unbelievable to me that I am not at their side. I am their brother; I should be beside them.
The battle will come and then I shall have to look over my horse’s ears at their standards, at their beloved, familiar standards, and see them as the enemy. The day will come when I shall see the honest English faces of the other side, and still I shall have to tell my men to prepare to stand against a murderous charge, but it won’t be today. Thank God it won’t be today. But the only reason it is not today is their choice. They are choosing their moment. We are defeated already.
1569, CHRISTMAS EVE, COVENTRY: MARY
My chaplain locks my door and my household and I celebrate Mass on this most special night, as if we were Christians in hiding in the catacombs of Rome, surrounded by the ungodly. And like them we know, with utter conviction, that though they seem so powerful, though they seem to dominate the world, it will be our vision that triumphs and our faith that will grow until it is the only one.
He finishes with the bidding prayers and then he wraps up the sacred goods, puts them in a box, and quietly leaves the room. Only his whispered “Merry Christmas” stirs me from my prayer.
I rise up from the kneeler and blow out the candles before the little altar. “Merry Christmas,” I say to Agnes and Mary, and I kiss them on each cheek. The members of my household file out, one by one, pausing to bow or curtsy to me and whisper their blessings. I smile as they go, and then the room is silent, warm.
“Open the window,” I say to Agnes, and I lean out. The stars are sharp as diamonds against the blackness of the sky. I look for the north star and think that my army will be sleeping beneath it, on its way to me. A story Bothwell once told me comes to my mind and I take in a breath of cold, cold air, and whistle a long cold whistle like the howl of a gale out into the night.
“What are you doing?” Mary asks, throwing a shawl around my shoulders.
“I am whistling up a storm,” I say, smiling at the thought of Bothwell, who whistled up his own storm the night before Carberry Hill. “I am whistling up a storm that is going to blow me all the way to my throne.”
1569, DECEMBER, COVENTRY: BESS
A cold season and little chance of much joy at a Christmas feast for my household this year. This is the second Christmas for me and my lord that has been spoilt by this other queen. I wish to God I had never heard of her, never mind thinking I could make a profit from serving her. Far from my home, and separated from my children, with no news of my mother and sister or my house, we wait in anxiety for the arrival of the army of the North. Hastings sends out scouts three times a day to see if we can get at least some idea of where it is now, and when it will be upon us, but half the time they are riding blind in mist and rain and could be within feet of the Northern army and not see it.
The town is fortified as well as it can be but there is no doubt in anyone’s mind that we cannot hold out a siege against an army of nearly six thousand men. We have a handful of men whose loyalty we cannot depend on, nor will the citizens of Coventry defend us. They want to see the queen freed too. We are not popular here; we are an army of occupation.
I cannot stop fretting for my mother and sister at Chatsworth. My girls are safe in the south, in service with friends, learning how to run great households and making the friendships which will serve them in later life, and my boy Charles is at school. But the Northern army could march through Chatsworth, and though my mother has the determination and the courage to order them off my land, what if the soldiers take offense? I worry too for Henry, my son, and Gilbert, my stepson, who are both at court. I cannot stop thinking that they may take it into their heads to volunteer to march with the queen’s army and come north against her enemies. If