The Cardinal’s Daughter

Dorothy Clausey grows up near Worcester Cathedral believing that she is the daughter of the loving family who raised her. Soon after reaching adulthood, she learns that her true father is Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, Henry VIII’s chief minister and one of the most powerful men in Europe. Wolsey’s fall leaves Dorothy exposed to suspicion, and she enters Shaftesbury Abbey in search of safety. As Henry’s break with Rome leads to the dissolution of the monasteries, Dorothy must decide whether religious life is truly her vocation or merely a refuge chosen for her. The short story places an imagined personal struggle inside the political destruction of Wolsey’s world and the transformation of English religious life.