Raven Queen (5 page)

“Spoilsport,” she said, pouting. She put her sampler on the cushion and drummed her fingers on the windowpane.

I carried on reading Heinrich Bullinger’s book. He is a Protestant reformer living in Zurich and I have been writing to him for the last two years.

“Doctor Bullinger says that parents must keep their daughters from lewd conversation. You should remember that, Cate.”

“Do you like Ned?” she carried on. “Alice says that—”

“Leave me alone!” I shouted.

She ran out, slamming the door, and I picked up her sampler and pulled out the golden threads she had sewn. Then I sat in front of my looking glass and lifted my lips with my fingertips to make them smile.

At the edge of the forest where the trees thinned, I heard a cry. At first, I thought it was a bird being hawked and I ran on. Then I realized it was coming from the ground, close to my feet. I looked down.

It was a raven caught in a snare.

He struggled at first, but then lay still as if waiting for death. I knelt beside him, trying to loosen the net, and he flapped his wings, afraid, and in his struggle he pecked the little finger of my right hand. When I held him at last, I saw that he was only a fledging and new to the world.

“Throw him into the air.” It was Ned’s voice. I turned round to see him standing behind me. “That will force him to fly.”

I threw him gently. The raven spread his wings, soaring above us and we laughed out loud as we watched him. As he disappeared from sight, Ned’s face darkened. “You did not tell me you were to marry the King of England!”

“Does it matter?” I shivered.

“Yes. I like being with you. I hate the days when I do not see you.”

“And I want to be with you,” I whispered. “I have never felt like this before.”

“And Edward?”

I shook my head. “It is my duty; you know that, Ned. But I do not want to be the Queen of England. They always die, either on the block or in childbed.”

“It will not happen to you, Jane.” It was the first time he had used my name. “I shall not allow it.”

My heart pounded. “I would ask for the sword as Anne Boleyn did. She saw too many people suffer from the axe, twitching and crying out between each blow... They say that the executioner does it deliberately so that the victim can repent of their sins between each blow. How they must suffer!”

He looked at me in horror.

“One day, Ned, my life might hang by a thread. How many blows of the axe will it take to kill me?”

He put his arms around me and stroked my hair. “Death is only a hobgoblin sent to frighten us in the night,” he whispered. “If we believe in everlasting life, we should welcome it with open arms.
The body is only the place where our soul is held.
Do not be afraid. I am here.”

We did not see the hunters burst through the trees until they had surrounded us. My mother was leading them, her face fierce, her hair wild around her hat. They fell silent one by one.

Ned stepped forward and bowed. “A raven was caught in the net, madam.”

“You should have left it there,” she snapped. “They are only good for sniffing out dead bodies. Get back to your work!”

“Go!” I whispered. “Or you will be dismissed.”

Ned backed away, bowing until he was out of sight. My mother rode over to me and lashed me once with her hunting whip. Then she lashed the ground around my feet, raising a cloud of dust and I had to run backwards and forwards to dodge her whip. Mary began to cry. Catherine looked away.

“We Greys are one of the most important families in England,” my mother shouted. “People look to us to set an example of how to behave. I did not raise you to run around the forest giggling with a woodman!”

“Do not tell father, I beg you.
Please.
Ned will lose his job and he has nowhere else to go.”

She leaned over towards me and I thought she was going to slap me. I stared back at her, at the spittle on her lips, at the spidery veins on her chin. “I shall not tell your father. But only because Dudley is here.”

She turned her horse and led the hunting party across the deer park and I stumbled after them, rubbing my sore arm. The sun was colouring the windowpanes of my bedchamber, licking around its stone sill, and I wished they were flames that would burn my prison to the ground.

He was standing in front of the fire in the Great Hall, his back stooped. As my father beckoned me towards him, Dudley straightened and turned round. He seemed so tall that I could hardly see his face above his ruff. His hooded eyes darted up and down my body.

I shivered.

Now he bowed, his eyes level with mine. I did not curtsy as I should. My legs were trembling too much. My mother came forward, took my arm and twirled me around.

“You see, My Lord, she is becoming a young woman at last.”

“Yes, she has a glow about her that I did not expect.” He put his hand under my chin. “You have a look of love about you, My Lady.”

“Only for life, sir,” I said.

He walked past me, to my mother. “Has she become a woman yet?” he asked. My mother flushed. “Sir, this is neither the time nor the place...”

“Has she?”

“No, My Lord. She is small for her age.”

“She can only marry when she can bear a child.”

My cheeks burned as I watched him leave us. How dare they talk about that most private part of me?

“I thank God there are men like Dudley,” my father said. “There has been enough talking in the Privy Council. That is the trouble with the world today. Dudley is a man of action.”

“Yes, he murdered men in Norfolk because they were protesting about losing their land,” I said. “He hunted them in the fields, killed them where they stood. The cornfields of Norfolk are stained with their blood.”

My father was in high spirits that evening. I led Catherine and Mary into the banquet and knelt in front of him. He fingered his goblet of wine, his eyes bright. Then he rose to his feet and moved his hand above my head. “In the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost.”

“Amen,” Dudley said. The black feather in his cap fluttered as he spoke.

I hardly spoke that evening. Let them see that I cannot be bartered, I thought. I was uncomfortable. I usually was in the company of men – except Ned. They remind me of the hunt.

“Jane is tired after her studies.” My mother excused me, smiling at me until I looked away.

The din of the trumpets drowned Dudley’s reply as the servants carried in silver platters: a boar’s head, its mouth stuffed with roasted apples; a peacock royal, its cooked flesh sewn inside its own feathered skin, and flocks of birds.

A rush of wings filled the hall. Were the birds coming to life?

It was a skylark.

It had flown through a high window, terrified, and now it circled until it settled on an oak beam where it sang as we ate. I did not eat meat from that day.

I longed for bed.

My life was in my father’s hands. I could never forget that. Later, I lay my head on my pillow and begged sleep to release me from the world.

And by dawn, Dudley had gone.

The bruises on her arm gleam like buttercups. She is like a wounded animal and I cannot bear the thought. But she has dared to come to the pool and I am glad for that.

“I am sorry, Jane.
Mea culpa.
It is my fault. I should not have spoken to you. But how could she do it! Does she treat your sisters like that?”

“No. Catherine is pretty and knows how to please. And Mary, you saw her... My mother thinks it was because she saw a raven just before her birth.”

“You should not have come here. It is dangerous for you.”

“My parents have gone to visit my mother’s cousin, the Lady Mary.” She shudders. “The Catholic Mary. If the King dies, she will be Queen. She will restore England to the old faith.”

“How will you bear that?”

“I shall have to, because she is the rightful Queen and it is everybody’s duty to follow the faith of their ruler, at least in public, and especially a royal family like mine.”

“There are plenty who do not,” I reply.

“We shall be drinking Christ’s blood in clouds of incense, surrounded by chanting priests and gilded statues.” Her voice becomes mocking. “The mystery of faith will come upon the common people again. They will not listen to the Latin Mass. They will perch on their pews like birds longing to be outside.” I pull back, revolted by her words, but she cannot stop. “They will no longer understand their faith, Ned, and that is the worst thing of all.”

“Well, you must hope that the King lives a long life. Then you can both bring Protestantism to its peak of perfection.” I try to keep the bitterness from my voice.

She gasps. “Oh, Ned, it is such a muddle. I do not want to marry the King. I do not even want to marry.” She grasps my arm and pulls me. “Let us walk. It will be safe. Charnwood Forest is so big that a bird can hop from tree to tree for six miles.”

“I cannot be long. Thomas will be waiting for me as soon as he has eaten.”

As we walk, I want to hold her hand, but I cannot. She is running ahead, laughing and spinning around. “We are nearer to God in a forest than anywhere else, Ned! I do not need priests to tell me what to think – at least, not priests dressed from top to toe in gold and silver, telling me what God means and filling my nose with incense.
This
is all I need.” She stops and smiles up at me. “Give me the new faith any day. It suits me.”

I want her to stop talking. I have seen how religion divides people and already I know that I do not want it to divide her from me.

“What do you want to do with your life, Jane?”

She stands still, surprised. “Nobody has ever asked me that before.”

“Tell me!” I insist. “You must know.”

“I want to do whatever I choose!” she replies, her face serious. “I want to live where brightly coloured birds fly amongst trees that do not lose their leaves! I want to go to Zurich to talk to the Protestant reformers!” She giggles. “I want to go to Utopia!”

“It seems a grim place. I should not like it.”

“You have read it?” she asks.

“Yes. You need not look so surprised.”

Her cheeks redden. “Why do you not like it?”

“Nobody is allowed to own their own house and nobody is ever allowed to be idle. There would not be time for walks such as these.”

“Oh!” Her voice is flat with disappointment. “I have not read as far as that.”

“Have you read the chapter about thieves? Is that why you saved me that day?”

“No. I saved you because it is wrong for one human being to kill another.” She hesitates. “Why did you come with me?”

“I had nowhere else to go, but I stayed because I love you.” She gasps and I want to hold her close enough to count the sunspots on her face.

A flickering shadow catches my eye and I look up. It is the fledgling raven, smooth beaked and as black as midnight, his feathers faintly gleaming. Beneath him is a rowan bush drooping with berries. The raven leans forward and dangles upside down to pluck them with his beak. He does not wait for them to fall to the ground as some birds do.

We laugh. Then I raise Jane’s hand to my lips and kiss it and she does not try to stop me. “Do you love me?”

“I do not know. Do not be angry, Ned. I think with my head, not my heart. It is better that way, and safer. And even if I did, how could
we
ever be together?”

“It is possible to change your life,” I say.

She shakes her head. “It is too late for me. Parents draw the map of life for us and it is not a rough draft that can be rubbed out and done again.” She keeps hold of my hand. “I have lived the life of a princess since the day I was born, Ned. I have worn the finest silks in summer and the warmest velvets in winter; I have always slept on a goose-feather mattress. But it did not bring me what I wanted. I am still trapped.”

I want to tell her who I am.

But I cannot because I like holding her.

For Mary’s birth day, we went to Leicester to buy her a new skylark.

We travelled the five miles in a horse-drawn litter. Ours was a handsome cart with a silk canopy. I would rather have ridden one of the horses with Ellie because I do not like being close to my mother or to Mary. I could not bear to be close to her bent back. So I sat next to Catherine.