Who, then, had caused Hal to be seized and held? And why? The idea that Hal had been planning rebellion was laughable. Hal’s only interest in the royal court lay in the competitions to be found there—”he lived for jousting. To Buckingham’s mind, that meant that the charges against Hal had been intended as a warning to him as Hal’s brother.

Had it been the old king’s outgoing Privy Council who’d ordered the arrest? They’d been anxious to keep King Henry the Seventh’s death secret until his son’s succession was secure. That they should fear Buckingham as a rival claimant to the throne amused the duke. It was true he had more royal blood in his veins than the new king did, but there were others who had even more. Regardless, he’d never thought to seize the throne for himself. He was a loyal subject, sworn to support the Tudor dynasty.

It was tiresome to have to prove his loyalty to a new king, but Buckingham did not suppose that he had any choice in the matter. The Staffords must make themselves indispensable to young Henry the Eighth.

He looked again at the women clustered around his wife, Eleanor, a plain, even-tempered woman, and the sister of the Earl of Northumberland. She and her brother had been raised, as had Buckingham and Hal, in the household of Henry the Seventh’s mother, the Countess of Richmond. Fatherless, they had all become wards of the Crown. Just after his twelfth birthday, Margaret Beaufort, Countess of Richmond, had arranged a marriage between her charges.

It was a good match, the duke thought now. He and Eleanor had always been fond of each other. She was soft-spoken and made him an excellent wife. In the years since they’d wed, she had provided him with a son, his heir, and three daughters to use to forge alliances with other noblemen. Unfortunately, none of his four children was old enough yet to be of use at court. Elizabeth was twelve; Catherine, ten; Henry, eight; and Mary only six.

Buckingham’s gaze slid over assorted waiting gentlewomen, including plump, pretty Madge Geddings and Knyvett’s half sister, Bess, to come to rest on his own siblings. His sister Elizabeth was a year his senior. He had contracted a match for her with Robert Radcliffe, Lord Fitzwalter. They’d been together for nearly four years now and Elizabeth had done her duty, giving her husband two sons. The elder was three years old and the younger an infant.

Then there was Anne. She was twenty-six years old. Buckingham had thought he’d had her settled in a marriage to Sir Walter Herbert, the old Earl of Pembroke’s younger son. But Herbert had died in a fall from a horse afterward and, for nearly two years now, Anne had been back in her brother’s house. Widowed, she’d returned to Thornbury, the Stafford family seat in Gloucestershire, bringing with her over a dozen servants but no heir for Sir Walter’s estate. She had failed in the primary duty of a wife by not producing a single child of either sex to inherit.

Anne had moved away from the group and now sat alone on a window seat, her head bent over her embroidery frame. Buckingham’s eyes narrowed as he assessed her attributes. She was more attractive than his other sister, although no great beauty. Her chin was too sharp—”an outward sign of an unfortunate stubborn streak—”and her complexion lacked the pink and white prettiness that was so popular at court. Still, she’d do.

“Go about your business,” he told his men. “I must speak in private with my sister.”

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