Lady of the English (4 page)

Elizabeth Chadwick

He bent, took her hands, and, having kissed her on either cheek, raised her to her feet. “Welcome home.”

Matilda looked into his face. Six years had increased and deepened the lines on his face. His hair was greyer and more sparse and the pouches beneath his eyes were more prominent, but the eyes themselves were the same hard, shrewd grey. For the moment they held warmth, and his smile was genuine.

“Sire,” she said, before turning to curtsey to and be embraced by her stepmother, Adeliza, a year younger than herself, delicate and slender as a young doe.

“I am so pleased that you are here, daughter,” Adeliza said.

“My lady mother.” The words were incongruous and sat uncomfortably on Matilda’s tongue.

Adeliza’s eyes sparkled with amusement and it was plain she was thinking the same thing. “I hope I can be like a mother to you,” she said, “but more than that, I hope we shall become friends and companions.”

Matilda’s father processed her around the gathering on his arm, and she was introduced to the great men attending the court. Not all were present; some had duties elsewhere, or had remained in England, but enough were there to make a substantial gathering. Bigod, D’Albini, Aumale, de Tosney, Martel, the archbishop of Rouen, the abbot of Bec, her cousins of Blois, Theobald and Stephen, the latter now Count of Boulogne through his young bride, the Countess Maheut.

“I am sorry for your loss, cousin,” Stephen said. “I offer my sincere condolences.” He spoke with grave and apparent honesty, although Matilda was wary because things were not always what they seemed. Stephen’s remark was a meaningless courtesy.

“I remember you as a little girl with long braids,” he added with a smile.

A vague memory surfaced. “You used to pull them,” she accused.

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He looked wounded. “Only in play—I never hurt you.

Your brother William used to pull them too.”

There was a momentary silence at Stephen’s mention of Matilda’s brother—almost as if his words had conjured up the young man’s sea-ravaged corpse from the waters of Barfleur harbour. “God rest his soul,” Stephen added swiftly. “I am glad for the memory of our play and I think of him often.”

Matilda suspected that Stephen would tug her braid now if the chance arose, and he would still call it play.

“Nephew, you are a great comfort to me,” Henry said, his hard grey gaze missing nothing. “I know I can always count on your strong support and I value it for my daughter too.”

“Assuredly, sire.” Stephen bowed, first to Henry and then to Matilda.

The talk turned briefly to matters of Boulogne and Stephen’s progress there as its overlord. Matilda observed the camaraderie between her father and Stephen. The latter’s gestures were sure and expansive and he knew how to engage her father’s interest and make him laugh. The other men in the vicinity all laughed with him too, apart from her brother Robert, who was reserved and watchful. Stephen’s small, plump wife hung on his words as if they were jewels in a diadem, but she too was constantly glancing around, assessing the men and conversations in her vicinity even while her demeanour remained becomingly modest.

Matilda thought Stephen’s performance polished, but how much was lip service, and how much sincerely meant, remained to be seen.

ttt

Matilda gazed round her appointed chamber. The larger furnishings and baggage, which had set out ahead, had all been arranged: her own bed with its coverings and curtains, the rich hangings from her imperial chamber, the lamps, candlesticks, 23

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chests and coffers. The lighter baggage she had brought in person was here too, waiting to be unpacked. And when that was done, she could close the door and pretend if only for a moment that she was back in Germany. A sudden wave of homesickness brought a lump to her throat.

“I hope you have all you need,” Adeliza said anxiously. “I want you to feel at home.”

“You are very kind.”

“I remember how I felt when I arrived from Louvain and everything was strange. It was such a comfort to have familiar things around me.”

Adeliza’s voice was like a silvery bell. Her daintiness and innocent air gave her a childlike quality, but Matilda suspected there were more facets to her father’s wife than first met the eye.

“You are right, it is.” Matilda said. “I am grateful for your consideration.”

Adeliza opened her arms and clasped Matilda with spon-taneous warmth. “It is going to be so good to have another woman of the family to talk to.”

Startled, Matilda did not return the hug, but neither did she recoil. Adeliza smelled of flowers. Her own mother had never used perfume. She had been strict and austere, dedicated to learning and to worshipping God in stern and rigorous devotion. Matilda had no memory of softness or cuddles from her. Any affection had been cerebral and this compassionate embrace almost brought tears to her eyes.

The door opened on a gust of cold air and her father strode into the room. Waving aside the curtseys of the women, he stood with his hands on his hips, looking round as if taking an inventory, although she knew he must have seen most of the furnishings when Adeliza was organising the chamber.

“You are settling well, daughter?” His brusque tone demanded a positive reply. “You have everything you need?”

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“Yes, sire, thank you.”

Going to the portable altar she had brought with her personal baggage, he picked up the gold cross standing at its centre and examined the gems and filigree work with a professional eye.

Then the candlestick, also of gold, and the image of the Virgin and Child painted with gold leaf and lapis lazuli.

“You made a good start tonight,” he said. “I was pleased with you.” His attention turned to a long leather casket on a table at the side of the altar. “Is this what I think it is?” he asked with an acquisitive gleam.

Matilda curtseyed to the image of the Virgin before picking up a key lying in a small golden dish on the altar, and used it to unlock the casket. “I was married on the feast of Saint James,”

she said. “Heinrich and I always kept that day with special reverence. This is mine to bestow as I see fit, and I wish to give it to the foundation at Reading for the souls of my brother and my mother.” She opened the box to reveal a hollow life-sized left forearm and hand wrought in solid gold, set upon a gem-studded plinth. The arm was clad in a tight-fitting sleeve with a jewel-banded cuff and the index and middle fingers raised in a gesture of blessing.

Her father expelled his breath in a long sigh. “The hand of Saint James,” he said with reverence. “Indeed you have done well, my daughter.” He made no attempt to unfasten the base to look inside at the relic itself, because it would have been disrespectful to do so in a secular setting, but he touched the gold with possessive fingers. “They gave you this?”

Matilda said evasively, “Before he died, my husband said I was to have it.”

He gave her a sharp look. “Does the new emperor know?”

“He does by now. Would you have me return it?”

Her father quickly shook his head. “A man’s dying wishes should always be honoured. Reading Abbey will be greatly 25

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exalted by this gift from an empress—and perhaps a future queen.” He gave her a meaningful look.

She waited for him to say more, but he drew back with an enigmatic smile. “Such matters are not for discussion now.

Settle in first and we will talk later.”

She curtseyed to him and he kissed her brow and left the room, his tread assertive and buoyant.

Adeliza had curtseyed too, but remained with Matilda and went to look at the relic of Saint James herself. “Does it have healing powers?”

“So it is said.”

Her stepmother bit her lip. “Do you think it would cure a barren wife?”

“I know not.” Matilda had entreated the saint and her prayers on that score had been answered, but the baby had not survived his birthing and she did not know Adeliza well enough yet to open her heart on such matters.

Adeliza sighed. “I know I must accept God’s will, but it is difficult, when I know it is my duty to conceive.”

Matilda felt a surge of compassion for Adeliza because she had been in a similar situation herself: married to an older man and people looking at her month on month, waiting for her to quicken. When that man had already fathered children on other women, the pressure was even greater.

“He is thinking of making you his heir; you must realise that.”

Matilda nodded. “I also know I am not the only one he has in mind. My father always has a plan and a contingency plan and then a plan to back up both the original and the contingency.” She gave Adeliza a measuring look. “I respect him, and I know my duty, but I also know that for all my father says he loves me as a daughter, I am but another playing piece on his board. We all are.”

“He is a great king,” Adeliza said firmly.

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“Without a doubt,” Matilda agreed, and thought that whoever succeeded her father would have to be even greater in order to fill the void that the last son of William the Conqueror would leave behind.

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Four

Harbour of Barfleur, Normandy, September 1126

W atching the gap widen between the quay at Barfleur and the deck on which she stood, Matilda shivered and huddled inside her cloak. Waves chopped and surged, frilled with small whitecaps, and beyond the harbour mouth, the sea was a heaving grey swell. Spume burst at the prow of the royal galley and wind bellied the square canvas sail so that the great red lion painted on it seemed to roar and flex its claws.

She had not been aboard a ship to cross the sea since she was eight years old. Inevitably she thought of her brother’s last voyage from this port, ended like his life before it had properly begun as the ship struck a rock in the harbour mouth and sank in the black November night. It was daylight now and circumstances different, but although she lifted her chin and tried to look imperious, she was still afraid.

Brian FitzCount joined her. “England will be upon us before sunset,” he remarked, “especially if the wind continues to blow this strongly.”

“You must be accustomed to crossing the sea, my lord.”

“Indeed, but I am nevertheless always glad to reach the shore. It is not so bad when there’s a fair wind like this.” A smile entered his voice. “And we have the extra protection of the hand of Saint James today.”

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“I hope you are not humouring me.”

“Domina, I would not dare,” he replied, his dark eyes alight.

Matilda arched her brow and said nothing. Since their first meeting, she had grown accustomed to his company and enjoyed it. He was a mainstay of her father’s government and a close friend of her brother Robert. She had often sat up with them and others talking long into the night on all manner of subjects, from the best way to skin a hare to intricate aspects of papal policy and points of English common law and custom in which Brian was well versed. She loved to hear him in debate.

“This is the next stage on your voyage, domina.” Brian’s face was straight now, and there was an intensity in his gaze that made her look down before a spark could strike between them.

“And who knows where landfall will be.”

“I am certain your father does.”

“It is a pity only he knows the location and he will not share it.” She glanced at her father, standing on the opposite side of the vessel with a group of courtiers. She had attended on him in Rouen when he made judgements and spun policy.

He had included her in the proceedings by having her at his side, but even so, he seldom sought her opinion. Last month, without consulting her, he had rejected marriage offers for her from Lombardy and Lotharingia. She had dwelt at court now for almost a year, but time seemed to hang in suspension like a spider’s web between two twigs, waiting for something beyond dust to alight on the strands. He had summoned her to join him and then done nothing about it, as if she were a valuable surety to be held in reserve.

“Matters will move apace once we reach England.”

Brian’s placatory tone set her teeth on edge. “You know something that I do not?”

“Domina, I do not, except that there are people there your 29

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father needs to consult on all manner of things. Your uncle King David for one and the bishop of Salisbury for another.”

Matilda shot him an exasperated look. “More talk between men. I am the king’s daughter, and my father’s lords have sworn allegiance to me, but it is still as if I have neither place nor voice in the world.”

“But you will have one day,” Brian said quietly. “Now is the time to gather your resources and prepare the soil.”

The sound of retching made them both turn to regard a green-faced young nobleman heaving over the side of the ship.

Brian grunted. “I doubt he’s really that sick,” he muttered,

“unless it is with vexation.”

Matilda considered Waleran de Meulan. He had been an instigator of a failed rebellion in support of her cousin William le Clito and had been held prisoner in Normandy for the past two years. That he was not currently in fetters was because he had no means of escape. Her father had deemed it unwise to leave him behind and Waleran was set to continue his captivity in England in the custody of her father’s justiciar, the bishop of Salisbury. He was the son of one of her father’s most trusted servants and had a twin brother, Robert, who had not been involved in the uprising. Matilda was well aware that preparing her soil would involve deciding how to deal with men such as this from powerful families, who preferred to back le Clito as rightful ruler of Normandy and England, rather than her father’s line. Waleran de Meulan might look pathetic and ineffectual just now, but he was still a dangerous man.