The Boleyn Inheritance

Anne, Richmond Palace,
March 1541

Ambassador Harst has come to tell me the news from court. He has placed a young man as a servant in the king’s rooms, and the boy says that the physicians attend the king every day and are struggling to keep the wound open so that the poison can drain from his leg. They are putting pellets of gold into the wound so that it cannot close, and they are tying the edges back with string. They are pulling at the poor man’s living flesh as if they were making a pudding.

“He must be in agony,” I say.

Dr. Harst nods. “And he is in despair,” he says. “He thinks he will never recover. He thinks his time is done, and he is sick with fear at leaving Prince Edward without a safe guardian. The Privy Council are thinking that they will have to form a regency.”

“Who will he trust to guard the prince in his minority?”

“He trusts nobody, and the prince’s family, the Seymours, are declared enemies of the queen’s family, the Howards. There is no doubt that they will tear the country apart between them. The Tudor peace will end as it began, in a war for the kingdom between the great families. The king fears for the people’s faith as well. The Howards are determined on the old religion and will take the country back to Rome, but Cranmer has the church behind him and will fight for reform.”

I nibble my finger, thinking. “Does the king still fear there is a plot to overthrow him?”

“There is news of a new uprising in the North, in support of the old religion. The king fears that the men will come out again, that it will spread. He believes there are Papists everywhere calling for a rebellion against him.”

“None of this endangers me? He will not turn against me?”

His tired face folds downward into a grimace. “He might. He fears the Lutherans as well.”

“But everybody knows I am a practicing member of the king’s church!” I protest. “I do everything to show that I conform to the king’s instructions.”

“You were brought in as a Protestant princess,” he says. “And the man who brought you in paid with his life. I am fearful.”

“What can we do?” I ask.

“I shall keep watch on the king,” he says. “While he acts against the Papists we are safe enough, but if he turns against the reformers, we should make sure that we can get home, if we need to.”

I give a little shudder, thinking of the mad tyranny of my brother as opposed to the mad tyranny of this king. “I have no home there.”

“You may have no home here.”

“The king has promised me my safety,” I say.

“He promised you the throne,” the ambassador says wryly. “And who sits there now?”

“I don’t envy her.” I am thinking of her husband brooding on his wrongs, trapped in his bed by his suppurating wound, counting his enemies and allocating blame, while his fever burns and his sense of injustice grows more mad.

“I should think no woman in the world would envy her,” the ambassador replies.