The Uncrowned Queen (30 page)

Her hands flew to her hair. It had been braided the night before, ready for bed, but when Edward had crept into her room after the household had gone to sleep, it had become disarranged. She would not think of that now.

She could no longer hear men's voices—they must have gone somewhere. The kitchen?

There. She was ready now to face whatever was needed, having bundled her hair up into a kerchief and tied it severely tight.
Groping her way across the room, she found the door and lifted the latch. Little Edward had slept through the noise and so, it seemed, had Deborah—though Anne did not believe that.

She stepped down the treads of the spiral stone stair in the corner of her house, placing her feet gently to make as little noise as possible. For some reason, each of her senses said “caution.”

“…you are certain of this?”

“Yes, Your Majesty. The duke asked me to ride to you immediately.” One lone candle had been lit in Anne's brick-floored kitchen, the wavering light making odd shadows on the men's faces. Richard was there, William Hastings, and Lord Rivers. And so was Edward. Somehow he'd found enough of his clothes from where he'd dropped them on the floor of her room to look entirely respectable. Anne marveled at that fact. Battle readiness, was that it? She turned to see a messenger, too, wearing the duke of Burgundy's livery.

“Gentlemen, is anything wrong?”

Each of the men bowed to her, Edward most deeply of all.

“Lady Anne, the duke has finally decided. He will help the cause of the king.”

Richard of Gloucester suddenly looked fully as young as he was, a boy not even twenty years old. Anne was surprised. He'd been a responsible lieutenant for so long in his brother's service that she'd come to think of him as mature. But now the lilt in his voice, the way he jigged from foot to foot, betrayed the youth he still was.

“Money?” Anne found she was sitting on the settle by the banked embers of the kitchen fire.

“Better than that. Ships and men, as well. There's to be a meeting, an official one this time, after the Christ-mass feast, and then we shall see.” Edward spoke carefully, his tone composed, but Anne knew him, body and bone. She saw the light in his eyes. He was looking at her so eagerly, so happily, and she knew that if the others had not been there, he would have scooped her up in his arms, wanting her to be a part of it, a part of the future that was being born.

A slow shiver made its way up her spine until it reached her scalp. This, then, was the tipping point, the time when all would
change. When her life, too, would change—again. For this man. Did she want that?

“Lady Anne, you should go back to bed. We are sorry to have wakened you.” William Hastings spoke from the shadows. It was a courteous dismissal from Edward's chamberlain: this is the world of men, lady, he seemed to say, you have no part to play here.

Anne lifted her chin and her eyes sought William's. “I am grateful for your care of me, sir, but I'm awake now and eager to hear more. This is a lucky day for all of us.”

Be careful, chamberlain, was Anne's response to Hastings. The king needs me, I am important to him; you should understand that. Anne rose and curtsied to the man who had only so lately been in her bed. “I am so happy for you, Your Majesty. The wait is over. At last.”

Edward bowed in response and waved Anne back to her seat, an honor, since the men crowded into her small kitchen were standing. “There is still a way to travel, Lady Anne, but this is the end of the beginning, I am certain of that.”

“Do you have a plan, sire, as yet?”

There was an embarrassed silence. Anne looked from face to face. None would meet her eyes. And, suddenly, she understood. They would not speak in front of her nor share anything they'd been discussing, not even Edward. Anne was more than shocked. She was hurt, and beginning to be angry. Did he not trust her? Was that possible?

“Lady Anne, we have much to ponder on and it is very late—or, rather, very early. We are so grateful for all that you have given us, the valuable and tireless assistance you have rendered to our house.” Anne sat mute, staring up into the bright eyes of the king. He was using the royal plural, speaking at her, not with her. “The courage you have shown will ever be dear to us. And it will be rewarded.”

Anne would not let herself cry. Good enough to be his lover, but not good enough to be his trusted friend?

“Reward?” Anne stood and faced Edward, not even an arm's length from where he stood. She spoke over the king, interrupting him, her anger just greater than her hurt. He was silent from surprise.
“I want nothing from you, sire. Your greatest gift to me is your presence in my house. I need, or desire, nothing more.”

Head high, Anne turned to Hastings. “You were right, Lord Hastings. It seems I am more tired than I knew.” Anne managed it well, even smiled, but the chamberlain would not meet her glance.

Turning back to the king, she bent her head and curtsied, low. “Your Majesty.” Edward was pale, staring at her. “I should be grateful for permission to withdraw.” Anne kept her tone neutral, light, and steadfastly gazed at the second pearl button on the king's jerkin. Above it his throat worked.

“Certainly, Lady Anne. We are sorry your rest was disturbed.” It was hard to swallow what she burned to say, and Anne took a deep breath before the words could escape her mouth. But one glance from her and the king knew.

It was never rest I wanted from you. I thought I had your love and trust
. He heard her in his heart, and knew Anne knew it as she walked from her kitchen, leaving it silent behind her.

Great damage had been done and he, Edward Plantagenet, had done it. But he had a kingdom to think of, not his own personal happiness. He was right to confine the discussion to his men, and his men alone. Yet what had he lost in that one moment?

He would not think about that now. It frightened him.

Brother Agonistes was exhausted by the journey from Paris. On Louis's instructions, he'd been given a litter for part of the distance—such a jolting ride, his very joints had shaken loose, not to mention the teeth in his head—but the remaining days had been a blur of cold and pain in muscles unaccustomed to such exercise as he and his escort rode north until they came to the walls of Brugge.

Lodged now at a Dominican priory near the Prinsenhof, Brother Agonistes had slept very little, for when Philippe de Commynes knocked at the outer door on the following morning, he was advised to seek the visitor in the order's chapel. Entering the opulent little building quietly, de Commynes could not see the monk at first, but then what he had taken for a dark rug lying before the altar twitched.

Facedown upon the cold tiles, arms outstretched in imitation of Christ's last suffering, Brother Agonistes heard nothing of worldly sounds and saw nothing. Privation, pain, and exhaustion had brought him to the emptiness and silence of perfect peace. He was preparing himself for the trial to come.

“Brother? Can you hear me?” A faint voice was calling. God, at last?

“Brother?” Philippe de Commynes shook the monk gently by the shoulder. “Brother Agonistes? We have very little time.”

The human world claimed him. In despair, Agonistes fell
down, down from the Light, into candle-flickering, incense-woven dark. He returned convulsing, curling in on his own body like a fetus, for to reenter the world of men brought back the agony of locked muscles and lungs bruised by the freezing air of the recent journey.

Philippe de Commynes gazed at the writhing heap with distaste. If this fit killed the monk, what would he tell Louis? He nudged the man with his foot, unwilling to dirty his hands.

Agonistes opened his eyes; they were clouded as those of a newborn child. A moment later he coughed, hawked, and spat green phlegm onto the pristine tiles of the chapel floor. The contempt was deliberate. This was a worldly place, far too close to the court for Holiness to dwell here naturally.

“Brother?”

“I hear you, monsieur.” The monk was hoarse; it felt unnatural to speak and he was too weak to stand. He gave up the effort, closing his eyes once more.

“Brother, give me your hand. I will help you.”

Philippe de Commynes was sweating with anxiety as, overcoming revulsion for the man's dirty flesh, he reached out his hand.

The monk ignored him as he recited a novena.

Time was passing. Already they were late. “Come, dear Brother. The duke will be most offended by our absence. King Louis expects you to obey him, also.”

Agonistes heard de Commynes, but unwillingly. He sighed. “Very well then, messire. But tell me again, what must I do? I am so fuddled…”

Turning his head away from the stench, Philippe leaned down to help the monk stand. “You must tell the duke and his court all that you know. Much depends on what you say today. More than you can possibly understand.”

As he hurried the weak and stumbling cleric from the chapel, Philippe de Commynes gloried in the mission bestowed on him by Louis de Valois, his true master under God. This stinking monk would today accomplish a noble purpose; his words would be a weapon in the hand of God. Like a stag in the forest, Edward Plantagenet would first be wounded in his most tender part—the
heart—then he would weaken, falter, and fall as he was hunted, and then he would be torn to pieces by the dogs of his fate.

A deluded monk and a slut—fit tools indeed to serve his master's ends. Between them today, these two would turn the key, the key that would unlock the greater destiny of France: dominance of all Europe.

“Brother Duke, hear me on the anniversary of Christ's birth-day. Hear the word of God, of which I am the humble conduit.” His voice shook but Agonistes had power now; the words carried well throughout the huge space beneath his feet.

The great hall of the Prinsenhof was a restless mass of moving color as Duke Charles, Duchess Margaret, and their court settled before boards bending under chargers, dishes, and great bowls of rapidly cooling food. The duke's stomach rumbled; the monk would need to be quick in his homily, or all heat would depart entirely from the feast.

“If you fail to destroy the abomination and embodiment of sin and earthly lust that walks among you, even on this most Holy Day, all your works will turn to ash and dust as God strikes you down in your pride.”

Charles was not concentrating on what the monk was saying; he had so much to do that sitting here, at the feast, was to be racked on the bed of lost time. Around him, however, the fidgeting court slowly settled and grew still, listening. The monk's intensity was compelling.

“I am here, wretched, unworthy sinner that I am, to guide you to the truths offered by Our Lord and Savior, and to give you, Duke Charles, the courage to act so that your soul and the souls of all here present in this great hall today may be saved.”

Margaret, duchess of Burgundy, was immune to the heightened rhetoric of Brother Agonistes. Having been brought up in the courts of England, she was a connoisseur of sermons. She gazed with detachment at the filthy, emaciated monk in his temporary pulpit, the gallery above their heads, but she was beginning to be irked by the direction his words were taking. He was altogether too grim, too fervent, for the season. The duchess frowned as she thought back to the meeting earlier today with Philippe de Commynes. In the end, Charles had agreed that the monk would be permitted to deliver the homily since Philippe had assured them he was a most holy mystic and seer, well known in Paris. There was the added interest, too, that Agonistes had lately been the personally appointed healer to the body of the king of France. The duke had decided he would speak with the man after the feast; in war, too much information was never enough.

The duchess, however, did not favor smelly mystics, whatever their credentials. Her nose wrinkled—the aroma of the monk's unwashed flesh, even at this distance, competed powerfully with the food in front of them. Perhaps the man was merely mad? In her experience, such ascetics often were and this one bore all the signs: ranting, spitting, skinny arms flailing as he mouthed dire warnings and promises of damnation—of what, and against what, it was hard to grasp—into the air above their heads.