Elizabeth Chadwick - The Summer Queen

That brought a severe smile to her lips, but did not banish the anxiety from her eyes. ‘Rest well then,’ she said. ‘And God bless your slumber.’

‘Are you sure you are well?’ Alienor asked him as they arrived at the palace.

‘Of course I am,’ he snapped. ‘God on the Cross, why do women always make so much fuss? I’m tired, that is all, and my mother would try the patience of a saint. Do not you follow her example!’

Alienor raised her chin. ‘If women make a fuss it is because we are the ones who always have to clear up afterwards and deal with the debris, but you have made yourself clear. I shall not ask again.’

They retired to bed, irritated with each other. Henry fell asleep almost immediately, but it was a restless slumber in which he moaned and tossed and turned like a demon.

In the early hours of the morning he woke up complaining of a sore throat, and saying he was frozen, although his skin was as hot as a coal to the touch. The night candle had burned down to the stub and Alienor felt her way into her chemise and stumbled to the door to summon the servants. Behind her she heard the sound of Henry vomiting. ‘The Duke is sick,’ she said. ‘Bring fresh bedclothes and warm water.’

She hastily dressed while servants stripped and replaced the stained bedclothes. Henry huddled before the embers of the hearth, a cloak draped around his shoulders and his body shuddering. Kneeling at his side, Alienor took his hands in hers and felt the scalding beat of his blood against her skin. Even by the shadowy light of candles she could see that his eyes were glazed.

‘Ask me again why women make so much fuss,’ she said.

‘It’s nothing,’ he replied, his voice thick and hoarse. ‘A chill. I will be all right by morning.’

But by morning he was delirious and struggling to breathe. His throat was so swollen and raw that he could barely swallow the potions the physicians gave him. They bled him to cool the excess heat of his blood, but it had no effect.

Alienor sat at the bedside, insisting on bathing his body herself and dribbling honey and water into his open mouth. He was propped up on pillows to help him breathe, but every rise and fall of his chest was an effort. She could see his diaphragm sucking in and out, making hollows under his ribcage that echoed the shape of Christ’s image upon the crucifix hanging on the wall.

The Empress flurried in from Bec soon after dawn. The weather had turned autumnal and she entered the room bearing the smell of rain and woodsmoke on her clothes.

‘Henry?’ She hastened to the bedside and, as she looked at her eldest son, her expression filled with shock. ‘How can this be? How can this have happened?’ She flicked an almost accusatory look at Alienor.

‘He must have picked up some bad air at the French court,’ Alienor said, and then bit her lip. The air of the French court had been very bad for his father too. She was terrified lest he die. There would be more conflict and war, and she and her children would be at its centre. She would be forced to make another marriage or else find herself constantly under siege from ambitious suitors.

‘Not my golden boy,’ Matilda said. ‘Not after all this.’ She gazed around at the servants with sharp eyes, marking who was present and what was being done. ‘He is not going to die.’ She pushed an attendant out of the way, and pressed her hand to Henry’s forehead. He groaned and struck out. ‘Burning up,’ she said. ‘He needs to be purged and his blood cooled.’

‘That has already been done, madam my mother,’ Alienor replied.

‘Then do it again until it works. He must have fresh spring water to drink, and gruel, and make sure it is tasted first by someone else.’ She clucked her tongue as if at the incompetence of everyone else, and Alienor clung to her own civility by the tips of her fingers, because she and Matilda were allies in this, and if they argued, they would weaken each other when they needed to be united.

For the next hour the Empress stamped around the chamber issuing orders, flinging blame about indiscriminately, and behaving like the termagant of her worst reputation. But then she stopped for a moment and passed a trembling hand across her eyes, and Alienor’s angry resentment melted, for underneath all the bluster and rage, she glimpsed and recognised desolate terror.

Alienor and the Empress took turns at Henry’s bedside, wiping down his fevered body, changing his shirts and linens, spooning liquid into his mouth. The fever stripped the flesh from his bones and his body shook as if his pounding heart was going to break out of his body. Chaplains and priests came and went, but always stayed close to hand. Throughout Rouen prayers were said for Normandy’s desperately sick young duke. When the Empress was not at his bedside, she was kneeling before the altar at Bec, entreating God to spare her son’s life. She ruined her knees on the hard stone flags, and neither noticed nor cared.

Alienor sat beside him in vigil as the evening of the third day fell. He still lived, but it was more of a status quo than an improvement. She took his hand, tanned from the summer sun, but paler further up his wrist and covered in faint golden freckles overlaid by a shimmer of fine gilt hair. ‘How will you build your empire and leave your mark lying here like this?’ she asked him. ‘How will you see your sons grow tall and strong? How will you beget daughters if you leave now?’

She could not tell if he heard her, but his chest gave a spasmodic heave. ‘You will be an almost king,’ she said bitterly, ‘and that is worse than none at all. Even Stephen has bettered that … even Louis.’ Her voice shook. After a moment she unclasped her hand from his and went to the coffer at the foot of the bed. She unlocked it and lifted out the purple silk wrapping containing his great-great-grandfather’s sword. Carefully she unrolled the delicate cloth, took the scabbard and unsheathed the blade. The steel had a dull glitter, cold as a winter morning. She brought it to him and put it in his hand, curling his fingers around the silk binding on the hilt. ‘This is yours,’ she said. ‘Take it and use it, for if you do not, then it will rust away in the hands of others less able.’

Gripping his other hand, she pressed it to her womb where new life was growing. And then she bowed her head and prayed.

She woke several hours later with the dawn filtering through the shutters, its grey light touching the sword and lighting a steely gleam along the blade. Her mouth was parched and her eyes felt hot and gummy. Henry’s hand was cold and for one terrible moment she thought his soul had flown his body in the night. His eyes were open, staring at her.

‘An almost king,’ he croaked. ‘What kind of insult is that?’

Alienor gasped, her breath leaving her as if snatched from her chest by an unseen force. She touched his cheek and it was gently warm under her palm. ‘The worst kind,’ she said shakily once she had drawn another breath. ‘I hope I never have to apply it to you.’ She held a cup of watered wine to his lips. ‘Will you drink?’

He took a clumsy sip, spilling the liquid down his chest. She dabbed it away with a napkin. His heartbeat no longer thundered against his ribcage and his skin was cool to the touch where it was exposed to the air. She pulled up the bedclothes.

‘Christ’s bones,’ he wheezed. ‘My chest feels as if it is full of rusty nails.’

‘You terrified us,’ she said. ‘We thought you were going to die.’

‘I dreamed I was drowning, but the sea was made of fire,’ he said. ‘And I dreamed I was being ripped apart by an eagle and fed to its young, but they were my young too.’ He drank again, this time more steadily, and then he looked at the sword down by his right hand. ‘What is this doing here?’