Revenge of the Rose (13 page)

In private discourse with His Majesty, Willem was comforted to see that Konrad was in fact a learned and cultured (if not pious) man, that he was capable of conversation nearly as engaging as Jouglet’s or Lienor’s, and that he was, however calculating, generous of spirit.

For example— Konrad explained— the landless freemen in certain of his burgeoning castle towns, the growing class of merchants and artisans, were not taxed the way most towns were by royal tolls or levies; Konrad on a seasonal basis simply invited them to make a gift to the royal coffers.

“And they do?” Willem asked, surprised, trying to imagine how his serfs might respond if he made their week-work on his fields voluntary.

Konrad smiled and spat out a cherry pit. “I get more now than I did when they were taxed in the conventional manner,” he said confidingly. “They are made so grateful by the
principle
of not being taxed, and so aware that other towns will pay according to their own ability, it becomes a competition to prove which community is most prosperous. Filling the royal coffers becomes almost festival in feeling. His Holiness in Rome is sick with envy.”

“What if they grow wise to it, and cease…gifting?” asked Willem.

“Then I’ll start taxing them again,” Konrad said offhandedly. “And anyhow I always tax the Jews.” He smiled. “I love my Jews. Germany could not be the power that she is without them. I so prefer them to those blasted Lombards for enhancing trade. They know enough to revere
this.
” He held up his right pinkie and wagged the signet ring.

“Oh, yes, that! My sister set the seal in a brooch, so she would have a king in the house,” Willem said with boyish enthusiasm.

Konrad grinned at Jouglet. “This fellow is almost too good to be true.” He turned back to Willem. “Would you like to see it?” He held his hand out and rested the signet ring in front of Willem’s nose. Willem automatically reached up toward it, but Konrad pulled his hand slightly away. “For obvious reasons I cannot let you examine it.”

“I don’t think he knows the story, sire,” Jouglet prompted, when Willem looked confused.

“Ah,” Konrad said in concession, and relaxed back against the bed. “Of course, you were a child when my father died, so you don’t remember the scandal.”

Willem bit his lower lip. “I remember His Majesty’s death because he died in Alphonse’s castle. It was the most dramatic thing to happen in Burgundy for years. I don’t remember hearing of a scandal around it though.”

“Yes, well, Father’s signet ring was stolen from his finger on his deathbed. Paul and I were taking turns standing vigil, and to this day we bicker about whose negligence it was, but of course it was his. He was probably in the garderobe, trying on father’s crown. Lord knows Alphonse did that often enough. What a headache— for years after my father’s death, every petty document that was presented to me with his seal on it had to be inspected for authenticity. Not the big ones— the town charters, the establishing of baronies— those were all affixed with the great seal. This was the pettiness of court etiquette— personal gifts, dispensations, penalties, minor proclamations and transfers of land, and on and on. Thank God I had Marcus to oversee it all. So I am even more diligent of securing my signet than Jouglet is of securing those little magic tricks in his drawstring bag.”

“What magic tricks?” Jouglet asked innocently, attention on the harp. “I’m merely keeping careful guard over the generous salary Your Majesty provides.”

Konrad tapped Willem’s shoulder conspiratorially. “Most people think it’s herbal powders to keep his voice boyish and his face pretty.” He winked. “I’m guessing it tends toward more lascivious concoctions.”

Willem looked narrowly at his friend; the minstrel smiled with secret amusement and said comfortably, “Merely lucre, I assure you, sire. I already have Venus entirely in my thrall. Would you like to hear some Sevelingen?”

As Jouglet serenaded them, they played a game of chess. Throughout the match, Konrad grilled the young knight on his knowledge of battle strategy, which Willem frankly admitted he had only ever had a chance to practice in tournament, and never on a real field. He reminded His Majesty that strategy was considered unworthy of a knight, and seen as a form of deviousness. But for each scenario that Konrad threw out, often based on his actual experiences against the infidels, or with rebellious princes (or entire rebellious Italian towns), Willem matter-of-factly answered with tactics that matched or bettered Konrad’s own. The emperor was delighted.

And yet Willem lost the chess match.

(“And he really did lose,” Jouglet quietly assured Konrad, spitting out a cherry pit. “Unlike me, my lord.”)

“Now that we are away from the vultures of court gossips,” Konrad said, “speak candidly to me, Willem. Tell me about your land being taken. I want to remedy that.”

“Oh, sire,” Willem said with a quick breath and began to fidget with one of his rooks, running the edge of his thumb around and around the base. “I don’t think there is a remedy. We have questioned the justness of it, but it was lawful. And consider that whoever has that land now, his children are growing up considering themselves the rightful heirs to it. And so they are. It would be folly to rob them of their patrimony— they would seek vengeance.”

Konrad smiled condescendingly. “That is naïve.”

“Sire, I speak from my own life,” Willem said awkwardly, continuing to fidget. “My sister and I were infants when our land…became another’s. And young children still when we were made aware of the injustice— “

“And you clearly did not seek retribution.”

“
I
did not— ” Willem began, nearly breaking the base off the rook. He would have said more, but he was interrupted by a loud knock from the direction of the gallery. The door swung open.

Marcus the steward stood there in his elegant dark tunic. “Pardon me for interrupting your leisure, sire,” he began. “But I am concerned with a matter of…” He glanced meaningfully at Willem— who, misunderstanding the look, abruptly put down the chess piece as if he’d been caught stealing it. He began to sort nervously through the bowl of cherries with great concentration. Marcus lowered his eyes and bowed. “The cardinal, sire, is presenting a challenge to my duties.”

The emperor sighed. “Who does he want excommunicated this time?” Seeing Marcus hesitate, he said brusquely, “Speak freely, we’re among friends.”

Marcus grimaced. “He demands the removal of a considerable portion of the household, sire. Already we’ve had to replace two chamberboys, his groom, and a young woman who served drinks to the high table, and now— “

“Why?” Konrad knew the answer to his own question; he asked it entirely for Willem’s edification. Willem looked up from the cherries, curious.

“He accused them of deviancy, sire, or in the woman’s case, simple lechery. Tonight he demanded the dismissal of a particularly pretty hall boy who holds a washbasin, and he wants another groom gone. If I hesitate he says he’ll report to the pope that you keep a court of sodomites and whores.”

Konrad grunted. “And His Holiness doesn’t?”

“Sire,” Marcus pressed softly, looking at his sovereign’s slippers. He coughed demurely. “I cannot empty the court of servants merely because your brother knows he lacks the willpower to keep his hands off the winsome ones.”

Willem blinked in shock, but Konrad and Jouglet threw their heads back and hooted laughter. “I wasn’t aware he had started restraining himself,” Konrad said, and signaled a boy for more wine. “Pity him his burden!”

“It is not a laughing matter, sire,” Marcus said, without looking up. “He has begun to insinuate similar things about certain members of the court. Including Jouglet.”

Willem blinked again, and Konrad stopped laughing. But Jouglet, with a characteristic shrug, said in a lisping, girlish tone, “Oh, heavens, I’m flattered His Grace noticed me at all.”

Konrad shook his head. “Marcus, you should not have let him get away with that.”

“I am hardly in a position to naysay the emperor’s brother— “

“Balls to that,” Konrad snapped impatiently. “That’s exactly what you’re in a position to do— you’re my deputy, if you can’t stand up to the pope’s deputy, then what’s the point of having you? I don’t need you to demonstrate your servile family pedigree, Marcus, don’t prove Alphonse right about that or you’ll suffer the consequences.” He grabbed the wine his boy offered and drank it all at once. His irritation was acute; Willem felt uncomfortable being present for the rebuke. “We cannot let Paul think for a
moment
he can affect the fabric of my court. Reinstate the servants he’s had sent off and make sure he understands that he has no more say over who is expelled from court than over who is included in it. And send us up more fruit. Willem seems displeased about the state of the cherries.”

Marcus, looking grim, withdrew. Konrad relaxed a little and turned his attention back to Jouglet. “Nicholas will be jealous,” he said wryly. “Usually he’s the one singled out for fancy. He’s handsomer than you are, and a better dresser.”

“But I have milkier skin,” Jouglet crooned, pulling up a sleeve to bare a skinny arm, much paler than the sun-toughened calloused hand it was attached to. “That’s worth more in the dark.”

Willem looked mortified until the other two broke out into adolescent laughter.

Vespers was tolling that night, when Willem accepted an invitation to return to the castle for breakfast in the morning. He was exhausted from long travel and his first evening at court, and it was not a short trip down the mountain to the town; he really wanted only to sleep. But Jouglet followed him down the uneven sandstone stairway to the lower court and waited with him to retrieve his sword and horse, as if presuming an invitation back to the inn for further carousing. More out of affection and gratitude than enthusiasm, Willem invited his friend to ride behind him. Nicholas the messenger followed on his own mount to bring the celebrated helmet in its wooden box, and to guide the way: the path was well marked, and the five small watch-towers of the town twinkled, but it was still a steep and treacherous road after dark.

When they finally approached the northern gate to the town, some half-mile distant of the castle mount, Nicholas offered up a wax imprint of Konrad’s ring, and they were allowed through, although curfew was long past. The street threaded through the darkened, quiet artisans’ quarter, past the Street of the Bakers, behind the church— the biggest church Willem had ever seen— along the pavilion of jewelers, and through the green market.

As they approached the inn, which was still well lit and full of sounds, the knight gestured for Nicholas to enter the courtyard before him. Then Willem stopped Atlas outside the gates on the cobbled street and sat for a moment looking up into the clear night sky, where the waning moon was creeping over the town walls. The town air, even here, was thicker than the open fields, but the difficult bouquet of smells woke him up a little, and he decided he was glad after all that Jouglet had returned with him.

“Jouglet,” he said quietly. He felt the jongleur press up against his back to catch his words. “I would never have survived this evening without you. I cannot pretend to understand what inspires your generosity toward me but I am deeply, deeply grateful. I hope I did not disappoint you with my behavior any time tonight.”

“Are you serious? You were a perfect success!” Jouglet chucked him affectionately on the shoulder, then slipped to the uneven cobblestones and leapt away from the charger’s haunches. The curve of Willem’s back where the minstrel’s body had pressed felt suddenly cooler in the night breeze; the space behind the saddle felt conspicuously empty.

Usually the castle was asleep by now, but not tonight, in the aftermath of such a lavish supper. Marcus was at the table in his antechamber hearing the droning daily reports from his household officers, when Alphonse of Burgundy paused at the outer doorway, on the spiral steps that led up to his guest quarters. In the torchlight, his hair for a moment looked like Imogen’s, dark and wavy; Marcus suddenly felt hers between his fingers. He made himself look away and put her out of his thoughts.

Alphonse had paused for no apparent reason other than to eye the steward appraisingly. Marcus, knowing why he was being appraised, tried to appear ducal while discussing the fermentation of horse manure with the marshal but doubted very much he was convincing.

His Majesty came down into the room from the other direction, with only the gold-encrusted bed-robe thrown over his shoulders and shadowed by his night guard. Yawning into his rings, he said to Marcus, “When you’re done with that I want a cure for my insomnia, preferably blond. I send the page boys, but they never quite understand what it is I’m after.”

Suddenly there was a cry of boyish laughter from the inner courtyard below, followed by irritated hushing noises from the kitchen, beneath Marcus’s own suite. The laughter darted about the small enclosed area, then headed for the stairway and bubbled up so that the count had to leap away to avoid the source of it: Jouglet and Nicholas, who came bursting past him through the narrow door and into the room together, in high humor— and well dressed in tunics much too large for them.

“Sire!” Nicholas gushed, referring to tunics Jouglet had absconded with at the inn, against Willem’s protests. “See what Willem of Dole gave us!”

“And you should have seen the rings he gave the ladies!” Jouglet added.

Alphonse, his face set in a neutral mask, took a step up the tight circular stairs— but then paused, to study Konrad’s reaction. Marcus watched Alphonse watching Konrad. There was a calculating expression on the count’s face that worried Marcus.

Konrad looked astonished. “What a peculiar fellow,” he said. The pair approached, offering him and the cluster of domestic officers pieces of their appropriated clothing to feel. “He’s going to give away everything he has.”

“Everyone at the inn
adores
him, sire,” Nicholas said, as if this somehow justified it.

“And not just for the gifts,” Jouglet added to all of them, heartily. “The gifts are just an expression of his generous and loyal heart.”