheath.”
“Nay, Papa,” Nyssa said. “He did not use the lady Anne. I know.”
“But what has this to do with your marriage to this gentleman?” Blaze pressed her eldest daughter. “I do not understand.”
Nyssa quietly explained to her family what had happened on that fateful night.
“And you lent yourself to this, my lord?” Anthony Wyndham said scathingly to Varian de Winter. “I think little of you for it.”
“What would you have had me do, sir?” the Earl of March said fiercely. “My grandfather did not care with whom she was discovered. Better it be someone who loved her than someone who did not.” He glared at his father-in-law.
The veins in Anthony Wyndham’s neck stood out with his anger, but his wife had understood the words that he had not. Better it be someone who loved her. Looking at the Earl of March, Blaze saw that he did love her daughter. He was as angry, and as protective of Nyssa, as Tony. She put a restraining hand upon her husband’s arm.
“He loves her, Tony. Can you not see it? Temper your anger and look at him. He loves her,” she said softly.
“But does she love him? We always promised her that she could marry the man she loved,” Lord Wyndham replied. He looked at the girl. “Do you love him, Nyssa? Tell me the truth, poppet. If you are unhappy, if this is not to your liking, I will move heaven and earth to free you from this man! I will not allow you to be unhappy for the rest of your life, Nyssa. Neither your mother nor I want that.”
“I do not know if I love Varian,” Nyssa said honestly, “or if I will ever love him. Is that not a chance people of our station take when we marry? You did not know if Mama would ever love you when you married her. Varian is a good man, and I do not think I can expect anything more than that, Papa.” She kissed her stepfather’s cheek. “Now come, and give my husband your hand in friendship. Give us your blessing too.”
“But,” he protested, “I always promised you your choice of a husband, Nyssa. I feel that I have failed you somehow. I should not have allowed you to go to court. I knew it at the time, but I let you all overrule me because the king promised to watch out for you. Bliss, you swore to me that you would chaperone my daughter carefully. You failed, and now my child is trapped in a loveless marriage.”
“Anthony,” his wife said sternly, “Nyssa is not trapped in a loveless union. She is as loved by her bridegroom as I was loved by you when we were first married. Look at your son-in-law! He is calf-eyed over the girl. If you cannot see it, it is because you do not want another man in Nyssa’s life but you. You never encouraged her to consider any of the young gentlemen hereabouts. Well, the matter is now out of your hands. Nyssa is a married woman, and if you will not, I will now welcome the Earl of March into this family.” Standing upon tiptoes, Blaze kissed her son-in-law. “Welcome to RiversEdge, Varian de Winter. I met your father but once, at my wedding feast, when I married Nyssa’s father, Edmund Wyndham. You favor him, except about the eyes. You have your grandfather Howard’s eyes.”
He smiled a slow, warm smile at her, raising her hand to his lips and kissing it. “I appreciate your kindness, madame. Let me assure you that I will care for your daughter with all the devotion I am capable of, I swear it!”
“Aye,” Blaze said, returning his smile, “I think you will. You have my blessing.”
“Hrrrumph!” Anthony Wyndham cleared his throat noisily, and they turned to him. He held out his hand to Varian de Winter. “You have my hand, my lord, and my blessing as well,” he said. “But treat my daughter badly and you will have my enmity. I am not pleased with the fait accompli that you have presented me with, but since it would appear that I can do nothing about it, I will give you the benefit of the doubt.”
“I thank you, my lord. I love Nyssa. I will not fail the trust you have placed in me,” the Earl of March said.
“Then it is settled, and we can go home to Marwood Hall,” Bliss said brightly, relief permeating her entire being. It had not been as bad as she had thought it would be. Anthony had been angry, and he had castigated her, but he was now resigned, thank goodness!
“Where is Giles?” Blaze asked her sister.
“The Princess of Cleves is going to remain in England,” Bliss said. “She will now be called the king’s sister, and only a new queen and the princesses will take precedence over her. She asked Giles to remain with her household, and he agreed to do so.”
“He’s a born courtier,” Nyssa told her parents. “He thinks he has a future at court, and considers the lady Anne’s household as a starting place. He will eventually be asked to join another household, Mama, I’m quite certain. He is very well-liked, and most clever for a boy so young.”
Blaze and her husband nodded, satisfied. It was a good future for their second son.
“Will he come home anytime soon?” Blaze asked.
“He said perhaps in the autumn,” Nyssa replied.
“We really must depart before dark,” Bliss said loudly.
“Oh, very well, Bliss,” her sister said. “Go home!”
The Countess of Marwood practically ran from the Great Hall, her husband following in her wake, chuckling quite audibly.
Anthony Wyndham could not prevent the smile that set the corners of his mouth lifting upward. “Poor Bliss. She was, I see, quite fearful of what I would say about this matter,” he said.
“And with good cause, I think, Papa,” Nyssa told him, laughing.
“You must be exhausted with your traveling,” Blaze said. “Show Varian to your chamber, Nyssa. We will eat at the usual hour.”
“Where are my brothers?” Nyssa asked her mother.
“Probably swimming in the river. Surely you have not forgotten? ’Tis summer, and all of you loved to paddle about the old Wye,” Blaze said. “That is far more important than having an old sister return from court.” She laughed, and Nyssa joined her.
“How old are your sons, madame?” Varian de Winter asked his mother-in-law.
“Richard will be nine in the late autumn. Teddy was just five, and wee Henry is three,” Blaze told him. She looked at her daughter. “You will not believe how Jane and Annie have grown, Nyssa. Jane is already saying ‘Da, Ma,’ and she says ‘Bo’ for her brothers. They adore her. Annie, however, is quieter, allowing her sister to speak for them both, but she is close to walking on her own, and getting into everything.” She looked at her new son-in-law again. “Do you like children, my lord?”
“Indeed I do, madame. I hope we will have as fine a family as you do. I was raised with my aunt and uncle, but I was some years their senior. I would have enjoyed a larger group of siblings.”
“If you wish to remain here talking,” Nyssa said, “I shall leave you, my lord, for I desire nothing more than a bath right now. I vow that all of the dust from England’s roads is lodged in my h
air and on my skin. The tub I had at our house in Greenwich was nowhere near as big and as comfortable as the one I have here at RiversEdge. I shall insist upon taking it, Mama, when Varian and I depart to Winterhaven.”
“Go then, my dear,” Blaze told her daughter. “We shall be happy to entertain your husband while you bathe, unless, of course, he would like to bathe too.”
“Perhaps I shall,” Varian de Winter said, and he quickly followed his wife from the Great Hall.
“Must you encourage that licentious behavior, madame?” Anthony Wyndham growled to his wife.
Blaze laughed. “Ohh, Tony, do not be such an old fuss,” his wife teased him. “You like to bathe with me sometimes.”
“But Nyssa is just a girl, Blaze!”
“Our daughter is a married woman,” she said. “You will simply have to accept it. She might even be with child already. They have been married almost three months, after all.”
“Do not even think it,” the Earl of Langford said. “Nyssa is far too young to be a mother. Besides, we are far too young to be grandparents.”
Blaze laughed again. “I was seventeen when I had Nyssa. She will be eighteen shortly. She is certainly old enough. You refuse to see it because she is your daughter. Ohh, Tony, she will always love you. You have not lost her because she is married. But her husband must now be first with her, and then their children. Still, there will always be room for us, and the rest of the family.” She kissed her husband.
“What happened, Blaze? She was just a little girl the last time I really looked,” he said. “Suddenly she is a beautiful woman, a wife, the Countess of March. The time has gone too quickly.”
“Children grow up, Tony,” Blaze said gently to her husband. “I do not know what my daughter would have done without you to look to as her father. We have much to thank you for, and you know that Edmund, may God assoil his good soul, would bless you also for the love you have given his daughter. Now she is grown. We have two little girls of our own. Give Jane and Annie the love you have given Nyssa.”
He nodded, and then said to her, “I do not suppose you would like to have a bath, Blaze.” His blue eyes were hopeful and twinkling. “If Nyssa grows with age to be as beautiful and as wise as her mother is, my angel, Varian de Winter will be a fortunate man.”
Blaze smiled and took his hand in hers. “Let us go and bathe, my dear lord,” she replied to him.
Nyssa and her husband remained with the Wyndhams of Langford for several weeks. Varian sent word to his servants at Winterhaven that he would be arriving at the end of August with his bride. In the meantime he became acquainted with his bride’s family.
News of the king’s marriage to Catherine Howard reached RiversEdge the end of the first week in August. The marriage had taken place quietly at the king’s hunting lodge at Oatlands on the twenty-eighth day of July. That same morning, quite early, the king’s former chancellor, Thomas Cromwell, was executed on Tower Green. The Howards were now triumphant.
“We must find a particularly nice gift to send Cat,” Nyssa told her husband.
The royal honeymoon progress moved slowly through Surrey and Berkshire to Grafton in Northamptonshire, on to Dunstable, to More, and finally to Windsor. The king, it was said, had become a new man. He behaved very much like the young man he had been in his youth. He arose between five and six in the morning, attended mass at seven, and then rode until ten A.M., when he wanted his dinner served. He played at bowls and archery in the afternoon, and then danced the night away with his lively, laughing bride. His leg seemed to have healed, and his temper was excellent.
The international situation seemed not to require his personal attention for the moment. Cleves was content with the treatment he had meted out to their princess. Indeed Duke William was reported to have said he was glad his sister fared no worse than she had. France and the Empire fussed at each other, but that was nothing new. Henry Tudor had nothing on his mind but pleasure in that hot summer of 1540. Few other than the Dukes of Suffolk and Norfolk could remember his ever having been so merry.
The Earl of March had to twice postpone their departure for Winterhaven, for Nyssa had not been feeling well. He was beginning to wonder if he was ever going to get his wife to leave RiversEdge, and voiced his distress to his sympathetic mother-in-law as the month of August ended and September began.
“Wait until mid-month,” Blaze advised him. “She will feel well enough to travel then, Varian, and it will be less dangerous.”
“Less dangerous?” He looked puzzled. “What has danger to do with our traveling to Winterhaven? There is no danger.”
“Has Nyssa said nothing to you, then?” Blaze was surprised.
“About what?” he asked her.
A strange look came over the Countess of Langford’s face. “Oh, dear,” she said. “I wonder if she even knows herself.”
“Knows what?” the Earl of March demanded.
“Come with me, Varian,” Blaze said, and she hurried off to seek Tillie. She found her daughter’s tiring woman mending the hem of a petticoat in Nyssa’s dressing room. “Tillie,” the Countess of Langford said to her, “when was your mistress’s last link with the moon broken? Think carefully, my girl.”
“ ’Twas June, m’lady. Is something wrong?”
“Did you not think it strange that she has had no flow since then, girl? Why did you not come to me about it when you got home?”
Tillie looked totally astounded. Why on earth would she have even bothered to mention such a thing to Lady Nyssa’s mother? Then suddenly Tillie knew, and clapped her hand over her mouth, her eyes wide with comprehension. “Ohhhhhhh!” she gasped.
“Oh, indeed!” the Countess of Langford replied. “Where is your mistress now, Tillie?”
“You’ll find her lying down, m’lady. She was took with one of them queer spells again,” Tillie answered.
Blaze hurried into her daughter’s bedchamber, followed by her son-in-law. Nyssa lay upon the bed. She was pale, and clutching a cloth scented with lavender to her nose. “How could you live in this house all your life and not know what is the matter with you, my child?” her mother began without any preamble. “You have seven siblings, Nyssa! Did you not even once suspect?” Blaze demanded of her daughter.
“Suspect what, Mama?” Nyssa replied weakly.
“I cannot believe I have raised such a doltish daughter!” Blaze fumed. “You are with child, Nyssa! It is as plain as the nose upon your pretty face. From what Tillie tells me, I would say you are to have a baby sometime in mid to late March. Ohh, I am so excited! I am to be a grandmother at long last!”
Nyssa grew even paler at her mother’s words. Her poor stomach was roiling. Reaching for the chamber pot, she retched into it. Her forehead was riddled with tiny beads of perspiration. “Ohhhh,” she moaned helplessly, setting the pot back upon the floor and putting the cloth back to her nose. “I do not remember you ever being sick like this, Mama, when you had a baby. I thought it was the fish we had at dinner today. I cannot be with child. It is too soon.”
Blaze burst out laughing. “Considering the amount of time you and Varian spend in this bed, I am hardly surprised to find you having a baby, Nyssa. It would have been more extraordinary if you had not become enceinte. The women of this family are known for their fertility. Why, your grandmother produced your twin uncles just three months after you were born.”
“We are to have a child!” Varian had been standing stock-still, astounded by their conversation. Now he managed to voice his happiness. “Ohh, sweeting, how can I thank you?” The Earl of March had tears in his eyes.
“I suppose Mama is correct,” Nyssa allowed.
“Of course I am,” her mother said firmly. “I am never wrong about these things.”
“I had hoped to have my heir born at Winterhaven,” the earl said slowly, “but I realize it will be impossible for Nyssa to travel in her delicate condition. We will have to rely upon your hospitality.”
“Nonsense!” Blaze told
him. “In a week or so Nyssa will have passed through this unpleasant part and will feel much better. There is no reason why she cannot travel in safety to Winterhaven. It is time that you went home, my lord. My daughter will have a great deal to do there, considering how long it has been since anyone has really kept their residence at Winterhaven. There will be servants to train, and the entire house will have to be refurbished. It is, I suspect, quite woefully old-fashioned. Nyssa tells me you have given her carte blanche to do whatever she would with the house.”
“I have never had a baby before,” Nyssa said nervously. “I will be all alone at Winterhaven. Ohh, Mama! Please let me stay!”
“When the time comes, I will come to you, Nyssa,” her mother replied. “Besides, you are much nearer to Ashby at Winterhaven. No one knows more about birthing babies than your grandmother. You will be fine. Now, I must go and prepare Anthony for your happy news.” She bustled from the bedchamber, her smile wide.
“You did this to me deliberately!” Nyssa accused Varian.
“My only thought, I swear, was for our pleasure,” he told her. “Certainly my ignorance of your condition should have told you that I knew no more about it than you.” He chuckled. “How could you not know?” he wondered aloud.
“I suppose I never paid a great deal of attention to Mama when she was breeding,” Nyssa said, somewhat mollified. “We never really knew until suddenly one day her belly would bloom and she would tell us we would soon have another little brother. Philip and I never really cared, for we had each other to love and keep company. Giles was not born until I was almost eight. Puppies, kittens, my pony; these things were of far more interest to me than Mama having a baby, Varian.”
“Aye,” he said, remembering the duchess Elizabeth, his grandfather’s second wife, when she had had her children. He had paid her scant mind, and if someone had asked him if she was breeding, he would have been hard-pressed to say if it was so or not. None of it mattered now. What mattered was that they were to have a baby.
Love, Remember Me Page 26
