The Last Queen (12 page)

She gave me a mirthless smile. “I suppose he expected us to walk there.”

“That is impossible.” My gaze flew to Beatriz. “I paid out of my own purse for

your expenses. I was told you would be well cared for.”

Doña Francisca reached into her frayed cloak pocket and withdrew a bunch of

crinkled papers, tied with a string. She dropped it in front of me. “Here are our letters to you. Every day, for weeks, we wrote. Each one was returned. Then one night, they

came and locked us in. It was only by chance we found a way out.”

I reached out with a trembling hand to the papers. “Chance―?” I echoed.

“Yes. Once we realized no help would come, we grew desperate and implored

that serving girl who brought us our daily meal. She took pity on us, agreed to carry

our message to you in person after you arrived― if my lord Besançon didn‟t come

with you, of course. We are fortunate he did not. Otherwise you might have found

five corpses.”

Besançon was with Philip. He‟s traveled with us throughout Flanders before

retiring to one of his houses. I had mostly ignored his corpulent waving presence. Yet

in all that time he had known my matrons were left here to subsist on one solitary

meal, which was less than allotted to any stable-boy or scullery maid.

Blind rage surfaced in me. I had let this happen, yes, but I had done so in

ignorance. I could never have conceived of such treachery. In that moment, my

dislike for my husband‟s premier adviser, for the man Philip regarded as his only true

father, turned to hatred.

I would see him brought low, I vowed. I stood, my fingers closing about the

packet of letters. “Soraya,” I said, “Please, attend to Doña Ana and help Doña

Francisca and our other matrons pack up their belongings. I‟ll send word as to where

they should go. Beatriz, come with me. I‟ve urgent business to attend to.”

_________________

I SUMMONED MADAME DE HALEWIN. “You dare tell me you knew nothing of

this? How is that possible? Did you not tell me to my face that my matrons would

lack for nothing?”

To her credit, Madame looked upset. Pallid and trembling, she said, “Your

Highness, I swear it to you, I conveyed your order. I told them you would pay from

your own purse. I―”

“Yes? You what, madame? Speak up!”

“I knew nothing!” She lowered her eyes. I thought she might drop in a swoon at

my feet. She feared the worst, as well she should. I could see her dismissed this very

hour to the same quarters my matrons were about to vacate, and had half a mind to

do just that. “Your Highness, my lord Besançon said he would attend to your

matrons‟ arrangements. he gave his express command that he was to be apprised of

everything that transpired in your household.”

“Yes, I‟ve been told as much,” I replied. “I also understand my lord the

archbishop has taken to reviewing my correspondence, before I have a chance to. I

plan to address this matter as soon as my husband returns. In the meantime, I shall

personally review my finances and see how this disaster occurred.” I gave her a hard

stare. “Now, madame.”

She rushed out, returning minutes later with a leather register I‟d never seen, and a

anxious avian-looking gentleman I‟d likewise never met, though evidently he was

responsible for the register‟s contents. Bowing low, he introduced himself as

Monsieur my treasurer and began to pedantically explain the process whereby money

entered and left my privy purse, while Madame stood by, wringing a section of her

gown. Listening to the poor man‟s panting explanation, staring at the cramped

formulas, I hoped I did not betray the fact that they could be robbing me blind and

I‟d never know it. As learned as I was, the intricacies of managing my own finances

had not formed part of my educational curriculum.

“My matrons have suffered unspeakable privation,” I finally interrupted, with

deliberate severity. “I hardly see why you simply didn‟t use the monies I allotted for

their maintenance.”

“Monies, Your Highness?” He repeated, blinking at me as though I were some

strange being whose language he did not fully comprehend. “I am aware of no such

monies.”

“How can you not be aware? I signed the vouchers myself before I left with my

husband.”

“I am aware of the vouchers, yes.” He flipped through the register‟s pages, paused

at an entry. He pointed. “See here: I submitted them for approval to my lord the

archbishop‟s secretary. But none were for the maintenance of your matrons. Indeed, I

was told that as Your Highness had dismissed them from service, they must return to

Spain.”

I slammed shut the register, barely missing his fingers. “Who told you that?”

He recoiled, as if he expected me to strike him. “His Eminence the archbishop‟s

secretary.”

“Is that so?” My tone could have congealed honey. “Well, I am the archduchess

of Flanders, and I‟ve no recollection of giving such orders. A simple rest is all that I

requested for my matrons― rest and a suite of rooms where they could properly be

attended. It would appear my lord Besançon needs reminding that he does not rule

here.”

The treasurer grabbed his register and bolted. Madame gave me a fearful look. “I

fear Your Highness does not understand. I beg you, do not confront him. He is

greatly respected by both the court and His Highness your lord husband. To go

against him would risk his worst enmity.”

I regarded her in stark silence. Somewhere inside me, her warning struck a chord,

but I chose to ignore it. I would not allow Besançon to dominate my household or my

decisions.

“I thank you for your advice, Madame. And I do not hold you responsible. You

may go.”

Curtsying swiftly, she left me.

_________________

BY THE TIME NIGHT HAD FALLEN, I‟d had my matrons transferred to the rooms I

saw prepared for them and retired to my own chambers. The next day I made the

decision to send them to Spain before Philip returned with Besançon. After the

humiliation my matrons had endured, they would never see Flanders and anything

other than a place of torment, and in truth, I didn‟t want to suffer their eternal

reproach. I couldn‟t let Doña Ana leave, not as ill as she was, but the others were hale

enough to weather the trip. Once again, I summoned Madame and my treasurer and

entrusted them with the arrangements. By the following week, my matrons were on

their way to Antwerp and a specially provisioned ship. So too was my letter to Philip

by courier, apprising him of the situation I had encountered. Let Besançon deal with

that, I thought smugly.

I appointed a physician to watch over my duenna and visited her every day. To

my relief, she began to improve under his ministrations, eating her fill and even

complaining that she did not understand anything of what the elderly doctor said to

her.

“Though he understood me well enough when I slapped his hand after he tried to

examine my chest,” she declared. “The nerve! As if I‟d let him put his hand anywhere

near my bosom.”

I chuckled under my breath. She was on the mend by the time Philip came home.

But he did not come to see me immediately; he‟d arrived late the night before, I

was told upon awakening and I dressed at once to go to his apartments. I found him

seated in his still-shuttered bedchamber, clad in his soiled riding gear, a half-emptied

decanter of whine at his side.

I paused on the threshold. “Philip?”

He did not look at me. He poured a goblet, quaffed it in a single gulp and poured

again.

I went to him. “Philip, what is it? What has happened?”

He looked exhausted, bruised shadows encircling his eyes. Before I could touch

him, he flinched and rose to stride to the other side of the room.

“Not now,” he muttered. “I‟m in no mood.”

I went still. “I only wish to welcome you home and speak with you about―”

“I know what you want.” He lifted icy eyes to me. “I would rather you did not.

I‟ve had a trying enough time as it is without having more cares laid upon me.”

“Cares?” I was so taken aback I scarcely knew what to say. I almost let loose my

tongue, informing him that I doo had my own share of cares while he‟d been gone. I

held back. I sensed it would be wiser to simply sit and try to discover the reason from

his chagrin.

I went to a chair. “I apologize if you think I‟m here to berate you. It‟s not my

intention, I assure you.” I paused. The schooled look in his eyes seemed to bore right

through me. He didn‟t look anything like the man I‟d left only a few weeks before.

“Philip, what has happened?”

His rigid shoulders abruptly slumped. “Everything,” he said in a low voice. “I am

nothing. I am less than nothing.”

“You are not nothing,” I said. “You are everything to me.”

“Then perhaps you should sit on my esteemed Estates-General.” He went back to

the decanter. I reached out, took hold of his hand with the goblet. He did not say a

word as I removed it from his fingers. I rose, looked into his muted eyes.

“Did they try you so?” I asked. I wouldn‟t have been surprised. My father had

raged often enough about the Castilian Cortes and its refusal to grant one thing or

another. I‟d heard him with my mother and she always managed to soothe him out of

his temper with the same moderate reminder: “We rule by their sanctioned approval,

as appointed sovereigns. Without their wisdom, we would be like tyrants or prey to

the nobles‟ ambitions.” I wondered if Philip suffered the same, as if archduke he too

must submit on occasion to those common-born officials who looked to his realm‟s

well-being first and distained the exigencies he faced as a ruler.

“Try me?” He shook his head. “They do far more than try me. They humiliate

me.” He lifted his gaze to mine. Anger sparked in his bloodshot eyes. “I am in

archduke in name alone, given lip service while my father orders all behind scenes.”

He paused., “I‟ll never have what I desire.”

The helplessness in his voice roused every protective instinct in me. He looked

like a desolate boy standing there, his matted hair hanging about his pale face. I took

his chin in my hands. “What do you desire, my love? Tell me and I will give it to you.”

They were the words of a young wife seeking to console her husband, of a woman

who cannot bear to see her lover in pain. I had no idea what I could give him that I

hadn‟t already, but in that moment I would have walked to the ends of the earth to

get it.”

“I want―” He swallowed. “I want my freedom. I asked the Estates-General to

declare me archduke in my own right, to release me from my vassal obligations to my

father so I can assume the rule of Flanders in name as well as in deed. I told them I

will turn nineteen soon, of age to rule alone, and that I had spent these past years

proving myself.”

“And they refused you?” I said. I was bewildered. I thought he was the ruler of

Flanders. I thought he and Besançon oversaw the duchy. My mother had said as

much: she had told me Philip had ruled here since his childhood.

He turned away from me. “They said until my father grants me legal maturity, I

must abide by his decisions. I asked, why did they make a mockery of me by obliging

me to attend their session when I had no authority to affect its outcome? They replied

my father wished it so. He said it was how I would learn the proper way to rule.” His

voice hardened. “The proper way! Bloody Christ, I‟ve lived my entire life under his

shadow. I‟m but a pretty prince in his cage, without power or prestige, playing with

toys given to me on loan.”

So he was not sovereign. He held his title through his father, but nothing he had

was truly his. It was the first time reality had intruded on our idyllic world and I failed in my innocence to recognize the darkness it could engender. All I wanted was to see

him smile again.

“Are you disappointed in me?” I heard him say.

“No,” I replied softly.

He looked over his shoulder at me. “Even though you know I am my father‟s

puppet?”

“You are not a puppet. I don‟t care about titles, Philip. We are happy, aren‟t we?

We don‟t need anything more.”

He gave a mirthless chuckle. “Perhaps you don‟t, but I do. I was born to rule. I

inherited my lands through my late mother and am a Habsburg same as my father,

damn his miserly soul. I deserve my crown. He has no right to keep it from me until

he thinks I am worthy of it.”

“Phillip, a crown isn‟t all it seems. My parents have crowns and what has it

brought them? My mother dedicates her every waking hour to Spain, while my father

spends months on end traveling about the realm and arresting or threatening the

plotting
grandes,
because otherwise they might think him weak and seek to revolt. It is not an easy existence.”

“Perhaps.” He turned back to me, held out his hand. “Come here.”

I went to him slowly. He took me in his arms. “Forgive me. It‟s not your fault.

But I wish to make my mark in the world. I can‟t be my father‟s undeclared heir

forever.”

I looked into his eyes. “You will make your mark. One day, he will die. You will

inherit his mantle. You will rule everything he does, and more. And I, my love― I will