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.

She moved her hand lower, stroking the small of his back. He opened his eyes, stretched, and with a sleepy smile, turned over and pulled her down for a kiss. ‘You are so beautiful,’ he said.

‘So are you, my husband.’ He was erect from having just woken, and she took advantage, straddling him with a mischievous sparkle in her eyes.

His eyes widened at the sinful position and he gasped, but he did not push her off. A feeling of power tingled through her as she moved upon him and he thrust within her. In the two months since their marriage, she had grown accustomed to the procreation duty, and had come to enjoy it and even find it needful. There was no sign of a pregnancy yet, but both she and Louis were certain it would happen. As Louis arched beneath her and gave her his seed, she clenched upon him, crying out in pleasure.

They lay together recovering, and she nuzzled his shoulder. She knew that beyond the chamber, the servants would be hurrying to report to Adelaide that the young King and Queen were still abed and fulfilling their duty to procreate, and it brought a sour smile to her lips. Adelaide would be on tenterhooks, hoping that she and Louis had conceived a child, and at the same time suspicious of the time they were spending together, time she could not influence.

Her mother-in-law continued to strive for dominance under the guise of teaching Alienor the etiquette of the French court and preparing her for the official crowning ceremony in December at Bourges, but she was like a snappy dog, always chivvying Alienor and criticising her clothes, her manners, the way she walked, how much time she spent adorning her chamber and her frivolity when she should be at prayer. Alienor was always civil to Adelaide’s face, and demure in her presence, but she was deeply resentful of the older woman’s interference.

Louis sat up. ‘I should go,’ he said with reluctance. ‘Abbé Suger is expecting me, and I have already missed first prayers.’

‘There are always people lying in wait,’ Alienor replied with a toss of her head. She set her palm against his back, claiming him for a moment longer. ‘Perhaps after we are crowned, we should consider returning to Poitiers.’

He looked impatient. ‘We have officials there to keep us informed; there is too much to do here.’

‘Nevertheless, we should think about it,’ Alienor persisted. ‘We are Duke and Duchess as well as King and Queen, and our stay was curtailed because we had to return to Paris. We must not let my people think we have forgotten them.’

He avoided her eyes. ‘I will ask Suger and see what he says.’

‘Why should it be up to Suger? He has a duty to advise you, but he treats you as if you are still his pupil, not the King of France. You can do as you please.’

Louis said defensively, ‘I do take his advice, but I make my own decisions.’ He reached for his clothes and began putting them on.

‘You could decide to go to Poitou after the coronation. It would not be too difficult, surely?’ She tossed her head, making her hair shimmer over her naked body like cloth of gold.

Louis devoured her with a glance and his pale complexion flushed. ‘No,’ he conceded. ‘I suppose it would not be too difficult.’

‘Thank you, husband.’ She gave him a demure, sweet smile. ‘I so much want to see Poitiers again.’ The image of the good and doting wife, she knelt at his feet to fasten his shoes.

‘I do love you,’ Louis said, as if blurting out a shameful confession, before tearing himself away and hurrying from the room.

Alienor gazed after him and gnawed her lower lip. Obtaining what she wanted was a constant battle, and had become more of a routine irritation than an interesting challenge.

Her women arrived to dress her. She chose a new gown of russet and gold damask with deep hanging sleeves and coiled her abundant hair into a net of gold thread set with tiny gemstone beads. Floreta held up a delicate ivory mirror for Alienor to study her reflection. What she saw pleased her, for while her beauty did not rule her life, it gave her an advantage she was prepared to exploit. Her face needed no enhancement, but she had Floreta add a subtle touch of alkanet to redden her lips and cheeks in defiance of her mother-in-law’s scrubbed severity.

Her chamberlain announced that a set of painted coffers she had ordered had arrived, together with some new bed curtains, and a pair of enamelled candlesticks. Alienor’s mood brightened further. She was gradually making her chamber into a little part of Aquitaine in the heart of Paris. Northern France was not without its great riches, but it did not possess the sun-drenched ambience of her homeland. The French palace was heavy with the weight of centuries, but no more so than Poitiers or Bordeaux. However, Adelaide’s dull and sombre tastes permeated everything, so that even this great tower, built by Louis’s father, had the feel of a building much older and stultified with time.

Servants arrived with the new furnishings and Alienor began arranging them. She had one of the chests set at the foot of the bed and the other, depicting a group of dancers hand in hand, put against the wall. She had the existing bed hangings taken down and new ones of golden damask put up. The maids opened out a quilt of detailed whitework stitched with eagle motifs.

‘More purchases, daughter?’ Adelaide said from the doorway, her voice full of icy disapproval. ‘There is nothing wrong with what you had before.’

‘But they were not my choice, madam,’ Alienor replied. ‘I want to be reminded of Aquitaine.’

‘You are not in Aquitaine now, you are in Paris, and you are the wife of the King of France.’

Alienor replied with a hint of defiance, ‘I am still Duchess of Aquitaine, my mother.’

Adelaide narrowed her eyes and stalked further into the room. She cast a disparaging look over the new chests and hangings. Her glance fell on the rumpled bed that the chamber ladies had yet to make, and her nostrils flared at the smell of recent congress. ‘Where is my son?’

‘He has gone to see Abbé Suger,’ Alienor replied. ‘Would you care for some wine, my mother?’

‘No, I would not,’ Adelaide snapped. ‘There are more important things in the world than drinking wine and frittering money on gaudy furnishings. If you have time for this, then you have too much free rein.’

The air bristled with Adelaide’s hostility and Alienor’s resentment. ‘Then what would you have me do, madam?’ Alienor asked.

‘I would have you comport yourself with decorum. The sleeves on that dress are scandalous – almost touching the ground! And that veil and headdress do nothing to hide your hair!’ Adelaide warmed to her theme, flinging out her arm in an angry gesture. ‘I would have your servants learn to speak the French of the north and not persist in this outlandish dialect that none of us can understand. You and your sister chatter away like a couple of finches.’

‘Caged finches,’ said Alienor. ‘It is our native tongue, and we speak the French of the north in public company. How can I be Duchess of Aquitaine if I do not maintain the traditions of my homeland?’

‘And how can you be Queen of France and a fitting consort for my son when you behave like a silly, frivolous girl? What kind of example are you setting to others?’

Alienor set her jaw. It was pointless arguing with this cantankerous harridan. These days, Louis was far more likely to listen to the ‘silly, frivolous girl’ than his carping mother, but the constant criticism and sniping still wore her down and made her want to cry. ‘I am sorry you are vexed, Mother, but I am entitled to furnish my own chamber as I choose, and my people may talk as they desire, providing they are courteous to others.’

Adelaide’s abrupt departure left a brief but awkward silence. Alienor broke it by clapping her hands and calling brightly to her servants in the lenga romana of Bordeaux. If she was a finch, she intended to sing her heart out in defiance of everyone and everything.

Two days later, accompanied by her ladies, Alienor went to walk in the gardens. She loved this green and fragrant part of the castle complex with its abundance of plants, flowers and lush turf. Sweet-smelling roses were still in bloom at summer’s end, and everything stayed greener than in Aquitaine because the sun was less fierce. The gardeners were skilled and, even enclosed as it was, the pleasance was an escape into a different, fresher world that offered respite from the machinations and backbiting of the court.

Today, the September sun cast mellow, translucent light over the grass and the trees, the latter still clad in their summer green but beginning to crisp with gold at the edges. The dew sparkled on the grass and Alienor had a sudden desire to feel the crystal coldness under her bare feet. On an impulse, she slipped off her shoes and hose and stepped on to the cool, sparkling turf. Petronella was swift to follow her example, and the other ladies, after a hesitation, joined in, even Louis’s sister Constance, who usually hung back from any kind of daring or giddy behaviour.

Alienor took several dancing steps, turning and twirling. Louis never danced. He had not been raised to such skills and delights, whereas she had. When forced, he performed each move with rigid precision, but did not find it pleasurable entertainment and could not understand why others thought it was.