The Uncrowned Queen (17 page)

“I shall see that you are not disturbed, Your Majesty,” he said, and backed away reverently, gently closing the door as he left.

In the silent room, Edward Plantagenet leaned forward and delicately brushed a strand of hair from Anne's face. She did not move. He picked up one pale hand and held it to his face. Her skin was cool and soft. “My darling girl. I'm here. I'll be with you all this night. And tomorrow—as long as you need me. But, if you can hear me, tell me, what do you have for me, Anne?”

There was no answer, just the crack of the fire as a log dropped and sparks flew up the chimney. But in that sudden flicker of light, Edward saw Anne's small leather pack. It had been cast without thought into a corner of the room and now an edge of bright blue with a flash of yellow caught the king's eye. “Forgive me, my darling girl.”

In two strides he had picked it up and unbuckled the straps that held the bundle together. And there, inside, wrapped tightly in a kirtle beneath a shawl of finely woven blue and yellow, he found what he was looking for.

The milk-pale girl in the bed remained still and silent as Edward Plantagenet stuffed the letter from his sister into the front of his jerkin; he would read it later. He weighed the heavy purse of coins in his hands and gazed at Anne's closed eyes, the bandages around her head. Anne had paid for his freedom. Was the price worth it?

The baby whimpered, hungry again. Duchess Jacquetta picked the prince up from his cradle and rocked him, but it was not enough. Even one of her fingers to suck made no difference. “There, there, little man; soon, soon.” Wails turned into a healthy bellow.

“Mother?” The voice from the bed was sharp. “It's no good, I cannot sleep; the poppy they gave me did not work. Give him to me. At least one of us will be happy.”

The baby was swaddled tightly, arms bound to his sides. Just like a little silkworm, thought his grandmother tenderly as she took the boy who should have been born the prince of Wales over to her daughter. Elizabeth Wydeville struggled to sit up and uncovered one breast, swollen and proud now that the milk was well established. Taking the baby in the crook of her right arm, she tapped him on the cheek so that he turned his head toward her. Smelling the milk, he fastened his tiny open mouth around the nipple. The wailing stopped as, urgently, the infant sucked and snuffled and sucked again, so fast that he choked. An indignant roar filled the small room.

“No, Edward, not so impatient. Really. Just like your father, sometimes…” Elizabeth looked up and caught her mother's amused glance. The glimmer of a smile curved the queen's mouth, the first of many weeks. She rocked her son, settling him with the ease of an experienced mother. “Here, yes, like that… slower, no
gulping.” She relaxed as the baby's suckling found a rhythm and he closed his eyes, concentrating.

“I'm sorry we couldn't get you a nurse, child.”

The queen shook her head. “I'm not. I haven't done this before. It's… different. I'm glad I'm giving this child suck.”

The duchess was curious. “But your breasts, daughter. Are you not concerned your son will wither them?”

A hard expression marred the queen's lovely face. “I don't care. Let him suck them to dry husks. He'll suck my rage into him. He'll suck my desire for justice into his bones. It will make him stronger. Besides, what does it matter if my breasts turn to empty bags? I'll never see the king again if Louis has his way, and then beauty won't matter to me ever again.”

Jacquetta smiled. “Perhaps you will change your mind, in time. Besides, I think there's a way to go before Louis gets what he wants. I've heard some interesting news.”

Her daughter's eyes sharpened on hers. “What?”

“Charles of Burgundy is wavering. He doesn't know what to do, which side to back. In that fact, there is opportunity.”

Elizabeth Wydeville snorted with derision, disturbing her son. As he yelled, she swapped him to the other breast, and he subsided into earnest silence as he fed once more.

“Who says this?” she demanded.

“I've had a communication—a message from Sir Mathew Cuttifer. He says he has a reliable source in Brugge. A friend of the duchess.”

The queen's face darkened. “Why should we trust what he might say? He, and his house, have never been our friends. That woman, Anne de Bohun, was his servant. She tried to steal Edward from me.”

Patiently, Jacquetta shook her head. “Tried, and failed. Ah, daughter, daughter, this is all in the past. Do not distress yourself. The king has not seen Anne de Bohun since his sister's wedding. She has disappeared from our lives for good. But information is useful, whatever its source.”

The baby sighed deeply at his mother's breast and his small red
mouth softly detached from the nipple. He slept, his little face flushed rose-pink from the effort of sucking. Automatically Elizabeth rocked her son back and forth, back and forth.

“And so?” Her tone was sullen.

“Don't you see? If Charles is uncertain what to do about Edward and England, then he may be influenced. Influenced to our cause; influenced to help the king. But first, we must deal with Louis.”

“How can we do such a thing?”

There was little light in Abbot Milling's cell, even though it faced east. Elizabeth Wydeville squinted and leaned forward to inspect the thing her mother was holding toward her; something Jacquetta had fetched from the pocket-bag slung from her girdle. “What is that?”

Jacquetta held the object up in the light from the one small, high window.

“A toy for the baby?”

The duchess shook her head and spoke softly. “Look closer, my daughter. This is no toy.”

Gently placing the sleeping child on the counterpane of the bed, the queen held out her hand to inspect the object. It was a doll-sized man, mounted on a little wooden horse caparisoned in blue cloth. Painted in gilt on the cloth were miniature fleurs-de-lis. The doll had a tiny gold circlet around its head.

“Who is this, Mother?” She might ask the question, but Elizabeth Wydeville knew the answer.

Jacquetta looked around. The door was closed and they were alone. She leaned toward her daughter and whispered one word. “Louis.” The queen gazed fearfully at her mother. Jacquetta had something else in her fingers now: two tiny silver daggers, blades as sharp as thorns.

“Hold out your hand, my daughter.”

The baby whimpered in his sleep and twitched, frowning. Both women turned to look at him.

“We have no choice, my daughter. For your son's sake. He will be king one day, but only if we help him now.”

Elizabeth looked down at her infant and nodded. Slowly, she extended her hand and took one of the wicked little knives from her mother's fingers.

“Together. We must do this together. Now.”

There was an instinctive rhythm to what happened next. One breath, two, and on the third, the deposed queen of England plunged the little knife deep into the straw breast of the doll; at the same instant, her mother stabbed hers into the effigy's groin. There was a sound like breath escaping. Perhaps it was the wind.

The baby woke, screaming, as is the way of a fractious child when his mother is tense. But try as they might to comfort him, mother and grandmother both, the distraught baby did not close his eyes for the whole of that day, nor the night that succeeded it until Thomas Milling, the abbot of Saint Peter's Cathedral Church, touched his brow with holy water.

Then he slept.

Louis XI was not an athletic man, and he didn't like riding because horses didn't like him; a feeling that was mutual. This was not only an inconvenience, however; it was a scandal. The king of France, after all, was expected to be Le Grand Chevalier. Well, this king wasn't. He preferred to travel by litter.

And so, on a freezing evening just after the second Sunday in Advent, Louis de Valois arrived at an obscure hunting lodge he favored, huddled behind the curtains of his shabby litter. He was accompanied by a small party of guards and a scant few annoyed and wet courtiers. He was grumpy, tired, and in pain from his belly—a not uncommon occurrence.

The king liked this place for its unfashionable anonymity. Cramped and uncomfortable as it might be, the lodge was close enough to Paris for intelligence to reach him if he required it, yet sufficiently hidden away to be discreet and therefore safe. Louis didn't like his capital, Paris, for it contained many unhappy memories of the father he'd loathed and been frightened of. As a consequence, he was suspicious of the city's loyalty and avoided it whenever he could. Paris was also where the nobles liked to congregate, especially now that Advent had begun, and too, the palace of the Louvre was Queen Charlotte's most favored residence. If Louis went there, he would have to speak to her, even go to her bed, since it would be scandalous if he did not.

This last, and the fact that the magnates and lesser lords would even now be gathering to petition him for this thing and that as seasonal boons, made up his mind. They would all have to wait. He didn't want the distraction of dealing with their plots and counterplots, for there was urgent work at hand. Tonight he'd received news that worried him; perversely, he blamed his functionaries in Paris for that. They should have told him sooner! It was their job to find him, to track his progress around the kingdom. He would have no excuses!

Edward Plantagenet and his men had disappeared from the Binnenhof. Sitting down to dinner, Louis called his advisor to go over the details once more.

“How many of them?”

“We are uncertain of their numbers, sire.” Olivier le Dain—called “the barber” due to his humble beginnings in the court as Louis's valet—was extremely nervous but hoped he did not show it. Born under the sign of Saturn, le Dain lived up to the stereotype, being dark, quiet, cautious, and dangerous. But this king, to whom he had become a useful advisor, reduced him to a fearful, sweating jelly, much to the secret joy of his enemies. It was the specter of the “cage” that did it.

Two years ago le Dain had displeased the king—he still did not know in what way—and had spent an appalling winter hanging in a cage over the battlements of Nantes, exposed to the wind, the sleet, and the snow, wearing only what he'd had on when arrested. He'd nearly starved and both his little fingers had frozen black and fallen off, but eventually, praise be, he'd been forgiven his sin, whatever it had been. But what if he should offend again? How would he know?

Le Dain watched nervously as Louis turned his attention to the food. The king attempted to gnaw on a goose leg, but even at this distance the advisor could see it looked slimy—the sign of putrefaction. He blanched as, grimacing, the king threw the leg down on the silver charger. “Too much pepper. They've burned my mouth! The cooks are idiots, did they think I would not notice? This meat is putrid. Do they plot to poison me? Le Dain! I want answers. Now!”

Le Dain hurried forward to the table; he was sweating, giddy
from fear. He would have to distract Louis, and quickly, or God alone knew how far the king's paranoia might run.

Tonight, the king was dining in a small room at the back of the hunting lodge, completely alone except for five servants and the barber. Wiping greasy fingers on the sleeve of his gown, Louis waved the food away, scowling, and belched foul breath full into the face of his advisor. Then he winced. He'd been troubled by pain in his guts all day; it was getting worse.

Another scowl, this time at le Dain. “Why are you uncertain of the Englishmen's number, Olivier? It is not useful to me if my servants know less than I expect them to.”

Le Dain resisted the urgent desire to piss himself as he ran through the best way to present what he knew. Plainly, this was a night when the king's digestion would be a trial to both master and servant. The barber would accept any kind of reprimand for poor performance, just as long as it did not end with the cage.