Three Sisters, Three Queens

ON PROGRESS, RICHMOND TO COLLYWESTON, ENGLAND, JUNE 1503

Our journey is unbelievably grand, something between a masque and a hunt. First, at the head, free of the dust and setting our own pace, comes my father the king and me: Queen of Scots. He rides behind his royal standard, I behind mine. I change my riding outfits and they are brushed clean every time we stop, sometimes three times a day. I wear Tudor green, dark crimson, a yellow so dark that it is like orange, and a pale blue. My father tends to wear black—always dark colors—but his hat, his gloves and his waistcoat gleam with jewels, and his shoulders are loaded with chains of gold. Our horses are the best that can be had. I have a palfrey, a lady’s horse that has been trained with crowds and fireworks to make sure that nothing startles her, and my groom leads a spare horse. I ride astride, on a thickly padded saddle so that we can go many miles every day, or I can ride behind my master of horse on a pillion saddle embroidered with the emblem of Scotland: the thistle. If I am tired, I have a litter carried by mules, and I can get inside, draw the curtains and sleep while it gently rocks me.

Behind us come the courtiers, as if they were out for a day of pleasure, with the long sleeves of the ladies rippling as we canter, and the cloaks of the gentlemen billowing like standards. The gentlemen of my father’s rooms and my ladies mingle without ceremony, and there is continual laughter and flirtation. Behind them come the mounted guard, though England is supposed to be at peace. My father is perennially suspicious, always afraid that the foolish, wicked people still hold their loyalty to the old royal family. Behind the mounted guard comes the wagon with the hawks and falcons, their leather curtains tied tightly against the dust, and all the birds standing on their traveling perches, their little heads crowned with leather hoods, blinded to all the noise and confusion so they are not frightened.

Around them, baying and yelping, are the big hounds—the wolfhounds and the deerhounds with the huntsmen and the whippers-in riding alongside and keeping them under control. Every now and then one of the dogs gets a scent and gives tongue and all the others are desperate to give chase and follow; but we cannot stop to hunt if we are riding towards a feast or a celebration or a formal welcome. Some days we hunt before breakfast, and sometimes in the cool of the evening, and then the dogs can take a scent and make a run, and the court will spur on their horses, scrambling over ditches and riding through strange woods, laughing and cheering. If we make a kill we present the meat at the next halt to our overnight host.

Ahead of us, starting half a day before we mount, goes the baggage train. First out: half a dozen carts that carry my clothes; one, specially guarded, carries my jewels. The steward of my household and his servants either sit beside the drivers or ride alongside, to make sure that nothing goes missing and nothing is lost. The wagons are strapped with oilskins dyed in the Tudor colors of green and white and sealed with my royal seal. My ladies each have their own wardrobe cart, displaying their own shields, and when the wagons rumble, one after another, it looks like a moving tree of shields from a tournament, as if the Knights of the Round Table had decided to invade the North, all at once.

My father is not amusing company on this great journey. He is unhappy at the state of the roads, and the cost of the travel. He is missing my mother, I suppose, but this does not show itself as grief but in continual complaint: “If Her Grace were here she would do that” or “I never had to order that, it is the queen’s work.” My mother was so beloved, and her family were so accustomed to rule, having been on the throne for generations, that she always used to guide him in the great public occasions, and everyone felt easier when she was at the head of a procession. I begin to think that it would have been thoroughly good for Katherine of Arrogant to have been forced to marry my father: serving him would have humbled her far more than marrying Harry will ever do. She is going to lord it over Harry, I know, but my father would have set her to work.

He is glad when we get to my lady grandmother’s house at Collyweston because here everything is commanded by her to the highest standard, and here he can rest and do nothing. I think he may be ill; certainly, he seems tired, and my lady his mother fusses around him with all sorts of potions of her own mixing and strengthening drinks. Here we will part—he will go back to London and I will go on northward to Scotland. I will not see him again until I come back to England for a visit.

I wonder if my father is distressed at my leaving and hiding it under ill temper, but truly, I think he will feel my loss no more than I feel his. We have never been close; he has never made much of me. I am his daughter, but I resemble the smiling tall blondes of my mother’s family. I am not a precious little doll-faced princess like Mary. I have inherited his temper, but his mother has made sure that I keep it hidden. I have his courage—he spent his life in exile and then came to England against all odds—I think I can be brave too. I have my mother’s hopefulness; my father thinks the worst of everyone and plans to catch them out. Anyone seeing us side by side—he so spare and dark and I round faced and broad shouldered—would never take us for father and elder daughter, no wonder we feel no sense of kinship.

I kneel for his blessing as my train of courtiers waits in the sunshine and my grandmother inspects me for flaws, and when I rise up he kisses me on both cheeks. “You know what you have to do,” he says shortly. “Make sure that husband of yours keeps the peace. England will never be safe if Scotland is an enemy and always stirring up the Northern lands. It’s called the Treaty of Perpetual Peace for a reason. You are there to make sure that it is perpetual.”

“I’ll do what I can, Sire.”

“Never forget you’re an English princess,” he says. “If anything happens to Harry, which God forbid, you will be mother to the next King of England.”

“The grandest thing in the world,” my grandmother adds. She and her son exchange a warm glance. “Serve God,” she says to me. “And remember your patron saint and mine, the Blessed Margaret.”

I bow my head at the name of the woman who was saved from being eaten by a dragon when her crucifix scratched his belly and he vomited her up.

“Let her life be an example for you,” my lady grandmother urges.

I put my hand on the crucifix at my throat to indicate that, should I be swallowed by a dragon between here and Edinburgh, I am fully prepared.

“God bless you,” she says. Her old face is set firm; there is no danger of her weeping at our parting. I may be her favorite granddaughter, but neither Mary nor I can compare to her passion for her son and grandson. She is founding a dynasty: she only needs boys.

She kisses me, and holds me close for a moment. “Try to have a son,” she whispers. “Nothing else matters but your son on the throne.”

It is a cold farewell to a motherless girl but before I can answer, my master of horse steps forward and lifts me onto my palfrey, the trumpeters blast out a salute, and everyone knows we are ready to leave. The king’s court waves, my lady grandmother’s household cheers, and I lead out my court, flying my standard, on the great north road to Edinburgh.