The Unicorn Hunters: A Novel(34)
She shoved it into the fire. “Nonetheless I will have her betrothed and out of Nantes as soon as may be. One odd circumstance may perhaps be discounted, but the odd circumstances are proliferating, and I dislike it.”
“I have said I am your servant in this,” said Louis of Orléans.
“See that you are,” she answered.
But to herself, Marguerite thought, Proliferating? The odd circumstances were piling up like leaves around the duchess of Brittany. Unicorns and faerie-kings. Let the duchess live in Blois or Amboise before the wedding, safe in the rational seat of Marguerite’s very rational court. A pox on this wet, green, ghost-addled country.
As she and her escort drew near to Nantes, the first thing Marguerite saw was not the high wall of the city, nor the dazzling spires of the cathedral, nor was it the sunlight on the side of the new castle that Duke Francis had built. No, it was a collection of silk pavilions pitched in the water-meadow beside the rolling Loire, and among them a great hurry of people. In the midst of all this stood a tall beast on wheels, like a Trojan horse.
No, not a horse, but a unicorn, built upon a cart, with a large, ornate, throne-shaped saddle. Around the unicorn lay absurd gilded swags made of plaster, and a mess of silk streamers.
Louis was riding at her heel; she heard him say dryly, “Is there a feast-day we have neglected?”
Someone must have seen them; sudden turmoil erupted among the pavilions. A group of riders burst from between the tents, most of them dressed and caparisoned for hunting.
“What on earth?” said Marguerite. Her escort pressed in closer.
Orléans said, “A welcoming-party, I think.” She could not tell if he was amused or dismayed. A girl on a white palfrey called, laughing, to the others, “I saw them first,” just as she came up with them. She dismounted, handed someone her reins, and made an extravagant courtesy, strands of hair coming loose. She straightened, smiling. “Well met, cousin.”
“The honor is mine,” Marguerite said automatically, for this could only be Anne of Brittany, mussed and sweating and modishly dressed; nothing like the stiff paragon of virtue Marguerite had envisioned. Vast, melting eyes, tender mouth, a figure that owed nothing to the dressmaker’s art. At least there would be no objections to the match from Charles, she thought. If Marguerite were the girl’s mother, she’d have been negotiating a marriage for her sooner, not later.
“You have come on a blessed hour, cousin,” the duchess said, looking up earnestly.
Marguerite was off balance, and when was the last time that had happened? “Have we?”
“Oh, yes,” said Anne forthrightly. “Wait, come and ride with me and I will tell you.” She turned back to her palfrey, then frowned. “I do forget it’s harder to remount. Henri—come and help me.”
A tall young man, strapped all over with muscle, wearing a thin silk doublet and an ostrich hat, leaped down from his courser and—without a word, but with a very censorious look—boosted the duchess back into the saddle.
This must be the brother, Marguerite thought. The one deep in the duchess’s councils according to La Trémoille. The baron of Avaugour, Francis’s bastard. “As I was saying, this is a blessed day,” the duchess continued breathlessly as she remounted. “But— Oh, it is my lord of Orléans!” She kissed her hand to Louis and said, “Monseigneur, you are welcome. We had thought you were in prison.”
Was that a barb? Marguerite wondered. Or was the duchess just very na?ve?
“So I was,” returned Louis. “Decayed, forgotten, the black hole, bread and water. But quite restored now to the bosom of my dear cousins of France.”
What did Orléans mean by that answer? A warning? Or was it mere irony?
The duchess had noticed nothing. She was still rattling away innocently. “It must have been dreadful, languishing in prison, with all your French relations resenting you for betraying them.”
“Present company excepted,” said Louis, with a bow toward Marguerite.
“Of course,” said the girl ingenuously, misunderstanding him. “You never betrayed Father, that is true. Though he was quite angry with you after all those battles were lost. But now all is forgiven. Come, or we shall be late.”
Had the duchess misunderstood? Or was she needling him?
Was she as wholly guileless as she seemed?
Marguerite couldn’t tell. Her gelding stood stolidly, but she still felt she was being heaved along by a runaway horse. “Late for what, Highness?” They put their horses into a trot toward the pavilions.
The wide eyes turned to her at once, and this time Marguerite noticed the fillet round the girl’s brow. Her breath caught. It was merely a band of cut-velvet, embroidered in white and silver. And yet Marguerite knew, without a word being spoken, that the white thread of its embroidery was the hair of a unicorn’s mane. The thread did not glow, exactly. It merely—caught the light, seized the eye, held it fast. So the rumors were true, then: This rattle-brain had touched a unicorn, and wore the proof upon her person. Dear God, what an heirloom. Would other princes covet it? Covet her? How to reconcile it, the pretty, silly face and this proof of highest virtue?
The duchess was answering her question. “Why—late for the Triumphal Entry, of course.”
“Triumphal Entry?” said Louis. Marguerite thought with exasperation that he was swallowing a desire to laugh.