Yes, Your Grace," I correct her. "I am My Lady, the King's Mother, now, and you shall curtsey to me, as low as to a queen of royal blood. This was my destiny: to put my son on the throne of England, and those who laughed at my visions and doubted my vocation will call me My Lady, the King's Mother, and I shall sign myself Margaret Regina: Margaret R.

Words have weight, something once said cannot be unsaid. Meaning is like a stone dropped into a pool; the ripples will spread and you cannot know what back they wash against.

For he loved her and he understood that a woman cannot always live as a man. He understood that she cannot always think as he thought, walk as he walked, breathe the air that he took in. She would always be a different being from him, listening to a different music, hearing a different sound, familiar with a different element.

Although some people think I am a romantic novelist I have always thought of myself as a rather gritty radical historian.

I was born to be your rival,' she [Anne] said simply. 'And you mine. We're sisters, aren't we?

Katherine of Aragon was speaking out for the women of the country, for the good wives who should not be put aside just because their husbands had taken a fancy to another, for the women who walked the hard road between kitchen, bedroom, church and childbirth. For the women who deserved more than their husband's whim.

... all that that I learn just teaches me that I know nothing.