“If Your Majesty had not been so good to his pig, I should have been roasted by now!” George crows.

“Smoked like back bacon!” the king replies. He turns in his chair and narrows his eyes at Stephen Gardiner. “Wherever the hunt for heretics leads you, those that I love are exempt,” he says. “There is a line that I expect you to observe, Gardiner. Don’t forget who my friends are. No friend of mine could be a heretic. To be loved by me is to be inside the church. I am the head of the church: no one can love me and be outside my church.”

Quietly I step forward and rest my hand on my husband’s shoulder. Together we look at the bishop who has arrested my friends, my yeoman of the guard, my preachers, my bookseller, and the brother of my doctor. Stephen Gardiner drops his eyes before our gaze.

“I apologize,” he says. “I apologize for the error.”

* * *

I am triumphant at this public humiliation of Stephen Gardiner, and my ladies rejoice with me. George Blagge is welcomed back to court with the king’s declaration of his love for him, and the king’s declaration of his protection over those who love him. I take it that we are to be reassured by this. The tide that was flowing so strongly in favor of tradition and against reform has gone still, and is now on the turn, as tides ebb and flow, drawn by some invisible power. Perhaps it is the pull of the moon, as the new philosophers suggest. At court, where the tides of power are pulled this way and that by the turn of the expressionless moon face of the king, we know that we reformers are a spring tide once again, flowing strong and high.

“So how can we get Anne Askew released?” I ask Nan and Catherine Brandon. “The king released George Blagge for love of him. Clearly, we are rising high again. How quickly can we set her free?”

“Do you think you are strong enough to act?” Nan queries.

“George’s return shows that the king has gone as far as he wants with the old churchmen. Now we return to favor.” I am certain. “And anyway, we have to take a risk for Anne. She can’t stay in Newgate. It’s at the very heart of disease and the plague. We have to get her out of there.”

“I can send one of my men to see that she is housed well, and well fed,” Catherine says. “We can bribe the guards to let her have some comforts. We can get her into a clean cell and get her books as well as food and warm clothes.”

“Do that,” I nod. “But how can we get her released?”