The Dauphin doesn’t speak, so Joan’s gaze moves to the snake in the tapestry. Its forked tongue tickles Eve’s white heel, like a single flame. But if the Dauphin doesn’t address her, he still commands all attention to himself. So, he gently clears his throat. He rustles his sleeves and, turning sideways, offers Joan a profile to look at and to admire, the prominent Valois nose, which, some argue, is his best claim to the French throne and physical proof that he is, in fact, his father’s son. He tilts his head and the glow of candlelight beams across his cheekbone, makes his skin shine a liquid, silken gold, as though all his features were in the process of being melted and sculpted to classic Romanesque handsomeness from scratch. The effect lasts for a heartbeat. The candle’s flame shifts, and when she looks again, he is no longer glowing but dim, even slightly drooping beneath the collective weight of robes and black fur. He is tall, a slender young man twenty-six years of age, and his clothes, despite their opulence, have the impression of being passed down from a father or older brother. They are tailored for a person with fuller shoulders, a broader chest, someone with a healthy appetite and a rotund, protruding stomach, not one flat as a plank of wood. From a steeple of red cloth, the narrow gatepost of his body, his face juts like a pale moon.

Joan thinks, Perhaps the Dauphin does not look like a king because he was never made into one, not properly. Le Maçon had told her that when his father died, the Dauphin was named king by his own court in Mehun-sur-Yèvre with the first suitable crown the Archbishop could find. But the holy oil, which baptized the first Clovis nearly a millennium ago, was missing from the ceremony. As was Joyeuse, the sword of Charlemagne, and his crown. Still, she does not know if either would make the Dauphin droop less, if they would fill out his body so his robes do not sway so much like sheets drying in the wind.

She also thinks he looks tired, which is why he is yawning. A rumor has spread that he is considering a move to sunny Castile, just south of the kingdom’s border. And Castile would welcome him with open arms, give him sanctuary for the term of his natural life. But don’t bring that up, le Maçon warned her. We want him to stay where he is.

Again, the Dauphin sighs. He wavers, and she reads his thoughts as he glances back at the chair, the plump cushion. He is wondering whether he should remain on his feet or sit. The result is a compromise. He hovers closer to the chair but stands.