Lionheart A Novel - By Sharon Kay Penman Page 0,13

he would make it worth the man’s while to remain in Sicily and enter his service. Because he rarely seemed sick, Joanna had learned to view his preoccupation as an endearing quirk. She remembered now that he had been complaining last night of soreness in his abdomen, and when he revealed that he’d slept poorly and the pain had moved down into the lower right side of his belly, she showed the proper wifely sympathy, feeling his forehead for fever and asking if he wanted her to summon one of his physicians straightaway.

“No . . . I think not,” he decided. “I’ll see Jamal al-Dīn later if I do not feel better.” He offered amends then for his earlier rudeness with a lingering kiss and, peace made between them, they rose to begin their day.

JOANNA HAD PROMISED to take Alicia to see Zisa, their nearby summer palace in the vast park called the Genoard, and after making sure that her husband had consulted his chief physician, Jamal al-Dīn, she saw no reason not to keep her promise. Accompanied by several of her younger attendants and household knights, they made a leisurely progress down the Via Marmorea, acknowledging the cheers of the market crowds and throwing handfuls of copper follari to the shrieking children who sprinted alongside their horses.

Joanna’s obvious popularity with her subjects was a source of great pleasure to Alicia. She was already in high spirits, for Joanna’s favorite Sicilian hound had whelped and she’d been promised one of the puppies for her own. She’d spent the morning with a tutor, for Joanna was determined that she learn to read and write, and feeling like a bird freed from its cage, she was talking nonstop, pointing out sights that caught her eye and blushing happily when the queen complimented her riding style, for that was another of her lessons.

Joanna was gratified to see the difference that the past few months had made; this cheerful chatterbox could not have been more unlike that mute, terrified child she’d first encountered in the abbey infirmary. Upon their arrival at Zisa, she enjoyed taking Alicia on a tour of the palace’s remarkable hall, where a marble fountain cascaded water into a channel that flowed across the hall and then outside into a small reflecting pool. Alicia was awestruck, kneeling to study the mosaic fish that seemed to be swimming in the ripples generated by a hidden pump, and giggling in polite disbelief when Joanna told her that during special feasts, tiny amphorae of wine were borne along by the water to the waiting guests.

As fascinated as Alicia was with the indoor fountain, she was even more interested in the royal menagerie, home to lions, leopards, peacocks, a giraffe, and elegant cheetahs which Joanna swore could be trained to walk on leashes. Afterward, they took advantage of the warm spell known as St Martin’s summer and had a light meal by the large artificial lake, sitting on blankets and rooting in the wicker baskets packed by palace cooks with savory wafers, cheese, sugar plums, and oranges. Joanna would later look back upon this sunlit November afternoon as a final gift from the Almighty, one last treasured memory of the privileged life that had been hers in the island kingdom of Sicily. But at the time, it seemed only a pleasant interlude, a favor to an orphaned child in need of days like this.

Joanna’s knights were flirting with her ladies, her dogs chasing unseen prey in the orchards behind them. Finding herself briefly alone with the queen, Alicia seized her chance and bravely broached the subject that had been haunting her for weeks. “May I ask you a question, Madame? The Lady Mariam . . .” She hesitated and then asked bluntly, “Is she truly a Christian?”

“Yes, she is, Alicia. Her mother died when Mariam was very young, just as your mother did. Mariam was brought up in the palace and naturally she was raised in the Truth Faith, for it would have been cruel indeed to deny her salvation.” Joanna finished peeling an orange before saying, “I know why you are confused. You’ve heard the talk, the gossip that the Saracens who’ve converted are not true Christians, that they continue to practice their infidel faith in secret . . . have you not?”

When Alicia nodded shyly, Joanna handed a section of fruit to the girl. “That is most likely true,” she admitted composedly. “The Palace Saracens take Christian names and attend Mass, but I