‘She has done nothing but follow her conscience,’ I defended her.

‘She must follow her tender heart,’ he said. ‘Her conscience is not a good advisor these days. She must follow her tender heart instead. And you must do your duty to your love for her, and tell her that.’

I rose up from the pew, I found my knees were shaking. ‘I am afraid, Will,’ I said in a small voice. ‘I am too afraid. You saw what she was like when I spoke out before . . . I cannot have her accusing me. I cannot have anyone asking where I came from, who my family is . . .’

He fell silent. ‘Jane Dormer will not speak with her,’ he said. ‘I already tried her. The queen has no other friend but you.’

I paused, I could feel his will and my conscience pressing against my head, forcing me to do the right thing despite my fears. ‘All right. I’ll speak with her,’ I burst out. ‘But I’ll do it alone. I’ll do the best I can.’

He stopped me with a hand on mine, and pulled my hand out to see it. I was trembling, my fingers shook. ‘Child, are you so afraid?’

I looked at him for a moment and I saw that we were both afraid. The queen had made a country where every man and woman was afraid of saying or doing the wrong thing, which would lead to a stake in the market place and a pile of green kindling that would burn smokily and slow.

‘Yes,’ I said honestly, pulling my hand from him to brush a smut off my cheek. ‘I have spent my life running from this fear and now it seems that I have to walk towards it.’

I waited till the queen was going to bed that evening and was kneeling before her prie-dieu in the corner of her bedroom. I knelt beside her but I did not pray. I was going over in my mind what I could say to persuade her not to do this dreadful thing. For a full hour she was on her knees and when I peeped through my half-closed eyelids I could see that her face was turned up to the statue of the crucified Christ and the tears were pouring down her cheeks.

Finally she rose from her knees and went to her chair at the fireside. I drew the poker from the embers where it had been heating, and thrust it into the mug of ale to warm it for her. When I put it in her hands her fingers were icy-cold.

‘Your Grace, I have something to ask you,’ I said very quietly.

She looked at me as if she hardly saw me. ‘What is it, Hannah?’

‘I have never asked you for anything in the years I have been with you,’ I reminded her.

She frowned slightly. ‘No, you haven’t. What is it you want now?’

‘Your Grace, I have heard that your prisons are holding three good men on charges of heresy. Bishop Latimer and Bishop Ridley and Archbishop Cranmer.’