Princess of Thorns

by Saga Hillbom

  ‘Then he does not love in earnest. I think that is what Anne would say, and she knows these things best even at her age.’ I wish my little sister were with us now to chime in with me.

  ‘Everyone loves differently, yet that is of little importance in this instance. I am leaving and you shall learn to live with it, just like I have, bless you.’

  I accept her hasty blessing with an expanding cavity in my chest. I have not always agreed with her, and I have felt more animosity towards her than befits a dutiful daughter, but her presence has provided me with security. Regardless of whom she loves best in the moment of truth, she has protected each of her children with teeth and claws. Without that protection, I am left to my own, admittedly dubious, devices. Moreover, I do not know how my sisters and I will be able to keep the peace between us for long once she is gone, because we will have lost the unifying force that has so often cut our petty arguments short. And Margaret Beaufort… Does she not prance around enough as it is? Tudor, also. It appears to me they have rid themselves of yet another reminder of an older, rightful regime, another imagined threat. Perhaps they have forgotten it was Mother, unfortunately, who made Tudor’s ascend to the throne possible by granting him Elizabeth’s hand and with it a chunk of Yorkist support.

  That particular thought obscures my surge of affection the slightest, but I nevertheless have to make an effort to remain composed and dry-eyed as I watch her carriage roll away the following day. I must visit often, as often as the Pretend-King and his mother will allow.

  Mere days after Mother’s departure, Tudor hosts a joust. He will not compete himself—it is a risk he refuses to take, especially while his only heir is barely six months old—but many nobles mount their horses most eagerly.

  We ladies take our place on the spectators’ bleachers among the men who are too old or too young to participate, wrapping our thick cloaks tighter around our shoulders to ward off the biting cold. The Pretend-King sits on his dais in the midst of us, presiding over the competition like a hawk.

  Meanwhile, the contestants mass in the roped-off tiltyard, preparing for their turn, prancing in their colourful coats of arms. A handful sport ribbons or handkerchiefs tied to their lances: tokens from wives or sweethearts.

  The horses’ speed and force send cold rats’ feet of fear skittering down my spine. The highest standing magnates use destriers, the most prized kind of warhorse, while the regular nobles and knights have to contend with coursers and even all-purpose rounceys. I used to think of every creature simply as a horse of varying fineness, but Thomas has refreshed my knowledge of the proper terms. The animals’ muscles rise and fall under their glossy hair as they scrape their hooves in the tiltyard, stirring up clouds of dust, their nostrils flaring and their eyes like pearls of black glass. One single kick from those hooves could smash my skull to mush. The wooden tilt-barrier is to keep them from crashing into each other, however, it looks feeble from where I am sitting.

  I always find the joust itself thrilling, though, for it is a remnant of a time when troubadours and knights competed for the fair maiden, and it is an excellent way to exhibit what is left of chivalry in our age. I suspect the men who fight love it more for the violence it allows them to participate in without judicial consequences, but no matter. It is violent, yet also an art of perfecting technique. My family have mastered the joust since before I was born; Father and a number of my uncles, both Woodvilles and Yorkists, were reckless enough to enjoy it. I have heard many stories during my childhood about a particular joust where my uncle Earl Rivers excelled. It was part of a tournament to cement an alliance between England and Burgundy, furthering marriage negotiations between Aunt Margaret and the Burgundian duke. Rivers made the nasty mistake of killing the Burgundian representative’s horse, whether it was an accident or not, but the marriage did come to pass in the end.

  Anne, who is sitting on my left, takes my hand. Her eyes are glittering in the crisp sunlight. ‘It is so very similar to the romances, isn’t it, Cecily?’

  ‘Are you looking for your own knight again?’

  ‘You make me sound so silly.’ She lowers her eyes.

  I squeeze her hand, a smile playing on my lips. ‘I did not mean to. But I happen to know something you do not.’

  ‘What?’ She frowns. ‘You just mock me.’

  ‘No! Well, perhaps a little. I suppose you know Bessie Tilney? The tall woman who is always forgetting her rosary in the most peculiar places, the lady who was with us at Winchester?’

  ‘The Countess of Surrey?’

  ‘Yes, her. I have heard it said that she intends to petition Tudor—His Grace, I mean—for your hand in marriage on behalf of her eldest son.’ I revel in my little sister’s wide-eyed gaze. How I love to be the deliverer of gossip and secrets, as long as they are not harmful.

  ‘But our betrothal was broken…?’

  ‘It faded into nothingness, that was all, when Uncle Richard was no longer alive to protect our interests.’

  ‘Then I hope His Grace concedes. I like the Earl of Surrey’s son, yes, I like him very much.’ A peach blush tints her cheeks.

  I laugh. ‘You’ve never met him. But you are fortunate, for both the earl and his father the Duke of Norfolk were loyal to York till the end.’

  Margaret Beaufort, sitting on my right in a pompous black gown, interrupts us. ‘Do not fill your sister’s head with nonsense, girl. You listen to too much gossip. The Howards are still in disgrace, and my son the King’s Grace shall not bestow this match on them.’

  I roll my eyes at Anne and she hides a giggle behind her hand. Beaufort cannot possibly control everything in our lives.

  Thomas Stanley jousts against his younger brother William, flustered like the hellish brood they are; Northumberland defeats a myriad of lesser knights; Dorset topples three opponents from their horses. Several of the contestants are on the verge of old age, yet their physical prowess is undeniable.

  A man called Viscount Welles, Margaret Beaufort’s younger half-brother, competes against Jasper Tudor and is marvellously victorious. I know very little of the man other than that he is an unyielding Lancastrian who rose in rebellion along with Buckingham and then fled to join his nephew’s provisory court in exile. Now, he is without doubt a royal favourite and handsomely rewarded.

  Beaufort nods toward the viscount just as he dismounts. ‘His father was killed at Towton, and our brother and nephew both beheaded in the year of our Lord 1470.’ Her voice is bitter as almonds.

  I crane my neck for a better view. When the viscount removes his helmet, I spot a weathered man, perhaps approaching forty, with wisps of light reddish hair fluttering around a square, dimpled chin.

  Beaufort continues. ‘You ought to know this already, for said brother and nephew rebelled against your father.’

  A wave of cold washes through me. ‘Then their deaths were justified. They defied their rightful king.’

  ‘They defied a usurper.’

  ‘I refuse to listen to your slander, Madam.’

  We exchange a glare. What I cannot bring myself to say is that I do feel sorry for his father, Lancastrian or not. The twenty-six-year-old ghost that is the Battle of Towton is deeply carved in our collective memory. The wound has not yet healed even in those who were not born at the time, and once it does heal, there will be the tissue of an imperfect scar. Twenty thousand dead, or so I have heard it said. The bloodiest battle ever fought on English soil. My own father was scarcely older than I am now, king though not yet formally crowned. He hacked his way through the Lancastrian ranks, fierce as he was in his youth, winning a decisive victory for York. After that fateful day there could be no doubt as to who the new monarch was—but the incomprehensible slaughter still overshadows the triumph to this day.

  ‘He is in need of a wife,’ Beaufort says, interrupting my lament.

  A few seconds pass before I catch the insinuation in her words. ‘No. I shan’t wed a man who is among the foremost of my
enemies.’

  ‘We will see, girl.’

  ‘You need my consent, and I will not give it.’

  ‘I said we will see.’

  Eventually, Welles wins the joust, and Tudor grants him another piece of land for prize. It cannot be a significant grant compared to what the viscount already holds, but it is a significant gesture, since Tudor so rarely loosens his grip on crown property, preferring to keep it under his own watchful control rather than deal it out like his predecessors did.

  I sneak away to find Thomas, who is brushing Northumberland’s sweat-soaked destrier, humming to himself, his strokes with the brush long and firm.

  ‘What are you doing?’ I ask.

  ‘What does it look like? I volunteered to care for the lord’s horse.’ He strokes the white stripe on the animal’s mule.

  ‘Volunteered? But you are an esquire. The tasks of a groom are far below you.’

  Thomas shrugs. ‘You know I love the creatures. Just look how beautiful this one is.’

  ‘They are terrifying.’

  ‘I beg to differ.’

  A painful silence settles, a silence filled with smiles withdrawn before the other has a chance to respond, a silence which has become habit. It has been like this ever since that day by the fountain and it tortures me, because it is not as easy as I hoped to be friends and nothing more, nothing less. At least, that is what I try to convince myself we must be, though my heart yearns for that ‘more’.

  After a while passed in this manner, I leave him with his precious horse and join the other ladies.

  Court is ablaze with whispers, saturated with hearsay. Henry Tudor’s first real challenge in the shape of a Yorkist claimant has materialised: a young boy who states he is Edward, Earl of Warwick, eldest living nephew to Edward IV and Richard III descending from a male line. We all know him to be a pretender, since the real Warwick is clapped in the Tower, but the rest of England cannot be quite so certain.

  The boy would not be cause for concern if he was alone, but as the courtiers soon gather, a band of influential nobles back his claim. Foremost among them is the Earl of Lincoln.

  I have been writing to my cousin occasionally since he left court again in autumn last year, and received short messages back every so often. Francis Lovell is with him. They intend to have the imposter—whose actual name is Lambert Simnel—crowned Edward VI with the support of the Irish lords and Aunt Margaret of Burgundy, then march to face Tudor in battle. The more I hear, the gladder I am to not be on their side other than in his thoughts, because this is indeed madness. Lincoln asks me to send details on how many men his opponent might be able to muster and whether there is any support for “Edward VI” in London. I believe he overestimates my closeness to Tudor.

  I deliver the details he requests, but they are all false, a product of my imagination. Let him try and arrange a usurpation based on made-up information. I thought to reveal my position to my sister and her husband long since, so that I might expose Lincoln’s strategy in turn, however, I am caught in the thrill of having a perilous secret, of being the sole privy to a grand plot. This combined with my lingering reluctance to approach Tudor with friendly words causes me to delay much too long. At the point when rumour of the rebellion spreads at court, I have still failed to utter a word of my involvement, and this proves to be a fatal mistake.

  I am sat in my bedchamber writing one of my messages to Lincoln, the letter he sent me spread out before me for reference, when Elizabeth gives me a start. I was too absorbed in trying to correct a spelling mistake to hear her enter, and before I know it, her slender fingers rest on my shoulder.

  I shuffle to hide my papers, placing one of the books lying on the desk over the note from Lincoln—too late.

  ‘What is this, Cecily?’ She pulls out the letter from underneath the book.

  I attempt to snatch it from her but she is too tall. ‘Nothing. Give it to me!’

  ‘What have you done this time?’ My sister’s glance wanders over the paper, slowly, while I watch in agony. ‘Oh, what have you done?’

  ‘I was going to tell you, I swear I was! I had no intention to conspire with him, not truly.’

  ‘Yet conspired with him you have.’

  I shake my head, panic sizzling in my stomach. ‘No. Only…only at first. I wanted a king of our blood on the throne.’

  ‘Was a queen not enough?’

  ‘Queens have so little influence—or rather you do. But then he told me of the imposter and his choice of Warwick and…and I never wanted to support him from that moment! I never wanted you and the little prince to suffer so we could have that kind of king. A simple-minded boy-king, the son of a traitor, brought to power in this way—’

  ‘Would you have let us suffer if his plan had been another? If your own gain had been greater?’ Elizabeth’s voice is low, causing my own to sound frantic. It is the dreaded voice of a parent telling a child they are not angry, merely disappointed.

  I clutch the fabric of my gown, clenching my fists. ‘I cannot say.’

  ‘How weak your love for me is, how fickle your loyalty.’

  ‘I chose you in the end, did I not? Were it not for my love for you and your son, I’d picked Warwick and Lincoln, even if it was unlikely to succeed, even if I stood little to gain.’

  ‘But you didn’t choose me. This letter proves it.’ She holds it up high in the air once more, as if to proclaim my supposed betrayal to the whole world.

  ‘It proves the opposite. I was going to show Tudor and thus give him all the information he needs to win. You have to believe me,’ I plead, disgusted at the note of desperation.

  Elizabeth raises her chin. Strokes of sunlight filter through the stained windows and illuminates the soft contours of her face. ‘I do not have to do anything. I am your queen and you would do well to remember it.’ She picks her battles, and she has picked this one, against me rather than all the struggles against her husband and mother-in-law.

  ‘Well, all the details I have told our cousin are false tracks.’ I hand her the letter I was halfway through writing and point at one of the paragraphs. ‘See? Why would I write him this if I wished him to succeed?’

  Elizabeth is silent a moment before announcing her decision. ‘I have to take you to His Grace so that he can pass judgement on all this.’

  What follows are three days of raw fear. The Pretend-King is as suspicious as ever, and his general opinion of my character does little to alleviate said suspicion. It would cause unrest at court if someone as close to the royal bosom as me was seen to be alienated before he is certain of my crimes, hence he interrogates me in person with only Elizabeth as a quiet witness. He reads through every letter I have received from Lincoln these past months, his expression set in stone, before moving on to the one I was writing myself. He asks a thousand questions regarding my intentions and whether I know anything more than what the letters spell out, and by the end of the third day, I could weep from exhaustion. He does not raise his voice a single time, which serves to frighten rather than reassure me.

  Elizabeth sits by his side, eyeing me, face pinched. A tiny spark of hope ignites in me, because I think I spot a flicker of pity in her face. I used to loathe her pity—I still do—but if it can soften her again and make her come to my rescue…

  Margaret Beaufort is summoned on the third day. After listening to a lengthy recounting of Elizabeth’s discovery, she grabs my face like she did the time I found Queen Anne’s silver casket, and turns my head from side to side as if searching for a sign of truth or lie. I hate her even more than Stanley in that moment, though my hatred quickly shifts to relief when she releases me and speaks.

  ‘Let the girl swear on the Holy Scripture. You know, do you not, what happens if you take a false oath or break a true one?’

  I nod several times. ‘I do, Madam.’

  Beaufort turns to her son. ‘Then she will either tell the truth or be punished in hell for all eternity. Let
it rest at that.’

  ‘Are you certain, Lady Mother?’

  ‘Please, Your Grace,’ Elizabeth says. ‘I believe my sister has committed a blunder, that is all.’

  Beaufort orders a servant boy to fetch her personal Bible, which the Pope himself once gave her, and I take the required oath. The shadow of a doubt creeps upon me. Would I really have burnt in hell if I had lied? It does not matter, because my three temporary foes believe it, and they at last believe me as well.

  With the crisis averted, Tudor can turn his attention to his greater dilemma.

  Chapter XIX

  I BEGIN TO dread being alone with Thomas, dread it because I know not what I might do or say, dread it because I adore those moments. I dare not kiss him. I always wished I was more courageous, like Queen Anne, both in matters of the heart and in the face of danger. However, my wish has not been granted, and although I can say or do any rash thing when I do not think first, I am now thinking too much to even move my little finger. I feel infinitely small where I sit on the table in our room of charts, my feet not reaching the floor.

  ‘I should go,’ I say.

  Thomas keeps his gaze on his drawing. ‘Must you?’

  ‘I think I must. My sisters will be expecting me.’ I slip off the table and out of the room, stumbling over my own feet. The moment the door closes behind me, I breathe a sigh of alleviation. How much longer can this go on? Forever, I hope, but I do not think it is possible to maintain a brimming infatuation while keeping it from ever erupting into a full-blown liaison. I want nothing more than to let it, yet the risk is too great.

  An urge to lift the weight off my chest washes over me. There is no one I could tell, though, no one except… I am not certain what council I can expect from a man of the cloth other than a scolding and an instruction on how I may repent for my shortcomings in chastity, but priests are bound to silence, and I doubt the cleric will care about my little follies anyways—and it was too long since I last took confession.