“I did not mean to,” she whispered. “I thought this would be merely a meeting of bodies and ambitions.”
He should have felt triumph at her words, but he felt only sadness.
“I made your fair Prince Hal an offer,” Philip said. “Both he and I lust after the throne, but neither he nor I could achieve it on our own. So I suggested an alliance between him and me, against poor unsure Charles and this saintly Joan—”
Catherine allowed herself a small measure of relief.
“—after which victory he and I would have to fight it out over France itself. But, Catherine, we don’t have to fight it out at all, do we? You carry the throne on your wedding finger—
whichever of us you choose as husband also beds France.”
She waited, silent, her eyes watching his face carefully.
“We have wagered,” Philip said, “to allow you to decide the fate of the French throne.”
“Oh no, Philip, no—”
Gently, he pushed her back until she lay flat.
The firelight scattered over her pale body, and Philip had to take a deep breath. “He thinks he will win.”
“Philip—”
He moved over her, leaning down to kiss her once more.
“Have I not been the most foolish of men,” he said finally, “to wager a throne on love?”
She reached up a trembling hand and touched his face. She tried to smile, and couldn’t.
“In your wisdom,” she whispered, “you have become the most dangerous of enemies.”
He ran his hand down her body, and she understood how badly he wanted her.
“If, in his turn,” he said, “Hal had offered me the choice of either you or the throne, I would have taken you.”
“Oh, sweet Jesu,” she said, “what have I done?”
“WE MAY not have a marriage of love,” Mary said, “but I would that it be a marriage of honesty, and even one of some respect. Tell me of Catherine.”
They were in their bedchamber, each as far apart from the bed and each other as they could possibly get: Mary sitting on a small chest under a great Arras tapestry which hung on the far wall of the chamber; Bolingbroke standing, leaning against the doorframe with folded arms.
This was not a conversation he felt like having, not after what he and Philip had talked of earlier, and not while he imagined how Philip might currently be employing his body to further his cause. Nonetheless, Bolingbroke was tired of subterfuge … and knew that, having seen his face as he stared at Catherine this afternoon, Mary was tired of it too.
“Catherine and I met many years ago,” he said, his eyes steady on Mary’s face. “There were some negotiations—mainly pushed by my father—but they did not prosper. King John did not want his granddaughter marrying the son of the fourth in line to the English throne … and for that matter did not want her marrying an Englishman at all.”
“But you loved her. You still do.”
“Yes,” he said, and Mary looked away.
She thought a long while before she spoke again, but when she did she raised her eyes back to her husband with a clear, steady gaze.
“I do not think that I shall long encumber you, Hal, but while I do I would that you treated me with respect, and with dignity.”
Bolingbroke straightened and crossed the floor, dropping down on one knee before her. He kissed her hand.
“I did you wrong this afternoon, Mary,” he said, “even though it was unintentional. Respect and dignity is the least I can give you.”
She nodded, knowing the words were easy enough to say, and knowing also that his ambition to wrest the throne from Richard meant that he could not yet afford to alienate her.
The English commons loved Bolingbroke, and Mary was certain that many of the nobles respected him and were prepared to back him—but that love and respect and support would be severely tried if fair Prince Hal threw over his respected English wife for the sluttish daughter of the French whore Isabeau de Bavière.
For the first time in many, many long months Mary felt an inkling of her own power, and an understanding of how she might use it. She reached out a hand, caressing Bolingbroke’s face, thinking how comely it was … and thinking of how much he undoubtedly would prefer to be with Catherine this night.
She smiled slowly, thinking of the most effective means to revenge herself for the humiliation he had visited on her earlier.
“Then make love to me,” she said. “Gently, and slowly. As any husband should do to his wife.”
CHAPTER IX
Nones on the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary
In the second year of the reign of Richard II
(noon Wednesday 15th August 1380)
TWO DAYS AFTER Philip and Catherine had departed, news arrived for Bolingbroke that brought him to his feet, a tight and hungry gleam in his eyes as he scanned the letter.
He scrunched the letter into a crackling ball in his fist, then flung it on the fire.
“Tom,” he said, “you have an uncle who is worth more than his weight in gold.”
From that moment, everything became frantic activity.
Almost from the hour of that letter’s arrival men and horses had arrived in groups of two or three, ten or tens, crowding the courtyard of the Gravensteen, more and more arriving each day until it appeared that hundreds of men clattered in every hour.
By mid-August they were gone from the Gravensteen.
Bolingbroke had long held plans for this day.
A COLD, gray wind swept across the waterfront of Sluys Harbor in northern Flanders, binding everything in its frigid embrace. Men bustled to and fro, rolling kegs and barrels over the cobbles toward the great ship bobbing at the wharf’s edge. Others murmured soft and reassuring words to the skittery and white-eyed warhorses they led toward the gangplank.
Others yet counted and then recounted sheaves of arrows and crossbow bolts before piling them into their grim stacks of hate.
Sailors swarmed about the deck and rigging of the ship, readying her for sea. One scrambled up the mast, unfurling the red, gold and white standard of Bolingbroke—a combination of the three lions of the Plantagenet dynasty, the Lancastrian fleurs-de-lis and castle, and Bolingbroke’s personal emblem of the head of a visored knight.
It snapped in the wind as if angry, chafing at the delay.
Beyond the ship, bobbing impatiently in the deep sea channel of the harbor, waited five more
vessels, already fully laden with men, horses and weapons.
Bolingbroke was striding to and fro, shouting orders and curses in equal amounts. At his shoulder strode Thomas Neville, now and then speaking urgent words in Bolingbroke’s ear.
Both men wore thigh-length chain mail, heavy metal-studded gloves and steel greaves above their boots. Over their chain mail, both wore sleeveless tunics: Bolingbroke’s white and Neville’s scarlet, but both with the Bolingbroke standard sewn across their chests. Cloaks, colored and embroidered to match their tunics, flew back from their shoulders in the cold wind. Both men had swords swinging at their hips, and daggers thrust into their sword-belts.
Their faces were tight and determined, but glowing with purpose and what was probably subdued exuberance.
Bolingbroke stopped to clap a hand on the shoulder of a man-at-arms, sharing a brief smile and jest with him. Then he and Neville were off again, striding to the horse lines, each seeking out his own mount. Raby, the ever-faithful retainer, had managed to ship over to Flanders Bolingbroke’s and Neville’s favorite stallions when he’d sent Bolingbroke’s household goods many months ago.
MARY WATCHED, still and silent to one side, wrapped tightly in a black cloak. Margaret was by her side, similarly wrapped. The ever-vigilant Agnes waited with Rosalind under the eaves of one of the waterfront warehouses, where they could observe the activity but were protected from the wind.
“War,” said Mary. “See how they enjoy it!”
Her mouth twitched. And a war and an ambition heavily funded by the dowry I brought to my marriage bed.
“If you wish,” Margaret said, her eyes following the movement of men about them, “we could wait in the house of the Lieutenant of the Harbor. He has offered us its facilities.”
Mary shook her head. “Nay. I prefer that I stand here and watch what my husband does.
Margaret shot her a look, wondering exactly what she meant.
Mary’s mouth twitched again, and she smiled, unable to keep the grin back. “Poor Hal. Every night that Catherine and Philip stayed at Gravensteen I demanded that he make love to me.”
She saw the look on Margaret’s face, and she untangled one of her gloved hands from her coat and briefly touched Margaret’s heavily wrapped arm.
“I may not be the woman he wants,” Mary said, “but I am the woman he has.”
“Catherine is not an evil woman,” Margaret said.