Page 18 of The Queen’s Witch

On that slender thread hung my hope of tying my thrice-braided cord.

6

Greenwich Palace

I had thought Hever Castle grand. Once again, I had known nothing, including the depth of my ignorance.

Mistress Anne sent me two gowns, kirtles and bodices and petticoats, along with shifts, aprons, and caps. All were of the plainest materials and not new. I wondered who had worn them and what had happened to her. The garments were slightly too big but well made, and I was glad to bathe in the river, dress in clean clothing, and wash my own.

We started at dawn for Greenwich. I rode in the wagon along with Anne’s chests and various barrels and her body woman, Emma Colmer. Emma had also been ill with the Sweat or, she informed me coldly, she would have nursed Mistress Anne herself. Anne, her mother, and two ladies in service to Lady Rochford started out later on horseback, overtaking us in late afternoon. An armed guard rode with the wagon, and many men accompanied the riders.

Crowds gathered by the road to watch the procession pass. The smaller gatherings were silent, but as we approached the palace, some people cried, “God save Queen Katherine!” Since Anne rode ahead to avoid our dust, I could not see her face.

Greenwich Palace seemed to go on forever. Faced with red brick, it stretched alongside the River Thames, five stories high, a bewildering city in itself of towers, windows, chimneys, gates. Emma, disdainful of me and close mouthed, measured out her words like coins, but she did tell me that the palace had been expanded and refurbished by the king, who had been born there. It contained state apartments, banquet halls, a tiltyard and a tennis yard, an armory, a smith, multiple kitchens—everything needed for rich and indulgent living. “You will see,” she said darkly. “Now leave me be.”

The wagon drove into a small courtyard, and there King Henry waited to lift Anne from her horse. The king was tall, well built, and handsome, with curling reddish hair and small, very blue eyes. He wore a beard, also red. In the countryside, most men were clean shaven, and I would learn that Henry had set this new fashion, now widely copied.

I did not set a spell to hear what he and Anne said to each other, but he held her longer than needful, until she pulled away, laughing. To my surprise, her laugh held not warmth but mockery, even as she smiled. They went into the palace, and Emma led me to Anne’s apartments off the tiltyard, separate from the huge central building. We entered through a door far to the back.

“This is Mistress Boleyn’s taster,” Emma said roughly to a manservant. “House her somewhere she can be summoned quickly when needed. Elyn, take your bundle to your pallet and return here. You will need to be familiar with these rooms.”

My pallet was in an alcove off a kitchen that served, I was told, the tiltyard towers. I shared the alcove with two other pallets piled with rough clothing and blankets. The scullery maids, I guessed. Pipkin found a small chink in the stone wall and disappeared behind it, emerging mostly at night to curl beside me and munch on whatever good things I brought him in my pocket. Greenwich housed cats to keep down vermin, but I did not worry about Pipkin. A familiar cannot die until his Sister does.

Emma showed me how to find Lady Anne’s suite of rooms: reception chamber, privy chamber, bedchambers for Anne, her mother, and their ladies. I would come to know these rooms well, but now all was an impression of paneled walls, painted ceilings, richly carved tables and chests, candelabra of silver or gold, tapestries, shelves of gleaming plate, treasures too many to count.

Emma said, “My lady may dine here or in the palace, as the king wishes. You will never speak to His Majesty, and to Mistress Boleyn only if asked a question. You will kneel on the floor behind her chair and taste whatever she bids you. Eyes cast down the entire time. Do not rise until the nobility have all left the room. Do you understand?”

“I am not stupid,” I said mildly. I needed to be this close to Anne, but that did not mean I was not apprehensive. Nothing in Tydd Saint Stephen had prepared me to survive in this place.

Emma snapped, “Then be intelligent enough to draw no additional attention to yourself. There will already be enough talk about you. Even the king does not employ a taster.”

Was that because he was in no danger of being poisoned but she was?

Magnificently dressed in tawny silk, pearls edging the low, square neckline of her gown and sparkling with jewels, Anne, beside her mother, curtsied low to the king. And yet even I, on my knees beside the wall, with head bent, could see from under my lashes that Anne’s curtsy held more playfulness than respect. Lady Rochford rose, but the king held out his hand to raise Anne. There were no other guests for this late supper in Anne’s apartments, not even Anne’s ladies; perhaps the king wished to have her and Lady Rochford to himself for this first evening.

He gave his arm to Lady Rochford, but he had eyes only for Anne. He looked at her the way Mark had looked at me, and my heart ached. They passed from the reception chamber into the privy chamber, and I followed on my knees. The king flicked his glance in my direction. “The taster?”

“You are good to indulge me about her,” Anne said, although with a faint undertone of challenge that said indulgence was less a gift than her due. Did he hear it? I thought not. He was too besotted.

He said, “You know I would give you whatever you wish, sweetheart,” and a look passed between them. Lady Rochford ducked her head to hide a small smile.

Servants carried in a dizzying array of dishes: duck stewed in wine, roasted aloes, venison, a pie stuffed with oranges, roast swan, tarts and jellies. The king ate hugely, with great enjoyment; Lady Rochford tasted a half dozen dishes; Anne nibbled. For each of her choices, I smelled and then tasted a first spoonful, the tastes startling and exquisite. Never had I imagined such food. It was, of course, ridiculous to think that poison could affect me in the moments between my swallow and Anne’s, but neither the king nor Lady Rochford remarked on this. Whatever Anne had told them, it made my presence acceptable.

During the supper, musicians performed on lute, virginals, flutes, and instruments I had never before seen. The three at the table talked and laughed. I did not understand most of the talk about persons at court, hunting, jousts, masques, and dances. I did understand that when the king looked at Anne, he displayed a hunger that was not for food, while Anne teased and played with his desire. I wondered at her audacity. This was, after all, not some love-wilted shepherd—he was king of England, France, and Ireland, Defender of the Faith, and half a dozen other grand titles.

When supper finished, the three left the privy chamber for the large room beyond, now thronged with ladies and courtiers who greeted Anne’s return to court as if she were dear kin rescued from the Dark One. Laughter, more musicians, formations for dancing. Emma appeared—from where? She seemed to materialize from air, or a hidden door. “You are needed no longer tonight.”

Only three false turns and I found the kitchen, and then my alcove. Sleep eluded me as my mind turned over and over the sights the day had brought, all bright as a silvered sea under strong sun. And, beneath the silver, dark waters.

I had grown up near the sea. I knew better than to trust currents, eddies, storms that could blow up between one breath and another. With such a storm, Joan had killed the father I never knew.

I must be careful. And so must Mistress Anne.

I was not permitted to leave the palace. As the days passed, I crept in and out of Anne’s privy chamber on my knees, tasting delicacies and wines. The king often dined there. Courtiers and ladies flocked to her rooms, chatted, danced, flirted, paid court to Anne as if she were already queen. Who was left in attendance to Queen Katherine?

Many, it seemed. I said little, and in a short while, both nobility and servants treated me like furniture, mute and deaf as a stool or a dicing table. Gossip, true or not, was the currency of the palace with its two courts, Katherine’s waning and Anne’s ascendant. Yet it was not certain that the king could put aside his wife and take to himself a new one. And so, in addition to those championing Anne and those championing Katherine, there were many simply waiting to see what would happen. A cardinal was on his way from Rome to hear the king’s case for annulment.

Anne’s rooms swarmed with rumor: Cardinal Wolsey worked to further Anne’s cause, often referred to as “the Great Matter.” No, he opposed Anne’s rise. Queen Katherine, so pious, had agreed to retire to a nunnery and leave Henry free to beget an heir elsewhere. No, the queen would never permit her marriage to be declared invalid; that would make Princess Mary a bastard. The king was determined to marry Anne no matter what Rome said. No, the king was tiring of Anne as he had tired of her sister, Mary, once his mistress.