Read The Virgin Queen's Daughter - Ella March Chase for Free Online Page B

smiled. “Then we must be quite sure she never knows.”

Chapter Three
    May 1561
    C ALVERLEY M ANOR
    I T WAS NOT UNTIL SEVEN YEARS LATER THAT I LEARNED the bitter lesson my princess mastered the moment her mother became a Tower ghost. That life is like the Thames in winter: At any instant the ice beneath your feet can shatter, plunge you into a torrent that sucks you under. Once you realize that hard truth you can never return to blissful ignorance. You spend the rest of your life waiting for the ice to give way.
    As the weeklong celebration of my twelfth birthday approached, my father kept the estate buzzing with his promise of a diversion more spectacular than any Calverley had seen. I chafed with curiosity, attempting to spy upon him, uncover the surprise, but he was far too wise for my trickery. He gave me a book sent by his friend Roger Ascham, my own princess Elizabeth’s tutor, knowing I would not be able to resist it.
    Curiosity pricked me, sharp as the needles Mother used as she and Eppie tormented me with the fitting of new gowns. “Put the book down, Elinor, or we will never get the length of these skirts right,” Mother grumbled, taking pins from between her lips. “Do you wish to appear before the Barton children with your hem halfway to your knees?”
    “I do not wish to appear before the Bartons at all! They talk of nothing save jewels and gowns and who they will marry one day.”
    “It is important to consider who you will marry. The future course of a woman’s life will depend upon the choice her parents make.”
    “Your parents did not choose for you. Father told me.”
    Mother’s brow rose in mild displeasure. “My parents were surprised, true. But your father was a suitable choice in every way. He was Baron of Calverley, had wealth enough and ancestors stretching back to Agincourt. He was already known as one of the foremost scholars in Lincolnshire.”
    “I doubt Clarissa Barton has ever opened a book! Last time she was here, she frightened Moll so with tales of witches that Moll bought a charm from some Gypsy woman and smelled of spoilt fish for days!” Eppie had brought Moll from one of Calverley’s outlying farms after seeing the girl’s skill with a needle. From the moment of her arrival at the manor, Moll had been so gullible; few of the other servants could resist toying with her. Mother frowned. “Is what Nell says true, Moll?”
    Moll ducked her head. Though she was a few years older than I, she was not yet used to the force of Mother’s disapproving glance. “It was tales of that witch Nan Bullen Mistress Clarissa was tellin’, an’ then Jem chimed in, an’ all I could see was the witch queen’s corpse wanderin’ about with her head tucked under her arm.”
    “You can be sure I will scold Jem over scaring you thus.” Suddenly Mother stiffened, remembering some task. “I will return in a minute. Moll, mind that hem you’re stitching,” she called as she hastened out of the room. “If you aren’t careful the edging will end up wriggly as a snake.”
    “Maybe the witch queen will turn it into a snake!” I snickered. “Surely any self-respecting witch could do such magic. If Anne Boleyn was really a witch, why didn’t she fly away? Or do a spell to grow another head, just like she grew a sixth finger on her hand? By the devil’s magic?”
    I could see Moll shiver. “Nay, Mistress Nell! Do not make fun on it. Old Lucifer will snatch you up.”
    “If he did I would ask him to make a brain sprout in your head! I vow, you believe the stupidest things!”
    “Nell, what is this about?” I heard Father’s voice from the doorway. He strode into the chamber, a smudge of black powder on his cheek.
    Glad to have an ally in logic, I appealed to him. “Moll is claiming Anne Boleyn was a witch. But near as I can tell, Queen Anne got her head cut off for no reason at all.”
    “She was condemned of witchcraft!” Moll insisted. “ ’Twas all written down, was it not, Lord