A Queen Twice Over: Mary Tudor the Elder Marries Francis I of France
- Thread starter FalconHonour
- Start date
Well, you made me care (somewhat) for Jean.
And, of course, the “dropping a barrel of horse manure on Papa Boleyn” offer still stands! I’ll even write it for you if you so desire?
Am starting to think about the next couple of years, story-wise.
Suggestions for Lisabelle (b.1528) ' s husband much appreciated!!
Suggestions for Lisabelle (b.1528) ' s husband much appreciated!!
The future Maximilian II, Holy Roman Emperor? Or maybe the future Antoine, Duke of Lorraine? Maybe Alfonso, future Duke of Ferrara? Or Emmanuel Philibert, future Duke of Savoy
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Ooh, he could work. Charles V’s daughters are marrying different cousins ITTL, as I recall.
Yeah - One goes to Hungary and one goes to Portugal iirc - Although I must admit that Charles marrying his daughter to Max while Lisabelle goes to Hungary might make more sense. I can’t recall why he chose to send a daughter to Hungary
Sure it makes more sense, but the idea of Marie’s daughter as an empress is very appealing.
I may be wrong, but I think he's marrying Louise of Bohemia, daughter of Mary of Austria. Also Lisabelle deserves better.
Right, I forgot about her. Then I second Max II or the duke of Savoy as possible husbands for her.
Duke of Savoy or duke of lorraine, duke of julich-cleves-berg, second wife for sigismund augustus of poland-lithuania
Cleves is out - Dorothea of Denmark married William. And Elizabeth of England is going to Savoy. But Max is a good shout, as is the young Duke of Lorraine...
Part V: Section CXLIX: April 1540
Exeter Castle, April 1540
“Have you got everything you need?” Catherine lingers with her hand on the door of Lillibet’s bedchamber, reluctant to say goodnight. Her tearful persuasion might have been enough to persuade Henry to give into his own inclination and let Lillibet stay in England until she reached her sixteenth birthday rather than her thirteenth – though of course they hid the true reason behind a diplomatic fig leaf of mourning for Mary and issues concerning Lillibet’s dowry – but now, even that extra three years’ grace has come to an end. They leave Exeter for Plymouth in the morning, from whence Lillibet will sail to Savoy.
Catherine’s heart is aching. She can’t imagine life in England without her now sixteen-year-old stepdaughter at her side. Oh, her ladies are fantastic, particularly Lady Surrey, but they’re not Lillibet.
Lillibet, who is more like her younger sister than her daughter, although with only three and half years between them, perhaps that isn’t all that surprising.
Lillibet, with whom she has been so close over the past eighteen months, since her eldest stepdaughter left the nursery behind her, that their households have been all but indistinguishable.
Lillibet, the only one who can keep Cecily, Edward and Charlie from each other’s throats. Catherine dreads the day they have to hold a formal banquet without Lillibet there to keep the peace between her headstrong younger siblings. Heavens knows Cecily won’t step into that pair of shoes. The red-haired rising eleven-year-old has none of her older sister’s acumen for soothing nursery squabbles. Indeed, she’s more than likely to be the one causing them, for, while she has more or less learnt to behave in public, behind the doors of Hunsdon, she is still almost as sulky and explosive as she was at five, often screaming herself hoarse at Doña Mencia or one of her companions at the slightest provocation.
Catherine’s only comfort is that Eliza Brandon, newly married to the young Baron Herbert, will be staying behind, providing a link to the past, when Lillibet and Kitty set sail. Well, that and the fact that, once they turn seven, Edward will be sent to Ludlow and Charlie to Calais, meaning they won’t be in Cecily’s vicinity for much of the year. Perhaps, with a bit more distance between them, the middle children in the royal nursery will learn to get along better.
Sensing her stepmother’s reluctance, Lillibet smiles and pats the edge of her tester bed, inviting Catherine to stay just that little bit longer.
“Of course I’m ready, Mama. I’ve got everything I need – everything I could possibly want. My plate, my dresses, my jewels. Even Cinders is coming! And Kitty is more than ready to act as my Chief Lady of the Bedchamber, let me tell you!”
Catherine chuckles. Kitty Howard has always been the most effusive of Lillibet’s household, and, in some ways, making her head of Lillibet’s household, rather than the younger but more responsible Eliza, had been something of an interesting choice, although they’d been rather forced into it when Eliza had been betrothed to Baron Herbert. They can hardly send the future Countess of Worcester to Savoy, after all. However, on reflection, she thinks it might just work out. Kitty has always been able to bring out dutiful Lillibet’s more playful side, meaning she should be able to ease Lillibet’s transition to her new country, by not letting her vanish behind a wall of haughty courtesy, as the teenager is sometimes wont to do when she’s discomfited.
“I’ll bet she is,” she teases, before humming in thought, “You’ve got your portraits?”
It is Lillibet’s turn to laugh, “After all the trouble we went to get them this winter? I wouldn’t dare leave them behind! Papa would string me from the battlements!”
Sinking on to the edge of the bed, Catherine rolls her eyes and shares a wry smile with the younger girl.
Mary’s death, coming so hard on the heels of Charlie’s birth, made Henry incredibly sentimental. As such, last winter, he got it into his head that Lillibet should take a full-size family portrait with her to Savoy.
Oh, the idea was well-meant, but the execution, coming as it did in the midst of the celebrations for Lillibet’s sixteenth birthday and Michaelmas, was nothing short of a disaster.
For one thing, Henry had insisted on Mary being painted into the happy scene, despite her death, leaving the painters no choice but to work from a series of miniatures to achieve their ends. That would have been fine, had Henry not been incredibly exacting as to the accuracy of Mary’s likeness.
Oh, Catherine can forgive him. She’s never lost a child, or even a sibling, so she can’t even begin to imagine the pain he must be going through. However, it is a shame that his demands set the painters on edge so early in the process.
His irritation, moreover, had communicated itself to the children, leaving them cross and flustered in turn. Edward, five years old and newly conscious of his status as heir to he throne, had been unbearably bossy, barking orders at his siblings and reprimanding them sharply if they didn’t immediately jump to do as he said.
Thirteen months younger than his brother, Charlie had squirmed throughout, too lusty and active to find the process even slightly interesting. Indeed, Catherine had eventually been forced to take him on her lap and bribe him into compliance with a steady stream of his favourite comfits – sugared violets.
Add to that Cecily’s scowls and whines, more suited to a toddler than a ten-year-old and the fact that two-month-old Katy, sickly and fractious at the best of times, had been suffering a stomach upset, leaving her hungry and dirty and wailing for the comfort of her wet nurse’s breast what felt like every other minute, and well, small wonder that, by the middle of the afternoon, Lillibet had burst into tears of nervous frustration and Henry had lost his temper completely, threatening to have each of his younger children horsewhipped if they didn’t begin to comport themselves with at least a semblance of royal dignity.
It was something of a miracle they’d ever finished the painting at all, really.
Catherine is suddenly startled out of her musings by the weight of Lilibet’s sleek dark head landing in her lap.
Looking down at her stepdaughter, she swallows the urge to remind Lillibet of her deportment. After all, this is likely the last time they’ll ever be in private together. Lillibet will be sailing for Turin within the next forty-eight hours. Catherine doesn’t want anything to spoil her favourite daughter’s last memories of England.
Instead, she simply tangles her hands in Lillibet’s hair, playing with it as she once saw Lady Surrey do, as she herself has done a thousand times since.
“You’ll be a wonderful Duchess, darling,” she whispers, “If you can keep Cecily, Edward and Charlie from tearing each other’s hair out, you can most definitely rule a Court full of squabbling nobles. Prince Ludovico will be so very lucky to have you at his side.”
“Really?” Lillibet’s voice is small, and more uncertain than Catherine has heard it in years, “If that’s true, then why did Papa delay my departure again? Mary had been Duchess of Ross for a year by the time she was my age. I’ll be nearly seventeen by the time I get to Turin. Why would Papa put off my leaving, not once, but twice, if he didn’t think I wasn’t good enough to be the Princess of Piedmont?”
Catherine sits up sharply at Lillibet’s plaintive words. How is this the first she’s hearing of Lillibet’s fears? They normally tell each other everything. More importantly, how long has her sweet, biddable daughter been suffering under this horrible misapprehension?
“Lillibet, no! That’s not the reason at all!”
Letting go of Lillibet’s luxuriant tresses, she spins the girl in her lap, sliding her hand under the back of Lillibet’s neck and tipping her head so that the young woman has no choice but to let their gazes meet, brown eyes into grey-blue.
“Your father isn’t keeping you from Savoy because he doesn’t think you’re good enough to be its Duchess. He kept delaying your departure because he’s protecting you!”
“Protecting me?” Lillibet’s eyes go wide at this revelation, “Protecting me from what?”
“From sharing the same fate as your sister.”
Catherine sighs, then takes Lillibet’s hand, stroking it with her thumb, “Your father has always blamed himself for Mary’s death. He thinks he wed her to Lord Ross too young, that he should have given her another couple of years in England because of how delicate she was as a child. He thinks having intercourse at fifteen weakened her and that’s why her pregnancies were so hard on her, why she was dead just months after her twentieth birthday. He doesn’t want the same to happen to you. He’s been fighting the Savoyards for you, Lillibet, not to shame you. At least in his own head he has.”
Silence greets Catherine’s words. After a moment, the Queen feels the sixteen-year-old’s head slip to her shoulder and she chances a glance at Lillibet.
The brunette’s mouth is open in a silent ‘O’ as her entire world view is recalibrated.
“Papa loves me that much?” she whispers at last, her voice disbelieving, “I never realised. I thought Mary was far and away his favourite. I’ve spent my entire life trying to match up to her, trying to be my perfect older sister.”
And well, what can Catherine say to that? There are no words and she knows there aren’t. in the end, she simply hums in sympathy and cards her hand back into Lillibet’s raven hair, easing the younger woman back down into her lap.
They sit like that for the better part of an hour, until Lillibet has finally drifted off to sleep.
You better not kill off Lillibet too! Poor girl seems to have had it rough enough already… The royal family will be a mess without what appears to be the only patient one left. I shudder to think of what Cecily will be like now
No, I promise you Lillibet is safe. I've saved her husband and she's going to go to Savoy and have a nice happy marriage
Awww how sweet to see the Tudors again, Catherine has her hands full but she seems to be managing just fine. Hopefully, she can keep the children in line with Lillibet leaving, but it seems a fool's errand...
FalconHonour what do you think of this chapter beginning idea for your story?
Recife, Captaincy of Pernambuco, May 1st,1540
Jean smiled at the squirming infant he was holding carefully in his hands. Gabrielle had been named for the saint whose day she had been born on, March 18th.……..
Do you like it enough that you would incorporate it into this timeline?