Queen Of Four Kingdoms, The by HRH Princess Michael of Kent Page A

growing daily more tense.
    Couriers arrive several times a day from Louis and her informers as well as friends like Valentina, bringing Yolande news of the growing aggression between the Orléanists and Jean-sans-Peur’s Burgundians; small skirmishes here and there, inside the walls of Paris and without, until the local people are too afraid to go outside the city’s walls to work in the fields or harvest their crops.
    As if this constant fracas between princes, lords and their supporters is not sufficiently harmful to the people and the land, nature is punishing them as well. France is experiencing exceptional droughts, which ruin harvests, and livestock is starving. The result is famine, and worse: disease is spreading – cholera, smallpox, diphtheria and the greatest killer of all, the bubonic plague. Whole villages and most of the citizens in some towns are succumbing to it. In less than a hundred years, France has lost half her population.
    To Yolande’s relief, she receives word that Louis is coming home. She has given his affairs her utmost attention, but she misses him and needs him to guide her. He arrives a day before he is expected and she has not had time to prepare herself or his welcome as she would have wished.
    ‘Welcome home, my lord,’ she says hurriedly as she runs to greet him, smoothing her skirt and tucking back a loose curl. ‘We expected you tomorrow.’
    ‘And are you sorry I raced to be with you as quickly as I could?’ he says with a teasing smile. ‘My poor horse is lame with the effort and you admonish me?’
    ‘No, no, my darling, you misunderstand! I wanted everything perfect for your arrival,’ she quickly corrects herself as she embraces him with all her heart.
    ‘And it is,’ he says in her ear as soon as he can close the door behind him. He holds her tight and breathes her in, sighing deeply into her neck.
    He is home; my strong, loving husband is home.
    *
    That evening, after they have dined, Yolande can see he wants to talk seriously. And as they talk, she realizes that there has been a change in their relationship. No longer is he shutting the door on important affairs, family affairs, and leaving her on the other side of it. Now, he is actually seeking her counsel. Has she proved herself? Or is it that, without his mother and brother, he has need of a listening ear? It does not matter – it is the opening of a door she is eager to step through.
    ‘The sparring between the two royal factions is growing out of control and I fear for the consequences. You are fully aware of the situation – I have written to you almost daily and you have your own sources I believe.’ He raises an eyebrow, but Yolande says nothing. ‘As you know, I have always held back from taking sides in my family and their differences. Now I am being pushed into aligning myself with one side or the other – and there is no contest; my loyalty will always be with the king – but how can we stay out of this rapidly growing feud, or defuse it somehow?’
    Now that she has Louis at home, it might help him in taking a decision if he learns more about their troubles in the countryside.
    ‘My darling, allow me to tell you what is going on here on your estates. You should know that anxiety for our family in this time of plague has prompted me to send couriers in every direction, but in particular to our several houses in Anjou, Maine and Provence. I am deeply concerned about the fate of our own people, not only our administrators and household staff, but the families of our workers, our loyal Angevin and Provençal peasants with whom we have such good relations.’
    ‘Yes, I know, and that is one of the reasons for my return. I must see for myself how things are here, my dearest, though I can tell from my factor’s report how well you have coped.’ And his heart-warming smile of approval fills her with pride.
    ‘I believe I have done, and am doing, all I can. I send medicines and doctors wherever I hear