Four Sisters, All Queens (28 page)

Henry has explained to the barons many times why England needs Poitou. The kingdom has already lost Normandy, Anjou, and Aquitaine—three territories on the French coast. Without Poitou and Gascony, where on the continent would England land its ships? Trade would become most difficult. England would be diminished.

But the barons’ council refused to pay a single mark. “Damned shortsighted,” Henry huffed later in his chambers, to Eléonore and Richard. “A pity that I must heed the edicts of fools.”

The French king has none of these concerns. Without the
Magna Carta tying his hands, he governs his kingdom as he—and his mother—desire. As a result, France is expanding, swallowing everything around it to become the most powerful nation on the continent. “That position should be England’s, if not for my father’s weakness,” he says. Which weakness he is speaking of, he does not say: King John’s lust for the beautiful Isabella of Angoulême, which caused him to lose his lands to France, or his failure to take back those lands?

Some of the barons are calling this a woman’s battle. “They blame our mother,” Richard told Henry. The whole world knows, by now, how Queen Blanche snubbed Isabella during Alphonse’s feast. In outrage, Isabella rode to the château which Alphonse had provided for her and her husband, and set it on fire.

“They blame Queen Isabella? Instead of Blanche?” Eléonore said. Which of the barons would not avenge such an insult as Isabella bore? Which of them would not fight for his son’s honor, as she is doing?

“They say she seduced our father, she seduced the Count of La Marche, and now she seduces you, Henry.”

Henry reddened. “Charter or no charter, I don’t need the barons’ permission to travel over the sea and take what is mine.” He brandished his most recent letter from Hugh of Lusignan. The rebel forces have amassed, many thousands from Poitou, Gascony, Anjou, Aquitaine. Never mind the paucity of English warriors: Henry need only bring money.
All are eager to serve you, now and after our victory,
he wrote.
We cannot lose.

Bring money. This request seems simple enough for a wealthy kingdom such as England. Then Richard calculates the costs: Ships. Crews. Horses. Men. Food. Weapons. Armor. Housing. Bribes. The sum is staggering—forty thousand pounds, two times the amount collected in the last English levy.

“Without the barons’ aid, how will we afford to go?” Eléonore asked. “Where will we find the funds?”

“I’ll take it from the Jews,” Henry said, giving her a surprised look. “Of course.”

After the storm has subsided, she lies in bed, one hand on her jumping womb—a boy in there, surely—and one hand gripping her mattress, as if the ship had not ceased its violent plummeting. Henry wants to take not only Poitou, but all the lands his father lost. To do so, he will need to usurp the French crown completely. Should he succeed, what would become of Marguerite? Would Henry protect her from the terrible, dank Gascon jails? She is one reason Eléonore has come, heavy with child and foreboding. Sanchia is the other.

Toulouse’s marriage is annulled, one of Pope Gregory’s final acts. Now the pope is dead, and Toulouse has sent for Sanchia.
I can do nothing,
Marguerite has written. She has no power to stop the marriage, especially with no pope to hear an appeal. Richard of Cornwall is their sister’s only hope.

Richard, however, has been away for two years. After rescuing the French army from prison in Outremer—while the French were taking over his castle—he took advantage of his new “hero” status to increase his stature in the world. Not only did he pay homage to Pope Gregory in Rome, but he also visited the Holy Roman Emperor in Sicily, where Saracen dancing girls entertained him for months. Sanchia’s beauty, once so entrancing, has faded from his memory—but that is going to change very soon.

The baby kicks again, harder this time, looking for a way out. As impatient as its mother. Eléonore smiles.
Tarry a while longer, little one. You have a very important role in my scheme, but you must make your appearance at the crucial time.

I
F
G
ASCONY’S JAILS
are notoriously grim, its people are even more so. Its lush landscape, mild climate, and meandering river ought to produce gentle, cheerful folk, as in Provence, but here no one smiles. Even the castle staff greets the royal party with downturned mouths and looks askance.

“They resent you,” Simon tells them. “The Gascons do not want to be ruled from across the sea. They want to shape their own
destiny.” Coming from France as he does, Simon knows Gascony better than Henry, who has relied on seneschals to administer it for him.

“Silliness,” Henry snaps. “Destiny is God’s to determine.” And God has given Gascony to England, which intends to keep it. When Prince Edward comes of age, he will become its duke, and the duchy’s income will be his—enabling him to care for his wife and family until he becomes king.

Simon’s knowledge of the French is one reason Henry recruited him for this campaign. After fleeing England he lived in his family’s manor in Montfort-l’Amaury, near Paris, and became a companion to King Louis. To Henry’s irritation, he demures when asked for the French king’s secrets.

“Would he confide in me, your vassal?” Simon’s exaggerated shrug tells Eléonore the answer is “yes.”

After a few sunny days in Bordeaux, the Gascon capital, the storm and its omens have faded from memory. Henry and Richard wave jauntily as they depart for battle, as though on a pleasure excursion. They are confident of victory, and why not? Practically all of southern France waits at Taillebourg to fight with them. Eléonore and Eleanor Montfort wave good-bye while their toddling children play at their feet, bumping into their mothers’ shins and evading their nurses’ grasping hands. On his horse, Henry leads the procession in full regalia—tunic and fur-lined mantles of colorful silk, golden crown—and holds his sword high. Before him, heralds blow trumpets and pipes, and tap drums to announce his approach along streets that are virtually empty. Except for a few curious onlookers, the disgruntled citizens of Bordeaux have chosen to stay at home today, “extracting the sticks from their bottoms, one hopes,” Eleanor Montfort says. She glances at the Gascon servants nearby, but they pretend not to hear.

“These Gascons have no sense of humor,” she declares. “Of course, the truth is painful.”

In the pleasure of her sister-in-law’s company, Eléonore forgets, for a moment, her fears for Henry’s safety. Yet she cannot set aside
her anxieties about Sanchia, whom Raimond of Toulouse has twice tried to abduct.

Abhorring the marriage as much as her daughters, Mama delays.
We do not wish to send her now,
the Countess Beatrice has written.
She has reached the age of womanhood, but Sanchia is still a child.
Toulouse doesn’t care about her readiness for married life. He craves the prize of her exotic, golden-haired beauty, and of her presumably fertile womb.

When the warriors have disappeared into the trees and the notes of the trumpets have dwindled, Eléonore feels a touch on her shoulder.

“They have gone at last,” Uncle Peter says, rubbing his hands together. “I am off to Provence, my dear, to execute our plan. Trust me. I visited Sanchia only two months ago. She is more stunning than ever before. One glimpse of her, and Richard of Cornwall will beg for her hand.”

Sanchia

A Piece of Ripe Fruit

Aix-en-Provence, 1243

Fifteen years old

T
HE SKY’S BLUE
is so deep, she wants to dive into it and swim around. How many months has it been since she was allowed to leave the château? Not that she minds being inside. She prefers her clean, safe home to dirt, thorns, and insects—and strange men lurking about the grounds, waiting to steal her away. Today, though, she must be out, for her kitten has escaped. Beatrice let her go, cook said. Now poor Poivre is lost and Beatrice won’t help find her.

“It was an accident,” her little sister said (with a wicked grin). “She followed me out the door, and I couldn’t catch her.” How she lies! Satan has wormed his way into Beatrice’s heart. Her sister has tormented the kitten since Sanchia got her, a gift from Papa “to console you in your confinement,” he said. She will ask the saints to erase Beatrice’s jealousy—after she rescues Poivre from the dangers of the wild.

“Poivre!” she cries, for, although she knows that kittens do not answer to their names, her cat is very intelligent. Poivre might come bounding up at the sound of Sanchia’s voice, for she knows it well, having been sung to, read to, and cooed over by her mistress
every day for the last week. “Come to me, darling! Your mama is worrying about you.” Her kitten might be snatched away by a hawk (her eyes fill with tears at the thought), or eaten by a boar. The woods are full of danger, and not just for kittens.

A movement catches her eye, and a flash of white in the long grass at the edge of the willow grove. She runs, singing, her
petit chou
is safe, and as she nears the grove she sees her kitten in the grass, pouncing on crickets. Sanchia’s laugh is a sparkling brook, but Poivre, who hates the water, scampers into the woods.

She stops at the forest’s edge. Her
paire
warned her to stay near the château. Vicious creatures live in the woods, wolves and snakes and nasty, mean boars. “Come back, Poivre, or you will be eaten!” Her plea bounces from tree to tree but Poivre does not return.