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crackled, and an old house always moved and shifted in the night. René of Anjou didn’t look up as Yolande settled herself beside her sister and peered down through the upright wooden balusters on to the scene below.
    The upper hall had survived the stripping of Saumur almost intact. Perhaps because it remained the heart and centre of the family seat, its tapestries and oak furniture had been safe from the men of Paris. The fireplace was big enough for a grown man to walk into without dipping his head. A log the size of a small couch burned merrily there, heating black iron pokers laid across it until the tips glowed gold. King Charles sat in a huge padded chair drawn close to the flames, while her father stood and fussed with cups andbottles. Margaret watched in fascination as René plunged one of the pokers into a goblet of wine for his king, sending up a hiss of steam and sweetening the air. She could smell cloves and cinnamon and her mouth quirked as she imagined the taste of it. The heat did not reach as far as her hiding place, unfortunately. The stones of the castle sucked warmth away, especially at night. Margaret shivered as she sat there with her legs curled up to one side, ready to dart away from the light if her father looked up.
    Both men had changed their clothes, she saw. Her father wore a quilted sleeping robe over loose trousers and felt shoes. In the flickering light she thought it made him look like a sorcerer, gesturing with steam and fire over the cups. The king wore a heavy garment of some shimmering material, belted at his waist. The fanciful idea pleased her, that she was witness to some arcane rite between magic workers. Her father’s unctuous tones shattered the illusion.
    ‘You have brought them to this position, Your Majesty, no other. If you had not secured Orléans and strengthened the army into the force it has become, they would not be pleading for a truce now. This is a sign of our strength and their weakness. They have come to us, Your Majesty, as supplicants. It is all to your glory and the glory of France.’
    ‘Perhaps, René, perhaps you are right. Yet they are cunning and clever, like Jews almost. If I were dying of thirst and an Englishman offered me a cup of water, I would hesitate and look for the advantage it brought him. My father was more trusting, and they repaid his goodwill with deceit.’
    ‘Your Majesty, I agree with you. I hope I am never so trusting as to shake the hand of an English lord without checking my pockets afterwards! Yet we have the report of your ambassador. He said their king hardly spoke to him at all and he was rushed in and out of the royal presence as if the roomwas on fire. This Henry is not the man his father was, or he would have renewed their wanton destruction years ago. I believe this is an offer made from weakness – and in that weakness, we can regain lands lost to us. For Anjou, Your Majesty, but also for France. Can we afford to ignore such an opportunity?’
    ‘That is
exactly
why I suspect a trap,’ King Charles said sourly, sipping his hot wine and breathing in the steam. ‘Oh, I can well believe they want a French princess to improve their polluted line further, to bless it with better blood. I have seen two sisters given over to English hands, René. My father was … inconstant in his final years. I am certain he did not fully understand the danger of giving Isabelle to their King Richard, or my beloved Catherine to the English butcher. Is it so surprising that they now claim my own throne, my own inheritance? The impudence, René! The boy Henry is a man of two halves: one angel, one devil. To think I have an English king as my nephew! The saints must laugh, or weep – I don’t know.’
    The king drained his cup, his long nose dipping into the vessel. He made a face as he reached the dregs and wiped a purple line from his lips with his sleeve. He gestured idly, lost in thought as Margaret’s father refilled the cup and brought