The Secret Eleanor (21 page)

“I hope neither of these is the lute player Uncle Bordeaux wants to give us.”

“So do I, very heartily.” Eleanor turned to send a page for more wine. “It should not be said of any lute player that I would rather listen to flatteries than him.”

As soon as they were back in the Queen’s chambers, the door shut, the braziers glowing hot, Eleanor almost burst out of her bonds, flinging her gown off, turning around and around as Alys unwound her. She sprawled out on the bed with a sigh. The other women hurried around, putting her discarded clothes away and setting up the room for the night. Petronilla sat down by the window, her hands in her lap, watching everything.

She had been thinking over what Eleanor had told her of the talk with Bordeaux, and she agreed with her sister: They were running out of time, and there seemed no way to force the issue. Claire went by her with a candle, shielded from the draft, to light the candles by the bed. Eleanor’s hair, spread out on the pillow, picked up the light like a bed of embers. Petronilla looked away. She had begun to lust for her freedom, and now they were snatching the chance away from her.

Then, in through the window, came the first notes of a lute.

Petronilla’s lips parted; in the heat of the crowded room the notes fell upon her like drops of cool clear water. The jangling of the monastery’s musicians faded out of her memory. This was how the lute should be played, the tones firm and mellow at once, deep and singing. She turned her gaze toward Eleanor and saw her sitting up in the bed, looking toward the window. All of the other women had fallen utterly still.

The melody came in, two or three lines of pure music, and then the voice rose. And it was equal to the lute, strong and manly, deep and resonant, like a dark slow-flowing river of sound.

 

 

She found herself smiling. Her gaze went again to Eleanor, who was flushed, her eyes bright, canted toward the window. The song went on, telling of the courage and honor of the knight, the beauty and passion of the Queen, the fate that exalted and destroyed them like a pure, cleansing flame. Inside the room, the candles guttered, and one by one went out. Claire huddled up, her head on her knees. The other women lay down on their blankets. Slowly, everyone else, even Eleanor, fell softly into sleep, but Petronilla stayed by the window, listening.

The song and the voice seemed only for her, and especially for her, as if the night itself wakened her from some prison of memory, called her back to life. Locked in her current frets, she had not thought for days of the treacherous Ralph, and now, in her mind, he seemed faded, thin and insufficient. The song lifted her up strongly on its sensuous wings, and she felt herself opening to that, her body yearning, as if the music were a key to some door inside that she had forgotten was there.

Even as she wakened, she felt herself hesitant, almost withdrawing, afraid of the risk. In the great bed, Eleanor murmured luxuriously in her sleep and cast one arm wide—Eleanor, who loved risk, and risked everything, at every opportunity.

Petronilla thought,
Am I going to spend the rest of my life sitting under the window listening to someone else’s song?

The last notes hung in the night like struck silver. The troubadour’s voice faded. At last she got up and went to the bed, to lie by her sister and sleep.

In the morning, the room was icy cold, and when they brought in the braziers, full of smoke and smells. Eleanor gave a flurry of orders, and the women rushed around to clean up and try to improve things. Petronilla went out to the garden with some pages to look for rosemary to sweeten the floor.

They had to go far out into the garden to find bushes not already cropped nearly to their bare stalks. By the wall at last she found an untouched stand, and she pointed here and there, and the boys with their shears cut armfuls of the sweet blue-flowered sea dew, which would perfume the room. The boys gathered them and ran on ahead of her, and she walked back slowly through the winter-deadened garden.

The path took her around a corner, and there she came on a man sitting on the ground eating an apple.

He looked up at her, startled, a stocky, ordinary-looking man, with a shock of thick black curly hair. She shrank back, wary. He leaped to his feet, his eyes gleaming, bobbed a little bow, and smiled.

When he smiled, she felt a ripple all along her body, as if he radiated some intense interest, fixed totally on her, a wave of desire. Beside him on the ground lay a leather sack, lute-shaped. She realized at once who he was, even before he spoke.

His voice was like dark honey, roughened with a strange accent. He said, “My lady, excuse me—is this your garden? You must excuse me—I have no business being here—I hoped to go unnoticed.” His black eyes glistened. “Are you the Queen?” And he smiled again.

She knew he was lying; he had intended to be found. In spite of this, his smile drew her a step toward him. “No,” she said. “Only the Queen’s sister. You are the lute player, though—Brintomos?”

He bowed, only with his head, not with the whole body bent as the French courtiers did it. “Well, something like that. Thomas will do, I suppose.” His smile deepened, mischievous. He had dark eyes under thick black brows. “They told me of a beautiful Queen. Nothing of an even more beautiful princess.”

She did not disabuse him of the idea of princess. She gathered her hands before her, her body warm with the compliments, but wary, as she always was, of being held worthy only for her sister’s sake. She said, “We heard you last night—my sister is very pleased with you. You should go to her steward, Matthieu; he will give you a place in her retinue.” The magic of his art laid hands on her. She wanted him to sing to her again; suddenly she wanted to sit down beside him and let him lavish all his attention on her. She could not look away from his smile, and his brilliant black eyes. Then the page came up behind her, with Alys.

“My lady—”

She turned, swirling her cloak around her, as if she had been naked before. “Alys, what is it?”

“My lady, we need more rosemary,” the waiting woman said. A half smile curved her lips, and she looked from Petronilla to the lute player. “Did we disturb you, my lady?”

Petronilla felt her neck and cheeks warm, and knew she was flushed. She cast a look over her shoulder at the lute player, Thomas.

“This is the man who sang to us last night, Alys. You, Thomas, go, as I said, to the steward, Matthieu. You may say that Petronilla has sent you.”

Alys said, mildly, “The Queen will want to see you also, sir.” Her voice had an edge of amusement. Petronilla took her skirts in her hands and skipped away up the path, her spirits rising, but she did not look back.

The lute player came that afternoon and sang for Eleanor herself, surrounded by the women; Eleanor was much pleased with him and gave him a ring and bade Matthieu provide him with a mule to ride, so that he could accompany them when they left Fontevraud. Petronilla reveled in the music, with its soft, sinuous invitations. He had the gift of seeming to sing to her alone, even in a roomful of other women. Every time his glance strayed near her, she saw a message in it. All the women made much of him, but she held back, as if going too near him might burn her.

In the evening, restless, she went again into the garden. The night was falling, cold and blue, the light gone out of the air, and yet everything still visible in the half-darkness. She held her cloak close around her and her feet were quiet on the pebble path. Then, turning that same corner, she found the lute player Thomas again, not entirely by accident.

But he was not alone. He sat on the ground, with Claire on his lap, her arms around his neck, and her lips against his. In spite of the cold, the girl had half her gown pulled down, revealing one small, perfect, virginal breast.

Petronilla’s jaw dropped. She saw at once that his glamour fell equally on everyone who heard him—it was part of his craft, like playing the lute. She wondered briefly if he was a spy. Claire had spied, and now her heart turned to ice against the girl; unreasonably, she longed to scratch her eyes out, and claw the lute player’s face until he bled. Quickly she went away up the pebble path.

With each step she went more easily. His spell was broken; she saw there was no truth in all his flatteries. He wanted only some advantage, like all the rest. She felt suddenly sorry for Claire, whom he had seduced, and her anger drained away. She remembered that she liked Claire, and began to hope she did not give in to him. When she reached the door, she was smiling again, relieved she had escaped.

When she went in, Eleanor said, “We are going tomorrow, are you ready?”

“Oh, yes,” Petronilla said. The room was more orderly and smelled a little better, but the braziers still filled the upper air with smoke. She went to the window, where the air was good. “I’ll be glad to leave. Every day takes us nearer to Poitiers.”

In the morning, with the porters hauling all their baggage out, Petronilla walked in the gallery, and Claire came to her, looking guilty.

She said, with no preamble, “My lady, I saw you. In the garden.”

“Oh, did you,” Petronilla said. She took the girl by the elbow, and steered her into a corner. “I trust you enjoyed yourself.”

Claire fumbled with her hands. “I didn’t mean—I had nohe—he—” She shook her head slightly, casting off cobwebs, and said, “What should I do?”

Petronilla leaned against the wall, watching through the side of her eye for anyone listening, and said, “Well, what did you do?”

“Nothing. Only what you saw.” Claire’s face was crooked with worry. She looked much younger. Her voice was taut as a lute string. “I knew it was wrong, but I couldn’t stop him, until I saw you there.” She lifted her eyes, imploring. “Then I stopped him.”

Petronilla grunted at her; she did not believe her. She said, “Give him nothing more. He can give you nothing; you are noble, and he baseborn.” She doubted this advice was timely. “His heart’s in his music, girl. You cannot win him to any other love. Go along, now, there’s much to do.”

“My lady—” Claire licked her lower lip. The creams Alys had given her had improved her complexion, her skin smooth, pink and white, but her nose was too large, her eyes too small, ever to be beautiful. She gave an unhappy laugh. “Don’t tell the Queen.”

“Why do you think the Queen is even interested?”

The girl looked away, her mouth drooping, and a tear coursed down her cheek. Then, abruptly, she was facing Petronilla again.

“He has talked to me. My lord Thierry.”

“Ah,” Petronilla said. “That will interest the Queen. What did he say?”

“He wants—” Claire swallowed. “He wants to meet with her. The Queen. Quietly, in some private place.”

“Does he,” Petronilla said, startled. She glanced sideways again, to see they were unnoticed. “What did you say to him?”