The wall between the two glowing doorways is to be ornate, like a jewel box, with a ceiling of red roses and four golden pillars, a fitting background to this family that own everything. On the right will be Elizabeth, on the left will be Mary, and center stage, also in deep Lancaster red, will be the prince, darling Edward, standing beside his father the king, seated square on his throne, and me beside him. The picture will be copied and engraved and will spread through the kingdom, through Christendom. It will proclaim the triumph of Tudor ambition. Here is Henry, broad and handsome, strong and virile, with his son, a healthy boy, growing into manhood beside him, me his wife still in her fertile years seated at his side, his two beautiful daughters adjacent to us, and the people of England—a pair of Fools—looking in at our glory.

“She looks well,” Henry says quietly behind me, glancing approvingly at Princess Mary.

“She suffers very badly from pain in her belly, but I think she is improving,” I say. “I think she is better all the time. I make sure that her diet is regular and that she takes exercise and rest by turns.”

He nods. “Perhaps she should be married,” he says, as if the idea has just occurred to him.

I shoot him a small, sideways smile. “My lord husband,” I say teasingly, “who do you have in mind? For I know, as well as I know you, that you will have someone in mind for her. And probably an ambassador is already speaking of it in some great court.”

He takes my hand and draws me away from the artist and from Princess Mary, whose dark eyes follow us as if she would know what her father is planning for her.

“I fear she won’t like it at first, but with France against us, and Spain such an unreliable ally, with the enmity of the pope, I was thinking of a new alliance—perhaps Germany, perhaps Denmark or Sweden.”

“She would have to be free to practice her faith. Aren’t they Lutheran?”

“She would have to obey her husband,” he corrects me.