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  And to whom do I confess? the priest wondered. Memories swirled back like prophets of doom. Old enemies bearing old sins. The battle line at Senlac buckling. The mailed horsemen milling in, faces hidden behind conical helmets and broad nose-guards. The Fighting Man, the battle standard of Wessex, drooping like a wounded bird in the wind. The screams of blood-splattered men, his own heart giving way. The ring of faith around Harold Godwinson tearing and splintering like a tree struck by lightning; his own courage ebbing like wine from a cracked cup.

  ‘Coward!’

  The word still lashed Alberic’s soul, as it did when he tramped the roads with Brother Norbert. Anstritha was simply a fresh cut to an old wound. A clever woman, skilled in simples and herbs, she was a woman of secrets who had followed the same path as Alberic, Norbert, Hugh and Godefroi, searching for the truth. Perhaps she could have been better protected? Yet she had certainly been marked down for death. Villagers, hooded and visored, taking advantage of their manor lord’s absence, had attacked her in her shabby house on the outskirts of the village. God knows the reason! A child had died. Food was scare. The signs had been seen. A victim was needed, and Anstritha became the scapegoat. She had fled to this church, begging for Alberic’s help. He was going to give it, God knows he was! He was terrified. Anstritha even might name him as an accomplice in her secret business. He had hurried back into the sacristy, but the corpse door had been forced and the mob surged in. Alberic had hid in the narrow, incense-filled enclosure whilst the mob had dragged Anstritha out and hanged her from a makeshift gallows above a fire. Eventually she had stopped screaming. The Lord Godefroi had returned the following week, but despite his anger and that of Lord Hugh, the culprits escaped unscathed.

  A loud cough made Father Alberic take his hands away. Robert the Reeve, anger incarnate, was waiting, his choleric face twisted in impatience. The priest secretly wondered if Robert had had a hand in poor Anstritha’s death, yet he doubted the reeve would confess to that. After all, in the eyes of many villagers, Anstritha was a witch, deserving of death, a righteous act pleasing to God. Behind Robert waited the rest: Imogene, the pretty, dark-haired widow whom the Lady Eleanor had agreed to take with her on pilgrimage as a helpmate and companion; Fulcher the blacksmith; Peter Bartholomew, the young hunchback who saw visions in the dark, wet woods; and behind him a score of others, including Alberic’s close friend Norbert the Benedictine monk. Norbert, however, would not be kneeling at the mercy chair. He crouched at the foot of a pillar while the rest milled around. They were impatient for the priest to finish so they could feast on the bread, wine and tasty meats laid out on trestle tables, garlands of wild flowers woven around the jugs and flagons. Tonight they would celebrate, and within the week they would join Raymond of Toulouse, Count of St Gilles, in his march on Jerusalem. For now, however, the shriving continued, though the harsh whispers were drowned by the rising hum of conversation. Hungry eyes drifted to the heaped platters, and people wondered if their horses and pack ponies stabled in God’s Acre outside were safe. At last Father Alberic finished. He climbed into the crude wooden pulpit and they all gathered around.

  ‘The Lord is a man of war,’ Alberic intoned from the Book of Exodus, ‘and so must ye . . .’

  Father Alberic’s tongue changed from the words and phrases of the langue d’oc, the speech of the south, to those of the langue d’oïl of the north, as he described the exploits of the great warriors of God in the Old Testament. Eleanor, leaning against a pillar, jumped as the priest’s talk was cut short by the church door slamming shut. She whirled round and stared at the man garbed in a black cotehardie that fell over leggings of the same colour, his stout ox-hide boots jingling with spurs. He wore a white tunic beneath the black, which peeped out between the creases of his robe. The sword belt slung over his shoulder carried a sheath, a knife and a short stabbing sword. Eleanor’s first impression was that the stranger was the devil come to dispute with them: that saturnine face under the close-cropped hair and those clever eyes, which, despite the poor light, reflected the mockery in his soul.

  ‘I am Beltran.’ He spoke the langue d’oc like a troubadour. He glanced impishly at Eleanor. ‘I am a poet, a soldier, but above all, the emissary of His Excellency Raymond, Count of Toulouse, fidelis miles Christi et Papae, faithful soldier of both the Lord Christ and the Pope.’ He brandished a small scroll tied with a red ribbon. ‘I am here at Count Raymond’s behest to lead you.’

  ‘We have a leader.’ Eleanor pointed to her brother.

  ‘Then I will be his adviser.’ Beltran’s face broke into a smile. ‘I also bring you a copy of the Count’s personal banner.’

  ‘We have taken an oath to God,’ Godefroi declared hotly. ‘We hold nothing in fief or knight service to any lord.’

  ‘No, no,’ Beltran replied merrily. ‘The Count offers you protection under his banner.’ He undid his jerkin and brought out the blue and gold pennant of the Lords of St Gilles. ‘I must also check your supplies and stores. So,’ he held up his hand, ‘by what name shall ye be called?’

  ‘The Poor Brethren of the Temple,’ retorted Hugh, walking forward. ‘We took the idea from the psalm about living in the Lord’s house all the days of our lives.’

  ‘Yes, I know it.’ Beltran let the banner ripple towards Hugh, who caught it and held it up. The nave rang with cheers. Swords, daggers, spears and axes were raised to shouts of ‘Deus vult, Jerusalem!’ and ‘Toulouse, Toulouse!’ Father Alberic shrugged and came down from his pulpit, and Hugh ordered the feasting to begin.

  The following morning the Poor Brethren of the Temple left a little later than had been decided, the sun already high above the grassy slopes and black volcanic rock of the surrounding countryside. The cause of the delay was the sudden death of Robert the Reeve, who had apparently staggered out, deep in his cups, and drowned trying to cross a stream. A most unfortunate mishap. God knows, there was a footbridge nearby, whilst nobody could explain why Robert was stumbling around God’s Acre in the dark. Nevertheless, they found him floating face down, dead as wood. Father Alberic murmured the words of absolution and they buried Robert quickly beneath the ancient yew trees. Imogene the widow remarked how the reeve was already in the new Jerusalem. Father Alberic heard this and quietly prayed it was so, for, if any man needed God’s mercy, then surely it was Robert the Reeve.

  Part 2

  Sclavonia: The Feast of St Lucy, 13 December 1096

  Diesque mirabilium tonitruorum fortium.

  (A day of marvels, of mighty thundering.)

  The Dies Irae of St Columba

  ‘I will wash my hands among the innocent and encompass thy altar, oh Lord. I have loved, oh Lord, the beauty of thy house and the place where thy glory dwelleth.’

  Eleanor de Payens murmured the verse from the psalm at the entrance to her goat-skin tent. She stared out at the bank of mist swirling round, muffling sound and blurring the glow of camp fire, candle and lantern horn. Somewhere in the camp, a child cried. Eleanor shivered; it sounded like the echo of her baby’s first and only cry as he slipped in blood from her womb. She could still feel his warmth, his little face shrivelled like a plum, the blinking eyes, the tip of that tongue hungry for her breast.

  ‘The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away,’ Eleanor murmured. She crossed herself; the hard wood of the crucifix on her Ave beads knocked the tip of her nose, which was already cold and sore. ‘And the same for noses.’ She grinned to herself, always averse to self-pity, and went back to sit on the small chest that served as a stool. She extended her mittened fingers over the chafing dish, a mix of charcoal and dried twigs, and stared across at Imogene sitting on a leather pannier. The widow woman was dressed like a nun in black veil and robe, her olive-skinned features and raven-like hair almost hidden beneath a grimy wimple. Her fingernails were bitten to the quick and she sat with hands extended over the heat, eyes closed, lips moving soundlessly. Beside her, as always, was that carved wooden box, its lid sealed, the top embossed with three crosses and th
e IHS monogram representing Jesus’ Passion above the words ‘Deus vult’. Imogene, who shared Eleanor’s tent, had assured her that that casket contained the heart of her husband, which she hoped to bury in some holy place in Jerusalem. Eleanor was not convinced. Imogene had a great deal to hide, but there again, Eleanor conceded, so did many of their fellow pilgrims, including her own brother.

  ‘How long, sister?’ Imogene was now staring full at her, eyes watchful. Had she, Eleanor reflected, realised that she shared a tent with a light sleeper? As the poet said: ‘The truth always comes in dreams.’

  ‘How long what?’ Eleanor smiled.

  Imogene shivered. Eleanor rose, went across and tightened the tent flap closer.

  ‘We have been journeying for weeks.’ Imogene pulled the threadbare shawl closer about her shoulders. ‘These mountains . . .’ Her voice trembled.

  Eleanor nodded understandingly. As she had scribbled in her chronicle, they had left the grass-filled glades of the Auvergne and travelled north before turning east. Ahead of them the blue and gold banner of St Gilles flapped above the grizzled head of Raymond of Toulouse. Behind him, in the dark robes of a monk, rode the shaven-faced Adhémar, Bishop of Le Puy, the Pope’s legate in all matters of the cross-bearing. At first anyone would have thought they had reached Jerusalem as they marched joyously through the sun-warmed valleys. The trees still proclaimed the glories of summer, even though the silver and gold of autumn was beginning to appear. The Count rode his swift destrier ornamented with the gilded leather harness of Cordova, decorated with deep stitching and small gold and silver discs. The crowds surged out to greet such magnificence, scattering green leaves and scented petals along the dusty trackway. Garlands of flowers were looped over the weapons and harness of Christ’s warriors, bowls of fruit thrust into their hands together with red stone jugs filled with the rich wines of the south or honey mead so sweet on the tongue. Church steeples trembled with the booming of bells. People clamoured to join them, including wiry mountaineers who would act as their guides through the Alpine passes. Farmers, yeomen, tinkers and traders, ribalds and counterfeit men swelled the throng to somewhere between fifteen and twenty thousand souls. Count Raymond took them all in to form new companies. Eleanor soon noticed how the Count remembered Hugh and Godefroi’s participation in the chevauchées in Iberia: their company, now publicly known as the Poor Brethren of the Temple, was singled out for special favour, whilst its captains sat high in Raymond’s councils.

  ‘They say we should have marched south through Italy,’ Imogene murmured.

  Eleanor broke from her reverie. The sounds of the camp had grown louder: the blowing of horns, the shouts of huntsmen returning with fresh meat.

  ‘My brother says no. Count Raymond believes the mountain passes down into the Lombard plain would not be passable, whilst a sea voyage from southern Italy to Greece always threatens danger.’

  Imogene nodded understanding, though Eleanor suspected she had meagre knowledge of maps. Indeed, Eleanor herself had swiftly realised how little she knew of the world outside Compiègne or the Auvergne. Everything and everyone was strange and hostile until proved otherwise. The journey had only reinforced this. The Franks were taking their own ways with them, highly suspicious of everything new. If a stranger could bless themselves or intone the Ave Maria then that was better than any letter or writ. If they failed to, fingers crept to sword and dagger hilt. Distances and new kingdoms were only miles to travel on their way to Jerusalem, which lay at the centre of the world, however the maps portrayed it. Hugh and Godefroi had borrowed copies of such maps. They had shown Eleanor how Count Raymond had decided to march east across Italy, around the northern coastline of the Adriatic then south through Sclavonia to Dyrrachium in the kingdom of the Greeks. The journey was proving difficult enough, Eleanor decided to break the cold distance between herself and Imogene.

  ‘At night you talk in your sleep about Robert the Reeve.’

  ‘And what else?’ Imogene asked quickly.

  A horn brayed. Eleanor heard Beltran calling the Poor Brethren of the Temple to a colloquium before their standard. She was glad to evade Imogene’s question, and quickly grabbed her hooded cloak. Imogene did likewise, and they left the tent. Eleanor summoned a boy, one of the mountaineers now attached to their company, to guard their possessions. Once satisfied, they hurried through the mist across the frost-hardened ground, trying to avoid the puddles of horse urine, the dirt of men, horses and dogs. On its perch at the mouth of a tent, a huge hawk screeched and stretched, claws moving to the jingle of its jesse-bells. Eleanor wondered how long such a creature could survive this cold. The frost stung her eyes, nose and mouth. The mist curled, a thick white vapour cutting off the light and obscuring all around them.

  At last they reached the meeting place between the tents and the horse lines, a stretch of frozen grass now lit and warmed by scattered roaring fires, flames crackling greedily at the dry thorn and bracken. In the centre of this ring of fire stood a cart from which the Poor Brethren’s banner floated on a pole. Beltran, Hugh and Godefroi standing behind him, grasped the side rails of the cart and gestured at them to draw closer. They did, though Eleanor, like the rest, also tried to position herself to catch some warmth from the fires. Beltran blew on a hunting horn, stilling the clamour. He had a powerful voice and had quickly assumed the role of being their herald and news-bringer. He stood silently for a while, then delivered his message like an actor in a play or a troubadour reciting a poem. Hugh and Godefroi looked very grim; Eleanor caught her brother’s eye, but he simply shook his head and glanced away. At first, the news was good.

  ‘Other armies of cross-bearers,’ Beltran declared, ‘are moving east. Indeed, some are already approaching Constantinople. The Franks of the west are on the move accompanied by wondrous signs,’ he added. ‘Mysterious flocks of birds have been seen forming in the sky, pointing to the east, whilst some talk of a sacred goose that will lead them to Jerusalem.’ Beltran paused as the crowd laughed and shook their heads. He then pressed ahead with his other news. He described how the men of northern France and Germany had been eager for standards to tramp behind. Some of the great princes of Europe had emerged to lead them. Godfrey of Bouillon was such a man, a true warrior. He and his two brothers, Baldwin and Eustace of Boulogne, who owned swathes of estates across northern France and the Rhineland, would also join them in Constantinople. Philip I of France had been eager to go but could not because he had been excommunicated for his infatuation with another man’s wife. Instead Philip had sent his brother, Hugh of Paris, with two other warriors, Baldwin of Hainault and Stephen of Blois. These had been joined by the red-haired, green-eyed Robert of Normandy, nicknamed ‘Short-breeches’, brother of Rufus, the Red King of England, both sons of the Great Conqueror. These lords had collected as many men as they could and taken to the roads, escorted by their households, their greyhounds, lurchers and falconers running alongside them, a glorious cavalcade journeying to Jerusalem. More news was flowing in. How Bohemond of Taranto, the Norman adventurer from southern Italy, also intended to march with his warlike nephew Tancred. God was surely with them!

  ‘Nor is it just the lords,’ Beltran explained after a brief pause. ‘The People’s Army, under its leader Peter the Hermit and his lieutenant Walter, Lord of Boissy Sans-Avoir, nicknamed “Walter Sans-Avoir” – Walter Without Anything – have already clashed with the Turks – though with disastrous results. Peter’s message is simple,’ Beltran hastily explained. ‘We must take the road to the Holy Sepulchre, rescue Christ’s fief and rule over it ourselves. Such a land, flowing with milk and honey, was given by God to the children of Israel. Now we have inherited it ourselves, we must seize it from our enemies. We must take possession of their treasuries and either return home victorious or go to eternal glory blessed and purpled with our own blood . . .’

  Beltran paused. People began shouting questions about Peter. Beltran replied that little was known about the hermit. Peter had possibly been born near
Amiens. A poor man, he dressed only in a grey woollen robe with a hood pulled over his head. He rode a mule, his bare feet hanging down loose as he preached the taking of the cross. The hermit was dark of face, burnt black by the sun; he ate and drank nothing except a little fish, bread and some wine. According to Beltran, he was a passionate preacher whose tongue had been blistered by the Holy Spirit, a brilliant orator who, despite his shabby appearance, could persuade the most beautiful and noble women to lay their treasures at his feet. They even cut off hair from his donkey as sacred relics, and regarded Peter’s bath water as a holy elixir. Beltran paused to slurp noisily from a goblet of wine. Eleanor wondered if their herald was quietly mocking this common preacher who had stirred up so many to follow the cross. She glanced at Hugh; he stood, arms crossed, staring down at the wooden slats of the cart.

  Beltran continued. According to one story, Peter had visited the Holy Sepulchre to witness first hand the violence of their enemies. Whilst in Jerusalem, he had also fallen into a trance and experienced a vision of the Lord Jesus, who had told him, ‘You will receive a letter for your mission from heaven bearing the seal of a cross.’ Peter claimed to hold such a heavenly letter, which was how he had swept through the Frankish kingdoms, exhorting all to follow the cross – not just the lords, but the forgotten and dispossessed. According to Beltran, orange-wigged whores, bejewelled pimps, catamites, counterfeits, cripples, vagabonds, adulterers, soul-killers, fornicators, perjurers and outlaws surged from the dank slums of the towns to mingle with his army of artisans, labourers, knights from Picardy, axe-men from Swabia and swordsmen from Cologne. Again Beltran paused to drink, smacking his lips in relish. Eleanor’s stomach clenched. Beltran was a cynical soul. He was openly scoffing at those poor cross-bearers, and she suspected the story he was telling would end not in triumph but disaster. Beltran, however, now had them all spellbound and they drew closer. The herald described how the great People’s Army, almost sixteen thousand souls, had surged across Germany threatening the Jews, extorting monies from these unfortunates before they assembled to hear Mass in hedge-Latin and chant their popular hymns. Peter’s horde had then left Germany, following the Danube through the kingdom of Hungary, watched from afar by the Hungarian king’s sheepskin-coated scouts on their swift ponies. The Hungarians, Beltran declared, were wise to be cautious. Coloman, their king, was wary of this long column of carts and horses and the unruly throng streaming across his kingdom beneath a host of crosses and tattered, brilliant banners.