Page 20 of The Rose at Twilight

“I do not require to be announced,” declared the Countess of Richmond. “You may rise, all of you, and explain to me what has transpired in this chamber that Lady Alys Wolveston dares to approach the Princess Elizabeth without due courtesy.”

Alys suddenly felt the same way she had felt on certain occasions in her childhood when she had been called to account by her tutor or by Anne herself.

Fighting an impulse to look down at her toes, she held her head erect as she straightened, and kept silent.

Elizabeth likewise made no attempt to speak, and the silence lengthened until Margaret Beaufort broke it.

“I trust,” she said quietly, “that the Lady Alys will recite a few extra decades of her rosary when next she attends to her devotions. Perhaps our Lord, in His infinite mercy, will then see fit to guide her to behave in future with proper submission.” Then, without missing a beat, she turned to Elizabeth and added, “I have ordered silks and canvas for you and your ladies. It is our wish that you work some altar cloths for the chapel here. And I have asked your lady mother to allow your sister Cecily to join us. I would not have it said that you were separated from your family by any will of mine or of his sovereign highness. Your mother, too, if she desires it, is welcome to join us here.”

“She knows that, your grace,” Elizabeth said in a tone of gentle submission.

“In faith, she would be the first to express gratitude for your kindness to me, to all of us, but I know that you, of all people, must understand her desire to remain mistress of her own establishment insofar as that is possible.”

Alys blinked, controlling her countenance with difficulty.

She knew Elizabeth Woodville only by reputation, but she felt a sense of growing respect for Elizabeth of York that she could so easily (and without turning to stone on the spot) describe in bland terms her mother’s well-known, implacable obsession for power.

Elizabeth Woodville, as Edward the Fourth’s queen, had exerted every effort on behalf of herself and the huge Woodville family, gaining honors and positions for them far beyond the station God had allotted to them; for Elizabeth Woodville—as everyone but the Woodvilles themselves had known—had been no great prize for Edward the Fourth to marry, which was why he had kept his marriage secret until he was forced to acknowledge it.

And now that Alys came to think of it, Margaret Beaufort was known to be as hungry for power as Elizabeth Woodville; however, Margaret’s ambition was centered in her son, not in herself.

If the Tudor had any claim to England’s throne, it was only because Margaret had had the same claim before him.

But the Lancastrian claim was a faulty one, relying upon the feminine line, and two illegitimate connections at that.

The Yorkist claim was both legitimate and masculine.

Realizing suddenly that if Edward or Richard Plantagenet were still alive Henry Tudor would be the last man to assume that their illegitimacy barred them from the succession, Alys felt an icy shiver of fear race up her spine.

While she had allowed her thoughts to distract her, Lady Margaret had said something else to Elizabeth, but now she said directly to Alys, “You will be taken to a chamber to refresh yourself and prepare to be presented to the king. He might not see you today, but you will await his convenience. That he has expressed a desire to see you and to speak to you personally is a measure of his compassion and mercy toward his enemies.”

There was an ominous note in Margaret’s voice on the last three words, one that prevented Alys from saying anything more than “Yes, Lady Margaret.”

“We will hear mass in an hour,” Margaret said to the others in a tone of dismissal. As she turned away, the ladies all sank quickly into deep curtsies again.

When she had gone, Alys felt a sense of profound relief and glanced at Elizabeth, wondering if she felt the same.

But there was nothing to be read in the princess’s expression when she straightened to her full height.

She was taller than many women, certainly taller than Alys, and very slender.

She wore a blue cap-and-band headdress, and as she turned toward Lady Emlyn, Alys saw that her shining flaxen hair was unconfined beneath the short veil at the back.

The fine, straight, silken tresses hung like a sunlit sheet to the backs of her knees.

Alys remembered with a glow of satisfaction that Sir Nicholas had said it was too pale.

“Emlyn,” Elizabeth said, “prithee, be so kind as to go with Alys and see that she has all she needs to make her comfortable. With no waiting women of her own, she will feel sadly discomposed in such strange surroundings.”

For once Alys had no wish to dispute a point of Elizabeth’s making.

Even before the appearance of the awesome Lady Margaret, the great palace of Greenwich had seemed a foreign place, a place of strangers who wished her, if not ill, at least no great good.

Swallowing hard, and despising herself a little for wishing she need not leave Elizabeth, who was at least a familiar enemy, she turned to follow Lady Emlyn from the room.

After that, things moved more swiftly than Alys expected, for the king did not keep her long, awaiting his pleasure.

She was scarcely bathed, brushed, and gowned in tawny velvet—a dress that she suspected was sadly out of fashion—her hair oiled and arranged beneath a gauzy butterfly headdress, before the summons came.

Lady Emlyn led her across the entire width of the palace to the doors of the presence chamber, then abruptly left her.

Alys was taken into the royal presence by an armed yeoman, which surprised her, for she knew the Plantagenet kings had been surrounded by gentlemen, not soldiers.

The yeoman’s dress was elaborate enough for a royal palace, however, for he wore green trunks and hose and a white damask tunic embroidered with green vines decked with silver and gold spangles.

A red rose, the device of Lancaster, was embroidered in the center of the design, both front and back.

Inside the presence chamber, along with a large, murmuring crowd of elegantly attired nobles and gentlemen, there were other armed yeomen wearing the same uniform.

The new king clearly did not feel safe, even in his own palace.

Henry Tudor sat in an estate chair on a raised dais.

Having imagined him a cross between the magnificent Edward Plantagenet and the devil (with possibly a Welsh touch of Sir Nicholas thrown in), Alys had expected a tall, broad-shouldered, dark-haired man; so Henry, with his long pale face, gray eyes, and straight, shoulder-length light brown hair came as a shock.

Though he was royally gowned and bejeweled, and seemed to be above middle height, he looked more like a scholar than a king.

His elbows rested on the arms of his chair, and he slumped a bit against its back.

His hands, clasped beneath his pointed chin, were thin and pale, not those of a trained knight but more like her father’s hands had been.

His nose was long and pointed, his lips thin and colorless, and there was a red wart on his right cheek.

Silence fell upon the white-and-gilded chamber, and Alys realized that the yeoman had spoken her name.

She sank into her curtsy, bowing her head, hating herself for bending her knee to the Tudor, but unable to contemplate the consequences of refusal.

In that moment, she understood defeat as she had never before understood it.

And once again she was glad that Anne was dead and had never had to submit herself to the usurper.

“You may rise.” Even his voice sounded thin.

King Edward’s voice had been loud and generally merry.

Dickon’s voice had been more controlled, firm rather than imperious, except when he spoke to Anne.

Then it had always been gentle, even when he had had to deny her wishes.

Henry’s voice, in her opinion, was that of a rather lazy priest, certainly not that of a king.

She straightened, hoping her headdress was straight and that the skirt of her tawny gown was not caught up somewhere it ought not to be, revealing more of her emerald-green underdress than was seemly.

She was hot in the crowded room and would have preferred to have worn damask or brocade, but the occasion had called for the most elaborate gown she had brought with her, velvet or not.

She had not thought much of fashion at Drufield Manor, for such thinking was not encouraged by Lady Drufield.

But now that she was at court, she would have to find a way to acquire some fashionable new gowns.

Perhaps Henry would choose to be a generous guardian.

He had said nothing further. He merely looked at her as though he examined some oddity or other. Not wishing to appear to challenge that look, Alys dropped her lashes a little and allowed her gaze, thus veiled, to wander.

The Tudor was flanked by two yeomen guards and backed by the three standards he called his own—the Cross of St. George upon white silk, the fiery red dragon of the Tudors on white and green sarcenet, and the Dun Cow of the Warwicks—but Alys’s gaze swept past them to the attending gentlemen, their splendid clothes making her more aware than ever of her outdated gown and headdress.

But then her eye was caught by a familiar smile, and she found herself staring at Sir Nicholas.