Chapter 35

England, 1175

BY LATE SPRING, THE brief civil war in England had been over for some months. Alais and the other royal prisoners had been confined to Windsor Castle for almost a year when they heard that King Henry was back in England with Harry. Shortly thereafter they received a summons to attend the king’s court at Woodstock. Alais, bored and restless, eagerly looked forward to the change.

Constance, thank the Holy Mother, had returned to her duchy of Brittany to join her husband Count Geoffrey. Richard, whom Alais had expected would accompany his father and brother to England, had been sent to Aquitaine. No nuptials were planned for the immediate future. When the justiciar, de Lucy, had told her this she made an effort to appear disappointed but it was all she could do to keep from skipping with joy.

Alais, Marguerite, and Joanna left Windsor on a bright morning in mid-April and after two days of travel and a night spent at the guesthouse of an abbey, they were on the last leg of their journey to Woodstock. Mounted upon a white palfrey, a soft breeze blowing her dark hair about her shoulders, Alais gazed curiously at the rolling hills and soft green downland of Oxfordshire. Well-kept manor houses and thatch-roofed cots dotted the landscape; hawthorn blew on the breeze and the twitter of birdsong echoed from nearby woods. In the far distance shimmered the outline of a small castle surrounded by a wall. Quite a pretty land, she supposed, even if the English people were uncouth compared to the civilized French and the sophisticated Aquitainians. The sound of their accented Norman French grated harshly on the ear, and those few who spoke English were unintelligible.

They were on a stretch of road bordered by thick hedgerows when Alais first saw her.

Riding toward them from the opposite direction was a young woman seated on a mare the color of smoke. She rode with the ease and freedom of a boy, despite the folds of soft blue kirtle and cloak that hung down either side of the saddle. The ice-blue eyes and silver-gilt hair, the milky skin flushed with the pink of a summer rose, made Alais catch her breath. Everyone in their party stared at the young woman as she rode by, her hand raised in greeting, her lips parted in a warm smile. Men-at-arms, grooms, archers, all craned their necks to catch another glimpse. Alais hated her on sight.

“I wonder who that is,” Alais said to Marguerite, riding beside her.

“The king’s leman. I met her when Harry and I were crowned in London several years ago.”

So this was the notorious Rosamund de Clifford, cause of the original quarrel between King Henry and Eleanor. “Met her? You cannot mean the king introduced this creature to a princess of France?”

“I had just been crowned queen of England, would you believe?” Her sister raised a flaxen arc of eyebrow.

Alais was truly shocked. Such a gross breach of etiquette was beyond her comprehension.

“They say the king is still mad with love for her even after ten years,” Marguerite continued in an undertone, with a watchful eye on Joanna riding ahead.

“Lust, more likely. She is little better than a whore, after all.” Alais turned her head, watching the figure until the road curved and she vanished from view.

“No, sister, she is not a whore. Harry told me that Rosamund de Clifford is the daughter of a highly regarded Norman family fallen on hard times.” Marguerite frowned. “I do not think it can only be lust, for Harry says that King Henry is no more faithful to his leman than he was to Eleanor.”

“If we speak of tumbling some tavern wench for a night or two, where is the harm?”

“Our father was faithful.” Marguerite looked taken aback. “I expect Harry to observe his marriage vows. Surely you would want Richard to be the same. Adultery is a mortal sin, after all.”

Alais wished her sister did not see the world in such strict terms of black or white. “A short-lived pleasure is soon forgotten. I doubt it would trouble me. After all, I too could find consolation elsewhere.”

Marguerite signed herself as she gave Alais a reproving glance. “Really, sister, I am shocked at your boldness. One might expect this dissolute attitude from the countess of Narbonne or that saucy troubadour of Altaforte, not a French princess. Unlike myself, you appear to have picked up some worldly and shameless ideas at the Poitevin court. It would behoove you to shed them now.”

Alais flushed. In truth, her comment to Marguerite had been made by both the sophisticated Ermengarde and Bertran de Born as well. Their discussion came to an abrupt end as the gates leading to Woodstock Castle swung open and their party rode through.

Over the next sennight Alais expected to see the de Clifford creature make an appearance, but she did not do so. Determined to learn all she could about the ways of King Henry’s English court and adapt accordingly, Alais kept to herself and observed those in attendance. In addition to Harry, at his most charming and biddable, she noted, William Marshal was also present, as well as members of Henry’s council, several prelates, and nine-year-old Prince John. She had not seen the prince for some years and he had grown into a spindly boy with a pale skin and thick black hair.

For the first time, Alais met King Henry’s misbegotten son, Geoffrey, who, at twenty years of age, had just been appointed archdeacon of Lincoln.

“Unheard of in one so young and also a bastard,” Marguerite told Alais as they strolled in the courtyard a few days after their arrival. “Harry says Richard is jealous of him and resents the fact that Geoffrey was forced upon the royal household.” Marguerite shuddered. “How can you hate your own brother?”

Alais raised her eyebrows. “Cain killed Abel because he was jealous, didn’t he? In truth, I think it is disgraceful Eleanor was asked to raise the son of a Saxon street whore, but why would Richard be jealous of him?” She tried—and failed utterly—to imagine her prim and pious father urging the proud Adela to welcome his bastard, if he had ever had one, into the royal palace.

Later when she observed the misbegotten Geoffrey with his father, Alais felt a burst of sympathy for Richard and understood his jealousy. It was so obvious that this baseborn son was close to Henry’s heart. The king visibly brightened in the boy’s presence and chatted easily with him, reminding Alais of Eleanor and Marie.

As the days passed, Alais wondered if she would ever get used to the customs of this strange land. She remembered her father, King Louis, telling her that despite their fierce efficiency the Normans were coarse and ill bred, the descendants of seagoing marauders, after all. She must never forget that she was a princess descended from aristocratic French monarchs whose royal line went back to Clovis, the first Christian king of France. Certainly the atmosphere at this court was vastly different from the funereal courts in France and totally unlike the frivolous carefree courts held at Poitiers. Here the doors were always open to an odd assortment of people—humble burghers, knights, clerks, even moneylenders in saffron robes came and went as they pleased. Instead of troubadours singing of love there was a joculator who told tales, and a Welsh harper who, night after night, sang only of the glories of the brave Welshmen who had helped King Henry rid his domains of his enemies.

“God’s eyes, Maddog, you old rogue,” Henry had shouted one night after a particularly heartrending version. “Is it only my imagination or is it so that every time you sing of these battles, my role gets smaller and smaller?”

“A discerning ear you have, my lord king, look you.” The Welsh harper had bowed his head. “And when I sing this tale before the Welsh chieftains, no offense to Your Grace, I doubt you will play any part at all.”

Henry threw back his head and roared with laughter. He would forgive a person a great deal, Alais observed, if they had a quick wit. She could not imagine her father bantering with a harper, or conversing with merchants and goldsmiths who came to Woodstock from London to show King Henry their wares. He would haggle with horse dealers who paraded strings of horses in the park surrounding the castle, and personally inspected his pack of hounds, all of whose names he knew.

Although Rosamund de Clifford did not initially show herself at the court, there were times when Henry was absent and Alais was told that he had gone to Everswell, only a short ride across the park into the woods on the other side. People had only praise for Fair Rosamund, as they called her, openly admiring her kind heart and her skill at healing animals. As if these qualities signified something.

One day in August, Rosamund finally appeared, looking just as lovely as Alais remembered. When they were introduced, Alais’s heart beat wildly but she dared not offend the king by refusing. Despite the fact that the leman curtsied respectfully and behaved with deference, Alais had the sudden urge to rake her nails across that flawless skin until she drew blood. She watched King Henry stroll with Rosamund across the courtyard, and when he reached for her hand and held it, Alais felt a surge of jealousy so strong it clutched at her throat and gripped her belly. Since she had first him met at Montmirail six years earlier, Alais had seen King Henry at Bures, Chinon, Limoges, and Poitiers. She had seen him with his children, with his half sister, and with Eleanor, whom he really loved, anyone could tell that. But she had never seen him as he was with this woman. It was not that he behaved like a man in love, but more as if he were a youth, carefree and joyous. Everyone in the courtyard watched them together.

“I don’t like her either,” said a low voice.

Startled, Alais looked down at Prince John, who had come up beside her. “What makes you think I don’t like her?” Were her feelings that obvious?

His dark eyes examined her face. “I notice such things. My brother Harry, the young king, falls asleep in council meetings when my father is discussing matters with his advisors. I am allowed to attend, and I listen to everything and watch everyone.”

“You must have learned a lot.”

“I have. But not as much as I want to learn, which is why I made my tutor start teaching me about law and the workings of the exchequer.”

“Don’t you have to read Latin to understand law?”

John smiled. “I can read Latin almost as well as my half brother, archdeacon Geoffrey, who is fluent.”

Alais was impressed despite herself. John stood on tiptoe and put his face up to hers as far as he could reach.

“I know something. Something important. But it’s a secret. Shall I tell you?”

Alais looked down at him. “Do you want to?”

“Only if you won’t repeat it. Only two other people know.”

“I won’t,” she said indulgently.

“My father is very, very angry with my mother.”

“That is hardly a secret.”

John glanced about the courtyard. Although filled with people, they were standing alone, out of earshot of anyone present. “What no one knows is that he is so angry he is going to try and put her away. Force her to enter an abbey, like Fontevrault, where I stayed for so long.”

Alais caught her breath. “That does not seem possible.”

“It’s true. I heard it in a council meeting. Only King Henry and a few of his closest advisors, Lord de Lucy and the sheriff, Ranulf de Glanville, were there. My father thought I was asleep.” He gave her a conspiratorial look. “After my mother has gone into the abbey, my father will try to get the marriage annulled so that he can marry Rosamund de Clifford and make her queen.”

Frozen with horror, Alais could not credit what John was saying. How could King Henry even consider such an unworthy alliance?

“I can hardly believe such an outrageous tale. Not that I think you made it up out of whole cloth, John, but perhaps you misheard your father?” Alais shook her head. “I mean, on what grounds could the king even get an annulment?”

“‘I wish to marry Rosamund de Clifford.’ That is what I heard my father say, those very words,” John replied in an adamant tone. “Then he asked de Lucy if he thought the pope would grant him an annulment on the grounds that he and my mother are too closely related.”

Sweet Marie! That was how Eleanor and her father, King Louis, had managed to have their marriage annulled. Henry and Eleanor, Alais remembered hearing, were even more closely related. Unexpectedly, Alais felt tears rush to her eyes.

“Poor, poor Eleanor. How dreadful for her. You must be extremely upset.”

John nodded. “I am, but not about my mother. Eleanor hates me, you know. My nurses told me she hated me from the very first time she saw me.” For an instant Alais thought she detected a shadow of pain in his eyes, but it vanished almost immediately. “What I am upset about is what might happen if my father marries again.”

“Of course you are, and I don’t blame you. The very idea of King Henry marrying that low-born—”

“No,” John interjected, shaking his head impatiently, “that’s nothing to do with it. If the king marries Rosamund, or anyone else, and they have sons, what happens to me and my brothers? What are we left with?”

Alais, who had no idea what he was talking about, stared at him in perplexity.

“If two people have their marriage annulled, it is as if they were never married. Doesn’t that make their children illegitimate in canon law?”

“Oh. Well, that may be so, but if you are all sons of an anointed king . . . What I mean is that my half sisters, Marie and Alix, were illegitimate after my father and Eleanor had their marriage annulled, but they still made prestigious marriages.”

“Girls.” John shrugged dismissively. “But if they had been sons, what then? Could they be barred from their inheritance because they were now bastards? Would the sons of another marriage be able to displace them? Even my half brother, who is illegitimate himself, does not know for certain. Which is why I am studying law. Remember your promise not to tell.”

Stunned, Alais watched him saunter away. Eleanor, her marriage annulled, shut away in a convent! Leaving Henry free to marry again and produce more sons. It did not seem remotely possible and yet, what if it were? Certainly she could not then marry Richard if he were proclaimed a bastard, which was no real loss in her eyes.

There was nothing she, or anyone, could do about Eleanor’s plight, Alais realized, but there might be some way she could turn this startling news to her own advantage. Assuming, of course, that John’s version of events turned out to be accurate. Her eyes followed his small, resolute figure trudging across the courtyard. A devious boy, precocious and too old for his years. But with a cunning gift for survival, she sensed, and also far more vulnerable than he wanted anyone to know. She did not believe he really hated his mother, despite his bold words. He was only a child still, she reminded herself, even if he was not a very likable one.

At the same time Alais felt a thread of understanding between John and herself that she did not share with any of Eleanor’s other children. Unaccountably, he seemed oddly familiar to her, as if she had once known a child like John. It tugged at her memory, fragile as a cobweb just out of reach, and she could not quite catch hold of it.