The Fallen Queen

Merry my Spright.

Merry my hey down derry.

I kist her once and I kist her twice,

And we were wondrous merry!

At the end, as the last notes hovered in the air, he leaned forward and pressed his lips softly against Jane’s.

“There now,” he said, “whatever happens, I shall always be the first. Come what may, whether you are ever Queen of England or remain only Queen of My Heart, my darling Jane, I will always be the first man to kiss Lady Jane Grey, and no one can ever take that away from me; that honour—that very great honour—will be mine forever.”

Jane sat back on her heels blinking and befuddled. “M-My L-Lord, wh-what … what are you saying?”

The words had scarcely left her lips before she found herself enfolded in Thomas Seymour’s strong embrace, pressed suffocatingly tight against his hard, muscular chest in such a way that the pins holding her hood in place stabbed into her scalp like tiny knives, some of which Mrs. Ellen would later discover, when she helped Jane prepare for bed that night, had actually drawn blood.

“What am I saying?” he repeated. “Only that I love you, darling Jane, I love you! I love you! I love you! Can you not hear it in every breath I take, in every move I make, in every beat of my heart? I love you, Jane, I love you! You—only you!”

And then he let her go, so abruptly that Jane fell back onto her elbows and almost crushed the lute. With a resigned, defeated sigh, he sat back, but as he did so he deftly caught up her hand. With one last smouldering gaze and heart-tugging sigh, he took a moment to compose himself before he shut his eyes and then, reverently, bowed his head and pressed his lips chastely against the back of her trembling hand. “But, for England’s sake, for the greater good, I must sacrifice my heart and let you go,” he said with a crestfallen sigh. “You, my darling, were meant for far greater things than I can give you. You were meant to wear a crown and be the torch that leads the English people out of the Papist darkness into the light of the Reformed Faith! You, my darling, as much as it hurts me, must be Edward’s helpmeet, not mine.”

“But I don’t want to marry Edward!” Jane protested, for the first time giving voice to her feelings. “He … he … frightens me! And I don’t … I don’t … love … him.”

“I know you don’t, my darling.” Thomas Seymour enfolded her in his arms once again. “And I don’t blame you. No one loves Edward, not really! He is my own nephew, the son my own beloved sister lost her life giving birth to, yet I cannot find it in my heart to love him and must in his presence resort to playacting. He is as chilly as a fish, a frigid little prig who takes himself far too seriously. He has none of his great sire’s charm or the common touch, and no sense of fun, and he knows nothing of love and warmth and has no desire to learn. But you must marry him, my love; it is your destiny to be Edward’s godly and righteous, virtuous and learned queen; united together you will be the rulers of a new Jerusalem, the thunderbolt of terror to Papists everywhere; your reign will be the death blow to the Catholic faith in England! We must each sacrifice our own hearts, and deepest desires, for the greater good, for England, and the Reformed Faith, my darling. Our love shall be the martyr of duty!”

He pulled the hood from her head and plucked the pins from her hair and stroked it before drawing her close again and pressing his lips warmly, tenderly against her temple. “When you lie in his arms, think of me, darling Jane, think of me and how my heart beats only for you! We will always have our dreams to console us and the knowledge that they were sacrificed, selflessly, for the greater good. And as cold as Edward is, always remember, my love for you is pulsing hot, and it will keep you warm and give you the strength to go on and do your duty, as you must, indeed, as must we all.

“And when he enters you, close your eyes, my love, and think of all the good that you, our homegrown Protestant queen, can do for England, all the souls you will save, and the seed he plants in your womb is England’s future, the son that will someday rule and keep us all safe from Papist enslavement, the Catholic shackles and chains that the Pope and Mary Tudor would fasten tight upon us! England needs you, Jane, and that claim, that need, must take precedence over my desire for you, and yours for me. For you do desire me, don’t you, Jane?”

In that moment Jane suddenly realized, even as she was nodding her head and stammering it, that yes, indeed she did. How curious that she had never known it until the moment when she must renounce it. It was, she said, like never knowing you had an arm until the surgeon came to cut it off. The Lord Admiral really was the most persuasive and overwhelming man!

Jane was so overcome by the Lord Admiral’s declaration of love that she couldn’t eat a bite, only gulp nervously at the ale, and the honey cakes grew cold as her face and heart grew hotter. And when they walked back to the house, arm in arm, this time at a more leisurely pace, the Lord Admiral paused to pluck a pink rose and present it to Jane.

“Every morning when the dew appears upon the roses, always remember, my dearest, darling Jane, that they are weeping in envy because their colour cannot compare with the pink in your cheeks …” And then he bent his head and pressed a last lingering kiss onto her cheek. “And lips …” And he kissed her, long and deep, and she tasted the cakes and ale still fresh upon his mouth.

When Jane ascended the stairs, she encountered Elizabeth upon the landing in a bold red gown that, coupled with the fiery unbound hair streaming down her back, made her look like a figure of flame. She was standing beside the window that overlooked the garden, idly tracing the CP and TS worked in red, gold, and green stained glass, moving her long, pale white finger in such a manner that, with a confident brush of her fingertip, the C acquired an extra appendage and became instead an E with a middle arm reaching out greedily for TS—Thomas Seymour. At Jane’s approach, she abruptly turned around and gave Jane such a blazing, burning stare, the fire in her eyes as bright as her Tudor red hair, that Jane was certain that Elizabeth had seen what had just passed between the Lord Admiral and herself, that looking from a window above she had witnessed that tender kiss and imagined the words of love that accompanied it. Then Elizabeth turned on her heel, her loose hair flying out like a curtain of flame, almost slapping Jane in the face, and, with her nose in the air and a impertinent flounce of her harlot-scarlet skirts, flounced upstairs to her room and gave such a resounding slam to her door that it echoed throughout the manor.

The next morning, warm under the fringed velvet coverlet of her deep feather bed, Jane would smile to herself and wiggle her toes when she heard Tom Seymour creeping down the corridor and the door to Elizabeth’s room creaking open, happy and secure in the knowledge that it was herself that the Lord Admiral truly loved, not the brazen and fiery tart Elizabeth.

“Elizabeth is just a toy, a peppery little tart to add spice to a man’s life, a dalliance that means nothing.” Thomas Seymour had shrugged when she dared to tentatively mention his seeming infatuation with the princess. “I am a man, with needs and urges, my darling,” he explained, “and, since I cannot have you, as there cannot be any hint of unchaste behaviour to sully the name of our future queen”—he lifted his handsome shoulders in a light, carefree shrug—“since I cannot have you … I amuse myself with Elizabeth, a little whore born of a great one, but I don’t love her. How could I? When I love you, Jane, only you! I love you with enough nobility, respect, and honour to renounce you, to lay my own heart on the altar as a sacrifice and set you free, to serve a greater purpose. I cannot hold you back, my darling, for I love you far too much to think only of my greedy pleasure and deny England the queen it both deserves and needs.”

In her bed at Bradgate, under the covers, safe in the loving arms of her sisters, Jane shook with sobs. “But I did not ask him about Catherine, his wife; I could not! I could not forget her. I could never forget her. She was so kind to me, but in those happy moments when he professed his love for me, I did not want to remember her either! He loved me! Someone loved me, really loved me! And that was enough! We knew we could not have each other, and I tried to tell myself that in truth we did no wrong, but we did, we did! The thoughts, the feelings, the desires were real and true and thus worse than what he did with Elizabeth, which was base and false and meant nothing! And now Queen Catherine is dead, and I cannot confess and beg her forgiveness. I shall have to live with the guilt for the rest of my life!” She sobbed and there was nothing we could say to comfort or console her; all we could do was hold her and let her cry herself to sleep.

After the Dowager Queen’s death it all began to crumble. Her baby daughter died, yet another unloved, unwanted, and inconvenient little Mary. And without Catherine Parr’s restraining hand to rein him in, the Lord Admiral cast off all caution and common sense and galloped headlong at full speed straight into the briar patch of disaster. His last flamboyant gamble cost him all when he crept into the King’s bedchamber late one night and tried to steal the sleep-befuddled boy away to marry him secretly to Jane, hoping to see the marriage consummated and thus legally binding before the first light of dawn. In the morning light, he planned to return to the palace with the King and his new Queen, and replace his brother, Edward Seymour, as Lord Protector of the Realm.

But he had forgotten to factor a watchdog into his plans—upon spying an intruder, the King’s pet spaniel barked. The Lord Admiral tried to distract the dog by snatching off one of his soft-soled velvet slippers—eminently more suitable for creeping about the palace after midnight than the Spanish leather boots he usually wore—and tossing it across the room, but Edward’s vigilant pet showed no interest and instead ran at the intruder and lunged to bite. The Lord Admiral panicked and pulled out a pistol and shot the dog dead, and thus ruined any chance he had of charming his nephew into an act of royal clemency. The guards came rushing in as Edward howled and wept, his bare feet slipping in the loyal canine’s rapidly cooling blood as he pummeled his formerly favourite uncle’s chest.

Thomas Seymour spent the rest of his life in the Tower as, one by one, all his crimes came to light, his intrigues with pirates, a coin clipping scheme to embezzle money from the Royal Mint, the stockpiling of arms, and, most interesting of all to a public avid for royal scandal, the sordid details of his dalliance with Elizabeth. And that was the emphatic end to all plans to make a royal match for Jane as our parents hastily moved to distance themselves from Thomas Seymour and his foolhardy schemes.

Our lady-mother rushed in a state of feigned alarm to the Lord Protector and indignantly informed him that her eldest daughter was not a pawn in the Lord Admiral’s game, and she resented and hotly contested all who tried to make it so. She slapped her palm flat and firmly down upon the King’s proudest achievement, his Book of Common Prayer that was to grace every church in England. “I swear it is not so and never was!” Jane, she firmly stated, had been the Dowager Queen Catherine’s ward, and she had promised to arrange a suitable marriage for her; she had even hinted, our lady-mother with a demureness any who knew her would see through like the finest Venetian glass, that his own son, Edward Seymour the younger, had been one of the likely suitors Catherine had in mind, praising to the skies his wisdom, maturity, and charm, proclaiming him a promising young lad poised to follow in his father’s footsteps. After all, with Catherine dead, there was no one to contradict her but the Lord Admiral, and his own brother knew better than any that if Thomas said the sky was blue it was best to glance upward just to be sure. And our lady-mother was canny enough to add that the Dowager Queen had told her in confidence that she herself had no quarrel with the Lord Protector and his wife, that the unpleasantness over the ownership of some jewels, whether they were Crown property or the Lady Catherine’s, had been blown entirely out of proportion by the Lord Admiral; “knowing your brother as well as you do, my lord,” our lady-mother added in a low voice accompanied by a sympathetic nod, which she reenacted for our father later, “I am sure you understand.”

While the storm was bursting over Tom Seymour’s head, Jane languished and moped around Bradgate. She tried to lose herself in the pages of her beloved books, to pound sense back into her head with Socrates and Scripture, struggling and fighting against her secret love for the Lord Admiral, now crushed like a flower under the hard boot heel of Truth, yet still stirring weakly with life, trying to revive itself even as Jane resisted. For all she disliked Elizabeth, many years later when I grew to know our sovereign lady better and witnessed personally her fight against her feelings for that charming, seductive scoundrel Robert Dudley, I would think that she and Jane had far more in common than either of them could ever have guessed.

Finally, our lady-mother, “sick unto death of Jane’s sullenness and gloomy face,” decided to accept Princess Mary’s invitation to have us come spend Christmas and New Year with her at Beaulieu Manor in Essex.

Kate and I were unable to conceal or curtail our excitement, bobbing up and down on our toes and fidgeting enough to provoke some sharp words from our lady-mother, until at last we mounted our ponies and rode out with glad hearts, revelling in the warm softness of our winter furs, gold-fringed and embroidered leather gloves, and new velvet riding habits—cinnamon for Kate and black cherry for me.

Cousin Mary was always very kind to us, and a visit to, or from, her always meant lots of presents. She liked to pretend that we were the little girls, the daughters, she always longed for but never had and lavish us with the gifts she would have given them.

But Jane came out dragging her booted feet as though her severely cut ash-coloured habit were made of lead instead of velvet, and the silver buckles on her boots iron shackles, letting the skirt drag until our lady-mother shouted at her to pick it up.

Jane mounted her horse with such a glum spirit I could almost see a dark rain cloud hovering over her, dripping icy rain onto her head. She despised our royal cousin’s devotion to the Catholic faith she was raised in, and the rich ornaments, jewelled crucifixes, “the accoutrements of Papist luxury,” with which she adorned her person and her chambers.

I had such a feeling inside me as we left the courtyard and passed through the gates, such a sick, fearful foreboding that I slowed my prancing pony to a walk and glanced back at Jane’s scowling countenance. One look at her made me wish I had the power to tell her to turn back, but I was only a little girl, powerless to intervene or change anything. Our lady-mother, riding before us, looking grand as a queen, sitting straight in the saddle in her orange velvet, red fox furs and golden roses set with rubies, with her hair netted in gold beneath her feathered hat, had decreed that we would go, and she would make certain that I regretted it if I dared speak up about the fear that so suddenly and overwhelmingly possessed me. And I knew that if I tried to put it into words it would sound quite silly, just as I knew that the laughter that would burst from her lips would not ascend to her eyes; there I would see only derision and contempt. And that I did not like to see in my own mother’s eyes, so I kept silent.

When we arrived at Beaulieu, Lady Anne Wharton, one of our royal cousin’s ladies-in-waiting, came out to greet and escort us inside. As we passed the chapel, she paused before the open doorway and curtsied deeply to the altar upon which sat the golden monstrance containing the Host, the wafer of bread the Catholics believed would be miraculously transformed into the body of Our Lord when elevated by the priest during Mass.

Jane bristled, and I felt the icy prickle of fear down my back. I tugged at her sleeve, but she ignored me.

“Why do you curtsy?” my sister asked, in a voice sickly sweet, like rotten meat disguised beneath a thick coating of spices. “Is our cousin within?”

“No, my lady,” Lady Wharton patiently explained, “I am curtsying to the Host—Him that made us all.”

Jane brushed past her and made an exaggerated show of peering into the candlelit chapel, then turned back to face Lady Wharton with wide-eyed amazement. “Why, how can He be there that made us all when the baker made Him?”

My sister was fervently opposed to the Catholic belief in Transubstantiation and the Doctrine of the Real Presence. She had no tolerance at all for anyone who believed that during Mass the bread became Our Saviour’s body and the wine His precious blood. She scoffed and derided and venomously attacked this belief at every opportunity, insisting that it was an insult to common sense, faith, and intelligence.

At such times I was always glad I had never confided in Jane, the way I had Kate, that I believed in miracles and prayed every night that God would work one for me and make me grow up into a beautiful and shapely, slim-limbed young lady just like my sisters. Jane would have been so disappointed in me if she had known and I cringed to think of the scathing sermons and lectures she would have bombarded my poor little ears with. But Kate and our father were always kind and quick to assure me that our family breeds diminutive and dainty women, our beefy, robust mother being the exception of course, but we always knew that I was different. Even though I used to sneak out into the forest surrounding Bradgate and climb a tree and tie to my feet the bricks I had stolen when the workmen came to build a new wall and hang from a limb, ignoring the bite of the bark into my tender palms and the awful, wrenching ache in my arms and shoulders, and in the small of my back, praying and concentrating with all my might, willing the weight of the bricks to straighten my spine and make my arms and legs stretch, I never grew another inch after my fifth birthday.

It was at that moment that our royal cousin appeared. Her sumptuous jewel-bright purple satin gown, gold brocade under-sleeves and petticoat, and the elaborate jewelled hood perched like a crown atop her faded grey-streaked hair could not disguise the lines etched across her brow and framing her taut, thin-lipped mouth, her deep-sunken eyes, or the fact that she was pale and pinch-faced. A bulge in her cheek and a strong scent of cloves hovering about her, vying with the flowers of her perfume, told me that she was nursing a toothache. I saw the smile falter then die upon her lips, and her eyes were both fire and ice when she looked at Jane.

“I would lay my head on the block and gladly suffer death rather than sit through one of Edward’s prayer book services!” she declared as she and Jane faced each other like enemies on a battlefield.

Thinking fast, I hurled myself at Cousin Mary, embracing her knees. She tottered and reeled backward, flailing her arms, and only our lady-mother’s quick intervention kept her from falling. Drowning out our lady-mother’s angry words with my tears, as soon as Cousin Mary had regained her footing and knelt to try and soothe me, I flung my arms around her neck and into her ear whispered a fervent plea that she not be angry with Jane. “She has been so sad since Queen Catherine died.”

Cousin Mary gave a quick nod and said, “I understand.” Then she rose and went to embrace first Kate, then our lady-mother, and lastly Jane, lingering as she held my sister’s stiff-backed body in her arms and offering her condolences over the death of the Dowager Queen. I thought for certain Jane would challenge her when she said that Queen Catherine had been in her prayers, for Jane, as a Protestant, did not believe in saying masses for departed souls and prayers for the dead; the living had greater need of them. But Jane bit her tongue and smiled wanly when our royal cousin caressed her pale face and said she would pray for Jane too, for her “sadness to be lifted,” and that happiness would again find her in this household. “I shall endeavour to make it so.”

“I have a special gift for you, little cousin Jane—and for Katherine and Mary too,” she added with a warm smile as she urged us to follow her upstairs. While our lady-mother, her patience sorely tried by Jane’s, as well as my own, antics, claimed a headache and let Lady Wharton lead her to the room that had been prepared for her, Kate and I each took Cousin Mary by the hand and, with Jane trailing sullenly behind, followed eagerly to the room she had prepared especially for us.

In the great, grand pink and gold brocaded chamber we three sisters would share, sleeping in a giant canopied bed with gilded posters as round and thick as burly men, lovely gowns waited, spread out upon the bed for us to sigh over and admire. But first, three white-capped and aproned maids—one for each of us—stood by in readiness to undress and bathe us. There were three copper tubs lined up in a row before the massive carved stone fireplace, and the maids stood ready to pour in steaming pails of water and sprinkle dried rose petals on top. The baths would warm our flesh, and while we soaked, there would be cups of steaming, spicy hippocras to warm our insides as well. And then … the dresses!

For Jane there was a gown of palest sea green silk, a marvellous colour that seemed to shift between blue and green as the shimmering folds, embroidered with silver, white-capped waves and exquisite little silver fishes, flowed like water over my sister’s limbs, rippling as she moved. It was trimmed in pearly white embroidery, like the finest, most delicate filigree, punctuated with pearls, giving the illusion of white froth floating upon the sea. And for Kate, to complement her gleaming copper curls, there was a pale orange silk, not too delicate nor too bold, over which gold-embroidered butterflies fluttered, with frills of golden lace edging the square-cut bodice and encircling her dainty wrists. And for me, Cousin Mary, knowing that I preferred darker hues to clothe my person, had chosen a deep mulberry silk with a kirtle and sleeves of silver floral-figured crimson damask, with silver lace at the neck and wrists. And there were satin slippers to match each gown. With what loving care our royal cousin had chosen each gown and its accessories!

She had us line up in a row for her to admire, then walked behind us and around our necks, one by one, she fastened a necklace—pearls for Jane with a square spring-green emerald pendant hanging by one corner; a fiery orange stone suspended like a blazing fireball on a golden chain for Kate, a fire opal Cousin Mary said when I asked what it was called; and a long, braided rope of garnet and amethyst beads interspersed with silver roses for me. And then Cousin Mary, lamenting how faded and sparse her own lank, lacklustre locks had grown despite the washes of saffron she had lately tried, recalling wistfully, with sighs and misty eyes, the happy golden days of her childhood when the people had called her “Princess Marigold” for the orangey gold glory that was her hair, had us each stand between her knees while she gave our tresses a hundred strokes each with a thick-bristled gold-backed brush, which she had us count aloud so that she might judge how well we knew our numbers.

Jane recited the numerals with poor grace, making clear with her voice and manner that she considered this exercise an insult to her intelligence. But Cousin Mary chose to ignore it and smiled and nodded encouragingly throughout, then she kissed Jane’s cheek and crowned her ruddy chestnut waves with a chaplet of pearls. For Kate’s coppery ringlets there was a delicate cap of gold net latticed with peach-coloured pearls, and for my stubborn sable red frizzy curls, a plum velvet hood with a garnet and silver rose border. Then, all smiles, she led us down to the Great Hall where another surprise awaited us.