Chapter Seven - Betrayal at Compiègne

CHAPTER SEVEN

Betrayal at Compiègne

SHE SHOULD HAVE gone home.

Joan had done the impossible.
Lifted the siege.
Rallied the kingdom.
Crowned the king.

But France wasn’t saved yet.
So she stayed.

Not because she was told to —
because she believed it wasn’t over.

She wanted to take Paris.
To keep the momentum.
To finish the war before the fire cooled.

But Charles VII had other plans.
He hesitated.
Negotiated with enemies.
Delayed attacks.

Joan kept pushing forward anyway.

In May 1430, she rode to defend Compiègne — a town under threat.
A loyal town.
A symbolic one.

It would be her last battlefield.

She led a small force to break the siege.
But the gates closed behind her.

Some say it was an accident.
Others say betrayal.

Either way, she was left outside the walls — outnumbered and surrounded.

The Burgundians took her.

And then sold her.

10,000 livres.
That’s what the English paid for Joan of Arc.

The girl who heard God —
handed over like a bounty,
while the king she crowned stayed silent.

No ransom.
No rescue.
No royal plea.

She was the voice of France.
Now she was a prisoner in chains.

And what happens next would make her immortal.

But first,
they’d try to break her.