Devil's Brood

CHAPTER TWENTY

February 1175

Le Mans, Anjou

On the day after Candlemas, Richard and Geoffrey once again did homage to their father; Hal was still exempted because of his status as a crowned king. Afterward a lavish feast was planned, but before the meal and the entertainment began, Henry summoned his sons to the castle solar. They entered to find him already waiting for them.

“Come in, lads,” he said cheerfully. “Ere we go back to the great hall, I want to tell you of my plans for this coming year.”

They exchanged guarded glances, for experience had taught them that they were not always in accord with his plans. He was standing by the hearth and they quickly joined him by the fire, for the chamber was chill and damp, with drafts seeking entry at the shuttered windows and winter cold seeping in from every crack and fissure.

“It is time you started to earn your keep,” Henry said with a smile. “No more lolling about like pampered princelings.” His gaze lingered fondly for a moment on his second son, for Richard had come to full manhood in the past year; at seventeen, he was taller than most grown men, even taller now than Hal. “Come the morrow, you’re off to Poitou. My scouts tell me that the Poitevin barons are champing at the bit again. I want you to rein them in.”

To Richard, that sounded almost too good to be true. “I’ll have a free hand to restore order?” he asked warily, and when Henry said that he would, he grinned. “Do I have to wait till the morrow? I could be ready to leave within two hours.”

Henry grinned, too, remembering how eager he’d been at Richard’s age to prove himself. “Tomorrow will be soon enough.” He turned then toward Geoffrey, saying, “And you’re to go into Brittany, lad, to deal with Eudo de Porhoet and the rest of those Breton bandits. Roland de Dinan will accompany you. I know his loyalty has been suspect in the past, but that is only to be expected of a Breton lord; they play at rebellion the way other men play at dice. He has been steadfast for the past nine years, which counts as an eternity in Brittany. I can trust him with your safety, and you’ll learn much from him.”

Geoffrey glanced from Henry to Richard, back to his father. “Why do I need a wet-nurse if Richard does not?”

“I’d not call Roland a wet-nurse to his face, lad; he’d not like it. And the reason you need more guidance than Richard is simple. He’s a twelvemonth older than you and passed much of last year on his own in Poitou, where by all accounts he acquitted himself well.”

Richard’s face flushed with pleasure, but almost at once he felt a twinge of guilt. How could he take pride in his father’s praise as long as his mother remained entombed at Sarum?

Geoffrey was not satisfied with his father’s response, but unlike his brothers, he never wasted time or energy in arguments he was sure to lose, and he subsided with a shrug and a neutral “As you wish.”

Hal had been a silent observer until now. No longer able to conceal his impatience, he interrupted when Henry began to expand upon the unreliability of the Bretons. “What of me?”

“You may be sure I’ve not forgotten you, lad,” Henry assured him. “You’ll be spending the coming year as a king in training. I have to venture into Anjou, but I expect to be back in Normandy within a few weeks. Then we will take ship for England, you and I.”

Hal struggled to hide his dismay. “Together?” he said glumly, his hopes dashed. He’d known that his father was planning to return to England and, when he listened as Richard and Geoffrey were given authority and commands, his own expectations had soared. Why should he not be entrusted with Normandy? Or at the least, Anjou. Instead, he was to be his father’s shadow, at his beck and call day and night, with no more independence than an indentured apprentice. Where was the fairness in that?

“This time together will give us a chance for a new beginning, Hal, whilst being a learning experience for you,” Henry said, with such enthusiasm that Hal mustered up an unconvincing smile, and tried to ignore his brothers, who were laughing at him behind Henry’s back. Let them mock all they wanted, for the last laugh would still be his. He was the one who was king, even if it did seem like an empty honor more often than not.

The Earl of Essex reached the coastal city of Caen in late March, and headed for the ducal castle. He was at once ushered into the king’s solar, where Henry was occupied in confirming to Montebourg Abbey the chapel of St Maglorius on the Isle of Sark. He looked up with a smile as Willem entered, then reached for his great seal. A number of men had gathered to witness the charter, but once it was done, they exited the chamber, leaving Henry with a handful of his most trusted inner circle: the Archbishop of Rouen; Maurice de Craon, his English justiciar; Richard de Lucy, his Norman constable; Richard du Hommet; the abbot of Mont St Michel; his natural son Geoff; and the newly arrived Willem, returning from a diplomatic mission to the court of the Count of Flanders.

Willem had just begun his report, though, when they were interrupted by a message from Henry’s eldest son, presently at Rouen. Henry at once ordered the man to be admitted, explaining to Willem that he and Hal would soon be sailing for England. He was somewhat surprised by the identity of the messenger, for Hal’s letter was delivered by his vice-chancellor, Adam de Churchedune, not the sort of errand normally undertaken by men of rank.

“Take a seat, Adam,” he said, for the cleric was not a young man, and then broke Hal’s seal, began to read his missive. Almost at once, he looked up, his expression so blank that the other men knew at once something was very wrong. “Hal refuses to accompany me to England,” he said, and he sounded so shocked that the normally even-tempered Earl of Essex felt a stab of hot rage, fury that the king’s ungrateful whelp was once more giving his father grief.

“I do not understand,” Henry confessed. “When we parted last month, all was well between us. What new grudge can he be nursing now?”

“Does it matter?” Willem said. “You’ve been more than patient with him, my liege. If it were me, I’d command him to come to Caen straightaway and nip this nonsense in the bud.” As Willem glanced around, he saw that his words were well received by the other men; several were nodding in agreement and Geoff was muttering under his breath, too outraged by his brother’s antics for circumspection. But Hal’s chancellor was shaking his head emphatically.

“My lord king, that would be a great mistake.” Leaning forward, he said earnestly, “I offered to take Lord Hal’s message myself so that I might speak with you in confidence.”

None of the others were surprised by this revelation; they’d taken it for granted that Henry would have put men he could trust in Hal’s household, men whose loyalty would be to the sire, not the son. Henry looked down again at Hal’s letter, so terse and succinct, so brusque and defiant. Glancing up at the chancellor, he said, “I hope to God you can explain this, Adam,” too shaken to pretend he was not angry, perplexed, and hurt by Hal’s latest transgression. “I thought we’d put all this lunacy behind us last September.”

“My liege…it grieves me to say this, but the young king, your son, is as constant as wax. I do not doubt that he has a good heart. He is easily swayed, though, swings like a weathercock in a high wind, and of late he has been listening to the wrong men again, to those who wish you ill. They have planted a poisonous seed in his mind, warning him that you want to lure him to England so that you may then imprison him like the queen.”

Henry was stunned. “And he believed that?”

Adam nodded somberly. “Alas, he did, my lord. They played skillfully upon his doubts, his resentments, and stirred up his fears by suggesting that there was something sinister in your decision not to demand homage from him. They argued that homage is an act of mutual obligation, claimed that you did not want to accept his homage because you did not want to be held accountable as his liege lord, proof that you must be plotting treachery once he was in England and utterly in your power.”

“That is ludicrous! I waived homage to honor Hal.”

“I know that, my liege. But now you see why I say it would be a mistake to command his presence at Caen. That would only confirm his suspicions, convince him that his so-called friends had spoken true.”

Henry slumped down in his seat, suddenly as weary as if he’d spent a full day on the hunt. “What would you suggest?” he said at last, and when the chancellor urged gentle persuasion, words of reassurance rather than rage, he agreed to take that approach. But he felt defeated even before he began. Christ on the Cross, were they to start the madness all over again?

Wolves were usually hunted only from September’s Nativity of Our Lady to March’s Annunciation. But upon Henry’s arrival at his hunting lodge, the villagers of Bures asked him to track down and slay a lone wolf that had been killing their sheep. He set out early the next morning. His lymer hounds had no luck in picking up the rogue wolf’s scent, though, and men, horses, and dogs returned tired and disappointed at day’s end, where he found Hal and Marguerite were waiting for him.

Hal greeted him effusively, apologized for the “misunderstanding,” and announced that they were ready to depart for England whenever he wished. Greatly relieved that Adam’s “gentle persuasion” had worked, Henry welcomed his son and daughter-in-law warmly, thankful that they’d avoided a confrontation. The lodge was neither large nor spacious, ill suited to accommodate the retinues of two kings and a queen, but Henry’s servants did their best to provide a more elaborate meal than Henry would otherwise have expected, and after the dining was done, Hal held court in the great hall, laughing and jesting and charming with his usual ease, basking in the attention he was attracting. He did not notice when his father withdrew, ceding him center stage.

Henry slipped out of a side door, stood for a time staring up at the starlit April sky. His initial pleasure had slowly ebbed away as the evening wore on, leaving him with an edgy sense of unease. Was this to be the pattern for years to come? Hal would balk, be coaxed into compliance, and all would be well-until the next time he took offense. How could the thinking of his own son be so alien to him? How had they ever gotten to this road that led nowhere?

It was a mild night and others were outside, too. As he was recognized, several men would have approached him, but he waved them off impatiently. But then he saw one man he did want to speak with, and he moved to intercept William Marshal as he ambled from the direction of the latrines.

“Marshal,” he said, stepping from the shadows into the knight’s path. Beckoning, he led the younger man away from their audience of eager eavesdroppers. Will followed, but his stiff posture and ducked head conveyed his discomfort as clearly as words could have done. He showed no surprise when Henry launched into a low-voiced, angry reprimand, for he’d been anticipating his sovereign’s displeasure.

“I expected better from you, Will. You are one of the few men of Hal’s household who has a grain of common sense and a speaking acquaintance with honor. Why have you failed so dismally to protect my son?”

“My liege…what would you have me say? I told you at Avranches that I could not spy upon him.”

“I am not asking that of you,” Henry snapped. “But I do expect you to give him the benefit of your maturity and your good judgment, and I see precious little evidence of that. When his legion of lackeys and drones and leeches seek to poison his mind against me, what do you do? Do you stay silent? Or do you join in with the rest of the baying hounds?”

“Sire, that is not fair! I would never speak against you to the young king. I have always encouraged him to mend this rift between you. But mine is not the only voice he heeds.”

That was not what Henry wanted to hear. He needed to believe there was at least one rational voice to counsel his son, for his own words seemed to be falling upon deaf ears. “Then what good are you to me?” he said harshly, and turned on his heel before Will could respond, heading back toward the great hall. Will trailed unhappily after him, but knew better than to try to plead his case when the king was in one of his tempers.

Hal was encircled by his knights, and they were applauding and cheering so enthusiastically that Henry wondered sardonically if he’d just ordered another wine-keg broken open. Gesturing to Will, he said, “Tell the ‘young king’ that the old one wants to speak with him upon the dais.”

Hal soon sauntered in his direction, an arm draped around Marguerite’s waist, his face flushed with wine, his eyes bright with laughter. “You wanted me, Papa?”

“I am going to my own chamber, will leave the festivities to your keeping. Enjoy yourselves, but remember that men bed down in the hall at night, so if you carouse till dawn, they’ll get no sleep.”

Hal promised to keep that in mind, then turned as one of his knights approached, fervently expressing his eternal gratitude and loyalty. Hal sent him off with a laugh and a quip, then explained for Henry’s benefit that Giles had suffered a stroke of bad luck; his palfrey had gone lame on the ride to Bures and the village farrier had given a dread diagnosis, that the horse had foundered and must be put down. “Giles has barely two deniers to rub together, and a tightfisted father who’d see him mounted on a goat ere he’d help out. So I offered him one of the horses in my stable. He’s a good lad, is Giles, so why not?”

“Why not, indeed?” Henry agreed dryly, for he knew that he’d end up getting the bill for the stallion Hal would buy to replace the one he’d so magnanimously bestowed on Giles. But he reminded himself that generosity was a virtue, lauded in a prince, and he asked Hal if he’d like to join the hunt on the morrow for the elusive, sheep-killing wolf.

“I’d like nothing better! I’d ask a favor of you, though-that I be given the wolf’s pelt to make a mantle.”

Henry blinked in surprise. “Why? You know how difficult it is to get rid of the stink of wolf.”

Hal grinned and dropped his voice conspiratorially. “You know Adam d’Yquebeuf,” he said, naming one of the most sycophantic and fawning of his knights. “He’s not a bad sort, but sometimes I think that if my boots got muddied, he’d offer to lick them clean.”

Henry understood, for that was always a risk of kingship; a crown too often drew the servile and obsequious as well as the capable and confident. “So you are going to give that poor sod a fur cloak that is likely to reek to high heaven,” he said, “knowing he’d wear it day and night if it came from you.” Hal laughed and Marguerite giggled even as she pretended to disapprove of his mischief-making, but Hal looked thoughtful when Henry then pointed out that since d’Yquebeuf was so often in his company, he’d be exposed to the rank wolf smell, too. Before bidding them good night, he offered Hal one final boon, seeking to ease his mind by removing any doubts about the dual obligations of homage, and told his son that he would receive Hal’s homage ere they sailed for England. But he was taken aback by his son’s reaction. Hal’s face shadowed and he glanced away, no longer meeting his father’s eyes.

A pile of correspondence had been heaped on the table in his bedchamber, and Henry had planned to tackle it before he went to bed. But he was too restless to concentrate, and instead of summoning his scribe, he began to root through a coffer for something to read; the recipient of an excellent education, he never traveled without books. The first one he picked up was Wace’s Roman de Brut, a history in verse of the English people. Wace had dedicated it to Eleanor, though, and that reminder was enough for him to put it aside. He flipped through Geoffrey of Monmouth’s Historia Regum Britanniae next, a mythic history of the English kings and the legend of King Arthur, and eventually settled upon Commentarii de Bello Gallico. But even Caesar’s own account of the conquest of Gaul could not long hold his attention, and he sent one of his squires to fetch his son.

Hal did not look pleased to be dragged away from the revelries in the hall, and did not seem reassured when Henry dismissed his squires so they could speak in private. “Help yourself to wine,” Henry said, and Hal quickly drained a cup, almost as if he needed to fortify himself for this interview. For a fleeting moment, Henry was assailed by a treacherous memory from his past, the day he’d awakened his wine-besotted father to confide that he would be marrying Eleanor as soon as she could shed the French king.

Geoffrey had cursed him freely and loudly for this unwelcome invasion of his bedchamber, and when Henry had laughed and said he had a great favor to ask, he’d grumbled, “Quit whilst you’re ahead, Harry, whilst you’re still in my will.” Henry’s news had sobered him, of course, and he was soon marveling that “Marriage to Eleanor could make you master of Europe one day…Christ Jesus, Harry, Caesar might well envy you!” He’d later warned Henry, though, that he should save his passion for his concubines, not his wife, offering the cynical counsel that “the best marriages are those based upon detached good will or benign indifference. But unfortunately for you, the one emotion you will never feel for Eleanor of Aquitaine is indifference.”

The memory was troubling. Any remembrance of Eleanor was painful, especially recollections of those early years. But recalling the easy camaraderie and barbed banter he’d enjoyed with his father, he also felt a deep sense of loss, of regret and bafflement that he did not have the same close relationship with his own sons. Where had he gone wrong?

“Papa?” Hal was regarding him in perplexity. “Why did you summon me? You pulled me away from a game of hazard when I was winning!”

“Hal…I know that others sought to convince you I had a nefarious motive in not demanding homage from you as I did your brothers. You need not look so surprised, lad; nothing travels faster than gossip. I daresay at least half of these boon companions of yours are in the pay of the French king, and I expected no better from them. But I never imagined that you’d be taken in by such slander. Jesu, lad, how could you believe that of me?”

Hal had stiffened, but by the time Henry was done speaking, he’d been disarmed by the naked pain in his father’s voice. Hal hated discord and quarrels, could not understand people like his brother Richard, who seemed to thrive on strife and controversy. He truly wanted to be at peace with his father, truly regretted their constant clashes of will. “I am sorry, Papa,” he said, as contritely as he could. “I ought not to have doubted you. It will not happen again.”

“Hal, words are cheap and easily offered. Actions are what count. And when I told you tonight that you’d do homage after all, I saw the expression on your face. You liked it not. Whatever I do, it seems to displease you. If I do not demand homage, you see that as some sort of devious scheme. If I do, your royal dignity is affronted. God’s Bones, lad, what do you want from me?”

Hal looked at him unhappily. “I guess I…I want your respect.”

“Respect cannot be demanded or given, Hal. It must be earned. There are wounds still to be healed. But this I can assure you, that I love you as my life. Surely you believe that?”

“Yes…I do. And I love you, too,” Hal added quickly, even though there were times when he was no longer sure that was true.

“Then why…why in Christ’s Name are we always at odds like this? Why can you not come to me when you have a grievance instead of letting it fester? Why do you pay more heed to that fool on the French throne than your own father?”

“Louis listened to me, said what I needed to hear. I ought not to have had such faith in his good will. I know that now; things were never the same after that shameful trick he pulled at Verneuil. But…” Hal hesitated, pinioning his lower lip with even, white teeth. “How honest can I be, Papa?”

“Speak your mind,” Henry said. “I’ll not get angry.”

Hal smiled faintly. “Can I have that in writing?” He rose suddenly, went to the table to pour another cup of wine, and finished half of it before he could nerve himself to take his father at his word. “I said I love you, Papa. But…but I am not sure I can trust you.”

Henry drew a sharp breath. This from the stripling who’d played him for such a fool at Chinon! That betrayal lay between them like an imperfectly healed scar, for they’d never discussed it, prevented first by circumstances and then by caution. But he’d promised to hold his temper and so he said only, “Why not?”

“Because…because I know the king will always prevail over the man, over the father.”

Henry started to speak, stopped himself. “That may be true,” he said at last. “But all that I am doing, I do for you, Hal! I want only to secure for you a peaceful and prosperous kingdom. Nothing matters more to me than that. Why must we be at cross-purposes about this? Our interests are one and the same. Why can you not see that?”

Hal had never been one for the unexpressed thought, rarely curbed a jest in the interest of prudence or even good manners. He almost made a dark joke now about the flaw in his father’s grand scheme-that the only way two kings could contentedly share power was if one of them was dead. But he sensed that Henry would find no humor in the gibe, for there was too much truth in it for comfort. He studied Henry’s face intently, wondering how honest he could be. Dare he confess his resentment that his father meant to bestow his English castles upon that unwanted afterthought, Johnny? When there were sons to spare in most great families, one would be destined for the Church. Why would Papa not pack the little tadpole off to a monastery? Or if he was bound and determined to reward the boy beyond his station in life, let him look to Richard’s lands or Geoffrey’s.

All of this remained unsaid, though, for he was not a fool, knew better than to trust his father’s assurance that there’d be no anger, no recriminations. If he dared to defy Papa’s will, he’d be tossing a torch into a hayrick. It had always been so. Nothing had changed.

“In the future,” he promised, “I will come to you first with my grievances,” and the evening ended upon a note that satisfied neither father nor son.