by Lynn Cullen
I tried not to think of my overfull belly, while in the chamber beyond the drawn bed-hangings my husband poured water into a basin. I could smell the rosewater as he splashed it onto his face. Outside our door, men laughed and shouted—his everpresent men. The number of ladies bidden to Mother’s chaste bedchamber when Father was abroad was paltry compared with the number of followers surrounding my husband. He was the handsome and vivacious lord of the land, and courtiers were attracted to him like moths to torchlight. Yet Philippe was anything but chaste. Far, far from it. My loins burned just to think of our coupling.
I heard the tinkling of little bells. Philippe’s gyrfalcon must have been shifting on her perch. My husband had brought his much-loved bird into our rooms this evening, reassuring me that she could never free herself of her tethers and do harm.
The hangings were yanked open. My naked husband stood with the candlelight behind him.
“Well, Puss.” He dropped onto the bed next to me, sending bits of down into the air. “What did you think of a real Burgundian wedding feast?”
“It was big.”
He leaned over and kissed my cheek. “The Houses of Burgundy and Habsburg like an excuse to show off. Was it better than in the Spains?”
I thought of when we celebrated my sister Isabel’s marriage to the King of Portugal. There was feasting and jousting all the way to the Portuguese border, but there was also much attendance of Mass. And there was no wine for the ladies. No delicious, fruity wine. “Your sister won’t have as magnificent a wedding feast as ours.”
He blew away a bit of down floating before his face. “A pity. Marguerite’s a splendid girl. As witty as a jester, and damn goodlooking. Does your brother deserve her?”
“Juan has a good heart. He’ll treat her kindly. She’ll fare especially well if she likes to hunt.”
“Likes to hunt! She has Burgundian blood in her—we would all rather commit murder than miss a good chase. My mother died hunting, you know.”
“I am sorry, Monseigneur.”
“Don’t be. From what I hear, that’s exactly how she would have liked to die. Come to think of it, me, too. At any rate, I didn’t know her. I was not quite four when she died. Tell me—what did my sister have to say about me?”
“That I had better like hunting.”
He laughed, then raised his voice. “Delilah!”
Through the open bed-hangings I could see his gyrfalcon, craning forward on her perch as if to listen to her master. She cocked her head to catch his voice, for she wore a leather hood and could not see.
He clucked at her. “Isn’t she beautiful? And I’m not just saying that because she’s one of the most expensive birds in the world.”
“Would not a male of her type be more valuable?”
“Not at all. Female gyrfalcons are bigger and stronger than the males—quite the reverse of mankind.”
I thought of Mother, dominating both council and home as Papa good-naturedly stood back. She loomed over him and everyone else like a single mighty oak over a grove of squatty olive trees. Perhaps I was wrong to have been disappointed in Papa. Perhaps it was Mother who was to blame. It was she, by her dominance, who had caused him to stray. I would do things differently. I would like the things my husband liked, do what he desired to do. We would be such kindred spirits that he would never be unfaithful.
“Does your bird always wear the hood?” I knew nothing of falcons. I would have to learn.
“Indoors, yes. Or would you prefer that she mark your ladies’ little dogs as prey?”
I sighed, missing Estrella. My only comfort was in knowing she would hate it here—the cold, the wet, and now having to share a bedchamber with a falcon whose talons were as long as my fingers. She would have never come out of the bedclothes.
“What did my grand-mère have to say about me?”
I stopped pinging the tassel with my toe. A sense of discomfort penetrated my haze as I saw myself at the feast, with Madame la Duchesse perched immediately to my right. Margaret of York, Dowager Duchess of Burgundy, the third wife of Philippe’s grandfather, held her receding chin aloft with the authority of a queen. Though the rest of her aging face was as bland as a skinned rabbit, a compelling, nay, intimidating, fire sparked from her eyes. Here was a woman used to going her own way. Indeed, my ladies have whispered that she once bore an English bastard. Surely that could not have been true. Charles the Bold, Philippe’s grandfather, and in his time the richest man in the world, earned his name by demanding nothing but the best. He would not have accepted a soiled woman as his wife, even if she was sister to the English king.
At the feast, as the ships had sailed by with their splendid fare, the Dowager Duchess had taken little of the exotic foods offered to her, even though it was her glittering palace in which we were dining. She said even less, noting with disapproval every bite or sip I put into my mouth and every word that dribbled out. Trying to make conversation, I had asked if she might offer me advice on how to please my new husband.
She speared the single stuffed quail’s egg marooned in the center of her golden plate. “My dear, my grandson always finds his pleasure. It is you who must find how to please yourself.”
I had blinked at my own plate, overflowing with peacock, prawns, and roast boar dripping in truffle gravy. Was she testing my desire to be a good wife to Philippe? Evidently, they were close, she having raised him in the absence of his mother, who was Charles the Bold’s daughter from his first marriage. “But Madame, I want to make him happy.”
“Make him happy! My dear child, he has no idea what unhappiness is.”
“That is admirable, Madame.”
She raised the quail’s egg on the tip of her knife. “Is it? All his life, ‘yes’ is the only word he has ever heard. It has made for a man whose appetite grows larger from eating.” She poked the white orb past her thin lips, then chewed, grimacing.
Now my husband stroked my arm. “Tell me what she said about me. She had to have said something. Grand-mère would not miss an opportunity to voice her opinion.”
I resumed my play with the tassel. “She said you were happy.”
“I am. Come now, surely she said more.”
“Truly she said little else—save that the only word you know is ‘yes.’ ”
The sweet pouches on either side of my husband’s lips slackened, as they did whenever he was serious. Then he rolled onto his back and laughed. “I do believe that she might be right. Of course she is right—Grand-mère is always right. Well, I take that as a compliment. Being agreeable is an admirable quality in a man.”
I had meant that he had heard only the word yes, not necessarily that he said it, but now was not the time to split hairs. “Indeed, Monseigneur. Being agreeable can never be bad.”
He stretched his arms above himself. “You know what my people call me?”
“Yes, Monseigneur—Philippe the Handsome.”
“Not that.” He slid his lower lip forward in a pout.
“But Monseigneur, you should be proud.”
He waved me off. “That is silly woman talk. My men call me ‘Philippe Believer in Counsel.’ I like it. I do try to say yes as much as possible—it’s a good policy. Someday I will be called simply what my great-grandfather was called.”
I kicked at the tassel. “What was that?”
“Philippe the Good.”
“I shall call you that now: my good Philippe. Philippe the Good.”
He grinned at me, his lids heavy with drink, then suddenly grabbed my leg. “And now, Madame, will you dare say yes?”
I rolled toward him, still caught in his grip.
“Yes, Monseigneur. Always yes.”
“Mm.” He kissed me hard. “You do learn fast.”
8.
31 October anno Domini 1496
Our horses thundered through the dripping woods outside Malines. The wet undergrowth whistled beneath the bellies of the greyhounds bounding beside us. Men shouted, bridles jangled, and the bells o
n our falcons’ legs jingled merrily. Starbursts of gray mud splattered against my yellow skirts as I wedged myself more firmly against the jolting seat of the pillion. I tightened my grip on the reins, though I had but one hand to do so; a hooded falcon dug into my thickly gloved left wrist.
Philippe’s mother had died like this.
So my husband had reminded me before we took to our horses that morning, eleven days after our wedding feast. His falconer was setting a bird to my hand—a peregrine, with wings and back the shining gray of cold charcoal. Blinded by its hood, it turned its head from side to side, as if to see who I might be.
My husband stroked the bird’s smoothly feathered wings. “My mother had a falcon just like this one, is that not so, monsieur?”
The falconer, a leather-faced man whose hooked nose and chin nearly met over his toothless mouth, responded in French strongly flavored with Flemish. “Oui, Mijnheer. The bird caught three ducks before your mother la duchesse fell, God rest her soul. It was a very fast bird.”
He guided the creature onto my wrist. It took hold, the pressure of its talons painful even through my heavy glove. “She is well trained, Mevrouw,” he said to me. “She will not give you trouble unless she thinks you are weak.”
I looked up in panic. I was terrified of her. She would know this?
Philippe ran his hand down the bird’s dark wing. “Mother was not expected to hunt the day that she died. She was great with child, and she would not have gone riding, even though the King of France had organized the hunt, had it not been for the Archbishop of Cambrai. After Mass that morning, the fool had given her a Book of Hours that contained an illustration of her hunting with her hawk while Death, bony and grinning and swinging a mallet, hunted her. Silly friar, he should have known she would take that as a challenge. There was a reason her father was known as Charles the Bold—and Mother inherited all of his fire.”
“My mother killed a bear,” I said. “With a javelin. Outside Madrid. Last year.”
“What? Well. That’s the spirit.” He gave his falconer’s back a friendly thump, then mounted his horse. “Make sure her bird doesn’t escape.”
Now our group galloped through a muddy field stubbled with the remains of the harvest. With a whoop, my husband urged his steed faster, slime slinging from the horse’s hooves. Our party met his challenge with cries of delight, quickening our pace and loosing our own storm of muck. Blinking away the flying debris, I moved to wrap my reins more tightly around my free hand and thus startled my bird, causing her to fly up in protest. Her jesses halted her flight, jerking her back to my wrist, and in turn rocking me in my seat. My heart jumped as I fought to regain my balance.
Aliénor de Poitiers, the Viscountess of Furnes, one of the Burgundian ladies assigned to me by my husband, slowed to shout at me. “Are you well?” Her hood blew back on her shoulders, exposing a tumble of blond curls and a smudge of mud on her cheek. She glanced toward the party racing ahead of us. None of my Spanish ladies had come with us. It being the Vigil of All Saints’ Day, they preferred to stay home and pray—it made a fine excuse for Beatriz to tackle the latest translation at which she was toiling. In truth, I had seen little of her and the rest of my Spanish ladies since my wedding, as much company did I keep with my husband. Save for Beatriz, who was of commoner birth and less rigidly formal, they clung to their Spanish habits as I sampled the delights of the Burgundian court. I had to adapt to Burgundian ways—it was that or lose my husband’s interest.
“Yes, I’m well!” I shouted. “Go on!”
The dogs began barking with excitement. Our group was nearing the river—the destination of our eager scramble. It was there that our birds were to find good prey.
“Are you sure?” the Viscountess asked.
“Go! I’ll catch you.”
She took no further urging. Off she galloped, her blond curls whipping in the wind.
My unhappy falcon pranced upon my glove, jingling the bells on its legs, the short white-and-gray-striped feathers of its muscular thighs ruffling as they caught the breeze. I cautiously trotted forth. Alone, and at a manageable speed, I was able to marvel at the flat wet landscape, crossed by reedy streams and checkered with fields and forests, all made dark and mysterious by the gloomy sky. Though the Meseta, which stretches across so much of Castile, is dry and stony, the skies are wide and high and the purest sapphire blue, their brilliance set off by white puffs of clouds. I missed the bright broad skies, but not so much that my husband’s caresses could not cure me.
Hoofbeats thudded behind me. I looked over my shoulder to see a gangling steed upon which rode an equally gangling young man, his long limbs bouncing as he neared. Hatless, beardless, and wearing tunic and buskins, he looked to be a peasant’s son, near my years in age.
My falcon hopped on my wrist, causing me to tip forward. I cried out and locked my feet against the planchette.
The long-limbed peasant’s son rode up beside me. “Do you have her?” he called over the sucking of our horses’ hooves in the mud.
I looked sharply to see if he might be mocking me, but his eyes were bright with friendly curiosity. A grin lit his wide and bony face as he gained my side. Bold, this fellow was, approaching an archiduchesse this way. Perhaps he was a huntsman’s varlet, there to collect from the brush any birds our falcons might take, though that hardly excused his impropriety.
Near the river’s weedy edge several furlongs ahead, my husband abruptly pulled up reins. Men scattered to avoid a collision. He shouted to his falconers, who unhooded their birds, untied the leather jesses, then cast the birds up from their wrists. Bells tinkled from the legs of the falcons as they soared into the sky.
The youth chirruped to his horse as if to join the rest of the party. Feeling much the outsider, I found myself anxious not to lose his attention.
“My brother hawks,” I called, trying to keep up.
He slowed and raised his brows, waiting for me to finish.
Beaters ran forward at the river, pounding their drums. Five ducks winged up from behind a stand of cattails, their alarm palpable as we approached the party.
“He hunts, too,” I said, “with all manner of dogs.”
The falcons circled high overhead, the melody of their bells faint here on earth. “Very well for your brother—”
Suddenly one of the falcons tucked in its wings and dropped like a dart toward the low-flying ducks. With an abrupt ching of bells, feathers burst from the back of a duck.
I gasped.
The falcon circled back and snatched the falling duck from the air. The fowl’s feet dangled limply as the falcon flapped back toward its master.
The youth turned to me. “As I was saying, very well for your brother, but what about you?”
With a whistle from its handler, the falcon dropped the duck. The dead fowl plummeted to a thicket on the other side of the river.
The varlet’s bold address disconcerted me. “Should you not retrieve the duck for your master?”
The carelessly beautiful Viscountess of Furnes brought her horse back to ours. “You have caught up.” The smile on her sweetly bowed lips was not for me. “Dear Hendrik, so chivalrous you are, assisting the ladies. You do love your tales of King Arthur. Did he keep the dragons at bay, Your Grace?” she asked me.
She was flirting with this varlet at the expense of caring for me? No one would have ever treated my mother thus. “Yes,” I said. “But who is going to get the duck?”
“Get the duck?” The girl blinked at me. The smudge on her face had dried, calling attention to the impossibly creamy skin of her dimpled cheeks. She broke into laughter. “Hendrik, I do believe the Archduchess thinks you are a varlet.”
The stately madame de Hallewin, my husband’s former governess and now, at his orders, my chief lady, dropped back to join us. “What’s this?” Her features were as perfect, serene, and cold as those of a marble Madonna.
The Viscountess smiled merrily. “Madame la Duchesse has promoted our Hendrik
to a huntsman’s boy.”
“I did not actually—” My falcon lifted her wings.
“You had better watch your bird,” said madame de Hallewin.
“Whisper to your falcon like this”—the Viscountess put her lips to her own bird’s hood—“Hendrik is a bird boy.”
I wished to ride off, splattering great pats of mud upon their skirts draped so handsomely over the sides of their steeds, but instead I sat on my horse, feeling lonely and ridiculous.
“Look,” said Hendrik, “a heron has been flushed.”
Smiling, the ladies turned as a heron rose from its hiding place in the reeds and languidly flapped along the river, its pearl-gray wings gracefully skimming the water.
At the riverbank, my husband shouted something to his men, then unhooded Delilah and released her from his wrist. The great white bird shot after the heron, which, sensing its pursuer, sharply altered its course and lifted toward the clouds.
“It’s going to dive!” exclaimed the Viscountess.
High above the nearest trees, the heron drew in its wings and dropped toward the river in a spiral. Delilah mirrored its fall, each of her own spirals closing the gap between them until she slammed into the heron and broke its back. When the heron tumbled earthward, Delilah shot forth and snatched it in her talons. Faithful as a dog, she flew to Philippe and dropped the great limp bird at his horse’s feet.
