The ladies in waiting are standing in a line, and they bow as my father comes in. The senior men of the household follow us into the room to hear the news. Behind them come the servants, the garrison of the castle and those of the troop who chose to come to listen rather than go to rest. Father speaks clearly enough so that everyone can hear. ‘We rode in support of my kinsmen Lord Richard and Sir Robert Welles,’ he says. ‘They think, as I do, that the king is under the control of the queen and her family and that he has reneged on his agreements to me, and that he is no king for England.’
There is a murmur of approval; everyone here resents the power and success of the Rivers family. George clambers up on the dais to stand beside my father as if to remind us all that there is an alternative to this faithless king. ‘Lord Richard Welles is dead,’ Father says bleakly. ‘This false king took him out of sanctuary –’ he repeats the terrible crime done against the laws of God and man ‘– he took him out of sanctuary, and threatened him with death. When Lord Richard’s son Sir Robert was arrayed for battle this false king killed Lord Welles before the battle even started, killed him without a trial, on the field of battle.’
George nods, looking grave. To break sanctuary is to undermine the safety and power of the church, to defy God Himself. A man who puts his hand on the altar of a church has to know that he is safe there. God Himself takes such a criminal under his protection. If the king does not recognise the power of sanctuary then he is setting himself up as greater than God. He is a heretic, a blasphemer. He can be very sure that God will strike him down.
‘We were defeated,’ my father says solemnly. ‘The army mustered by the Welles’ was broken in Edward’s charge. We withdrew.’
I feel Isabel’s cold hand come into mine. ‘We’ve lost?’ she asks disbelievingly. ‘We’ve lost?’
‘We will retreat to Calais and regroup,’ Father says. ‘This is a setback but not a defeat. We will rest tonight and tomorrow we will pack up and march out. But let no-one mistake, this is now war between me, and the so-called King Edward. The rightful king is George of the House of York, and I shall see him on the throne of England.’
‘George!’ the men shout, raising their fists in the air.
‘God save King George!’ my father prompts them.
‘King George!’ they reply. In truth they would swear to anything that my father commanded.
‘À Warwick!’ My father gives his battle cry and they bellow with one voice after him: ‘À Warwick!’
DARTMOUTH, DEVON, APRIL 1470
We travel at the steady speed of the mules that carry Isabel’s litter. Father has scouts following behind our retreating army and they report that Edward is not chasing us out of his kingdom. Father says that he is a lazy fool and he has gone back to the queen’s warm bed in London. We go by easy stages to Dartmouth where Father’s ship is waiting for us. Isabel and I stand on the quayside as the wagons and the horses are loaded. The sea is so calm it could be a lake, the day is hot for April, with the white seagulls wheeling in the air and calling; there is a pleasant smell of the quayside, the tang of salt, of drying seaweed from the nets, of tar. This could almost be a summer day and Father planning a pleasure voyage for us.
Midnight, Father’s black warhorse, is one of the last to be led up the gangplank. They put a sack on his head so he cannot see the ridged plank and the water beneath. But he knows they are putting him on board a ship. He has gone criss-crossing the seas many times, he has invaded England twice. He is a veteran of Father’s many battles but now he behaves like a nervous colt, pulling back from the gangplank, rearing up so that the men scatter from his flailing hooves, until they put him in a sling and load him on board and he cannot resist them.
‘I’m afraid,’ Isabel says. ‘I don’t want to sail.’
‘Izzy, the sea is as calm as a pond. We could practically swim home.’
‘Midnight knows there is something wrong.’
‘No he doesn’t. He’s always naughty. And anyway, he is on board now, he’s in his stall eating hay. Come on, Izzy, we can’t delay the ship.’
Still she won’t go forwards. She pulls me to one side as the ladies go on board and Mother too. They are raising the sails, shouting commands and replies. The royal cabin door stands open for us. George goes past us, indifferent to Izzy’s fears, Father is giving his last orders to someone on the quayside and the sailors are starting to release the ropes from the great iron rings on the quay.
‘I’m too near my time to sail.’
‘You’ll be fine,’ I say. ‘You can lie in the bunk on the ship just as you would lie in your bed at home.’
Still she hesitates. ‘What if she has whistled up a wind?’
‘What?’
‘The queen, and her mother the witch. Witches can whistle up a wind, can’t they? What if she has whistled up a wind and it’s out there, waiting for us?’
‘She can’t do a thing like that, Iz. She’s just an ordinary woman.’
‘She would, you know she would. She will never forgive us for the death of her father and her brother. Her mother said as much.’
‘Of course they were angry with us, but she can’t do it, she’s not a witch.’
Father is suddenly beside us. ‘Get on board,’ he says.
‘Izzy is frightened,’ I say to him.
He looks at her, his oldest, his chosen daughter; and though she has her hand on her swelling belly and her face is white, he looks at her with hard brown eyes, as if she were nothing to him but an obstacle between him and his new plan. Then he glances back inland, as if he might see the billowing standards of the king’s army trotting down the road to the quayside. ‘Get on board,’ is all he says and he leads the way up the gangplank without looking back, and gives the order to cast off as we scurry after him.
They cast off the ropes, and the barges come and take their lines on board to tow us out to sea. The rowers in the barges lean forwards and pull as the little drummer boy starts a steady beat to keep them in time and they edge the ship away from the cobbled quayside and out into the river. The sails flap and start to fill with wind, and the boat rocks in the slapping waves. Father is beloved in Devon, as in all the ports of England, for his protection of the narrow seas and there are many people waving, kissing their hands to him, and calling their blessing. George immediately goes and stands beside him on the poop deck, raising his hand in a kingly salute, and my father calls Izzy to his side and puts his arm around her shoulders, turning her so that everyone can see her big pregnant belly. Mother and I stand in the bow of the ship. Father does not call me to his side, he does not need me there. It is Isabel who is to be the new Queen of England, going into exile now, but certain to return in triumph. It is Isabel who is carrying the child that they all hope will be the son who will be the King of England.
We reach the open sea and the sailors drop the ropes to the barges, and reef the sails. A little breeze comes up and the sails fill and then the timbers creak as the wind takes the boat and we start to plough through the blue water with the waters singing along the prow. Izzy and I have always loved sailing and she forgets her fear and comes and stands with me at the side of the boat, looking over the rail for dolphin in the clear water. There is a line of cloud on the horizon like a string of milky pearls.
In the evening, we heave to off the port of Southampton where the rest of Father’s fleet is at anchor, waiting for the command to join us. Father sends a little rowing boat to tell them to come, and we wait, wallowing a little in the swirling currents of the Solent, looking towards land expecting to see, at any moment, a moving forest of sails, our wealth and pride and the source of Father’s power – the command of the seas. But only two ships appear. They come alongside us and Father leans over the side of our ship as they bawl to him that we were expected, that the Rivers’ son, Anthony Woodville, with his family’s cursed foresight rode like a madman with his troop to get here before us, and that he has commanded the crews, arrested some, killed others; but at any rate he has all of Father’s ships, including our brand-new flagship the Trinity, in his grasping hands. Anthony Woodville has the command of Father’s fleet. The Rivers have taken our ships from us, as they took our king from us, as they will take everything we own from us.