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  Anne felt a sudden chill. In the dimness, Margaret Beaufort’s narrow wolfish face had taken on a cruel look. Her smile seemed forced, strangely twisted, and her deep-set eyes glittered with menace. Anne chastised herself for her uncharitable thought. Margaret Beaufort has stepped between me and the candles, she told herself, throwing her shadow over me momentarily and moving into darkness herself. That was all. She was a good woman, known for her piety, and favoured by God. At the age of ten she had received a vision….

  Her head ached from the noise of the ceremony. The air in the Abbey was musty and cloying, reeking of incense and the stale perfumes of the nobles. She closed her eyes and tried to remember the rush of the cool wind sweeping her beloved Yorkshire moors, but all she could feel was the weight of the crown. Cardinal Bourchier’s voice droned on.

  She opened her eyes. Her glance fell on Stanley’s square, bulky figure. Why had Buckingham insisted on giving Stanley the honour of carrying the mace, which rightly belonged elsewhere? Why had he heaped Stanley and his new wife, Henry Tudor’s mother, with such honours? She turned the question over in her mind, making no sense of it. Because it defied reason, it acquired a suspicious and sinister aspect. Buckingham… He reminded her so much of Richard’s dead brother George. The same smile, the same golden curls, arrogance, eloquence, need for attention. The same shallowness and ambition. She couldn’t trust him, yet she knew Richard trusted him implicitly. As my own father once trusted George. She blinked, lifted a hand to her brow. Something was wrong with her sight. Shadows were everywhere, all around her and Richard. It was the fatigue and the noise. They made her mind play tricks on her. She wished the ceremony would end. But it continued. There was still Holy Communion.

  At last, Richard offered the crown of St. Edward and other relics at the shrine. Anne sighed with relief. It was over. She prepared to rise. Clarions sounded. She turned her eyes on Richard. His face was pale and grave. At that instant the knowledge struck her with full force. Richard was King of England.

  Blessed Mother, and she was Queen!

  Queen. What her father had dreamed. What she had never wanted. Now it was thrust upon her! She put out a hand to the shrine of St. Edward for support, and whispered a prayer.

  ~ * ~

  Chapter 2

  “In the dead night, grim faces came and went.”

  The Thames shone like satin in the twilight of the sultry night. Richard stood at an open window in his privy suite at Windsor, listening to the music flowing from the piper and harpist in the corner of the chamber. These two had been among the minstrels who had played at his coronation banquet. How splendid the evening had been! His friends Rob Percy and Francis Lovell had served him from dishes of silver and gold, and the King’s champion had ridden into the hall in pure white armour on a horse with trappings of red and white silk. As drums thundered and cymbals clashed, he had delivered his traditional challenge and the hall had rung with the cry, “Long live King Richard III!”

  King Richard.

  He rested his hand on the stone embrasure. So must have stood every Plantagenet king before him, gazing on the mighty river and listening to the murmur of its tide. So must his brother Edward have stood.

  He winced.

  Lights glimmered in the city. I should get back to work, he thought. While much had been accomplished this past week—a treaty broached with Isabella of Spain, an embassy received from Scotland to discuss a truce—much still remained to be done. He needed to address problems in Ireland and to persuade Duke Francis of Brittany, who harboured the former queen’s brother, Edward Woodville, and his Lancastrian enemy, Henry Tudor, to deliver them up to England. As for France, he had sent Louis XI an announcement of his assumption of the throne by his herald, Blanc Sanglier. Jesu, how much had happened since he left Middleham three months ago.

  “I wish Ned were here,” said Anne at his shoulder.

  Richard turned from the window. Anne looked wan and pale, and it troubled him that she had lost weight in these weeks. Illness and the demands of the coronation had sapped her energies. But then, London had never agreed with her. He knew she was lonely and he felt a stab of guilt for neglecting her. The pressures of state never ceased. Her sole purpose in coming to London was to bring him comfort, yet he’d been unable to spend much time with her. “Go to him, Anne. Though London will be the worse without you.” He took her hand, remembering with an ache the picnic on the River Ure before his brother’s premature death changed their lives. How long ago those golden hours seemed now!

  “But you’ve been gone from Middleham even longer than I, Richard… Can you not come with me? The change would do you good.”

  Richard was about to refuse, then changed his mind, suddenly buoyant. “Indeed I shall! We’ll go together, dear Anne. We’ll have a progress to meet the people and let them see their new king. A progress north—to Middleham!” Already it was as if the fresh wind of the moors had touched her cheeks. Colour flooded them, and light returned to her dull eyes.

  “Oh, Richard! I shall write Ned and tell him…”

  “Stay while I dictate a letter to Kendall, Anne. Work always seems less arduous when you are with me.” Anne smiled, raised on tiptoe and kissed the cleft in his chin. “There’s embroidery I must finish… A banner for Ned.” She went to a chest and removed a roll of colourful cloth. “He wants one just like yours.”

  Richard’s mouth lifted in a smile as he called for his secretary. “Kendall, my good man, take a letter to the Earl of Desmond.” John Kendall went to his desk and Richard began his customary pacing. After requesting his friend to administer the oath of allegiance to the people of Ireland, he sent instructions on various state matters.

  “And it gives me much pleasure,” he concluded, “to send you this collar worked in gold of the Suns and Roses of York, with my White Boar appended—” He halted, his gaze on the dark river curving towards Westminster. A sudden stillness had fallen and the lapping of the river came to him clearly; lapping as it had that night long ago when he’d sat by the water’s edge as a child and overheard Anne’s father Warwick, and Desmond’s father, Thomas Fitzgerald, in conversation about Edward’s odious queen, Bess Woodville. Their words were to prove fatal to them both.

  “Your father’s service to my father, the Duke of York, is warmly remembered,” he added quietly, “but we, their sons, are also bound together by a common tie of sorrow. For those who encompassed your father’s death are the same who encompassed the death of my brother, George, Duke of Clarence. If you desire to prosecute the guilty parties to the full extent of the law, I promise you the opportunity.”

  He glanced at Anne. She had bowed her head and halted in her embroidery. To the charges against Bess Woodville could be added another: the destruction of Anne’s family, the Nevilles…

  He couldn’t undo the past; he could only learn from it. If his brother Edward had not been ungrateful to Anne’s father, the man who’d made him King, might it all have come out differently? He was determined not to make the same mistake. “Make a note, Kendall… The Duke of Buckingham is to be appointed Constable and Chamberlain of England and to receive the de Bohun estates, which are now the property of the Crown.”

  Anne’s head jerked up. “Is that not excessive, my lord?”

  “He helped me gain the throne. He should share in the glory as well as the responsibility. I cherish his loyalty and wish him to know it,” Richard said roughly.

  Anne bit her lip, thrust her needle and scarlet thread into the silk cloth and yanked it through. If only loyalty weren’t Richard’s strongest trait! It made him blind to the faults so clear to others. That could be dangerous in a king, but there was no reasoning with him. How she wished to be wrong about Buckingham! Maybe I’ve rushed into judgement? Maybe, this once, my instincts have failed me? she thought hopefully. Buckingham might well be guilty of nothing more than a physical resemblance to the man who had charmed her father then turned his coat and helped destroy him. At least she could hope that was the cas
e.

  There was a rap at the door. A smiling Buckingham entered the privy chamber. He bowed to Anne. Richard brightened.

  “Ah, Harry, speak of the devil! You’re the first to know: Anne and I have decided to make a progress north. Isn’t that a splendid idea? We’ll spend a few days at Warwick Castle and stop at Minster Lovell to visit Francis. I want you at my side, naturally.”

  Buckingham didn’t respond. Anne noted that he was taken aback and seemed strangely thoughtful. He has been strangely thoughtful too often of late, she thought.

  “When do you plan to go?” Buckingham inquired with a raised eyebrow.

  “In about ten days.”

  “Dickon, I can’t leave that soon. Can I meet you on the way?”

  “What keeps you in foul London, Harry? Nothing unpleasant, I hope.”

  “No… but I’ve had scant time to attend to my own affairs in these past weeks.”

  “Then so it shall be, Harry!”

  Anne watched Buckingham leave, more disturbed than ever. Her instincts told her something was very wrong.

  ~ * ~

  That night in bed Anne tossed and turned fitfully.

  “What’s the matter, my sweet?” asked Richard, lifting up on an elbow. He could see her dimly in the moonlight flowing in through the open windows. “What troubles you?”

  “Nothing, Richard, nothing—” she said, and the hand that lay along his thigh dug into his flesh.

  “Anne, tell me.”

  “I mustn’t, Richard. It’s not my place—it would be an intrusion.”

  “An intrusion? Nothing you could say would be an intrusion, Anne. You can’t think that!”

  When Anne still hesitated, Richard reached for her hand.

  With a smile in his voice, He said, “Tell me, my lady. ’Tis a royal command.”

  “It’s Edward’s boys, Richard,” Anne replied softly.

  Richard’s smile vanished. He dropped her hand, lay back down, and stared at the silk canopy overhead. “They’re well treated, Anne, I assure you. Surely you don’t think otherwise?”

  “No, Richard.” Anne sat up in bed. Now she couldn’t rest until she’d spoken her mind. “I know you’d always do your best for your brother’s children but…”

  Richard waited.

  “The plots by the Lancastrians and the Woodville sympathisers to deliver them from the Tower and use them to foment rebellion against your rule—that’s why you’ve forbidden them visitors and to play in the garden, isn’t it?”

  “Aye. ’Tis necessity, not malice, that obliges me, Anne.”

  “I know, my love. But they’re children. Little Dickon is only nine—Ned’s age, Richard.”

  Richard threw back the covers. “Christ, Anne, well do I know that! Do you not think I’m troubled by what I must do?”

  “Richard, I believe I’ve found the solution that will solve your problem and still permit the boys a measure of freedom.”

  Richard rose and went to the window, regretting he had opened the door to the subject. Women understood nothing of such matters and Anne’s feelings would be hurt when he refused to heed her suggestion, as he surely must.

  It was a beautiful, clear night; the sky sparkled with stars and a cool breeze stirred. Anne appeared beside him and shut the window. He looked at her with surprise. She was the one who insisted on sleeping with the windows open and the bed curtains drawn back. She met his gaze boldly, not shyly from beneath her lashes with her head lowered as she was accustomed to do. He was caught off guard.

  “No one must hear this,” she said. Then she unfolded her plan.

  The solution was so simple, lying there all along, so clear…Why hadn’t he thought of it himself?

  “There’s one more thing, my love,” Anne said.

  “Aye?” he said in wonderment.

  “Entrust the task to Francis.” She hesitated. “And don’t tell Buckingham.”

  “But Buckingham’s my blood, my ally. I owe my throne to Buckingham—”

  “Call it a foolish whim, Richard. It would mean much to me.”

  In the moonlight, in her white filmy shift with her fair hair streaming down to her waist, she looked more than beautiful: she looked ethereal, and he was struck as never before that she was heaven’s gift to him.

  “I can deny you nothing, flower-eyes,” he said, and drew her to him.

  ~ * ~

  Chapter 3

  “To ride abroad redressing human wrongs.”

  “Rule fairly in your region,” Richard told his lords before setting out on his progress two weeks after his coronation. “Allow no oppression of the people.” He rose from his throne. “I thank you for your loyal support. All who wish to leave are dismissed.”

  There was a murmur. His nephew Jack de la Pole, Earl of Lincoln, pushed forward. “But my royal uncle, will you not require an armed escort?”

  “There is no need. I rule by the will of the people.”

  “But, Sire—” It was Anne’s kinsman, Lord Scrope of Bolton. “To go abroad without men-at-arms is dangerous, even in times of peace.”

  “Nevertheless, I am decided. My throne must rest on loyalty, not force.”

  Scrope exchanged an anxious glance with the others. “My lord, I choose to stay.”

  “So do I,” said Richard’s boyhood friend Rob Percy.

  “So do I,” echoed Jack.

  Richard descended the dais. “I shall be glad of your company, my good friends.”

  “M-m-may I c-come, too, L-lord Uncle?” stuttered a small voice at his waist. Richard looked down at his brother’s son, whose mother had been Anne’s sister, Bella. His heart twisted with pity. With his rosy cheeks, bright blue Neville eyes and wealth of wheat-coloured curls, his brother George’s son—yet another Edward—was a beautiful child and exceptionally sweet-tempered. But thanks to the neglect of his guardian, the Woodville queen’s son, the Marquess of Dorset, he was a timid, dull-witted boy, unable to comprehend at eight what most understood at five.

  “Of course you may, Edward, if only to meet your cousin, my own little Edward,” said Richard gently. He tousled his fair hair. “From now on, you’ll come with me everywhere I go, won’t he, Gower?” He exchanged a knowing look with little Edward’s new squire, Thomas Gower, who had been squire first to Anne’s uncle, John Neville, and then to John’s young son, George, until their deaths.

  “Aye, sire,” answered Gower with soft eyes. Richard managed a smile, and his glance, moving over his company of friends, passed to one who stood apart: Lord Stanley.

  Clearly reluctant to be there, alone at the back of the group, Stanley was watching him warily. You, too, will come with me, my wily fox, thought Richard. Everywhere I go.

  ~*~

  In the glaring sunshine of the July morning, Richard set out with his entourage, trumpets blowing, dogs barking, baggage carts creaking. He was accompanied by those of his lords who had chosen to stay and a great train of bishops, justices, and officers of his household. The crowds were sparse in the streets and the procession only drew the curious, but those present remarked on the King’s lack of an armed escort.

  Everywhere along the way, through the towns and villages, Richard was welcomed with pageants and processions, and offered gifts of money. He could have put these to good use defraying his expenses. Money had been a constant problem from the day the Woodvilles had absconded with half the treasury. But he refused. “I would rather have your hearts than your money,” was his common refrain. Instead, he made them gifts of his own. In Woodstock, it was a grant of royal forest land that Bess had appropriated for her own pleasure and that he knew would greatly ease the people’s burden gathering food for their families; in Gloucester, it was a charter of liberties. And everywhere, it was justice.

  Tirelessly, Richard presided at the local courts, heard the complaints of the poor, and punished offenders. In Oxford, his second stop after leaving Windsor, Richard, whose scholastic tastes ran to moral philosophy and Latin theology, lingered two days to enga
ge in lively discourse with the Chancellor and eminent doctors before leaving for Gloucester. But the visit was marred by ill tidings. Another plot had been discovered, hatched around Bess Woodville. Her daughters were to be smuggled abroad to join Tudor so that they might marry princes willing to carry on the fight against Richard.

  In their lodgings at Magdalen College, Anne exchanged a weary glance with his close friend Rob Percy as the messenger from Westminster apprised Richard of events. Conspiracies swirled around Bess. She was a born plotter who thrived on discord. To live peaceably went against her nature. Richard’s Chancellor, John Russell, had crushed the plot swiftly, but more were sure to be hatched in spite of the strong guard placed around Bess.

  The next morning Richard and Anne set out in a pelting rain to visit Francis at his ancestral home in Oxfordshire. The skies cleared as they rode westward, the sun came out, and the dewy green slopes glittered like emeralds. They passed shiny fruit orchards and old churches; they crossed stone bridges and gurgling waterfalls. Gradually the conspiracy faded from their minds and smiles replaced their strained looks. Dusk was falling when they arrived at Minster Lovell.

  “I forget how beautiful it is here, Francis,” breathed Anne. She fingered a white rose in full bloom on a trellis running up the stone of the manor house and bent her head to its perfume.

  “Here a troubadour might well think himself in heaven, Francis,” smiled Richard, pausing to admire the magnificent view. To the trilling of larks, swans glided past with their cygnets on the smoothly flowing river that glittered silver in the fading light. Tall cypresses, in relief against the darkening sky, defined the spacious walks leading to a splashing fountain, and butterflies flitted among the profusion of white Persian lilies, purple pansies, and violets, their brilliance heightened by evening.

  “I must admit I have been driven to song on occasion,” said Francis Lovell softly, “especially at night. Nothing is more beautiful than the night, when nightingales sing and the moon hangs high and bright, and stars fall in the sky.”