~𝕭𝖊𝖙𝖗𝖆𝖞𝖆𝖑 𝖎𝖘 𝖔𝖓𝖑𝖞 𝖙𝖍𝖊 𝖇𝖊𝖌𝖎𝖓𝖓𝖎𝖓𝖌~
Born the youngest daughter of Charles I, Duke of Bourbon, Constance of Bourbon grows up amidst comfort and splendour on her powerful family's estates in France. A shy child, she prefers her...
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~Strike Firm, Strike Hard~
9th of October 1484, St George's Chapel, Windsor....
They were all meant to ride together through the night to Windsor when the sun set the day before but when Constance had asked where Edward was she found he'd already left; speeding off without them. She hadn't seen him all day, no one had and she couldn't conjure one word while stood by him in the chapel, not one that wasn't Ned's name marred by a sob.
Her beloved Edward's year's mind mass was meant to be held a year to the day after he died, an evening to remember him, to reflect on twelve months without him. Instead she thought of eighteen. Or tried to. She shuddered and cried, cried and shuddered. All she could think of was her husband's face as the bishop recited Latin, her own hidden by her black veil, eyes swollen from crying and resting on the tomb not ten feet from her.
Carved from white marble, a painted effigy of Edward lay atop it, dressed in his robes of state and crown. The hand closest to her was laid upon his chest, clutching his sword and the other bent at the elbow, raised slightly aloft, waiting for hers to intertwine with it. Below were a simple wall of marble would be were carved great arched windows through which could be seen a chamber where an effigy of his corpse lay.
A memento mori tomb - she remembered him telling her she wished for one ten year prior. Next to his stone skull lay his favourite bejewelled cap - red velvet with a diamond brooch - and at his feet lay his banner, unfurled and covered in dust. At the left side of both his living form and the dead lay an empty space - a space for her.
She'd not yet had her effigies made but knew in her heart and mind she would do the same as he despite her hatred for that skeletal corpse, its cold presence that taunted her wickedly every second.
She could only thank god and the stonemasons that his side had been finished before his death for she knew she'd have to destroy, unable to bear the thought of it stained by Woodville hands, Woodville ideas. She wouldn't let them touch her husband in death - wouldn't let Elizabeth have him in death.
' No!' Her mind hissed, how could she even think of that bitch at such a moment? She shivered, fresh tears sliding down her cheeks and looked at the tomb again.
How could her Edward be in there? Her strong, handsome Edward who embodied life itself in his merry laugh and stunning smile? How could he be beneath the cold earth? He wouldn't like it there, she thought, he wouldn't be able to move and it would be so very dark! Was he cold? Was he lonely? Did he look like the lower effigy, flesh rotted away, bones twisted and cracking? She silently sobbed harder, her onyx rosary twisted around her fingers so tightly she could no longer feel them.
