THE NEXT MORNING LOUIS and his entourage, accompanied by Constance, paid a visit to St. Peter’s Church to hear a special noon mass. After that they planned to visit an ancient monastery that lay just outside the city walls. Eleanor, furious with Louis and unwilling to join him anywhere, sent her women while she remained in the palace.
When the bells rang for Sext, she was sulking in a wooden tub of perfumed hot water. Since her arrival in the principality she had taken to bathing every other day, a luxury she had never indulged in before. But in Outremer, she had been told, both men and women went to the public baths two or three times a week. Alone for the first time since the crusade had started, the ubiquitous eunuchs and serving girls strangely absent, she welcomed this rare moment of privacy.
Closing her eyes, Eleanor lay back in the tub, aware of the mingled musky odors given off by burning incense and bowls of freshly picked anemones. The heady scent always seemed to waft through the rooms and corridors of the palace. Through the open window that overlooked the tiled court came the soothing murmur of a splashing fountain. This was followed by the soft strings of a lute. How familiar the melody sounded. What was it? Of course! “The Infallible Master,” one of her grandfather’s songs. Eleanor smiled in delight and began to sing aloud along with the music.
When she heard someone enter the chamber she paid no attention, assuming one of the serving girls had returned. It was not until a deep voice joined her in the chorus that Eleanor’s eyes flew open.
Raymond, his robe fallen to the Persian carpet, was just getting into the tub with her.
He slid down into the steamy perfumed water but not before she had glimpsed a tall muscular body with broad shoulders and flat belly. His chest was covered with a pelt of curly bronze hair, the plumage of his manhood a deeper bronze.
“You don’t mind if I join you?” he asked, as if this were the most natural occurrence. His eyes rested on her breasts, floating on the water like round shimmering pearls tipped with coral.
Eleanor, whose heart had begun to drum, slid deeper under the water. She could think of nothing to say.
“I’ve dismissed the servants,” he said in a casual voice. “We won’t be disturbed.”
There was a long silence while Raymond smiled at her. “Stand up,” he said softly.
Eleanor could not bring herself to comply. She shook her head.
“Surely you’re not afraid?”
She nodded.
He raised his brows. “No granddaughter of the Troubadour can be guilty of false modesty.” He paused. “Because I am your uncle?”
She nodded again.
“Do you feel as if I am your uncle?”
“Not—not at this moment, I don’t.”
“At any time since your arrival in Antioch?”
She shook her head.
“Well then? Are we not in truth two strangers who, by a fortunate stroke of fate, have found one another in an alien land? As the Moslems would say, inshallah—as God wills.”
Eleanor was not looking at it in quite that way, but … She stood up in the tub, the water pouring in crystal rivulets down her body. For a long moment she watched Raymond leisurely examine her with the heavy-lidded eyes of a connoisseur. It was the first time a man had ever really looked at her naked, and Eleanor found a warm reassurance in the seasoned glance that traveled slowly and appreciatively from the arch of her neck, across the uptilted breasts, down her slender body to the silky chestnut fringe covering her sex.
“Quite, quite charming. You cannot imagine how lovely you are, sweet Nell,” he said, using the name only her immediate family ever used. He reached up; one finger lightly brushed the tip of a pointed nipple.
The ripple of excitement that swept through her was so unexpected that a lump formed in Eleanor’s throat. Leisurely, Raymond stood up and held out his arms. In one quick step she was pressed tightly against him. She could feel the wet hair of his chest tickling her breasts, the strength of his arms closing around her. When he bent his head to touch her lips, the slow kiss spread through her like melting honey. Although she had no mind to resist him, she knew she could not have resisted if she tried.
Famished for years, Eleanor could no longer repress her hunger for passion and affection. When Raymond carried her to the bed, casually sweeping aside a tray of figs and honied almonds, and laid her gently down upon the scented linen sheets, she was already in a fever of desire. A small part of her remained detached, reminding her that this was her blood uncle, obviously a practiced voluptuary, and she did not truly love him, but none of that mattered. She was helpless, in thrall to her own overpowering need.
“Has Louis come to your bed since arriving in Antioch?” Raymond asked, as his hands cupped her breasts, lifting them, stroking the taut flesh, watching the coral nipples become firm as pebbles.
“He has made a vow to be celibate until he prays at Christ’s tomb,” Eleanor whispered, her eyes closing under the mounting pleasure of his slow and deliberate caresses.
“I might have known. Pity. Still, there is more than one kind of pleasure. I doubt you have ever known any with that monk you married. Am I right?”
Eleanor, no longer capable of speech, wished he would stop talking. He had taken a nipple into his mouth, and began to tease it with his tongue, causing a wave of rapture to surge through her body. She pressed his head tightly against her breasts, savoring the feel of his lips.
“What a great hurry we’re in,” he said in a lazy voice, lifting his head.
His fingers slid down her hips to stroke the silken hair that lay between the apex of her thighs. When she felt him gently probe the warm mystery of her sex, she thought she would faint, momentarily embarrassed at the flood of moisture released by his touch. He bent his head to her breast again.
Caught in a whirlpool of liquid fire, Eleanor was totally unprepared for the overpowering frenzy of her response. Raymond’s practiced fingers seemed to know exactly where to go, stroking, pausing just where the feeling was so exquisite. Within moments she was drowning in a wave of ecstasy that gradually spent itself upon a golden strand. A voice she did not recognize screamed aloud. Afterward she knew it for her own. But by then Raymond had stuffed a fig into her mouth.
She opened her eyes and started to laugh, almost choking on the fig. Raymond looked down at her with an amused expression.
“Sweet Jesu, that was a fire that needed quenching! Smoldering for years, if I’m any judge, and I flatter myself that I am.”
Eleanor, totally at peace with her body, gave a luxuriant sigh of contentment as she stretched limp arms above her head and chewed the remains of the fig.
“I must confess I’ve been forced to console myself on occasion,” she said. “But that, I now see, was a pale substitute.”
Raymond rolled his eyes. “Like trying to put out a raging bonfire with a trickle of water. What a pity I may not introduce you to the total joys that a full consummation would provide. But since Louis does not honor your bed, that would be too hazardous. One cannot take the chance.”
Eleanor propped herself up on one elbow. “Now, what would you like me to do—”
Raymond held up his hand. “Oh my dear, there is a surfeit of carnal joys to be had here in the East, where they are masters of the sensual. These joys come in various sizes, shapes, and colors, and I’ve sampled them all. I need nothing. To please you has given me immense pleasure.”
He gave her his lazy smile that reminded her now of the boy he had been. “No pangs of conscience about Louis? Or the Church?” She shook her head. “Good. As my father used to say, these little sins of the flesh are the least of God’s worries.”
She smiled her agreement, wondering why it was that only fellow Aquitainians seemed to share her outlook on life. After a few moments she sat up and started to get out of bed. He pulled her back down onto the rumpled sheets.
“And where are you going in such a rush?”
“Oh, well, I thought—”
“My dear Nell, this afternoon we are not going to think but to feel, and we are going about this matter with no haste whatsoever. There is still plenty of time. What a delightful innocent you are in these matters. That was only the beginning. There are many more fires to set alight—then quench.”
By the time the bells rang for None, Eleanor had received an education in the art of love she would not have believed possible. Without actually entering her, Raymond had led her through a veritable garden of delights, teaching her to savor each one. Even Petronilla would envy her, she thought with satisfaction. She could hardly wait until she returned to France to tell her sister all the blissful details.
Her only regret—if indeed regret was the word—had been a moment when she wished that her heart was as enraptured as her body. She had been aware of a void, as if the experience, satisfying as it had been, had only rippled the surface when, in truth, she longed to be overwhelmed, shaken to the depths, possessed to the very core of her being.
Still, she was grateful for what Raymond had taught her: that in the leisurely hands of an expert minstrel, her body would respond sweetly, like a fine-tuned lute. More importantly, she knew that the feminine, sensual side of her nature, having now been fully awakened, could never be easily sublimated again. Nor did she want it to be.
“You can see what Louis has been denying you all these years,” Raymond said. “Say what you will about the infidel, but when I think of all the strictures the Church has placed against the act of love, I thank God I live in a more civilized land. The Mohammedans hold that if married couples do not bed at least once a week there are grounds for dissolving the marriage!”
“If that were true in France, Louis and I would have separated within the first two weeks!” Eleanor sighed as she pulled on her chemise and gown. “How can I continue to live with that monk and not take leave of my wits?”
Her uncle, clad now in a shimmering purple robe, reclined against a heap of rose and lavender pillows while a honey-skinned serving girl—who had glided silently into the chamber only moments after she and Raymond had finished—served him aromatic wine and a fresh platter of dates, figs, and glistening slices of orange quince dipped in honey. Eleanor wondered if the girl had been listening at the door.
“Would you like to rid yourself of him?”
“Of course. But that is impossible.”
“Difficult, yes, impossible, no. Have you forgotten that you and Louis are related in a degree forbidden by the church? Third or fourth cousins if I’m not mistaken.”
Eleanor stared at him. She had totally forgotten—if, indeed, she had ever known they were distantly related. “But no one said anything about consanguinity at the time. The marriage was rushed through as if I were already carrying his child. Abbé Suger and the archbishop of Bordeaux must have known!”
“Consanguinity is conveniently forgotten when a marriage is desired, instantly remembered when it is no longer desirable. Someone wants to be rid of an unwanted wife and suddenly it is discovered they are third, fourth, fifth cousins!”
“But Louis would never agree to an annulment.”
Raymond nibbled on a fig. “When the grounds for annulment abound? To begin with there are no heirs, only a daughter, surely evidence of God’s displeasure. Secondly, Louis’s conscience is bound to trouble him when reminded he is living in sin with his own third cousin. Were you ever granted a papal dispensation?”
“Never. There simply wouldn’t have been time between my father’s death and my marriage to Louis,” Eleanor said slowly, as the possibilities became apparent. “I wonder—yes, I wonder if Louis realizes that. The subject has never come up. Not once.”
“Naturally. If, in their greedy haste to acquire Aquitaine, Fat Louis of France and Abbé Suger bent a few ecclesiastical rules, who would be witless enough to call attention to it? Undoubtedly the good abbé provided makeshift dispensations, but these are no substitute for the papal dispensation required by canon law. Let sleeping dogs lie was the watchword, I’ll warrant.”
Eleanor was dumbfounded. To think that the means of her release had been sitting there from the very beginning! Why had she never realized it before? The issue of consanguinity was really the only door that provided escape from the prison of her marriage. Now that she had experienced not only fulfillment of the flesh but also a camaraderie of spirit, it was inconceivable that she should stay with Louis. They disagreed about virtually everything and—her thoughts hung suspended as her eyes met the cynical sea blue gaze of her uncle.
He knew exactly what was going through her mind. Her skin prickled, and she stifled a gasp, suddenly recalling what her uncle had said about Louis’s insult to the House of Aquitaine, that he would regret his failure to help him. Eleanor remembered as well his enigmatic smile when she asked what he would do about it. Raymond of Antioch, seasoned voluptuary that he was, had surmised her weakness, and, with her more than willing agreement, taken advantage of this susceptibility. His carefully planned seduction had revealed to her the depths of her desperate need—the devil in her own flesh, Louis would probably call it. Anticipating that she would react exactly as she was doing, he had used her as an instrument of vengeance against her own husband.
It was a bitter blow to her pride and Eleanor felt a surge of outrage. How dare he use her, his own niece, in such a cavalier manner? And yet—how could she be angry with him? In truth, when all was said and done, Raymond had opened a locked gate which might ultimately lead her to freedom.
He rose from the bed. “Mea culpa. Mea maxima culpa. I see that I have been discovered, judged, and—forgiven.” He walked over to her and, taking her hand, brought it gently to his lips. “You will never regret this afternoon’s events, sweet Nell. One day you will thank me. You are a vital and intelligent beauty with a unique and glorious capacity for sensation; I envy the man you will eventually love. Believe me, you deserve better than Louis of France.”
Eleanor blushed, but his words, carefully chosen she suspected, had soothed her vanity. “I agree with you about Louis. But exactly how am I to go about ridding myself of him? Abbé Suger will never allow France to lose Aquitaine.”
“The abbé is an old man; he will not live forever. Time is on your side. In any case, resourceful women always find a way. You have a powerful weapon in your hands. Use it.”
“You sound like my grandmother. She said a clever woman could always change what she did not like by taking matters into her own hands.”
Raymond laughed. “Dangereuse was a most discerning creature! A woman to emulate—despite the fact she displaced my own mother.”
Eleanor gave an impatient sigh, trying to ignore the pressure of his lips against her palm. “I swear that if I ever wriggle free of this coil I’ll never marry again, but rule Aquitaine alone.”
“With a lover to solace you discreetly from time to time?” Raymond released her hand, then reclined again on the bed, patting a place beside him. “That would never suit you. I am not saying you shouldn’t have a lover, heaven forfend. But you need a strong husband and a brood of sons—and a land of your own to rule as well.”
“I will not marry a man I don’t care for.” Eleanor sat down and idly picked up a slice of honied quince. “Not again.”
“There are more than just your wishes to consider. You cannot manage Aquitaine on your own, you know. Fatal to try.”
“Not you too! That was exactly the argument the archbishop of Bordeaux used when he persuaded me to marry Louis.”
“Naturally. His main concern was Aquitaine—and it should be yours as well. With such a disparate land as ours, filled with constant unrest, you must have a man to help you rule. Come, you know perfectly well I’m right.”
“I could have been a real help to Louis if he had not been so opposed to my interfering, as he called it. Sometimes he listened to me but not in Aquitaine, where I understand the people so well.”
“It is precisely because you could have administered affairs in the duchy more effectively that you were prevented from doing so. It is a rare husband who is not threatened by a woman’s exercise of power. A stronger man than Louis might have had misgivings. Even my father, a most enlightened man where women were concerned, never believed them to be the equal of men—except in affairs of the heart.”
“And you?”
Raymond gave her one of his enigmatic smiles. “So many questions. A wise woman controls the world from—”
“—between her legs,” she finished the sentence for him. “Yes, I know.”
“Follow your grandmother’s example.” He reached over to touch her arm. “What you need is a man who not only can please you but who also possesses great strength of will—or you’re apt to devour him alive.” His fingers stroked her cheek. “So lovely, so contrary—Aphrodite and Artemis all in one.” His hand dropped to her breast. “So desirable. But what a dreamer we have here! You want to lose yourself in a great and all-consuming love.” At her look of astonishment he laughed. “You think I didn’t know that? But at the same time you are not willing to relinquish one inch of your power. I fear you cannot have it both ways.”
Eleanor burst out laughing. What an absurd conversation. She threw a date at Raymond, who promptly showered her with a handful of purple figs.
“Think about what I’ve said, Nell. Think about it seriously. Once you have an annulment your great love will show himself.”
“As God wills—inshallah?”
“Ah, you are learning.” He smiled. “And when you have found this great, transcendent passion you so desperately hunger for, remember: try not to do everything better than he does.”
The bells of all the churches in the city rang for Vespers in concert with the muezzins’ call to the Moslems to pray. Louis and the others should be back by now, attending the evensong service. It would be wise for her to meet them there. Eleanor stood up and walked to the chamber entrance. She opened the door, turning her head to throw Raymond a last kiss. He lay against the cushions with his eyes closed. She was neither surprised nor disconcerted to see the serving girl fall to her knees between Raymond’s legs. With a smile she softly closed the door.