My Lady Jane(117)

“The sun is up, and you are still a man,” Jane confirmed.

G closed his eyes, and for the first time in six years, eight months, and twenty-two days, he felt the sunlight on his skin. He breathed in its rays and absorbed its glow, and there rose a peace in his heart, the kind of calm that comes from the feeling of arriving home after a long journey. His curse was broken.

The two lovers embraced, while Edward and your narrators turned their heads to give the lovebirds their moment of blessed union.

“Ahem. Are you quite done?” Edward asked, when lips finally parted long enough for them to take a breath.

“Not quite.” G pressed one last soft kiss to Jane’s poetry-inspiring mouth. “Now we’re ready.”

“Good,” said Edward. “Because there’s still something I have to do.”





TWENTY-EIGHT


Edward

Edward threw open the door and strode into the throne room.

He’d done it. He’d gotten into the Tower, a nigh-impossible feat. He’d fought bravely and well. He’d dispatched the guards, confronted Dudley, even beaten Bash at swords. And now he was about to reclaim his crown. Everything had gone according to Jane’s plan. He was nearly there—he could practically taste his victory.

His first surprise was that the throne room was almost empty. He’d supposed it would be bustling with courtiers and members of the Privy Council there to advise Mary and show the queen their support during the attack on the city wall. But at best there were a dozen people present. Not exactly the boisterous crowd he’d been hoping to witness his glorious return.

Still, the room fell silent when he entered, all eyes turning to him, mouths opening in shock. Because even though he was streaked with sweat and stained with blood and not wearing any shoes, he was undoubtedly King Edward, back from the grave.

This was going to be good.

He turned to the steward stationed next to the door, whom he’d known since he was a young boy. “Announce me, Robert,” Edward commanded.

The man looked like he was seeing a ghost (which he kind of was) but he obeyed without question. “His Majesty Edward Tudor.”

Edward padded toward the throne to stand before Mary.

“You’re sitting in his chair,” piped up Jane from behind him.

Mary fidgeted with her handkerchief. “Oh, Eddie. I’m so glad to see you’re alive. My heart was simply broken when they told me you were dead.”

“How dare you,” Edward said to her, his voice so dark with fury that he didn’t sound like himself. “How dare you steal what is mine. You poisonous bunch-back’d toad!”

“Ooh, that’s a good one.” There was a rustle of paper behind him as Gifford wrote the line down.

His sister’s face paled. “Now, brother—”

“You have the audacity to call me brother after what you’ve done? I should have you drawn and quartered. Or would you prefer to be burned at the stake? Purified—isn’t that what you called it? Isn’t that what you had planned—a great burning of traitors?”

“It was Dudley’s doing,” Mary said softly. “He took your throne because he wanted it for his son. I simply took it back.”

Edward laughed, but it was not a merry sound. “Oh, am I supposed to thank you for keeping my chair warm?”

She stared at him mutely.

“No more lies, sister,” Edward said. “Let us speak plainly now, about what’s to be done.”

This would be the part where she’d beg for her life, he thought, where she’d cry and plead and grovel before him. He wondered if he could ever find it in his heart to forgive her.

Probably not.

But in this he was surprised again, because Mary did not beg. She stood up slowly, her back straight and unyielding before him. Still wearing his crown. “You’re only a foolish boy,” she said at last. “How could you possibly know what to do with this great kingdom?”

“I’ve been ruling this great kingdom for years,” he pointed out.

She scoffed. “You call that ruling? You were a puppet of the council, nothing more. And look what we’ve come to. E?ians running about freely, causing havoc at every turn, savaging the land, defiling our very way of life. You have let this country slide to the edge of ruin. The E?ians are determined to bring us into an age of darkness and perversity, and you are helping them.”

“I am an E?ian,” he said. “Like my father before me. I am my father’s son.”

“And I am my father’s daughter,” Mary replied hotly. “I am his firstborn child, his only true heir. He may have played at marriage with a bunch of E?ian harlots, but my mother was his only legitimate wife. Which makes me, and not you, who are basically a bastard, the rightful ruler of England.”

Huh, thought Edward. He hadn’t been expecting her to argue. His mouth opened, then closed again. He wanted to say, Wait, no, that’s not right at all. I’m the rightful ruler. Mary can’t be. Because she’s a woman.

But that logic didn’t make sense to him anymore. He didn’t believe it.

He couldn’t think of what to say. He was, quite literally, speechless.

At his silence, a triumphant gleam appeared in Mary’s eyes.

“I am the queen,” she said, drawing herself up still further. “All my life I’ve watched you wrest that title from me, you a flagrant heretic, a pathetic, trifling boy. You talk of stealing, but it’s you who are the thief here. You are the usurper.”