“I want a flock of sheep,” she said. “I shall put aside the gold from the sale of their wool and invest it. By the time Sabrina is ready to wed one day, I shall have a fine dowry for her.”
“The lambs born this spring are yours,” he said. It was a highly practical idea, Varian thought. There would be other children, and some of them were bound to be daughters. Daughters needed fine dowries to obtain fine husbands. One day the king would die, and being related to a Howard queen would mean nothing then. Gold was the only thing that lasted. That never changed.
The babies were returned to their mother, and looking down at them, Nyssa felt a tremendous rush of love for her children. She was astounded to have two of them, amazed that they were finally a reality that she could touch, and caress. She looked at her mother. “How can you give both equal attention, Mama? I adore them both already.”
“You cannot,” came the wise reply, “but if you kiss one, be certain to kiss the other so neither will feel slighted. You will need a wet nurse now, my child. Twins are hard that way.”
“Not yet!” Nyssa cried. “I have just had them. I want them to myself, Mama.” She looked at her husband and smiled.
“A wet nurse will share the burden with you, Nyssa,” her mother answered. “These grandchildren of mine will need all the food they can get. Look how quickly Jane and Annie grew in the last year. I have had a wet nurse to share my load. I favor neither of your sisters. When they cry for food, I pick one up, and Clara picks the other one up to nurse. Sometimes I have Jane, and sometimes Annie. It matters not to your sisters as long as their little bellies are filled.”
“Listen to your mother, sweeting,” Varian told her. “She has experience in these matters.” He took his son from Heartha and smiled down at him before handing him to Nyssa. Then Varian removed his daughter from Tillie’s arms. “They are perfect, and I thank you, madame, for giving me such fine children. They shall be baptized in the morning. Let Anthony stand godfather for Edmund and Sabrina both.”
“Let us wait a few days, my lord, so that the rest of my family might be summoned. Anthony may stand godfather for Edmund, but I would have my brother Philip be Sabrina’s godfather.”
“And the godmothers?” he queried her.
“Aunts Bliss and Blythe, with your permission, my lord.”
He agreed. “And the king must be notified, of course.”
She nodded. “Aye. The sooner the better, and then perhaps Cat will realize that we cannot come back to court to play with her.”
Several days later the king, at Whitehall, received a messenger from the Earl and the Countess of March. The messenger bowed low, and given permission to speak, said, “On the first day of March, in the year of our lord fifteen hundred and forty-one, Lady Nyssa Catherine de Winter gave birth to twin children, a son and a daughter, Your Grace. The heir to Winterhaven was baptized Edmund Anthony de Winter, and his sister will be called Sabrina Mary de Winter. Both the infants, and their mother, are well. The earl and his wife tender you their loyalty. God save good King Henry, and Queen Catherine!” He bowed again, and was dismissed.
“Twins,” Henry Tudor said, his eyes narrowing to slits. “I would be content with one child.” He looked at his pretty wife. “We must try harder, Catherine, my rose. Your cousin and his wife are already two up on us. It will not do, my pet.”
“Can we see them this summer on our Midlands progress?” the queen said, ignoring him. “Will you order them to join us? She will have to have a wet nurse with two children, and so surely she can come to court for a short time, my dear lord. It would make me sooo happy to see Nyssa again. Perhaps I shall even be enceinte by then, and Nyssa could tell me all that I needed to know about babies.” She smiled sweetly at him.
“Very well,” he said, unable to resist her, and he pulled her down into his lap for a cuddle. “Would it truly make you happy, Catherine? You know I would do anything to make you happy.”
“Aye, my darling, it would make me very happy,” she told him, and kissed his mouth, her little tongue snaking unexpectedly over his lips. “Do you like that, my liege?” She pressed herself against him.
He fumbled with her bodice, pulling it open, handling her breasts with great familiarity. Then one of his hands slipped beneath her skirt and slid up her leg, past her thigh, and a single finger found its target. “Do you like this?” he growled at her, his finger working faster and faster against her little jewel.
The queen twisted her body about, unfastening her husband’s codpiece loosed about his manhood, which was already well-aroused. Then seating herself upon his lap, facing him, she took him into her sheath. “Does that please you, my lord?” she murmured against his ear, biting down hard on it. Then she began to ride him.
He slipped his hand beneath her bottom, crushing the flesh of her buttocks with his fingers. “I am going to mark you,” he said.
“Yes!” she half sobbed. “Yes! Mark me! Make me your own, Henry Tudor.” She moved faster and faster upon him, until finally they both exploded with their mutual pleasure. “Ahhhhhh,” she groaned as his love juices filled her. “Ahhh, Henry!”
Perhaps they had made a child, the king thought, praying it was so. He wanted a child with this exquisite girl-wife whom he loved so very, very much. How had he gained such good fortune in his old age?
“You will not forget your promise to me, my lord?” she said sweetly. “You will order the Earl and Countess of March to join us on our progress this summer?” She kissed his ear and then licked it.
“I will not forget, Catherine,” he told her. Ahh, the little russet-haired vixen was making him feel like a boy again! He found her mouth and became lost in their kisses.
Part III
THE QUEEN’S
PAWN
COURT
SUMMER 1541–WINTER 1542
Chapter 11
The king was ill. A difficult man when healthy, he was absolutely impossible when he was unwell. His ulcerated leg, which for the past few months had been fine, was suddenly painful again. The wound, always kept open for purposes of drainage, had suddenly closed. The leg grew inflamed and swollen. Henry Tudor ran a fever, and refused to follow his doctors’ instructions once they had reopened the ulcer again.
“You need much liquid, Your Grace, to help us wash the fever away,” Dr. Butts told the king sternly. As the king’s senior physician he knew better than anyone how to handle his patient.
“Am I not drinking wine and ale aplenty?” growled the king.
“I have told you, Your Grace, that you must not drink ale, and your wine must be well watered,” the doctor replied. “What we want you to ingest in great quantity is this herbal decoction that we have mixed with sweet Devon cider. It will ease the pain and chase the fever.”
The king wrinkled his nose. “It tastes like piss,” he said stubbornly.
Dr. Butts mightily struggled to control his temper. The king was without a doubt the worst patient any physician could have. “I would humbly suggest, Your Grace,” he responded sharply, “that you overcome your childish aversion to your medication. The longer you are ill, the weaker you will become. It will be harder for you to regain your former strength. I am certain the queen would be very unhappy if your strength did not come back tenfold. You cannot fulfill your obligations to England if you do not get well.”
Dr. Butts’s meaning was crystal clear to the king. He glowered at the man, annoyed that he was so right in this matter. “I will meditate upon your advice,” he said sullenly. How he hated being told what to do, but he had to admit that he felt like merry hell right now. He had even sent Catherine away from him. He could not allow her to see him in this sorry state. He looked so old. Every afternoon at six he would send Master Henage to his queen with loving messages and news, but he hardly wanted his beautiful young wife to see him in this disgusting condition. One good thing was coming of it, though. He could hardly eat a thing, and was rapidly losing weight.
He had been measured for a suit of
armor just before his marriage last summer. He had been shocked by the measurements that had been called out. “Waist, fifty-four inches.” That could not be right! He had made the fool armorer’s apprentice measure his waist again, only to hear, “Waist, fifty-four inches,” repeated. “Chest, fifty-seven inches.” It was embarrassing.
After his marriage he had embarked upon a strenuous program of physical exercise. To his delight he had begun to see his muscles beginning to emerge from the fat in which they had been encased. He was watching what he ate, and now this sickness was aiding his endeavors. He did not, however, want to lose his sexual potency with the queen. He began to drink the doctor’s disgusting potion, and to his further aggravation, he felt better almost at once.
Still, his temperament was terrible. He began to grow suspicious of the courtiers about him. They were all using him for their own gains, and his people were an ungrateful lot as well. He’d raise taxes. That would teach them! Henry Tudor thought about Thomas Cromwell. Dear, devoted old Crum. “He was the most faithful servant that we ever had,” the king was heard to mutter darkly on more than one occasion. “Why is he not here for me now? I will tell you why,” he shouted, and his gentlemen shifted their feet nervously. “Because my loyal and steadfast old Crum was convicted by false accusations, and on light pretexts!”
Once again the king was blaming everyone else for his actions. He wallowed in dark self-pity, and no one could oppose him in any matter whatsoever. It had been almost ten days since he had seen his wife, and he was not yet ready to be with her.
The queen was lonely. She sat amongst her ladies embroidering her motto, beneath a crowned rose, onto a square of brocade, which when finished would be set into a silver frame and presented to the king. Catherine had taken for her motto: Non autre volonté que la sienne, which when translated into English read: “No other wish but his.” It was dull, tedious work, and she was bored with it. She gazed about her at her ladies: Lady Margaret Douglas, the Duchess of Richmond, the Countess of Rutland, Ladies Rochford, Edgecomb, and Baynton. Same old faces. When she had been married, her uncle, the duke, had told her the women he wanted her to include in her household. They were pleasant enough ladies, but they were the same old faces. She had had to tell Henry that she wanted her father’s widow, her dull stepmother, Lady Margaret Howard; Lady Clinton, Lady Arundel, her sister, whom she did not really get on with; Prince Edward’s aunt, Lady Cromwell, who was the late Queen Jane’s sister, Elizabeth, and married to Thomas Cromwell’s son; and Mistress Stonor, who had been with her cousin Anne in the Tower. She is a cheerful companion, Catherine thought ironically, grimacing. There were others, of course, but few were young, and none were fun.
When she complained, her uncle had told her sternly, “You must remember that you are now the Queen of England, Catherine. You are a woman of property and position. Such women do not cry and whine for fun like unimportant little girls.”
God’s foot! She was bored. What good was it to be a queen when you could not have fun? She could almost wish she were not the queen; that the lady Anne was still the queen, and she just a maid of honor who could flirt with the gentlemen and have fun. Now it was the lady Anne, the king’s dear sister, who was having all the fun. Gone was the slightly dowdy lady of Cleves. In her place was an absolutely fashionable woman who danced gaily into the night, bought whatever took her fancy, and was beholden to no man. It was not fair!
Still, the lady Anne must be lonely without a man. Catherine could not imagine life without a man. In that respect she found the lady Anne odd. Not that the gentlemen did not court her predecessor, but the lady Anne, while enjoying their attentions, would favor no man in particular. Still, she did enjoy leading them on; implying much, giving nothing. Princess Elizabeth, who was with her often, clearly admired the lady Anne.
When asked why she would not remarry, she would say with a twinkle in her blue eyes, “How could I choose another gentleman vhen I vas ved to a king like Hendrick? Who could compare vith him?” Then she would laugh merrily, and Catherine was never certain what she quite meant by her words, or why she laughed so happily.
Actually the lady Anne was a great deal more fun than any of the queen’s ladies were. She came to court on a regular basis and was quite friendly with both the king and her pretty, younger successor. The first time she had come, Catherine was very nervous. But Anne had thrown herself facedown before the royal couple, and then rising up, wished them every happiness. She actually meant it, and had also brought magnificent gifts for them both.
The king had gone to bed that day with his leg paining him, but Queen Catherine and the lady Anne had danced together into the night, much to the court’s amazement. The next day the former queen returned by special invitation to have dinner with the bride and bridegroom. They sat together laughing and toasting one another. No one had ever seen the king so genuinely affable toward Anne of Cleves. The court was goggledeyed, which delighted both women.
At New Year’s the lady Anne had presented the king and the queen with two great magnificent horses from her own stables. Identical yearlings, they were a fine dun color, with ebony fetlocks, and were caparisoned in rich mauve velvet edged in gold fringe with golden tassels. Their bridles were of heavy silver. They were led into the hall at Hampton Court by two handsome young boy grooms garbed in mauve, gold, and silver livery. The royal couple were enchanted, but some of the court sneered at the lady Anne for a fool.
“On the contrary,” said Charles Brandon, the Duke of Suffolk, wisely. “She is an extraordinarily clever woman, I think. The only one of the king’s wives to survive his displeasure, regain his favor, and lose nothing but a crown for her troubles.”
And fun, thought the young queen. The lady Anne is far more fun than these proper ladies of mine. Unfortunately, it would cause talk if I kept her about me all the time, but oh, how I wish I could! If only Nyssa were here. The queen sighed so deeply that her ladies looked at her.
“What is it, Your Grace?” Lady Rochford asked solicitously.
“I am bored,” the queen admitted irritably. “There is no music or dancing because the king is ill. I have not seen my husband in almost two weeks.” She flung down her embroidery.
“There is no reason why we cannot have some music here in the privacy of your chambers, Your Grace,” the Duchess of Richmond said.
“Let us call upon pretty Tom Culpeper to come and perform for us,” Lady Edgecomb suggested. “He has a lovely voice, and plays both the lute and the virginals quite well.”
Catherine considered the suggestion. “Very well,” she finally agreed. “If the king can spare him, I should like it if Master Culpeper would come to amuse us for a time.”
The queen’s page was sent to the king to ask his permission, and Henry granted his young wife’s request. He felt very guilty that she was beginning to chafe with boredom, and all because of his damned weaknesses.
“Go,” he told Tom Culpeper, who was one of his favorite gentlemen. “And tell the queen I send her my dearest love. I will see her in just a few more days. Tell her that, Tom, and then when you return later, I would know in detail how she took the news.” He grinned almost lasciviously and chuckled. “I know she has missed me.”
Tom Culpeper was a handsome young man in his mid-twenties. His hair was chestnut-brown and his eyes a bright blue. He was fair of skin and had a most pleasing countenance, which he did not hide behind a beard. The king was very fond of him, and consequently spoiled him badly. It was something of which Tom Culpeper took full advantage. He had come to court as a boy to seek his fortune, and it would appear as if he were finally going to be successful in his quest.
Picking up his lute, he bowed to his master, saying, “I will bring your message to Her Grace. Then I will entertain her and her ladies, my liege.”
The queen’s ladies fluttered about Master Culpeper from the moment he arrived. Tall and slender, with a well-turned leg, he accepted their homage as his due. His charm, coupled with the twinkle in his
eye and his easy smile, did not escape the women, most of whom were married. He amused them for two hours, singing and playing upon his lute. At one point he played his lute and sang while little Princess Elizabeth, up from Hatfield to visit her father, talented beyond her years, played upon the queen’s virginals. Bess’s fingers were gracefully long for a child of seven. Several of the ladies whispered that she had her mother’s beautiful hands.
Finally the princess was escorted off to bed and the queen dismissed her women. Culpeper lingered a moment, and when Lady Rochford made to shoo him away, he said with authority, “I have a private message for the queen’s ears, from His Grace. I should like to deliver it now.”
“Go along then, Rochford,” Catherine said, “but stay near.”
Lady Rochford curtsied, and backing from the room, closed the door behind her. Her pinched face was curious, but she dared not listen at the door.
Tom Culpeper bowed politely to the queen. He thought how very beautiful she looked. Her gown, in the French style, was quite smart. He had always known she would shine in the proper setting.
“Scarlet velvet becomes you,” he said quietly. “I once tried to give you some, as I recall, and not so long ago.”
“I accepted it,” Cat reminded him. “I simply did not pay your price, Master Culpeper. It was far too high. Now, what message did His Grace send to me?” Her look was imperious, but she was thinking how young and how very virile he looked right now. His hose hugged the curving calves of his long legs, and she wondered what it would be like to have those legs wrapped about her.
Tom Culpeper repeated the king’s message slowly, watching her face as he did so. She was no great beauty, but there was an enticing sensuality about her.
“You may tell His Grace that I miss him greatly and will welcome his return to my bed, and company,” the queen said when Culpeper had finished speaking. “You may go now, Master Culpeper.”
“Will you not call me Tom again, Your Grace?” he asked her. “We are cousins, after all, through our mothers.”
Love, Remember Me Page 29