“When I have won,” he says steadily. “Let me go and win now, beloved.”
I let him go. I think no power in the world would have stopped him, and I tell the girls that we are staying in London at the Tower, one of their favorite palaces, and that their father and their half brothers have gone to fight the bad men who still hanker after the old King Henry, though he is a prisoner at the Tower himself, silent in his rooms on the floor just below us. I tell them that their father will come home safe to us. When they cry for him in the night, for they have bad dreams about the wicked queen and the mad king, and their bad uncle Warwick, I promise them that their father will defeat the bad people and come home. I promise he will bring the boys safely back. He has given his word. He has never failed. He will come home.
But this time, he does not.
This time, he does not.
He and his brothers in arms, my brother Anthony, his brother Richard, his beloved friend Sir William Hastings, and his loyal supporters, are shaken awake at Doncaster in the early hours of the morning by a couple of the king’s minstrels who, coming drunkenly home from whoring, happen to glance over the castle walls and see torches on the road. The enemy advance guard, marching at night, a sure sign of Warwick in command, is only an hour away, perhaps only moments away, coming to snatch the king before he can meet with his army. The whole of the north is up against the king and ready to fight for Warwick, and the royal party will be taken in a moment. Warwick’s influence runs deep and wide in this part of the world, and Warwick’s brother and Warwick’s brother-in-law have turned out against Edward and are fighting for their kinsman and for King Henry, and will be at the castle gate within an hour. There is no doubt in anyone’s mind that this time Warwick will not take prisoners.
Edward dispatches my boys to me, and then he, Richard, Anthony, and Hastings fling themselves on their horses and ride away in the night, desperate not to be taken by Warwick or his kinsmen, certain that this time there will be a summary execution for them. Warwick tried once to capture and keep Edward, as we have captured and kept Henry, and learned that there is no victory as final as death. He will never again imprison Edward and wait for everyone to concede defeat. This time he wants him dead.
Edward rides out into the darkness with his friends and kinsmen and has no time to send to me, to tell me where to meet him; he cannot even write to me to tell me where he is going. I doubt that he knows himself. All he is doing is getting away from certain death. Thoughts of how to return will come later. Now, tonight, the king is running for his life.
AUTUMN 1470
The news comes to London in unreliable rumors, and it is all, always bad. Warwick lands in England, as Edward predicted, but what he did not predict is the rush of nobles to the traitor’s side, in support of the king they have left to rot in the Tower for the last five years. The Earl of Shrewsbury joins him. Jasper Tudor-who can raise most of Wales-joins him. Lord Thomas Stanley-who took the ruby ring at my coronation joust and told me that his motto was “Without Changing”-joins him. A whole host of lesser gentry follow these influential commanders, and Edward is swiftly outnumbered in his own kingdom. All the Lancaster families are finding and polishing their old weapons, hoping to march out to victory once again. It is as he warned me: he could not spread out the wealth quickly enough, fairly enough, to enough people. We could not spread the influence of my family far enough, deep enough. And now they think they will do better under Warwick and the mad old king than under Edward and my family.
Edward would have been killed on the spot if they had caught him; but they have missed him-that much is clear. But nobody knows where he is; and someone comes to the Tower once a day to assure me that they have seen him and that he was dying of his wounds, or that they have seen him and he is fleeing to France, or that they have seen him on a bier and he is dead.
My boys arrive at the Tower travel-stained and weary, furious that they did not get away with the king. I try not to hang on to them, or kiss them more often than morning and night, but I can hardly believe that they have come safely back to me. Just as I cannot believe that my husband and my brother have not.
I send to Grafton for my mother to come to us in the Tower. I need her advice and company, and if we are indeed lost and I have to go abroad, I will want her with me. But the messenger comes back and his face is grave.
“Your Lady Mother is not at her home,” he says.
“Where is she?”
He looks shifty, as if he wishes someone else could tell me bad news. “Tell me at once,” I say, my voice sharp with fear. “Where is she?”
“She is under arrest,” he says. “Orders of the Earl of Warwick. He has ordered her arrest, and his men came to Grafton and took her away.”
“Warwick has my mother?” I can hear my heart thudding in my ears. “My mother is a prisoner?”
“Yes.”
I hear a rattling noise, and I see that my hands are shaking so badly that my rings are clicking against the arms of the chair. I take a breath to steady myself, and grip tight to stop myself shaking. My son Thomas comes closer to stand on one side of my chair. Richard steps up to the other.
“On what charge?”
I think. It cannot be treason: nobody could argue that my mother has done more than advise me. Nobody could charge her with treason when she has been a good mother-in-law to the crowned king and a loving companion to his queen. Not even Warwick could stoop so low as to charge a woman with treason and behead her for loving her daughter. But this is a man who killed my father and my brother without reason. His desire must only be to break my heart and rob Edward of the support of my family. This is a man who will kill me if he ever gets hold of me.
“I am so sorry, Your Grace-”
“What charge?” I demand. My throat is dry and I give a little cough.
“Witchcraft,” he says.
There is no need of a trial to put a witch to death, though no trial has ever failed: it is easy to find people to witness on oath that their cows died or that their horse threw them because a witch had overlooked them. But in any case, there is no need of either witnesses or a trial. A single priest is all that is needed to attest a witch’s guilt, or a lord like Warwick can simply declare her guilty and no one will defend her. Then she can be strangled and buried at the village crossroads. They usually get the blacksmith to strangle the woman since he, by virtue of his trade, has big strong hands. My mother is a tall woman, a famous beauty with a long slim neck. Any man could choke the life out of her in minutes. It does not need to be a brawny blacksmith. Any one of Warwick’s guard could easily do it; would do it, in a moment, on a word, gladly on Warwick’s word.
“Where is she?” I demand. “Where has he taken her?”
“Nobody at Grafton knew where they were going,” the man says. “I asked everyone. A troop of horse came, and they made your mother ride pillion behind their commanding officer, and they took her north. They told no one where they were going. They just said that she was under arrest for witchcraft.”
“I must write to Warwick,” I say quickly. “Go and eat and get a fresh horse. I shall need you to travel as fast as you can. Are you ready to leave at once?”
“At once,” he says, bows, and goes out.
I write to Warwick demanding her release. I write to every archbishop we once commanded, and anyone who I think would speak for us. I write to my mother’s old friends and family attached to the House of Lancaster. I even write to Margaret Beaufort, who, as the heir of the House of Lancaster, may have some influence. Then I go to my chapel, the Queen’s Chapel, and I get down on my knees all night to pray that God will not allow this wicked man to take this good woman, who is blessed with nothing more than a sacred foresight, a few pagan tricks, and a total lack of deference. At dawn, I write her name on a dove’s feather and send it floating downstream to warn Melusina that her daughter is in danger.