The King's Mistress (60 page)

This room had been decorated with gifts from Edward and everywhere were cherished memories. One cushion held his scent, another a bloodstain from the bouquet of roses Edward had gathered himself, forgetting to trim the thorns. Here was the nick from the mazer I’d dropped as Edward swept me up in his arms. Memories of our love overwhelmed me on every side. I fell to my knees and wept, hugging the cushion that smelled of him.

I could not sleep in the palace. I escaped as soon as Robert sent word a barge was arranged. As I left Sheen for the final time I felt as if I had been stripped of past and purpose, walking naked and bewildered into an obscure future. I had loved Edward with my heart, body, and soul.

IV
A PHOENIX

N
AKED AND
bewildered. I had lost myself. I was yet spinning in the dance, dizzy, seeing but shreds of memories, spinning, spinning, and Edward’s hand was not there to pull me out of the gyre. Death had interrupted our dance
.

Edward, my beloved Edward, was gone, and with him my life, my purpose. With him died the intimate history of my role at court. The dowager Queen Isabella, Dame Tommasa, Janyn, Queen Philippa, and King Edward—they were now silent. Not even Edward’s sons or Princess Joan knew all the story. How could they?

Voices whirled about me but none of them the voice I strained to hear—the voice of Edward, my beloved, calling for me, guiding me to his side. The voices accused me, threatened me, condemned me. I could say nothing, for I was a sinner, though my sins be not the ones they intoned. How might I find my way to absolution … salvation? Spinning, spinning, breathless and overwhelmed with grief and remorse. Where had I fallen off the path of righteousness? At what moment had I misstepped? When had I a choice to be other than I was?

• 1377 •

A
HAND REACHED
out. Robert beckoned me. I knew his voice as if from a great distance, more memory than sound. I remembered. My daughters needed me. Joan and Jane were too young to be without
their mother. I must not abandon my precious Bella. And John. My son might need my comfort as he mourned his father.

I strained toward Robert’s hand, spinning toward it and away, toward it and away, and at last the sickening movement slowed, I felt warm fingers curl round my wrist, and I was still. I was Alice, sitting in the barge, my hand in Robert’s, warm, alive. I saw the riverbank sliding by. Gwen sat nearby.

“I must see my daughters. Are Joan and Jane at Gaynes?” My own voice startled me.

In his eyes I could see that Robert had been aware of my absence. “Yes. Joan and Jane are safely awaiting you at Gaynes in the company of their aunt. But before we join them, would you care to rest at Barking Abbey? I thought you might find comfort in Bella’s company.”

My heart swelled with the thought of my eldest child. “Bella! Oh, yes, Robert, I would see her first.”

That he had suggested something so certain to comfort me helped me come to a decision. I drew out from my scrip Edward’s signet. “I entrust this to you,” I said, closing his hand over it.

He knew what it was when he saw the intaglio. “Are you certain?”

“I am. I trust that you will keep it safe for my son John. When he is ready, I shall ask for it.”

Robert kissed my hand, then looked at me with his steady eyes, blue, but a softer shade than Edward’s, grayer, as if he knew the world he looked on would not always be gladsome. “I swear that I will prove worthy of the trust with which you honor me, Alice.”

His gaze steadied me.

“I have always believed you trustworthy, Robert.”

When we arrived at Barking I went at once to the chapel while a sister fetched Bella. Gwen offered to assist in arranging some light refreshment for us. She who had been with me so many years understood that I yearned to be alone with my grief.

The dimness of the nave after the golden morning sun at once seemed to quiet and cool my anxious, feverish mind. The smoky, spicy aroma of incense mingled with the delicate fragrance of roses and the ordinary scent of candle wax, all familiar smells calling me to prayer. I found myself kneeling before the lady altar without having consciously chosen it. Ribbons, prayer beads, flowers, and jewelry adorned the statue of the Mother of God. With a sob I remembered the woman holding out Janyn’s paternoster beads in the church—could that truly
be nearly seventeen years ago? I could see it so clearly, feel it so sharply, that it seemed it had been only a few weeks past. I took out my own beads and bowed my head.

This was no time for remembering Janyn. Today I wished to remember Edward. Edward, the king who had loved me. Edward, the man who had satisfied me and filled me with beautiful children. Edward, the friend who had delighted in my achievements. Edward, my companion in riding and hawking, my opponent in chess, the frightened, ill, aged man who had feared little when I held his hand. He had filled me and depleted me, over and over again.

There, in the chapel at Barking, I prayed for release from Edward, from the spell with which he had bound me, for release from the dance. I prayed to reawaken, to remember my family, my friends, my purpose. Work I might now be free to enjoy. At any moment I would hear Bella’s voice. I would soon be with my precious Joan and Jane, my sister Mary and my brother John and their children, and my friends. Robert and Gwen would take me there. I could walk and work in the gardens at Gaynes, become reacquainted with my hawks and horses. I reminded myself of all this, of life’s continuance, the possibility of joy.

A rustle of silk. The abbess of Barking was highborn and elegant. She took my hand, cupped it in her warm palms, waited until I looked her in the eyes.

“I had not recognized you at first in your widow’s garb, Dame Alice.”

“I was not permitted to wear it when my husband died years ago, Mother Abbess. Now I am free openly to mourn him and the king.”

She pressed her hands together and gave me a little bow. “God grant you peace now, Dame Alice.”

“May God protect and guide me.”

“Your daughter suggested that you might be in need of her prayers and companionship in your mourning. Would it please you if she were to bide with you for a fortnight?”

I felt a warmth rush through me, the promise of a thaw. “I can think of no greater comfort.” I bowed to kiss the hand of the abbess.

When Bella joined me she cried out with raw emotion to see me in mourning.

“For Father?” she asked.

“For Janyn, yes, and for Edward.”

“Both good men,” she said.

We talked for a while in the abbess’s parlor, remembering. I warned her that there would be trouble ahead, at the least a trial.

“I fear that you will hear horrible things said of me. And I fear the outcome.” I told her of the possibilities—forfeiture of my lands, even imprisonment or exile.

She held me and assured me that her love for me was unwavering.

T
HE FOLLOWING
morning we continued on to Gaynes—Bella, Gwen, Robert, and me. Joan, Jane, Mary, and her little ones, all came rushing from the hall to greet us, encircling me in love. I gave myself up to the joy of homecoming.

I fell into bed exhausted that first evening at home and slept as one drugged, a blessedly dreamless night. In the pale hour of dawn I placed a statue of the Blessed Virgin and a reliquary containing a drop of her milk on a low table in the corner of my chamber. On a cushion I knelt and began a prayer vigil. For a week I prayed while memories assailed me, tears cleansed me, prostrations purged my soul. Sometime during the first day Bella joined me, and she stayed by my side, a blessed companion, until at last I slept for a day and a night.

On the following morning Gwen helped me dress in one of my simple country gowns, humming as she worked on the buttons, shaking her head a little at how loosely it fit.

“At least I set aside the weeds,” I said. “I promise to fill this out by summer’s end.”

“I shall see to that,” she said with a little laugh.

When I descended to the hall, Joan and Jane timidly looked up from their milky bread with wary eyes.

“I am well again,” I said, kissing each of them on the forehead.

After breaking my fast with bread, cheese, and watered wine, I went in search of Robert, and together we rode out to see the manor. It was a joy to be out in the air, and with someone I trusted completely. I was ready to see my land and talk of the mundane chores of managing it. Once back at the hall, Joan and Jane, curious to see the contents of the chests I had brought from Sheen, begged to help Gwen and me unpack. They anticipated redecorating my bedchamber with the finery that Mary Percy, now Southery, had told them I must have brought from Windsor. She was unfortunately still living in my household while John was serving as a page in Henry Percy’s.

I did not like to dip into those chests, drawing forth memories still raw and painful, but my daughters, at seven and five years of age, were too young to understand my reticence, and I acquiesced.

By evening I was agitated by the memories released in my bedchamber and loath to return to it. I sat in the hall until even Bella reluctantly left me. Only Robert remained, sitting by the fire opposite me, working oil into the leather of a harness as he had done all evening while the women talked.

“Surely that is the groom’s work?” I said, crossing over to him and settling on the edge of the bench.

He looked up at me, his blue-gray eyes warming me. “I find it soothing.”

“You are troubled?”

“I am worried about you. Lyons is worried about you.”

“I am as well, Robert.”

We sat quietly for a time, occasionally commenting on the fire or some trivial event of the day, and I began to calm. My daughter Jane’s favorite cat, Willow, a battle-scarred calico with a notch in one ear and one eye missing, curled up on my lap. I stroked her to the rhythm of her loud purr and thanked her for gracing me with her warmth.

After a long silence Robert left the hall, promising to return in a few moments. I waited, gazing into the fire, holding Willow, wishing that I might put all the past behind me and settle into a quiet life. Wishing again that I might be forgotten. Robert returned, standing before me, reaching out to me with clean hands. I could smell the soap he had used to remove the oil.

Willow jumped off my lap and curled up on a cushion near the fire.

“Come,” Robert said, “I shall sit with you until you sleep.”

Up in the solar, Gwen was nowhere to be seen. She must have noticed us in the hall and guessed we might go up together.

Robert took a turn around the room, admiring the finery, the silken cushions, the tapestries, the great bed. I had thought he might be uneasy there, but he seemed relaxed, curious even, and when he returned to where I stood by the door, simply said, “I have never been in a room this fine.”

I smiled at his words and gestured to a chair. “Do sit with me awhile. I do not want to be alone just yet with the memories furnishing this chamber.”

He drew me close and held me for a moment, then released me. “Are you certain?” He studied my face, his smoky blue eyes crinkling as he read my expression.

“I am.”

He settled on the chair. “I’ll close my eyes while you prepare for bed,” he said.

Once I lay beneath the covers we talked of crops and boundaries, tenants and livestock, until the chamber felt familiar to me once more and I drifted into sleep.

I
AWOKE TO
a morning of billowy white clouds moving languorously across a deep blue sky. I had invited Bella, Joan, and Jane for a long walk, leaving their cousins behind for the nonce. The air was warm but with a freshening breeze that lifted our skirts and tousled our hair. I had already decided with Bella that it was time to tell Joan and Jane of the death of their father.