Emma Campion - A Triple Knot (33 page)

“I must not see you, Sir Thomas. His Grace, he has been so kind, but if he knew … My children—”

Lucienne sat down beside the flustered woman, taking her hands. “No one will know of this visit, I promise you.”

Katarina looked at Thomas. “Do you come to gloat, Sir Thomas?”

“I hoped you thought better of me than that. I pray for you and your children, and for your husband’s soul. No matter your purpose, you provided sanctuary for my lady, and comfort. Faith, I came here today to ask one more favor of you.”

Henry Vanner cleared his throat. “My wife and I will leave you for a little while so that you might talk.” Their hosts withdrew.

Lucienne still held one of Katarina’s hands, stroking it. Thomas settled across from them, awaiting a sign that Katarina would hear him out. Her arresting eyes bore the signs of much weeping—a puffiness, a redness poorly masked. Listening to the wind without, the whispering behind the closed door, he waited for her to break the silence.

In a little while she slipped her hands from Lucienne’s and
reached out to touch Thomas’s scar. “Did this happen in combat?”

“Yes.”

“He saved the life of Raoul de Brienne, the son of the Constable of France,” Lucienne said with pride.

“A noble deed. It must have caused you much pain.”

“That pain was nothing compared with learning that my wife was wed to another in my absence. But that did not surprise you, did it?” He tried to keep his tone flat, unemotional.

Katarina bowed her head. He’d not expected an apology.

“Your husband’s death has left us with only you as witness to our betrothal. Will you still stand behind us when we bring our case to the pope?”

“I must think of my children.” She lifted a scented cloth to her eyes.

Thomas nodded. “I encourage you to do so. You must not deprive them of the king’s protection. If he were to hear the complete story of your interference in his plans for Lady Joan—” he stopped. This is not how he’d meant to proceed.

The feather on Katarina’s black velvet hat quivered as she met his gaze. Now she looked like the Katarina he remembered, challenging him with the ghost of a smile in her eyes. “How cruel you are, Sir Thomas. And ungrateful. Did we not bring the two of you together?”

“For your own ends. Shall I go to the king?”

“There is no need. My late husband and I signed a letter attesting to your betrothal, the night spent with Lady Joan, the bloodied sheet, and I have it with me. I’ll keep it safe until you have need of it.”

“You will give it to a messenger I will send to your home, Dame Katarina. Tomorrow.”

“You do not trust me?”

“I trust no one, with good cause. You will also be available to my lawyer and to any representatives of the pope when the time
comes. If His Grace should move you to a different location, you will get word to Lady Lucienne at once.”

Katarina began to play with a button near her waist.

“My lawyer will take every care to be discreet.”

“Thomas is an honorable man,” Lucienne assured her.

Thomas rose and thanked Katarina for her time. “I am sorry to come to you in this way while you are in mourning, Dame Katarina. My lady and I will not forget your help.”

“And if the pope decides in young Montagu’s favor, will you blame me for that?”

“As long as you do all that we ask of you, we will let you live in peace.”

“Peace.” She looked at him as if he’d lost his mind. “You did not see what they did to Jacob, his body so pounded and slashed our servants needed shovels to retrieve his remains. Someone had tried to saw off his head, but gave up and smashed it in, again and again. My children thought their father beloved by the people. Now they know how easily such love turns to hate. I’ve lost my husband, my status, my country, and you speak of peace.”

Thomas’s father had also met a violent end at the hands of those who had once been his comrades. He was no stranger to such suffering. “Forgive my intrusion on your mourning. Admit my lawyer tomorrow, that is all I ask for now.”

“Will she help us?” he asked Lucienne when they were out in the street.

“I will see that she does.” She slipped her arm through his, kissing his cheek.

He asked if she might arrange for him to see Joan.

“I do not think it wise. But I shall tell her all that was said.” She kissed him again and crossed the road to her town house.

Thomas continued on to his lawyer’s home, a sour taste in his mouth for intruding on a widow in mourning. But he could not afford to leave Katarina in peace.

S
ITTING BENEATH THE OLD LIME AT THE EDGE OF THE GARDEN
, J
OAN
was sorting rose hips with her mother and Efa, their voices only slightly louder than the drone of the bees collecting the late-summer pollen and frequently drowned out by the calls of the bargemen on the Thames. Half the city seemed to be out on the water that afternoon, basking in the warmth. They spoke of Lucienne’s visit the previous day, her account of the meeting with Katarina Van Artevelde, picking apart the particulars, turning them over and over to see what they might hide. Joan found it hard to take much comfort. A letter such as Thomas now held was useless without the means to petition the pope.

“Oh, my dear,” Margaret said as she glanced up toward the house. “Your cousins approach.”

Bella and Ned were advancing down the path, followed by servants carrying baskets.

“We brought refreshments!” Bella announced, flouncing down on the bench beside Joan. “Why have you been avoiding us, cousin?” she whispered. “We hardly see you anymore.”

“My responsibilities as lady of the manor keep me away, dear cousin,” Joan said, adopting Countess Catherine’s haughty voice.

Bella had begun to ask about the countess when Ned interrupted, sitting cross-legged at Joan’s feet and reaching for her hand.

“You don’t want to touch me, I’m sticky with rose hip juice.” She held her palms out to prove it.

It was the first time Joan had seen Ned since he accompanied his father to Sluys. For the next hour, he entertained them with stories of his adventure. His descriptions of the dissembling and self-important Low Country officials were amusing, his boasts of his part in the proceedings unbelievable. But none of them challenged him, not even his sister. Joan waited,
knowing that he was likely saving for last his real reason for this visit.

“Since then I’ve had the pleasure of meeting Jacob Van Artevelde’s family. What a strange pair they were—he a river rat, she a swan. And their daughters—such magpies!”

“Dame Katarina would agree,” Joan said as her mind raced—what might the girls have told him? Would he betray Katarina to the king?

“Do you not wonder how culpable they were in their father’s unpopularity, with their careless gossip?”

“Not at all. They loved him. They spoke openly only with those they trusted. How they must have thrilled to meet you. You have guaranteed their success in London society.”

Joan spent the afternoon deflecting the bait and beating Ned at his own game. He did mention a sighting of Thomas and Lucienne together in London, and appeared disappointed in Joan’s lack of reaction. It reassured her. He must be unaware of Lucienne’s continued support. And Thomas’s lawyer had Katarina’s letter. Thank God for that.

F
rom atop the crumbling keep of Guildford Castle, Joan and Bella watched servants and squires struggling to fold the huge banners, standards, and pennons the women had sewn for the ships in the king’s fleet. All must be packed by morning, when king and company departed for Portsmouth, where the invasion force was gathering. By midsummer they expected to be in France. A dozen servants held on to the huge streamer with the quartered arms of the king, blue garters, and the figure of St. Lawrence. The heavy worsted cloth had to be carefully folded to take up as little space as possible, for already the carts were laden with several hundred standards and pennons, smaller but still bulky and heavy.

Joan and Bella had not worked on these. Their fingers were pricked and sore from the needlework on the king’s and Ned’s gorgeous jupons, and the hangings for a grand bed for the king—for, no matter that they were on campaign, a king must be suitably magnificent when entertaining noble guests. The ladies of Philippa’s chamber had sewn hundreds of small azure-and-silver garters on the blue taffeta bed hangings and spread, the king’s latest favorite emblem, with the motto “Hony soit qui mal y pense,” or “Shame to those who think evil of it.” Two jupons, one of taffeta and one of silk, had been powdered
with the silver-buckled garters. There were also satin doublets and velvet jupons with the king’s arms. The work had begun in midwinter, when Edward chose the chivalric design.

Bella had teased her father that the garter emblem might be misconstrued as a woman’s undergarment rather than as straps for armor. The queen’s smile had frozen, and Joan guessed that in her mind she was back in the pavilion, seeing Edward kiss Catherine’s garter and tuck it away. This was the very image of that garter.

“Nonsense,” the king had said, laughing at his daughter. “Such buckles must never chafe the soft flesh of a woman’s thigh.” The guests at the high table had laughed with him and toasted to the great cause, as the queen excused herself, saying she felt unwell.

Bella had slipped over to Joan’s seat to continue her plaint. “Garters. Why didn’t he choose something more chivalric? Arthurian. And the motto—shaming those who think evil of Father’s campaign—it’s bullying, not chivalry. Of all his mottoes, I like this one the least.”

Joan noticed the king frowning at the queen’s departure. She agreed with Bella. “He might have consulted your mother on the symbol. She might have warned him.”

“Mother? No. She cares about quality, not meaning.”

Not always
, thought Joan.

Shouts rose up from the castle yard, pulling Joan from her reverie just as Ned appeared down below, laughing as he ducked past the sagging banner. He enjoyed the adulation, waving to the crowd, stopping here and there to make someone laugh.

“He will be knighted upon landing in France,” said Bella. “He’ll be insufferable then. How awful it is to be a girl, always left behind.”

Joan’s brother was also to be knighted upon landing, and Will, too. Poor Will. He’d asked her to share his bed the previous evening, to hold him through the night, and she’d done so,
seeing his fear. He’d stayed away since that one night at Bisham. She could afford to be kind. She waved to him now as he entered the yard with several of his fellows, scanning the battlements to see who watched. He proudly waved back.

“You waste your kindness,” said Ned, leaning over the battlements beside her. “He’ll have his pick of pretty boys in the field.”

“Oh, hush,” she snapped, leaving him.

He hurried after her, stopping her on the tower steps, his hands cupping her face. “You must pray for me every day, Joan. Will you promise?”

His hands were damp with fear. Poor Ned. He strutted about like a peacock pretending that nothing touched him, nothing moved him, but it was all an act. “Of course I will, cousin. All of you.”

“I know why you say that. But, just this once, could you let me know you’ll pray for me especially?”

“Ned, you know I will.”

“And stand on the battlements when I ride out so that I can see you. I must know that your heart is with me, Joan. I fear that if you are not up here seeing me off, if I look up and don’t see you lifting your arm in farewell, I won’t return.”

Just this once, she slipped her arms round him as he kissed her, and held him close. “You will return triumphant. I feel it in my bones.”

I
N THE MORNING
, J
OAN STOOD ATOP THE BATTLEMENTS WITH SEVERAL
of the queen’s ladies and the royal children, watching King Edward, Prince Edward, and their great company ride out to war. As they reached the gate, Ned looked up to see if Joan was there. She lifted her hand to signal that all would be well. He bowed to her, hand on heart, and rode out. “God watch over him,” she whispered, and was about to turn away when a
knight a few horses behind the prince caught her eye. Straight and proud he rode, his curling hair almost hiding the eye patch. Thomas. She waved, but he did not look up.

“Who is it? Who are you waving to?” Bella asked.

“All of them.”

“Oh!” Bella and her sister Joan both began to wave wildly.

When the yard was empty, Bella sighed. “Nothing will ever be the same.”

“I should hope not,” said Lady Angmar. “His Grace means to return triumphant, the pretender Philip of Valois deposed.”

“You don’t understand,” Bella snapped.

Joan did. Thomas’s eye was only the most visible of his scars. Earl William’s head wound had changed his character while slowly killing him. Long ago, she and Bella wondered at the horribly puckered scars on the men’s bodies in the practice field, the missing fingers, hands, but she knew now that, for many, the deepest wounds were invisible.

“What if Ned can never dance again—if he comes back at all?” Bella whispered, slipping her hand into Joan’s.