‘Go,’ she said. ‘I know what kind your prayers will be, and at what kind of altar you will offer them.’

‘Oh, in the name of Christ, woman, the only thing that will drive me away are your groundless accusations. I can no longer hold any kind of sensible conversation with you.’ Turning on his heel, he flung from the room.

Alienor gazed at her sister. ‘What’s wrong?’

‘Other women,’ Petronella said, her lip curling. ‘It is always other women with him. He thinks I do not notice, but I do, and when I confront him, he denies it. Dear God, he is old enough to be my grandsire, but still he cannot stop the chase.’

Alienor took a proper look at her sister. Petronella’s dark hair was flat and draggled. Her eyes were pouched with dark circles and her dress was stained. She smelt sour and unwashed. She was like their grandmother Dangereuse. Her passions were so intense that they burned her out. She had a desperate craving to be wanted and loved, and Raoul could not sustain the fire at that kind of level. And perhaps Petronella was right to an extent. Raoul’s nature was such that he would indeed be chasing women until the day he died.

‘Come. You must eat and rest. How can you think when you are so tired and overwrought? Remember how you counselled me when I was heartsick?’ She took Petronella’s arm and gestured the nurses to attend the children.

‘You know it’s true, don’t you?’ Petronella said. ‘That is why you don’t say anything.’

‘Because there is no point while you are like this.’

Petronella shook herself free of Alienor’s grip. ‘It is all your fault!’ she burst out. ‘Without your annulment Raoul would still cleave to me. Once you return to Poitiers, he will cast me off because I shall no longer be of any use to him – indeed I shall be a hindrance. If my mind is in turmoil, you are to blame!’

There was no reasoning with Petronella when she was like this, and she spoke enough truth for Alienor to feel a stab of guilt. Once her marriage with Louis was annulled, Raoul would indeed have no reason but love to remain wed to Petronella, because all the affinity would be gone and there would be no gain in being shackled to the former Queen of France’s unstable sister.

‘Railing at me will change nothing. If you are to keep Raoul, then you need all your faculties.’

Petronella tossed her head, but allowed Floreta and Marchisa to wash her and dress her in a clean chemise. She refused to eat, but she did drink the wine containing a soporific that Marchisa gave to her. Her lids grew heavy and she lay down on Alienor’s bed. ‘If he doesn’t want me,’ she whispered, ‘then I do not wish to live.’

‘Do not talk like a fool,’ Alienor snapped. ‘Raoul de Vermandois is not the beginning and end of the world. You have three children to call you Mother. You have kin and friends in Poitiers. How dare you say that?’

Petronella just rolled on her side away from Alienor, shutting everyone out.

Alienor went to find Raoul and discovered him, as he had said, praying in the chapel of Saint Michael. She knelt at his good side, where he had vision, and sent up her own prayer while she waited for him. He lingered as if reluctant to engage with her. His thick white hair was thinning at the crown, she noticed, and the flesh that had once been taut on his bones was sagging at the jawline. His clothes were immaculate and he still projected an air of power, but his years sat on him with more weight these days.

Eventually he stood up and she rose at his side. ‘Are you intending to annul your marriage to my sister?’ she asked him bluntly.

Raoul’s expression grew very still. ‘Why should you think that?’

‘You know as well as I do. Do not play a courtier’s game with me, Raoul.’

He heaved a sigh. ‘You have seen how she is, and that is most of the time these days. If I so much as glance at another woman she throws a jealous tantrum. She demands my attention and does not understand that I have duties to perform. She falls into dark moods where she takes to her bed and will not bestir herself for days. The priests say it is judgement upon us for what we did, but I do not believe it. I believe she has always been like this, but now it has become much worse.’

‘That does not answer my question.’

He shook his head. ‘Yes, I am considering the matter, and I must consult with the King. It seems to me that if you are returning to Poitiers, it would be better if Petronella went with you. She will fare better in the land of her childhood – in so many ways she has remained a child herself.’

‘So you would put the responsibility for her on to me?’

‘She needs to be cared for and I believe it will be for the best.’

‘For your best or hers?’ Alienor asked with scorn.

‘For both our sakes, and that of our children.’

‘And when my marriage is annulled and I part company with the King, what then?’

‘Then I shall have to decide.’

Alienor inhaled to remonstrate, but stopped as she saw the genuine pain in his expression.

‘Then I hope your conscience steers you in the right direction,’ she said. ‘You swore to protect her. Do so now.’


38

Angers, August 1151

Henry, Duke of Normandy, was enjoying himself. The young woman straddling his thighs was a beauty with thick ash-brown hair, wide grey eyes and a full, cushion-soft mouth capable of rendering the most exquisite pleasure. Being eighteen years old, Henry’s enthusiasm and capability had remained firm over several sessions of love-sport, begun the previous evening when he had retired to bed with Aelburgh, a flagon of wine and a platter of honey-drizzled pastries.

‘I am going to miss you,’ he panted as she rode him. He admired the jiggle of her breasts and felt the twinges of crisis as she rose and dipped.

‘Then take me with you, sire.’ She leaned over him to nip his shoulder. ‘I would keep you warm on your journey.’

Henry briefly entertained the notion. He had been going to bring her with him on battle campaign. He appreciated the comforts she could provide and Aelburgh was not one to complain about life on the road; she would be no trouble. Regretfully he set the notion aside. His father would not be best pleased. ‘No, sweetheart,’ he gasped. ‘Much as I would enjoy having you in Paris, it would not be seemly.’

‘Hah, I did not realise you cared for what is seemly and what is not.’

‘I care when necessary. My father and I have some delicate negotiations with the King of France. There are things we want from him, and it behoves us to be perfect courtiers. What I need from you is a … fond farewell.’

She tossed her head and laughed. ‘Then I will drain you dry, my lord. When I am finished, you will not desire a woman for a full month!’

Henry doubted it, but let her continue anyway.

As the morning sun climbed out of the dawn, Henry dismissed Aelburgh with a slap on the buttocks and a pouch of silver sufficient to keep her during his absence. He felt full of wellbeing but by no means exhausted. It took more than a few sessions of enthusiastic bed-romping to wear out his vivid, vigorous energy. He needed very little sleep; when awake his mind was always busy on several tasks at once and his overflowing energy would cause him to stride about the room and fidget. Remaining still in church was the most difficult routine duty of his life. He considered that God intended him to be a king and a duke and would excuse him time spent in prayer. That was what monks and priests were for.

Henry went to look out of the window as he donned a tunic of red wool, somewhat frizzy around the cuffs where he had been playing tug of war with one of the dogs. Henry knew the value of dressing for formal occasions, but for every day he liked the old and the comfortable. It was the man inside the clothes that mattered, and how he used his power. His father disagreed with that stance, but then his father used clothing as part of his magnificence.

The courtyard was busy with activity as servants made ready for the journey to Paris on the morrow. There were horses to be shod, harnesses to be polished and equipment to be checked so that when they did set out, all would be smooth and brisk without delays. King Louis had pulled back from his intention to strike at Rouen and called for talks instead. He had claimed ill health, but in politics, unless you were face to face with someone, it was never possible to tell whether the claim was the reality or an excuse.

Whistling, Henry fastened his belt at his hips, combed his thick red-gold hair into a semblance of order, and went to find his father.

Geoffrey was in his own chamber with his bed curtains hooked out of the way and the bed itself made up with its day covers. His attendants and courtiers were already hard at work, his scribes toiling over sheaves of documents. Geoffrey sat at a trestle, his foot elevated on a padded stool. He was looking thoughtfully at a document in his hands.

‘Ah,’ he said as Henry breezed into the room. ‘The sluggard arrives.’

Henry poured a cup of wine and took a small loaf from the basket on the table. ‘I’ve been awake awhile,’ he said with a knowing grin.

His father raised his eyebrows. ‘Indeed? Let us hope you put your early rising to good use.’

A moment of humour glimmered between father and son, although Geoffrey’s expression had an irritable edge.

‘Indeed I did. Experience is all to the good, as you are forever telling me.’ Henry gestured at the stool. ‘Is your foot troubling you again?’

Geoffrey continued to look irritated. He wanted to garner sufficient respect and attention for his ailment, the result of a wound sustained in a battle campaign more than ten years ago, but without attracting any hint that he was becoming incapable. His son was eighteen and a handsome young stallion arching his neck over the stable door, but Geoffrey was still in command and never let his heir forget it. ‘No worse than usual, but better to rest it on the day before a long journey.’ He gestured Henry to sit down. ‘There are still matters we need to discuss.’

They had already talked about dealing with the French. Louis was demanding that the lands of the Vexin on the border between Normandy and France be handed over to him in return for his recognition of Henry as Duke of Normandy. There was also the matter of the rebellious castellan of Montreuil to be settled, but since Giraud de Berlai was in chains in their dungeon and Montreuil razed to the ground, it was a moot point. However, since de Berlai had appealed to Louis for aid against his Angevin overlords, he might prove a useful lever in negotiations. Henry was keen to have a truce arranged and Louis bought off or pacified. Keeping the French out of Normandy meant he could concentrate on England. If that meant greasing the wheels with conciliatory words and a strip of land, then so be it. All might change on another occasion. ‘What kind of matters?’ He sat down on a chair facing his father.

Geoffrey said, ‘King Louis is in the middle of annulling his marriage. He needs a male heir and sadly his wife’s seed is too strong and his own too weak to make this happen. All he can get on her is girls.’

Henry frowned, uncertain where his father’s speech was leading. Surely this was not about the union between himself and Louis’s eldest daughter. That had been mooted and rejected many years ago.

‘That is his fault, of course. Your mother is far more of a termagant than Alienor of France and my seed still dominated hers to plant three sons in her womb. You will have no such difficulty.’

Henry stared at him. The piece of bread he had been chewing almost stuck in his throat and he had to gulp.

‘Think of how much prestige and power we would gain from such an alliance and how much France would be weakened.’

Henry coughed and took a swallow of wine. He had not envisaged taking an older woman to wife – another man’s leavings at that.

‘Aren’t you going to say anything?’

‘I was not expecting this, sire,’ Henry managed to reply. His mind filled with the image of himself lying in bed with a world-worn hag. He could remember his father having dealings with Alienor and Louis when he was still trailing after his wet nurse with a comfort cloth in his hand. His epitome of a perfect bride was someone virginal, innocent and younger than he was, but political reality was a different matter entirely. Caught between his ideal and brutal fact, he was briefly nonplussed, and that for Henry was disconcerting.

‘Well, overcome your astonishment and accustom yourself to the notion,’ Geoffrey said curtly. ‘I expect your compliance in this.’

Henry stiffened.

Geoffrey raised his right forefinger in admonishment. ‘You must see the advantage. You will gain Aquitaine for the taking of a marriage vow. Your rule as duke will stretch from the Limousin to the Pyrenees and give you the resources to go forward in England and Normandy. If you do not seize this opportunity, others will, and you will be the loser.’