The Rose at Twilight (19 page)

When she was dressed, she sat down again on the joint stool to let Molly attend to her hair. This task was simple, requiring only that what little showed look smooth and neat and that her headdress be clean and modest. She knew from experience that Elizabeth would take exception to any garment more grand or more costly than what she wore, and she had no wish to draw the princess’s ire at this, the beginning of their new relationship. Thus, when Molly unearthed the wire frame for her gauzy butterfly headdress, she did not object. That the style was going out of fashion would render it acceptable in Elizabeth’s eyes, but it was becoming to Alys and would serve until she could get settled in and try to acquire some new things. Since she was not by any means certain of how that last task was to be accomplished, she thought it best to tread softly for a time.

When she was dressed, Molly advised her to go along to the princess’s chamber as quickly as possible, lest she be late for morning mass.

Alys sighed. She had always thought herself properly devout but was beginning to think that the custom prevailing at court would require her to spend a good deal more time on her knees than she was accustomed to spend there. She doubted that the notion was Elizabeth’s. She did not remember Elizabeth as being more than ordinarily pious in her habits.

“Hears mass three times a day, does the princess,” Molly said. “The Lady Margaret said it were right and proper, but even the servants be a-hearing God’s word dunamany times a day now, m’lady. Can’t scarcely get our work done between, we can’t.”

Reminded, Alys made certain she had her rosary tucked up her sleeve, swept up the train of her skirt over her left arm, and set off to find Madeline. That young damsel, gowned in lavender, had only to fasten her gold belt beneath her plump bosom before she was ready to go. The pair of them, seeking the aid of a yeoman guard, soon located the ladies’ chamber, where they found an elderly priest preparing to say the mass. Kneeling with the other women on the hard floor, Alys regretted leaving behind at the Tower the cushion she had stitched for the chapel there. She would, she decided, have to make another, and right speedily.

While the priest’s voice murmured the Latin phrases, she let her gaze wander, inspecting the room and the other women. Only one other wore the butterfly headdress. Most wore the simple cap-and-band favored by Elizabeth and Lady Margaret. The latter was not present, a fact for which Alys was intensely grateful.

Elizabeth knelt at a prie-dieu beside her elaborately carved armchair. Another woman knelt beside her, also at a prie-dieu, and the smooth golden-blond hair showing beneath the front edge of her headdress made Alys nearly certain that she was the queen dowager, Elizabeth Woodville. Alys had never seen her before, but her features were enough like her daughter’s to make it a near certainty. The woman chose that moment to open her eyes and look at Alys, who had forgotten to keep her eyelids lowered. Blushing, she quickly returned her attention to her prayers.

When the priest had gone, the ladies arose gratefully to their feet and began chatting to one another. Alys soon learned that not only was the woman beside the princess indeed the queen dowager but that the princess’s sister Cecily was also present. Alys thought Elizabeth looked tired, but the princess conducted herself as she always did, with an air of gentle distance and quiet elegance, taking no part in the conversation around her but sitting in her chair with her slim, fair hands properly occupied with her stitchery. Even when her gaze drifted, attracted by an overloud voice or laughter, her expression remained serene. She seemed to pay no heed to Alys, for which mercy Alys was grateful.

There was nothing in the ladies’ conversation to displease the princess, for nearly all of it concerned the wedding festivities—the splendor of the groom, Elizabeth’s beauty, the magnificence of the banquet. And Alys soon learned that although it was more common for a king and queen to dine separately with their attendants, there was to be another feast that day.

She soon tired of standing, but since there were more ladies than joint stools or cushions, her only choice other than to stand was to sit upon the floor. She glanced across the room at Madeline to see her shift awkwardly from foot to foot. Clearly, there were details about being a lady in waiting that one had to learn, such as how to find a stool or cushion of one’s own. Perhaps the stool in her chamber would do, though she would have to find someone to carry it for her. To carry such an object herself would be both unseemly and demeaning.

Though she was interested in learning more about the women with whom she would serve, she soon found their constant chatter tiresome compared to the talks she had had with Sir Nicholas, and she even yearned for the peace she had known at the Tower. Her back began to ache, and her legs grew tired, and she was soon bored, but nearly three hours passed before she found relief.

Madeline returned to her side then with a weary sigh. “I am as hoarse as a crow,” she said. “Do these females never cease twittering? Even Elizabeth must long for the time when she had to make do with only two ladies in waiting.”

“I would not wager a button on that likelihood,” Alys said. “Elizabeth will not willingly deny herself anything that adds to her consequence. She has waited all her life for this.”

“You know her as I do not,” Madeline admitted, “but I must say, she still appears to be as I thought her before, quiet and gentle. Surely she is not as bad as you remember her. Might not your previous opinion have arisen from a natural, childish hostility toward another living beneath the same roof?”

“We cannot discuss that here,” Alys said, feeling oddly betrayed by Madeline’s casual words. She had not described every detail of her prior relationship with Elizabeth, but she had said enough to think that Madeline understood she had reasons for her opinion. “Here is the priest again,” she said. “My knees are already bruised. We simply must get kneeling cushions.”

Madeline chuckled. “No doubt Lady Margaret will willingly procure the materials for us if we will but promise to bequeath our results to her favorite chapel when we pass on.”

Alys smiled. One could not long remain vexed with Madeline. A silence fell upon the room. The mass had begun. To their relief, when it was over, the queen dowager announced that the princess intended to retire to renew her energy before the evening’s festivities. The ladies were dismissed.

The irrepressible Madeline, tripping along some moments later at Alys’s side on the way to their chambers, said, “I’ll warrant she got no sleep last night. The Tudor looks a bit chilly, but no man is cold on his wedding night.”

Absently Alys nodded agreement. She had been wondering if she was expected to remain in her chamber until Elizabeth chose to send for her. The prospect was not an appealing one. Madeline’s thoughts had obviously taken a similar course, for when they reached Alys’s room, she suggested using the time to explore at least the ladies’ side of the great palace.

Alys had no objection, and they spent the afternoon locating the privy gardens, garderobe towers, and other sites of interest. They both knew the court would soon leave Westminster, for huge as the palace was, no royal residence was big enough to support for long the hundreds of people in a royal retinue. They would move to Sheen or Greenwich, or maybe, as spring drew near, some palace farther from London. It was common for a king to make a circuit of his residences each year, staying at one till the moat and the garderobes—more commonly called the jakes—became too noxious to bear, then moving on to the next.

By the time the two young women returned to their chambers, it was time to dress for the evening festivities. They had enjoyed their freedom, however, knowing that later, when their routine became more settled, they would spend much more time with the princess and have little free time of their own.

The gathering that night was held again in the huge hall, but there were fewer people present, so the place no longer seemed to be bursting at the seams and the marshals were able to seat everyone without commotion. Alys and Madeline sat with the other ladies in waiting, near the high table. Again, there were jesters and minstrels, acrobats and players, but Alys soon became bored, and her gaze began to wander.

Sir Nicholas was at a table some distance away, seated with other gentlemen and ladies of the court. He did not look her way, and since she did not want to be caught staring at him, she looked at the others at his table instead. She thought one might be Sir Lionel Everingham. Her gaze froze on the man next to him. She could see only his profile, a strong chin and aquiline nose, but he turned toward her a moment later, and she was sure.

“What is it?” Madeline demanded when she gasped. “You look as though you just saw a ghost.”

“Perhaps I did,” Alys muttered. “If that is not my brother, Roger, at that table yonder, then it is someone exactly like him. But if it is my brother, why has no one told me that he is here? And if he is here, why has he not sought me out?”

“Marry, do not continue to stare at him. He will see you.”

“I want him to look at me.”

The gentleman was involved in a conversation then, but several moments later he looked up and Alys managed to catch his eye. For a moment he looked puzzled, as though he thought he ought to know her but did not recognize her. Then, politely, he smiled and nodded before turning back to his conversation.

“Goodness,” Madeline said, “if he recognizes you, he does not appear particularly delighted to see you.”

“I am not sure he knows who I am,” Alys said with a sigh.

“When was the last time you saw him?”

“More than a year ago, I suppose, and then briefly, but he ought to know me.” She relaxed, then smiled when a new thought entered her mind. “Since he is here, he must have submitted to the king, so surely I will be released to him and will not have to continue to serve Elizabeth.”

She was able to indulge this hope only until she managed to confront her brother, after the tables had been cleared and removed, when the company began to mingle again.

“So it is you indeed, Alys,” Roger Wolveston said with satisfaction when she stepped in front of him. “Everingham said that it was, but you have grown up since last I saw you.”

“Thank you,” she said crisply. “No one saw fit to tell me that you were here at court. I was told only that you had been at Bosworth with Francis Lovell.”

“True enough, but one need not speak of that awful day in such company as this,” he said sternly, glancing around the hall. “I have sworn fealty to the king, and he has been gracious enough to restore my title and estate. I am Lord Wolveston now.”

“In faith, I am glad to hear that. We knew he had pardoned some, but I feared he would punish many who fought against him.”

“Some he did, but he pardoned most of us from the north, where it is said he seeks to gain friends. He even named Tyrell Sheriff of Glamorgan and Warden of Cardiff Castle. However, you must not mention Lovell, for he refuses to submit, and so he was not pardoned with the rest of us, and has been named in a bill of attainder. He will no doubt be executed if they catch him.”

“He truly is alive now? We heard that he was dead.”

“False reports,” Wolveston said, “put about by the king himself to dissuade men from rallying to him. He has fled to sanctuary, but he ought to have submitted with the rest of us.”

Alys was shocked. She had met Viscount Lovell often and liked him very much. “Surely, you do not reproach him for remaining loyal to his cause, sir.”

Wolveston shrugged. “You are only a woman, my dear, so one cannot expect you to understand these things.”

Alys struggled to hold her temper in check, for she had not yet learned what she most wanted to know. “I must suppose, sir,” she said carefully, “that I am no longer the king’s ward.”

“Well, as to that,” he replied casually, “it cannot signify for I have already agreed not to interfere with your betrothal.”

Alys stared at him in astonishment. “My betrothal!”

He flushed, looking annoyed with himself. “I was to leave it to the king to tell you. We will say no more about it, if you please, for it is not right that I discuss it with you yet.”

“But I understood that my betrothal to Sir Lionel—”

“You do not wed Everingham,” Wolveston interjected hastily, “although as you have seen, he submitted to the Tudor when I did. But he could not hope, even then, to be allowed to claim you.”

“Then who?”

He would not tell her, insisting he had already said too much, but she had not long to wait before one of the yeomen came to escort her to the dais. As she followed him, she saw standing beside Henry Tudor another, much older man, who watched her approach with interest, in much the same way, she thought, that a man would look over a mare he thought he might purchase.

“Lady Alys,” the king said with regal bluntness when she had made her curtsy, “it is our pleasure that you shall accept the suit of Lord Briarly, who is connected to us through our good friends the Stanleys. Appropriate betrothal ceremonies will be arranged within the week. That is all. You may go.”

Stunned, clearly dismissed, but not certain she ought to believe her own ears, Alys backed away from the royal presence. Lord Briarly stood where he was, still staring complacently at her but making no attempt to follow or even to speak to her.

She did not know him, but he was an enemy who filled her with loathing, and not at all the sort of man she had expected to marry. Even as the notion crossed her mind, she realized she had never thought really seriously about the man who would be chosen for her. She had accepted that such a thing would happen, that she would have no control over her own fate. At least, she thought she had accepted it. Now, turning away from Briarly in dismay, she knew she had not accepted it at all.

B
LINDLY MAKING HER WAY
through the crowd, Alys thought only of finding her brother, of making him say he would not stand for such a marriage, not to any member of the traitorous Stanley family, forcing herself to believe Roger would go to the king, would somehow right the world that had so precariously tilted beneath her feet. But before she could find him, her right arm was caught from behind, the gesture nearly oversetting her.