The Rose of York (13 page)

The morning wore on. The children grew impatient. Bess had almost despaired when barking dogs and galloping horses emerged from the trees and headed towards her, the King alone in front, leading the hunting party. Her heart racing, she stepped out from the shade into the sun.

Edward saw her standing there with the sun streaming through her pale gold hair and shimmering over her violet cloak, reflecting a rose aura around her so that she appeared almost an illusion. He blinked, focusing his gaze. He pulled up sharply.

“Good God, lady! What do you here?”

She knelt with her sons. In the sudden motion of bending her head, her cloak loosened and her glorious gilt hair tumbled out and swept the ground. She raised her head slowly and her emerald eyes met those of the King. Edward saw that her face was pure oval with a milk-and-roses complexion, the line of forehead and nose carved with perfect symmetry, her lips full as rosebuds. But it was the eyes that held him, those cool green eyes that looked at him lazily through half-closed lids and exuded an erotic magnetism. He stared, unable to drag his gaze away. Beneath his red velvet riding jacket, his heart pounded wildly.

“Lady, I bid you rise,” he said.

The hunting party arrived and waited nearby, exchanging covert grins. They knew how Edward felt about beautiful women. And this one was a beauty, indeed.

Bess rose and Edward’s eyes clung to her. She looked a goddess in her simple gown with her cape flowing from her statuesque shoulders.

“What is your name, fair creature?”

“Lady Elizabeth Grey, my lord.”

“Grey,” he said, noting the sweep of golden lashes against smooth skin, the lift of the red lips, the short, perfect white teeth and pointed chin. Nor did his practised gaze miss the fullness of the breasts that hugged her closely fitted gown. “And what would you have of me, my lady?”

“Your Grace, my husband was killed at the battle of St. Alban’s and I come to beg you to restore my husband’s estates to me, and to grant my father an audience.”

“Your father?”

“Lord Rivers, Sire.”

“Ah, Richard Woodville,” said Edward, who never forgot a name. He glanced around at Hastings, sitting comfortably in his saddle, leaning on an elbow, watching them. Hastings quirked an eyebrow and they exchanged an amused glance. Richard Woodville was the lowborn knave who’d managed to marry royal blood and get himself made lord. While outfitting Holy Harry’s ships in Sandwich, he and his son Anthony had been surprised in their beds and taken prisoners to Calais, where Warwick and his father, Salisbury, had given them a tongue lashing and called Anthony “a knave’s son.” All England had laughed at their shame.

Edward turned his attention back to the widow. “Your husband and father fought against me, Lady Grey. Why should I help you?”

“Because my father sees the error of his ways and wishes to serve you loyally, my lord, and because my children and I are innocent of any crime against you and in dire poverty.”

Edward smiled. “Well spoken, my lady. I shall think on it.” He turned his horse. Over his shoulder he called out, “Come tonight for my decision.”

Snickering followed this invitation and Bess blushed furiously as she watched him ride away.

~*~

“You should have heard him,
Maman
!” Bess raged, pacing back and forth. “As if I were some merchant’s wife! And they were all laughing…”

“We will both go,” Jacquetta said. “With me there, he would not do something rash. We royals respect one another.”

“I don’t wish to go at all!”

“But you will. There is money at stake.” She arranged an emerald cape about her daughter’s shoulders and, putting on her own black cloak, she tied it firmly around her chin. “
Alors
, let us go.”

Escorted by a male servant, the two women rode into Stony Stratford and made for the King’s halting place on Watling Street.

“We seek an audience with the King,” said Jacquetta.

“Indeed?” Lord Hastings smiled derisively at Jacquetta’s accent. He glanced at the tall slender woman beside her, trying to see her face, but her head was bowed and he could make out nothing beneath the riding hood. “And what name shall I give him?”

“The Duchess of Bedford.”

Ah, River’s wife—the witch
, Hastings thought.
And this is her daughter from the forest
.

“Wait here,” he said with a smirk.

~*~

Hastings entered without knocking. Clad in a loose shirt, Edward rolled on a pallet with a buxom lass. Hastings cleared his throat. Edward looked up.

“The damsel from the forest is here to see you, my lord,” Hastings leered.

Dismissing the girl, Edward tucked his shirt back into his hose, downed a draught of wine and smacked his lips. “By God, bring her in. I am good and ready,” he laughed.

Surprised when two women entered, he ignored the one who bent to kiss his hand, his eyes following Bess’s every move as she dipped in and out of her obeisance. A heavy scent of lilies assailed him.

“My lord, we are here for your decision,” Jacquetta said, rising.

“Do I know you?” he asked, finally registering her. The woman seemed an oddity beside the girl, like a crow guarding a rose tree.

Jacquetta smiled. “I don’t think so, my lord, but I remember you very clearly. I was attending on your mother when you were born in Rouen.”

His face split into a wide grin. “I knew you looked familiar!”

She laughed at his jest.

He regarded her warmly. Her sweet French accent evoked happy memories of his childhood in France, and her grey hair and slender frame reminded him of his nurse, Anne of Caux, whom he’d loved, and who’d been French. “My first language was French,” he said. “My ladies—would you care for refreshment?”

“My lord King,” replied Jacquetta when Bess made no answer, “we shall be delighted.”

As Jacquetta and Edward laughed and exchanged stories about France, Bess and Edward exchanged glances. He was clearly reluctant to let them leave, yet by the end of the night they still didn’t know his decision.

“My lord, the hour is late and we must return to Grafton,” Jacquetta said at length. She waited expectantly.

“I’ve never seen Grafton Manor,” the King replied, avoiding the hidden question.

Jacquetta realised there was nothing to be done about it. They’d have to endure another evening with him. “Perhaps you will sup with us tomorrow night?” she said with her best smile. Surely that would be the end of it. He couldn’t stay forever. He had to get himself to London to be crowned one day.

Edward glanced at Hastings, who stood with arms folded, leaning against the doorframe. “Will, do we have a battle engagement tomorrow?”

“Not that I’m aware, my lord,” he grinned.

“In that case, my ladies, we shall be honoured to accept,” Edward said.

~*~

Before Edward started on his way back to London, he sent word to his Chancellor, Bishop Neville, that Bess’s father, Lord Rivers, and her brother, Anthony Woodville, were pardoned all offences and that the Duchess of Bedford was to be paid the annual stipend of the dower she held of the Crown—in advance.

He returned to Grafton often during the next three years, at first with Hastings and a party of friends, later alone and in secret, but his visits continued to be unfruitful to him. He wished he were more like Hastings, who thought nothing of abducting unwilling women, but he could never resort to force. His honour forbade it, and until now—with one terrible and deeply regrettable exception—women had flocked to him willingly. At last, in desperation, he pulled Bess down on the bed in her chamber and held a dagger to her throat.

“You may kill me if you wish,” she said, “I’m willing to die for my virtue.”

“What do you want?” he demanded hoarsely. “You know I’m deep in love with you, Bess!”

“’Tis best if you leave and never come back, my lord. I was a virtuous wife to my husband and I won’t be any man’s mistress. Not even yours.”

Edward froze. He’d heard those words before. For an instant, with striking clarity, he saw
her
face, the face he wished only to forget. He put the dagger away with an unsteady hand. “What do you want, Bess?”

“Nothing you can give me,” she said. “Farewell, my lord.”

He watched her leave and he felt as though the sun had left with her, turning a bright world of blues skies and flowering fields into a grey, barren stillness. He rose from the bed and went to the open window. Linnets twilled and a soft breeze fluttered through the room. It was spring, the season of love, and the scent of flowers hung heavy on the air. He sank down on the window seat.

Jacquetta appeared. She heaved an audible sigh and stood before him.

“’Tis the curse of royalty to have everything but love,” she said. “Only your noble ancestor John of Gaunt was able to marry his Katrine… and Kate of Valois, she had her Owen Tudor for a time, poor soul.” She stole a sly glance at him from the corner of her eye, and sighed again. “Thanks be to the merciful God I married my knight in secret and nothing was to be done about it. But then, I was only a princess. You are King…” She turned her eyes on Edward, who was gazing at her silently. “’Tis the curse of royalty to have everything but love,” she repeated, pleased at how sad she sounded.

~ * * * ~

“Thro’ the peaceful court she crept And whisper’d.”

Edward had expected to tire of Bess Woodville once he’d bedded her. He’d expected to leave her as he’d left the others, without a backward glance. If she had tried to expose the marriage, he would have laughed her out of the hall. As far as the world was concerned, only a mad woman would dare to claim that a King stooped so low to wed her.

To his surprise he found himself more desperate for her than ever before. She was a perfume and he was intoxicated. The more he made love to Bess Woodville, the more he had to have her. Against this frenzied, tormenting passion, he struggled in vain. Eventually he knew he had to proclaim the marriage, though it meant scandal, and worse—opposing Warwick and drawing his ire. Fortune, crown, future and soul were as nothing before the mysterious force that possessed him.

Despite his perennial money woes, he spared no expense on his queen’s coronation, making it the most lavish in living memory in the hope that people might forget her low birth. The streets of London were hung with bright banners, rotting traitors’ heads were removed from their poles above New Stone Gate, and London Bridge was spread with sand to cover filth and feces. Tall-masted ships, carrying the Duchess of Bedford’s royal relatives from Burgundy, including the Count de St. Pol and a hundred of his knights, rocked at anchor in the sparkling Thames. Edward had stressed to Bess Woodville’s royal kin the necessity of making an extravagant display.

After eight months of planning, two days before Whit Sunday in the year of 1465, all was ready. Bess Woodville came to London from her palace at Sheen, one of many Edward had given her. Through the gaily decorated streets she progressed to the Tower of London, past the mummers and colourful pageants, past the singing minstrels and the two angels with wings assembled from a thousand peacock feathers. On the next day, seated in a velvet litter drawn by white horses, she was led to Westminster Palace by fifty newly created Knights of the Bath dressed in blue robes with white silk hoods.