Free Beloved Enemy by Ellen Jones

nothing.”
    “Doing nothing?” Aunt Agnes, along with all the female relatives in the chamber, looked at her with their mouths agape.
    Finally, her aunt shook her head in disbelief. “Worse and worse. Of course you will be doing something. In truth you will be doing everything! Who do you think runs matters? Men? Of course not. Women! Why, without us every castle, fief, and manor in Aquitaine would fall apart tomorrow. Who do you think organizes the households, the servants, sees to the food, clothes, wounds, illness, the raising of children—”
    “If the men are at war or on pilgrimage and we’re besieged, who do you think prepares the boiling pitch, the hot oil—” interjected another relative.
    “I even ensure that my lord’s armor is kept oiled and polished, his arrows sharpened, and his bow strings taut—” said an elderly cousin.
    There was another chorus of agreement.
    Aunt Agnes sniffed. “Why should it be any different in France? You will do everything but, of course, your husband will hardly be aware of it. My dear departed lord—may God assoil him—never made a decision in his life—and never knew that he didn’t. That is women’s lot: you do the work but never receive the acknowledgment. Such is the way of the world.”
    Eleanor could not keep from laughing. “But that isn’t sufficient for me. If I run my duchy I want everyone to know it. To take notice of me. I will not hide my light behind a husband’s vanity.”
    “Humph. What say the old saws? ‘Gentleness is better than haughtiness,’ and ‘No galling trial until one gets married.’ Meanwhile, what will happen to Aquitaine? If you are not in Paris to keep an eye on the duchy, do you think Louis of France will? Or anyone else? What do you think it means to be a duchess? A life of singing, frivolity, and dalliance? Your subjects are depending on you to look after them, never forget that.” She shook a warning finger in Eleanor’s face. “ ‘If the head cannot bear the glory of the crown, better be without it.’ ”
    Eleanor got up and walked to the turret window. Below, the courtyard was thronged with people, their upturned faces reminding her of daisies straining toward the sun. Someone caught a glimpse of her and pointed, shouting. Instantly she drew back. Forget? How could she ever forget? In the end everything always came back to Aquitaine. Even the glory of the French crown.
    She turned and straightened her veil with resigned fingers.
    A short time later when she and Louis led the wedding procession through the cobbled streets of Bordeaux to the sound of bells pealing and horns blaring, it was all Eleanor could do to keep a smile on her face. Only her cheering subjects lining the streets prevented her from giving way to the misery and frustration welling up inside her. She barely noticed the housefronts proudly displaying gaily colored banners and wreaths of pink, white, and yellow flowers, hardly felt the warmth of the July morning, was indifferent to the blaze of blue sky and fragrant air.
    She paid no attention to Louis, a silent shadow marching beside her, except to note that his clothes were appropriate for the occasion. He wore a white linen shirt, a purple pelison of cloth and silk trimmed with fur and embroidered in gold thread around the neck and sleeves, a deep purple tunic and mantle of the same color also edged in fur. A golden chaplet crowned his pale hair. The gems flashed brightly in the morning sunlight.
    Inside the Cathedral of St. André, hundreds of white tapers had been lit; incense lay like a stifling fog; the sound of chanting monks was overpowering. Enclosed in a suffocating web of doubt and loneliness, Eleanor knelt before the archbishop of Bordeaux. Was her aunt right? Would she feel less miserable now, more accepting of her fate, even well-disposed toward Louis if her mother had lived to guide her? For the first time in years, her heart yearned for what might have been, for the reassurance and