They stood as tall and straight as lances, prideful and spirited and bred for greatness. Hal, already handsome enough to attract female eyes, his the fair coloring and easy grace of his grandsire. Richard, Eleanor’s favored cub, with a lion’s ruddy mane and a lion’s strut. Geoffrey, tawny-haired and sharp-eyed, of smaller stature than his brothers, but lacking only years, not confidence. Sons to do a man proud, the true treasure of his kingship.
They had done their homage to the French king, showing a poise that belied their youth: Hal for Normandy, Anjou, and Brittany; Richard for Aquitaine. Richard was then plight-trothed to Louis’s daughter Alys, a dark-eyed lively child who giggled and squirmed her way through the solemn ceremony of betrothal. Later in the year, Geoffrey would do homage to Hal for Brittany, thus assuring his ascendancy to the Breton duchy. Watching as his sons basked in the winter sunlight and the admiration of the highborn spectators, it was easy for Henry to believe that a dream once glimmering on the far horizon was now within his grasp. His heirs would not have to fight for their inheritances. Their rights would be recognized by one and all during his own lifetime, beginning with this public Epiphany Day acknowledgment by their liege-lord, the King of France.
Raising his hand, Henry signaled and his gift was led out. Murmurs swept the crowd. The pony was small even by the standards of its breed, less than twelve hands high at the withers, its coat groomed to an ebony sheen, saddle pommel and cantle lavishly decorated with jewels. The little animal submitted composedly to the French king’s delighted inspection, displaying a temperament calm enough to reassure the most anxious of fathers. They were an ancient breed, roaming the moorlands of England’s West Country since time immemorial, Henry explained, ideally suited for a lad’s first mount. Louis thought so, too, and beamed as all eyes focused upon the little boy who held his heart. Philippe Auguste, the son whose birth had seemed so miraculous to his father and subjects that he was called Dieu-Donne. The God-Given.
Philippe was in his fourth year, but so undersized that he looked younger. He seemed reluctant and had to be coaxed forward by his father. When Louis lifted him up onto the pony, he froze and then started to cry. Henry was taken aback, for his sons had been eager to ride as soon as they could walk. Louis’s attempts to reassure the little boy were futile, his tears giving way to hiccuping sobs and then to loud wails.
Henry’s sons shared his astonishment. They were soon nudging one another and grinning; fortunately he was close enough to quell their amusement with a warning glare. Louis had plucked his son from the saddle, but Philippe did not seem to realize that he was no longer astride the pony and his shrieks continued until he felt the familiar arms of his nurse. As she carried him away, an awkward silence settled over the field.
Henry took in the glowering looks of the French and knew they suspected him of masterminding this debacle. He knew, too, that his denials would count for naught; his enemies invariably ascribed diabolical motives to his every act. But it had never occurred to him that Philippe would have a fear of horses. Moving over to Louis, he did his best to act as if Philippe’s terror was perfectly natural, commenting casually that the lad was just a little too young yet. Louis nodded distractedly, his eyes following the small figure of his son surrounded by attendants as he was borne from the field.
Henry glanced again at his own boys. They were perfectly at ease in such a public setting, their eyes bright with suppressed laughter, and he felt a surge of fierce joy that these young fledglings were his. He wished suddenly that Eleanor could have been here to see how their sons shone at the French court. How proud she would have been, and how disdainful of Louis’s timid little whelp.
Becoming aware that someone had drawn near, Henry turned. William of Blois, the newly consecrated Bishop of Sens, was not a man whose company he enjoyed, yet another of Stephen’s troublesome nephews, nursing a grudge that should have been buried with Stephen. The bishop was watching him intently, as if searching for signs of satisfaction, but Henry was not about to give him any. Smiling blandly, he said that it had been a good day, indeed, a day in which the seeds of a lasting peace were sown.
The bishop could hardly disagree and responded with an innocuous platitude of his own. But then he wiped the smile from Henry’s face by saying coolly, “Let us hope that another peace will be made on the morrow, when you meet with His Grace, the Archbishop of Canterbury.”
The weather on the following day mirrored Henry’s unsettled mood, the sky blotched with clouds the color of snow, occasional patches of pale blue hinting at a possible reemergence of the sun. Henry and Louis were flanked by the papal legates who had arranged this meeting: Simon, Prior of Mont-Dieu, Bernard de la Coudre, Prior of Grandmont, and Engelbert, Prior of Val-St-Pierre. The legates were scanning the crowd intently, for they had a stake in this outcome, too. If they could reconcile England’s king with his rebellious archbishop, they’d earn the Pope’s undying gratitude. This was a quarrel that only Thomas Becket seemed inclined to pursue; everyone else simply wanted it to go away, especially now that it jeopardized hopes of another holy quest. Henry had spoken of taking the Cross, but how likely was that if his feuding with Becket continued to occupy his time and energy? It had been a long and tiresome struggle, but the papal envoys had eventually convinced the archbishop that his protracted exile served neither his own interests nor those of his Church.
Henry was not as confident as the papal legates that Becket was finally willing to compromise. They had assured him this was so, that the archbishop would make a public submission without qualification or reservation, promising him that there would be no repeat of that restrictive clause Henry had found so odious at Clarendon, “saving our order.”
Henry harbored some doubts, though, for he’d bribed a man who’d been privy to their discussions with Becket, and his spy had reported to him that Becket had wanted to substitute “saving our order” with a phrase even more inflammatory: “saving the Honor of God.” The legates had been able to persuade Becket that this proviso was not only unacceptable but offensive, too, implying as it did that the king cared naught for the Almighty’s Honor. Henry waited now to find out if the papal mission had been as successful as they claimed.
He hoped they were right. He, too, had grown weary of the unending discord. Becket had become a distraction, a tool for his enemies to use against him, a needless bone of contention with the Church. He would never understand why the other man had betrayed him, for that was how he still saw it. And until the day he died, this was a wound that would be imperfectly healed, sore to the touch. He had no intention of repudiating the Constitutions of Clarendon and suspected that Becket’s opposition to them had not weakened during his years of exile. But the Pope governed on a far greater stage than the one Thomas Becket occupied, especially now that he’d been able to return to Italy. The King of England was a more valuable ally than one aggrieved archbishop, and a peace cobbled together with strategic silences and calculated omissions was still better than no peace at all.
The Bishop of Sens had just come into view, and as the crowd parted, Henry saw Thomas Becket. This was their first meeting in more than four years and his immediate, unbidden thought was that those years had not been kind to Thomas. Becket had always been of slender build; now he was gaunt. Fair-skinned by nature, his was now the sickly pallor of the ailing. Henry suddenly believed those stories he’d heard of Becket’s deprivations and denials, no longer dismissed them as self-promotion. The archbishop’s eyes were hollowed, his dark hair well salted with silver, and his black beard had gone white. Only his height was as Henry had remembered. His throat tightened unexpectedly; could this be the man who’d once playfully tussled with him over a crimson cloak?