The King's Women

by Deryn Lake

  She could never remember being more grateful than at that moment, filled with love and tenderness, longing for the beautiful boy to throw open her door and demand to see her, which a minute later he did. Behind him, Yolande could spy Jacqueline Sarrazin, scampering to catch up with him, red in the face with annoyance.

  Before anyone could say a word the Duchess raised her hand. “Jacqueline, I will deal with this so please go and regain your breath. I would like to speak to Monsieur Due alone.”

  Staring somewhat, the panting Lady Sarrazin retraced her steps down the stone-flagged corridor, turning once to look over her shoulder to where Richemont still stood in the Duchess’s doorway, Yolande fixing him with an icy stare.

  “What is the meaning of this?” the lady-in-waiting heard her mistress say before she went out of earshot.

  Turning to check that he could not be overheard, Richemont whispered urgently, “I had to see you, Madame. I could not go without being with you once more. Have me whipped if that is your will but please let me speak to you for a moment.”

  Yolande stood back from the archway. “Come in,” she said, and her voice could have frozen the river.

  Visibly shaking, Richemont took a pace or two forward.

  “Well, close the door behind you. Or do you want all the world to hear what you have to say?”

  “No, no, Madame,” he answered nervously, and wheeled to pull the heavy oak door shut. When he turned back again, Richemont saw that the Duchess had gone to stand before the fire, staring into it and holding out her hands to the flames.

  “Forgive me,” he said miserably.

  “It is I who need that,” she answered softly, her tone entirely changed.

  He took a further step towards her. “What do you mean?”

  “That I am glad you came, and that it is wrong of me to feel so.”

  The boy could not believe what he was hearing. “Glad! You say you are glad, ma Reine?”

  “Yes,” she said, and turned to look at him. In wonderful disbelief the Earl saw that her eyes were lit from within, glowing with such warmth that he was drawn to stand beside her.

  “You are not angry at all,” he said in astonishment.

  “Only with myself.”

  “Then why did you look at me so furiously just now?”

  “Because the door was open and I wanted no one to witness the Queen of Sicily making a fool of herself.”

  Still Richemont shook his head, totally bewildered. “What am I to think, ma Reine?”

  Yolande took his face between her hands, her eyes almost level with his because of her exceptional height.

  “That I have fallen in love with you, poor idiot that I am. I am old enough to be your mother and, as for you, you should have been married years ago. But none of that changes the fact that I love you.”

  Richemont did not wait another second, full of a virgin’s wonderful desire. Almost roughly, he drew the Duchess into his arms and poured kiss after kiss onto her mouth, her eyes, and her neck, even daring to kiss her breasts on the outside of her heavy gown. But it was she who eventually loosened the fine stuff till it slipped to the floor about her feet, and it was she who gently led him to her beautiful bed, decorated with woven hangings of green and silver.

  “You are virgin still?” she asked quietly, her face soft now that the heavy coil of hair had been loosened and lay upon the pillow.

  “Yes, ma Reine.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I was waiting for you.”

  “Why really?”

  “I was betrothed when I was a boy to a woman many years older than I was. Poor thing, she was so frail and decayed that her skin seemed stretched over her skull like a mask. She died long before the marriage could take place and by then the situation had changed at home and no other match was arranged for me.”

  “But that doesn’t explain why, at seventeen, you are still innocent.”

  Richemont smiled a little sadly. “Perhaps it was true that I was waiting for you, ma Reine. I wanted the first time to be so wonderful that I hung back from strumpets and whores.”

  “Then I shall make it memorable for you,” answered Yolande quietly, and drew him to her, guiding his every move until instinct took over and the boy kissed and thrust and changed position as if he had been making love for years. It was exquisite for them both, the difference in their ages irrelevant as they mingled and became one. Over and over again, Richemont took the Duchess for his own, claiming her with that part of him which penetrated her deepest mysteries.

  Exhaustion alone brought their exquisite coupling to an end, after a night whose secrets only those who truly love can learn. And then, before they slept, the young Earl kissed every part of Yolande d’Anjou before he finally lay silent beside her.

  In the darkness before dawn, pierced only by the flame of a solitary candle, she stayed awake, staring at the perfect face so near to hers, noticing the sweep of his black lashes, the gleam of lights in his cap of hair. She was aware at that moment that Richemont was flawless, truly the most exquisite creature ever born.

  “I love you with all my heart,” whispered Yolande, then she rose, slipping on a long loose robe and going to her desk. Once again she picked up her pen and wrote him a letter.

  He found it in the morning when he woke alone and stretched out to hold her, his hands grasping the rough parchment instead of her soft warm body. With a sinking heart, Arthur de Richemont read aloud what Yolande d’Anjou had to say to him.

  ‘My darling,’ he whispered in horror to the empty room. I want you to know that you are all that could be desired as a lover and I envy the woman who will one day be your wife. It was with great sadness that I left you asleep but knew that it was better I did so. Secrets have a way of being discovered and I could not bear either of us to be in disgrace. Leave my room by the hidden door behind the tapestry depicting Spring, go down the staircase and you will find yourself in Nobles’ Court. Go from the castle today and join your brother quickly. Tell no one what transpired between us. Last night I gave you my heart. It is yours always. Yolande.’

  With a groan of despair, the Earl put his head in his hands. At seventeen years of age it seemed to him that his life had come abruptly to an end.

  Four

  The worst had happened. As everyone had anticipated, Charles of Orleans and his warmongering father-in-law were arming their men. The challenge to Jean the Fearless was expected daily, the dark hour of civil war was at hand.

  In the teeming alleys of Paris where the shadows of the houses blotted out the daylight and fresh air never penetrated, the inhabitants, crammed together in noisome proximity, prepared to defend themselves. Built on the right and left banks of the Seine as the City was, the entire right bank had been surrounded by a protective wall during the reign of Charles V, and this was now put into good repair. Enclosed within these ramparts there loomed to the west the fortress of the Louvre, once a royal residence but considered gloomy by Isabeau and her husband, while on the eastern side towered the Bastille. Yet there was none who held out much hope for the citadel should an invading force make a strong attack.

  Outside the encompassing wall, standing on the left bank, was the University of Paris, granted its charter in 1215 and housing some twenty thousand students, hailing from all over Europe as well as every part of France. Here Latin was spoken as the common language and because of this the autonomous borough which housed the university buildings was known as the Latin Quarter. By contrast, on the right bank was the commercial part of the city, administered by a Provost, where each individual trade could be found in its own particular area.

  At la Cité were gathered the apothecaries; goldsmiths and money changers were based on the Grand Pont; the butchers near the Grand Châtelet; mercers close to the Rue Saint Denis; the bankers and money lenders, known as Lombards, near the Rue Saint Martin. Only the booksellers, scribes, parchment sellers and illuminators traded in the Latin Quarter where, indeed, lay most of their custom.
/>   There were also many markets in the overcrowded city, each specialising in one thing: herbs could be obtained from the quayside at the Isle de la Cite; eggs and flowers on the Petit Pont; sausages from the market near Saint Germain l’Auxerrois; bread in the Place Maubert. Alongside these stood shops, all with brightly coloured signs: des Trois Visages, du Pied de Boeuf, du Chat qui Pêche, and many others equally jolly.

  Every day before first light, when the gates of Paris opened, peasants came in from the country to buy and sell, alongside them the travelling jongleurs and mountebanks, the hawkers and traders, the couriers carrying urgent messages from one part of the country to the other. And with this daily increase the population swelled to bursting point, and all crammed within the odorous and confined space of a fortified city.

  To go out into the bustling streets always meant, for better or worse, that there was a sight to see, and today was no exception. A group of mountebanks, accompanied by two jongleurs, were playing the fool in the square outside the house with the sign of the Eagle, a crowd already gathering to watch.

  To Isabeau, reclining in a litter borne by two stout horses, it was a wonderful excuse to pause in her journey, reluctantly undertaken as it was. For the time had come, as duty insisted, when she must leave her pretty chateau and go to the Hotel St. Pol, to see her children and glance in the direction of the King. This chore alone was enough to put the Queen into a bad mood but today there were additional troubles. Menstruation had not been easy for her since puberty but now, with her childbearing days done, it had become agonising. So painful indeed, Isabeau had been forced to swallow an extra dose of ground emeralds and potable gold, the only things in the lady’s opinion which alleviated her sufferings.

  But this was not all. Pierre de Giac, who had proved to be a sensational lover, delighting in his own depravity and introducing the Queen to strange rituals in which nudity was all important and smoking black candles threw flickering light on their exotically mingled bodies, had finally returned to Anjou. Not only that, with the threat of civil war he had been unable to give Isabeau any reassurance as to when he would return.

  “You cannot go,” she had sobbed. “No one could satisfy me after you.”

  “Many men will, Madame,” de Giac had answered, his lupine smile twisting his handsome face. “You will dance the jig with a thousand men, that is your destiny.”

  “How do you know?”

  Pierre laughed soundlessly. “My Dark Master has told me all of this and much more. Will you not join me in his service?”

  “Of course not,” Isabeau had answered, but not with as much conviction as usual, wondering if she too could barter even greater riches and sex with any man she chose, in exchange for one of her hands.

  Yet these ideas were not in her mind as she watched the buffoons through a parting in the curtains of her litter. Instead she thought what glorious creatures they were with their painted faces and croaking voices, barracking the crowd even while they tumbled and jumped. And the spectators obviously shared her view for they roared their approval and threw coins onto the cobbles beneath the mountebanks’ feet. It was at this point that one of their number dressed in a black gown like a student from the university came to the forefront.

  “Good people,” he called, launching into his sales pitch, “good people of Paris, threatened you may be by outside forces, dying you might be of the plague, but all of you can be protected from this and more by buying one of my magic amulets brought all the way from the court of the Khan of Tartary. With these incredible charms you will be safe from attack, seen or unseen. And in addition to this mystical protection I can also guarantee to save you from any ailment. Watch in awe, citizens, as I give a demonstration of the healing powers of the enchanted water drawn straight from the legendary golden spring of Damascus. This liquid can cure you of anything, from the pox to palsy and pimples. So, by buying both, you can not only protect yourself from danger but be immune to all illness into the bargain.”

  The mountebank paused, looking straight across at the grandly draped litter.

  “I see that we have a great lady amongst us. What say you to these magical properties, my Dame?”

  “Keep him away,” hissed Isabeau to the captain of her escort, and drew the curtains so tightly that she was only left a peephole. But even this obscured vision did not stop her from seeing what happened next. Out of the crowd, advancing towards the mountebank with a pitiful expression on his face, came one of the saddest sights she had ever set eyes on. A boy of about twelve, a small thin starveling of a creature, with a hunch on his back and gangling limbs desperately in need of flesh, was coming forward. The Queen of France watched in amazement as the child stepped in front of the salesman.

  “Can you cure me?” it said in a tired, somehow lifeless, voice.

  The mountebank stroked his chin. “Well…”

  “Oh, please, sir, please,” the wretched whine went on.

  “But can you afford it, sonny?”

  “I have no money,” the boy replied pitifully, on the verge of tears.

  “Then I am afraid I cannot help you. Unless someone in the crowd…”

  Again he looked straight at the litter and the captain, his horse pressed close, whispered through the drapery, “Don’t give him anything, Madame. This is a well-known trick.”

  “But I’d like to see it,” Isabeau retorted, and slipped money into the captain’s hand.

  He looked doubtful but none the less called, “My mistress says you are to cure the boy,” and flung a sparkling coin at the mountebank’s feet.

  The man grinned, picked it up, tested it between his teeth, then slipped the money into an invisible pocket.

  “Well, lad, it would seem you have a patron, so we mustn’t disappoint the lady, must we? Kneel down in front of me.”

  The wretched child stole a glance towards the litter and Isabeau saw dark hollow eyes, one of them half closed, swelling up from a recent blow. For the first time in her life she felt genuine pity.

  “Go on, child,” she called, her voice muted and mysterious through the swaying fabric of the drapes.

  The boy obeyed, kneeling down, his head bowed in an attitude of utter resignation. Isabeau found that she was holding her breath as the charlatan produced a stone bottle from deep in his gown, drew the cork, and poured some water into the palm of his hand.

  “Pull back your shirt,” he ordered, and the boy heaved at his terrible rags, exposing the hump for all the world to see. Isabeau craned her neck, morbidly fascinated by freaks, especially this one for whose cure she had paid.

  “Now, pay attention,” called the mountebank to the crowd, every one of whom already was. “I shall rub a little of the enchanted water into the hunch and wish it away.”

  “It’s a trick,” the captain repeated. “Look carefully, ma Reine, and you will see that the mountebank uses two boys. One of them is concealed somewhere at this very minute.”

  In her excitement Isabeau almost drew back the shielding curtains but remembered in time that it would not be discreet to do so. Instead she widened her peephole a fraction more and saw that the hunchback was now rolling round the cobblestones as if in some great and mortal agony.

  “Watch the table, Madame,” the captain whispered. “Now, do you see?”

  And indeed she did. It had been done so quickly that it was almost impossible to pinpoint the moment when the changeover took place, but as the hunchback rolled by the crude table used during the act, another child rolled from underneath the concealing black cloth, the original disappearing beneath; all this action concealed by the mountebank, who let off a puff of smoke from a long-necked vessel at exactly the appropriate second. The crowd, who had noticed nothing, pressed forward as the ‘cured’ child stood up.

  “But it’s the same boy!” breathed Isabeau, unable to believe her own eyes.

  “Twins, I expect, Madame,” answered the captain. “They usually use children who are almost identical.”

  “How clev
er,” Isabeau said in wonderment. “I think they deserve their money.”

  And that indeed was pouring in as the onlookers jostled round the mountebank, begging a bottle of his miraculous cure-all.

  The captain made to take his place at the head of the column, calling, “We’d best be off, ma Reine. The show is over.”

  “One moment,” the Queen called back. “I have an idea.”

  And what a good one! Even before he had left, Isabeau had been mulling over what present to send to Pierre de Giac, what novelty might capture his frenzied imagination, and now she had found the answer. For where the Queen was fascinated by freaks, her favourite being dwarves, de Giac actually collected them. With what enormous enthusiasm had he described for her his assortment of cripples, giants and midgets, all used as participants when he celebrated the Black Mass, and with what cynical power had he insisted that Isabeau’s dwarves were present when he made love to her, saying their presence gave him additional strength.

  “At home I always have at least two voyeurs, if not three,” he had informed her.

  “How disgusting!” Isabeau had answered, but secretly the idea had excited her.

  And now here was a young hunchback, gloriously misshapen but with a face that might turn out to be comely when all the dirt and bruising were gone. Impulsively, Isabeau put her hand through the curtains and took the captain by the arm.

  “Mon Capitaine, kindly go to the mountebank and offer to buy the hunchback.”

  “What!” exclaimed her escort, certain he had heard incorrectly.

  “Go and buy the hunchback.”

  “But he won’t sell him, Madame. The boy is part of his act.”

  “I have made up my mind to own the child,” Isabeau answered determinedly. “And the mountebank will sell all right. Offer him this,” and without another thought she plucked a ring from one of her fat fingers and thrust it into the captain’s hand. He stared in astonishment, seeing a ruby bright as a cherry winking at him in the sunshine.