Lady of the Roses (34 page)

OUR UNHAPPY TIMES CONTINUED, AND MEG’S MARRIAGE
ushered in more troubles in its wake. Unsure whom to trust, King Edward turned increasingly to his queen’s relatives. My uncle, who had done such a dismal job in Ireland and was hated in England for his cruelty, was replaced as Constable of England by Elizabeth’s father, Earl Rivers. London became a scene of daily executions, as men Rivers suspected of treason were arrested and executed. The young Earl of Oxford, whose father and brother had been put to death by my uncle, was thrown into the Tower but obtained his release by turning witness against his friends. Others were not so fortunate. Henry Courtenay, who was heir to the earldom of Devon and generally regarded as innocent, but whose earldom was coveted by a friend of King Edward’s, went to the block.

We did not see Warwick in these days, for he had obtained a naval command that gave him an excuse to reside at Calais. We knew he was only biding his time until he could deal with Edward. That day arrived with news that shocked us all: In defiance of King Edward, who had refused to sanction Bella’s marriage to Clarence, Warwick had the two young lovers wed in Calais on Tuesday, the eleventh day of July, 1469. Archbishop George officiated, and the Earl of Oxford and five Knights of the Garter witnessed the ceremony.

“What possessed my lord of Warwick to defy the king on this marriage?” Ursula whispered, as stunned as the rest of England by Warwick’s act of mutiny against the king.

“Warwick does so because King Edward defied him on Meg’s marriage,” I replied. “And he means to show he is the king’s equal.”

With a heavy sigh, I laid down my embroidery and gazed out the window at the peaceful Aln flowing past Alnwick’s tall, mullioned windows. On the heels of Bella’s marriage, Warwick issued a proclamation declaring his intention to arrive in London and tender a petition of grievances to the king, just as the Duke of York had done to Henry in the fifties. King Edward immediately left the city for a pilgrimage north to Walsingham.

“’Tis a collision of wills between two giants, and where it will lead is anyone’s guess,” I added. “But one thing is certain…. There’s no going back now.”

I turned from the window to find John standing in the doorway. He entered the chamber with weary strides, setting his gauntlets on a table as he passed.

“Interesting observation,” he said, dropping into a chair. No clarions had sounded, and I was so stunned to find him home unexpectedly that I rose to my feet and remained there, unable to move for a moment.
Something is terribly wrong.

Recovering, I rushed to his side. “Oh, John, my dear lord, you look so tired. Is there anything I can get you?”

“You can get me a scribe,” he said, putting a hand to his brow.

I knew that gesture. “What has happened?” I breathed through cold lips.

“The king has been taken prisoner by Warwick. The queen’s father, Earl Rivers, and her brother John have been executed. So has their friend the new Earl of Devon.”

I swallowed, struggled for composure. “How—?” I asked in confusion, sinking into a chair.
This is too much, too much!

“There was a battle at Edgecote. In some strange coincidence, the king’s forces under Devon and Pembroke going north to join the king at Nottingham collided with Warwick’s troops moving south to London. Devon and Pembroke had broken with one another the previous night after a fight over a damsel, and they had separated their forces. Warwick caught them divided the next morning, and crushed them. Then he moved on the king and took him prisoner.”

“Like Henry?” I murmured incredulously. “Two kings…two prisoners?”

John rose and went to the window.

My heart twisted to see the way he stood, leaning his weight on the stone embrasure, his shoulders slumped, a hand rubbing on the old thigh injury from Blore Heath that always ached in damp weather. “I’ll send for the scribe,” I said softly, not knowing if he heard.

I soon learned that none of this had shaken John’s resolve to stand by his king. When a rebellion led by their rabid Lancastrian relative Sir Humphrey Neville broke out in the North, John received orders from Warwick to put it down, but he didn’t answer his brother’s summons. “Not while the king remains your prisoner,” he’d told Warwick. Hoping that somehow all would be mended between his brother and his king, John turned his focus on the Scots and strove to keep peace on the border.

On a sunny autumn day in late October, as I was interviewing a new manservant, two messengers arrived, clad in Warwick’s scarlet livery of the bear and ragged staff. My spirits lightened when I saw their smiles, and I ran to meet them. We gave them ale and nuts in the great hall and listened to the news they brought.

“My lord of Warwick has made peace with King Edward, and to celebrate the end of enemies, the king has ordered a love-day ceremony!”

It was as if a dark curtain dropped on my hopeful spirits. Oh, how I wished to exult with them at this news, seemingly the answer to all our prayers! But half my heart bore the memory of Henry’s love-day celebration after the Battle of St. Albans.

Mounted on Rose, I journeyed to London with John, battling my thoughts all the way as I pretended gaiety. The sun shone bright, and minstrels played their lilting tunes. But, engulfed by the dull ache of foreboding, my misery was almost a physical pain. I leaned over and patted Rose’s silken neck as we passed through Bishopsgate. It was near Henry’s love day that Warwick had given her to me. Gazing up at the birds wheeling in the sky, I remembered that other shining day, the other hopes. Now, as then, there had been deaths. This time the queen’s own father and brother had died. Would Elizabeth Woodville forgive?

Time seemed propelled backward as I watched the procession from my seat in the stands. Warwick and King Edward walked hand in hand to St. Paul’s. The queen followed the king, holding Clarence’s hand, enemies putting away enmity to swear loyalty and friendship forever. As the Duke of York and the Earl of Salisbury had done with Henry and Marguerite so long ago…

That day slid into this; memories shifted and I lost time, so that I did not know for a moment where I was. Then I blinked: The past fell away, and the present rose before me. Celebrated with such hope, that other love day had proved as hollow as a dried egg. Would this one follow in its footsteps?

We sat at the royal table, feasting and making merry with King Edward at Westminster, and I caught a glint in Elizabeth Woodville’s eyes when they rested on Warwick during the banquet. All the doubts and misgivings of Henry’s love day flooded me tenfold. I stole a glance at John. He seemed preoccupied. This day must dredge up even more painful memories for him—memories of a time when his father and brother still lived and hoped, a time that had offered promise of peace, a peace the years had proved elusive. Sometimes I felt we were on a ship in an endless storm, waves ever rising and crashing around us. We kept avoiding the rocks, but could we do so forever?

Alas, within three months, Edward’s love day proved as false as Henry’s. As at St. Albans, the deaths had been few, but as at St. Albans, the bloodshed was neither forgotten nor forgiven. The Woodville queen, always vengeful, willing to behead a man for a minor slight, was scarcely willing to forgive the execution of her father and brother. Behind the scenes, Elizabeth worked to redress the books, fanning Edward’s jealousy and Warwick’s rage, until finally she forced Warwick’s hand.

It was said she had tried to poison Warwick and Clarence at a Yuletide feast at Westminster, but they had been warned at the last moment. King Edward had defended his queen when the matter was laid before him, and angrily dismissed the plot as a figment of their imaginations. Following Elizabeth Woodville’s attempt on their lives, they had withdrawn to their estates. John came to Warkworth to greet the New Year of 1470, but we had no heart for celebration, so we sat quietly together as church bells chimed the hour of twelve. I listened to the last stroke fade away. Though I knew cheer would likely not be our portion this year, when the last chime sounded I sent a silent plea to Heaven that glad tidings come to us. For the heart is stubborn and foolish, and hope always triumphs, even in the midst of disaster. On John’s departure, I sought reassurance from a soothsayer, something I’d never done before. But the old woman, toothless and brown as a nut, with skin as wrinkled as a dried raisin, offered no comfort. “Beware the ides of March,” she said, as another of her ilk had said to Caesar fifteen hundred years ago. Her words plunged me into a dark mood, and I could not shake the sense of gloom that descended on me.

Indeed, messengers were soon caught bearing papers that spoke of Warwick’s intent to replace Edward with his brother Clarence. This was followed by reports that Warwick had lost a battle near Stamford in early March dubbed the “Battle of Lose-coat Field” since his fleeing army had shed their coats bearing his emblem as they ran. Taking his daughters and Nan, Warwick had fled to Calais with his son-in-law, Clarence—whose wife, Bella, was now eight months pregnant.

Reading John’s letter, I cried out and clutched my chest. A frightful pain had seized my heart.

Ursula ran to me. “Isobel, dear lady…are you all right? Here, sit!” She helped me into a chair.

The cramp in my chest slowly receded; I inhaled deeply. “I am…fine….” I lied, for my heart had been acting strangely for months. “’Tis merely the letter….”

Ursula took it from me, gasping and murmuring as she read. She laid it down with a heavy sigh. “One good thing,” she said. “Matters cannot get any worse.”

But they did. Even more dread tidings followed. Obeying King Edward’s orders, Calais refused to admit their Captain. In the throes of labor, no doubt brought on by the harsh sea voyage, Bella gave premature birth to a son, born dead aboard the tossing ship, with only Calais’s gift of wine as comfort.

I was at Warkworth, and John was occupied with his duties on the border, when the Northumberland herald arrived to inform me of even worse tidings from Westminster.

“King Edward has proclaimed Warwick and Clarence traitors, and placed a bounty on their heads. Your gracious uncle, the Earl of Worcester, has been reappointed Constable of England in place of the queen’s father, Earl Rivers, who was executed at Edgecote.”

Not trusting myself to speak, I inclined my head in dismissal. The man withdrew.

I yearned for the comfort of John’s arms after this news, but he did not come home. I wrote to him and received no reply. This bothered me more than I cared to admit, for our thirteenth wedding anniversary neared and, except for the time John had been imprisoned after Blore Heath, this occasion had been filled with plans and celebration through all the troubles of the years. If I didn’t know better, I might have thought he was avoiding me, but I did not permit myself such foolish thoughts. I knew many troubles preyed on his mind as he worked to maintain the peace of the realm against his own brother, and that the estrangement with his family weighed heavily on him. In my loneliness, however, I could not find consolation even in my children’s company, and I ached for him with a desperate longing. Every so often, like lightning from a summer sky, came the thought that thirteen was an unlucky number. Perhaps something had changed, and John was indeed avoiding me. But that made no sense; we had not had a serious argument since Somerset.

Meanwhile, fresh disturbances broke out in the North. Robin of Redesdale had been defeated once, but now he raised another rebellion. And, strangely, this news came to me not from John, who continued his silence, nor from itinerants, for they no longer came seeking shelter, but from Ursula, who learned it from the tavern keeper in the village before she left for York to buy almonds, sugar, and sundry supplies.

The notion that something was wrong grew harder to dismiss.

“AGNES, HOW IS THE FAMILY?”

She curtseyed, but did not look at me. “Fine, thank ye, me lady.”

I watched her, troubled. Her demeanor toward me had changed sharply in the past fortnight, reflecting the same coldness of the shopkeepers in the village, in York, and everywhere else I went. “How is your husband’s cousin, the one wounded at Hexham?”

She swallowed hard, and for a moment she did not reply. Then she said, “I know not where he be, me lady, but he has my prayers. With yer permission, me lady, I’ll tend to the privy now.”

I inclined my head, and she disappeared around the bend of the chamber. She had avoided my eyes both times. But it wasn’t only Agnes; all the servants treated me differently, whispering together and falling strangely silent when I appeared. They did my bidding without smiles and disappeared quickly from my presence. I could not fathom the reason. I had always treated them well, and I was certain they knew how much I cared for them.

Making no further attempt to talk to Agnes, I quit the chamber, headed for the courtyard, and took the path to the stables. The chambermaids and servants I passed along the way stepped aside sharply and bowed their heads, with a murmur of “m’lady” that seemed sometimes fearful, sometimes sullen.

“Where is Geoffrey?” I asked one of the young boy grooms scrubbing the horses.

He retreated a step in my presence before recovering to give his obeisance. “M’lady countess of Northumberland, I know not, but if ’tis yer wish, I can go and find him for ye.”

He seemed nervous. I shook my head. “No matter, thank you.”

I found Geoffrey deep in conversation with the saddler, their heads together. “Geoffrey—”

Both men leapt to their feet. Geoffrey bowed formally to me from the waist, in a way I found disturbing. He had always been courteous, but never obsequious. I looked at the saddler, who seemed to shrink beneath my gaze. I nodded to him, and he hurried away as if wild boars were on his tail.

“Geoffrey, what is happening?”

“M’lady, I’m sure I don’t know what you mean,” he said, his color rising.

“I’m sure you do,” I replied.

His color deepened to crimson. “M’lady…” He shifted his weight from foot to foot, weighing his words. “Perhaps you should speak to—” He broke off.