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Chapters (116)
  1. Cover
  2. The Last Tudor
  3. Family Trees
  4. BOOK I
  5. BRADGATE HOUSE, GROBY, LEICESTERSHIRE,
  6. SUFFOLK PLACE, LONDON,
  7. GREENWICH PALACE,
  8. GREENWICH PALACE,
  9. DURHAM HOUSE, LONDON,
  10. SUFFOLK PLACE, LONDON,
  11. THE OLD MANOR, CHELSEA,
  12. SYON HOUSE, ISLEWORTH,
  13. THE TOWER, LONDON,
  14. THE TOWER, LONDON,
  15. THE TOWER, LONDON,
  16. THE TOWER, LONDON,
  17. THE TOWER, LONDON,
  18. THE TOWER, LONDON,
  19. THE TOWER, LONDON,
  20. THE TOWER, LONDON,
  21. THE TOWER, LONDON,
  22. THE TOWER, LONDON,
  23. BOOK II
  24. BAYNARD’S CASTLE, LONDON,
  25. BEAUMANOR, LEICESTERSHIRE,
  26. BEAUMANOR, LEICESTERSHIRE,
  27. HAMPTON COURT PALACE,
  28. OATLANDS PALACE, SURREY,
  29. WHITEHALL PALACE, LONDON,
  30. HANWORTH PALACE, MIDDLESEX,
  31. GREENWICH PALACE,
  32. NONSUCH PALACE, SURREY,
  33. HAMPTON COURT PALACE,
  34. HAMPTON COURT PALACE,
  35. CHARTERHOUSE, SHEEN,
  36. WINDSOR CASTLE,
  37. WHITEHALL PALACE, LONDON,
  38. CHARTERHOUSE, SHEEN,
  39. WHITEHALL PALACE, LONDON,
  40. GREENWICH PALACE,
  41. WINDSOR CASTLE,
  42. WINDSOR CASTLE,
  43. WHITEHALL PALACE, LONDON,
  44. WHITEHALL PALACE, LONDON,
  45. CANNON ROW, LONDON,
  46. WHITEHALL PALACE, LONDON,
  47. WHITEHALL PALACE, LONDON,
  48. WHITEHALL PALACE, LONDON,
  49. GREENWICH PALACE,
  50. ON PROGRESS: THE ROAD TO WANSTEAD,
  51. PIRGO PALACE, ESSEX,
  52. MR. MORE’S HOUSE, HIGH STREET, IPSWICH,
  53. WHITEHALL PALACE, LONDON,
  54. THE LIEUTENANT’S HOUSE, THE TOWER, LONDON,
  55. THE TOWER, LONDON,
  56. THE TOWER, LONDON,
  57. THE TOWER, LONDON,
  58. LAMBETH PALACE, LONDON,
  59. THE TOWER, LONDON,
  60. THE TOWER, LONDON,
  61. THE TOWER, LONDON,
  62. THE TOWER, LONDON,
  63. THE TOWER, LONDON,
  64. THE TOWER, LONDON,
  65. THE TOWER, LONDON,
  66. THE TOWER, LONDON,
  67. THE TOWER, LONDON,
  68. THE TOWER, LONDON,
  69. THE TOWER, LONDON,
  70. THE TOWER, LONDON,
  71. PIRGO PALACE, ESSEX,
  72. BOOK III
  73. WINDSOR CASTLE,
  74. WINDSOR CASTLE,
  75. WINDSOR CASTLE,
  76. GREENWICH PALACE,
  77. WHITEHALL PALACE, LONDON,
  78. WHITEHALL PALACE, LONDON,
  79. WHITEHALL PALACE, LONDON,
  80. WHITEHALL PALACE, LONDON,
  81. WHITEHALL PALACE, LONDON,
  82. WHITEHALL PALACE, LONDON,
  83. WHITEHALL PALACE, LONDON,
  84. WINDSOR CASTLE,
  85. CHEQUERS, BUCKINGHAMSHIRE,
  86. CHEQUERS, BUCKINGHAMSHIRE,
  87. CHEQUERS, BUCKINGHAMSHIRE,
  88. CHEQUERS, BUCKINGHAMSHIRE,
  89. CHEQUERS, BUCKINGHAMSHIRE,
  90. CHEQUERS, BUCKINGHAMSHIRE,
  91. CHEQUERS, BUCKINGHAMSHIRE,
  92. CHEQUERS, BUCKINGHAMSHIRE,
  93. CHEQUERS, BUCKINGHAMSHIRE,
  94. CHEQUERS, BUCKINGHAMSHIRE,
  95. CHEQUERS, BUCKINGHAMSHIRE,
  96. CHEQUERS TO LONDON,
  97. THE MINORIES, LONDON,
  98. GREENWICH PALACE,
  99. GREENWICH PALACE,
  100. GREENWICH PALACE,
  101. THE MINORIES, LONDON,
  102. GRIMSTHORPE CASTLE, LINCOLNSHIRE,
  103. GRIMSTHORPE CASTLE, LINCOLNSHIRE,
  104. GRIMSTHORPE CASTLE, LINCOLNSHIRE,
  105. GRIMSTHORPE CASTLE, LINCOLNSHIRE,
  106. GRESHAM HOUSE, BISHOPSGATE, LONDON,
  107. GRESHAM HOUSE, BISHOPSGATE, LONDON,
  108. GRESHAM HOUSE, BISHOPSGATE, LONDON,
  109. GRESHAM HOUSE, BISHOPSGATE, LONDON,
  110. GRESHAM HOUSE, BISHOPSGATE, LONDON,
  111. GRESHAM HOUSE, BISHOPSGATE, LONDON,
  112. GRESHAM HOUSE, BISHOPSGATE, LONDON,
  113. OSTERLEY PARK, MIDDLESEX,
  114. ST. BOTOLPH’S-WITHOUT-ALDGATE, LONDON,
  115. AUTHOR’S NOTE
  116. BIBLIOGRAPHY

We are seated together in my room, enfolded in the shabby chair that once served as Jane’s throne. We are both half-undressed, warm from the bed, wrapped in a rug before the fire, sated with kissing and touching.

“I have to say that I’ve been in worse places.” He gathers me closely to him.

“I would spend every evening of my life with you like this,” I say, “but not under lock and key. Elizabeth has freed Margaret Douglas and her husband, the Earl of Lennox. Why not us?”

“They’re not freed,” he corrects me. “He’s been released to live with her, but they’re still under arrest. Elizabeth had to let him go to his wife because he cannot bear imprisonment.”

“I cannot bear imprisonment!” I exclaim. “Perhaps she will let us go to live under house arrest. We could ask for it, if they will not agree to free us completely. I could have my baby under your roof at Hanworth.”

“When we are freed, I will never come back here again. Only once a year to lay a flower on the tombs of our family,” Ned promises.

“Not even for my coronation? It is the tradition.”

“We will make a new tradition,” he says. “I am not having my son inside these walls again.” Gently, he touches my rounded belly. “Neither of them.”

“I like Windsor Castle best,” I say sleepily.

“Hampton Court,” Ned rules. “And perhaps we shall build a new castle.”

“A new palace,” I correct him. “We won’t need a castle. The country will be at peace. We can build beautiful palaces and houses and live as a royal family among our people.”

“A godly peace at last,” he says.

“Amen.” I pause for a moment, thinking of a new beautiful palace that we might call Seymour Court. “It will happen, won’t it?” I ask. “For we have had so many hopes and so much trouble.”

He considers. “Really, I think this time that it has to. She truly has no other credible heir, and this time she has gone too far even for her friends and advisors.”

THE TOWER, LONDON,

WINTER 1562

Ned and I have a prisoners’ Christmas with gifts brought in from the city, and green boughs from the governor’s garden. We eat like princes. The people of London leave presents at the gateway of the Tower every day: food and little fairings. I am so touched that they send gifts for Teddy. A London silversmith sends him a spoon with our family crest of angel wings engraved on the handle; a toymaker sends him a wooden hobbyhorse. He is most excited by this, though he does not yet have the skill to walk with it held between his legs. Instead, he pushes it before him wherever he goes and commands me to say “Gee up.” All he can say is “Hee!” and his father complains that his first words should be “À Seymour!”