He did not take his eyes from hers as he said it, but there was a flickering in their depths that told her he was not being honest with her.
"When will I meet this—Mameluke?"
"Tomorrow we go falconing. The forest is a good place to talk freely." He paused and grinned at her. "But do not dress just yet. This may be my last chance to enjoy your lovely body."
She looked away. She felt no desire for him. She was sick of being enjoyed.
"Forgive me, Sire, I have much to do," she said. Before he could object, she had slipped through the curtains around the bed and was pulling her blue gown over her head. She had left half her clothes behind with Manfred, but that did not matter. Her own quarters were near, and later she could send a servant for her things.
As she hurried out the door, she pretended not to hear Manfred's angry cry, muffled by the bed's thick curtains.
Sophia wrapped in white linen the satin mantle in which she had been presented at Manfred's court. She laid it in her traveling chest, then brought her jewel box from the table on which it had stood since she'd arrived here, and laid it on the mantle.
Manfred would gladly have ordered servants to do this packing for her, but it was easier to preserve her privacy when she did for herself.
She looked down at the polished ebony box with the double-headed eagle of Constantinople in mother-of-pearl inlay. A gift from the Basileus when he sent her to Sicily. The eagle of Constantinople, tradition said, was the inspiration for the two-headed Hohenstaufen eagle.