“I had not considered these knights in this way,” the seneschal’s sprig said, gravely. “I shall make a proper report. It must be verbal, I think.”
“The Templar knights come from good families,” Guilhem agreed, “There is always the danger of false loyalties.”
And so it happened. It was slow. First the report had to be made to the seneschal and then it had to go to Paris and then to the king himself, but the lure of the Temple money and the threat of the Temple’s arms throughout France both fitted Philippe’s way of thinking. This Guilhem had known.
Philippe, however, could not simply act: the Templars had their Order. Even with the Pope under his thumb, Philippe needed more than visible threat. In the report from the Seneschal, Guilhem’s circumstances had been noted (although Guilhem himself was not named). ‘Consorting with demons’ was excuse enough to check for Templar irregularities. If the knights were guilty of heresy and of making a mockery of the Church, it would be simple enough to bring the new pope to heel. And Bernat, if Guilhem were lucky, would be burned as a heretic.
Having set this all in train, Guilhem returned to Saint-Guilhem. He still felt bad, but at least he had done something.
* * *
“We need a clearer understanding of boundaries,” said Luke, earnestly.
“How can I help?” Artemisia’s question was sincere. It was so unusual for her to be called into Luke’s office for something that was not a scolding that she felt a particular desire to assist. Maybe she could belong to the team, still, even after all the water under the bridge. After all, it was simply water. And Sylvia was simply Sylvia. Artemisia wondered if this was about the good doctor and her tendency to drag Pauline into places they should not be.
“I want you to annotate the map in the office.”
“The big one?”
“The big one,” Luke nodded. “I want it very clear where members of the team will be seen from the town. I want to see where the locals work and where the pilgrims walk.”
“You want us all to walk in safety?”
“Precisely.” Luke looked rather smug. He had a solution to all problems.
Maybe not all problems, thought Artemisia, as she worked on that map. Or maybe if he realised that not all problems waited for his lordly attention. Ben had been called into Luke’s office after her. She heard the names Luke called Ben and they were not good. There was one she didn’t know: mischling. Luke called Ben, “Son of a mischling. Grandson of a traitor mischling.” The anger in his voice was more terrifying than the words.
Artemisia realised that she had no idea why Luke thought it was an exceptional insult. She was worried for Ben. It seemed to be about what he was, not about anything he had done.
Artemisia looked up mischling and her worries were confirmed. It was a German word for mongrel, someone who was part Aryan. All she could do was be nice to Ben when he got out. His ancestry was not something he could change. She wished that there was someone she could take this to, but there was only Sylvia, and she knew exactly what would happen if she took the issue to Sylvia.
Artemisia was completely correct in her estimate of the good Dr Smith. Sylvia made certain that she heard her response to the annotated map. She took Pauline out on an excursion to the town wall and debriefed the doctor in the main office area, pointing things out on the map the whole while. Her reasoning (expressed loudly) was that anything Artemisia did had to be redone anyhow, so they might as well check things out.
Luke refused to help. The map was there, of course everyone would use it. Artemisia wondered if his personal grief was the fact that Ben had disappeared.
Two days later, Ben reappeared, perfectly cheerful. It was as if nothing had happened.
* * *
There was a big difference between being unchaste with protectors and being unchaste without. Sibilla was discovering this difference the hard way. Three times she had ventured out and three times she had been beaten. Berta did her shopping for her and tended Sibilla’s garden and helped with the housework, but this would not work in the long term. In the long term, Sibilla’s life was at risk if she remained in Saint-Guilhem.
Fr Peire and Guilhem-the-smith talked about it and decided that something must be done. Both of them handled the matter of the local conscience. Every day they stirred the pot and made people feel more and more aware of their role in Sibilla’s broken arm and her bruised body. Additionally, Fr Peire found some money from the church coffers and set things up so that Sibilla could move to Montpellier.
“No-one knows you there,” he argued, “You can start afresh.”
“I don’t want to leave. This is home.”
“I know,” said Fr Peire, gently, “but it’s an unhappy home. You’re not safe.”
Sibilla gave her best belt to Berta, the one with the removable letters. Sibilla mostly used those letters to spell as it currently did - words like ‘amor,’ to quietly boast about her latest conquest. “You can spell prayers,” she told her friend, “Look, see. That shows why I got the belt. My first husband gave it to me as a part of my relic collection.”
“It’s not a relic, though,” Berta objected.
“No, but it can be used in the same way. If you spell out a prayer then it will act as a charm and keep you safe. If I’d worn it, I’d never have been beaten up.”
“Thank you,” said Berta. “I shall miss you.”
“You can visit me when you go to Montpellier to sell your cloth.”
“I never go to Montpellier to sell my cloth.”
“It’s about time you did. Think of the prices!”
“Maybe I’ll visit you and see.” Berta put on her new belt, admiring the metal letters.
Sibilla handed over the bag with extra letters. “Ask the priest for help - that way you get a better prayer.”
Once Sibilla was gone, she ceased to be a target. Once she ceased to be a target, those who had looked to beating her up as a solution for their problems had to find new solutions. They started to blame the folk under the hill again. The parishioners of Saint-Barthelmy, in particular, jostled and talk about action.
“It’s our parish that is threatened.”
No-one said this in the presence of Fr Peire or Guilhem-the-smith, of course. What they said to Guilhem-the-smith was that he should talk to Guilhem-the knight, and that Guilhem-the-knight should persuade the strangers to leave.
Guilhem was in a quandary. He knew already, from Artemisia, that the team would leave at the end of the year. He also knew that he didn’t want to see Artemisia or talk to her ever again. He didn’t want to leave ribbons on the bush. He didn’t want to see her walk towards him, her long skirts making the steep slope almost impassable. He didn’t, and yet he did. He yearned after her in a most uncomfortable way. He hated her and he loved her and he missed her and he wished he could undo what he had done.
He wandered the pilgrim’s path, alone, trying to sort his thoughts and his feelings. When he reached the End of the World, he made his decision. He would leave.
In preparation for his departure, he wrote Artemisia a letter. With the letter were many of his treasured objects, carefully placed inside a solid and large messenger’s satchel. In giving them up, maybe he could forget her and forget the guilt and, maybe, avert the curse. At the last minute, he placed the rose paternoster on top of the satchel and on top of the note.
He packed his travel chest and he took himself and his valet to Montpellier.
* * *
Artemisia didn’t expect to find Guilhem at the meeting place, but went there anyway. If there were no new ribbons, she could take the old ones back and either pack them or burn them, as early preparation for departure. Everything now was about whether something could be burned or whether it should be packed. And the curse was not a farewell. She needed to farewell the good as well as the bad. So she found herself at the clump of badasse frutescens, looking for freedom.
There were no ribbons. Bona had helped herself to them, as she had other t
imes. There was, however, a lump of strange matter next to the plant. Artemisia went close to investigate. She lifted up the paternoster and smelled it, the rose scent clinging to her memory. Then she looked at the folded parchment with its seal. The seal of a knight, she noted, with its man on horseback.
She didn’t want to open the note. She took the bag and the paternoster and the parchment back to her room. “Geoff,” she called, gently, into the main office space, “Can I borrow you a minute, please?”
“Sure,” said Geoff, alert.
They walked to her room, Artemisia ahead. The corridor had seemed wide all those months ago, but it wasn’t broad enough for the two to walk together. Artemisia reached back for Geoff’s hand anyway. They reached Artemisia’s room and shut the door behind them.
“What’s this?” Geoff looked at the bed.
“I think it might be from Guilhem,” Artemisia said, “But I didn’t want to open it alone.”
“I’m here,” Geoff said, and they sat together, the satchel and parchment between them, the paternoster on the chest of drawers.
I am sorry, the note said. I cannot explain what I did. You should not forgive what I did. Please take these gifts. They are not atonement, for I must atone before God. They are simply a gift, to a much-loved friend whom I have wronged. There is nothing on this earth that does not have an end, but this end is not the one I would have wished. May you travel safely to your far home. My thoughts will be with you. May you walk in the grace of God, always.
One of Guilhem’s phrases resonated: “There is nothing on this earth that does not have an end.”
The soft scent of the crushed dried roses softened her mood just a fraction. She realised, “If the child is his, then it needs something from the father. His father will be seven hundred years dead when we return. There will be no record. Nothing. The baby needs something - this is not about me.”
“That sounds fair,” said Geoff. “We’ll have to smuggle all this home in our backpacks.”
“You’ll help me?” Artemisia didn’t know why she was surprised.
“Of course.”
* * *
Ben was alone, quietly working with his friend the farmer. His silent companion never caused him the grief that the people from his own world did. They understood the land and its needs, the two of them. They understood the vintage and the joy of treading grapes. They understood wine.
This was his farewell to his silent friend and to the vines he so loved. He gave the farmer Cormac’s boots - they were close enough in size - he justified that the boots would perish in this dry climate and would cause no rift in time.
It was a good gift.
Chapter Forty-Nine
Waiting
“Time’s up!” Luke clapped loudly to reinforce his point. “We’re going home!”
From that moment on, things were frantic. Sylvia and Ben had to massage the final data and get it ready for upload. All the other scientists supported them and also helped Mac. Cormac was instructed to burn everything that could possibly be burned and that wasn’t essential for reporting home on top of the hill. Ben was sent to do the rounds, by himself, and to check they had left nothing behind, anywhere.
“We don’t have any indications of problems from the town, do we?” Luke looked across at Artemisia.
“Nothing I’ve been told,” she said. She couldn’t admit that there was no-one to do the telling.
“Good. We’ll start the fires at once. It’s going to take days to deal with all this stuff.”
“Anything that can be burned we should get rid of, so we don’t need to take it home. We won’t have much of anything in the last couple of days, so you may want to prioritise. Don’t wait to collect and document specimens - I want all collection and all data entry regarding it finished by 23 December. I want all the refrigerators and machines on that platform on 24 December so we can start piling stuff on top of them. From Christmas Day, we’re roughing it. We will have 25 minutes to get everything and all of ourselves back at midnight on 31 December and I don’t want to lose a second of it. This means the final stages start now.”
Artemisia was delegated to do the schedule for the final hour, in consultation with Mac, who knew what could go and how quickly it could be shifted. Mac was responsible for making sure everything was shifted and also to double-check Ben’s final check. Nothing could be left behind. Sylvia and Pauline were responsible for outside checks. Artemisia and Geoff and Ben were to assist Mac whenever other duties permitted.
Luke said, “It should all work nicely.”
The first thing Artemisia did was put most of what Guilhem had given her in her satchel and backpack, ready for 31 December. Geoff took the rest. She dumped some of her clothes into the bonfire, to make space. Her private possessions now contained (in addition to the rose petal paternoster, the cloth, the other small gifts) a quadrans vetus that Guilhem bought from the Jewish goldsmiths in Beziers (“Why is it called an old quadrant?” he had asked, not wanting an answer), a merchant’s calendar with illuminated initials and red letter days, folded twice and fitted into a fine leather case, a tiny portable altar, a little brazier with elegant metalwork, a ring, and the Book of Hours that Sylvia had tried to steal. Even now, when these items were not ancient, her possessions were suddenly worth a vast amount of money.
She wanted to declare them and she wanted to hide them and she wanted the whole thing not to have happened. She did that last time, however - this time she would keep everything. For herself and for her child and because, from what Guilhem had said in the note, he really was repentant.
And besides, the curse had helped. A lot.
* * *
The bedroom partitions were burning. The smell of charred cork infused the air. The chairs had already burned and lounge disassembled: the team all lived in the office area. The desk chairs served a multitude of uses and the trestle table likewise.
The living area shrank as Cormac took up mesh floor and made it small for transit. It was not long before the platform was full to the ceiling and the next load was being assembled, ready to be pushed on, and the load after that. It was a rigorous operation and Cormac handled it inexorably.
Artemisia was worried about her timetable. These big things were the easy part of it. Sylvia had already snubbed her. “Do you want to go home near the beginning,” Artemisia had asked, “Or later?”
“I’ll go home when I’m ready,” Sylvia had said.
And Ben was impossible to find, and Luke was so obsessed with his calculations that she was stuck. She put Sylvia and Pauline down for early departure. Mac would be the last to go. He and Ben had both asked for that.
Artemisia copied the schedule several times and used up the last of her precious paper. She handed a copy out to each and every team member.
Luke nodded as he received it, during the staff meeting. “Good,” he said. “One more thing out of the way. Tell the others not to disturb me. I think I might have something.”
“I’m not going to get all this into the datastream,” he warned Sylvia. “You’re going to have to put it in as I do it, as much as you can.” Sylvia nodded to Mac and Artemisia to rearrange her duties to encompass this.
“I can only do it until about lunchtime on the thirty-first,” she worried. “After that I have to make sure everything’s in place. What do I do if you have a big breakthrough after that?”
“I will have that breakthrough,” Luke said, quietly satisfied. “It’s all leading up to it, now. The rest will come back in here,” and he tapped his forehead, significantly. “There’s too much and too little time.”
“It sounds exciting.”
“It’s what we came here for,” replied Luke, jubilantly.
The midwinter day wasn’t long enough to contain all the activity. The bonfire blazed all night, sending a signal to the region. Those whose task was to tend the bonfire didn’t think of that. Instead they waited for the moment when work beneath them ended for the night and they were joined
by the others for singing and campfire.
The more they fed to the bonfire, the more the empty caves echoed.
Bona and her brother watched, of course. Mac and Geoff chased them away, also of course.
The people in Saint-Guilhem regarded this as a new problem. Not just the fire. Berta told anyone who would listen that the fire showed that her children were being lured by the demons from under the hill. Fiz repeated this to anyone who would listen, and to some who were not paying him sufficient attention.
Fr Peire was worried and checked with Guilhem’s household. He was not terribly surprised to discover that he had simply walked out. Their intermediary was gone.
“If the fires last, we’ll send a party to talk to them,” they agreed.
Not everyone thought this is was good idea. Some still felt that the hillfolk were dangerous - they had lured Guilhem into sin, after all.
The good people of Saint-Guilhem talked with the castle folk and with the monks. Both told them that as long as the hillfolk finally stayed under their hill and had stopped coming down to the town, there was no problem. They both explained, as if to simpletons, that if there was no threat, it was not their jurisdiction. They had never seen these strangers as posing a threat. None of the townsfolk of Saint-Guilhem were happy with this response, not even the priest.
“It’s now a waiting game,” Peire announced gloomily.
Chapter Fifty
Endgame
There was no more observation. No more delta T or meteorology. No more scraps of plants or animals or observations of water and wind and sky. Luke calculated and thought and worked out the future with more and more fury. Sylvia’s model had led to what Luke had been after, what the whole expedition was for: he could see how to change their reality. The sky was obscured by the smoke from the bonfire. It was like the end of the world.
* * *
Mac quietly and very cautiously set up his explosives. He checked and he double-checked and he made sure that the caps were not too warm and that he didn’t drop anything. He set them up when the others weren’t watching. The caps alone could take his eyes and hands, if he weren’t careful, but this had to be done - both he and Ben were agreed. It was why he was going to be the last out. No-one should get caught when the caves blew up.
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