The Silken Rose Page 21

  The cheering grew louder. After the procession reached the great conduit that provided water for that part of London, it quietened and Ailenor was able to speak again.

  ‘Is my father well, my mother in good health? Did you speak with my sisters?’

  ‘Your sister Sancha is as enchanting as the moon and calm as the cloister. Her nature is as pure as that of the Holy Virgin herself. If she were free, I would press my suit. They are all well.’

  Ailenor turned to Richard, her mouth widening into a large smile. ‘Sancha may yet be free. Uncle Peter can be persuasive. If you agree, we can send him to my father as our ambassador. Who would not wish to be a princess of England?’

  ‘She is the most beautiful damsel in Europe. . . apart from her sister, that is.’

  ‘You flatter me, Earl Richard. It is not necessary.’ She glanced towards the gate. Henry, riding a little ahead, had not overheard their conversation. He was distracted by a tableaux. Edward Confessor knelt before him and on either side of the Confessor, in the shadow of the gate, stood an angel and a devil. The angel darted forward but the devil skulked malevolently by the wall.

  ‘Bless you, Earl Richard,’ the saintly figure of Edward Confessor said solemnly as they reached the gate. Throwing a vial of holy water at Henry, the angel added, ‘God’s blessing on Your Graces.’

  As they rode under the gate tower, a shower of white rose petals descended from arrow slits above. It was as if they moved though a scented snowstorm. Ailenor brushed the flowers from her sleeves.

  Richard rode alongside Henry. Ailenor smiled to herself as Henry beamed at them both and turning to his brother said, ‘Ah, Richard, you must see my shrine to the Confessor. Finished at last. Pure gold and wondrous to behold.’

  ‘Costly, I imagine.’

  ‘Nothing is ever too costly for our Lord and his saints. Crusades are expensive. Yours in the Holy Land, mine in our kingdom – God’s kingdom. I shall soon have masons building a new abbey for Westminster. Though we shall need all our gold if we are to save Gascony and protect Poitou.’

  Richard lowered his voice. Straining to hear, Ailenor stilled her jangling reins. ‘You are determined to break the French treaty, Henry. Is this wise?’

  ‘You are nominally Governor of Poitou. The White Queen has insulted our mother again.’

  ‘But a war. Is it worth it?’

  ‘Our mother is. I intend calling the Council in January when the barons come to my Christmas crowning. It’ll remind them who is appointed by our Lord to rule the kingdom. Will you grant me your support?’

  ‘What knights do we still have? Gilbert Marshal was slain at a tournament. I thought you banned tournaments.’

  ‘Oh, I had. Served Marshal right. He was always disobedient.’

  ‘And Walter is the Marshal heir now.’ Richard laughed. ‘If he dies there are only girls left in that family. Great heiresses, huh?’

  ‘Aye, that’s true. Valuable heiresses the lot of them. You should know. You married one. Walter is even more difficult than Gilbert. He’ll wait for his earldom.’ Henry turned to the cheering crowd, nodded, and waved at a band of monks who stood by their riverside monastery gates calling out blessings.

  Red crosses fluttered in the breeze against the grey walls of Westminster as they approached. Ailenor fell to thinking about Poitou. Henry was right. It was a gamble, but if the people were happy with them now they would be ecstatic if they recovered lost Poitou. This thought made her think of Richard’s son who was in their nursery with Lord Edward. Looking across Henry to Richard she said, ‘Henry and Edward cannot wait to see you - Margaret, of course, is a baby.’

  ‘Healthy, I hope.’

  ‘They all are.’

  She noted how Richard’s eyes looked moist. Isabel had lost children, several babies that lived only a short time, but, of course, he could have a family with Sancha who was young. Richard shook his head. ‘Thank you for your care of Harry. He needs brothers and sisters.’ There was a break in his voice.

  Ailenor wondered if Richard had missed Isabel in death as he had not in her lifetime. They must all look forward, not back. Isabel’s death was a great sorrow, but it was a sorrow that was God’s will.

  Isabel of Cornwall’s death was not the only death that touched them during those years. Just as barons and earls rode in for the Christmas feast two months later, Henry received news that his sister, another Isabel, had died in childbirth. He raged to Ailenor when the messenger from Sicily arrived with the terrible news. This time, she did not know how to calm his anger. Henry, who had been neglected by his run-away mother, craved family and loved his sisters.

  ‘Emperor Frederick never loved her,’ he said, wringing his hands and weeping. ‘The ungodly heathen kept a harem as the sultans do. Richard says he cared more for Arab dancing girls than our own sister.’

  ‘Calm,’ Ailenor said, entwining her hands around his neck to comfort him, repressing a shiver. She was pregnant again herself and although she was pleased, childbirth was dangerous. ‘It is not unusual for a woman to die giving birth; it’s not Frederick’s fault, no matter how strange he is.’

  ‘God was displeased,’ Henry shook her away. ‘God took her instead of Frederick.’ In a flash of temper, he swept his hand over a low table, scattering chessmen laid out on a chess board. The thump of carved bishops and pawns dropping to the tiled floor disturbed Edward. He ran to his mother and buried his head in her gown.

  ‘Papa angry,’ he whimpered into her skirts. He balled his tiny fists as he let go handfuls of silk, looked up red-faced and shouted, his face as red as his father’s, ‘I shall kill the bad man who made Papa angry.’

  She forced a smile. ‘He is an Emperor who lives far away over the seas. Aunt Isabel took ill and died, sweeting,’ she whispered. ‘Papa is angry because he loved her. He will have thousands of candles lit in the chapel to honour her memory. Later, you, he, and I shall pray for Aunt Isabel’s soul. But now you need to visit your pony.’ Ailenor called for Edward’s nurse. ‘Take him. The King and I wish to be alone.’

  Edward was persuaded away. Sinking back in his chair, Henry said with bitterness, ‘The Emperor never permitted Richard to see our sister on his return to Sicily. He claimed she had already withdrawn from court. That was August. It is now December and she is gone from us.’

  ‘Shall I order the candles lit in her memory?’ Ailenor said after a while.

  A silence followed until Henry said, ‘Mansel will see to that. There has to be a feast in her honour. . . for a thousand of the City’s poor, more than a thousand if they can be found.’

  ‘There are always poor in need of sustenance,’ she said in a placatory tone.

  Another expense when they wanted money granted for a war. At least the impoverished would benefit from poor Isabel’s death. ‘Where do you wish this feast to be held?’

  ‘Here, in the Hall at Westminster.’ He smiled a sad smile. It was as if his temper had never shown itself that day. The thought of planning a feast to remember his sister mollified his anger. Henry became as subdued as the little dog that had curled up under her chair, where it had slunk at his first outburst of anger.

  ‘I shall find our clerk at once,’ she said. ‘It shall be done. Your sister will be honoured before the nobles and our people.’

  As she swept from the painted chamber to seek out John Mansel in his office behind the Great Hall, she thought how although Henry hardly knew this sister, he was broken-hearted. Now two Isabels were gone to Heaven and the third lived in a state of outrage in Poitou, determined to drag them, unready as they were, into war with France.

  If only Nell and Simon would return to court. Simon, such a great warrior and a knight with integrity, would give Henry sound advice about war with France. She exhaled a long breath. According to Richard, Simon had been offered the governorship of Jerusalem where he imposed peace and order. He had declined the honour and was now resting in Italy with Nell. There was no knowing if they would ever return to England, not with hu
ge debts and confiscated lands. Simon might chose to dwell in France indefinitely. Ailenor turned into another corridor. Simon de Montfort would become a formidable enemy if he fought for Louis in the coming conflict. As Ailenor knocked on the door of her clerk’s closet, she felt herself alone and fearful for the future. Candles for Isabel. One day there might be candles lit for her. Childbirth was dangerous. And war terrifying, no matter how justified it was.

  Poor were fed daily in honour of a princess they had never known. Candles glowed for Princess Isabel’s memory beside the new shrine to Edward Confessor. The usual period of fasting that led to Christmas followed. Earls and barons gathered at Westminster.

  As Christmas approached, the court became merry again. Henry wooed his barons with exotic foods from the day they all rode into his courtyards. Ailenor watched with concern for expense as he ordered salmon and sauces laced with cream for the fasting period leading up to Christ’s Day. Herring, green fish, haddock, and eel pies graced his table, accompanied by fresh-water fish from his ponds. There was no shortage of rice imported from Italy, almonds from Spain, and sugar-coated fruits.

  Christmas revels, dancing, and music edged their way into court festivities as the fasting period ended. Henry provided a more luxurious feast than usual on Christmas Day and paid for it from his own coffers. He played chess with his barons and rode out with them through the woods around Westminster. They, though Ailenor doubted their sincerity, admired his golden, jewelled shrine to St Edward that now dominated the Abbey’s Nave.

  In January when the Council met, the barons changed their tone. Ailenor knew they would not want to provide from their coffers for a war in Poitou. They were reconciled to the loss of their ancestral lands. They would not take their knights and villeins away from lands that needed planting in March and reaping in August. Rather, they wished to look to what they cared about in England, the kingdom they now considered their native land.

  Despite these sentiments, Henry optimistically remained hopeful until Walter Marshal declared, ‘Sire, we have heard rumours from Poitou that Hugh de Lusignan is not to be trusted. He changes alliance as quickly as a rotten apple sheds it skin. It’s imprudent to side with him. He will betray us.’ Assents of agreement raced through the Council.

  Henry shouted so all could hear, ‘I should never have brought Walter Marshal back to court. He is a bad influence. He’s worse than his brother Gilbert. Worse than that other traitor who once challenged my authority, Richard Marshal, Gilbert’s older brother, long since gone to his maker.’

  It was Richard of Cornwall who recounted the story to Ailenor. ‘Your uncle Peter calmed it all down. Ailenor,’ he reported, ‘the majority of the barons, and it’s not just Walter Marshal, have refused to finance a war requested by our mother and her husband.’

  ‘How did it end?’ she asked fearing total disaster. The barons would quote rights to their own freedom of opinion, contained in the Great Charter of King John’s reign.

  Richard drew breath, his face darkening. ‘Henry told them they must think further on the matter, insisting Gascony is threatened. They said, “Our merchants say that if there is a war with France and a French King ever comes to London again, they will all be ruined. There is peace now with France and peace equals prosperity. They will not spend their hard-earned groats on a war against France.” Groats indeed. They possess more silver than I.’

  Ailenor snorted at this. ‘That, I doubt.’

  He glared at her. ‘They say if we don’t contest Poitou, Louis will leave Gascony alone. And for all his fine words and haranguing, Henry could not persuade them otherwise. Our Council insists we cannot afford a war.’

  ‘And you, do you support Hugh and Isabella? Do you support Henry, Richard?’

  Richard looked away. ‘I fear I must. She is our mother and Count Hugh our stepfather.’

  A month passed and the Council met again. They said that since their King had in his treasury a sizeable income from the empty see of Canterbury since Edmund Rich had died, he could well afford to equip an army without taxing London. Henry was collecting funds from the see until the Pope approved a successor as archbishop. They would not grant funds, but neither would they oppose the war if Henry could afford to equip his own army to protect Gascony. Again, they voiced distrust of Hugh de Lusignan.

  Henry invited those knights he considered loyal to him to a private supper. ‘We shall make ready an army once the weather improves. When we win back territory, they will be only too glad to back us. We depart after Easter,’ he said.

  ‘Let us hope that you are right.’ Richard laid down his eating knife and turned to Uncle Peter who sat across from him. ‘And when do you leave us for Provence?’

  ‘Ah, a pleasanter subject. I wondered if you would ask. Agnes will accompany me. We intend visiting Savoy and then my Lady Agnes’s lands before we visit Provence. We leave as soon as I put all in order in Yorkshire.’

  Ailenor said, ‘Do not wait too long. I would not like to hear that Sancha was married before you reach my father’s kingdom.’ Richard nodded with enthusiasm. She continued, ‘Time is short, Uncle Peter.’ Smiling at Henry she said, ‘Perhaps tonight it is appropriate to announce our news.’ She took Henry’s hand in her own. He nodded and for the first time that afternoon beamed around the Painted Chamber.

  ‘My lords, the Queen is with child once again.’

  ‘He will be born in Bordeaux.’ She wore her most gracious smile as she contemplated each lord seated at their table. It was, as ever, her triumph when she was about to produce a child for England.

  ‘Or a princess,’ Richard said.

  ‘Girls are always welcome,’ remarked Henry. ‘I myself had three, nay four, sisters because Joanna, wed to Llewelyn of Wales, was always owned as my sister even though my father was not yet wed to my mother when Joanna was born. Her mother was only his mistress, but my father loved Joanna and honoured her, God rest her soul.’

  ‘Girls bring marriage alliances,’ remarked Uncle Peter.

  ‘They are expensive too,’ Richard said pointedly, possibly aware that Sancha would bring no dowry. He turned a worried face to Ailenor, ‘Is it wise that you cross the seas? It’s safer for you here.’

  Ailenor had wavered but decided it was prudent she accompany her husband to Bordeaux. ‘I have my ladies to watch over me.’

  Henry squeezed her hand. ‘And, after all, we’ll be returning before next Christmastide, my mother’s honour restored, the French running for cover in Paris and Gascony safe for our son.’

  ‘I see the cooks have made us a subtlety,’ Ailenor said, changing the conversation, pointing to where a group of cooks stood in the doorway waiting for a signal for them to move forwards to the table.

  ‘Come, come, show us your magnificence,’ Henry called to them.

  It was an apt subtlety, a small fleet of ships bearing red crosses on their sails settled on a blue sea with sugared waves, so well executed that Ailenor was reluctant for it to be broken. Henry, as usual, invited Richard to select the first piece.

  ‘Another crusading fleet,’ he said, sweeping his hand back through his dark hair, before breaking off a mast. ‘Let us pray for another success.’

  After the ships and their sails were shared around the company, Ailenor looked down on a shipwreck and could not repress a shiver. France was the more powerful and larger nation.

  21

  Bordeaux, 1242

  Ailenor made her way along the deck of the King’s vessel, The Royal Lion, her ladies and Henry following her, occasionally glancing towards the fleet that trailed the foamy wake of their lead ship. Pennants of England flew proudly in a gentle breeze below a sky the shade of eggshells. The sea was unruffled. It boded well for a safe crossing.

  Ailenor lifted her face towards the freshness of the breeze. Although she knew she ought to be resting, she felt exhilarated by the sea’s slow roll. After all, she could rest for weeks once they reached Bordeaux, whilst Henry led his knights forth to reclaim his father’s
lost lands.

  Flags fluttered from the other ships, gold and silver embroidery glinting, red, yellow, blue— a bright rainbow of colour. She admired the glorious pageantry presented by their knights who made an impressive showing for England - their chain mail covered with embroidered surcoats, their mantles of silk and velvet emblazoned with golden lions. Many knights remained at home— malcontents who would not share in the spoils—it came as a surprise when at the last minute Walter Marshal joined the venture. She smiled to herself as she spotted the Marshal red lion rising proudly on green and yellow silk cloth, flying above the ship he commanded. Marshal simply wanted his Earldom of Pembroke confirmed, she thought with cynicism.

  ‘Look!’ She pointed towards another vessel. ‘Henry, I can see Richard.’ Passion filling her voice, she declared fiercely, ‘If I were not so heavy with child, I would take up arms and ride with you.’

  Henry placed his arm under her elbow as the ship gave an unexpected heave. ‘War is not like it is depicted in books of romance, my love. I am not King Arthur. Richard is no Launcelot of the Cart. War is messy, violent, and cruel and I wish with all my heart it was not necessary.’ He gathered her into the crook of his arm. His next words were a repetition of his usual refrain since she had announced her intention to sail to Bordeaux with them. ‘You, my Ailenor, should be in your bower at Windsor resting.’

  She shook her head. ‘It is right we show the people of Gascony we remember them. Our child will be born in Bordeaux.’ She regarded him coolly and added, ‘You will lead us to victory. You will recover Poitou for our crown. And after that, Normandy.’

  ‘Let us pray it will be so.’ Henry lifted his arm and waved to his brother who bowed low in acknowledgement, the breeze whipping his cloak into a golden cloud as he rose. A sailor shouted, ‘Land ahead.’

  Ailenor twisted her head around to see the coast rise from the sea to greet them. Before long she would be resident in the mysterious Palais des Ombres, Palace of Shadows. She had not seen it since her wedding journey six years before. It had seemed to her youthful eyes a beautiful, mysterious castle, even in deep mid-winter.