The Heretic Heir, page 29
part #2 of The Elizabeth of England Chronicles Series
“I do,” she said, “and matters of the highest importance… to you, at least, I am sure.”
She paused and looked from the window.
“When our father was alive, Elizabeth… when I was much the same age as you are now… there was one thing I wanted that our father was afraid to grant to me; the office and comfort of marriage. I desired a family, and a babe of my own to hold in my arms, but he would not endure the idea of me marrying, nor seek out a husband for me, as most kings would, to further the dynastic strength of England. I resented that our father would not allow me to marry; it was wrong of me to think so, but we are only ever fragmented beings when it comes to goodness. Only now do I see that our father’s decision to withhold on my marriage allowed me to contract with the greatest man that ever lived, and so only now am I grateful for the long gap in my life without a husband at my side. It was indeed God’s will that I be married to Phillip, and it must have been the hand of God ensuring that I remained a maid to wait for the most perfect of men. But such a long wait to have the comfort of a husband is not befitting to all women. The natural state of a woman is to marry with one who will complete her, and bring further glory to her name and her lineage. My husband and I have decided that such a fate as mine should not await you; you will have the comfort of marriage soon, Elizabeth. We have discussed the matter at length and come to a conclusion; you will be married to Emmanuel Philibert, the Prince of Piedmont and Duke of Savoy. He is a fine man, a good Catholic prince, a strong general, and, a close ally of my beloved Phillip and his empire.”
The heat in the room was stifling, and I suddenly felt as though I could not breathe. I stared at my sister. The oppressive warmth of the chamber and the words which came from Mary’s mouth seemed to have stolen my wit from my mouth or my mind.
“You say nothing, Elizabeth,” said Mary, her bright eyes shining at me as though flamed with fever. I believe she was enjoying the look of horror that must have stretched across my face.
“Are you not grateful for such a match, to such a man? The gratification and peace that comes from marriage completes a woman in truth, there is nothing like the harmony that is brought to a woman through finding her lord and master… even for royalty such as we, there is always a man to make us whole.”
I swallowed; my throat had gone very dry.
“You would intend on sending me from England, Your Majesty?” I almost whispered my voice harsh in my suddenly tight throat. I had not been expecting this.
“Not all of the time,” Mary smiled benignly making her look like a cat. “I believe your marriage would be much the same in practise as that between my beloved and me; although of course, Duke Philibert has far less extensive territories than those of my treasured Phillip. You would spend some time in his territories, and some in yours. The Duke is also the Lieutenant of the Netherlands, a position granted to him through alliance with the Hapsburgs, and so will have duties in those lands as well.”
I swiftly understood this plan of my sister and her husband. Duke Philibert was a pawn in the pocket of Spain; a Catholic noble, a lord loyal to the machinations of the Hapsburgs and their interests. Duke Philibert owed the Hapsburgs his position and standing; he was their man. My sister and her husband were seeking to control me, and dilute the threat I bore… through marriage. In any marriage, the husband is the legal lord and master of his wife. She becomes his property, as does her wealth. Only spare few women ever came to wield their own power within marriage, and even then they were usually censured as unnatural creatures.
With a Catholic husband controlling me, I could be kept a Catholic. With a husband mastering me, I could be melded to the will of Spain. My destiny would come to be controlled by Spain, through their ally. If they could marry me off to this Duke of Savoy, then I would be in the palm of Spain for the rest of my days, guarded and mastered, subject and never truly the Queen even if I came to that title in time. They would own me, mind, body and soul, both now and in my future. I would no longer be my own person, have my own power… I would be mastered, through marriage.
Mary was staring at me; I realised I had not said anything for quite some time. I was sure that all the blood must have fled from my face, but yet it still felt hot and flushed.
“Your Majesty,” I stuttered, feeling at a loss for words. “I am very grateful for the honour and attention that you and His Majesty have shown to me, but I feel I am too young to consider such a proposal.”
Mary’s eyes narrowed and a dangerous glint came into them. She had been hoping, I am sure, that my narrow brush with danger this time might have made me more pliable to her plans here. Finding me not so, finding me as her rebellious younger sister once again, was not pleasing to her.
“You are not so young,” she said bluntly. “Twenty-two is a good age to become a wife, and you must consider that you will need all the good years you have left to produce children. Many women marry much earlier. You will need all the goodly years you have to breed, and give children to your husband.”
Children! My heart stopped in horror again. Little Catholic babies that I should have no freedom to raise in the faith I believed in. Images raced through my head of myself becoming older and sadder, watching my phantom children worship in the confused manner of the Catholics and never once knowing the true touch of God’s grace. Images of a husband who would use me, my body and my position only for his own ends, forcing me to lay with him, taking the country I loved, ruling where I should rule and all sanctioned in law by the subservient position of a woman who was married. The terms of Mary’s marriage had been ordered and beaten out to exclude Phillip from real power over England, but I doubted the same concessions would be done for my marriage… that would not be what Mary and Phillip would want… they wanted me caught under the boot heel of Spain. They would ensure the power of marriage rested with this Philibert, and therefore in the Empire of the Hapsburgs… Look at the wives of our father, controlled and subject to his will and whim on pain of death… should my fate become as theirs?
I could not become so enslaved. I could not be so ruled. I could not let my spirit and freedom be taken by Spain, by a husband, or by my sister… I could not let this happen.
I had already considered for a long time that I might never choose to marry at all, for all I had ever seen of that estate was fear, danger, disgrace and loss of power for a woman…. But to be told that I would be forced to marry a Catholic lapdog in the seat of Spain? No! This could not be my fate.
“Your Majesty,” I said, swallowing again. “I have no inclination to marry at this point in my life. I am grateful for the honour done to me, and the attention given to my situation, but I must refuse this proposal of marriage as it goes against all my natural inclinations.”
“Natural?” Mary’s voice grew high with anger. “What is there that is natural in a woman refusing the hand of a fine prince in marriage? What was there ever in you that was natural and not… perverted?”
She spun around and walked up the room. I stared after her in dread and shock; the mask that she had worn to welcome me so warmly to her presence was gone. She must have suspected already that I would refuse, and my refusal to bend to her will had once more filled her with fury.
Mary was anger. Mary was wrath.
“All our lives you have tripped and pranced your way along, always managing to slip out of trouble like an eel!” Mary shouted, her hands flailing about in the air and spittle flying from her dark, toothless mouth as she spoke. She was furious, red in the face, her eyes like burning sea coal in the hearth. “Much like your mother, oh, she knew well how to charm… to slither out of blame for whatever evil she did, and look where she ended! Our father ne’er did a finer nor greater thing than to order that swordsman of France to slice off the head of that heretic witch! And now here you are… looking at me with her eyes… pretending and charming and slithering your way through life just as she did! You protest often of our joined lineage through my father, but you are more in truth like your mother than any other! See to it that I do not decide to send you once again to the Tower where I truly believe you belong!”
I fell to my knees and held my hands out to her. Her rage was escalating and it was quite terrifying, but I could not leave these rooms with my hand and my independence given away to some lackey of the Hapsburgs.
“Mary,” I begged, holding my hands out to her and shaking slightly. “Sister… Your Majesty… Please believe me when I say that I am grateful for all you have done for me, and for the belief that you have had in my innocence in matters treasonous and rebellious… But I cannot make my heart marry where it screams to me that I should not! Surely, you would understand that? Surely as you refused to marry, unless it was to Phillip of Spain… you would understand, too, my wishes to marry only where my natural inclination led me?”
Mary pulled up and turned on me. Her eyes glinted and flashed like agate and her hands whipped out around her like she was possessed by demons.
“My marriage,” she hissed, spitting the words at me, “was sanctioned by the Holy Spirit! It was intended by God that I should marry Phillip, for there was none other in this world that the Lord wanted for me. You! You seek to compare yourself to me? You are still suspected of holding religious beliefs most abhorrent to God! You are secretly a heretic in your heart, I know this well enough. Perhaps that is why you refuse this honourable match! You think you may still be able to marry a heretic heathen like yourself, do you? And to take my throne as yours? Well, any such plans shall come to nothing if you end your days in the sanctifying fires of salvation! What do you say to that, My Lady?”
I pressed my hands closer together and tried to remain calm. If I was not careful I should find myself either locked in the Tower, beheaded or burnt at the stake due to my sister’s rage.
“Mary,” I implored. “I am your sister… I don’t believe you would ever sanction my murder. Please, sister! Your Majesty....” I burst into tears that were not feigned nor faked in any manner. I don’t believe in any of the situations I had ever faced, that I had been as afraid as I was on that day facing the full and unpredictable wrath of my sister.
Mary drew herself up. She breathed in, attempting to calm herself. “If you do not accept this proposal of marriage that has been most carefully chosen for you,” she spat, her jaws clenched as though she was a wild beast waiting to bite me, “then I shall have no choice but to publicly declare, through Parliament, that the issue of your bastardry makes you unfit to be the heir to my throne. I will have you stripped of all lands, titles and possessions and the position of heir to the throne shall instead be granted to our cousin of Scots, Mary Stuart.”
I stared at her, aghast.
“Surely… that would not be in the interests of the Hapsburgs,” I pleaded, stuttering. “Surely Phillip would not want…”
“Think not that you understand the mind of my own husband!” Mary screamed in my face, her previous controlled coldness vanishing under a fresh torrent of rage. “Think not that you are the only one who understands anything about everything! Vain, conceited and self-centred you have always been and this blinds you to everything else in this world, and beyond it! Even if I did not leave the throne to Mary of Scots, there are more possible claimants to the throne than just yourself and our Catholic cousin, sister. You are easily replaced in line to the throne of my gracious father.”
Mary turned away again, fighting back tears of frustration and bunching her hands into fists and then out again. Her back shook with tremors of anger and I could hear her trying to catch her breath. I trembled before the might of her wrath. “You will leave now!” she shouted with her back to me. “Go back to Hatfield and think on all I have said. I will not have you at my court this Christmas; vainglorious, foolish, treacherous girl that you are. If you will not submit to me as you should through all duty and for all the graces I have shown to you, then I will remove you from your position in the royal house… One way, or another.”
I was still on my knees, staring at her, when she turned back to me and screamed, “get out!”
I stumbled to rise. My legs were weak and I felt sick. I staggered to the door and wrenched it open, lurching past Jane Dormer who was standing just outside. Jane ran past me and into the arms of Mary who clung to her like a limpet. I ran from the room, faltering and tripping into the arms of my own ladies, who almost carried me back to my rooms.
When we reached my apartments, I vomited long and hard into my chamber pot. I could not stop shaking. I was under threat of death or the loss of my position if I did not marry the man they had chosen. And if I did marry him, I should lose all the singular power and independence that I had, or might have had, as queen in the future.
I was trapped; not by the walls of a prison this time, but by the fast-approaching bonds of marriage.
On the third of December my party made its way back to Hatfield. The people of London cheered and yet I could barely wave back to them, my body felt so ill and my head so scared and confused. My breaths came in short, panicked bursts that made me light-headed and faint. When we arrived at Hatfield I collapsed and was taken to bed. Although I had often feigned illness to escape a dangerous situation, this was no feint. For days I hovered in fevered dreams between life and death, subject to a raging temperature and a mind that knew no quiet and no peace.
When I awoke from my sickness I was plunged into a realm of misery and darkness; for in all the times of my life, I had never felt at such a loss to know what I should do. Imprisonment and suspicion of treason I could escape from with words, but as the law stood, Mary was my sovereign and master… and if she insisted that I marry then I was bound by the laws of God and man to obey her.
Chapter Forty-Seven
Hatfield House
January 1557
In times of need one finds out who one’s friends truly are. There was never more truth in this than during the peril of marriage that beset me in the early months of 1557.
My sister threatened imprisonment, debasement and perhaps even death if I did not come to heel and marry the lapdog of Phillip of Spain; only if I married Philibert would she officially name me her heir. Only by doing as she commanded would I escape her threats of loss of position and titles. But to do so would not only rob me of my own independence and power, but would, in reality, amount to accepting my God-given position as heir to the throne of England from the hands of Phillip, King of Spain, and place me firmly in the palm of Spain for the rest of my life.
The idea outraged me. Perhaps Mary had always resented the idea of me as her heir, so disgraced was she by the treatment that she and her mother had received as a result of the fortunes of my own mother. But whether Mary liked it or not, I too was a daughter of Henry VIII; I was named heir to the throne after Mary in the will of our father. If my sister passed from this world without heirs of her own body, then the throne was mine.
There was no possible path I could walk on which I would bargain to be granted my God-given position by the hands of Phillip of Spain.
No one likes being forced to do something. In my case, as I am sure is common with many others, it made me all the more determined to resist such a position. But what could I do? Once again I faced the prospect of prison, debasement or death, this time for stating I wished not to marry the man chosen for me by the Hapsburgs.
It was then that my instincts upon choosing my own ladies of my house really proved their worth.
It is a truth rarely acknowledged in this world that women can be as great in mind as their male counterparts. Perhaps this is because men generally hold the reins of power; perhaps it is because women work in less obvious ways than men. But for whatever reason, the influence of women on world affairs is generally overlooked, and that, to my mind, suggests that females are much better suited to the practise and persuasions of covert operations.
My ladies Anne and Bess had watched over me at Hatfield in some horror during the tenure of my illness resulting from the verbal abuse and threats thrown at me by my sister. They had waited over my bedside, fed me chicken pottage and boiled rice like a child, and as I lay, prostrate with fear and worry, they conceived a plan between them that might enable me to stretch out my arms to new friends who might help me in this time of trouble.
As I recovered in private, they kept up in public the rumour that I was ill. As I gained my strength, they spoke gravely of my weakness to other servants. Much as I had so often hidden myself under a cloak of illness when it seemed politically expedient to do so, they hid me under a blanket weaved of their words. As I recovered, they un-hatched their plans to me; that if I had gained the support of Phillip, whose powerful friendship had saved me in the last plot, they reasoned, then it was possible now, perhaps, to make powerful friends in other quarters of the world to save me from this marriage.
Anne and Bess sat on my bed and whispered their ideas to me. If the Spanish could not be trusted as friends, then why not turn our sights to their natural enemies, the French?
“As one door closes, so another opens,” Anne counselled, with all the wisdom of Moses, it seemed to me then. “There may be powerful friends that can be cultivated here and now, who may serve you well, my lady.”
