The Rose of York (22 page)

The glow of sunset reflected off the western battlements as he clattered over the drawbridge into the inner court with his small party. Weary from the long, dusty journey from Raby, he’d dismounted and thrown the reins of his horse to one of the groomsmen, wondering as he did so why his brother Thomas hadn’t come out to greet him. Surely they’d made enough noise? At that instant he’d heard a laugh light as silvery bells, a sound that seemed to fall from the heavens, like the beating of angel wings. He glanced up.

Framed by the violet sky, a face gazed down at him from a high window, the face of an angel, serene, beautiful, with a complexion white as lilies and hair dark as chestnuts. It was an oval face with a pointed chin, luminous smile, and extraordinary eyes. He stared, rooted to where he stood, unable to tear his gaze away from those two brilliant topaz orbs. He didn’t hear the jangle of steel, the shouts of men or the neighing of horses as Thomas rode into the castle with Lord Cromwell and a troop of men-at-arms. He heard only the lyre and the angel’s sudden laugh, sweet as chapel bells over the dales at morning time.

“John!” Thomas cried cheerily, leaping off his horse and running to him. His thick crop of dark hair was dishevelled and there were two streaks of dirt on his cheeks, but his brilliant blue eyes were alight with joy to see him. “My fair brother!” He clasped John to his breast and held him out at arm’s length. “What a relief you’re safe! You were so late, we rode out to search for you. One never knows with those damned Percys.”

“Aye,” Lord Cromwell boomed, “’tis good you’re safe! Worried, we did. Damned Percys out there, you know…”

Isobel’s laugh interrupted his reverie.

“All these years you’ve called me your angel,” she said, “and all these years I’ve been telling you angels don’t have chestnut hair. They have golden hair, as any painter or coloured-glass maker will tell you.”

He grinned. “My angels have chestnut hair.”

Isobel put her hands over his. “I love you, and have loved you from the first moment that I saw you.”

John smiled into her hair. “That blessed twilight eve at Lord Cromwell’s castle.”

She threw him a startled glance. “Nay, ’twas not at Lord Cromwell’s castle where I first saw you. I was twelve and riding past the River Ure with my cousins. We surprised you as you came out of the water after a swim.”

John flushed, remembering the party of giggling young maidens that day long ago. “You mean you saw me…”’

She laughed. “Aye, naked as Adam, standing on the river bank! Thomas had the sense to cover himself, but you blushed as red as a beet and covered the wrong part.”

“My face.”

“That was why we were all laughing, my sweet lord.”

John grinned. He clasped her tightly around her waist and bent his head tenderly to hers. “My love,” he whispered softly, “you never told me.”

~ * * * ~

“And in Arthur’s heart pain was lord.”

Richard watched Edward standing at the window with the queen’s father, Earl Rivers. He was breaking the seal on a missive while Hastings, the Woodvilles, and their friend, a lord from Wales named Herbert, looked on from the council table. Richard hoped for good news. The past three months had been weighted down with troubles. The Thomas Cook affair kept recurring like a bad toothache, stirring fears throughout the land. Though the kindly merchant had been acquitted in his second trial, the furious queen had prevailed on Edward to dismiss the judge and retry him, after which poor Cook was assessed a ruinous fine. And Bess Woodville, by resurrecting the obsolete custom of “Queen’s Gold,” levied another.

His gaze went to Hastings seated beside the queen’s son, Thomas Grey.
These two
, thought Richard,
had turned Edward from Camelot and led him into Sodom and Gomorrah
. At only fifteen, Thomas had already carved himself a reputation for wantonness and cowardice in arms, emerging to join Hastings as Edward’s boon companion. The three spent their nights revelling with drink and bawdy women. Newly elevated to Marquess of Dorset, and flushed with his own self-importance, Thomas had demanded Richard address him by his title, and Richard obliged happily. The formality put distance between them.

Edward passed the letter to his father-in-law and took his seat at the head of the table. “From John Neville, my cousin of Northumberland. He’s put down the rebellions and executed Robin of Holderness.”

“But he fails to mention Robin of Redesdale, whose uprising seems to be of a more serious nature,” said Earl Rivers. His rich gown of crimson velvet lined with green silk, loaded from shoulder to hem with jewels, flashed as he crossed the room to pass the missive to his friend.

“If John says it’s under control, then it is, Sire,” said Will Hastings. “John’s a man of his word.” Hastings’s rivalry with Dorset sometimes ran bitter, and his wife, Katherine Neville, was John’s sister. But always the consummate statesman, Hastings betrayed none of his dislike for Woodvilles on his broad-carved face.

Edward lounged in his chair, toying with his near-empty wine cup, which a wine-bearer quickly refilled. He fastened his gaze on Richard. “What say you, brother?”

“I agree with Will. Our Cousin John is a man of his word and loyal unto death.”

“He’s a Neville,” spat the queen’s father. “There’s talk his brother Warwick may be behind this trouble in the North, even that Robin of Redesdale is his kin.”

Edward tapped John’s letter, which had been passed back. “He has assured me of his loyalty, in his own writing, no less. ’Tis sacred as an oath.”

“Then, Sire, why did he not pursue the leaders of the Redesdale rebellion with the same zeal he showed Robin of Holderness?” demanded the Woodville’s friend, Lord Herbert.

The queen’s father guffawed. “Because Redesdale didn’t call for the earldom of Northumberland to be given back to Percy!”

Dorset gave a snicker. “Nine years in the Tower has chastened Percy, Sire. Restore the earldom of Northumberland to him. Better a Percy than a Neville.”

Trembling with rage, Richard leapt to his feet. “Better a Lancastrian turncoat than a man loyal unto death, eh, Dorset? Why does it come as no surprise you’d favour a turncoat?”

There was an uproar from the Woodvilles. Richard swung on them with murderous eyes. They recoiled and sputtered into silence at his expression. Without Bess they were not only outranked, but helpless against the King’s favourite brother, and they knew it. They also knew their time would come when Bess, alone with the King, presented their case. So did Richard.

“Sire,” Richard pressed, “our gracious cousin is your truest subject. He’s a Yorkist, and of noble birth and noble intentions, unlike some others here in this room!”

Dorset gave a cry and lunged at Richard, a hand on his heavily jewelled dagger-hilt. In a lightning stroke, Richard had his own blade pointed at Dorset’s throat. Edward came to his stepson’s rescue, his long arms spreading between them like eagle wings. “Let it lie, both of you.”

Reluctantly, Richard returned his dagger to its sheath.

“May I offer a suggestion?” said a voice silent until now. “These are troubled times and it would avail us much to make a pilgrimage and pray for God’s help in our travail.”

A hush descended over the group. Richard turned his eyes on the queen’s oldest brother. He didn’t know what to make of Anthony Woodville. The man was both like, and unlike, his kin. While sly of expression, as all Woodvilles were, he was dark, not fair, and his scholarly pursuits had won him notice and set him apart from his brothers, whose sole accomplishments were to marry well. He was also a chivalrous jouster, not chicken-livered like Dorset. On this day, in contrast to his gaudy nephew, he was sedately attired in a doublet of dark velvet edged with sable. Richard had heard that he had grown so pious that sometimes he wore a hair shirt beneath his silks and velvets. He wondered idly what had prompted such a change from his former flamboyant style. His manner, too, was sober, though he used to be as brash and boastful as his brothers. Indeed, he’d changed much since the Smithfield tournament two years earlier, and Richard almost liked the man. But it was impossible to forget he was a Woodville, and Woodvilles were not to be trusted.

Richard returned his attention to Edward, who now stood at the window draining his wine. “’Tis a good time for prayer, I doubt not,” said Edward. “Therefore we shall make a pilgrimage to Walsingham, on our way north, to determine matters there.” With a wave of the hand he dismissed his council. The chamber emptied.

Richard waited. “Do you really believe Warwick is behind the troubles in the North?”

“If he is, there’ll be war before long. That’s why I must leave as soon as possible and see for myself.”

Richard swept up his gauntlets. “I’ll go to him at once. He’s at Warwick Castle…”

“No!”

Stunned, Richard froze in his steps. “You doubt me?”

“Experience is a hard teacher. I’ve already lost one brother to Warwick.”

“I’m not George!”

“How can I be sure?”

Much as Richard hated to admit it, even to himself, the question was a valid one. Loyalty and honour were ideals. Men had died for them willingly from the time of Scripture. But Anne was real. Could he give her up? He’d never thought to be tested, had always believed it impossible for matters to reach this point. Safe in the cocoon of certainty he had spun for himself, he had felt confident of the choice he might be called upon to make. But in the end a man didn’t truly know himself until he confronted the point of the sword.

“Do I have your permission to see Warwick, or not—Sire?” he demanded coldly so Edward would not guess how close to the mark he’d struck. He held his breath until his chest felt it would burst.

At last, Edward inclined his head.

With relief, Richard fled the room.

~*~

Warwick Castle, where Anne was born
, Richard thought, anguish flooding him like a mighty river about to charge its banks. A suffocating silence filled the stone-vaulted chamber where he stood alone with the Kingmaker. Nothing he had said had moved this will of granite: this man who’d been a father to him, who’d been his guide and his family, whose daughter he loved, in whose household he’d spent the happiest years of his life. Warwick had remained resolute against Edward.

Splintered by the coloured glass border, the sun’s rays poured through the tall lancet window like a funnel from heaven, brightening Warwick’s hair and bathing his tall, crimson-brocaded figure in a strange play of light so that he appeared unreal, ghost-like. Richard could even see the tiny motes of dust that danced in the air he breathed. Behind him the River Avon wound placidly through the quiet countryside.

“Edward has taken a serpent to his breast that will destroy us all unless we strike first,” declared Warwick in a tone ringing with finality. He moved out of the light.

Richard blinked to focus his vision. Now he saw that Warwick’s face had an odd pallor, his skin was drawn tight across his cheekbones, and his mouth was set in a long tense line. In his vivid blue eyes an anxious question awaited Richard’s reply.

Richard’s head pounded. The hourglass had emptied. The moment he had dreaded, had hoped would never come, hung expectant for his answer.
Edward or Anne? Oh, God, Almighty Father in Heaven, no!

Loyalty or love?

His mind, his heart, his soul, shouted for love.
For Anne.
Without Anne, there was no song, no joy. Only darkness, a vast emptiness.

Anne, Anne, Anne…

But had he not chosen as his motto,
Loyalty Binds Me
? Loyalty, the foundation of honour, and law, and justice; the principle of his life. If that were a lie, then all was a lie, and he was no better than Trollope, who had betrayed his father at Ludlow and unleashed a nightmare of death, destruction and misery.

Anne…

Was there no one to guide him? No one to take the decision from his hands?

No one. He alone held the answer. Could he truly turn against Warwick? His cousin was arrogant, aye, self-righteous and ambitious, aye. But he was Anne’s father. He was generous and courageous beyond all limits. He had once risked his own life to save his. He owed Warwick, maybe as much as he owed Edward.

He stood in silence, the silence tearing at him, buffeting him in a desolate darkness, and gradually, out of the murk, formed an image from the misty past. It took shape dimly at first, then with increasing clarity, until he stood face to face with the truth; a truth he’d always known in some secret core of his being and had not wished to embrace.
Lancelot had broken his oath to his king and chosen love over loyalty, and with that broken oath he’d shattered Camelot and destroyed all whom he’d cherished.