Richard raised his chin, met his father’s eyes challengingly. “Can you also forgive our mother?”
Henry stiffened and, as he looked at his sons, never had the gap between them seemed so wide to him, so impossible to bridge. “So be it,” he said flatly. “We are done here.”
As Henry started to turn away, there were startled murmurs from the French, and he marveled wearily at their surprise, for he’d warned them from the first that he’d not come to bargain with his sons. He’d only taken a few steps toward his horse, though, before Louis hastened after him.
“You are a fool, Harry Fitz Empress!” The French king’s voice shook with fury as he confronted the man he blamed for most of his life’s disappointments. “Do you not see what you are throwing away? You are losing your sons! Do you truly value your pride more than you do them?”
“They were not lost,” Henry snarled, more than willing to turn upon Louis the anger he’d not wanted to let loose upon his sons. “They were lured away, and if there is any justice in this world, you’ll answer to the Almighty for it. You may not even have to wait till Judgment Day to atone for this particular sin. You have a son, too. Who knows-one day he might grow restless under your tutelage, look elsewhere for advice and support. If so, I will most gladly return the favor.”
“You can rant and threaten all you want, blame me, your queen, blame everyone but yourself. It changes nothing. You had a chance today to win your boys back, and you trampled upon it. It is not a chance that will come again. Do you know how we celebrated your son Richard’s sixteenth birthday? I knighted him, Harry. I knighted him, not you!”
Louis’s taunt drew blood. Henry looked at the other man with loathing, and then turned accusing eyes upon his second son. “My congratulations, Richard,” he said scathingly. “What an honor for you, to be knighted by the victor of Verneuil.”
Richard’s reaction was unexpected; he grinned. But then Henry realized why; Richard had not been at Verneuil, felt none of the shame. And as their eyes met, they shared a moment of odd understanding, one of mutual contempt for the French king.
It was very different, though, for Louis and Hal. Louis turned beet-red and spun on his heel. Hal flushed darkly, too, and cried out that Verneuil was not his doing.
Henry turned back toward his son. “Yes, it was your doing, Hal. All of this is your doing. Part of being a man is taking responsibility for your actions. I hope you learn that one day. But based upon what I’ve so far seen, I doubt that you will.”
Hal went white. Humiliated, hurt, indignant, he glared at his father, sure in that moment that he hated Henry, that he would always hate him. “It will be war then,” he warned, his voice hoarse and none-too-steady. “And you may be certain of this-that I will never offer you terms as generous as those you offered me! If you want peace, you will have to beg for it on your knees!”
Henry’s eyes glittered. “What do you know of war, boy? It is not dressing up in scarlet boots and wearing a sword on your hip, or promising half your kingdom to the Scots and the Flemings, or swaggering about like the hero in a minstrel’s chanson. You want to know about war, you ask the Count of Boulogne, the Earl of Chester, and the burghers of Verneuil. But you cannot, can you? The Count of Boulogne is rotting in his grave, the Earl of Chester is rotting in one of my prisons, and the citizens of Verneuil are too busy grieving for their dead and the French king’s lost honor.”
Hal started to protest again that he was not responsible for Verneuil, realized just in time that he’d only be proving Henry’s point, as Henry continued remorselessly. “I suppose you could ask the allies you have left, but they are dwindling rapidly in case you’ve not noticed. The Count of Flanders and the Scots king have cut you loose. So have the Breton rebels, who were only too happy to surrender to me at Dol. So who does that leave? Your brothers, who’ve yet to bloody their swords? Your formidable father-in-law? The fearsome Earl of Leicester? Indeed, Hal, I am shaking in my boots at the very thought of facing such worthy adversaries!”
That provoked a choked cry of utter outrage, but it did not come from Hal. Thrusting aside the French lords in his way, the Earl of Leicester strode over to confront Henry. “Are you calling me a coward?”
Henry found it remarkable that his late justiciar, a man of honor and integrity, could ever have spawned such a worthless whelp as this. “I’d say your conduct at Breteuil speaks for itself,” he said contemptuously.
The look Leicester gave him was murderous. “I retreated in good order when I saw that I could not hold the castle!”
That was so preposterous a claim that Henry laughed in his face. “You bolted at the first sight of my banners. I daresay I could have sent our camp laundresses to take the castle and you’d still have run like a spooked sheep.”
Leicester saw Henry through a red mist of rage. “I am not running now, you Angevin son of a whore!” he shouted and drew his sword.
There was instant pandemonium. Amazed, Henry dropped his hand to his own sword hilt, making ready to defend himself. But his men were already in motion. Willem’s blade caught the sun as it slid from its scabbard, and Geoff, not as experienced but just as eager, unsheathed his weapon almost as swiftly. The others were no less quick to react, though. Hal and Richard were yelling at Leicester, the Count of Champagne had darted forward to get between Henry and the earl, and Will Marshal, appearing from nowhere, was there, too. But the French king was the most horrified of all.
“Have you gone mad?” He was staring incredulously at Leicester, as if the earl had suddenly sprouted horns and a tail. “How dare you draw your sword upon a king?”
“I have a right to defend my honor!” But as he glanced around, Leicester saw this was a cock that wouldn’t fight. He’d managed to do the well-nigh impossible-temporarily unite them all in a common cause, for there could be no greater crime in their world than to kill a man who was the christus domini, the Anointed of the Lord. Jamming his sword back into its scabbard, Leicester shouted defiantly at Henry, “This is not over! When we next meet, it will be on the battlefield in England!” Whirling then, he shoved his way through the press of men, yelling for his men and horses.
The Archbishop of Rouen had taken it upon himself to lecture them all on the sin of spilling blood during God’s Truce, and Louis’s brother, the Archbishop of Rheims, added his moral authority to Rotrou’s, both men uneasily aware of how contagious violence could be. With that same thought in mind, Henry’s men had brought over his stallion. Swinging up into the saddle, he paused to stare down at his sons and the French king.
“You wanted war?” he said. “Then by God, that is what you’ll get!”
The Lady Beatriz, one of Eleanor’s attendants, halted in surprise as she entered the queen’s bedchamber, for it was dusk but the hearth had not been lit and no lamps burned on the table. Glad that she’d brought a candle, she hastened over to light the oil wicks, intending to have some harsh words with the servants for being so neglectful. As an oil lamp sputtered and ignited, she caught movement from the corner of her eye, turned, and then recoiled in surprise.
“Oh, my lady, how you startled me! I had no idea you were here.” Moving toward the silent figure in the window-seat, she gasped as her candle illuminated the queen’s face. “Madame, are you ailing? Shall I fetch a doctor?”
“I am well, Beatriz,” Eleanor said, but the girl was not convinced, for the older woman was ashen. Her gaze darting from Eleanor’s hollow eyes to the parchment crumpled in her lap, Beatriz dropped to her knees, stretching out a hand in mute entreaty. “My lady…forgive me if I have overstepped my bounds, but you look so troubled. Something is wrong, I can tell. Is there nothing I can do?”
Eleanor looked down at the kneeling girl. Most of her ladies-in-waiting did not serve her for long, eager to find husbands at the royal court. But Beatriz, a young widow and distant cousin on her mother’s side, had been with her for more than four years. Her uncle Raoul had recommended Beatriz, and at first Eleanor had wondered if he’d put the girl in her household to spy upon her. But Beatriz had passed every test she’d set for her, and Eleanor had no doubts about her loyalty or her love. She’d only had two female confidantes in her life, though, her sister Petronilla and Maud, the Countess of Chester, and she was not about to confess her heart’s pain to a sweet child young enough to be one of her daughters. Yet Beatriz was right. She was in great need of solace, in need of one she could truly trust.
“There is something you can do for me, Beatriz,” she said, and managed a flickering smile. “Fetch my constable.”
