Donna Russo Morin

by To Serve A King

  Anne looked down at him. “Why …?”

  “Why I have asked Eleanor to help me.”

  His wife’s name hung between them like the smell of spoilt milk; Anne’s lips curled in distaste.

  “She is his sister, Anne,” he said as if by apology, and sat up to face her.

  Geneviève dared a glance at the couple, shocked to see the king’s face look so old, so weary with worry; she hardly recognized him as the man she had come to hate.

  “I must use every weapon at my disposal. I’m sure you can understand. Our country needs this victory, but I will not—can-not—make our people suffer another war.”

  He appealed to her devotion to nation, one as strong within her as him.

  “Of course, Majesté, you are right, as always,” Anne conceded with courtly grace and acumen, the very kind in which she had tutored Geneviève. “We must do whatever it takes.”

  The king smiled broadly, appeased, lowering himself back into his lover’s embrace.

  “You have read something enlightening?”

  Geneviève flinched at the question and spun to find Arabelle standing at her elbow. She looked at her in confusion.

  Arabelle grinned, refusing to surrender the flimsy bond of friendship between them. “You appear a bit dumbfounded. I thought perhaps you had read something confusing.”

  “Oh, ah, oui.” Geneviève played along and gazed down at the book in her hands, but she saw none of the words printed there. Her mind whirled with the words of the message she would write to her king, one filled with all she had learned. “It is some of the most intriguing I have read in a long time.”

  Queen Eleanor held her head high as the king escorted her into the great hall; she looked like a different woman from the one Geneviève had seen in all the weeks since coming to court. As she must, the duchesse d’Étampes followed behind; François would abandon Eleanor as soon as the meal ended, but the notion did little to quash the mistress’s resentment. The queen preened, aware that the court—especially Anne—would know by now of her king’s request; she basked in the glow of her husband’s need.

  No matter how triumphantly Eleanor strutted, her pudgy body encased in her dowdy gown, she could not eclipse her rival’s beauty, looking more like Anne’s mother than a contemporary nigh on but ten years older. Anne glowed in pale jade silk, trimmed in creamy lace and pearls as was her crescent headdress; she looked every inch the greatest beauty of the realm, despite her features scrunched in a mask of displeasure. It would be a long, tedious banquet for everyone with Eleanor so smug and Anne so an-noyed—especially for the king.

  When the musicians struck a gaillarde between the meat and fish courses, the entire room heaved a collective gasp as Eleanor took to the floor, none other than Montmorency as her partner.

  “This cannot be happening,” Anne hissed under her breath to the ladies seated around her, Geneviève among them. She smiled at François as he caught her eye in obvious apology from across the room.

  The growing rift between the king’s two most intimate coun-cilors—the two Annes—became more and more evident with each passing day. Many wondered who would emerge the victor and who would fall. Anne grabbed her jeweled goblet and drank the liquid in one long gulp.

  “She is his pathetic puppet,” Anne continued to grouse. “Can she really believe this one event will change her status? The king uses her and she cannot see it.”

  Jecelyn leaned toward her mistress, the very devil looking out from her black eyes. “She makes a fool of herself,” she jeered. “Look at her—she flounders like an ox.”

  They watched the queen as she attempted the complicated steps, turns, and hops of the dance, but her bumbling brought the duchesse little ease.

  “Shall we return to your room, madame, and take our entertainment there?” Arabelle suggested kindly.

  Anne spun on her with fury. “I will not retreat. I will not surrender to … to … that,” the duchesse spit.

  Arabelle’s tawny skin turned crimson and she hung her hood-covered head. “My pardon, madame.”

  Geneviève felt Arabelle’s anguish. She had made the suggestion to be helpful; the lady-in-waiting was perhaps one of the kindest people Geneviève had ever met. There was no need for the fuming mistress to take her anger out on the devoted servant.

  “Look at her, she can hardly breathe.” Geneviève threw out the insult at the queen, wanting only to divert the attention away from Arabelle.

  “God’s blood,” Anne cursed, Arabelle’s misstep forgotten. “Ladies, take partners. Fill the dance floor, please. Fill the space so I might not see her.”

  The women jumped. Arabelle, Jecelyn, Lisette, and others reached out to the first man they found, rushing onto the dance floor and forming a barrier around the queen and her partner.

  Geneviève floundered, lost and unsure, searching the faces for someone familiar to partner, uncomfortable with the forward behavior of the ladies at court.

  The powerful hand spun her around before she recognized the face of the man who brought her to the dance floor, imposing his lead with such mastery, she had no choice but to follow.

  Geneviève found her footing and looked up, unable to keep all relief and delight from her features as she found the roguishly handsome face of Sebastien smiling down at her. Clamping down on her emotions, she found herself stepping a little lighter, hopping a little higher, as they pranced in the lively and strenuous routine.

  “You are one lucky man.” The dashing blond youth approached his friend as he stepped off the dance floor and handed Sebastien a pewter mug of frothy ale, slapping him indelicately on the back.

  Sebastien chugged down the quenching liquid, wiping white foam from the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand, and smiled at his companion. “Is that so, Dureau? And why is that?”

  Dureau’s honey brown eyes flitted back to the dance floor, caught and held upon Geneviève as she partnered the marquis de Limoges in a courante. Together the men watched with appreciative stares as she ran across the dance floor with the agility of an athlete, the light catching the auburn satin of her gown and her hood and the shimmering daffodil yellow of her hair, as she skipped beneath the chandelier. The fiddlers’ bows flew across the strings, the hautbois players’ puffed cheeks reddened, the drum beats raced. She smiled at her partner as they turned a particularly difficult maneuver, while Albret tripped, clearly besotted, and Se-bastien cringed a little at the sight.

  “She is a great beauty,” Dureau said, nudging Sebastien with a pointy elbow. “And you seem to be her favored friend.”

  Sebastien’s gaze never wavered nor did his mouth smile in reply. “She is striking, I grant you. But tell me this: Why and how does any woman come to shoot so well?”

  “Did you not tell me she was raised in a manly household?” Another gallant had joined their ranks and the study of Geneviève.

  “I did, Edgard,” Sebastien conceded. “But somehow it does not ring with great truth. Dureau here was raised in much the same way, and he couldn’t hit a dead stag two meters away.”

  The trio of cavaliers laughed, but Sebastien’s smile faded away long before the others’.

  “With all that is perfect and fine about her, there is something not right there,” Sebastien said with deathly seriousness. “I will make it my duty to keep a close watch on her.”

  The two men by his side guffawed uproariously, their bawdy laughter drawing glances of curiosity from the surrounding men and sighs of desire from the women.

  “I bet you will.” Edgard threw back a mug of spirits.

  Sebastien tried to keep the sheepish blush from his face, but failed. “It is only logical,” he defended himself. “I already have an acquaintance with her.”

  “Like I said,” Dureau teased, “you are her favorite.”

  Sebastien cuffed him on the shoulder, and the man tripped as the group swaggered from the room. “Be off with you then,” he said. “Let us play some cards so that I may take your money.”
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  Sebastien brought up the rear of the merry triumvirate as they left the hall in search of some private game. Tr y as he might, he could not stop himself from looking back, from taking one last glance at Geneviève.

  The argument begun in his head some days ago grew louder, and he did not know which voice to heed: the one urging him to seduce her or the one insisting he keep to his duty.

  15

  Better to laugh than weep, then, if we can,

  For laughter is the special mark of man.

  —François Rabelais (c. 1494–1553)

  They filled the narrow pathway between the tall conical shrubs flanking both sides of the garden corridor like sentries at post, their bright afternoon gowns luminous against the evergreen. There would be no hunt or other sport to entertain them this afternoon; it was a day for deputations, and the king would be imprisoned in his public chamber all day—his gentlemen with him—giving audience to the people of the region, and listening to their appeals.

  Anne had worn a path upon the hearth rug all morning, pacing like a caged animal, seething as the day for Eleanor’s meeting with her brother approached. The queen had departed three days ago to travel by horse to Marseilles; from there she and her entourage would travel upon a stately barge to Nice and attempt to convince Charles to meet with François. The importance of her errand eclipsed the joy of having the dowdy queen gone from court; if she was successful, who knew to what lengths François’s gratitude would take him? For Anne, the possibilities were not to be borne, and she had flung herself from the confines of the room, looking for any distraction available.

  Like a general taking point as he besieged a battlefield, Anne led her half dozen ladies through the symmetrically patterned gardens, oblivious to nature’s artistry, stomping upon the gravel and grass as if she were stomping on Eleanor’s head. The ladies had long since surrendered their attempts to divert her, and spoke amongst themselves in hushed whispers.

  Geneviève followed obediently, Arabelle by her side, as devoted as ever, perhaps more. The door had opened a crack and Geneviève knew it, yet she did nothing to close it again. The fear and the worry assaulting her from every direction felt like the pummeling of fists, and though she knew her duty took precedence above all else, she needed the small succor of a friend. It could never be a true friendship, for such intimacy required a baring of the soul, and she guarded hers with a steely determination. But the isolation was no longer all encompassing, and for that, she was grateful. Geneviève could not deny the guilt she felt; it was the same when dancing with Sebastien, but she could not gate them out any longer. Her true king indulged himself, she rationalized; he would not begrudge her a little of the same.

  The lovely but doleful procession passed through the archway shorn through the shrubbery, and entered the courtyard beyond, taken unawares as they stepped into the midst of a great brouhaha. A clamorous cluster of servants fussed around one man and his horse, packing his saddle bags, handing him his gear, readying his mount. Geneviève had never seen the man before; though no doubt of middle age, the man’s sharp nose, pointed chin, and over-long swath of gray hair spoke of preeminence, affording him a dashing air.

  “What’s goes on here?” Geneviève asked Arabelle over the clip-clop of their heels upon the cobbles.

  Arabelle turned her blue eyes to the man and shook her head. “I’m not sure. He could be one of the king’s chevaucheurs making ready. The king keeps these messengers forever on the move.”

  Geneviève felt the tremble as it crested through her body. Questions about the French king’s messenger had come up twice in her communiqués with England, so desperately did King Henry want to know the identity of François’s message riders. As much as they could surmise the nature of the discourse between France and Spain, England needed to know the details, needed to prepare if an attack was soon to be forthcoming. By cutting off the dispatches between the two sovereigns, such information might be gleaned firsthand.

  “Do you know who he is?” Geneviève asked Arabelle and the miniature, mousy Lisette, who had joined them.

  Once more Arabelle shook her head, but Lisette giggled. “I do not know him, either. Do you find him attractive? He is quite debonair.”

  Geneviève smiled indulgently at the small woman. She had come to realize how deceiving this pocket-sized woman’s quiet demeanor was; in truth, Lisette was one of the most unbridled among them.

  “No, not attractive,” Geneviève said, feigning nonchalance. “I merely find all the fuss curious.”

  “Well, if he is a messenger, it must be quite an urgent dispatch to send him forth during the day. They most usually leave at night, when there is less chance he will be followed.”

  Geneviève ground her teeth, wishing to moan aloud at the disobliging information. She had to find out this man’s name; she could not let this opportunity pass.

  Without another word for her companions, Geneviève skipped to Anne’s side.

  “You have forgotten your fan, madame, and you are flushed with the heat. I will run and fetch it for you,” Geneviève announced, and scampered off.

  “It’s not necessary,” Anne called to the swiftly retreating form, but to little avail. Geneviève continued on unabated.

  “I’ll be no more than a moment,” Geneviève tossed over her shoulder. “I’ll cut through the kitchens and catch up quickly.” She disappeared into the small wooden door leading to the kitchens and the quartermaster’s station.

  Her eyes took a moment to adjust to the dim interior of the low stone hallway, and Geneviève staggered about, unsure of which direction to travel.

  “Oof!”

  Bumped into from behind, she hit the wall to her left, scraping the palms of her hands on the rough stone as she braced herself.

  “Beg pardon, mademoiselle,” the youthful squire called as he rushed past.

  “Of course,” she assured him, brushing the dirt off her hands and silently thanking him for becoming her unwitting guide.

  “Can you tell me, please, who is that man in the courtyard?” She trod on his heels like an obedient pet, heading toward the scent of curing meats and the clang of pots and pans.

  The youth took the last step out of the confining hallway and into the cavernous kitchen. As large as the great hall itself, the sooty stone walls rose far above their heads. The chamber clamored with frenetic activity. The hundreds of servants who kept the king and court fed and happy, rushed about their work, calling out and talking as they did. The staff of the paneterie, who baked the bread in the stone ovens, and the échansonnerie, who dispensed the wine, worked beside the butchers and the pastry chefs while the scullions dashed about every which way. Geneviève almost forgot her purpose as her mouth salivated, assaulted by the enticing aromas—the warming dough, the sizzling meat, the juice-soaked fresh fruit—coming from every corner of the room.

  “Beg your pardon, mademoiselle?” the young man asked, moving toward the scullery maid who held out the bulging sack toward him.

  “The man in the courtyard,” Geneviève repeated. “Can you tell me who he is?”

  The squire took the package and stared at Geneviève with ill-disguised suspicion upon his long, horselike face. She forced a kittenish mask to fall over her features, one she had seen Lisette and the other women adopt so often when they plied all the weapons at their disposal on some handsome gallant.

  The kitchen maid wiped her hands on her dirty apron and pushed back the lace-edged cap upon her forehead. “It is Monsieur de La Bretonnière, is it not?”

  The young man suffered the loquacious servant a remonstrative gaze, but the damage had been done.

  “Ah, oui, it is he, Pierre de La Bretonnière, the seigneur de Warthy,” he said reluctantly.

  “Merci.” Geneviève dipped the young man a fine curtsy with a bat of her exotic eyes and he willingly dismissed the departure from procedure. With a wink to the kitchen maid, who smiled broadly back at her, Geneviève rushed from the room before the youth’s mind cl
eared and any questions came her way.

  By no more than a good sense of direction did she find her path through the castle to Anne’s deserted rooms. Locating the seed-pearl-embroidered fan her mistress favored, she composed her next message to King Henry in her mind, so anxious to send the most profound information she had garnered yet. She imagined his happiness, his pride at her work done so well. As she curled the finger brandishing the exquisite amethyst ring, Geneviève wondered if perhaps he would send her another token of his affection. Far better, perhaps he would soon send for her to live by his side, as did his daughters, Mary and Elizabeth.

  “This package has been delivered for you, mademoiselle,” Carine said with a flick of her pert nose toward the vanity, as she lay out her mistress’s outfit for an evening at the king’s salon. The maid smoothed the lavender and cream brocade, and beside it the matching bejeweled hood. By the foot of the bed, she had placed the cream, lace-covered shoes with their dainty wooden heels.

  Rushing into her chambers with little time to spare, Geneviève pulled up short. This could not be one of her clandestine transmittals; it would never have been left with such lack of consequence. Yet she could not fathom who but King Henry would send her anything.

  Geneviève scooped up the small square wrapped in periwinkle silk and untied the scarlet ribbon as she sat with a thump upon her embroidered stool. Carine bustled about, done with her work on Geneviève’s clothing, flitting like a hummingbird over to the dressing table with forced insouciance, and taking great interest in the organization of Geneviève’s brushes and perfumes. Geneviève smiled at her maid’s obvious curiosity; Carine would make the clumsiest of spies.

  Geneviève curled her shoulders and spun away, out of no grave concern to hide what lay within but to tease her exceedingly inquisitive maid.