Henry is displeased to learn that the Emperor Charles V, Queen Katherine's nephew, has released King Francis of France from prison and is forced to look for a foreign ally elsewhere. Meanwhile Katherine's alliance with Charles intensifies as does her hatred of Wolsey. Anne Boleyn turns down the king's proposal that she be the royal mistress, demanding nothing less than being declared queen.

Cardinal Campeggio's long awaited papal legation has arrived at court to decide with colleague-cardinal Thomas Wolsey on the royal request for divorce, claiming Catherine's first marriage to Henry's late elder brother nullified his. When Campeggio learns the king won't yield, he suggests an alternative: the queen could retire to a monastery, but only voluntarily, which she refuses, swearing in confessional she came as a virgin to Henry. Thomas Tallis proposes to his late lover Joan's sister Jane. Under Anne Boleyn's love spell, Henry sends bishops to tells the queen she's suspected of hating and conspiring against him, and grows angry at Wolsey's failure to persuade or threaten Campeggio, even sends Charles Brandon to Paris to question the French king Francis I about the true intentions of the emperor, pope and cardinal. Brandon also confirms to father Thomas Boleyn's party the time may be ripe to bring Wolsey down. When the legatine court finally assembles, the king states his case personally as a matter of justice, allegedly after 'his conscience' finally stopped him from keeping silent out of love for the queen. Wolsey simply brushes aside the queen's objections to the competence and objectivity of the court. After imploring justice and appealing to Henry kneeling at his feet, Catherine walks out, to public acclaim, royal fury and Wolsey's despair.

The legatine court's divorce trial continues in the Queen's absence, hearing testimony suggesting prince Arthur carnally consummated his marriage to Catherine: embarrassing for the court, amusing for the populace. Catherine's council, bishop Fisher, dares claim even heaven can't dissolve the royal marriage, comparing to Herod Antipas' adultery shamed by Saint John the Baptist who was executed for that truth. Woolsey sends Thomas More to Cambria (Cambray) to check if France and the pope remain irreconcilable with the emperor. After Anne walks off, disbelieving Wolsey's promises to the king of a divorce by summer, Henry implies to cardinal Campeggio a negative verdict could turn him and England Lutheran, like half of Germany, yet after a papal message the legate prorogues the court till the end of the Roman Curia's recess, in October; imperial ambassador Mendoza, who is ceding his post to bishop Chapuys, tells Catherine it's the emperor's doing. Henry's sister Margaret dies from the consumption she contracted from Brandon, who recovered. When Thomas More reports the negotiations reconciled the emperor with France and pope Clement, Woolsey fears facing the royal wrath and ends up banned from court, ordered to relinquish all lucrative offices and accused of usurping royal authority. More is persuaded to succeed him as chancellor, under Henry's promise his conscience won't be abused by matters such as the divorce.

Now cardinal Wolsey lives in misery as penniless archbishop of and in York, barred from court, hoping in vain Anne Boleyn who broke his hold on the king will reward his efforts as she once wrote, honors and offices are mainly distributed to the Boleyn clan, with Norfolk in charge -Charles Brandon neglects his joint presidency- of the royal council. While the devout, rather ascetic new chancellor Thomas More is determined to crush heresy, personally attending the stake, Thomas Cromwell convinces Henry that under Luther's vision the king is above all earthly laws, even his annulment should merely be treated as a theological matter, so he is commissioned to put the case before European theology faculties, while ambassador Boleyn must approach pope and emperor. Once he tastes the burden of government, Henry reproaches the council less virtue and worse results then the cardinal, especially now the treasury is empty and troubles spread, but when Cromwell learns trough a physician about Wolsey's plot for his own reinstatement with pope and queen, the former master of the game is thrown in the Tower, where he slits his own throat, while More and the Catholic church are doomed now Henry has decided to make his own, almost Lutheran break-up with Rome after most universities and princes sided with Catherine.

As he seeks the annulment of his marriage to Katherine of Aragon, King Henry VIII appoints himself the head of the Church of England. And Anne Boleyn insists that Henry remove Queen Katherine from the picture -- and Court.

The Archbishop's capitulation to Henry results in Thomas More's resignation and a triumphal trip by Henry to France to show off his new queen to Francis.

After Henry breaks all ties with the church and marries Anne, the Pope threatens him with excommunication and authorizes Anne's assassination.

After princess Elisabeth's baptism, Henry orders Thomas Cromwell to draw up a bill of succession favoring his and Ann's offspring, to be accepted by an oath from all subjects. The affront to the imperialist party is maximized by making princess Mary a lowly lady in waiting to her half-sister, yet the French King still refuses openly to recognize the new Queen. Ann orders her rival lady Eleanor Luke eliminated, by false charges of jewel theft. Tired of Henry's schismatic obstinacy, Pope Paul III makes the loyal, hence jailed bishop Fisher a cardinal, Henry orders his beheading. Thomas More can no longer support his entire family, yet answers Cromwell's questions with Henry's own pamphlet arguing for papal supremacy by divine right. At her father Thomas Boleyn's suggestion only an ambitious mistress is a problematic rival, Ann urges Margaret 'Madge' Sheldon to 'succeed' Eleanor. Thomas More refuses to take the oath as phrased, while accepting he succession, landing him in the Tower.

Fisher and More continue to resist the coercion to take the oath and pay with their lives as Henry's ardor toward Anne subsides after her miscarriage.