La Palais de la Cité, Paris
He watched from a shadowy corner of the yard, smirking at the two young popinjays trying to knock each other off their horses. It was a bright, clear day with a taste of spring in the air, and Mortimer had decided to come and watch young Prince Edward, Isabella’s son, go through his paces in the tiltyard.
The secret of winning a joust, so Prince Edward’s tutors drummed into him, was to have the courage to throw one’s full weight into the charge just before the moment of impact. A man’s natural instinct was to flinch away from oncoming danger, but the true champions of the lists were usually those who managed to conquer their natural fear and put their bodies at risk for one or two crucial seconds.
It seemed Edward had this lesson in mind as he thundered down the length of the tiltyard, deliberately riding loose in the saddle to fool his opponent. At only fourteen, he was an undersized figure, bouncing like a pea on the back of his mighty Flemish war-charger, but he held his lance steady in a much-practised grip between finger and thumb.
The stalls either side of the lists held a smattering of French girls, come to see the young English prince demonstrate his prowess, or lack of it. Daughters of the nobility, they wore fine silks and muslin and elaborate headgear, and squealed and clapped in excitement at the rapidly converging riders, faceless behind their tilting helms.
The frosty ground had been covered in straw, and great wisps were thrown up by the flailing, plate-sized hoofs of the enormous war-horses as they plunged towards each other.
Edward’s opponent was a squire from Brabant, ambitious to make a name for himself by dumping the Plantagenet, and probable next King of England, on his royal backside. Alas for his hopes, he was not quite as well-trained as Edward, or quite as brave, and as they closed the flattened cup of Edward’s lance took him in the armpit and lifted him clean out of his saddle.
To shrill, excited screams from the stalls, he crashed to earth in a sorry heap of ironmongery, dropping his lance as he fell. It rolled and clattered away before coming to rest against a fence, no longer a knightly weapon but a useless length of painted timber.
“Well ridden,” cried Mortimer, clapping in mock salute as the triumphant prince galloped past.
His own military apprenticeship, served in the mists of Ireland and Wales, had been rather different. He had killed his first man when he was about Edward’s age, a bare-legged Welsh spearman who had come screaming at him out of some woods near Shrewsbury. Mortimer could still remember the easy slide of his sword into the man’s unprotected belly, and the surprised look in his victim’s eyes as they glazed over – and how good it had felt, afterwards, to know he had been blooded, and to feel like a man among his father’s hard-bitten soldiers.
Mortimer walked into the yard and helped the fallen squire’s page get the boy to his feet. The squire groaned as they lifted him, and staggered like a new-born calf as he tried to stand unaided.
“Stop whimpering,” Mortimer said as he unlaced the squire’s helm. “It was a clean fall.You’re not bleeding and nothing seems broken. You will suffer many more such falls unless you improve your technique. Don’t show so much daylight in the saddle, and grip harder with your heels.”
“Take your fucking hands off me,” the squire whined. His helm came off, revealing a beardless, sensitive face disfigured by sweat and skin that burned with shame. He pushed Mortimer away, and limped off across the yard, head bowed as the girls jeered and spat at him. His dutiful page ran after him.
Mortimer was still chuckling when he was interrupted by the jingle of a harness. He glanced up and saw the prince, bare-headed and holding his helm in the crook of his arm. His long fair hair was sodden with sweat and plastered to his skull, and he gazed down at Mortimer with barely concealed distaste.
“Christ’s bones,” said Mortimer, planting one hand on his hip and shading his eyes with the other, “but you are the spit of your father. And your grandfather, come to that. You Plantagenets never seem to carry any fat.”
Edward also bore an uncomfortable resemblance to his mother. He had inherited her almond-shaped green eyes, shrewd and intelligent, missing nothing.
“Why are you here?”
“I came to see a display of riding and jousting, and I got my wish. You were splendid, sire.”
Edward smiled in boyish gratitude. “My royal uncle, the King of France has given me a skilled master-at-arms to train with, almost as good as the one back home. And he gives me fine armour, horses and weapons, everything I ask for!”
“Does he, now? How generous of him.” The fat bastard is always pleading poverty. Why is he spending money trying to crawl up Edward’s passage? “Could you dismount, sire? I also came to speak with you. We seldom have the opportunity, and when we do your mother is invariably present.”
Edward frowned and then clambered out of the saddle, lithe and graceful despite the weight of his armour. His page came scurrying up with a flask of wine.
Mortimer took the prince by the arm and led him away to a quiet corner, deftly snatching the wineskin as he did so. Pulling out the stopper with his teeth, he greedily tossed back the contents – it was a fine, savoury Rhenish, though sadly watered down – and passed the depleted skin back to Edward.
“I am told you received another letter from your father,” Mortimer said, in the same easy, conversational tone. Edward nodded cautiously and tilted back his head to drink.
“Your mother won’t let me read it. We usually share all our correspondences, but she insists it is a private family matter.” Mortimer spread his hands and laughed “I am family, am I not?”
He folded his arms and leaned in closer to the prince. “Come, Ned,” he prompted, just stopping short of nudging him, “let me read the damn thing. Or if not, give me an idea of the content.”
‘Ned’ was a mistake. “You are not part of my family,” Edward said firmly, wiping his mouth, “you are not my friend, and you may not address me in such familiar terms. My father’s letter is none of your business.”
“Tell me, sire,” he said, placing a sarcastic emphasis on the honorific, “tell me your true opinion of your father. Do you think he is a good king?”
Edward looked surprised for a moment. His jaw tightened, and Mortimer knew he had hit him on the raw.
“My father…” the prince said uncertainly, losing the calm self-possession of a moment before. “My father is…he is a good man.”
Mortimer thought that highly debatable. The remains of dead men hanging in cages and irons from Carlisle to London told a different story, but he let it pass. The prince was opening up a little.
“Speak,” he said encouragingly.
“A good man, but…he is not worthy to keep a realm!” Edward looked on the verge of tears, clearly hating every word he uttered.
Mortimer nodded. “True. He lost Scotland, and only held on to Ireland thanks to me. He would have lost England to Lancaster, but for Sir Andrew Harclay. And now look. I am in exile, and Harclay’s head adorns a spike on London Bridge. Your father rid himself of the best men in England, and chose the company of men like the Despensers instead. That is the measure of his kingship.”
“I am in no wise willing to speak to you on these matters, my lord,” he said, and tried to move away. Edward turned on his heel with a fair degree of poise, a monarch brushing off the unwanted attentions of a subject. It reminded Mortimer of the prince’s grandfather, Edward Longshanks, of awesome and terrifying memory.
His hand did not relinquish the prince’s arm. Edward tried to pull free, but Mortimer had a grip like a steel trap.
“Been practising hard at the lists, have you not? I’ve watched you, prancing up and down in your spotless new armour. All the girls love to watch you, laughing and clapping at your little victories, getting all hot and damp in their underclothes. Tell me something else, sire, have you had a cunt yet?”
The prince’s eyes glittered, and the blood rushed into his face. “Churl!” he said, and threw a punch with his free left hand. Mortimer caught his wrist before the blow could land, and for a moment they stood poised on the verge of an unthinkable brawl.
It was Mortimer – it had to be – who broke first, releasing Edward and taking a step back. The prince was still fuming, but he made no move.
“Thank you for this conversation,” said Mortimer, resuming his genial mask, “I have learned a great deal. What you have chosen not to tell me, I will learn for myself. Depend on it.”
He bowed elegantly, like a good courtier should, and sauntered away without waiting for permission. The prince did not come after him, or burst into tears, or react in any of the ways that Mortimer hoped he would. For the first time, he felt a tremor of anxiety about the boy.