The Other Henry VIII

The Curtain Rises

As though orchestrated by God himself, Edmund and Clara entered the Queen's apartments to find none other than the Duchess of Suffolk sitting by the fire with a half-embroidered purse in her lap. A kind of eerie stillness filled the chamber. Every step they took felt like a trespass, a violation of that untouched tranquillity. Edmund reminded himself of the early hour; in their haste, he had almost forgotten that most of court lay abed in blissful ignorance. This was nothing but the calm before the storm.

Verity did not stir. Perhaps she knew their purpose — sensed it in the deliberating reluctance of their footfall with her guilt-sharpened mind — and did not want to expedite what would soon tear her life apart. Looking at her now, one could not imagine that this was a woman who poisoned a child two nights ago. Porcelain skin, flushed at the apples of her cheeks. Narrow pink lips. Smooth brows, furrowed in concentration. A grand velvet gown that wore her. The same snowy-blonde hair with which she had been born. Of course it had been easy to believe that snide, calculating Marianne could be a murderer — for was it not always the godless  temptress and never the plain, pious, unassuming Duchess? Was it not always the sinner and never the saint?

But Edmund knew their theory was correct. Months, perhaps years, of doubts and questions and conjectures were slowly slotting into place. He remembered greeting her on court progress, how uneasy and absent-minded she had seemed, and wondered how long this scheme had been in the making. Like all other courtiers beneath this roof but Clara, he had skirted over her without second thought. He ought to have known better, he knew Verity, he should have seen it long ago, but... she was Verity. And try as he might, Edmund could not look at her without seeing his boyhood playmate. That scrawny bright-eyed girl with short skirts and raggedy plaits flying out behind her. What had corrupted her? he wondered. What mutated sweet young children into twisted, vengeful adults? Or perhaps she had been this way for a while. Perhaps he had never really known her at all.

"I could not sleep," she murmured softly, answering the question she knew they would ask.
"How is Her Majesty?" said Clara.
"Greatly recovered. She is conscious and sitting up in bed if you should like to visit."
Unable to restrain himself any longer, Edmund spat back, "Why should you care?".
The Princess shot him a chiding glance, but even she could not quell the rage which was simmering inside him. At long last Verity looked up, and one could see the terror in her soft expression; but beyond that... there was a shadow of something else. Gazing out at them from behind the mask of a duchess grieving for her cousin were the steely eyes of a guilty conscience. "Because she is my dearest friend."

Edmund's knuckles blanched as he gripped the back of the chair opposite her. "Tis a wonder indeed, cousin, that you do not choke to death on your own lies," he growled, so low his voice was almost lost in the crackle of the hearth. But Verity heard. "If Leia is your dearest friend, as you allege," he continued, "Then why did you poison her?"
"I... I did not.. I know not of what you speak... Edmund, please... I did not... I..."

Inhaling tremulously, she closed her lips and placed her needlework on the table by her side with careful, shaking hands. Recognising, perhaps, that denial in this case was utterly futile. The pair of them stood there like marble statues, waiting with bated breath for her to respond, but she did not. Her face paled. Eyes murky with contemplation, as though frantically searching her mind for any fragment of an excuse which would save her from this. But nothing could. Specks of panic began to show, engorging like ripples in a pond, until her fingers trembled in her lap. Edmund longed to interrupt her silence, to take her by the shoulders and demand a reckoning for all the pain and loss she had caused. When he could take the agony no more, his eyes strayed to Clara's. This was her discovery, her case; if anyone deserved their resolution, it was her.

"Tell us," said the Princess levelly, lowering herself into the seat to which he clung. "Everything. Of course we shall take it to my father regardless, but I should like him to hear the full story. Wouldn't you?"
The chair appeared to consume Verity Westover as she sank back into its wooden embrace. Her nostrils flared, and she gulped down what must have been a half-hearted deflection. Then, gazing into the fire with all the weariness of a woman twice her age, she began to speak.