The House Of Allerbrook. Valerie Anand

people remarked that King Henry evidently wished to be as merciful as he could—as long as he wasn’t left with a living ex-wife whose existence might call the legality of a new marriage into question.

      He had enough of that with Queen Catherine, said the knowing voices in the taverns and marketplaces. Well, Catherine of Aragon is dead now, poor soul, and so is Nan Bullen. Never cared for the Bullen witch myself, but I don’t think she got justice.

      Nor me. Can’t believe she ever went with her brother, or played the fool with some court minstrel. I mean, I ask you, five of them! If it were just one, well, a fellow might believe it, but five—and her the queen, and adultery for a queen is high treason! She’d have to be out of her mind.

      Ah. You’re right there. Whatever next, that’s what we’re all wondering.

      Jane heard of the queen’s death from Father Anthony Drew, the vicar of Clicket, on the Sunday following, and shuddered. That Sunday was a particularly lovely May day, more beautiful even than the day when Francis had brought home the news of the queen’s arrest. Rain in the night had been followed at daybreak by drifting early mist and then sudden, lavish sunshine. The tree-hung ride down the combe to Clicket was dappled with it, as though by a scattering of gold coins, and vegetation was growing almost while one watched. Long grass and cow parsley and red valerian overhung the edges of the lanes and the meadowsweet had come out early. May was no month for dying.

      Whatever next? Everyone was asking that, and the answer came soon enough. On May 20, the day after Queen Anne’s head had rolled into the straw, King Henry had been betrothed to her former lady-in-waiting Jane Seymour.

      On May 30, he married her.

      Francis and Jane heard the wedding announced by the Dulverton town crier. Eleanor was not with them. She had of late seemed more and more out of sorts and now they knew why. She had been with child, but something had gone amiss and she had miscarried. She was in bed, with Peggy looking after her, while the new chaplain, Dr. Spenlove, took charge of the house. He was cheerful and competent and had very quickly established himself as someone who could deputize for Francis when required.

      “It’s a relief to have him,” Francis said to Jane. “I feel easy about going to Dulverton, and I really must. I’ve half a dozen things to do there. Come with me.” And with that, they set off on the seven-mile ride to the little town, among other things to order supplies of wine from a vintner there, and buy linen to make new shirts for Francis.

      On arrival, they heard the loud bell and the stentorian voice of the crier and went toward the sound. They sat on their mounts in the midst of a crowd, listening. When the crier ended his announcement of King Henry’s new marriage, Francis, turning to Jane, said something that terrified her.

      “So the new queen’s one of the old one’s ladies-in-waiting. It’s a thousand pities Sybil didn’t behave herself better, or you weren’t a bit older. If one of you had been at court, why, the next queen could have been you!”

      He wasn’t joking. Jane knew it at once. He meant what he said. He was harbouring hair-raising ambitions. He was seriously imagining himself as the brother-in-law of King Henry, with one of his sisters on a throne.

      “It might be dangerous,” she said, and knew that her voice was trembling. “Look what happened to Queen Anne!”

      “Well, I don’t believe it would ever happen to you, though I can’t say the same of Sybil,” Francis said. “Everyone says there was no truth in the charges, but who can really know? Maybe there was.”

      “Even with her own brother?” said Jane.

      “Yes. I grant you that’s hard to believe,” Francis agreed. “But all the same, I feel that perhaps Queen Anne was…shall we say, not quite trustworthy. What happened to her isn’t likely to happen to anyone else.”

      They rode slowly homeward, their various purchases stowed in saddlebags. The moorland tracks were narrow, but when Jane saw a chance to edge her pony up alongside Francis, she seized it.

      “Francis, I want to ask you something.”

      “Of course. What is it?”

      “Please can you tell me how Sybil is? I haven’t seen her or heard a word about her since she went away. The Lanyons haven’t visited us, but I know you’ve seen Master Owen, more than once. I heard you tell Eleanor you’d seen him last year at a fair somewhere….”

      “Dunster,” said Francis. “Where the castle is. During the fair, Owen and Katherine dined at Dunster Castle as guests of the Luttrell family. Owen’s a successful man these days.”

      “He must have mentioned Sybil, or you must have asked after her, surely! How is she? Did she have the baby safely? I want to know.”

      “Sybil is nothing to do with you, Jane. Not anymore.”

      “But she is! She’s my sister, whatever she’s done, and if there’s a child, it’s my niece or my nephew. And yours, too!”

      Francis relented a little. “Sybil had a boy child last August. He has been named Stephen. They are still with the Lanyons. They are perfectly safe and there’s no need for you to worry about them.”

      “I’d like to visit them. I’d like to see Sybil again.”

      “No, Jane. I can’t allow that.” Francis spoke sharply. “Your life is going to take a very different course from hers, believe me. With a new queen on the throne, there may well be a need for new maids of honour. I’d like to see you become one of them. I want to bring our family up in the world, Jane. And it’s a hard world. Life was cosier, perhaps, for our forebears. The world is wider now, and colder. You want to stay at Allerbrook, I know, but sometimes, my sister, sacrifices must be made.”

      No, prayed Jane, silently but passionately, to God in the sky above, to fate, to Providence—if necessary, to the ancient gods who had been worshipped by the long-departed people who had left their strange marks upon the moor in the form of upright stones and the barrow mounds where they buried their chieftains. There was a barrow on top of the ridge. When she had been free to take walks, she had liked standing on top of it. The view from there was so immense. No, and no and no. I don’t want to go. Don’t make me go. Stop Francis from sending me. Please!

      * * *

      Her prayers were apparently answered. Word came from London that there were no vacancies for maids of honour or ladies-in-waiting. Queen Jane Seymour had all the ladies and maids that she required.

      “Well, the queen’s little namesake is still young,” said Thomas Stone, arriving for the Christmas revel at Allerbrook and greeting Jane with a kiss. “Plenty of time. Maids of honour marry, ladies-in-waiting go home to produce children. Vacancies will arise sooner or later. I fully intend to get Dorothy a place at court one day.”

      He and his family had been away on their principal estate in Kent, but had come to Somerset for Christmas so that Mistress Mary Stone could visit her cousins in Porlock, though not stay with them.

      “We get on their nerves if we stay long,” Thomas confided, “and there are no girls there of Dorothy’s age. Still, family is family and besides, here in Somerset we can stay at Clicket Hall, which we like very much, and Dorothy can have Jane for company sometimes. Isn’t that so, Dorothy?”

      “Yes, of course,” said Dorothy dutifully. Jane tried not to sigh. She did not enjoy spending time with Dorothy Stone, who seemed to her very dull and was inclined to take offence easily. She longed for Sybil instead.

      CHAPTER SEVEN

      Avenue of Escape 1536–1537

      Sybil, at that very moment, was longing with all her heart for Jane.

      She had been missing her sister more