“And is that your recommendation for the man, sister, that father likes him?” Anne teased. They both smiled as Mary helped Anne shrug out of her tight satin bodice. “Rather a condemnation, I would think. I know you agree with me now on how to handle father. We shall be great allies in France.”
Anne lifted the covers and got in, ignoring the hairbrush Mary would have used on her long tresses. She pulled the covers up to her chin like she used to do when she was a little girl to ward off night goblins outside the comforting stone walls of Hever. Mary felt suddenly touched and she cherished the feeling since she had been so often angry with Anne’s growing petulance these last months. She opened her mouth to say something comforting and wise, but she was not sure what would do. If she could only think of something their mother might say now.
“Mary, forgive me, but I would ask you a question—a personal one.”
“Yes, Anne.”
“Will you tell me truly and not be angry?”
“Yes. I promise.” Unless you would ask of my love for Staff, little sister, Mary thought. But she smiled and crossed her heart the way they used to do when they had some deep secret to share.
Anne smiled up from her ivory silk pillow, suddenly radiant. “I had forgotten that, Mary. How silly we were then. What I wondered was whether His Grace is very demanding when he...when he possesses a woman’s body.” Her smile faded from her lips and she sat bolt upright clutching the sheet to her small breasts and leaning close to Mary. “You see, Mary, he has begun to make love to me many times and he is so strong and big. I mean, not just in kisses and caresses, but he has pulled my dresses down to my waist and feasted his eyes and hands and mouth. And then, too, he nearly took me standing once and lifted all my skirts and yanked off his huge codpiece and would have...have gone inside me right there had I not become hysterical from fear, and he thought he was hurting me and he apologized all over himself for at least half an hour. And then, lately, if I sit on his lap, he puts his hands up between my legs and strokes and probes and I have to pretend I like it, Mary. Please tell me if he is gentle when it comes to it. I seem so very small and he is so...so big, Mary.”
Her wide eyes glistened with unshed tears, and Mary’s love went out to her. She felt deep shock that this little sister, this Anne she had known to flirt and tease and scream like a fishwife at a man, could know fear. But then, somewhere inside, there must still be the little girl with all the questions.
“Anne, Anne, it will be all right. Yes, everything will be all right. The king loves you and it is obvious to anyone who sees him with you.”
“But there are things they do not see, Mary. It becomes harder and harder to hold him at bay.”
“You have said you are certain of his love and that he is yours indeed now and would never go back on that.”
“Yes, I said that.”
“Then he will marry you as soon as he is able. He is ridden hard by the passions you stir in him, Anne. You cannot blame him or fear him for that.”
“Why cannot he control himself as I can?”
“Foolish little Anne. His Grace is a man—the most powerful man in the world perhaps.” In the momentary silence Mary beat down the memory of herself in Francois’s demanding arms so long ago, entranced, ensnared, but frightened. “He is hardly used to waiting for anything he wants, Annie.”
“Is childbirth so terrible then?”
“Are you...but you have not?”
“No, Mary, I said no. Only I know children will come if I submit to him. You screamed horribly for hours when you bore little Harry at Hever.”
“I had forgotten, truly, Anne. The joy of a child is so great that after, well, after the pain and troubles, the thought of the bad part goes away. You will see.”
“Yes, I suppose so. Well, it must be done.” She pulled back slowly from her closeness to Mary. “Father is right, I fear, though I do not like to hear it from him. His Grace needs something extra from me romantically now. The dreadful divorce and all this nasty business with dissolving the pope’s wretched church is depressing him more and more. He cannot see the happy end of the road as clearly as he used to.”
“The forest for the trees,” Mary thought aloud.
“Yes. Exactly. I must sleep now. We are going to fly my new gerfalcon in the morning. He can hardly rape me with our falcons on the wing, you know.” Anne smiled impudently and Mary returned the look warmly.
“Fear not, little sister. ‘The dark outside the window is never so dark when you go out,’ dear old Semmonet would say if she were here. I tell you true, Anne, when His Grace gets right down to possession, he makes short work of it. That can have its rewards, but then it can mean tragedy too—if you love him.”
“Of course I love His Grace, sister,” Anne returned heatedly.
That sounded more like the new Anne. The mood of intimacy and warmth was broken. Mary rose slowly.
“Mary,” Anne’s voice floated to her as she blew out the cresset lamp and moved toward the door. “You were not speaking of love for this king just then, were you—about love having its rewards? Nor Will, I warrant.”
“Please, Anne, let it be.”