the deep moans round with many voices

Happy New Year! Also, it is Yuletide reveal day! Here are the stories I wrote:

( 1 ) A Changing of the Tide: "It may also please you to advertise my lord his grace that since his repair to Richmond I have been at Lesnes, where I saw one of the most piteous and grievous sights that ever I saw, which to me before the sight of the same was incredible, concerning the breach out of the Thames into the marshes at Lesnes, which are all overflowed and drowned." --Thomas Cromwell to Stephen Gardiner, January 18, 1529. (4,800 words, written for Aramley)

In other words, I signed up for Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall series in a fit of enthusiasm for the canon, and naturally that was where I was matched. I am not, by any stretch of the imagination, an expert on Tudor England. Thus, research. All the research!

Aramley asked for fic centered around Thomas Cromwell: a scene from his past, an exploration of his relationship with his family, a view of him from another character's POV, etc. The words 'missing scenes' were used. I may have taken that too literally. *wry*

"A Changing of the Tide" fits into Wolf Hall 'Part Two, Chapter II. An Occult History of Britain. 1521-1529.' It sits between the section that opens "Autumn 1528: he is at court on the cardinal's business. Mary is running toward him, her skirts lifted, showing a fine pair of green silk stockings. Is her sister Anne chasing her? He waits to see," and the section that opens "New Year's 1529: Stephen Gardiner is in Rome, issuing certain threats to Pope Clement, on the king's behalf; the content of the threats has not been divulged to the cardinal. Clement is easily panicked at the best of times, and it is not surprising that, with Master Stephen breathing sulfur in his ear, he falls ill."

(This works because at that time, England marked the new year on March 25 (Lady Day) rather than January 1. Which technically means the opening sentence of my story is wrong -- it should say January 1528 rather than January 1529 -- but in the interest of not confusing modern readers I followed the modern calendar.)

I did think about trying to write something set in Italy, perhaps to detail the episode where Cromwell petitioned a pope on behalf of a guild in the town of Boston, but that would have involved researching Renaissance popes and Rome and travel from England to Italy, and Erasmus's translation of the New Testament into Latin, and that sounded like even more of a headache than researching Lesnes Abbey and medieval marsh reclamation, so I stayed firmly in England where I at least had a letter in Cromwell's own hand to work from.

I'm not sure why I didn't write a domestic scene with Cromwell and his children in their younger years, but for some reason that only occurred to me as an option after I was well committed to the flood at Lesnes. Possibly I find Mantel's version of Gregory Cromwell as baffling as her version of Thomas Cromwell does. I did induce Cromwell to think about his children a few times, and also to think about Rafe Sadler in the context of family, since Rafe is effectively his foster son, but that was not the main focus of the story.

There isn't a lot of plot qua plot, but then, this is more an attempt at what could be a lost section of Mantel's novel than a standalone story, so I'm inclined to consider that a feature rather than a bug. My dad did suggest, when I ran the story past him, that I could replace Katherine Greene with a character from some other historical novel or series -- perhaps the Matthew Shardlake mysteries -- and thus turn this into a stealth crossover 'where did Character X come from and what is her backstory?' fic, but that seemed like a lot of work on short notice so I didn't bother.

On that note, I would like to thank three people for looking over and improving the story. cat_i_th_adage told me how to make the final paragraph work properly. My dad listened when I ran some worries about logistics past him, and suggested the inclusion of Cromwell's thoughts about Thomas More and More's education of his daughter Margaret Roper. My sister Vicky fixed two small mechanical issues and told me I needed to expand Cromwell's conversation with Bledding in the final scene, and give Bledding some more concrete reasons to think Cromwell was a trustworthy person.

Everything else should be in the endnotes of the story itself, which are more or less a bibliography (albeit not in formal MLA format), plus some historical trivia.

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( 2 ) Faint Heart Never Won: Lucifer does not need her to defend him, but that is irrelevant. Mazikeen/Lucifer. (475 words, written for rosaxx50)

And then I wrote a little Yuletide Madness treat late on Christmas Eve, because there should always be more Lucifer fic in the world and I agree wholeheartedly with rosaxx50's analysis of Mazikeen and Lucifer and why they are awesome together.

Someday somebody is going to write Lucifer fic for me at Yuletide. Until then, I will just keep writing it myself. :-)

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The stories only add up to 5,275 words total, but wordcounts are not everything, and I am damn proud of "A Changing of the Tide." I set out to imitate Mantel, down to the word choice and pattern of sentences, and while in retrospect I should have tossed in a couple mentions of cloth and clothing patterns, I think I otherwise achieved that goal.

I am also very pleased with "Faint Heart Never Won," which is almost enough to make me stop snickering at the way I stole the title from a song in Iolanthe -- said song is all about faint heart never winning fair lady (and is also ridiculous, given it's from a Gilbert & Sullivan musical)... but then I think of Mazikeen as the Lord Chancellor pursuing Lucifer-as-ingénue, and I'm sorry, it's just too silly. :-p