Roses Have Thorns: A Novel of Elizabeth I (6 page)

Heat rushed to my cheeks. I was to be married!

Bridget held herself steady, however. “The princess has that many debts?” she asked.

“And more,” Christina said. “I’ve heard her speaking with the margrave. He’s to slip out of England soon, to Germany, escaping his English debtors and finding a way for us to return home.”

Both Bridget and I were shocked at that. Fifteen hundred pounds was an unimaginable amount of money, and I did not want the payment of the princess’s debts to be the manner in which I started married life. William would have to pay a dowry, of sorts, rather than receive one. But I quickly moved to thinking of my wedding, and what I should tell my mother, and if she would receive a letter if it were quickly sent.

I sent that letter off to Sweden, telling my mother that I would be married here, begging for her approval, and steeling myself to
tell her that I was giving my blessing to Philip and Karin should they choose to marry. I was to remain in England! I would become an Englishwoman. The thought terrified me, and thrilled me, and I tried not to think upon the fact that I may never see my mother or sisters again but rather that I would be the beloved wife of a marquess and would make my way, somehow, at the Queen of England’s court. William could not have been more kind. He was attentive and presented an expensive necklace and a new gown to me as New Year’s gifts. I made a fine ruff for him and did the lacework on a delicate pair of gloves for the queen.

One of the queen’s men arrived at Bedford House with a New Year’s gift for me from Her Majesty.

“For me?” I said. “Are you certain?” I hadn’t attended the New Year’s ceremonies, as the princess had pled illness.

“Yes, my lady,” he said. “I’m certain.” He unloaded the gift from the cart and brought it into the great hall, where he took the satin sheet off it with a flourish. It was a gilded cage with a pair of lovely songbirds.

The other Swedish girls tittered politely behind their hands while I stuttered out my thanks. After the queen’s man left, we all let free our laughter. They knew, though the English didn’t, that I cared not at all for songbirds. I hadn’t, of course, informed the queen, who’d assumed I shared her love of them.

“These you must care for, no matter what,” Bridget said.

“Indeed, I understand that,” I said. “I shall write to Her Majesty immediately, offering profuse thanks.” I took the cage to our room, held at arm’s length. Songbirds.
Milde makter
.

To my utter dismay, Princess Cecelia had rather another kind of gift in mind for me, and it was an unwelcome surprise of a much
stronger sort. She called me to her chamber one morning in March after the margrave had fled for the Continent.

“I have changed my mind,” she said.

“About what, my lady?” I asked.

“About your marrying Northampton. I’m revoking my permission. You will return home to Sweden with us.”

•   •   •

I hid my anger and feigned willing obedience as I sank to my knees on a cushion before her. “Madam? Surely you cannot mean that. I have already written of this to my mother and given my blessing for my sister Karin to marry my, er, former fiancé, Philip Bonde. I have given Lord Northampton my answer, my word. As have you,” I dared to point out. Of course, I said nothing about the £1500 debt as I did not desire to be slapped.

“The Lord Northampton may be a marquess, but I am a princess, and I shall write to the queen. Shall you act as my secretary, as I have been deprived of my own?”

“Indeed, I shall, if you wish it,” I said, though I could scarce keep my wits about me with this news. With one half of my mind I was thinking how to untangle the knot in this delicate thread and with the other I was putting to paper the words she spoke.

We do not doubt, most gracious and powerful Queen, that you remember how we once complained to your Majesty of wrongs done to us by certain of your subjects, who until now have gone unpunished, which fact has caused us great grief of mind. This grief has been further increased today by a great wrong done to us by Ephippiarus, who, not satisfied with any of the reasonable
terms which the other creditors have accepted, has arrested and detained our Secretary, and has spread a false report about us through the whole city, that we are planning a secret departure from here. . . .

May it please your Majesty graciously to call to mind our love toward you, and that we came into this kingdom for no other reason than to declare the same. Therefore we do not doubt that your Majesty will equally reciprocate our love and ward off from us every harm, and kindly restore to us our Secretary out of arrest; and this kindness we will labor to deserve by our love toward you, whatever injuries we may receive.

“There now, quickly seal it and hand it to a court messenger,” the princess said. I did as I was bade, but I knew there were mistruths therein and it disgusted me. It was indeed true that the princess was planning a quiet escape; the margrave had cut his beard and disguised himself to reenter the city with plans for the Swedish party to meet him at Dover, where he would have a ship from the Continent waiting. Christina Abrahamsdotter had told us that not only the jewelers and the tailor but the butcher, the poulterer, the grocer, the baker, the butter man, the fishmonger, the brewer, and the grocer had all petitioned the Queen’s Privy Counsel for overdue payments. The margrave had also fallen in with some unsavory persons to whom he owed great gambling debts.

That night William came to call for me and conveyed Bridget and myself to his manor to dine. One of his friends took Bridget from hall to hall to show her some of the statuary while William spoke with me privately. “You do know that Princess Cecelia would like to revoke her permission for our marriage.”

I nodded. “I do. I’m distraught about it. I wish to remain here, and to become your wife.”

“Must you do as she insists?” he asked.

“I have had no word from my mother. I shall write her again tonight and tell her of my affection for you and my desire to remain. But the princess is likely to sail before I hear back.”

“I shall write to your mother, too, to reassure her of my protection and care, and enclose my letter with yours,” he said. “In the meantime, perhaps you could speak with the queen?”

“She would be interested in so mean a matter?” Hope rose within me. I had already begun to imagine a sweet and meaningful life with William.

“ ’Tis not a mean matter to me,” he said with deep emotion, taking my hands in his own. “And therefore it is not to her, friend that she is.”

•   •   •

A messenger came from court the very next day. Princess Cecelia was vexed when it was not the expected letter returning her secretary and promising to pay all her debts, but rather a summons for me to appear before the queen. “Go, then,” she barked at me.

I did not take her bitterness to heart. I knew she was greatly disappointed that the queen she had nearly worshipped for many years would not come to her royal defense. As for me, I sided with the queen. Silently.

When I arrived at Whitehall, the queen was in her receiving chamber with a few of her women. I clamped my jaw to stop my teeth chattering and willed my knees firm under my rich, gold-stamped gown, thanking my mother, in my heart, for the gift of it
before I’d left Sweden, and asking the Lord Jesus to help me be strong and courageous.

“Lady Knollys, please inquire after the mending of the blue gown we wish to wear this evening,” she said to a woman who smiled back at her intimately and warmly. Lady Knollys was a softer, gentler version of her daughter Lettice, whom I’d seen in the hallway with Lord Robert. When Lady Knollys departed, the queen and I were left alone, with the exception of a page or two on the fringes of the room and a maid of honor silently sewing.

“We understand that your princess is shortly to return to Sweden,” she began after she bade me rise from kneeling.

“Yes, Majesty.” I neither confirmed nor denied, simply acknowledged the queen.

“She has extended her permission for you to marry Northampton?”

I nodded, then apologetically explained, “She extended permission, then withdrew it, Your Grace.”

“And what is your mind upon this matter?”

“I wish to stay and marry Lord Northampton,” I said, fervently hoping she could assist us. “And I believe that my mother would wish it so as well, as she desires happiness and contentment for all of her children.” Even Karin, I supposed.

The queen nodded and thought for a moment. “We like you well, Lady von Snakenborg. You have a quick wit and will be a charming ornament to our court. You may stay at our leave, if you wish, and serve as one of my maids of honor until such time as Northampton takes you as his wife.”

I crumpled to my knees again. “Oh, thank you, Majesty, thank you. You shall never find a more dedicated lady. I should forgo eat and drink if that was your wish!”

She laughed at that. “We have been accused of eating lightly, but we do not starve our ladies,” she said. “We heard that, while at Dover, you suffered an injury while protecting your princess. From that, we know you understand what it means to wait upon a royal mistress.”

“I should not only clasp a bee for you, Majesty, but would walk into the very den of lions ahead of you and shut their mouths on your behalf should no angel appear to do so!”

She laughed again and waved her hand. “I doubt you not, mistress. But remember that promise, for someday that very well might be required of you.”

I deeply curtseyed again and backed from the room, then ran into William’s arms. He’d been waiting nearby. “I stay!”

He reached his arm around me and kissed me, lightly, which was welcome and lovely and I kissed him back of my own accord for the first time.

I waited until morning to approach Princess Cecelia. There were agents at Bedford House carrying off items that might be sold to partially pay for the margrave’s debts; it was humiliating, and most Swedes kept quietly to their chambers, packing for the journey home.

“I have spoken with the queen, at her command, and she has offered me a position with her ladies until I can soon marry Lord Northampton,” I said. “If you will allow it.”

She abruptly stood up. “No, no, I will not allow it. It is utterly traitorous when this realm has stolen from your own crown and refused to treat me with honor. Do you think you will be well looked upon after we leave? Indeed not. These people do not care for any but themselves. You will always be an unwelcome foreigner among strange people, and they will not hold faith with you. Mark me in this.”

I stood before her, head bowed. I had not thought of it before,
that I would be utterly alone, so taken was I with the idea of marrying Lord Northampton.

“You saw what the journey here was like; none is likely to undertake that again. There will be no way for you to return to Sweden.” She sat down again; in the distance I could hear someone quieting the wailing Edward Fortunatus.

“I understand, my lady,” I said. With so much money owed, it was unlikely anyone would return from Sweden to England in my lifetime. “I am sorry this journey did not bring you the happiness with the queen you had hoped it would.”

At that, she heaved a heavy breath. “The queen is by no means who I understood her to be. She is unkind, she is selfish, she is vicious. Do you know that she has kept her cousin Katherine Seymour in exile for nigh on six years, and she with two young sons, for marrying a man the queen did not approve of? I think, mayhap, it is the sons and the husband the queen covets and not the protection of her honor and law.”

I took a deep breath before speaking. “I did not know that.”

“Katherine’s sister Mary Grey is now likewise detained, a young woman who is”—she pointed at her temple—“not complete. Hardly a threat.”

A bit of dismay must have crossed my face because Princess Cecelia smiled for the first time in our conversation, but wickedly. “Perhaps this queen is not all you understand her to be, either. So stay, stay if you insist. I give my permission. But by the time you figure out who this queen really is inside, my dearest Elin, it will be too late.”

She dismissed me with a wave of her hand and went back to directing those who were helping her pack her considerable number of trunks and coffins.

•   •   •

Within two weeks the entire Swedish delegation had packed and was leaving Bedford House. I had told William that I would remain there to see them off, and he promised to send a litter for me and my things later that afternoon. I said good-bye to the ladies one by one, feeling especially torn to be parting from Christina Abrahamsdotter and Bridget.

Bridget and I held one another’s hand until she needed to get into a litter to depart. “I shall miss you desperately,” I said. I did not want to let go of her hand. Had I made a grave error? If so, it was not too late to join them for the return journey. I was homesick already. I might never see Sweden again, nor hear my native tongue spoken, kiss my mother good night, or eat of the small strawberries Brita and I collected each June on the hillside near our summer home.

“You’ve rightly chosen,” Bridget reminded me, seeing, I supposed, the fear cross my face. “Karin and Philip are likely already married. And William loves you well.”

I nodded. “Write to me.” She agreed, and I kissed her on the hairline.

The princess came up to me and I curtseyed before her one last time. “Thank you, my lady, for everything you have done for me,” I said, voice trembling.

She nodded, holding her head erect, and then began to walk away. Before she’d taken more than three steps, though, she turned back to me and spoke with no trace of kindness. “Lord Northampton won’t marry you. He can’t. He’s already married.”