by Karen Ranney
Gregory’s sword bit into her skin, enough that Juliana turned, faced him.
Eyes the shade of Sebastian’s frowned at her. “You are either a leper or a foolish woman. Do you care so much about him, then?”
“Do you care so little?” she asked.
“Let her go, Gregory,” Sebastian interjected. “She is no leper.”
“Even if she is not, her actions have now tainted her as well.” Gregory studied her. “You meant it to be so. Why?”
Sebastian moved, standing between her and Gregory. “If you want Langlinais, it is yours, Gregory. Take it. But release her.”
“You would trade your birthright for this woman’s freedom?”
“Yes,” Sebastian said shortly.
“Nevertheless, that was not the agreement.” Gregory signaled to a sergeant who came forward. Gregory spoke with him and a moment later, he returned, a document in one hand. He placed it on the ground in front of Sebastian.
“Langlinais is yours, brother. Not that it will do you any good. But we are men of God, Sebastian, our word is worthy of trust.”
Sebastian said nothing to this pronouncement. It was the ultimate irony, especially spoken there, at Montvichet.
“I will burn the bridge, Sebastian. A wise move to imprison lepers. There are those who would kill you if they could.”
“You among them.”
A small smile played on Gregory’s lips. “I am no Cain. I’ve no rancor for you, Sebastian. In fact, I can feel only pity for your fate. I do not understand, however, why you would wish to bargain the Holy Grail for a demesne. Nor why you would care so much when you are so obviously dying.”
“Langlinais will revert to my wife, Gregory. She will benefit from this trade.” Sebastian’s tone seemed to warn Juliana to keep silent.
“So, you’ve taken a concubine like our father.” Gregory studied Juliana, but he made no further comment.
At the gateway, he turned, glanced one more time at his brother. It looked as if he might say something further, but he turned and walked over the bridge.
Moments later, the smell of burning wood hung like a cloud over Montvichet.
The moment the Templars were gone, Sebastian ran to the side of the courtyard, dislodged the timbers lying on the stone floor. A square opening revealed a series of stone steps that descended into darkness.
He lowered himself into the opening, feeling for a handhold. There was none. He held both arms outstretched to feel the wall. The steps were mossy and he knew that there must be an underground spring nearby. That would account for the well behind the refectory.
The descent was difficult. Twice the steps angled down and seemed to disappear. He should have thought to bring an oil lamp or torch with him. By the time he was a third of the way down, he was in full darkness. He cursed himself for his lack of foresight and made his way back to the courtyard. Reversing his steps was less difficult than descending into blackness. He found a torch, trimmed the handle, lit it, and returned to the stygian darkness of the tunnel.
At the bottom, Sebastian found what he’d expected. Five years ago, he and Jerard had investigated the valley opening. It had been blocked by large building stones, leading him to believe that it was by this method that the Cathars had been starved in their fortress.
He wiped the sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand. The air here was fetid, the moisture glistened on the stones in front of him. How long would it take to clear a way through the tunnel? Time leered at him from the shadows as the torch flickered.
They had an abundant supply of food bought from the villagers. Gregory’s sergeants had not thought to take the supplies not yet loaded on the packhorses. They would be able to survive for a while.
He bent and stuck the torch into a gap of stone between a step and wall, then stripped his leper’s robe from his body. He would concentrate on only one task, that of saving Juliana.
The descent to the valley floor could have been made in better time. It was not the prisoners that hampered them as much as it was the horses. His brother’s high-stepping horse was the most recalcitrant of all, and Gregory had asked the prisoners who among them was responsible for tending to the beast and had been led to the squire. He released the man that he might lead Faeren off the mountain.
The men he held captive were all from his birthplace, a home he’d not seen in eight years. He did not miss it, but he could not help but wonder if these men had known him when he was a boy. Had he trained with some of them, drunk with them? A strange irony that he was perhaps closer to them than the troops he commanded.
He could kill them all now, or set them free to return home. He chose the latter course. It was one thing to arrange for their ambush by a third party, another to explain killing thirteen unarmed men. What, after all, had they seen? A leper and his woman imprisoned at Montvichet. The Holy Grail being given to the Knights Templar. Nothing that would lead to shame or disgrace.
At their encampment, the Templars mounted their own horses, but still led the men, their hands tied in front of them. All except the squire who led the wild-eyed Faeren. Only Sebastian would name his horse fear, Gregory thought.
The chest that cradled the chalice was affixed to his saddle. It would not be far from him until they reached Courcy. He placed his hand over the chest reverently. It was not solely faith that awed him as it was the sense of power he felt at this moment. By such an act, he could rise to become Master of the Order.
They had traveled two hours before he raised his hand in a signal to halt. He rode back to where the prisoners stood, shoulders drooping. He looked past them, to the mountain that sheltered Montvichet. It was far enough.
He sliced their bonds himself.
“You are free to go. Onward, but not back to Montvichet.” Their assembled mutters were seemingly in the assent.
When he reached the squire, he studied him. “Will you go on? Or return to him?”
The man did not answer him, only stared mutely ahead.
“He is doomed, you know.”
There, that comment elicited some response. There was fury in the man’s eyes.
“I will return, Templar.”
“What manner of man is my brother, squire, that he would command such loyalty from you? From her?” He gestured toward the mountain.
No answer, but then he did not truly expect one. Gregory turned and walked away.
“A man of honor.”
He turned. The squire’s gaze was sharp, no longer directed at the scenery, but directly at him.
“He is a man of great honor, Templar. You should count yourself fortunate to be his brother.”
For a long moment, the two men stared at each other, Templar and squire.
“Tell him, squire, if you ever look upon his face again, that I was not at Montvichet. That I knew nothing of the treachery that destroyed them. But tell him this, also. That, had I been there, I would have done my duty well.”
Gregory strode back to his horse and mounted again, one hand upon the chalice as if to assure himself it was real. He made the signal for the knights to move out.
He did not look back.
Chapter 34
Minutes passed, and still Sebastian did not return. It was as if the ground had swallowed him whole. Juliana retrieved the Templar document, then walked to the edge of the pit. There was not even a dot of light to illuminate the steps. She called out his name once, and had been answered with a faint response, but the nature of it she could not decipher. It was enough to know he was well.
Nothing remained of the bridge that crossed the gorge. Not ashes, not embers. Not even a trailing bit of rope. Everything had fallen into the chasm. Juliana stood at the gateway and measured the distance to the other side of the mountain, then wondered why she took the time to do so. She could not hold a rope and it was absurd to think of jumping it.
She retreated to the scriptorium, her attention caught by the basket of relics below the table. Should she take them back to their hidi
ng place? How odd that the basket looked like a thousand others, equally as innocent and innocuous, yet she knew now that the Templars would kill for such symbols of faith. Yet, if it was truly faith, why would they require such proof?
Sebastian had said nothing to her after she’d kissed him. Only bargained for her life by giving all that he had. Yet, when the Templars left, not one word did they exchange, not one look. It was as if she had no longer existed.
Slowly she began to unwind the bandages that bound her fingers. In moments, she’d had them exposed to the sun streaming through the small ceiling windows. This morning, she’d begun to bathe them, and instead of discomfort, she’d only felt relief from the eternal itching. It was as if her hands healed while her heart was breaking. She discovered that the more she moved her fingers, the easier it became. Therefore, she didn’t see the point in replacing the linen wrapping again.
A noise alerted her. Sebastian stood there. He wore the leper’s uniform still, but his face was damp with moisture, his hair wet. His face was set into stern lines.
“I wish you had remained timid, Juliana,” he said. “Yet, you have decided to become an opponent as daunting as any I’ve met on a battlefield. Beneath your trembles rests a will of iron, however misguided it may be. You challenge fate and sneer at Templars and declare yourself a leper with equal belief in your impunity.”
She laid her hands, one upon the other, at her waist so that they did not betray her by trembling. “Life is sometimes perilous, Sebastian. May I not choose how I am to live mine?”
“You might have lived in peace at Langlinais.”
She shook her head. “For what reason would I have held your estate, Sebastian? For whom would I have guarded it? Our child?”
“For yourself, Juliana. For your own peace and happiness.”
“I will not be happy without you, Sebastian.” She tilted her chin up.
“You will have to learn to be, Juliana.”
“We shared our breaths, Sebastian. I kissed you.”
“Do you think I do not remember?”
If he had been standing close, she thought she might have felt the heat of his rage, it seemed to burn so hot. Gone was the man with understanding and compassion in his gaze, the warrior with sorrow in his eyes. This was the avenging angel, who held an arrow that flashed lightning in his hand.
“I will see you free of this place, Juliana. I will see you whole and living and filled with life. I will not watch you die in front of my eyes. Once before you touched me, and we are only fortunate that nothing came of that. But this time, you pushed too far, you dared too much. Despite what you wish and what you do, I will not let this touch you. This is my vow.”
She did not speak, simply went to him. Her hands, bare and unadorned, reached for his. It was not until she touched him that she realized he wore no gloves.
Their eyes met.
He slowly pulled his hand away.
“I will not let you be a martyr, Juliana.”
“Do not forswear me, Sebastian. Do not send me away or cast me out. I did what I had to do because I do not choose to leave you.”
She could battle against ignorance by writing the words of great thinkers, by adding to the store of the world’s knowledge. But she could not fight Sebastian’s will. That stood between them, a bulwark against any pleas she might utter.
“That was never your choice to make, Juliana.”
He stepped back and left the room without saying another word.
Jerard swore as Faeren tried to take a bite out of his rump.
“It’s your good fortune that my lord holds you in affection,” he said, glaring at the horse. His own mount, of a more even temper, looked up almost in amusement. He’d tied them both too close, but he waited for Templar treachery and wanted to be able to escape quickly.
He had returned to Montvichet as Gregory had taunted, but he did not attempt to find a way over the gorge. Even if he could have constructed some means across, he doubted Lady Juliana could have used it. Instead, he’d come to the tunnel he and Sebastian had discovered, and began to clear it of the rocks and stones that blocked it.
He’d not expected to be released. Why had Gregory done so? At first, he’d thought it was because the Templar regretted leaving his brother marooned atop Montvichet. Then, Jerard had realized that it was simply better for Gregory to dispose of witnesses to his actions. One way had been to kill them. The easiest way, however, had been to send them home to England. Every one of his fellow men-at-arms must have done exactly that. They had disappeared like the morning mist. And they would lose no time telling the people of Langlinais what fate their lord suffered.
The future Jerard had once feared was here.
He would forever remember that moment when Lady Juliana had looked at him as if he betrayed her. He’d wanted to ask for her forgiveness, but his first loyalty had always, would always, be to Sebastian. Still, he recognized courage when he saw it and he’d wanted to commend her in some way, both for that and the expression in her eyes when she looked at his lord.
Love, it had come to both of them.
He had not been unaware of Sebastian’s irritation thoughout the journey. It had shown in a hundred different ways. Another man might have thought it had been purely jealousy, but Jerard knew that despair had been present as well.
He bent to pull another rock free of the opening. De Rutger’s troops had filled the tunnel well from this side. He only hoped that it was not blocked all the way to the top.
It would make the job ahead difficult, but it would be accomplished. On that, he swore his oath.
Chapter 35
Sebastian avoided her the rest of the day and two days after that. For three days he managed to escape being in the same room with her. He worked in the tunnel, leaving it late at night and beginning again at dawn. She wondered if he ate, then found evidence of it in the room set aside to prepare the Cathar meals. If he slept, it was in one of the sleeping chambers; he never again joined her in the courtyard.
If he meant to wound her, he did. Yet, for all his protests, for all his logic, for all his sacrifice, Sebastian had never said the words that would have dissuaded her from accompanying him into exile. I do not want you. She had always been able to see the hint of loneliness in his eyes. Or perhaps it was only the reflection of hers.
She spent the time in chores that occupied the hours. She bathed in the large stone bath. The sensation was odd, that of silky water and scratchy stone. She straightened the empty chambers, as if in silent apology to all those people whose lives had once been so tidily lived in these rooms. One morning, she found a small carved doll beneath an over-turned bed. The doll boasted a body of soft down, a face that bore a sweet smile. Upon her cheek was a shiny rubbed spot, as if stroked often. Juliana placed it gently upon a pillow as if its owner would return soon and need it to sleep.
Once or twice she thought she heard the whisper of voices. She could almost believe that, if she remained perfectly still, she might be able to eavesdrop upon conversations, smile at the sound of laughter.
Most of her time, however, was spent in the scriptorium. She had removed the relics from their basket with trembling hands. Her awe and wonder was such that she could hardly bear to touch them. More than twelve hundred years had passed since these objects had been used, yet there was still an aura of holiness about them. She extracted a few scrolls to occupy her before returning the precious objects to their place.
Sebastian had been right in saying that the first treasure of the Cathars was knowledge. There was a collection of bestiaries, each describing strange animals she’d never seen. The tales were accompanied by a series of drawings. One showed an enormous animal with an appendage sagging in front of him like a fifth leg. Another, a spotted beast with an elongated neck and triangular head. There was a series of scrolls entitled Speculum Divinorum, and a practicum that appeared to be a text on medical remedies. A few scrolls were filled with the knowledge of plants, almost an encyclopedi
a of drawings with captions below the illustrations. A few scrolls were in Greek that she could not read, but the majority were in Latin.
She found herself enthralled, delighted, the words whisking her from her misery as nothing else could. Hours passed while she read, her eyes widening at some passages, her smile broadening at others. Evidently, scribes from long ago left personal colophons in the margins, just as she did. A few of them amused her. “It is cold today. It is natural, it is winter.” “I feel quite dull today, I don’t know what’s wrong with me.” But her favorite was the self-chiding of a scribe whose sentiments had echoed her own on too many occasions. “He who does not know how to write supposes it to be no labor, but though only three fingers write, the whole body labors.” How many times had she ached from head to toe because of being bent over her desk all day?
That day when she emerged from the scriptorium late in the afternoon, Sebastian was in the courtyard. He stood at the ruined wall, looking down into the valley. Because of the steep angle, the road was not visible from there. Nor could they see beyond the thick growth of trees.
At her footsteps, he turned. For a moment he tensed, and she thought he might seize upon any excuse to leave. She would not beg him to remain. It was not pride that made her hesitate, but only the certain knowledge that asking him to yield would only firm his determination to remain aloof. He was determined to free her from Montvichet and from himself.
She looked at the red L upon his back and chest. Loved, perhaps. Her lord. She smoothed her fingers against the initial, feeling the heat of his body through the smooth fabric. It was a coarser weave than his monk’s robe, but so much softer. Her hand pressed against his back, and he moved away.
A long moment later, she moved to stand beside him, relieved when he did not move or retreat even farther from her.
“What will happen to Jerard and the others?”