Three (History Plays, Book 2)

Afterword

Afterword

This is based on the first half of Edward III. The second half is largely just Henry V on crack, and while fun it's very disjointed with this part of the story. I was going to include the second half, but it's so different tonally I felt like it would have felt off. Catherine of Salisbury doesn't appear in the second half of the play at all, nor is she mentioned. The king of France and his son instead are major supporting characters. Ned has an arc throughout, but that's about it. Lodowick hardly appears, and Audley has a good death scene, but after the court drama of the first half the gritty battles are just weird, they are good, but it leaves the reader a bit confused as to where the play is going. Ned is the only child to appear in the play, though Edward mentions he has more sons.
While this work theoretically contains characters/descendants/ancestors of previous books (Second, Henriad) I am considering it a different universe since the play has different authorship.
I majorly changed the kids ages to have them closer together, and kept some of the kids alive as the black plague wouldn't have happened in modern day.
It's unknown who wrote Edward III, though it's suspected it was Shakespeare, Marlowe, and possibly Kyd and Nashe, all Elizabethan playwrights. It's a fun little play, and sadly the least believable part, the part where Edward leaves Ned in battle and doesn't back him up, is 100% true, that and Philippa forcing Edward to pardon some prisoners, did happen. The entire affair with Catherine almost definitely didn't. Edward was not known to have any affairs, except maybe after his wife's death (I say maybe because it's out of character when we have no other affairs, however he did joust a lot and get hit in the head, he could have had early Alzheimer's which would explain a change in character). Also, it is highly likely Edward was having the affair with William. They did the whole bosom companions life partner thing, and Edward didn't really pick a new best friend after William died. We are going to assume Pippa and Edward were happy. To have a child at forty five means they were still sleeping together past when she should have been able to bear children, so he was still attracted to his older wife, and she still wanted him. John of Gaunt was very attached to his mother, I doubt he would have been happy if she was being hurt. He inherited the braincells of the family from her, and he used them to make an absurd amount of money. He didn't want to be king, he wanted power, and boy did he get it. By the time Edward did have the affair (rumored with one of Pippa's handmaids) John of Gaunt could have quite literally bought and solid not only his father but also Ned twice over. Very little happened in England that John didn't want to.
Edward went to battle well into middle age. His 6ft 8in broadsword would have been wielded on horseback and on the ground. He participated in jousts in England and France under assumed names, interestingly enough this habit is ascribed to his son, the Black Prince, in the film 'A Knight's Tale', when in reality while Ned did joust, I couldn't find evidence he did it under a false name. His dad was pretty sympathetic to wanting to participate in tournaments.