‘You cannot do so like this. At least change into clothes more suited to the chamber than the stable.’

‘I care not,’ Louis replied, but allowed the maids to remove his soiled garments. Once more Alienor was horrified. If his outer robes were dirty and dusty then his shirt and braies were rancid. Insect-bite marks pocked his body and stinking black grime threaded every fold and crevice of his skin. He had lost muscle and bulk and was as bony as an old man. She wondered when he had last eaten a decent meal and felt a mixture of revulsion, compassion and deep anxiety. ‘I will care for you now,’ she soothed, wiping the rose-water cloth over his emaciated body.

He shook his head. ‘It is a waste of time.’

He refused to wear the fine linen shirt she had ready for him, insisting instead on a coarse chemise from the ones that her women had been stitching to give to the poor. At least it was clean, and Alienor yielded to his whim. She eventually persuaded him to lie down on the bed. As well as keeping the light, he insisted on having chaplains sit either side of him to pray for his soul.

Alienor left the room in a state of anxiety. It was one thing to deal with enemies when you had a powerful husband to protect you, but if Louis lost that power, the implications for herself were terrifying.

‘What has happened to him?’ she demanded of Raoul de Vermandois and Robert of Dreux. ‘Why is he like this? Tell me!’

Raoul rubbed a tired forefinger across his eye patch. ‘He had not been himself for some time, but Vitry was what tipped him over the edge. He has barely eaten or slept since, and as you see he has to have his chaplains with him all the time.’

‘What happened at Vitry? There has been nothing in the letters I have received.’

Robert said, ‘The church burned down with the townspeople inside it – over a thousand men, women and children.’ He looked away and swallowed. ‘I never wish to witness or smell such a thing again. I fear it has turned my brother’s mind. He blames Theobald of Champagne and the monks of Bourges, but still he sees his own hand upon the torch.’

‘You should have warned me before he arrived,’ she said. ‘I could have been better prepared.’

‘We thought he would recover and come to terms with it,’ Raoul replied. ‘Indeed, he may do so now he is back in Paris.’ He gave her a piercing look. ‘He called out in the night for you … and for his mother.’

Alienor bit her lip. She had not been prepared for this – could never have imagined it happening – but she would have to bring Louis round. If she did not, others would seize the moment and she had precious few allies at the French court.


20

Castle of Arras, October 1143

At Raoul’s home in Arras, Alienor sat in a window embrasure with Petronella. Outside the leaves were turning russet and gold. Petronella was spending her confinement here, having conceived in the months following Raoul’s return from Champagne.

‘There is no room for the child to kick now,’ Petronella said ruefully. ‘It surely cannot be long, or I will burst asunder!’ She laid her hand on her swollen belly. ‘I can barely walk as it is.’

‘You look well,’ Alienor said. Her sister’s skin was blooming, and her hair as lustrous as brunette silk.

Petronella preened a little. ‘Raoul says that too.’

‘Now that Pope Innocent has died, we might be able to resolve the matter of the Archbishopric of Bourges and your marriage. Pope Celestine is prepared to be more conciliatory. He has already said he will lift the interdict on France.’

Petronella jutted her chin. ‘It does not matter what the Pope says. I know I am married to Raoul.’ She picked up her sewing. ‘How is Louis?’

Alienor made a face. ‘Better than when he returned from Champagne, but so changed. He dresses like a monk and he talks like one too.’ She waved her hand impatiently. ‘It’s God wants this and God wants that. You could not begin to imagine how much God wants! Sometimes I do not see him for days on end, and when I do it is impossible to talk to him. You and Raoul, you are at ease with each other, you laugh and kiss; yet you are under interdict and vilified by Rome and the Church. When I reach out to Louis, he draws away as if I am unclean. You are round with child, but how am I to bear an heir for France when I sleep alone? Since his return from Vitry, he has not lain with me once.’

‘You should give him a love philtre,’ Petronella suggested. ‘Slip some grains of Paradise into his wine.’

‘I have tried that, but it made no difference.’

‘Then perhaps you should dress as a nun, or a monk … or a Templar. Have you already tried that too?’

Alienor wagged her finger at her sister. ‘Enough. That is going too far.’

‘Is it?’ Petronella gave her a long look and rose to her feet, pressing her hands to the small of her back. ‘I would do those things if that was what it took. Who knows, you both might enjoy it.’

Alienor bit her lip. Petronella was incorrigible, and yet there was a worrying truth in her sister’s words. The delayed remark about the Templar was telling. Louis had been taking fiscal advice from a Templar knight called Thierry de Galeran who had also been one of his father’s advisers. He was a eunuch but had been made so after manhood and still exuded an aura of power and virility. Louis was unduly influenced by him, especially since Thierry had become one of the guardians at his bedside dedicated to banishing the fear of demons that plagued his nights. Once she had come to see Louis early in the morning and Thierry had been there clad only in his shirt and braies as he washed his face and hands in Louis’s basin. She suspected that he and Louis shared the same bed, platonically or otherwise, but suspicion was not proof, and she could not bring herself to take that final step and find out.

Alienor gazed at the washed and swaddled baby girl lying in the crook of her arm. She was to be baptised with the Vermandois family name of Isabelle. Her skin was softer than petals, the hair on the tiny skull had the glint of a gold coin and she was utterly beautiful.

Petronella had had a swift and easy delivery and was already sitting up in her clean, fresh bed, drinking wine fortified with strengthening herbs and enjoying the attention following on from the drama.

‘Madam, your husband is asking to see you and the child,’ announced a chamber lady who had just taken a message at the door.

‘Give her to me,’ Petronella said to Alienor, setting her cup aside and gesturing for the baby. Alienor carefully transferred the small bundle into Petronella’s arms and, with a pang of envy, watched her sister arrange herself like a madonna. ‘Tell my lord that I am pleased to receive him,’ Petronella called to the maid.

Raoul entered the chamber and tiptoed to the bed, an incongruous sight for he was such a large man. He kissed his wife tenderly. His gaze then flicked to her engorged breasts with appreciation, and she laughed softly. ‘These aren’t for you just yet,’ she said.

‘I’ll look forward to the day when they are then.’ He folded aside the blanket to look at the new arrival. ‘Aaah, she is almost as beautiful as her clever mother.’

Alienor left Raoul and Petronella and went to look out of the window. She felt wistful and teary because she would never have such an intimate and tender bond with Louis. He would be horrified at the thought of coming anywhere near the birthing chamber, let alone taking her hand and sitting with her so soon after childbirth, especially of a girl, because it would sully his purity and he would view the baby’s sex as failure. The teasing, the frank sensuality, the genuine love shining between her sister and Raoul made her throat ache. Petronella, despite all the opposition she faced, was rich indeed, and standing here now in this chamber, a party to their joy in each other and their daughter, Alienor felt bereft and impoverished.

‘A baby girl,’ Alienor said to Louis. ‘They have named her Isabelle.’

Louis grunted. ‘That is all to the good since Raoul has a son from his first marriage. At least there won’t be a fight over inheritance.’

‘But she may yet bear a son. She quickened swiftly with the first.’

‘That bridge can be crossed later. We have a year’s grace at least.’

Alienor poured Louis a cup of wine and brought it to him. Today he was wearing a long tunic of plain wool, dyed a rich midnight blue, with a large gold and sapphire cross around his neck. Although he had kept his tonsure, his hair had grown back around the shaved area and was silvery bright. He had mercifully recovered some balance since his return from Champagne and the grubby hermit now resembled an aesthetic prince of the Church. The effect was not unattractive and, despite their difficulties, Alienor still felt affection for him. Besides, being with Petronella and Raoul had spurred her on to try and conceive. It was politically essential for herself, for France, and for her husband.

‘I missed you while I was gone,’ she said, putting her hand on his sleeve.

‘And I missed you,’ he replied with a wary note in his voice.

‘Will you come to me later?’

He hesitated, and she could see him working through all the possible excuses not to do so. She swallowed her anger and impatience. Petronella would not have to ask it of Raoul even once.

‘We have to beget an heir,’ she said. ‘We have been wed for more than six years. I cannot give a child to France unless you give me the means. Surely it cannot be so difficult a thing to contemplate.’

Louis stepped away from her and, drinking the wine, went to look out at the river. She allowed him to stand alone for a while before joining him. ‘Let me rub your shoulders,’ she said in a soothing voice. ‘I can see how tense you are, and we have not talked in a while.’