VIII

which:
    Edward .
    I never did take him hunting.
    Someone close by says, “Perhaps he can hear me still?”
    “Perhaps.”
    The small figure starts forward towards me. He has heard me. The black and white robes of the archbishop, bending at my side, block him from my view for a moment.
    “Your Majesty.” The Archbishop has put his face close to mine. “If you cannot confess your sins, it will be enough if you give me some sign, sir, either with your eyes or your hand, that you trust in the Lord. It will be enough for your salvation.”
    Has it come so soon?
    A hand swims into focus: thin, clawlike fingers extended. My hand is lifted.
    I say: You .
    It is him . Not my son, the boy. That thing. He looks like a corpse now: the contours of his sharp bones are visible under a thin layer of greyish skin. His ragged clothes are stained with mould or old blood. Something tiny wriggles at the corner of his mouth; a dark tongue darts out and licks it away. He says:
    Get up. Up. Up.
    I can’t.
    You can.
    His hand looks skeletal but is of preternatural strength. Holding it, I am able to rise from the bed, stepping out of that great, fetid carcass as if discarding a too-heavy coat. No one around me turns; none of the figures bending over the bed see me go.
    Behind me, the Archbishop says, “He pressed my fingers; he did give a sign.”
    The boy leads me to the window and pulls aside the hangings. Outside there is bright, cold sunshine – harsh and beautiful.
    Is this the end?
    Oh yes.
    But it can’t be you that has come for me! Why are you here – some final test? Oh Lord God, hear me: I have endured all Your tests; I am Your chosen; I am a warrior of light. Where are Your angels? Where are Your handmaidens?
    The boy turns from me, unconcerned. He leans on his forearm and stares through the window.
    Coming from beneath me, such heat: waves of hot air fan upwards from some invisible source.
    The prophecy, says the boy, without turning his head. The ‘blessed ruler’, the ‘glory down the ages’. God’s Chosen . His tone is scornful. It wasn’t you. It never was .
    I am reeling; I want to tug at his sleeve, to slap his face. Yes. It is me. It is. I know – I have known all my life…
    It is as if an abyss has opened at my feet; limitless space yawns below me, though I am standing too, somehow, on the floor. The wall is in front of me still, the panes of the window set into it – but I know that if I fall I will meet with no resistance. I am trembling.
    The boy does turn his head now; he looks at me with such pleasure – with triumph – and as he does so images flash into my mind with dizzying speed: a burned-out candle by my father’s bed; a door opening with thin fingers gripping it; a boat crossing dark water; a dark-eyed woman turning to laugh in my face; the boy’s own face crying; those dark, dark shadow-eyes; a sense of falling. Something comes to hit me like a speeding slamming lance, and it is horror. White-hot horror.
    The boy grips the window mullions – hard, as if there is an earth tremor and he is steadying himself; or as if he will break them apart. He stares out at the world, drinking it in urgently, drinking it in as though he will never see it again. No, it is not the boy: it is me. It is him in me and me in him – it is us. We are gripping the stone; we are staring through the window. Outside, the winter sunshine slants into the courtyard below, slicing it diagonally in half – half brilliant, blinding light, half deep shadow.
    Quickly, desperately, I blurt, If the blessed ruler of the prophecy is not me, then it must be my son, Edward—
    No, you fool, interrupts the boy’s voice, a voice in my mind. Look there …
    A figure is crossing the courtyard below me, emerging at that very moment from the murky shadow. A girl – no, a young woman, slight but tall, with red-gold hair. At first I do not recognise her – then with a jolt I realise that it is my younger daughter, Elizabeth. Anne’s daughter.
    Her? A girl?
    She stops as if she has heard and, turning, looks up. At that moment, birds take off from the roof above me; I hear their hoarse croaking. She lifts her head and watches as their large black shapes wheel against the sky. Then her gaze slides down to the window. For an instant her eyes – her mother’s dark eyes – look directly into mine.
    A slight frown crosses the girl’s face, as if she is puzzled; as if she thinks she sees something at the window. A shadow, the smudge of