Read Isabeau, A Novel of Queen Isabella and Sir Roger Mortimer Online
Authors: N. Gemini Sasson
*****
Leeds Castle – October, 1321
Two swans, wing to wing, their bills tucked to their downy breasts, floated across the lake encircling Leeds Castle. The ripples of their wake broke the mirrored surface in a broadening fan. A bank of white rolled across my view, obscuring the limewashed walls beyond and the helmeted figures that watched us from the crenels of the uppermost towers. Even the sun, climbing toward its pinnacle now, had not chased away the morning mist.
While I had gone to Canterbury and knelt before the shrine of Thomas Becket a week past, Edward had ridden out to the Isle of Thanet – where he met Hugh Despenser. I know this not because he admitted it, but because he went with such haste and purpose that it left me no doubt. While he made to return to London, he ordered me to come here to Leeds Castle, “To befriend and forgive,” he had written. And so I came, even though the pretense of my visit was as flaccid as a wet rope. I considered it a diplomatic gesture, if nothing more. This morning, however, I had awoken with my bowels churning. The day, I feared, would not end well. My breath hung trapped in a cloud before me in the damp air. Draping the reins of my gray palfrey across the horn of my saddle, I called my newest squire to me. Arnaud de Mone parted from the rest of my guard, some thirty armed men, and came to stand before me.
“You sent word ahead as soon as we left Canterbury, requesting lodging for us?”
He nodded. Pearlescent beads of moisture shimmered among the golden ringlets of his hair. Although young – and temptingly beautiful – he had, in a very short span, proven himself devoted. “I did, my lady.”
“And just now – you asked that we be permitted entrance?”
“I did.”
“And what was Lord Badlesmere’s reply? They have had ample time to prepare for our arrival. Why have they kept us waiting?”
“Lord Badlesmere is not inside, my queen.”
“Then who refuses us?”
“Lady Badlesmere. She says that her husband gave the fortress into her care with firm orders that no one, for any reason, was to be permitted entrance.”
“But I am not
no
one!” I protested impulsively. How dare she? Indeed, I traveled with armed guards, but that was only a precaution. I had not come here to take possession of the fortress, but to engender harmony. That had been clear in my message. Why must even the simplest of good intentions be suspect? Edward had given in to strict demands. Pardons had been issued. The peace may have yet been a fragile one, but it was peace. Trust first had to be a matter of practice before it could become belief. This
...
this disobedience threatened that very premise to the core. If she would not do it willingly, then Lady Badlesmere would need to be forced to open up her home. “Go back to the gate. Tell her that her queen
demands
entrance and lodging.”
Arnaud moved a foot, hesitating. “If
...
if she refuses?”
My mare twitched her ears, as if she, too, awaited my response. “We go back to London. This will be dealt with later.” By Edward – who would not likely find it in him to be lenient this time.
He dipped his head in a nod and trotted away. With a detachment of two dozen soldiers, he rode across the narrow bridge of land connecting the mainland to the island on which Leeds Castle sat and up to the gate. A guard appeared at a crenel atop the gatehouse. Arnaud shouted my orders. I could not make out the guard’s reply, but it had the terse ring of a warning. Arnaud stood his ground and repeated my demands. The guard disappeared.
A moment later, one of my mounted soldiers behind him snapped back in his saddle, an arrow protruding from his chest. Clutching at the shaft, he uprighted himself. Blood poured between his fingers. He swayed, then slumped to the side, his other hand still entwined in the reins. As the wounded man tumbled to the ground, his horse wheeled around, feeling the sudden yank of its bit. Unable to scramble free, the man threw an arm over his head. But too late. An iron-shod hoof circled through the air and cracked squarely against his skull, shattering it like an eggshell beneath the blow of a hammer.
I gaped in horror, barely able to comprehend what I had just seen.
Then, the air hissed. Arrows sailed above the breaking mist, arced downward and plunged into flesh. Two horses went down, pinning their riders. Another man fell from his mount, eyes wide in death. His party trapped on the narrow tongue of land, Arnaud flailed an arm, signaling retreat. But even as they turned to go without ever having put up a fight, another volley of arrows sang their requiem. The causeway was too narrow to allow them to all flee at once. Corpses clogged the way.
I could not move or speak. A dozen dead or wounded lay scattered before the gate and along the land bridge. One man staggered to his feet and took two steps before he was struck through the neck. Another behind him, his way blocked, leapt into the water, desperate to escape. His head bobbed above the surface, then flew back as an arrow pierced his cheek. Blood sprayed around him. With a drawn-out gurgle, he slipped below, crimson bubbles marking the spot where he had last drawn air.
Trumpeting in alarm, the swans beat their wings and arose in a cloud of white above the silver-dark water. Sleek necks stretched out before them, they ascended, going higher, higher. Above the pandemonium unfolding in the mist. Away from the massacre.
The remaining men cleared the causeway and rounded the lake with a rumble of shouts. When Arnaud came to me, he said nothing, but grabbed my reins and led me away.
My heart thudded in my throat. Hooves clattered around me. Taunts rang out from the castle.
The moans of the dying fell away behind me. But I could not look back.
It had begun.
4
Roger Mortimer:
Kingston-upon-Thames – October, 1321
THE RIVER THAMES FLOWED by in ageless indolence. A young boy, adrift on the current in a battered old rowing boat, rested his oars in his lap. In open-mouthed awe, he stared up at the long column of eight thousand fighting men moving along the road. My men. Many had fought with me in Ireland. Others lived on my lands or those of neighboring Marcher lords. They had all seen the consequences of Edward’s indulgences on Despenser. With every footfall and plodding hoof they stirred up swirls of dust. Several men stared back menacingly at the boy. He flipped his oars down into the water and pulled away as fast as he could.
We had not yet crossed to Kingston-upon-Thames on our way from Oxford to Leeds Castle when the banner of Aymer Valence, the Earl of Pembroke, appeared at the bridge over the river. I reined my horse and signaled the column behind me to stop.
“Who is it?” My uncle, Roger of Chirk, squinted into the angled morning rays of a late October sun. The creases around his eyes deepened with shadows. Beside him, Lord Bartholomew de Badlesmere stiffened and readjusted his dented helmet with a finger to his noseguard. He was Edward’s Royal Steward and the reason we had been plunged into this latest mire. He was also my kinsman by marriage. My eldest son, Edmund, had been married to his daughter, Elizabeth, for some years now, although at eight the girl was not yet old enough to join my son’s household. Of late, Bartholomew likely regretted the union, for it placed him squarely at odds with the king.
I shaded my eyes with a bare hand. Plates of armor caught the sun’s reflection in scattered bursts. Pennons fluttered atop lances in the cool breeze. The earl’s small contingent clattered over the stone bridge. “Pembroke, but he hasn’t more than fifty men with him.”
My uncle snorted. “So, the king sends Pembroke to do his talking for him. At least he picked the right man.”
Bartholomew touched the hilt of his sword. His jaw quivered. “Is there hope yet, d’you think?”
“I’ll not grasp at hope until I hear what the earl has to say.” I spurred my horse forward and my personal guard fell in behind me. My uncle let out a sharp curse as he struggled to catch up before I reached the earl, who was now across the bridge and coming up the road.
My uncle huffed as he came abreast of me and strained to stay in his saddle. “Do you believe me – what I said about Despenser long ago?”
I gave him a sidelong glance. He jounced hard in his saddle, but rather than a grimace he threw me a smug smile. I leered back at him. “Your gloating is of no help at the moment. But yes, I do. I should have believed you when you first warned me about Despenser. And I should have believed what you said about the king. But what good would that have done, Uncle?” I lowered my voice as the earl slowed his horse and prepared to dismount beneath a grove of oaks on the north side of the road. “In the end, we’re all forced to choose sides anyway. And if we don’t, the king will somehow make us, won’t he?” I leaned back and jerked so hard on the reins that my horse arched his neck and spun in a half circle before coming to a stop.
I dropped to the ground and felt the weight of my armor with the impact.
“Good day, Earl Pembroke!” I called with feigned enthusiasm. I swept my mail coif from my head, tossed it to a squire behind me and reached a hand toward the earl in greeting.
He clasped my hand firmly and drew me to him in an embrace. His head barely came to my shoulder, but he was broad of girth. Each of his thighs was as stout as a Yule log. As reputation had it, he was not a man one wanted to face in the jousts. “A good morning it is, my lords.”
When he stepped away, his eyes, dark as a Moor’s, were grim with foreboding. His gaze swept toward Bartholomew. The strained smile that crossed his mouth was not one of goodwill, I guessed.
“King Edward is still besieging Leeds?” I said.
My uncle sidled up to me, his breathing still ragged. He acknowledged the earl with a stiff bow.
Pembroke nodded at each of us in turn. “He is. Lady Badlesmere will not surrender the fortress.”
Bartholomew clambered down from his saddle and stretched his hands forward, imploring. “M-my wife,” he sputtered, unable to hide the desperation in his voice, “she did not understand my orders. She did not know the queen was merely returning from a pilgrimage. Please, she meant no harm.”
“Perhaps,” Pembroke impugned dryly, “she should have advised her archers not to aim so accurately.”
I silenced Bartholomew with a glare. “Earl Pembroke, let us not waste breath arguing over what is already done. We come, at the lady’s request, to relieve the siege. However,” – I summoned a smile as diplomatic and genial as I could, given the circumstances – “this can be easily resolved with words alone. There need be no more blood shed.”
“You would do well, Sir Roger, to go back to Wigmore and stay there awhile.”
I glanced over my shoulder at the sizable army my uncle and I had brought with us. “There are more coming.”
Pembroke was too levelheaded, and well-informed, to be swayed by my threat. “Who? Lancaster? Forgive me, but whatever promises he may have made to any of you, he won’t hold.”
It was true. Lancaster had proven unreliable more than once. What’s more, he detested Badlesmere and made no secret of it.
My uncle shook his finger in the air and limped intrusively close to Pembroke. Without his stick to lean on, he was noticeably lame. “Aymer, we’re old friends, are we not? Fought together in Scotland how many times? You were there when I tumbled from my horse and shattered my hip. It has never been good since.” He clamped a hand lightly on Pembroke’s upper arm and gave him a stern look. “We know each other too well to dance around this. So, let us leap to the truth, shall we? It was well out of Queen Isabella’s way to stop at Leeds Castle. And she approached, not with a mere retinue of damsels, but an armed force. All this less than two weeks after Edward and Despenser met at the Isle of Thanet?” My uncle had his sources, too. “Oh yes, we heard of that. How bloody coincidental. I say the queen was an instrument of their devices, not a passing pilgrim who became the victim of the Lord or Lady Badlesmere’s mistrust. We both know that.”
Pembroke’s lips tightened beneath his coarse, black mustache. He was not a man to betray his own emotions, but there were subtle signs he was not at ease representing the king in this. He looked away for a moment and selected his words with care. “I did not come to hear complaints and speculations, Lord Roger. Do you think any of us want this?”
“I think King Edward takes cruel delight in it,” my uncle retorted. “My son’s daughter-in-law Elizabeth is in there. Other children, as well. Surely the king has not resorted to holding women and children as captives in their own homes?”
Bartholomew blanched. This encounter, undoubtedly, was doing nothing to lift his hopes.
“Go back, all of you,” Pembroke urged with a trace of kindness. “Understand what I say. For the mercy of God, I’m trying to spare your lives. If you march on Leeds, you’ll be outnumbered, you’ll be defeated, and your little Elizabeth won’t have a father-in-law or a father, let alone a home. Norfolk and Kent have joined the siege. Even the Earl of Surrey. They number some twenty-five thousand. By now maybe more, with Arundel’s men. I do not exaggerate, my lords. If you believe me a liar, come count them yourself.”
The words fell heavy and foreboding in my ears. Many of those he spoke of had stood with us only weeks ago. Now they flocked around the king like birds during a lean winter to peck at crumbs. My uncle and I exchanged a swift glance.
“A moment, my lord,” I said to the earl. I drew my uncle across the road where we could not be overheard. I put my lips close to his ear. “We must negotiate.”
“No.”
I gripped his arm. “We cannot argue in front of Pembroke. He knows we are fewer in numbers. I beg you, let me handle this.”
His wrinkled lips contorted in a sneer. “I want full pardons, for all of us. Nothing less.”
I nodded and we rejoined the earl. “My lord,” I began, “we shall withdraw our army, disband it and return to our lands.” At that, my uncle glared at me so murderously I thought he might silence me with the butt of his sword across my jaw. But he clamped his yellowed teeth shut and allowed me to go on. “In return, the king shall break the siege and grant the inhabitants of Leeds their freedom in exchange for possession of the fortress.”
Bartholomew did not raise his eyes from the ground.
“Furthermore,” I continued, “our grievances shall be heard out in parliament and no actions taken against us beforehand.”
Pembroke turned toward his horse. “I will do what I can to convince the king.”
“No, you
will
convince the king. It will be done. You are the only one, my lord, who can.”
He stifled a smirk and paused with one hand resting against his saddle. “As I said, I will do what I can.”
We all clasped hands in agreement and mounted our horses. Pembroke sped off with devilish purpose. Badlesmere galloped back to our ranks for safety. But my uncle and I lingered on the riverbank.
Uncle Roger shook his head in disbelief. “Return to our lands? Disband? What sort of swine manure was that? Have you lost your wits?”
“Hardly. We will collect our allies and go north – to meet with Lancaster in Pontefract. As for Leeds, we can do nothing there. We’ll have to trust that Pembroke can work his miracles on the king. By the time King Edward learns where we are and who we are with, Badlesmere will be back with his children.”
But I held little faith in that.
*****
Bridgnorth – December, 1321
Leeds surrendered to the king. Mercy, however, was not forthcoming. They hung twelve of the garrison from its walls as a warning. Lady Badlesmere and her children, including Elizabeth, went to the Tower. As prisoners of the king.
In Pontefract, we secured Lancaster’s promise to join us, then swiftly returned to the Marches to secure our holdings. Edward, bloated with confidence, advanced up the Thames from Leeds. He halted in Gloucester long enough to gorge himself at Christmas supper and take wicked amusement in a few more hangings.
In haste, we withdrew west of the Severn, secured the bridge at Worcester against the royal army and pressed north to wait for Lancaster.
How easily Lancaster had sworn to stand with us. How easily he soon forgot.
Rain turned to sleet. Sleet to snow. The hills gleamed like polished marble beneath an iron sky. The valleys lay eerily still and the towns barren as folk fled before us. All the while Edward’s army stalked us like the specter of death from the other side of the Severn.
We had no time to stop and warm our bodies before a fire. Our bellies roared with hunger. Yet every day we pushed on, our fingers stiff and frozen, our feet swinging like dead stumps from the ends of our legs. My horse began to lag and soon he developed a rattle in his chest. I left him tied to a post at the gate of a farmer’s pen and hoped he might live to serve another, but knew he probably would not. Men went off to piss and never came back or disappeared into the darkness while others fought for sleep beneath tattered cloaks. Each day we waited for word of Lancaster. Each day none came. Just as the winter sun became veiled behind high clouds, our hopes grew ever dimmer.
I looked southward into a coal black sky smeared with amber flames. Smoke rose in twisting spires from the town of Bridgnorth and drifted on a brisk, cold wind to sting my nostrils. Earlier that night, we had launched a surprise attack across the bridge. Edward, unfortunately, recovered quickly enough to prevent a complete routing. Before my men fled back west across the bridge, they touched torch to thatch. The damp thatch was slow to spark, but once it did, billows of thick smoke poured into the streets, creating confusion amongst the king’s ranks.
A growl of contempt rumbled deep in my uncle’s throat. “So what did this buy us? One more day? A few hours?” A streak of soot ran from the right side of his forehead to the edge of his mail coif, making him look like some old beggar who had been digging in the ashes for bones. “What do you suppose the king was thinking,” he mused, rubbing at his sagging jowls, “when he told me to secure Wales against you?”