Médicis Daughter (45 page)

My cousin is wrong: the ballet is not the worst part of the spectacle. I sit in my place seething. The scenery is splendid, as are the effects, but the whole of the extravagant tale was clearly deliberately designed to demean my new husband and the gentlemen closest to him.

“Madame,” I say to Mother, “I wonder you permit such a performance. Surely humiliating the King of Navarre and his friends is contrary to your wish that the Court be exhibited as one and united.”

“I did not plan the entertainment.”

That may be, but I do not believe for a moment Anjou would stage such a thing without Mother’s imprimatur. I give her a sour look.

“Margot, it is all in good fun. In just a moment your husband will be freed and will be back at your side. I did not realize you would be so eager to have him there.”

When the dreadful allegory is over, the King of Navarre does not return. Charles throws one arm around my cousin and the other around Coligny, smiling and talking with great vigor. Glancing at Mother, I see her give a little scowl. “Well,” I say, “Anjou may wish my husband in hell, but His Majesty clearly loves him. As he loves the admiral. I will wager that you wish that gentleman had left town today with his cousin.”

“No, indeed, daughter, I assure you.”

*   *   *

“Dear God, this weather!” Henri removes his sword and leans it against a chair. “I will be glad to quit Paris.”

“You go to Fontainebleau, then?”

“If you do.”

“And if I do not?” I have already made up my mind that I will travel with the Court, whether my cousin does or not. But I have no intention of telling Henri that until I hear his reply.

“Then I suppose I must stay here, though it be hot as Hades. Speaking of which, I am enjoying the celebrations of your marriage more than I would have believed possible.”

“I am glad someone is,” I reply stiffly. I cannot decide which vexes me more: how quickly Henri has accustomed himself to my being another man’s wife or the fact that his enjoyment of the festivities is obviously based in great part on the fact they seek to make a fool of that other man.

“Come, Margot! You did not enjoy the evening’s allegory?”

“Not at all.”

“I am amazed. The only thing that might have made that bit of playacting more satisfying would have been if Coligny had been consigned to the flames with that wretched gentleman who has been made your husband.” Henri closes his eyes and takes a deep breath as if relishing that image. “But the admiral would only have been granted clemency in the end with the others,” he continues. “When Coligny is dispatched, I want him more permanently in hell.

“Come”—he puts a possessive arm around me—“let us think and talk no more of the Protestant rabble.”

I begin to unbutton his doublet.

“The King showed great affection for your husband this evening. I assume that is because Navarre supports this foolishness in Flanders.”

I stop. “I thought we were not speaking of Protestants.”

“We are not. We are speaking of courtiers, of influence, of politics. Topics that are not new to us.”

Henri is right. I have always speculated on the issues of the day with him, and always sought to help him advance in a court where knowledge, favor, and influence are closely linked. Over the years I have told tales of my brothers and mother—though, I would like to believe, never anything that would allow him to damage my kin. It feels different, however, to make him privy to what I have heard from my cousin.

“I hardly saw the King of Navarre this evening. In fact, I believe I am less in company with him than I was before we wed. Not that I am complaining.”

He nods. “Nor I. The less time you pass with that gentleman, the better. Yet you will be called upon to ride, sit, and dance with him, to be in proximity with his gentlemen, and so long as you are I would have you keep your ears and eyes open.”

I stare up at him. “You’re asking me to spy on the King of Navarre—an action I am already accused of by his followers.”

“Why not? He is nothing to you. And the opinion of his gentlemen means still less.” He puts a crooked first finger under my chin, tilting my face upward and lowering his mouth to kiss me. I turn so that his lips merely brush my cheek.

Releasing me, he looks puzzled. “Marguerite?”

“He is not
nothing
.” My voice is firm. This surprises me, because before this moment I would not have suspected myself equal to a show of loyalty to the King of Navarre under such circumstances. “He is, however, unwilling I was to have him, my husband.”

“What is that but a word?”

A good question. Oddly I do not have to struggle for an answer; it just comes. “Marriage is an honorable estate and I wish to behave honorably by it.”

Henri gives a short laugh. The sound is unpleasant, more like a bark of a dog than the warm laughter we have shared. “Your sudden embrace of decorum astounds me. We decide what is honorable and what is not. Were it otherwise, what we call love would be merely adultery. Yet I do not recall you objecting to my embraces.”

I know Henri’s pride speaks, not his heart, but his words prick me. Why can he not try to see things from my perspective? “I do not ask you to betray your wife’s confidences—”

“What would be the point?” he interrupts derisively. “She has nothing interesting to say, and certainly nothing useful.” Henri takes a few strides away, then turns back, offering a look of complete exasperation. “Marguerite, I must worry constantly about my influence with the King and must work always to maintain the position of my family. Do you forget that two years ago His Majesty threatened to have me killed and on account of the very love which I now find unreliable? Then you would have done anything for me.” Henri’s voice catches for a moment. Has he perceived the widening of my eyes, my shock at the implied manipulation in his words?

“You would have done anything to save me,” he rephrases carefully.

“And were your life in danger, I would still do whatever was necessary to safeguard it.” I approach him slowly, fearful he will turn from me again, but also fearful that his next words—like his last—will disappoint me. “How can you say my love is unreliable?”

When he makes no reply I reach out and touch his sleeve. “The King of Navarre has no claim upon my love, and I deny him the exercise of his rights upon my body. You have both those things. But surely, surely, he is entitled to this much loyalty, entitled to trust that I do not support his rivals in political matters.” I close my hand more tightly, feel the heat of the arm that has held me so many times in a lover’s embrace. I will him to understand me.

“If you do not aid me against Navarre, how can I be sure that you will not betray me to him?” The question feels like a slap.

“I give you my word.”

This must be enough. Yesterday he told me he would never doubt my pledges.
I can see the love in Henri’s eyes but it is mingled with anger. I expect the love to triumph. Then he deliberately removes my hand from his arm. “A woman’s word is as fickle as her affections. You
swore
I would always be everything to you, and yet now you refuse to aid me against a man who, if he could, would oust me from your brother’s favor and my offices. More than this, you ally yourself with a heretic who seeks not only to undermine His Majesty’s good Catholic servants but to destroy the Holy Church upon which all order in France rests.”

My eyes sting. “Love—“

“Do not call me that.”

“Henri, please. I love you and I will be everything to you save a teller of tales on the King of Navarre.”

Henri retrieves his sword and buckles it on, then pauses. “I am going.” He looks at me expectantly.

I am aghast and panicked. Part of me wants to beg for forgiveness and repent of my decision. But the larger portion is tired of being pushed, of being offered love only on the condition that I behave as someone else wants me to. My mother has always loved me thus, and my brother Anjou. Now this man who has proclaimed countless times that he loves me for myself alone wrings my heart for his ambitious purposes. I might forgive him that, but in doing so he vindicates my mother, whose cruel taunts that the Duc loved me only for my connection to the King have never been entirely forgotten.

“If you leave me tonight, Henri—if you abandon me alone with your bitter words and unjust accusations—do not look for a welcome tomorrow.” The words come out less forcefully than I would like, but the fact that they come out at all is miraculous.

Turning, he stalks toward the window. For a moment, just before he reaches the sill, I see him hesitate. I hope he will turn back, but he does not. Opening the shutters, he drops the ladder and is gone as quickly and as silently as a specter.

Indeed, in the first moments after his departure, I wonder if our encounter really took place. Perhaps it was all a frightful dream and Henri has yet to arrive for our tryst. I will it to be so, my eyes fixed on the night sky beyond the shutters he left thrown wide. The damp of a tear rolling down my cheek disabuses me of that happy notion. Sinking to the floor in a pool of my own silken gown, I cover my face with my hands and weep.

The Duc has come. The Duc has gone. I have turned away the man I loved but could not marry for the man I have married but will never love.

CHAPTER 19

August 21, 1572—Paris, France

The sun glinting off the armor of the gentlemen waiting to enter the lists hurts my eyes. Banquets, balls, tournaments, I am sick of them all. Nearly as sick of them as of the heat.

Sitting between Mother and the Queen Consort on a balcony erected to give us an excellent view, I find myself desperate to avert my eyes as my brothers advance to be recognized by the crowd. They have Henri with them—one of the favored few. All the King’s men are “disguised” as Amazons, and while I might ordinarily find this humorous, my present situation makes mirth impossible. The heart of my bargain with the King of Navarre became meaningless last night. Seeing Henri accepting the approbation of the crowd is a painful reminder of how alone I felt when I awoke this morning—how I could not smell him on my person—and of the fear I experienced that this condition might not be temporary. So I turn my eyes upon my husband, dressed as a Turk. As this is more spectacle than tournament, he is destined by choreography to lose, yet he smiles at me and gestures to my colors, which he wears on his arm. I try to smile back and, failing, move my gaze to the balcony opposite where it is drawn to Henri’s mother, the Duchesse de Nemours, who is fanning herself. As I look at her, thinking how Henri has her mouth, blood begins to drip from the hand with which she holds her fan.

I gasp.

Mother looks at me strangely.

I put my hands on the railing before me, breathing deeply in an attempt to collect myself. With breath comes the smell—blood. I know the odor from the chase. Surely I cannot smell the Duchesse’s blood from this distance! I stare down to the area below. The mock combat has not yet begun, yet to my eye the ground is crimson. Where does the blood come from? I look at those around me to gauge their reaction, but all smile, clap, or hoot as called for by the theatrical prologue of the gentlemen. None seem shocked or frightened. I look down into the lists once more. The blood is gone. I sway in my seat, clinging yet more tightly to the rail. As soon as I am steady again, I force myself to look across at the Duchesse de Nemours. It is as I suspected, there is no blood upon that lady either.

I try to tell myself it was a trick of the light or an effect of the heat. I slept precious little last night after Henri left, so of course I am subject to being overcome by the unrelenting weather. But a terrible presentiment has hold of me, driving out these rational explanations. I harken back to the tale Mother told me as a girl, of foreseeing my father’s mortal wounding. Could I be doing the same? Will the mock combat below end in death? Whose? I watch the King of Navarre attentively as his men press forward and are driven back. Then, in panic, I think that I play sentinel for the wrong soldier. After all, it was Henri’s mother whose hand bled. I turn my attention to my Duc. If something should happen to him—if he should be injured or worse while we are at odds! I am all apprehension, and absolutely nothing untoward happens. Nothing. The Amazons are victorious. Combat ends. Those surrounding me applaud. I try to join them and find I have clutched the railing so fiercely, my fingers are numb.

Rising with the other royal ladies, I toss flowers to the victors. I ought to feel relieved. I do not. I scramble from the balcony. I must see Henri. At the bottom of the stairs I spot Charles and his Amazons, but Henri is not with them. The decorative fabric that cascades from the balcony moves slightly, close to where His Majesty stands. There is no breeze. Pushing the drapery aside, I peek inside. In the shade, Henri accepts a bow from a man I have never seen—a man with a narrow face and a dark beard.

“You ought not to have come here.” I hear Henri’s words clearly as I slip fully into the space beneath the balcony. Seeing me, Henri pushes the man through the curtains behind him. “Madame,” he says, “you gave your word last night you would never betray me to Navarre. If that word is good in the light of day, say nothing of what you have observed.” Before I can reply, he disappears through the parting of the curtains that the sharp-faced man used.

Bursting into the daylight, intent on going after him, I find myself only a few feet from the King of Navarre. He raises his eyebrows but does not ask why I was concealed. Perhaps he saw Henri exit and thinks we met to exchange whispered words. I do not care what he thinks. I need to warn him, though I do not know of what.

“Sir, I am most earnestly glad to see you and would be grateful for your arm.”

He offers it at once.

“Madame, your hand is cold as ice despite the heat. And”—he looks at me more closely—“you shake. What has happened?”

“I feared … I feared someone would be injured in the tournament.”

My cousin looks confused. “My pride, perhaps. This is the second ‘battle’ I have been called upon to lose in two days.”