In the Shadow of Lions: A Novel of Anne Boleyn (Chronicles of the Scribe #1)(34)

Henry removed his hand and grunted. “Enemies. Thomas More wants to burn them. Wolsey asks for mercy. Says they may yet repent.”

Anne felt fear. Her name was on that list. “But Henry, why would Wolsey have mercy on your enemies?”

“He is a merciful man.”

“He is going to be Pope, is he not? Do you trust him?”

“Do not speak of him like this. Wolsey is not stupid, and he is not a traitor.”

“It may not be treason. It may be faith. He has not worked with all haste to secure your annulment.”

“This pertains to the Hutchins book, not my annulment.”

“Hutchins pertains to you, Henry. He offers the people a new path to God, one that has not so much need for the Church. The realm will be in an uproar. Their faith will be shaken, their king will be held in disdain, and Wolsey will be Pope in another land, another land that stands ready to invade. Maybe More will burn these people; it can only work in Wolsey’s favour. He will be the kind saviour.”

“Wolsey banned these books,” Henry corrected her, “because of a violent uprising in Germany, attacks on the princes and nobility. This man Hutchins incites fury against establishment. I will not tolerate this book in my realm, and I’ve no more patience for the matter.”

He pulled her up and she turned into his arms.

“The Spanish, the French, and the Pope,” he said, “all these want one thing: power. As long as I am without an heir, I am weak. Without a queen in my bed, Anne, I do not think I will have much luck producing one.”

“I do not want to refuse you, Henry, and harp like a shrew night after night.”

“Do not make me wait. I have no marriage in the eyes of God.”

“Neither do I.”

He released her and pushed her away.

Anne reached for his arm, to put her hand upon it and so soften her words, but Henry jerked his arm away and would not look at her.

“The law serves the king,” he retorted. “I suggest you adopt the same attitude. I will speed this matter to its conclusion, but I will not take a shrew for a wife.”

“Henry,” Anne began.

But Henry yelled, “Back to your chambers! You’ll wait for me in the city, where the heat and stench will remind you to cherish the respites I offer.”

He turned his back. Anne did not know how to make a dignified exit, being swept from under his feet like a kitchen dog. She picked up her skirts and walked back to her room, her tears glistening as they fell to her bodice, a thousand tiny stars falling on this dark night.



In her chambers, her tears still fell. She berated herself for not understanding the king better, for provoking him, though she had tried to do what was right. There was only one other woman who could offer her counsel, and this was the very woman Anne was destroying. Catherine had survived years under Henry’s thumb. Anne doubted she could survive a week without ruin.

She yearned for his softer words and lifted the lid of her trunk to fish out his letters, kept safe at the bottom, where no one dared disturb her private treasures.

They were gone. A stab of panic made her cry out, and she began removing the items one by one, setting them on the enormous bed, until the trunk was empty and there were indeed no letters.

She had committed treason in those letters, asking for the crown when another woman, very much alive, still wore it. Anne was sweating, a cold sweat that stung her brow. She shivered, wrapping her arms around herself, pressing in hard on her roiling stomach to calm it. Those lovely white papers bared at this moment before some enemy—they were no less than her neck. Is this what Hutchins must fear? Were they all doomed by ink and presses?

Anne shook herself awake from these terrors. She had to think. Who had access to her trunk, and who would want her in such a vulnerable state? It was either Wolsey or Henry, she decided. Henry could blackmail her to get her into his bed, and the law would still be on his side. Wolsey might not have known what he was looking for in her chambers, but if he was the thief, he had found the papers that would cause such outrage against her that Henry would have no choice but to dismiss her from court and remain with Catherine. Wolsey’s life, and his fortune, would be secure if there were no troubles with Catherine and the Pope.

Either man could be the thief. Both could be her adversary.

She paced in little turns, trying to find a spot that would stop her stomach from flipping and twisting. She accidentally knocked the book to the floor, and as she bent to retrieve it, her eyes fell upon the same words. But this time, the words were balm, and she pressed the book against her stomach, cradling it, murmuring the words again to herself. The words, spoken into thin air, did not disappear but lingered, settling in around her chamber, steadying her nerves as a friend might who sits with you on a night of fevers and dreams.

“I am surrounded by invisible witnesses,” Anne murmured.

A tapestry against the wall fluttered.





Chapter Fourteen

The crowds made progress through London tedious. The shop on Honey Lane was not so far that Rose and Margaret were compelled to travel by barge but had instead taken the litter drawn by two great mares. The horses, in their snorting, belligerent impatience, strained to make quick work of the journey, but the slow-footed, dim-witted commoners impeded them at every turn. That is how they looked to Rose, at least—throngs of oily stained people who lacked the wits to let the quick-moving nobility pass. Once Rose had resented these litters darting through London’s streets, making hazards for children and the infirm. But it was clear that bearing down on the people produced no ill effect, nor did it encourage them to move. Rose and Margaret were stuck, forced to submit at points to the indifferent will of the people.