Kinda interesting to think Mary secretly thought she didn't have any stepmoms at all. People always act like Anne's the problem, if she'd "known her place" pure Mary would've liked her. They try to make her out to be a person of totally rigid, unshakable morality, someone so above average human weakness we should see her as an example of unparalleled goodness we could never equal. And all that makes the burnings ok. Because a virtuous woman did it it's fine. But in social terms it sounds like she'd "go with the flow" like everyone else, say whatever to keep the peace, something Elizabeth is critcized for doing. And really interesting about declaring Edward illegitimate and Jane's marriage void. People always paint their relationship in this cutesy gloss, that Jane was devoted to her and reached out to her, that Mary felt it back, this is how she responded to a "real" stepmom, but now I'm wondering if she even liked Jane at all.

I mean, considering most of these accounts use quotes from Jane Dormer as their literal only source on Mary I's personality and reign...probably?

Mary was as much of a dissembler as Elizabeth for sure, I would say her dissembling just manifested differently. She also eventually came to be (mid 1536-1547, that is) nearly as much of a pragmatist as Elizabeth had to become during her sister's reign, just during her father's: leaving rooms Chapuys entered and refusing to speak with him, never voicing any opinion contrary to HVIII's policies, apologizing profusely and abjectly when servants and diplomats visited her household without express royal permission, etc. She became more resolute and less pragmatic during Edward VI's reign, imo, but there were reasons for this which make logical sense...the reign of children were always weaker and less stable, Edward Seymour's protectorship, by the terms of Henry VIII's will, was technically illegitimate (he hadn't been granted that position by him), arguably John Dudley's was as well, although it was much stronger, etc.

The evidence cited to argue Mary's affection for the Seymours in general and Jane is particular is...shaky, at best. For one, her propagandists certainly didn't seem to think denigrating Edward Seymour was anything that would be ill-received by her, since that was included in their tracts a lot. For another, it's generally like 1) Mary sent her a gift of cucumbers! (...ok? she sent her subsequent stepmothers lots of gifts as well), 2) Mary was her chief mourner in her funeral services, a position that was obviously assigned by HVIII and a position that, had she still remained Princess, would never have even been suggested (royals in the succession could not be chief mourners because that included funeral services in which their death might be thought of, which was treason), so likely stung on some level...

And this letter, which to me, says it all:

“Promises to continue in obedience according to her promises, both spoken and written, made to the King. I beseech our Lord to preserve your Grace in health with my very natural mother the Queen, and to send you shortly issue; which I shall as gladly and willingly serve with my hands under their feet as ever did poor subject their most gracious sovereign.”

'My very natural mother the Queen' is in the same sentence as a promise to 'willingly serve' Jane's issue 'with [her] hands under their feet'. Given the events of Edward VI's reign, that was obviously a promise she made because she knew it was what they expected her to say, rather than one she actually kept. There's also the context that there's no announcement of Jane being with child at the time of this letter, so it's a promise made for a future that's quite uncertain at this point, not necessarily seen as likely.

Unfortunately, there remains about only one succint, sentiment-absent conjecture about Mary's probable feelings regarding her second stepmother, particularly in the spring/summer of 1536:

"Was Mary perhaps also deflated that Jane had not tried to prevent her ordeal? Jane and her supporters had promised a turnaround, but nothing had eventuated; instead she had had to concede more than she anticipated. In this matter, Chapuys had been her sole supporter." Inside the Tudor Court, Lauren Mackay