Read Tudor Princess, The Online
Authors: Darcey Bonnette
Tudor Princess, The (44 page)
‘Now that you have nothing to fight against,’ Harry supplied.
I seized my cup of wine and raised it to Harry. ‘I am going to appease all of you worriers,’ I told him. ‘I am going to rest.’
We clanked our cups and laughed.
All at last was right. Jamie was married to a sturdy, lusty woman who would be my friend and give me legitimate grandchildren and heirs to the realm. England and Scotland were enjoying as much peace as they could. Harry and I achieved some sort of friendship, and I had, as Harry pointed out, nothing to fight against or for.
At last.
I turned my eyes to Jamie. For a moment it was not my son any more but his father dancing in his place. The woman beside him was not Marie de Guise but I, tossing my long red locks about as I showed off before the court. I shook my head, squinting, and in our place stood the children once more. It was beginning again, another dynasty, another life of heartaches and triumphs that they would share and I would only observe. I was content to observe.
‘You know, Harry, I have been thinking,’ I said then, more to myself than to him. ‘All my life I have been searching for my place, as either Tudor or Douglas or Stewart. But I was never any of those women. This is who I am.’
‘What do you mean, Margaret?’ Harry asked with an indulgent smile.
I reached up, fingering the crown on my head. At once it was weighty with meaning. I thought of my father in my fevered dream where he presented me with a fiery crown stating,
This is who you are
. How then I did not want it but could never seem to escape it.
‘It suits you more than any wedding ring ever could,’ Harry told me, noting the gesture. ‘You are every inch a queen.’
How often had I been told that? How often did I not believe it? Yet it was my place. It was indeed who I was born to be, who I now accepted myself as being. A woman too much for any common man, a woman who at times was too much and not enough for a king. A woman whose search for a constant in life always led her back to herself.
‘I am, Harry,’ I admitted, my tone rich with contentment. ‘I am every inch a queen.’
I was, and ever had been, Margaret R.
And it was, for once, enough.
Though I utilised all of the research as was at my disposal at the time, this, as with all of my works to date, is a dramatic interpretation meant to entertain. It is not intended to be consulted for scholarship. For a deeper study of the historical, military, and political events surrounding Margaret Tudor’s life, please look to the ‘Further Reading’ section I have provided as a starting point.
Robert Barton did bring two ‘Moorish lasses’ to the court of James IV in the early part of the first decade of the sixteenth century. It is true that Margaret Tudor enjoyed choosing gowns to accentuate the beauty of ‘Black Ellen.’ The fates of the dark ladies, whose origins were likely in Guinea, remain unknown. They faded off the records of the Scottish treasurer in the 1520s.
Robert Barton remained an integral member of the government of James V till his death in 1540.
Margaret Tudor did claim to have had dreams prophesying the death of James IV. She spent her last years in relative peace with Harry Stewart and was active at the court of James V at the indulgence of her very patient daughter-in-law. She proved a great comfort to James V and Marie de Guise during the mourning of their two infant princes. Margaret died at Methven Castle in 1541 of a stroke, missing the birth of the princess who would become the ill-fated Mary, Queen of Scots, a woman whose life would parallel her grandmother’s in many ways.
Margaret left her possessions to her daughter, the neglected Margaret Douglas, but her wishes were never carried through and her humble estate reverted to the Crown. Her last words were an appeal to be remembered to the Earl of Angus, whom she believed she had wronged. Harry Stewart went on to marry his Janet, and the Earl of Angus wed Margaret Maxwell. Margaret Douglas married the Earl of Lennox and remained involved in court intrigue for the whole of her life. Her imprisonment in the Towerof London in 1536, where her first love, Lord Thomas Howard, ultimately perished, would not be her last.
James V died in 1542, a year after his mother. He remained haunted by the execution of Janet Douglas, Lady Glamis, for the rest of his days.
Despite a turbulent life that some have regarded as an embarrassing sequence of bad judgments, Margaret Tudor had the last laugh, albeit posthumously, when the union between her grandchildren fulfilled her father’s long-ago prophecy. Her grandson by Mary, Queen of Scots, and Henry, Lord Darnley, son of her daughter, Margaret Douglas, became not only James VI of Scotland but also James I of England when he inherited the throne from his cousin Elizabeth I.
England and Scotland became one kingdom at last.
Chapman, Hester W.,
The Thistle and the Rose
:
The Sisters of Henry VIII
(New York: Coward, McCann & Geoghegan, 1971).
Dawson, Jane E. A.,
Scotland Re-formed, 1488–1587
(Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2007).
Harvey, Nancy Lenz,
The Rose and the Thorn
:
The Lives of Mary & Margaret Tudor
(New York: Macmillan, 1975).
Mackie, R. L.,
King James IV of Scotland: A Brief Survey of His Life and Times
(Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1976).
Moffat, Alistair.,
The Reivers
:
The Story of the Border Reivers
(Edinburgh: Birlinn, 2008).
Perry, Maria,
The Sisters of Henry VIII
:
The Tumultuous Lives of Mar
garet of Scotland and Mary of France (Cambridge: Da Capo Press,
2000).
Thomas, Andrea,
Princelie Majestie
:
The Court of James V of Scotland 1528–154
2 (Edinburgh: John Donald Publishers Ltd, 2005).
A READING GROUP GUIDE
THE TUDOR PRINCESS
DARCEY BONNETTE
About This Guide
The suggested questions are included to enhance your group’s reading of Darcey Bonnette’s
The Tudor Princess
.
- Margaret Tudor learned early that she was destined to be Queen of Scots. How did the knowledge of the daunting responsibility before her affect her?
- Describe Margaret’s relationship with her family and siblings as children. Whom was she closest to? Why or why not?
- Did Margaret love James IV? Did he love her? Was he a good husband, in the context of the times?
- How did the deaths of her children affect Margaret?
- Margaret loses James IV as a young woman while with child. How did this tragic circumstance affect her? How did it factor into her marriage to the Earl of Angus?
- Describe the relationship between Margaret and Angus. Was there any love there?
- At one point, Margaret is forced to flee Scotland and leave her children behind. Was this the best option? Did she have any other alternatives?
- Was Margaret a capable regent? Why or why not?
- Did the Duke of Albany do right by the royal children?
- Describe Margaret’s feelings toward her sister-in-law Catherine of Aragon. Why did Margaret resent her? Is it understandable? Why or why not? Were these feelings ever resolved?
- Throughout the novel, we see Margaret go through a series of changes regarding her emotions toward Angus. How did she ultimately feel toward him? Why?
- Margaret often finds herself playing both sides while trying to secure James V’s throne, between that of Scotland and that of her brother, Henry VIII. Why did she do this? Whose side was she on ultimately?
- Describe Margaret’s relationship with Harry Stewart. Compare and contrast it to her previous relationships with James IV, Angus, and the Duke of Albany. Who was the love of her life?
- What was the turning point or points that contributed to the deterioration of Margaret’s marriage to Harry? Was this inevitable?
- Compare and contrast Margaret’s relationships with her daughter, Margaret, and son, Jamie (James V). Was she a good mother? Why was it difficult for her to resist meddling in the rule of James V when he came to power, yet (seemingly) easy to let go of her daughter, Margaret Douglas?
- Describe Margaret’s relationship with Henry VIII as adults. Did Henry do right by his sister?
- Margaret was told by several that to be a queen and to have true love was next to impossible. In the context of her time, was this true? Is it true of people in power now?
- Margaret acted often out of impulse, necessity, and at times seemed impervious to the needs of others. In regards to her regency, marriages, and children, did she make the right choices? What could she have done differently? Did she fulfil what she viewed as her purpose in life?
As always, I must first thank my wonderful agent, Elizabeth Pomada, who has worked so hard to help keep making my dreams of living as a working writer come true. I must also thank my editor, John Scognamiglio, for his patience, encouragement, and his ability to meet challenges with tireless grace, along with Paula Reedy and the rest of the magnificent team at Kensington Publishing. A big thanks to Vida Engstrand, my publicist, who is such a joy to work with. I also want to thank the team at the National Archives of Scotland in Edinburgh for their devoted correspondence as I researched this novel. To the authors who became mentors, the bloggers and reviewers who became huge sources of support (you all know who you are!), and the readers who keep me working, my deepest, most heartfelt thanks. I must thank my favourite beta reader, my mother, Cindy Bogdan, who was always up for a late-night phone call as I read her my latest scenes. Not least of all, I must thank my son Quinn for sharing his life and mother with so many historical figures. He knows far more about the Tudors and Stewarts than any twelve-year-old should! To my stepchildren Kristina, Ashley, and Cody (all lucky enough to have grown up and left home, thus avoiding the day-to-day travails of the latest historical obsession), thank you for supporting, respecting, and understanding my work; it means a great deal. And finally, thank you to the love of my life, my best friend, biggest encourager, and shameless promoter: my husband, Kim. I love you, my forever Chief and anchor.
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