lent their relationship deeper roots than we could ever achieve.
I glanced down the table to the empty stool that was the Princess’s place. When they were at court both Elizabeth and her half-sister Mary were denied the right to sit with the King beneath the canopy of state. Both were obliged to kneel to him and fulfil all the intricate rituals of royal ceremony. I could not blame them for so frequently sending their excuses in order to be free of his company. It was one of the things I disliked most about the King; to my mind Edward was fortunate to have his family about him yet he did not value his sisters. Instead he demeaned them in ways great and small through his arrogance. I had little liking for Elizabeth, of course, but it made me wince that Edward made no secret of the fact that he believed his sister a bastard. I wished the King would marry her off to some foreign prince in a miserable political bargain and put an end to both her humiliation and my jealousy.
‘I will not regret a move from Somerset House,’ I said. The new palace was half built and draughty and uncomfortable. ‘I shall look forward to summer back at Ely Place. The strawberries in the garden are the best in London.’
Her grace smiled but it did not reach her eyes. ‘Summer is far away,’ she said. ‘Who knows where we shall all be then?’
I did not much care. The news that we were to leave Somerset House had heartened me even though I wished Robert had been the one to tell me. It had been unpleasant living in a house designed for the Duke of Somerset, not only stepping into a dead man’s shoes but occupying the chamber he had planned for himself. The place was haunted by the ghost of his ambition. It mocked me at every turn, showing me what happened to those who rose too high. Robert laughed at me when I shivered and told him how much I hated living there. He did not understand, even when I tried to explain. I remembered one morning lying in the huge oaken four-poster in our chamber. The window was open and the breeze blew in from the river. I could hear the cries of the boatmen and the splash of the waves. There was a scent too, of fresh air and dank water mingled with thyme and lavender from the gardens, an odd mixture of sweetness underpinned with something less pleasant. I looked up at the rich red velvet folds of the bed hangings and felt smothered by how opulent our life was. No, I should not be sorry to go even if it meant that the Lady Elizabeth was once more casting her shadow over my life.
In the event, our remove was short-lived. The King developed a fever during that winter and was often struggling for breath. He rallied but then he would fail again. He started to cough up blood and bile. The doctors, at first hopeful of a recovery, started to despair as gradually Edward grew wasted and weak. In the end he wanted to die. I could see it in his face. He wanted the peace of it. Yet with each step closer, the Duke too came closer to disaster. I knew that he and Robert and other members of the Privy Chamber plotted like thieves through the spring and Robert grew ever more distant and did not confide in me. Perhaps I should have been glad of it for had I known what was to come I do not know how I would have borne it. It is not good to know the future.
I should perhaps have guessed at the wedding in May. It was a ridiculously ornate affair, a triple union of powerful families, with Robert’s younger brother Guildford marrying Jane Grey, the King’s cousin, whilst two other cousins were also parcelled off to tie the bonds of alliance tighter. The King presided over it looking sick in heart and spirit, and despite the celebrations there was about it an air of conspiracy and hurry that felt ill-wished. Two months later Edward was dead and Jane, as bookish and quiet as he, was the new Queen.
‘You are crazed,’ I said to Robert when I discovered it. Even though a part of me had not wanted to know the treason they plotted, I was still furious he had not told me his