He was younger than his wife, whom I suddenly pitied, for no woman could be beautiful beside this man. Even in the dull light of the room his yellow hair shone like the sun. I had never seen such hair. His eyes were pale, as blue as the sea, a startling shade. His skin was fairer than any in Sicily, despite the golden touch of the sun, so that he looked like a shining statue. I could not look away; I feared if I did he would disappear and I would never see such a man again. Robert of Anjou, I whispered under my breath, naming him, making him real. No one had told me the French were so beautiful, only that they were foreign. As foreign as gods, I thought. Why ever had we not wanted a French king? What did it matter that no one in Sicily spoke French? This young warrior-prince would surely speak Italian and if he did not, who cared what he was saying as long as that rich, mellow voice kept speaking?
I forgot the cramp in my legs, the sore spot in my back. I could have bent there staring up at him forever. If only I had been able to wash my hair and change my cap and collar as Princess Violante had. As if I had a second cap or any collar at all! I had never longed for fancy things but I did now, for him. I wanted to make him see me, notice me, even once.
He kissed Charles on the forehead and handed him back to his nurse—oh, how I wished I was the day nurse and not merely the wet nurse. Did their hands touch when she took Charles? What would it be like to touch this prince? He bent over Violante and kissed her full on the lips, murmured something that made her blush and smile, and then he left us. He had not once glanced at me. The princess had not told him how I—my mother and I—had saved her life and his son’s. I was sorry, but I could not blame her. It was impossible to collect one’s thoughts in his presence. Surely we were all of us only now coming out of a spell cast by the golden prince who had just left us.
I did not see Prince Robert again before he led his men back into battle a few days later. I prayed that he would not be killed, and it was a small step from that to praying he would win over Frederick III. If he were our crown prince he might stay in Sicily. Even after I returned home to Antonio and Guilio, I might hope to see him riding past sometimes.
I looked at Princess Violante differently after that visit. To think she was married to such a man. She was not much to look at, but he had kissed her in front of us all and made her blush. I tried not to think of that kiss, of how his hand must have felt, warm on her cheek, of what he might have whispered, but I began to watch her, how she moved her hands, how straight she sat with her head held high. It no longer looked proud or vain to me, but womanly and desirable. Strong. A strong man likes a strong woman, a woman who knows her worth, my mother had often told me. I had thought that foolishness, not seeing it in my father or Guilio or any of the boys I knew, who wanted submissive women. Now I remembered Violante’s quiet courage in the face of her likely death and Prince Robert’s expression when she sat holding his son so straight and proud before he kissed her. My mother was right. I straightened my back, even when I was feeding Charles, and tried to remember to hold my head up.
The next time my mother came I asked her, since they had money enough now, to bring me some shoes. I was ashamed of having bare feet here, where even the servant girl wore woven slippers. Hers were not good, softened leather, and not dyed in blue or green or russet like the princess’s and her maid’s, but even they looked better than my dirty bare feet. As my mother prepared to leave I suddenly realized I had forgotten to ask about Antonio. It was too late now. Charles was complaining in his cradle and he could go from whimpering to screaming in the time it took to cross the room if I did not put him to the breast quickly enough. Princess Violante hated to hear him cry. Well, my mother would be back and I could hear about my son then, I told myself as I lifted little Charles from his cradle and loosed him from his swaddling board.
When the princess stopped bleeding the tent door was thrown open and the window flaps tied back. Charles and his nurses were moved into a smaller tent nearby, which became the nursery. We opened the window flaps to let in some light; Charles was now several weeks old and need not be protected from a mild daytime breeze. The princess visited every day, but my mother had no more excuse to come. I was free to play with Charles after his feedings when the nurse and I were alone with him. Since it made her job easier the nurse was happy to leave him with me until he had to be bound back onto his swaddling board. I wondered if Antonio’s legs were growing crooked, for we did not use swaddling boards as the nobility did but wrapped our babies only in their swaddling cloths. My mother had assured me his legs were straight, but I knew Charles’ would be straighter.
We waited for news of the war. Now and then a wounded soldier would ride back to recover and tell us of a recent skirmish. At first the news was good, but then more wounded men began to arrive and their news was of losses and retreats. Soon every face I saw as I walked about the camp looked glum, including mine.
Violante’s footstep outside the tent was my cue to pop Charles into his cradle if I was holding him. The nurse began to do the same; the princess was a jealous mother and now that the war was going badly it took very little to set her off. We curtseyed to the floor when she came through the door, and stayed there till she motioned us up.
Back straight, head bent, I chanted to myself as she stood looking us over critically. A messenger had come this morning from the most recent battle. We had not heard the news but we had seen the faces of those who had. My stomach was in knots with fear for the prince. Violante’s face was not as anguished as I was sure it would be if he had been wounded, or worse. But who could tell with royalty what their face might show?
“I will speak with you later this afternoon,” Violante said to the nurse. She turned to me. “And you, can you not wear another kirtle? I am tired of seeing you in those rags!”
“I have no other clothes, Your Majesty.”
She looked down at me, eyes narrowed. “Then have your father order you one. He is doing well enough now, thanks to our generosity. And have it made in the French style. I am tired of looking at dowdy, dark Sicilian clothes and frowning faces!”
I forced myself to smile at her, still bent low in my curtsey. Fortunately, the princess had never learned to look at a person’s eyes when they smiled. Royalty does not need to know the value of the smiles given them.
“What is there to smile at?” she shrieked. “Get up! And see that you have a better kirtle tomorrow!” She left the room with a swirl of silk, graceful despite her petulance.
I rose from my curtsey and looked down at my kirtle. It was not the bright blue of the princess’s silks, but there was a bluish hue to it, and despite being only rough homespun it was nearly new; I only wore it in the evenings. I had been married in it. If Princess Violante wanted to see rags, she should see what I wore to do my chores at home: the dull grey skirt I had worn to save her baby’s life!
I took a breath. It was no use being annoyed or embarrassed. Let the nurse smirk at me from across the room. At least Prince Robert was unharmed. Violante would not have been able to say “our generosity” so casually if he were dead.
“What will you do when they leave and King Frederick III learns you served them so faithfully?” I asked the nurse. The same could be said to me, of course, but I wanted the smirk gone from her face.
“Nothing, for when they leave, I will go with them. The baby will need his nurse on the journey,” she answered.
I gaped at her. Such a thing had never occurred to me. I had hoped to escape my life for a little while, had thought now and then that if they stayed... But to go to Naples with them? Across the sea to a foreign land? It was inconceivable. I looked at the nurse’s smirking face. And yet... who would feed Charles on the journey?
No. I pushed the idea from my head. My home was here.
The next day another messenger came. I was in the princess’s tent, braiding up her hair and helping her to dress, for her maid was ill. Violante sent me away, but it was clear what the message was, for as soon as the man left her tent, Pri
ncess Violante ordered all their belongings packed up. I learned it would be several days before Prince Robert and what was left of his men arrived, but she was determined to be ready. She sent two dozen armed men—nearly all those she had here in any shape to fight—to Catania to hold the town. If Catania rebelled in a show of loyalty to Frederick III, they could cut off Robert’s retreat to his ships. For the first time I saw fear in her eyes, but it did not deter her, rather it spurred her on.
Later that day one of the cook’s helpers arrived at the nursery tent with a yellow kirtle in her arms. “The princess says when she gets back to civilization,” she wrinkled her nose in a fair imitation of Violante in a certain mood, “this will no longer be in style, so you may as well have it. You will have to let the hem down yourself.”
I let her lay the kirtle over my arms in a daze. It was a brilliant yellow, like the sun, and made of fine linen! The color was perfect for me, with my black hair and dark eyes. My skin was fairer than it had ever been from staying inside the tent with Charles so much of the day. I would look like a lady in this gown! I blinked back tears. Guilio would never let me keep it, but at least I could wear it here for the next few days.
“Princess Violante wishes to speak with you. Someone will come to take you to her tent later today. You are to wear this.” The girl smiled, a mixture of envy and good will, and left me with my yellow linen miracle.
I draped it over a chest and stared at it as I fed Charles. The next time the tent door opened it was my mother. “I heard,” she said, walking briskly toward me. “So they will leave us now.”
I pressed my finger against my breast, breaking Charles’ hold, and eased him off my nipple. He had already stopped suckling but protested anyway as I handed him to his nurse. I motioned toward my yellow kirtle, unable to hold in my smile.
Her eyes lit up. “You’re going with them!”
“Of course not.” I frowned at her. She knew I had a husband even if no one else knew. “It’s only a gift for my services. She didn’t want to bother packing it. Will you help me lower the hem?” I did not add that I had only a few days to wear it; she would know that.
“I will be going with them to Naples,” the nurse said, standing up proudly after depositing her charge in his cradle. Violante had asked her to accompany them home the day the messenger came. The woman had been crowing about it to anyone who entered the nursery tent. Not many did, so she was desperate enough to boast to my mother. Everyone else was busy getting ready to leave as soon as the prince and his men arrived. King Frederick III had soundly beaten Prince Robert and was preparing to drive him out of Sicily.
My mother and I hemmed in silence. When it was done she insisted on washing my hair before I put it on and had me send for some water. Borrowing three hairpins from the nurse, who sulked unwillingly but was afraid to refuse my mother, the woman who had saved the princess’s life, she braided up my hair. I closed my eyes as she lifted the beautiful gown over my head and pulled it down around me. I had never felt anything so light and cool. It was like walking inside a breeze. I blushed, feeling as though I was wearing nothing but my shift.
My mother looked at me astonished. “How did I not know you were so beautiful?” she said, making me blush even more.
“Better not get used to it,” the plain nurse said. “You will have no occasion to wear it here when the prince and princess are gone. Unless you want to announce to King Frederick III that your loyalties were not with him.”
“She can’t have given it to you now, for no reason...” my mother murmured, paying no attention to the nurse’s envious words.
“I told you, Mother, she didn’t want to pack it.” I twirled like a child, watching the skirt swirl out around me.
The door to the nursery opened. I stopped twirling, embarrassed.
“I have come to take you to Her Highness’ presence chamber.” The princess’s guard stood at the opening, looking me over approvingly. Would I never stop blushing?
My mother beckoned me. “A moment, please,” she said to the guard as I followed her into a window alcove.
“She’ll ask you to go with her,” she said quietly. “You must say yes.”
“I... I can’t,” I stammered. “You know I can’t, Mother!”
“You were bound to go with them the moment I called you from the river.”
“Why me? Why not my sister? Why—”
“Because you are bold and quick-witted enough to succeed. Now go!”
“Wait! What if she doesn’t want me to bring Antonio?”
She looked at me as though I were simple. “Of course you can’t bring Antonio. I told the princess your babe died soon after it was born.”
I stared at her, horrified, and crossed myself.
“Do you think your husband’d let you leave if you tried to take his son?”
Never. I didn’t have to think to know the answer. Which showed I had not thought about it at all. Guilio was an indifferent husband but he was proud as a cock strutting about the hen-yard crowing the praises of his son. He had had only daughters with his first wife, sickly infants who mostly had not lived long. He was constantly fussing over Antonio who was since birth as strong and healthy as I have always been.
“If you try to take the child he’ll show up and make a scene. Princess Violante will look a fool, not knowing her own servant was married and had a son.”
“And whose fault is that?”
“D’you imagine you’re irreplaceable, daughter? That there are no other girls in Catania willing to wet-nurse the son of the crown prince of Naples?”
I shook my head miserably, looking at my feet. “I can’t leave Antonio,” I mumbled, near to crying. “How I’ve missed him these past weeks!” Antonio was my son, not Charles, however beautiful and sweet Charles might be. Charles could never take Antonio’s place in my heart.
“Young Francesca’s daughter died of a fever last week,” my mother said. I felt her watching me although I would not look up. “Shall I tell her Violante of Aragon is looking for a wet-nurse for her son? Would you rather Francesca goes to Naples while you stay here with Guilio?”
“No!” I whispered fiercely. I looked at her, wretched with indecision.
“You must go,” she said. “I’ll watch out for Antonio. He’ll be happy and well cared for with his father.”
Still I could not go. My feet were stuck to the floor, my heart as heavy as an iron bolt holding me in place. I wanted to stand there forever and never have to make this terrible choice. What kind of woman would desert her own child?
“You must go, Philippa,” my mother said again. “It’s your destiny. My grandmother foretold it at your birth.”
“Beware of tempting Fortune.”
My mother snorted. “Good advice for foolish, fearful people.”
“How does it end, the prophecy?”
“How can anyone know?” She looked surprised—eyes wide, brows drawn together in a puzzled frown. If I had not seen her fool others so often—women in labor who needed reassurance, my father who would not have let her keep a penny to buy us clothes if he had known what she was really paid—it might have worked.
“You always stop before it ends. Don’t lie to me, mother. I’ll know. If I’m to go away and leave Antonio, I want to know it all. Or else I won’t go.”
She watched me, considering. Weighing my resolve against hers. My mother could prophesy a little. Not like my great-grandmother, and not for anyone she cared about. But even with strangers she never told them how they would die, or any other awful thing she saw. “It does no good,” she said, “and often does harm. A man told he’ll die in his sleep is afraid to sleep. Finally, exhausted, he succumbs to sleep on his fishing boat and falls overboard. A woman is told her husband will desert her. From then on she looks at him with suspicion and imagines he’s sleeping with every woman who looks at him. Eventually, her distrust and accusations drive him to leave her. The prophecy comes true in the telling. Because of the telling.” No matter
how much money she was offered, no matter if my father beat her half to death, she would not tell if she saw tragedy or death in a person’s future.
“I won’t leave without knowing,” I repeated. “And then none of the prophecy will come true and you’ll know what I think of prophecies.” I snapped my fingers scornfully, because what I thought of my great-grandmother’s prediction, of its power or lack of power over me, was the important part for my mother.
“Then you’ll have to stay,” she said.
“So be it,” I answered, but it hurt me. It pierced me to the core, the thought of staying when I was so close to... escape. To a life at a royal court, to wearing garments like this yellow kirtle and having food sent to me when I was hungry and discussing what was happening in the world, if only with the other servants. To being able to see Robert of Anjou again. I had to reach the point of losing all of it to know how much I wanted it. Needed it. I would suffocate here, married to Guilio, taking in laundry, mending his fishing nets and cooking his dinners...
“Tell me, Mother,” I pleaded. “I already know it’s bad, or you would’ve told me. I know no prophecy is binding. We’re bound to the wheel of Fortune only by our own accord. But if you keep it secret it will haunt me. I’ll imagine ten new things each night, every one worse than whatever my great-grandmother saw. There’s greater power in secrets than in prophecies!”
“Enough!” the guard called across the room. “Who are you, to keep Her Royal Highness waiting?”
“She’s coming,” my mother called, pretending to adjust my gown. “It’s your own choosing, then,” she murmured, and leaning close, she told me.
I went with the guard, and when Violante asked me to come with her to Naples as Charles’ wet-nurse, I curtsied low and said I would go. I kept my eyes downcast walking back to the nursery and tried to think of Antonio, to remember his little face and be sad. But it was blurry in my mind. When had I stopped thinking about him? I wanted to weep. I told myself I would never see him again, trying to make myself weep.
The Girl Who Tempted Fortune Page 5
