Breton story, you think?”
“Your guess is as good as mine,” Richard said with a shrug. “From what I’ve heard, he preferred knowing bedmates, not skittish virgins.” He thought that showed his father’s common sense, for he’d never understood why so many men prided themselves upon luring coy or chaste women into their beds. Why bother with smiles and songs when it was so much easier and quicker to buy a bedmate with coins?
While Richard had little interest in discussing his father’s carnal conquests, he did want to know why Philip had taken such a risk. “You’re going to pay a price for your honesty, as you well know. Not many men would have dared to defy Philippe like that, for he’s one to nurse a grudge to the end of his earthly days. Yet that does not seem to trouble you.”
“And you want to know why.” Philip leaned back against the altar and was silent for a moment. “Ah, hellfire, Cousin, I’d think the answer would be obvious. I am nigh on fifty and there are mornings when I feel every one of those fifty years, thanks to aging and the joint-evil. I can no longer ride from dawn till dusk without aching bones, find the pleasures of the flesh are losing their allure, and I’ve had to face the fact that I’ll not be siring a son to follow after me. At this point in my life, I do not much care about disappointing Philippe Capet. What matters is not disappointing the Almighty. This is the second time I’ve taken the cross. The first time I had less worthy motives, for I had it in mind to meddle in Outremer’s politics, hoping to see the Leper King’s sisters wed to men of my choosing. As you know, that did not happen. Now I’ve been given another chance, and I mean to make the most of it. Most likely I’ll die in the Holy Land, but to die fighting for Jerusalem is not such a bad fate, is it?”
Richard had never expected to feel such a sense of solidarity with Philip, for they’d been rivals for as long as he could remember. Now he found himself looking at his cousin through new eyes. “No, it is not such a bad fate at all,” he agreed, although he did not share the older man’s fatalism. He was confident that he would return safely from Outremer, for surely it was not God’s Will that he die in a failed quest.
THE COUNT OF FLANDERS gave Philippe another reason to despise him by hammering out an agreement that handed Richard virtually all that he sought, for the French king’s bargaining position had been crippled by the exposure of his double-dealing, the disapproval of his own vassals, and the Church’s rigid code governing sexual relations. Richard was released from his promise to wed Alys in return for a face-saving payment of ten thousand silver marks to Philippe. He was to retain the great stronghold of Gisors and the Vexin; it would revert to the French king only if he died without a male heir. The other lands in dispute were disposed of according to which king held them at the present time. And Alys was to be returned to Philippe’s custody upon the conclusion of the crusade.
ELEANOR AND BERENGARIA reached the ancient seacoast city of Reggio on the twenty-ninth of March, where they were welcomed by its archbishop and installed in the royal castle. Berengaria was anxious now that she could see Messina from the window of her bedchamber, and she had a restless night. As a result, she slept past dawn, and when she was awakened later that morning, she was startled to see a blaze of sunlight filling the room. “Why did you not wake me, Uracca?” she said reproachfully, for she could not remember the last time she’d missed Morrow Mass.
“My lady, you must get up! The English king is here!”
Berengaria sat bolt upright in the bed. “Are you sure? We were not expecting him till late this afternoon!”
“He is with the queen, and they have requested that you join them in the solar.” The girl’s eyes were round. “I see why they call him Coeur de Lion, my lady, for he is as golden as a lion and just as large!”
She continued to burble on, but Berengaria was no longer listening. Fumbling for her bedrobe, she flung the coverlets back. “Fetch my clothes!” Her ladies obeyed, pulling her linen chemise over