Time and Chance

PROLOGUE It began with a shipwreck on a bitter-cold November eve in God's Year 1120. The English king Henry, son of William the Bastard, conqueror of England, lost his only lawfully begotten son in the sinking of the White Ship. In his despair, he named his daughter Maude, widow of the Holy Roman Emperor, as his heir. But his lords balked at being governed by a woman, and when the old king died, Maude's cousin Stephen seized the throne. Stephen was not feared by his lords, who dismissed him as a mild man, gentle and good, who did no justice. When the Empress Maude and her bastard brother Robert, the Earl of Gloucester, led an army onto English shores, many rallied to her cause. Even more served only themselves or the Devil. Outlaws roamed the roads and barons became bandits, raising up stone castles by forced labor, emerging from these wolf lairs to raid towns and plunder the countryside. Women, pilgrims, priests-none were spared by the lawless and the damned. Because men feared to venture into the fields, the earth was not tilled, crops did not grow, and hunger stalked the land. In this wretched way did nineteen years pass, years of suffering and anarchy, and people said openly that Christ and his saints slept. The Empress Maude failed in her attempt to reclaim her stolen crown. But by her marriage to Geoffrey, Count of Anjou, she had given birth to a son who vowed to recover his lost birthright. He called himself Henry Fitz Empress and men began to hope that he might deliver them from their misery. It was said that he was Fortune's favorite; when that was reported to him, he said a man makes his own luck and some thought that was blasphemy. He was only nineteen when he stunned Christendom by wedding Eleanor, the beautiful and headstrong Duchess of Aquitaine, less than two months after she'd been freed from her marriage to the King of France. He then turned his gaze upon Stephen's unhappy realm. Within a twelvemonth, he had forced Stephen to recognize him as the rightful heir, and it was agreed that Stephen would rule for the rest of his days and then Henry would be king. In less than a year, it came to pass. He was but one and twenty when he was crowned as the second Henry to rule England since the Conquest, and the people rejoiced, for he promised them justice and peace. CHAPTER ONE JULY 1156 CHINON CASTLE TOURAINE, FRANCE As the King of England crossed the inner bailey of Chinon Castle, his brother watched from an upper-story window and wished fervently that God would smite him dead. Geoffrey understood perfectly why Cain had slain Abel, the firstborn, the best-beloved. Harry was the firstborn, too. There were just fifteen months between them, fifteen miserable months, but because of them, Harry had gotten it all-England and Anjou and Normandy-and Geoffrey had naught but regrets and resentments and three wretched castles, castles he was now about to forfeit. He'd rebelled again, and again he'd failed. He was here at Chinon to submit to his brother, but he was not contrite, nor was he cowed. His heart sore, his spirit still rebellious, he began to stalk the chamber, feeling more wronged with every stride. Why should Harry have the whole loaf and he only crumbs? What had Harry ever been denied? Duke of Normandy at seventeen, Count of Anjou upon their father's sudden death the following year, King of England at one and twenty, and, as if that were not more than enough for any mortal man, he was wed to a celebrated beauty, the Duchess of Aquitaine and former Queen of France. Had any other woman ever worn the crowns of both England and France? History had never interested Geoffrey much, but he doubted it. Eleanor always seemed to be defying the natural boundaries of womanhood, a royal rebel who was too clever by half and as willful as any man. But her vast domains and her seductive smile more than made up for any defects of character, and after her divPenman, Sharon Kay is the author of 'Time and Chance' with ISBN 9780399147852 and ISBN 0399147853.