“You must learn this now, Lady Elizabeth,” says Ralph, stroking my thumb. “That an unquiet peace can be more miserable than a decisive battle. One can live a whole lifetime in a state of unquiet peace.”
I do not know how to respond. I do not like being challenged this way. I would just like someone to see things as I do. I expel a heavy sigh of frustration.
“Your father will return, my lady,” he assures me. He bows his head. “Oh, I do wish I could be among them! But, alas, I must remain behind.” He casts a shy glance my way and I shiver in delight.
“I hope you can find ways to pass the time while everyone is harvesting their fruits of fortune on the battlefield,” I say with a smile.
He reaches up, tracing my jawline with a velvet fingertip. “I’m sure I can find something….”
He leans forward, pressing his lips to mine. They are soft and moist, warm, filled with sweet eagerness. Only loyalty to my good queen’s virtues gives me the will to pull away and stare into his face in bewildered joy.
“Ralph …” I murmur, just for the sake of saying his name.
He kisses my forehead. “I have longed for you, Elizabeth,” he says. “Say you are mine.”
The courtly language is not the least bit original but as it is addressed to me, I cannot help but offer a giddy little nod and say, “Yes!”
“When your father returns, we will seek his permission to be married,” he continues, his eyes wide with excitement.
I cannot say I really know Ralph altogether well, but he is so handsome and charming that the thought of being his wife has me nodding my assent, caught up in his enthusiasm. I am already imagining what our children will look like. They’ll have our blue eyes, no doubt. I begin to tingle.
“Oh, Ralph, do go away so I can find someone to confide our news to!” I cry, shooing him off.
Ralph laughs, rising from the garden bench and dipping into an extravagant bow. “Fare thee well, my wife,” he whispers.
My face flushes bright crimson. I lower my eyes, watching Ralph’s boots as they plod off.
All thoughts of battle and bloodshed are abated, replaced with fantasies of a grand wedding.
I shall be Elizabeth Neville!
The king departs with great fanfare. My father accompanies him with an entourage of six hundred archers, three hundred household servants, musicians—even the choir of the Chapel Royal! No one is left out of this campaign. Wolsey leaves, Bishop Foxe leaves—everyone. They are all dressed in the Tudor livery of green and white. It is a splendid farewell.
The queen rules as regent from Greenwich Palace and it is very quiet without His Majesty. In the company of Her Grace I help sew banners and badges and standards for our soldiers. As my fingers work the needle, I feel I am a part of something great, that somewhere in France someone will be carrying a standard or wearing a badge that I, Elizabeth Stafford, have sewn with all of my love and good wishes.
We follow the war from our safe vantage, learning that on 16 August the king and Emperor Maximilian I routed the French at what became known as the Battle of the Spurs, taking the town of Therouanne.
But the triumphs are accompanied by tragedies. We learn of the casualties. Thomas Knyvet, the shy courtier who amused us all by climbing naked up a pillar when the rabble stole his clothes at the festivities celebrating the late prince’s birth, died at sea off Brest when fighting the French. There are so many others, all young merry men eager for such useless enterprise.
With heavy hearts we mourn our soldiers. Soon there are no more banners to sew, no more standards to bear. The queen’s household grows smaller and smaller.
I am sent home to Thornbury that autumn, but to my delight, Ralph Neville, as my father’s ward, is there as well. As much as I am devoted to Her Grace, I am relieved to be away for a while. The household was so tense waiting for news of the king’s success that my gut was constantly churning and lurching in anxiety.
Now I have but to await the return of the king and his army in a more peaceful place with my betrothed at my side.
Change Winds
Thomas Howard, Winter 1512
It is a thoroughly disgusting affair. No one has come through for me, not the kings of England or Spain. I am short of supplies, horses, everything needed for any successful endeavour of war. I write to Wolsey, that ridiculous upstart, appealing for some sort of objective in all this. After our success at Bayonne, I am left with little or no direction. Should we try for Aquitaine? No one knows and they’re certainly not inclined to inform me.
Meantime I am beset with sick men, bad weather, and worse morale. Wolsey is blamed for it all, to my good fortune, and it is not long before I decide it prudent to wash my hands of the whole affair.
I hire ships to take us home. The king is in a Tudor temper, but there is nothing else to be done. I am not going to remain so that we might be obliterated by dejection, inactivity, and Spanish food.
And so I leave Spain behind. I have not failed. I cannot help if no one cooperated with me and I was given no aid or support. This affair could not have been handled more ineffectively. It is Wolsey’s fault, not mine. Yes, that is it. Someday the king will see that, hopefully sooner rather than later.
I will not think on it anymore. There will be other wars and other victories. For now I am content to go home to my princess and rest.
She is at Lambeth with my stepmother, Agnes, and her increasing brood. When I arrive, Agnes greets me with a sad shake of her head.
“She cannot rise from her bed,” she tells me in her gruff voice. “She’s in a bad way, my lord. I am sorry.”
I rush to her chambers, panic gripping my heart. It is thudding wildly in my chest; I hear it pounding in my ears. I slow my steps upon entering her sanctuary. Everything about her suggests the need for quiet and tranquility.
She lies abed. Her rose-gold hair is plaited and worn over her shoulder. Her skin is so pale it is almost translucent, pearly and ethereal as a seraph. She is so much thinner than when last I saw her. Once so tall and fine of figure, she is now all bones. Upon seeing me, she offers a weak smile. Her lips are blue.
“My lord …”
I have not cried in a long while, not since the death of my Thomas. I had thought to be through with tears forever, but now they come easily enough, flowing icily down my cheeks unchecked as I approach the bed. I am as tentative as the child I was when I approached my mother’s bed after she bore my Alyss, another life fated to be stolen from me.
I sit beside my wife, reaching out to stroke her fevered brow. I remove her nightcap. “This is making you hotter,” I say uselessly. Then in a strangled voice I add, “I do not understand. You were not this bad when I left….”
“Don’t be frightened, my love,” she tells me, reaching up to cup my cheek. With a slender thumb she wipes away a tear. Her eyes are soft, unafraid, and filled with something I had not seen in what seemed like an eternity: hope. “Soon it will be over. I am going to the faery country. I will be with the children.”
My heart lurches at this. She has not spoken of her faery folk in years. I do not know what to say. I continue stroking her brow, but my hand jerks and trembles and I imagine it does little to soothe her.
“I waited for you,” she whispers, coughing. “And now that you are here, I beseech you for your blessing, dearest Thomas.”
“You have it,” I tell her in urgent tones. “You’ve always had it.”
She closes her eyes.