and where it had once said ‘Enter and ask. Do not be afraid to seek justice for here you will find it,’ in the beautiful shapes of Arabic, she prays to a sterner, more intolerant God than Allah; and no-one comes for justice any more.
But nothing can change the nature of the palace. Not even the stamp of our soldiers’ feet on the marble floors can shake the centuries-old sense of peace. I make Madilla teach me what the flowing inscriptions mean in every room, and my favourite is not the promises of justice, but the words written in the Courtyard of the Two Sisters which says: ‘Have you ever seen such a beautiful garden?’ and then answers itself: ‘We have never seen a garden with greater abundance of fruit, nor sweeter, nor more perfumed.’
It is not truly a palace, not even as those we had known at Cordoba or Toledo. It is not a castle, nor a fort. It was built first and foremost as a garden with rooms of exquisite luxury so that one could live outside. It is a series of courtyards designed for flowers and people alike. It is a dream of beauty: walls, tiles, pillars melting into flowers, climbers, fruit and herbs. The Moors believe that a garden is a paradise on earth, and they have spent fortunes over the centuries to make this ‘al-Yanna’: the word that means garden, secret place, and paradise.
I know that I love it. Even as a little child I know that this is an exceptional place; that I will never find anywhere more lovely. And even as a child I know that I cannot stay here. It is God’s will and my mother’s will that I must leave al-Yanna, my secret place, my garden, my paradise. It is to be my destiny that I should find the most beautiful place in all the world when I am just six years old, and then leave it when I am fifteen; as homesick as Boabdil, as if happiness and peace for me will only ever be short-lived.
Dogmersfield Palace, Hampshire, Autumn 1501
‘I say, you cannot come in! If you were the King of England himself – you could not come in.’
‘I am the King of England,’ Henry Tudor said, without a flicker of amusement. ‘And she can either come out right now, or I damned well will come in and my son will follow me.’
‘The Infanta has already sent word to the king that she cannot see him,’ the duenna said witheringly. ‘The noblemen of her court rode out to explain to him that she is in seclusion, as a lady of Spain. Do you think the King of England would come riding down the road when the Infanta has refused to receive him? What sort of a man do you think he is?’
‘Exactly like this one,’ he said and thrust his fist with the great gold ring towards her face. The Count de Cabra came into the hall in a rush, and at once recognised the lean forty-year-old man threatening the Infanta’s duenna with a clenched fist, a few aghast servitors behind him, and gasped out: ‘The king!’
At the same moment the duenna recognised the new badge of England, the combined roses of York and Lancaster, and recoiled. The count skidded to a halt and threw himself into a low bow.
‘It is the king,’ he hissed, his voice muffled by speaking with his head on his knees. The duenna gave a little gasp of horror and dropped into a deep curtsey.
‘Get up,’ the king said shortly. ‘And fetch her.’
‘But she is a princess of Spain, Your Grace,’ the woman said, rising but with her head still bowed low. ‘She is to stay in seclusion. She cannot be seen by you before her wedding day. This is the tradition. Her gentlemen went out to explain to you …’
‘It’s your tradition. It’s not my tradition. And since she is my daughter-in-law in my country, under my laws, she will obey my tradition.’
‘She has been brought up most carefully, most modestly, most properly …’
‘Then she will be very shocked to find an angry man in her bedroom. Madam, I suggest that you get her up at once.’
‘I will not, Your Grace. I take my orders from the Queen of Spain herself and she charged me to make sure that every respect was shown to the Infanta and that her behaviour was in every way …’
‘Madam, you can take your working orders from me; or your marching orders from me. I don’t care which. Now send the girl out or I swear on my crown I will come in and if I catch her naked in bed then she won’t be the first woman I have ever seen in such a case. But she had better pray that she is the prettiest.’
The Spanish duenna went quite white at the insult.
‘Choose,’ the king said stonily.
‘I cannot fetch the Infanta,’ she said stubbornly.
‘Dear God! That’s it! Tell her I am coming in at once.’
She scuttled backwards like an angry crow, her face blanched with shock. Henry gave her a few moments to prepare, and then called her bluff by striding in behind her.
The room was lit only by candles and firelight. The covers of the bed were turned back as if the girl had hastily jumped up. Henry registered the intimacy of being in her bedroom, with her sheets still warm, the scent of her lingering in the enclosed space, before he looked at her. She was standing by the bed, one small white hand on the carved wooden post. She had a cloak of dark blue thrown over her shoulders and her white nightgown trimmed with priceless lace peeped through the opening at the front. Her rich auburn hair, plaited for sleep, hung down her back, but her face was completely shrouded in a hastily thrown mantilla of dark lace.
Dona Elvira darted between the girl and the king. ‘This is the Infanta,’ she said. ‘Veiled until her wedding day.’
‘Not on my money,’ Henry Tudor said bitterly. ‘I’ll see what I’ve bought, thank you.’
He stepped forwards. The desperate duenna nearly threw herself to her knees. ‘Her modesty …’
‘Has she got some awful mark?’ he demanded, driven to voice his deepest fear. ‘Some blemish? Is she scarred by the pox and they did not tell me?’
‘No! I swear.’
Silently, the girl put out her white hand and took the ornate lace hem of her veil. Her duenna gasped a protest but could do nothing to stop the princess as she raised the veil, and then flung it back. Her clear blue eyes stared into the lined, angry face of Henry Tudor without wavering. The king drank her in, and then gave a little sigh of relief at the sight of her.
She was an utter beauty: a smooth, rounded face, a straight, long nose, a full, sulky, sexy mouth. Her chin was up, he saw; her gaze challenging. This was no shrinking maiden fearing ravishment. This was a fighting princess standing on her dignity even in this most appalling moment of embarrassment.
He bowed. ‘I am Henry Tudor, King of England,’ he said.
She curtseyed.
He stepped forwards and saw
