Secret History of Elizabeth Tudor, Vampire Slayer (19 page)

Kat leans forward, looking directly into my eyes. Without hesitation she says, “Your mother was no more guilty of that than of anything else.”

Relief floods me, of course, but hard on it comes fresh pain. As grateful as I am to know of my mother’s innocence, it raises the question that has haunted me since I first began to glimpse the outlines of her terrible downfall. She had failed to bear a
son, so be it. But why had Henry felt driven to destroy her so utterly? Why had he not simply divorced her, as he later did Anne of Cleves when he found her unpleasing as a wife?

True, my father had executed a second queen, poor Catherine Howard. But she was a foolish girl who really had crowned him with cuckold horns. Humiliation more than anything else had driven him to slay her. What compulsion swung the sword that severed my mother’s neck?

“You are convinced,” I ask, “that nothing ever happened that could have even remotely given my father cause to believe that my mother had dealings with the supernatural?”

And there it is, the flick of an eye, a quick tilt of the head. Kat has never lied to me, of that I am sure. But I am equally certain that just then she is tempted to.

“I had hoped,” she says softly, “that it would not come to this.”

To what? What does she know? What does this woman who has loved me dearest and best all my life, who has never hesitated to do what was right for me, now hesitate to say?

She slips a hand beneath the bodice of her gown and draws out a packet of yellowed parchment folded over and sealed by wax cracked with age. “I have carried this next to my heart since Mary died and you were proclaimed Queen. Before that, I kept it locked away, never touching it from the day your mother put it into my hands.”

Something of my mother after all this time. I can scarcely credit it. I have nothing of Anne’s except the diadem made for her and curiously kept by my father when he might have had it melted down and recast instead. No other item that she ever touched has been preserved, at least not to my knowledge. Perhaps something is hidden away here and there, but if so, no one speaks of it.

Now suddenly there is this—what?

“Your mother told me to give this to you only if you ever asked the question you have just posed. Otherwise, she wanted you left in peace, untroubled by its contents.”

“Do you know what they are?”

Kat shakes her head. “I do not. They are for you—and only you—to know. Your mother made that clear.”

My impulse as I take the packet is to break the seal right then and there and devour whatever lies within. But the circumstances under which I have received this message from my mother fill me with caution. Whatever I am about to learn of her, there will be no turning back from it.

“Do you want me to stay?” Kat asks.

Of course, I do. I want her to gather me into her arms, rock me back and forth, and tell me that everything will be all right. I want to roll back time and be a child again with no awareness of the sword that hangs over my life. I want to sleep without dreams of a woman swinging me round and round in a garden full of roses, and of the love she had for me shining in her eyes.

It does not matter what I want. I am Queen and I must do what is needed whatever the cost.

“Go to your rest.” When she hesitates, I add, “You have fulfilled your duty. Now I must do the same.”

She obeys, reluctantly and not before embracing me most lovingly. I cling to her for a moment before finally forcing myself to let her go. Even then I have to resist the impulse to call her back.

When I am alone, I sit in the chair before the fire and stare at the packet. My hands are steady as calm seeps over me. This is my mother, who will speak to me from across the grave. The woman who bore me, who died for doing so, and who still managed to endow me with power I can barely comprehend.

I heard her voice once in the moment of my awakening.

Now I will hear it again. Please, God, let me be guided by it.

I split the seal and unfold the parchment, bending closer to the candle to make out the fine hand written there. A quick glance at the first words and my breath catches. The letter is dated two days before my mother’s execution.

At the Tower, London
17 May, Anno Domini 1536

My beloved daughter, light of my heart and comfort of my soul, I rejoice at your continuance on this earth for my only wish has ever been to keep you safe. Pray God that Kat remains with you. If it has pleased the Almighty to take her to Him, I abide in faith that she will have entrusted this letter to the best of hands.

Know that it is my hope that you will never read this. I yearn for you to live in peace, perhaps as a comfortable country woman far from the treachery that is the court. Should it please you, I hope that you are wed to a kind and loving lord, and that many children play at your feet.

But if the secret horoscope that I had cast at the time of your birth proves true, none of that has come to pass. Instead, you are Queen. No doubt you are surrounded by those who believe that a woman is not suited to rule. Do not be swayed by their petty minds. Only you can protect our realm in the great struggle that will determine England’s fate for a thousand years and more. It is for this that you were born a woman and my daughter.

In those days when I basked in the constancy of your father’s love, all swore that I carried the longed-for
prince. So, too, did I swear to your father. Only one dared say otherwise. On a bitterly cold night in February in the year of your birth, I received a most unexpected visitor …

A tear slips down my cheek and falls on the parchment, followed swiftly by another. I break off reading to brush them away before they can smear the ink. In the stillness of the room, where every pop and hiss of the fire seems magnified ten times over, I can manage only a single thought: my mother loved me. I have always wanted to believe that but now I know for certain. She did not blame me for her fate or regret my existence. She went to her death wanting only the best for me.

To be the recipient of such love is humbling in the extreme, yet I am also exalted by it. She has reached across the grave to soothe my greatest fears and strengthen me in this time of trial.

Regaining control of myself, I quickly read the next few paragraphs, my astonishment growing with each word. My mother describes her first encounter with Mordred, how he appeared in her apartment in Whitehall on that winter night, entering unhindered despite all the protection surrounding the newly wed Queen carrying the King’s child. He came, she believed, through a window that, though high above the ground, presented no barrier to him.

At that time, she wrote, she knew only a little about the existence of vampires in England, stories passed down through her mother’s family, which had deep ties in Cornwall where Arthur had dwelt. She was afraid, naturally enough, at Mordred’s sudden appearance, but he made haste to assure her that he meant no harm. That was the first of his many lies.

And then he warned her …

… Mordred told me that the child I carried beneath my heart was not the fervently desired prince. I would bear a girl, and unless I took steps to prevent it, her birth would mean my death. I did not believe him. Such was your father’s power and will that I could not imagine the Almighty denying him the son he desired above all else.

In the spring, with you in my belly, I went to my coronation. The night before, I was in residence here at the Tower. I cannot explain the impulse that took me into the Chapel of St. Peter ad Vincula, but once there, I remained to pray. As I knelt before the altar, the world as I knew it fell away. I found myself standing on a hilltop within sight of the river Thames. A lovely woman beckoned to me. In the way of dreams, I recognized her as Morgaine, who is whispered to be the ancestress of my mother’s line.

She, too, said that I would bear a girl, but she added that you would be the means by which either great evil or great good came to reign over Britain. She cautioned that if I was to protect you and this realm both, I would have to make a terrible choice.

And so the war for my soul began.

You were born, my beautiful daughter. Even as I rejoiced at your life, the shadows deepened around me. Mordred’s visits grew more frequent. Despite Morgaine’s warning, I came to look forward to them. Alone of everyone I knew, he expressed no disappointment that you were a girl. But he did caution that the King, curdled by his disappointment, would in time strike out against me.

Even so, the blow came sooner than I expected. I had not considered that Henry would set spies on me, searching
for any grounds to free him from the wife he had come to despise. Nor that my association with Mordred would give them what they sought.

By the time I realized the extent of the danger, it was too late. Henry was determined to be rid of me, and nothing I nor anyone else could do would stay his hand. Except Mordred. He pointed out that if Henry died before he could dispose of me, you would be Queen. Until you came of age, under the laws your father himself had set in place, I would be Regent.

As such, I would be able to reform the country in ways that Henry balked at doing. There would be true freedom of religion and a rebirth of learning. So Mordred promised when he laid out his plan for me. All that he said would come to pass provided I agreed to one small concession: when you were of an age to wed, he would become your consort and rule as king over this realm.

I love life as much as anyone and I long to be at your side as you grow. The thought that I must climb the scaffold that I can hear them building even now on the green and lay my head upon the block fills me with terror. But the alternative …

I have arranged for your protection. Darkness will hover over you, but, God willing, by signs and symbols, prayers and portents, you will pass safely through into the light of your true destiny—Queen Regnant, protector of this realm, victorious over the demonic forces that, should you falter, will rule to the end of time.

Beloved daughter, joy of my heart, know that with my last breath I think of you.

Your loving mother, forever,

Anne B.

Someone has come into the room and is opening the shutters. I blink in the sudden light, not waking for I have not slept, but roused nonetheless from the dark pool of my thoughts.

Kat is there. She stands by the chair where I have remained all through the night. Gently, she takes the packet still lying open on my lap, folds it, and slips it beneath her bodice.

“Come now, my lady, you must dress.”

She speaks with cheerful firmness but I can hear the quaver in her voice. She does not know what I have learned but she can see the effect it has had on me.

I stand stiffly. The room, the day, even dear Kat herself, scarcely seem real. In my mind, I am back in the Tower, listening to the steady pounding of hammers as the scaffold rises.

“My lady—”

Her concern touches me at last. With an effort, I drag myself into the here and now.

“By heavens, Kat, what hour is it? I will be thought the worse layabout in the world if I am not about my queenly business soon.”

She snorts but pretends to be persuaded that nothing is wrong. All the same, she keeps a close eye on me as I dress. We are not alone; there is no chance for private speech. To please her, I manage to eat a little but her frown remains. As I take a sip of ale, I notice Robin lurking on the other side of the door left just far enough ajar for me to see him.

At my raised eyebrows, Kat shrugs. We both know that she does not approve of him, convinced as she is that he is somehow a danger to me. Yet on this day, under these circumstances, she has taken pity on him.

I can see why. He looks dreadful—pale with deep shadows beneath his eyes, unshaven, his dark hair barely brushed, and, unless I am very much mistaken, still wearing the same clothes I saw him in yesterday, only now badly wrinkled.

I crook a finger at him. He comes quickly, stopping just in front of me, and, despite his haggard state, executes a lovely bow. When he straightens, he is grimacing.

Perhaps I really should forgive him … but not quite yet.

“Do you have any more instructions for me, Lord Dudley? Anything more that you will not allow?”

He flushes and ducks his head. Not for a moment do I believe that he is penitent. Men by nature believe that women should not have the ordering of our own lives. But he has been caught out and now he must retreat, cover his flanks, and maneuver for a defensible position.

Truly, if I am ever called upon to lead men in battle, I will acquit myself well enough for I understand the way of it in my very bone and sinew.