The King and Queen moved into the room from their conversation by the window and Joanna swiftly curtseyed as they crossed her path.
Henry stopped and gently raised her to her feet, tilting her chin on his forefinger. ‘An eventful night, little demoiselle,’ he said ruefully. ‘I hope you are none the worse for your ordeal.’
Joanna shook her head. ‘No, sire.’ The King’s eyes were warm blue, and the morning light made his beard sparkle like gold. He smelled of incense.
‘I am glad to hear it.’
‘Joanna has a sensible head on her shoulders for one still a child,’ said the Queen, who was not yet sixteen years old herself. ‘She serves me well and often runs errands for Willelma. Cecily is well pleased with her progress.’
‘Well then, continue as you are, and who knows what shall grow from such diligence.’ Henry patted her head and unfastened a delicate round silver brooch from his tunic. ‘There,’ he said, pinning it to her gown. ‘Wear it always in token of that service.’
‘Yes, sire.’ Joanna curtseyed again, overwhelmed with pleasure and embarrassment.
The Queen smiled warmly and she and the King went on their way arm in arm, trailing scents of incense and flowers.
Her uncle Gilbert, following them, paused and smiled at her too, his complexion ruddy with tiny thread-veins in his cheeks. ‘I am glad to hear good news of your progress, niece,’ he said. ‘Well done, and long may it continue.’ He beckoned to his youngest squire. ‘Iohan, come with me and wipe that moustache off your lip, there’s a good lad. I’ve work for you.’
Iohan hastily scrubbed his mouth with the back of his hand, made a face at Joanna, ensuring that their uncle did not see, and followed Gilbert out.
Joanna looked at the shiny silver circlet pinned to her gown and with a full heart vowed to do exactly as the King commanded.
2
Royal Palace of Woodstock, October 1238
Joanna stroked the pony’s muzzle and presented him with half an apple on the flat of her palm. Ears pricked, he lipped the treat from her hand and crunched with enjoyment while Joanna watched him with pride. Usually when the court took to the roads, she travelled in a covered cart, but her uncle Gilbert had given her this pretty dappled grey gelding with a red bridle and saddle. He said good riding skills were important, for her mother had been a Marshal, and every member of her maternal family was born to horsemanship.
Her new mount was from her uncle’s estate at Goodrich on the Welsh borders, and his name was Arian, which meant ‘Silver’ in the Welsh tongue. She had ridden him for the first time today and he had been swift to respond to her voice and her touch on the reins. She could scarcely believe her good fortune.
‘He’s a beauty,’ Iohan said with reluctant admiration, leaning against the stable door, arms folded. Sausagez snuffled around in the straw, hunting for rodents, Joanna having brought him with her for exercise.
‘Yes, he is.’ Brimming with happiness, Joanna patted Arian’s warm dappled neck.
The last rays of evening sunlight tinted the trees beyond the palisade with burned gold. A man led a donkey towards the kitchens, two side panniers mounded with chestnuts from the woods.
‘Of course, he is far too small for me,’ Iohan said condescendingly. ‘Uncle Gilbert lets me help with the destriers.’ It wasn’t strictly true. He was allowed to polish the harnesses and mix the feed, but the head groom and the older squires saw to all the close work on the big stallions.
A fanfare announced the arrival of visitors, and moments later horses came pounding into the yard, their hides steaming and streaked with sweat. There were serjeants and knights, squires and heralds, one bearing a banner blazoned with a fork-tailed lion on a crimson ground.
‘Simon de Montfort, back from Rome,’ Iohan said knowledgeably. ‘His harbingers brought the news to the King this morning.’
Joanna eyed the men on their big, stamping horses with trepidation. Their open mouths and laughter, the boldness and colour, vivid in the burnished light. She had heard several tales in the bower about the clandestine marriage between the King’s sister, Eleanor, and the French knight Simon de Montfort. The marriage had happened shortly before she came to court. Her uncle Gilbert’s brother, William, had been Eleanor’s first husband. After he died, suddenly, the lady Eleanor had taken a vow of chastity, but had broken that vow for love of de Montfort. They had conducted a clandestine courtship – discreet, but not discreet enough, and rumours abounded that they had shared a bed out of wedlock. The King had agreed to let them marry and their hasty, secret wedding had taken place in his private chapel at Westminster. Almost immediately that secret had come undone and when the news broke in public, the scandal and upheaval had been enormous.
Eleanor had retired to Kenilworth to await the birth of the child, so swiftly conceived that many whispered she had already been pregnant on her wedding day. Simon de Montfort had journeyed to Rome to obtain a papal dispensation for the match amid much cynical grumbling about bolting the stable door after the horse had gone, and remarks louder than whispers about newcomers shouldering their way up the ranks through dishonourable and ribald behaviour. The King’s brother, Richard, and Joanna’s uncle Gilbert had protested furiously because of the implications to their own families and status, and although peace had been made it was fragile. She had overheard her uncle Gilbert grimly telling one of his lawyers that if de Montfort thought to pursue claims to his new wife’s rights from her former marriage, he would be sadly disappointed, for he would not receive a single penny.
Joanna called Sausagez to her side and leashed him, deciding it was time she returned to the Queen. Iohan watched the dismounting men, admiring their equipment, but stiff with tension.
Joanna took his arm. ‘Will you escort me back to the bower?’
His irritated look was superficial and she saw the relief in his eyes. ‘Very well, but only because you are my sister and you need protecting. Don’t think I am your servant.’
Joanna curbed the retort that Cecily said all men should serve ladies courteously. She gave Arian a final pat and left the stable, Iohan at her side and Sausagez dragging on his leash.
De Montfort, wearing a fine fur-lined cloak, reined his pawing sorrel stallion across their path, amusement brightening the hard planes of his face. ‘What have we here?’ he asked. ‘Are you both not a little young to be attending a tryst?’
Joanna’s cheeks flamed. Sausagez bared his teeth and began a shrill yapping that caused the horse to put back its ears.
‘I am escorting my sister to the Queen,’ Iohan said stoutly, although his voice wavered.
