Heart of Gold (2 page)

“These are the finest of warriors, Sir Ambrose,” the French king called out. “And you have vanquished every one.” He motioned for the Lord Constable, and took his winnings from the minister’s open fist. Holding up the Tudor king’s emerald ring to the light, he looked at it admiringly for a moment before handing it over the railing to the young knight. “I should have gotten England to wager Calais!”

Francis and Ambrose exchanged a smile while the surly English king looked on unamused.

With a nod of his head, the Scottish warrior turned away from the royal box and steered his horse down past the rows of French courtiers. Acknowledging the adulation of the still excited throng, he searched the crowd. He saw the women leaning forward in their seats, hoping for a chance to capture his attention. But his gaze swept over them all.

And then he saw her. She stood where she had been before. She hadn’t moved.

Elizabeth studied the image of the warrior. He was all power, all elegance. She had seen enough. She was ready to start. She could feel the tingling, the excitement—in her hands, in the tips of her fingers. The sight of the man as he sat on the magnificent horse, watching her, would remain emblazoned in her memory.

Ambrose had never seen eyes as beautifully dark as hers. They were riveted on him. Studying him. He felt her gaze boring through his shield, roaming his body, studying him. She wanted him, he could tell. He would have her in his bed. Tonight.

Drawing his sword, Ambrose placed the great emerald ring on the razor-sharp point and extended it toward the young and beautiful maiden.

Elizabeth held out her hand as the knight deftly placed the token in her upturned palm.

The crowd fell silent as they watched the exchange. Then a thousand wagging tongues came alive with gossip.

Her mind raced but her hand was slow to follow.

Elizabeth dipped the brush in the paint mixture and once again raised it to the canvas.

“What are you calling it?”

“The eighth wonder of the world!” Elizabeth murmured as she took a step back, studying her latest creation.
The Field of Cloth of Gold
. She had captured it. The sweep of the rolling countryside outside Calais. The grandeur and the majesty of the royal processions. The unadorned lowliness of the gawking poor. The blue skies overhead and the green fields of late spring. The thick, gray clouds darkening the distant skyline. The gaudy liveries of scurrying servants. The competitive thrill of the joust. The conquering knight. Her best work so far.

Mary shifted her weight on the couch as she stuffed more pillows behind her head. “May I see the ring?”

Elizabeth turned in surprise and looked at her younger half-sister. This was the last thing Mary needed right now, with this illness that was plaguing her. As if the sores from the pox were not bad enough, Mary had been unable to hold down any food for the past week. This once beautiful and robust young woman lay on Elizabeth’s bed, exhausted and spent. Elizabeth held back her pity and her tongue. After all, what could she say to this seventeen-year-old who had already endured more pain than others might bear in a lifetime? Elizabeth’s mind wandered vaguely to thoughts of her other sister, Anne, and she wondered whether the youngest sister had been the source of Mary’s knowledge about the afternoon’s incident. The thirteen-year-old Anne was, for most part, Mary’s eyes and ears these days.

“Where is the ring, Elizabeth?”

“I don’t have it anymore.”

“For God’s sake, don’t pity me.” Mary turned her face away, speaking as much to herself as to her sister. “He took my innocence. He slept with me. He used me. So what if you are the one that ends up with his ring?”

“You slept with the Scot?”
“Don’t be funny, Elizabeth. You know what I’m talking about.”

It was no secret that Mary had been the mistress of Henry VIII, King of England, in the recent months. The affair had begun immediately after Mary and Anne were summoned to England and to the court by their father only four months ago. From what Elizabeth had been able to gather from Anne, their father had clearly encouraged Mary to respond in kind to the handsome young king’s amorous advances, and Sir Thomas had even gone so far as to arrange private meetings in the hunting lodges away from court...and away from the queen. It was common knowledge that the king had long ago grown tired of the woman who could bear him no son.

Ten years back, after death of his wife, Sir Thomas Boleyn had sent Mary and Anne to France to be brought up in the company of Elizabeth, his daughter from an earlier liaison. Growing up together in France in the household that their father kept in the court of Queen Isabel, the bonds had grown strong between the three young siblings. Elizabeth, then ten years old, was only three years older than Mary. Nonetheless, from the start she had taken on the role of guardian and had looked after and offered guidance to her newfound half-sisters.

It was a joy to have them. As a young child, before her sisters’ arrival, Elizabeth had been an extremely lonely child. With no parents and no friends, Elizabeth had found other ways way to capture the magic she missed in her life. The little girl had a God-given gift. Elizabeth Boleyn had the ability to see and depict beauty in the darkness around her.

She could still remember what it had been like the night of her mother’s death. Dry-eyed, sitting by the burned-out hearth, she had held a fistful of warm ashes in one hand, a charred twig in the other. Using stick and ash, the young girl’s small fingers had quietly, desperately swirled and traced a lifeline of patterns. Standing and moving to her mother’s cold, lifeless body, Elizabeth had touched her mother’s face, as beautiful in death as it had been in life. She left smudge of ash on the high cheekbone.

Elizabeth had only wished the ash could make her warm.

The rest of her childhood was spent drawing on boards, floors, and walls—using whatever subjects she could find and then letting her imagination fill the void.

Years later, she began to paint. As long as Elizabeth made no trouble for her new guardian, she was allowed to run away from the confining prison of her quarters and spend countless hours with the craftsman and the artists that visited Queen Isabel’s court. None of the men had ever minded or questioned the bright-faced child who sat silently watching, her knees pulled up to her chest, her eyes intent on their every move. With apprentices bustling about, some of the painters had, in fact, shown interest in the little girl and, as she quietly told them of her interest, provided her with precious scraps of canvas or pigment for paint. She had watched the artisans fashioning their brushes, gazed with wonder at the mixing of paints, and studied the planning and the steps of each artist’s technique.

Elizabeth had practiced all she learned. While other young children of the court might fear and avoid the dark corners of the grim castle keep, Elizabeth had taken sanctuary in them. Though the dark stone walls exuded dampness and cold, Elizabeth herself radiated the glowing vibrancy of life. The bold colors that she used in her paintings shone with sunlight and warmth. The lively detail of her work evoked smiles and good cheer in the few who shared her secret.

And then her sisters had arrived.

As time passed, the three black-haired daughters of Sir Thomas Boleyn had soon attracted the roving eyes of courtiers and knights from France and from many different countries. Of the three, Mary had always been the one drawn to the glamour of that fashionable life. Indeed, something in Elizabeth’s sister had always cried out for the fawning attention of the court rakes, but nothing unfortunate had ever occurred. Not while Mary had been under Elizabeth’s care.

Four months had now passed since her sisters had left. During the years Mary and Anne had been with her, Elizabeth had learned to discipline her creative urge. She would only paint when time allowed and when her siblings did not need her. After their departure, it had taken a long time to overcome her loneliness for them. But as time passed, Elizabeth had actually grown fond of her newfound solitude. It allowed her time to paint. With no disruptions, no one to baby, soothe, or look after, she was tasting the first fruits of freedom. But freedom was short-lived.

Suddenly Elizabeth found herself unexpectedly summoned to Calais by Sir Thomas. On arrival, she’d found Mary sick and bedridden. Her sister had contracted the dreaded pox.

She knew what it was. The scourge of every court in Europe. A miserable disease that attacked a lover’s body first, and then attacked the mind.

Elizabeth tended to Mary with loving care. There was no need for scolding the younger woman. If the syphilis didn’t kill her now, then Mary could look forward to a lifetime of suffering.

Though she herself had always shunned the allure of the court and its shallow inhabitants, something within Elizabeth kept her from condemning Mary for becoming the love interest of the most powerful man in England—the man who held their father’s future in his hands. After all, Elizabeth had always had her talent
,
her painting, her secret life, and her hopes of becoming a great painter. Those dreams offered all the passion that Elizabeth sought in this life. They made her independent, even as a woman. Lost in her art, she needed no man to look after her, to protect her. But Mary was different. She needed attention. She wanted glamour. As Elizabeth strove to be the observer and to capture the image, Mary had always taken pleasure in being the object, the observed, the center of all attention.

Elizabeth thought now of the price her sister was paying. She picked up the brush and started to paint puffs of clouds scudding across the clear blue sky.

“Anne told me everything that happened today at the tournament,” Mary whispered, watching the smooth strokes of her sister’s brush. “I have to warn you. He is a womanizer.”

“You know him?” Elizabeth asked without breaking stride.

“It is hard not to notice him. That Scot is a good-looking man. But don’t worry, sister. He is clean. I haven’t slept with him.”

The crash of the jug against the floor jolted Mary to a sitting position. She looked down sheepishly, trying to avoid the blazing temper of her older sister.

“I warn you!” Elizabeth took a step toward the cowering creature. “If I hear you even one more time belittling yourself as you have been...” She took a deep breath to control her anger before continuing. The walls of these tents were too thin for her liking. “You cannot hold yourself responsible, Mary. If someone should to take the blame, it is that king of yours for giving this god-awful disease to a mere child.”

“Then you believe me that he is the only one I have ever slept with?”

“Of course I believe you.”

The soft tears that left Mary’s eyes did not go unnoticed by her older sister. Elizabeth moved quickly to her and gathered the young woman in her arms.

“Henry doesn’t. He hates me. He called me ugly. He said he never wants to see my sickly face. The night before you arrived, I went to him. I was delirious with fever. He wouldn’t even let his physician tend to me. He called me a...” Mary clutched at the neck of her sister and wept.

“Hush, my love. That’s all in the past. That’s all behind you now. Just think of the future. Of a beautiful future.”

Elizabeth clutched Mary tightly in her arms—holding her, rocking her. She knew her words lacked conviction. She bit her lips in frustration as she thought of the cold and selfish king. But men were all alike in that respect. Born free to do as they wished. Free to take what they claimed was theirs by right, but never abiding by any civil rules.

“Oh, Elizabeth!” Mary wept. “What future? They once called me the fairest girl in France. Every man at court was after my affections. You know how popular I was. Now see what I’ve become. No man will ever want to look at me. I’ll never have any place in society. No one will want me not even as a friend. I’m already shunned. I just want to die. Why doesn’t Death just come and take me?”

“Stop your foolish talk, Mary. That will not happen.”

“Why not?”

“Because Death has to face me first before he gets to you.”

“You think you could scare him off the way you scare me?” Mary asked with a weak chuckle.

“Of course!”

Mary closed her eyes and took comfort in the protective embrace. She should have asked Father to bring Elizabeth here sooner. Everything would get better now that she was here. Elizabeth would take care of her, the way she always had. She would never be alone. And she’d get better. Her sister had said so. Elizabeth had already sought the assistance of the French king’s physician in examining her illness. The man had been here twice and was coming back this afternoon. He had sounded quite hopeful the last time.

The gentle footstep outside the tent separated the two. Elizabeth moved quickly to her painting and threw a sheet over it.

“Why don’t you want me to see it?” The young girl stood in the opening of the tent, watching her eldest sister with a pout on her pretty face.

“Anne, you should not march in on grown-ups as you do. It is not proper.” Mary whispered in her weak voice from the couch. “You know very well that Elizabeth doesn’t want anyone looking at her pictures.”

“I am not anyone. I’m her sister. And what you say is untrue. I saw her show her paintings to the Duc de Bourbon!”

“She saw what?” Mary turned to her older sister in surprise. Elizabeth had sworn Mary to secrecy years back. No one was to see her pictures. No one was to be told. Mary knew it was Elizabeth’s greatest fear—that if people discovered her paintings, they would be taken away. After all, it was not proper for a young woman to pursue such hobbies to the extent that Elizabeth did. Mary had been shocked in seeing that some of Elizabeth’s paintings actually portrayed nude men and women. Though truthfully, considering the builds of some of the men, she’d been tempted more than once to ask Elizabeth whom she’d used as models.

“I saw her with my own two eyes,” Anne broke in before Elizabeth could respond. “In fact, I saw her accept a bag of gold coins from the duc and leave one of the paintings with him.”