“I am sorry for your loss, Jane. I know what it is to be orphaned.”
“My mother’s mother died when she was younger than I am now.” I do not know why I told him that, and I realized as I spoke that I had no idea when my mother’s father had died. I’d never known any of my grandparents and, except for my uncle, had never met another Velville. If the rest of them, unlike Maman, were as unfeeling as he was, I did not want to.
“My father died when I was eleven.” Will sat down beside me on the bench and took my hand in his. “After that I became one of the king’s wards.”
“One of the king’s wards,” I repeated. “That is what my uncle said I am to be. What does that mean?”
“That the king will look after you, manage your estates if you have any and, one day, arrange your marriage. You need never worry about having a roof over your head or food in your belly. You will always have a home at court and a place in the royal household.”
“With the Lady Margaret?”
“Or with the Lady Mary. In a year or two each of them will have her own household and you will have to choose.”
A terrible thought came to me. “What if they should die?”
His grip tightened painfully on my fingers. “Why would you think such a thing?”
“Anyone can die. Even princesses.”
He nodded, his expression solemn. “You are right. King Henry and Queen Elizabeth had another daughter, born between Prince Henry and Princess Mary. She died when she was the same age the Lady Mary is now.”
Fresh tears made my vision blur.
“But the Prince of Wales lives and is healthy, as is Prince Henry. There is nothing sickly about the Lady Margaret or the Lady Mary or anyone in this household.”
Sniffling into my uncle’s handkerchief, I tried to embrace Will’s optimism, but it was no easy task.
Maman is dead. I will never see her again.
As if he sensed my thoughts, Will stood and pulled me to my feet. “Come, Jane. No one can take the place of a mother, but here you have brothers and sisters, in spirit if not in blood. The children of honor look out for each other.”
His words did make me feel a little better. “Are the prince and princesses our brother and sisters, too?”
Will slung an arm around my shoulders and steered me toward the palace. “Indeed they are, Sister Jane…except that they must be catered to at all costs.”
2
King Henry VII rebuilt Pleasance during the first two years I lived in England, facing the whole in red brick and renaming it Greenwich Palace. My “brothers” and “sisters” at Eltham, however, had already taken to calling it “Pleasure Palace” in private.
By the time I reached my ninth birthday, during my first January in England, I was fluent in English and no longer had any trace of an accent. This pleased me very much, for I did not wish to call attention to my foreign birth. The English, by nature, are suspicious of anyone who is not a native of their island. That may be why I never became close friends with any of the other girls among the children of honor. Little Princess Mary, however, took to me from the first and tagged along after me, chattering in French, even when I wished she would not.
In February of that same year, a new prince was born—Edmund Tudor. Queen Elizabeth of York gave birth to him at Pleasure Palace, but soon after, he was sent to join his siblings at Eltham, while the queen continued to live at court with the king.
The court never stayed in one place long. Sometimes it was at Richmond, which King Henry built to replace Sheen, sometimes at Windsor Castle. It was often at Westminster Palace and Greenwich. In the summer, it went on progress.
In late November, Perkin Warbeck, pretender to the throne, was executed. He had involved himself in one too many plots and had to pay the price for it. I felt sorry for his wife, Lady Catherine Gordon. I had never spoken to her, but she was one of Queen Elizabeth’s ladies and I had seen her once or twice when I was at court with the princesses. I did not see much of Queen Elizabeth either, although she always spoke kindly to me and brought me gifts of clothing when she visited her daughters at Eltham.
When I was ten, the Lady Margaret and the Lady Mary were given separate household staffs. Harry Guildford’s mother, who until then had been one of Queen Elizabeth’s ladies, was appointed as Mary’s lady governess. Princess Mary took to calling her “Mother Guildford,” and soon we were all using that name behind her back. To her face, we addressed her as Lady Guildford or madam.
I was nominally assigned to the Lady Mary—she refused to be parted from me—but I still conversed with the Lady Margaret, in both French and English, on a daily basis. All four households—Prince Henry’s, the Lady Margaret’s, the Lady Mary’s, and Prince Edmund’s nursery—continued to live, for the most part, at Eltham. But we were all at Hatfield House again in June that year when Prince Edmund died. He was only sixteen months old. I was saddened by his death, but I would have been much more upset to lose one of my princesses, Prince Henry, Harry, or Will.
I was always happy to go to Pleasure Palace when the court was there. It lived up to its name as a place where we could indulge in pleasant pastimes. We were allowed to watch the disguisings and the dancing, and we had games of our own. Harry Guildford was always the cleverest at devising those. He was the one who set prince and princess against each other in a contest with hoops.
One day in my tenth year, Prince Henry, the Lady Margaret, Harry, and I eluded the tutors, governesses, and five-year-old Mary to meet in the passageway that ran beneath the king’s apartments. Above us, King Henry’s rooms were stacked one above the other in the five-story keep.
“The goal,” Harry explained, “is to be the first to roll these hoops from the chapel to the entrance to the privy kitchens.”
The passage, newly floored, was long and level and perfect for the purpose, but I regarded the metal barrel hoops and sticks Harry had “found” for us with a sense of dismay. I did not see how I would be able to keep control of such an unwieldy thing.
The Lady Margaret had no such doubts. She sent her younger brother a superior smile and was off, deftly spinning the hoop at her side. Prince Henry followed an instant later and nearly overtook his sister near the royal wardrobe; but for all her stocky build, the princess was fleet of foot.
My hoop toppled over at the first uneven bit of flooring. Harry completed the course, but was wise enough to move much more slowly than his young master.
“I was faster!” Prince Henry complained. “If you had not started before the signal to begin, I’d have reached the finish sooner.”
“Is it a race, then?” Margaret asked, eyes aglow with anticipation.
“It is. Let us see who takes the best two out of three.”
“Agreed. We will go back the way we came.” Margaret kilted up her skirts and ordered Harry to count to three.
Prince Henry was off at “two,” but his sister still passed him halfway to the chapel and beat him handily.
“Best three out of five,” the prince said, panting.
“Done.”
This time when Margaret won, they had an audience. Servants had come out of various household offices and courtiers had trickled down from the king’s apartments, drawn by the commotion.
“You cheated!” Face red, eyes bulging with anger and humiliation, Prince Henry threw his hoop against the wall. When it bounced back, the sharp metal rim nearly struck Harry. He barely jumped out of the way in time.
The spectators made themselves scarce. I eyed a nearby tapestry, wishing I could duck behind it and hide. I stiffened my spine. It was my duty to remain at Princess Margaret’s side, but I dearly wished she would wipe that smug expression off her face. Seeing it only heightened her brother’s anger. He glared at her, saying not a word, but if thoughts could kill she’d have burst into flames.