The sun was at its zenith, but the heat did not bother Mariam, who’d grown up in Sicily. She was waiting for the queens to return from the papal palace. In recent weeks the Pope had been too busy to see them whenever they’d requested an audience. While Berengaria still clung to her faith in the Holy Father, Joanna had given up all hope and his evasiveness infuriated her almost as much as his lack of action, for there was nothing she could do about either. This sudden summons by the Pope had excited them both, convincing them that it meant he’d gotten news about Richard. Mariam did not share their optimistic certainty that the news must be good; no Sicilian harbored any illusions about the Emperor Heinrich.Mariam would be happy for Joanna and Berengaria’s sake if the Pope did indeed have encouraging word about Richard’s plight, but she knew it was unlikely that he’d have heard anything about the man who mattered to her, Joanna’s Welsh cousin Morgan. As soon as she’d found out that Richard had ventured into enemy territory with only twenty men, she’d been sure Morgan was one of them, and her suspicions had been confirmed by the de Préaux brothers, Guilhem, Jean, and Pierre.
