Chapter 2
Catalina (Lina) de Aragón
No one saw the woman in the hooded cloak leave the Tower of London, just as no one had seen her arrive.
Lina couldn’t chalk her stealth up to magick—the extent of what she knew about the dark arts had just been delivered to the witch upstairs.
No, she had just become very good at staying out of sight, at blending in with shadows and faces until no one could have described her as anything but the phantom she’d become.
It was a skill, like many others, she’d picked up thanks to the betrayal of Anne Boleyn.
Lina crossed the grounds of the Tower, grimacing at the silhouette of the gallows awaiting fresh blood, though it hadn’t been long since she had hungered for Anne’s blood herself.
In fact, if she’d been asked a year ago, Lina would have rather died than extend a hand to that woman.
Even now, a little voice in the back of Lina’s mind was shouting at her, telling her to let the usurper suffer her well-deserved fate.
Lina hushed that voice, turning her face up toward the sky and seeking the dim light of the stars to guide her home.
She’d secured lodging near Westminster, and by the time Lina left the shadows of the old castle behind, her knees were aching, and she was dreading the remaining walk.
This is why grown women don’t go capering about in the dark, she scolded herself when she stubbed her toe on a stone on the packed dirt road, her feet weary and nearly dragging.
She was glad Anne hadn’t seen her like this—it was better that Anne believe Lina was a ghost, or at the very least invincible.
It was why she had waited in the stairwell for five minutes to catch her breath after climbing up the White Tower steps and why she hadn’t given the younger queen any sign of warmth or welcome other than to show the Sisterhood’s symbol.
Despite the late hour, London was teeming with energy and people.
Lina had forgotten how much she hated the city, having been away for the better part of five years.
The smell alone was overwhelming—human and animal waste, spoiled food, and spring mud mixed together on even the cleanest of streets.
More houses and shops had been built since she’d last visited, and Lina had the distinct impression of the buildings looming over her, ready to tilt and crumble at the slightest breeze.
Like pearls on a broken string they would fall, one by one by one, burying her in the rubble of wood and stone.
Lina shook off the image, breathing shallowly through her mouth and keeping her eyes fixed straight ahead.
Even for a lady of her distinctly fallen station, midnight was not a respectable hour to be out alone in London.
Lina averted her gaze from a couple having sex against an alley wall and crossed the street when she reached a lively pub with drunken occupants spilling out into the road.
Her hood offered some camouflage, and she kept to the shadows as best she could.
Certain men, no matter how many Sundays they spent at church, saw women as nothing more than objects for the taking.
It wasn’t for decoration that Lina carried a dagger at her waist.
It was then that a man bumped her shoulder, brushed a hand over her breast, and tipsily tried to get a look at her face. Lina’s wariness sharpened into fear, and the man had an elbow in his gut and a knee in his groin before he saw a flash of Lina’s blue eyes.
Not so old after all, Lina thought proudly, leaving the man bent double and wheezing in her wake.
It was a move she had practiced a hundred times in the last few months—the Sisterhood was particular about the importance of self-defense—though she’d never had a chance to use her new skills in the field.
The adrenaline rush of success lightened her steps for the rest of the walk.
The streets were dark, with only the lights from candles in windows, but Lina found her lodging at last. It was a boardinghouse called the Winter Rose, a two-story wattle-and-daub affair painted white with limewash.
The only thing that made it stand out from the rest of the homes of the London merchants was the flower carved into the wooden sign above the door: five-petaled with a spray of nectaries at the center.
Few people would recognize the flower as a hellebore, and fewer still would know it as a symbol of the Sisterhood. [*1]
Before entering, Lina reached up and traced the hellebore’s outline, gaining strength from the grooves etched deep into the wood.
Her hosts had long since gone to sleep, and Lina crept through the house, taking care not to knock against any furniture or walls on her way to her room upstairs.
The stairs creaked in time with her knees, Lina’s earlier high wearing off and leaving her drained.
She was glad to shed her cloak and exchange her dress for a linen chemise.
The straw-filled mattress was a bit musty and sagging in spots, but Lina’s aching bones didn’t mind.
There were moments when Lina had to laugh at the absurdity of her situation.
Her hosts didn’t know they had the former queen of England under their roof—Queen Catherine was dead, after all, just as Anne had said.
In Lina’s old life, she would have been sleeping in a feather bed covered in silks, attended by dozens of maids of honor and ladies-in-waiting and palace servants.
Her knees wouldn’t have bothered her, nor would she have felt a bruise forming on her elbow from where she had struck that man in the ribs.
And she most certainly would not have been plotting to break out a prisoner from the Tower of London.
And yet here she was, all because of a letter from her daughter.
I’ve heard there is a secret cult of women who call themselves the Sisterhood, nineteen-year-old Mary had written last year, delight evident in the hurried slashes of ink.
They are dedicated to improving women’s rights and education throughout all of Europe.
Can you believe it, Mama? What a strange and wonderful idea. If only it were true.
Though Lina and Mary had been kept apart at Henry’s order even before the dissolution of the royal marriage in May of 1533, their letters never slowed, and that one had thawed a tiny, curious corner in Lina’s frozen heart.
A few well-placed queries had earned Lina an audience with Princess Marguerite d’Angoulême, the sister of the French king and secret leader of the Hellebore Sisterhood, who traveled to England in disguise, appearing on Lina’s doorstep with a single guard and a confident smile.
Lina could still remember Marguerite’s first words to her: “Hello, Your Majesty. Are you ready to enter a rebellion?”
As France and England were rarely on good terms, largely due to Henry’s insatiable ego, Lina had never before met the French princess, though she had observed the woman’s accomplishments from afar.
Few men, let alone women, could claim to be poets, diplomats, patrons of the arts, and public advocates for charity…
and that was before the whole business of the secret society began.
Marguerite had been more than happy to tell Lina of the work the Sisterhood had done, from improving literacy in the major cities of Europe to working to change succession laws among the nobility so their daughters could inherit lands and titles.
The Sisterhood had been Marguerite’s brainchild more than fifteen years earlier.
The scope of the movement was astounding, with pockets of noblewomen now active in nearly every country in Europe.
Men—few, but loyal—were part of the movement too, Marguerite had explained.
“The clever ones join us,” she’d said. “And the kind ones, and the brave ones. They are the men who love their wives and daughters, sisters and mothers, who respect them truly.”
Lina had instantly been impressed by the Frenchwoman, jealous of her liberty to venture off to England without so much as a by your leave to her husband.
“It is a bit of a risk, of course, for someone in my position,” Marguerite had said as they sat by the fire one night.
“My husband and my brother would lock me away if they were ever aware enough to suspect we women were thinking, let alone plotting, behind their backs.”[*2] She’d grinned. “That makes it all the more fun.”
When an invitation to join the Hellebore Sisterhood was extended, Lina accepted without thought as to where the journey would lead.
Turned out, the journey took her right back to the ashes of her former life and the woman who had burned everything to the ground. A woman who—all along—had been a member of the very organization Lina had joined.[*3]
It was too bad she couldn’t have snuck Anne out in the dark tonight, for she didn’t envy her task tomorrow.
But if the queen had simply disappeared, Henry would have turned London upside down looking for her, and the Sisterhood wasn’t willing to risk discovery if they were caught hiding a royal fugitive.
No—death was the only escape, and Lina just had to hope Anne was brave enough to stare her mortality in the face.
The woman was brave, Lina had come to realize.
Anne had sacrificed everything, given up every conceivable dream and personal desire, only to be branded a traitor and a whore and be given over to the executioner’s sword.
Lina had seen resignation in Anne’s eyes tonight, but when she handed her the witching tools, she’d seen that resignation flare and burn away into hope.
Lina didn’t pray much anymore, but before she closed her eyes, she whispered a prayer that tomorrow morning, Anne Boleyn would keep her head.
Skip Notes
*1 The hellebore is a symbol of the goddess Minerva, who, among other strengths, is the goddess of strategic warfare.
(The only kind I bother with.) The five petals of the flower represent Minerva’s five realms of protection—wisdom, war, justice, commerce, and art—and the methods through which the Hellebore Sisterhood plans to change the world.
I claimed the flower as our calling card, both for its beauty and its poison.
*2 I do love my brother and my husband, but truly, they believe I am only ever thinking of the next party or dress or diamond necklace. Little do they know I can think about all of those things and concoct plenty of plans they would consider highly treasonous at the same time.
*3 Indeed, I had recruited Anne ages before I even met Lina, but that’s a tale for later.