The Grail Quest Books 1-3: Harlequin, Vagabond, Heretic (123 page)

‘Aye, that’s true. But you have to give them something, don’t you?’

‘Just a coin,’ Thomas said. They had emerged onto the bare summit of the ridge and Thomas looked about for enemies and saw none. He was puzzled by Robbie’s odd questions, then realized that the Scotsman, who went into battle with apparent fearlessness, was nevertheless nervous at the prospect of travelling alone. It was one thing to journey at home, where folk spoke your language, but quite another to set off for hundreds of miles through lands where a dozen strange tongues were used. ‘The thing to do,’ Thomas said, ‘is find some other folk going your way. There’ll be plenty and they all want company.’

‘Is that what you did? When you walked from Brittany to Normandy?’

Thomas grinned. ‘I put on a Dominican’s robe. No one wants a Dominican for company, but no one wants to rob one either. You’ll be fine, Robbie. Any merchant will want you as company.
A young man with a sharp sword?
They’ll be offering you the pick of their daughters to travel with them.’

‘I’ve given my oath,’ Robbie said gloomily, then thought for a second. ‘Is Bologna near Rome?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘I’ve a mind to see Rome. Do you think the Pope will ever move back there?’

‘God knows.’

‘I’d like to see it, though,’ Robbie said wistfully,
then
grinned at Thomas. ‘I’ll say a prayer for you there.’

‘Say two,’ Thomas said, ‘one for me and one for Genevieve.’

Robbie fell silent. The moment for parting had almost come and he did not know what to say. They had curbed their horses, though Jake and Sam rode on until they could see down into the valley where the fires of Astarac’s burned thatch still sifted a small smoke into the chill air.

‘We’ll meet again, Robbie,’ Thomas said, taking off his glove and putting out his right hand.

‘Aye, I know.’

‘And we’ll always be friends,’ Thomas said, ‘even if we’re on different sides of a battle.’

Robbie grinned. ‘Next time, Thomas, the Scots will win. Jesus, but we should have beaten you at Durham! We were that close!’

‘You know what archers say,’ Thomas said. ‘Close don’t tally. Look after yourself, Robbie.’

‘I will.’ They shook hands and just then Jake and Sam turned their horses and kicked back fast.

‘Men-at-arms!’
Jake shouted.

Thomas urged his horse forward until he could see down the road that led to Astarac and there, not half a mile away, were horsemen.
Mailed horsemen with swords and shields.
Horsemen under a banner that hung limp so he could not see its
device,
and squires leading sumpter horses loaded with long clumsy lances.
A whole band of horsemen coming straight towards him, or perhaps towards the great plume of smoke that rose from where his men savaged the village in the neighbouring valley.
Thomas stared at them, just stared. The day had seemed so peaceful, so utterly empty of any threat, and now an enemy had come. For weeks they had been unmolested.
Until now.

And Robbie’s pilgrimage was forgotten, at least for the moment.

For there was going to be a fight.

And they all rode back west.

—«»—«»—«»—

Joscelyn, Lord of Béziers, believed his uncle was an old fool and, what was worse, a rich old fool. If the Count of Berat had shared his wealth it would have been different, but he was notoriously mean except when it came to patronizing the Church or buying relics like the handful of dirty straw he had purchased for a chest of gold from the Pope at Avignon. Joscelyn had taken one look at the Christ-child’s bedding and decided it was dunged straw from the papal stables, but the Count was convinced it was the first bed of Jesus and now he had come to the miserable valley of Astarac where he was hunting for even more relics. Exactly what, Joscelyn did not know, for neither the Count nor Father Roubert would tell him, but Joscelyn was convinced it was a fool’s errand.

Yet, in recompense, he had command of thirty men-at-arms, though even that was a mixed blessing for the Count had given strict instructions that they were not to ride more than a mile from Astarac. ‘You are here to protect me,’ he told Joscelyn, and Joscelyn wondered from what? A few
coredors
who would never dare attack real soldiers? So Joscelyn tried to organize a tournament in the village meadows, but his uncle’s men-at-arms were mostly older men, few had fought in recent years and they had become accustomed to a life of comfort. Nor would the Count hire other men, preferring to let his gold gather cobwebs. So even though Joscelyn tried to instil some fighting spirit into the men he had, none would fight him properly, and when they fought each other they did so half-heartedly. Only the two companions he had brought south to Berat had any enthusiasm for their trade, but he had fought them so often that he knew every move they would make and they knew his. He was wasting his time, and he knew it, and he prayed ever more fervently that his uncle would die. That was the only reason Joscelyn stayed in Berat, so he would be ready to inherit the fabulous wealth reputed to be stored in the castle’s undercroft and when he did, by God, he would spend it! And what a fire he would make with his uncle’s old books and papers. The flames would be seen in Toulouse! And as for the Countess, his uncle’s fifth wife, who was kept more or less locked up in the castle’s southern tower so that the Count could be sure that any baby she bore would be his and his alone, Joscelyn would give her a proper baby-making ploughing then kick the plump bitch back into the gutter she came from.

He sometimes dreamed of murdering his uncle, but knew that there would inevitably be trouble, and so he waited, content that the old man must die soon enough. And while Joscelyn dreamed of the inheritance, the Count dreamed of the Grail. He had decided he would search what was left of the castle and, because the chapel was where the box had been found, he ordered a dozen serfs to prise up the ancient flagstones to explore the vaults beneath where, as he expected, he found tombs. The heavy triple coffins were dragged from the niches and hacked open. Inside the outer casket, as often as not, was a lead coffin and that had to be split apart with an axe and the metal peeled away. The lead was stored on a cart to be taken to Berat, but the Count expected a far greater profit every time the inner coffin, usually of elm, was splintered open. He found skeletons, yellow and dry, their fingerbones touching in prayer, and in a few of the coffins he found treasures. Some of the women had been buried with necklaces or bangles, and the Count tore away the desiccated shrouds to get what plunder he could, yet there was no Grail. There were only skulls and patches of skin as dark as ancient parchment. One woman still had long golden hair and the Count marvelled at it. 1 wonder if she was pretty?’ he remarked to Father Roubert. His voice sounded nasal and he was sneezing every few minutes.

‘She’s
awaiting
judgement day,’ the friar, who disapproved of this grave-robbing, said sourly.

‘She must have been young,’ the Count said, looking at the dead woman’s hair, but as soon as he tried to lift it from the coffin the fine tresses disintegrated into dust. In one child’s coffin there was an old chessboard, hinged so that it could fold into a shallow box. The squares, which on the Count’s chessboards in Berat were painted black, were distinguished by small dimples, and the Count was intrigued by that, but much more interested in the handful of ancient coins that had replaced the chess pieces inside the box. They showed the head of Ferdinand, first King of Castile, and the Count marvelled at the fineness of the gold. ‘Three hundred years old!’ he told Father Roubert, then pocketed the money and urged the serfs to hammer open another vault. The bodies, once they had been searched, were put back in their wooden coffins and then into their vaults to
await
the day of judgement. Father Roubert said a prayer over each reburial and something in his tone irritated the Count who knew he was being criticized.

On the third day, when all the coffins had been pilfered and none had proved to hold the elusive Grail, the Count ordered his serfs to dig into the space beneath the apse where the altar had once stood. For a time it seemed there was nothing there except soil packed above the bare rock of the knoll on which the castle had been built, but then, just as the Count was losing heart, one of the serfs pulled a silver casket from the earth. The Count, who was well wrapped up against the cold, was feeling weak. He was sneezing, his nose was running and sore, his eyes were red, but the sight of the tarnished box made him forget his troubles. He snatched it from the serf and scuttled back into the daylight where he used a knife to break the clasp. Inside was a feather.
Just a feather.
It was yellow now, but had probably once been white, and the Count decided it had to be from the wing of a goose. ‘Why would someone bury a feather?’ he asked Father Roubert.

‘St Sever is supposed to have mended an angel’s wing here,’ the Dominican explained, peering at the feather.

‘Of course!’ the Count exclaimed, and thought that would explain the yellowish colour for the wing would probably have been coloured gold. ‘An angel’s feather!’ he said in awe.

‘A swan’s feather, more like,’ Father Roubert said dismissively.

The Count examined the silver casket, which was blackened from the earth. ‘That could be an angel,’ he said, pointing to a curlicue of tarnished metal.

‘It could equally well not be.’

‘You’re not being helpful, Roubert.’

‘I pray for your success nightly,’ the friar answered stiffly, ‘but I also worry about your health.’

‘It is just a blocked nose,’ the Count said, though he suspected something worse. His head felt airy, his joints ached, but if he found the Grail all those troubles would surely vanish. ‘An angel’s feather!’ the Count repeated wonderingly. ‘It’s a miracle! A sign, surely?’ And then there was another miracle, for the man who had discovered the silver box now revealed that there was a wall at the back of the hard-packed earth. The Count thrust the silver box and its heavenly feather into Father Roubert’s hands, ran back and clambered up the pile of soil to examine the wall for
himself
. Only a scrap of it was visible, but that part was made from trimmed stone blocks and, when the Count seized the serf’s spade and rapped the stones, he convinced himself that the wall sounded hollow. ‘Uncover it,’ he ordered excitedly, ‘uncover it!’ He smiled triumphantly at Father Roubert. ‘This is it! I know it!’

But Father Roubert, instead of sharing the excitement of the buried wall, was looking up at Joscelyn who, armed in his fine tournament plate, had ridden his horse to the edge of the uncovered vaults. ‘There is a smoke pyre,’ Joscelyn said, ‘in the next valley.’

The Count could hardly bear to leave the wall, but he scrambled up a ladder and stared westwards to where, in the pale sky, a dirty plume of smoke drifted southwards. It seemed to come from just across the nearest ridge. ‘The English?’ the Count asked in wonderment.

‘Who else?’
Joscelyn answered. His men-at-arms were at the bottom of the path that climbed to the castle. They were armoured and ready. ‘We could be there in an hour,’ Joscelyn said, ‘and they won’t be expecting us.’

‘Archers,’ the Count said warningly, then sneezed and afterwards gasped for breath.

Father Roubert watched the Count warily. He reckoned the old man was getting a fever, and it would be his own fault for insisting on making this excavation in the cold wind.

‘Archers,’ the Count said again, his eyes watering. ‘You must be cautious. Archers are not to be trifled with.’

Joscelyn looked exasperated, but it was Father Roubert who answered the Count’s warning. ‘We know they ride in small parties, my lord, and leave some archers behind to protect their fortress. There may only be a dozen of the wretches over there.’

‘And we may never have another chance like this,’ Joscelyn put in.

‘We don’t have many men,’ the Count said dubiously.

And whose fault was that? Joscelyn wondered. He had told his uncle to bring more than thirty men-at-arms, but the old fool had insisted that would be sufficient.
Now the Count was staring at a patch of grubby wall uncovered at the end of the vault and letting his fears overwhelm him.
‘Thirty men will be enough,’ Joscelyn insisted, ‘if the enemy is few.’

Father Roubert was staring at the smoke. ‘Is this not the purpose of the fires, my lord?’ he enquired. To let us know when the enemy is near enough to strike?’ That was indeed one purpose of the fires, but the Count wished Sir Henri Courtois, his military leader, was with him to offer advice. ‘And if the enemy party is small,’ Father Roubert went on, ‘then thirty men-at-arms will suffice.’

The Count reckoned he would have no peace to explore the mysterious wall unless he gave his permission and so he nodded. ‘But take care!’ he ordered his nephew. ‘Make a reconnaissance first! Remember the advice of Vegetius!’ Joscelyn had never heard of Vegetius so would be hard put to remember the man’s advice and the Count might have sensed that for he had a sudden idea. ‘You’ll take Father Roubert and he’ll tell you whether it is safe to attack or not. Do you understand me, Joscelyn? Father Roubert will advise you and you will take his advice.’ That offered two advantages. The first was that the friar was a sensible and intelligent man and so would not let the hotheaded Joscelyn do anything foolish, while second, and better, it would rid the Count of the Dominican’s gloomy presence. ‘Be back by nightfall,’ the Count commanded, ‘and
keep
Vegetius in mind. Above all, keep Vegetius in mind!’ These last words were called hurriedly as he clambered back down the ladder.