I see him, as bright as life, laugh in his confidence and his power, as he promises them that the good times are coming, that they need only stand fast, be true, and they will win.

He swings his leg over his horse and he drops to the ground. He pats his horse’s neck and the big dark head turns with trust as his hand goes up to pull gently the black moving ears that flicker forwards to listen to him. ‘Other commanders will ask that you stand and fight, will ask that you fight to the death,’ he tells them. ‘I know that. I’ve heard that too. I have been in battles where commanders have asked their men to fight to the death but then ridden away and left them.’

There is a ripple of agreement from the men. They have known battles where their commanders have betrayed them, just like this.

‘Other commanders will ask you to stand and fight to the death but when the battle goes against them they will send their pages for their horses and you will see them ride away. You will face the charge alone, you will go down, your comrades will go down, but they will be spurring their horses and riding away. I know that. I have seen it as well as you.’

There is a mutter of agreement from men who have been able to run away, who remember comrades who could not get away in time.

‘Let this be my pledge to you.’ He takes his great broadsword and carefully, feeling for the horse’s ribs, puts the point of the sharp blade between the ribs, aimed at the heart. There is a low murmur of refusal from the men and in the dream I cry out, ‘No, Father! No!’

‘This is my pledge to you,’ he says steadily. ‘I will not ride away and leave you in danger for I shall have no horse,’ and he thrusts the blade deep into the ribcage, and Midnight goes down on his forelegs and down on his backlegs. He turns and looks at my father with his dark beautiful eyes as if he understands, as if he knows, that this is a sacrifice my father has to make. That he is a pledge that my father will fight and die with his men.

Of course he died with them, that day on the battlefield of Barnet, he died with them to make me queen, and I had to learn alone later what a hollow crown it is. As I turn in my bed and close my eyes once more, I think that tonight I will see my beloved father, Warwick the kingmaker, and the prince who is my little boy, Edward, and perhaps, in fields greener than I can imagine, Midnight the horse is turned out to graze.


AUTHOR’S NOTE

What we know from Hicks and from other historians is that she was related to most of the great players of the Cousins’ War (only called the Wars of the Roses centuries later in the 1800s). What I suggest in this novel is that perhaps she was a player in her own right.

She was the daughter of the Earl of Warwick, known in his lifetime as ‘the kingmaker’ because of his extraordinary role as puppeteer to the claimants of royal power in England. First he supported Richard Duke of York, then his son and heir Edward, then the second son George, then their enemy Henry VI. Warwick died fighting for the House of Lancaster, having lived his life as the great supporter of the House of York.

Anne, although a young woman, moved with her father through these twists and turns of loyalty. She attended the coronation dinner of the new queen of the House of York and witnessed her father’s gradual exclusion from the court, which became dominated by the Rivers family and adherents. As the novel describes, Anne fled with her father into exile in France, returning to England as his new candidate for queen, at the head of a Lancaster army, married to their Prince of Wales, and in little more than a year was married into the house of her enemy: York. It is at this point that I suggest that the young woman, who had lost her father and her husband, and whose mother had abandoned her, took her life into her own hands. Nobody knows the true story of how Anne escaped from the protection or imprisonment of her sister and brother-in-law. We have no reliable account – but some wonderful versions – of her courtship and marriage to Richard. My version of these stories is to put Anne at the heart of things.

It was fascinating to me as a novelist to portray the York court as a centre of intrigue and a source of fear for the Warwick girls. Part of the joy of writing this series based on rivals and enemies is turning the page upside down (as it were) and seeing a totally different picture. As an historian the known facts looked very different when I changed my viewpoint from my favourite, Elizabeth Woodville, to my new heroine, Anne Neville. The confused conspiracy around the death of Isabel and the judicial murder of George suddenly becomes a far darker story with Elizabeth as the villain.

Another reputation which I have had to address in this story is that of Richard III. As I suggest here and in The White Queen, I don’t subscribe to the Shakespearean parody that has blackened his reputation for centuries. But also I don’t acquit him of usurpation. He might not have killed the princes but they would not have been in the Tower without the protection of their mother except for his actions. What I think might have happened to the two royal boys is the subject of my next book, the story of their sister and Richard’s secret lover, Princess Elizabeth of York: The White Princess.

I list here the books which have been most useful to me in writing The Kingmaker’s Daughters.


BIBLIOGRAPHY

Baldwin, David, Elizabeth Woodville: Mother of the Princes in the Tower (Stroud, Sutton Publishing, 2002)