Page 68 of Love, Remember Me

Several days later the king, at Whitehall, received a messenger from the Earl and the Countess of March. The messenger bowed low, and given permission to speak, said, "On the first day of March, in the year of our lord fifteen hundred and forty-one, Lady Nyssa Catherine de Winter gave birth to twin children, a son and a daughter, Your Grace. The heir to Winterhaven was baptized Edmund Anthony de Winter, and his sister will be called Sabrina Mary de Winter. Both the infants, and their mother, are well. The earl and his wife tender you their loyalty. God save good King Henry, and Queen Catherine!" He bowed again, and was dismissed.

"Twins," Henry Tudor said, his eyes narrowing to slits. "I would be content with one child." He looked at his pretty wife. "We must try harder, Catherine, my rose. Your cousin and his wife are already two up on us. It will not do, my pet."

"Can we see them this summer on our Midlands progress?" the queen said, ignoring him. "Will you order them to join us? She will have to have a wet nurse with two children, and so surely she can come to court for a short time, my dear lord. It would make me sooo happy to see Nyssa again. Perhaps I shall even be enceinte by then, and Nyssa could tell me all that I needed to know about babies." She smiled sweetly at him.

"Very well," he said, unable to resist her, and he pulled her down into his lap for a cuddle. "Would it truly make you happy, Catherine? You know I would do anything to make you happy."

"Aye, my darling, it would make me very happy," she told him, and kissed his mouth, her little tongue snaking unexpectedly over his lips. "Do you like that, my liege?" She pressed herself against him.

He fumbled with her bodice, pulling it open, handling her breasts with great familiarity. Then one of his hands slipped beneath her skirt and slid up her leg, past her thigh, and a single finger found its target. "Do you like this?" he growled at her, his finger working faster and faster against her little jewel.

The queen twisted her body about, unfastening her husband's codpiece loosed about his manhood, which was already well-aroused. Then seating herself upon his lap, facing him, she took him into her sheath. "Does that please you, my lord?" she murmured against his ear, biting down hard on it. Then she began to ride him.

He slipped his hand beneath her bottom, crushing the flesh of her buttocks with his finger. "I am going to mark you," he said.

"Yes!" she half sobbed. "Yes! Mark me! Make me your own, Henry Tudor." She moved faster and faster upon him, until finally they both exploded with their mutual pleasure. "Ahhhhhh," she groaned as his love juices filled her. "Ahhh, Henry!"

Perhaps they had made a child, the king thought, praying it was so. He wanted a child with this exquisite girl-wife whom he loved so very, very much. How had he gained such good fortune in his old age?

"You will not forget your promise to me, my lord?" she said sweetly. "You will order the Earl and Countess of March to join us on our progress this summer?" She kissed his ear and then licked it.

"I will not forget, Catherine," he told her. Ahh, the little russet-haired vixen was making him feel like a boy again! He found her mouth and became lost in their kisses.

PART III

THE QUEEN'S PAWN

COURT

Summer 1541–Winter 1542

CHAPTER 11

THEking was ill. A difficult man when healthy, he was absolutely impossible when he was unwell. His ulcerated leg, which for the past few months had been fine, was suddenly painful again. The wound, always kept open for purposes of drainage, had suddenly closed. The leg grew inflamed and swollen. Henry Tudor ran a fever, and refused to follow his doctors' instructions once they had reopened the ulcer again.

"You need much liquid, Your Grace, to help us wash the fever away," Dr. Butts told the king sternly. As the king's senior physician he knew better than anyone how to handle his patient.

"Am I not drinking wine and ale aplenty?" growled the king.

"I have told you, Your Grace, that you must not drink ale, and your wine must be well watered," the doctor replied. "What we want you to ingest in great quantity is this herbal decoction that we have mixed with sweet Devon cider. It will ease the pain and chase the fever."

The king wrinkled his nose. "It tastes like piss," he said stubbornly.

Dr. Butts mightily struggled to control his temper. The king was without a doubt the worst patient any physician could have. "I would humbly suggest, Your Grace," he responded sharply, "that you overcome your childish aversion to your medication. The longer you are ill, the weaker you will become. It will be harder for you to regain your former strength. I am certain the queen would be very unhappy if your strength did not come back tenfold. You cannot fulfill your obligations to England if you do not get well."

Dr. Butts's meaning was crystal clear to the king. He glowered at the man, annoyed that he was so right in this matter. "I will meditate upon your advice," he said sullenly. How he hated being told what to do, but he had to admit that he felt like merry hell right now. He had even sent Catherine away from him. He could not allow her to see him in this sorry state. He looked so old. Every afternoon at six he would send Master Henage to his queen with loving messages and news, but he hardly wanted his beautiful young wife to see him in this disgusting condition. One good thing was coming of it, though. He could hardly eat a thing, and was rapidly losing weight.

He had been measured for a suit of armor just before his marriage last summer. He had been shocked by the measurements that had been called out. "Waist, fifty-four inches." That could not be right! He had made the fool armorer's apprentice measure his waist again, only to hear, "Waist, fifty-four inches," repeated. "Chest, fifty-seven inches." It was embarrassing.

After his marriage he had embarked upon a strenuous program of physical exercise. To his delight he had begun to see his muscles beginning to emerge from the fat in which they had been encased. He was watching what he ate, and now this sickness was aiding his endeavors. He did not, however, want to lose his sexual potency with the queen. He began to drink the doctor's disgusting potion, and to his further aggravation, he felt better almost at once.

Still, his temperament was terrible. He began to grow suspicious of the courtiers about him. They were all using him for their own gains, and his people were an ungrateful lot as well. He'd raise taxes. That would teach them! Henry Tudor thought about Thomas Cromwell.Dear, devoted old Crum. "He was the most faithful servant that we ever had," the king was heard to mutter darkly on more than one occasion. "Why is he not here for me now? I will tell you why," he shouted, and his gentlemen shifted their feet nervously. "Because my loyal and steadfast old Crum was convicted by false accusations, and on light pretexts!"

Once again the king was blaming everyone else for his actions. He wallowed in dark self-pity, and no one could oppose him in any matter whatsoever. It had been almost ten days since he had seen his wife, and he was not yet ready to be with her.

The queen was lonely. She sat amongst her ladies embroidering her motto, beneath a crowned rose, onto a square of brocade, which when finished would be set into a silver frame and presented to the king. Catherine had taken for her motto:Non autre volonté que la sienne, which when translated into English read: "No other wish but his." It was dull, tedious work, and she was bored with it. She gazed about her at her ladies: Lady Margaret Douglas, the Duchess of Richmond, the Countess of Rutland, Ladies Rochford, Edgecomb, and Baynton.Same old faces. When she had been married, her uncle, the duke, had told her the women he wanted her to include in her household. They were pleasant enough ladies, but they were the same old faces. She had had to tell Henry that she wanted her father's widow, her dull stepmother, Lady Margaret Howard; Lady Clinton, Lady Arundel, her sister, who she did not really get on with; Prince Edward's aunt, Lady Cromwell, who was the late Queen Jane's sister, Elizabeth, and married to Thomas Cromwell's son; and Mistress Stonor, who had been with her cousin Anne in the Tower. She is a cheerful companion, Catherine thought ironically, grimacing. There were others, of course, but few were young, and none were fun.

When she complained, her uncle had told her sternly, "You must remember that you are now the Queen of England, Catherine. You are a woman of property and position. Such women do not cry and whine forfunlike unimportant little girls."

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