Above All Others

by G Lawrence

  “If you keep my secrets, Doctor,” I said. “Then I shall keep yours.”

  He hesitated. “My lady,” he said. “There are men of my acquaintance, poor scholars, but men with minds that are keen, quick and eager for new knowledge, who would greatly benefit from the patronage of one such as you, who is high in favour with the King, who understands the worth of such books, and who is in a position to aid them.”

  “They are reformists?” I asked.

  Again he nodded. “Children of God, just as I am, and just as I suspect you are…” he trailed off. “I put myself in peril to admit these things to you, madam, but I believe you think the same way I do.”

  I was nervous. It could be a trap. Thomas More had many men about the country engaged in spying for him and the Church. Butts could be More’s agent, or that of Wolsey, but there was something in his air and in his eyes that told me this was not so. “I would be willing to be a patroness to such scholars, Doctor, as long as they obeyed the King’s law as far as is possible, and did not sanction rebellion against it.” It was a careful answer, but one which opened great possibilities.

  “When you return to court, my lady, may I ask permission to present some cases to you… so that you might judge each scholar’s worthiness and perhaps support their educations?”

  I smiled. “I have more money than I need, Doctor. If some of that can go towards the further education of worthy men, who believe in reform of the corruptions of the Church, then I would be glad to share it with them.”

  “Then I shall visit you often, my lady,” he said and put a thick finger to his lips. “And as you say, I shall keep your secrets, as you keep mine.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Hever Castle

  Summer 1528

  Some days later, when my mother was by my father’s bedside, I found myself alone in my room with she whom my mother had called the cunning woman of the village. I awoke from another deep sleep of dreamless darkness. I could sleep all the hours of the day, it seemed, and still be tired enough to sleep through the night. I awoke but for short periods to eat, drink and to hear news, and then I would sleep again. My mother assured me that my body required it, and I had not the will to resist. I dreamed of demons no more. My rest stole me away me into warm, safe, darkness free of all thought and word. That day, with my mind and eyes fogged from this deep sleep, I awoke to hear prayers being muttered in broken Latin near me and looked up into the watchful eyes of the old woman sitting by my side.

  “You pray for me?” I whispered harshly. My throat was still devoid of natural wetness by the rage of the fever. I coughed, and a dry retch shuddered through me.

  “I do, my lady.” She helped me to sit up so that she could hand me a cup in which ground up leaves and roots bobbed in bright ale. I drank gratefully and deeply, and then made a face at the terrible taste as I swallowed. “What is this?” I asked.

  “Eyebright and Angelica.” She nodded. “They do not taste pretty, I understand, Mistress, but they will help with your breathing. Your illness has brought with it some strange complications; your father does not suffer from this wheezing as you do.” She pushed the cup at me. “Drink up now, my lady. Although you may not appreciate the taste, it took me many hours to gather these herbs fresh for you this morning. And you are lucky it was me, Mistress, and not another doing the picking, for Eyebright and Angelica are easy to confuse with dangerous plants, by those who know not what they are doing.”

  “My mother called you a cunning woman,” I said, eyeing the cup hesitantly. “Does she mean you are a witch?” The woman snorted and her coal eyes crinkled as she looked closely at my face. She put the cup to one side and with a cool hand she touched my forehead, grunting with satisfaction. She did not answer me. “Am I well as yet?” I asked.

  “You are one who has many questions, my lady,” she said, amusement twitching at her lips. “To answer all of them may take some time, but to the last asked, yes… I believe that you are free from the sweat. It was lucky your mother called me when she did… There were many others too far gone for me to save them. My daughters have been working at all hours God sends through the village to save those they could, and help to bury those they could not. But it seems you are very valuable, not just to your mother and to your family, as a daughter should be, but to higher powers.”

  I sighed, sitting back on my pillows. “The King was kind to send his doctor to me.”

  “Indeed,” agreed the old woman with a wry smile. “There were many in this land who should have been glad of the honours you received, although what they teach these doctors is beyond me. The man seemed to know nothing of herb lore… Still, he did his work well… with my help.” The old woman breathed in deeply. “For all the fuss that was made of you, my lady, I might have thought you were the Queen… You seem to be rather important for one so young.” She handed me the cup again, this time with insistent eyes.

  I obediently sipped her foul potion. “You did not answer my first question,” I protested. “I would know… does your wisdom come from good or from evil?”

  She raised her eyebrows. “There is no wisdom, no true wisdom, surely, that comes from evil, Mistress.”

  “So you are not a witch?”

  “I do God’s work, as far as I am able, my lady.” She brushed at her crude gown of brown, ugly wool. “All the wisdom and the power that lies in my hands is there at His will and grace and that of no other. If I was able to save you, it was because God wished you saved, my lady. He has a plan for all of us.”

  “Then you are a true Christian?” I asked, still suspicious.

  “I am the servant of God as we all are, my lady.”

  “Then we think alike,” I said feeling more assured. Although I did not believe that my mother would knowingly employ a servant of the Devil, she may have been deceived by one. But the crone seemed convincing in her protestations, and the Latin she had spoken over me, although uncouth and ill-said, were words of the Bible. “What is your name?”

  She smiled widely, showing spare and broken stumps of blackened teeth. Her laugh was a throaty cackle, warm and amused. “When you reach my age you find you have many names, my lady,” she said. “They called me Maude when I was a young maid. They called me good mistress when I cured them and good mother when I delivered their babes into the world. When I could not save them, they oftentimes called me hag or crone… But such is only to be expected. And now that I am old and have given two husbands unto Heaven and borne many children, they called me Mother Stephens, for the name of my second husband.”

  “You have my thanks, Mother Stephens,” I said, “for saving my life and that of my father.”

  “I was glad to be called, Mistress.” She rose with some difficulty due to her aged, stiff limbs, and hobbled to the fire, returning to my bedside with a plate of herbs and boiled roots. Her fingers were swollen and red about the joints, and she had trouble holding the plate, although she did not drop it. “As I said, it seems you are a valuable young lady, one worth saving, and I have long honoured your family who rule the lands on which I was born and on which I live now. You mother has ever been a good lady to me and my village and has offered us the generosity of her table and of her charity. If you are anything like her, then you are worth any effort that is in my power to make.”

  She passed me the plate. Dark green parsley and feverfew lay on it along with cool wispy strands of chamomile and fennel. There were also stripped, cooked roots and other herbs that I recognised not. “They will aid your rest, and promote healing,” she advised. “And protect your sleep from nightmares of the future, or the past.”

  I hesitated and then started to chew the herbs as she had instructed. “You know of my dreams?”

  “You were screaming in your sleep as the fever worked its way through your blood,” she told me. “There were demons pursuing you, my lady; such dark spirits hunt us when we are at our most vulnerable… They come to test us when we are weak. You fought them off. I heard you struggle
against them in your dreams… That is always a good sign. When I heard you fighting them I knew you were recovering.”

  “Do your powers reach to see the future?” I asked as the peppery taste of parsley and the fennel caused my mouth to water, painfully, for the first time since my illness. I put a hand to my jaw, cringing. She handed me ale to wash them down.

  “Sometimes,” she admitted cautiously. “Shadows of the future can be shown to some, by the powers of the Almighty… if He wills it, so can it be. But the future is oftentimes uncertain … and dangerous to gaze too closely upon. The future depends on our choices, and sometimes, knowing what the outcome may be, we alter what should have been… or wander right into what we wished to avoid.” Her black eyes were fixed on mine and all hints of a smile had vanished from her face. “What is it you would know, Mistress?”

  Tears sprang to my eyes as the silent fear that had plagued me since I woke from my fever escaped my mouth. “Shall I still be able to bear a child?” I asked. Tears slid down my pale cheeks. “This fever… You do not know of it affecting fertility?”

  Her black eyes narrowed and softened; perhaps she had thought I would ask something else. She touched my face with a light hand. “You will bear children, my lady.” I choked on my relief. “I see children in your future,” she continued softly, her eyes far away. “Children can be a woman’s greatest consolation… and sometimes they can be her greatest sorrow, too.”

  “What do you mean?” Her face was grave and her eyes shone no more. Her form seemed to merge with the bed hangings, with the painted cloth on the chamber walls. For a moment, I thought I saw another presence looking out at me from behind her black eyes. I shivered. “What do you mean?” I asked in little more than a whisper. “What do you know of my future? Of my children?”

  Her eyes did not break from mine. Her face was a mask, unreadable and watchful. I trembled. It was as though I looked into the eyes of the last Fate, that creature whose job it was to snip the threads of mortal lives with her clever knife.

  “The future is not something I would cause any to look into too deeply,” she advised slowly. “We choose the paths we walk because we are the people we were born to be; the people that God made us to be. I see great extremes in you, Mistress Boleyn, great love and great passion I see but also great danger and hate. But you must tread your path yourself, not be guided by the ramblings of an old woman.” She broke off and suddenly she did not seem terrible and ancient, supernatural or mystical. I blinked. My terror vanished. Perhaps in the aftermath of the fever I was imagining things.

  She rose. “I must go and see my other patient. Who complains a lot more than his daughter about my herbs...” She smiled. “You chew those herbs and rest, Mistress. I have opened the window shutter to let in a little air and it will make you feel better. Some people would say that was dangerous, but I have ever believed in the benefits of clean country air.”

  As she rose to leave I sat forward in my bed. “Will I bear a son?” I asked her as she reached the door.

  Her shoulders lifted as she inhaled deeply and without turning she replied. “You will bear a son, my lady, perhaps more than one. But they will bring you no solace, I fear.” She turned her head slightly. I could see one side of her face only. “Those extremes I spoke of, my lady? Please be wary of them. You seem like a sweet child inside. Be wary of the fire that not only heats and warms, but burns and consumes. There is no escaping that once it is inside you. Learn to control the passions within you, to tame them to your will, rather than being ruled by them… and you will live to be a happy woman.”

  The old woman left the room. I did not see her again.

  Some years later I remember my mother telling me that old Mother Stephens had died and the village had helped to pay for her burial in the churchyard at Hever. Although she was a peasant, my mother gave money for her to lie in a proper grave and gave orders that flowers were to be placed for her each summer on the anniversary of the time that she had helped our family. Her many daughters continued her work, tending to the sick and injured in the small village, using their mother’s wisdom to bring comfort and promote health.

  As to her warnings to me, who knew then what she meant? Once I was well enough to rise from my bed, I began to dismiss her words as the confused wonderings of an old woman, who wanted to appear important and all-knowing by muttering loose portents about the future. And yet, I drew comfort from her promise that I would bear sons. A strange mixture of scepticism and belief occupied me then. I chose that which I wanted to believe and dismissed all I did not. It is often the way; we see and believe what we wish to.

  Soon enough though, as I recovered, I was thinking only of one thing. I wanted to see Henry.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Hever Castle

  Summer 1528

  My father recovered the same week as I, and, strong man that he was, he was up and walking before I had left my chamber. When I first saw him, he strode over, embraced me, and laughed as he held me back from him to assess me. “Still thin and pale,” he said, his voice gritty.

  “As you are also, father,” I said, moving to a window seat. He did not remonstrate with me for my boldness.

  “The fever was a terrible happening.” He nodded. “But we are all through the worst now and soon enough you shall return to the King...” Pulling a rolled sheet of parchment from his sleeve, he handed it to me. “The King, who has been writing daily for news of you, demands that you go to him as soon as you are well.” He smiled. “I think we should wait until you are properly recovered so he may see you at your most beautiful.”

  I was still thinking of something he said previously. “What of Mary?” I asked. “You say that we are all recovered, my lord father, but my brother Will is dead. What provision is there for Mary and her children?”

  My father glanced at me with astonishment. “She will be well cared for through the provisions of Carey’s will and her own dowry. Our family is not expected to take care of her or her children, although we may arrange another marriage for her when you marry the King. To marry Mary off now would be premature. There will be time enough to find Mary a useful, profitable, match once we have settled the King’s Great Matter.” His glance became stern. “There should be no thoughts in your head but the acquisition of our goals, Anne; to see you wedded and bedded to the King of England; to see our family rise in station and title. Mary will understand, as she must, that this is our family’s sole aim.”

  I stared at him, sadness wrenching my heart. For all the things I had thought about my father, I had never suspected he would ever abandon his own child in her time of need. “You care nothing for the suffering of your daughter…” The words came harshly from my throat. His eyes narrowed and went flat with anger.

  “My sole care,” he said slowly in an ominous tone, “is the advancement of my daughter.”

  He had answered my question. “I beg your leave to retire, sir,” I said in a stiff tone. “I feel unwell.”

  He rose, turned from me, and walked off, saying nothing. Anger, and a most confusing, intense feeling of disappointment, welled up inside me. As I stalked off to my room to throw myself on the luxurious bed, padded with the rich covers and furs that Henry had sent, it occurred to me that if our father would do nothing for Mary, then perhaps I could. I sent word to her secretly so that my father would not know I was disobeying him; a letter with a costly jewel and a bag of coin enclosed. I wrote of my sorrow for the loss of Will. I could hardly believe he was no longer here. He had been a good man, and I had loved him as a brother. I told Mary I would do all I could to help her. I would see Mary was taken care of, and if I could not rely on our father to help, then I knew where to turn.

  Sad news came from court later that week. Bess… my good, faithful, kindly Bess, had died of the sweat along with many others at court. The doctor who had tended to her had also died. I received the missive with dread, thinking it was ill news about George, or Henry, and was therefore almost relieved to
read that it concerned them not. Feeling guilty for thinking so, I rode out to Bess’ family. Her father was a tenant on our lands. The sweat had not reached their small farm, and, apart from in the larger towns and cities it was almost gone from Kent, so I believed I was safe. I took Bess’ family a purse of money and consoled them, telling her wretched, sobbing mother that Bess was the best maid I had ever known. I promised to take their younger daughter named Katherine, or Kate for short, into my service in Bess’ place. This would mean that the family would benefit from her wages and position.

  Although they were distraught to hear of poor Bess, they were grateful for my offer and promised to send Kate to me later that month. She was no more than eleven years old, with wispy fair hair and wide, pale blue eyes. She stared up at me, bobbed a curtsey, and declared that she would do all she could to live up to her sister’s reputation.