Daughter of York Read online

  ALSO BY ANNE EASTER SMITH

  A Rose for the Crown

  Touchstone

  A Division of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  1230 Avenue of the Americas

  New York, NY 10020

  www.SimonandSchuster.com

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2008 by Anne Easter Smith

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information address Touchstone Subsidiary Rights Department,

  1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020.

  First Touchstone trade paperback edition February 2008

  TOUCHSTONE and colophon are registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  Designed by Mary Austin Speaker

  Manufactured in the United States of America

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  ISBN-13: 978-0-7432-7731-0

  ISBN-10: 0-7432-7731-7

  eISBN: 978-1-4391-4461-9

  With love to my husband, Scott,

  who encourages me every day to dream

  Content

  Acknowledgments

  Part One

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Part Two

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Part Three

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Part Four

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Author’s Note

  Glossary

  Bibliography

  A Touchstone Reading Group Guide

  Acknowledgments

  It is my great pleasure to acknowledge and thank several people for helping me tell Margaret of York’s story. First and foremost, my friend Maryann Long, who agreed to accompany me on my journey to Belgium to follow Margaret’s footsteps. She was Passepartout to my Phileas: carrying the maps, taking hundreds of photographs, acting as a sounding board as I plotted out the novel and saving my life as I blithely stepped off sidewalks onto busy Belgian boulevards thinking I was back in the fifteenth century. We discovered Burgundy together and shared many fascinating excursions. I must also thank my sister, Jill Phillips, who once again hosted me in London while I went to the British Library, the Public Record Office and other venues. Through her friend Jo Cottrell I was able to view the only medieval portion of Greenwich Palace (now the Royal Naval College), which is not generally open to the public. Thanks, too, to Ann Wroe, author of The Perfect Prince (entitled Perkin in UK), whose knowledge of Margaret was invaluable to my research and who gamely photocopied the entire Vander Linden’s Itinéraires de Charles, duc de Bourgogne, Marguerite d’York et Marie de Bourgogne for me. Claire Denenberg, nurse practitioner extraordinaire, helped me with medical aspects of the book.

  I would also like to acknowledge: Professor Marc Boone of the University of Ghent, who graciously gave me a crash course in Burgundian politics in just under two hours in his office; Professor Emeritus Walter Prevenier of the same university, who through an e-mail exchange pointed me in the direction of fifteenth-century buildings in Mechelen; medieval-history consultant Henk’t Jong of Dordrecht, Netherlands; my friend Kiek van Kempen for help with Dutch/Flemish; and Pamela Butler, membership chair of the U.S. branch of the Richard III Society, who kindly lent me Joseph Calmette’s Philip the Good and Charles the Bold for more than a year even before she had read them herself.

  My thanks to erstwhile singing partner and graphic artist Patrick Duniho of Plattsburgh, N.Y., for contributing his creative talent to the chart and map at the front of the book.

  I would be remiss not to thank again my tireless agent, Kirsten Manges, and my overworked and brilliant editor, Trish Todd.

  And finally, to my family for supporting my new career venture, all love and thanks.

  Dramatis Personae

  *Fictional Characters

  ENGLAND

  York family

  see Plantagenet Family Tree

  Lancaster family

  see Plantagenet Family Tree

  Woodville family

  Sir Anthony (later Lord Scales and second Earl Rivers)

  Eliza Scales, his wife

  Elizabeth Grey (later Queen Elizabeth), his eldest sister

  Jacquetta (formerly duchess of Bedford), his mother

  Richard, first Earl Rivers, his father

  Sir Edward, his brother

  John, his brother

  various brothers and sisters

  Neville family

  Cecily, duchess of York (see Genealogy chart)

  Richard, earl of Warwick, her nephew

  Countess Anne, his wife

  Isabel (later duchess of Clarence), Warwick’s daughter (see Genealogy chart)

  Anne (later duchess of Gloucester), her sister (see Genealogy chart)

  George Neville, Warwick’s brother, chancellor of England

  Miscellaneous

  Anne of Caux, the York family nursemaid

  *Jane Percy, Margaret’s attendant

  *Ann Herbert, Margaret’s attendant

  *Beatrice Metcalfe, Margaret’s attendant

  *Fortunata, Margaret’s attendant

  John Harper, soldier and messenger in Edward’s train

  William, Lord Hastings, Edward’s councilor and chamberlain

  John Howard (later Lord Howard and duke of Norfolk), Edward’s councilor

  John Tiptoft, Earl of Worcester, Edward’s councilor

  Jehan Le Sage and Richard L’Amoureux, Edward’s jesters

  Lady Eleanor Butler, one of Edward’s mistresses

  Isobel, countess of Essex, lady-in-waiting to Duchess Cecily

  *Francis, Anthony Woodville’s squire

  *Brother Damian, monk at Reading Abbey

  Dr. Fryse, one of Edward’s physicians

  Señor Martin Berenger, emissary of the court of Aragon

  *Master Vaughan, Margaret’s steward

  Burgundy, (see Plantagenet Family Tree)

  Charles, count of Charolais (later duke of Burgundy), Margaret’s husband

  Duke Philip, his father

  Dowager Duchess Isabella, his mother

  Countess Isabelle, his first wife

  Mary, his daughter

  Antoine, count de la Roche, the Grand Bastard of Burgundy, his stepbrother

  Maximilian, archduke of Austria and heir to the Holy Roman Empire

  Marie de Charny, Charles’s stepsister and Margaret’s chief attendant

  Pierre de Bauffremont, count of Charny, her husband

  Anne of Burgundy (later Lady Ravenstein), Charles’s stepsister

  Adolphe of Cleves, Lord Ravenstein, Margaret’s councilor

  Lord Louis of Gruuthuse, merchant of Bruges and Margaret’s councilor

  Guillaume de la Baume, Lord of Irlain, Margaret’s chevalier d’honneur

  Henriette de Longwy, his wife

  Jeanne de Halewijn, Mary’s chief attendant

  Jehan de Mazilles, young courtier

  Dr. Roelandts, one of Margaret’s physicians

  Olivier de Famars, captain of Margaret’s bo
dyguard under Guillaume de la Baume

  *Hugues, one of Margaret’s bodyguards

  William Caxton, governor of merchant-adventurers at Bruges, later printer

  “Jehan Le Sage,” Margaret’s ward or “secret boy” (real name unknown)

  *Frieda Warbeque, his mother

  Madame de Beaugrand (Azize), Mary of Burgundy’s dwarf

  Chancellor Guillaume Hugonet

  Guy de Brimeu, Lord of Humbercourt

  PART ONE

  A Plantagenet Princess

  1461–1468

  1

  1461

  The Micklegate towered above her, seeming to touch the lowering sky, as she knelt in the mud and stared at the gruesome objects decorating the battlement. Rudely thrust on spikes, several human heads kept watch from the crenellations, wisps of hair stirring in the breeze. A paper crown sat askew on one of the bloodied skulls and drooped over a socket now empty of the owner’s dark gray eye. The flesh on the cheeks had been picked clean by birds, and there was no nose. Yet still Margaret recognized her father. She could not tear her eyes from him even as his lifeless lips began to stretch over his teeth into a hideous smile.

  It was then Margaret screamed.

  “Margaret! Wake up! ’Tis but a dream, my child.” Cecily shook her daughter awake. She watched anxiously as Margaret’s eyes flew open and looked around her with relief.

  “Oh, Mother, dear Mother, I dreamed of Micklegate again! A terrible, ghastly dream. Why does it not go away? I cannot bear to imagine Father and Edmund like that!” Margaret sat up, threw her arms around her mother’s neck and sobbed. “Oh, why did they have to die?”

  Cecily held her daughter close and was silent for a moment. Why, indeed, she thought, fighting back her own tears. It was surely a mistake, a horrible mistake! If only she had stopped them venturing out that fateful New Year’s eve. Christmas was supposed to be sacrosanct no matter how great the hatred between enemies—all retiring to hearths and homes to celebrate the birth of Jesus. The great hall at Sandal Castle had been decorated with boughs of holly and pine, the rafters ringing with the noise of men feasting and drinking. The Christmas fortnight was half spent, and thoughts of death had been put aside for the holy season. Cecily sat close to her beloved husband, Richard, duke of York, and their second son, Edmund, earl of Rutland, aware of the uneasy peace that lay around them, for the enemy army of Lancaster lay not ten miles hence at the royal castle of Pontefract. Then came the knocking at the great oak door and the unexpected entrance of more soldiers—but these were armed, disheveled, bloody. Richard upset a goblet of wine as he rose in alarm.

  “Ambush!” cried the leader of the stragglers. “Trollope ambushed us as we foraged!”

  The duke and seventeen-year-old Edmund called for their arms, and the cry was taken up by the rest of the company: “Aux armes! A York, à York!” Pandemonium broke out as servants ran to fetch weapons and armor, men donned breastplates, helmets and shields and ran out to the castle courtyard.

  “My lord, my dearest lord, this is Christmas!” Cecily cried, taking Richard’s face between her hands. “Surely Somerset would not break a Christmas truce! These men must have come upon a band of brigands, not an army of the king!”

  “Perhaps you are right. Trust me, mon amour, we shall be home again in a little while. Keep faith, Cecily. I must go and avenge my comrades.” Richard bent, kissed her hard on the mouth and grinned. “Just a little while, have no fear!”

  “I beg of you, wait for Edward, my love! We know he is coming with his own army. Wait, for the love of God!” But she spoke to an empty hall. Her husband was gone, impetuously—and arrogantly—believing he could defeat any Lancastrian force. She had broken down and cried.

  The scene faded, and Cecily stifled a sob in her daughter’s blond hair. That had been exactly a month ago, but it seemed to her a lifetime of lone-liness. Richard and Edmund had been killed that day at Wakefield alongside the great Yorkist lord, Richard, earl of Salisbury, who was Cecily’s beloved brother. Two thousand men fell in the York ranks, trapped as they were by a far superior Lancastrian force, which lost a mere two hundred, so the messengers said. In an unwonted act of spite, the Lancastrian victors had taken the heads of the defeated Yorkist leaders and stuck them on the city of York’s Micklegate, adorning Richard’s brow with a paper crown. “See,” they laughed, “he wanted to be king, this duke of York, and now he’s king of his namesake city!”

  “Richard, my Richard, why were you always so hasty—so rash?” Cecily muttered to herself unintelligibly. “If only you had been patient that day—waited for Edward—listened to me—you might be with me still.” Her voice rose, “Oh, my dearest love …”

  Margaret heard her mother’s soft moan and immediately wiped her eyes. The girl was astonished by this uncharacteristic display of emotion from her mother. Cecily came from strong northern stock. Her family were Nevilles—after the royal princes, the most powerful nobles in England. Her father had been earl of Westmoreland, and she was a granddaughter of John of Gaunt on her mother’s side. A noble line indeed—and one used to the vagaries of political fortune and the terrifying consequences of battle.

  “Mother! I am so sorry. How you must be grieving, too! All this time you have allowed me to think … made me wonder …” She hesitated, embarrassed by such an intimate conversation with her usually imperturbable parent. Aloof, proud and stoic were words Margaret had heard whispered behind Cecily’s back, and for the most part she agreed with them. But she had also been witness to Cecily’s deep devotion for her husband and the recipient of a motherly protection as fierce as any lioness’s. Margaret had known, as had her seven siblings, a mother’s love from the day she was born.

  Cecily allowed her tears to fall. “Aye, sweeting. You thought I had a heart of stone. Is that what you would say?” She attempted a wan smile. “Nay! My loss is so great I feel my heart is shattered in so many shards that they pierce my skin here,” she tapped her breast, “and make me want to scream in agony!” And she sobbed again.

  This time, it was Margaret who put her arms around Cecily and soothed her with gentle sounds. How glad she was to see a softer side of her mother. At fifteen, she had already formed her own shell and learned to hide inside to protect herself from hurt, but there were times when she ran into the garden and found a solitary place where she could cry or stamp her foot in anger—emotions that were frowned upon in Cecily’s strict household.

  “Hush, Mother. God has Father and Edmund in his care now. Let us pray together for their souls,” Margaret cajoled, gentling the older woman away. She knew her mother would respond to a call for prayer; Cecily’s piety was well known. The two women knelt by the bed, crossed themselves and intoned the ritual, “In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost …” and then disappeared into silent memories of their lost dear ones.

  Margaret shut her eyes tight, hoping the darkness behind them would erase the grisly dream. When that didn’t work, she forced herself to think of her father as alive and well and dandling her on his knee when she was a child. She knew she was his favorite—the boys told her so constantly. Richard of York had not been a big man, but his body was sinewy and carried not an ounce of fat. He used to allow Margaret to test the solid muscle in his upper arm and try to wrap her hands around it. He’d laugh at her wide eyes and loudly kiss her fair head. All his children except the eldest, Anne, and the youngest, Richard, had inherited their mother’s fair hair. Margaret and Richard, however, had their father’s slate gray eyes. He had worn his thick, dark hair in the old-fashioned short cut—Margaret told him it looked as though his squire had stuck a bowl on his head and simply chopped off the hair that hung below. That would make him throw back his head and neigh with laughter. Margaret loved it when her father laughed. His whole body shook, and he would make little snorting sounds between the laughs. It would make everyone else laugh—even Cecily, who never found life very amusing.

  Remembering his laughter now, Margaret fou
nd herself smiling and thanked the Virgin Mary for giving her a happy memory of her father to replace the nightmare.

  DICKON AND GEORGE were fighting again. Margaret found the antics of her two brothers as tiresome as any elder sister would. She was too grown up now to jump into the fray—something she would have relished a few years ago.

  There were three years between each of them, and nine-year-old Richard—nicknamed Dickon to distinguish him from his father—was the runt of York’s litter. Small for his age, he had been sickly as a little boy but had survived those first five precarious years when so many children died and now was not loath to tackle his bigger brother, George, when the occasion arose. The three siblings were, in fact, firm friends. During these most tumultuous years, they had endured being dragged around the countryside with their parents or left in the care of others while Cecily followed her beloved husband wherever she could on his quest for the crown—very often into danger. The children frequently squabbled like dogs over a scrap, but woe betide anyone else who picked on one of them. The other two would rush to their sibling’s aid and staunchly defend the victim, fists clenched. Cecily and duke Richard encouraged this behavior in their brood.

  “Never forget your blood kin, children,” their father would say. “The most important people in your world are right here in this house—the house of York.”

  Now, whenever someone referred to the proud lineage of her family name, Margaret would hold her head high, puff out her chest and brim with confidence.

  As she idly watched her brothers laughing and tumbling—taller George with his fair hair and good looks and Richard, who was a miniature of their father—she wondered what would become of them. Would they, like Edmund, end up on a pike on top of a city gate? She shuddered.

  And what of Edward, her godlike eldest brother? Where was he this cold February day? She turned to look out of the window and onto the courtyard of Baynard’s Castle, the York family residence in London on the banks of the Thames. Mercifully, Edward—titled the earl of March—had been in Wales gathering forces for his father and not at Wakefield that fateful Christmas season. Margaret knew her mother was worried. Edward should have been marching to London with an army to head off King Henry and Queen Margaret’s force. Whoever owned London owned the kingdom, she said. Fear akin to panic had greeted Cecily in every village when she rode posthaste to London after the loss on New Year’s eve. The people knew Queen Margaret was allowing her troops to loot and pillage the towns and villages as they marched south, intent on making London their own. London merchants shut up their shops in anticipation of her arrival; they had no love for the French woman.