The Winter Crown (38 page)

Alienor tenderly adjusted Matilda’s cloak and strove to control her sorrow. ‘If you need anything, write to me and I will send it,’ she said. ‘Do not think that distance will divide us.’

‘Yes, Mama.’ Matilda’s grey eyes were steady and clear.

‘Remember me in your prayers, as I will remember you in mine.’ Earlier Alienor had given her a small folding triptych for her personal devotions so that when Matilda opened and closed it each day she would be reminded of her family.

‘Yes, Mama.’

Alienor strove for composure while her daughter remained serene and sensible. She was fearless and Alienor was so proud of her.

The ship rocked under Alienor’s feet and she heard the shouts of the crew as they prepared to cast off. ‘Until I see you again,’ she said, imbuing her voice with all the warmth and certainty she could muster as she embraced Matilda for a final time. In all likelihood she would never see Matilda again; even if she did, she would not be the child to whom she was bidding farewell but a young woman who would have grown and learned from experiences in which Alienor had had no participation. She sent up a silent plea to God.
Keep my child safe on this journey. Give her Your blessing and let her flourish.

The courtiers who were escorting Matilda to Germany boarded the vessel. The tall, red-haired Richard de Clare, lord of Striguil, had been chosen to lead them. He wore a sword at his hip with casual grace and he had a feline air, poised, elegant and dangerous. ‘Look after my daughter,’ Alienor said, her voice tight and fierce. ‘As you value your life, look after her.’

‘Madam, my life would be worthless if I let anything happen to the Princess Matilda,’ he said with a bow. ‘She is my sacred charge; you can rely on me.’ There was a courtly smile on his lips, but the sharp candour in his eyes and the flexing of his broad shoulders conveyed that he took his duty seriously.

Alienor liked Richard de Clare a great deal. She enjoyed his flirting and banter when he was at court, which had been often of late as preparations advanced for Matilda’s departure. Henry considered the de Clares over-powerful, and had removed Pembroke Castle from their custody and demoted the family from the rank of earl. Richard de Clare had always sworn his loyalty to the Crown but Henry deemed it prudent to send him on a diplomatic mission and have him out of the way for a while. He was good with a sword but eloquent of speech, and ideal for the task. The ageing William D’Albini, Earl of Arundel, was attending too. As the father of several daughters, and the widower of a former Queen of England, he was perfectly suited to the assignment. With strong young sons to rule his estates, he could afford to leave them and embark on this diplomatic mission. He had been showing Richard and Geoffrey how to tie a particular knot in a length of rope, but now brought the boys over to Alienor.

‘We shall be casting off very soon, madam, the tide is nigh.’ His gaze was compassionate and he exuded an air of solid dependability.

Alienor nodded. ‘God speed you on your way. You are all in my prayers.’

She disembarked to stand on the wharfside. The vessel still took a while to cast off, and she clenched her fists inside her cloak. Matilda stood at the ship’s side, a brave figure in her scarlet cloak, protected by the powerful bulk of William D’Albini while de Clare strode about the ship, making sure everything was in order.

At last the galley eased from her moorings, together with her companion vessels, laden with the baggage and trousseau of a princess going to her betrothal and marriage. A gap of sea opened between ship and shore. Matilda raised her hand and waved, and Alienor waved in return, her eyes burning with the intensity of her focus as she took a last look at her daughter’s pale face.
I love you, I love you, I love you.

Once back at the castle, Alienor buried herself in preparing to move to Winchester, but as she chivvied the maids and spoke to her officials, her mind was constantly on Matilda as she waited for the turn of the tides to receive news that she had made safe landfall in Normandy.

She eyed a gown that Emma had laid out on the bed. A wine stain had gone unnoticed on the apple-green silk, and looked almost like the mark of a deep wound.

‘It is ruined, madam,’ Emma said. ‘What shall I do with it?’

The gown had been a favourite, but the last occasion Alienor had worn it was on discovering the building at Everswell. Since then it had lain in the bottom of the coffer. The stain might be remedied by dabbing with a solution of vine ashes steeped in water but even if it were cleaned, she would never don it again. Nor would she cut it down and make dresses for her two remaining daughters; every time she saw it, she saw Rosamund de Clifford. ‘Give it to the Church,’ she said. ‘They will find a use for it.’ The Cistercian monk Bernard of Clairvaux had always said no one should clad themselves in the work of worms but vast numbers of the clergy did not subscribe to that view and she had no doubt the silk panels could be reworked.

Emma laid another robe on the bed, gold silk this time, with a weave so fine that it was almost possible to believe it had been created by angels. Alienor had brought it with her from Constantinople, a gift from the Empress Irene. She thought of the marble columns and pavements of the Blachernae Palace in the Greek capital, the gilding and the resinous perfume of incense. Every piece of cloth, every garment had its history, and this silk had travelled on sere desert roads from the lands of the Zin peoples.

And now here was her coronation gown, catching radiance from the September light gleaming through the window. A promise that had turned out to be a lie. Little Alie was awed by the sight of the shimmering silk lozenges and stroked it with a pale, tentative hand. ‘May I wear this when I’m grown up?’ she asked.

Alienor gave a wry smile. ‘You will have such robes of your own one day, when you are a queen in your own right.’

‘When I go away to my marriage?’

The words cut Alienor to the quick. She didn’t want to think of that now. Losing Matilda was already a struggle. ‘When you are a bigger girl,’ she said. ‘Not yet … you are mine for a little longer at least.’

Alienor’s chaplain entered, followed by a messenger, his garments stained by salt and sweat, and his expression tight and grim. Alienor’s first horrified thought was that Matilda’s ship had foundered and sunk.

The messenger knelt and handed her a sealed packet from which dangled the seal of the Archbishop of Rouen. ‘Madam, I regret to tell you that the Empress Matilda died two evenings ago in Rouen. She was at peace with God and all has been settled as she wished.’

Alienor’s knees almost gave way because she had been preparing to hear the worst. This was momentous and sad indeed; it made her heart lurch, but there was also a euphoric surge of relief.

Alienor took the letter and, fumbling, broke the seal. The Archbishop sent her the sad news and offered his condolences. He had written to Henry too, but he was dealing with rebellion in Brittany and unlikely to attend the funeral. He would not deal with it well. Death was just another form of betrayal to him, and grieving about it a weakness. Yet despite everything, her heart went out to him.

‘There was another message on the same ship,’ her chaplain said, and handed her a second package. ‘The lady Matilda has landed safely in Barfleur and is continuing with her journey.’

Relief and gratitude flooded through her at the confirmation, and she put the packet aside to read later because she could not deal with both at once and the situation with the Empress was more pressing.

‘Go and refresh yourself,’ she told the messenger. ‘Be ready to carry a letter to Normandy within the hour.’ She turned to her women and clapped her hands. ‘Pack the small baggage chest,’ she said. ‘I am going to Rouen.’

The abbey of Bec blazed with torches and candelabra, creating crowns and flowers of light to illuminate the passing of an empress from her mortal life. Alienor inhaled the scent of incense and dust, and felt the heat from the candles reflect on her skin. The Empress’s sealed lead coffin stood before the altar, the fringed silk shroud surrounded by wax tapers in a radiant palisade.

The inscription on her tomb read: ‘Great by birth, greater by marriage, greatest in her offspring. Here lies the daughter, mother and wife of Henry.’ The Empress had worded that epitaph before her death, and indeed all her hope and pride had been invested in her golden son who was too occupied in dealing with war and politics in Brittany to attend her burial. There was no mention of his father, Geoffrey le Bel of Anjou; rather she had chosen to recall her first husband, Heinrich, Emperor of Germany, to whom she had been wed for eleven years from girlhood to young maturity.

As Alienor knelt and prayed, stood and bowed, she deeply mourned the Empress’s passing. Something great and noble had gone from the world. All that hard-won wisdom now silent in the tomb. Her different ways of solving problems had given Alienor fresh perspectives. Matilda had always defended Henry fiercely, but she had not been unsympathetic to Alienor and had often taken her part and offered support.

The Empress had been a restraint on Henry too. He might not always have taken her advice, but he had been willing to receive it, and she had been a bridge between Church and State, respected by both. Now he would no longer have that resource to call upon and it would only diminish him.

The Empress had bequeathed vast amounts of treasure to the Church. Gold chalices, portable altars, a magnificent cross set with gems, various crowns that she had commissioned throughout her life. She had liked her crowns, had thought them vital to her standing. Alienor’s lips curved in a sad smile. And Henry had put his on the altar at Worcester and left it there.

Alienor’s chamber for her stay in Rouen had belonged to the Empress: the place from which she had governed Normandy, and where she had died. That did not bother Alienor, for Matilda’s soul had departed in peace and it was a space that had seen courage and loyal service. She drew strength from it and was not afraid.

Entering the room in the evening shadows, she saw a movement in her peripheral vision, and for a moment her heart clenched. A youth turned in haste from the table beside the hearth, and she found herself gazing at Henry as he must have looked in the space between boy and man. He had Henry’s wide brow and strong jaw; his hair gleamed with coppery tints in the light cast by a cresset lamp. He held a box of carved ivory that contained the Empress’s chess pieces and seemed unable to decide whether to hide it behind his back, or brazen it out.

‘Jeoffrey,’ she said in a level voice. ‘What are you doing here?’ Removing her cloak, she draped it over a coffer. Emma, who was attending her, went to light more candles.

‘Nothing, madam,’ he said stiffly.

‘Indeed?’ Alienor raised her brows.

He gave her a wary look, not exactly hostile, but it could easily turn that way and was all Henry’s. He would have to be found a new household, and that meant either taking him into her own, sending him to Henry in war-ravaged Brittany, or leaving him in the care of his tutors at Bec.

‘Sit,’ she said, and gestured to the bench by the hearth.

He swallowed. The large knot in his throat revealed his change towards manhood, and with the increased light, she could see a sparkling line of gilt hair on his upper lip.

‘Sit,’ she repeated. ‘I will not bite.’

Still clutching the box, he lowered himself on to a bench.

‘It seems a strange thing to risk sneaking in here to steal.’ Alienor poured a cup of wine and gave half a measure to him.

A flush mottled his face. ‘I wasn’t stealing it.’

‘Then what were you doing?’ She gestured and reluctantly he handed the box to her. It was surprisingly heavy and for a moment her hand bowed under the weight.

‘My grandmother … I … She used to play chess with me in this chamber.’ He sent her a defiant look. ‘She said one day the pieces would be mine in her memory. But I do not think she had it written in any will.’

‘So you came to take them without asking?’

‘I … I wanted to stand in her chamber again before it was all changed and remember how it was. And then I saw the chess set on the table.’

‘And if I had not walked in at that moment, what then would you have done?’

‘I do not know, madam. I suppose I would have taken it – no one would have noticed.’

‘You think not? Where would you have hidden such a thing about your person? You were bound to be discovered.’

He made no reply. She considered him thoughtfully. Henry’s bastard son. What sort of a man was he going to make? She was ambivalent towards him. When her children were younger she had regarded him as a threat, but with four sons to her name, the danger had diminished and she could view him objectively. His upbringing with the Empress had given her that distance. It would still be for the best if he entered the priesthood – a bishop or two in the family was always useful – but it would be expedient to bring him into her sphere all the same.

‘You were fond of your grandmother?’ she said.

‘Yes, madam.’ A forlorn note entered his voice. ‘She was kind to me and she taught me a great deal.’

Alienor wondered at the bond between the Empress and her grandson. She had seldom been present in Henry’s childhood, her focus concentrated on fighting for her crown. Perhaps she had compensated for that lost time by lavishing her attention on this boy who looked like Henry and was her own flesh and blood.

‘So,’ she said. ‘What is to be done with you? Did your grandmother ever speak of your future?’

He looked down. His eyelashes were like Henry’s – short and stubby, and dusted with gold. ‘She said it was for my father to say, but in the meantime I was to receive an education fit for all purposes.’

‘Well, for now you shall come with me to England and dwell in my household,’ she said, deciding as she spoke. ‘And I will bring you to your father at Argentan for the Christmas feast – should he complete his business in time to be there.’ She could not keep the cynicism out of her voice.

‘Yes, madam.’ He drew a steadying breath.

She gestured to the chess box. ‘Perhaps you will play with me now to honour your grandmother. I think she would approve.’