“Mea culpa,” she said, with an apprehensive glance at her husband, as she knelt to take Maud in her arms. “Forgive me. I was in the midst of kissing the feet of the blessed poor and did not realize you were ready to leave.”
Having often seen the ulcerous and bleeding feet of the beggars that came to the castle gates, Maud hastily turned her lips away so that her mother’s kiss fell on the side of her head.
“May our Blessed Lady send you safe to Germany.” She pressed a crude wooden rosary into Maud’s damp palm.
“Fare well, Sister,” Robert said, holding Maud’s puppy in his arms. “I’ll miss you.” He leaned forward to kiss her hot cheek. “I’ll take good care of Beau.”
She saw that his eyes were unnaturally bright. Why, he’s the only one who really cares that I’m leaving, Maud thought. She cast a longing glance at the small dog, wishing she could take him with her.
William stuck out his tongue, then ran off without a backward look.
“The Graf is ready,” King Henry said, as he lifted Maud into the immense gilded litter hitched between two roan mares.
For a moment he stared at her, then reached into the leather purse at his belt. “This was my mother’s.” He held up a plain silver ring suspended from a finely wrought chain, then slipped the chain around her neck. He patted her cheek with an awkward gesture. “Try to be worthy of your Norman heritage,” he added in a gruff voice, then abruptly turned away.
As the long procession wound its way across the outer bailey of Windsor Castle, through the open gates, and started down the road, Maud looked longingly over her shoulder. Numb with suppressed grief, she felt as if she were going into a long exile from which she would never return. The brutal wrench of this parting was unbearable. She reached over to clutch Aldyth’s hand. The horses turned a corner; the castle was no longer in sight. Far down the road she could just make out five riders and a sumpter horse laden with packs approaching the litter.
“That must be Maurice, returning with your cousin, young Stephen of Blois,” Aldyth said, giving Maud’s hand a reassuring squeeze as she looked ahead. “I hear the lad has caused so much trouble at home his mother had to send him away to your father’s court. They say that—”
Maud closed her eyes, unable to listen to her nurse’s steady stream of gossip. Yet something Aldyth said struck a responsive note. Both she and Stephen of Blois were leaving their native lands at the same time. It was like a bond between them.
Stephen of Blois saw a cloud of dust ahead that signaled a large procession. His heart jumped a beat.
“Who is raising all that dust?” he asked the grizzled knight, Maurice, who, along with two men-at-arms, had met Stephen and his squire, Gervase, at the port of Dover yesterday morning.
“That must be young Princess Maud,” the knight replied, a note of pride in his voice. “Due to leave for Germany today for her betrothal to the Holy Roman Emperor.”
Stephen recalled his mother, Countess Adela of Blois, reminding him of his twin cousins, Maud and William, before he left for England. She had probably mentioned the impending betrothal as well but he had forgotten it among the host of instructions she had given him. At the thought of the Countess, Stephen’s belly tightened into a hard knot. His mind returned to that fateful morning, barely a month ago, when matters had come to a head between his mother and himself. But for the events of that day, he would not be in England now.
It had been a cold Sunday in March during the Feast of Annunciation, which coincided with his younger brother Henry’s departure for the Benedictine monastery at Cluny. Arriving long after the meal started, Stephen had slipped quietly into a seat at the end of the table, hoping not to be noticed.
“Where have you been?” his mother asked with an accusing glance, spotting him immediately. “As your brother leaves for Cluny tomorrow, you might have had the courtesy to attend the feast on time.”
“I was in the stables,” he mumbled, “tending to my stallion. He—he lost a shoe.” Without much hope, for she continued to regard him with suspicion, Stephen prayed his mother would let it go at that.
The Countess, formidable in black and crimson, presided at the high table flanked by her sons Theobald and Henry, her daughter Cicily, and a handful of guests. A tree trunk burned in the vast hearth, filling the cavernous hall with warmth against the chill March wind whistling through the cracks in the tapestry-covered walls.
Ten-year-old Henry repressed a smile as he threw a piece of fish to the hounds sniffing and yelping hungrily in the rushes under the table. Tearing a chunk from the wheaten loaf on the table, Stephen gave his brother a warning look from green-gold eyes.