Greenwich, October 1530
“The Marchioness of Lancaster to see you, Your Grace.”
“Ah, Annie, come in,” Glancing up from sheaves of parchment, Marie waved her younger sister up from her curtsy and over to the table, “I could do with your advice.”
“What are you trying to do?”
“Find someone to be Dickon’s tutor in Normandy,” Marie sighed.
“To be Dickon’s tutor?!” Anne gaped at Marie’s words, “But isn’t that Henry’s job? You know what he always says, sister. You worry about raising Maria, Caitlin and Jackie, and leave Lionel and Dickon to him. Are you not worried he’ll think you’re meddling?”
“He might, but he seems to think that Lord Hastings can juggle the duties of being Governor of Normandy and my son’s tutor. I’m not quite so sanguine about the matter. I’m sure Lord Hastings is an admirable man and that Dickon will learn a lot from him, but I’m not prepared to leave it entirely up to him. So I want someone else to help with the day-to-day of lessons and such. But of course, the moment there were even whispers that I was looking for someone, I was inundated with begging letters and now I haven’t a clue who to choose, or at least, who to suggest to Henry. Any thoughts?”
Anne shrugged, “You know Harry would do it in a heartbeat.”
Marie chuckled, “Loyal though your husband is, we can’t have the Marquis of Lancaster leaving the North to fend for itself for years on end. And you know we have to throw a sop or two to the other families, what with George practically running Wales and Ireland and you and Harry in the North. We can’t be seen to be working off too narrow a power base,” She raised a delicately plucked eyebrow as she spoke and Anne scoffed.
“You’ve given this country both a Prince of Wales and a Duke of York. I’d say you could get away with anything, Marie. Besides which, George isn’t running Ireland. Young Lord Richmond is Lord Lieutenant there.”
“Oh yes, because a ten-year-old sharing the school room with my son at Tickhill can really be ruling Ireland,” Marie rolled her eyes at Anne and gestured for her to take a seat.
Knowing better than to push her luck any further, Anne pulled up a stool opposite her sister and began to shuffle through the sheaves of parchment.
There was silence for a few moments, before Anne broke it tentatively.
“What about Sir Edward Seymour?”
“A Seymour?” Now it was Marie’s turn to look shocked. “When I said I wanted to reach out to another family, I wasn’t necessarily thinking of our greatest rivals! You don’t do things by halves, do you, Annie?!”
“Old rivalry aside, Sir Edward is clever and able, Marie. And he’s served the King in France before. He was with me in Queen Mary’s household as a boy and then he went over with Lord Suffolk in the war and has been an emissary there numerous times since. He’d be the perfect candidate to help Dickon get used to ruling Normandy, which, despite Lord Hastings’ best efforts, is going to take at least another generation to be thoroughly English.”
“Well, yes, but… Annie, there are rumours that Sir Edward is a reformer, that he attends clandestine meetings of banned preachers in the city. I’m not saying they’re true, but you know Henry. He’s not going to want anyone whose piety he can’t trust around his sons.”
“Ned’s pious!” The words had sprung to Anne’s lips before she could stop herself, “Ned only attends those meetings because he truly believes what they’re saying! It’s Thomas who goes because he wants to stir up trouble!”
“Ned?” Marie was brought up short by her sister’s reaction, “Since when were you on first name terms with Sir Edward Seymour?”
Anne flushed scarlet and darted her gaze away from her sister’s, but Marie knew Anne well enough to read into her body language. She closed her eyes in horror.
“Oh no. You don’t! Please. Please don’t tell me you attend these meetings too.”
“What if I do?” Anne attempted to sound casual, but there was a defiant light in her eyes as she dared to look at Marie again.
“You’re my sister! What you do reflects on me and therefore on the King! The people you’re mixing with could be seen as heretics, Annie, or as traitors! Do you not think -”
“Traitors?! How can we be
traitors when all we want is the good of England, of all of England’s people?” Anne cut her sister off, dark eyes blazing, “We want to bring Tyndale’s Bible into England, so that every man, woman and child can learn to read the Scriptures for themselves and learn what the faith they profess to follow is really about. Yes, all right, we do think we should break the monopoly of the clergy on salvation, to allow the scriptures to speak for themselves and bring faith back to being a matter of a person’s own belief and works rather than being mediated through others, as God intended it to be, but that does not mean we are traitors! Not a single one of us has ever said a word against the King, and I’d swear that on my soul. My
soul, Marie, do you hear me?!”
The final words rang through the room. Stunned, Marie couldn’t think how to respond. Anne’s chest heaved as she fought to control her temper. Several long seconds passed before she managed to press her lips together and say tightly, “Besides, whatever you may think of the faith I believe, sister, it is a fact that part of the reason Lord Hastings is managing to turn Normandy away from the French sphere so successfully is because he is offering sanctuary to men like Lefevre and his followers.”
Marie flinched back as Anne spoke. Seeing her sister’s disbelief, the younger woman hissed sourly, “You heard me. The Governor of Normandy is sheltering the very same men you just called heretics. Oh, I doubt he follows their beliefs, but he’s protecting them all the same. And the King is letting him, if only to annoy King Francis. Which means that, whether you and the King like it or not, if Dickon is to be successful as Normandy’s Duke, he is going to have to learn to deal with the reformers. And to do that, he’s got to understand them.”
Anne turned her back on Marie and stalked to the window. She stood in the embrasure for a moment or two before spinning around.
She crossed back to the table in a stride and fell to her knees beside Marie, snatching up the older woman’s hand.
“I am begging you, Marie, for the love you bear me as your sister, get Henry to name Ned as Dickon’s tutor. Give your son a chance. Put the right men at his side and give him a chance.”
Jesting aside, I'm taking bits of every reading and/or portrayal of Henry I've seen over the years, but adapting them for a Henry for whom almost everything has gone right, rather than wrong. Things like Katherine of Aragon being the love of his life that he names a daughter after - I truly believe she would have been, if she'd died in the 1510s/early 1520s, before she kicked up a stink at being asked to step aside. And he's got sons and has taken a huge swathe of France, so he's riding high on confidence rather than being insecure and desperate to continue his father's legacy. Do I see him as an Original Character? Well, not really, but I am very aware that I am having to create a very different Henry from the one we all know and love to hate... so... bit of both. maybe?
