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The Death of King Dinis
Chão da Feira Palace,
Santarém
6th and 7th of January 1325
Despite Afonso’s anxious wish to get to the palace, a throng forced them to a slow walk as they exited the castelo’s grounds to make for the other side of town, lest they overrun a child or animal in the crowded street. The large horses nearly filled the narrow road and caused people to back up against walls or step into alleys. Afonso and Gonçalves approached the square with the Monestario de Sao Fran cisco at the northeastern end and the Chão da Feira Palace on the eastern side of the square. They passed the facade of the palace to enter a courtyard gate. The Infante Afonso and his men dropped to the ground from their snorting coursers; the spurs on their boots made a sharp clanging sound as they hit the stones. They stretched weary limbs and took a few steps toward the doorway.
“Come to seek a final blessing from our father?” Sancho taunted. His laughter echoed off the stone walls of the palace’s inner ward. Sancho and João emerged from the shadows of the royal apartment’s portal into the light of torches as the setting sun cast dim winter light into the courtyard. A casual swagger suggested confidence.
Gonçalves bumped into Afonso, who turned and whispered with widened eyes, “We are too late.”
“Give not the two bastards the satisfaction of your unease,” Gonçalves whispered in return. When Afonso spoke, Gonçalves realized his advice had fallen on deaf ears.
“Has he passed? Have you played the part of Jacob? Why are you not in Albuquerque?” the Infante Afonso snapped as his eyes narrowed.
Gonçalves feared Afonso would either grab or punch Sancho. He noticed servants had paused and were taking in the scene. A fight among royal brothers as the king lay dying would not be seemly. The king cannot be dead, he reasoned, or an armed escort would greet them.
“Come,” Gonçalves said, attempting to calm the infante’s blaze of anger. “Ignore these surly whoresons. Let us go to the king’s bedchamber.”
January’s cloudy day and icy winds had left the newly arrived men chilled to the bone. Last night’s poor sleep on hard ground diminished the men’s temperament. Urgency drove them here, and now they would learn their destiny.
Afonso’s gaping mouth and labored breath betrayed his shock at seeing his half-brothers looking for all the world as though they owned Santarém. Gonçalves’s message and warning had not adequately prepared the infante for the situation. Sancho’s strutting, evidenced confidence, and belied his status as a man exiled from Portugal. João, nine years older than Sancho, played the sycophant to the younger man.
With Gonçalves in tow, Afonso brushed roughly past Sancho and João to step inside the portal. Of the two remaining men-at-arms, one stayed to deal with the horses while the other followed Afonso and Gonçalves into the staircase. Sniffing the piquant air on entering the stairs to the royal apartments, Gonçalves’s nose wrinkled, and his mouth involuntarily watered. The aroma of cloves, roasted meat, and chestnuts enveloped them and set their stomachs growling. Gonçalves shut his eyes briefly to breathe in deeply the rich scents boding well for a good meal, a mug of wine, and a warm fire.
“Come,” Afonso commanded, jerking him out of his moment of anticipation. Afonso had raced up a dozen steps before pausing mid-step and turning back to seek them. They climbed the steps two at a time to catch up. They strode down the hall and turned left into an antechamber filled with men. The man-at-arms paused in the passageway to wait, as it was not his lot to enter the king’s solar. Conversation ceased as Afonso erupted into the room; he moved swiftly across the space to enter his father’s bedchamber. Afonso neither looked at nor spoke to an yone as he passed through the room.
The king was hardly visible under a mound of coverlets. The pungent air shrouded their heads, stale and smelling of the gas a body passed as death neared. While Gonçalves paused a few feet from the foot of the bed, Afonso moved to stand next to his mother, Queen Isabella.
Afonso gazed down at his father’s waxen features. The shallow rising and falling of the king’s chest told Gonçalves the king was yet alive. Gonçalves saw the breath go out of Afonso as his shoulders relaxed. For a moment, Gonçalves was lightheaded with relief. He glanced around the king’s private bedchamber. The queen was the only woman present. While the outer room teemed with courtiers of various levels of importance, the bedchamber held half a dozen men of the highest rank. The bishop and chanceler stood by the side of the bed opposite the queen. The other four men huddled by the fire ceased their whispered conversation upon Afonso’s entrance.
“My Lady, I came as soon as I heard,” Afonso said, turning to his mother. “He looks so pale. Have you spoken with him today?”
“Your father has slept this day,” Queen Isabella sighed without looking at Afonso.
The bishop cleared his throat, drawing their eyes to him. The bishop spoke, “Welcome Dom Afonso. Your safe arrival is a blessing. King Dinis woke briefly yesterday to make a final confession, receive the host, and hear last rites. He did on the last day of the year just past make his fourth Will and Testament. He is shriven and in all manner prepared to meet his Lord in Heaven. Your brother Sancho spoke privately with him but yesterday.” With a touch of malice, he offered, “Mayhap Sancho will have some word to share of what passed twixt them.”
Gonçalves made a mental
note to find some way to repay so cruel a comment. All knew the ill blood
between Afonso and Sancho. For Afonso to learn that the king, in his dying
moments, had spoken with Sancho and not Afonso was a tonic of bitter wormwood.
Now Gonçalves prayed the old king would wake and speak yet one more time with
his final words to Afonso.
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