The Beheading Game

An enchanting and clever retelling of Queen Anne

I was quick to fall under the spellbinding story that was brilliantly woven into an extraordinary and compelling alternative tale regarding the beheading of Queen Anne as ordered by her husband and King Henry.
When she wakes still alive somehow in the arrow box her beheaded body and detached head had been placed into awaiting burial she was stunned. She was rightfully enraged as well once discovering she’d been put into an arrow box instead of a casket, cursing the cheapness and thoughtlessness of her horrible and narcissistic husband the King Henry.
She quickly runs from the church which the box and her beheaded body was lain and would find a boat to scurry her away from the royal palace and from being seen. She finds a way to reattach her head and once that is done her sight and ability to move in her body as she once had in previous was restored. She is determined to get back to her daughter and ensure she is safe and her plan to kill the King, her previous husband to do so, is settled. She finds herself in a position that could jeopardize her plans when she is saved by a woman named Alice. Alice is kind enough to take Anne under her wing, brings them to a shelter that is full of women, has her bathe, allows her to borrow some clothing since Anne’s had the stench of urine on hers having lost her bladder upon losing her head. She convinced Alice to help her head back into the palace to rescue her daughter and promises to pay her handsomely. She sneaks into the mint where the royal makes its money and then into her apartments where she was held imprisoned for weeks before being killed. She has jewelry and other sentiments she’d wanted her daughter Elizabeth to have in her absence but thankfully they’re still there. Hiding her scar that’s gruesome along her neck and jaw, she’s sewn a collar in Elizabeth’s satin baby swaddle. It hides her scar and helps her remain anonymous in the crowds of the middling people and also to the Fens, the people and area where Alice lives.
Alice is critical for Anne to see the perspective of living in their time not as wealthy nobles but as a commoner and how unfairly they are treated and forced to paying taxes on land that previously was owned by their peoples not the nobles. She shows Anne the hardships of all different peoples as they travel to the palace and again once they barely escape from royal and noble lands. Anne was spotted when she had snuck into the caste walls by her jailer and another childhood friend, and then chased by guards but they managed to escape. Anne is often called out by Alice throughout their journey heading back to the Fens so she can see her children and hide Anne for awhile until the hunt for her alleged ghost is called off. She makes Anne contemplate her arrogance and ignorance regarding commoners and see the truth of greed and corruption the nobility has forced those in stations beneath them to endure such as paying taxes to them when they’d no rights to land, withholding wealth and opportunity to these people’s and being quick to judge them as unintelligent and dimwitted, overlooking their ability’s and capabilities choosing to believe what their class of nobility has always spoken towards them rather than personally getting to know these peoples and visiting their homelands and learning more about them. Anne is embarrassed by her bigotry and willingness to follow the crowd and their beliefs instead of learning for herself what she should’ve taken the time to know intimately especially at her elevated station.
Alice and her family welcome Anne with open arms, change her heart and mind about the Fenlanders and is able to clearly see herself as someone who was limited in her knowledge and ignorant in her prejudice by adopting preconceived notions and beliefs that were created by the nobility not from first hand knowledge but through ignorance and arrogance. She yearns to incorporate these new facts into the crown and make crucial changes within it through her daughter Elizabeth with whom she must protect and to do so, it means killing Henry and ensuring her daughter becomes the next Queen and one who will be a people’s leader interested in beneficial changes to assist all of their communities and not just nobility. She knows her child will be the one to do so. And so she says heartbreaking goodbyes to Alice and her family and heads off alone to journey back into the noble land and the castle.
So many magical and mystical revelations happen along the way, Anne is able to open her heart and mind more than ever feeling such confidence in the promise of her daughters future reign and how it will best benefit those who’ve previously suffered under the rule of the nobles.
This was a tribute to female empowerment and mothers unconditional love and the strength one must continue to have under the reign of patriarchal power and the inferiority they’ve placed upon women.
In a fight for herself, her daughter and a future filled with equality and justice for all, Anne will stop at nothing to ensure she can influence the future to be ruled in matriarchal power. I think Anne would agree due to patriarchy still leading the majority in power positions it will not change until a change happens particularly one in which matriarchy replaces the patriarchy.