The ship carrying Edmund Plantagenet, Earl of Leicester and Lancaster, second son of the English King, entered the port of Palermo at mid-day. Edmund was awed by his first sight of Sicily. He’d been told that it was a beautiful land, and he found it so: mountains soaring into infinity, harbors of translucent turquoise, a landscape on fire with flowers. He knew that it was a rich land, too, blessed with iron and salt mines, sugar cane, cotton. And as he looked upon this exotic island city, Edmund felt a sharp stab of regret, for it might have been his.
Although he had little interest in the past, Edmund was well-versed in the history of Sicily. He knew it had been settled by the Phoenicians a thousand years before the birth of the Lord Christ, that it had been conquered by the Greeks, the Romans, the Saracens, and then the Normans. After the death of the Emperor Frederick, his empire had split asunder, and the Pope sought English support for his feud with Frederick’s son by offering the throne of Naples and Sicily to Edmund, then a lad of nine. Henry had been thrilled by the prospect of obtaining a crown for his younger son. But the English barons balked, unwilling to fight a war and drain the Exchequer in order to make Edmund ruler of a foreign realm.
It had been a bitter disappointment for Henry, just one more grievance to tally up against Simon de Montfort’s account. But Edmund soon came to terms with his loss. It was not that difficult, for his was an equable, genial nature, not given to grudges. Moreover, he might lack a coronet, but he did not lack for lands; Henry had bestowed upon him Simon de Montfort’s estates, and those of Lancaster as well. Young, healthy, with a doting father, an elder brother he adored, an heiress for his child-bride, and two earldoms, he was indeed blessed, but it was his saving grace that he knew it—even on this April afternoon in Palermo harbor, gazing upon palm trees and flowering mimosa and lemon groves, a sight sure to beguile anyone accustomed to the cool grey mists and recurrent rains of England.
Edmund had been told that his brother was staying at La Favrah, a Norman palazzo a few miles southeast of Palermo. He was looking forward to his reunion with Edward, eager to fulfill his crusader’s vow. But he was also somewhat apprehensive about his brother’s frame of mind, for upon landing at Naples, he’d been told of the murder in Viterbo.
Edmund had not been that well acquainted with Hal, who was ten years his senior. He was shocked, though, by the circumstances of his cousin’s death, and he knew that Edward would not rest until the de Montforts paid a blood debt. His brother had a temper to rival the eruptions of Sicily’s Mount Etna. As little as he liked to admit it, he could see Edward, too, raging into a church in pursuit of an enemy, blind to all but his own fury.
But no…they said Hal had not resisted. Ned would not have struck down a defenseless man. A foe crossing swords with Ned had one chance of saving his life: surrender. In that, Guy de Montfort was utterly unlike Ned. Unlike his own father, for Edmund was sure that his uncle Simon would never have shed blood in a church. An ugly business, for certes. Poor Uncle Richard; it was his ill health that had been bringing Hal home. Sad, so sad. Well, at least Hal would be avenged. That was a certainty. He knew his brother.
La Favrah was the most magnificent palace Edmund had ever seen. It was surrounded on three sides by a vast man-made lake that stretched to the foot of Monte Grifone. The grounds were crisscrossed with fishponds, planted with oleanders and orange trees and cypress, and barges gilded gold and silver floated upon the waters of the lagoon. The residential part of the palace encircled a large courtyard. The walls were of bright Spanish tile and white Parian marble. Red mosaics lined the pathways, and wherever Edmund’s eye alighted, he saw cascading fountains, strutting peacocks, and graceful arcades adorned with honeycomb tracery. It was beautiful beyond compare, but in an alien, Arabic sort of way; Edmund had the uneasy sensation that a mosque would look more at home here than a chapel.
A tall, elegantly gowned woman was walking by one of the fountains. She smiled at sight of him, held out her hands in welcome. Edmund did not begrudge his brother the English crown—not often—but he did occasionally envy him his wife, for not only was Eleanora an alluring beauty in the dark Spanish style, she was utterly devoted to Edward, pledged to him heart, body, and soul. The best proof of her devotion was that she had left their three small children behind in England, knowing she would not see them for years, rather than be separated from Edward. Of course that could just be common sense, Edmund acknowledged wryly. Ned might be a loving husband, but he was not always a faithful one. Better to keep him close, lest temptation beckon. Kissing Eleanora’s hand, he began to laugh, having belatedly become aware of her swelling silhouette.
“Ned did not tell me! When is the babe due?”
“Mid-summer, or so the midwife says. Eduardo tried to persuade me to remain here whilst he returns to the Holy Land. But I prevailed upon him, and we expect to sail for Acre within the fortnight.” Eleanora had come to England as a child-bride of ten, but her voice still held echoes of her native Castile. “Edmundo…do you know?”
When he nodded, she sighed. “Never have I seen Eduardo so wroth,” she confessed. “He is in council, making plans for his campaign against the infidel. Come, I shall take you to him.” And linking her arm in his, she led him across the courtyard toward a spacious southwest hall.
Edmund was not surprised by the raised voices; his brother’s strategy sessions tended to be turbulent. The men with Edward were well-known to him: Thomas de Clare, Erard de Valery, and William de Lusignan, Earl of Pembroke. The first was a friend, the younger and more amenable brother of the Earl of Gloucester. The second was a French knight who had the dubious distinction of having once saved Guy de Montfort’s life. And the third was a kinsman, Henry’s half-brother and their uncle, a man detested by virtually every Englishman who’d had the bad fortune to cross paths with him.
They were all arguing with Edward, each in his own fashion—Thomas reasoning, Erard joking, and William de Lusignan blustering—but Edmund knew none were likely to prevail. His brother might not yet have a king’s crown, but he did have a king’s will. So imperial was his bearing, so regal and forceful his demeanor, that people sometimes forgot he was a king-in-waiting, forgot the frail, aging shadow who blocked Edward’s emergence into the sun. It saddened Edmund that their father’s last days should be so meaningless, that he should be reduced to the status of a caretaker king, or worse, a ghost lingering beyond his time. Despite his manifest failings as a monarch, Henry had been a loving father, and Edmund ached for his twilight impotence, while understanding why England yearned for Edward’s reign.
Not that it had always been so. Edmund knew there’d been a time when men dreaded the day that Edward would be King. Edmund had no memories himself of his brother’s lawless youth; he’d been just a child. But he’d heard the stories. Edward’s escapades had gone far beyond the usual hell-raising expected of young men of rank. Galloping through villages at midnight, making enough clamor to awaken the dead. Appropriating wagons and abandoning them in cemeteries. Playing cat-and-mouse with the City Watch, getting drunk in Southwark whorehouses. Edward had done it all. But then his games took on darker tones. The brawling was no longer in sport. There was an ugly incident at Wallingford Priory, where monks were beaten and wine casks looted. There were reports of women being molested. And then a young man who’d somehow incurred Edward’s displeasure was cruelly mutilated by Edward’s servants, at Edward’s command. And as these accounts were bruited about, people began to cross themselves and shiver at the thought of Edward wielding the manifold powers of kingship.
But such fears had been—for the most part—laid to rest during those tumultuous months between the battle of Lewes, in which Simon de Montfort scored a stunning victory over the forces of the Crown, and the battle of Evesham. Held hostage while Simon vainly sought to win him as ally, Edward had contrived a daring escape, and brought Simon to bay after a campaign brilliant in conception, flawless in execution. Men had called Simon de Montfort the “greatest soldier in Christendom.” Af
ter Evesham, they began to say the same of Edward. It was Edmund’s belief that the civil war had been for Edward a crucible, a trial by fire in which the sins of youth were burned away and his true manhood emerged from the ashes, as it was meant to be. For others, Edward’s renowned skill with a sword was enough; much could be overlooked in a battle commander of Edward’s caliber.
As Edmund stepped forward, Edward was the first to glance up. “Well, now,” he said, “if it is not the prodigal sheep!” The other men looked understandably baffled, for that was an old family joke, the result of Edmund’s childish confusion between the biblical prodigal son and the proverbial lost sheep. Edmund was not surprised that Edward had remembered; his memory was as sharp as his sword. He grinned, moved to embrace his brother.
Edward’s bear hug took his breath. He was five feet, nine inches, the same height as their father, but Edward stood several fingers above six feet, so tall that men called him “longshanks.” They were as unlike in appearance as they were in temperament. In childhood, Edward’s hair had been as fair as Edmund’s, but it had later darkened, was now a brownish-black, although in full sunlight, his beard still showed red-gold flecks. His eyes were a pale, clear blue like Henry’s, and like Henry, one eyelid drooped drowsily. A slight speech impediment—a faint lisp—which would have put another man at a distinct disadvantage, was in Edward an irrelevancy, so impressive was his physique, so dominant his personality. White teeth flashed now as he laughed, throwing his head back, enveloping Edmund in another exuberant hug.
“By God, lad, it’s glad I am to see you! What word from England?”
“I have a casket full of letters for you. Mama is thriving, as ever. But Papa is still ailing, and so is Uncle Richard. When he hears about Hal, it’s like to kill him, Ned.”
“You know, then.” Edward’s voice was flat. “All of it?” Edmund nodded quickly, hoping thus to avert a gory reenactment of the crime. He would rather not dwell upon the brutal details of his cousin’s death, although he was unwilling to admit this, lest the other men think him squeamish or soft. Edward had begun to pace back and forth, taking long, sweeping strides, every line of his body communicating his outrage. He had yet to notice his wife, who seemed content to wait until he did.
“What I cannot understand,” Edward said suddenly, “is why Hal did not fight back. If it had been me…” He shook his head, then gave Edmund a look of such searing intensity that his brother was thankful he was not the real recipient. “I would have bartered my very soul for a chance to cross swords with Guy de Montfort,” he said, and none doubted him.
Moving to the window, Edward stood for some moments, staring out at the silver-sheened lake. “I would that I could lead the hunt to track them down. But my army awaits me at Acre. Charles has promised, though, that he’ll see them brought to justice. Christ pity him if he does not, for I’ve sworn a holy oath that the de Montforts shall pay for Hal’s murder, every one of them, and I—”
“Every one of them? Surely not Aunt Nell, too?” Edmund blurted out uneasily, and Edward gestured impatiently.
“Of course not. Aunt Nell would not have countenanced such a killing.” After a pause, he said grudgingly, “And neither would Simon.” An acknowledgment to an enemy did not come easily to Edward; moving back to the table, he reached for a cup of sweet red wine, swallowed to take the taste away. “There was a time, though, when I would have said the same of Bran…”
William de Lusignan laughed. “I hear he has not drawn a sober breath in years. He was probably so besotted he thought the bloodletting to be some quaint Italian custom, part of the Mass!”
Edmund and Thomas and Erard looked at him in distaste, the first two because they detested him, Erard because he had been Bran’s friend. But then, so had Edward—once. He was staring out onto the lake again, eyes narrowed against the white Sicilian sun. “It was mainly Guy’s doing,” he said. “I know that, for I know Guy, God rot his misbegotten soul! But the fact that his guilt is greater does not excuse Bran or Amaury. They, too, have a debt to pay, and I shall see that they do.”
“Amaury, too?” Edmund gasped, horrified that a priest might have taken part in a church killing. “I heard naught of Amaury at Naples!”
Erard shifted uncomfortably in his seat, wanting to speak up for Amaury, but loath to remind Edward of his friendship with the de Montforts. Thomas was reluctant, too, to intervene, but he’d been burdened with an innate sense of fairness. “Ned, you know there is no proof whatsoever that Amaury was—”
Edward spun around. “Proof? He is Simon de Montfort’s spawn, is he not? What more proof do I need? When I think of all that man has to answer for, the evil ideas he brought to England like some noxious French pox, the way he tried to cripple the God-given powers of kingship, I know he must be burning in eternal hellfire!”
By then the others had realized he was speaking not of Amaury, but of Simon. “He would have torn asunder the very foundation of the realm, dashed us down into hellish chaos and darkness! Look at the allies he drew to him: the London rabble, Oxford students, unlettered village priests, Welsh rebels. But not men of good birth, not men of the peerage. And yet there are people who still hold his memory dear, who have made him into a martyr, who bleat that he died for them and their precious Runnymede Charter, for their ‘liberties.’ If Simon de Montfort is a saint, then I’m the living, breathing incarnation of Christ Jesus the Redeemer! But fools flourish in England like the green bay tree, and still he wreaks havoc upon us, even now from the grave.”
None had dared to interrupt. When Edward at last fell silent, Eleanora crossed to his side, wiped away with gentle fingers the perspiration that trickled down his temples. He looked exhausted by his outburst, by this continuing struggle to defeat a phantom foe five years dead.
“Do you know whom I truly blame for Hal’s death? Simon de Montfort, for it was he who led us to the cliff’s edge. He’s beyond my powers to punish. But his sons are not, and I shall see them in Hell. This I swear upon the surety of Hal’s soul.”
5
Talamone, the Maremma, Tuscany
May 1271
Other men might envision Hell as a subterranean underworld, an abyss filled with flames and rivers of boiling blood. But to Hugh, Hell would forever after be the bleak, low-lying marshes of the Maremma.
Hugh was not alone in hating it, this vast, barren swampland stretching north from Viterbo, south from Siena, a haven for snakes, wild boar, and pestilent fevers. Men who’d remained loyal to Bran, even after Viterbo, balked at the Maremma, and their numbers dwindled daily.
None knew exactly what had passed between Bran and his brother; Bran said nothing and not even the bravest man dared to breach his frozen silence. That the rupture had come surprised no one, for Guy had taken a bitter satisfaction in his act of vengeance, and Bran, once he’d sobered up, was sickened by it. Most of their men made the predictable and pragmatic decision to remain at Sovana Castle with Guy and his powerful father-in-law. But a score of knights had elected to follow Bran.
These die-hard loyalists had not bargained upon the Maremma, though, had not bargained upon endless, empty days under a searing sun, a landscape of windswept desolation, muddy bogs, reed-choked ponds of stagnant water. The impoverished port of Orbetello, the shabby coastal village of Talamone, the inland town of Grosseto, then back to Talamone—theirs was an aimless wandering without purpose or plan, and to the disgruntled, uneasy men, it began to seem like the accursed odyssey of Cain. Bran shrugged off their queries, ignored their protests, and as their patience waned, one by one they slipped away. By this hot, humid Whitsunday in late May, they had all forsaken Bran but two—Hugh and a French knight, Sir Roger de Valmy.
Hugh had risen early, eager to escape the oppressive atmosphere of their inn. He’d meandered about the harbor for a while, practicing his Tuscan upon obliging passersby. Out of sheer boredom, he stopped to help the blacksmith shoe a recalcitrant filly and then drew well water for an elderly widow. When several youths invit
ed him to join in a rough-and-tumble game of palone, he was quick to accept.
Hugh was still surprised by the continuing friendliness of the Tuscan people. They were unabashedly curious about the Viterbo murder, but he found none of the hostility he’d expected. While he encountered no one who condoned the killing, he met no one who did not understand it, either. Blood-feuds were too familiar to shock. A pity, all agreed, before pointing out that it would not have happened if the Earl’s body had not been so foully abused at Evesham. Two sides of the same coin, no? Men crossed themselves, then shrugged.
For several hours the boys tossed a football back and forth. By the time the game broke up, Hugh was sweaty and out of breath and limping from a particularly energetic tackle, but happier than he’d been in weeks. His conscience was beginning to prickle, though, and he headed back toward the inn, in case Bran might have need of him. Reaching the stables, he detoured to check upon their horses, and it was there that he found Sir Roger de Valmy, saddling his stallion.
Hugh could not conceal his dismay. “You are leaving?”
The Frenchman nodded. “I ought to have gone weeks ago, but I kept hoping Bran would come to his senses.” Buckling the saddle girth, he stepped from the shadows. A dark, stocky man of middle height, his most notable feature was an ugly scar, one that twisted his mouth askew, into a sinister smile that could not have been more deceptive, for he was by nature affable, generous, and perceptive. “Look, lad,” he said slowly, “I like Bran. But he is drifting into deep water, and I am not willing to drown with him.”
Hugh saw there was no point in arguing. “Where will you go?”
“South. Charles keeps his court at Naples. I mean to seek him out, offer him my sword. I’ve fought for him in the past; he knows my worth.”
“But…but are you not afraid to face him? After Viterbo…”
The Reckoning Page 8