The Sister Queens (14 page)

“Your Majesty appears well recovered from your confinement,” the Countess of Devon remarks. “I am heartily glad to see it.” She herself nearly died after the delivery of her second child, a daughter, two years ago.

“Have you seen the prince?” I am eager to hear praise of my son.

“Indeed, at his baptism,” the Countess of Lincoln replies effusively, “and as fine a child as ever I laid eyes upon.”

“We must have your Edmund for the Lord Edward’s household.”

The Countess of Lincoln opens her mouth to reply, but it is Henry’s voice I hear. “Viper! Of all the unmitigated gall. How dare you show your face here?”

I look for Henry. He is no longer where he stood moments ago but is advancing through the crowd toward Simon de Montfort and his Eleanor, who, it appears, have just arrived. Simon’s face is drained of color, and Eleanor looks as if she has been slapped.

“Your Majesty, were we not invited with everyone else to celebrate the birth of your son and the churching of his mother?” Simon’s voice is cautious rather than dismayed.

“That is so, but I would never have issued the invitation had I known you were a thief.”

“Thief, Majesty?” The color rises in Simon’s cheeks. “Pray what have I taken that you label me so?”

“My very name! You used it as your guarantee. And, knowing that you have done so, even as I did not, you ought to have thought the better of coming.”

“Henry”—Eleanor’s voice is pleading—“however my lord has offended you, can we not speak of it in another, better, setting? No doubt his actions were error, not purposeful effrontery.”

“He did not know he named me surety for a massive debt? Madam, perhaps
you
did not know, but he knew it certainly.” Henry is only a few feet away from the couple now but continues to shout as if they stood at the other end of this great and cavernous hall. “Is it not enough,” he continues, turning to Simon, “that I gave my sister to you against my better judgment and in contravention of the wishes of my council? Must I also stand liable for the bribes that you found necessary in securing a dispensation? As if a piece
of paper could make your ill-begun marriage acceptable in the eyes of God.”

I have no idea what to do. My stomach heaves. Fits of Henry’s temper I have witnessed before, but never, no never anything like this. Part of me wishes to rush forward and stop this horrible entertainment before it goes further, but another counsels me to stay where I am, safely out of the range of the king’s anger.

Eleanor is crying softly. Her husband puts a protective arm around her, which seems to enrage Henry further. He is now a horrible shade of purple.

“Your Majesty, whatever debts I have incurred, I swear that I will pay them and make this right,” Simon says.

“The things you have done, sir, can never be put right! How will you repair the honor of my sister whom you seduced before you wed?”

Eleanor, looking past Henry, stares at me with disbelief. I would swear to her that I never told Henry of her surrender to Simon before their marriage, for it is the truth. But I cannot find my tongue, and even if I could, such a protestation would confirm what Henry already thinks as well as the rumors that doubtless gave rise to his thoughts.

“Your Majesty—” Simon’s color is now as high as Henry’s.

“Besmircher!” Henry prods the earl on the chest with one angry forefinger. Heaven help us if swords are drawn. I can see the Earl Richard moving in from Henry’s right. Surely he must end this, but how with all the eyes of the court upon the quarrel? And suddenly, instinctively, I know what must be done. I let my knees go and collapse onto the ground.

“Your Majesty!” The Countess of Devon’s distressed voice brings Henry’s eyes to where I lie—a pile of expensive fabrics and
jewels—and it is enough. He moves in my direction immediately, and all the court’s eyes move with him. As I am helped to my feet by a concerned Henry and several other pairs of equally gentle hands, I see the Earl Richard shepherding Simon and Eleanor out of the doors at the far end of the hall. There is some satisfaction in that. But, I reflect miserably as Henry leads me to sit down, when I thought to be the center of attention today, it was certainly not like this.

M
ARGUERITE
A
UGUST 1239
T
HE
R
OYAL
H
UNTING
L
ODGE AT
V
INCENNES
, F
RANCE

J
ust once,
I think as my women undress me for the night and rub my limbs to bring them to a rosy glow,
just once I wish we could enjoy marital relations as we used to—without praying.
I raise my arms reflexively so that Marie may slide my shift over my head; the time is past when Louis will take me naked.

After all, we are no fornicators. Louis is my husband. Our
marriage vows, now five years old, permit our activities, and the need for an heir to the French throne adds urgency to them. If I do not become pregnant soon, I may well be gone. Perhaps this thought is less worrisome to my husband than to me. Certainly my repudiation would delight the dragon of Castile. At the thought of delivering such a victory to my hated mother-in-law, my cheeks burn like fire, and my sisters-in-law, convinced it is a flush in anticipation of my husband’s company, of his “attentions,” titter irritatingly. Louis is still good-looking—
mon dieu
, there is no denying that. On the nights when he comes to me, it is easy to remember my first impressions of him—golden hair, golden armor, golden boy. Until he opens his mouth.

I know all too well what is happening to the man I married. He grows increasingly obsessed with things not of this world. And while penance and love of God are noble things, when they interfere with being king and husband, I cannot approve. Once hungry for my body and vexed only that, thanks to the dragon’s machinations and the demands of his confessor, he must eschew my bed for Sundays and holy days, Louis now makes us kneel to pray before and after the act. Not that I might successfully conceive, but that we might be forgiven our carnal desires and any animal pleasures we experience—pleasures that he now considers wrong and self-indulgent. Pleasure of every kind has become his abhorrence.

Sometimes Louis even prays during the act. My ears burn with the memory of “mea culpas” that have choked from him as he enjoyed my body and censured himself for that enjoyment.

Tonight must be different. Holy Mary, Mother of God, you must help me to conceive a son. Eleanor has one. He is all she thinks and writes about now. He has made her secure, in her husband’s love and in her kingdom. Surely I am no less worthy than she to be either queen or wife. Have I not been humbled enough
by the pilgrimage that wicked Blanche made me take to visit the shrine of Saint Thibault? Being paraded by the dragon past the throngs lining the roads in all the villages on the journey to Saint-Thibault-des-Vignes so that all might see and pity my barrenness was so humiliating! Surely such pain will persuade you to intercede on my behalf and open my womb to my husband’s seed? And if I conceive, I pledge I will have a silver reliquary made for the remnant of your Son’s crown of thorns that Louis has just purchased from the King of Jerusalem, and I will offer the box to Louis as a token of gratitude for my fecundity.

Louis arrives. He undresses in silence, and I wince to see the raw flesh on his back where his whip with its five lengths of chain has flayed him. I must remember not to put my hands there as we couple. He sits on the edge of the bed.

I reach for the goblet I prepared before undressing and left on the small table at the bedside. “Husband, will you take some wine? It is watered.” I know that Louis will reject the refreshment as part of his practice of self-denial unless he believes it is diluted. In fact it is not, save for the few drops of water I put in so that my statement would not be a bold-faced lie.

“Thank you.” He takes a sip, and his eyebrows rise slightly. He is suspicious.

To distract him, I turn his mind in the one direction capable of holding it. “Louis, I have been waiting with great anticipation to ask how the plans for the Sainte-Chapelle progress. The Countess of Poitiers and I saw Pierre de Montereau with you. Surely if he has ridden from Paris, it was for the purpose of discussing the chapel?”

Louis’s eyes illuminate, and his voice is warm when he speaks. “Every part of it shall praise the glory of Our Lord and of his saints. The stones themselves shall be adorned with likenesses of the martyrs.” He relaxes visibly against the headboard, and I draw myself
close to his side. Turning to face him, I wrap my leg over his. He does not draw away, may the Virgin be praised, but rather, as he continues to describe in detail all that was said this afternoon by his favorite architect, the excitement of his mind appears to spread to his body.

As my hand runs, unopposed, down his chest and he leans to kiss me, I offer one last prayer and allow myself to be transported by the anticipation of my own dear son.

“I FEEL A DRAFT,” MATILDA
says, turning her head this way and then that as if expecting to see the December wind where it seeps in. “Can you feel the chill, Your Majesty?” The concern in my sister-in-law’s voice is sincere and sincerely gratifying.

“I am fine.” I assure her. And indeed I am better than fine. It is Christmastide and I am nearly five months gone with child.
Joyeux Noël
indeed!

“I will go get your fur-lined mantle,” Matilda insists, rising. As she moves away from the table, one of the dogs curled up at Louis’s feet stirs itself to follow—animals love Matilda—attracting the king’s attention.

“Where does the Countess of Artois go?”

“Merely to get my mantle, Your Majesty.”

“That is most thoughtful of her. We ought to have positioned the table differently. Nearer to the fire. It shall be so.” Louis stands up. The eyes of those gathered at the lower tables are immediately upon him, and the musicians stop playing.

“Please, Your Majesty.” I reach out and put a hand on Louis’s sleeve. “Do not disturb the assembled company on my account. I am fine.” And when he hesitates, I add, “See, the servers begin to enter the hall with the peacocks. To disrupt their procession would be a shame.”

“If you are sure,” Louis replies, sinking back into his seat.

“Perfectly.”

A gorgeous roasted peacock, redressed in its own feathers for a spectacular effect, is placed on the table before my husband. A servant rolls back the spiced skin of the bird, carves a slice, and moves to place the meat on Louis’s trencher.

“Pray serve Her Majesty the Queen with the first cut,” Louis instructs.

This is how it is of late. Everyone pampers me. Well, everyone except for Blanche. The dragon ignores me, but this is still an improvement. She no longer insults or slights me publicly. Perhaps she senses such treatment will no longer be tolerated by her son. The thought of the dragon tamed by my condition makes me smile.

I recall what Yolande said one afternoon early in my pregnancy, as she held a basin for me to retch into. “Blanche will not know how to feel, wicked woman.” The duchess’s voice brimmed with satisfaction as if the triumph were her own.

“This prince will be her undoing,” I crowed, wiping my mouth on a cloth she handed me.

Now, looking across the figure of my husband at my mother-in-law, I say a quick
Ave
that my prediction may come to pass.

When the evening’s celebrations end, Louis comes to sit with me in my rooms before I retire. Marital relations are now out of the question, of course. I wish this were not so, for while Louis does not seem to miss them, I, strangely, long desperately for his touch in my present state.