The White Princess (Cousins' War) Read online

  Composedly, she takes her seat, folds her hands in her black silk lap, and looks at me. I note her earrings of black and the only other piece of jewelry that she wears, a gold brooch that is pinned to her belt: two gold hearts entwined. I permit myself a small smile, and there is an answering warmth in her eyes. I imagine that we are never going to say more than this.

  We line up to prepare to enter the hall for dinner. I go first as queen, My Lady walks at my shoulder, slightly behind me, and Lady Katherine Huntly must come next, my sisters taking one step down the order of precedence. I glance back and see Cecily’s pale face, her lower lip pressed tight. She is now fourth behind me, and she does not like it.

  “Is Lady Huntly going to return to Scotland?” I ask My Lady the King’s Mother, as we proceed into dinner.

  “Surely she will,” My Lady replies. “What would she stay here for? Once her husband is dead?”

  But apparently she is in no hurry to leave. She stays until my husband has completed his slow progress from Exeter to the palace. The outriders come into the stable yard and send a message to my rooms that the king is approaching and expects a formal welcome. I order my ladies to come with me and we go down the broad stone stairs to the double entrance doors, which are held wide open, welcoming the return of the hero. We arrange ourselves at the head of the steps. My Lady the King’s Mother’s ladies stand beside us, she makes sure she is on the same step as me so that I am not more prominent, and we wait in the bright autumn sunshine, listening for the clatter of the horses’ hooves.

  “Has he sent the boy directly to the Tower?” Maggie asks me as she bends to pull out the train of my gown.

  “He must have done,” I say. “What else would he do with him?”

  “He hasn’t . . .” She hesitates. “He hasn’t killed him on the way here?”

  I glance at the boy’s wife, all in black like a widow. She is wearing her black velvet cape against the cold and the gold brooch of twin hearts is pinned at the neck.

  “I haven’t heard,” I say. I cannot help a little shiver. “Surely he would have sent word if he had done that? To the boy’s wife if not to me? Surely I would have known?”

  “Surely he wouldn’t have executed him without a public announcement,” she says uncertainly.

  Behind us, in the darkened hall, I hear the constant ripple of noise as the servants come through and run down the stairs to the stable yard so that they can line the road to watch the king come home in triumph.

  First we hear the king’s trumpets, a victorious bray of sound, and everyone cheers. Then there is another noise—a ridiculous “tootle-toot-toot!” from someone on the roadside, and everyone laughs. I feel Maggie stand a little closer, as if we are somehow threatened by the “toot-toot” of a toy trumpet.

  Around the corner come the first riders, half a dozen standard bearers carrying the royal standard, the cross of St. George, the Beaufort portcullis, and the Tudor rose. There is a red dragon on a white and green ground, and a red rose for Lancaster. Only the Round Table of Camelot is missing from this ridiculous display. It is as if the king is showing all of his badges, naming all of his antecedents, as if he is trying to demonstrate his claim to the throne that he only won by force of arms, as if he is trying once again to convince everyone that he is the rightful king.

  Then he comes, wearing his enameled breastplate but no helmet so that he looks martial and brave, about to fight a battle or a joust. He is beaming, a broad bright confident smile, and when the servants on the roadside and the people from the nearby villages, who have been running alongside the procession and now line the road, cheer and wave their hats, Henry nods to one side and the other as if agreeing with them.

  Behind him come his usual companions, the men of his court. No one else is in armor, the rest are all dressed for a day’s ride, booted, caped, one or two in quilted jackets, and among them, a young man I don’t know, who attracts my attention in the first moment, and then I find that I can’t look away from him.

  He is dressed like all the others, with good leather boots—his a dark tan color—a good pair of brown breeches, a thick jacket fitted across his broad shoulders, and his riding cape rolled and belted on the saddle behind him. His bonnet is of brown velvet and at the front of it he has a beautiful brooch with three pendant pearls. I know him at once, not by the brooch but by the golden brown of his hair and his merry smile, my mother’s merry smile, and the proud set of his head that is just how my father used to ride. It is him. It has to be him. It is the boy. He has not been sent to the Tower, nor brought wrapped in chains, nor tied backwards on his horse with a straw hat crammed on his head to shame him. He rides behind the king like one of his companions, like a friend, almost as if he were a kinsman.

  Someone points him out to the people on the roadside and they start to jeer, an ugly noise, and someone shouts, “Traitor!” Someone else makes a mock bow, and a woman screams, “Smiling now! You won’t smile for long!”

  But he does smile. He lifts his head and he nods in acknowledgment to one side or the other, and when some silly girl, taken by his easy charm, shouts “Hurrah!” instead of an insult, he sweeps his hat from his head with all the charm and easiness of my father, King Edward, who could never ride past a pretty woman on the roadside without throwing her a wink.

  Bare-headed in the bright autumn sunshine, I can see how his gold hair shines. This boy’s hair is straight, cut long and smooth, falling to his shoulders, but I can see where it curls on his collar at the back. His eyes are brown, his face tanned by the weather, his eyelashes long and dark. He is the most handsome man in the whole court, and beside him, dressed in his shiny new armor, my husband the king looks like a man trying very hard.

  The boy is looking anxiously at the ladies of the court as they stand, waiting on the steps, until he sees his wife, and he throws her the cheekiest grin, as if they were not in the most terrible circumstances that anyone could imagine. I glance sideways at her, and see a different young woman altogether. The color has flooded into her pale cheeks, her eyes are bright, she is dancing a little on the spot and gazing at him, blind to the king and the parade of banners, radiant, as if the joy of seeing him is greater than any other worry in the world. As if it does not matter very much what circumstances they are in, as long as they are together.

  And then he looks from her to me.

  He knows me at once. I see him take in the elegance of my gown, the deference of my ladies, and that I hold myself like a queen. I see him note my high headdress and my richly embroidered dress. Then he looks into my face and his smile, his roguish laughing smile, just like my mother’s irreverent joy, shines through. It is a smile of complete confidence, of recognition, of delight in his return. I have to bite the inside of my cheek to prevent myself from running forwards to greet him with my arms open wide. But I cannot stop my heart lifting and I feel myself glowing as if I want to cheer. He’s home. The boy who calls himself my brother Richard is home at last.

  Henry holds up his hand for the cavalcade to halt and a page boy flings himself from his horse and rushes to take the king’s bridle. Henry dismounts heavily, his armor clattering, and he walks up the shallow steps towards me and kisses me warmly on the mouth, turns to his mother and bows his head for her blessing.

  “Welcome home, my lord,” I say formally, loudly enough for everyone to hear my greeting. “And blessing on your great victory.”

  Oddly, he does not make any formal reply, though the clerks are waiting to record his words at this moment of history. He turns a little to one side and then I see him gasp—just a tiny little betraying breath—as he sees her: the boy’s wife. I see the color rise in his cheeks, I see how his eyes brighten. He steps towards Lady Katherine and he does not know what to say; like a lovestruck page he is breathless at the sight of her and wordless when he should speak.

  She drops him a low, deferential curtsey and when she rises up he takes her hand. I see her lower her eyes modestly, and the little hint of her smile, a