Roan Rose Read online

  Roan Rose

  By Juliet Waldron

  Digital ISBNs

  EPUB 978-1-77362-199-9

  Kindle 978-1-77145-151-2

  WEB 978-1-77362-200-2

  Print 978-1-77362-201-9

  Dedication

  To the Legend I met in my tenth year,

  sitting behind that Barbadian bar, nose in a book.

  God send to every gentleman,

  Such hawks, such hounds

  And such a Leman….

  —The Three Ravens, archaic

  A Game of Chess

  The King of England and I played chess, passing his sleepless hours. After years of struggling with the game, I can say, without exaggeration, that I'd become a formidable competitor, nearly his equal. I will stand firm upon this claim, even though I was a lowly servant—and female, at that.

  Nightly, our forces swayed back and forth across the board, until the birds began a summons to Dawn, calling her, as the harpers say, “from that silken couch whereon she dreams.”

  We sat in a steady circle of candlelight in a small, high room at the palace of Nottingham. From our vantage point, the narrow river, spangled by summer stars, flowed below a single, open window. The distance, I might add, was sufficient to prevent the smell from blighting the view.

  Of late, I had won a few these matches. This I credited in part to the King's growing distraction and exhaustion. By June of 1485, he’d realized that his rule was unraveling around him, and, that he, in no small part, had been the architect of oncoming disaster.

  What other choices, however, could my Lord have made? If he had let his nephew come to the throne, his own head would, sooner or later, have become his vengeful sister in law's trophy. Either that or he would have been arrested and mewed up by his enemies, murdered in secret like so many members of his family. Richard Plantagenet knew history and he was not a passive man. All he'd done in deposing the boy was to strike his enemies before they could strike him.

  Men now say otherwise.

  There is mystery in the dark hours between two and four. The black and white squares of the board swam before my eyes. I, too, was tired to my very bones. The King's wakefulness had become his servant's. I was ready to make a move when his foot, under a long red robe, touched mine beneath the table. The contact seemed accidental, but was it?

  He knows how greatly I love him, how I hunger for any touch….

  Concentration broken, I glanced up and met his brilliant hazel eyes, burning deep in hollows of chronic sleeplessness. For an instant, a slight smile curved those thin, mobile lips, but his gaze returned naturally to the board. Our relationship had always been singular. Only recently had it turned—let us say—customary. During the winter, his queen, the mistress I'd served and loved for nigh onto twenty years, had died. That is why his touch distracted me, made my concentration falter.

  Was the move I'd planned such a good one?

  My hand wavered over the few remaining strong pieces. Traps lay on every side. Several, I saw clearly, for I'd been playing chess with Richard since our shared childhood. Whatever coup de grace he'd planned, I feared I'd never see until it was too late.

  "That wasn't fair." In our secret kingdom of night, titles, and much else customary between master and servant, had been abandoned.

  "Check."

  I'd revised, chosen to move my last knight to pin down his king. Of course, I knew quite well that second guesses are nearly always fatal this deep in a match.

  "Nothing in this world is fair.”

  As his hand went for it, I saw my doom—a lurking bishop.

  "Checkmate," Richard lifted a dark brow in triumph. Extending those jeweled, elegant fingers, his bishop cast down my helpless king.

  "You touched my foot on purpose."

  "What of it?"

  It was worth losing any number of chess matches to see him smile. Always glorious—and always rare—it had, lately, become a thing of legend.

  "Old Dick" doesn't smile. This was well known all over his Kingdom. Like a great many other things that are ‘well known’, there was not a grain of truth in it.

  "I don't mind. It's only that you used to win by your wits, and now it seems you must rely upon the lowest tricks to best your humble servant."

  He laughed shortly, but it was not an entirely happy sound. Playing with my king now, turning it between ringed thumb and forefinger, he said, "Better for all of us had I learned the game of low tricks at a far earlier age."

  How to reply? Crouching at the back of this night's wakefulness lay the same old horror. Where are his nephews?

  Pawns are always the first to go. In my Lord's case, crime had brought, as it so rarely does in this wicked world, a punishment not only swift, but apt. In the space of sixteen months, the King had lost his adored son and his dearly beloved wife, my noble mistress.

  On this night, Richard Plantagenet had traveled almost to the end of his earthly course, to the haunted land where human tribulation ends. Gazing at the ruin of our board, I believe we both knew it.

  Chapter I

  "Little Witch!" A slap always followed the malediction. "Dost thou stare?"

  This was my father. He did not like children whose opinions showed in their eyes. Large dark eyes I had—my mother's eyes—and when I displeased him, he was not slow to punish the unbroken will he saw.

  I was born at the village of Aysgarth in the house of a stark yeoman farmer, Master Whitby. He was not pleased when my mother gave him a daughter, and then another and another, as if by the force of her own contrary will.

  Master Whitby acknowledged me, however, as he acknowledged my sisters. I was written down in the book at the Church of Our Lady as "Rosalba Whitby, legitimate, born to Master Raymond Whitby and his espoused wife, Roseanne."

  When I was old enough to hear the tale, my mother very kindly let me know matters stood otherwise. To learn I had been conceived in liberty and was not the get of that humorless, ham-fisted tyrant fills me, to this day, with satisfaction.

  Aysgarth lies on Wenslydale, north and west of the great Keep of Middleham. Here our peasant houses grew from the ground like mushrooms. The poorest were of turf, but the best homes, like the one in which I was born, rose upon a costly timber frame.

  Those hard packed earthen floors! In the East Wind time, rain slanted through the central smoke hole and pelted the fire of our hearth. I remember huddling close, thinking how the flames were like serpents, lowering their fiery heads and hissing whenever the drops landed. During the worst weather, the entire family, including Master Whitby's curly-pelted white cattle, sheltered with us.

  Our village was linked by a single, rutted path. Beyond the stone fences lay fields, wild water and wind. The river went down rapids and over the falls, on and on until it reached the stormy eastern sea through the Great Wash.

  My mother kept a garden behind the house. Well-manured with the leavings of our animals, tended by my hands and those of my older half-brothers, it flourished. Here mother grew turnips, mangels, carrots, parsnips and greens, food for us and for our animals. In a raised patch, she also grew herbs, for she was Aysgarth's midwife.

  She knew how to cultivate and how to distill what was useful. She delivered children, here in Aysgarth and on the dales round about. So skillful and well-reputed was she that she lived to the age of nineteen free of the marital yoke.

  Our priest, however, did not approve. My maternal grandmother had been hanged as a witch and people hereabout have long memories. Although my mother had mostly been raised by a pious woman, Mother Margery, the blood line of a witch was said to run strong.

  After my foster mother died, the priest and the other men of the village decided it was best that my mother, so inclined to independence, be placed under the thumb of a stro
ng man. Farmer Whitby, recently again a widower again, was elected to the task. My mother was his fourth and final wife.

  Edward Duke of York took the throne, apparently once and for all, from the House of Lancaster during my sixth year. With the help of our mighty Earl of Warwick, Edward imprisoned the mad old King, Henry VI, and drove out his wife, Queen Marguerite, a damned French princess. Edward then declared the Queen's son by the old king to be a bastard.

  Master Whitby had no love for queens, especially French ones. He rallied at once to the idea that Queen Marguerite's son had been gotten in adultery.

  "It is said that our poor monkish King cried out she must have made that little shit with the Holy Ghost! I'll tell you, no good has ever come from a single one of these French queens. They bring us only bad government and war. Their courts are filled with their lovers and prancing catamites whose only care is to plunder decent folk. Look at Great King Hal’s French bitch! Popping out pups to a dirty Welsh stable-boy as soon as the Lord Chamberlain's back was turned."

  Rosalba—White Rose—was a name given to me by my mother, who favored flower names. I think Master Whitby acquiesced in it because at the time he thought it politic to have a foot in the Yorkist camp. One of my elder half-brothers still glowered about the house under the name of Clifford, in honor of that other great northern family. Supporters of the House of Lancaster, they had once been a great power among us. One of Master Whitby's favorite adages was: "Coats must go on as the wind blows."

  * * *

  When I was ten, the Duchess of Warwick, wife to the Mighty Earl named "Kingmaker," arrived in Aysgarth. This lady was on her way to the Keep of Middleham, and had fallen ill. This was how she came to rest, with all her train, in our small stone church.

  We all went to gawk. Lords and their ladies did not pass our way often.

  I say the whole village, but this is not quite correct. My mother would never dare leave the house without my father's permission. Master Whitby's rule in this, as in all things, was enforced with blows. Mother picked her battles.

  I can still call the old man to mind, him with his long salt and pepper beard, lank grizzled hair, and his wide, work-thickened hand, a member with which all his dependents had close acquaintance. His gaze alone could scald you, for he was a man of choleric humor. Even his flesh bore testimony, for every exposed inch of him turned scarlet at haying time. Master Whitby was certain that while he and other men labored in the fields or among the cattle, their women were likely to waste either their time or a husband’s hard-won goods. He was a firm believer that women were vain, foolish and lazy.

  I shall recall no more of him, for to carp is a poor pastime. There were others in our village who suffered more. For all I know, my mother would have ended like her mother had she had remained without the protection of marriage. Master Whitby took at least as good care of his children as he did his cattle. He allowed my mother to exercise her gifts, for any reward she received only made him that much richer.

  Ordinarily, during a visit by high gentry, Mother would have remained in the kitchen. Going to gape at the progress of the mighty was not worth the price she'd later have to pay. Nevertheless, this time she eventually did go, for she was summoned by a power far higher, by Lady Anne Beauchamp, Countess of Warwick.

  * * *

  The retainers of the Earl had gathered around our church, making a better spectacle than any feast day. Mother and I walked through a forest of armed men, of horses and carts and bright banners.

  I wondered at the beauty of the ladies. Their mounts were hinnies with delicate legs and long ears, decked with brasses and draped in scarlet. The Ragged Staff banner of the Countess’ husband stood before our church, snapping in a raw April breeze. The great lady’s journey had been interrupted by woman's trouble. Her ladies, perhaps desiring a scapegoat, had called for the local midwife. I accompanied my mother, scurrying behind her and carrying a small wooden box of hastily assembled vials.

  The dark, echoing interior of the church was familiar, but I had never seen or imagined it like this, filled with torches and retainers, their coats of mail and polished armor bright against the stone. We were led in straightaway by a sharp-nosed lady in the most beautiful dress I'd ever seen. I remember it to this day, a dashing scarlet, a kind of cloth for which I then had no name. The material fell in luxurious folds. The white scarves adorning her headdress were fine as fairy wings.

  She took us to a narrow room behind the high altar, usually only visited by choir or the priests. I could feel sweat beneath my shirt, although the day was cold. Mother was nervous too, although she held her head high. Before answering the summons, she had taken time to wash her face and put on a clean apron and cap, as if it were a Sunday. Now, I understood why.

  * * *

  I smelled blood at once. All the colors—all the clean and sheen of her numerous attendants, as fair as angels in the church windows, all—vanished with that smell. It was strong, the smell of birthing. It was not the sharp, clear smell of a pumping wound or of an animal bleeding its last under the butcher’s knife, but heavy and musky—sure sign of a she-creature in trouble.

  "Stay close."

  I stood beside my mother, clutching the box.

  "You are midwife of Aysgarth?"

  My knees knocked as I looked up at the great lady, seated on a make-shift bed, a plank covered with blankets and set between stools. My father was a king in his house and we feared him, but we knew that he feared his lord who lived in Kendall Castle, Sir William. In turn, Sir William feared his lord, the great Earl of Warwick, whose knee bent only to the King in London! This proud lady, now suffering like a commoner in our poor church, represented great power.

  "Yes, Milady. Mistress Whitby, at your service." Mother curtseyed low and bowed her head. Her emphatic downward motion sent me to my knees on the cold slate beside her, still clutching the box.

  "Come to me quick, woman! I miscarry."

  I raised my eyes and this time managed to focus upon the most high and noble lady. Her brows were narrow and perfectly arched against her forehead, the whitest I'd ever seen. The eyes beneath those brows were like a gray autumn sky. Her pallor was deep, as if she had been struck in a vital part by a sword. I followed my mother, the box held against my flat, freckled chest.

  The ladies who attended, with their fair skin, their soft hands, and round plump cheeks, parted before us. They looked like queasy angels, uncertain for the first time in their divine lives. This was not a trouble which could be managed by smooth address.

  Mother went straight to work. I was used to this commanding demeanor when she assumed the midwife's mantle. The Countess lay back and submitted to her handling. Great Lady she might be, but now she must abandon modesty. Like a cow in a difficult calving, she must accept our helping hands.

  The small, bloody lump my mother soon delivered from between her white knees was a boy. A noble child, but he looked to me the same as any other miscarry I’d seen. The Countess of Warwick's pain and her tears were also familiar.

  I knelt by mother, first handing her vials, some of precious glass and others of equally precious metal, exactly as she called for them. The ladies served, bringing basins of hot water to us and a goblet of hot red wine to their mistress.

  Cures were mixed with the wine; the Countess sipped. After passing away the cup, much to my surprise, the great lady took my hand and squeezed it. I did what Mother had taught, and offered her both hands. I gazed in awe at the whiteness that my fingers—so freckled and rough—enclosed. Veins crossed the back of her hand, and I wondered if it were true, the thing men said about the aristocracy having “blue blood,” different from ours.

  Our priest said it was true, that he'd seen the heads cut from Lords, and that the first blood was dark as the winter sea. Master Whitby scoffed. If that were so then pigs or bulls must also be noblemen, for didn't their blood—when “struck proper”—flow just as dark?

  As I held the Countess' hand between mine, her breathing eased
. I could see her muscles relax. Mother helped her patient with a clout of clean cloths, and fed her the wine in which she'd let fall four carefully measured drops of distilled knotweed and nettle.

  Knotweed to tie up bleeding.

  Nettle for a heated illness….

  The noble child was lost, but the Countess did not blame. She grieved that she had failed her lord and that she had lost a child of her body. My mother assured her the miscarriage was clean, that nothing remained behind to poison the blood.

  "God willing, there will be others, Milady Countess." Mother ventured the common comfort.

  The Countess responded with a weary smile that turned down on one side.

  "Yes. God willing."

  My mother asked if the lady felt much pain.

  "Yes, good woman, though I know it well. This is a trial I have stood before."

  I was impressed by the way she bore her misfortune, with pride and grace, even in this most wretched physical moment.

  If it cannot be helped, it is best just to get on….

  Mother finished by giving a draught containing poppy from one of the vials, then she brought from her pocket a smooth round stone from the river. It was gray, apparently like a thousand others, but my Mother was never without it.

  "With your permission, Milady Countess; may I speak a charm to stop pain?"

  "Yes." The Countess lay back and closed her eyes.

  There was a silent moment while mother began to pass the stone over the lady's body.

  "Hair and hide

  Flesh and bone,

  Feel no more pain

  Than this stone."

  The charm was told thirteen times. Still holding the Countess' hand, I ventured to gaze at her. Everyone knew that her husband, the great Earl whose power made and broke kings, had sired only two daughters. No sons to fight at their warlike father's side! Wondering if the Earl upbraided her for dereliction, I felt a wave of pity.