The Secret Eleanor

by Cecelia Holland

  He smiled at her. He was replacing strings on the lute; the twisted lines of gut were set in pairs, and so he needed to put in two at once. A little jar of oil sat by his knee. He turned the wooden peg with one hand to tighten the string. “Well, I’m glad you came. You surprised me, Clariza. I didn’t know you were so brave.”

  She said nothing. He had not told her why the Queen had sent him north, only that she had. When he said he was leaving, she gave no thought at all to staying behind. She would not give this up, being with him, the music, which was the same thing.

  He said, “Here, listen to this,” and played a little playful run of notes. Frowning, he twisted the wooden peg again. “I thought of that for the King’s song.”

  She sang it, under her breath; he was still working on his long story about the knight of sorrows, and the queen who loved him. She had heard most of it in several versions. “Is it too merry?”

  “Try this.” He played it again, this time slower, one note stepped down, so it sounded sad.

  “That’s better,” she said. She wondered if she could make songs, too. It amazed her how he drew meanings and feelings out of a piece of wood and some entrails. “Let’s sing,” she said. “No one will hear.”

  He laughed at her. “You are the only musician I have ever met who doesn’t want anyone to hear.” He picked out the notes of the opening to the knight of sorrow; gladly she lifted her voice to the song.

  Two days later they came into Chatellerault. The Jew at once went to his own people in the city, and the rest of them moved into a dank, stinking inn by the river. There for a lot of money the innkeeper brought them bread and wine. The Flemish merchant and his servants took over the only separate room.

  There was only one hearth, and everybody else gathered close around it. Night closed in. Claire bundled her cloak around her; the smell of burnt garlic, piss, sweat, and filthy clothes made it hard to breathe. She wondered how she would sleep in such a crowd. Thomas put his arm around her. Against her will, she began to think of the Queen’s apartments in the Maubergeon, the airy rooms, the quiet, the food and the wine, and her mood gave a little lurch downward. Maybe she had made a mistake. He was pulling her closer; he kissed her forehead. He knew, then, that she wasn’t as brave as he thought. As foolish as she acted. A flutter of panic ran over her skin. She stiffened, holding herself away from him, thinking, I could still go back.

  From the other side of the hearth, someone said, “Sing.”

  The rest of the group murmured, agreeing. She looked up, surprised, and the man across the way nodded at her. He was the tinker, an older man, his face seamed and lapped with lines. “Sing, the two of you, like the other night.”

  Claire flushed. She had not known they listened. Thomas straightened and reached for his lute. “You see,” he said to her, and his fingers moved deftly over the strings. “Let’s sing the Queen’s song.” He knew it was her favorite.

  She licked her lips, trying to gather her rattled attention to the music. They were all watching her, these strangers. She began, and at first her voice wavered. She remembered to straighten, to bring it all the way up from her belly. Then his voice joined hers, and she turned and her gaze met his eyes. The rest of the room faded away, and their voices rose together.

  Her fear fled. This was what she loved, what she wanted best to do, no matter where it led her.

  A door opened somewhere. They were coming in from the other room to listen. She sat watching him play, and giving forth music, and even in the cold and the dark, her spirit soared up; she thought, I have done well. I am brave, after all. She laughed, even as she sang, content.

  “What do you want, then?” Thomas asked pleasantly, later, in the dark. “To jump over a broomstick?”

  She kept her eyes shut, although they were in the darkest corner of the inn’s garret. The innkeeper had brought them up there, with many flourishes, as if he gave away a hidden treasure: this tiny bare room, the narrow pallet. She said, “I want nothing to change.”

  Her body still sang with triumph. They had won this place, singing half the night in the tavern; her voice was still raw from the hard work of it, her ears still full of the thunderous applause, the cries for more, the calls of desire and longing and tribute.

  “Nothing will change,” he said, “save I will have a comfortable bed, up there with you, instead of sleeping down on the floor.”

  She put her hand out, meaning to shut this off. He had been edging toward this since they left Poitiers, but tonight was the first time they had been alone enough. “Good night, Thomas.”

  His fingertips touched hers. Then, softer than a whisper, he was singing.

  She had to strain to hear him, hold her breath, lean a little toward him. He sang in his own tongue, some strange words whose tenderness came even through their strangeness, note by note of sweetness. She shut her eyes, lulled. He was coming closer. His lips brushed her cheek.

  She started a little, but he was singing; and the voice smoothed over her, wiped away her fears, and lifted her, expectant. She held her breath to hear him sing. For a moment he only leaned over her, his lips near her face, the soft words crooned into her ear. Then slowly he slid into the bed beside her.

  She trembled; she had known this would come. She could say no. She could deny him. Oh, but she could not deny this. She had always wanted this. He took her cheeks between his two hands and sang to her until the tears sprang in her eyes. He stopped singing only to kiss her.

  That was a song, too, that deep, sweet kiss, gentle and eager. She parted her lips. Let him stroke the inside of her cheek with his tongue. Uncertainly, she put her tongue into the warmth of his mouth.

  He sucked her tongue. She let a moan slip out of her, and somewhere deep down in her body a little spark leaped. He shifted against her, and one hand slipped inside her gown.

  “Clariza. My darling one. My wife. Clariza.”

  She gasped, at his touch, at what he said. Were they married, then? Oh, the warmth of his hand on her breast. His thumb on her nipple, as if he played the strings of his lute. He sang into her ear as he stripped away her clothes. He mouthed her collarbone, pressed his mouth to the pulse in her throat. She ran her fingers through his thick curly hair, her body warm, singing with him. He knew just where to touch her. He whispered her name again. She lifted her knees to him, drunk on the song, and he slid his hands under her backside. Something hard rubbed against her woman’s part, fit into it, and then stroked up into her so suddenly she yelled out. She gasped, filled to the brim. She flung her arms around his neck, clutching him, panting, her eyes squeezed shut, amazed. It hurt. Her body throbbed. She groaned, with hurt, with excitement. He held her tight against him, singing.

  They crossed the river, going north; the Jews left, headed for Troyes, and the palmers scattered. During the day local people came and went, getting some protection for small trips between villages. At the villages, they watered their horses, and people swarmed around them, trying to sell them bread, cheese, wine, even clothes and shoes.

  A wool merchant joined them with a string of pack mules, and a couple of rough-looking horsemen who said they were knights. Every night, Thomas and Claire sang, and other people gave them the best meats, wine, and the softest bed.

  It was colder as they went north. The wool merchant turned off on another road, and a crowd of black-robed men joined them, chattering in Latin, who said they were from the Studium, going to England, where there was another Studium. That night they stayed at another inn, where she and Thomas managed to find a corner to themselves.

  This was behind the kitchen, and warm, and they lay down together. Her mouth was dry. There was enough light to see, but she could not look at him. She wanted to touch him. He kissed her forehead and held her close against him, and shyly she laid her hands on his shoulders.

  He pressed against her, full length, his legs moving against hers. She slid her hands down his back, to his hips. She opened her legs a little, to let him in.

  B
ut he did nothing, only kissed her. His hand slipped in between her thighs, barely touching her. Her woman’s part felt as if it reached for him.

  She said, “I’m ready,” and flushed, ashamed of having to say it.

  “No,” he said firmly. “No, I am too big, you are too tender.” His fingers stroked the edges of her crease, until she arched her back, pleading with her body, and his kisses made her breath short.

  “Thomas—”

  “No, no, I don’t want to hurt you.”

  He was laughing. He was playing with her. She gave a yelp. She seized hold of his stalk and drew it in, and they rollicked together in a gasping delicious dance, a new kind of music until the sun came up.

  A few days later they stopped at midday at a well by the road; some dozen houses stood around it. She went off by herself, having perfected this now, found a sheltered place in a ditch, and made water. When she went back to where their mules were tied, he was gone.

  She started. But before she could even look around, he came up, striding long.

  His eyes were intense, as they were when he played the lute. He got her hand and led her a little away from the road, away from the crowd at the well, and from his sleeve he took a bit of paper.

  “See this?”

  She frowned at it; the edges were dirty. She held her cloak around her with both fists. The chill breeze had turned his cheeks ruddy; she thought he was the most handsome man she had ever seen. She shook her head. “What is it?”

  “This the Queen bade me give to Henry of Normandy.” He wiggled the paper under her nose.

  “Oh.” She looked sharper. “What is it? A message.”

  “I haven’t read it. It occurs to me—” His voice fell to a murmur. “I could get better reward for it somewhere else, though. Maybe we should read it.”

  “What?” Her jaw dropped. The ground seemed to tilt under her. She looked at him as if he had turned into a toad. “You mean—betray her? She would never forgive you.” It would be his end. She shook her head at him. Everything she thought of him was suddenly coming loose, flying around her like a dust devil. “No. Who, for one thing? Where? How? Keep honest, Thomas. It’s easier.”

  He laughed. “Good.” He stuck the slip of paper away in his sleeve again. “I knew how you would go at that.” He slipped his arms around her waist and kissed her.

  She sighed, relieved. He had been testing her; it was his way, she realized, joking and gaming, as if he always had to come at truth slantwise. Then he said, “But therefore, what I just heard, by the well, changes everything.”

  “What?” she said, with some foreboding.

  He let go of her, except his hand rested on her hip. “That Duke Henry is in Le Mans, and going south. So if we keep going north, we will miss him.”

  “Ah,” she said. Her gaze went to his sleeve, where the note was, wondering what was in it. If it mattered so much.

  “Therefore,” he said, “I am going to Le Mans, as fast as I can, faster likely than you can keep up. I want you to go on to Rouen and I will meet you there.”

  She gaped at him. The suspicion fell over her like a clammy fog. Everything whirled around her again, clattering and coming apart. He was abandoning her. Petronilla had been right all along; he had used her and now he was casting her off. He had turned, looking up the road toward the others, who were making ready to go on. He faced her again. “What?” he said innocently. He looked into her face. “Don’t you trust me?”

  She composed herself, blinking; she remembered what he had proposed first, betraying Eleanor, which had been a trial, which she had won. Here was another trial. She faced him. “I trust you.” Her heart racketed under her ribs.

  “Good.” He put his hands on her waist and lifted her up onto her mule. “I will meet you in Rouen.” He took the purse from his belt and shoved it at her.

  “Thomas—”

  “And this.” He slid the sacked lute off his shoulder and held it out.

  She dropped the purse. With both hands she took the lute. Suddenly the upside-down world turned right and settled, still again. He was smiling at her, his eyes merry. By the road, someone called, “We’re going, hey, over there.” She heard a whip crack. She held the lute in her arms like a child, and Thomas stooped for the purse and tucked it between her thigh and the saddle.

  “Watch out for that, it’s all we have,” he said, and turned away. She reined her mule around, one arm still wrapped around the lute, and followed the others out the gate. She did not turn to see him go.

  She knew he would come back. He would never abandon his lute.

  She jogged the mule along to get ahead of the wagons. The Flemish merchant too rode up in front, out of the dust, but she stayed behind him, riding by herself. Ahead the road wound off across the wintry countryside. She thought over what had just happened.

  It was like an ordeal, she thought. Like a test of arms. First tempting her, with the Queen’s message, then trying her by leaving her. These things came in threes. Here was the second. There would be another one. She felt a little dizzy; abruptly she longed for Poitiers again, for the familiar people there, that easy life. “Yes, Your Grace.” Find the comb. Do as she was told. On the other hand, she thought, best to keep her wits about her here, where she was. Her hand fell on the purse, wedged against her thigh, and she took it and stuffed it inside her cloak.

  Twenty-three

  From Poitiers Eleanor’s train rode south through a countryside in the clutch of winter, the wayside reeds standing in hedges of broken black sticks, the sky a wide pale sweep of cloudy blue. By the first evening, when they stopped for the night, a drizzle was falling. She bundled herself up in a cloak, worn to exhaustion, and the horse himself was tired and went meekly along under a slack rein.

  They continued on again, the next morning, very early, still moving along ahead of the King with his larger, slower train, and the morning after. So at midday of the third day they came to Limoges.

  The rain had changed to wet snow, falling into a keen sweeping wind. Divided in half by its river, the city spread out before them over the valley and up the far hillside, its highest spires barely visible in the heavy gray air. Its river divided it; it was the upper half that mattered. Petronilla thought it beautiful, perched on its hillside, its tiled roofs in steps against the snow.

  The Vicomte of Limoges had just girded his city round with a new wall, about which there were some issues of legality, but the gate was open for the King and Queen, and the sentries bowed her procession through into the close passages of the streets. The snow was sticking to the roofs and weighed down the trees and shrubs; the horses walked stiffly on the slippery cobbles.

  Petronilla had a sudden feeling of the sky closing relentlessly down on them as if to crush them under the eternal night of winter. She pulled the hood of her cloak full around her face, the fur against her cheeks.

  On the road below the castle, in the upper city, she gave a nod to de Rançun to stop their progress and reined the Barb around toward the wagon, and Eleanor.

  Her sister was bundled up in the mourning clothes and swathed in veils and looked as big as a cow. Tapping her heel on his girth, Petronilla pressed the snorting Barb to the side of the wagon. With a glance she drove back the curious people around them, who sidled away out of earshot and pretended not to be paying attention.

  “How are you?”

  Eleanor said, “Very well, actually. Thank you. If this is Raimund, up here, we are in some trouble. He’s fairly clever, you know, and I always flirt with him. Can you do that?”

  “No.” Petronilla chewed her lip. She had met the Vicomte of Limoges once or twice, and he was more than clever, and she certainly could flirt with no one the way Eleanor did. She said, “You must be ill. I shall be very concerned.”

  “Good,” Eleanor said, and lay back, giving out a tragic groan. Petronilla went back up to the head of the train, the reins slippery in her sweating hands.

  But only the Vicomtesse, in a crowd of ladies and
churchmen, awaited them in the arched gateway of the castle, overflowing with welcomes and explanations. “Your Grace! My lord has gone out to attend the King, but we are very glad to bring you in here, my gracious lady—”

  Petronilla leaned down from her saddle to let the woman kiss her hand. “My lady, we are very glad indeed to be here. My sister is suddenly taken very ill, and we must go at once to some quiet place where she can be made comfortable.”

  The Vicomtesse was a short, round woman, like an apple, with shiny dark eyes like apple seeds. These widened with a sudden expansion of understanding, and Petronilla saw she had heard the rumors and was leaping to her own conclusions about what ailed her sister. “Oh, yes, Your Grace!” She swept out of the way, performing an elegant bow as she did and ushering Petronilla on past her.

  They clattered into the courtyard, swept clean of snow, where the castle’s servants and guests were gathered all around, their clothes bright as banners against the windy white and gray stone. The wagon rolled in, drawing every eye. Voices rose, chattering, and all craned their necks to see. Petronilla went on across the courtyard, hidden in her cloak, ignored. Ruefully, she realized that, even buried in coarse cloth, veiled out of sight, and traveling under a false name, Eleanor was still the center of attention. She let de Rançun lift her down from her saddle, but even he was twisting to look back at the wagon.

  They carried Eleanor off like the Martinmas hog, very dramatically, on a cloak borne by a dozen men. With de Rançun in charge, they took her in through the main hall of the castle and around to a separate set of rooms in the north tower. The stair was narrow and twisting, but with a great deal of shouting and apologies they managed to haul her up to the top room.

  Once they were in the bedchamber, Petronilla had no trouble sending away everybody except their own women and throwing the door closed. Eleanor, who had been laid tenderly on the bed, sat up, pulling aside the tangled veil.