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shimmering in her unsteady hand. ‘One day I may embrace the cloister, but not yet. My child-bearing years are behind me, but I shall not be treated like a used-up old nag put out to grass for her last days.’ She shot Isabel a fierce look. ‘I will never consent, never!’
    Isabel sat down beside her, and after a moment said hesitantly, ‘I know it must be difficult to consider, but is it notbetter than returning to Sarum or being kept under lock and key at Winchester?’
    Alienor tightened her lips and looked away towards the light from the window. The strand of gold thread Henry had been winding around his finger sparkled on the floor. ‘No,’ she said, ‘it is not.’
    ‘But you will have the company of other gentlewomen, and books to read and all manner of matters to keep you occupied.’ Isabel touched Alienor’s knee, her tone coaxing and sympathetic. ‘You will have fresh air and daily comforts, and you will be honoured. When you think about it, is it really so bad what he is asking?’
    Isabel’s determination to see the good in every situation even if it meant taking the path of least resistance had always exasperated Alienor and now, because of what had just happened, it spilled over into fury. ‘You do not understand, you never do!’ she lashed out. ‘I am a queen and this thing he asks of me is not my role. It sweeps me out of his way like dust.’
    Isabel made a gesture of appeasement. ‘I did not mean to offend you; I mean it for the best.’
    ‘The best? Hah! He would make me nothing and you condone it because you refuse to see the world as it is.’
    ‘Alienor—’
    ‘Oh go away,’ she spat. ‘I do not need your kind of advice.’
    Isabel bit her lip. ‘I want to help you, that is all.’
    ‘You cannot help me,’ Alienor snapped with miserable anger. ‘I mean it, leave me; I do not want you here.’
    Isabel rose to her feet, her chin dimpling. ‘As you wish, madam.’ She formally curtsied and fled the room.
    Alienor closed her eyes and covered her face with her hands. She almost called Isabel back, but pride and anger fettered her to her seat.
    No one approached her, for who would risk the lioness’s den? She was alone. After a while she lowered her hands to her lap and raised her chin, her expression taut and regal. Ina strange way she felt expanded and filled with purpose. She would deal with whatever came her way on her own. She was a queen, and by the very nature of the role she was set apart from other women, even those she thought to call friend. This incident with Isabel had proved to her yet again that the only person she could rely on was herself.

4
Winchester Castle, Easter Court, April 1176

    Hamelin de Warenne, Earl of Surrey, was relaxing before the fire enjoying the ministrations of his three daughters. They fussed around him, voices bright as songbirds as they combed his hair and bathed his sore feet. He had been on them all day, attending to the demands of his energetic royal half-brother, and this respite was a blessed relief.
    He thought with complacence how fortunate he was in his family. His son was a clever lad with a quick mind and robust strength that boded well for the future of the earldom, while his daughters enriched his life with a warm glow of family and fulfilment. One day they would marry, and their husbands would be fortune-favoured to receive such wonderful wives – and would know it from him constantly. But not yet; he and Isabel could take pleasure in the girls for a little longer. Belle, although beginning the journey into womanhood, was not yet twelve, Adela was seven and Matilda five. Unlike Henry’s daughters, there was no rush to tie them into grand dynastic unions.
    He glanced at his wife who was busy sorting through a clothing chest, her back turned and her movements erratic as she tugged and pulled, but he thought little of it, other than to note she was engaged as usual in some mysterious female domestic business.
    ‘Belle,play for