Secrets at Court (19 page)

Then he felt her breath against his cheek and sent up a prayer of thanks.

And then he wondered. What if she had broken bones, a leg or an arm? Worse, her neck or her back? What if she could not move or walk or hold her crutch?

He leaned away so he could see her. ‘Anne. Anne.’ He ran his hands quickly over her arms and legs. ‘Do you hurt? Are you all right?’

She nodded. Her neck worked, then. ‘Nicholas?’ Then she glanced up and he followed her gaze. Lady Joan was running down the stairs, her face a mask of concern.

She joined them, her skirt covering Nicholas’s arm, and crouched down, stroking a hair away from Anne’s white forehead. ‘Anne? Are you all right?’ Then she looked to Nicholas. ‘Thank goodness you were here. It’s so awkward for her, yet she insists. As if she will not let her leg hold her back.’ She turned back. ‘Anne?’

‘Yes.’ A soft and painful word. She closed her eyes again.

The Princess took a breath. It did not seem to be one of relief. ‘Come. Bring her to my chambers. I don’t want her trying to walk. Not now.’

‘No!’ Anne’s voice had the steel in it he knew so well. ‘It is too much trouble.’

The Prince’s wife rose and looked down on them with the imperial gaze of a woman now part of the royal family. ‘I insist. Bring her.’

‘Please. Let me rest here, just for a bit.’ Anne’s fingers dug into his arm, hidden where Joan could not see.

Joan. Joan, who had pushed Anne when she thought they were alone. When Anne had returned unexpectedly from exile.

Fool. He had misjudged the situation entirely.

Suddenly, he wondered whether Anne was the only one in danger.

And he wondered whether this time, he would be able to find a way out.

Chapter Twenty-Two

A
nne had thought him an angel at first. Thought she had woken in Purgatory, where she would pay for her sins.

Yet she still lived, breathed, and lay near Nicholas again. One more memory to hold. The feel of his arms, strong around her one final time. It seemed, now, that she might not have years left to think back on it.

If Lady Joan had her way, Anne might have hours.

‘The Prince was looking for you,’ Nicholas said, the words comforting above her.

Her lady’s face changed. ‘Where is he?’

‘I’m not certain. He was near the Hall when I left him.’

She rose. ‘Take Anne to my quarters where she can be cared for. I’ll be there as soon as I can. Leave her stick here. She won’t need it.’

Nicholas waited until Lady Joan had disappeared at the top of the stairs, then he retrieved her stick.

She wondered why he was here. Ah, because the Prince had sent him to find her lady. That was her good fortune, these extra minutes. ‘May your journey be safe.’ Nonsense, but the shock of the fall and then the shock of seeing him had turned the world on edge. ‘Remember to look at the cathedrals as well as the battlefields.’

He didn’t answer, but touched her methodically, searching for parts in pain, and when he opened his mouth, what came out was not what she expected. ‘Can you move at all?’

She would be black and blue for weeks, but God had been merciful. Nothing seemed to be broken. She nodded and he helped her sit upright.

‘Are you dizzy?’

She shook her head, grateful that she could.

‘How do you feel?’

Free. I feel free
. ‘Lady Joan...’ she could not tell him she was in danger. That would put him in danger, too ‘...worries overmuch.’

Could she manage to escape Windsor before Lady Joan found her? She would not be so lucky the next time.

‘No more lies, Anne. She pushed you. I saw her.’

She met his eyes. No, there was no reason to lie. He knew all the truths. ‘In all these years, she had never said anything. Never admitted anything. It was as if we both knew, but we never said a word. I wanted her to admit the truth.’

‘What did she say?’

‘That my mother had lied to me, not to the Pope. I wonder what she will say when the Prince confronts her.’

‘I did not tell him.’

She stared at him. ‘What?’

‘Oh, I tried. But he did not want to know. Or did not want to admit that he already knew. Your lady’s secret is safe.’

She smiled and shook her head. All the years. All this time.

Nicholas was not smiling. ‘You, however, are not. If you feel well enough to move, I’m taking you away from here before she kills you.’

* * *

Nicholas had no time to explain, no time to do anything beyond act to keep her safe. Fortunately, Anne did not argue. The habits of his life, planning, finding alternate routes, continuing to move, all those worked to get them out of Windsor and on the road.

He left a message saying Anne had decided to return to the convent and pray for the remainder of her life. He only hoped Lady Joan would believe it. Or if she chose to search, that she would send the men north instead of east. He smuggled her out in a cart, which not only made it easier to hide her, but also allowed her to sleep for long stretches of the journey. She might not have broken anything, but, bruised and shaken, she needed time to heal.

Anne had asked few questions, made no complaints, and Nicholas hadn’t wasted breath to discuss the future until they were days and miles away. By then, she could sit up in the cart and move without wincing and on the fifth day, when they had stopped to eat by the road side, he had found himself staring at her. Something had transformed her. No, her leg had not healed, but something that had dragged down her face for all those years had lifted when she walked away from Joan. Homeless and without protection, she looked radiant.

After they ate, she pulled out her pilgrim’s badge, the one he had given her, and ran her fingers over the outline of Saint Thomas’ horse. ‘How far are we from Canterbury?’ she said.

‘Maybe five days.’

‘Will you take me there?’

This part he had not planned. ‘Do you believe the Saint will cure you?’ When it did not happen immediately, many pilgrims stayed near, in faith that the cure would come in time. Sometimes it did. Sometimes, death came instead.

‘No. But I think it is a good choice. At least for now. I believe I now have a choice.’

‘I would offer you a different choice,’ he said.

She looked puzzled. ‘What would that be? Not the convent.’

He smiled. ‘Nothing like the convent. Come with me.’

* * *

Anne’s heart beat in her ears so loudly she thought she must have misheard. She looked at him, unable to hide the sliver of hope, but she would not be the burden that would hold him back. Never.

‘With you? Across the Channel? You have not made such a mockery of me before.’

‘I do not now. I want you to come with me.’

She shook her head, wondering if the fall had clouded her hearing. ‘You want to go back to war and ride freely where it takes you.’ And how she envied him that.

‘I want you.’

Had her fall ignited his pity? ‘There is no place for a crippled woman in that life.’

‘But there is room for you.’

She looked at him, not speaking, but knowing all her love for him was in her eyes. ‘For me? To do what?’

‘I want you, I want us, to go to Compostela, to Rome, to Jerusalem if you like.’

Us. ‘There will be no miracle cure from God. Did we not learn that already?’

‘Did God not just give us a miracle?’

Her laugh escaped then, the laugh that had saved her from anger and despair so many times. The laugh that reminded her that God’s kindness could be cruel and inexplicable. And his cruelty full of mercy. She had taken a fall that could have, should have, killed or at least maimed her. And God had insisted she stay alive. ‘Not the one I expected, but, yes.’

‘Anne.’ He put his hands on her arms. ‘Look at me. Please.’

She did, then, intending to take a last picture for her memories. Of his square face with the broad brow, deep-set eyes and lips she only knew were sensual after he had kissed her. ‘I’m looking at the man who had said he was leaving England and leaving her to burn in hell.’

‘Marry me.’

Did she blink? Did her jaw drop open? Did she nearly fall, held up only by his arms? She licked her lips and swallowed, then started to argue. ‘I thought we were beyond pity.’ No hope. She mustn’t hope. ‘Is that what this is about? Do you feel sorry for the poor, helpless cripple?’

‘Helpless?’ He squeezed her upper arms and gave her a little shake. ‘You are the strongest woman—no, strongest person I’ve ever known. You put Edward’s knights to shame.’

The words stopped her speech, this time with heat in her cheeks. ‘I thank you for that, but it changes nothing. You cannot have the life you want with me.’

‘I cannot have the life I want without you.’

Hope, hope buzzed in her ear, persistent as a fly. ‘Are you sure?’

‘I love you. I don’t want a life without you. I want to take you to all the cathedrals in every city in the whole world. I want to see them, to see everything anew through your eyes. I want to sleep beside you every night and wake beside you every morning. I want to show you the things you need to show me.’

She nearly laughed, then. ‘How fanciful you sound.’

‘I will help you walk. You can help me see.’ His voice, low, his words, intense. ‘If you love me, Anne. Please. Come.’

And suddenly, it seemed as if God had indeed given her the miracle she asked for. ‘Yes. No matter what, yes.’

* * *

They reached Dover the next day. He had sent Eustace by a different way and now he was reunited with his armour and his destrier. Nicholas found a boat willing to brave a winter crossing. Staying longer in England would tempt fate and tempt Lady Joan, too. Eustace would come with them as far as the Continental port. The young man had a taste for war, not pilgrimage. He would go on to find the Great Company and earn his spurs.

‘The crossing may be difficult.’ Only madmen crossed the Channel in winter. They had braved frost on the road. The winds had picked up.

Yet Anne looked up at him, smiling, happy. ‘I’ve crossed the Channel before. A rocking ship is a good match for my unsteady legs.’

He smiled and put his arms around her, glancing behind to see that they were casting off.

‘Don’t look back,’ she said, looking steadfastly forwards toward Calais and the future.

‘It will take months, you know.’ Compostela first. A pilgrimage of penance, in case God had wanted them to tell the truth.

‘Months by your side to see the world. What else might I hope for?’

‘A child.’ He did not ask a question, but he watched her face, uncertain what she might say.

The enormity of it was reflected there, followed by a moment of peace. ‘If it comes,’ she said, ‘I will make my way. With you by my side.’

‘As my wife.’ A word that sounded wonderful to his ear.

A moment of distress passed across her face. ‘How are we to marry? We’ll be strangers to a French church. How can they read the banns? What priest would agree?’

He smiled. ‘We need none of that.’ The boat had pushed off and already the chop was starting, the stiff breeze whipping their hair and cloaks behind them. ‘We know exactly what is needed if we are to be wed.’

He reached out and took her hand. ‘I, Nicholas, take thee, Anne, to be my wedded wife.’

Her smile became a laugh. ‘I, Anne, take thee, Nicholas...’

And the gulls were their witnesses.

* * * * *

Afterword

T
he accepted wisdom of the clandestine marriages of Joan of Kent is that she did, indeed, marry Thomas Holland, then William Montacute (also Montague), who became the second Earl of Salisbury, and that when Holland returned, he claimed her as his wife by their previous vow. He waited five years to pursue his legal claim to her, however, ostensibly because he lacked money to take it to the courts. After several years, and a petition to the Pope, his claim was accepted and her marriage to Salisbury was put aside.

The story was, apparently, accepted at the time and few questions have been raised about it over the years, though there were whispers. The reference to Joan as the ‘Virgin of Kent,’ was taken straight from the medieval chronicles. When her son, Richard II, was deposed, he was slurred as a bastard, though that is easily explained as further justification for removing him from the throne.

But as I dug into the details, I could not reconcile the facts as I uncovered them with the story that had been spun about them.

Why would Joan allow herself to be married if she believed she was already married in God’s eyes?

How could her first husband work for her second, and fight beside him, if he were truly married to Joan? And how could Salisbury allow it if Holland had immediately stated his claim when he returned to England in the winter of 1341–42?

Bit by bit, I came to believe that there was another story, more believable, to me, at least, to explain what had happened. It is that story, and its discovery, that drive Nicholas and Anne in this book.

I am not the first modern researcher to raise doubts about Joan’s first marriage. Chris Given-Wilson and Alice Curteis in
The Royal Bastards of Medieval England
said much the same thing. There has been no full-scale biography written of Joan, but the scholarly articles continue to support the official story that she had two clandestine marriages.

And what about King Edward and Queen Philippa’s role in all this? Joan was in their care when young, so if the story were true, she had ‘married’ Holland right under the Queen’s nose in Flanders. They supported her marriage to Salisbury and one explanation for Holland’s long delay in petitioning to have her returned was that he needed the money to go directly to the Pope because the King would have stopped him if he had started with the English ecclesiastical courts, as would have been the protocol. This suggested, to me at least, that Edward did not believe he was in the right. Still, Holland was one of the first knights to be initiated into the Order of the Garter, so he was certainly part of the King’s trusted circle.

Imagine King Edward and Queen Philippa’s chagrin to have to deal with Joan’s irregular marriages not once, but twice, and the second time to their oldest son and future King. A few historians have suggested that the King was opposed to this marriage, but other interpretations disagree and, in the end, he did not forbid it.

And there was a real Nicholas Lovayne—or Loveign or Loveyne or Lovagne—who was sent by the crown to the Curia on matters relating to the dissolution of Joan’s marriage not once, but twice. (I have borrowed his name in homage, but few other particulars of his life.) So if King Edward had protested, he ultimately supported his son’s efforts.

The traditional tale of the Black Prince and Joan, the Fair Maid of Kent, is that theirs was a love match. It’s even been suggested that he had loved his ‘Jeanette’ as a child and there’s a charming, though probably imaginary, tale that the Prince had been sent to plead on behalf of a friend for the hand of the beautiful and wealthy widow. She declined, saying there was only one man she loved and would marry. Him.

Edward and Joan stayed happily married, apparently, for the remainder of Edward’s life. Shortly after their marriage, they went to Aquitaine to rule over what was left of Edward III’s French possessions. Prince Edward continued his record of successful leadership in war, but died before his father. Thus, Joan, the first Princess of Wales, never became Queen of England. She was, however, very influential in the court of her son, Richard II, and popular with the people.

After Edward’s death, she did not remarry, though she lived another nine years. But on her death she was buried, as she had asked, not beside her royal husband, but ‘near the monument of our late lord and husband, the Earl of Kent.’ Thomas Holland.

* * *

Readers of my other books might want to note these connections. Joan and Thomas’s ostensible rendezvous in Flanders took place in the same world as
INNOCENCE UNVEILED,
though I do not portray any of these characters in that story except for Queen Philippa.
THE HARLOT’S DAUGHTER
and
IN THE MASTER’S BED
both take place in the reign of Richard II, Joan’s son. She was very likely at court at this time, though again, I did not show her in the story.

Coming soon

WHISPERS AT COURT

Next, Anne’s friend Lady Cecily
is drawn to a French knight,
held captive at the English court.

Lady Cecily frowns on the developing romance between the English Princess she serves and a wealthy French lord, held hostage in her father’s court. Though King Edward triumphed in war, Cecily’s father was slain in battle. The royal family may forgive their one-time enemies. She never will.

Another hostage, Marc de Marcel, resents the English as much as Cecily does the French. Refusing to languish in a foreign land waiting for a ransom that may never be paid, he is determined to find another way home. One his captors will not like. But as Cecily and Marc struggle against an attraction neither wants they discover that love has a way of upsetting the strongest loyalties. And the best-laid plans.