WESTMINSTER PALACE, LONDON,
WINTER 1458

The loveday peace lasts only for eight months. I leave court in the summer for my confinement and give birth to anoer baby, a daughter whom we call Katherine, and when she is well and strong and thriving at the breast of the wet nurse, we leave home and stay with my daughter Elizabeth at Groby Hall. She is brought to bed with a child and she has another boy.

‘What a blessing you are to the Greys,’ I say to her as I am leaning over the cradle. ‘Another baby: and a boy.’

‘You would think they would thank me for it,’ she says. ‘John is as dear to me as ever but his mother does nothing but complain.’

I shrug. ‘Perhaps it is time for the two of you to move to one of the other Grey houses,’ I suggest. ‘Perhaps there is not room for two mistresses in Groby Hall.’

‘Perhaps I should come to court,’ Elizabeth says. ‘I could serve Queen Margaret and stay with you.’

I shake my head. ‘It is no pleasant place at the moment,’ I say. ‘Not even for the lady in waiting that you would be. Your father and I have to go back and I dread what I will find.’

I return to a court busy with rumour. The queen requires that the Earl of Warwick takes the almost impossible task of keeping the narrow seas safe for English shipping; but at the same time hands over the fortress of Calais to Edmund Beaufort’s son, the new young Duke of Somerset, an inveterate enemy of all the York lords.

This is to ask a man to do difficult and dangerous work and to give the reward to his rival. Warwick of course refuses. And just as Richard predicted, the queen hopes to entrap him with an accusation of treason. In November she publicly blames him for piracy – using his ships out of Calais – and a parliament packed with her supporters commands him to come to London and stand trial. Proudly he arrives to defend himself and confronts them all, a courageous young man alone before his enemies. Richard comes out of the royal council room to find me waiting outside, and tells me that Warwick shouted down the accusations and claimed in turn that the loveday agreement had been betrayed by the queen herself. ‘He is raging,’ he says. ‘And it’s so heated it could come to blows.’

Just at that moment there is a crash against the council chamber door and at once Richard jumps forwards, drawing his sword, his other arm outstretched to shield me. ‘Jacquetta, go to the queen!’ he shouts.

I am about to turn and run when my way is barred by men in the livery of the Duke of Buckingham, storming down the hall with their swords drawn. ‘Behind you!’ I say quickly to Richard and step back against the wall as the men come towards us. Richard is on guard, sword drawn to defend us, but the men run past us without a glance and I see from the other direction Somerset’s guard are ready, blocking the hall. It is an ambush. The council doors are flung open and Warwick and his men, in tight formation, come out fighting. They have been attacked in the very council chamber and outside the men are waiting to finish them off. Richard steps abruptly back and crushes me against the wall. ‘Stay quiet!’ he commands me.

Warwick, sword like a flail, goes straight at his enemies, stabbing and striking, his men tight behind him. One loses his sword and I see him punch out in rage. One falls and they step over him to hold the defensive box around their commander: clearly they would die for him. The hall is too narrow for a fight, the soldiers jostle one another and then Warwick puts down his bare head, shoutso;À Warwick!’, his battle-cry, and makes a run for it. Moving as one, his men charge at their attackers, they break out and are free, the men of Somerset and Buckingham running after them like hounds after deer, and they are gone. We hear a bellow of rage as the royal guard catches the Buckingham men and holds them, and then the noise of running feet as Warwick gets away.

Richard steps back and pulls me to his side, sheathing his sword. ‘Did I hurt you, love? I am sorry.’

‘No, no . . . ’ I am breathless with shock. ‘What was that? What is happening?’

‘That, I think, was the queen sending the two dukes to finish what their fathers started. The end of the truce. And that, I think, was Warwick drawing his sword in the demesne of a royal palace and getting away to Calais. Betrayal and treason. We’d better go to the queen and see what she knows about this.’

By the time we get to her rooms the privy chamber door is closed and her women are outside in her presence chamber, gossiping furiously. They rush towards us as we come in, but I brush them aside and tap on the door and she calls me and Richard in together. The young Duke of Somerset is there already, whispering to her.

She glances at my shocked face and hurries to me. ‘Jacquetta, were you there? Not hurt?’

‘Your Grace, the Earl of Warwick was attacked in the council chamber itself,’ I say bluntly. ‘By men in the livery of Buckingham and Somerset.’

‘But not by me,’ the twenty-two-year-old duke says, as pert as a child.

‘Your men,’ my husband observes, his tone level. ‘And it is illegal to draw a sword in the royal court.’ He turns to the queen. ‘Your Grace, everyone will think this is ordered by you, and it is most treacherous. It was in the council chamber, in the demesne of the court. You are supposed to be reconciled. You gave your royal word. It is dishonourable. Warwick will complain and he will be right to do so.’

She flushes at that and glances at the duke, who shrugs his shoulders. ‘Warwick doesn’t deserve an honourable death,’ he says pettishly. ‘He did not give my father an honourable death.’

‘Your father died in battle,’ Richard points out. ‘A fair fight. And Warwick has begged and been given your forgiveness, and paid for a chantry in your father’s name. That grievance is over and you have been paid for the loss of your father. This was an attack inside the safety of the court. How will the council do its business if a man risks his life attending? How will any of the York lords dare to come again? How can men of goodwill come to a council which attacks its own members? How can a man of honour serve such a rule?’

‘He got away?’ the queen ignores Richard to ask me, as if this is all that matters.

‘He got away,’ I say.

‘I should think he will get away all the way to Calais and you will have a powerful enemy in a fortified castle off your shores,’ Richard says bitterly. ‘And I can tell you that not one town in a hundred can be defended against attack on the south coast. He could sail up the Thames and bombard the Tower, and now he will think himself fre do so. You have broken his alliance for nothing and put us all in danger.’

‘He was our enemy at any time,’ young Somerset remarks. ‘He was our enemy before this.’

‘He was bound by a truce,’ Richard insists. ‘And by his oath of allegiance to the king. He honoured it. Attacking him in the council chamber releases him from both.’

‘We shall leave London,’ the queen rules.

‘That’s not the solution!’ Richard explodes. ‘You can’t make an enemy like this and think that all you need do is flee. Where will be safe? Tutbury? Kenilworth? Coventry? Do you think to abandon the southern counties of England altogether? Shall Warwick just march in? Is it your plan to give him Sandwich, as you have given him Calais? Shall you give him London?’

‘I shall take my son and go.’ She rounds on him. ‘And I shall raise troops, loyal men, and arm. When Warwick lands he will find my army waiting for him. And this time we will beat him and he will pay for his crime.’