Free Nell by Jeanette Baker

“Thank you for coming.”
    Frankie reached out to tug on a sausage-shaped curl. “It was my pleasure, lass.”

Five
    Whitehall Palace, London, 1537
    Henry Tudor rubbed his aching leg. The pain was sharp, piercing. Spirits brought relief, but it was only temporary, and he hated the groggy feeling that dulled his senses and brought the pounding to his head. Everything was more difficult since Wolsey had acquired principles. For years, the cardinal had padded his coffers with gold from the royal treasury, mounted mistresses, bestowed land and favors on his bastards, only to refuse, stubbornly, to renounce his Catholicism. His reward was the executioner’s blade. The good cardinal fought until the end, but he was no match for a Tudor.
    Light from the casement window illuminated the room and the sinister figure of Henry’s chief secretary. Thomas Cromwell pored over the rolls of parchment on the massive desk. Despite the pain in his leg, Henry managed a smirk. Cromwell was invaluable to him. Hated by gentry and common folk alike, with his sly rat’s face, he was the current scapegoat for Henry’s often ill-received strategies. The burning monasteries, the boarded-up churches, and the Geraldine executions could be laid directly at the feet of the priest-hater, Thomas Cromwell.
    Henry felt a slight twinge of remorse when he remembered the earl of Kildare’s response to the charge against him. “I am your cousin, Henry. We are Celts. We share the same blood. Never will you find a house more loyal than the House of Kildare.” But the blood they shared was Plantagenet blood. Geraldine and Plantagenet, a dangerous combination when the Tudor succession was still not established.
    Again, he rubbed his leg. The child that Jane Seymour carried in her belly would be his last. Henry could feel the ardor of his youth growing dimmer, replaced by pain and an ulcerated wound that refused to heal. It was a miracle that he had gotten Jane with child. She was young and fertile but very small. Daily he prayed that the child would be born alive. This time, it must be a boy. If not—
    Henry refused to consider such a possibility. England could not be ruled by a woman. Tudor enemies surrounded her. Catholic Spain to the south. Catholic France to the east. Catholic Ireland and Scotland to the north. Without a king on her throne, England would succumb to the papist scourge. He clenched his fists and shouted even though his secretary was only feet away. “Cromwell, bring me the boy. Bring the last of the Geraldines. My heir will not be safe until every Fitzgerald is dead.”
    Thomas Cromwell crossed the room and knelt at the king’s feet. Not by the slightest flicker of an expression did he reveal that such an order had been sent out the day before and was at this moment being executed. “It shall be done, Your Grace. Robert Montgomery was ever your faithful servant. Shall I give him your message?”
    Robert Montgomery. Henry concentrated. Robert Montgomery. Robert— Then it came to him. The Welshman. “Yes. Send Robert to Ireland. He will find the boy.”
    Cromwell backed away toward the door. “It is already done, Your Grace.”
    Donore Castle
    Nell wrung out the linen cloth and wiped her brother’s feverish brow. His face was marked by the oozing boils of the dreaded pox, and his fever burned dangerously high. Fearing for their lives, the physician had left Donore Castle the day before with the gallawglass and the last of the servants. He had warned Nell that the fever would rise before it fell. The boy’s tenuous hold on life would grow slim. Nell brushed away tears as she bathed the face of the only member of her family still living. There was Margaret, of course. But since her marriage to the earl of Ormond, Margaret had ceased to be a Fitzgerald.
    â€œPlease, Gerald,” Nell pleaded. “Don’t die.” Her eyes blurred, and she lowered her head