Isabeau, A Novel of Queen Isabella and Sir Roger Mortimer

by Sasson, N. Gemini

  Edward jerked his face away and snarled. “Traitors, everywhere.”

  He narrowed his eyes at me, as if he were still suspicious as to why I had been spared by the Scots. I hardly knew. Nothing more than luck, I supposed. Bad luck, at this point.

  He skimmed the Great Seal upwards over his throat and the whiskers of his chin, until it came to rest on his lips. He kissed it before he returned it to his lap. “Then I thank you, Sir Roger, for your loyalty. And your service. You have done well by me in Ireland. I do not forget such things.”

  I bowed to him and went from his presence. Maltravers hoisted the reeking bundle back onto his shoulder and followed.

  To have a king’s gratitude was a good thing. But kings were fickle creatures. Especially this one. I did not want to offend him, although that was a hard thing not to do.

  To offend a king is to court death.

  *****

  Wigmore – July, 1314

  In Gloucester, I gave Gilbert de Clare’s body over to his sister. She fell to her knees and wept while she clung to my shins. I hardly knew the earl well enough to share in her grief, or Lady Eleanor enough to comfort her.

  On the road north of Hereford, I paid Sir John Maltravers with the money that Lady Eleanor had given me for my labors and dismissed him. He wanted to go home, he said. So I let him, but I told him also when the time came for me to go to Ireland, I would need him.

  It was well past nightfall when I arrived at Wigmore. Not wanting to be assailed by an exuberant flock of children, for I was too spent to endure their attentions, I hushed the porter and crept up the stairs. I turned the latch to our chamber door and nudged it open.

  Joan stood by the open window, vigilant. Moonlight outlined the pleasing roundness of her hips through the edges of a white nightshift. My weariness was swept away in a rush of longing for her.

  She glanced over her shoulder at me, nothing more than passing irritation in her voice. “So, did you come home merely to dispel rumors of your death – or is there some other reason?”

  “I’ve come home to be with my wife.” I barred the door behind me.

  “For longer this time, I hope.”

  “How else,” I said, “is a man to advance himself at court when it is his sword that is his strength? It has won me the king’s gratitude several times over.”

  “And the king’s gratitude is more important to you than your wife’s company?”

  I let the matter go. Too often our reunions had been callous ones, tainted with misunderstanding. This first night, at least, I wanted to be pleasurable for us both.

  As she turned sideways to fetch me a cup of wine, I noticed the slight fullness of her belly in the haze of the moon’s silvery glow. How long since I had lain with her? Four months? No, five. And only eight since our last child was born.

  I walked past her, took the cup she held out for me, and eased onto the bed. While I gulped down the wine, Joan knelt at my feet and tugged off my boots. I must have stunk like a cow shut up in the byre too long. Despite my rankness, she kneaded at the arches of my feet, my calves, my thighs.

  “Your uncle is here from Chirk,” she said. “He heard of the king’s defeat at Bannockburn and hoped ... knew you would be home soon. Although, we heard nothing until the Earl of Pembroke passed through. Shall I fetch your uncle now?”

  “In the morning.”

  “How was your journey home?” Her question was a courtesy, the same one she posed every time upon my return.

  I leaned back, caught her by the wrists and pulled her hard against my chest. Her breath caught. “Let us not talk of it. I would rather have you.” I rolled her over beside me and ran my calloused palm over the curving mound of her middle. “Is it safe?”

  “Has that ever stopped you before?” She looked up at the ceiling.

  It was not an answer, but it was not denial, either. Beyond our bed, sometimes even in it, we were strangers to one another. Even after so many years.

  I tried to lighten her mood, teasing, “Have we room here at Wigmore for an eighth? Do I need to build another wing?”

  “It will be our ninth, Roger.” She wriggled free of my hold and slipped from the bed.

  I propped myself up on an elbow to gaze at her. “Will it? Well then, tomorrow I shall have to reacquaint myself with them all. They forget their father so quickly.”

  “It is not the children who forget.”

  In invitation, I pushed the corner of the bedcovers away. “After this one, let us work on the tenth, and the eleventh, and the ...”

  As she lifted her nightshift from one shoulder and then the other to let her breasts spill out, I forgot what I was saying. I went to her, peeled her shift downward so it rested on her hips, and kissed her neck. Instinctively, I pressed against her body, the growing heat in my loins seeking to be quenched within her. She turned her head aside and a thin sigh escaped her throat.

  Had I cared to listen, I might have heard it for what it was – a sigh of indifference.

  *****

  The next morning I awoke late. Joan’s side of the bed was long since cold, the indent of her body smoothed over by fastidious hands. She was probably with the children somewhere already or going over records with the steward. I had not told her I could be sent back to Ireland at any time, should the Scots cause trouble there. When the time came for me to go, I would insist that she come with me, even though I expected her to protest profusely over the conditions there. At least she would not be able to complain of my absence.

  Wearing only my breeches, I rose, stretched my arms and went to the washbasin Joan had left out for me. I dipped the washcloth in and began to scrub. Every time I wrung the cloth the water turned browner and cloudier, until I could not see the bottom of the blessed bowl. Indolent servants. Or had Joan shooed them all away to let me sleep?

  “Gladys? Clementina?” I grabbed a dry shirt and buried my face in it. There was a faint knock on the door and a long creak as it swung open. “Fetch me more water.”

  “Fetch your own.”

  I turned to see my uncle, Lord Roger Mortimer of Chirk, in the doorway, propped up by a carved walking staff. He hobbled across the room and tapped me on the knee with his stick.

  “I waited up half the night, do you know? Going to tell me about it? The whole thing?” He leaned into the gnarled staff, rotated his weight on it and gimped over to a chair, where he plopped down in anticipation of a story. He pounded the staff on the floor to punctuate each sentence. “I want details. Who fought well. Who died. Who lived. Who’s being held for ransom. All that.”

  “Tales of battle are better told over a cask of wine and late at night.”

  He grumbled in disappointment. “What took you so long to find your way home? Pembroke came this way over a week ago. Said he lost you after the battle and had not heard from you. For shame, you should have seen your poor wife. She assumed you were dead. We all did.”

  “How unfaithful of you all.” I gave up on getting clean water and put on the shirt I had dried my face on. Next, I went in search of a fresh pair of hose. As she always did, Joan had lain everything out for me on top of the chest at the end of our bed. “The king has another sycophant, Uncle.”

  His white feathered eyebrows leapt upward. “Who?”

  “Hugh Despenser the Younger. His brother-in-law, Gilbert de Clare, was killed at Bannockburn. I think he covets his earldom.”

  “Gloucester dead? That will set things on end.” He hunched forward, scenting scandal. “Is Despenser anything like Piers de Gaveston?”

  The king had pandered to the impertinent Gaveston, a man of humble Gascon origins, by granting him the earldom of Cornwall. Rumors about the king and Gaveston had abounded, until the Gascon’s murder ended speculation. “No, this is no roistering boyhood friend of the king’s, to be spoiled with sparkling jewels and fancy clothes. No, he is ... different.”

  “Hah, I don’t doubt, given his stock. Watch him carefully, but from a distance.”

  I hitche
d my shoulders in a half-shrug. “What do you mean? Do you know something of this Hugh the Younger?”

  “Him? Barely anything. But I know his family. I know the oath his father once made to your father.”

  “Tell. What oath?” I fastened the cord on my hose.

  “That he would kill him.”

  “Come now. I have never heard such a story. Did father slight the elder Despenser somehow? Steal his cows? Hunt on his lands? Sleep with his mistress?”

  “You take it too lightly. I warn you not to. This Hugh the Younger – your grandfather killed his grandfather at the Battle of Evesham.”

  “Evesham?” I scoffed. “Evesham was fifty years ago, Uncle. My grandfather fought for Longshanks then. Saved his life – it was you who told me so. Surely King Edward will know of that?”

  “Hmph, a Plantagenet’s memory is not that long. But Despensers ... they do not forget.” He slammed his stick down hard once, emphatic. “Watch him.”

  I belted my tunic and sat down on the chest. “I am more concerned for the king than for myself.”

  He replied with a visceral grunt.

  “Despenser and I are on the same side – unlike our grandfathers.”

  “For now. But be careful. If you offend the king’s favorite, you offend the king. Edward has hardly forgotten what they did to Gaveston.” He drew a kerchief from his sleeve and wiped his nose. “Now, tell me about Bannockburn.”

  “Later, I told you.” I slipped my shoes on and went to the door. “I’m going to go find my wife. Have a look at my children.” And count them again.

  3

  Isabella:

  Tower of London – August, 1321

  ONCE, LONG AGO, I dreamt of a happy marriage. But how quickly that dream had been quashed. First, Gaveston had owned Edward’s attentions. Now it was Hugh Despenser upon whom he lavished titles and treasures. Whenever I spoke up, I was chided by Edward, spurned even – as if he resented my presence altogether. Yet time after time, when things were at their worst and there was nowhere else to turn, it was me Edward called upon. Me, who salvaged the shattered bits of his life and pieced them together like shards of pottery into a mosaic. My one reward for enduring such perpetual misery had been my children, four of them. Four joyful blessings that gave some purpose to this misery of a marriage.

  Beyond the Salt Tower, dawn’s first blush showed against a brightening sky. Armed sentries peered sleepily down at us from their posts along the walls of the outer ward. To the west, a pair of guards clutching poleaxes glanced through the open gate behind them. The groan of a winch rumbled in the morning silence. Iron scraped stone in a drawn-out screech as the portcullis of the Middle Tower went up.

  Puffy-eyed and yawning, my nursemaid Ida cradled a tiny bundle in the crescent of her plump arms. I peeled back the edge of the blanket to gaze upon my little Joanna’s pink face. She wriggled a hand free to grasp my thumb, a bubble of spittle forming around her tiny mouth. When I smiled down at her, she cooed, bursting the bubble, and laughed. If only I could know such happiness, too.

  “My lady?” Aymer de Valence, the Earl of Pembroke, cleared his throat in a signal of impatience and swept a hand toward the waiting carriage, which was surrounded by a mounted guard of three dozen fully armed men. Impatient hooves tapped on the cobbles. Bits jangled. Pembroke had returned from Paris only a week ago, having just wed my cousin Marie, a daughter of the Count of Saint Pol. Although he was nearly two decades my senior, I regarded Pembroke as a dear friend, but I sorely regretted that he was being tossed into the lion’s den of disorder that was Edward’s court so soon upon his return. By evening, we would arrive in Westminster. Worse than leaving my youngest child behind, who was barely now a month old, I dreaded the purpose of this journey.

  Reluctantly, I tugged my thumb free of my daughter’s grasp. Her forehead puckered like a grape that has shriveled under the sun’s rays. Red fists flailing, she stretched her lips taut across toothless gums. An ear-splitting wail emanated from bottomless lungs.

  “You’ll come back soon, my lady?” Ida rocked her arms gently to soothe the babe. When that did not seem to work, she bounced on her heels, making her too heavy bosom jiggle inside her unbelted gown. There was a fleeting moment of peace as Joanna inhaled, but too soon another demonic howl ensued.

  “Take the babe outside for fresh air as often as you can,” – I stepped back, guilt weighing down my heart like a sack of stones – “but shield her face from the sun so that her cheeks do not blister. When you’re walking in the garden with Ella, watch that there are no bees about. She likes to sniff the roses before looking. It was most traumatic when she was stung inside her nose last month. She could not breathe properly for two days because of the swelling. Take care, too, that she does not prick a finger. She’d sooner smear the blood on her clean skirts as she would complain of a throbbing finger. As for John, do not allow him within sight of Young Edward’s new pony. That, if nothing else, is imperative. He wants to do everything exactly as his brother does, but he cannot understand that he’s more likely to get trampled than anything. He’ll sulk and wield his temper, but do not be swayed, Ida. Do not. Let him cry himself to sleep, if you must. I’ll not come back to find my second oldest lying broken in bed.”

  Ida harrumphed at me. “My lady, you know I do not let them fool with danger. Never. Or say cross words, or eat with dirty hands or forget their prayers. None of that. I’ll see that Young Edward is awake for his lessons, too, and does not pester his tutor with requests for stories about battles.” She cocked her chin out, her pride evident.

  “My lady, please.” Pembroke came up behind me and hooked an arm about my waist to shepherd me toward the carriage.

  I stole one last glance over my shoulder at Ida and my daughter, then climbed inside and scooted along the cushioned bench seat. On the opposite bench, my damsels Patrice and Marie leaned against one another, already dozing.

  Pembroke appeared at the rear of the carriage and undid the ties of the curtains. Before he let them fall, he held them aside for a moment, concern furrowed between his Spaniard-black brows.

  “Thank you, my queen, for obliging my request. I know you are not long out of childbed, but this is dire. The Marcher lords have surrounded London and will not scatter until their demands are met. The king must come to his senses. The past, unfortunately, seems to be repeating itself and if so ...” He shook his head of close-shorn dark hair and let out a long sigh. “If so, there will be bloody days ahead. Worse, I fear, than before.”

  He disappeared then, leaving me in near darkness to contemplate his warning. The carriage jolted forward and soon we were rumbling along over the cobbles as London stirred sluggishly to life around us. I groped for the stray cushion at my feet and wedged it behind my back to ease the jarring.

  If I could not convince Edward to exile Hugh Despenser and make amends with his barons, blood would rain down upon England until we were all bathed in it.

  Already it was worse than before.

  *****

  Westminster – August, 1321

  Edward marched the length of the King’s Chamber of Westminster Palace. The long toes of his leather soles slapped the tiles like the rhythmic threshing of a flail. Twenty-five paces. Head down, hands clasped behind him. He halted beside the vast canopied state bed, gazed up at the metal bosses studding the panels of the ceiling, then spun around to face me.

  I stood moored in the doorway, Pembroke behind me. It would be dangerous to approach the king or speak before judging his mood – that much I knew. Too far from me to see his countenance clearly, I dipped my head in a bow and waited.

  A warm breeze stirred the hairs that had pulled loose from beneath the brim of my coif, tickling my cheeks. Tall windows lined the long wall across from me where Robert Winchelsey, the Archbishop of Canterbury, stood. Jewels, a hand-width apart, trimmed his brocaded red chasuble. Piled in folds around his neck, his amice was adorned with quatrefoils formed from gold braids. He smiled serenely at me and tipped h
is head so far I thought his miter would topple from it.

  When I looked again, Edward had grabbed at one of the dense green curtains hanging down from the canopy above the throne. He buried his face in the heavy cloth for a moment, then yanked hard before letting go. The frame of the canopy rattled, but held. Hands outstretched, he rushed toward us. “Have you any idea how they have betrayed me?”

  I shook my head, feigning ignorance. During the time that I had been awaiting Joanna’s birth at the Tower, I had insisted on hearing the news from across England. Patrice had fed me every detail. Edward’s unbounded patronage of the younger Hugh Despenser had fostered widespread dissent among the Marcher Lords. Rebellion loomed. Had he heeded the signs – any of dozens – it could have all been averted. But Edward was beyond obstinate. He was blind with devotion to Despenser, just as he had been with Gaveston – and that had ended miserably.

  Edward stomped to a halt before me, his face contorted, as if he were wracked with anguish. “Not only have they burned and ravaged Hugh’s lands, but they’ve taken up with Lancaster. God in Heaven – Lancaster!”

  Eyes downcast, the archbishop’s shoulders sagged, as though he had long since given up trying to persuade the king to hear reason.

  Pembroke stepped past me into a slanted beam of reddish sunlight. “It was said that the Mortimers sent Lord Badlesmere to meet with Lancaster in Pontefract. If Lancaster joins them, their might and power will be far beyond anything we can muster. I beg of you, sire, this is not the time to resist. Remember your coronation oath. Hear the barons out. Grant their request to banish Despenser. Then promise pardons in full. If you shut your ears to their pleas, you stand to lose more than your kingdom.”

  “I know what I stand to lose, Aymer,” Edward snapped. “I will lose him either way, it seems. Already I have lost the power my birthright has afforded me.”