Lady of the English - By Elizabeth Chadwick Page 0,64

all of your own doing.”

“By God, you go too far!” He seized his jewelled staff from the side of his chair and advanced on her.

Adeliza was suddenly between them. “No!” she cried.

“Please!” She dropped to her knees in front of Henry, head bowed and one hand extended in supplication. “I beg you, sire, do not!”

Matilda swallowed, feeling ashamed and sick and furious.

Her father stood with heaving shoulders, glaring at her, and then he lowered the rod. “Be thankful that your stepmother has invoked her right as a peacemaker,” he said. “She at least knows her place and her duty.”

Matilda refused to drop her gaze. “Do I have your leave to retire and think on this news?”

“You have my leave to retire and consider your position,” he said. “As my daughter, I expect you to know where your loyalties lie.”

Matilda made an abrupt curtsey and swept from the room.

Adeliza was still kneeling at Henry’s feet and Matilda was 159

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mortified. Adeliza had deflected the blow meant for her and that was something she had never intended. She wanted to shout at Adeliza and embrace her at the same time. And she wanted to take her father’s jewelled rod and break it over his head again and again.

ttt

Adeliza bounced little Henry in her lap, watching as Matilda locked her jewel casket and placed it in a larger wooden chest.

“You should not have put yourself in his path,” Matilda said crossly. “There was no need.”

Adeliza kissed Henry’s ruddy curls and, as he started to squirm, set him down. He trotted over to look in a coffer that a maid was packing. “There was every need. Things had gone far enough. Who knows where it might have ended.”

“But it was for me to deal with, not for you to intervene.”

“It is the prerogative of a queen to intervene,” Adeliza said with gentle assertion. “Would you rather he had struck you?” Matilda tightened her lips and added her cosmetic pots to the chest. Adeliza sighed. “I wish you would not part on a quarrel.”

“That is up to my father. I have stayed here for too long. It is time I returned to Anjou. If it eases your path, tell him I am leaving to be a peacemaker with my own husband.”

“And are you?”

Matilda said nothing but continued with her packing. After a moment, Adeliza rose and kissed her and left the room.

ttt

Geoffrey eyed his namesake. “He looks like you,” he said as he chucked the infant under the chin. His second son eyed him out of solemn grey eyes. His bonnet had been removed so that his father could see his hair, which was soft dark brown, sticking up in comical tufts. “Perhaps a daughter would be useful next, or even two, and then a further pair of sons to secure the inheritance.” There was a sardonic gleam in his eyes. “What do you think?” 160

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Matilda refused to be drawn. “I think you would be a fool to plan ahead in such a fashion.”

“Oh, but I do need to plan ahead, because otherwise I will not be ready when the time comes.”

“I said ‘in such a fashion,’ not that you should not plan at all.” He conceded her the point with a look of irritated amusement.

“You are going to tell me now that you almost died bearing this one and it would be too dangerous for you to have more.” She arched her brow. “If I died, it would make your situation with regard to your power beyond Anjou more awkward than it already is. You need me whole and well for the time being.”

“Indeed, and I am flattered you chose to return to me rather than stay with your father—or did he send you to make peace?”

“You do not know my father.”

“To the contrary, I know the old spider very well indeed.” His attention diverted to the nurse who was bringing Henry forward. “Last I saw he was a babe in arms, now look at him!” His expression bright with pride, Geoffrey squatted to be at eye level with his son. He was used to very small children—

Aelis’s two were in the nursery and there was not so great an age difference—but even so, this was his heir, the future Count of Anjou, and there was something about Henry that sent a pang of uncharacteristic tenderness through Geoffrey.

Matilda had carried him in her womb, but he had set the life spark inside her body and