Pray for Reign (an Anne Boleyn novel) (26 page)

I
n the center of a whole outdoor assembly, upon the
snow-dusted lawn of Tower Green, waited a hastily built gallows. The cool
breeze of winter made the empty ropes flail madly at the air. Anne felt forlorn
in the presence of such an ominously cold structure. She watched quietly as
three monks who had just been led through the city streets on hurdles were led
to the platform that had been made ready. She cringed and cried aloud when
their legs flailed as madly at the air as the previously empty loops. But they
weren’t allowed their deaths, were cut down while barely conscious, tongues
hanging out like swollen blue slugs.

"Ghastly," George said, and Anne clung to him the
more. All around she heard mumblings and groanings. Someone near her vomited as
the monks were laid prostrate upon the ground and gutted like swine. Their
blood ran out and over their robes.

"Death to the whore, as well!" A woman’s voice cut
through the complaints clear as the tolling of a mass bell. Anne trembled where
she stood; angry at the outburst, but too afraid of the mob’s outrage to defend
herself.

"Sweet Jesu, why must they suffer so?" She ignored
the slurs and hollers, hugged her chest with her cold arms. Her fur-lined cloak
did little to warm her spirit. She thought she would lose her stomach from
knowing the pain they must yet be feeling—it was a specialty of the executioner
that he know the exact moment to let them die.

She couldn’t tell, but she knew they lived still, in silent
agony, waiting for the executioner to heave his ax towards their limbs. Only
after each limb was hacked from their bodies, would the axe man deign to sever
their heads.

And worse still, was that the executioner stooped to gouge
the entrails and hearts from each cavity, and throw them into an open fire. The
smell of burning, cooking organs rose high on the breeze. Nan Gainesford
fainted; George moaned aloud but bent to catch her. Anne closed her eyes tight
and walked away.

She couldn’t stand to face a moment more. She made her way
to her barge, hoping no one would notice her picking the way to escape. She
couldn’t bear to be swarmed upon and yelled at, not while those poor souls were
separated from their bodies. Would God catch them as they ascended? Or had God
forsaken them in favor of Henry’s new religion?

Such a lumpy broth, this religious transformation. Henry was
God now, at least on this earth and though he and Cromwell had passed the act
that made mere words against the crown high treason, the god had no way yet to
secure his heaven. It hadn't taken long for Henry to realize she had no issue
within, that the son he had hoped for had died early in Spring, and now he
would have nothing to do with her. Instead he chose to spend time with the
lady, and bed her rather than secure his throne by his wife. And there lay the
irony. He had decreed that hanging and disembowelment would be penalty for
anyone refusing to agree with his conscience—and though he loved Anne no more,
she was responsible for that conscience’s transformation—quartering and
skewering to a gatepost awaited those who ridiculed it.

"He blames me, George," she whispered to her
brother as he followed. Holding tightly to Nan’s arms, he struggled to board
the barge.

"Who? Henry?"

Anne nodded and sat. The helmsman barely looked at her, but
in the instant he did, she read the hatred.

"As does everyone." Hiding her face beneath her
hood, she allowed the tears. She should be pleased that Henry cared enough to
go to such lengths to protect her station. But in truth, he did it for himself.
The blackening of his soul would not stand the smallest criticism, and though
he threatened the lives of his subjects, the rebellion seethed beneath the
surface.

Matters grew worse when Henry seized dissident chapels and
had the friars starved and tortured when they refused to admit his supremacy.
Anne knew the country squirmed beneath the tyranny and at odd times was able to
successfully plead leniency for a few. But many hated her still, believing as
Henry did, that hers was the ultimate blame. If not for her, the country would
not be separated from Rome. She laughed at the thought she could have so much
power.

"This new tax will see Henry more hated," she
sighed as she sat with her favorites, George and Francois and Marc and Hal
Norris. A dozen ladies chattered to themselves, scorning her even as they
pretended to pay her court. A dozen men courted them or drank their wine,
watching Anne intently as she whispered hoarsely. But it was all just a grand
show. Most of them were here only because they could find no way out of
visiting or because they spied on her for Henry.

"And so then, me," she continued, studying her
entourage.

"We know the truth, my lady." Came support from
Marc.

"Not all, you don't. For Henry's attitude has changed
since his handsome lady." George interrupted. "And he's been favoring
his elder daughter lately. That's a bad sign."

"Yes, well, hopefully that will change if Francois will
affiance his son to Elizabeth. Then Henry will have to see the power of even a
daughter," she sighed, it had been some time before he had been in her
bed. And no son was in sight.

"And if not?" George asked quietly.

"Let's think of it when we must," she answered,
not wanting to imagine the consequences should the French King not support her
claim to the throne.

She had offended his envoy just last month when she laughed
in front of him at supper. The King had told the envoy he would step out for a
moment, and while the envoy waited patiently for him to return, Anne saw Henry
standing at the door with his mistress.

She had blurted a spluttering laugh that it would now take
much longer for Henry to return because, on sight of the harlot, everything
would leave his mind. The envoy didn't see the hilarity in it, and had given
her a cold shoulder afterward. Now, Anne waited impatiently to see if that
effrontery would settle against her through Francois, and while she waited, the
atmosphere of her own court grew steadily cooler.

Spies watched her every move, hoping to catch her in some
horrible act that would harden Henry against her. She knew every countryman
writhed beneath Henry's imposed Supremacy, and hoped the King would rid himself
of his new Queen and return the land to sanity. But she knew he wouldn't. Henry
had grown greedy, and fat, and tyrannical. He would never return his country to
Rome, and was content to let the country blame her until she construed menace
in every court action. She scanned an opulent chamber, took in the darkened
walnut paneling, the books she had collected. No matter that she could have
anything she wanted, from the gilded clock to the ivory statues, she was fast
falling into a pit as black as the walnut.

"But for now the hostilities are everywhere, save
here," she whispered aloud, only becoming aware that she had captured
unnecessary attention from her courtiers, losing for a moment the sanity that
would have kept the admission quiet.

"Hush, my Queen," said Francis, who had admitted
to her just the day before that he worried for her safety, and conceded Henry's
odd behavior. She didn't have the heart to scold him for shushing her.

"You'll see at the dance this eve, that all is well,
and not as sinister as you believe."

"I'll not go to the dance," she broke in, not
daring to say she felt the pressings of fate.

"Instead I'll wait in the King's chambers ’til he comes
with his lady." She didn’t want to admit she was afraid to face the
court—and not even the lure of dancing could make her go.

And wait, she did. In Henry’s bedchamber, but not to combat
him—she had tried that too many times to no avail. She waited naked beneath the
large fur coverlet of his huge bed, and shivered at what she thought to do. She
had reflected on the problem long, and while Elizabeth's future waited in
limbo, she must act to save that future from disaster. In the early hours while
she dozed lightly, she heard voices outside the chamber—he and his mistress as
she suspected. Anne stretched and took a deep breath.

The time had come to woo Henry. She stood brazenly, the cool
air of the December evening made her aging breasts perk and the nipples tauten.
She thanked heaven the gray in her hair had not reached her thighs—the hair
there was still thick and raven black. When Henry opened the door and saw her
standing nude next to the bed, his breath caught and the arm stretched across
his lady's shoulder jerked. She didn't give him time to dismiss her.

"My lord King, since you've decided to keep this woman
rather than secure your throne, I offer you a compromise."

"And what would that be?" Blue eyes narrowed to
black slits, as he considered her still slim figure.

"That you share your bed this night with two women. If
you like." She tilted her chin defiantly, let her fingers trail
seductively across her breast. She avoided the woman's eye. Instead, she
watched him look to the harlot. He touched her arm before caressing her chest
and pulling her gently into the room. The woman’s large cow eyes blinked furiously
and Anne couldn't help but grin.

"Are you willing, my Lord?"

"If you are," he said, and with the answer, Anne
padded forward on light feet to touch the woman's cheek. A soft brush,
seductive. The woman screeched and bolted from the room like a rabbit. Anne
turned her grin to him.

"It seems we're alone, my husband."

"It seems so, my wife." His husky voice curled
around her tongue as he kissed her.

T
he chamomile carpet had seemed the perfect place for
Anne’s reflections, providing a soft cushion, a sweet smell. She lay prone upon
it, chin in hands, elbows propped, digging slightly into the turf. She faced
away from Bridewell palace and into the gloom of trees that stood sentry around
the garden. She thought of the winter’s passing—a cold, anxious season that had
nearly frozen her heart as well. She thought too, of the early spring dusk she
was now a part of, feeling its chill breeze on her unbound hair.

She breathed deep, filling her lungs with the slight scent
of apples and the mist of dusk. So much time had crept upon her, unseen,
unheeded. So many worries had come and gone—though they had left a tiny blemish
on her mind. She wondered, in the eerie stealth of night, how she had managed
to maneuver through the murk unscathed. Three babies dead, dead as love to her.

She rolled onto her back and stared into the encroaching
night. The moon hunkered into a slit in the sky, hiding his face and keeping
secrets. It lent little light, only as much as it deigned. So much like Henry,
the crescent moon was—hiding a second half within folds of its nature.

He had come back to her, and in the months, shared her bed
and smiled civilly in public. But there was no passion in the depths of his
eyes, no zeal in his kiss. She thought of his coolness, tried to believe it was
because of the threat of a commoner’s rebellion, or the riots that besieged the
country. Henry loved her no more, and stayed away from her because he wanted to
fool her into believing everything remained as normal. She cursed the
intelligence that wouldn’t allow her the peace of ignorance. She had been
spared the rivalry of Henry’s handsome lady however, and that relieved her. Now
she simply had to carry this child to term. So during the afternoon, trying to
keep her nerves still, she had sat serenely in her court sewing one of Henry's
shirts.

"Anne, oh sweet Jesu, Anne. Bad news." George
barged into the chamber, his riding clothes wet from the sweat of a hard ride.

"Bad, brother? Come. Sit. What is it?" She touched
her belly nervously, then remembering he had been in Calais for the past few
days, realized the news must be of Elizabeth's match. She had better receive it
in private—Catherine's spies were everywhere.

"No, wait. Come into my bedchamber." She rose,
discarding the shirt onto the chair.

"All is lost," he whispered hoarsely into her ear
as she shut the door behind them.

"Henry won't agree to Francois' terms, and so Francois
refused to offer his son for Elizabeth, saying your hold on the throne is weak,
and that Elizabeth is a bastard."

Ah, sweet Jesu, indeed. At last the news had come, and the
country that had nurtured her finally purged her as she had her babies. It hurt
her to the core, to think her country by choice, whose language she had made
her own, and whose fashions she wore had betrayed her.

"Who will help me now?" She murmured. Francois'
support would have sustained her claim, given her an ally. Now there were no
countries who would ally with England, and she had to prove the throne was
secure. She prayed a fast and fleeting prayer.

"And all of this on the heels of those executions.
Damn." She stomped her foot.

George inclined his head, brown locks fell loose in his
eyes.

"The city is in an uproar over them, I agree." He
shuddered. "The heads still stare from the city gateposts."

"Perhaps the city wouldn't be so outraged if they had
been stripped of their orders first. Damn Henry's pride. He's costing his own
popularity, and dragging me down with him. Bad enough the country hates me, now
he's given them more reason." She paced back and forth from bed to
fireplace, fireplace to bed, and finally plopped down on it. She sighed
heavily, helplessly.

"Leave me George, I need to be alone." She turned
away and listened to his steps retreat to the door. The mumble of voices from
her court rose, then fell as he did so. Moments later she donned a cloak and
rushed to the garden. Her uneasy sense of safety had disappeared; she should
never have believed in it anyway. Lying on the damp earth, she smoothed her
stomach, which hadn't yet begun to show.

"Don't worry my prince, my heart is set on you."
Tiny flutter within, probably gas, but she didn't want to believe that was all
it was. She’d rather it was a sign of life, of safety, and as that life spurred
in her over the month, it kept her believing in her success. For success was
now measured, not in gaining the throne as it used to be, but in maintaining
it. She got up and wandered back to her apartments, thinking on her troubles.

Menace abounded everywhere, hostility in every crevice. She
suspected her uncle Norfolk of trying to ally one of his sons to Henry's elder
daughter Mary, and she had publicly berated him like a dog. He in turn had
slung insults back, but she had won the fight, if only for a time. She simply
couldn't have the uneasy court believe she had lost potency, or that her family
had begun to desert her.

The only supporters left in her circle whom she could trust,
were her father—who now loathed her, and George—who championed her because he
loved her. But while her father was a statesman, George was merely a courtier.
She didn't see how the three of them could hold the faction together without
Henry. So the next morning, she decided to take her meal with Henry, using her
pregnancy as an excuse for him to see her. He smiled when she came, helped her
to her seat, flirted a little. It eased her mind to see him so indulgent; she
had begun to worry about him sporting with one of her ladies, a quiet,
soft-spoken, but crafty Seymour girl. The only curse of her pregnancies was his
sporting with other women, and she hated it, worried over it.

"Marmalade for that toast, my husband?" she asked
as sweetly as she could, trying her best not to grow irritated at the way he
gluttonously crammed his breakfast into his fat cheeks.

"Thank you, no," he considered her still trim
figure suspiciously.

"Does the babe grow?" She dared him, though her
mind worded the accusation a bit differently.

"Yes, my love, I think it is. Might we finally get that
son we crave?"

She wasn't fooled. His manner might be light, but his eyes
told her he felt no passion for her, and probably hoped the son wouldn't
survive, for then would be his reason to cleave to his mistress.

"I believe so. I feel its movements even now. He will
be hearty, like his King." She scooped the marmalade onto her bread, thick
and orange with small swirls to it. She had just taken a bite when Francis
Weston entered the room.

"Pardon, my graces, but I've a note for the King."
He bowed quickly, and hurried to Henry, tucked a note in the swollen palm and
left. Henry scanned it quickly. Anne watched his face turn furious.

"Brah!" The bellow echoed throughout the room.

"A cardinal! That resolute old bastard. The Pope wants
to make Fisher a Cardinal." He scrunched the tiny parchment into a small
ball and threw it across the room. Anne watched it slowly expand.

"Curses on that Clement! Who does he think he's toying
with?" Jowls trembled with rage.

"I'll have Fisher's head sent to Rome for that hat.
Hah!" The shock of Henry's outburst swept aside her discretion.

"Is it truly so bad?" She didn't want to see this
happen; the country would go mad over such an event. Fisher had long been
revered in the country, and his imprisonment had only hardened the populace’s
reverence. They saw him as a man noble enough to face prison for his beliefs.
If Henry had him murdered, they would consider him a martyr—much harder to deal
with. The question only goaded Henry more.

"That bad?" He roared again.

"Of course it’s that bad; and all for you. Brah! Would
that you had never bewitched me."

The bitterness welled inside her, he knew well the country
hated her even as he sought her. This was his fault, not hers. Didn't he think
if she could use sorcery, she would have done so on the populace, or even
Catherine to ease the way? Finally the public displays of hatred he had been
showering her with, coercing the court to ridicule her, broke the tether of
restraint. She kept her voice cool and level.

"You should be thanking me, rather than cursing me, my
King. And be more bound to me than any other man to a woman."

"Have I not rescued you from a state of sin?" She
asked sarcastically, reminding him of his original argument, that his first
marriage was null.

"Have I not made you the richest prince ever in
England? I'm the cause of your supremacy, of your great profit, and that of
your people." She rose from her chair and threw her napkin at him. She was
tired of this Queenship anyway, it had held nothing but bitterness and
loneliness for her.

His mouth worked in a wet impotency to retaliate, and she
grinned a perverse grin, decided to sting him even more before she left.

"Ah, I see your lips are as powerless as your
manhood." She threw the chair to the floor as she swept from the table and
out the room.

A mere week later, Bishop/Cardinal Fisher was tortured and
beheaded, though Henry didn't send his head to Rome. Instead he stuck it on the
city gates where it blackened in the sun like the others. And when, a month
later, Sir Thomas More followed suit, Anne's shaky hold on the throne and her
sanity began to rock.

"This is your doing!" Henry yelled at her when
news of More's death came to him while the court gambled at tables. He threw
the dice across the floor and accused her before the court, while she stood
defiantly at her spot.

"Even the most honest man in my Kingdom has fallen to
your sorcery."

She refused to answer. The first words he had spoken to her
in a month certainly asked for no conversation. Instead she turned regally away
and continued her gambling, while he stormed from the gaming room in a fit of
rage. Thankfully, the babe still lived within her, and grew so that the three
months spanned to six. Henry had long neglected her, and flirted openly with
Jane Seymour. Though Anne's jealousy rankled, she contented herself that the
child would soon be born and she would again gain control.

"She misses no opportunity to beguile Henry," Anne
said of Jane to her small court. "And he dances with her often."

She had taken to staying in her apartments as frequently as
she could, so she didn't have to see the two of them together, or listen to the
ridicule behind faces hidden by hands.

"That scene you caused with her yesterday certainly
didn't help much," George scolded her, but laughed after rather than
accuse.

"She deserved it, trying to make the court think she's
a naive innocent when she sits boldly on a married man's lap. And Nicholas
Carew makes matters worse, twisting his way into Henry's heart and advancing
her cause."

"But the rest of you, I thank God for you every day, for
you visit me when the rest of court pays tribute to his mistress. Francis, what
do you here, rather than spend time with your fiancée?" She flirted. It
did her heart good to know he was here, and the rest of them. She could only
imagine what the rest of the court was doing, probably singing and dancing in
Jane's new apartments. Curse Henry for putting her up in such estate.

"I come to see you, your Grace, for I love you
well." Black eyes pretended surprise, and it heartened her. So nice that
the banalities of court flirtations hadn't changed for the ruler's choices. It
gave her a measure of normality, of safety.

"So well that you postpone your marriage?" She
asked, suddenly in need of more than the comfort of his presence. She needed
him to say he wanted to be here. She needed him to say it didn't matter that
she was hated and ridiculed, that he would come to her despite the ridicule he
might receive. The intensity of her paranoia, and loneliness made her reach out
for any favorable comment, and when she realized what she had asked of him, she
laughed heartily, giving him reason to ignore her remark, for not to do so,
would be rude.

"Ah, well, if you wait for my hand, you wait for dead
man's shoes."

The men in the court joined her laughter at Francis' expense,
and he blushed tellingly. Her own laughter died in her throat, my God, what had
she just said? Even in the best of circumstances, spies would eat that comment
for later purging.