The King's Women

by Deryn Lake

  Another who flocked to her cause was the young Duke of Alençon, Charles’s beautiful brave cousin, whose father had been killed at Azincourt, making the boy a Duke when he was only six, and who had himself been taken prisoner by the English on the field of Verneuil when he had been barely fifteen. For three years the boy had remained locked up in the Fortress of Le Crotoy until his family had managed to raise his vast ransom money, and now he itched to get back into the fight. D’Alengon’s attraction to Jehanne was also greatly enhanced by the fact that he adored the supernatural, fascinated by both astrologers and clairvoyants. Once having made her acquaintance, the young Duke spent hours in La Pucelle’s company, sitting slavishly at her feet like an adoring dog.

  So, with the entire Court either siding with Jehanne or pretending to do so because it was fashionable, it was left to a mere couple of people, Georges de la Trémoille and Regnault de Chartres, Archbishop of Reims, to make trouble. Arguing in Council that Jehanne might just as well be an envoy of the Devil as of God, they insisted that she should undergo some sort of trial to prove her spiritual allegiance.

  Yolande moved against the two decisively. First, she had Jehanne received into the Third Order of St. Francis, knowing the power and piety of the Franciscan movement, inducted by the Mother Superior of the Order of St. Clare, Colette de Corbie herself. Next, she persuaded Charles, only too willing to listen in his present state of jubilation, that if there were indeed to be a trial and a physical examination of Jehanne — this insisted upon by de la Trémoille who declared that if the girl were the Devil’s bitch then she most certainly could not be a virgin — it must be undertaken by the preaching orders.

  Thinking that he had made his point Georges agreed to this, and it was decided that Jehanne should go to Poitiers where the doctors of law and theology who had left Paris at the time of Burgundy’s invasion had set up a rival university.

  “How do you feel about going on trial?” Charles asked the girl, alone with her in her bleak tower.

  “I object to the delay but not to the enquiry itself. It’s just that the longer I leave them at Orleans the worse their situation will get. And, of course, they are now expecting me.”

  And it was true. Word had reached the beleaguered city that a miraculous virgin had appeared whose avowed intent it was to relieve the siege, and messages came regularly from the Bastard repeatedly asking when the girl was to join him.

  “I sympathise with you,” Charles answered, thinking seriously about what he was saying. “But Queen Yolande believes the only way to refute those who doubt you is by recourse to theologians.”

  “Then she must be right for she is a good woman. And besides, my voices will tell me what answers to make.”

  The King smiled faintly. “Jehanne, I know you are the predicted one, and I believe in you completely…”

  “But?”

  “But there is still one thing that worries me. How can you, a seventeen-year-old girl from Domrémy, take command of an army of mercenaries, of rabble, most of them deserving little better than the gallows? How can you convince the hardened generals, especially that devil La Hire, to follow you? And, most of all, how can an innocent virgin possibly engage in physical fighting?”

  There was silence, then finally Jehanne put out her hand and said, “Come with me. There is something I have to show you.”

  Simultaneously apprehensive and mystified, the King followed her down the stone staircase to the room below, the place in which the wretched Templars had eked out their last days before being taken away for execution.

  “Here,” said Jehanne, and made her way to the northern wall, on which the prisoners had engraved messages in the stone. Charles gazed on the rough plan of a church, a radiant heart, monks’ faces, the cross and instruments of the crucifixion, a raised hand.

  “There are messages too,” added La Pucelle, and her fingers traced out the name J. Molay, scratched above the representation of a stag being hunted down by a hound.

  “The last Grand Master of the Templars.”

  “Not the last. They are still in existence though long ago forced to become an underground stream. I am one of them, sweet Dauphin. You need have no fears for my safety. I am a Poor Knight of Christ.”

  “But that is not possible.”

  “It is,” said a voice from the arched and vaulted doorway and Charles swung round to see that it was René d’Anjou’s lean frame which had suddenly blotted out the light.

  “What do you mean?”

  For answer, René held up his extraordinary hands, and the disproportionately long little fingers cast their own small shadow.

  “Years ago you asked me if I knew a man called Nicolas Flamel and I did not answer you. The reason was that though I knew the name it meant nothing to me at the time. It was only when I went to Lorraine that my great-uncle, the Cardinal of Bar, told me that Flamel had nominated me as the next Grand Master of the Priory of Sion, the secret society who at one time had been the non-military arm of the Knights Templar.”

  “But why you? A child?”

  “That I will never know but, whatever the reason, I became the guardian of the Priory’s secrets, one of which was that many of the Templars remain alive, have gone underground, and that an entire chapter is active in Scotland.”

  “It was to them that I was sent for my training,” said Jehanne. “And it was into that chapter I was finally received as a member of the Order.”

  So now it was clear. La Pucelle’s ability as a horsewoman, spoken of in awed tones by the King’s courtiers, and her incredible strength with the lance, discovered by the handsome d’Alengon, who liked nothing better than to take the girl into the tilt-yard to joust, was explained.

  “Is the Queen of Sicily aware of all this?”

  “Oh, yes,” René replied wryly. “My amazing mother found out, as she always does everything.”

  “Amazing indeed!”

  “I like her,” said Jehanne. “You are both very lucky to be her kin. I envy you that privilege.”

  The Trial of Poitiers was without doubt a great success, Jehanne mostly answering the examiners’ questions with patience and humour. Only once did she come near to losing her temper, shouting out, “In God’s name, I have not come to Poitiers to make proofs — but take me to Orleans, and I’ll show you the sign for which I have been sent.”

  She had then gone on to make four predictions to the court of enquiry: that the siege of Orleans would be raised and the English defeated; that the Dauphin, whom she declared she would not call King until he had been anointed with sacred oil, would be crowned at Reims; that Paris would be taken and returned to the King; and that Charles, Duke of Orleans, would be set free after being a prisoner of the English for twenty-five years.

  “And if these things do not come true, and more, then you may indeed denigrate me as a false prophet.”

  But, when all was said and done, they were only words and Regnault de Chartres, head of the enquiry and no champion of the girl, an ally of de la Trémoille, persisted that she should still be physically examined to prove that she was both female and virgo intacta. It was the Queen of Sicily who was finally nominated for this task, in company with Madame de Gaucourt, wife of the governor of Orleans, and Lady de Treves, wife of Robert le Maçon.

  Yolande had gone alone into the room where Jehanne lay upon the table, stripped of all her clothing and naked as on the day of her birth, which her mother still remembered as though it were yesterday. Glancing at her daughter, the Queen could see what she already well knew. Jehanne was obviously female, though very small in the breast and packed with sinew and muscle. Yet, on stepping closer, there was indeed one small peculiarity which would not have shown itself in a baby but would have become apparent as the child grew. To her horror, Yolande d’Anjou realised that the lips of her secret parts were joined together by nature and there was no doubt that Jehanne would remain a virgin for the rest of her life.

  “Have you menstruated?” the Queen asked abrupt
ly, too shocked to tread delicately.

  “No, I am still waiting,” answered the girl, blushing wildly, obviously not used to such direct questioning. “Why?”

  Yolande thought rapidly, and lied. “Because sometimes athletic girls such as yourself never do.”

  “Really? It would be helpful not to in my case.”

  Poor little creature, so innocent and yet so tough. “I feel that perhaps you will be exempt,” the Queen said quietly, and then, spontaneously, planted a kiss on her daughter’s freshly scrubbed cheek. “Now put on your breeches and I will call in the other ladies.”

  “But won’t they want to look at me as well?”

  “Just your top half. I will not let you be embarrassed further.”

  Nor did she, and it was Yolande’s sworn word alone that Jehanne was a true and intact virgin that was given to the court.

  “In whom I can say there is manifest no corruption or violence,” the Queen concluded her evidence.

  “Definitely?” asked Archbishop Regnault de Chartres.

  “Definitely,” she replied with dignity.

  And with that matters were finally done. The hearing retired to deliberate their findings and Jehanne, in the confident hope that they would decide in her favour, dictated a challenge addressed to the King of England and the Duke of Bedford, ‘who call yourself Regent of France’, telling them to leave the city of Orleans or ‘wait for news of La Pucelle who will shortly come to see you to your very great loss’.

  It was a threatening and belligerent letter in which Jehanne described herself as chief of the army, and it was enough to push the tribunal in her favour. On 24th March 1429, she left Poitiers in triumph, the next move to equip her as a fully-fledged knight of France, the indignity of the court hearing behind her.

  The armourer’s shop in the town of Tours seemed a veritable palace of splendour and excitement to Jehanne, who unashamedly adored weapons and all the accompanying accoutrements of war. Filled with the sound of clinking hammers, pieces of armour displayed all about the place, it held as much fascination and charm for her as a merchant’s warehouse would for any other girl of her age. La Pucelle stood, half smiling, one foot upon a velvet cushion, being fitted into the leg pieces of the small but extremely special suit of armour that was being made for her, twirling a flower that an admirer had given her in one hand, the fingers of the other resting lightly upon the hilt of her sword, a sword which had indeed been found by truly miraculous means.

  Those piercing voices which told her everything that guided her life, had whispered that a sword lay buried in the ground near the altar in the shrine of Ste. Catherine de Fierbois. When a search party had looked where Jehanne had described, they had indeed found something, an old crusader weapon decorated with five crosses on its blade, extremely rusty but for all that in good condition. An armourer at Chinon had sharpened and cleaned it for her and now she wore the sword constantly, only taking it off when she went to bed. To those who had had any doubts left about the girl’s visionary powers, the finding of the sword had been proof positive that Jehanne was a genuine clairvoyant.

  “The saboton is not too big for you?” asked the armourer, slipping on one of the foot pieces.

  “No, I don’t think so.” Jehanne stretched her toes inside the metal. “It seems a good fit.”

  “Then that’s well.”

  He grinned cheerfully, immensely flattered to have been asked to create the girl’s entire armour, separate pieces usually being made by different people and then assembled together, and delighted by the fee of 100 livres toumois being paid to him by the Queen of Sicily herself.

  “In fact I’m very pleased with all of it,” Jehanne went on, and looked down at the extraordinary little suit with obvious satisfaction.

  ‘What a warlike creature it is,’ thought the man, unable to stop himself wondering if such a girl could be absolutely normal.

  “You look superbly savage,” said a voice from the door, and both Jehanne and the armourer gazed round to see who had come into the shop.

  It had become the habit for various young dandies of Tours to follow the miraculous Pucelle around, studying and marking what she was doing and who she was going to see, and it had not been a surprise to either Jehanne or the craftsman to observe a small group of youths watching her through the shop window. But now one of them had detached himself and come in, standing in the doorway, looking at Jehanne with a certain amusement, determined to catch La Pucelle’s eye and wink.

  It did not need the cry of her voices to warn the girl that she was in the presence of evil, nor the prick of thumbs to tell her that here was wickedness made flesh. So it was very slowly that Jehanne braced herself before staring into the furnace of the stranger’s pupils.

  The man’s smile deepened. “I greet you,” he said.

  “And I greet you,” she answered steadily.

  They stood looking at one another, not as a man and a girl, but as two adversaries of old.

  “Why have you come?” she said quietly.

  “To be at your side,” he answered. “For you need me. You have no true meaning unless I accompany you, ma Pucelle.”

  The armourer, made uncomfortable by the strangeness of their conversation, stood up from his kneeling position at Jehanne’s feet.

  “Well,” he said, rubbing his hands together, “that’s that then, I’m glad you’re satisfied, Mamzelle.”

  The girl turned to look at him and he saw that her eyes were far away, not thinking of her armour or his shop or anything remotely to do with reality.

  “Thank you,” she answered automatically, then gazed once more at the stranger. “Introduce yourself, Monsieur.”

  He bared his strong white teeth. “Gilles, ma Pucelle. Gilles de Rais. I am a Marechal in the army of which you are so soon to take command.”

  “I see,” answered Jehanne, smiling to herself. “So you will indeed be always by me.”

  “I will never leave you, you know that.”

  “Yes, I do.”

  “Will that be all?” said the armourer, coughing.

  Gilles de Rais laughed, a harsh sound. “I think La Pucelle has done with you, yes.”

  Jehanne took control of the situation, pulling the metal gauntlet from her hand and holding it out to the craftsman.

  “You have done well and I am grateful. Pray for me.”

  “I will,” the armourer answered, kissing her fingers.

  “And now to battle,” said Gilles softly.

  “Yes indeed,” answered Jehanne, drowning him with her eyes, “now to battle.”

  Thirty-One

  No one who saw La Pucelle set out from Blois to relieve the City of Orleans would ever forget the sight. As a symbol of her purity she rode a white horse, while over her head fluttered a white silk banner depicting the world in God’s hand, two angels at His side, the background fleur-de-lis, the words Jhesu Maria written above. Behind Jehanne rode the members of her household: Jean d’Aulon, the squire; Jean Pasquerel, her chaplain; Abbot Jacques, her confessor; two pages, Louis de Contes and Raymond; her two brothers, come especially from Domrémy, and finally two heralds, Ambleville and Guyenne.

  Over her silver armour Jehanne wore a short red cloak, her head covered by a hat of crimson felt, her helmet carried by d’Aulon. She had been appointed Chef de Guerre by Charles VII and there was not one of the great soldiers of France who was not now answerable to her.

  The entire court had turned out to see La Pucelle go to war: Charles and Marie and their first-born child, six-year-old Dauphin Louis, who waved his little handkerchief to Jehanne; Yolande, openly weeping, her enemies whispering that it was because she had sold her silver and jewels in order to raise enough money to pay the soldiers and buy provisions for the people of Orleans; de la Trémoille who, to his credit, had negotiated at all levels to get La Pucelle extra help, trying to smile; Regnault de Chartres, reluctantly giving the girl blessing. As to the military leaders, they had every one of them either been persuaded
or bribed to accept their extraordinary new commander with as much good grace as possible.

  The most difficult of all to either impress or win round had been, without doubt, Captain Etienne de Vignolles, known as La Hire by the mercenaries, of whom he was one, a man of such repute that he had kept his men loyal to him throughout five gruelling years of defeat. He was too tough a warrior to be impressed with talk of God and holy virgins and Yolande d’Anjou had done the most sensible thing and filled his pocket with a handsome douceur. Now, leaving the lines of troops, La Hire gave La Pucelle a florid salute and verbally pledged his allegiance to her. At this, the Marshal de Rais raised a cheer which was taken up by the ranks. So it was in the midst of the army’s jubilant cries that Jehanne finally rode out of Blois at the start of her mission.

  Still weeping, Yolande d’Anjou turned to go back into the chateau.

  “My good mother,” said Charles following her, “why are you so sad? Are you not convinced, as I am, that La Pucelle will lead us to victory?”

  “But at what cost to herself?” answered Yolande bitterly. “She is a child, a seventeen-year-old. How can we do this to her?”

  “Because she is inspired,” Charles replied, meaning it. “This is no ordinary girl going off to fight. This is the prophesied one, remember that.”

  But Yolande was too distressed to answer, a strange combination of pride and anguish fighting in her soul. Yet overriding those feelings came another, a certainty that events had now moved too far for the Earl of Richmond, still banished from court and stripped of office, to be left in ignorance of the truth. A desperate need to see him, to confide in him all that was in her over-burdened heart, overcame the Queen and, as she had done so often in the past, Yolande sat down to write the Earl a letter.

  Then, because she had made up her mind at last, everything had to be done on the instant. Knowing that he was, after all their years together, still unable to resist her summons, Yolande wrote, ‘Meet me in two days’ time at Saumur. I must see you on a matter of extreme urgency. I shall leave Blois at once in order to receive you there.’