The White Queen (48 page)

Richard the false king, appalled at the betrayal of his great friend and the man he
had raised to be Constable of England, takes only a moment to realize that the force
mustered by the Duke of Buckingham is enough to defeat the royal guard twice over.
He has to raise an army, commanding every able-bodied man in England to rally to his
side, demanding their loyalty as their king. Mostly, they turn out for him, albeit
slowly. The Duke of Norfolk has held down the rebellion in the southern counties.
He is sure that London is safe, but he has no doubt that Buckingham is raising troops
in Wales, and that Henry Tudor will sail from Brittany to join him there. If Henry
brings in a thousand men, then the rebels and the king’s army will be well matched,
and nobody would bet on the outcome. If he brings in more than that, Richard will
be fighting for his survival against bad odds and against an army led by Jasper Tudor,
one of the greatest commanders that Lancaster has ever had.

Richard marches to Coventry and keeps Lord Stanley, Lady Margaret’s husband and the
stepfather of Henry Tudor, close at his side. Stanley’s son Lord Strange is not to
be found at home. His servants say that he has
massed an enormous army of his tenants and retainers and is marching to serve his
master. Richard’s worry is: nobody knows who that master might be.

Richard leads his forces south from Coventry, to cut off his betraying friend Buckingham
from the uprising of our forces in the southern counties. He plans that Buckingham
will cross the Severn River to enter England, and find no allies but the royal army
waiting grimly for him in the pouring rain.

The troops move slowly down the churning mud of the roads. Bridges are washed away
and they have to march extra miles to find a crossing. The horses of the officers
and the mounted guard labor chest-deep in glutinous mud; the men march with their
heads down, soaked to the skin, and at night when they rest they cannot light fires,
for everything is wet.

Grimly, Richard drives them on, taking a little pleasure in knowing that the man he
loved and trusted above all others, Henry Stafford, Duke of Buckingham, is also pushing
his way through mud, through swollen rivers, through incessant rain. This must be
bad weather for recruiting rebels, Richard thinks. This must be bad weather for the
young duke, who is no seasoned campaigner like Richard. This must be bad weather for
a man dependent on allies from overseas. Surely Buckingham cannot hope that Henry
Tudor has set sail in storms such as these, and he will not be able to get word of
the Rivers forces in the southern counties.

Then the king hears good news. Buckingham is not only facing the driving rain, which
never stops, he is
constantly attacked by the Vaughans of Wales. They are chieftains in this territory,
and they have no love for the young duke. He had hoped they would let him rise against
Richard, perhaps even support him. But they have not forgotten that it was he who
took Thomas Vaughan from his master the young king and executed him. At every turn
of the road there are half a dozen of them, guns primed, ready to shoot the first
rank of men and ride off. At every valley there are men hidden in trees throwing rocks,
firing arrows, setting a shower of spears down through the rain into Buckingham’s
straggling force until the men feel that the rain and the spears are the same thing
and that they are fighting an enemy like water, from which there is no escape, and
which drives down mercilessly and never stops.

Buckingham cannot get his messengers to ride into Wales to bring out the Welsh men
loyal to the Tudors. His scouts are cut down the moment they are out of sight of the
main column, so his army cannot swell with hard fighting men, as Lady Margaret promised
him that it would. Instead, every night, and at every stop, and even in broad daylight
on the road, his men are slipping away. They are saying he is an unlucky leader and
that his campaign will be washed away. Every time they line up to march they are fewer;
he can see the column on the drowned road does not stretch so long. When he rides
up and down, cheering the men on, promising them victory, they don’t meet his eyes.
They keep their heads down, as if his optimistic speech and the pelting of the rain
are both the same meaningless noise.

Buckingham cannot know, but he guesses that Henry Tudor, the ally he plans to betray,
is also beaten by the wall of water that never stops. He is pinned in port by the
same storm that is blowing Buckingham’s army away. Henry Tudor has five thousand mercenaries,
a massive force, an unbeatable force, paid and armed by the Duke of Brittany—enough
to take England on his own. He has knights and horse and cannon and five ships, an
expedition that cannot fail—except for the wind and the pouring rain. The ships toss
and yaw; even inside the shelter of the harbor, they twang at the mooring ropes. The
men, packed inside for the short journey across the English sea, vomit with seasickness,
miserable in the hold. Henry Tudor strides like a caged lion on the dockside, looking
for a break in the clouds, for the wind to change. The skies pour down on his copper
head without pity. The horizon is black with more rain, the wind is onshore, always
onshore, keeping his ships shuddering against the harbor walls.

Just over the sea, he knows, his destiny is being decided. If Buckingham defeats Richard
without him, he knows he will have no chance at the throne. One usurper will be changed
for another, and he still in exile. He has to be there at the battle and kill whoever
is the victor. He knows that he must set sail at once, but he cannot set sail: the
rain pours down. He can go nowhere.

Buckingham cannot know this, he knows nothing. His life has shrunk to a long march
in pouring rain,
and every time he looks back over his shoulder there are fewer men behind him. They
are exhausted, they have not eaten hot food for days, they are stumbling in knee-deep
mud, and when he says to them, “Soon be at the crossing, the crossing to England,
and dry land, thank God,” they nod but don’t believe him.

Their road rounds a corner to the crossing of the River Severn, where the waters are
shallow and broad enough for the army to march into England and face their enemy instead
of fighting the elements. Everyone knows this crossing point—Buckingham has been promising
it for miles. The riverbed is firm and stoned, hard as a road, and the water is never
more than inches deep. Men have been crossing to and from Wales at this point for
centuries; it is the gateway to England. There is an inn on the Wales side of the
river and a little village on the England side. They are expecting that the crossing
will be flooded, the river running deep. Perhaps there will even be sandbags at the
doorway of the inn, but when they hear the roar of the waters they halt as one man
in utter horror.

There is no crossing. There is no land that they can see. The inn in Wales is drowned;
the village on the far side has disappeared altogether. There is not even a river,
it is out of its banks so far that it is a lake, a watery waste. They cannot see the
far side: England. They cannot even see a downstream or an upstream. This is no longer
a river but an inland sea with waves and its own storms. The water has taken the land,
swallowed it as if
it were never there. This is not England or Wales, this is water, this is triumphant
water. The water has taken everything and no man is going to challenge it.

Certainly, no one can cross it. They look in vain for familiar landmarks, the track
that ran into the shallows of the river, but it is deep underwater. Someone thinks
they see something in the flood and with a shudder they realize that it is the tops
of trees. The river has drowned a forest: the very trees of Wales are reaching wildly
for air. The world is not as it was. The armies cannot meet; the water has intervened
and conquered everything. Buckingham’s rebellion is over.

Buckingham does not say a word; he does not give an order. He makes a little gesture
with his hand, like a surrender, a palm-raised wave: not to his men but to this flood
that has destroyed him. It is as if he concedes victory to the water, to the power
of water. He turns his horse’s head and he rides away from the vast churning deeps
of it, and his men let him go. They know it is all over. They know the rebellion is
finished, defeated by the waters of England that rose as if they had been summoned
by the very goddess of water.

It is dark, almost eleven o’clock. I am on my knees, praying at the foot of my bed
before I sleep, when I hear a light knock on the great outside door. At once my heart
leaps, at once I think of my son Edward, of my son Richard, at once I think they are
come home to me. I scramble to my feet, throw a cape over my nightgown, pull the hood
over my hair, and run to the door.

I can hear the streets are quiet now, though all day they have been buzzing with the
return of King Richard to London, and there has been endless talk of what revenge
he will take on the rebels, whether he will break sanctuary and come against me, now
he has proof that I raised the country against him. He knows this, and he knows the
allies that I chose: Lady Margaret and the false Duke of Buckingham.

No one can tell me if my kinsmen are safe, captured, or dead: my three beloved brothers
and my Grey son Thomas, who were riding with the rebels in Hampshire and Kent. I hear
every sort of rumor: that they are run away to join Henry Tudor in Brittany, that
they are dead in a field, that they are executed by Richard, that they have turned
their coats and joined him. I have to wait, as does everyone in the country, for reliable
news.

The rains have washed away roads, destroyed bridges, cut off whole towns. News comes
into London in excitable bursts, and nobody can be sure what is true. But the storm
has blown itself out; the rain has stopped now. When the rivers go back into their
banks, I will have news of my family and their battles. I pray that they have got
far away from England. In the case of defeat, the plan was to go to Edward’s sister
Margaret in Burgundy, find my son Richard in his hiding place, and continue the war
from overseas. King Richard will grip the country with the power of a tyrant now,
I am sure.

There is a repeated tap on the door and someone rattles the latch. This is no frightened
runaway, not my boy. I go to the great wooden portal and slide back the porter’s grille
and look out. It is a man, as tall as me, his hood pulled forward to hide his face.

“Yes?” I say shortly.

“I need to see the dowager queen,” he whispers. “A message of great importance.”

“I am the dowager queen,” I say. “Tell me your message.”

He glances from right to left. “Sister, let me in,” he says.

Not for a moment do I think it is one of my brothers. “I am no sister of yours. Who
do you think you are?”

He pushes back the hood and lifts the torch that he carries so I can see his handsome
dark face. Not my brother, but my brother-in-law, my enemy, Richard. “I think I am
the king,” he says with wry humor.

“Well, I don’t,” I say without a smile; but it makes him laugh.

“Have done,” he advises me. “It’s over. I am ordained and crowned, and your rebellion
has been utterly defeated. I am king, whatever your wishes. I am alone, and unarmed.
Let me in, sister Elizabeth, for all our sakes.”

Despite all that has been, I do just that. I slide the bolts on the little lantern
door and open it and he slips in. I bolt it behind him. “What d’you want?” I ask.
“I have a serving man in earshot. There is blood between you and me, Richard. You
killed my brother and you killed my son. I will never forgive you for it. I have laid
my curse on you for it.”

“I don’t expect your forgiveness,” he says. “I don’t even want it. You know how far
your plots went against me. You would have killed me, if you had the chance. It was
war between us. You know as well as I. And you have had your revenge. You know and
I know what pains you have given me. You have put an enchantment on me, and my chest
aches and my arm fails me without warning. My sword arm,” he reminds me. “What could
be worse for me? You have cursed my sword arm. You had better pray that you never
need my defense.”