Eleanor shuddered. All these years later, she could not bear to think of what happened at Vitry. It had changed Louis forever.
My marriage has not been easy, she admitted, glad to do so. Let Henry not think she was in love with her husband. Once she had been, in a girlish, romantic way, but that was long years ago.
You need a real man in your bed, Henry told her bluntly, his eyes never leaving hers, his lips curling in a suggestive smile.
Thats what Ive been trying to tell Abbot Bernard, Eleanor said mischievously.
Him? The watchdog of Christendom? Hed never understand. Henry laughed. Do you know that when he was young, and got his first erection from looking at a pretty girl, he jumped into an icy pond to cure himself!
Eleanor felt herself flush with excitement at his words. So soon had they progressed to speaking of such intimate matters, it was unrealand extremely stimulating.
You are very self-assured for such a boy, she said provocatively. Are you really only eighteen?
I am a man in all things that count, Henry assured her meaningfully, slightly offended at her words.
Are you going to prove it to me? she invited.
When? he asked, his expression intent.
I will send a message to you by one of my women, she told him without hesitation. I will let you know when and where it is safe for us to be alone together.
Is Louis a jealous husband? Henry inquired.
No, he never comes to me these days, Eleanor revealed, her tone bitter, and he rarely ever did in the past. He should have entered a monastery, for he has no use for women.
I have heard it said that he truly loves you, Henry probed.
Oh, yes, I have no doubt that he does, but only in a spiritual way. He feels no need to possess me physically.
Then he is a fool, Henry muttered. I cannot wait.
Im afraid you might have to, Eleanor said lightly. I have enemies at this court. The French have always hated me. Everything I do is wrong. I feel I am in a prison, there are so many restrictions on what I do, and they watch me, constantly. So I must be careful, or my reputation will be dragged further in the dust.
Henry raised his eyebrows. Further?
Maybe you have heard the tales they tell of me, Eleanor said lightly.
I have heard one or two things that made me sit up and take notice. He grinned. Or stand up and take notice, if you want the bare truth! But I have been no angel myself. We are two of a kind, my queen.
I only know that I have never felt like this, Eleanor whispered, catching her breath.
Hush, madame, Henry warned. People are looking. We have talked too long together. I will wait to hear from you. He raised her hand and kissed it. The touch of his lips, his flesh, was like a jolt to her system.
Later that night, Eleanor sat before her mirror, gazing into its burnished silver surface. Her image stared back at her, and she looked upon her oval face with its alabaster-white skin, cherry-red rosebud lips, sensuous, heavy-lidded eyes, and well-defined cheekbones, the whole framed with a cascade of coppery tresses. She marveled that she had as yet no lines or wrinkles, but even so, wondered if Henry would desire her as much when he realized that, at twenty-nine, she was eleven years older than he was. But of course he must know that. The whole world knew of her great marriage to Louis; there was no secret about her age.
Setting aside her fears, she stood up and regarded her naked body in the mirror. Surely Henry would be pleased when he saw her firm, high breasts, narrow waist, flat belly, and curving hips. The very thought of that steely, knowing gaze upon her nudity made her melt with need, and her fingers crept greedily down to that secret place between her legs, the place that people like Bernard regarded as forbidden to the devout: the place where, five years before, she had learned to feel rushes and crescendos of unutterable pleasure.
It was Marcabru the troubadour who had shown her how, the incomparable Marcabru, whom she herself had invited from her native Aquitaine to the court of Pariswhere his talents, such as they were, had not been appreciated. Dark and almost satanic in aspect, he had excited and awakened her with his suggestiveand very badpoems in honor of her loveliness, and then done what Louis never had to bring her to a climax, one glorious July day in a secluded arbor in the palace gardens. But Louiss suspicions and jealousy had been aroused by Marcabrus overfamiliarity in the verses he dedicated to the Queen, and he had banished him back to the South without ever realizing just how far Marcabru had abused his hospitality. It had been Eleanors hunger to know that sweet fulfilment once more that had driven her into the arms of Geoffrey the following autumn.
Since then she had learned to pleasure herself, and she did so now, hungrily, her body alive in anticipation of the joys she would share with Henry of Anjou when they could be together. And, gasping as the shudders of her release convulsed
her, she promised herself that it would be soon. After all, Henry and Geoffrey would not be staying long in Paris.