Heretic. Bernard Cornwell
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‘Unkind? I’m his jailer, not his nurse.’
‘And he is a genius. He thinks he is making me a Mass cup, so he has no idea how important his work is. He fears nothing, except you. So keep him happy.’
Charles moved away from the door. ‘Suppose they find the real Grail?’
‘Who will find it?’ the Cardinal asked. ‘The English archer has vanished and that fool of a monk won’t find it in Berat. He’ll just stir up the dust.’
‘So why send him?’
‘Because our Grail must have a past. Brother Jerome will discover some stories of the Grail in Gascony and that will be our proof, and once he has announced that the records of the Grail exist then we shall take the cup to Berat and announce its discovery.’
Charles was still thinking of the real Grail. ‘I thought the Englishman’s father left a book?’
‘He did, but we can make nothing of it. They are the scribblings of a madman.’
‘So find the archer and burn the truth from him,’ Charles said.
‘He will be found,’ the Cardinal promised grimly, ‘and next time I’ll loose you on him, Charles. He’ll talk then. But in the meantime we must go on looking, but above all we must go on making. So keep Gaspard safe.’
‘Safe now,’ Charles said, ‘and dead later.’ Because Gaspard would provide the means for the brothers to go to Avignon’s papal palace and the Cardinal, climbing to the yard, could taste the power already. He would be Pope.
At dawn that day, far to the south of the lonely tower near Soissons, the shadow of Castillon d’Arbizon’s castle had fallen across the heap of timbers ready for the heretic’s burning. The firewood had been well constructed, according to Brother Roubert’s careful instructions, so that above the kindling and around the thick stake to which a chain had been stapled there were four layers of upright faggots that would burn bright, but not too hot and without too much smoke, so that the watching townsfolk would see Genevieve writhe within the bright flame and know that the heretic was going to Satan’s dominion.
The castle’s shadow reached down the main street almost to the west gate where the town sergeants, already bemused by the discovery of the dead watchman on the walls, stared up at the bulk of the castle’s keep outlined by the rising sun. A new flag flew there. Instead of showing the orange leopard on the white field of Berat it flaunted a blue field, slashed with a diagonal white band that was dotted with three white stars. Three yellow lions inhabited the blue field and those fierce beasts appeared and disappeared as the big flag lifted to an indifferent wind. Then there was something new to gape at for, as the town’s four consuls hurried to join the sergeants, men appeared at the top of one of the bastions that protected the castle gate and they dropped a pair of heavy objects from the rampart. The two things dropped, then jerked to a stop at the end of ropes. At first the watching men thought that the garrison was airing its bedding, then they saw that the lumps were the corpses of two men. They were the castellan and the guard, and they hung by the gate to reinforce the message of the Earl of Northampton’s banner. Castillon d’Arbizon was under new ownership.
Galat Lorret, the oldest and richest of the consuls, the same man who had questioned the friar in the church the previous night, was the first to gather his wits. ‘A message must go to Berat,’ he ordered, and he instructed the town’s clerk to write to Castillon d’Arbizon’s proper lord. ‘Tell the Count that English troops are flying the banner of the Earl of Northampton.’
‘You recognize it?’ another consul asked.
‘It flew here long enough,’ Lorret responded bitterly. Castillon d’Arbizon had once belonged to the English and had paid its taxes to distant Bordeaux, but the English tide had receded and Lorret had never thought to see the Earl’s banner again. He ordered the four remaining men of the garrison, who had been drunk in the tavern and thus escaped the English, to be ready to carry the clerk’s message to distant Berat and he gave them a pair of gold coins to hasten their ride. Then, grim-faced, he marched up the street with his three fellow consuls. Father Medous and the priest from St Callic’s church joined them and the townsfolk, anxious and scared, fell in behind.
Lorret pounded on the castle gate. He would, he decided, face the impudent invaders down. He would scare them. He would demand that they leave Castillon d’Arbizon now. He would threaten them with siege and starvation, and just as he was summoning his indignant words the two leaves of the great gate were hauled back on screeching hinges and facing him were a dozen English archers in steel caps and mail hauberks, and the sight of the big bows and their long arrows made Lorret take an involuntary step back.
Then the young friar stepped forward, only he was no longer a friar, but a tall soldier in a mail haubergeon. He was bare-headed and his short black hair looked as if it had been cut with a knife. He wore black breeches, long black boots and had a black leather sword belt from which hung a short knife and a long plain sword. He had a silver chain about his neck, a sign that he held authority. He looked along the line of sergeants and consuls, then nodded to Lorret. ‘We were not properly introduced last night,’ he said, ‘but doubtless you remember my name. Now it is your turn to tell me yours.’
‘You have no business here!’ Lorret blustered.
Thomas looked up at the sky, which was pale, almost washed out, suggesting that more unseasonably cold weather might be coming. ‘Father,’ he spoke to Medous now, ‘you will have the goodness to translate my words so everyone can know what is going on.’ He looked back to Lorret. ‘If you will not talk sense then I shall order my men to kill you and then I shall talk to your companions. What is your name?’
‘You’re the friar,’ Lorret said accusingly.
‘No,’ Thomas said, ‘but you thought I was because I can read. I am the son of a priest and he taught me letters. Now, what is your name?’
‘I am Galat Lorret,’ Lorret said.
‘And from your robes,’ Thomas gestured at Lorret’s fur-trimmed gown, ‘I assume you have some authority here?’
‘We are the consuls,’ Lorret said with what dignity he could muster. The other three consuls, all younger than Lorret, tried to look unworried, but it was difficult when a row of arrow heads glittered beneath the arch.
‘Thank you,’ Thomas said courteously, ‘and now you must tell your people that they have the good fortune to be back under the Earl of Northampton’s rule and it is his lordship’s wish that his people do not stand about the street when there is work to be done.’ He nodded at Father Medous who offered a stammering translation to the crowd. There were some protests, mainly because the shrewder folk in the square understood that a change of lordship would inevitably mean more taxes.
‘The work this morning,’ Lorret said, ‘is burning a heretic.’
‘That is work?’
‘God’s work,’ Lorret insisted. He raised his voice and spoke in the local language. ‘The people were promised time from their labour to watch the evil burned from the town.’
Father Medous translated the words for Thomas. ‘It is the custom,’ the priest added, ‘and the bishop insists that the people see the girl burn.’
‘The custom?’ Thomas asked. ‘You burn girls often enough to have a custom about it?’
Father Medous shook his head in confusion. ‘Father Roubert told us we must let the people see.’
Thomas frowned. ‘Father Roubert,’ he said, ‘that’s the man who told you to burn the girl slowly? To stand the faggots upright?’
‘He is a Dominican,’ Father Medous said, ‘a real one. It was he who discovered the girl’s heresy. He should be here.’ The priest looked about him as if expecting to see the missing friar.
‘He’ll doubtless be sorry to miss the amusement,’ Thomas said, then he gestured to