The Tudor Witness

If Arthur had said that he was just okay at archery, he was being modest. He hit the bull’s eye each and every time.

“I’ve had years of experience up here!” he laughed when Catalina asked him how he’d gotten so good.

The cold March air was much too cold to stay out any longer.

“Goodness, it’s so cold!” Catalina exclaimed.

Arthur wrapped his arm around her. “Let’s get inside, then.”

Catalina nodded and grasped his hand as they ran into the castle and out of the cold.

Henry met them at the door. “Why are you back in so soon?”

Arthur helped Catalina take off her thick shawl. She couldn’t believe she’d even survived through the winter. Of course at night, with Arthur’s arms holding her tight, she was always warmer.

“’Tis quite cold out,” Arthur explained as they began to walk down the stairs to the Great Hall.

Henry shrugged. “Just a bit nippy, I think it is. But all the same, father has sent word that there is rumor of the sweating sickness in London.”

Catalina had heard of the sickness before. It had never been in Spain, though, only kept in England. Her mother had talked about it though, how it had first come to England in the year of Catalina’s birth.

“So they are off to Oxford?” Arthur asked.

“No, actually, father said they would be coming here,” Henry sighed, knowing what would come next.

Arthur and Catalina shot each other a quick glance and he pulled her to the side as Henry walked off to for dinner. This had been exactly what the two had been worrying about.

“Catalina, we’ve been married nearly six months, and we have yet to…” his face reddened, “Well…you know. We are the futures of this country and my parents will be breathing down both of our backs if we don’t start having children soon. I know it scares you, Catalina, it scares me greatly too, but I think that we are ready.”

Just then she heard the faint sound of thunder off in the distance. Hadn’t it just been sunny a few moments ago? She looked off to the window, trying not to listen to the words Arthur said.

“Catalina,” Arthur’s voice was worried. “Catherine…” He only called her that when he was serious. “Are you listening to me?”

She nodded and looked into his piercing blue eyes, falling in love once again, under Arthur’s spell. She still could not believe that such love could come from an arranged marriage.

“Let’s go to dinner,” Arthur said.

Arthur was sitting in his high chair, looking worried and wondering what would happen when his parents came.

Catalina was dancing with Henry on the dance floor. Arthur and Henry had equal skill in that, though she could tell that with a few more years, Henry would far surpass his brother. Such things he would do in the future, even if he would not be king.

“Arthur is worried, again,” Henry sighed as they twirled around.

“I’ve never seen him this worried,” Catalina felt her stomach turn, afraid for what might happen that night.

“You don’t have to be afraid,” Henry sensed her worry. “Marriage is a wonderful thing, especially with the one you love.”

“You are a silly boy,” Catalina laughed.

“I know things about love, Catalina; I’m not blind to see the things that happen in court. I just haven’t had the chance to experience it yet.”

“I’m sure you will soon,” Catalina assured him.

Henry sighed. “You know, you don’t have to have children at such a young age. Goodness, my family knows what that is like. My grandmother conceived my father when she was but 12 and he was all she had for she was so scarred from the experience. My parents are understanding people. They don’t need to worry about an heir for now. Even if things don’t turn out like they planned with you and Arthur they still have me to provide an heir.”

“Oh don’t say that, I love him!” Catalina cried.

Henry shrugged. “Things change, they always do. You never know what might happen.”

That night there was an awkwardness between the couple, each wondering what to do.

Catalina sighed and turned over, hoping that tonight was not the night things were to abruptly change.

“I think we should try,” Arthur finally whispered, wrapping his arms around her.

Catalina shivered. She loved the feel of his skin against hers. It was also so warm and comforting. Then, not knowing what she was doing, she nodded and turned over to face him.

“I think we are both ready,” she smiled, looking into his eyes.

Wine was brought for them to help put things at ease and soon off the two were kissing.

Catalina knew it was so close. It would only be a second or two and then it would be over. She hoped it would be okay, and that she wouldn’t feel anything.

As Arthur kissed her passionately he moved in closer and closer and Catalina could feel his heart beating fast. He promised her he would not hurt her and then moved on top of her, careful not to hurt her small body.

And then he started coughing. He threw himself off of his wife so as not to cough on her in his coughing fit.

“Arthur, are you okay?” Catalina asked, secretly wanting to get back to the important things.

He continued to cough, and he would not stop.

She sat up and looked over the side of the bed, where Arthur was coughing.

She screamed as she saw the blood upon his hands as he pulled them away from his mouth. “You are bleeding!” she cried.

The color suddenly drained from his face. “Catalina, you must call a maid; suddenly I’m feeling so weak…”

She was frantic. Here lied her husband, looking as if he was to faint at any moment. She cried for a maid to come in quick and look after him while Catalina ran for the physicians.

Henry opened the door to his room as Catalina ran past. He caught her in his arms and held her back, seeing the tears spilling from her eyes.

“Catalina, what is wrong?” Henry asked.

“Arthur is sick,” she wailed. “Blood coming from his mouth and all.”

Catalina hoped she didn’t see the color drain from Henry’s face.

Just then Catalina herself broke into a coughing fit, her wailing mixing in with the coughs when she found a chance to breathe.

She never knew just how right Henry had been until then.

=+=

Summer

We arrived at the steps of Ludlow on the first day of June. At first the guards were wary as to whether they should let us in, as they had heard about the sickness in London, but the queen had been sure to write a letter to let us is, just in case.

The castle was very large, though not as large as the king’s castles in and around London. We walked through the gate and into the large courtyard, which was covered in early summer flowers in various colors. A few fountains stood in the center, but there were not on, and the cobbled sidewalks reminded me of London.

The three of us were taken to Princess Mary’s rooms. When we walked in Mary was sitting, like her mother, on a chair by the fire.

“Visitors, my Princess,” the guard announced.

Mary waved her hand and did not turn to look at us for several minutes. It was quite obvious that she hadn’t been expecting us.

She turned her head just for a moment, her eyes looking quite tired. But as she realized who we were, she stared up at us in amazement.

“Elizabeth!” she cried and ran from her chair to embrace me. “What are you doing here?”

“There is a sickness in London,” William explained. “Your mother wanted us to come to safety here.”

“We could not write and tell you beforehand,” Tom added.

A slight frown appeared on her face. “Where is Hannah?” she asked.

I hadn’t been expecting the question. When no one else seemed to come up with an answer, I replied, “She wished to stay with her family. She is not sickened though, and she may join us later.”

Mary nodded. “We haven’t heard anything about a sickness. Which is it? I hope to the Lord that it’s not plague!”

“No…it’s the sweating sickness,” I mumbled, barely loud enough for Mary to hear.

“Oh…” she muttered and nodded her head slowly. She knew how my parents died.

“But we are safe from it now,” Tom jumped in.

“And your mother wants us to stay here till the sickness dies down,” William also added.

“Then we shall have a wonderful time!” Mary cried. “I will teach you archery, and we will ride horses, and we can pick out flowers for the garden together and we can design rooms for you and maybe even go for a swim in our pond! I am so very glad to have you here, for this summer seemed as if it was going to be quite dull, for I was not invited for summer progress…”

I gasped. “You weren’t?!”

Just then an older lady stepped in. She was dark and mysterious looking, as well as deathly skinny.

“I think you’ve had enough enjoyment today. Come and work on your sewing,” the lady said in a dark voice.

“Mistress Pole, I must show them the room they can stay in,” Mary protested.

“Let them rest then, I’m sure they have had a terrible time trying to sleep in a carriage,” Mistress Pole nodded.

Mary took my hand and led the three of us to a room next to hers. Two beds were set up there.

“Goodness, sometimes I think she is crazy,” Mary muttered to herself.

“Who?” I asked.

“Oh, my governess, the older lady. Her name is Margaret Pole, Countess of Salisbury. I’ve grown up with her, and she has taught me nearly everything I know. Like a second mother, she is. She can be a little dark at times.”

“I can tell,” I smiled.

“Well, this is your room. It’s not big, but it’ll have to do. There are two closets in here, and I will have another bed brought in. There is also a little sitting room behind the door to the left, and a bathing room to the right,” Mary explained.

I yawned, suddenly feeling quite tired. And then I remembered that all I had with me was the gray dress I wore then.

“Mary, I have not anything to wear,” I confessed.

“The closets are full of clothes, no need to worry,” Mary answered.

“But where is the closet?” I asked, looking around the dark room. There were no windows. I would never get used to it.

“Oh, come, I’ll take you. Best not to be too long, though. I don’t want my governess waiting.”

The closet was huge, and packed with hundreds of dresses and gowns and corsets and petticoats.

“I don’t know why I never wear these things,” Mary sighed, looking through the various clothes drawers for a nightgown.

After a moment’s silence I commented, “I can see why you get lonely here.” I only remembered seeing two or three maids in her room besides her governess.

“It’s not so bad,” Mary shrugged. “I like to be away from court sometimes. Get some fresh air, you know?”

“Of course, it is seems so calm up here,” I sighed and went to sit on a vacant chair near the large window.

“So what has happened in these past few months?” Mary asked.

“Well Anne is still with the king…” I explained. “Yet she was the first one…the first one to get the sweating sickness.”

“I’m sorry,” I could see Mary trying to stifle her laughter as she threw a nightgown to me and left the room, her hand covering her mouth.

But I didn’t think it could be over and done with as easily as that.

I think I preferred Mary’s court better than her father’s.

Margaret Pole took me under her wing as well, and taught both Mary and I our first Greek lesson. She was a wonderful teacher, and even though I was skilled in writing, I still had a bit of trouble in reading. She taught me some French as well, which she told me would be the language of the future.

She was a wise old woman, much like the queen, and she dressed very old fashioned. It was good to learn more skills.

Soon she took up Tom and William in lessons too, teaching them to better read and write and also about science and geometry.

I was surprised at how much I liked lessons. They took up most of our day, but I liked it, and found I really didn’t miss riding and things as such like I thought I would.

We did occasionally find time after quiet dinners in the hall to go out riding.

I found that up near Wales it was very wet. It rained nearly everyday.

Mary did not really have much entertainment either. Only local nobles came to dine with the Princess, from the county of Shropshire, and many nobles from Wales. Mary had a few fools, yet we never had grand balls, and we never danced, something that I missed terribly.

We did take up singing lessons. Mary had a Spanish man come to teach us. I soon found that I did have a voice. I’d never liked to sing much before.

“Oh, beautiful, Senorita!” the instructor would clap for me every time I sang. “What a beautiful soprano you are!”

I soon learned that that meant I had the higher voice. Mary also had a beautiful voice, deeper than mine, but very pure. The instructor called her voice contralto.

One day while we were in Church, as we went every single day, Tom observed that it was not raining.

“I will call upon the archery instructor,” Mary smiled and we went back to our prayerful attitude.

I found archery a bit hard in the beginning. Mary had already been practicing for a year, and William and Tom were naturals.

When I really could not get it, Tom placed his hands on top of mine and helped me pull back the bow just so. I found I liked that, his arms around me.

“There you go,” he would whisper when it was just so. He stopped helping me for a time, but I forced myself to look terrible at it again just so he would help me.

That night as I sat with Mary by her window, she smiled at me and teased, “It looks like someone is in love.”

I felt myself blushing. I was much too young to be thinking about being in love. I was almost eleven, and Tom was almost fifteen. Both him and my brother would be courtiers soon, and I was quite sure Tom only thought of me as another little sister.

“Well…Hannah hinted that the two of us will be betrothed in the near future, and that she will also be betrothed to my brother,” I smiled.

I suddenly missed Hannah terribly, her ready smile and large, blue eyes. I missed riding with her, and talking to her. It was terrible not being able to even write to her, like I had been able to do with Mary so many times before.

“You miss her don’t you?” Mary asked, reading my mind like her mother always did.

I nodded and sighed, looking out across the dark sky and upon the little villages dotting the countryside.

“It will be over soon. Must not be too big, if it hasn’t even reached us yet,” Mary whispered and yawned. “Well, I’ll be off to bed now. Don’t stay up too late.”

It seemed I could not even move from the window seat. I started thinking, then, of Anne. I wondered how she faired, and if she was even still living at all. I let a tear roll down my cheek and feel asleep the many soft cushions as the clouds crept over the bright moon.

I could tell something was wrong when I arrived at breakfast the next morning. Mary, Tom, and William, sat at the high table, looking down upon the numerous empty tables below them. Only few tables were occupied, and all by people that worked at the castle.

Mary looked distraught with worry, and I noticed then that Mistress Pole was standing beside her. She looked her normal, gloomy self though.

I went to sit next to Mary. It was quiet in the hall, almost too quiet. The maids and footmen and pages sitting at the tables below ate slowly and quietly.

“Mary, where has all the nobility gone?” I asked, almost afraid to open my mouth.

“They are afraid,” she whispered.

William nudged my hand and leaned in to whisper in my ear, “A few people in Shropshire have contracted the disease.”

“Well then, as long as they stay away then we will be fine,” I tried to bring everyone back to spirits. Why worry if there was nothing to worry over?

“I guess you are right,” Mary sighed, playing with her sugared oats.

“Yet still, I will not have the four of you out and about until this disease is gone. I’ve heard word that it has gone from London, but now it is creeping everywhere else in England, even, some say, onto the continent,” Mistress Pole explained.

“To France, you mean?” Tom asked.

Mary nodded. “I expect letters from my mother soon, saying that the three of you must be whisked away back to London, to be kept out of danger.”

“And why wouldn’t you be included?” I asked.

“I am Princess of Wales, Elizabeth. I must show my people I am brave, before I become their queen.”

To that I tried to say nothing, but I knew Mary was right crazy in thinking such things. Surely she had to know by now, at age 13, that she herself would never be able to be the sole ruler of England. Everyone kept their comments to themselves, and for that I was grateful.

Lessons began to lose their appeal. Now, in a brilliant and cloud-free August, we were forced to stay inside and not allowed to enjoy the wonderful weather.

We tried to stay focused on learned our French, but looking outside made us in melancholy spirits. I did want to learn French, yet it was so hard when I knew I could be riding or hawking.

Mary eventually convinced her governess to have only singing and musical lessons while being forced to stay inside.

The four of us sang and began to play on the harpsichord. I found that I was much better at singing than at the instrument, and I left it to Mary. She’d learned to play when she was very small, and she was very good, better than all of us, as she usually was.

“Goodness, that’s hard,” Tom whispered to me as he left his lessons on the harpsichord to join Mary and I in singing.

I smiled and we went back to singing Greensleeves, my favorite song.

But as I sang it it reminded me of Anne. I was so worried about her, and how she faired. I wanted to go back home to London and share a room with Anne and be part of court again. I guess I missed it more than I thought I did.

The next day two letters arrived, early in the morning.

Mistress Pole handed them to me as soon as I walked into Mary’s room.

I noticed the queen’s seal right away, and I saw an empty envelope, not addressed, underneath. I wondered who it could be from.

I ripped open the queen’s letter and read it fast.

For the Eyes of Lady Elizabeth Rushford,
I am overjoyed to tell you that the sickness has passed in London and that a carriage will be coming soon to pick you up from Ludlow. I am sorry, but Mary cannot come. She must stay up in Ludlow until we know it is gone from London forever. I cannot risk that. But it is safe for you to travel. I am happy to tell you that all the court is well, only about a dozen deaths we have suffered. Your friend Anne is well, having fully recovered awhile before. I am looking forward to the day you will come back to court.
Sincerely,
The Queen, Catherine

Only a few seconds later did I realize that Tom was standing behind me, reading the letter as well.

I threw my arms around and jumped up and down in excitement.

“I can’t wait to go home!” I cried.

Mary and William also joined us in the room, each still tired and rubbing their eyes.

“It’s not like I wanted to go back there anyway,” Mary shrugged when I told her that she was not to be coming.

Then William noticed the other letter in my hand. “What’s that you’ve got?”

I looked down at the letter. “It’s not marked for anyone.”

“You open it,” Mary suggested.

“But who could it be from?” Tom asked.

I opened it all the same, hoping that it might’ve been from Anne, telling me that she was okay. How else could it have been from?

For Elizabeth, Tom, Princess Mary, and William,
It seems such a long while since I’ve last seen all of you. I don’t know how right to put this, but I will say it now, lest I regret that I did not.

I have contracted the sweats. Now, I would surely love to tell you that I will be fine, and that you will see me when you arrive home, but I know ‘tis not the case. Mother and father talk constantly, and I know what they speak of, I am not deaf. It seems I am to be dying soon.

Do not mourn over me, Elizabeth, though I know that you will cry for me more than once. I am not afraid of dying, for I have lived much more than I ever expected to when I was born. I put my trust in God that he will keep me in his Kingdom.

I know it must be right terrible. If one of you were to die I would grieve myself to death right then as I read your last letter to me, but know that I wish you not to cry over me. I am just a person, and people die eventually, do they not? Believe now that I will be with you now more than ever.

Besides all that, people must die someway or another, and now is just my time.
Your Sister, Loyal Friend, and Servant,
Hannah Devon

“So who’s it from?” Tom asked as I looked up from the letter. I could not even think, for grief was all I could feel.

I let the letter drop to the floor and slowly made my way to the door. I could not be there as they read it, as Tom read it.

I ran from Mary’s rooms all the way to the courtyard and to the fountains and the pond.

I sat down and tried to think, trying to make myself believe that the letter was just a trick, just a joke. A sick joke was all it was.

I could hear the thunder in the distance, and then the rain began to pour.

The downpour was so loud I believed no one would hear my wailing. But soon enough as I looked to the gate back into the castle I saw Mary, William, and Tom rush through.

Tom was faster then all of them, catching me in his arms before the others were even half way across the courtyard.

“Don’t touch me!” I screamed and tried to wiggle out of his grasp, but it was too strong.

“Elizabeth, it’s okay, it’s okay,” he kept saying over and over again, but it would never be okay.

I tried one last time to get out of his grasp, and when I finally did, I tripped and fell into the pond.

I knew not how to swim, and I was okay with it. Soon, I knew, I would just sink to the bottom; I just hoped it would come soon. I already could not breathe as my body was plunged under the water. The cool water felt good as it flowed through my clothes and petticoats and all the way down to my shift. It was warm and comforting as a blanket.

After a few seconds, something happened. As I laid there in the dark water, I felt something come over me, something come into me. My body shook and I couldn’t remember anything that happened next, except that soon, I was out of the water, and that I had stopped my crying.

For a few moments, even, I couldn’t even remember that I knew a girl named Hannah.

I almost thought…maybe it was her that had come to me, told me to be strong, told me to understand, and became apart of me.