Mariam tried to remember when she’d seen Joanna as happy as this. Only when she’d held her infant son for the first time, and then in the harbor at Messina, as she’d gazed at the ships flying the royal lion of England, realizing that her ordeal was over, that her brother had set her free.
“It is not uncommon to use marriages to end rivalries, to forge new alliances. Joanna . . . did you never think that might happen for you and Raimond?”
Joanna shook her head emphatically. “Never, for there was too much hatred between our Houses. The dukes of Aquitaine claimed Toulouse for their own, Mariam. I could not imagine Richard being willing to cede that claim, not when he knew Raimond was no match for him on the battlefield. Why would he have chosen compromise over conquest? No, it would have been mad to torment myself with false hope.”
“And yet it happened,” Mariam pointed out and Joanna nodded.
“Yes . . . Richard continues to surprise. People are always praising his skills as a soldier, but he has a sure touch when it comes to statecraft, too, and he does not often get enough credit for that. He was willing to offer Raimond terms generous enough to bridge that sea of bad blood. I never expected that and I am sure Raimond did not, either.”
Kicking her shoes off, Joanna curled up on the bed. “So much to be thankful for, Mariam. That I am able to do this for my family. That I’ll not have to bid them farewell again. That this marriage is going to give the French king so many sleepless nights.”
“And . . . ?” Mariam prompted playfully.
Joanna lay back against the pillows, green eyes glowing. “What am I forgetting?” she murmured, with a soft, sultry laugh. “Ah yes . . . that I get to take Raimond de St Gilles as my lover, with the blessings of Holy Church!”
JOANNA WAS SEATED BESIDE her brother on the dais, her eyes never straying from the entrance at the far end of the great hall. Raimond and his men had been sighted approaching the castle, so he’d soon be walking in that door. She was suddenly nervous, for it had been three years. Would it still be the same between them? Could her memory be trusted?
She was surprised when Richard reached over and squeezed her hand. “You need not fret, irlanda,” he said softly. “There’s not a man alive who could resist you when you put your mind to it. Even as a little lass, you had us all singing your song. And husbands are much easier to handle than brothers.”
Joanna smiled, touched that he’d noticed her unease, for he was not always so observant, for certes not where his wife was concerned. It amused her, too, that he still thought she’d agreed to wed Raimond as a dutiful daughter and sister. She’d have to enlighten him about that—eventually.
There was a stir outside, enough noise to indicate Raimond had come with a considerable entourage. Joanna was glad, for she wanted him to show them all that he was a prince of power and influence; she knew some of Richard’s vassals, especially the Normans, did not think highly of the southerners, considering them to be lazy, dissolute, and infected by heresy. Given how freely wine flowed at weddings, there was a potential for trouble, but she was confident that Richard would keep these regional animosities from getting out of hand.
Raimond was accompanied by the lords and bishops of Toulouse. Some of the men had brought their wives, and Joanna recognized his sister Azalais and his nephew Raimond-Roger. They’d changed in the three years since she’d last seen them, for Azalais had been widowed and her son was now a self-possessed youngster of eleven. Richard leaned over, asking their identities, but she never heard him. Raimond was striding toward the dais, looking just as he had upon their first meeting in Alfonso’s palace at Marseille.
“My lord king,” he said respectfully and knelt, for Richard—not Philippe—was now his liege lord, owed homage for Toulouse. He greeted Richard’s mother and queen next, with the gallantry for which the south was famous. Joanna watched with composure, for all her qualms had vanished as soon as their eyes had met. When he took her hand, she felt again the heat surging between their bodies, a fever of the flesh that burned just as hot as it had in that moonlit Bordeaux garden. He pressed a kiss into her palm, a lover’s gesture that he now had the right to make, and as they smiled at each other, she remembered what he’d said that night. Like being struck by lightning and living to tell the tale. Words meant to seduce, but true, nonetheless. It was, she thought, the best description she’d ever heard of the sweet madness that could ensnare men and women, decried by the Church but soon to be sanctioned within the bonds of matrimony.