The Crippled Angel Read online

  He took another breath, with much less difficulty this time, then leaned forward again and spewed forth more of the rotting, sodden earth that he’d swallowed.

  Rivers of mud ran from his nose.

  He choked, retched, vomited one final time, then managed to find breath enough to talk, and smile reassurance at the men-at-arms and knights who now surrounded him.

  “France cannot kill me that easily,” he rasped, and the circle of men laughed too loud in relief.

  “Tom,” Mary said, and, stunningly, managed to lift one of her shattered hands to take hold of his fingers.

  She smiled, full of love and tenderness and peace.

  “Tom,” she said again, “I do love you so very much. Remember that.”

  And then she died.

  Much later, after Mary’s corpse had been washed and laid out as best it could be, a valet came through the door of the chamber, hesitated, then spoke quietly.

  “The carpenter is here to measure our beloved queen for her casket,” he said.

  “Tell him,” said Neville, “that he is far too late.”

  And with that he pushed past the servant and left the chamber.

  He did not want to see the carpenter.

  PART SIX

  Mary

  10000 frenchmen there were slaine of enemies in the feeld, & neere as many prisoners tane that day were forced to yeeld. thus had our King a happy day & victorye ouer france; he bought his foes vnder his feete that late in pride did prance…but then Katherine, the Kings fayre daughter there, being proued apparent his heyre, with her maidens in most sweet attire to King Harry did repayre; and when she came before our King, shee kneeled vpon her knee desiring that his warres wold cease, & that her loue wold bee.

  Excerpts from Agincourte Battell, late medieval ballad

  I

  Friday 6th September 1381

  Five days after he had decimated the French at Agincourt, Bolingbroke strode into Catherine’s chamber in Rouen.

  She was waiting for him, serene, well groomed and robed in a brilliant sky-blue and ivory silken gown, sitting on a carved chest by the lead-paned window.

  Her eyes were as glassy and as hard and as cold as the glass through which the sun streamed.

  “My lady,” Bolingbroke said, striding across the chamber before halting before her, bowing, and kissing the hand she raised. “I have tragic tidings—”

  “I have already heard of your return,” said Catherine, and almost smiled at the sudden flush of anger in Bolingbroke’s eyes.

  “Your husband is dead,” he said softly, allowing her hand to drop back into her lap. “You are in need of a new one.”

  “And you are here to offer your hand?”

  “Damn it, Catherine. We had an agreement.”

  “By law,” she said, her voice both soft and hard, “I am allowed to say either yea or nay.”

  “There is no law between you and me.”

  “Apparently not.”

  They stared at each other, the silence growing colder with every passing heartbeat.

  “I will burn Paris to the ground if you refuse me,” Bolingbroke said suddenly.

  “You terrify me,” Catherine said, and turned her face towards the window.

  Bolingbroke leaned forward, seized her left upper arm, and hauled her to her feet.

  “We will marry this afternoon, after Mary’s funeral mass. No need to change your dress, you are well enough accoutred for what I need. But I would have you put a smile on your face, for I do not intend to wed with a wasp.”

  In response, Catherine smiled brittlely, falsely. “Will this do, my lord?”

  Bolingbroke cursed, and let go her arm, swivelling about and walking for the door. “I will send your escort in two hours.”

  Then, just before he reached the door, Bolingbroke turned, stared at Catherine, then walked back to her. He grabbed her face in both his hands and kissed her deep and hard. She tried to tear herself away, but he was too strong, and when he’d finished, Catherine was red-faced and gasping.

  “I will wive you on my terms,” Bolingbroke said. “Not yours.”

  And then he was gone.

  Catherine sat back in her chair, stared at the door, then lowered her face into a hand, weeping softly.

  People, nobles and commoners alike, French and English both, packed the great cathedral of Rouen for Mary’s funeral mass. It was a solemn affair, attended by genuine grief and loss. Mary’s casket lay on a bier before the altar, covered in a crimson cloth, embroidered over with thousands of lilies and crowns.

  She had been a woman, she had been a queen, and she had been deeply loved, and the mourning for her was accomplished with all due respect and dignity.

  A respect and dignity marred only by Bolingbroke’s several bouts of coughing. He sat with Catherine and several earls and dukes in ornately-carved chairs just to the right of the altar. Several times through the mass he began to cough, almost choking on his phlegm on one occasion. Catherine ignored him, and it was left to the Earl of Suffolk to aid Bolingbroke as best he could.

  But, by the time the monks had carried Mary’s casket, still draped in its wondrous cloth, towards the side chapel where it was to be laid under the floor, Bolingbroke had managed to overcome whatever had tickled his throat.

  No sooner had Mary’s casket disappeared than Bolingbroke stood, taking Catherine’s hand and forcing her to her feet beside him, and led her towards the waiting Bishop of Rouen.

  “No point in waiting,” he said to the bishop.

  The bishop glanced nervously towards the nave. Most of the people who had come to pay their respects to Mary were now departing, and the cathedral was filled with the noise of their shuffling feet and murmured conversations.

  Only a few people apparently intended to remain for Bolingbroke and Catherine’s nuptials, Neville and Margaret among them.

  “Bishop,” said Bolingbroke, and the bishop licked his lips nervously, raising an unsteady hand for a blessing.

  And so were wed Catherine of France and Bolingbroke, King of England, their nuptials accomplished to the shuffling of feet and the irreverent whisperings of departing mourners and the silent stares of those who remained to witness.

  Once the abbreviated ceremony was done (Bolingbroke had informed the bishop that the marriage need only take the minimum of words), Bolingbroke lowered his head to kiss his bride.

  Just as his mouth touched hers, Catherine’s lips moved. “France shall have you,” she whispered, her eyes staring into Bolingbroke’s, her lips moving against his, “and everything you hold dear.”

  He took her directly back to his bedchamber to consummate the marriage—no need for the inconvenience of a wedding feast. He dismissed the ladies who had come to serve Catherine, and the valets who had come to attend him. He tore her lovely gown from her body, determined to wipe the look of disdain from her face, and bore her to his bed. He did not kiss her, he did not caress her, he merely jerked her limbs into the position he needed and plunged immediately into her body, taking satisfaction from her involuntary cry of pain and the defensive arching of her back.

  “I want blood on the sheets,” he whispered, thrusting into her again and again with all the force he could muster, “as any proud husband expects from the conquering of his new wife.”

  She bit and scratched, but she could do nothing to stop him. He was resolved to make her hurt and bleed and weep, and in all three objectives he succeeded.

  It was his revenge for her love for Philip.

  When he’d finally done, he pulled himself out of her and rolled onto his back, breathing heavily. “I’m sure we shall have a long and productive marriage,” he said.

  Catherine rolled away from him, curling up into a ball, hugging her belly, praying that his damage of her had not gone too deep.

  Bolingbroke laughed softly, but then his laugh was cut off as another bout of coughing claimed him.

  She curled into a protective ball about her belly, still asleep, still
caught in her dream. She jerked, and cried out softly, then whimpered.

  Her cry woke her husband. He rolled close to her, cuddling her, stroking her shoulder, gently waking her.

  “Do not be afraid,” he whispered. “You are here with me.”

  She blinked, finally rousing into full wakefulness.

  One of her hands slid about her belly, checking. She sighed, relieved, and he felt her shoulders and back relax against him.

  “Our child is safe,” he whispered against the roundness of her shoulder, and she felt his mouth smile.

  “I have been caught in the most vile dream,” she said, very low.

  “I know.”

  She turned slightly, enough so she could look into his face. “I dreamed I lived in a broken world of darkness with a man who hated me. I dreamed our child was nothing but a black malignant mass in my womb. I dreamed I was broken…” She lifted one of her arms, frowning a little at its smooth round paleness, as if such wholeness was strange to her.

  “You are whole now,” he said. “And our child is living and warm cradled within you, not a dark malicious imp waiting to murder you.”

  “Do people still hate us?” she said, unable to believe they could possibly be safe.

  “No one hates us now. We are but simple folk. No one takes any note of us, no one sees us.”

  She relaxed even further, giving him a loving smile. She touched his face, marvelling at every angle, every line, every hollow.

  “In my dream,” she said, knowing she could say this to him, “there was one brightness.”

  “And that was…?”

  “A man who loved me. Respected me. Trusted me. He was my friend.”

  “And did you love him?”

  “Aye, I did. I could weep before him, confide in him, trust him, and not doubt him. I had no shame before him.”

  “Then he is a man to be treasured.”

  “Aye,” she said slowly. “A man to be treasured.”

  Then she grinned, impishly, her hand slowly traversing his chest. “As are you.”

  He laughed, filled with wonder that she had finally returned to him. “As are you.” He bent and kissed her.

  II

  Monday 9th September 1381

  Paris still held out against Bolingbroke, but there was little he could do about it until reinforcements arrived from England. While he waited, Bolingbroke meant to dispose of Joan once and for all.

  In this ambition, Bolingbroke had an unexpected ally. Isabeau de Bavière—now his mother-in-law—had somehow managed to extricate herself from Paris to arrive at Rouen in time for Joan’s trial.

  It was the least she could do for her daughter’s new husband, she’d announced, and not even Catherine’s studied indifference could wipe the triumphant smile from Isabeau’s face.

  Isabeau de Bavière had not only managed to reposition herself at the centre of power, but she had also arrived in time to slide the dagger deep into Joan’s hated back.

  Life for Isabeau was very good indeed.

  The trial of Joan of Arc, Maid of France, for heresy and witchcraft began at eight of the clock of the morning of Monday the ninth of September and continued for a full twelve hours. It was conducted by Abbé de Fécamp, aided by French, Roman and English clerics, and all armed with the information that Regnault de Chartres had given them. Two years of jealousy, hatred, rumours, innuendo and bigotry fed their ardour to achieve a successful verdict…and for them a successful verdict meant nothing less than a guilty verdict on as many charges as possible.

  There had been many people, both within the Church and without it, who had lusted for this opportunity for a long time. Most of them had made their way to Rouen, determined that the court should hear their version of how the Maid had conducted sorcerous rituals, magicked several women into giving birth to deformed infants (and one fivelegged rabbit), and uttered hundreds of heretical and hurtful criticisms of the true Church, exclusive mouthpiece of God and His angels. Her so-called miracles had been nothing but Satanic magical spells, her military skills an obscene parody of her womanhood, her alleged conversations with Archangels delusional hysteria, or, worse, diabolical plottings with Satanic imps.

  Joan might have a devoted following among the common people of France, but among both churchmen and nobles she had won many enemies. As much as they might detest the English, on this matter the French bishops were prepared to work with Bolingbroke. Joan must be stopped, and this court was just the vehicle to do it.

  As quickly as possible so that the damage she’d wrought might be contained in timely fashion.

  The castle in Rouen hosted the trial. Joan’s guards woke her at dawn, offered her breakfast, which she had refused, then gave her the opportunity to pray and clothe herself. When the guards finally brought her into the chapel, Joan wore the same tunic and breeches that she had worn for so many months.

  Her judges and their clerics were arrayed in a semicircle of benches and desks, their backs to the altar.

  Their faces were grave, their eyes gleeful. They had her, and they knew it.

  The trial began with a request by the Abbé de Fécamp for Joan to summarise as briefly as she could the history of her visions, and her campaign on behalf of the French king (who, the Abbé noted, was remarkable for his absence).

  Joan, standing before them with her hands folded neatly across her abdomen, declined. “My visions have ever been personal,” she said, “and my efforts on behalf of our gracious King Charles a matter of public record. I do not see why I must repeat them here.”

  “Mademoiselle,” said the Abbé politely, even though his grey eyes were flinty with hatred, “there are many among us,” several of the bishops to either side of the Abbé nodded, “who are concerned that these visions may not have been the work of the great Archangel Michael, but of Satan, disguised, whispering dark words into your ears. You must reveal what you know, or we shall be forced to think the worst.”

  Joan regarded the Abbé steadily. She did not answer.

  “How,” said the Bishop of Beauvais, who sat three places to the Abbé’s left, “can we believe that the great archangel thought to confide himself in you, a common peasant girl?”

  Joan almost did not respond, but just as the bishop was about to speak again, she said, “I suited his needs.”

  “His ‘needs’?” said the bishop.

  Joan remained silent.

  “What do you mean by his ‘needs’?” said the Abbé. “You surely do not suggest that the archangel had ‘needs’ as mortal sinful men have ‘needs’?”

  Now Joan hung her head, her cheeks mottling dark pink.

  All the churchmen drew sharp breaths of horror.

  “Are you implying,” said Jean Lemaistre, the Dominican Vicar of the Holy Office of the Inquisition in Rouen, “that the archangel sought sexual comfort from women? Mademoiselle, I remind you that in this holy chamber you must speak the truth.”

  Now Joan raised her head, the colour in her cheeks coalescing into a bright red spot in each cheek. Her eyes were brilliant. “The Archangel Michael,” she said, “is a sexually lascivious rapist. No more, no less.”

  Horrified before, the churchmen were now speechless. They stared at Joan, then they finally managed to turn their heads and stare at each other.

  “As are all the angels,” Joan said. If they do not burn me for that, then they will not burn me for anything.

  The Abbé de Fécamp stared at Joan a moment longer, then turned in his chair and whispered to the friar who served as his aide. “Once we are done we burn the transcript of this trial. I do not care what you put in its place, but this transcript must be buried for all time.”

  The friar nodded, understanding, and the Abbé turned back to Joan.

  “You can have no evidence of this,” he said. “Unless you claim that the archangel lay with you.”

  There were impolite sniggers about the chapel. The Maid was too ugly for any man, let alone a mighty archangel, to contemplate lying with her.r />
  “The archangel lay with my companion Marie,” Joan said, “getting her with child—”

  “She lies,” said the Archbishop of Rheims, Regnault de Chartres. He had been listening to proceedings from a spot hidden behind a rood screen to one side of the altar. Now he stepped forth.

  “The midwife Marie has admitted that she lay, shamelessly and adulterously, with a guard of the watch at La Roche-Guyon—”

  “You lie,” Joan began, but was halted from further speech by the appearance of a woman from the shadowy aisles of the chapel.

  She was dressed splendidly in robes of blood-red silk and velvet, with ropes of pearls festooned about her jewelled girdle and collars of emeralds and garnets about her neck and wrists.

  On her face she wore an expression, strangely combined, of loathing and triumph.

  Isabeau de Bavière. “The good archbishop speaks nothing but truth,” Isabeau said, her voice flat, then she turned to face the panel of clerics. “The midwife has admitted to me that she spent many nights in lustful copulation with the guard in question, my lords. When she found herself with child, the woman panicked, and thought to deflect blame from her sins by naming the archangel as the father.

  “If that were not enough,” Isabeau continued, “I myself once came upon them in the stables of the castle, naked and sweating as they sated their lust.” She cast down her eyes. “I was appalled, not only at the midwife’s lechery, but at her later claims.”

  “How can you,” said Joan, her voice soft and compassionate, “a victim of the archangel’s lust yourself, so seek to demean Marie? Can you not remember how terrified you were when you discovered yourself with child during a time when you knew you had slept with no man?”

  Isabeau went pale, the only sign of her profound shock. How did this peasant know about Catherine? “Are you so great a witch,” Isabeau finally managed, “that you would claim I copulated with the archangel?”