Disclaimer: I still don't own anything... People must think that us FanFiction authors are such hobos!

A/N: Okay, another inexcusable long wait between updates, I know. However, now that I completed a 65km hike through the French countryside and took all of my exams, I am now freer than ever to continue this story! I don't know when I'll decide to end this fic, but I still have some plans for it, so keep an eye out for at least a couple more updates in the near future! Also, for the purposes of this story, Mary only has one daughter, Annie, who is about 6 in this fic. Also note that this fic becomes extremely AU from this point, as I shall make the Pilgrimage of Grace a much larger rebellion, almost like a mini war.

Chapter 12: More Than Just an Uprising

Mary Boleyn was extremely relieved to see her once close sister Anne step out of the grand carriage she had arrived at the palace in, and also satisfied that the King was helping his wife out. She remembered the days when it was she warming Henry's bed, though lacking the social security that Anne now had as his Queen. Mary did not envy Anne, since the security that Anne had was not yet sealed with her lack of a son, but she only wished the best for her sister. She had not been surprised to learn soon after her arrival at Court that her overly ambitious father had finally lost it, and was to be confined in the Tower until further notice. Mary winced at the memory of her father's menacing hands after he had learned that the King no longer wished for her company. George Boleyn dismounted his dark brown mount soon after the royal couple entered the palace, greeting his now much maturer sister. They met in a tight embrace.

"Mary, I'm so glad you got my letter in time. I was worried that you might have changed your address since the last time I had heard from you," said George, as they broke the hug.

"I would have told you if I was moving!" chided Mary. "I can't believe you think me to be that heartless!"

"Well, I wouldn't have blamed you if you wanted to distance yourself from your prying and controlling family," muttered George sheepishly.

"The past is the past, and I have no regrets about my decision to marry William," brushed off Mary. "Besides, I couldn't just sit by myself at home knowing that Anne was injured and needed my help."

"Alone? What about William and Annie?" asked a puzzled George.

"Well, William was stationed somewhere up north, I think near Lincolnshire. And once I heard that Anne was injured, William's sister was happy to watch Annie for a couple of weeks," explained Mary.

"Lincolnshire?" repeated George distantly. "Isn't there some uprising going on up there?"

"Oh yes, the Duke of Suffolk was telling me about it while I was waiting here for you all to return from Hatfield. He left earlier today with a small group of soldiers to meet up with a larger force to quash the rebellion," replied Mary nonchalantly.

Mary and Charles Brandon had spent a lot of time talking and walking together whilst she was waiting for her sister to arrive back at Court. Mary found that she was very lonely, as she was still a social outcast for marrying a man of such low status against her family's will. They were still unsure if she was still out of the Queen's, and therefore the King's, good graces, and therefore tried to keep their distance. Charles noticed this and tried to spend as much of his free time with her as possible. Or at least that's what Mary kept telling herself, since he seemed to talk with her much longer and with more attention than she had seen him speaking with anyone else, especially for a woman. During their conversations she learned that he had recently annulled his marriage to his wife, whom he had sheepishly revealed had plotted against the Queen, and that he had personally looked through the interviews and evidence of Anne's trial, proving her innocent. Mary had gained a large respect for Charles. She had originally thought that he was another rich, snobby, stuck up, young noble, but he turned out to actually have a brain, and a sense of humor to boot! Charles had grown to be her only friend at Court in her sister's absence, and she was relieved that he was only leaving the day her sister and her entourage would be arriving.

"Erm, Mary? Shouldn't you be worried about William? He is stationed in a hostile post!" George asked worriedly.

"Well, as the wife of a soldier, you learn that you can't work yourself over every little squabble William gets in. And also, the Duke told me that this little uprising should be easily dealt with, and that he doubted that there were going to be any actual casualties," said Mary.

"I hope so Mary, I hope so," agreed George, as they entered the palace together.

Though Anne had been well enough to make the journey from Hatfield back to the palace, it did not keep most everyone close to her from confining her to her bedchamber. Even the normally pushy Norfolk insisted on her staying in her bed for at least another week. Anne, though understanding their good intentions, was flustered that she was being treated like a glass feather. George wouldn't even stand up for her. To make things even more humiliating, Henry decided to gather the entire Court to announce her continual bed rest, causing almost every ambitious courtier to come and pay respects to her at her apartments. When finally the courtier paid their get well wishes and was ushered out the door, Anne flew back on her pillows in exhaustion.

"Thank God that they are all finally gone!" exhaled Anne as she buried her face in her pillows.

The rest of Anne's ladies continued to scramble around her chambers, tidying everything up from all of the visitors and getting ready for the evening meal. During this flurry of activity, Mary slipped into the room unnoticed.

"Then I guess you shan't want me in here then," sarcastically announced Mary. All of the ladies snapped to attention in the room, waiting for their mistress's response. They all knew who Mary was, though no one was sure if she was still disliked by the Queen. They were either ready to throw out or welcome the woman, depending on their Queen's response.

Anne quickly flipped onto her back to see the speaker's face, making sure it was indeed Mary. Realizing after that such quick, jerky movements did not sit well with her current condition, Anne clutched her stomach in agony as her old wound moaned in a dull pain. Everyone, including Mary, rushed forward, trying to glean the condition of the Queen. When she exhaled slowly, it seemed as if she simultaneously deflated all of the tension her previous actions had brought in the room. As she motioned for her ladies to continue their business, she turned her attention to her once disgraced sister.

"Mary! What brings you here to the palace?" Anne asked warmly.

"Well, George sent me a letter while you were still at Hatfield, and you seemed so busy receiving people today that I thought you might need someone to talk to," Mary answered with relief. She was so glad that her younger sister was no longer angry at her (or under the selfish and narrow minded influence of her father, she couldn't tell which one it had been at the time), and that all of that nasty business seemed to be behind them.

"Well, I'm glad that we can finally talk as sisters again," admitted Anne. She blushed sheepishly, "and I am sorry about the way we parted last time. I know that I'm normally the brash one, but that was just so uncalled for Mary, you have to understand! And father had said—"

Mary put her hand up, silencing her sister. "I know you had reason to act like the way you did, but I had my reasons as well. Being known as the Great Prostitute among the nobles did not help my marriage stock, and being married to William Carey the first time was luck in itself. When my William proposed to me, I knew that it was my best chance. A slut with a daughter? That would have never let me have a 'proper' husband again!" laughed Mary. She had come to terms with her situation, and she figured that the rest of her family should as well.

"How is little Annie anyway? I haven't seen her since she was just a baby!" inquired Anne. She had sometimes wondered during her visits to Hatfield if Elizabeth was ever lonely without any other girls her age to play with. Sometimes she regretted not having someone like Annie to be a companion to Elizabeth, something she thought she might amend later. A request, though it should seem like an honor, with that much magnitude seemed too large to ask of her only sister so early in their reunion.

"She's growing up to be such a fine young girl!" beamed Mary proudly. "She's with William's sister now while I'm here with you."

"I'm glad," said Anne, and she sincerely meant it.

"But enough about me, Anne, what about you? After all, the only reason George thought to contact me at all was because of your injury." Mary asked.

"Well, I'm fine now; Dr. Linacre is a master at what he does. They say that William Brereton, one of the men who were accused and confessed to being one of my lovers in my trial, pulled the trigger. He claims it was for God and His Holiness, something that the Church obviously denies. However, the Imperial Ambassador confided to Henry, unofficially because of the Emperor's allegiance with the Church, that they had a hand in the plot," revealed Anne in a low whisper, trying to avoid the prying ears of her ladies-in-waiting.

"And what about things with the King? I mean, he did almost have you executed on false charges!" pushed Mary.

"Henry is, well, being Henry. He admits to having been mistaken, but I think that he has shifted most of the blame to the people who misled him to ease his own conscience. I don't think he'll ever be happy with me until I give him a son, but he hasn't pushed me about it recently. Once I'm out of this bed though, I think I'll find that I'll be in it sooner than I thought," remarked Anne snidely. "Oh, speaking of Henry, he's supposed to come and have supper with me in my chambers tonight, so I best get ready now. Do you have proper accommodations? Do you need anything?"

"The Duke of Suffolk gave me a room near his apartments," Mary ignored the look her sister was giving her, "but I think I'd like to have some closer to your apartments since he has gone to fight the rebels up north."

"Madge!" called Anne, beckoning to their cousin. "Please arrange some rooms near mine for Mary,"

Madge bobbed a curtsy and led her other cousin out to her new rooms while Nan came to help Anne out of bed and change for supper.

Henry and Anne's supper that night was considerably richer and more decadent than the meals they had shared while at Hatfield. Because of this sudden change in food quality, neither of them could find room in their stomach's to eat another bite of their food, and spent most of their time at the table talking.

"How are you feeling?" asked Henry, being as overprotective of Anne as he normally was when she was pregnant.

"I am fine, Henry," insisted Anne. "I just wish that someone would just let me walk freely like I used to be able to. I haven't done so in such a long time," she bemoaned.

"Well I don't want to risk your health," stubbornly insisted Henry. Anne sighed. She knew that this basically cemented her prediction that they would be trying for an heir almost as soon as he felt she was physically up to it.

"So, how goes the uprising in the North?" asked Anne, hoping to take the attention away from herself. "My sister's husband is stationed up there,"

"Ah, yes, your sister Mary is at Court. Have you forgiven her for her disgraceful elopement now?" questioned Henry, ever the stickler for appearances and conduct, except when he deemed it unfit for himself.

"Yes, she is forgiven. You can tell all of the courtiers that they can stop avoiding her like the Plague now," said a slightly exasperated Anne.

"I'm sure they will figure it out without me announcing it. They always seem to figure out everything somehow," joked Henry. "Charles should have arrived just about now, and he assured me that he would send regular messengers with updates on the situation. I doubt anything major will happen, and if so, Charles has the authority to deal with it." Henry clenched his fists abruptly. "Whatever the cost, I will not let England fall into another civil war."

Anne nodded. She knew that Henry's greatest fear was undoing his father's work and somehow plunging England back into the War of the Roses. That was why he was so frantic to have a son. That, and because he needed reassure himself of his virility every so often, but that was beside the point.

Once again trying to change the topic of their increasingly awkward conversation, Anne asked, "So did you talk to either Charles or Mary about your idea?"

"Well, as I said earlier, Charles left this morning, so I didn't have a chance to speak with him. As for Mary, do you really think it wise to tell her about this now, when it is not yet set in stone?" replied Henry.

In truth, Anne thought that most of Henry's ideas were destined to be set in stone once he had his mind set on it, with their marriage a glaring symbol of it. Yet, she guessed that sometimes he could change his mind, as evidenced by her still being alive. She hoped that Mary would have the same luck as her, except with the near-death and humiliating experience of being locked away in the Tower.

"I think that she should know all of the dealings that concern the marriage she so greatly wants. If you are seriously considering this, which I hope you are not, then I do think you should tell her."

"Why are you so set against this idea, Anne?" asked Henry, slightly irritated.

"Why are you so set with going through with this idea, Henry?" shot back Anne.

"Why can't you ever be patient with my decisions?" growled Henry, getting worked up by their now commonplace arguments.

"Why can't you ever be patient and wait to make a decision? Honestly, she gave you her ultimatum a few days ago, and now you are almost dead set on her companion for life almost without a second thought!" scolded Anne.

"Fine, I will talk to her about it tomorrow. But unlike you, Madame, she will see the logic and graciousness of this arrangement. Good night, wife," said Henry tersely, and departed without another word.

Anne sighed. Henry and her relationship was never a smooth one, but she guessed that's why they never got tired of each other.

"I do not like it," bluntly replied Mary, after Henry told her of his plans to marry her off to Charles. The Duke of Suffolk, while handsome in his own right, was not the type that Mary wanted to share the rest of her life with. He was a womanizer, bad to his wives (that she knew of), and was almost the same age as her father! There was no way that she would accept such a marriage.

"But why, Mary?" asked Henry exasperatedly. Why did no one like his marriage ideas? Margaret had never forgiven him for marrying her to the late decrepit King of Portugal, Charles had gone against his will and married his sister, the Pope still did not approve of his marriage, and now his eldest daughter would not accept his newest proposal! Not to mention all of the times the royal betrothals of his daughters to the Emperor and Francis always fell through.

"Why would you have me marry someone your age?" Mary asked with disgust.

"It's not about age," said Henry. It's about wealth, position, power, and status, something which you lack, he thought.

"Well I say no," stubbornly refused Mary.

"It may not be up to you. You never said in our agreement that you had to approve of your husband, you just said that I had to get you one," pouted Henry.

Mary sighed. He had her there. She just hoped that the Duke of Suffolk would also see the wrongness of the proposed union dangling in front of them.

A few days later in the outskirts of Lincolnshire

Charles looked on grimly at the carnage surrounding him, the battle still raging on. The peace talks that he had held with the leaders of the rebellion had fallen through almost immediately, with the leaders too unwilling to accept any sort of a compromise. Charles knew that their demands were too high to be met, and the rebels weren't taking any answers but yes before they raised their arms. Both he and Henry had gravely miscalculated the number of commoners that the rebel group had amassed. In addition to the inhabitants of Lincolnshire, people from York, lords, and some of their retainers had also joined in the fray, providing some skilled swordsmanship to the mainly guerrilla group the commoners represented. The pas couple of days had been non-stop fighting, and Charles knew that his side was losing. Over half of his men were killed or wounded, and no matter how many rebels they killed it seemed as though two more took the fallen man's place.

Charles feared that he would have to pull back soon; there was no way his men could hold out much longer. He knew that Henry would be furious and embarrassed, but no one at Court could have known how large the rebel force was going to be, not even Charles. They were going to need reinforcements, but at what cost?

A/N: So yeah, the Pilgrimage of Grace is a lot different from the show, and the political environment of Court will change drastically next chapter. How will Henry react to this latest development? Thank you all of your patience! I feel that there may be two or three more chapters to this story, plus maybe an epilogue. Reviews are always welcome!