It is the twelfth night, the feast of the epiphany, the last day of the long feast of Christmas, which this year seemed to last forever. I dress with particular care in my red and gold gown, and Elizabeth, matching in every detail in her red and gold gown, follows me into the throne room and stands beside my chair, as if to show the world the contrast between the old queen and the young mistress. There is a masquing, telling of the story of the Christmas feast and the epiphany, there is music and dancing. Richard and Elizabeth dance together, so practised now that their steps match. She has all the grace of her mother; nobody can keep their eyes off her. I see Richard’s warmth towards her and I wonder again, what is courting and what is charade?
Twelfth night, of all the nights of the year, is one where shapes shift and identities flicker. Once I was the kingmaker’s daughter, raised in the knowledge that I would be one of the great ladies of the kingdom. Now I am queen. This should satisfy my father and satisfy me, but when I think of the price we have paid, I think that we have been cheated by fate itself. I smile down the room so that everyone can know I am happy with my husband dancing hand-in-hand with his niece, his eyes on her blushing face. I have to show everyone that I am well and that the insidious drip of Elizabeth Woodville’s poison in my food, in my wine, perhaps even in the perfume that scents my gloves, is not slowly killing me.
The dance ends and Richard comes back to sit beside me. Elizabeth goes to chatter with her sisters. Richard and I are wearing our crowns at this final feast of the season, to show everyone that we are King and Queen of England, to send the message out to the most distant shires that we are in our pomp. A door opens beside us and a messenger comes in and hands Richard a single sheet of paper. He reads it briefly and nods to me as if a gamble he has made has been confirmed.
‘What is it?’
He speaks very quietly. ‘News of Tudor. No Christmas announcement of his betrothal this year. I have won this round. He has lost the York princess and he has lost the support of the Rivers affinity.’ He smiles at me. ‘He knows he cannot claim her as his wife, everyone believes she is in my keeping, my whore. I have stolen her and her followers from him.’
I look down the long room to where Elizabeth is practising her steps with her sisters, impatiently waiting for the music to start again. A circle of young men stand around, hoping that she will dance with them.
‘You have ruined her if she is known throughout the country as broken meats, the king’s hackney.’
He shrugs. ‘There is a price to pay if you venture near the throne. She knows that. Her mother, of all people, knows that. But there is more—’
‘What more?’
‘I have the date for the Tudor invasion. He is coming this year.’
‘You know this? When is he coming?’
‘This very summer.’
‘How do you know?’ I whisper.
Richard smiles. ‘I have a spy at his ramshackle court.’
‘Who?’
‘Elizabeth Woodville’s oldest son, Thomas Grey. He is in my keeping too. She is proving a very good friend to me.’
WESTMINSTER PALACE, LONDON, MARCH 1485
Richard prepares for invasion. I prepare for death. Elizabeth prepares for a wedding and a coronation, though there is nothing in her quiet respectful service that would reveal this to anyone but me. My senses are extreme, on the alert. Only I see the glow in her cheek when she comes back from walking in the garden, the way she pats her hair as if someone has pulled her towards him and knocked her headdress askew, only I see that the ribbons of her cloak are untied as if she has opened them to allow him to put his hands on her warm waist and pull her close.
I have someone to taste my wine, I have someone to test my food, but still I weaken steadily though the days grow lighter and the sun is warmer and outside my window a blackbird is building a nest in the apple tree and sings for joy every dawn. I cannot sleep, not at night nor in the day. I think of my girlhood when Richard came and saved me from poverty and humiliation, I think of my childhood when Isabel and I were little girls and played at being queens. It is incredible to me that I am twenty-eight years old, and there is no Isabel, and I no longer have any desire to be queen.
I watch Princess Elizabeth with a sort of shrewd sympathy. She thinks I am dying – I give her the credit to believe that it is not her hand that is sprinkling poison on my pillow – but she thinks I am dying of some wasting sickness and that when I have wasted quite away then Richard will make her queen for love, and every day will be a feast day, and every day she will have a new gown, and every day will be a celebration of her return to the palaces and castles of her childhood as her mother’s heir: the next Queen of England.
