The Summer Queen (8 page)

Alienor turned with the nurse to go back to the palace. Heaven was all very well, but it was her mother’s physical presence she craved. She wanted to feel her arms around her, and to be tucked up in bed like a child. She wanted someone to lift the burdens from her shoulders, and let her sleep without worry. Floreta for all her caring would never understand the true depth of her need. No one would.

Louis was enthusiastic in his lovemaking that night, keen to do his duty and continue the great success of the day following his investiture as Duke of Aquitaine. Alienor answered him fiercely, because it seemed to her that unless she replied with assertion she would lose her identity, and they finished in a sweating, gasping tangle, which left her feeling as if she had been dragged through the heart of a thunderstorm. Certainly Louis behaved as if he had been struck by lightning, and when they prayed afterwards, he knelt at his little altar for a long time, his damp silver hair falling forwards, hiding his face, and his hands clenched so tightly that his knuckles were bloodless.

‘I was thinking we should visit the abbey at Saintes,’ Alienor said when eventually they returned to bed. ‘My aunt Agnes is the Abbess there. She is my father’s sister and could not attend the wedding. I wish to make a grant to the abbey now I am Duchess in full.’

Louis nodded drowsily. ‘That is a seemly notion.’

‘I desire to visit my mother’s grave also, and make her chapel into a proper abbey.’

Again he murmured agreement.

Alienor kissed his shoulder. ‘Perhaps we could stay in Aquitaine a little longer.’

She felt him tense. ‘Why?’

‘Some of the vassals have not yet sworn allegiance. If we leave without their oaths, they may think they can do as they please. We need their allegiance, and the longer we stay, the more loyal people will be.’ She pressed small, seductive kisses to his collar bone and throat. ‘You could always send Suger and the others back to France and then you would be able to make your own decisions without them telling you what to do all the time.’

He was silent, absorbing this, and then he said, ‘How long were you thinking?’

Alienor pursed her lips against his throat. As long as she could keep him here was the straight answer. ‘Just a little while,’ she coaxed. ‘Until it is cool enough to travel in comfort and the vassals are more settled.’

He grunted and turned over, drawing away from her and pulling the sheet over his shoulder. ‘I will give the matter some thought,’ he said.

Alienor did not push further. It had to come as his idea, and would be better digested after a night’s sleep. She could work on him again over the next few days on their way to Saintes. The longer they remained in Aquitaine, the better pleased she would be.

During the night, Alienor was roused by a rapid banging on the door followed by the click of the latch and the sudden flare of a torch. She jerked to a sitting position, still struggling out of sleep. She cried out in alarm as Raoul de Vermandois clashed back the bed curtains. His gaze flicked over her tumbled hair and naked body with passing appreciation, and then shifted to the far side of the bed where Louis was sitting up and squinting against the blaze of the torch borne by Raoul’s squire.

‘What is it?’ Louis demanded blearily.

‘Sire, there is grave news from the court.’ Raoul dropped to one knee and bowed his head. ‘Your lord father took a turn for the worse five days ago at Béthizy and, at dusk, gave up his soul to God. You must return to France immediately.’

Louis stared at him blankly. Alienor pressed her hand to her mouth as she absorbed Raoul’s words and everything expanded in a rush. Dear God, this meant that Louis was King of France and that she was Queen. Her plans to stay in Aquitaine were so much chaff in the wind. They would have to go to Paris now, not just to join the royal household, but to head it as its rulers.

Louis staggered from the bed to kneel at his altar, head bowed over his clasped hands. ‘Blessed Saint Peter, I beg you to intercede on my father’s behalf so that he may be granted entry into heaven. God have mercy, God have mercy.’ He repeated the words in a continuous litany, rocking back and forth.

The seneschal eyed him with consternation. ‘Sire?’

Alienor rallied as she donned her chemise and turned to Raoul. His tunic was inside out and his thick white hair stood up in tufts as if he had come straight from his bed. ‘Has Abbé Suger been informed?’

A grimace crossed Raoul’s face. ‘I have sent a servant to fetch him. He was dining with the Archbishop and staying with him until the morrow.’

Swift to pick up nuances, Alienor had noticed the friction between Suger and Raoul de Vermandois during their progress. The men were not at ease with each other, although both would have vigorously denied there was any incompatibility. ‘My lord, we need to dress and compose ourselves.’

Raoul’s gaze on her sharpened, as if he was reassessing an item that was more interesting than he had first thought. He bowed. ‘I will send in your servants.’

‘No,’ she said. ‘I will summon them myself in a moment. My lord husband is overwrought, and it would be imprudent for them to see him like this. It will give you time to sort out your tunic before the good Abbé arrives.’

‘My tunic?’ He looked down, and then plucked at the exposed seams. His mouth twisted in a wry smile. ‘I will remedy the situation and see you are not disturbed until you are ready.’ He took his leave, his stride swift and authoritative. Alienor suspected it would give him great satisfaction to deny entry to the Abbot of Saint-Denis, if only for a few minutes.

Alienor went to kneel at Louis’s side. She knew what it was like to lose a father, but her own prayer to God was swift and practical. The world was waiting outside their bedchamber door and if they did not go out to face it, then it would come to them, and they would be at its mercy.

‘Louis?’ She put her arms around him. ‘Louis, I am sorry your father is dead, but let there be prayers and masses said for him in the proper places. You cannot do it all yourself here and now. We have to get up and dressed; they are waiting for us.’

His chant faltered and ceased. He gave her a dazed look. ‘I knew he was sick and that his days were numbered, but I did not think his time was so short and that I would never see him again. What am I going to do?’

She made him sit on the bed and drink a cup of wine while she brought their clothes from the coffer where the servants had folded them the night before. ‘You are going to compose yourself, and get dressed,’ she said. ‘De Vermandois has gone to organise the household, and Suger has been sent for.’

He nodded, but she could tell he was not absorbing the information. She remembered feeling that initial numbness when her own father had died. Words had meant nothing. She held him against her and stroked his hair. It was like soothing Petronella, as if she was the mother and he was the child. He turned to her with a soft groan and pressed his face into her neck. She shushed him and he clung to her. But then he lifted his head and kissed her with his mouth open. She was startled but, recognising his need, returned his kiss and opened herself to him.

When it was over, he lay beside her and panted like a shipwrecked sailor washed up on the shore. She stroked his back gently between the shoulder blades and murmured hush words, feeling a little tearful herself. They had shared something momentous. She had channelled his grief and panic away through her body and brought him to calm. ‘It will be all right,’ she said.

‘I did not really know my father.’ Louis sat up and buried his head between his upraised knees. ‘He gave me to the Church when I was a child, and I was only taken out of the cloister when my brother died. He saw to my welfare and my education, but it was all at the hands of others. If I have a father, it is Abbé Suger.’

Alienor absorbed the detail with interest but no surprise. ‘I thought I knew mine well,’ she reciprocated. ‘I had been his heir since I was six years old. But when he died, I discovered I barely knew him at all …’ She fell silent before she said something she would later regret.

The sound of authoritative masculine voices rumbled in the antechamber. Suger had arrived, and she could also hear Archbishop Gofrid. She swiftly cajoled Louis into getting dressed.

‘You must show everyone you are capable of fulfilling the role of king – even while you are mourning your father,’ she said as she slipped his shoes on to his feet. ‘You are God’s chosen. Why should you fear?’

His focus returned as he stared at her, and some of the anxiety left his face. ‘Come out with me,’ he entreated her as she fastened his belt.

Alienor hastily donned her gown and bundled her hair into a gold-wire net. Her heart was pounding, but she raised her chin and, showing neither fear nor apprehension, set her hand upon his sleeve and drew him to the door. Under her palm she felt him trembling.

The antechamber was full of assembled courtiers who knelt as one in a rustle of cloth, Suger included. Looking at the serried ranks of heads, Alienor thought that they resembled cobblestones on a road awaiting the tread of their new king and queen.

Adelaide of Maurienne, Dowager Queen of France, gestured brusquely with a pale, bony hand. ‘You will want to change your gown and take some refreshment after your long journey.’

Alienor curtseyed. ‘Thank you, madam.’ Her mother-in-law had spoken with emotionless practicality – the way she might address a groom about a horse that required tending after a hard ride. Adelaide’s grey eyes were cold and judgemental. Her dress was grey too, matching the fur lining of her cloak. Austere and wintry. A short while ago she had formally greeted her new daughter-in-law in the spacious great hall of the palace complex with a stilted speech of welcome and a chilly kiss on the cheek. Now they stood in the chamber that had been allotted to Alienor, high up in the Great Tower.

The room was well appointed, with handsome wall hangings, sturdy furniture and a big bed with heavy curtains smelling strongly of sheep. The shutters were closed and since there were few candles, the effect was one of encroaching deep shadow. In full daylight, though, the double arched windows would give a view over the busy River Seine, much as the Ombrière Palace at Bordeaux looked out on the Garonne.

Under Adelaide’s watchful gaze, servants brought washing water, wine and platters of bread and cheese. Alienor’s women started unpacking, shaking out gowns and chemises before draping them over clothing poles or storing them in the garderobes. Adelaide’s nostrils flared at the sight of the colourful and detailed garments emerging from the baggage chests. ‘You will find us accustomed to plainer ways here,’ she said primly. ‘We are not a frivolous people, and my son has simple tastes.’

Alienor tried to look demure, thinking that if Adelaide knew what her precious son had been doing throughout their progress of Aquitaine, she would have an apoplexy. Even for Louis, the Church was not the only influence in his life.

Petronella tossed her head. ‘I like bright colours,’ she said. ‘They remind me of home. Our papa loved them.’

‘Yes, he did.’ Alienor slipped her arm around Petronella’s waist in support. ‘We shall have to set new fashions!’ She smiled at Adelaide, who did not smile back.

Several young women in Adelaide’s retinue exchanged glances with each other, among them Louis’s sister, Constance, who was of a similar age to Alienor, and Gisela, a young royal kinswoman with dusty-blond hair and green eyes. Someone stifled a giggle and, without looking round, Adelaide made a terse gesture commanding silence. ‘I can see you have much to learn,’ she said severely.

Alienor refused to be browbeaten. She would not allow her unfamiliarity with Paris and French ways to make her feel diminished. She would be proud and stand tall because she was the equal of anyone here. ‘Indeed I do, madam,’ she replied. ‘Our father taught us the importance of education.’ Because to outwit your rivals, first you had to know their ways and how to play their games.

‘I am pleased to hear it,’ Adelaide said. ‘You would do well to listen to your elders. Let us hope he taught you the importance of manners too.’

‘She doesn’t like us,’ Petronella said when Adelaide eventually left to attend to business elsewhere. ‘And I certainly don’t like her!’

‘You will be civil to her,’ Alienor warned, lowering her voice. ‘She is Louis’s mother and owed respect. There are different customs here and we must learn them.’

‘I don’t want to learn their ways.’ Petronella pursed her lips in fair imitation of Adelaide and folded her arms. ‘I don’t like it here.’

‘That’s because it is late and you are tired. Tomorrow, in daylight, when you have slept, it will be different.’

‘No it won’t,’ Petronella said, just to be awkward.

Alienor suppressed a sigh. Tonight she did not have the wherewithal to humour Petronella because her own mood was low. Adelaide plainly disapproved of them and viewed their presence as a thorn in her side. Her power at court had grown stronger as her husband’s health deteriorated, but to maintain that power, she now had to control and influence Louis. She clearly viewed Alienor as someone who would usurp her position if not put down from the outset.

Louis had been reticent about his mother but Alienor had gleaned the impression that the emotional ties between them were rigid and about dominance. There was no love, except in the way of a need for it on Louis’s behalf, and a refusal to give it on Adelaide’s. Alienor had already seen how easily Louis was manipulated by stronger personalities, and how stubborn he could be once persuaded to a certain decision. The factions at court fought over him like dogs over a fresh bone, and it was her duty to protect him and in doing so also protect herself and her sister. If Louis needed the reassurance of lit candles at night, it was because of what had been done to him by others who should have cared for him and hadn’t.

Alienor ran her hand over the smooth milky skin on Louis’s back. He was asleep on his stomach, and he looked so handsome and vulnerable that he filled her heart. On their journey to Paris, he had been forced to divert to put down a rebellion in Orléans. Seasoned battle commanders Raoul de Vermandois and Theobald of Champagne had advised him, but he had taken overall responsibility and the rebellion had been successfully quashed. The victory had given him a new assertiveness and confidence that sat well on him.