Sexual obsession. Greed.  Bitter sibling rivalry. Political ambition unto death.  These constitute Henry VIII's foul legacy, his wives and children its victims.  But none more able than the young Elizabeth, future Queen of England. 

Elizabeth, daughter of Henry and Anne Boleyn, banished from the court at the age of two, finds an unlikely ally in her father's sixth wife, Catherine Parr.  A kindly woman with no children of her own, Catherine offers motherly love to the young princess and her brother Edward, and works to soften her father's heart and gain her readmittance to the Tudor fold.  But when Henry dies and a ten-year-old Edward is crowned King of England, a new era of instability begins for the young and suggestible monarch, and the sister he has left behind in Chelsea House. 

It is becoming increasingly clear that Catherine's new husband, Sir Thomas Seymour, has dangerous designs on the vulnerable teenage princess in his charge, and on the power to which she is key.