“My council is displeased with you,” Mary snapped. “And this displeases me.”
Whatever sisterly affection Mary had expressed in the euphoria of her rise to the throne was nowhere in evidence. She glared at Elizabeth with an outrage that reflected Henry Tudor.
Elizabeth stared back at Mary, their father reflected in her as well. Just when I thought Elizabeth might respond in kind, she burst into sobs and pressed her hands tightly to her face.
Elizabeth’s body shook, but she never removed her fingers from her eyes. Perhaps she waited to manufacture tears before she raised her head to Mary again.
“You must forgive my backwardness, sister,” Elizabeth said, her voice muffled. “I was raised in a household that taught nothing but the reformed faith. How can I transform myself in the space of weeks to something I have never known? I am all ignorance. Tell me, dear sister, what I can do to overcome this?”
While Mary’s expression did not soften, I saw her unbend slightly at Elizabeth’s contrite plea. She’d steeled herself for a long argument with heated, perhaps hateful words, and here was Elizabeth at her feet, weeping and begging for forgiveness.
“I am pleased to hear you acknowledge your error,” Mary said stiffly. “I know so many who refuse to even admit they’ve been led astray. You will come to chapel with me, sister. You will show the world what it is to repent your sins and beg God and the Virgin for forgiveness.”
I held my breath, waiting to see what Elizabeth would do.
I knew, through my whispered meetings with Colby whenever he sought me, that many in England were pleased that Elizabeth remained of the reformed religion. They hoped it meant that the reformed church could continue intact, in spite of Mary’s wishes. If Mary would not force her own sister’s conversion, they could believe the queen sincere in her wish for tolerance.
Mary appeared anything but tolerant as she stood over Elizabeth, her small hands clenched, her agitated breath pressing her bosom against her too-tight stomacher.
“Will you be willing to do as I ask?” Mary demanded.
Elizabeth gazed up at her sister, true tears on her face. “I beg you to give me books to read and a priest to instruct me. Help me to learn.”
Mary bent to Elizabeth, the sapphire crucifix at her neck nearly swinging into Elizabeth’s nose. “You will attend the Chapel Royal with me next week at the Feast of the Nativity of the Virgin. May I send a litter to you for your convenience?”
“I will come.” Elizabeth’s voice held a quaver. “You are a kind, dear sister.”
Mary at last relented. She lifted Elizabeth to her feet and then embraced and kissed her. Elizabeth daintily wiped her eyes and returned the kisses.
Mary dismissed her, watching her go with some suspicion, despite the hope Elizabeth had given her.
Mary’s suspicions would have been justified if she’d witnessed Elizabeth storming into her chambers when we returned to them, overturning tables and flinging aside anything she could lay her hands on.
“The fool,” Elizabeth snarled as I quickly closed the outer door. “She’s buried herself in her piety all her life, and now she wants to drag me down with her. Can she not see that people do not want her church, can she not hear their muttering?”
One of her ladies, Elizabeth Sandes, a staunch believer in the reformed faith, snorted. “Not over the droning of Latin and the ringing of chancel bells,” she said.
Elizabeth whirled on Mistress Sandes, her face red with rage. She glared at her lady for a few seconds, then abruptly burst into uproarious laughter.
Elizabeth began the morning of the Feast of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin by being sick in a bowl, the stink of it tainting her bedchamber.
She’d not been fabricating when she’d informed Mary and her chancellor that she was a victim of severe headaches. They could confine Elizabeth to bed for days, with her ladies in constant attendance to place cool cloths on her brow and dose her with herbs.
“I am wretched,” Elizabeth whispered. She clenched her teeth, her skin as colorless as the linens on her bed. “The pain tears at me like claws.”
Mistress Sandes suggested we send word to Mary and beg her to let Elizabeth rest, but Elizabeth instructed Mistress Sandes to help her stand, determination in every move. “Lace me into my gown, Eloise. My sister shall see what I am made of.”
We got her bathed and dressed, though it consumed most of the morning. The escorts who’d arrived to accompany us to the Chapel Royal grew impatient and irritated as Elizabeth kept them waiting.
It took a long while for us to traverse the grounds of the palace in the litter Mary had sent, as we had to move very slowly to not upset Elizabeth’s head. Elizabeth lay against the cushions, a cloth on her forehead. We hovered beside the litter with herbal balls and worried expressions.
Inside the chapel, Elizabeth descended the litter, her cheeks almost gray. As she entered the royal box, high in the chapel, she pressed her hand to her stomach and sat down next to Mary, breathing heavily. Jane Dormer, sitting behind Mary, scowled her disapproval.
Mary slid out a hand to clasp her sister’s. “I am pleased you have come. I shall not forget this.”
“My head pains me something terrible,” Elizabeth whispered back to her. “Let me sit quietly, or I am undone.”
Mary nodded in understanding. Jane Dormer continued to frown, her skepticism evident.
