* * *

I fall asleep in his arms like a mermaid diving into dark water but in the night something wakes me. At first I think it may be one of the children, so I struggle awake and slide from under the covers to sit on the side of the bed to listen. But there is no sound in our quiet house, just the creak of a floorboard and the sigh of wind through an open window. The house is at peace, the master is safely home at last. I go into the chamber outside our bedroom and open the window and swing wide the wooden shutter. The summer sky is dark, dark blue, as dark as a silk ribbon, and the moon is on the wax, like a round silver seal, low on the horizon, sinking down. But in the sky, towards the east, is a great light – low over the earth, a blaze of light, shaped like a sabre, pointing to the heart of England, pointing to the Midlands, where I know Margaret is arming her castle and preparing her attack on the Yorks. I gaze up at the comet, yellow in colour, not white and pale like the moon, but golden, a gilt sabre pointed at the heart of my country. There is no doubt in my mind that it foretells war and fighting and that Richard will be in the forefront as ever, and that now I have new men to worry about as well: Elizabeth’s husband, John, and Anthony, my own son, and all the other sons who will be raised in a country at war. For a moment I even think of the young son of the Duke of York that I saw with his mother that day at Westminster: young Edward, a handsome boy; no doubt his father will take him to war and his life will be at risk too. The sabre hangs in the sky above us all, like a sword waiting to fall. I look at it for a long time, and think that this star should be called the widow-maker; and then I close the shutter and go back to my bed to sleep.

KENILWORTH CASTLE, WARWICKSHIRE,

SUMMER 1457

Richard and I join the court at the very heart of Margaret’s lands, in the castle she loves best in England: Kenilworth. As my guard and I ride up, I see to my horror that she has prepared it for a siege, just as the night sky foretold. The guns are mounted and looking over the newly repaired walls. The drawbridge is down for now, bridging the moat, but the chains are oiled and taut, ready to raise it in a moment. The portcullis is glinting at the top of the arch, ready to fall at the moment the command is given, and the number and the smartness of the household show that she has manned a castle here, not staffed a home.

‘She is ready for a war,’ my husband says grimly. ‘Does she think Richard of York would dare to attack the king?’