In the Shadow of Lions: A Novel of Anne Boleyn (Chronicles of the Scribe #1)(27)

The sun bore down strangely, and sweat beaded along her lip and down between her breasts. She shrugged, trying to make herself comfortable as the heat grew remorseless. A cough rattled her chest—not the deep cough of a winter cold, but a choking, bloody cough. She saw the sleeves of her dress speckle with red as she covered her mouth.

The last thing she remembered was hearing Catherine’s courtiers arriving behind Henry’s procession. Henry had brought his queen in on the progress after all. Anne fell to the ground, thinking of this doomed queen who held everyone’s heart but his. She wished to be trampled under the hooves of a fast horse so she could be absent at last from this world.



She was aware of voices, warm and whispering, all around her. She laid there, listening for the one voice she always heard in her dreams, but it was not among them. Instead, she recognized the clipped, short speech of Dr. Butts, the court physician, a man of many remedies and few words. She felt his hand on her forehead and heard him whisper.

“Graces, no!” another voice said.

Anne opened her eyes. She grabbed his hand and jerked it from her forehead and sank back, lifeless, onto the pillows. Why was she so weak?

The men stared at her dispassionately. She tried to make her gaze fierce but began to shake, as helpless before them as a bent old woman. She shook so hard the linens quaked all around her and slipped down, revealing an immodest view of her bosom. She saw she was in her linen shift and it afforded a generous view at the moment. She saw her chest was spattered with blood.

Dr. Butts began putting his bottles back into his bag and spoke to the other man, not to her. “We’ll have to inform the king of this. You know how he detests sickness, especially the sweats. The Boleyn name pollutes everyone it touches. Her attendant, Jane, has fallen too. Send Miss Boleyn away from court, back to her parents at Hever Castle. We’re done with her.”

She watched them leave, without giving her even so much as the dignity of a nod or bothering to adjust the linens so she was not exposed. She tasted something—old blood?—in her mouth. She wished for the crown, thinking how she would use it to crush this man. She had been indifferent to the promise of power until she had someone to hurt. Now she was tasting revenge.

A violent tremor shook her, and warmth moved through her body. She thought she was dying, and it was clean and tasted sweet. She slipped away.



The room was dark when she awoke. Anne did not know how many hours, or days, had passed. Her tongue was thick and dry. Everything within her cried out for a drink. Her very bones were made of sawdust and brimstone; the fever burned through her thoroughly. She groped about in the dark, finding the table next to her bed but no bell upon it.

“Help,” she called, with no energy behind it. No one came.

“Help me!” she called again, but nothing beyond her door stirred. She sank back onto the pillows and fell back into unconsciousness.



When she awoke again, the sun was piercing the curtains, splitting the mattress she was lying upon into light and shadow. Strength was returning to her flesh, though her tongue remained swollen and cracked. It burned as she opened her mouth to call for help, but no noise came out that would bring anyone to her door. Hoisting herself into an upright position, she banged her head against the wall above her bed, wincing from the pain it caused and the halos she saw as the room doubled and spun around her.

The door swung open and her brother cried out when she saw her. “She’s alive!”

Anne sank down as George rushed to her side, touching her forehead and calling for others to come and help. Her father poked his head in the room.

“Fetch wine and some cool rags—hurry!” George commanded him.

Anne did not remember the next few days that passed, only the comforts they brought. She remembered the sweet stinging warmth of the wine flowing over her cracked mouth and tongue, filling her empty belly and making the pain in her joints and head less worrisome. She remembered soft rags dipped in cool water from great bowls of copper, brought to her bedside and laid over her forehead and face. She remembered her first appetite for food, the way the smashed berries, so early in the harvest, tasted on her tongue. She didn’t care that the juice ran down her mouth and stained her shift. All of her bedclothes would be burned anyway.

Her brother slept on the trundle that pulled free from under her bed. He did not mind that this was a duty most often left to women. He loved Anne better than himself, he told everyone, and would trust none to care for her as he would.

Her tongue was healing, but her lips broke their cracks whenever she tried to speak, bringing tears to her eyes. She had not tried to say much, only pointing to what she needed as her brother attended her every day. But there was one name she must speak, one question she had to know. She prayed it was over, and she was home to stay.

“Henry?” Anne asked, her voice like a rusted spit grinding against its stake.

George went back to wetting rags. He laid one on Anne’s head and attempted to cover her face next, but Anne shook it off.

“Henry?” she asked again. She had to know. Perchance God had delivered her while she slept.

“He fled to his estate in Essex the moment he knew you were ill. We sent word when the fever broke. You recovered against all hope, a sign of God’s favour. The king’s heart rejoices with us. They say he has burned with a desire to know of your health, to see you once more.” He sounded flat as he recounted all this, and Anne saw tears in his eyes.