The Mirror and the Light opens in the heartbeat after Anne Boleyn's death, as the young queen's blood is sluiced from the scaffold and Thomas Cromwell picks his way across the wreckage to take up his position as principal councillor to an unpredictable king.

Despite his lowly beginnings in a Putney blacksmith's forge, Cromwell has made a reputation for himself as one of England's most formidable politicians. On the day of the queen's death, he is at the height of his powers. He has found a bloody way for the king to escape his marriage, pinning Anne Boleyn and her circle to crimes they could never have imagined. He has delivered her to the Calais swordsman's blade. He has smoothed the path for the king's marriage to his third wife, Jane Seymour. And he has been rewarded well. Now both master secretary and lord privy seal, there are few parts of the state's business that do not pass over his desk.

But in rising so high, Cromwell has also attracted powerful enemies...

A rising in the north destabilises Henry's kingdom. Despite the risks to his own life, Cromwell moves to protect Lady Mary from becoming the rebels' greatest prize.