Abbey of St. Agnes, Bath May 1178 I became myself again, living the next five years among the nuns of St. Agnes. Mother Sebastian welcomed me back with open arms. I wondered at first if she had not heard of my affair with the king and of all that followed. But when we prayed together alone in my room, in front of the prie-dieu that they had built for me so long ago, she commended the soul of my daughter to heaven. I knew then that she had heard the whole story of my time with the king. I prayed for Marie Helene, safely married to Charles of Anjou at the queen’s bidding. I prayed also for Bijou, though she was only a dog. Marie Helene had taken my puppy away with her when she went by ship to meet her husband. Even I could keep no dogs in the nunnery. I prayed for Henry and for Richard, the men I would always love, the men I could not keep. And always, I prayed for Eleanor. I took to painting again almost as if I had not left it. I found myself fascinated with the Birth of the Holy Child, and I would paint nothing else. I worked with deep colors, leaving the dark tones of the vellum to stand in place for the skin of Our Lord. I painted Him always in the manger, surrounded by His Mother and singing angels, His limbs swaddled and His mouth smiling. Always, when I was done, the Christ Child wore her face. These little vellum paintings became valued by the sisters as objects of devotion, and in the last year there had been a call for them even out in the world. The wealthy women of the county would come by litter in person to take one of my paintings from the convent, leaving a healthy gift of gold or silver in its place. The Mother said that these paintings caught something of the joy as well as the sorrow in the birth of Our Lord. She said also that I was not the only woman ever to lose a child. I was old enough by then to understand her. I sat in the garden on a beautiful spring day, five years after my daughter had been born and died. I wore a simple black gown and veil. My hair had grown back long past my shoulders. The sun was high and warm, and I worked with my paints laid in the shade so that they would not dry out. I had brought my high table into the yard, as no one else would have been allowed to do. Though I lived among the sisters, I was not one of them. I added the smallest touch of blue to the Christ Child’s eye where He looked out from my painting, smiling as Rose had smiled at me. I laid my brush down and looked at the face of my daughter where I had painted her on the vellum. It was intended for a squire’s wife down the road in Bath, and her retinue was coming for it on the morrow. As I sat among the flowers of the simples garden, Richard came to me. He had met with my father the year before at Rouen. He had stood as witness to the lie Henry swore was truth: that Henry had never touched me. My father and King Henry had confirmed my betrothal to Richard once more. I wondered now, and not for the first time, what Richard thought of this, of the whole world pushing me into his arms, when all but my father knew I had been the king’s mistress. Richard was as tall and straight as I had ever seen him, and it seemed that his shoulders were even wider than I remembered. His red hair was touched with gold in the sunlight. I had forgotten how beautiful he was. He seemed older than his twenty-one years. I knew that he still bore the burden of his father’s enmity, and the loss of his mother. Just weeks after I had last seen her, Eleanor had led her sons in a rebellion against their father, a war that even I, as close as we had been, could not have foreseen. Even Henry had been caught unaware, but he had known, as I did, that his sons would never have united against him without Eleanor urging them to it. The rebellion had ended with each of Henry’s sons falling one by one, as pawns on a chessboard, to Henry’s superior strength. Henry had forgiven each of them, going so far as to offer them additional incomes and castles on the lands they held by title only. But Henry, being Henry, gave up none of his political power. Just as he had been unable and unwilling to have a partnership with me or with Eleanor before me, Henry would brook no half measures with his sons. Though all three held title to their duchies, both by right of birth and by oath to their overlord, the King of France, Henry conceded nothing. Then, as always, Henry held his power close. I wondered if he found his power cold comfort, as my prayers were cold comfort for me. Despite his largesse to his sons, Henry had not forgiven Eleanor. As the architect of the rebellion, as the mind who had united her sons against their father, Eleanor had been locked away. I did not stand to greet Richard as I once would have done. I shaded my eyes from the sun with one gloved hand and smiled. “Well met, my lord prince. You are welcome to this place.” There was a stone bench near my high table, and he sat down on it. “That is beautiful,” Richard said. “Thank you. Painting soothes me as nothing else can.” His hair was longer, and reached his shoulders. This lion’s mane suited him, and brought out the electric blue of his eyes. “I have come to say that I am sorry.” I came down from my stool and sat beside him. Though it was no longer my right, I reached out ............