Part I
Princess
1547 - 1553
Chapter 1
I was born in the same year as my Lady Elizabeth, in the year of our lord 1533. My mother found this auspicious—she, like Dr. Dee, put much faith in the stars and the dance of the heavens, and predicted that my life would be filled with wealth and happiness.
My grandmother skeptically observed that I was a sickly child and that arriving in the world five days before the Lady Elizabeth gave me no benefit.
However, Grandmother acknowledged that I had some skill with a needle and thought it would be advantageous for me to live with my Aunt Kat Champernowne and be useful to the very young Princess Elizabeth.
And so, at four years of age, I was sent to Hatfield, where Aunt Kat had already been installed as Elizabeth’s governess. There I assisted Aunt Kat and learned to sew the sumptuous garments that would robe the ladies of the court in later days, which would have many consequences for me and the entire kingdom.
At that time, I knew only that my Aunt Kat was a much preferable guardian to my feckless mother, who’d remarried soon after my actor father had died. Her new husband wanted nothing to do with me, and so I was bundled off, with my grandmother’s assistance, to Elizabeth’s household. There I learned that Elizabeth was also gifted with the needle and that I was happiest surrounded by fabrics and trim, creating whole ensembles from nothing.
Elizabeth and I sewed together in the dappled sunlight of the house at Hatfield, or Enfield, or at Ashridge Priory, which Elizabeth’s father eventually bequeathed her.
Princess Mary, the daughter of Henry’s first queen, lived with us all as well, but she was older and a bitter young woman. I came to feel sorry for her, having been forced by her father to become a lady-in-waiting to the daughter of her mother’s rival, but I could never grow to like the prickly Mary. On occasion, Lady Jane, the princess’s cousin, joined us, though truth to tell, I found Jane, though quite book-learned, dull company compared to the radiant Elizabeth.
Being young Elizabeth’s companion was not always an honor, I was quick to discover, as her status fell, rose, and fell again. When Henry executed Queen Anne, Elizabeth’s mother, and married his next queen appallingly swiftly, Elizabeth was declared illegitimate and stripped of her title. Mary rejoiced, but she was not restored to his good graces either, until Henry married his final queen, Catherine Parr, in 1543.
Queen Catherine managed to reconcile the king with his two daughters, but even so, they were only women, and King Henry’s attention and adoration went for his son, Edward.
The princess Elizabeth—Lady Elizabeth, after her star had fallen—formed a friendship with me, though I never forgot how lowly I was compared to her. We sewed together, she read to me from books I didn’t much understand, and I patiently listened to her rant when she was in a fit of pique.
Our life did not begin to take shape, carved into the sharp patterns it would become, until the day in 1547 when we learned that old King Henry was dead.
Elizabeth and I were both nearly fourteen. Her recent portrait showed her in a gown of scarlet damask over a sumptuous gold underskirt, with a pearl-studded French hood pinning back her beautiful red hair—every piece designed and sewn by me.
My talent as a seamstress, my only talent thus far, had grown as I’d experimented and practiced the art through the years. I’d begun sewing gowns for Aunt Kat and other ladies of the household, including ones for myself with leftover fabric. Elizabeth praised my work and began to request—then demand—that I create gowns exclusively for her.
The day our lives changed dawned like many others in January: crisp and cold, clouds from the previous day’s rain fleeing before a fresh wind. We were at Enfield, north of London, lodging in Elsyng Palace, a lovely house from which King Henry often went hunting.
I was in the Lady Elizabeth’s chamber after her lessons with her tutor and Aunt Kat, sketching an idea for a new gown. I wanted to try something in the recent French fashion—sleeve caps puffed above the shoulders and stuffed with wool. I was not certain the style would become Elizabeth, who had slim shoulders that looked well in the gowns where the sleeves slipped the slightest bit to show her modest bosom.
Aunt Kat was with us, having set her plump form before the fire, her feet on a stool, a book in her lap.
“My brother has come,” Elizabeth announced abruptly from where she stood in a window embrasure. She peered out into the afternoon, which was already clouding over for more rain. Her red-gold hair hung long from her high forehead, parted in the middle to reveal a straight white streak of scalp.
Her lips thinned, and her brows drew together in disapproval. “His uncle has accompanied him,” she continued.
I left my unsatisfactory drawing and came to the window. I noted as I drew close to her that Elizabeth’s milk-pale skin smelled of lemons.
“Aunt Kat, come and see,” I called over my shoulder.
Aunt Kat threw me an irritated glance. Had it been only myself in the room, she’d have remained seated, but Elizabeth frowned at the courtyard, impatient and curious.
My aunt heaved herself up and joined us at the window, her wide skirts pressing mine.
“Whatever does Hertford want here?” Aunt Kat demanded over Elizabeth’s shoulder, her disparagement as heavy as Elizabeth’s.
Edward Seymour, the Earl of Hertford, was the older brother of the late Queen Jane—Jane, who’d caused Elizabeth’s mother to be sacrificed so that she could bear Henry a son.
Aunt Kat had never met Anne Boleyn, but her love for Elizabeth extended to animosity to those who had harmed her charge, even indirectly. Jane’s hold over Henry had caused him not only to label Anne an adulteress but proclaim Elizabeth a bastard and no heir to the throne. Aunt Kat had become Elizabeth’s stalwart defender against all who’d tried to brush her aside.
Prince Edward traveling to Enfield from Hertford Castle, where he’d been staying with his uncle, was not strange. Edward and Elizabeth sometimes shared a house, either here or at Ashridge, combining his entourage as a royal prince with hers, Mary’s, and often that of Jane Grey, crowding us all dreadfully.
