Tu Es Ma Lumière

87 - The Ghost Queens

(Before we start this little AU, I wanna thank the people in my life and my readers who've reached out to me over the last couple days. People who know me know that a couple days ago, I was dealt a huge blow in my life, I'm not gonna get into details beyond that, but I wanna say that I appreciate and love you all for being here for me. Ever since, I've been in a really, really dark place in my head, and as of writing (May 7/8) I've had an extremely, extremely rough couple days. Not only in my head, but with the progression of my injury (that's now spread from my right shoulder to the middle of my shoulder blades and all down my neck and back, into my left shoulder and down that arm) and a kinda tense conversation earlier (naming no names, btw) even on this website, your girl is going through the ringer, ladies and gentlemen. Not helping matters is the fact that I'm an insomniac and I haven't been sleeping a lot lately, so your girl isn't at 100 percent right now. I'm exhausted, in pain, sad, angry, sick and a million other adjectives, including not being inspired at all to write or create what I love. I'm trying to transfer all the energy and emotion that's built up inside over the last few days, so if I can find my mojo to write, it's gonna be majorly depressive and sad stuff, at least for a while. I won't be offended if you choose a later date to read what I've written, since the world is sad and scary right now, nor am I looking for any sympathy online, I'm just trying to let you all know what's going on in my world. As you should all know by now, I'm blunt and honest that borderlines on mean and dramatic sometimes, but that's just how I am. Nice comments will be majorly appreciated down below, although I know that this might not be seen until all of this is blown over.

Again, a major thank you and love to all the people in my life and here online who've reached out and sent some love, it's really meant the world.

I hope you enjoy this oneshot, even if it is sad.

Love,

me)

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The Queen Mother of France sees ghosts. Two small girls, no older than nine years old, dressed in blue and purple cotton, golden bronze hair, running around the hallways of her son's court, always just a couple steps ahead. In her right hand is her new constant companion, a bundle of fresh sage, held together by a piece of white cotton. She's gone through so much that she shudders to walk past the greenhouses, even when the staff cut the herbs from the plants themselves.

She awakens just after dawn each morning. Servants dress her in her fine red and gold velvet, and her bronze curls are pinned up over her ears. She dons her crown and clutches at her sage, absentmindedly wondering how Henry would see her in such a demure gown that exposed her neck and shoulders. How, eventually, his lust turned from his wife and to his mistress, and then directed itself at their daughter in law and England. And how eventually, his lust drove him mad.

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The Queen of France and Scotland sees ghosts. A child, a newborn boy, so new and fresh that he isn't even named, let alone christened. A healthy, miniature male, sired from her husband and her best friend, wrapped in fine blankets fit for royalty. Of course, the child isn't royal, but he's her husbands' child, and that's close enough. Court whispers if the child will grow to hold curls in his hair as he ages, if they will be dark like their mothers, or light like their fathers. Nobility look down their noses at the new bastard son of France, but the nannies coo down at him lovingly. The nannies wonder amongst themselves when they don't see the Queen of France in the doorway, if this child will have his fathers' piercing blue eyes, or his gentle and dependable spirit. Mary says nothing, but she thinks, so could her baby, placing a hand upon her horridly flat stomach.

Lola's child smiles up at his father whenever he is held. Francis' responding beam could outshine any burning, dancing hearth, even the sun if she looked at it for too long. He cradles the newborn like he's cradling the most precious thing in the world. Mary wonders if he in fact, is. But she knows that staring into the sun would burn her insides less than this.

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Catherine sees ghosts. She wonders through the darkened corridors for hours each night, finding the small Queen tucked deeply in a window seat, illuminated by the moonlight and the starlight. She's silhouetted, the window is so large and the moon is so bright. Her knees are tucked tightly to her chest, one hand laying upon her black satin bodice, the other upon her dark rose coloured lips.

She remembers that place, sitting almost exactly in the same spot, only she was on the other side, mirrored, in a way. She remembers being the Dauphine and being the Queen, overshadowed and silhouetted by grief and stepmotherhood. Years upon years upon years ago, when Diane had came out of confinement with baby Sebastian, the strong newborn boy who was the spitting image of his father. She remembers the lavish celebration the Dauphin of France had thrown for his wife and bastard son, how bright Henry's beam was, how it outshone the sun as he looked at this precious creature that lay in his arms. 

She excused herself to her alcove several hours after she should have done. Henry hadn't noticed, too caught up in his bastard son to think of how his wife would suffer because of the boys' mere existence. She remembered pressing her hands to her lips, her hand to her abdomen, flat and barren after three losses.

It seemed, however, that only one Francis noticed the Princesses' suffering. And it was not the one who bound them all together.

She remembered Francis' bronze spun of curls, the rich golden and crimson velour of his bodice, his fine crown and rings cold against her body as his arms wrapped around her, pressing his lips against the heir he cherished a tenfold more than the one he had sired from his own loins.

She knew that, one day, three years after, Henry would look at her Francis in the same way, that bright smile. It was ironic, that the one thing that could awe a King was the fragility and tininess of his newborn sons. But those three years had been torture, loss after loss after loss within those two years, how sacred every turn and kick had been when she had finally fallen pregnant with her golden child. He had been born so early, five years of sickliness and weakness, until the very same young Scot had travelled from her homeland to provide a brighter future for France.

Would the young Queen have such luxury of time, if it could even be called such a thing?

Catherine walks to Mary, not in control of her motions, and her arms wrap around her little frame, her lips press against the softness of her hair. Mary sucks in a startled breath, but doesn't pull away. No, she leans in closer and closes her eyes gently as Catherine begins to comb through her long, dark locks, just like she had done as a child when she missed her mother, cold and alien, locked away in a dark, unwelcoming fortress, thousands of miles away.

Mary opens her eyes after a while, and golden locks upon hazel. Neither moves.

"Does it get easier?" she whispers. So quietly, so, so young. Her eyes are as red as Catherine's own had once been. She looks at her young daughter in law, and wants, so, so, wants, more deeply than she ever expected, to lie.

"No." she whispers back, shaking her head. Mary closes her eyes again, in acquiescence, in grief, in pain? Catherine didn't know, but she also did.

They stay there for so long, but it passes by quicker than the blink of an eye. The sun peaks from the darkness of the French horizon. Home, yet foreign. Known, yet unknown. For the both of them.

Mary leans into her as the sun raises from the trees. And the baby starts to cry.