The King's Sister

Richard stepped down at last, to salute me formally on each cheek. ‘I know that you will be a good friend to my wife, Cousin.’

‘I will be honoured, Sire.’ I tried successfully not to laugh. How remarkably pompous he sounded for a lad whom I had rescued from the carp pond at Kenilworth where Henry had pushed him.

‘And be pleased to give her advice until she becomes familiar with English ways,’ he added.

And as I caught Queen Anne’s eye, we laughed. The whole introduction had been unnecessary. Richard, with a flash of eye between us, froze.

‘We already know each other very well, Richard,’ the Queen explained gently, as she came to stand with him, a hand on his arm.

‘We have already discussed fashion, horseflesh and men and what to wear for the tournament tomorrow,’ I added, and took a risk, but a small one. ‘And when did you last address me as my lady or even cousin?’

Richard thought about this, I could see the workings of his mind behind his stare, tension hard in his spare shoulders. Encased in cloth of gold and enough ermine to coat fourscore of the little creatures, he looked like one of our grandfather’s knights got up in frivolous costume for a Twelfth Night mummers’ performance. Pride held him rigid, until he took a step back onto the dais, so I must look up into his face.

‘Elizabeth will be my friend,’ Queen Anne murmured. ‘As she is yours.’

‘Of course she will. Do we not order it?’

‘Richard! You cannot treat her like a diplomat from Cathay. You have known her all your life! She will be my friend and to me she will be Elizabeth, even if you continue to address her as Countess. And how foolish that will sound. Now greet her properly, my dear husband.’

And when Anne stepped up to kiss Richard’s cheek, and laughed openly at him, so did he smile and all the tension was broken.

‘Welcome, Elizabeth,’ he said gruffly.

‘I am so happy for you, Richard.’

And we were restored to a close-knit family group.

The days after the fright of the attack on the Tower had not been easy for any of us, but now all was smoothed over. A new year and new beginnings with this foreign bride. Leaving my husband to continue his growing up at Kenilworth, I had come with Henry to Richard’s marriage celebrations. How it pleased me, this new delight in outward appearances, in feasts and dancing and ceremonial. And as close family to the King, Henry and I had been given the honour to receive the new Queen into London in the cold of days of January. My father, too, was restored to grace, escorting her from Dover to London. The dire lash of Walsingham’s tongue against the Duke who had brought all the evils of defeat and rebellion tumbling down onto England’s head had been obliterated by Richard’s acceptance of the family closest to him.

Not that I was without complaint. It was not in my nature to be content. How could I be so, for here we were, celebrating a potentially happy marriage, which I did not have, a marriage in more than name and promises for the next decade. Despite the remarkable headdress she was wearing, surely hot and cumbersome, Richard was beaming at the new Queen as if he were already in love with her, while Anne, undoubtedly pretty, knew how to manage Richard’s strange humours.

Jonty continued to be more enamoured of his horse, his tiercel, his new hauberk since he was growing like a spring shoot, and even a pair of shoes with riskily extreme toes that caused him some loss of dignity, than he was of me.

‘We will talk after supper,’ the Queen said, a gleam in her eye. ‘Come to my room, Elizabeth, and see what I will wear tomorrow, when I am Queen of the Lists.’ She tugged on Richard’s arm. ‘I think it would be an excellent idea if you choose Elizabeth to step into my shoes for the second day. She is my cousin now, is she not?’

‘I think I will do whatever pleases you on our marriage day.’

‘Then it is decided.’

Richard took his wife’s hand, regarding her as if she were some precious object that he had acquired and must keep safe from harm or disappointment. ‘We must speak with my uncles who are waiting to greet you.’ Then to me, as the musicians tuned their instruments, looking over my shoulder to whomever it was who had approached: ‘I’ll leave you in the care of my brother. John, come and entertain Elizabeth. And if you don’t wish to talk to her, you can always dance. I’ll guarantee she’ll not tread on your toes.’ And to me, with a strange slide from ceremony to rude familiar: ‘My brother has a reputation for entertaining beautiful women. But don’t believe all he says …’

With a particularly un-regal smirk, Richard led Queen Anne to the little knot of Plantagenet uncles of Lancaster, York and Gloucester, who stood in an enclave, deep in discussion. This marriage was not popular with everyone. Anne had proved to be an expensive bride, with no personal dower worth mentioning and few diplomatic benefits for England.

Meanwhile a soft laugh reached me, stilled me. Slowly, I turned, knowing who I would find. Here, filling my vision, was my father’s old cheese, riddled with maggots. A less appropriate comment I could not envisage for this courtier, resplendent in court silks heavy with gold stitching, impeccably presented from his well-shaped hair to his extravagantly long-toed shoes. Every sense in my body leapt into softly humming life, like clever fingers strumming lightly across the strings of a lute.

Sir John Holland, illustrious half-brother to King Richard, with whom he shared a mother in the dramatic form of Princess Joan, once the Fair Maid of Kent. He had made a reputation for the charm of his smile, for the wit and sparkle of his conversation, for his legendary temper, as well as for his unquestionably handsome face. Some men were wary of him, for he made much of the value of his royal connections, employing a smooth arrogance. He was ambitious for power, but that was no deterrent in my eye. As half-brother to King Richard, why should he not wield authority at the King’s side?

But that was not all. He was thirty years old, with an impossibly seductive glamour. Even to me, he had a court gloss that intrigued me. When he smiled his face lit with a wild lustre, and I sighed with youthful longing, for this brilliance was irresistible. The last time I spent any length of time in the company of Sir John Holland, he had been wielding a blood-stained sword, while I had been shivering with terror, gripping his arms as if I were a child in the midst of a nightmare and he could shield me from the dark torments. Now the situation was very different. Sir John bowed. I curtsied. How superlatively decorous we were, as I surveyed him and he surveyed me. I could not read the mind behind those remarkable features, but as I acknowledged the intensity of his gaze that took in every detail of my apparel, memory came flooding back.

It had been in the previous year, when what we had come to call the Great Rising had erupted, drenching us all in fear. Peasants’ mobs from Kent and Essex, vociferous in their complaints, had turned their ire on my father as royal counsellor and the instrument of all their woes, and since he was on a diplomatic mission to Scotland they vented their wrath on all connected with Lancaster. My brother Henry had been dispatched to the Tower of London to take refuge with Richard’s court, newly come from Windsor, and I accompanied him, anticipating safety behind the impregnable walls until my father could return with an army to rescue us.

But then all unimaginable horrors overtook us when the garrison opened the gates of the Tower to the rebels fuelled with blood-lust. Brutal violence and fire and death descended on us, creating the nightmare that troubled me long after. Hopelessly manhandled, pushed and dragged, Henry fought back but I was beside myself with speechless terror. Were we destined to join the Archbishop and royal Treasurer as well as my father’s physician on Tower Hill for summary execution?

And then in the hot centre of my fear, a new hand closed on my arm, hard and remorseless. I wrenched away, but it held tight.

‘Quietly!’ a voice said in my ear.

‘I’ll not die quietly!’ I retorted, speech fast returning, as defiant as my brother, only then realising that Henry and I had been carefully separated from the rest of the prisoners.

‘Be silent!’ The same voice. The grip on my arm tightened even further. ‘If you draw attention, we’re lost.’

I whirled round, fury taking control in my mind, in my heart. ‘Take your filthy hands off me. I’m meat for no lawless rabble.’

‘They are filthy. But they are at your service, if you’ve the sense to accept it! Be still, girl!’ my captor snapped back.

And I saw that I knew him, and that we were surrounded by a small body of soldiers. My furious response died on my lips as he began to issue orders to his men.

‘Here, Ferrour! Take him!’ he ordered. ‘Hide him if you must. But keep him safe. At all costs.’ And Henry was snatched up and pushed into the arms of one of the soldiers who nodded and dragged him away.

‘Henry!’ I called, not understanding, now beyond fear. ‘In God’s name …!’

The hand on my arm shook me into obedience. ‘We must get the boy out of here or he’ll surely die. As Lancaster’s heir, this rabble will execute first and ask questions later.’

But I cried out, unable to take in what was happening. The horror of the past minutes had robbed me of all sense. ‘He is my brother. I can’t let him go.’

‘You must. Listen to me, Elizabeth.’ I tensed as his demand cut through my panic. He knew my name … ‘Elizabeth.’ An attempt to soften his voice. ‘Stop shrieking in my ear. And listen …’

‘Yes,’ I said, but without clear thought. ‘I don’t know what to do.’

‘It’s me, Elizabeth. John Holland. Look at me. You know me. Henry will be safe. Now we have to get you out of here. This is what you do. You go with these men …’

To my astonishment, in the midst of all the violence and squalor around us, he grabbed at my hand, lifting it briskly to his lips in a beautifully punctilious salutation as if I were some court lady, not the bedraggled figure I knew myself to be. My gaze snapped to his, and for the moment it took to draw a breath, our eyes held, before his moved slowly over me, from my head to my feet. I could sense him taking in my ruined skirts, my hair tumbled down my back, then as his gaze focused, he seized my hand and lifted my arm.

‘Is it your blood?’

I looked with surprise as he pushed back my sleeve, where it had been wrenched apart, to reveal a short but deep scratch above my wrist. I had not been aware, and the blood had now dried. I had not even felt it in the heat of the moment.

Abruptly he allowed me to go free.

‘Get one of my mother’s women to tend it for you. It would be a tragedy if you were scarred. Now go. And fast, or I’ll use the flat of my sword to encourage you.’

I fled with my escort, to be thrust ignominiously into Princess Joan’s barge, the impression of his kiss still viable against my skin. My first meeting of any tangible quality with John Holland. He had undoubtedly saved me from violent, terrible death.

He had done more than that.

This man’s reputation was not merely one of military prowess, for Sir John had a name for attacking the defences of beautiful women, and with great success. His striking features won him the laurels, and not all on the battlefield or at the tournament. There was one particular rumour of a torrid affair that set the court about its ears. He had no reticence in casting his net as high as he liked when persuading a lovely woman to his bed.

Yet this did not stop him from being the knight whose vivid, volatile features I could summon into my mind as accurately as I could see my own in my looking glass, the dark-haired man who invaded my thoughts and my dreams.