The Kingmaker's Daughter Read online

  ‘I don’t doubt that. That’s almost certainly true. The queen trusts no-one, and she pays servants for intelligence. So do we all. But why would she poison Isabel?’

  ‘For revenge,’ I say miserably. ‘Because she has our names on a scrap of paper in an enamelled box hidden among her jewels.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Isabel knew, but I wouldn’t listen. She said the queen has sworn to be avenged on the murderers of her father – that would be our father. Isabel said she had written our names in blood on a scrap of paper and kept them hidden. Isabel said that one day I would hear she was dead and she would have been poisoned.’

  Richard’s hand is on his belt, where his sword would be, as if he thinks we might have to fight for our lives here, in the Palace of Westminster.

  ‘I didn’t listen!’ The loss of her suddenly hits me and I am shaken by sobs. ‘I didn’t listen to her! And her baby! And Margaret! And Edward! They will have to grow up without a mother! And I didn’t go to her! I told her she was safe.’

  Richard goes to the door. ‘I’m going to talk to the messenger,’ he says.

  ‘You wouldn’t let me go to her!’ I fire out.

  ‘Just as well,’ he says drily, and turns the handle of the door.

  I scramble to my feet. ‘I’ll come too.’

  ‘Not if you’re going to cry.’

  Roughly, I rub my wet face. ‘I won’t cry. I swear I won’t cry.’

  ‘I don’t want this news getting about just yet, and not by accident. George will have written to the king also, announcing the death. I don’t want us making accusations and you crying. You will have to be silent. You will have to be calm. And you will have to meet the queen and say nothing. We will have to act as if we think nothing against her.’

  I grit my teeth and turn to him. ‘If George is right, then the queen killed my sister.’ I am not shaking any more and I am not sobbing either. ‘If George’s accusations are true, then she plans to kill me. If this is true then she is my mortal enemy and we are living in her palace and dining on the food that comes from her kitchen. See – I am not making accusations, and I am not crying. But I am going to protect me and mine, and I will see her pay for the death of my sister.’

  ‘If it is true,’ Richard says levelly.

  It is like a pledge. ‘If it is true,’ I agree.

  WESTMINSTER PALACE, LONDON, JANUARY 1477

  The court wears dark blue in mourning for my sister and I keep to my rooms as much as I can. I cannot bear to look at the queen. I truly believe that in her beautiful face I see the murderer of my sister. I am afraid for myself. Richard refuses absolutely to discuss anything until we meet with George and know more. But he sends his right-hand man Sir James Tyrrell to Middleham with instructions to guard our son, to examine every member of our household, especially any that are not Yorkshire born and bred, and to see that Edward’s food is tasted before he eats anything.

  I order my food to be cooked in our private rooms in the palace, and I stay in my privy chamber. I almost never sit with the queen. When I hear a sudden knock on the door I start from my chair and have to steady myself, holding the table by the fireplace. The guard on the door swings it open and announces George.

  He comes in wearing deepest blue, his face drawn and tragic. He takes my hands and kisses me. When he draws back to look at me he has tears in his eyes.

  ‘Oh, George,’ I whisper.

  All his smug confidence has gone; he is lean and handsome in grief. He leans his head against the carved chimney. ‘I still can’t believe it,’ he says quietly. ‘When I see you here – I can’t believe that she is not here with you.’

  ‘She wrote to me that she was well.’

  ‘She was,’ he says eagerly. ‘She was. And so happy! And the baby: a beauty, as always. But then she suddenly weakened, fell away almost overnight, and in the morning she was gone.’

  ‘Was it a fever?’ I ask, hoping desperately that he will say yes.

  ‘Her tongue was black,’ he tells me.

  I look at him aghast: it is a sure sign of poison. ‘Who could have done it?’

  ‘I have my physician inquiring into her household, into our kitchen. I know that the queen had a woman in Isabel’s own confinement room, to report to her at once whether we had a boy or a girl.’

  I give a little hiss of horror.

  ‘Oh, that’s nothing. I have known of it for months. She will have a servant set to watch you as well,’ he says. ‘And a man placed among the household, perhaps in your stables to warn her when you mean to travel, perhaps in your hall to listen to the talk. She has watched us all ever since we first came to her court. She will have watched you as well as Isabel. She trusts no-one.’

  ‘Edward trusts my husband,’ I protest. ‘They love each other, they are faithful to each other.’

  ‘And the queen?’

  He laughs shortly at my silence.

  ‘Will you speak to the king about this?’ I ask. ‘Will you name the queen’s guilt?’

  ‘I think he will offer me a bribe to buy me off,’ George says. ‘And I think I know what it will be. He will want to silence me, he will want me out of the way. He won’t want me accusing his wife of being a poisoner, naming their children as bastards.’

  ‘Hush,’ I say, glancing at the door. I go to him at the fireplace so we are head to head, like conspirators, our words blowing up the chimney like smoke.

  ‘Edward will want me out of the way, somewhere I can’t speak against him.’

  I am horrified. ‘What will he do? He will not imprison you?’

  George’s smile is a grimace. ‘He will command me to marry again,’ he predicts. ‘I know that is what he plans. He will send me to Burgundy to marry Mary of Burgundy. Her father is dead, our sister Margaret his widow has suggested my name. Mary is her step-daughter, she can give her in marriage to me. Edward sees this as a way of getting me out of the country.’

  I can feel the tears spill down my cheeks. ‘But Isabel has been dead less than a month,’ I cry. ‘Are you supposed to forget her at once? Is she to be buried and a new wife in her place within weeks? And what of your children? Are you supposed to take them with you to Flanders?’

  ‘I’ll refuse him,’ George says. ‘I will never leave my children, I will never leave my country, and I certainly will not leave the murderer of my wife to walk free.’

  I am sobbing, the loss of her is so painful, the thought of George taking another wife so shocking. I feel so alone in this dangerous court without her. George puts his arm around my shaking shoulders. ‘Sister,’ he says tenderly. ‘My sister. She loved you so much, she was so anxious to protect you. She made me promise that I would warn you. I will protect you too.’

  As always, I have to wait in the queen’s rooms in the hour before dinner for the king and his household to join us, so that we all go into the great hall together. The queen’s ladies assume that I am quiet from grief, and leave me alone. Only Lady Margaret Stanley, recently come to court with her new husband Thomas, takes me to one side and tells me that she prays for the soul of my sister and for her blessed children. I am oddly touched by her goodwill and I try to smile and thank her for her prayers. She sent her own son, Henry Tudor, overseas, for his own safety, as she does not trust this king with his keeping. Young Tudor is of the House of Lancaster, a promising youth. She would not allow him to be raised by a York guardian in this country, and though she is now married to one of the lords of York and high in favour with both king and queen she still does not trust this royal family enough to bring her boy home. Of all the court she will understand what it is to fear the king that you serve, she knows what it is to curtsey to the queen, uncertain if she is your enemy.

  When Richard comes in with his brother the king, all smiles, and takes me by the hand to lead me into dinner, I walk close to him and whisper that George has come to court and promised me that he will find the murderer of my sister.

  ‘How will he do that from Flanders?’ Richar