Free Rebellion by Livi Michael

back in the spring with a new army.
     You do see, don’t you,’ she said, turning back to the king with an eager, defiant look,
     ‘that this is our only hope?’
    He could not tell her that
     the only freedom lay in giving up hope. He closed his eyes. Even then he could see how
     much she had suffered, from one defeat after another; all the castles she had conquered
     being retaken by the Yorkists.
    â€˜Yes,’ he said again. None of the other
     councillors contradicted him; it was pointless, in any case, to contradict the queen.
     The next day she set off to Edinburgh to seek an audience with the Scottish queen.
    When she returned, the king could see how
     terrible that audience had been. At first she would say nothing at all, except that she
     had no money; she’d had to borrow a groat from a Scottish archer to pray at the shrine
     of St Margaret – she hoped one of them would be able to pay him back.
    Her face looked haunted; there was an
     expression of baffled pain in her eyes. Queen Mary had said that the Scots could offer
     no more help to the House of Lancaster and its dispossessed king. She would give them a
     little money to return to England, but not enough to go to France. And, worse, she’d
     broken the betrothal between her daughter and Prince Edward. She’d had no choice, she’d
     said. All their foreign allies were turning against her.
    The look in his wife’s face was partly
     disbelief that God could send them so much undeserved misfortune, and injury because she
     never could believe that people could so suddenly change. It was the same look she’d had
     on hearing that the Duke of Somerset had gone over to the Yorkist king. She herself was
     quite incapable of being deflected from the course she was on.
    He wanted to comfort her, to say that he
     understood how terrible the blow to her pride must have been, and to her hope. He wanted
     to hold her, but she shied away from him.
    She would go to St Omer, she said, if she
     had to row herself all the way there. But for the time being they had to leave Scotland
     – they were being evicted, in effect, even from the austere hospitality of the convent.
     They would have to travel south to Bamburgh,where Sir Ralph Percy now
     held the castle for the Yorkists, but she believed that he was still secretly on their
     side.
    And so the next day they set off for
     Bamburgh, with a small party of men, and such food as the convent could supply.
    They could not travel quickly, partly
     because of the king, partly because they needed to avoid being seen. The queen was
     afraid to pass through the great forest again so they had to skirt its edges, taking the
     longer route. And they quickly ran out of food.
    About four miles from the castle they took
     shelter in an empty hut while Pierre de Brézé rode ahead with John Fortescue to give Sir
     Ralph the news of their arrival.
    De Brézé’s squire, Barville, lit a fire for
     them, then left them to keep watch over the other men, who were making a camp outside.
     The king and queen were alone in the hut.
    They were both exhausted, damp from the rain
     and pinched in the face from hunger, for though they were used to fasting and to making
     long journeys on low provisions, this was their second day without food and the king
     felt light-headed, transparent almost, as if the light of God might shine through his
     palms. Steam rose from the queen’s clothing and from her hair. She did not look at him
     directly, and her head shook a little as she turned it aside.
    After a while the silence, or the king’s
     gaze, seemed to press on her, and she stood up and went to the door of the hut to watch
     the men. Fine rain fell around her like a soft curtain. The king hesitated for a few
     moments then got up to join her.
    Now would be the time to explain to her that
     they could give it all up, that she could accompany him on a different path, and neither
     of them