The Rose of York: Crown of Destiny

by Worth, Sandra

  Once he’d dealt with them, he’d take care of Edward, the accursed lying bastard who called himself their father’s son.

  About to enter the great hall at Barnard’s Castle, Richard stood unnoticed for a moment, watching Anne rock Ned in her arms as she sat framed by the oriel window that had been his wedding gift to her. Four deaths, all in the span of six short months. Archbishop Neville, George’s newborn babe, and the two Isobels—both dead within two months of one another. He had brought his little family here for the spring, hoping the change would do them good, and later, had taken them to York for the festival of Corpus Christ in June. At his suggestion, he and Anne became members of the Guild to honour Archbishop Neville’s memory. It had been a glorious summer’s day. The city of York had sparkled, for the streets had been hung with arras and the doorways strewn with rushes and flowers. In a dazzle of torches, tapers, crosses, and banners, they had walked in the procession from Holy Trinity Priory to Yorkminster, surrounded by smiling guild members, clerics, and officials of York who bore the gem-studded shrine of silver gilt that contained the sacred elements.

  For a short while it had helped to be among laughter, but they had returned yesterday, and already Anne was listless, the Countess was weeping in her room, and young George Neville, so recently orphaned, was left alone without comfort to mourn his own loss. If only George had not cut Bella off from her mother and Anne… If only George had permitted Bella to visit them, it might have gone easier on them all, Richard thought. The Countess had not seen her daughter since their days of exile in France before the Battle of Barnet, and she’d never met Bella’s two children, one-year-old Edward and three-year-old Margaret. Her grief was wretched. All because of George.

  God, how hateful George had been!

  Richard braced himself and crossed the chamber. Anne was still unaware of him as she cooed to Ned, explaining the lay of the land. Aye, even in the rain, the view was splendid. Mist bathed the treetops and the river glistened like crushed crystals. The sound of gushing water was so comforting he could almost forget what he had to tell Anne. He stood mutely a moment, seeking words for the news he bore.

  Heaving a heavy sigh, he looked down at her. “Dearest, I must go to London on a matter of great urgency.”

  Anne turned abruptly from the window. Her eyes flew to him in alarm and, though her lips parted to speak, no words came.

  Richard bit his lip. They had everything now. Peace. Love. Ned. Yet fear had come to join them, a shadowy, unmistakable presence hovering beneath the surface. He had prayed fervently for an end to the ill tidings, but the new year had arrived on a note of death and gloom, which it seemed would continue. In January, Meg’s husband, Charles, that half-mad duke of Burgundy, was killed besieging another inconsequential town. He left no male heir, only a daughter, Mary, so King Louis declared that Burgundy had reverted to the crown of France. Meg appealed to Edward for help, and Edward vacillated. Though England’s trade was at risk, he had no desire to lose the fifty-thousand crowns Louis paid him yearly. And his Queen, ambitious Bess Woodville, desperate that Edward not jeopardise the marriage which would one day make her mother of the Queen of France, also agitated against Burgundy.

  Richard had journeyed to court briefly in February to attend Edward’s council meeting and argue in support of Burgundy. There he found aligned against him faces he had hoped not to see again for a very long time: the murderer, St. Leger, now brother-by marriage to him; that devious man of the cloth, Bishop Morton, whom he had always despised; the Queen’s brother, Anthony Woodville; her son Dorset; Edward’s debauched companion Hastings—and cold, hard Henry Percy, a former Lancastrian for whom Edward had inexplicably sacrificed their faithful cousin, John Neville. These here had urged Edward not to move against France, but to wait and see what developed. His muscles tensed beneath his topaz doublet. Of course they had. Like Edward, they didn’t want to lose their pensions from Louis. Unfortunately, what developed was not much to Edward’s liking.

  In view of Edward’s reluctance to support Burgundy, Meg offered another proposal: that George, a widower since Bella’s death, wed her stepdaughter, Mary. The marriage would keep Burgundy in the English orbit, Meg said, and George could at last wear a fine coronet if not a crown. Edward rejected Meg’s proposal and refused George permission to ask for Mary’s hand. His reasoning was clear: George was trouble enough at home under his watchful eye. He had no desire to put into his hands power that would surely be used against him.

  As far as Anne was aware, that was where the matter ended. But there was more. Richard had kept it from her.

  Ned had fallen asleep in Anne’s arms clutching the velvet blanket she had embroidered for him. He was a sweet babe, good-natured, with a sunny disposition. He loved to laugh and romp, and showed a lively curiosity about his world. In all ways save one, he was everything they could wish for. If only he enjoyed better health! Richard bent down and adjusted his coverlet. He was always battling some rash, or illness, or chill, and twice this winter he had burned with a raging fever that lasted a full month, causing them much worry. He’d be glad when Ned was grown and the troubles of childhood were behind him.

  Richard watched Anne disengage Ned’s little fingers from around the gold cross that hung at her neck and hold him out to his nurse. He rested his hand on Anne’s shoulder and their eyes followed Mistress Idley and her charge until she disappeared from sight into the stairwell of the Keep.

  Anne patted the silk cushion. “Come and sit, Richard.” He settled beside her on the window seat. “Now tell me why you must go to London.”

  “’Tis to do with George.”

  “Let me guess. He’s asked Mary of Burgundy for her hand despite Edward’s refusal to allow him to do so?”

  “Nay, it would have done him no good if he had. As it turns out, Mary herself was against the match and wouldn’t have accepted George. She said that what she needs is a great prince who can defend her dominion against Louis, not an English duke who will bring her nothing but trouble.”

  “George must be furious.”

  “Aye, he’s convinced Mary would have married him had Edward granted permission to bring his suit. And Edward…” Richard hesitated, drew a deep breath, “…spitefully crowned George’s injury with an insult. He gave the Queen’s brother, Anthony Woodville, permission to ask for Mary’s hand.”

  “Mary is the richest heiress in Europe; the Woodvilles are low-born! Has Edward gone mad?” The moment the words fell from her lips, Anne wished she could recall them. This was no time to start a bitter argument. She braced herself for Richard’s response, but it was not what she expected.

  “Edward’s not altogether in his right mind. Bess Woodville has cast him under her evil spell.” He fell silent and a faraway look came in his eyes as he gazed at the river.

  So he is beginning to see the faults in Edward, Anne thought. Yet the old loyalty demanded the blame be placed elsewhere.

  Lost in thought, Richard stared at the river, seeing Warwick’s face in the rippling currents, hearing his voice in its roaring. So much of what Warwick had foretold had come to pass. Charles of Burgundy had proven as mad and useless an ally as Warwick had predicted, and had practically served up Burgundy to Louis on a silver trencher, just as Warwick had warned. If Meg had married into France, how much better would it have been for her—and for England…

  Warwick had been far too accurate about another marriage as well. The Woodvilles had proven the plague he’d feared. He recalled the prophecy Warwick had made to Edward: that his Queen was a woman so reviled throughout the land, no son of her blood would ever be permitted to mount the throne of England. A dread prophecy, for kings were not ousted without war. If only Edward hadn’t married that woman!

  But, unable to help himself, Edward had wed Bess Woodville in a secret marriage after a chance meeting in the woods where she had lain in wait for him during a hunt. Months later, he’d made the marriage public and unleashed her on the land. She was the cause of his ruptur
e with his Neville cousins, and the cause of civil war. The image of the council chamber at Reading Abbey where Edward had announced his secret marriage flared in his mind. Once again he saw John’s ashen face, saw Warwick pounding his fist on the table.

  And so began the rift that led to civil war. Richard shook the memories away.

  “My dearest, there’s more… Two months ago, in April, George sent his men to abduct Bella’s midwife, a woman by the name of Ankarette Twynyho, from her home in Somerset. They brought her to Warwick Castle where George charged her with poisoning Bella.”

  “Tell me she didn’t do it, that it’s not so!”

  “Nay, my little bird, it’s all in George’s sick and clouded mind. Ankarette Twynyho had been sent to Bella by the Queen. No doubt she was a talebearer, but the woman would never stoop to the foul murder of a duchess. She protested her innocence to the end and George had to force the justices to condemn her. She was dragged off to the gallows, along with a doctor whom George claimed had poisoned his babe.”

  “Why would George do such a brutal thing?”

  “By taking the King’s justice into his own hands, he wants to show the land that he is rightful King… He once put out the story that Edward was the bastard son of an archer…” Richard rose abruptly from the window seat, the old doubts about his own paternity assailing him once again. As far back as he could remember, he’d been tormented by the thought that he was no true Plantagenet. The evidence had seemed overwhelming to him as a child: in a family of blonds, he was dark; where they were self-confident, he struggled to find his place in the world. His brothers were tall, powerfully-built natural warriors, while he had been born puny and of average height. Only by study and force of will had he overcome his handicaps. Even now as a grown man the dragon of his childhood nightmares appeared at times of strain to cry out that he was a bastard.

  He had always doubted himself, but only George could doubt Edward.

  “A shameful tale for it impugns our mother’s honour. Now he’s sent his servants through the land to proclaim that Edward practises the Black Arts and has ordered his followers to be ready in armour within an hour’s warning. It seems he’ll stop at nothing to gain the throne.”

  “God help us!”

  “Anne, there is more…I would keep all this from you if I could, my dear one, but I may be gone a long while and the tales that come to your ears may be more fearsome than the truth.”

  Anne jerked back her head and looked at him wide-eyed.

  “There has been a prophecy…” Richard hesitated. “…that the King will be succeeded by one whose name begins with the letter G.”

  George. Anne held her breath.

  “The prophecy has unsettled Edward. One of George’s servants was executed three days ago for trying to procure the King’s death by sorcery.”

  “He was innocent, too,” Anne whispered. “The Woodvilles.”

  “Aye, the Woodvilles drove Edward to it… They’ve been plotting George’s downfall for a long time, and with George’s own help they’re succeeding.”

  She closed her eyes on a breath. Why wouldn’t the past stay buried? Like an ugly tune that ended and returned to the beginning to start over, the past kept repeating itself. “You had a messenger today,” she said, her voice a bare whisper. Last year they had returned from the joyful Corpus Christi celebrations in York to a waiting messenger and the news that her uncle was dying. Yesterday they had attended those same ceremonies. In the outpouring of love and merriment around her, she’d managed to forget her sorrows for a few hours, but from the moment she’d espied the Sun in Splendour emblem of the royal messenger, she had felt unsettled. She’d persuaded herself that it was only fatigue. After all, they had celebrated for two full days and walked through the streets for hours. Now she had to face the truth. That emblem had always meant trouble. For her father, and for Richard.

  Richard nodded grimly. “That’s when I realised I could no longer keep all this from you. The messenger bore evil tidings, Anne.” His jaw clenched. When he spoke again, his voice was thick, unsteady. “George has been charged with treason and taken to the Tower.”

  ~*^*~

  Chapter 7

  “O brother… woe is me!”

  Richard’s pleas to Edward to pardon George were singularly unsuccessful. Though his mother journeyed from her castle at Berkhampsted to add her voice to his, Edward remained curiously impervious to their entreaties. Richard was unable to comprehend his intransigence. Edward yielded neither to logic nor brotherly love, not even to their mother’s anger and condemnation. As he strode with Edward through the cloisters of Westminster Abbey on an overcast September morning before he departed for Middleham, Richard pressed his brother one last time. An unseasonably cold wind blew their cloaks about their legs and the silent arches threw long dark shadows across the stone walk. Richard shivered from the cold, but as much from the unease that held him in its grip.

  “You’ve always pardoned George’s treasons; what is different this time?”

  “The prophecy,” said Edward. “That ‘G’ will rule after me. It will not happen, by God!”

  “Once there was another prophecy. It said your sons would never rule and your daughter Elizabeth would be Queen in their stead. Have you forgotten? That also troubled you. They cannot both be true.”

  “Nevertheless, I am decided.”

  “God’s curse, Edward!” Richard blurted, halting in his steps. “What has come over you? Have you gone mad? We’re talking about our brother.”

  “A brother who’s spent his life wronging us. Why do you persist in your pleas? Of us both, you have more cause to hate him than even I.”

  “Whatever his sins, he’s our brother. You can’t live with his blood on your hands. I beseech you, for the love you bear me, forgive him.” He looked up desperately into Edward’s resistant face. A muscle quivered at Edward’s jaw and his mouth was clamped so tightly shut, it resembled a blade. The strain of the past months had taken a harsh toll. Richard thought of a lyre and a string pulled so taut that it would surely break. He drew a sharp inward breath. “Something is different this time… ’Tis not the prophecy that impels you, is it?”

  Silence.

  A gust of wind shrieked along the cloister, tore at their mantles, and was gone. All was still again except for the cawing of ravens. Richard stood transfixed, unable to drag his gaze from Edward’s face. It was as if Edward were aging before his eyes, as if the mask that hid the true set of his features was now melting away. He was shrinking, his face growing more pinched and haggard as, line by line, pain etched itself deeper into the creases around his eyes, the grooves around his mouth.

  “It must be done!” Edward cried out suddenly, his voice quivering in a way that Richard had never heard before. He pressed his hand to his brow, and dropped it, exposing eyes filled with agony. “I have no choice.”

  A sudden, terrible realisation struck Richard. He stared at Edward in speechless horror, his mind reeling. It is not the prophecy that compels Edward. It is Bess Woodville. This foul deed had her seal on it. She had found a way to force Edward to kill his own brother! He clenched his fists against the revulsion that flooded his body.

  Richard returned to Middleham in a despondent mood. The respite proved brief. Soon he and Anne had to return to Westminster to attend the Christmas festivities, which were to be crowned by a royal wedding. Finding himself strangely in need of a connection with his dead cousin, John, he borrowed Thomas Gower away from young George Neville for the journey. John’s faithful squire was now squire to John’s son, and not only had he rendered long and faithful service to the Nevilles, but he was a solid man, inherently dependable and, at forty-six, the same age John would have been, had he lived. With his carved features, kindly eyes, and reserved temperament, Richard found in him a comforting sense of John’s own presence.

  Spirits were high at the Woodville court. Gaiety was everywhere. With Edward, though, Richard knew it was forced, because he’d glimpse
d his soul that day in the cloisters and knew that what Edward did, he did in spite of himself—not that the knowledge made it easier to bear. With a gloom and foreboding unmatched since the days of civil war, Richard ushered in the New Year of 1478 at Windsor, his hand clasped tightly in Anne’s.

  Anne shared Richard’s mood. Not only did court bring back wrenching memories, but the Queen and her ilk kept looking at her and whispering. She had overheard one of Bess’s sister’s remark: “How has she survived such storms when she looks as if the next breeze will carry her off?”

  “Do not fool yourself,” Bess Woodville had replied. “The tiny red finch, barely a spark of life and weighing scarcely more than a feather, is not swept away by the merciless winds of winter.”

  Then they had laughed.

  No, there was nothing redeeming about court, not a moment she enjoyed. Her head throbbed most of the time and sleep was fitful. It didn’t help that she worried about Richard, whose misery struck at her heart. A heavy burden of guilt weighed on his spirits for participating in a celebration that gave the Woodvilles cause to rejoice when his own brother lay confined to the dark of the Tower.

  Early on the morning of the wedding day, Richard escaped the Woodvilles and slipped out to St. Stephen’s Chapel. The January morning was bitter cold and a rare drift of snow swept the cloisters. In the side chapel of Our Lady of the Pew, he stood alone, admiring the lofty, narrow nave, the great columns gilded by thousands of leaves of gold and silver foil. Sunlight played on the cold, brilliantly coloured glass, sending darts of cobalt blues, violets, oranges, and yellows through the gloom. The peace which had eluded him since his arrival at court found him now. He knelt and murmured a prayer for George.