Matilda Empress Read online

  With carmine cheeks, Gerta informs me that many at Bristol palaver at length over the relationship between FitzCount and their empress. Sir Brian’s solicitude cannot be hidden. Our arrival together, his friar’s costume, and my bare limbs, stimulates the invention of our retinue. Much is made of his being chosen to escort me in the hour of greatest danger. My supporters wonder why there has been no earldom created for him. They are sure his bloated passion for me robs his wife of her due. My own court scorns my negligent return of the knight’s affections, thinking nothing of my foreign husband’s rights.

  I have asked my maid to bring FitzCount to my solar tonight, at midnight watch.

  She blustered, not wishing to fuel the stories that circulate, yet must obey.

  †

  My ardent devotee arrived.

  I was bathing, holding my torn feet up out of the water, so as not to wash away the stinging paste of mint coating my blisters.

  Scrubbing my back and shoulders, Gerta adjusted her position, so that my admirer could see less of my form from the bench that he had chosen.

  I turned my head. Brian was dressed as befits his position, but his tonsure has not yet grown in; the discrepancy between his noble tunic and his pious coiffure unsettled me. “Sir, the world notes the nature of your fervid attachment. As intimate as you are with me, you must realize what boon I demand of you.”

  FitzCount hung his head, and addressed the ground. “You have never asked me to account for my most despicable failure, Empress. I am grossly ashamed to have let you down in such an ignominious fashion.”

  I pushed my waiting woman to the side. “The risk that you took was immense. If you did not succeed, then the task was too great for any man.”

  Brian rose from his seat and approached. He lowered himself to his knees and clasped his hands on the ridge of the tub.

  Gerta froze, incredulous.

  The knight made his confession. “I befriended the ugliest of Maud’s servants, the one least likely to have enjoyed a man’s favors, and sullied myself with her ungainly flesh. In gratitude, the hussy agreed to brew Marie’s herbs. She was to offer the potion to the queen, as a digestive drink, after the Feast of the Exaltation.”

  I reached up one wet hand, to stroke FitzCount’s boyish face. “What terrible luck.”

  “The news of your decampment from Winchester cut short Her Majesty’s dinner. Instead of whiling away the evening, she stormed furiously across the countryside in hot pursuit. Abandoning her entourage to come to your defense, I do not know what became of the packet of poison.” His glance fell to what was clearly visible under the water.

  “Gerta, the temperature falls. Perhaps you might retire to the hearth in the great hall. Sir Brian will help me to my pallet.”

  My maid nodded gravely, and spoke with as icy a tone as she had ever mustered. “As you wish, Empress.”

  After she quit us, FitzCount stroked my hair.

  I trembled. “Do not lay a finger upon me. You told me once that all you needed was my regard. Is it no longer enough for you?”

  The young man slid his palm onto my collarbone, and then along its ridge. Softly, he grunted.

  “You must not allow everyone in my household to translate your fulsome sentiments. I cannot be the subject of so much lurid talk.”

  Brian plunged his hand lower, onto my belly. “Do not refuse my adoration!”

  I shivered, but when I closed my eyes, I saw Stephen’s face. I swept Brian’s arm away from my thigh.

  Just then he moaned aloud. “Oh God! An angel commands me to adorn myself with excrement.”

  I blushed. “I deny you the solace of my embrace, for I am the seraph whose virtue cannot be sullied.”

  †

  In the hour before the dawn, I slid along dark passageways, gliding in stealth to the oubliette, in the basement of the marshal’s tower, in the outer ward. I carried a candle, carefully sheltering its small flame. Holding the taper to the grill on the floor, I could barely pick out Stephen’s prone form. Gradually, I discerned his red head and his emaciated body, curled up like an infant. I muffled a cry, for he was a shadow of himself.

  My chest thudded. “Shall I trade your decrepit carcass for my brother’s?”

  The Count of Boulogne turned over onto his back. Mutely, he gazed up at me.

  I gathered my thoughts in the silence. “On the other hand, I might send you, or what is left of you, to the wilderness of Ireland.” Was he gone into the void?

  Then his voice came out in a croak. “Ah, Matilda, my fair one. It would be something to cavort again in one another’s arms. I would relish your hot touch in the cold of my prison.”

  How could he flirt with me now? “The Virgin herself deposed you; without Her favor, how can you ask for mine?”

  Stephen rolled back onto his stomach.

  A sharp pain coursed through me. Tears moistened my cheeks, but I dashed them away, and struggled to strangle my emotions, or, at the very least, to conceal them under the guise of sterile detachment. Had I fooled him, or myself, or the heavens above?

  †

  At terce, Amabel accosted me in the sewing room. I was at work upon a small tapestry, stitching two bodies intertwined, surrounded by serpents. “Queen Maud makes my husband a magnificent offer. If he swears affiliation to their party, he will stand the second lord of the land. After the king’s, his will would be law.”

  I looked up from my needlework, into her pouting face. “Robert is no fool; he will never agree to such a patently absurd proposition. My brother knows what little trust to put in the promises of the House of Boulogne. He will be immune to the blandishments of that slut, the countess. He is not like most warrior earls.”

  Amabel’s wide face registered surprise. Perhaps she had not thought to be jealous of Maud’s bribes or allure. “Without Gloucester, your cause is lost. Trade him for His Majesty, and regain your respectability.”

  I pricked my finger and put it in my mouth to suck. “Robert would never advise me to unleash the pretender. With the usurper enslaved, the throne of England sits empty, ready to receive me.”

  The countess looked as if she would have spit upon floor, if she had been beside any person beneath her in rank. Her fury exploded. “Your own brother sacrificed himself, to guarantee that you lived! Would you let him die? The queen threatens to ship him off, to rot in Boulogne.”

  In my lap, the snakes harassed the lovers. “Gloucester would not want me to capitulate, merely because he is no longer his own master.”

  My sister-in-law fairly shouted. “You are a hard mistress, Lady!”

  †

  To be Empress of the Romans is nothing.

  Loyal only to themselves, Amabel and Maud agree to barter their husbands. My birthright and all the oaths of fidelity sworn to me do not stop the Countesses of Gloucester and Boulogne from circumventing my authority. When Eustace arrived at Bristol Castle, as surety for my brother’s safe conduct, Amabel’s keys freed our prisoner. Accompanied by a splendid procession of his barons, my desiccated cousin trotted off to be reunited with his wife. His destrier gleamed, somehow sporting crimson trappings and brass fittings. Which lout of a groomsman in my stable washed and brushed the animal’s mane? What disloyal page wound red ribbons into its tail?

  Meanwhile, Henry of Blois and the archbishop of Canterbury safeguard the earl’s return to us. Until then, my sullen hostage ill recompenses me for the loss of his father. Indignant at the threats to his succession, Eustace alienates everyone in my household. The resentful youth, still unbearded, has his mother’s features. My Plantagenet inherits Stephen’s beauty and charisma.

  Discounting my disapproval, everyone, on both sides of the conflict, agrees that the civil war must revert to the time before the Battle of Lincoln. The gains and losses of this year shall be erased; Boulogne and I are to resume our rivalry from our previous positions. No one speaks of peace. Every corner of Britain remains at odds. All are blind to the horrors of continued disorder.

&nbs
p; I pray to the Holy Mother for my own ambitions, and also for the plight of my subjects. In anarchy, nothing shelters them. In misery, they fester. When will the Lord lift up His countenance upon them?

  †

  At a festival court in Canterbury, the archbishop crowned and anointed Stephen and Maud for the second time. The minstrels swear that the spectators were more dazzled by the countess’s comeliness than by her copious jewels. The ceremony renewed the pretender’s solemnity and repaired his eminence, restoring him from obscurity to his status, his regalia, and his friends.

  A great entourage assembled to celebrate the usurper’s reinstatement. Bishop Henry was one of many who assured my rival of his renewed partiality. His Grace excused his brief flirtation with my cause, calling it the result of extreme necessity, not of zealous preference. The false king repaid this betrayal with amity, and humored his sibling by agreeing to enter into a pact of brotherhood. The jongleurs, pretending to have witnessed the ritual, describe the chalice into which they each dribbled a bit of their blood. They vowed not to divorce in times of trouble, then drank to one another’s prosperity.

  Oddly, my cousin’s late sufferings reinforce the mildness of his demeanor. In his renewed glory, he is no harsher than he was before. Of course, those who adhered to him throughout his ordeal are well rewarded. Adeliza’s husband, William, is granted the earldom of Lincoln, formally negating Ranulf of Chester’s claim to this title.

  †

  In pity and loneliness, I license Sir Brian to enjoy my beloved’s carnal privileges. I blush now to record my shameless foolery. I have stooped so low as to dance lewdly before him, while strumming upon a little harp.

  In gratitude, FitzCount pushes a scrap of parchment under the lintel of my solar door.

  There is no man on earth, no king, no prince, no emperor, who could not be charmed by your dimpled navel, your lean flanks, the very soles of your feet.

  Gerta suspects that the knight has subjected me to some enchantment. She ransacks his quarters looking for evidence, and triumphantly presents me with a mangled broom, missing a chunk of its straw. She is sure that she saw him, at three consecutive Masses, clutching a bulging satchel. She declares that he has brewed the sheaths into some infusion, and drunk it, to have his way with his goddess.

  In truth, I burn to consider that Stephen must have fornicated with me for the same reasons that I permit FitzCount’s attentions, a charitable impulse and the promptings of a vicious nature. I take reasonable precaution, and swallow a hornet, so as to prevent the conception of a child, but still I allow Brian to caress me, and quiver under his touch. He is not my heart’s idol, but I have consigned my beloved to the past.

  If I am to recover my sanity and my worthiness, I must disavow the pretender everywhere, in everything. The corpse of a great passion decays in my heart; its effigy swings in my mind. I can no longer permit myself to feed this cadaverous yearning. My lust is infected, putrid; it saps my resolution, drains my vigor, and tarnishes me to the core. It offends Christ, and I would be spotless for Him, as before my own son.

  The Matter of

  the Crown

  Scroll Fourteen: 1142

  And so Matilda found refuge, yet her spirit drowned in the waters of discord. She could boast of her freedom, but rage and misery contaminated her soul. Too soon, her supremacy melted away, inundated by the atmosphere of disharmony and contention. Her husband denied her his protection. Her lover stripped the pleasure from her flesh. In vain, the queen fought and trysted, but nothing tasted sweet. Her vision clouded; she could no longer distinguish between mastery and servitude.

  †

  Spring

  I move my court to Oxford. My couriers relay my messages to all those fighting men bound to me in homage, enlisting their continued support. I hear tell of my cousin’s similar attempts to gather battalions, and his success with many young knights, new to their mail, eager to dent their gleaming shields and to blunt their spotless blades.

  Henry of Winchester, that forked-tongued serpent, essays to lure FitzCount away from my cause. Sir Brian refuses to show me the bishop’s letter, but shares its substance. His Grace admits that his brother’s captivity constrained him, for a time, to make one of my party. He intimates that FitzCount, poor man, is also driven by political realities to align himself with the Angevins. As I have broken faith with all my promises, Winchester is free to follow the dictates of his conscience. Disillusioned, but unchained, he renews his pledge to the blessed king of name. Brian must open his eyes, and see that my word is not to be trusted, whilst the pretender holds out his hand, in amity and generosity.

  FitzCount permits me to read his response, hoping to counteract the pall that has fallen over my mood.

  To His Grace, nephew of Henry the king, cousin to Empress Matilda. The holy church and the Lion of England have several times obliged me to kiss the hand and the skirts of their true daughter. I remain under oath to abet her in the contest against the Count of Boulogne. She shall not forfeit her legacy, or permit it to be stolen.

  Neither I, nor my vassals, choose to fight for Matilda in the hopes of accruing gold, or fiefdoms, but we do it solely because the empress is the rightful heir to the crown and throne. She remains the Lady of the English. I, Brian FitzCount, who received from Henry I and his daughter all his arms, titles, and honors, am ready to prove, either by battle or ordeal, where my fealty lies.

  †

  The jongleurs aver that Stephen falls ill among his new recruits. He lies, they claim, on a sorry pallet, his army sent back home. Smirking with self-importance, they pronounce the pretender’s imminent death. Many among my retinue believe the troubadours and begin to bow more deeply in my presence. But I cannot credit any honied news, so bitter does my fate lie on my tongue. Although my vitals boil with loathing, it cannot be denied that my heart still beats in time with the Count of Boulogne’s. If he were no more, I would know it.

  Wishing to make the most of my cousin’s sickness, Robert advises me to appeal to Geoffrey. Tonight, among our entourage in the great hall, he tried to galvanize my enthusiasm for a new offensive. “It is the Count of Anjou’s duty to maintain his wife and child’s English inheritance. It is time for him to cooperate with us.”

  A frisson of excitement surged through the room. The barons and their ladies sat up to listen, and neglected their fèves—chocolate discs rolled in ginger syrup and granules of crystallized sugar. Despite their renewed animation, I hunched over the high table, my energy flagging.

  With her usual peevish vehemence, Amabel pushed her venison ribs to the side. “The Angevin has conquered Lisieux and Falaise, indeed all the land in the neighborhood of Rouen.”

  I sneered. “Geoffrey was rebuffed from the city itself.” Why could she not be silent? Had I given her leave to speak? My head ached; I could not remember.

  Brian’s voice was light. “It is a fine day for us in Normandy.”

  Suddenly ravenous, I waved over a page who brandished a frumenty pudding. I gulped down the dessert, tasting the wheat and the milk, thick and pasty. Then my belly cramped. “Send an envoy to Geoffrey, if you find it mete and fitting.” All I wanted was to sleep.

  †

  Presumably, the Angevin does not intend to participate in my English war. He regrets to disappoint the empress, but he rebuffs my emissaries. Instead, he invites Gloucester to his court, assiduously flattering the earl, engaging to draw him out of my sphere. He calls him “Brother,” and professes to need his honorable, noble presence in order to weigh the costs and benefits of our proposal. He will parley only with the son of a king, not with mere messengers.

  For now, Normandy, Geoffrey’s hard won prize, takes precedence over my throne. Yet the Lord of Anjou will not be able to ignore forever the mutual suspicions and jealousies of the continental barons. To my aggrandizement, he rests indifferent, but he must understand that it is the Plantagenet who will come to ensure their ultimate surrender.

  †

  My wounded s
pirit is in need of balm. The castle plantations burst with renewal, and I hunger to commune with the glories of nature. Unfortunately, I am but seldom in solitude. I am vexed to be always under the surveillance of my bustling entourage, which further strains my bilious disposition.

  This afternoon, I wandered with my closest associates in the Mary Garden that I have installed directly adjacent to Amabel’s kitchen plot. The flowers, all named for the Virgin, are arranged in the shape of a cross. I would have preferred to give my attention to the brittle trills of the plump-bellied robins, but instead listened glumly as my retainers encouraged my brother to take his leave of my household.

  Even FitzCount dispensed with Robert’s presence. “Go to Normandy! We need Geoffrey’s warriors to inflate our shrinking battalions. Foreign troops abet our enemies. We can no longer afford to shun the addition of mercenaries.”

  Despite the bright light, I saw his devotion; it emanated from him, as if he were the daytime moon, visible against the celestial blue of the sky.

  Gloucester, strangely neutral, bent down before a bed of marigolds. “What a lovely sight, reminding us of the Holy Mother’s love.” Nearby, the Madonna lilies were fully opened, giving off a noxious, sugary scent. He gathered a nosegay of both, choosing each bloom as carefully as he parsed his words.

  Brian grasped the earl’s forearm. “Think hard on it.”

  Bright orange pollen stained Robert’s fingers. “The journey that you propose entails traveling through enemy territory, on both sides of the Channel.”

  Where lay the seat of Gloucester’s pride? “Our cause will languish without you to mastermind it, brother. Who else dissuades the adventurers and scofflaws from desertion?”

  Brian reddened. “You have more than one trusted knight to stand by you, Majesty.”

  Robert considered. “I might take hostages from some of our barons, so that they cannot abandon you while I am away. Loyal magnates will furnish me with their sons, without complaint.”