In the Shadow of Lions Read online

  The child needed a baptism and a doctor. The doctor could bring medicine, but she would not have the money for this and his baptism. Purgatory was a danger more real to her than death. She had lived in purgatory; she could not sentence her son to an eternity there.

  She watched the baby breathe. His eyes were closed, the lashes dark little tendrils that nearly touched his cheeks. His fingers were impossibly small and perfect. She kissed him and held him against her breasts, rocking him as she draped her robe around them both. His flesh was so sweet and soft and new. She would not let him go even as death, a tender, shadowed nurse, came gently for him.

  “Please,” she whispered, “a little more time. I must find a priest.” She sensed Death pause for her, and though it was near, she was not afraid. She called for a neighbour, and when the woman poked her head through the thin curtain sheltering Rose from the others, Rose told her to find the priest.

  The baby’s movements grew less frequent. When the priest came, she held the baby firmly in her arms for the baptism. Then she had slept, feeling strong arms encircling them both, pressing them together so she could not separate the baby’s heart from hers. She never felt it cease, only that it joined hers and beat on and on. She had held him until their hearts and breath aligned, his growing fainter and freer. She knew the instant his soul had flown away like a little bird in winter. She did not know if she had dreamed this.

  This is why Christ hung there and never came down, she thought. He hung in agony so that those in grief could not accuse Him of less. He hung, rent open, and men were comforted by the sight. In this bitter life, who could love a God who did not suffer?

  She hoped she would never see Wolsey again, or Grimbald, or the inside of a church. She was done with men and their God.

  Rose realized Sir Thomas’s foot was tapping. These memories fled, and she faced the men as if she had forgotten it all. “Madmen?” she answered. “Yes, there were madmen. And sinners and thieves. The church welcomed them all. This is what I saw.”

  She didn’t know why she said it. Wolsey’s face, hard-set and ready to defend himself against the truth, softened into the face she had once glimpsed and dared to hope in. He smiled at her, and she knew, the way women who have given themselves do, that he desperately wanted a smile in return.

  “Sir Thomas has given you a chance for a new life,” he said to her. “May his name be praised. I pray you, make good use of it.”

  “Yes, but Rose,” More continued, his thoughts plainly too far away to see what was happening in his study. “Were there any heretics among you? Those who read Hutchins?”

  Rose held Wolsey’s gaze.

  “Yes.”

  She didn’t know why she had done that. Was she a weak woman, or a fool? Later she wanted that moment back, wanted to crush Wolsey with her words, wanted to scream her truth and hear the words out loud.

  But she knew the truth. She wanted this new life more than she wanted revenge for the old. She wanted another chance, and she feared her only way to get it was to give one to Wolsey, too. She prayed, the second surprise of the day.

  Jesus.

  It was the only word she knew, the only word not spoken in Latin in the Masses she had attended. I cannot stop sinning, she prayed. I just sinned to buy grace. I let my son die to buy him grace. I let my brothers die to find them a cure. Everywhere, grace and redemption are soiled by my hands. Help me. Help me stop.

  The next morning she sat on her bed looking out the window. It was late in the morning, but water still beaded on the panes, making her crane her neck to catch sight of the trees below. Though it was the end of April, winter and spring still wrestled for the trees. Green leaves had unfolded on all the trees, and only a few had dead brown branches—the stragglers that the last frost had bitten. There were several boulders placed below the trees in her view. She wondered how the men had moved them all into place, for they were large and rough-edged. Moss and green tendrils grew up all around them, content that the boulders would be unmovable features of their world.

  A knock at Rose’s door made her jerk, and she grabbed her skirt to be sure she was modestly covered, with no calve or ankle showing.

  “Margaret!” she exclaimed, opening her arms as the girl walked in. She was a sweet sight after a night of tears. Margaret rested in Rose’s arms for a moment as Rose inhaled the scent of her hair, powdered and perfumed with roses. Rose relaxed in the softness of the girl, her warm, steady breath, and was surprised love was again in her heart. It had been gone for years and its return made her laugh out loud.

  Margaret pushed away, her face serious. “Who does Father whip at the gatehouse?”

  “What?” Rose asked.

  “I saw him. There is another man at the gatehouse. He was whipped last night, lashed to Father’s Tree of Truth. Did you not hear his cries to God?”

  Rose shook her head. She had heard only her own. She wondered who God would answer first. “Has it happened before?” she asked.

  “Sometimes. Father says it is a great mercy, for if he turned the men over to Wolsey, they’d be racked. At least here their punishment is over swiftly, and they have much time to recant. Father thinks everyone will worship properly again if they can be broken first.”

  The prisons she had seen in Southwark were visions of hell. A whipping here would end; those who entered the gates of a prison were lost forever. Only a gravecloth was ever returned, and this went to the priest as payment for his final services. Guards stole the boots and cloaks.

  “I don’t understand, Margaret. What is their crime?”

  Margaret sat next to her on the bed. “Can you keep a secret?”

  “Yes,” Rose replied.

  “They are guilty of reading a book, that’s all. A book by a man named Hutchins. Father knew him. He even visited us the summer that Mother died. Hutchins believed every person could approach God and know Him intimately. Father said God could make no sense to the average man. We must be led by wiser men.”

  “If they are being whipped for reading it, it is no secret,” Rose replied.

  Margaret squirmed, biting at her cheek.

  Rose frowned and reached to assure Margaret, but Margaret pulled away. “Margaret, what is the real secret?”

  Margaret grew still and set her face in a cold frown. “I am a little bit afraid, although he promises to keep me safe.”

  “Margaret!” Rose shook her. “What is your secret?”

  “He is like Father in many ways, you know. Father hates him, but he does not know him like I do. The book is superb, Rose. It will open your eyes. You’ll never think of God the same way again.”

  Rose’s stomach turned. She had smelled death when she had first cracked open the spine of a book. She wondered what man would be so bold—or so careless—as to leave such a record of his thoughts and heart so that any man, anywhere, could know them. To see a book open was to see a shield laid down. It made no sense to Rose why anyone would wish to be exposed to their enemies this way. If men could see what was in the heart of the world, they would leave the books closed and the inkwells dry.

  Rose jumped from the bed and grabbed the hornbook from her table. Racing into Margaret’s room, she began pulling as many books from the shelves as she could, lifting her skirts to carry them in. She ran to the family room, throwing them into the fireplace, which roared and sprang up, nearly catching the edge of her skirts as she worked. Margaret screamed when she saw what Rose was doing, and the children came running, Sir Thomas just behind them. The fire was blazing out, high and hungry, when Sir Thomas pinned Rose’s arms to her sides, dragging her back from the flames. A book fell from the fire, its pages lined in burning red, sparks biting along its edges as it smoked.

  “What are you doing?” he demanded.

  Margaret was crying. Rose looked around at the children and the other servants, all staring at her with furrowed brows and deep, angry frowns.

  “All of you, to your rooms,” he ordered.

  Alone, he stared a
t her but did not release his grip. She didn’t want him to; she wanted to be shaken from her fear, her dread broken by his hands.

  “It is the books, Sir Thomas,” Rose began. “A man in your gatehouse is paying in blood for this man Hutchins, and your own children are curious about the book! I burned these books, and I would burn more, if it can save the children from their influence! They must not be tempted by the world beyond this one.”

  She didn’t notice his crushing grip on her arms; it would be only later she would see the bruising. His face was so near hers that his breath washed over her neck and bodice. She had been overpowered by men in a life that was far away. She had never been forced to stillness at that moment so that a man could see what was in her eyes.

  “You are salvation to me,” she whispered.

  For a long moment they stared at each other, his heart beating through his doublet, the heat of his body touching hers. He was pulling her closer in so that she was pressed against him, the distances between them being sealed off and forgotten.

  Her knees were weak, but she did not fall; his grip on her was too tight. She stopped trying to stand on her own and let him take her weight, lifting her face to kiss him on the mouth. She needed this kiss, needed to be taken hold of and firmly fixed in his world of grace. She could see his lips parting as he leaned down, and she closed her eyes.

  Then Sir Thomas shoved her away, a push so fierce it landed her on the floor. He did not look down as he left the room.

  Rose didn’t move from her bed, not for supper or evening prayers. No one came to fetch her. She watched as the red sunset faded through the garden and she could no longer see the trees that danced in the night breeze. Only the birds, still singing, were oblivious to the boundaries of More’s home. She wondered what they had seen today in London. Had they seen madmen and lost women, or mothers whose arms were as empty as their stomachs? Where would they go when they left here? She hoped they would fly to the bosom of God and tell. She wished she could follow, but she saw the world and doubted God would receive her. She stank of it.

  How long she lay in this position, curled into a ball, her face towards the garden, she did not know. In total darkness a noise had stirred her mind and she awoke.

  It was a dull keening, the soft groaning of a man. The hairs on her arm lifted, and Rose closed her eyes, listening hard to know where the sound came from. It was somewhere beyond her room, beyond perhaps the walls of the house. She eased her feet off the bed and pried the door back, careful to make no noise. As she crept down the hall, she saw that everyone was asleep and in several rooms the candles had burned out. The servants snored like drunks; Rose did not doubt a few of them kept refreshments under their mattresses for lonely nights such as this.

  Rose crossed through the servants’ wing and peered down the hall that would lead her to the children, but it was as dark and quiet as a closet. She went down the stairs next and peered into Sir Thomas’s study. It was empty. A candle burned before an open book, and a crucifix hung on the wall above his desk. In the shadows it appeared as if Christ moved upon His cross, and Rose fled the room. There was no movement or noise on this floor, so she looked at the heavy double doors leading to the garden, a side entrance for the household. She was debating the wisdom of leaving the house on a dark night, just after a man had been whipped there, but she saw she would not be the first to do so. One door stood slightly back from the other, not having been closed all the way after someone’s exit. She took a deep silent breath and decided.

  The door slid quietly, but the cold air that met her made her gasp. She hunched down, drawing herself in tightly, and stepped out into the garden. The dull keening continued but sounded wet, and there were not so many moans.

  She followed the path down through the gardens, the rows and plots of plants marked into squares, each for its own kind, going farther down the path until the house was nearly out of her sight. The voice grew louder, and she heard whispers of Latin, a man’s pleas punctuated by a long cry for mercy. This word, mercy, was the only one she knew, for it was the only one in English. She held her breath, waiting for the last cry, which would surely be a wail of death. The dull pounding continued.

  “I have made a covenant with mine eyes!” he cried out, his teeth grinding down on the last two words as a bolt of pain hit.

  Rose crept a few more paces, keeping to the side of the path, shrinking into the shadow as best she could, willing herself to make no noise no matter what she should see. As she came around one last curve, she saw the Tree of Truth. A man was beneath it, with a heavy stone in his hand, and a scourging whip in the other. In the moonlight, he glistened. It was the black glistening of blood. Stepping closer, she knew him.

  It was Sir Thomas.

  She stumbled back, her steps making the stones of the path scratch together.

  Sir Thomas stopped and stared into the darkness. “Who goes there?”

  Rose held her breath, mouthing a silent prayer that she would not be discovered.

  A rabbit jumped from behind a tree in between them and ran down past the gatehouse. Sir Thomas watched it go, and Rose watched him. He exhaled and raised his scourge again. Rose was more careful with her next steps and made it back to her room undiscovered. She eased the door closed and hung her head.

  She lay on her bed but could not face the garden, for she knew another of its secrets. Instead, restless, she turned to face the door, her mind exhausting itself of what might happen next. She could be thrown out or demoted to tending animals instead of children. She would certainly lose Margaret’s affection, and Margaret was a girl thirsty for affection. What would happen to the girl if Rose was thrown out?

  There were so many worries and visions that Rose could not tend to them all before sleep found her. It was a deep and dreamless sleep, and when she awoke, unsettled and unsafe, sleep having done nothing to put distance between her and her fears.

  She noticed her door was ajar. She rose and shut it. Perhaps it had swung open of its own accord, a breeze from an open window somewhere doing this.

  There was no breeze in the house. She opened it again, perplexed, and stepped into the hall to see if anyone had been there. Perhaps another servant had been trying to summon her to breakfast. The hall was empty. She heard the other servants just beginning to stir.

  A pebble on the wooden plank floor caught her eye. Bending to pick it up, she saw that it smeared in her hands. The stain was rust coloured, a stitch of bright red breaking through.

  Chapter Nine

  “Show me Germany,” Margaret asked again, shoving the map once more to Rose. Rose had no more idea about Germany than the moon, and she lost her patience.

  “Goodness and mercy, but you’re restless,” Rose chided. “Set about another lesson.”

  Their lives had resumed as if nothing had happened. Sir Thomas replaced the lost books, and the children found it amusing that Rose had burnt books on proper cookery and gardening. Rose had worked harder on her own lessons.

  Margaret pulled the map to her chest and sighed. She showed no signs of working.

  “What is it about Germany?” Rose whispered. “Why are you pulling a face like a moonstruck calf? Here. The English love stories, the Germans love beer, and the French love anything in a skirt. There. I’ve just explained the world. Quit wondering about it.”

  Margaret, still clutching the map, leaned in to Rose. The other children looked up from their work, and their tutor switched them with a feather. He was teaching the youngest to count money, and each child had a stack of coins in front of him, to practice counting and making change.

  “Margaret!” the tutor called. “Let the servants alone and finish your work!”

  Margaret blushed and set her mouth in that firm way of her father’s. “I’m going to my room to lie down. I’m not up to my lessons today.”

  Rose watched as Margaret stood and marched out, her soft shoes not yet having their wooden heels strapped on for the garden walk to follow the morning work. Ma
rgaret stopped only to kiss her little brother John on the head and wrap her arms around him for a quick hug. He giggled and pushed her away.

  Seeing there was to be no further dramatics, Cicely, Elizabeth, and John returned to their work as their tutor, Candice, watched. They enjoyed the routine and never made a peep as they sifted through books upon books upon papers and lessons. Only Margaret was unwilling to devote all her mind to the work. She scored brilliantly on her tests, and the tutors marked this as progress, but Rose could see there was nothing in this class that held her attention. Something was speaking to her, stirring her, and Rose knew its name.

  She followed Margaret’s exit with her own, making sure to close the door behind her so that no eyes would be on her. She crept from the study room, past More’s empty office, through the family sitting room, looking for Margaret but not seeing her. She moved on towards Margaret’s bedroom.

  The door was cracked open. Rose pressed against the wall and slid closer to the opening, leaning her head in to get a sly view. Margaret was standing with her back to the door, her hand in her skirt’s pocket. She pulled something out and crouched on the floor. Sliding her arm deep under her feather mattress, she began pulling back, and Rose could hear a familiar crackle. Margaret had been hiding a leather pouch under her mattress and it contained papers. She removed a sheet, a feather, and set to work. She placed the paper on the bed and grabbed a tiny well of ink from her night table. Her hand was fast and skilled, scratching out the words without careful deliberation. Dropping a few coins into the center of the paper, she folded it, again and again, until it was a tight parcel. She slipped it between her bosom and her bodice.