The Innocent

out his secret.

Oh, God, he prayed silently for the first time in years, please help me! He wondered if God would hear the prayers of a man such as Merin ap Owen. For Eleanore de Montfort’s sake, he hoped He did.

Chapter 17

The weather in the Channel was foul, and had been for days. A hard cold wind blew from the north. The rain came in torrents, and the sea was all afroth, the waves crashing over the seawalls in Barfleur. The king, snugly housed, groused and grumbled with his impatience to begin his journey. He must be crowned soon. England had been without a king for over a month. Henry Plantagenet could only pray that there was peace there, no civil war. The line of succession, he kept reminding himself, was clear and undisputed, but, still, the English were a most unruly people.

Ranulf de Glandeville seethed with impatience, too. All he had wished was to complete his mission for the king, get the little prince to England, and then go home to Ashlin. It had been almost five months since he had seen his wife and child. Eleanore’s sweet face haunted his dreams, and he longed to tell her that he loved her. Soon. Soon. He could have howled with outrage when he learned his services to escort the little prince to England were not needed at all. He had been brought to Normandy on a fool’s errand.

Queen Alienor, heavy with her second child, had insisted she would not be parted from her little son. The court had moved almost immediately following the king’s campaign in the Vexin to Barfleur. The empress was to remain behind in Rouen to govern Normandy in her son’s absence. She had sided with her daughter-in-law. So the little prince would travel officially with his parents and his own household.

'I am overruled by my womenfolk,' the king said by way of apology, with a wry smile, 'but my mother points out, and wisely, too, that Alienor must not be upset this far along in her confinement. I cannot help but concur, and my Provencal rose will have her son by her side.' He shrugged with apparent helplessness.

'Then, I am free to return home to Ashlin,' Ranulf said.

'Nay, my good de Glandeville, I would have you attend our coronation,' the king replied. 'You will remain with the court and cross over to England with us. I am grateful for your loyalty, and would offer you this small reward.'

Ranulf bowed. 'I thank you, my liege, but serving you with fidelity is naught worthy of a reward.'

'Nonetheless, you shall have it,' the king said jovially.

He was dismissed, and he knew it. Ranulf bowed again, and moved back into the crowd of milling courtiers. He wanted to go home! He didn't want to travel with Henry Plantagenet’s great train from Normandy to England and see him coronated in Westminster. He wanted to go home! He had come here on Henry’s whim. His mission had come to nothing because of a woman’s whim. His reward was to watch these two high nobles crowned king and queen of England. He had wanted a castle, but he had done nothing to warrant such a reward, nor would his Simon ever serve a prince as companion. Ranulf de Glandeville faced the fact that he was not an important man, although for a few brief months he had dared to dream.

***

On the morning of December seventh, the weather cleared just slightly. The king ordered their immediate departure, despite the fact the harbor master warned the weather would turn foul again before the sunset, and they would be caught in midchannel.

'We go!'the king said, and personally oversaw the loading of the boats with his knights and horses. The queen and her serving women were the only females with the great train; but Alienor, used to hard travel having gone on the first crusade to Jerusalem when she was France’s queen, was not fazed at all. She jollied her frightened servants along, walking up the gangplank of her vessel with her small son at her side, holding his hand.

The skies were gray, and the winds were brisk as they made their way out of Barfleur harbor. The seas grew rougher, and then a fog set in separating the ships of the great fleet from one another. Ranulf, Garrick Taliferro, and their squires had taken passage aboard a small smack with one of the king’s chaplains. They had secured the horses and the mule, sheltering them from the waves as best as they could. Then they sat together as the captain and his two sailors sailed their vessel toward England. Night came, and the sound of trumpets echoing in the fog to indicate where the vessels were, was somehow comforting. They shared their wine, bread, cheese, and sausage. The priest was, afterward, lost in his prayers for their safety as the ship bounced and bounded across the choppy waters. Up, up, up went the bow of the boat, and Ranulf could hear the wind rushing past beneath it just before it crashed into the sea again. The two young squires fell into a fitful sleep, their nerves raw.

The two men could not make out one another in the darkness, and so Sir Garrick did not see the look on Ranulf’s face when he said, 'Why were you really in Normandy, my friend?'

There was surely no need for secrecy now, he thought. So Ranulf told his companion the truth, admitting to his confusion when the plans changed not once, but twice. 'It was a fool’s errand, but how could I refuse a king?'

'You couldn't,' Garrick replied. 'Men like Henry Plantagenet are not like the rest of us. It would never have occurred to him that he was badly inconveniencing you. And indeed he meant no harm. You know that I envy you, Ranulf? I envy your manor and wife and child. You will go home now, and not have to depend upon the vagaries of a king’s wishes in the future.'

'But I will not get my castle.'

'Your castle?' Garrick was puzzled.

'I hoped that in doing the king a great service, he would allow me to build a small keep at Ashlin. We are so close to the Welsh, and a little castle would help to better control the king’s borders.'

'He'll eventually make some kind of arrangement with the Welsh princes,' Garrick told his friend. 'You may be certain of it.'

'But a castle would reinforce that arrangement. I know I'm no great lord, but still I had hoped to better myself by doing this favor for the king. In the end it has come to nothing.' Ranulf sighed. Then he asked, 'Did you not tell me when the king was crowned, you would go home and find a wife? What is to prevent you from doing that, Garrick? You have land. Take a wife from among the merchant class, preferably one who has a rich father. There is no shame in that, my friend.'

'I think I shall,' Garrick Taliferro said. 'I am growing weary of this single life. My mother is no longer a young woman. She would be happy for a daughter and grandchildren.'

In the morning the fog finally lifted, and they found themselves just outside of Southampton harbor. Shortly after landing, they learned the king’s vessel had been sighted, coming aground just a few miles down the beach near New Forest. Taking their horses, the two knights hurried to find their master, their squires coming in their wake. Word that the king had ridden on the very back of the storm to reach England with his queen and his heir soon spread. The English were joyous.

The great fleet had been badly scattered in the storm, but no ships had been lost. The boats came ashore up and down the coast, debarking their inhabitants and their horses, all of whom met at the various crossroads from Southampton to Winchester, where the king was to go first to secure the royal treasury. Those men who had been King Stephen’s strongest adherents waited fearfully to see what would happen, but none dared to call for a rebellion against Henry Plantagenet, grandson of Henry I, and England’s soon-to-be