Charles Duke of Orléans has been England’s prisoner more than twenty years, ever since he was pulled like a boot from the sucking mud of Agincourt. The fifth Henry swore he would never be released and laid the same oath on his brothers, Bedford and Gloucester, for Orléans is too fine a soldier and stands too close to the French Crown.

The cardinal shrugs. ‘He’s a natural enemy to the Duke of Burgundy, whose father murdered his. His release will win us favour with the French nobility and with Charles the King.’ His be-ringed hand describes a pathway before him. ‘It will open a road for diplomacy.’

She can see the sense in what he says. It’s audacious. But her uncle was ever so, and she admires him for it, but still. ‘To return to France one of her greatest fighters …?’

‘A fighter still, you think?’ He rubs his nose and shrugs. ‘Perhaps. I visited him in Pontefract this summer. He tends more to poetry these days. His hands are soft and ink-stained. And his English is better than his French.’

‘That doesn’t make him an ally.’

‘It may make him amenable.’

Cecily’s expression is sceptical.

‘What are you thinking?’ Richard asks her.

‘I’m wondering how amenable I would feel towards the people who kept me a prisoner twenty years.’

The cardinal’s sly smile takes mastery of his face. ‘Think instead how grateful you’d feel towards those who set you free.’

Richard lays his hand on her arm. ‘Orléans told me himself he thinks it’s time to find a diplomatic solution.’

‘Oh, so you too have been visiting poets in Pontefract?’ She looks around. ‘Please tell me, brother, that you have not been embroiled in this.’

Salisbury drinks deep. ‘Not I, sister. I’ve had enough of France for now. Beware our uncle, and what he might talk you into.’

‘Have you ever known me talked into anything?’

Her brother shakes his head and addresses himself to his wine cup.

She turns again to Richard. ‘And anyway, husband, won’t a man who hopes to barter for release tell his gaolers what they want to hear?’

‘Perhaps, but—’

The cardinal interrupts him. ‘At this stage, Cecily, I hardly care. If he’ll work for peace, that’s a blessing. If not –’ he spreads his hands – ‘if he drives a wedge between France and Burgundy, that will content me. And if his return sets the French bickering between themselves about who should lead them, better still. We need the distraction.’

‘Does Charles still sicken?’ Before she was immured Cecily had heard rumours that the French king was ill and, almost as promising, running out of money.

‘Our spies say so.’

‘I’m sure you pray avidly for his everlasting rest. But, has it not occurred to you that Orléans would make a formidable regent for the dauphin, little Louis?’