𝐔𝐍𝐂𝐎𝐍𝐐𝐔𝐂𝐑𝐄𝐃 : a dependent rp blog for 𝐁𝐋𝐎𝐎𝐃𝐘𝐃𝐀𝐘𝐒𝐇𝐐. written by 𝐗𝐀𝐍. (using beta editor)
𝐋𝐀𝐃𝐘 𝐒𝐈𝐁𝐄𝐋𝐋𝐀 𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐂𝐘 — of northumberland .
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𝐔𝐍𝐂𝐎𝐍𝐐𝐔𝐂𝐑𝐄𝐃 : a dependent rp blog for 𝐁𝐋𝐎𝐎𝐃𝐘𝐃𝐀𝐘𝐒𝐇𝐐. written by 𝐗𝐀𝐍. (using beta editor)
𝐋𝐀𝐃𝐘 𝐒𝐈𝐁𝐄𝐋𝐋𝐀 𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐂𝐘 — of northumberland .
dossier . biography . visage . isms . credit .
𝐒𝐓𝐀𝐓𝐔𝐒. closed to @philippaed 𝐋𝐎𝐂𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍. hampton court palace, library 𝐃𝐀𝐓𝐄 & 𝐓𝐈𝐌𝐄. late november 1559, mid-afternoon
sibella could not say for certain whether she'd come for contemplation, distraction, or mere disappearance. between the swell of the newfound feelings she'd discovered in the depths of her ribcage, there was the matter of edmund's wedding to katharine grey, a matter which hung over the entirety of the percy household like the executioner's axe. it truly confounded her; only just did he wax and wane on of duty, of unconditional deference (or at least the pretense of it) to the king. and yet his secret union to the dowager duchess of suffolk — a woman whose very presence, whose very daughters were a sword aimed at the crown — was anything but.
she did not know what to make of it. the redemption of the percy name had been promised over raised cups at private dinners at alnwick, drilled into her heart by her howard mother. the king's affection for isobel was a badly-kept secret; sibella dutifully joined his councilmen to find edward seymour despite her catholic sympathies. edmund, too, had only just been appointed to william's council. instead of now taking his rightful place at the table, he and his bride departed court entirely. the consequences of the union had yet to befall upon the rest of their respective households, and all sibella could do was hold her breath.
and hide, she finally decided. in truth, while she held a book in her arms, she could not concentrate on the words before her. she was filled with relief when someone entered, more so when she realized that it was her newly anointed in-law. "do you, too, seek solace among the pages of a book?" sibella pierces the air with the question, helplessly shutting the book. "i have come to the altar of knowledge only to find that it has forsaken me."
an apology of sorts sat on the tip on julian's tongue, but he remained an ever prideful sort of creature so the moment that sibella turned back with an expression devoid of any amusement or merriment - any sort of redemption he might've sought from her died on that dusty italian street. sibella remained a curious woman to him, not one who sought out the voyeuristic, lavish activies that other courtiers gorged themselves on ( as her own brother did ) nor was she whispered of as a coy beauty the way her sister was spoken of in the halls of hampton. sibella percy remained on the fringes of his realm within court since her return in months prior, and aside from their encounter previously - julia knew nothing of her.
he supposed that he knew now that she spoke a bevvy of languages, wrote in a similar fashion to a man driven mad, and held a grudge far sharper than most woman of her standing.
" perhaps for cecil, he is rather fond of a maiden untouched in god's garden," he mused, eyes drawn to the soap in her hand - what an endearing gift for sibella to procure for her kin. " and how shall you explain away where it was that you plucked such a peculiar gift for her?" julian watched her brush past him, the faint scent of her caught on the wind and teased at his senses. a faint quirk of his lips before he followed behind her, his longer stride catching her quickly. " alms? surely - you must not have dared to drag me about the city to simply give alms, lady percy."
sibella shouldered on wordlessly, neglecting to acknowledge neither his innuendo-seeped comment, nor his question. she did not have an answer for it; but she would rather have him believe that it had fallen on unhearing ears than admit ignorance. and yet it was his final remark that made her stop abruptly.
"my lord," she replied through gritted teeth, "i regret to inform you that i am but a simple christian. i have no motives other than charity. i needn't remind you that i am also a maiden, without polite freedoms to do as i please. i requested a chaperone from cecil, and while his fondness for unsullied maidens might have enticed him to escort me, fate saw to it that it would be you instead. you do not even have to join me. we need only to be in each other's proximity. and believe me," she says finally, turning toward the monastery. "it is as arduous for you as it is for me." she disappeared behind the oak doors.
sibella emerged from the complex, a pensive thought haunting her brow as she made her way to her chaperone. but where there once was an abundance of florentine sun was replaced by swaths of threatening grey, and rain began to pour down mercilessly. she seized his hand and sprinted towards the monastery chapel, and broke away once they were safely inside. "we shall wait it out here," she mused, taking in her surroundings. then she turned to him: dark ringlets glistened, soaked clothes clung to his frame, damp bronzed skin glowed in the candlelight. her breath hitched.
𝐒𝐓𝐀𝐓𝐔𝐒. closed to @bdwilliamshakes 𝐋𝐎𝐂𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍. greenwich palace, a private dinner of courtiers 𝐃𝐀𝐓𝐄 & 𝐓𝐈𝐌𝐄. december 1559, yuletide feast, near midnight
the sumptuous dinner table had been pushed to the edges of the room to make way for impromptu dancing, encouraged by lady hastings, who never refused the opportunity display her wanton talents. before the proceedings of autumn she'd been virtually unknown at court, but a shadow upon the wall known as edmund percy's other sister, another body that filled the halls of king william's court. but upon this private invitation from the hastings, sibella's suspicions were confirmed: her mother's scheming and plotting had indeed succeeded.
though wine flowed freely all throughout the dinner, the byzantine walls of her usual facade would not let. she would not be tempted into impolite conversation, nor would she allow herself to drunkenly expose the contents of her heart to those she did not trust. her resolve would have kept her silent for the entire night had she not spotted a figure in the corner. percy blue skirts swayed across the room to meet him. "master shakespeare," sibella greets, awe in her voice, as if to say, we finally meet. she glanced over her shoulder at the festivities, and turned to him with upturned lips, amused that she would find him on the dark fringes of the room, a mere observer and decidedly not a participant. "i had believed poets to to be in possession of a proclivity for dancing, for is it not a kind of corporeal poetry? there is at least, logic in my feet of lead, for as you know i am a woman of reason, and must be persuaded into a dance. i can find no justification in your stillness."
𝐒𝐈𝐁𝐄𝐋𝐋𝐀 𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐂𝐘: 𝐀 𝐖𝐄𝐀𝐕𝐄𝐃 𝐖𝐄𝐁 (2/?) | la religieuse (1967) / "the dialogue of desire and guilt" (1998), j.d. mcclatchy / the miniaturist (2017) / fish in exile, vi khi nao / tracery (bronze, 2016) by timothy cleary / if not, winter: fragments of sappho, sappho translated by anne carson / the passengers of the night (2022) / "heritage," calling a wolf a wolf, kaveh akbar / adam and eve (detail, oil on panel, 1528) by lucas cranach the elder / the diary of anäis nin 1939-1944, anäis nin
𝐏𝐀𝐔𝐋𝐄𝐓-𝐃𝐄 𝐕𝐄𝐑𝐄 𝐅𝐀𝐌𝐈𝐋𝐘 𝐓𝐑𝐄𝐄. (insp.)
see below for notes and details for third generation. see image descriptions for accessible graphic text and faceclaim information.
julian de vere and mary hatt met in 1548 and after a short courtship, married the same year. mary gave birth to their first child and only son, gideon, in 1551. in 1553, katherine was born. three years later, mary succumbed to an unexplained sickness. shortly before the death of his father in 1557, julian succeeded him as both earl of oxford and lord great chamberlain.
julian met sibella percy, the youngest daughter of privy council member james percy, duke of northumberland, in 1559. shortly after meeting they began a two year-long courtship. while there is evidence of both mutual romantic feelings and a marriage proposal, sibella ultimately married tobias paulet, marquess of winchester in january of 1563. their only child and son, edmund paulet, earl of wiltshire, was born in november of the same year. in june of the following year, tobias died from tuberculosis. his son succeeded him as marquess of winchester, but with no near male relatives, his mother governed the marquessate in his stead until he turned eighteen.
in 1566, shortly after the death of her father in february, sibella and julian rekindled their romance and married. in december, sibella gave birth to twins: emmanuel de vere, lord vere and lady esther vere.
in 1573, gideon de vere married anne gamage. they had three children (in birth order from left to right):
in 1578, katherine de vere married james devereux, earl of essex. they had three children (in birth order from left to right):
additionally, in 1578, sibella's brother, edmund percy, duke of northumberland died. henry percy, his only son with his wife, katherine brandon, succeeded him at the age of 16 and becomes sibella's ward. he died to smallpox two years later. (not pictured, see howard-percy family tree)
in 1587, edmund paulet married georgiana daubeny. they had five children (in birth order from left to right):
emmanuel de vere died unmarried due to sweating sickness in 1612. it is believed that he fathered a number of children with numerous women; the best known is katherine wainwright, likely born between 1605 and 1609. her mother is unknown. after her father's death she became a ward of his twin sister, esther. (see leftmost below).
in 1589, esther de vere married andrew talbot, earl of shrewsbury. they had ten children that survived past infancy, but only two that make it to adulthood (in birth order from second left to right):
It had been a lucky guess, a drawn arrow plucked into the midnight mass of secrets that emerged from innocent lips in waves of succulent gossip. But her reserved modesty seemed to rub against Héléne’s efforts of seduction, her eyes then narrowed with an annoyance that only coloured the maid of honour as stubborn as she had been rumoured to be. Still, she put on a smile, tilting her head to one side as Lady Percy looked around the room in some lost dream, a goal thus misplaced, a target already passed. Love, it seemed, made anyone do such reckless things — or so, that was yet another assumption, for what else would confuse a girl as intelligent looking as she but the matter of the heart? Héléne had never been so close to the affairs, however, for having her heart broken by the death of her father and then her mother in quick succession, she thought only to hold her heart at arm’s length, to keep a great manner of emotions then deep beneath the surface.
“Oh, I am glad to see that you are feeling well enough to join us then, my Lady,” she added with haste, before taking a cup of wine for herself — a jar of water then presented in the other hand to slip against the table, her body joining the other’s despite the lack of invitation. And though Héléne did not mean to test the friendliness of the girl in question, it was as if there was something poked out from beyond the precipice, something important looming in the background. With a smile, she poured the water, her eyes then dropping to concentrate instead. “Alnwick, is that where you grew up?” She asked, deciding on perhaps a different tactic.
like a beam of light aimed toward a divinely shaped crystal, sibella’s thoughts were scattered in the hollows of her mind. though she held the same ill opinion of every other sumptuous feast held at hampton court, not even the iberian perfumery of this particular fete could pique her interest. the presence of mary tudor might have stoked the flames of her catholic heart. and yet, she found an anglican had the thing firmly in his grip. sibella continued to comb through each face that passed. but everblue eyes only returned to her counterpart perhaps bluer than before. “only just,” she offered weakly, in part to maintain the masquerade, and to mask the grimace that came with the surprise at suddenly feeling the weight of héléne’s body against hers, velvet gown against brocade dress. so accustomed to navigating this world on her own, sibella considered herself an isle; rarely did she allow another to grace her shores. and when an intruder pressed their toes in her sands, she could not help but be on alert.
for all of her caution, sibella channeled her elder sister and maintained her poised demeanor even as héléne’s own eyes diverted towards the cup in front of them. sibella, too, watched carefully as she poured the water, her gaze focused on the frenchwoman’s svelte fingers assuredly fixed on the pitcher and cup. “indeed, my lady,” she replied without pomp. “alnwick castle is the seat of my father’s dukedom. he grew up there, as did my siblings, more or less.” as héléne set the pitcher down, sibella grasped the cup in her hands and took a sip almost immediately, more so as a sign of good faith than a needed refreshment. “it is near the anglo-scottish border. have you ever traveled north of london?”
There was nothing Bridget Parr loved more than a celebration; a crowd of people making merry into the wee hours of the morning filled her heart with joy, and when the pageant was announced, she had thought she might burst! Her choice of goddess was immediate, much to her father's chagrin, and she had met with her seamstress at once, sketching out the exact image she had pictured in her mind from the moment she made her decision. The thin fabric clung to her breasts and hips, the silk providing almost a second skin save for the wings of the knots tired about her shoulders and waist, secure enough so that nothing would budge as she performed a sensual dance conveying the passion of a pair of ill-fated lovers, but not so secure that they could not come undone if one were to make that their intent.
It took her a moment to recognize the younger Lady Percy, as the specific vision of Sibella that lived in Bridget's mind's eye was a more modest and reserved lady, but her eyes lit with delight when she realized that the other young woman had thrown herself into the theme head-first. "As have you and yours, Lady Nyx," Bridget replied, giving Sibella a nod of approval. "I must admit, I am suprised by your attire, but ever so glad to see you out of your shell! Perhaps the arrival of our French counterparts has inspired you?" She giggled lightly as their arms intertwined, placing her hand atop Sibella's. "The evening has only begun..." Bridget glanced about the room, musing upon Sibella's question. "I am most interested in whom might seek to tether themselves to you and I." She looked back to Sibella to gauge her reaction. "Shall I employ my talents on your behalf, Sibella?"
sibella's cheeks flushed at the unfamiliar breeze against her bosom as she walked amongst the courtiers. their condemning eyes caused fear and whispers of shame to creep up her neck. she thought it laughably ironic that it was only now that their attentions fell on her now, a wallflower in spring bloom, blessed stigma on full display. and yet bridget's approval gave her a kind of comfort she thought she'd never require. "why thank you," sibella replied, a almost-drunken giggle escaping her lips. "though i hesitate to allow myself to give the french credit," of any kind, she thought to herself, espeically where it concerns my person and my fashion decisions. and yet, even madeleine de limeuil's costume technically covers the entirety of her chest, though one does not have to wonder if the occasional indiscretion is but a faux pas and not instead a clever design. "i must admit, i do feel inspired this evening."
she could not deny the ache that reverberated through her neck after craning it to get a better view of the merry crowd that gathered in the great hall. and yet amongst the sea of courtiers she could not find the tousseled black waves that she adored ever so. nor could she hear the husk of his voice. she would hear it in spite of the racuous noise that filled the room, she would hear him if he was miles away, across the world. and yet... "as the primordial goddess of the night i have a consort, with whom i birthed day, doom, death, dreams, among others. but he seems absent tonight." she could not hide the disappointment in her voice, nor the minute slump of her shoulders at the revelation he was not there. her shadowy disposition was replaced by a look of feigned thought. "as such, i am most compelled to see whom you will grant your favor. but, if you wish to spend your talents on me, i am most curious to see who you'd pick as my match."
Fiercely accomplished was Sibella in the art of surveillance; she spoke low in the words she dropped to them, yet the hum of woman's voice pervaded, through the whole conventual ground. James had not been inspired to think of her as more than an academic; but she caught all imitation of things transpiring. Sibella had caught a glimpse of something remote and deceptive, of Thomas' transactions; his pulse quickened at the potential suspicion busy in her mind. "God help us." He had occasion to smile - nay to laugh - at incredulity as the madame continued. "I wish you sought us in some feeble matter; the transgressions of the heart, would be better than this - but continue my lady, and let us bear your findings with as much grace as possible.
A delicious little plot lay tempting her to disentangle -- in the midst, folded round the cobwebs, were secured James and Thomas. The Florentines undoubtedly boasted this exploit as a miracle - he wished Edward's existence to be nothing more than a holy man's extravagances; he knew this, not to be true. "Edward lives." The name alone was burning hot; his temples and heart throbbed so fast, that James knew his later sleep would be broken with excitement. Prudence recommended henceforward a swift clearance of their persons from this place -- he felt a stronger call to to the task of taking up testimony to the King. To tell him the truth? What was the use of tempting such a catastrophe? To lie; Sibella was safe as a spy in her love-poverty, but he and Thomas, a grief was shared in the heart between them. Complicated, disquieting thoughts of losing his head and thus Alice, broke up the whole repose of his nature. "Does Julian know?" James commenced, quiet as a church mouse -- he owned he should have felt a much greater difficulty in moving forward; but finding the path straight and orderly, he continued. "And these reports; of those who know - are they ardent to divulge this secret? Are any of this Edward's desires, known? Shall he live in quiet; or shall he emerge as a claim to the crown?"
His stomach dropped, his eyes lingering upon Lady Percy who presented herself in the same way a councilman would do. Without the fear, or the tempering ache of what was to come, perhaps he would’ve found some admiration for how she held herself before the two men, how she came to the table with her own seasoned intellect — before she had been sent alongside the men who acted on behalf of the King and the Lady Regent, he had barely known of whom she was other than the known fact that she was from the Percy household, who raised alongside many other ambitious noble families to stake a place upon the King’s inner circles. Indeed, Thomas hadn’t really known of her existence. But her knowledge and methods of presenting herself within Florence was enough to leave him bolstered, so much so that perhaps he could offer her some role as guardian to his only child and daughter, Cecily.
But, he would think of that later when the existence of his head was not put into question. For then, within that room that seemed thick with unbridled tension, Thomas could only think of this ghost of a babe he had once huddled from London to Essex, a babe now grown into a man placed in some sense of martyrdom against the break with Rome. Lowering his gaze then to the table itself as James moved into action, his voice filtering into nothing but a background haze, her jaw then clenched till he went to grind the back of his teeth.
“He will be displayed as some alternative to a Boleyn child, that is for sure…” With a grumble, he moved to sit himself up straight, his hands then flush against the table top as he turned his head to look at James, his eyes searching for his — his sudden need for action an unstoppable wrench in his attention. “I won’t put you in a situation, nor Julian, nor Lady Percy, that means you to toe the line of honesty. But I ask you, we must keep this under wraps till I can arrange safe passage for Penelope and Cecily…” With another curse, he banged the table beneath his fists, scraping his chair back against wood to rise to his feet, his hands then pushed through his hair as he began to pace behind the table before he faced Lady Percy at last, his gaze sincere if not overwhelmed with stress. “Thank you, my Lady. You have done us a grand service… Where is Julian? Have you seen him?”
as if time itself slowed, sibella watched as their placid complexions morph into furrowed brows and flushed cheeks. her own face, too, burned. but it was not in reaction to the news of edward seymour that caused the blood to creep up her neck, but at the mention of the man whose wrist she tied her silk ribbon around like a joust favor. hearing his name without ornament or formality confirmed what she suspected when he told her of walsingham's stake in the existence of the seymour child: that they cared for each other past what was required of their position as kingsmen, but as if they were bound by blood. "lord ox— ju—" her tongue stumbled on her own newfound familiarity, flustered at the feeling of his name in her mouth. her heart lurched at the thought of him, mere feet away in the next room. "he knows." she continued on, eager to push him out of her mind if it meant not revealing her heart to these men that she hardly knew.
"the prior is a gossip yet he only divulged the confirmation because of our friendship. but he knows not of edward's own aspirations, or even his motivations for coming to florence after all these years, no sooner or later. he is still young, only a year older than i. there are rumors that cosimo de' medici means to use his presence as a kind of bargaining chip in the ongoing papal election, and if he cannot secure his cousin upon the cathedra, he means to entice the king to come to his aid if the papal army were to encroach upon florence's city walls. should king william refuse..." she trailed off, trusting that they could fill in the blank. "that, gentlemen, is all that i know." there may have been a time that she would taken pride in delivering such precocious information that she acquired on her own to men that outranked her, but only the silver threads of solemnity were woven in her voice. she kept silent now, watching the scene unfold before her until again she was adressed again. "he is resting," she replies, glancing to the closed door. her eyes returned to walsingham, taking a moment to study his face. "but might i say, sir, that if you required anything of me, you need only ask." her heart was bound to the other man in the complex and thus she, too, was now bound to them in this secret. @jamescecils
The lady proving herself acquiescent to his request, William leveled Sibella with a regal, wordless nod, the easy apathy splayed across his countenance indicating to no one the intimate parley that was to follow. With the hand still lightly resting on her elbow, the King steered her in the direction of the large, oak doors, manned by a pair of sentinels adorned in rich livery, pried open at the sight of the sovereign approaching. Once out of sight, William dropped his hand from his arm – allowing distance to form a healthy cleft between himself and Ned’s sister. A wholesome shift, of course, from his procedures with the elder Percy girl. ‘I did not intend to tear you away from your luncheon. I found the atmosphere too stifling for us to speak freely. Are you still hungry?’ He asked, tossing Sibella a sidelong glance. The girl was tall enough that he could amble with long, confident strides – fingers flexing at his thighs with otherwise-veiled anticipation. ‘You may speak freely with me, Sibella. In your travels, you are my superior; and in gratitude for your service and truth, I am your humble servant. You need only tell me what you desire in turn.’
sibella followed frictionlessly as she was lead to a room that was likely too familiar to men of importance like her father or her uncle or her brother. women such as she were rarely ever given the chance to see behind the spectacle. but as the oak doors closed, she found herself opposite her king. she shakes her head without speaking in response to his question, her stomach hollow and empty for she knew what she must now do. "you wish to corroborate my knowledge with that of your councilmen," sibella stated plainly, the tone of her voice neglecting to turn upwards in question. it's then that she envisioned herself at two roads diverged in an autumn wood, the foreseeable paths swathed in identical sunrise'd blurs. she'd had time to consider if this path she would take, with julian's hand tugging her along, was truly the way to keep thomas upon this earth. but the fact was this: she knew not of all of the details of the story, and she would not find it in any novel. "i don't require anything in return. your constant kindness to my family more than fills my cup."
sibella had never anticipated ever blindly putting faith in someone that was not god, but began her story much the same as she did when she spoke with cecil and walsingham: "when i last traveled to florence, i fostered a friendship with the prior of il convento di san marco who, as prior, is often involved in the medicis' business and biddings." she paused a moment, and deviated. "when asked upon edward seymour, he confided in me that the man housed in their palazzo is not who they claim him to be. the rumor is thus: the man they house is cosimo de' medici's bastard son whom he fathered before his marriage. his mother, like jane seymour, was fair-haired and blue-eyed, her son likewise. seeking a more advantageous life after her death, he has appeared at his father's door, opportunity in hand. the prior believes that the duke of florence, against all advice and counsel, means to use the rumor of the lost child as a bargaining chip in the ongoing papal election, of which his cousin is nipping at the heels of the current frontrunner. in my humble opinion it is a flawed rumor. but all of rome is restless for it to be over that such an enticing idea would be enough to sway enough members of the curia."
a letter delivered to @bdwilliamshakes, dated late november 1559. the folded parchment is delivered to master shakespeare's quarters by a percy page near midnight, after dinner has concluded. sibella's usual neat handwriting is replaced by uncharacteristic scribbles and multiple lines of redacted text. as he opens the letter, he finds that the last lines and her signature are almost illegible, as she did not allow time for the ink to dry.
master shakespeare,
i am writing to you with utmost urgency as i am in need of advice. i apologize beforehand for my unladylike familiarity, as we are not properly introduced though i have been an audience to your work for as long as i have been at court. upon finishing your poem a lover's complaint, i have decided that only you have ownership of the wisdom that i seek. i hope that you forgive my transgressions and illuminate my young and naive mind.
i once believed that i would never dally in matters of the heart. my sister oft attributed it to a myriad of things: my preference for books over people and our isolated upbringing near the english-scottish border among them. even when i came of age and made my introduction at court, i half-expected some fine courtier to sweep me off of my feet, or at least ask my father for my hand. instead these two years have been filled with no affection of the romantic sort, until now.
our meeting was never proper and it previously brought me much grief. in fact, he came upon me in a moment of unbearable grief, much like the narrator and the young lady in the poem. and yet i find that he is moreso the casanova over whom the woman grieves than the old man to whom she grieves. i say that more so in the sense that he is beloved by those who know him, though i have witnessed one too many a volta that my heart breaks with each step, only to be mended if i might take the lady's place. i even listen intently now to my father's eludication of council meetings to seek the thrill of hearing his name; i peer through his papers so i might see his hand and feel close to him. oh, master shakespeare, i have been consumed!
and it is this, precisely, that i fear. i do not wish to become the pitiful protagonist, so devoured by her love that her honor be shattered irreparably. i do not believe that he would lead me to such a trap, for i believe that he is an honorable man. but could one love with only the heart and not the body? for all of his loveliness, both inside and out, i do not wish to lay with him, but i wish to spend my life with him — are those two things not one in the same?
most sincerely,
𝐒𝐓𝐀𝐓𝐔𝐒. closed to @bridgctparr 𝐋𝐎𝐂𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍. great hall, hampton court palace 𝐃𝐀𝐓𝐄 & 𝐓𝐈𝐌𝐄. evening, 23 november 1559
all of king william's courtiers gathered in the great hall as soon as the sun began to set, buzzing with the sensual exhiliration of discarding their stuffy court fashions for those of the ancients. though she had conspired soberly with her seamstress to create her raunchy ensemble, it required more than a few glasses of wine to put the thing on, and an additional glass to leave her apartments. like night herself she kept to the outskirts of the room, sneaking figs off of their platters and placing them promptly in her mouth, the juices bursting into her mouth. sibella spotted a familiar bundle of blonde curls accented with red roses. "mademoiselle peithos!" she exclaims, making her way over to her.
"my, my, how stunning you look," sibella mused giddily. "you and your seamstress have certainly outdone yourselves." as daughters of the nobility they were acquainted with the other. though the two ladies were more than unalike, bridget was her unlikely savior during her brief stay at the french court. the french courtiers were heathens and hedonists and the blonde reveled in their customs but her blood was english, and that was solace enough. with bridget's guidance she navigated the french court with less friction than before, and were it not for her nor the splendor, she would have recalled her time there even less than fondly. "now tell me, my lady peithos," she grinned, interlocking their arms. "see you any fledgling lovers you'd tether together? or more interestingly, any you'd see flung apart?"
𝐒𝐓𝐀𝐓𝐔𝐒. closed to @julicnn 𝐋𝐎𝐂𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍. great hall, hampton court palace 𝐃𝐀𝐓𝐄 & 𝐓𝐈𝐌𝐄. evening, 23 november 1559
as lady richmond finished her opening remarks, sibella slowly ascended the stage alone, the onyx silk of her dress trailing behind her. the first slow strums of the lute resounded throughout the great hall and she begins to move her arms and hips in accordance, depicting the creation myth of chaos, of whom her character was born. her costume was wildly unlike anything she deigned to wear before. where she'd altered isobel's dresses to conceal her décolletage, the entirety of her endowment was exposed for all of court to see. it exhilarated her, however, knowing that one person might see her in all her glory. from the dais she scans the room underneath the sheer of her eyelashes, her eyes pausing a moment on every costumed gentleman before deciding that he was not the one she sought. with the last notes of the ominous hymn she finished her dance to roaring applause, though in her mind she attributed that to freefalling wine than her performance.
exiting the stage and immersing herself in the crowd, her feet carry her to him. she's stopped by a vision of a man in swaths of dark grey fabric, the hair on his head so perfectly tousseled that she may have believed that a deity was before her. she instantly recognized him as her counterpart and delighted in the fact that perhaps there was some unspoken invisible tether between them, or that maybe he'd made his decision based on hers. such devotion was once unknown to her and now she reveled in it. she took a sip of wine from the glass she held and set it down on some table, praying that it might embolden her. "my lord erebus," sibella called from behind. "i thought i might find you in the shadows, or perhaps greeting lost souls to the underworld." she stopped a passerby servant with a plate full of figs and took two. she offered one to him, and she took a slow bite out of the other, never once deterring her eyes from his.
𝐒𝐈𝐁𝐄𝐋𝐋𝐀 𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐂𝐘 𝐀𝐓 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐆𝐎𝐃𝐃𝐄𝐒𝐒 𝐏𝐀𝐆𝐄𝐀𝐍𝐓 is another record of the youngest percy's fashions albeit they are not so thorough as other event ensembles. sibella percy's writings are comparably scant from november 1559, when the goddess pageant took place, and january 1561. it is widely accepted that she destroyed these writings, as opposed to having not written at all in this two year span.
however, according to court records, sibella attended the pageant as nyx, the primordial goddess of night. temperance shackleton, the tailor to whom the percys of northumberland frequented, wrote sibella's ensemble required a bolt of thin black silk. a tie was made to create a halter around her neck, and the fabric was draped into a floor-sweeping dress to drape upwards into a head covering. temperance noted that it was worn without any undergarments save for a simple black cotton petticoat. having her breasts exposed was a sharp divergence from her usual dressing tendencies, as shackleton's records are full of alterations to make secondhand gowns more modest. the simple yet daring dress was paired with a band of diamond stars, worn across her forehead.
court chroniclers wrote that, as she was portraying the first child of chaos and a goddess present at creation, she opened the pageant with a solo dance to a sensual lute tune. they note that for most of the night, her attentions and affections were focused on the man dressed as her consort, erebus. — 𝐗𝐀𝐍𝐃𝐑𝐀 𝐌𝐔𝐑𝐑𝐀𝐘, 𝐅𝐀𝐒𝐇𝐈𝐎𝐍 𝐈𝐍 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐂𝐎𝐔𝐑𝐓 𝐎𝐅 𝐊𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐖𝐈𝐋𝐋𝐈𝐀𝐌 𝐈𝐈𝐈
She had learned through whispers and gossip, a tactic often overlooked by many, that the few who had been sent from court but not to Dover during the King’s absence, consisted of three esteemed council men and an almost unknown, Lady Percy. Through inquiry she had mapped the House of Percy through tongue and ear, listening to the rumours that surrounded this ambitious, over-reaching family that seemed to extend their fingers to wrap finally around the King’s own ankles.
Well, what did she expect? They were hedonists diverted from the one true faith, broken by the desire and lust of their previous King and the mother of the current. She had heard, whether it was true or not, that the parents had always been ones to sup at the feet of their masters, to breed their children into making further claims in the higher echelons of society. She had heard it as: one daughter for the King, a son for his table and another for reservation in case the first yet died. But, what did Héléne herself know of family? She was an orphan adopted by a step-father, with dead siblings for all but one who lived in the battlefields of Italy. She wasn’t one to judge on that front, but the faith and the ambition was quite enough for Héléne to draw her battle lines.
With manipulation, she made sure to meet Lady Percy during the festivities that celebrated the Iberian royal family — an oddity, perhaps, if one was to muse on the idea of Mary Tudor as the only true claimant to the English throne. Steadying her trained precision, she approached, her blue and white visage matched with a similarly embroidered French Hood that veiled long, thick black hair. “You are not drinking, my Lady. May I tempt you with something? I have heard that if it was not for you, and your immeasurable talent, that English would be in quite a position,” Héléne charmed in English, her mother-tongue set aside. @unconqucred
sibella passed through the great hall with an inquisitive eye, recalling a smaller number of courtiers prior to her return than the crowd present at the feast. a scan of the room quickly made it clear that there were nearly as many spanish and french courtiers as there were english. vaguely familiar faces peppered the hall and the sweet sound of the continental languages titillated her eardrums. she would have been eager to sink her teeth in a foreign conversation if her mind were not otherwise occupied. cerulean eyes once-overed the sea of people, searching for the face that she had since committed to blessed memory.
instead before her she found lady héléne, a figure with whom she'd be completely unfamiliar if it were not for her travels. her brief months at the french court were hardly spent in any proximity to the serpent queen and her household of vipers. yet, it was no secret how they slithered; no amount of resplendent fashions could disguise their scales. "alas, i am not very easily tempted," sibella replies politely. her hand enclosed over a glass of the plainest ale, she raises it to her eyeline, as if toasting to their acquaintance.
"even if i were, my doctor has recommended only ale as i recover from a recent malady. what you have heard — though i cannot imagine from whom — is an inaccurate folly." she gritted her teeth and pushed the lie through the slim gaps. "if i were not a horrid liar and an adherent to the truth i would claim the story, as it does illuminate my modest talents. in complete truth i was indisposed and away at my family's home in alnwick. it is a mere coincidence that my absence concurred with that of the king's council."
OPEN STARTER
location : hampton gardens
IT WAS ON DAYS like these where Sisi understood why she had agreed to come to court with her brother. With the sun on her skin, a rarity with the recent drab weather, she felt the rare commodity of warmth, even with the chill air and breeze. So far away from home, the english court seemed odd and foreign. Which it was, odd and foreign, but she had found ways to adapt. Her accent ridden english did not seem to bother most, and she had found ways to occupy her time. Sisi had particularly found that gardens in this instance.
Pale hands held up the skirts as she walked through the garden, blue eyes scanning over almost each and every flower that was planted. While politics may be a man’s game, flowers were certainly some woman’s game. Sisi had a pension for both, but as of now she was appreciating the latter. The assortment of red roses had fascinated her so much, the German woman almost didn’t notice the person approaching.
“The gardens are quite beautiful, are they not?” Sisi hummed as she looked between the person approaching and the flowers. “I’m quite jealous of the sprawl of it all. The ones back home are quite small and they pale in comparison.”
despite the chill of november, sibella seemed to prefer it over the suffocating halls of hampton court palace. her mind and her heart had been clouded as of late. she stumbled over written words, misplaced items of daily use — she'd practically succumbed to uselessness. sarah, her maid, had jokingly suggested that a walk amongst the flora and fauna would shock her system into place. yet sibella was willing to try anything before people began to notice her off-kilter behavior since her return to court. wrapped in fur, the pair set out for the trimmed gardens, the gravel crunching beneath their feet. gloved hands cradled her latest read as furrowed brows willed her mind into concentration, sarah following dutifully behind.
a voice, tinged with an vaguely familiar accent, pulled her attention away from the text. (admittedly it was not a difficult task.) "indeed," she mused. "gardens upon the continent cannot hold a candle next to that of his majesty's, though if you find this scene impressive, you must return in the summer, when the gardens are at their most magnificent."
a letter delivered to @julicnn, dated late november 1559. it is delivered by a percy page during a council meeting alongside a letter from the duchess of northumberland adressed to her husband, and placed in front of the lord great chamberlain without ceremony. the parchment is scented with the youngest percy's signature scent of tuberose and myrtle, the perfume drops carefully placed so as not to smudge the ink. as lord oxford breaks the percy blue seal, a single cyclamen bloom tumbles from the folds, freshly plucked from the king's gardens.
julian,
i have sat alone at my writing desk for nearly an hour attempting to convey with exquisite precision how my heart moves for you. for all my fine education and erudition, i am sorry to say that i have failed thus far. and yet i would conjecture that such exact words have yet to be created or discovered by his majesty the king's finest wordsmiths. but i will muster on with this letter, for as my heart longs for you, it too longs to make itself and its feelings known to you. but know that whatever i may impart to you, i feel tenfold. perhaps more.
though our business there was less than pleasant, when i feel the now-familiar tug at my breast i return to the dusty streets of florence. oh, julian, god has forsaken you! for you will never know how divine you seemed underneath that continental sun. forgive my blasphemy, or perhaps it is my bias, but you were more seraphim than man beneath the chapel’s candlelight. i admit that, with the exception of that afternoon i do not recall the expedition fondly, especially with this damning knowledge rattling in my mind. but i am content to suffer if it means that those for whom you care are protected under this omission.
it pains me when we pass in the halls under pretense of hatred, or worse: indifference. with time the lead in my shoes has dissolved and my desire to dance with you is stronger than that to grieve the loss of my dearest aunt. though i understand if you do not wish to dance with me in the open; i will not pretend to understand council politics with the death of my father’s sister somewhat fresh in our memories. you did not know her, and i know you believe her to be a traitor, but the one thing she longed for above all was my happiness. i know she is at peace knowing that i have found the thing in you. i would be happy dance in the gardens, in the dark, in the stables even, so long as it meant that i could dance with you.
i would write more but i fear i might write in circles. if i felt less perhaps i might have been able to write more.
most ardently yours,