The Court of the Midnight King: A Dream of Richard III by Freda Warrington

Author:Freda Warrington [Warrington, Freda]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi, azw3
Publisher: Bloodwine Books
Published: 2014-11-20T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twelve. 1483: Anthony

QUEEN ELIZABETH

Ah, he is young; and his minority

Is put unto the trust of Richard Gloucester

A man that loves not me, nor none of you.

Richard III Act I scene 3

Night. A road unrolling into the darkness, on and on. A tunnel of trees, the hard glint of lantern light on stones. Red flashes spitting from the horses’ hooves, and within the forest the steady green eyes of its un-human denizens.

The party rode hard, silent with exhaustion. Raphael was beyond tiredness. He rode near the front with the handful of northern lords who accompanied the Duke of Gloucester: Lovell, Ratcliffe, Rob Percy and Lord Scrope. Behind them came a great comet-tail of horsemen; three hundred gentlemen of the north and their servants, all in mourning black. They’d been riding so long that Raphael’s whole existence was narrowed down to the long, swallowing throat of road and trees, the rumble of a thousand hooves. The men around him seemed spectral. He felt alone.

Richard, leading them, was grave and business-like. The news of King Edward’s death had stunned everyone. It was so unexpected. No one knew how Richard had reacted when the messenger from London first came; Raphael hadn’t seen him weep, but he’d glimpsed a livid fire in his face that appeared to be consuming him from the inside. Within the hour Richard had gathered his friends and commanded them to make ready to ride south.

“News of the king’s death should have reached me days ago,” he’d told them. “No one at court thought to inform me, except Edward’s good friend, William Hastings. He sent an urgent message the moment he realised the queen had neglected to do so. She and her family deliberately withheld the news from me, in plain defiance of Edward’s last wishes.”

Hastings’ letter was full of outrage and warnings. Dying, Edward had named Richard as Protector of the Realm and guardian of the new king until the boy reached the age of majority. Although Anthony Woodville, Earl Rivers, had been young Edward’s guardian all these years, it was traditional for the late king’s brother to act as regent. And Edward, thought Raphael, must have felt the only person he could truly trust was his own brother.

According to the indignant Hastings, the Woodvilles intended to exclude Gloucester from his rightful position. The prospect of him as Protector made them panic. Now they were scrambling to hold onto their power. If they lost the young king to the Duke of Gloucester, they lost everything. So they’d plotted to delay Richard, while they rushed the boy from Ludlow to London and got the crown on his head as quickly as possible. Thereafter, their position would be unassailable. Richard must come to London at once, Hastings insisted, to repudiate these jealous upstarts. The only sure way was to intercept the young king and take him under his own protection before they reached the capital.

Raphael remembered the court rivalries with unease. The Woodvilles were seen as glittering nobodies who’d stuffed themselves into positions of undeserved privilege.

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