Devil's Consort

by Anne O'Brien

  Louis lurched to his feet. ‘I am Count of Poitou. My Seneschal does my work—as you yourself did in earlier days. You will release my man immediately—and you will back off.’

  ‘Have him.’ Count Geoffrey consented as Henry pushed Berloi to his knees again, where he promptly slid to a heap on the floor. ‘But back off I will not, and no threats from your pet vulture there will make any difference. My son is Duke of Normandy. I’ll have your recognition of it. If not, I’ll resume hostilities. There’ll be an army within your borders within the week.’

  Louis’s face twitched at the ultimatum. ‘I won’t agree.’

  ‘Then it’s war.’

  I put my hand on Louis’s arm before he dug the hole any deeper, knowing that Henry watched me still.

  ‘I’ll await your decision,’ Count Geoffrey stated, ‘but not for long.’

  ‘Majesty.’ Henry bowed. ‘My lady.’ His gaze held mine just as long as it needed to. There was unfinished business between us. Business barely started.

  The Angevins stalked out in a black cloud of resentment, leaving the suffering Berloi on the floor. Louis collapsed back on the chair as clamour rose around us, the stunned court exchanging glances. But whereas Louis looked deathly, the exchange had stirred my blood, rekindled my defiance. All the fire I had lost in my fatal clash with the Pope was suddenly stirred from ash to flame. I would manage a meeting with the young lion before they left court. The only question was where. Where could we meet that did not draw attention?

  The irony of it was—our assignation was arranged by Henry Plantagenet, not by me.

  I met him on my knees before the High Altar in Notre Dame. Not necessarily a private place, with monks attending to their duties, or the one I would have chosen, but the hour was late, the air cold, despite the heat of the day, and the chancel blessedly empty, a sanctuary from prying eyes and ears. What would any interested eavesdropper see and hear? The Queen of France petitioning the Almighty for the health of the King. The Duke of Normandy bending God’s ear for a favourable resolution to the threat of war between France and Anjou. Louis, thank God, had retired again to his bed, drained of energy.

  Henry Plantagenet entered like a strong wind blowing through the door. Striding in, moving swiftly down the length of the nave, short cloak swirling round him with the force of his movement, he genuflected before the silver cross on the altar, then rose, to come to kneel beside me, hands clasped on the altar rail.

  His eyes were piously fixed on the gleam of silver and wax, as if in prayer.

  Nor did I look at him.

  Even inch of my body sensed that this meeting was vitally important to me.

  The silence settled round us, as dense as a winter snowstorm. Unnerved I might have been but I would not break it. Let the Angevin speak, if speak he must. The anonymous eavesdropper would have gone away, resigned to our lack of communication.

  ‘We need to talk.’

  His voice was soft, not a whisper but barely stirring the air, yet it reached me. I waited to see the direction he would take. What an enterprising man this was. What would he say to me?

  ‘The stronger I am,’ he observed, as if debating the direction of his foreign policy with one of his captains, ‘the more chance I have of winning the support of the English barons and taking the crown of England from Stephen.’

  ‘And taking England is paramount to you.’

  ‘Yes. It is.’

  Not once had he acknowledged my presence, even by a glance. Between us stretched at least ten handspans of space yet my skin prickled with awareness of him.

  ‘It’s my inheritance, you see,’ he continued in the same conversational mode. ‘It was never Stephen’s. It’s mine, as it was my mother’s—and I’ll not sit back and let a usurper rule it.’

  I thought for a little while, inhaling the silence. If Henry Plantagenet had his eye to me, so had I to him. However I might wish to argue against it, my position as a woman alone was untenable. I needed a man at my side and I knew that I needed this man. Even in this chill place, even with our deliberate distancing, it seemed that the air was charged between us.

  ‘You offered me your help if ever I was in need,’ I said at last. ‘Did you mean it?’

  ‘Yes.’ Unequivocal.

  ‘Do I understand, then, that you have an interest in Aquitaine?’

  ‘Of course. What man would not?’

  ‘How uncomfortably honest you are.’

  ‘What point in dissembling? I know you want an annulment. And if you get it, it opens up a treasure-trove of possibilities.’

  ‘Or a bloodbath.’

  ‘True.’ Slowly he turned to look at me, full face. I knew he looked at me, but I did not reciprocate. ‘I would risk it. It’s in my mind to get what I want.’

  ‘Ah! But what do I want?’ I saw every point in dissembling. It would not do for me to appear too eager. This must be on my terms. ‘I’m not at all sure that I want to end Louis’s authority over me, simply to hand it over to you,’ I said. ‘What would be the advantage for me in that?’

  Henry’s reply was direct to a fault. ‘You want your freedom. You want the restoration of your authority and your independence. And you need a man who’ll ensure that it’s not snatched from you as soon as you achieve it by some nonentity of a baron with neither integrity nor a brain to reason with, who’ll tumble you into his marriage bed without your yea or nae.’

  ‘And you have both integrity and wit?’ I could not resist.

  I could feel the force of that stare through my linen. ‘I am no nonentity of a baron!’

  So! ‘There’s no guarantee I’ll get the end to this marriage. Louis still totters on the edge of a decision.’

  I sensed the derisive quirk of Henry’s lips, even though he was once again facing the altar. ‘Surely a woman of your talents can persuade him.’

  I played my hand close. ‘Abbot Suger and Galeran don’t agree.’

  ‘An old man and a eunuch!’ Impatience now, a hint of temper. ‘Louis is in no position to refuse. Don’t let him. More than anything he needs a son and God’s not smiling on your union. Louis detests his brother so much that he almost vomits at the thought of passing the crown sideways.’

  Which was true. Henry’s summing up was masterful. But still I would not appear too compliant. Compliance was not in my nature and I would not throw myself in fervent gratitude into this man’s hands.

  ‘Louis will not listen to me if he’s distracted—if you and Louis are at war, for example.’

  ‘We’ll not be at war.’ My brows rose in disbelief, which he must have sensed. ‘Believe me. My father will come to terms with Louis.’

  ‘Do I believe that?’ Count Geoffrey had given off no aura of peacemaking.

  ‘Look, Eleanor …’

  Now his face, his whole body, was turned fully to me, no pretence at prayer, and I responded at his use of my name to return his gaze. The urgency in him, the directness of him was utterly compelling. An awareness rippled along my skin as if he had stroked it with a finger. Or was that too smooth a response to him? Was it not more like a hook embedding itself in my heart? I didn’t want it—but I could not deny it. I could almost sense the honeyed taste of him on my lips.

  ‘Once you’re free, you’re fair game for any riff-raff, common or noble, who’d chance a throw of the dice. I could name a whole parcel of them, and some not a score of miles from where we kneel in this diabolically cold place. Why in God’s name did I choose to meet you here …?’ In a quick gesture he rubbed his hands over his face as if to dislodge the cold, ruffling the short strands of his hair. ‘Do you want that? To be a prisoner in all but name, either walled up in one of your own fortresses or wed to some nobody who’ll rule from the protection of your skirts, giving not even a nod of recognition to what you might want? It’s like a game of chess, with all eyes on the Queen. And any raggedarsed pawn will chance his arm if that Queen is unprotected and open to rape, pillage and forced marriage.’

  Henry
had a vivid if crude way with words. ‘You warned me of that in your letter,’ I observed mildly, my mind racing, revolted by the picture he painted and knowing it for the truth.

  ‘So I did.’ He chuckled softly. ‘Do you still have it?’

  ‘I burnt it.’

  ‘Burnt it? Well, it wasn’t a love letter so I suppose, being female, you saw no need to keep it.’

  He was smiling. I had the strangest sensation that we were flirting. But suddenly his words were not tender; they were aggressive and they disturbed me with their presumption.

  ‘God’s eyes! Why have you not pushed for the split before now, woman? Don’t tell me you’ve any respect or affection for him. More like to have respect for the lad who cleans out the privies. Louis has as little backbone as a worm. And about as much wit …’

  I laughed, breath echoing strangely around us. How little he knew of my situation, the pressures on Louis to hold firm. How typical of a man to level the blame at me. It was, I thought, time to exert my authority.

  ‘I have not pushed for the split, as you put it, because Abbot Suger is Louis’s backbone and the Abbot still says no. And the matter of my safety concerns me. Why wouldn’t it? Do you think you can protect me from these vultures that would snatch and wed me without my consent? And don’t call me woman!’

  ‘Of course I can protect you, lady.’

  His confidence could have been arrogance, yet I thought it was not. He simply believed in his own powers to take and hold, without question. Even now he was looking at me as if I were an idiot to question either his right or his ability. The urgency was back, this time in his clenched fist on the altar rail.

  ‘Get your annulment, Eleanor, and come to me. Of course I want your land—I’ll not deny it and I’d be a fool if I did. But look at what I can give you one day in return—a vast empire stretching from the coast of Normandy through Anjou to Maine and down to the south of Aquitaine. Here I’m offering to toss it into your lap. Would you refuse it?’ His voice rose until he realised where we were, what we were about, and he forced it to drop. ‘What can we not do with such an empire? And if England falls at my feet …’

  Stop! Stop! Is this marriage? I had determined to keep this negotiation, if that was what it was, tight in my fist, and here I was carried along willy-nilly like a … like a twig in a whirlpool. Did I want this? Did I truly want to step, as I had said, from one curb rein to another?

  Well, it would all depend whose hand was on that rein.

  The man moved abruptly, flexing the muscles in his shoulders, stirring the air again so that the candle flames flickered. Energy pulsed from him, touching me, enveloping me. From the corner of my eye I caught the flex and clasp of his hands on the rail as if he would rather clasp them about my person and carry me off. The heat in my belly increased. I might not be averse to such a show of strength and yet …

  I frowned at my folded hands. ‘What are you offering me? Are we talking of marriage here?’ I asked bluntly.

  ‘Yes. What else would we be talking of?’

  ‘You did not make that clear in that letter.’

  ‘It was not the time. Now it is.’

  I glanced across. His voice, his words might be implacable, but his face held a striking serenity. He saw no obstacle at all to his plans—unless I proved to be the obstacle if I refused him. I suspected he would nag and worry at me until I surrendered—if he didn’t carry me off and wed me by force. So he enjoyed plain speaking. I would give him plain speaking.

  ‘Does it not worry you that I have failed to carry a son?’ I asked. ‘That in all the years of my marriage, of all my children, alive or dead, there has not been one male child? I may prove to be unable to give you an heir. Does that not concern you?’

  His glance snapped to mine. ‘By God, no. I’ll do better with you than that excuse for a man you’ve lived with for more than a dozen years. How could you stand it? I’ll do better. We’ll have sons together, Eleanor.’

  And he smiled at me.

  The words, the smile—so sensual, so possessive—drove like a sword into my body. My heart thudded against my ribs. Somewhere as the years had passed Henry had acquired a ruthless mouth as well as an inflexible will. The bones of his face had emerged, skin tight and surprisingly elegant over cheek and jaw and a powerful blade of a nose.

  ‘Here’s the plan …’ he stated.

  And he had a plan—all worked out, by God!

  ‘You get your annulment, Eleanor, and ride as fast as you can to Poitou. You tell no one, you don’t advertise your departure, you don’t waste time. But you send me a message—word of mouth only—by a courier you can trust—and I’ll come for you. I’ll wed you before anyone knows any better.’

  Never had I been issued so many instructions. Neither did he even consider that I might balk at such a flight cross-country. ‘Louis will never allow our marriage.’ I clawed to keep reality in my vision. ‘As your liege lord he must give his permission.’

  Henry Plantagenet merely shrugged, an overt defiance that tempted me to laugh again. ‘I don’t give a damn for the King of France’s permission. This is between us—and God.’ He waved a casual hand towards the figure of the pain-racked Christ on the crucifix. ‘Do we have a pact, woman?’

  The stare that fixed me was predatory and I could not look away. Did I have any choice? Not that I could see, and not if this Angevin had his way. Did I want to refuse? All was still uncertain but in that moment my mind settled. I needed this man’s protection, and I wanted him. By some strange alchemy, as our eyes held, I felt my heart beat in unity with his. In harmony? No, I thought perhaps not. Harmony was not a word I associated with him. But we were of a mind. Two halves of a whole, I decided fancifully. Henry Plantagenet was the man I wanted. I shivered with the enormity of the decision.

  ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘We have a pact.’

  ‘Excellent. One thing—have you thought? You’ll have to give up your daughters.’ Still his eyes bored into mine.

  ‘I know.’

  ‘Louis will keep them.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And I doubt he’ll let you associate with them if you wed me.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘But I’ll give you sons.’

  Not a word of love from either of us, but it was a wooing in its way. The honesty was blistering, breathtaking.

  ‘What next?’ I asked, to cover my reaction.

  ‘Leave it to me.’ His expression softened a little. ‘Why do you smile?’

  I lifted my shoulders in parody of his. ‘Will you leap to seize any chance, Henry Plantagenet?’

  ‘If it brings me an advantage, I will,’ he replied promptly. ‘I’ll not ride roughshod over the law, but if the victory’s there for the taking, then I’ll grip it hard.’ He closed his fist tightly. ‘It’s my great-grandmother’s blood. Not as highly refined as yours, lady, but undoubtedly bold. She—Herleva—was a low-born tanner’s daughter from Falaise who took the Duke of Normandy’s eye and made sure she kept it, until she bore him a son and he arranged an advantageous marriage for her to a man of status. Now, there’s a wilful woman for you. Are you willing to ally yourself with the gutter sweepings of Europe?’

  Enticed beyond all good sense, I committed myself. ‘As for gutter-sweepings …’ I wrinkled my nose, shook my head ‘.but I’m willing to ally myself with you.’

  Henry pushed himself upright, and waited until I too rose to my feet. He did not help me, as Louis would have done with wearying solicitude as if I were a weak woman in need of a supporting arm, as Raymond would have leapt to do with glorious chivalry, but this Angevin waited to give me my own space and time, despite the impatience that made him fold his arms and look sternly at me as I shook out my sleeves and arranged the folds of my skirts. Oh, yes, I would keep him waiting. When I stood, finally, facing him, he hefted his sword from its scabbard at his belt.

  ‘Don’t flinch. It’s not your blood I’m after. I think you still don’t trust me altogether, lady. I’ll just have
to prove to you that I don’t make promises lightly.’ And he pressed his lips to the simple undecorated cross hilt. ‘I swear by God that I’ll protect you, Eleanor, with my sword, my honour, my name.’

  How impressive. How solemn he was in this oath that came from the depths of his soul. And I believed him. He did not make promises that he intended to break. Still, for my own sake, I was of a mind to appear cynical.

  ‘Does God guide your actions, or self-interest?’

  ‘I don’t see them as incompatible.’

  ‘It’s a heavy oath. With a fine ring to it.’

  ‘I like to make a good impression. My father taught me that, if nothing else.’

  The vestige of a grin, a gleam in his eye, stirred the whisper: ‘Beware.’ Henry Plantagenet was a devious man after all. Yet he surprised me when he transferred his sword from right to left, and held out his right hand to me—and he must have read it in my face.

  ‘To seal our agreement, lady.’

  I placed my hand within his and felt it close around mine. A man’s way to seal a pact, hand to hand, palm to palm, an agreement of equals. It was a strong hand, dwarfing mine, the callus of sword and rein rough against my fingers, the gold shank of his ring digging in. I liked it. I liked the gesture. My hand felt as delicate as a songbird within his protection. As, I knew, he had intended. I thought I would get on very well with Henry Plantagenet, as long as I did not trust him! His fingers tightened around mine.

  ‘I’ll make you Queen of England,’ he promised, as if it would tip the scale of my decision.

  I was not so sure. England. What did I know about this northern kingdom, other than it being an uncivilised and barbaric place, worse than Paris with its lowering skies and constant rain? But to be Queen of England.

  ‘Do you doubt me?’

  I shook my head, admiring his skill at making the impossible seem entirely possible. And I laughed as a memory returned with sharp clarity.

  ‘King Roger of Sicily called you the Angevin brat,’ I remarked.