Between Two Kings (20 page)

When she remembered Henry and their vehement passion, a thousand emotions coursed through her veins – repulsion, fear, hate, trepidation, hate, and, probably, love. She was sure that she still loved Henry, despite his acts of atrocity and cruelty. At the same time, she hated him with all her heart. She hated him as much as she once loved him. It was a strange feeling, as though she had stepped into the land of confusion and uncertainty in sensitive aspects of her life. Did she still love Henry? Or did she hate him? Could love be so destructive and so hateful? There was a terrible mess in her head.

Anne still suffered from terrible nightmares as her past was haunting her in her sleep. It was early morning, and only a slight dawn washed the horizon with a blurred pink sunrise. Anne and François were lying in the bed, their limbs entwined after a dance of physical love. That night Anne had a terrible dream that she was being burnt at the stake while King Henry, Lady Mary Tudor, and Jane Seymour were watching her agonizing death and laughing at her torment. It wasn’t the first such dream she’d had since her escape from England.

As she awoke in cold sweat from her nightmare, Anne groaned and stared ahead in the dark emptiness of the bedchamber. Her face flushed with a hot rush of blood. Her breathing was quite, yet erratic. Her heart was beating wildly against her chest, and she found it difficult to catch her breath. A lump raised in her throat. She swallowed hard over and over again. Unspeakable horror and dreadful fear captured her entire being while heavy metal chains of intense pain nearly suffocated her like a hard touch of steel to her throat. Anne forgot that she wasn’t alone in bed. François also awoke and sat up. He reached for her and pulled her closer to his chest.

“Shhh,” François whispered. He buried her in the force of his solid arms, pressing her to his chest and waiting for her breathing to return to normal. “Shhh,” he soothed her.

During the night he had outdone himself in tender intimacy. He silently questioned whether he had probably scared her in the process. His heart missed a beat and started pounding harder. “Did I hurt you today?” He thought that his heart would burst with concern and anxiety.

“No, Your Majesty,” Anne murmured truthfully. Her eyes were closed.

He emitted a sigh of relief. “Did you have a bad dream?” Her dark hair was long and fell free on her shoulders. He reached out and touched a strand of hair near her face.

“Yes,” she murmured. She sounded melancholy.

François listened to her breathe, and then he kissed the nape of her neck where her hair fell away. She did not stir. He was overwhelmed with the lavender scent from her hair. “What was it?”

Anne took a deep breath and held it for a long, long moment. “Nothing serious,” she finally answered.

François only sighed heavily. He knew that “nothing” had meant Henry Tudor and Jane Seymour, the Tower of London, her execution, and something from her past life in England. Only now he realized how emotionally fragile she was, despite her brilliant masquerade of indifference and courtesy during the daytime. He bent his head down and softly pressed his lips to hers for a single chaste kiss. Then he broke away. “You will be fine, Anne. Please try to sleep,” he coaxed.

“I will try, Your Majesty,” Anne replied, closing her eyes. “Thank you.”

François encircled Anne in a protective embrace as they lay back on gold and ivory overstuffed silk pillows. She could hear nothing but his steady breathing, the warmth of it so close to her face. Anne still was grieving, and her anguish was stronger than the earthquake of the greatest magnitude. She wanted to escape from pain and wished nobody to suffer, apart from her enemies, particularly King Henry. Her pain was unbearable especially in the nightfall. However, when she was in his arms, she didn’t feel as lonely as she usually felt. His tenderness and protectiveness took away some of her pain. Then she drifted to sleep.

CHAPTER 10

August 1537, Venice, the Republic of Venice

Count Jean de Montreuil was delighted that Anne and François had allied themselves in the form of matrimony. He saw that they were not in love with each other, but they were anyway a stunning couple. Apparently, François respected and adored Anne, but she just accepted him and everything he gave her for granted. Jean knew that Anne was afraid of trusting the King of France, and she couldn’t be blamed for that after what she had endured in England because of her own mistakes and because of King Henry’s obsession with having a male heir.

The old man witnessed how François looked at Anne with a gaze of complete adoration. He was captivated by her. It was clear that François considered Anne not only a political instrument in his revenge on Henry Tudor; he was physically attracted to his new wife and was proud of her intelligence and shrewd mind.

Jean saw that there was no love between them, but there were respect and common interests. Maybe they could even become more than just friends over time. Jean thought that it was a miracle and a good omen that François was saved by Anne Boleyn.

“Anne, I think that you will find a marriage to His Majesty very interesting,” Monsieur Jean noted.

Anne forced a smile. “And useful,” she stated.

Jean shook his head, an ironic smile curving his lips. “This marriage can be more than just a convenient marriage. I hope that you will be able to see more positive things in your matrimony.”

Anne stared stonily at him. “It is a marriage of mutual benefit and nothing more,” she parried.

Jean laughed at her. “Anne, King François is very different from King Henry. Take that it into account.”

“Perhaps,” she said vaguely. Then she laughed. “I am like Eleanor of Aquitaine who married at first the King of France and then the future King of England.”

“Duchess of Aquitaine was a great woman. But you, Anne, will never be like her in one aspect - you won’t rebel against your own husband.”

Anne would never rebel against any king after she had managed to escape her death on the scaffold and at the stake. She would never do it even if it was the only way to place her son Arthur on the throne of England. “I am not out of my mind to rebel against either the King of England or the King of France,” she replied.

“Anne, I am sure that you cannot be displeased with your marriage to His Majesty King François.” Jean smiled at her. “So far it was fine?” he questioned curiously.

Anne emitted a sigh. “It is like a usual marriage of convenience.”

“I will be straightforward,” Jean said firmly. “If you haven’t seen it yet, you will soon understand that King François’ personality is the opposite of King Henry’s violent and rude personality.” Jean stroked his silver beard. “I don’t know whether you are able to see this difference and to use it as an unselfish advantage. Everything depends on you, Anne.”

She blinked in confusion. “An unselfish advantage?”

“An advantage to you and your husband, which is far from being purely political,” Jean clarified.

Monsieur Jean’s naked honesty surprised Anne. She sighed and averted her gaze. A silence reigned in the room.

On the same day, François and Anne, accompanied by several guards, decided to make a long trip on the canals of Venice. They specially chose the quite late afternoon time, around six in the evening, in order to preserve their secret more carefully. The royal blue and gold gondola belonging to King François waited for them. The reticent gondolier helped them onto the craft with silent reverence.

François looked at Anne. He was mesmerized. Anne glowed in the finest extravagant creamy silk gown, trimmed with creamy Venetian lace and pearls on the front. The gown tapered at the waist and its low square-cut neckline revealed the upper curves of her full breasts. She looked every inch the greatest beauty, even if an unconventional beauty, and the greatest charmer of the realm.

Under the King’s gaze, her body felt as disconcerted as her mind. He smiled at her inward embarrassment. Anne looked much more attractive and more beautiful than Eleanor of Austria and even better than Anne de Pisseleu d’Heilly, Duchess d’Étampes. The more time François spent with Anne, his new wife, the more he forgot about his lover Anne de Pisseleu. He didn’t want to remember that Duchess d’Étampes was impatiently waiting for him in Turin. He hadn’t sent her even a single letter since he had arrived in Venice.

Suddenly, their bodies lurched as the gondola was launched. Anne felt the ripples of the water pass beneath the wood at her feet. She heard the oar’s soft splash as it dipped into the water, again and again, like the ticking of a clock on a sleepless night. Suddenly, nausea attacked her as the splashes of water turned louder and louder that they reverberated in her ears.

The four windowless sides of the cabin seemed to draw closer around her. The beautiful headpiece of pinned-up, bejeweled braids felt tighter on her head. Blood throbbed in her temples. She drew a deep breath, but it wasn’t enough. Her chest constricted, her throat narrowed.

“Your Majesty,” Anne pronounced in one single breath. She was very pale.

François stepped closer to her and stared at her. “Anne, how are you feeling?” There was undeniable concern in his eyes and his tone.

Her face blanched even more as blood drained from her face. She was ghostly pale at that moment. “I cannot breathe,” she whispered. Leaning forward, she threw open the drape and rushed out. The gondola swayed under her sudden, jerky motion. With little grace, she flounced down on the bench just outside the baldachin.

Seconds passed before François joined her, sitting beside her on the bench. He put an arm around her shoulder. “How are you feeling now, Anne?” he inquired.

Anne turned to him and smiled. It was so pleasant when somebody asked about her health. Henry asked her about it rarely and didn’t care for it in the last months of their marriage. “Better, Your Majesty. Thank you for your concern,” she replied with gratitude.

François tightened his arm around her shoulder. He didn’t want to let her body vibrate along the splashes of the water. “Anne, please tell me if you want to leave the gondola. We will return.”

“No, it is alright. I want to stay,” Anne said convincingly.

Soon the gondola turned onto the wide Grand Canal where they passed many gondolas on each side, their drivers singing, their passengers talking and laughing. However, they continued on in silence, as mute and subdued as their gondolier and the guards. Anne decided that it would be better in order not to attract attention to them. Anne contemplated the beauty of her surroundings with a versant stare, as if seeing a rare beautiful flower for the first time. The magnificent palazzi dominated both sides of Venice’s main thoroughfare, their colorful stone façades of lime and ochre, with whimsical tracery ornamentation, and open loggias and arcades, giving these Venetian palaces their particular distinction.

“Anne, what a beauty you are,” François remarked. “Your eyes are so blue, Madame,” he said, as though he’d told her something she didn’t know.

Anne felt his hand on her shoulder. She knew that he was studying her appearance, despite her gaze away from his face. “Yes, Your Majesty,” she said simply.

“I have seen such eyes only once before.” His voice was very low, barely a whisper. Anne felt that he had turned his head and no longer looked at her, somewhere else. “They are like a columbine or a blue barlow flower of rich royal blue color. Columbine usually blooms in early spring to early summer. I saw a lot of these flowers in my early childhood in the gardens of the Château d’Amboise where I was raised.” François didn’t know why he had become sentimental. Anne gave him an impulse to behave strangely.

When she served as a lady-in-waiting to Queen Claude of France, Anne had spent quite some time at the Château d’Amboise because the queen mainly lived there, as well as at the Château de Blois. “I remember Amboise, but I don’t remember these flowers there.” Anne tipped her head to the side, turning her strikingly blue eyes upon the king and gave a small, benevolent smile. “And my eyes are exactly the color of these flowers at Amboise?” It was a question out of pure curiosity.

François’ face had a faraway look, with an irrefutable sparkle of pleasure. “Exactly the same color.”

The smile engulfed Anne’s face, both lips and eyes. “Your honor me, Your Majesty.” Anne’s eyes stopped on the Palazzo Barbarigo, the residence of the French ambassador to Venice, which was one of the most opulent palazzi on the Grand Canal, distinguished by its mosaics of some exotic glass. The Palazzo Barbarigo had the finest Renaissance design on three floors: an open loggia with an access to the canal surmounted by 
a Piano nobile
 with open loggias and decorated columns, with a “
secondo piano nobile
” or secondary floor above.

Many other Renaissance palazzi on the canal were covered in polychrome and gilt decorations, with elaborate plaster and stucco work adding to their splendor. Soon they saw the Palazzo Corner Spinelli, standing across the canal from the Palazzo Querini Dubois. Other palazzi bore different exteriors, though many possessed a large set of central windows flanked by twin towers, creating a stage to show the wares offered by the owner. Soon they faced the Palazzo Ducale or the Doge’s Palace that was built in the Venetian flamboyant Gothic style that was one of the main landmarks of the city of Venice.

“I like Renaissance style much more than the Gothic style,” François said.

Anne arched a brow. “Why, Your Majesty?”

The King of France also smiled. “In contrast to the Gothic buildings, the grand Renaissance buildings exhibit perfect symmetry of architectural details, exquisite proportions, and fine geometry of parts. They usually have numerous large windows with open marbles. Windows are often round-arched and have columns in the three classical orders. In the Gothic style columns tend to be thinner, while elongated arches are replaced by pointed or ogee or lobed ones,” he answered as a true professional.

A smile hovered over her lips. “Your Majesty, you are a true Renaissance gentleman.” She didn’t say “a true Renaissance King”, but a gentleman because at that moment both of them were just people who were enjoying their watery travels. She had always been stunned how well educated François was. It was indeed lucky she had been educated at the French court, not at the English court or at home, at the Hever Castle. If that had happened she would be proficient only in needlework and sewing.

“Anne,” François spoke her name with some lyrical accent.

She raised her brow. “Your Majesty?”

“Venice is a magnificent place,” he answered with a delightful smile.

Anne gave an enchanting smile in response, and suddenly François could see only that smile and nothing more. Everything else evaporated from his mind.

August 1537, Staffordshire, England

Lady Mary Boleyn Stafford and her husband William Stafford settled in Newcastle-under-Lyme, in the County of Staffordshire, in the West Midlands region of England. When Mary decided to get married to William in 1534, she hadn’t cared what others would think about her secret matrimony. She loved William and thus became his wife.

As a result, Anne and her father Thomas Boleyn had banished her from the court after she married a man so far beneath her station. Her father disinherited her and said that she wasn’t part of the Boleyn family anymore. Her father told Mary that she had brought only disappointment and shame to her family.

She was prohibited to have any communication with Anne, George, and even with her mother, Lady Elizabeth Boleyn, the Countess of Wiltshire, who was living quietly in the countryside. Mary was distressed and felt betrayed, but she silently obeyed and disappeared from London. A woman of strong character, kind heart, and decided principles, she wasn’t going to beg Anne and her relatives to give her money or a piece of bread even though she had literally been thrown into the street.

Many things happened in Mary Boleyn’s life, and they had substantially changed her character in the past years. Mary was considered by her parents a child of less intellectual ability than the rest of her family. She could even say that she was kind of neglected from infancy by her parents who loved Anne and George more than they did Mary. Mary knew that she didn’t have Anne’s sharp, lofty, and keen intellect and that she possessed much less determination, not being ambitious by nature.

While Anne was the one who climbed high, earned the plaudits from Thomas Boleyn and the Duke of Norfolk, and finally lost everything, Mary didn’t tempt fate too far and never wished to be raised to the queenship. Yet, she had Anne’s great vitality and some of her sister’s opportunistic nature that later prompted her to be involved in some adventures at the French court and afterwards at the English court.

It was true that Mary Boleyn used to be a woman of rather loose morals in her early youth. Indeed, she slept with King François and with King Henry, and she never forgot about her notorious past. Mary arrived to the French court with Princess Mary Tudor who became the wife of King Louis XII and at whose wedding Mary Boleyn was in attendance in England in proxy. Thomas Boleyn arranged that Mary had accompanied Princess Mary Tudor in France not aiming at the promotion of the Boleyns in England, but rather giving Mary a good opportunity of self-advancement in the princess’ entourage, probably hoping that she would secure a good marriage for herself.

Later, Mary Boleyn willingly succumbed to the temptations of the French court. Before King Louis XII’s death, when François was known as Dauphin François and Duke de Valois since 1499, François’ eye alighted on Mary’s young, easygoing beauty. He began to pursue her on a regular basis, but Mary resisted him for a while. Meanwhile, Mary couldn’t deny that she was utterly charmed by the notoriously wanton, highly artistic, and alluringly handsome young heir to the throne of France as he wrote her many love poems and sent her manifold expensive gifts, mainly exquisite jewelry and expensive French gowns.

When the old King of France died, François ascended the throne of France, which stimulated him to embark on many new amorous escapades than he had ever had before. François continued pursuing Mary, and she was gradually becoming more and more attracted to him. The aura of the magnificent and powerful Renaissance monarch contributed to her emotional attachment to the French king as she felt honored that he wanted her. She knew that he had many mistresses at the court, but the passion he inflamed in Mary overweighed her fears and hesitation.