“She’s only nineteen!” I say as if that means she cannot die. I should know better: my own sister died at the age of sixteen and our cousin the king at fifteen—sick like Janey.

Mrs. Thrift and I look at each other blankly, as if neither of us can believe she is gone.

“What am I going to do without her?” I say, and my voice is as plaintive as a lost child. “How am I ever going to face all this without her?”

She looks alarmed. “Face what, my lady?”

I lean my forehead against the wooden carved door as if my need for her will bring Janey back to me. I have lost my sister, I have lost my father, I have lost my mother and now my best friend. “Nothing,” I whisper. “Nothing.”

* * *

Ned is heartbroken at the loss of his sister. She was his greatest counselor and his most enthusiastic admirer. She was the first audience for his poems; she used to read them to him and suggest changes. She told him that I was in love with him before I told her myself. She was his friend and confidante, as she was mine.

“She found the minister!” he says.

“She made me brave,” I say.

“She showed us that love is dauntless,” he agrees. “Dauntless.”

“I don’t know what I will do without her,” I say, thinking of this court, which is so filled with enemies and half friends and pretend friends; with Elizabeth, the great pretender, at the head of it all, turning her two-faced face this way and that.

“William Cecil says he thinks I should go to France,” Ned remarks. “To attend the new king’s coronation. It’s a great honor for me, but I don’t want to go now.”

“Don’t leave me!” I say instantly. “My love, you can’t leave me! I can’t be here without either of you.”

“Janey said I should go,” he says. “She said that Cecil’s favor is as good as a pension. His friendship will help us, Katherine. He will tell the queen of our marriage.”

“Yes, I suppose so,” I agree uncertainly. “But I can’t think of this now. I can’t think like a courtier, with Janey just gone!”

“I shall have to make arrangements for her funeral,” Ned says sadly. “I’ve sent a message to my mother and I’ll speak again to my brother. And I’ll tell William Cecil that I will go if I can; I’ll tell him I’m not sure now.”

“I’ll come to the funeral,” I decide. “Everyone knows that I loved her like a sister.”

“You were her sister,” Ned says. “In every way. And you are her sister by marriage. She was so happy about that.”

* * *