June 25th
The christening of Henry, the Prince of Wales, happened without any incident. His godparents were Francis I, King of France, Margaret Tudor, the king’s sister and the Queen mother of Scotland, the Duke of Norfolk, the queen’s uncle, and Marguerite of Anglouême, Queen of Navarre.
His sister, the princess Elizabeth, had carried the christening cloth, and she herself had been carried by her uncle George.
One notable person was absent however, and that was Lady Mary, the king’s eldest daughter.
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Mary glared at the piece of paper on her desk as if it had personally offended her, and in a way it had. It was an oath saying she accepted the act of succession declaring her parents’s marriage null and void, admitting herself a bastard, and she was supposed to sign it. She was supposed to acknowledge the marriage between her father and his whore, her mother’s murderer, and make their children legitimate and placed over her in the line of succession. Over her, the grandchild of the catholic monarchs, the daughter of her sainted mother Queen Catherine, and the cousin of the Holy Roman Emperor!
She paced back and forth in her room, trying to make up her mind. She wanted to throw the paper in the fire, but she knew that if she did so she would have no more chances left. Not now that her father finally had a son with that protestant whore Anne Boleyn.
She wanted to believe that her father would never harm her, that she was still his precious daughter, but after she had been locked in her room after the birth of her brother she knew it was not so. Her father would not risk the life of his new heir, and she was apparently seen as a threat until she signed away her rights.
She had prayed for guidance for days, hoping to get a sign from God on what to do, but she had gotten no answer, and she knew it up to her to make a decision.
Would her mother be angry at her for risking her life, or proud of her for standing up for her rights? Would she be letting that whore win by signing, or would signing mean that she was still around to fight for her religion? Her younger siblings needed her to teach them the right way, the whore would surely try to poison them with her heretic views, and their father was no longer a defender of the catholic church.
Thinking about her father made her even more upset. He was the only parent she had left, was she really ready to lose his love and affection for good?
Mary sat back down, took a deep breath and signed her new name, Lady Mary Tudor, hoping and praying that her mother would forgive her.