I drew back from him. “And you? What do you think?”

“Meg, above any person in this world, I value you. I trust you, I dream of you, I long for you. But there is someone I value still more. And I have become more and more aware, lately, that He is calling me to Himself. To service.”

“You can serve Him whilst administering your father’s lesser properties.”

“I could,” Will said softly, trying to take my hand in his own. “But I don’t feel at leave to do that.”

I moved it away without speaking but I was thinking, Leave from our Lord or leave from your father?

“I know that I am supposed to pursue this,” he finished. “I…. love you, Meg. And I love God too. In fact, I only speak Latin with you and with Him. But I must obey.”

Dolor.

A great sorrow overcame me because I could see the stark truth commingled with sorrow in his beautiful, honest face. He would not hurt me if he could help it, and yet I could not help but feel that he could stop this, and he was choosing not to.

I stood to take my leave, and he, a gentleman, stood as I did. The gardens had grown empty now; several litters from nearby estates took their leave. The lutist played a sweet and winsome tune that twisted and turned through the estate till it found and remained with us.

I could have asked him, And I? What of me? But we had no precontract, nothing declared, nothing finalized. Will stood next to me, looking at the ground, and I loved him to the point of anguish. I had nothing but searing pain and wanted to run away as fast as I could. In spite of it all, my heart broke for him, seeing the grief of the moment writ on his face. Unlike almost anyone else I knew, he put God first, a trait I’d admired when it had cost me nothing.

He impulsively reached over and pulled me close to him, a personal volte dance. His scent, like my favorite spiced wafers, was both faint and intoxicating. He pressed his lips against mine softly at first, and then more powerfully. My flesh failed my will and I kissed him back readily, longingly. My body willed him to move forward though my spirit knew he must stop.

I pulled away—far away. “Don’t ever kiss me like that again until and unless you’re ready to make good on the promise behind it,” I said. I had never been kissed, but I knew that was the kind of kiss that should only be between a man and his wife.

I took to the castle as quickly as I could. Another woman I knew I would not lose to; no other woman could take my place with Will, of that I was as certain as I was that no other man could take his place with me. But God? How could I compete with God? I could not and therefore it was unjust of him to set up such a contest at all.

When I entered the room I saw my brother Edmund and he tipped his head toward me and smiled, if one could call it that.

He knew. And Thomas knew, too, which is why he’d told me earlier I wanted a man I could not have. Thomas had had too much to drink and was slumped in a chair in one far corner.

“Good-bye, Margaret,” Rose Ogilvy called to me as she headed toward her fine litter. No one called me Margaret—it was my mother’s name. They called me Meg to distinguish me from her.

I nodded politely, tears blinding my path, and hurried to Anne’s chamber ere the tears spilled down my cheeks.

I didn’t have to wait long. Anne arrived, dismissed her servants, and closed the door behind her.

“What ails you?” she asked, sitting beside me.

I fell into her arms and she held me as I poured out my story about Cardinal Wolsey and Lord Ogilvy and King Henry—the king who had his eyes and hands on the bride all evening!—talking about holy service.

“And so now Will’s studying for the priesthood of his own accord, and then he’ll take vows,” I said. Anne picked up a brush and began to brush my hair, and I finally calmed.

She began to tell me tales of the French court, and how exciting it was, and what her life was like. I stilled then, listening to her, glad to discuss something new.

After a bit I stood up, and as I did, the daisy fell from my hair.

“What’s this?”

I shook my head and let it fall to the ground. “Nothing important.”

I went to the trunk I had brought with my nightshift and a few personal items for spending the night. I withdrew a small, well-worn book and walked back to Anne.

“I want you to have this—a souvenir to take with you as you return to France.”

She held out her hand and took the book, then opened it and began to read a page here and there. “Meg, not your prayer book, your book of hours. Look here—you’ve added personal prayers and notes.”

“Take it,” I said.

“Surely it must be important to you—or you’d not have brought it tonight.”

She was right. I’d read from or written in or prayed from it every night.

No longer.

“I don’t need it anymore. I have no intention of praying to a God who has put me in the bloody hands of an evil father, who robs my kindhearted mother of her every breath, and who has stolen from me the only man I’ll ever love as well as my hope.”

Anne shook her head. “It’s not like that. You don’t know how this will end. Mayhap you and Will are not done yet.”

I sensed that there were things ahead that I did not yet understand nor could I foresee. I knew that feeling was meant to be comforting.

I did not want this comfort. I pushed the thought, and him, far away, and fast-locked the gate behind them.

“And you’ve written in your beautifully rendered Latin,” she said softly after reading a few pages, knowing that’s how I often spoke with God, and with Will. She tried to hand the book to me.

I firmly pushed the book back into her hands. “I will never speak Latin again.”

FOUR

Year of Our Lord 1522

Blickenham Manor, London, England

My mother had arranged for me to spend the months following the Christmas celebrations with my sister, Alice, at her home in Chelsea. So it was with some surprise that, one evening whilst we dined, a messenger arrived with a letter to my sister from our father. She nodded to the servant to set it aside till the meal was over, but her concern showed in her face. Had my mother passed away? Was my father in some kind of trouble? It was rare for him to have a care for me, so I wouldn’t have suspected that it involved me at all except for the burning feeling deep beneath my corset that warned me, preternaturally, that the tide was about to shift.

My nephew John Rogers was Alice’s oldest son, home from Cambridge; he paid no mind at all to the messenger. Rather he kept talking even whilst the serving girl ladled out his soup. “So Cranmer, of course, began to gather a group of us for late-night debates. He said he had been mightily troubled by the discourse that Luther had started and the longer he dwelled on the matter the more troubled his spirit became. Perhaps, he thought, Luther may be right on some points.”

Because Alice was the daughter of my father’s first wife she was much older than I, which meant that John and I were of an age, more like brother and sister than aunt and nephew. He turned directly toward me.

“A friend of yours was invited to the discussions,” he said to me. “Will Ogilvy. Do you remember him?”