Isabella: Braveheart of France by Colin Falconer

fixes her with a stare of withering intensity. “Do you know what it is to have someone who understands your very soul? This love your minstrels sing of, must it always be a knight and a lady? Who made this law? Was it God? Then God is a trickster, for there is no one else will do for me.”
    Gaveston says all this without pausing for breath. The king looks querulously in their direction. Isabella has never seen him like this, has only ever seen him in his usual guise, with the knowing smirk and the lofty tilt of the head.
    He realizes he has said too much. He turns away, murmurs something to Edward to make him laugh. Edward claps his hands for his dwarves and his tumblers.
    That night she slips down the stairs from her bedchamber and leans against the cold stone, watches their shadows on the walls as they sit by the fire drinking spiced wines. The last thing she sees is the silhouette of a kiss.
    The next day Edward summons a Parliament, but Lancaster and Burstbelly - she smiles at Gaveston’s description - and the other magnates refuse to attend because Gaveston is there. Pembroke tells the king that it is only “Burstbelly,” as he would call him, that keeps them all from civil war.
    They spend the Christmastide at Langley.
    One night Edward and Gaveston do not return from a hunt. She takes squires and rides out wrapped in furs to search for him by a rising moon. The frost glistens and wolves howl. She finds him in a glade in Langley Woods, dancing around a fire with people from the village, celebrating the old Yule. One of the women of the village is dressed as the Green Man in a verdant robe with a garland of berries. As the moon rises cold over the trees, she sees Edward and Gaveston kneel before him, as they did in the days of the Old Religion.
    They have not seen her approach and she rides away again. Later, her discovery sends her hurrying to the chapel. What has she married? Was he utterly godless?
    Before he had been at her side constantly; now she hardly sees him at all. He had promised her that things would be different, but already they were just the same as before.
     
     
     

Chapter 12
     
    He is watching some of his lads break in a horse. She picks him out because he is taller than the others by half a head, otherwise no one might have known him for a king. The way he is dressed, he might have been a smithy or a carpenter.
    One of the boys stands on the saddle and pulls a fool’s face. He falls off and makes them all laugh. Edward sends one of his lackeys to give him a sovereign.
    They cheer and huddle around. Look how they love him. He has an easy charm with stable boys, at least. He glances in her direction and she sees him sigh.
    He turns and lopes towards her through the mud. “Your grace. A fine morning. Chill, but blue skies always lift the spirits.”
    “I did not expect to find you here.”
    “You think I should be at court worrying over Lancaster and Warwick? They are wearisome men, are they not?”
    “What are you doing here, Edward? You are facing revolt. You know what they say about you. You are accused of keeping evil counsel...”
    “ - They cannot be talking about Perro!”
    “ - That you have lost Scotland, and that the country’s chief enemy lurks in your chamber. Their words.”
    “If they want war with me, they shall have it.”
    Her horse snickers and tosses its head. She brings him under control with a sharp tug of the reins and a dig of her heels. She wishes sometimes that Edward were a horse.
    “Isn’t this what you want? If they have their way you won’t have to worry about Gaveston anymore.”
    “I do not want to see them take your power. You are the king above all else.”
    “There is nothing to be done. I know what they want and they shall not have it.”
    “You will not forestall them by laughing with stable boys.”
    “What else would you have me do? I have asked your father for his support and he sends me letters full of puffery and little else. Perhaps you