The Rain Maiden

by Jill M Philips

  Thus the favors were meted out and paid for.

  There were some important vacancies in key positions of both Church and State, and Richard promptly filled them—not with those who necessarily merited the honor, but with men who could afford to pay the most. William Longchamp, a detested and unsightly dwarf who had served as Richard’s chancellor in Aquitaine (some men were heard to whisper he had served in Richard’s bed as well), was made Chief Justiciar in England and also nominated Bishop of Ely. For this privilege Longchamp paid four thousand pounds into the coffers of the realm, which Richard happily set aside for the crusade.

  All the offices of English government, great or small, were up for sale. In every county the sheriffs were made to pay if they wished to keep their positions. They were only reinstated if not outbid by other men. Those who resisted Richard’s cruel edict (and there were many) were imprisoned, their property made forfeit to the crown.

  Richard managed to make one generous appointment.

  In the time preceding the estrangement from his father, he’d often known Henry to speak of Godfrey as a possible candidate for the see of York. Therefore, Richard fulfilled his father’s wish in naming Godfrey archbishop, and at the same time soothed his own conscience, for now he could claim to have made peace with Henry’s restless soul.

  But Godfrey was still required to pay a token sum.

  In large and small amounts, the money was pouring in.

  Having consummated his marriage, John went forth to Wales at Richard’s bidding. The Welsh barons and princes, who had been kept so firmly under Henry’s restraining hand, had broken into fresh rebellion when they learned that he was dead.

  The trouble was not significant enough to warrant much attention, but Richard wanted all such actions stopped before they could flourish into a full-scale war. Considering John’s poor record as a diplomat and soldier in Ireland a few years back, it was somewhat ironic that Richard should choose him for such a task.

  Whether or not John would have bungled matters once again was never to be known, since most of the rebels had laid down their arms by the time he arrived. The chief conspirator was Prince Rhys ap Gryffud of South Wales, and once he learned his barons had not elected to support him, he was forced to surrender as well.

  John required Gryffud to return with him to Oxford and render an act of homage to the king. The two men became friends along the way, and toasted one another during many a long night of drinking and reveling in local brothels. It may not have been diplomacy in the truest form, but one thing at least could be said for John: he could appease the most resentful enemy in the world with a few ribald stories and a goodly supply of wine.

  The fellowship ended abruptly when they reached Oxford.

  Richard was too busy raising money to grant the Welsh prince an audience. Instead he sent a servant to deliver a brief treaty of accord, which he himself had already signed. Furious at this breach of courtesy, Gryffud put his name to the paper, then left Oxford within the hour.

  John said nothing but he winced at Richard’s haughtiness.

  He had never learned the importance of making friends.

  In shaded sleep, when thoughts are true

  And memories full of nights of bliss,

  When time dispels all broken dreams

  And paints past agonies with gold,

  I yet uncover heartfelt hopes, of love

  Which even now are real.

  From thousand moons and thousand stars

  And million kisses in between

  Which fed my soul, so long denied,

  I cannot separate my tears

  From all the lovely liquids spilled

  Or flames of love, from hell.

  My heart, so touched by melodies

  Of joy and promise long ago,

  I let it fly, as now I must.

  But in the dark when dreams come back

  To haunt me of a lover lost,

  I weep for what is gone.

  Eleanor of Aquitaine

  Fragment of a lost poem

  October, 1189

  PHILIPPE had never been so hungry for his wife.

  Since his return to Paris in July, he’d spent each night and nearly every afternoon with her. It was almost the way it had been for them at the beginning. No memory, just passion. And a sense that time was an enemy they could not fight.

  Isabel lay with Philippe’s cheek against her breast and listened to the rain falling on the stones outside her window. It was late afternoon, but dim as evening. The sun had not been seen for many days. Isabel loved when the wind blew just that way and rain turned everything to shadow. The sounds and images stirred up remembrances of Mons.

  Nearly half her life had been spent in Paris, and yet Hainault would always be the place she thought of when she thought of home. Isabel doubted she would ever visit it again.

  Philippe’s voice sounded close beside her, almost as if it came from her own body. “Are you asleep?” He raised on his elbow to look into her face.

  Isabel smiled back at him, weary and at peace. “I never sleep when I’m with you. It’s such a waste of time.”

  He ringed the nipple of her breast with kisses.

  Later she was dozing, but roused to the sound of him pulling on his clothes. “You aren’t going?” she asked.

  He gave a glance toward the bed. “I promised to meet Sully for an hour or so. He has some new designs he needs to show me, or so he says.”

  Isabel reached out for his hand. “It sounds more like a conspiracy to take you away from me.”

  He sat down on the edge of the bed, leaning to light another candle. The flame leapt up, illuminating her face in quavering shades of gold. Philippe studied her face for a moment, intent on its loveliness. She never looked more beautiful than she did after they had just made love—yards of tangled hair around her face and shoulders, her pale skin rouged with a blush of exertion.

  “Sully is more understanding than he used to be,” Philippe explained, “or at least he knows better than to make complaints about the time I spend with you. I’ve warned him of it enough.”

  “Spend time with me now,” she smiled and opened her arms to him.

  Sully could wait.

  Isabel loved his strong, broad shoulders and the feel of his body moving over hers. But after a moment she cautioned him, her lips to his ear, “You must not deal too roughly with me now, my darling. I don’t want to lose this child as I did the others who were early born.”

  Philippe slid his hand along her belly, caressing the fine, soft skin which separated him from his unborn child. “We needn’t fear for this one, love. It was made after my triumph over Henry, the greatest victory of my life. God will keep it safe as a special blessing to us.” He stroked the inside of her thighs with his heavy penis, then bent to kiss the tiny drops of moisture that glistened on her plush triangle of gold curls. “This is the sight I love best in all the world,” he muttered, “for there is nothing finer . ..” With those words still on his lips Philippe pushed inside with a grunt of pleasure. Then he rode her till both of them cried out with exhaustion and joy.

  He rolled over on his back and pulled her on top of him so that their flesh would not be separated even now, after all had been enjoyed. “My angel,” he whispered, his lips so close to hers, “I never want to be farther from you than this.”

  He meant it. Isabel knew he did. There had never been so much love between them as in these past four months. All of their passion had combined with feelings of tenderness in equal measure, and now they felt so close.

  But circumstance threatened to ruin it all.

  Philippe was committed to the crusade. With Henry dead and Richard on the throne, there was no longer any excuse for a delay in going to the East. Richard was planning his departure for July of the following year and he expected Philippe to accompany him. A year and a half had passed since the fall of Jerusalem, and still no western kings had come to fight! The trouveres had begun to sing mocking songs abo
ut the tardy monarchs.

  Philippe’s vow of taking the cross had been only half sincere at the time. Now he did not wish to go at all. He saw no hope that Jerusalem could be retaken, and any other reason for going seemed insufficient and hardly worth the sacrifice of leaving his domains behind for two years—to say nothing of his wife.

  Isabel was full of panic that he might go.

  To live without him for so long would not be possible. Her appetite for him was too prodigious to be so long denied. Philippe knew that. They seldom spoke of it, but it was always there. Even now.

  “If you go away I don’t know what I’ll do,” Isabel muttered against his chest.

  Philippe tightened his arms around her, but did not answer. “It makes so little sense for you to go,” she argued, but her voice was sweet and uncomplaining. “Think of what you could accomplish here while Richard was away! You could have Normandy, Anjou, the Aquitaine for yourself, while he’s off fighting Moslems in the East.”

  Philippe smiled at the sincerity of her words. “You talk as if conquest were an easy thing. A prize like Normandy doesn’t fall into your hand like a ripe apple.”

  Isabel sat up and looked down at him with a sulky expression on her face. “Don’t treat me as if I were a numbskull! I’ve been hearing tales of conquest since I was at my mother’s breast.”

  He had not forgotten her rich and able heritage, but she was a woman, with a woman’s view of things. She did not understand that to conquer did not mean simply to put an army in the field and lead them! He reached to take a handful of her hair, then stroked his face with it and kissed it lovingly. “To take even Anjou would need all the resources of my realm. Normandy would require still more than that,” he explained.

  Her hands moved over his chest, the nails sharp and tickling. “You took Le Mans and Tours in the space of just two weeks last summer! Why should it be more difficult a second time? At least you would have something to show for all your efforts.” Between kisses and little sucking nips at him she finished, “You deserved a piece of Maine and Anjou after all you did to secure it. I still wonder that you didn’t demand a settlement with Richard after Henry died.”

  Phlippe had never listened much to anything Isabel had to say but occasionally she surprised him with her well-informed appraisals. She was so beautiful and tempting, it was always hard for him to remember she had wisdom and ambition too.

  He squeezed her shoulders, enjoying the feel of her delicate bones beneath the flesh. God, there was no one like her! “I wish it were so simple,” he said in answer to her mild accusation, “but fighting with Richard and fighting against him are two different things.”

  She raised her head. “Not if he isn’t here. Why do you think I suggested it?”

  A sigh passed his lips. “I really don’t want to talk about this now.”

  A familiar look of obstinacy flashed in her grey-green eyes. “We have to talk about it! In three weeks you go to Normandy to meet with Richard, presumably about the crusade. We have to make some kind of decision now!”

  “I have to make a decision,” he corrected her. “You know better than to tell me my will, Isabel.”

  She lowered her head slightly in contrition. “I’m sorry. I spoke from excitement. I know the decision is yours. But I have a stake in this too, Philippe.”

  His hands strayed to her breasts, to the fine hard nipples that were shaped so perfectly and tinted with a deep shade of rosy pink. He squeezed the sweet white globes that filled his hands. What pleasure they had given him in the past. What pleasure now!

  He loved her so much. He wanted her more every day.

  How could he leave all this beauty and passion behind for the sake of a desert crucible of blood and flies?

  Isabel’s hands clasped his in a loving covenant. “I am being selfish I know, Philippe, but only a little, which is not so terrible. You see, I’m no longer the twelve-year-old girl who sulked whenever you went away. I understand this business more than you can know. But I want what is best for both of us, my love. I want you to have all that your greatness and power deserve. You could make great gains for France in Richard’s absence. You may have needed him to help you bring Henry down but you don’t need him any more.”

  Philippe pushed her over on her back and rolled on top of her. Every part of her excited him, even the sweet, high sound of her voice. He nestled his chin between her breasts. “I don’t wish to leave you any more than you wish for me to go,” he said. “But I have made a vow to Christ, and even if He will release me from it, I fear the Church will not.”

  Isabel held him to her in a vicious grip of love. “There are ways.”

  “Richard will press me as hard as he knows how. I tell you, my love, to change this course will not be easy.”

  Her breath was close upon his face. “You’ll find a way, you must find a way.”

  He pushed her legs apart and entered her in an instant. What glory! What was an earthly crown compared to this?

  “Your body is the sweetest thing God ever made,” he moaned.

  Isabel gasped in giddy pain as his teeth made bites upon her neck. “I’ll never let you go,” she whimpered, “you are mine until the grave makes ghosts of both of us.”

  Philippe closed his eyes and pushed deeper.

  Outside it seemed as if the rain would never stop.

  For the first time John and Godfrey had a common purpose.

  They were both outraged at Richard.

  He had been generous to both of them, but now he was exacting a hard price. He had drawn up a charter conferring his brothers’ separate powers of ownership; the ranks and honors which he had bestowed upon them were implicit in the wording. Then in an ending paragraph he promptly stated that concurrent with his own departure for the Holy Land, both John and Godfrey would be required to leave England, and stay away for a period of three years.

  Clearly, he did not trust them.

  Richard had aimed yet another insult, this one of consequence only to John. The king had made his will, naming Geoffrey’s son Arthur as his heir. Though this was in accordance with tradition (the child’s father having been next in line to succeed Richard), John despised the action all the same. His objection was rooted not just in selfishness, but good sense. How could Richard embark with any peace of mind upon his hazardous and lengthy sojourn—from which he might not return—having settled the succession on a child who was still wetting his blankets in the cradle?

  On one point at least Eleanor intervened on John’s behalf.

  He should not be banished to Normandy, she told Richard, for there he could cause more problems than he could ever bring about in England. Eleanor also explained the implausibility of putting John in close proximity to supporters of the French king, lest they gain his ear. Because Richard valued his mother’s advice, he soon relented and lifted the ban on his brother’s presence in England during his absence, but he did so with reservations. It was not until much later, with Richard far away in the Holy Land, that John permitted Godfrey to return as well.

  But at this moment Richard was still in England, and he had a lot on his mind. Besieged by details on all sides, he was anxious to put everything right so he could begin his long-awaited journey to the East. There was a hasty conference with King William of Scotland and a peace treaty was signed, assuring Richard that his northern borders would be safe from attack while he was gone. He accomplished a similar concordance with the Welsh. These were not merely diplomatic ploys. Wales and Scotland, by way of Richard’s carefully worded agreement, had furnished considerable monies to the royal war chest.

  Despite all the measures taken to increase Richard’s crusade fund, there was still a problem with outgoing expenses. He as yet owed his friend Philippe Capet nearly 24,000 marks for the wars against King Henry, since Philippe had borne most of the expense. That would have to be paid off in the next few months. There were also the spiraling costs of government to contend with. Even in his fervor to secure all he could for the
crusade, Richard could not assign all incoming money to that purpose. He was trying his best to meet all his financial obligations to the degree possible, but since he knew little how to economize on his extravagant tastes, this was not easy.

  Originally it had been Richard’s wish to depart England immediately after Easter, 1190. Now that date was beginning to look unrealistic, so Richard had substituted middle June instead. The question was whether or not Philippe would be ready by that time. The two kings agreed by letter to meet at Normandy after Christmas in order to fully discuss their plans for the coming crusade.

  Richard was beside himself with anticipation.

  Philippe was contemplating a way out.

  SHE COULD SEE the flames from her window, and smell them too. The stink of burning, borne upwards on thick layers of black smoke, filled every comer of the room. It was an ugly incense: sharp, pungent with the smell of grease, like fat pigs roasting.

  In the courtyard below they were burning Englishmen.

  Constance turned from her window. Let them burn.

  These were the last of the men who had come to Brittany two and a half years ago. They had come with the Earl of Chester, the odious man whose bed she had been forced to share. But he was gone now, fled back to England in the midst of the Breton uprising, and all those cohorts of his who had not gone with him were now cooking in the flames.

  She was glad.

  He was not out there, her detested husband, burning with the others—but she wished he was. How she wished. Of all men on earth, Constance hated Randulf de Blonde-ville, Earl of Chester. Of all the wretched things Henry Plantagenet had done to her, forcing her into marriage with Randulf had been the worst.