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Mary and Bash's flight from France proves short-lived, and they're dragged back to the castle. Henry threatens to execute Bash if Mary doesn't wed Francis immediately and press her claim to the throne of England. Evil Anne and Mary both freak out, since Sexy Nostradamus has foretold that Mary's marriage to Francis will cause Francis's death. But they can't tell Henry that, since he's not a huge fan of the occult and will burn Nostradamus (and Evil Anne) for treason and heresy.
So rather than take either of her options (Bash's certain death or Francis's probable [but also certain] death), Mary raises the stakes and tells the king she'll marry his son and claim the throne of England… but she'll only marry Bash. Henry agrees, so now he has to get the pope to annul his marriage to Evil Anne and then marry Diane, thus giving him one legitimate son and seven living illegitimate children, so this is completely awesome for them.
Evil Anne schemes one last time to kill Mary and Bash and everyone who might stand in the way of her pwecious Fwancis ascending to the throne and ruling forever and ever -- in celibacy and good heath -- but Henry thwarts her and threatens to have her executed, just for funsies. He imprisons her in the castle while he goes to Rome.
Sexy Nostradamus, who caused all this mishegoss, has the "ghost" Clarissa chained up in the tunnel to his dungeon. After he rants at her for killing Aylee to prove his prophecy to Mary, he gives her some food and a doll. There's a file in the doll and she uses it to stab him in the neck the time he visits her, and then she scampers off. Do not kill the sexy one, show. DO NOT.
And Francis cries a bunch about how he still loves Mary and he doesn't care that she thinks he'll die if she marries him, Kenna whines about what Henry's impending marriage to Diane will mean for her, and Greer's hot kitchen man-wench is nowhere to be found.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!Previously on Reign: Do you all remember how Mary and Francis and Bash and the girls got to this point? Yeah, me neither. Buckle on your chastity belts and we'll get through this together.
So Francis asked Mary to marry him, but Sexy Nostradamus had a vision that the marriage will cause Francis's death. Sexy Nostradamus also foresaw one of Mary's ladies would die, and since he was right (RIP, Aylee), she freaked out, renounced her claim on the English throne, and fled the castle, with Bash hot on her heels. And all the while Bash's mama, Diane de Poitiers, was scheming to legitimize her son and put him on the throne of France.
Mary rides and cries, rides and cries. She's still with Bash, so things can't be too bad. They gallop through the woods, with several armed men pursuing them. They come to a cliff, and it's awfully hard to do that Butch and Sundance move when you're on horseback. Mary's adamant that she won't go back to the French court to be part of Henry's plans. Bash tells Mary to dismount, asks if she can swim, and then they join hands and leap off this giant fucking cliff. Both of them dressed head to toe in leather (and, notably, without their luggage, which will mysteriously reappear later).
One of Henry's men reports that they haven't been able to find Mary and Bash. Henry clunkily replies, "They didn't just disappear. Bash has many talents, but magic isn't one of them!" Shows what you know, slutty king. He sends them back out to keep looking while Evil Anne of Green Gables lazily tells him to give up, as Francis has done after his own fruitless search. She is positively smug.
Henry asks why Evil Anne is so opposed to the marriage. She doesn't tell him about the prophecies, just says that Mary's in danger from the English if she claims the throne, and that brings the danger close enough to Francis to worry Evil Anne. Henry threatens to have Evil Anne executed if he finds she was behind Mary's departure. She sneers that she's weary of his threats, and he snaps back that he's been sick of her for a decade and would be happy to be rid of her.
Evil Anne heads straight to her son's room and starts yelling at him. She's happy to learn Francis hasn't so much as seen one of Mary's footprints, and further tries to convince him to give up looking. He just wants to know why Mary left him, and says the only explanation Mary gave was that she didn't trust him to put her above his loyalty to France. Evil Anne is happy to hear it, but Francis thinks that was just an excuse. He proclaims his love for Mary and says he thinks his mother was responsible for her departure.
Mary and Bash have found themselves a room at an inn. They huddle by the fire, trying to warm up and dry out, and Mary asks if Bash thought Evil Anne found out about Diane's legitimizing plot. He does. She turns to fretting that Francis will think the worst of them running off together. He says in the morning they'll find horses and sail from Calais, then tells her to undress—since her clothes are still soaked. She tells him to turn around and starts undressing (and she would definitely need help with that. That's what Greer and the others were supposed to be for).
Bash ogles Mary's naked shoulders for a moment, and then there's a knock at the door. He can tell by the sound of heavy boots that it's not the innkeeper, so Bash tells Mary to hide. She jumps under the bed just as two men in armor burst in and ask where Mary is. Bash lies that he left her in Calais, so she's certainly halfway to England by now. They notice the women's clothes Mary just took off, though, and threaten to cut off some of Bash's fingers if he won't tell the truth. Mary pops out from under the bed and tells the men to stop, which they do, but they won't release Bash, since he's a French subject rather than Scottish. They drag Bash away and Mary follows, helplessly.
Castle. The soldiers take Bash to the dungeon and leave Mary in the front hall. Francis trots up like a baby horse just figuring out how to use his legs and asks glassily if either of them is hurt. She just shrugs, and he starts rambling about how he still loves her and totally would have come to Scotland for her. I feel like all of Francis's descendants, had he gotten the chance to sire any, would have had girlfriends in Canada, you know?
Mary tells him he's prattling on like a twit, but he keeps at it and so they have the same argument they've been having forever, about how he doesn't love her more than he does France (which is understandable, as being the chief of France's fan club is kind of his only purpose in life), with the only difference being that now she has Aylee's death to throw into the mix.
Francis demands an honest answer for why she left, because he was willing to give her everything—even his life, Mary says, and that's why she can't marry him. A page interrupts and summons Mary to Henry's presence. Just Mary. Francis flollops off to cry into his sword collection.
Throne room. Mary wants to make peace. The only peace Henry will accept is if Mary weds Francis and claims the English throne (which we shall henceforth fall "The Franglish Plan," in the interest of expediency). Mary refuses, and Evil Anne observes with amusement that women don't usually say no to Henry. But since Mary isn't just any woman, she's a queen, he'll have to negotiate with her. Henry puts Bash on the table as the first bargaining chip. Mary insists that Bash did nothing wrong, but Henry claims there are witnesses who'll swear she shared a bed with Bash. Mary rashly tells him to go ahead and ruin her in France, but Henry threatens to have Bash killed, and let's see how the Scottish people like the idea of their queen whoring off and then getting her lover killed.
Even Evil Anne is horrified at Henry's ruthlessness. Henry insists that Mary follow The Franglish Plan or he'll have Bash executed. Mary's like, THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU OH MY GOD.
Mary's room. Evil Anne swans in and dismisses Mary's maids. They argue: Mary wants to acquiesce to Henry's demands to save Bash, but Evil Anne wants her to lie and say she married Bash while they were on the lam, in which case even Henry can't put aside a marriage. Mary thinks Henry would totally kill Bash anyway. She's written to her mother, asking for help, but Evil Anne says that won't work, as Henry's been corresponding with Mary of Guise since they learned Mary Tudor was dying. Mama Mary is super into the whole Franglish Plan.
Mary's solution: she wants to tell Francis about Sexy Nostradamus's prophecy. Evil Anne knows her son will ignore that as superstition and talk Mary out of believing it so they can get married. So the choices here are Francis or Bash. Spoiler alert: this is not going to matter either way.
Sexy Nostradamus's magic dungeon. He picks up his hunk of bread from dinner and a creepy little blank-faced baby doll and takes them to the tunnels, where Clarissa is chained up in a corner, still with the bag over her head. He chastises her for not even pretending to be sorry for killing Aylee, which she only did to fulfill Nostradamus's vision. She insists she did it to save Mary, and Nostradamus admits Evil Anne totally would have killed Mary. He says it's the prerogative of kings and queens to play God and kill each other, but monsters like Clarissa don't get to play that game. He revokes her privileges of freely wandering the castle, and tells her to obey him or he'll starve her. He tosses her the bread and the doll.
Clarissa clutches the doll, then rolls up her face-bag and uses her teeth to rip its belly open. She finds a file inside it.
Francis interrupts Mary's very important staring-out-the-window session. She tells him about the prophecy (somewhere in the castle, Evil Anne burns a serving wench with a hot poker just because she's pissed off). Francis, as predicted, is skeptical. Mary pleads with him to believe her, bringing up how Sexy Nostradamus foretold Aylee's death. When Francis wants to take the matter to his father, she says Henry will burn Nostradamus for heresy and treason. And he'd probably burn Evil Anne for consorting with him.
But we're still at this sticking point: Francis's life or Bash's. Francis tells Mary not to let superstition rule her life and pleads with her again to marry him, before Evil Anne or Nostradamus can pressure her. Mary hollers about how Francis is pressuring her, and he swears he'll accept the risk to his life. He thinks it's her grief over Aylee talking. But she walks away from him, again.
Back in the throne room, Mary tells Henry she takes neither of his options. Instead, she'll follow the Franglish Plan—but she wants to marry Bash. She demands that Henry legitimize him and put him in line to the throne. Evil Anne grinds her teeth so hard one of her molars vaporizes.
Both Henry and Evil Anne have vast objections to Mary's idea, but Mary points out that bastards are being legitimized all over Europe, and she thinks the Vatican will go along with it, too. The pope, Paul IV, is virulently anti-Protestant and desperately doesn't want the English throne to go to Elizabeth I. So Mary says she'll go after the throne, but she'll only do it with Bash. Henry agrees to make Bash a duke or an earl, but Mary rejects it. Henry points out that he'd have to have his marriage to Evil Anne annulled (he'll probably have an easier time with that now that the pope isn't her uncle), and won't Evil Anne have something to say about that?
Mary thinks Evil Anne might be okay with her plan (since it will prevent her from marrying Francis). Henry, of course, has no reason to believe that. Mary curtsies and excuses herself so Henry and Evil Anne can shriek at each other.
Evil Anne hates this idea, because obviously she did not bear ten goddamn children to Henry and bury three of them and almost die herself so she could be shunted aside, powerless. She thinks Mary conspired with Diane, which is totally news to Henry. Evil Anne reminds us that Kenna told her about the legitimacy plot, and Evil Anne used the knowledge to blackmail Diane into leaving the castle. She also thinks that's why Bash left with Mary, because he was afraid of what Henry would do when he learned of the plan. Henry's eyes are just goggling out of his head at this point.
In her room, Mary has filled the surviving girls in on her plans so far. Greer is all teeth and fakeness, while Kenna is sitting off by herself and sulking. She asks where Mary's plan leaves her, since if Henry legitimizes Bash, that will mean he marries Diane. And that will put Kenna out in the cold. Come on, Kenna. He's not going to stop liking teenage snatch just because he's married. Kenna wails selfishly for a while, then says she thinks Diane poisoned Aylee, causing her to fall. She explains her suspicions and points out that Aylee's death was what convinced Mary of the truth of Sexy Nostradamus's prophecies.
Mary runs straight to Evil Anne's chambers and demands to know if she poisoned Aylee. Evil Anne denies it. Mary relates the story of the poisoned cup that was meant for Kenna but delivered to Aylee. Evil Anne sits down, pretending shock, and explains how she had thought to get rid of both Diane and Kenna. Mary, for some reason, isn't placated that her future mother-in-law intended to kill a different one of her bosom companions. Evil Anne emphatically swears she didn't know about that specific Nostradamus prophecy.
Evil Anne offers to help Mary get back to Scotland and find her a suitable marriage. But she won't stand for Mary booting her off the throne and ruling three countries. I would not be surprised at all if she just stabbed her to death right now with a hairpin. Mary yells that she's doing all this to save Francis, and now she has to go tell him about her new Franglish Plan before someone else does. Evil Anne's all, uh, about that…
Mary runs into Francis's chambers, hollering his name. In the dungeon, Francis lets himself into Bash's cell and punches his brother right in the face. Bash, for what it's worth, is shackled, so he can't exactly fight back (not that he would, what with Francis being a fragile simpleton and all). Francis starts beating and kicking him and hollering about how Bash stole his woman. Mary comes running down the hall, shrieking, and pulls Francis off Bash, squeaking that they've both done what they did to try and save his life. If only Sexy Nostradamus could discover penicillin four hundred years ahead of schedule!
Mary yells that it was her idea to marry Bash and legitimize him, which is the first Bash is hearing of this plan. Francis yells back that Mary is unmaking his entire family, his entire life, because of a superstition, and if she thinks he'll forgive her because she thinks she's doing it for his own good, she's wrong.
Francis leaves and Mary kneels to Bash, who's bleeding from the mouth but not too poorly, considering. He grouches sourly about how he never wanted the crown, and he'll need a minute to think about this bomb Mary's flung into his life.
Evil Anne asks Sexy Nostradamus why he didn't tell her of the dead-lady-in-waiting vision, and he's like, uh, because you totally would have killed one of them? Der? Evil Anne shrugs, all, yeah, you know I would've. But at least Aylee's death will save Francis, Sexy Nostradamus says. Evil Anne mentions Mary's plan to fuck with the line of succession, and says if Bash becomes king, her sons will all be targets because some of the French people and nobles will still think Francis, Charlie, et al. belong on the throne.
So they need a new plan to stop Mary. Obviously, the plan is murder. Evil Anne tells the soldier behind her to have a scribe write a good-bye note in Mary's handwriting, implying that she's run off with Bash again. She instructs him to pay a jailer to lie that Mary bribed him to help her and Bash escape, and then to bury all the bodies in the woods. Deep. The soldier leaves and Sexy Nostradamus just stares after Evil Anne, unable to fathom this kind of viciousness. She and Henry really are more well matched than they realize.
Evil Anne's soldier lets himself into Mary's room, but finds her bed empty. Mary has let herself out through the tunnels, and finds Bash and Henry in the wine cellar. The king muses wryly that Mary has taught him that God has a nasty sense of humor, since a teenage girl is holding him hostage just as he was on the brink of his greatest triumph. Henry doesn't think Bash is ready to be king, but he reluctantly tells Mary he'll agree to her terms. Bash is all, WHAT IN THE WHAT.
Henry plans to go to Rome and press his case with the pope. He thinks it's a long shot, and admits that he's been a better father to Bash than to Francis. He doesn't know why Bash betrayed his brother, but he's sure this will destroy Francis. Unless he's a much stronger man than anyone knows. Henry pours wine and hands goblets to Bash and Mary, toasting "the future king and queen of France, Scotland, and England."
They drink. Can someone please get Bash a clean shirt? Mary asks what they'll do about the little problem that is Evil Anne. Henry says he'll handle her.
Evil Anne comes into her bedchamber to find her soldier strung up, dangling lifelessly over her bed. Henry swoops in behind her and says, "You're ." He drags her by the arm to the throne room, where Mary and Bash are standing together, both looking a bit horrified.
Evil Anne swears she won't agree to an annulment, and asks if Henry plans to execute her himself. No, he says, and he explains that his plan is for Bash to succeed him, then his sons by Evil Anne to succeed Bash if they survive him. (So Bash and Mary aren't planning to spawn any little princes in this fantasy storyline?) Henry knows Evil Anne well enough to guess that she plans to assassinate both Mary and Bash—and him, too. "A stray arrow, a hunting accident," he muses. (It was actually a jousting accident, but that's pretty good prognostication there.)
Evil Anne just seethes, flanked by soldiers, and grittily says she wouldn't dare have the king bumped off. Francis swans into the room then and says his mother would kill everyone in the room to put her oldest son on the throne. He snarls that his first order as king would be to execute Evil Anne if she harmed anyone in the room—Bash, Mary, Henry. Nameless soldier men are like, gee, thanks, Francis.
Francis pledges his undying love to Mary for like the ninety-seventh time in the past forty-five minutes, and then mansplains some more why Mary is making all her decisions. He is, of course, wrong on all counts, and Mary sadly says a future without him is her only choice. Francis turns to Bash and says he envied his brother his freedom for so many years, and now he has it, while Bash has what was his. With a melodramatic "Long may you reign," Francis takes his leave. It's too much to hope that that's the last we see of that guppy-faced twerp and the show just goes whole-hog into this alternate history storyline, isn't it?
Mary's room. One of the maids announces Evil Anne, who marches in, but before the maids and a guard can leave, Mary tells them to stay. She's learned not to be alone with Evil Anne, at least. Evil Anne baldly says Mary's plan has cost her her life—she's sure Henry will find some reason to have her beheaded after the annulment. Mary tells Evil Anne to leave France, and Evil Anne muses what could have been if only Mary had done that. Remember how she tried? A couple of times.
Mary's sure Henry will let Evil Anne live if she just goes away. "Grant him the annulment, and then go far from here and grant yourself a happy life," she says, still so naive. Evil Anne sighs, and asks if Mary doesn't yet realize that "happiness is the one thing we queens can never have." She almost tenderly tells her to sleep well, and leaves.
In the morning, the ladies-in-waiting have gotten themselves all tarted up in their best sparkly dresses and rabbit-fur shrugs to watch Evil Anne make her good-byes to the household. Greer says the official story is that Evil Anne will be visiting her aunt in a convent. Lola can't believe that's how Evil Anne would live the rest of her life, but Mary thinks she'll be safe there. (As safe as she was in the last convent that was her home? As safe as Mary was in her convent?)
Evil Anne dryly observes that the turnout to bid her farewell is awfully scanty. She gives Mary one last word of advice: her power is always fleeting, and it can disappear "with the stroke of a pen or the blade of an ax."
Evil Anne is about to make her exit when Henry interrupts. He says he can't let her go. But he hasn't had a change of heart—he doesn't trust her, with her vast wealth and affection for poison. So he's holding her prisoner in the castle until he returns from Rome. His soldiers try to grab her, but she smacks their hands away in the most delicious fashion. "Whoremonger," she hisses at Henry. "Devil," he replies. He smirks and tells her to consider her imprisonment a sign of his respect for her intellect and abilities. The soldiers escort her past Mary and the ladies.
Sexy Nostradamus brings a plate of food to his room, then goes again to the tunnel and feeds Clarissa. She doesn't take it, and when he crouches down, she lunges and stabs him in the throat with the file she found in her doll (and presumably used to whittle through her chains). As Nostradamus gasps and clutches his neck, Clarissa lightly frolics out the door.
Bash stands on his balcony, his busted lip still healing. Mary comes up behind him and they discuss what a crazy fucking couple of days they've had. At least Francis will be okay, they say. Bash still can't believe he's going to be king of France one day. He's pretty happy he'll get to marry Mary, though (does he know she slept with Francis? They weren't particularly discreet), as soon as Henry returns from Rome. He's happier than Mary is. They both stare pensively out at the water.
time: Someone tries to kill Bash.