Windsor Castle June 1172 My ladies were dancing for me in my solar, one playing the tabor and another, the lute, when Amaria signaled for my attention. She went to my prie-dieu and knelt instead of genuflecting. After she blessed herself with holy water, she stayed kneeling. This signal meant that the news she brought was dire indeed. I waited until the song was finished. Angeline and Mathilde, Margaret, and Joan all bowed before me, flushed with laughter. I applauded them, standing, and they bowed lower, sensible of the honor I did them, not knowing that I had a different motive. When they had taken their fill of my praise, I raised one hand. “Ladies, I must ask you to leave me alone. I feel the need to pray for my son’s safe return.” The whole court knew that Richard had been invested as duke in Aquitaine, and that he was expected to return to Henry’s court on the morrow. Alais was waiting for him. Even when sitting in my rooms, she always dressed her hair with the gold filet I had given her to match her ring. The filet was decorated with fleurs-de-Iys cast in electrum. It looked well on her dark curls. Though she loved my son, in the hall at each evening meal, I saw that her eyes tended toward the king. My women bowed and left me, save Amaria, who made my prie-dieu ready for my devotions. I knelt as my women left, drawing the door closed behind them. Amaria knelt beside me. We prayed together for two long minutes, long enough for anyone standing by my door to withdraw. Only then did Amaria reach into her gown and draw out a letter. “Clarissa sends this, my lady, with her compliments.” “How charming of her. She has no need to send me missives.” I knew the letter in my hand was not meant for me. I did not turn it over and look at the seal. I found, as I knelt in the sunshine as I had seen Alais do, that I did not want to know whose letter it was. Not yet. “As you know, Your Majesty, while she is at court, Clarissa makes it her business to be your eyes and ears at Windsor.” “Yes.” The news must be bad indeed, if my dour Amaria was loath to tell me. “Clarissa had the good fortune to spend the night with the French ambassador.” I knew then whose letter I held, but I did not allow myself to think on it. “Good fortune for him,” I said. “Louis’ courtiers were never much for love play.” Amaria laughed, as she knew I meant her to. “No, madam. So I have always heard.” She kept her hands clasped together, in case anyone was to peek in and see us there. “The French ambassador handed that letter to Clarissa as soon as he saw her. He asked her to give it to Your Majesty.” “He gave it to her before he had her?” “Yes, my lady.” “We must pay him, then.” I rose from my cushion, and turned the letter over in my hand. The letter’s seal was the fleur-de-lys from the ring I had given Alais only two days before. She was writing to her father, in secret. My mind felt like one large bruise as I looked down at that seal. I thought of Alais as a little girl, how she had loved her father when she first came to me. No doubt she loved him still. Her love, once given, was never taken back. Or so I had always assumed. “Pay him in ducats,” I said, “so that the money cannot be traced back to me.” “Yes, Your Majesty.” Amaria stood by, waiting for my next command. She would not send the money herself, but would have one of Henry’s men do it. A young and foolish boy, one who would think nothing of doing a service for the queen’s majesty. One who himself would never speak of it, and thus make himself useful to me again in the future. There were many such men in Henry’s train, more even than he knew of. Amaria left me then. She had been in my service many years, and knew without my telling her when I wanted to be alone. She drew the hidden door to my bedchamber closed behind her. She would not go far, but would wait on me, in case I had need of her. She had seen the seal, too. I sat in my chair, the bright summer sunshine falling across my hands, making the emeralds of my rings catch fire. Louis gave them to me the day I returned to him from Raymond, when we left the Levant together, to make a fresh start once more in France. I broke the seal, and read the letter. It was very short, and said almost nothing. Even the request it made was nicely phrased, and calm, almost blase in its demand. The fact that it had been written at all spoke volumes to me. Alais was desperate indeed, if she would turn to Louis herself, without consulting me. If Henry saw this letter, or even knew of its existence, he would lock the French princess away in a nunnery until all forgot that she breathed somewhere upon the earth. I could almost hear Henry’............