The Dragon and the Jewel

Informationen zum Autor Virginia Henley  is the author of more than twenty novels, including the New York Times  bestsellers Seduced  and Desired . Her work has been translated into fourteen languages. A recipient of the Romantic Times  Lifetime Achievement Award, she lives in St. Petersburg, Florida. Klappentext With her sapphire eyes and silken dark hair! Princess Eleanor was a bewitching beauty made for a man's pleasure. Once a child bride! but widowed at a tender age! she swore never to marry again and took a vow of eternal chastity...until Simon de Montfort marched into England and set his smoldering dark gaze upon her! King Henry's youngest sister! the royal family's most precious jewel. Bold! arrogant! and invincible! the towering Norman knight inspired awe in the bravest of men...and a reckless desire in Eleanor's untried heart. Princess Eleanor Katherine Plantagenet opened her eyes to the sound of birdsong greeting the dawn. Her heart soared with happiness as she realized that the day had finally arrived. She threw back the covers impatiently and ran barefoot to the polished silver mirror.   She didn’t look any different from yesterday. Her black hair was a mass of impossible tangles, the natural creamy color of her skin was marred by too much sun, and her mouth was still set in stubborn lines that clearly showed she got her own way about everything in life. She always would, she decided. Getting your own way was what made life sweet. Some things didn’t come as easily as others, but with unwavering determination, and also by making everyone else’s life hell, she always got what she wanted.   She had ruled her siblings since she was five years old and was the terror of the nursery. They were all older than she, one was even King of England, but by fair means or foul she bent them to her will. The corners of her mouth lifted as she remembered the day that had set her fate. Her brothers Henry and Richard, then fourteen and twelve respectively, had a ferret in a sack and were off to hunt rabbits. “Wait for me!” she cried imperiously, struggling to pull on her shoes over feet still wet from paddling in the fishpond.   “You’re not coming, Maggot!” cried King Henry.   “You bugger! Stop calling me that,” she screamed furiously.   “I’ll tell Nanny you swear,” six-year-old Isabella said.   Eleanor looked at her sister with contempt. “She knows I swear … you still pee yourself.” Joanna said from the lofty wisdom of her ten years, “We’re not to leave the garden. If you go off with the boys again I shall tell on you.”   Eleanor snatched up the sack that held the ferret and thrust it at Joanna. Screwing her face into that of a hideous gargoyle, she threatened, “If you tell, you will find a ferret in your bed some dark night.”   Joanna screamed, then took little Isabella by the hand. “Come away, she’s wicked.”   Richard, Duke of Cornwall, cuffed Eleanor across the ear and took the sack from her. “Go and play with the girls, Maggot, you’re not coming with us.”   She dug determined little fists into her hips and stuck out a belligerant chin. “If you don’t let me come with you, I shall tell that you chase the maids and give them belly-burns with your newly sprouted whiskers.”   “Maggot-faced little bitch,” swore adolescent Henry.   Richard, although younger than the king, was stronger and more dominant. He suddenly threw back his head and laughed. “She’s no bigger than a piss-ant, yet she rules the roost one way or another. Come on, Maggot, I’ll bet you don’t have the stomach for this sport anyway.”   In all truth she did not have the stomach for it. She watched in fascinated horror as her brothers slipped the slinky creature down a rabbit hole, then waited with a sack at the other end of the warren for the terrified bunny to pop out. All her sympathies were with th...

Product details

• Authors: Virginia Henley
• Publisher: Dell Publishing Inc.
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Released: 10.11.1991
• EAN: 9780440206248
• ISBN: 978-0-440-20624-8
• No. of pages: 496
• Dimensions: 106 mm x 175 mm x 28 mm
• Series: Medieval Plantagenet Trilogy; Medieval Plantagenet Trilogy
• Subject: Fiction > Narrative literature