Three Sisters, Three Queens

STIRLING CASTLE, SCOTLAND, SUMMER 1528

They all write to me: Harry, Thomas Wolsey, Katherine, Mary. They all deplore my divorce; Harry threatens me with the damnation of adulterers. Katherine begs me to think of the legitimacy of my daughter, and says that I am throwing her down as baseborn. Thomas Wolsey tells me that Harry’s outraged rant is a true copy of his spoken words, and Mary tells me that gowns are being cut slightly off the shoulder.

I write to Archibald, I write to James. I write to William Dacre, the heir to Lord Thomas Dacre, I write to Mary, to Katherine, to Harry; I write to Cardinal Wolsey. If I dared I would write to Anne Boleyn as the most potent advisor at Henry’s court. I try to contain my terror and I write, as calmly as I can, that my former marriage was annulled by the Pope himself on the basis of my husband’s precontract with Lady Janet Stewart of Traquair. Since I am free, I chose to marry Henry Stewart, and although I should have asked for permission for this match, I, like my sister Mary, am asking for permission after the wedding. All I am requesting is the same treatment as my sister Mary, who married Charles Brandon without her brother’s permission. All I am asking is that I am treated justly and fairly, as Mary was. Why should I accept harsher treatment than she? Why should anyone treat me with more unkindness than Mary—who was a king’s widow and married her choice during her year of mourning? What could be more disrespectful than that?

I write peaceably and soberly to Archibald. I say that I am happy that our daughter is safe in his keeping, but I remind him that she is high-born and legitimate. She keeps her good name. I expect her to visit me when I request it. I expect to see her when I want to.

I have a reply from my son James. He does not even answer my appeal for mercy for Henry Stewart. He writes of nothing personal; anything he writes to me is read by Archibald’s advisors. But this letter announces that James is calling a meeting of the council to complain of lawlessness on the borders. I don’t know why James should suddenly address the desolate state of the borders, nor why he should tell me, when I am begging him to release my young husband.

I am writing another round of appeals one evening when I hear the shout of one of the guards and the sudden ringing of the tocsin bell. It is three loud rings, the signal that a few men have approached the main gate, not the hammering peal that warns of an approaching army. At once, I pray that it may be Henry Stewart coming home to me, and I drop my pen, pull a cape around me, and go out into the outer close. The gate to the main entrance is open and as I watch, the great gates are flung open without a command from the captain of the castle, and I can hear the sound of the soldiers cheering.

This is extraordinary. They would not be cheering Henry Stewart, and I cannot imagine who else would come after curfew. I hurry across the outer close to see what late-night visitor has found the gates thrown open to him to cheers from my guard, when I see a big warhorse and above it the gleaming smile of my son James.

“James!” is all I can say, and he pulls up his horse, jumps off, and throws the reins to his groom.

“James!”

He is dressed like a poor man in a brown wool cape with a plaid over his shoulder of gray and brown. He has a thick belt around his waist and a great knife in a cheap scabbard on his hip. But he has his own good riding boots, and his own unmistakable beam of triumph.

“I got away!” He scoops me up into his arms and kisses me, a smacking kiss on both cheeks, then he takes me by the waist and dances me around the yard as his horse snorts and backs away from us and the men cheer. “I got away. At last. I’ve done it. I got away.”

“How, how did you?”

“He went off to the borders to make war on his own blackguards and I told everyone else that I would be up at dawn to go hunting. I went to bed early and so did everyone else. Jockie Hart and these two had my horse ready and a spare set of clothes and swore they would come with me. We had the horses out of the stable and were away up the North Road before dawn, before they even knew we were gone.”

“He’ll come after you,” I say, with a glance towards the south as if I can see Archibald’s army marching from Edinburgh.

“For sure. And he’ll guess I have come to you. Let’s get in and get the gates closed and post guards.”

He sweeps me in, his arm around my shoulder, and I call for lights as we go into the hall and the household wakes around us, half of them sleeping on trestles in the hall, getting to their feet and cheering the news that the king is here, the king himself, and he will never be captured again.

“We must fly the royal standard,” I order. “Then if they come against us they are declared traitors. And you must issue a warrant to ban any of the Clan Douglas from coming near you.”

“Write it out,” James says. “I’ll sign it and seal it with my ring.”

“You brought it?”

“I always wear it. Archibald has the big seal but I have this.”

“And send out a declaration that all the lords who are loyal to James are to come here to join His Grace. We’ll call a council of the lords and then a parliament in Edinburgh,” I say to my chief clerk, who is writing frantically, his writing desk slung around his neck, scattering sand on the letter to dry it. I give a little excited laugh. “It is like a masque, starting again. But this time we have the costumes and we know the moves.”

“And write to Edinburgh Castle to order the release of Henry Stewart,” James says.

I look up.

“It is your wish?” he asks me.

“Yes, of course, but I thought you were opposed to my marriage.”

“I was opposed to the scandal, not to the marriage,” he says, pedantic as any young man. “It was Archibald who ordered your husband’s arrest in my name. He wanted to please your brother and I consented, so he would think that you and I were enemies. Of course, Henry Stewart is not my choice; but if he is yours, he can be freed and I will make him a lord. What’s his estate?”

“Methven,” I say. “He can be Lord Methven.”

“Write it down,” James says, laughing. “These are my first acts as ruling king.”