Thank God, thank God who has answered my prayers. This is the way to get me quickly and safely back to my throne in Scotland, back to my son, and with a man at my side who can be trusted by his own ambition and by the power of his family to guard my safety in Scotland and ensure my claims in England. The queen’s own cousin! I shall be married to Elizabeth’s cousin and our sons shall be Stuart children and Tudor kin.

He is a handsome man; his sister Lady Scrope promised me as much when I was with her at Bolton Castle. They said then that the Scots lords who were loyal to me would approach him and ask him if he would take up my cause. They said he would be smuggled into the garden of Bolton Castle so that he could see me. They said that if he saw me he would be certain to fall in love with me and determine at once to be my husband and King of Scotland. Such nonsense, surely! I wore my best gown and walked in the garden every day, my eyes down and my smile thoughtful. At least I do know how to be enchanting; it was my earliest lesson.

He must be a fair man—he was judge at the inquiries and he will have heard every bad thing they said against me, but he has not let it stand in his way. He is a Protestant, of course, but that is only to the good when it comes to dealing with the Scots, and with pressing my claims to inherit England. Best of all, he is used to dealing with a woman who is queen. He was raised as kin to Elizabeth, who was a princess and heir to the throne. He will not bully me like Bothwell, nor envy me like Darnley. He will understand that I am queen and that I need him to be a true husband, an ally, a friend. Perhaps for the first time in my life I will find a man who can love me as a woman and obey me as a queen. Perhaps for the first time I will be married to a man I can trust.

Good God, I could dance for joy! Seated demurely on my chair I can feel my toes tapping in my silk slippers for sheer pleasure. I knew that I would rise from this defeat, I knew that in my end would be my beginning. What I did not expect was that it would come so easily and so sweetly and so soon.

TUTBURY CASTLE: BESS

SPRING, 1569