Captive Queen (11 page)

“He does not need to,” she assured them, springing to Henry’s defense. “He has sufficient men and resources of his own! I give you my word on that.”

She did not manage to convince them, however, and did not dare reveal this conversation to Henry. Things were bad enough, and the reluctance of her vassals to pay court to him all too plain. Inevitably, Henry’s temper had become increasingly foul throughout the progress. In vain she’d tried to distract him by pointing out ancient churches and mighty castles, and to tempt him with the fine food and abundant vintages of the region, which should have been the source of much mutual enjoyment. But it was a wasted effort. He was not going to say one good word about anything, on principle. In the end she gave up trying.

Now, having reached gentler countryside, and traversed peaceful pastures, they were before Limoges, her chief city of the Limousin, their gaily striped tents pitched outside the massive new walls, the pride of its citizens. Henry looked up approvingly at the impressive fortifications, and his mood lightened further as he and Eleanor entered the city to the unexpectedly rapturous acclaim of the people. He expressed admiration for the great abbey and shrine of St. Martial, the city’s patron, and showed a genuine interest in the Romanesque splendor of the cathedral and the exquisite, richly colored enamel plaques that he and Eleanor were given as gifts by the burghers.

That night, they were to dine in their silken pavilion beyond the walls, with the Abbot of St. Martial and the chief lords of the Limousin as guests. Eleanor’s damsels had dressed her in a beautiful green Byzantine robe that set off her red hair to perfection, and as she and Henry took their places at the high table, she’d begun to hope that her husband was feeling happier about the progress, and that things would be better from now on.

Given their warm welcome, she happily anticipated a lavish feast, and waxed lyrical about the succulent truffles produced in the Limousin, the rich game, the roast ox drizzled with sweet chestnuts, and the violet mustard. But Henry took one look at the puny duck and scrawny goose that lay on the golden platters before him and barked, “Is this all there is to eat?”

“It is all we have, lord,” the serving varlets stammered.

“Ask Madame the Duchess’s cook to come here!” Henry demanded. “This is mean fare indeed!”

Eleanor’s master cook came hastening into the pavilion, his lugubrious face crumpled with concern. He bowed ostentatiously to her, ignoring Henry.

“Lady, I am very sorry, but this is all we have. The citizens did not send the usual supplies.”

“And why was that?” Henry snarled.

“Let me deal with this,” Eleanor murmured.

“No, my lady, they will answer to me. Am I not the Duke of Aquitaine?” Henry’s cheeks were flushed with fury.

“My lieges, allow me to explain what has happened,” the Abbot of St. Martial intervened smoothly. He was a haughty man with a chill in his manner, and for all his courtesy, barely concealed his resentment of his new overlord.

Henry glared at him, while Eleanor shuddered inwardly. More trouble, she thought, and just when matters were improving.

“It is customary, I fear,” the abbot went on in his high, reedy voice, “for food supplies to be delivered to the royal kitchens only when Madame the Duchess is lodging within the city walls.”

Henry’s set expression suddenly changed dramatically. He went purple with anger. Eleanor had never seen him so enraged; was she at last going to witness the notorious Angevin temper at its worst? It seemed she was! Roaring curses on the abbot, the citizens, and—for good measure—St. Martial himself, Henry lost control and, throwing himself on the floor, rolled around yelling bloodcurdling oaths before finally falling quiet and grinding his teeth on the rushes strewn over the flagstones. The fit lasted a full three minutes, with Eleanor looking on open-mouthed, the abbot curling his lip in disgust at the prone, seething figure at his feet, and the aghast company craning their necks to get a better view.

After the worst excesses of his rage had subsided, Henry got dazedly to his feet and stood glowering at the sea of faces staring at him.

“Know this!” he cried in his cracked voice. “I, Henry FitzEmpress, your duke and liege lord, will not tolerate such blatant disrespect. Nor will my lady here.” He looked hard at Eleanor, challenging her to agree with him, and although she had been on the point of interrupting, she subsided, quelled by the menacing steel in his gaze.

“Limoges will pay dearly for this insult,” Henry announced to the silent company. “Its walls shall be razed to the ground. No one, least of all you, my Lord Abbot, will be able in future to use them as an excuse for depriving me or your duchess of our just and reasonable dues. Now you had best get back to the city and convey my orders to your people—and see that they are obeyed! Demolition must begin tomorrow.”

Eleanor watched, appalled, as the mighty abbot, who had up till now enjoyed great power and autonomy, was dismissed like an errant novice. She knew that Henry’s anger was justified, but also felt that his vengeance was overly harsh. Yet to appeal to him now would be disastrous—she must appear to be supporting him and show the world that they were united in their indignation.

Later, though, in the privacy of their tent, she burned with the injustice of it all. After they had lain silent in bed for a while, she turned to him.

“What on earth were you doing?” she asked. “People were looking at you as if you were possessed by devils.”

“Sometimes, when these rages are upon me, I think I am,” Henry muttered.

“Can you not control yourself?”

“No. Something in me explodes, and I have no power over it. Anyway, I was right to be angry. I will not be slighted like that. I will not have you slighted like that.”

“Yes, you were right,” Eleanor agreed. “No one could blame you for being angry. I just wish you could have curbed your temper a little and not made such a spectacle of yourself.”

Henry stiffened. “Don’t you dare preach to me, Eleanor!”

“I am not. I was embarrassed. And, if I may venture to say so without your biting my head off or throwing a tantrum, I think the punishment you handed down was severe in the extreme.”

Henry raised himself up on one muscular elbow. “Do you? Pah! The citizens of Limoges—and your people at large—need to be taught who is master here. Stern measures are called for. It’s called strategy, my dear.”

“Those walls are brand-new and strong, the latest in defenses. You were admiring them yourself. They took years to build, at great cost. If you force the people to pull them down, you will be hated and resented. Could you not rescind the order and think up some other punishment?”

“I would rather be hated and resented than not have my vassals fear me,” Henry declared. “How would it look, retracting my order? I would be seen as a weak man whose word is not his bond, one to be cozened and wheedled out of decisions. No, Eleanor, once my mind is made up, it is made up for good. There is no point in trying to dissuade me.”

“You might have taken counsel of me first,” she protested. “I am the duchess, after all, and these are my people.”

“You are my wife, and your part is to obey me,” Henry flared. “I am heartily sick of playing a subordinate role in this duchy. Now get on your back and learn who is master!”

No man had ever spoken to her like that, but Eleanor was too shocked to object as Henry forced her thighs apart and thrust himself between them, ramming his manhood into her with little care about hurting her. Not that it did hurt—not physically, anyway, for she usually thrilled to rough handling—but this was the first time that Henry had taken her in anger or used her body to enforce his own supremacy. Afterward, as he slumped at her side and his heavy breathing quietened, she lay there grieving, knowing that, without her being able to help it, the balance in their relationship had altered, and fearing it might never again be possible for them to come together as equals after this.

Henry, by contrast, seemed unaware that there had been a change. He was up early the next morning, pulling on his tunic and hose and splashing cold water on his face.

“Are you getting up?” he asked.

Eleanor gazed at him wearily from the pillow. She knew what this day must witness, and wanted no part in it.

He came toward her and sat on the bed.

“I am going to supervise the dismantling of the walls,” he said, bristling with determination. “I want you with me, to show that we are united in our anger.”

“No,” she said firmly. Henry snorted with impatience.

“Up!” he barked. “Get up! Like it or not, you are coming with me.” He grabbed her arms none too gently, pinching the soft flesh, and dragged her into a sitting position.

“Very well,” Eleanor said icily, realizing that further protest would only result in an undignified scuffle that she could not hope to win. She slid off the bed and pulled on her shift. “Grant me at least the courtesy of ten minutes to make myself presentable.”

Alone with her women, she asked for her black mourning gown to be brought. “That, and a black veil—and my ducal coronet. No jewels.”

“You look like a bloody nun,” Henry exclaimed when he saw her. “Why the weeds?”

“How perceptive you are!” she retorted. “I am mourning the loss of my people’s love.”

“Don’t be so dramatic,” he scoffed.

“After yesterday’s display, you are in no position to talk,” Eleanor snapped, adjusting her veil. “Well, I am ready,” she added quickly, seeing him framing a biting reply. “I suppose you are still insisting on this cruel, harsh order being carried out?”

“Come!” was all Henry said.

   They emerged from their tent to a maelstrom of activity. Scaffolding was being erected, tools commandeered, and surly, glowering men—long lines of them—were being impressed to do the demolition work. Even the master masons, loudly protesting, had been given no choice. Women, and even children, were scurrying to and fro with huge baskets, or carrying messages conveying orders, while great carts stood ready to carry away the rubble. The atmosphere was subdued, the resentment of the people palpable. When Henry appeared, there were muffled curses.

He leaped up onto a large boulder and signaled to his men-at-arms to sound the alarum. The activity ceased, and hundreds of pairs of angry eyes turned to the stocky figure of the duke. Eleanor, standing miserably behind him, almost shaking with resentment, could see burning hatred in those eyes—and a desire for revenge.

“People of Limoges!” Henry cried in ringing tones. “I hope you will not forget this day, and I hope you will learn from it. When Madame the Duchess and I next visit you, I trust you will treat us with greater courtesy. And maybe you might like to rebuild these inconvenient walls so as to allow better access to your kitchens!”

There was a sullen silence. Then someone in the crowd threw a stone. It missed, but Henry was not in a forgiving mood.

“If I catch the varlet who did that, I’ll have him castrated,” he threatened. “And anyone else who thinks they can mock my justice. Now, back to work, all of you.” He jumped off the boulder and strode over to Eleanor, then grasping her purposefully by the hand, led her along the perimeter of the plateau on which the old city was built, following the line of the doomed walls. Behind them tramped his armed escort. The citizens saw them coming as they bent furiously to their task, not daring to slacken, for Henry’s anger was still writ plain upon his face. Finally, he and Eleanor arrived at a vantage point at a safe distance from the demolition work and stood there to watch, as citizens who had lavished good money and pride, not to mention the sweat of their backs and the blood of their willing fingers, building their defenses, grudgingly pulled them apart, stone by stone. As the walls of Limoges began crashing to the ground in clouds of yellow dust, Eleanor felt the destruction like a physical pain. Yet her face remained impassive, for Henry was watching her, as if daring her to protest; but she would not allow him that satisfaction.

   After Henry finally let her return to their pavilion, when the choking dust became too much to bear, she just wanted to flee as far from Limoges as possible, or crawl into a hole like a badger, for she keenly felt her citizens’ grief and anger, and the conviction that, in failing to save their walls, she had betrayed them. She burned with fury against Henry, and even more so when they met for dinner later and he made no reference to the events of the day and was his usual genial self. In bed he was once again the ardent lover, by turns demanding and tender, and Eleanor almost managed to persuade herself that all was well, but found it hard to respond because she was deeply preoccupied with concern about what her people now thought of her.

She could not stop brooding. It seemed to her that this marriage that she had defied the world to make had become, in its own way, as much a form of captivity as her union with Louis had been in another. This was not the partnership she had planned for, but a vile endurance, she told herself angrily. She had been duped, no doubt of it. Henry’s passion had driven her sense of power, but now she saw that it had all been an illusion. Yes, they’d had mutual aims, and he had been happy to consult and defer to her, but only when it suited him. The reality was, he had the mastery of her, by all the laws of God and man—and was determined to assert it, even if it meant riding roughshod over her feelings and sensibilities. She seethed at her own helplessness, chafing against the invisible chains that bound her.

There were, of course, no cheers as they rode away from the destruction that was now Limoges, but the rest of the progress passed without incident, and Henry cheered up considerably when the people of Gascony showed themselves more than willing to be recruited for his English offensive, and ready to provide him with ships and supplies. He put it down to word of his strong and uncompromising rule going before him. In the future, these godforsaken southerners would think twice about defying him! Small wonder they were groveling.

At last they came to the Talmont, that pretty village nestling above the Gironde estuary on a promontory of high white cliffs. Here, Eleanor’s family had built a hunting lodge, a place much beloved by her. Yet even here her subjects’ antipathy toward Henry was palpable. She cringed when, on the first day they arrived at the mews, her falconers took no pains to hide their dislike, and kept Henry waiting an unconscionable time in his saddle for a bird; and when it was brought to him, he was not pleased to find that it was a lowly sparrowhawk—a bird deemed suitable only for priests or women—instead of the royal gyrfalcon he had been expecting, and which was his right. She, on the other hand, had a most noble hawk perching on her glove. It had been horribly embarrassing, because for all the servile excuses that no suitable falcon was available, quite clearly the slight had been deliberate.