Eleanor turned abruptly toward the bed, sat down, and beckoned for Maud to join her. “So what would you have me do? Follow in your footsteps?”
“No, there is no need for you to go down that rock-strewn road.” Maud grinned suddenly. “You could not even if you wanted to, for it is not in your nature to make ‘the best’ of things. If it were, you’d still be Queen of France.”
“God forbid,” Eleanor said, and they both smiled.
“As for Toulouse, I think you must resign yourself to its loss.”
Eleanor arched an elegant brow. “Must I, indeed?” she said, but with none of her earlier asperity, and Maud nodded.
“If two men as utterly unlike as Harry and Louis could not win it, does that not tell you something about your chances?” Maud paused, unable to resist adding, “Unless you mean to try again with a third husband?”
“Do not tempt me,” Eleanor retorted, but there was a hint of amusement hovering in the corners of her mouth. “A pity I could not ride against Toulouse myself. If only women were not so damnably dependent upon men to get what we want in this life!”
“Amen,” Maud said fervently. “But you cannot in fairness blame Harry for that, Eleanor. It is not his fault that men get to soar high and wide whilst we are earthbound, birds with clipped wings.”
“Ah, here it comes, the loyal kinswoman rallying to her cousin’s defense,” Eleanor mocked, and Maud grinned again.
“A defense, yes, but a qualified one. For all that I think the world of Harry, I am not blind to his flaws. He is stubborn and single-minded and surely not the easiest of men to live with. But he is also a man who does love you deeply . . . if reluctantly.”
Eleanor stared at her and then burst out laughing. “You do understand Harry,” she said, “much better than I realized! Harry was prepared, even eager, to give me his name, his body, his crown, but not his heart. That caught him by surprise, and even now I suspect that he is not entirely easy about it.”
“Harry has good reason to be mistrustful of love. His parents’ union was not so much a marriage as a war, and he was their hostage, for he was unlucky enough to love them both.”
“He rarely talks to me of his childhood, usually shrugging off my questions with one of his jokes. I suspect that you know more than I do, Maud, about his family’s bloodletting.”
“What I know comes mainly from Ranulf and from my own parents. My father was very protective of Maude and felt strongly that she was ill-used by Geoffrey. Of course there are those to argue that she was equally to blame for their feuding. I do know that the marriage got off to the worst possible start, for Maude had been forced by her father to wed Geoffrey and she was not loath to let him know of her unwillingness to be his wife. Their most bitter quarrels took place in those first years of the marriage, and by all accounts, Maude’s sharp tongue was a poor match for Geoffrey’s fists. I would wager,” she said unexpectedly, “that Harry has never struck you . . . has he?”
Eleanor shook her head. “No.”
“Did you never wonder why? Most men feel it is their God-given right to chastise their wives as they would their children, and why not, when Holy Church tells them that woman was born to be ruled by man? But I knew Harry would not, for I remember a talk I once had with him and Ranulf on that subject. Not surprisingly, Ranulf disapproved of wife-beating. God save him, he is the last truly chivalrous soul in all of Christendom. But Harry was no less emphatic, saying a man ought not to take advantage of his superior strength, and Ranulf and I knew he was thinking of his mother.”
Eleanor reached for a pillow, positioning herself more comfortably on the bed. “Harry has never lacked for advocates, but you make a particularly effective one. I daresay you could even find excuses for his unfortunate habit of always being half a world away whenever one of my lying-ins begins.”
“No, for some sins, no excuses will do and penance is required. I’d suggest you demand it be done in the bedchamber, but then, that is what got you so often into those birthing chambers in the first place.”
Eleanor could not help laughing, and Maud joined in. “I guess I did a bit of preaching, after all,” she admitted, “even if that was not my intent. Thank you for taking my meddling in good humor. It may be that I envy you, just a little, for I think you and Harry have found happiness in your marriage, and we both know how rare that is. I suppose I have been urging you to give more than Harry, and that may not be fair, but it is realistic. You cannot change a man, Harry least of all. You will always come second with him, for his kingship will come first. But to come second with the most powerful man in the known world is not such a bad thing . . . now is it?”
“I suppose there are worse fates,” Eleanor agreed wryly. “So you are saying, then, that I must accept Harry as he is. But what if I cannot?”
Maud shrugged. “Then learn to love him less.”
Eleanor had not been expecting such an uncompromising answer. She’d always prided herself upon her pragmatism, but she realized now that she was an outright romantic compared to Maud. “I’ve never been one to settle for less. But you need not fret on our behalf, Cousin Maud. I think I can content myself with what Harry has to give. Although,” she added, half-joking, half-serious, “I’d have been far more contented had he been able to give me Toulouse!”
THE STRONGHOLD OF GERBEROY was in its death throes. Henry’s lightning assault had taken its garrison by surprise, for he was thought to be still raiding south of Beauvais. But Henry was already famed and feared for the speed with which he could move his army, and his men had appeared without warning out of the mist of a damp November dawn. The castle had soon fallen, and now Henry’s commanders were supervising its destruction.
Rainald’s face was streaked with smoke and grime, his eyes puffy with fatigue. His smile, however, was jubilant. “I thought Harry’s seizure last year of Thouars Castle was a dazzling feat. But taking Gerberoy was even easier. The Bishop of Beauvais must be quaking under his bed by now!”
“I hope so,” Ranulf said, watching as flames consumed the castle stables, began to lick at the roof of the great hall. “I heard that Thomas Becket had ridden into camp. Do you know if that is true?”
Rainald nodded. “He and Harry are back there now and seem to have mended their rift. When I left, Becket was boasting about the havoc he’d wrought in Quercy, taking three castles and putting towns to the torch. Rather bloodthirsty for a man of the Church, wouldn’t you say, Little Brother?”
Ranulf smiled, for it had been years since he’d been called that. “I’ve never known Becket to be much for boasting,” he said mildly. “Why do you dislike him so, Rainald?”
His brother shrugged. “I’ve never seen him drunk.”
Ranulf laughed. “You’ve never seen Harry drunk either, have you?”
“That is different. Harry is good company, drunk or sober. Becket always seems to be standing apart, watching the rest of us sin.”
Ranulf suspected that Rainald’s animosity was based upon that most common of all motives, jealousy; any man so close to the king was bound to make more enemies than friends. “Well, if he is counting up your sins, he’d better have a tally stick to keep track of them all.”
Rainald guffawed, then clouted him on the shoulder. “You’re one to talk! You may not stray far from home and hearth nowadays, but I remember when—” He stopped abruptly, awkwardly, not wanting to remind Ranulf of those dark times when his adulterous passion for Annora Fitz Clement had nearly brought him to ruin. Fumbling for another topic, he said hastily, “You’ve not heard about Stephen’s son, have you? We got word this afternoon that he died at Limoges.”
“No, I had not heard.” Ranulf sketched a cross, feeling a twinge of sadness. William, the Count of Boulogne and Earl of Surrey, had fallen ill on their withdrawal from Toulouse, but he was a young man and Ranulf had expected him to recover. How sad to die in a foreign land, so far from home and family, in the service of the king who’d been his father’s implacable foe. “He had no children by his de Warenne wife, did he?”
“No, and that is the trouble. Boulogne is now up for grabs, since the only one left of Stephen’s children is William’s sister, Mary, and she cannot very well rule it from Romsey’s nunnery. Harry was right vexed, says the vultures will soon be circling—”
“Ranulf!” Hywel was coming toward them across the smoke-wreathed bailey. “Padarn has been hurt.”
Ranulf felt a jolt of alarm; the young Welshman had once been his squire and had insisted upon being included in the contingent of Welsh he and Hywel were commanding. “How badly?”
“A flaming rafter from the stables came crashing down, killing one of the king’s hired Flemings. Padarn was able to dive clear in time, but his arm was burned and I think we ought to get him back to camp straightaway.”
As Ranulf turned toward his brother, Rainald waved him on. “Go,” he said. “Find the lad a doctor. We’ve men enough to take care of things here.”
Ranulf glanced once more at the wreckage of Gerberoy, then hastened after Hywel. Enough men had already died in a country not their own. He meant to make sure that Padarn was not one of them.
RANULF AND HYWEL left Padarn in the doctor’s tent, his burns being treated with goose-grease salve, his pain with spiced red wine. Day was waning and shadows lengthening. Hywel glanced toward the north, where the glowing horizon attested to Gerberoy’s fiery demise. “I promised Padarn we’d find him some mead. Are we going to have to ferment it ourselves?”
“Probably.” Henry’s command tent lay ahead and Ranulf quickened his step. Just then the flap was pulled up and a tall man emerged, dark and saturnine and vaguely familiar. As Ranulf watched, he signaled imperiously to his waiting attendants, then strode over to a tethered bay stallion. Once he and his men were mounted, they galloped out of the encampment at a pace to send soldiers scattering, but he seemed as indifferent to their hurled curses as he’d been to their safety, never once looking back.
Hywel cursed, too, for he’d turned his ankle jumping out of the way. “Who is that arrogant whoreson?”
“I’ve seen him somewhere,” Ranulf said, “but my memory needs prodding. Let’s find out from Harry.”
Henry and Thomas Becket had spread a map out upon a trestle table and were studying it intently. They looked so pleased with themselves that Ranulf knew something was afoot. And it was then that he remembered where he’d seen the swaggering stranger: last year in Paris, at the court of the French king.
“Good God Almighty, that was Simon de Montfort!”
“You think so?” Henry asked innocently, but his eyes were full of laughter.
“Who,” Hywel asked, “is Simon de Montfort?”
“The Count of Évreux, a highborn and high-handed lord who happens to be a vassal of the French king. What was he doing here, Harry?”
“Betraying Louis,” Henry said, and gestured for a servant to fetch them wine. “He has agreed to do homage to me . . .” He paused deliberately, savoring the drama. “And to turn over into my keeping the castles of Montfort, Rochefort, and Epernon.”
“Which means,” Becket chimed in, “that Louis’s domains will be cut in half, as this map plainly shows.”
“I am impressed,” Ranulf said. “Dare I ask how you brought this about?”
Henry merely smiled, leaving it to Becket to answer for him. “De Montfort saw what befell the Bishop of Beauvais’s lands and, quite understandably, became alarmed that his own estates might suffer the same fate. It was not difficult to persuade him that he’d fare better as Harry’s vassal than he would as Louis’s.”
Hywel had followed Ranulf over to look at the map. “With his brothers in full retreat and his vassals deserting him, will the French king be able to continue the war?”
Becket shook his head. “We very much doubt it. De Montfort’s defection puts him in a perilous position, and even if he does not realize that, there will be plenty to point it out to him.”
Henry perched on the edge of the table, running his hand absently through his unruly coppery hair. “Louis has neither the desire nor the stomach to turn Normandy and France into a bloody battlefield. He’ll soon seek a truce, which I will agree to, and then we can all go home.”
“Now that you mention it,” Ranulf said, “Hywel and I are both eager to get back to Wales.”
“You and Lord Hywel can have the use of one of my ships,” Becket said, and when Ranulf looked inquiringly at his nephew, Henry nodded.
“I see no reason for you to wait upon the truce. Take Thomas up on his offer. He has six ships, you know, whilst the Crown only has the one. I ofttimes have to borrow one of his myself!”
Ranulf’s smile was brilliant, radiant with relief. “Is the morrow too soon? It’s been more than six months since I’ve seen my wife, after all.”
“It’s been nigh on that long since I’ve seen my wife, too,” Henry said, then smiled ruefully, for he suspected that making peace with the French king would be easier than making peace with Eleanor.
THE GREAT FORTRESS of William the Bastard was situated on an escarpment high above the Norman town of Falaise. One of the most formidable of Henry’s castles, it was here that he had chosen to hold his Christmas court, and it was here that he was to have his long delayed reunion with his wife.
Sleet was lashing the streets of Falaise, and few of the townspeople came out to watch as the king rode up the hill toward the castle. An earlier snowfall had yet to melt and the road was half-hidden, perilously icy in patches. Winter’s siege that year had begun early and seemed likely to be a long and brutal one, and Henry’s men were shivering from the cold, hunched over their saddles in a futile attempt to escape the wind’s buffeting fury. They were all looking forward to the roaring hearths and warm beds awaiting them at the castle; Henry alone felt no sense of relief as they rode into the bailey.