She closed her eyes and leaned against the wooden shutters. ‘And did you plead for her? Will she be forgiven?’

‘The queen is always merciful,’ I said.

She looked at me with eyes that were filled with tears. ‘I hope so indeed,’ Elizabeth said gravely. ‘For what about me?’

* * *

The next day she could resist no longer. The wagons with her trunks, furniture, and linens had already gone, swaying south down the great north road. The queen’s own litter with cushions and rugs of the warmest wool was standing at the door, four white mules harnessed to it, the muleteer at the ready. At the doorway Elizabeth staggered and seemed to faint but the doctors were at her side and they half-lifted and half-dragged her into the litter and bundled her in. She cried out as if in pain but I thought it was fear that was choking her. She was sick with fear. She knew she was going to her trial for treason, and then death.

We travelled slowly. At every halt the princess delayed, asking for a longer rest, complaining of the jolting pace, unable to put a foot to the ground to step down from the litter, and then unable to climb back in again. Her face, the only part of her exposed to the wintry wind, grew pink from the cold and became more swollen. It was no weather for a journey at all, certainly no weather for an invalid, but the queen’s councillors would not be delayed. With Elizabeth’s own cousin urging them onward, their determination told Elizabeth as clearly as if they had the warrant in their hand that she was destined for death.

No-one would dare to offend the next heir to the throne as they were daring to treat her. No-one would make the next monarch of England climb into a litter on a dark morning and jolt down a rutted frozen road before it was even light. Anyone who treated Elizabeth in this way must know for sure that she would never become queen.

* * *

We were three days into a journey that seemed as if it would last forever as the princess rose later every morning, too pained with her aching joints to face the litter until midday. Whenever we stopped on the road to dine she sat late at the table and was reluctant to get back into the litter. By the time we got to the house where we were spending the night the councillors were swearing at their horses with frustration, and stamping to their chambers, kicking the rushes aside.

‘What do you think to gain from this delay, Princess?’ I asked her one morning when Lord Howard had sent me into her bedchamber for the tenth time to ask when she would be ready to come. ‘The queen is not more likely to forgive you if she is kept waiting.’

She was standing stock-still, while one of her ladies slowly wound a scarf around her throat. ‘I gain another day,’ she said.