Sculley wheeled away, saw a Frenchmen staggering to his feet with a drawn sword, so kicked him in the face and raised the mace to finish the man off, but the heralds were running to intervene and the trumpets were shrilling and another Scotsman stilled Sculley’s blow. The crowd was utterly silent. Sculley was growling, twitching, flicking his head from side to side in search of another man to hit, but of the Frenchmen only Joscelyn of Berat was still in his saddle, and he had yielded. The fight had been fast, brutal and one-sided, and the cardinal discovered he had been holding his breath. ‘A demonstration of Scottish prowess, my lord?’ he enquired of the Lord of Douglas.
‘Just imagine they had been fighting the English,’ Douglas growled.
‘That is a cheering thought, my lord,’ the cardinal said, watching as servants ran to rescue the fallen French knights, one of whom was not moving at all. His helm was battered and there was blood seeping from the visor’s eye-slits. ‘The sooner we release you against the English,’ Bessières went on, ‘the better.’
Douglas turned to look at the cardinal. ‘The king listens to you?’ he asked.
‘I give him advice,’ Bessières said airily.
‘Then tell him to send us south.’
‘Not to Normandy?’
‘Edward’s pup is in the south,’ Douglas said.
‘The Prince of Wales?’
‘Edward’s pup,’ Douglas said, ‘and I want him. I want him yielding to me. I want him on his damned knees whimpering for mercy.’
‘And will you grant it?’ Bessières asked, amused at the passion in the Scotsman’s voice.
‘You know our king is prisoner in England?’
‘Of course.’
‘And the ransom will break our backs. I want Edward’s pup.’
‘Ah!’ Bessières understood. ‘So your king’s ransom will be the Prince of Wales?’
‘Exactly.’
Bessières reached out and touched a gloved finger to the Scotsman’s hand. ‘I shall do as you ask,’ he promised warmly, ‘but first I want you to introduce me to your nephew.’
‘To Robbie?’
‘To Robbie,’ the cardinal said.
Bessières and Robbie met that evening as the survivors of the tourney feasted with the French court. They ate eels seethed in wine, mutton dressed with figs, roasted songbirds, venison, and a score of other dishes brought into a hall where minstrels played behind a screen. The Scottish warriors ate together, clustered at a table as if protecting themselves from the vengeful French, who had suggested that some strange pagan magic, born of the wild northern hills, had been used against their champions, so that when Robbie was summoned, and ordered by his uncle to obey the summons, he crossed the hall nervously. He bowed to the king, then followed the servant to the table where the cardinal had four trenchers in front of him. ‘You will sit beside me, young man,’ the cardinal ordered. ‘Do you like roasted larks?’
‘No, Your Eminence.’
‘Suck the flesh from the bones and you will find the taste delectable.’ The cardinal placed a tiny bird in front of Robbie. ‘You fought well,’ he said.
‘We fought as we always fight,’ Robbie said.
‘I watched you. In another moment you would have beaten the Count of Berat.’
‘I doubt it,’ Robbie said ungraciously.
‘But then your master’s beast intervened,’ the cardinal said, watching Sculley, who was hunched over his food as though he feared men might take it from him. ‘Why does he wear bones in his hair?’
‘To remind himself of the men he’s killed.’
‘Some think it is sorcery,’ the cardinal said.
‘Not sorcery, Your Eminence, just deadly skill.’
The cardinal sucked at a lark. ‘I am told, Sir Robert, that you refuse to fight against the English?’
‘I made an oath,’ Robbie said.
‘To a man who was excommunicated from the church. To a man who married a heretic. To a man who has proven to be an enemy of Mother Church, to Thomas of Hookton.’
‘To a man who saved my life when I caught the plague,’ Robbie said, ‘and to a man who paid my ransom so I could go free.’
The cardinal pulled a sliver of bone from his teeth. ‘I see a man who wears bones in his hair, and you tell me you caught the plague and lived with a heretic’s help. And this afternoon I watched you defeat fifteen good men, men who are not easily beaten. It seems to me, Sir Robert, that you have unnatural help. Perhaps the devil aids you? You deny using sorcery, but the evidence suggests otherwise, wouldn’t you agree?’ He asked the questions silkily, then paused to sip wine. ‘I might have to talk to my Dominicans, Sir Robert, and tell them that there is the stench of wickedness in your soul. I might be forced to encourage them to heat their fires and wind the ropes of their machines that stretch men till they break.’ He was smiling, and his plump right hand was massaging Robbie’s left knee. ‘One word from me, Sir Robert, and your soul will be in my care.’
‘I’m a good Christian,’ Robbie said defiantly.
‘Then you must prove that to me.’
‘Prove it?’
‘By realising that an oath made to a heretic is not binding in heaven nor upon earth. Only in hell, Sir Robert, does that oath have power. And I want you to do me a service. If you refuse me then I shall tell King Jean that evil has entered his kingdom and I shall ask the Dominicans to explore your soul and burn that evil from your body. The choice is yours. Are you going to eat that lark?’
Robbie shook his head and watched as the cardinal sucked the meat from the fragile bones. ‘What service?’ he asked nervously.
‘A service for His Holiness the Pope,’ Bessières said, carefully not saying which Pope he meant. The service was for himself, who prayed nightly that he would be the next man to wear the fisherman’s ring. ‘Have you heard of the Order of the Garter?’
‘I have,’ Robbie said.
‘Or the Order of the Virgin and Saint George?’ Bessières continued, ‘or the Order of the Sash in Spain? Or, indeed, King Jean’s Order of the Star? Bands of great knights, Sir Robert, sworn to each other, to their king, and to the noblest aims of chivalry. I have been charged with creating a similar order, a band of knights sworn to the church and to the glory of Christ.’ He had made it sound as if the Pope had commanded the creation of the order, but it was all Bessières’s idea. ‘A man who serves in the church’s order,’ he went on, ‘would never know the torments of hell, nor the agonies of purgatory. A man who serves our new order would be welcomed into heaven and sung into the company of saints by choirs of shining angels! I want you, Sir Robert, to serve in the Order of the Fisherman.’
Robbie was silent. He watched the cardinal. Men were cheering a performer who was juggling half a dozen flaming brands while balancing on stilts, but Robbie did not notice. He was thinking that his soul would be freed of its perplexities if he were to be a knight in the service of the Pope.
‘I want the greatest knights of Christendom to fight for the glory of our Saviour,’ the cardinal went on, ‘and each man, while he fights, will receive a small subvention from the church, enough to feed himself and to keep his attendants and horses.’ The cardinal placed three gold coins on the table. He knew Robbie’s propensity to gamble, and to lose. ‘All your sins will be forgiven,’ he said, ‘if you become a Knight of the Fisherman and wear this sash.’
He took from a pouch a scapular made of the finest white silk, edged and fringed with cloth of gold, and embroidered with scarlet keys. The Pope received gifts daily that were heaped in the sacristy at Avignon, and Bessières, before he left that town, had hunted through the bundles and discovered a trove of scapulars woven by nuns in Burgundy and sent to the Pope, each of them lovingly embroidered with the keys of Saint Peter. ‘The man who wears this sash in battle,’ the cardinal continued, ‘will have God at
his side, the angels will draw their flaming swords to protect
him, and the saints will beseech our blessed Saviour to give him vi
ctory. A man who wears this sash cannot lose a fight, but neither can a man who wears this sash cleave to an oath made to a godless heretic.’
Robbie stared hungrily at the gorgeous scapular, imagining it around his waist as he rode to battle. ‘The Pope has enemies?’ he asked, wondering whom he would need to fight.
‘The church has enemies,’ Bessières said harshly, ‘because the devil never ceases his fight. And the Order of the Fisherman,’ he went on, ‘has a task already, a noble task, perhaps none nobler in all Christendom.’
‘What task?’ Robbie asked, his voice low.
For answer the cardinal beckoned a priest to his side. To Robbie the newly invited priest, who had startling green eyes, appeared to be the cardinal’s opposite in almost every way. Bessières had charm, but the priest looked stern and unbending; the Cardinal was plump, the priest was lean as a blade; the cardinal was swathed in red silk trimmed with ermine, while the lesser cleric was in black, though Robbie caught a glimpse of scarlet lining in one of the hanging sleeves. ‘This is Father Marchant,’ the cardinal said, ‘and he will be the chaplain to our order.’
‘By God’s grace,’ Marchant said. His strange green eyes rested on Robbie and his mouth twitched as if he disapproved of what he saw.
‘Tell my young Scottish friend, father, the holy task of the Order of the Fisherman.’
Father Marchant touched the crucifix hanging about his neck. ‘Saint Peter,’ he said, ‘was a fisherman, but he was so much more. He was the first Pope, and God gave him the keys of heaven and earth. Yet he also possessed a sword, Sir Robert. Perhaps you remember the story?’
‘Not really,’ Robbie said.
‘When the evil men came to arrest our Lord in the Garden of Gethsemane it was Saint Peter who drew a sword to protect him. Think of that!’ Marchant’s voice was suddenly passionate. ‘The blessed Saint Peter drew a sword to protect our Redeemer, our precious Christ, our Son of God! The sword of Saint Peter is God’s weapon to protect his church, and we must find it! The church is imperilled, and we need God’s weapon. It is God’s will!’
‘Indeed it is,’ the cardinal said, ‘and if we find the sword, Sir Robert, then the worthiest of the knights in the Order of the Fisherman will be permitted to guard the sword, and to wear it, and to use it in battle, so that God himself will be on his side in every fight. That man will be the greatest knight in all Christendom. So,’ he pushed the coins and the scapular a little closer to Robbie, ‘as it says in the scripture, Sir Robert, choisissez aujourd’hui qui vous voulez servir.’ He quoted the French for he was certain Robbie would not understand the Latin. ‘Today, Sir Robert, you must choose between good and evil, between an oath made to a heretic or the blessing of the Holy Father himself.’ The cardinal crossed himself. ‘Choose today whom you wish to serve, Sir Robert Douglas.’
And really there was no choice. Robbie reached for the sash and felt tears in his eyes. He had found his cause and he would fight for God.
‘Bless you, my son,’ the cardinal said. ‘Now go and pray. Thank God that you have chosen rightly.’
He watched Robbie walk away. ‘So,’ he said to Father Marchant, ‘that’s the first of your knights. Tomorrow you will endeavour to find Roland de Verrec. But for the moment,’ he pointed to Sculley, ‘fetch me that animal.’
And so the Order of the Fisherman was born.
Brother Michael was miserable. ‘I don’t want to be a hospitaller,’ he told Thomas. ‘I get dizzy when I see blood. It makes me feel sick.’
‘You have a calling,’ Thomas said.
‘To be an archer?’ Brother Michael suggested.
Thomas laughed. ‘Tell me that in ten years, brother. It takes that long to learn the bow.’
It was midday and they were resting the horses. Thomas had taken twenty men, all men-at-arms, their job merely to provide protection from the coredors who haunted the roads. He dared not take archers. His longbows rode with the Hellequin, but when he travelled in a small group the sight of the dreaded English bows stirred up enemies, so all the men with him spoke French. Most were Gascons, but there were two Germans, Karyl and Wulf, who had ridden to Castillon d’Arbizon to offer their allegiance. ‘Why do you want to serve me?’ Thomas had asked them.
‘Because you win,’ Karyl had answered simply. The German was a thin, quick fighter, whose right cheek was scarred by two parallel furrows. ‘The claws of a fighting bear,’ he had explained. ‘I was trying to save a dog. I liked the dog, but the bear didn’t.’
‘Did the dog die?’ Genevieve had asked.
‘It did,’ Karyl said, ‘but so did the bear.’
Genevieve was with Thomas. She would not leave Thomas’s side, fearing that if she was alone the church would find her again and try to burn her, and so she had insisted on accompanying him. Besides, she had told him, there was no danger. Thomas only planned to spend a day or two in Montpellier in search of a scholar who could explain a monk kneeling amidst snow, then they would all hurry back to Castillon d’Arbizon where the rest of his men waited.
‘If I can’t be an archer,’ Brother Michael said, ‘then let me be your physician.’
‘You haven’t finished your training, brother, that’s why we’re going to Montpellier. So you can be educated.’
‘I don’t want to be educated,’ Brother Michael grumbled. ‘I’ve had enough education.’
Thomas laughed. He liked the young monk and knew well enough that Michael was desperate to escape the cage of his calling, a despair Thomas knew himself. Thomas was the illegitimate son of a priest, and he had obediently gone to Oxford to learn theology so that he could become a priest himself, but he had already found another love, the yew bow. The great yew bow. And no books, no sacrament, no lecture on the indivisible substance of the triple-natured God could compete with the bow, and so Thomas had become a soldier. Brother Michael, he thought, was following the same course, though in Michael’s case it was the Countess Bertille who was the lodestar. She was still at Castillon d’Arbizon where she accepted Brother Michael’s worship as her due and was kind to him in return, but seemed oblivious to his yearning. She treated him like an indulged puppy and that made the young monk yearn even more.
Galdric, Thomas’s servant, and more than able to look after himself in a fight, brought Thomas’s horse back from the stream. ‘Those folk stopped,’ he said.
‘Close?’
‘A long way back. But I think they’re following us.’
Thomas climbed the bank from the stream to the road. A mile away, perhaps more, a small band of men were watering horses. ‘It’s a busy road,’ Thomas said. The men, he thought they were all men, had been behind them for two days now, but they were making no attempt to catch up.
‘They’re the Count of Armagnac’s troops,’ Karyl said confidently.
‘Armagnac?’
‘This is all the Count’s territory,’ the German said, waving an arm to encompass the whole landscape. ‘His men patrol the roads to keep the bandits away. He can’t tax merchants if they’ve nothing to tax, eh?’
The road became even busier as they neared Montpellier. Thomas had no wish to draw attention to himself by entering the city with a large band of armed men so, next afternoon, he looked for a place where most of his men could wait while he entered the city. They found a burned mill on a hilltop to the west of the road. The nearest village was a mile away and the valley beneath the mill was secluded. ‘If we’re not back in two days,’ he told Karyl, ‘send someone to discover what’s happened and send to Castillon for help. And keep quiet here. We don’t want the city consuls sending men to investigate you.’ He could tell the city was close by the smear of smoke in the southern sky.
‘If people ask us what we do here?’
‘You can’t afford city prices so you’re waiting here to meet the Count of Armagnac’s men.’ The count was the greatest lord in all southern France and no one would dare interfere with men who served him.
‘There’ll be no trouble,’ Karyl sa
id grimly. ‘I promise.’
Thomas, Genevieve, Hugh and Brother Michael rode on. They were accompanied by just two men-at-arms and by Galdric, and they reached Montpellier that evening. The two hills of the city, the towers of its churches and its tile-roofed bastions cast long shadows. The city was surrounded by a high, pale wall from which hung banners showing the Virgin and her child. Others showed a circle, red as the setting sun, against a white field. Outside the wall was a weed-strewn wasteland, and beneath the weeds were ashes, while in a few places there were stone hearths showing where there had once been houses. A woman, stooped and ancient with a black scarf over her hair, grubbed close to one of the hearths. ‘You lived here?’ Thomas asked.
She answered in Occitan, a language Thomas scarcely knew, but Galdric translated. ‘She lived here till the English came.’
‘The English were here?’ Thomas sounded surprised.
It seemed that during the previous year the Prince of Wales had come close to Montpellier, very close, but at the last moment his destroying army had sheered away, but not before the city had burned every building outside the walls to deny the English any hiding places for archers or siege engines. ‘Ask what she’s searching for,’ Thomas ordered.
‘Anything,’ was the answer, ‘because she lost everything.’
Genevieve tossed the woman a coin. A bell was tolling inside the city and Thomas feared it was the signal to close the gates, so he spurred his men forward. A line of wagons laden with timber, fleeces, and barrels waited at the gate, but Thomas passed them. He was in mail, carrying a sword, and that marked him as a man of privilege. Galdric, riding close behind, unfurled a banner showing a hawk carrying a sheaf of rye. The badge was the old banner of Castillon d’Arbizon, and a useful device when Thomas did not want to advertise his loyalty to the Earl of Northampton or his command of the feared Hellequin.
‘Your business, sire?’ a guard at the gate demanded.
‘We are on a pilgrimage,’ Thomas said, ‘so want to pray.’