The Secret Eleanor

by Cecelia Holland

  They traveled slowly along the river. Eleanor held her train back from the King’s, so that they never met, even when some delay brought them close enough that they stayed overnight in the same area.

  The broad wheatlands of the Beauce yielded to softly rolling tree-covered hills, cut through with little streams, all running, as the royal progress ran, to the Loire. During the day they stopped to eat wherever the noon sun found them, sometimes in an open field, where the household spread linens on the ground, and ate from baskets of bread and cheese, and sometimes at an inn, where they took over the whole place and drained the local cellars dry.

  They followed west along the river, flowing sleek and brown between woodlands now leafless for the winter. On the low hillsides, the thick stocks of little vineyards traveled in rows up toward the sky like crooked old men with outstretched arms. The cut heaps of last year’s vines were piled up at the ends of each row, and the smell of dead leaves flavored the air. In the stands of trees, globes of mistletoe clustered in the bare branches, with here and there the messy nests of magpies, like bowls of twigs. The birds circled overhead, crying in their hoarse, mocking voices.

  They stayed one night at Blois, the ancient city on the Loire. Stephen, who was now King of England, had been born there, his mother the daughter of the Conqueror, William the Bastard. Eleanor thought a curse against King Stephen, for the sake of her lover Henry. She clasped that thought to her, luxuriating in it: her lover Henry.

  But now the city and its famous old castle and rich lands belonged to the younger son of the Count of Champagne, Count Theobald, hardly older than her lover Henry himself. He gave a great feast for her and Louis, at which Eleanor stayed as far from Louis as possible. Count Theobald was a lanky young man with pimples and a raucous laugh. His court was rough; he had no wife or sisters to give it polish, and she was glad to leave. In the morning they crossed over the river on the arched Roman bridge and followed the old road, the pilgrimage road, down into the south.

  West of here and north was Anjou, she knew, where he was.

  There had been no rain for a while, and the brown water coursed slowly along between banks of dry crackling reeds, where the narrow boats of the local fishermen were drawn up in the shallows, and the women washed their linen and spread it to dry on the bushes. The weather was turning gray and grim, and a cold wind met them, sweeping up the river valley from the distant sea. Eleanor sent Claire to the baggage to unpack their fur cloaks, and she and her sister rode with their hands drawn up into the warmth of the sleeves.

  Day after day passed. At last, ahead of them, in a twist of the valley, they saw the black slate rooftops of the great abbey of Fontevraud, sprawled along the gentle skirt of the hillside. The people around Eleanor sent up cheers at the sight, and even the horses quickened their steps, their heads bobbing; she turned toward her sister and saw Petronilla already smiling at her, and the old shared love rushed back over her. Whatever had come between them was surely gone. She urged her horse closer and reached out her hand to her sister, and so, holding hands together, they rode into the abbey.

  Hereafter, on this side of the river, they were in their own country, and foolishly enough, they thought everything would be well.

  Fontevraud was a double house, containing both men and women, ruled over, as all such houses were, by an abbess. The dukes of Aquitaine had supported the place from its beginnings, endowing it with wealth and lands, and the current Abbess, who met them at the gate, was a cousin of Eleanor’s. Louis had already arrived and gotten the great welcome, and so there was little ceremony in their greeting.

  Petronilla and Eleanor left their horses and train in the gateyard and followed the Abbess down into the central courtyard of the dormitory, where the shadowy recesses of the galleries rustled with people sneaking away from their prayers or chores to watch. Petronilla was glad to be out of the saddle and longed to take off her dusty clothes; she followed at Eleanor’s side as they went down to the rooms kept for them during such visits as these.

  The Abbess was an older woman, short and round of face, who looked out of her wimple like a baby from swaddlings. Petronilla at once sensed some coldness and aloofness in her manner. Eleanor spoke to her once, familiarly, as a cousin, and the woman only gave a little bow, not meeting her eyes. Petronilla thought perhaps it was a mistake to let Louis arrive so long before them, so that Thierry Galeran and his minions had the chance to set people’s minds in his mold.

  The corner rooms on the ground floor of the cloister were kept always ready for the Duchess of Aquitaine, and the Abbess led them there now. The other women trailed after in a disorderly straggle, behind them some of the monastery’s porters with the baggage, loud and awkward. Flocks of nuns stuffed the corners, the doorways, watching them pass, giving off muffled gasps and giggles like penned-up geese.

  “Who else is here?” Eleanor asked. Her voice was a little too loud; Petronilla guessed she had also noticed the Abbess’s cool restraint. “I thought I saw the Archbishop’s colors.”

  “Bordeaux is here,” the abbess said. “And Geoffrey d’Anjou.”

  “He’s dead,” Eleanor blurted out, stopping at the door.

  The Abbess stood back so that a servant could open the door into the cell. “This is the son, the younger son, who has been robbed of his inheritance and seeks the King’s help.” She stood with her hands clasped over her rosary, letting Eleanor go by her, and as Petronilla passed her, the black gimlet eyes poked at her, clearly assessing the size of her waist. Petronilla flushed at this and went on deep into the room, toward the window.

  Across the room, she looked at Eleanor, and between them there flashed an understanding: If little Anjou was with the King, then Henry had driven him out and won the war.

  The Abbess pursued them into the cell, which was twice as large as most, and well furnished with bed, stools, and a clothes chest more suitable for a duchess than a nun. She said, “My lord Archbishop is here to meet the King, of course, but will come to you soon, Your Grace. And when he does—”

  In the center of the room, Eleanor swung around toward her; Petronilla marked the set of her shoulders and the loft of her chin, and knew her sister was angry. The Abbess went on, “When he does, I hope you will submit yourself to his wisdom. This is mad and wicked, what you propose, to separate from our good King Louis, and we all beg you to resign yourself to the fate proper for you.”

  Eleanor fixed her with a stare. Her back was stiff, her shoulders square, as if she made herself a wall against enemies, and her voice rang hard with anger. She did not pretend to misunderstand. She said, “God alone decides my fate, not the Archbishop of Bordeaux. Or you, my lady Abbess.”

  She fairly spat the final words, and the Abbess shrank a little; her slender hands rose, blue-veined, to smooth her stainless coif. Her knuckles were the color of ivory.

  “It is our duty as brides of Christ to pray for you,” she said. “And to counsel you in the right way. The King is your lord, as the Son of God is ours; your marriage to him is what must be, as ours must be. This is gravest sin, what you propose, and cannot happen.”

  “No,” Eleanor said. “I accept your prayers, mother, but I do not accept your view of this. For the King’s sake, as well as mine.”

  “It is God’s will you should heed,” the Abbess said, but she was already backing toward the door. Her mouth twisted like a wound. “God made you a woman, Eleanor of Aquitaine, and you must conduct yourself as a woman of honor.” Her gaze flitted toward Petronilla. “As others may not.”

  At the hurt and injustice of this look, Petronilla took a step backward. Eleanor said, “Get out.”

  The Abbess’s eyes, wide with shock, twitched toward Eleanor, and her mouth fell open; already almost on the threshold, she said, more protesting than defiant, “This is my place; I am Abbess here.”

  “This is my duchy,” Eleanor said. “And you will obey me, lady. Now.”

  The rest of them were still and silent as hunted rabbits, every gaz
e fixed on Eleanor. The Abbess hesitated only a moment, bowed her head, and went tamely out the door. Petronilla sighed and relaxed, pleased. She laid her hand on her flat belly. Alys rushed to shut the door behind the fleeing Abbess, and in the center of the room, Eleanor wheeled around, her hands flying up.

  “Damn them!”

  Behind Petronilla, she heard a little gasp; it was Claire, still not used to Eleanor’s temper. Petronilla said, “They have changed his mind.”

  Eleanor turned in a circle in the center of the room, her skirts swaying out, as if her rage drove her into motion. “I will not be treated like this—a mere woman! Ah! Damn their souls to some deep, hot hell where only men can be—a hole dug with penises! Ah!”

  The other women went into a flurry of action: opening chests, and laying out the great bed, and seeing to the fire and to the ewers of water and wine, while Eleanor paced up and down and swore. The room was larger than any monk’s cell, but it had only a small window to let in light and let out the smoke of the braziers. Petronilla stood by the window, where the air was clearest; she watched her sister steadily, seeing the cold fear that fed her rage. She was carrying the baby high and deep, so that her cloak and gown hid it, but as she swept her cloak off and flung it down, Petronilla could plainly see the swelling curve above her waist, and now Eleanor put one hand to her back, in the way of pregnant women everywhere.

  Suddenly Eleanor turned to the door. “I will go at once to the King.”

  Petronilla bounded across the room and into her way. “No. Eleanor, you must not.” She thought Eleanor did not realize how she looked—how obvious her pregnancy was; if she went to the King now, the game was all up, and Petronilla put her back to the door and spread her arms over it like a bar.

  Eleanor flashed at her. “Get out of my way! I know how to manage Louis—I must force him to my will.” She raised her hand. “Move aside, Petra!”

  Petronilla had never before stood against her, but she stayed fast, her arms out. “I am not letting you go from this room, Eleanor.”

  Eleanor struck her on the face. The other women caught their breath in a collective gasp, and Petronilla rocked her head to one side, but she straightened and fixed her eyes on her sister’s. “Strike me as you wish, Eleanor. But stay, and listen to me.”

  In her sister’s blazing green eyes she saw the fiery anger flash. Eleanor’s mouth twisted. But she lowered her hand.

  “I beg your pardon. I should not have done that.” As sharply as her temper had risen it was falling now, her shrewd wit coming to the fore. She reached out and laid her fingers against Petronilla’s cheek, as if her touch could heal what it had wounded. “But we must act—you know this.”

  “Yes,” Petronilla said. Her cheek stung, but she throttled down a feeling of triumph. “We must act wisely, and with effect. Think about what sways Louis—what has won him in the past? Always a churchman: Suger first, the Pope, that time in Rome, and then Bernard—he longs for God’s own word in everything. Only God moves him.”

  Eleanor tossed her head, impatient. “Bernard and Suger both are gone. I can deal with Louis as well as they.”

  Petronilla said, “Yes. But you got him to agree once before, Eleanor, and he changed anyway. Thierry Galeran is always with him, and you cannot be. Thierry wants only to have Aquitaine, as long as possible, which means you, as long as possible. We have to try something else.”

  Abruptly Eleanor wheeled, looking around the room, and her gaze fell on Claire, in the middle of the room by a chest. “Have you seen Thierry? Has he approached you again?”

  The girl bobbed up and down, her hands on her skirts, her eyes wide. “Oh, no, my lady. I have been with you always. I have not seen him.”

  Petronilla said, “If she had betrayed us, they would surely know it is not I with child.” Yet she cast a sideways look at Claire, who was flushing. Petronilla ran her tongue over her lips. There had to be some way to get by Thierry to the King. “What about Bordeaux?”

  “My lord uncle? The archbishop?” Eleanor laughed. She turned, her hands flexing, restless, and paced around the room in a circle. “He is less like Bernard and Suger than any man with a tonsure.”

  Petronilla also laughed; the Archbishop had bounced each of them on his knee. An Occitan to his fingertips, he was worldly and indulgent and easy. Nonetheless he was a churchman and Louis, apparently, only heeded celibates. “Who else is there?”

  Eleanor circled the room again, banging her hands together, and her gaze came back to Petronilla. “Yes, perhaps. Send for him, then; bid him here, my good uncle Bordeaux.”

  Petronilla’s taut muscles softened; she had not known until now how hard she had girded herself for this battle. She had not even known it was a battle. Amazed, she realized she had won it. She let Alys go past her out the door, to find a page.

  Sixteen

  FONTEVRAUD

  OCTOBER 1151

  Bordeaux was as large around the middle as if it were he, not Eleanor, who bore another life within; his cassock was splendidly trimmed with silk shot through with gold thread, and his rosary glittered with jewels. Eleanor met him in a secluded part of the garden, so that she could swathe herself in a cloak. Sedate as elders they walked along among the pruned vines, through a pale wintry sunlight, a couple of pages trailing behind out of earshot. The Poitevin hillside beyond the monastery wall lay dormant and brown in the first cold of winter. Somewhere nearby a magpie chattered, and from the rooftop of the monastery a second answered.

  One for sorrow, she thought. Two for joy. Let it be so. She crossed herself, to seal the omen to her.

  Eleanor had known the Archbishop of Bordeaux all of her life, and she had no awe of him; she knew he liked best to have things easy. At first he showed the signs of a recent conversation with the King, or more likely, Thierry Galeran, but she was patient; she could deal with him. After she had dipped her head for his blessing, he said, “Now, my dear, I hear very odd things of you. I had thought you past your girlish whims.”

  “Not so,” she said. “I shall ride my girlish whims all the way to the grave, Uncle.”

  “Oh, my,” he said, mildly. “That’s unhappy to hear.” He patted her arm; he was speaking in the langue d’oc, which she always used, their common tongue. They went along a line of cropped shaggy stalks, barren for the winter. He said, “Lady Eleanor, think of your duty to God. You can resign yourself to being Queen of France, surely, and fussed over and adored all the days of your life; what is so ill about this?”

  “Rather I were merely Duchess of Aquitaine,” she said. She rounded on him, nearly as tall as he was, and gripped his hand in hers. In spite of the cold, his hand was warmer than hers. “Think on it, Uncle. You are a true Occitan; do you want these cold northerners with their callused knees and their greedy fingers ruling our sweet land forever?”

  That tripped up the graces of his easy manner; he pressed his lips together, his eyes flattening. She went on, pushing where he was soft.

  “Think on it. They are steadily eating up our lands, our customs, taking away whatever they want, blighting everything else, and stuffing their laws down on us, telling us what to think and how to worship, and sneering at our language and our ways. How much longer before they have taken away everything that’s beautiful and merry and worth living for?”

  He said, “We are not such sheep as to let them do that.”

  “I mean to come back and rule here,” she said, “without Louis. I mean to live in Poitiers, where I belong, and which belongs to me. Where the antique Romans whose children we are came for the sun and the wine and the pleasures and made the old life live on when Rome itself was weary unto death. Poitiers, where we all can best remember and honor the glories of the past, where my own grand-fathers ruled in splendor that the North is too dull even to dream of. There people can think as they want and learn what they choose. I will give justice and bring peace, so that everything prospers, and I will have a court that every other court in Christendom will long to be, which wil
l call to it every art and every pleasure, and which will send its glories out to all the corners of the world. But I must be free of Louis, whose mind is too small. Especially I will be free of Thierry Galeran, who means to destroy me.”

  His round face flushed, but he made no immediate answer. His gaze drifted away toward the bare-branched orchard that began at the edge of the garden. His mouth curled down at the corners, and she guessed he remembered some slight against himself. She said, “How do they keep my duchy, sir? Is it fair, and rich, and lively as always? Or are they sucking the blood from it, and chilling even the sunlight?”

  He said, “Perhaps it is God’s will.”

  “I cannot believe that the gentle Jesus who called children unto him and walked among the humble artisans willed that we who are the true heirs of Rome should be subject to the furry, snorting northerners of Clovis the bloody Frank. You must help me.”

  “I?” he said.

  “Go to the King. Remind him that Bernard himself decreed we should part.” She leaned toward him, her hand on his arm, her words in a hot rush. “The saintly monk saw clearly, sir. And you know he had no love for me—he would do nothing for my sake. He knew the truth in this. The marriage should never have happened. It will blight everything—Louis and France, as well as Aquitaine and me. The dynasty of Hugh Capet will die with Louis, unless he sets me free.”

  The Archbishop crossed himself. “Blessed be Bernard of Clairvaux. He said this to the King himself?”

  “Before everybody, sir. Even Thierry will have to admit it. I pray you, do not let the likes of that fat, bloodless eunuch subvert the clear vision of the saint.”

  Bordeaux’s eyebrows performed a little bow, up and down, and she saw his pale eyes change. She had made him see what she wanted. A surge of triumph warmed her. She gathered the cloak around her with her hands, watched her uncle narrowly. The trick with him was to let him come to his decisions as if he made them himself.