~𝕭𝖊𝖙𝖗𝖆𝖞𝖆𝖑 𝖎𝖘 𝖔𝖓𝖑𝖞 𝖙𝖍𝖊 𝖇𝖊𝖌𝖎𝖓𝖓𝖎𝖓𝖌~
Born the youngest daughter of Charles I, Duke of Bourbon, Constance of Bourbon grows up amidst comfort and splendour on her powerful family's estates in France. A shy child, she prefers her...
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~Exile~
Bruges, Burgundy, 19th of January 1471....
Rain poured down from the sky in a torrent of freezing droplets, soaking the small group daring to walk thought it, melding leather and linen to skin until they were one.
Never in her life had Constance stepped onto the streets of Bruges but she still sped ahead of her rescuers, unable to stop. Her oversized boots splashed through dirty puddles, soaking her legs but she didn't care, it only spurred her on - strands of hair stuck fast to her damp face; swirls of dark paint across her flushed cheeks.
Her breaths came out in cold clouds when she paused at the end of each street, looking back and forth, listening for the calls of her children. She didn't notice the numbness in her fingers, she didn't feel the ice biting her toes. They were so close....
"Left, your grace!" Rob called, the sound of his and Francis' boots pounding on the wet street behind, louder and louder as they finally caught up with her. Taking in another breath, she hastened along the cobbled street of timbered houses; their windows filled with the amber glow of candlelight.
Inside her chest she felt it, the same beautifully agonising pull she felt in her heart when she'd heard her babes first cries.
It was a feeling only Mother's felt, a blend of pain and incomparable love that drew them wherever it led. It was an otherworldly bond, crafted not by the hands of God, nor by those of men but by Mother and baby; a bond belonging only to them. With every step, Constance felt it strengthen.
And then, she finally arrived at the streets dark end; lit by two blazing torches mounted either side of a stone arch surrounding a great wooden door, just steps from the street. Glancing upwards, her breath caught at the sight of the whitewashed, timbered house, bigger than the others but it's windows were filled with the same glow of candlelight.
The same glow of life.
Stepping through the puddle barring her from the threshold, her feet were doused in ice but she noticed not as she clambered up the single step to the door and pushed it open.
The ageing creak was music to her ears and Constance gasped as her body was enveloped in the true warmth that rolled steadily from the flames of the hearth. She stood in the entrance a small stone hall, equipped with a table and chairs surrounding it, not neatly tucked in but pushed hither and thither about.
'Evidence of the presence of men' She thought with a small smile, boots tapping on the wooden floor as she advanced further into the room and Rob and Francis shut the door behind them. A small blanket lay next to the hearth and a basket upon it, filled with blocks of wood to be used when the heated flames died down.
