Captive Queen (42 page)

When the company was seated and the first course had been served—a barely palatable dish of chunks of rabbit marooned in greasy gravy—Henry turned to her, his expression unreadable.

“As you know,” he said, “I’ve spent the autumn riding around Aquitaine quelling rebellion. Your vassals are worse than most, and they hate me.”

“You have given them little reason to love you,” Eleanor could not resist retorting.

“It’s not even worth the effort. In fact, I have also given up trying to make them obey me. You’ve always wanted power in the duchy, haven’t you, Eleanor? Well, it’s your turn now.” There was a hint of dark humor in Henry’s face.

“My turn?” she repeated, unable to still the excited racing of her heart.

“Yes, yours,” Henry told her, with the hint of a smile. He was enjoying disarming her. “Your presence in Aquitaine, and the reassertion of your authority as its duchess, might make all the difference. Your rebellious subjects love you, and if they see me devolving my power on you, they might yet cease constantly opposing me.”

Eleanor could not speak. He was asking her to go back to Aquitaine as its sovereign duchess. This was what she had longed for all through the fifteen years of her marriage—no, in fact it had been her dream ever since she was borne off to Paris, a bride of fifteen, by Louis. Aquitaine was her home, the place she wanted most of all to be, that enchanted land of the South, the land of mighty rivers, wooded valleys, wine and song. She wanted to fall to her knees and praise God for this sought-after blessing. She even felt some gratitude toward her faithless lord, although that was mixed with resentment, because he had been ignoring her urgent advice on courting her vassals for years, and had only belatedly come to this eminently sensible decision.

“Now you see why I asked you to bring all your belongings,” Henry said.

“I thought you were planning to set up home with me again,” she told him with an acerbic smile. He had the grace to look uncomfortable.

“Eleanor, circumstances have kept us apart,” he said. And Rosamund de Clifford, she thought bitterly. “Will you do it?” he went on. “Will you go back to Aquitaine as its ruler?”

“Did you have to ask?” she replied.

   To Eleanor’s astonishment, Henry followed her up to her solar at the end of the evening. He was a little drunk after all the carousing, and they left behind them most of the barons of Normandy slumped asleep over the tables or sprawling drunk on the rushes.

Henry waved her ladies away.

“I will be the Queen’s tirewoman tonight,” he told them, his speech slurred. They scattered, giggling and exchanging knowing glances. Evidently all
was
well between their master and mistress …

Once the chamber door closed, Eleanor turned to face him.

“Why are you here?” she asked coldly. He came lurching toward her.

“You of all people should know that,” he replied. “State business—the getting of heirs.”

“We have enough heirs,” she said, her voice strident. “I told you, I wanted no more children. And you know very well we have nothing to say to each other.”

“I didn’t come here to
say
anything,” Henry jested. “You’re still a beautiful woman, Eleanor. Time was, you would have been eager to bed with me.” He was becoming petulant.

“That was a long time ago. Before Rosamund de Clifford usurped my place.” Eleanor’s tone was frigid. It was only her body that betrayed her, responding involuntarily to the familiar nearness and scent of this man whom she had loved so wholeheartedly. She was shocked to realize that she still wanted him, despite the hurts he had dealt her.

But now it was out, the thing she had dreamed of saying. The gauntlet had been cast down.

Henry halted, stopped dead in his tracks, instantly sober. Lust withered and died. His eyes took on that shifty look she knew so well.

“Who told you that?” he asked, his eyes narrowing.

“No one! I saw for myself. And she told me, your little whore, how you love her, and she loves you. It was so touching I almost wept.” She felt like weeping now, but would have died rather than let him see her cry. “A pretty bower you’ve built for her at Woodstock—and that labyrinth, Henry: did you think to ward me off when I came seeking revenge? Did you think I wouldn’t find my way into that fine tower you’ve built for your leman?”

Henry was speechless with surprise: who could have predicted that, of all the houses she had to choose from in England, his wife would turn up at Woodstock? And Rosamund, the silly little fool, why had it pleased her vanity to brag of his favor and his love? With an effort he found his voice.

“I can explain,” he said, in the time-honored manner of cheating husbands.

“I’m listening,” Eleanor answered, eyebrows raised in disbelief.

“I don’t have to justify my actions to you or anyone,” Henry went on defensively, “but for the sake of courtesy, I want you to know the truth. I did have an affair with Rosamund, I admit it, but I haven’t seen her in eighteen months.”

“An affair? You told her you loved her! Or did you deceive her, much as you’ve deceived me?” Eleanor was in a ferment.

“No,” Henry said quietly. “I said I would tell you the truth.” He paused. “The truth is that I do love her. I can’t help it. I miss her desperately. And I know she returned that love—I hope she returns it still.” His voice was hoarse.

Eleanor could not speak. His brutal words echoed in her ears. I do love her, I do love her … It was the cruelest betrayal. She wished she could fall down and die, she wished she had never uttered the name Rosamund, she wished that Henry and his trollop were burning in the fires of Hell …

He had forsaken her, his aging wife, the mother of his children, for a younger woman, as so many men did; for a woman so young and beautiful that there could be no hope of him abandoning her.

“So this is the end for us,” she stated flatly.

“That’s up to you,” Henry said.

“Is this why you want me to go to Aquitaine?”

He snorted. “You know me better than that. Kings can’t afford the luxury of putting their pleasures before the demands of state. I want you to go to Aquitaine because your presence is needed there. It has nothing to do with Rosamund. If it did, then I would have been in Woodstock with her, instead of chasing after your rebellious vassals.”

“But, of course, it’s very convenient for me to go to Aquitaine just now,” Eleanor said caustically. “As soon as I’ve gone South, no doubt you will summon your whore here to rut with you.”

“No,” Henry replied, his voice leaden. “I have to treat with Louis.” He sank down on the fur-lined counterpane that covered the bed and buried his face in his hands. “I did not look for this to happen, Eleanor. I still love you, as my wife, you must believe that.”

“I know nothing!” she snapped. “Or I wish I did. And I don’t want to be loved as your wife. I want you to love me as you once loved me. When you were mine. Before Rosamund.”

Henry threw back his head and laughed mirthlessly. “You’ve got it all wrong, Eleanor. Our marriage was made for policy, as much as for love, and I not only loved you, I lusted after you as I had lusted after no woman before you. But lust like that doesn’t last. It dilutes in the marriage bed after long years of usage. I was never wholly yours, as you think. There have always been women along the way. I have a devil in me, and I can never be content with one woman, not even Rosamund. I’ve bedded quite a few since I left her in England. It’s not in my nature to be faithful, yet I am quite capable of loving you as my wife, and of lusting after you yet—and of loving her too.”

Eleanor had been listening in mounting horror, unable to accept the magnitude of Henry’s betrayal. She had wondered and speculated, all through the years; she’d heard what Raoul de Faye told her, but never truly believed … until she went to Woodstock. At the memory, the dreadful tears welled.

“You love her the way you once loved me,” she muttered, bitter.

“We are a partnership, Eleanor,” Henry was saying. “You are Aquitaine, and I am England, Normandy, and the rest. Together, we straddle much of the western world. Nothing can sunder us, not even hatred. To be invincible, we have to work together, to give a semblance of being in harmony. Our personal feelings do not count.”

“You talk very lightly of hatred!” she flung at him. “You make a nonsense of my feelings, and then preach to me about partnership. Come, Henry; I am not a fool. You itch for that strumpet, and you want me out of the way. No, don’t dispute that!”

“I will dispute it!” Henry shouted. “I love and honor you as my wife—”

“Honor? You don’t know the meaning of the word!” Eleanor screamed, tears coursing down her cheeks, and slapped him hard across the face. “That’s for every time you’ve fucked where you shouldn’t!” She lashed out again, her fury out of control.

Henry caught her wrists, his face a mask of wrath. His grip hurt.

“How dare you strike me, the King!” he roared.

“I struck my faithless husband,” Eleanor choked, crying helplessly now. “Henry, you have
hurt
me, to the quick. You have betrayed my bed and my trust. You have made me realize I am old. If I felt joy at going back to rule Aquitaine, it is dead now. There can be no more joy for me in this world. You have killed it. I hope you are satisfied!”

Henry said nothing, but suddenly slid his arms tightly about her and held her until the storm of weeping had passed; she could not see his face with hers pressed wetly against his beard, and wondered why she wanted to. Even when the tears dried and she was still, she stood there in his embrace, wanting to free herself, yet needing to be held there forever, and dreading the moment ending. It was a bitter realization that the only man who could comfort her was the man who had dealt her a mortal hurt. But just then she felt him stir against her.

“No!” she declared, beginning to struggle. “Not that. Never that.”

“You are my wife,” Henry muttered. “It is my right.”

“Then you will have to rape me!” she spat.

“Don’t tempt me,” he said, then let her go. When he spoke again, his voice was barely controlled. “Very well. I was trying to mend things between us, but you have made yourself clear. From now on we will observe the courtesies, and no more. You will not mind, I take it, if I indulge my lust in other beds?”

“Do as you please.” Eleanor seethed with the desperation of one who realizes she has deliberately, impulsively burned her bridges. “I will go to Aquitaine, and we will keep up the pretense that all is well between us, if that is what you wish.”

“You know very well I wished for something rather different,” Henry told her.

“No, my lord, it’s you who have got it all wrong,” Eleanor said, resolutely wiping away the last of her tears. “Our marriage is dead. You cannot have us both.”

36

   They were riding south together, making for Poitiers, a veritable army of lords, servants, and soldiers at their heels. Henry had insisted on escorting his wife, warning her that the times were lawless and that his mailed fist stretched only so far. They traveled in hostile silence.

Eleanor was in turmoil, resentful that her joy in her yearned-for return to Aquitaine as its rightful ruler had been ruined by the dread knowledge that it effectively signaled her separation from Henry, a situation that was her doing but in no way her fault. Every mile was taking them nearer to that parting, after which they would go their own ways, partners in a marriage, yes, but miles apart in far more than distance. She ached for inner peace, and could only pray that, once settled in her beloved domains in the South, she would find it.

There was to be more than one parting. With the King and Queen rode their children: Young Henry, now styled Count of Poitiers, fair of face and shooting up in height, wearing his royal status with all the assurance of his race. He would be remaining with his father from now on, to learn the business of government. Richard, eleven years old, long-limbed and blue-eyed, already a hardy warrior who was praised alike by the captains who drilled him in military exercises and the tutors who taught him Latin and book learning. He was to accompany his mother to Aquitaine with his brother Geoffrey, dark and handsome Geoffrey, who was patiently suffering the twittering of vain young Constance, who rode by his side; he would be wasted on her, this clever boy, Eleanor thought. Then there were the little girls, Eleanor and Joanna, golden-haired images of herself, but gentler, and far more docile and biddable.