Princess Of France (The Queen's Pawn Book 2) Read online

  As we left the hall, all my husband’s men bowed as I passed. I nodded to them, but Marie Helene looked neither right nor left, drawing me out of there. Gerald stood apart, his gaze on me. He stared but did not smile, and I saw the strength of his intention and that his duty was not distasteful to him.

  Marie Helene took me to my room where the braziers burned with the scent of lavender. The tapestries’ unicorns and flowers were shadowed by the low light from the candle.

  I sank into my chair and felt the cool wind blow in from the river. Marie Helene sat down beside me.

  “William wants me to take a lover,” I said.

  “He has selected one for you and left you to him.”

  “He wants an heir.”

  Marie Helene choked on bitter laughter. “Lady, I think myself hard, then I hear such a thing from you.”

  She said nothing of Jean Pierre, and neither did I. If my husband had told me of his desire for an heir, it would have behooved me to know it sooner. Jean Pierre might have broken his oath and stayed with me.

  As the breeze caressed my hair, I thought of the last time he had touched me by the river. I wished, if I were to enter into sin, that he would be the one to come with me.

  This thought was wicked, and I crossed myself against it. I did not know what political alliances William wished to make. I did not know anything of his affairs, only that they could not be simple, for he had been at court too long. If my husband wanted an heir, even by another man, it was my duty to give it to him.

  Marie Helene and I sat together beside the fire until its light began to burn down. Then she put me to sleep in my great marriage bed that was too large for a woman as small as I.

  Adultery, even sanctioned by my husband, was still a sin. I had lived long enough to see the cost of folly. I had walked the path of sin before. I had buried my daughter and lost my honor as well as the husband my father had chosen for me. But I did not lie to myself, even those many years later. There had been joy on that path, too.

  I could still remember the weight of my baby in my arms. The joy of that hour with my daughter had been worth all the pain before and since. As I sat by my window on that fresh summer morning, I knew that I wanted to feel a child of mine in my arms again.

  I went to William’s rooms for the first time since our marriage. I went early, before he was out for the hunt. I scratched at the door and his man let me in, bowing only once before retreating behind a screen.

  I looked around my husband’s rooms and saw that his tapestries, while well made, were not as fine as mine. I saw that his bed was large but draped only in linen. He had given me the best of everything in the household, as he had given it to his mother before me. The curtains of his bed were still drawn, and I wondered if the youth from the night before still lay behind them.

  “Husband,” I said. “I would speak with you.”

  “And I with you, wife.”

  William raised one hand, and his man drew open the curtains of his bed and tied them back. I saw then that the bed was empty, and the tension went out of my neck. I lowered myself into the chair William offered.

  We sat in silence as his man poured us each a glass of watered wine. A look passed between them, and William’s valet left without a backward glance.

  The door closed behind him. I did not touch my wine, and neither did William.

  “My House is an old one,” he said.

  When he did not speak again, I realized that he waited for some acknowledgement from me. I had known of the House of Bellême and its ancient lineage even as a child.

  “Yes,” I said.

  “I am the last of our line. My father’s House, and all that went before, ends with me.”

  I felt the heavy hand of my father on my shoulder, as I had when I was a child. I remembered the weight of my father’s crown, and how it shadowed his eyes even as he looked at me. The sin of adultery was something I would have to accept and be shriven for. My father had taught me to face the worst when he sent me away.

  “You cannot do it yourself?” I said.

  William looked at me. His pain stared back at me, the pain I had first seen in him on out wedding night, and never since. “I cannot.”

  Without an heir, there was no doubt that my brother would take the Bellême lands for the crown upon William’s death. The House of Bellême would end, and their name would go down into the dust.

  “Is Gerald to your liking?” William asked. “He is my first choice. I have known him many years. But if you cannot bear to touch him-“

  “I can bear it.” I rose then, because I knew I could not continue this discussion.

  William stood when I did and took my hand. I flinched, then held myself very still. He did not speak, and I forced myself to meet his eyes.

  “I am sorry, Alais. It is one more way in which I have failed you.”

  I moved away from him, and he let me go. As I stepped into the hall beyond his door, I saw the youth from the night before. William’s wash water was in a bowl between his hands. For a page, this work was lowly, and beneath his station. I saw in his face that he loved my husband and brought his wash water simply to be near him.

  My heart softened at the sight of that boy, and some of the bitterness that threatened me slipped away. He smiled at me, hopefully, as if I were his ally. I could not bring myself to be cruel to him. Nothing between my husband and myself was his fault. I nodded and went on my way.

  As I turned the corner of the hallway, I saw the youth waiting outside my husband’s door. I watched as his face lit up when my husband’s voice called for him to enter.

  At the evening meal, Gerald brought me a bundle of flowers he had picked by the riverside. They were wrapped in ribbon, and by their disarray, I could tell that he had prepared them himself.

  He smiled at me, his eyes warmer than they had been before. Marie Helene saw the flowers he brought and turned her back to us discreetly, as if we were not surrounded by my husband’s cohorts on every side. I accepted the distance she gave me and turned toward the man who would be my lover.

  Gerald caught my eye over the petals of those flowers. This time he did not smile, but held my gaze, so that there could be no question between us.

  “Will I do, my lady fair?”

  I raised one eyebrow and stared him down. I had never accepted impertinence, not even from a king.

  He did not look away even then, nor did he apologize. He raised my hand to his lips and kissed it, first the back, and then the tips of my fingers. I sat very still, the heat of his mouth on my skin. He met my eyes, and his tongue flicked once against the warmth of my palm.

  “Sir, you forget yourself, who I am, and where we are.”

  He did not smile or take his gaze from mine. He did not let go of my hand. “My lady fair, I forget nothing.”

  I did not try to take my hand from him again but let him hold it. I thought to look down the table, to where my husband sat with his own paramour. I thought to glance at the lower tables, to see if anyone noticed Gerald touching me. But I found I could not. I simply stared back at him, taking in the fire banked behind the chestnut brown of his eyes.

  “You have not answered me.” His eyes did not leave mine, but held them, as he held my palm in his own. “Will you have me, lady, or will you leave me pining?”

  I smiled; like Henry before him, this man pined for no one. I saw that our way could be made easy by falling back on the language of courtly love, and its easy lies.

  “I would not leave you to mourn me in darkness,” I said.

  Gerald laughed. He had not expected such a response from the convent-bred likes of me.

  Tales of my time in the nunnery had reached him, as had tales of my misdeeds. Clearly, he thought me too sheltered to know the ways of the world. He did not know that my soul had been forged, not in the cloister, but in Henry’s court. Of course, there were few left alive who knew that. How could he, a man and a stranger, be expected to know anything of me?

  And
yet, as he looked into my eyes, he seemed to find something in me that no one else had ever seen, not even Henry. He saw the place in my soul where softness gave way to flint. Those who loved me never saw it. As he did not love me, nor I him, he could see it. And it made him smile.

  “So, if darkness is not to be my fate, when and where might you favor me? Shall I bring more blossoms? Shall I sing of my love for you?”

  I raised one brow, but he did not mock me. His own soul was hard, forged in the fires of my brother’s court. In that, if in nothing else, he was my equal. My soul had its measure of hardness, too.

  “Tonight, if you are free,” I said.

  He laughed again, but his eyes darkened with desire. “There is no need to chase you then, or to win you with song and deed?”

  “There is only one deed worth mentioning between us, and it needs no songs sung of it.”

  I rose then, my trencher untouched. I did not stay for the dancing that night and knew that others in my husband’s house would take note of it, and of who left soon after me. But I found that I was beyond shame. What I did, I did for the House of Bellême. Perhaps, for once, there was a bit of twisted honor in that.

  William’s eyes did not leave me as I stood. It seemed that I felt his gaze on me even after I had left the hall. As all things of this world, it soon fell away, and I was alone, walking to my rooms unencumbered.

  There were no servants to greet me as I made my way down the torch lit corridors. They were all at the feast, or outside dancing at the bonfire. I could hear their shouts and laughter through the thick walls. William was a liberal lord and looked the other way on feast days, when the men and women in his service made merry with the lords and ladies. He looked the other way, as did I, so long as the work of the day got done.

  I opened the door to my rooms. Marie Helene had seen me leave the hall and had not moved to follow. My husband’s court was a world away as I stood in the firelight and waited for Gerald to come to me.

  I had not been in my room half a moment, but he appeared in the shadows. I had not yet had time to draw the door shut.

  Gerald came in after me, pulled the door closed behind him, and drew in the latch. He was far bolder than I had thought him to be, with his sweet songs, his poems, and his flowers.

  He took me in his arms as if I had never been a princess of France. He touched me as if he had never heard of my brother, as if I did not have a husband two floors below. His grip was firm and brooked no refusals. Any refusal I might have offered, he had given me the chance to voice before. Now there would be room for none.

  In this, he reminded me of Henry, so I was smiling when he kissed me. His lips were firm and warm and did not wait long to part over mine. He tasted of the mulled wine he drank at dinner, and of the bread he had eaten before he came to me. I had eaten little but did not feel the lack of it. My stomach fluttered with fear and with desire. He seemed to feel them both as I trembled under his hands. He drew me to the bed.

  The first time we touched could not be hurried, but neither could it be delayed. He was gentle, for he seemed to know that it had been a long time since a man had touched me, but he did not hesitate or linger over long.

  I felt myself quickening beneath him on the soft covers of my bed. It was as if I stood outside myself and watched another woman respond to the touch of a stranger.

  Gerald laughed a little when it was over. We lay together, our breaths catching in our throats, and he kissed me.

  “Still waters run deep, I see,” he said. I heard the compliment in his tone, and I smiled.

  “I am simply happy that I remember the steps. It has been a very long time for me.”

  He kissed me again, and his breath was sweet on my cheek when he pulled away. “They are steps I would dance again, my lady, if you are willing.”

  So, we spent the night in sin, adrift on my marriage bed, in a world of our own making. Too soon the morning light brightened my windows from dark blue to gray.

  Gerald lay still beside me, his arm thrown over me in sleep, his breath even for the first time in many hours. I did not sleep but lay alone in the knowledge of my sin. I knew myself not only to be an adulteress, but foresworn. Yet I could not confess the sin and free myself, for I did not repent.

  I prayed for a repentant heart, even as I lay there, but it did not come to me. Instead, I heard birdsong from my window and knew that a new day had come. No servants had entered to trim the lamps in my room, so it was certain that all the household knew of my disgrace and were gossiping about me as they lit the first of the morning fires.

  I felt no shame as I lay there, my lover close beside me. I thought of my husband. It should have been him lying against me in our great marriage bed. Instead a stranger had waked the desire within me, a beast that had slept for years. The lust of the night before had warmed my bones. I was not as old as I once had thought.

  I lay in the morning light, the soft breeze from the river coming through my windows. The bedsheets against my skin felt like another caress. I knew myself better from that night’s work than I had through many hours of prayer.

  I wondered if God and the Virgin would take pity on me, and hear my prayers for the dead though I was now in a state of sin, unworthy to plead for anyone. Never a day went by, but I lit a candle for my mother, my sisters, my father and my daughter. I would still pray that day, light the candles, and take Mass. God would hear me or not, as He chose. I could only pray for His mercy.

  For as I watched the sun come in, its golden light covering my bed, I felt nothing but triumph.

  Part II

  My Father’s Daughter

  11

  A Child

  Marie Helene had not come in early as she usually did, and I dozed a little past dawn, and woke with a smile on my face. Gerald was still with me. I had half expected him to steal away when I was no longer looking, but he smiled down on me, raised on one elbow. He had a look of pride about him, as if I were a mountain he had long wished to climb. I had seen the same look once or twice on Henry’s face when we had first been together, so long ago.

  I turned my mind from Henry and from any thought of my husband downstairs. I blinked the sleep from my eyes and let my new lover kiss me.

  “Good morning, my lady.”

  “So, it is, my lord.”

  He flushed at the courtesy I paid him, for he was not high-ranking enough to be the lord of a princess of France. “I must go, Countess, before your ladies come in.”

  He kissed me again and rose gracefully. I saw that he was in no hurry to leave. For men, a sexual conquest was something to be savored. Unlike women, they did not have to be discreet.

  I was not ashamed of anything we had done, so I did nothing to hurry him away. I sat up, drawing my shift over my head. I left the ribbon at my throat untied, and my shift hung down past one shoulder. I must have made a fetching picture, for he came back to me then, his hose still dangling in one hand.

  Gerald kissed me deeply, his need to dress forgotten. His lips were still on mine, his hands running up into my hair, when my women scratched at the door. They could not come in, for it was still latched tight.

  He pulled away from me as if I were a fire that had burned him, but I only laughed. “Will you open the door, my lord, or shall I?”

  He was flattered by my tone and by the false title I gave him. He was no fool, but I have never known a man who was not warmed by flattery, except perhaps my father, and he was a saint on earth. A king hears too much of false flattery to be taken in by it.

  Gerald let my women in, and they kept their eyes averted as they went about the business of bringing my wash water and fresh fruit for my breakfast. I let them work but held Gerald by his sleeve. He looked down at me, surprised that I would touch him before servants, but our time together was something my husband had wrought. Sin or no, I was not ashamed of it. I drew him down to me and kissed him.

  He kissed me back, his lips soft and warm on mine, tasting of the honeyed wine he had d
runk upon waking. He offered me the goblet and I took it, downing it to the last drop. Gerald had the grace to flush as my head woman curtsied before us, her eyes on the floor.

  “My lady, will you need anything else this morning?”

  “No, Maude. Another flagon of honeyed wine, but that will be all.”

  She curtsied again and left us quickly, the rest of the women trailing in her wake. The youngest one, a girl who could not be much older than ten summers, looked at me around the edges of her veil. I winked at her, and she smiled back, clearly surprised that I would so easily meet her eyes. One of the older women looked back and saw where the girl’s gaze was tending. She hustled the little one out, closing the door with an emphatic thump behind them.

  I looked down at my rumpled shift, my breasts soft and half visible beneath the white linen. My hair curled down my back and my legs lay beneath the rumpled bedclothes. A more wanton woman was not to be seen in Christendom, at least not in my husband’s household.

  I laughed then, a laugh from my belly, the kind of laugh that was never allowed in the nunnery, the kind of laughter I had forgotten myself capable of. Gerald forgot his embarrassment as he looked at me. In a moment, his lips were on mine again, and I was tasting his sweet heat, feeling it flame into desire between us.

  Before that heat could truly take fire, there was a knock on my door. It swung open before I could tell the intruder to go away.

  Gerald stiffened beside me, and drew himself to his full height, as if the king had come upon us in my bedchamber.

  It was not my brother the king who entered, but my husband. “Good morning, wife.”

  I watched William carefully for any sign of displeasure. I thought in the first second I turned to him that I saw a flicker of sexual heat behind his eyes. If it had turned into a flame, I would have ordered Gerald out and had my way with my husband. But the light disappeared like so much smoke, and for a long time after, I wondered if I had seen it at all.