“Not for long, though. The Holy Father will never tolerate such an outrageous breach of Church law. He will force Heinrich to release Richard and to make amends for daring to defy the Church and for treating a king, a man who fought for God in the Holy Land, with such disrespect.” Berengaria reached over, covering Joanna’s hand with her own. “I can confess now,” she said, “how fearful I was. I kept remembering those savage storms, how the sea seethed and raged, how the gales were said to be even more violent during the winter . . . but I ought to have had more faith. The Almighty would never abandon Richard.”
Joanna had opened her mouth, but she caught her words before they could escape. By now all in the hall had gathered around them as word spread, and Hubert related what little he knew—that Richard’s ship had been driven onto the Istrian coast during a storm and he had apparently been trying to reach his nephew’s lands in Saxony. “If he got as far as Vienna, he almost made it, too, for he’d have been safe once he’d crossed into Moravia. What I do not understand is why he had so few men with him. According to the archbishop, less than twenty, and only three with him when he was finally caught.”
That horrified Joanna almost as much as the news of Richard’s capture, for she had a vivid imagination and could envision all too well what those desperate weeks on the run must have been like for her brother. Mariam had drawn near and took advantage of the sudden silence to ask Bishop Hubert if the Archbishop of Cologne’s messenger had known the names of those twenty men. When he shook his head, she said nothing, but she soon slipped unobtrusively from the hall, her passing noted only by Joanna, who knew she was terrified for Morgan’s safety. She loved Mariam as a sister and was very fond of her cousin Morgan, but for now she could think of no one but Richard, facing the greatest danger of his life.
Berengaria withdrew as soon as she could politely do so, and as she exited the hall with her ladies, Joanna was sure she was going to the nearby church of Santa Maria in Capitolo to give thanks for Richard’s deliverance. Anna had accompanied her, as eager as Berengaria to believe the worst of Richard’s ordeal was over, taking Alicia with her.
Their household knights began to break up into smaller groups to discuss this momentous news and what its ramifications would be. Finally Joanna found herself alone with Hubert Walter and Stephen de Turnham, the English lord who’d been entrusted by Richard with the safety of his women on their homeward journey. From the corner of her eye, she saw Beatrix hovering nearby, as she’d done for every crisis of Joanna’s twenty-seven years, and she was grateful that she’d be able to turn to Beatrix for support, knowing Mariam, so often her mainstay, would be thinking only of Morgan. And she could expect no help from her sister-in-law, not as long as Berengaria clung to her belief that the Pope could bring a man like Heinrich to heel like a cowed dog.
She took her time, choosing her words with care, for she did not want to offend Hubert Walter, who was, after all, a prelate of the Church. “I fear I do not have as much confidence as my sister by marriage in the Holy Father’s ability to influence the emperor.”
“The Pope is indeed outraged, Madame, as are all at the Holy See. But if I may speak candidly, I very much doubt that he will dare to use the Church’s most powerful weapon against Heinrich, and nothing less than excommunication and anathema will compel the emperor to set the king free.”
Joanna rallied then, for to give in utterly to despair would be to fail Richard in his time of need. “Heinrich will seek to ransom Richard, as any common bandit would do. Whatever he demands, we will raise it. My mother will see to that.” Forcing a smile, she said, “And I would back her against Heinrich any day of the week.”
They smiled, too, as desperate as she for hope. But then the bishop showed Joanna just how much their world had changed by saying that it would be best if she and Berengaria remained in Rome indefinitely. It was too dangerous to pass close to the territories of the empire, for if they fell into Heinrich’s hands, he could use their captivity to force further concessions from Richard. “We must not labor under the delusion that we are dealing with a man of honor,” he said grimly. “There is nothing he will not do to enhance his own power, and we forget at our peril that he is utterly unfettered by scruples or moral boundaries.”
Joanna bit her lip, knowing he spoke the truth. She found herself imagining what it must be like for Richard, at the mercy of such a man, and she could not suppress a shiver. So caught up was she in her own dark thoughts that she did not at first hear Hubert’s question and he had to repeat himself. “I am sorry, my lord. You were saying something about letters?”
“I will be leaving Rome by week’s end. I thought that you and Queen Berengaria might wish to give me letters to deliver.”
“Letters . . . for my mother? Of course.”
“No, letters for the king. I am not going back to England. I am going to Germany.”
Joanna felt tears stinging her eyes. “Bless you for that.”
He reached over and patted her hand. “You must never forget that there are men beyond counting who’d willingly offer up their own lives for the king.”