Chapter Text
She moved as though carried by the mist itself, pale and trembling, her light layers of muslin and shawls drifting like spectral veils. Fever consumed her, yet she pressed onward, her horse plodding through the darkness with a deliberate slowness, as if it understood her fragile state.
If anyone can see her now in these woods, they would mistake her for a ghost, she creates the silhouette of a creature that haunts the forest—a pale wraith wandering between life and death. Sweat-drenched skin, her hair, tangled and damp, spills over her shoulders like a dark shroud, and her trembling hands clutch the reins as if holding on to sanity itself. She sways unsteadily, her vision blurred from exhaustion, but her purpose remains unbroken.
The muslin gown she wears is stained with the blood of her childbirth, now dried and cracked against her thighs. Her fever burns, yet the cold night air bites at her skin, chilling her bones. The forest, once a place of childhood laughter, seems now to conspire with the shadows, whispering secrets she cannot bear to hear.
The horse halted beneath the tree. That ancient oak stood tall and somber, its branches outstretched as if to cradle her grief. She slid from the saddle, her legs barely holding her weight. The world spun, but when she looked around, she saw him, she felt her heart beating as he would make her feel at his presence. Isabelle had teased her when they were younger, blushing so often when her little heartbeats would quicken with just the mere mention of his name.
It may have had led to her shyness. And when she did not learn how to hide her feelings, she learned how to be silent, hiding herself instead from everyone, but she never could with Richard, she never has to. He has always been different, he never laughed with Isabelle or George’s teasing. At first she thought that it was out the of the kindness that he treats everyone with, or that is was out of pity, but then she when she grew older, she learned to hope.
He stood there beneath the tree, just as he had all those years ago. The boyish smile that had always softened the sharp angles of his face was there, his green eyes held her, their depths reflecting the forest, but now tinged with something unspoken. The light of dawn spilled over him, casting him in hues of gold and gray, as if the world itself could not decide whether he belonged to life or memory.
“Anne,” he called softly, his voice cutting through the fever’s haze, carrying the same concern that always made her feel significant, as if her every breath, every movement of hers surpassed everything else in importance. She stirred, her hand reaching for his, the touch grounding her, pulling her back from the edge of her fevered delirium. His presence was the steady anchor she had always relied on, and in that moment, nothing else mattered but the quiet assurance in his eyes.
“Richard?” she whispered, tears spilling freely.
No one has spoken his name for days now
She remembers the morning he left to attend to his brother’s court in London for the first time, leaving her with an ache she hadn’t understood then. When she was still a little girl she would climbed this tree to watch him go, clinging to the branches as if they could keep him from leaving.
“Come down, please” he said, stepping closer, calming the horse and his voice steady and familiar, taking the reigns from her. “You’ll hurt yourself.”
His voice struck her like a sorrowful arrow piercing through the fatigue, a needle mending the obscure. Was this a memory rising from the depths of her mind? A fevered illusion conjured by her longing? Or something else entirely? She did not care. She clung to the comfort it brought, surrendering to the yearning she could no longer fight
Taking his hand to guide her to the ground, she leaped into his arms with all the strength she still has left in her.
he had called her then, too, with that same gentle, firm tone, coaxing her back to solid ground. And when she agreed, he kissed her on the cheek, a boy’s awkward promise of something more.
But this was not that morning.
“Don’t leave” she whispered, her voice so soft it was barely audible, as silent as a leaf falling in the forest "will you stay?"
She had never asked him to stay before, she would never dare, but she had always known that she would follow wherever he went, whenever he wanted to, regardless of the cost. But it was never about what his or her wants or wishes, in this lifetime at least, she would like to believe. They had never been free to choose; their lives had been dictated by duty, by forces beyond their control. Her husband, a royal duke outranks her father, he is a brother to a king, but titles and lineage meant little, they can be made or take. Power rested with those who commanded armies and coffers. Richard, ever modest and loyal, had placed honor above ambition. It had made him a respected commander and a good friend, but people in power, never had friends, only alliances. She understood that early, when she lost her sister Isabelle —before Richard— her only friend and companion.
It cast a shadow over her happiness with him in Middleham.
She had been lucky to be matched with someone she loves, she would have been happy just to be near him but to have him and hold him, in a world where love was rarely part of the bargain, was more than she could have hoped for.
But what if being apart would have kept him safe?
In their panic she was told
that `his grace is in his way back’
What if Richard had never stayed here, in the north with her. He could have had his pick of a royal bride, safe in the arms of a wealthy French princess, enjoying banquets at court in Burgundy with his sister, someone whose alliances brought more than love and a quiet few years.
“I am here, my Lady” he said, was it just the rustling of leaves as the mist rises from the ground.
For days, no one would meet her eyes when she seeks for her lord husband.
Outside her confinement she understands the whimpering and whispers, `ambushed’ 'outside castle walls’.
He knelt with her, guiding her to the ground, as cold as the air.
She reached for him, her trembling fingers brushing against the dark curls she had touched so many times before. She rested her head on his shoulder.
When no one can give her any news, She used that the tricks that she learned from childhood, reading lips and listen to the servants, pretending to be sleeping when she is not.
'struck under an oak tree’
There have been many unfamiliar voices and she heard fear from those she knows.
She cannot even cry herself to sleep, she’d passed out while lying in bed, from realisations, in fear and exhaustion and no one even notice.
His hands cupped her face, he leaned down kissing her forehead. His skin was cold beneath her touch, as cold as the air that clung to the forest. Yet she did not pull away.
Her back against the bark of the bloodstained tree.
An oak tree
There was no warmth in the breaking dawn, it could not chase away the chill creeping through her body.
if she is just dreaming then she does not want to be waken up. She does not care anymore, She is feeling so tired now.
He cannot be truly beside her, she knows. Now she understands how madness begins, being lucid and duelling one’s own logic, battling its own delusion. Richard would have rushed her back to the castle, making sure that the midwives are taking care of her, kneeling on her bedside, he would whisper assurances that she will recover. He would not linger under an oak tree, he would have welcomed his newborn son and thank her for the gift of life. He would have stayed at her side through the fevered nights, offering her reason to fight against the darkness. Richard always had a steadfast resolve and deep, unspoken devotion. His every action was measured, deliberate, and driven by an unyielding sense of duty. He would have done all for her, to keep her safe, to keep her alive. But this was not Richard anymore, just as Anne was no longer herself.
“You made me love these trees, Anne” words he said, a long time ago, and so perhaps it was only the murmur of the wind in the branches above, that she hears, guiding her, she smiled faintly, her fingers curling into the fabric of his tunic as though she could anchor herself to him.
The whispers lingered
“Je serai avec toi, pour l’éternité, mon cœur”*
—a promise
In the language spoken more often to them by their tutors or visiting massagers with friendly news, but she likes to remind herself that they contained the first thoughts of their mothers about them. The language spoken to them as infants being kept safe, a language when spoken by Richard is always filled with tenderness and truth, the words wrapped around her like a lullaby, the swaying of the trees lulling her into stillness
“come with me now, my love”
It is the voice of a man who had loved her beyond all reason. She nods and smiles at him. Tears fall, probably frim the mist as well, there is no fluids left on her body. And It didn’t matter anymore what is real and what is not, they would still be true for her. In the end, they had found each other again, together, if only for a moment, and for Anne, that was enough.
Light broke over Middleham, the woodlands and the rivers that surrounds it, in gold and silver, in soft hues of green and blue, but the light did not reach her. Her breathing slowed, her chest rising and falling with greater effort until, finally, it stilled. The forest held its breath, and the oak stood silent witness as the last traces of her life ebbed away.
She will never be without him again.