by Robyn Young
“They still are. Only now they are all the more powerful because they are truly meant.”
“In a story they are innocent. Enacted they are heresy.”
“Heresy!” scoffed Hugues. “You are as stuck in the old ways as Jacques de Molay. No matter how much scorn he poured on Armand de Périgord’s obsession with the stories of the Grail, Everard knew how powerful those ideas were. But he never used that power. He didn’t have the chance. I have taken his and Armand’s work and turned it into something real, not just some fantasy for grown men to pretend at, but something that can save the order.”
“How in Christ’s name is turning young, impressionable knights into blood-drinking sinners going to save the order?”
“The blood is a potent reminder of our ties as brothers,” said Hugues, his tone intent. “That is why Everard used it in his story of Perceval. I have simply taken it one step further and, in doing so, have made it that much more compelling. These knights”—he spread a hand to take in more shadowy figures at the edge of Will’s vision—“are true Brethren.”
“I doubt Martin de Floyran would think much of your idea of brotherhood.”
Hugues’s face fell. “My men went too far that night. But they are fiercely loyal to me and to one another, and Martin’s betrayal of our oaths wounded them deeply. It was my fault. He wasn’t ready for initiation. Some men aren’t.”
“And Esquin?”
“Another unfortunate sacrifice.” Hugues drew a heavy breath. “We aren’t sinners or heretics, Campbell. I believe in God as much as you do. The men I pick for initiation into the Anima Templi come to this chamber to act out the journey of Perceval with me as their guide.” He gestured to his shimmering cloak. “The Fisher King who leads them through their trials. They are asked to choose between two paths: the way of the old order, under the grand master, a way of blood and violence and war, a way that will destroy the Temple, or the path to a new order. But that new path is not an easy road. In following it they are betraying the oaths they took as knights, betraying their masters, their families even. To follow it they must trust me completely and I must trust them. They spit on the cross to prove their loyalty to me; to prove that when it comes to matters of the Brethren, I am the highest authority. Everard understood the power in these acts, or he wouldn’t have written the Book of the Grail. That is why he called Acre his Camelot. The idea of men fighting to save a mystical ideal is more potent than men struggling to save a dusty scrap of land, isn’t it?”
Will was shaking his head, incredulous. “You’ve been initiating men all this time? Robert told me you were doing nothing. That the Brethren didn’t even meet anymore.”
“I once hoped Robert might join us, but I knew he was as entrenched in the old ways as you and Jacques. It is time for a new order. A new Brethren. The Crusades are over, they were over the moment Acre fell to the Mamluks, and while the Teutonics advance into Prussia to take land and wealth, and the Hospitallers plan their conquest of Rhodes, our own leaders stumble blindly about in Cyprus, still grasping for Jerusalem and a vanished dream. This is a time for building empires, for expansion, not wasting men and resources on futile holy wars. The world changed while you were trying to hold up a crumbling idea in the East. The kings of the West are busy gathering their power, building their realms. We need to do the same if we are to survive. We must change too and to do that we need a secure base in which to consolidate our strength. In time, we will stretch out our hand into a new age, an age of discovery and learning, peace and prosperity.” Hugues’s eyes were shining in the candlelight. “But I knew I could only change the order slowly, from within, and so I began recruiting knights who would be loyal to me over Jacques and his Crusade.”
“So what do you intend to do? Invade a country with your personal army?”
“I do not need to. King Edward has promised to provide the Temple with an area of conquered Scotland.”
Will sat forward. His eyes narrowed with pain and anger. “If he conquers it!”
“He will,” answered Hugues calmly. “Robert Bruce and his followers have gone to ground and Edward’s army marches north as we speak. It is the greatest force since Falkirk. Scotland will fall under English steel and the Temple will have its security, away from the turbulent centers of France and England, Germany and Rome.”
“You’re a fool, Hugues,” murmured Will. “Edward has fought for eighteen years to control Scotland. Do you honestly believe he will give any part of it to you? You’ve been blinded by your own fantasies and you’ve twisted the aims of the Brethren to suit them. This isn’t what Everard, my father, Elias or Kalawun intended, what they lived and bled for. This isn’t the Soul of the Temple.”
“It is now. You left, Will. You haven’t been part of the order or the Brethren for years. While you’ve been picking away at King Edward, a mouse trying to bring down a lion, I’ve been leading the Temple to a golden future.”
“A golden future? Right now, a message is making its way to Cyprus that will summon Grand Master de Molay to meet the pope to answer charges of heresy within this preceptory. King Philippe and Guillaume de Nogaret have been trying to gain control of the order for years, to take its wealth for themselves. By your actions, you may have damned every man here.”
“Ridiculous. No one even knows of the Brethren.”
“Esquin de Floyran does and he is in royal custody.”
“That is impossible. Only I have the authority to free de Floyran.” Hugues stared at Will, realization dawning across his face. “Has Robert de Paris been more of a snake than I realized?”
“We can turn this around. I have the ear of the pope, but you must destroy all evidence of what you have been doing here. You must disband the Anima Templi and—”
“Disband it?” Hugues’s face filled with suspicion. “What game are you playing with me, Campbell?”
“No game, I swear—”
“Enough! I will not listen to these lies.” Hugues gestured to the men in the shadows. “Get him out of my sight.”
“Shutting me away in Merlan will not change what is happening!” shouted Will, as the masked Brethren untied his hands and pulled him roughly to his feet.
“You’re not going to Merlan. You’re going to England. It was Edward’s price for the Brethren’s new territory: you, for Scotland.”
“Don’t do this!” shouted Will. “Don’t do this, for God’s sake!”
But Hugues was turning away and a hood was coming down over Will’s face, cutting off his sight.
36
The Road to Carlisle, the Kingdom of England
JULY 1, 1307 AD
The wagon bounced and rocked along the road. Will sat hunched against the side, feeling every jolt in his bruised body. Through the weave of the hood he caught flashes of brightness slanting in through the open back of the wagon. Judging by the sporadic glints of light and change in smell he supposed they must be passing through a forest. He had been trying for some moments to think where they might be, but time and distance were so distorted in his mind he simply had no way of knowing.
He had been taken from Paris on the night of his encounter with Hugues, his captors spiriting him down to the Seine, where they boarded a small vessel. Recovering slowly from the injuries he sustained at the hands of Hugues’s men, he drifted in and out of consciousness. They kept him in isolation in the cramped, stinking hold, still blindfolded and bound, and it was only on hearing the cries of gulls over the slosh of water and creaking timbers that he knew when they reached the sea. He was dragged up on deck, gasping at the salt air, and transferred to a larger ship at Honfleur, but before it could set sail a summer storm blew in along the coast, forcing the vessel to remain docked for several days.
Shaken beneath deck in the boiling waves that dashed the port, Will’s thoughts settled on his daughter, presumably still in the palace. The image of her waiting for him, thinking he had abandoned her yet again, drove him into a frenzy and, yelling curses and threats at his ca
ptors, he struggled and kicked within his bonds until two men came down and methodically beat him into silence. Thereafter, the crossing to England passed in a haze. Arriving in London, he was taken to a building near the docks, where he spent a week or so chained in a cellar, surviving on bread and briny-tasting water, before finally being dumped in the wagon.
Listening to snatches of conversation during the ponderous journey north, he discovered that the thirty or so men conveying him were part of King Edward’s royal guard, following the English Army on the march to Scotland with extra supplies. There were other carts with them on the road, but the one he was in was filled with barrels of sickly smelling wine. The parched heat of the days seeped through the cloth, leaving him panting, sweating and mad for water, which he guzzled like a crazed dog whenever the guards thrust a bowl at him.
The glints of light flashing through his hood soon became a constant glare and Will guessed they must have passed out of the shade of the forest. The fertile smell of trees was replaced with the musty scent of dry grass and the soldiers muttered about the clouds of insects that plagued them. An hour or so later, Will caught a whiff of campfire smoke and began to hear the distant, incoherent hum of many people. The chatter of birdsong died away and soon the hum stretched itself out into proper sounds: dogs and horses, calls, laughter. The wagon trundled over fields and lurched to a stop. Will felt a shift in weight as two men climbed in. His arms were grasped and his stiff body yanked upright. He heard voices all around him, deafening after so long in relative silence. Suddenly, the hood was pulled from over his face and sunlight blasted into his eyes.
He was on an immense, grassy plain, covered, as far as he could see, by hundreds, possibly thousands of tents. Bright banners and pennants fluttered everywhere, a confusion of color and emblems, many of which he remembered from the campaigns he had fought with Wallace. Knights and lords stood about in groups or else rested in open-sided tents, while squires and servants hurried between them like lines of busy ants. As the guards marched Will through the encampment, he saw a huddle of men working on mail coats, painstakingly linking each metal ring, the shirts silvery and supple as fish scales in their quick-moving hands. There were cooks in stained aprons, laboring at fires, and a crowd of archers checking the flight feathers on arrows under the watchful eye of their captain. Hugues had said the army was as vast as the one that destroyed the Scottish force at Falkirk. As he passed through its midst, Will thought it might actually be larger.
In the distance, near several grand-looking tents, was a regal scarlet pavilion. He felt a twinge in his gut as he recognized the golden lions on the banner planted outside. Behind it, the land rose gradually, but the incline and heat haze made it impossible to see what lay beyond and he had no real way of telling where they were. He realized the two soldiers were leading him toward a small cage formed of bound wooden stakes, guarded by men in royal livery. One opened the door and the soldiers shoved him inside. He had to bend double the prison was so low, the grass inside yellow and flattened. Four figures within, faces bruised and wary, stared at him as the cage door was shut.
BURGH-UPON-SANDS, THE KINGDOM OF ENGLAND, JULY 3, 1307 AD
Will tore ravenously at the leathery strip of meat. His mouth was full of blisters from lack of decent food and it hurt to chew, but if this was to be his last meal he was determined to savor it. It was late in the evening, the sky above the amber gleam of torches and fires a boundless blue. The sun had risen twice since he had been tossed into the cage and still the army hadn’t moved from the grassy plain. It had, however, grown.
Over the past two days a stream of reinforcements had flowed onto the plain to swell the English forces, along with straggling supply trains. Infantry, faces burned dark by the midsummer sun, trudged wearily into the camp, bearing maces and axes, spears and shields, and nobles rode in, leading companies of knights. At night, when the rations were passed around, Will sat listening to the laughter and camp songs. These soldiers had fought the Scots for years. They knew the terrain and their enemy’s tactics, and they were confident. The rumor was that Robert Bruce was planning to fight back, but the English dismissed his chances scornfully. Despite some early successes for Scotland’s new king, Edward retained control of much of the country. Now, almost a decade after their terrible defeat at Stirling Bridge, his men had come again to make the rebel kingdom pay one last, bloody time.
Will had gleaned some of this information from his fellow captives. All four were Scottish scouts, two from Bruce’s camp, who had been sent to spy on the English advance. They had been tortured for information on the Scots’ whereabouts, but so far had managed to hold out, although Will wasn’t sure for how much longer. One of the four had been taken away that morning. He hadn’t returned. Between the creeping fear he felt, for his country and for himself, his thoughts traveled endlessly around what he had left behind. He thought of Hugues in his Fisher King’s cloak with his army of masked soldiers, waiting in the Paris preceptory for the Hammer to flatten them a piece of land. He thought of Robert, one of his oldest comrades, most likely imprisoned or dead. He thought of his daughter, trapped in the palace, and of Pope Clement’s message winging its way to Cyprus. He thought too of Esquin de Floyran, hidden in some royal tower, impatient to bring his jailers to ruin.
“Campbell.”
Will swallowed down the last of the dry meat, seeing two royal guards approaching. One gestured to him.
“Out.”
Will crawled his way to the cage door, knowing it was futile to resist, and caught a staunch nod from one of the Scottish prisoners as the guards pulled him to his feet. English soldiers stared as he was marched between their campfires. One man spat at him. Will fixed his gaze ahead, realizing his captors were leading him toward the scarlet pavilion.
The tent was sumptuously furnished with all the luxuries a king might require while on campaign: a bath, a couch, a table to dine at, servants and musicians to attend and entertain him. Despite this, the place seemed subdued, the lively confidence of the camp not reflected within the cloth walls, the attendants quiet and worried-looking. Will had time to sense this and to wonder what it meant, before he was led into a private compartment within the pavilion, filled with a large bed, the four carved posts of which stretched up to the undulating red roof. Two braziers gave off heat and smoke, but very little light. There was a figure in the bed.
King Edward was almost seventy and wore his years like a faded mantle, hanging heavy around his shoulders. Will heard his breaths crackle like parchment, smelled piss and stale sweat. Gone was the arrogant expression, the forceful stare and regal bearing. In place of the king who had haunted his life was an old, incontinent man.
“Have you seen my army, Campbell?”
The voice still had power and Will heard something of the king’s former self in that mocking tone. “You cannot exactly miss it,” he responded, and received a punch in his kidneys from one of the guards for his insolence.
“You should look well upon it,” croaked the king, his bloodshot eyes gleaming. “For it is the last thing you will see. Tomorrow I will do to you what I did to that bastard, Wallace. Then, with your entrails still reeking on the fire, I will lead my army into Scotland and—” Edward broke into a fit of coughing. One of the guards moved forward, but the king raised a trembling hand to halt him. He retched into a cloth, then drew a breath and fixed his watery stare on Will. “The traitor, Bruce, and his ragged band will rue the day they ever thought to stand against me. They will be hauled from their horses and trampled in the fields, cut down in the hundreds, nay the thousands! Cut down to their sons and their daughters, down to the unborn children inside their whores. The soil of Scotland shall be cleansed with their blood and noble English towns set up in place of their mud huts and tribes. Your own family, Campbell, will share this fate.” Edward leaned forward. “I want you to know that before I execute you. I want you to know how they will suffer for your treachery. I want you to . . .”
Edward con
tinued, but Will was no longer listening to the words. All he could see was the king’s twisted face, the spittle flying from his gray lips. All he could feel was the hatred coming off him. It poured from every part of the king, black and bitter as pitch, stinking of frustration and impotence. Edward was bowed under with the weight of it. Will was filled with a rush of clarity as he realized that despite everything—the deaths of those he loved, the confusion and deception—he hadn’t lost his soul. He could feel it inside him, blazing before Edward’s choking, malevolent form. However strong his need for revenge, he hadn’t let it poison him slowly over years. He knew, all at once, with absolute certainty, that even if Edward succeeded in Scotland, he would never now find peace. He had gone beyond that possibility a long time ago.
Edward’s tirade ended in a violent outburst of coughing that had attendants rushing in with fresh cloths for him to hack phlegm into. “Tomorrow, Campbell!” he was wheezing. “Tomorrow! ”
Will was marched into the sultry night, struck by his revelation. Edward’s coughs faded behind him as the soldiers returned him to the cage.
Most of the army was asleep, resting before the march into Scotland and the battle to come. Stars blinked, mirroring the low-burning campfires. Brushing aside the questions of his fellow captives, Will knelt and bowed his head. He prayed for his daughter and that she would learn he hadn’t abandoned her, prayed she would go to Simon and he would help her escape Philippe. He prayed Hugues would see sense and Clement would hold his nerve, and prayed that Robert was still alive and Jacques de Molay’s Crusade would fail. Once this was done, he lay down on the warm grass and closed his eyes. Even though he was afraid of what was to come, he knew the pain would only be transitory and in the end it would lead to something else, something far, far sweeter.
Tomorrow, he would see his father again and his mother. He would be greeted by Everard and Hasan and Elias, would clasp the hands of Kalawun and Owein. Tomorrow, he would be with Elwen. He would see them all with peace in his heart, knowing that in the end his path had been true.