The Sun in Splendour

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Jacquetta was watching from the topmost turret of Grafton Manor for the arrival of her daughter. She herself had made sure that Elizabeth’s bedchamber was ready and that it should be as comfortable as she could make it. Poor Elizabeth would be in need of comfort, sorrowing widow that she was with two young children to provide for and an uncertain future before her.

These were indeed uncertain times. The wretched war went on and on – swaying this way and that, victory one day for York and the next for Lancaster.

A plague on their wars, thought Jacquetta, which continually took a warm-blooded woman’s husband away from her and robbed her daughter of hers altogether.

At least her beloved Richard was safe and had managed to send news to her after having fled with the King somewhere up to the north, for the message had come to her from Newcastle. They were the losers again, and this time it seemed that some conclusion might be reached for Edward of York had proclaimed himself King and the people favoured him. He was a young man of great charm, Jacquetta had to admit, although the Rivers were staunch Lancastrians. ‘Every inch a King,’ was what they said of Edward; and as he was almost six feet four there were a good many inches. He was a magnificent soldier, an ardent lover of women and the greatest possible contrast to poor Henry who was so saintly that he longed to be a monk and had on more than one occasion lapsed into madness.

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