‘Stand up, Anne,’ she says coolly, and pulls down my shift and my cloak.

The tears are pouring down my face, I can hear myself sobbing like a child.

‘Go to your room and read the Bible,’ she says. ‘Think especially on your royal calling. Caesar’s wife, Anne. Caesar’s wife.’

I have to curtsey to her. The awkward movement causes a wave of new pain and I whimper like a whipped puppy. I go to the door and open it. The wind blows the door from my hand and, in the gust, the inner door to her privy chamber flies open without warning. In the shadow stands my brother, his face strained as if it were him beneath the whip of the birch, his lips pressed tightly together as if to stop himself from calling out. For one awful moment our eyes meet and he looks at me, his face filled with a desperate need. I drop my eyes, I turn from him as if I have not seen him, as if I am blind to him. Whatever he wants of me, I know that I don’t want to hear it. I stumble from the room, my shift sticking to the blood on the backs of my thighs. I am desperate to get away from them both.

KATHERINE, NORFOLK HOUSE, LAMBETH,

NOVEMBER 1539

‘I shall call you wife.’

‘I shall call you husband.’

It is so dark that I cannot see him smile; but I feel the curve of his lips as he kisses me again.

‘I shall buy you a ring and you can wear it on a chain around your neck and keep it hidden.’

‘I shall give you a velvet cap embroidered with pearls.’

He chuckles.

‘For God’s sake be quiet, and let us get some sleep!’ someone says crossly from elsewhere in the dormitory. It is probably Joan Bulmer, missing these very same kisses that I now have on my lips, on my eyelids, on my ears, on my neck, on my breasts, on every part of my body. She will be missing the lover who used to be hers, and now is mine.

‘Shall I go and kiss her goodnight?’ he whispers.

‘Ssshhh,’ I reprove him, and I stop his reply with my own mouth.

We are in the sleepy aftermath of lovemaking, the sheets tangled around us, clothes and linen all bundled together, the scent of his hair, of his body, of his sweat all over me. Francis Dereham is mine as I swore he would be.

‘You know that if we promise to marry before God and I give you a ring, then it is as much a marriage as if we were wed in church?’ he asks earnestly.

I am falling asleep. His hand is caressing my belly, I feel myself stir and sigh and I open my legs to invite his warm touch again.

‘Yes,’ I say, meaning yes to his touch.

He misunderstands me, he is always so earnest. ‘So shall we do it? Shall we marry in secret and always be together, and when I have made my fortune, we can tell everyone, and live together as man and wife?’