For a Queen's Love: The Stories of the Royal Wives of Philip II

was good to be a prince; but the best thing in the world was to be Leonor’s little Philip.

His mother loved him too; but he wished that he did not know so much; he wished that he did not know she loved him so much partly because he had been born a boy, because he had not died—as everyone had expected—and because every time she looked at him she remembered that she had done her duty to her lord and to her country. Yet he felt that part of her love was his because he was her little boy.

She never petted him as Leonor did. Always when he saw her he must kneel before her and kiss the hem of her robe. He must remember ceremony before love.

Often she talked to him of his great duties.

“Never forget that you are a prince of Spain. Even if you have brothers, you will still be the heir to the crown. You must be more like your father than any.”

“Why do I never see my father, your Highness?” he asked.

“Because he is far away. Your father is not only the King of Spain; he is Emperor of almost the whole of the world. That means that he cannot stay long in one place. He must roam the Empire, defending it.”

“Why does my father own half the world, your Highness?”

“Because he inherited it … as you will. It came to him through his father and mother; and his father was called Philip as you are.”

The boy liked that. He wanted to know more of this Philip.

“He was called Philip the Handsome because he was beautiful. He was fair and many loved him. Your grandmother loved him very dearly …”

Isabella’s face altered when she spoke of Mad Juana, and Philip missed little. He had heard voices other than his mother’s change when his grandmother was mentioned. He wished to know more about the mystery which surrounded her, the Queen who had brought the crown of Spain to his father. But Philip did not ask the question point blank. He already knew that if he wished to take people off their guard it was better to approach a subject by devious means.

“And Philip the Handsome died, did he not?”

“He died long ago.”

“And my grandmother … did she die too?”

There was the faintest hesitation, which the boy was not slow to notice. “Yes; she is dead, my son.”

For dead she was, thought Isabella, dead to the world, living her strange existence in the Alcazar of Tordesillas, surrounded by those who were really her keepers, frenziedly gay at times, at others lost in the depth of her melancholy.

The little boy looked into his mother’s face. One day he would discover more of this strange grandmother whose name seemed to have such an effect on everyone who heard it.

“Tell me of my father and his wars,” he said.

She was eager to tell, for she knew that his father wished him to learn quickly all that was happening on the continent of Europe.

“Your father has many enemies, my son, for when a king and an emperor is rich in his rightful possessions there are many to envy him. Through his father—Philip, your namesake—he inherited Austria, and that means that he is continually at war with the German Princes who seek to take his lands from him. Through your grandfather, your father inherited the Duchy of Burgundy as well as Milan; and in France there is a wicked king who wishes to take these from him. So, as well as the German Princes, you father has to fight this wicked French King.”

“But my father always wins.”

“Your father always wins.”

The little brow was puckered. “Why does he not kill the wicked French King and the German Princes? Then he would not have to fight them, and could be here with us.”

“Once he caught the French King and brought him to Madrid. But kings do not kill kings. They make treaties. Your father sought to make peace with the French King so that all might be well between them; but the French King did not keep his word, and when your father released him, he went back to France and his little sons became your father’s prisoners.” Isabella smiled at her son’s eagerness to hear more of these French Princes. “Yes,” she went on; “little Francis and little Henry came to be your father’s prisoners in place of their father.”

“Your Highness,” cried Philip, betraying a little of his excitement, “if my father had been the prisoner of the King of France, would he not have taken him to France and should I not have had to go in his place?”

This was one of the moments when he betrayed his youth and his folly. His mother was looking at him in astonishment.

“Your father could never be the prisoner of anyone. Your father is the greatest ruler in the world.”

The little boy blushed a deep pink. It was so easy to make mistakes.

Now he could ask no more about the little French boys who had been his father’s prisoners. But he knew that his Aunt Eleonore had become their stepmother. He wondered if they asked their stepmother—who was his father’s sister—about their father.

His mother said, softening as she saw his dismay: “There is not only the King of France to plague your father; there is also the wicked King of England.”

He nodded. He had heard of that King. His father distrusted the King of England, who was making a lot of trouble by being unkind to Philip’s great-aunt, Queen Catharine.

“One day, my son, all these tasks will fall to your lot. One day you will have to face them as your father does now.”

He knew it. Always the talk came back to that. It was the recurring theme. Already, although he was not yet