JOANNA AND BERENGARIA WERE euphoric upon receiving a papal letter informing them that Richard had been freed two days after Candlemas. They did not expect to hear from Richard or Eleanor until their return to England, and they spent much of their time discussing how long that journey would take. Since they were ignorant of German geography and lacked any German maps, they could only speculate. Berengaria confided that she was a little nervous about their reunion. She’d been taken aback to realize that she and Richard had now been apart as long as they’d been together; the sixteen months from their wedding in Cyprus to her departure from the Holy Land matched by the sixteen months since their Acre farewell. She was eager to see England for the first time and Joanna did her best to satisfy her curiosity about Richard’s realm, although Joanna’s memories were faded by the passage of time. It was nigh on eighteen years since she’d left England on her bridal journey to Sicily.
Their anxious waiting came to an end on March 25. Joanna and Berengaria were playing a game of chess in the latter’s bedchamber when a servant informed them that a messenger from King Richard had just ridden in. Berengaria hurriedly covered her hair with a veil—Joanna did not bother—and they flew down the stairs into Eleanor’s magnificent great hall. There they came to an abrupt halt, and for the moment, the messenger mattered more than the message.
“Cousin Morgan!” As soon as he’d made a gallant bow, Joanna caught his hand in both of hers, her smile bright enough to light the darkest corners of the hall. “How glad we are to see you!”
“We are, indeed,” Berengaria agreed, with a luminous smile of her own, for she was fond of Joanna’s Welsh cousin. “How wonderful that my husband thought to send you to us!”
Morgan grinned. “As soon as we reached London, he said he needed a man to carry letters to Poitiers. I’d gladly have groveled and begged for the honor, but he spared me that, merely saying he hoped I’d remember to come back.” When they asked if Richard was still in London, he shook his head, saying Richard was likely at the siege of Nottingham by now. He began to tell them of Richard’s welcome into the city, but Joanna noted the way his gaze was sweeping the hall and she beckoned to Dame Beatrix, telling her to find Mariam.
“I’d never seen anything like it,” Morgan confessed. “Someone told me London has twenty-five thousand citizens, and I vow every last one of them turned out to see the king. The mayor was there, and the Bishop of London, of course, the city sheriffs, aldermen, priests, merchants, journeymen, apprentices—so many people that I could not have thrown a stone without hitting someone. They escorted the king and his lady mother to St Paul’s through streets hung with banners and swept so clean the rakers must have been laboring all night long. At the cathedral, a special Mass was said and the bishop offered up prayers of thanksgiving, praising the Almighty for restoring the king to them. I think even the cutpurses and thieves took the day off.”
Morgan grinned again, almost adding that the whores in the Southwark stews had likely done a thriving business afterward, but thinking better of it in time, for Berengaria did not share Joanna’s bawdy sense of humor. “Now, what did I forget? Ah yes, the letters. They must be in here somewhere,” he teased, pretending to root around in his leather pouch. But then he happened to glance up and saw the woman just entering the hall.
Morgan and Mariam’s flirtation had begun with their first meeting in Sicily, but they’d not become lovers until their second summer in Outremer, for an army camp was not the ideal place for clandestine trysts. Although they’d sought to be as discreet as possible, Morgan had often suspected their efforts were futile, and his suspicions were confirmed when Richard chose him for this mission. If even the king knew he was besotted with Mariam, clearly their love affair was one of the worst-kept secrets in Christendom. But if there were any innocent souls still in the dark, that ended now when, with an utter disregard for propriety, Mariam flung herself into his arms. He pulled her close, holding her as tightly as he’d hungered to do during those long, dark nights in Germany, kissing her until they both were breathless. Only then did he remember the letters and handed them over with a sheepish smile before turning back to Mariam.
Berengaria eagerly broke the seal of her husband’s letter. She had an expressive face and when she looked up, her distress was obvious to all in the hall. “Joanna, he says I should remain in Poitiers instead of joining him in England!”
Joanna had received two letters, one from her brother and one from her mother. She’d already scanned Richard’s brief message and was reading Eleanor’s when Berengaria cried out in dismay. “He is going to be occupied putting down John’s rebellion,” she said, hoping she sounded convincing.
Morgan tore his attention away from Mariam long enough to say, “That is indeed true, my lady. Despite the joyous welcome he received in London, the king stayed there but one day, so impatient was he to get to the siege of Nottingham. It would make no sense for you to travel all the way to London when he’d be over a hundred miles to the north.”
Berengaria was not yet ready to concede defeat. “But why could I not join him at Nottingham? I often lived in an army camp during our stay in Outremer.”
“That was different, my lady,” Morgan said earnestly. “Men do not take their wives campaigning, for it is dangerous as well as distracting.”