Helena P. Schrader's Blog, page 63

"A Widow's Crusade:" Chapter 8

Montfort, GalileeOctober - December 1212  Abelard was exhausted, but he could not sleep. It was pouring rain and the sound of it drumming on the roof, gurgling down the gutters and shaking the trees was like a file to his nerves. The room was damp because he had not bothered with a fire. He tried to keep away the chill by pulling his cloak over his blankets, but still he was uncomfortable. The blankets smelt musty and dank. He got out of bed and went to the fireplace, determined to light a fire, but quickly discovered he had neither flint nor ember. He returned to bed. He had to sleep. He needed his wits for the morning. There was so much to do - things he should have done today and had failed out of distraction. He had to sleep.But every time he closed his eyes a memory threatened him. His brother had been two years older than he, and he could see his 16 year-old face taunting him as he struggled to get up from the turf where his brother pinioned him with a contemptuous toe on his stomach and a sword at his throat. His brother’s friends clustered around laughing and egging them on. Abelard was supposed to beg for quarter. His brother had won ― as usual. Instead he'd reached up and grabbed the blunted sword in his hand and yanked his brother to the ground with him. By the time they were finished he had a black eye, loose teeth, and three broken fingers, but his brother's nose was smashed and gushing blood and three of his ribs were cracked. His brother's friends had backed away, and his brother had never fought with him again.But they hadn't always been adversaries. There had been the dreadful year of  '83 when their father, although the Count of Poitou's vassal, had raised up in rebellion against him at the instigation of Henry the Young King on the assumption that the Old King would always support his favo­rite. But rebellion was rebellion, and the Old King sent his third son, Geoffrey, with Breton mercenaries to chastise the rebels. Geoffrey seized the opportuni­ty to put himself at the head of the rebels and rise up against his father, so Abelard's father had soon found himself fighting under Geoffrey of Brittany against not only his liege Richard of Poitou but against the Old King himself. Both Abelard and his brother Renaud had been squires at the time, serving with other households, but the news that their father was with the rebels at Mirabeau brought them together. Renaud sent Abelard to plead clemency for their house from the Old King and Count Richard while he himself set off "to talk sense to their father." What ensued was such a violent fight that they had come to blows. Luckily, Renaud managed to knock their father out, drag him outside and tie him to his horse, so he could take him out of the rebel camp by force. When their father came to again, he vowed to kill Renaud and verbally disinherited him, but that had only been in his rage. As always, they were soon reconciled again ― and took part in the Young King's plundering of Rocamdour, leaving Abelard to bear the brunt of Count Richard's rage for this new defection.It was also Renaud who had come to Abelard's aid when their father decided to marry Abelard off to a neighbouring widow. Abelard had refused and his father had unceremoniously locked him in a cellar with the words “when you're hungry enough, you'll come to your senses” Renaud had stolen the key from their father when he fell asleep over his wine and not only released Abelard but loaned him his best horse and four Louis so he could get out of range of their father's temper.          It had taken three months and much intercession on his mother's part, but his father had eventually forgiven him, received him back into the family circle with a hearty hug and a new stallion ― so he wouldn't have to borrow his brother's next time they had "a little falling out." Abelard could not get comfortable. He punched at the pallet under him and then took his shirt from a hook and bunched it up under his head. His mother seemed to bend over his bed as she had when he had been sick as a little boy. He could remember her long braid tickling his chest as she bent to brush his hair from his fevered forehead. He had resisted the gesture, feeling it was beneath his dignity as a boy, who was old enough to have his own pony and a short-sword. She had smiled, and accepted the rejection stoically. But she had not left his bed-side for more than a few minutes as long as he was ill. Her devotion to him had never wavered, and was never over-shadowed by jealousy or a clash of wills. His best memory of her was in the dim little family chapel built in first floor of the old keep. She had spent hours there on her knees. She prayed, she said, for the souls of the four daughters she had buried as children, but also, Abelard suspected, for a husband who could not keep an oath and an elder son who did not hesitate to plunder abbeys and churches. She alone had seen Abelard's crusade as something more than ill-advised adventuring. She had hoped that he would intercede with both heavenly and earthly lords to salvage the fortunes and souls of her husband and elder son.She had walked him out into the ward. "Promise you will take care of yourself. No, don't bother, I know that is the last thing on your mind." She had sighed. She knew he had his sights set on Lady Blanche, and more than once she had tried to talk him out of it. Lady Blanche might love him all she wanted, his mother had pointed out practically, but it was her father who decided who she would marry. Monsieur de Vacour had made his opinion of Abelard plain enough. Why did he insist on butting his head against a stone wall?He had bent and kissed her on the forehead. "I will not do anything foolhardy." He had promised, confident that he could win all the honour and fame he needed without going beyond the limits of his very considerable skills and assumed courage.His mother had managed a smile, but it was without glitter. Her sadness had been too heavy. She drew a deep breath and changed the subject. "If you get the chance, try to ― to explain to Count ― King Richard. He is said to be indulgent to his comrades-in-arms. This crusade means a great deal to him. If you can make him understand that your father is not really disloyal...." She had not finished her thought, sighing deeply instead.They both knew that his father was inveterately disloyal. In '89 he'd supported Old King for the first time in 10 years ― and the only time he lost. Of course Abelard's father managed to jump ship at the last minute, about the same time Prince John did, but Richard only held him all the more in contempt. It was the loyal William Marshal who was with the Old King to the end who was rewarded, not a turn-coat like de la Guiltiere who had rebelled against Richard so often before.Everyone else understood this perfectly, but Abelard's father had been furious at the slight, and issued a challenge to William Marshal, demanding a joust "without re­straint." Renaud had called his father an "ox-brain" when he heard. He had heatedly pointed out that the Marshal was the best knight in Christendom, that not even King Richard could beat him. To which Abelard's father had replied that that was why Abelard would have the "honour" of representing his "aged" father. Abelard was hardly modest when it came to his own skills, but a joust with the Marshal to the death just because his father had been treated as he deserved was not to his liking. It had come, as it must, to a violent argument, in which Abelard was accused of everything from disloyalty and cowardice to being a changeling.          Renaud had found the last charge immensely diverting, declaring that it explained all sorts of "unbrotherly" behaviour in the past. He had even speculated on who had cuckolded their father. Abelard and his mother had been considerably less amused, and the ensuing fight had quite over-shadowed the previous one. Abelard had never seen his mother so upset, which only enraged him further. She had trembled with emotion, and kept repeating "how can you do this to me? How can you do this to me?" Eventually A­belard had stormed out in the middle of the night and ridden straight to King Richard where he took the cross. Fortunately, the Marshal disdained to accept the ludicrous chal­lenge issued by Abelard's father, but Abelard kept hearing his brother's taunts in the rain on the roof. Twenty-two years and they were suddenly as clear as if they had been yesterday. "That's why you're taller than the rest of us. Did he have a long dick too, mother?"Abelard pressed his hands to his ears, trying to silence the voice in the rain."Now I know why he's so much fairer than me. I remember as a little boy there was a beautiful troubadour with long, blond hair. You remember, don't you father? That troubadour with the golden locks that mother was so fond of." His father’s grumbled reply was lost in the thunder, but not the taunting of his brother. "Bastards can't inherit, Abelard. No matter what happens to me, bastards can't inherit."Abelard flung back the covers and pulled on a pair of braies and a shirt. Barefoot and without any form of head-covering, he went out into the rain. Beyond the orchard was a stone wall that they hadn't finished building. Lord Hughes had decided he needed the men and stone for repairing the castle instead. The workmen had left at the end of the day, thinking they would return in the morning, but found themselves deployed at the castle the next day. They had left tools lying about. Abelard took up an abandoned shovel and started cutting into the rain-softened clay. In line with the wall, he cut a foundation ditch, two feet wide, two feet deep. The work of a despised slave. His lungs protested and breathing became difficult. The air rasped through his throat, his chest heaved. Before long his back and shoulder muscles started aching and then cramping. He drove himself with memories of the galley-master's drum. After a while his muscles no longer hurt so much. Maybe the rain let up. The ditch lengthened. Sometime before dawn he let the shovel drop and dragged himself back to the mill. Just inside the door of the former kitchen, he collapsed. His dreams were confused and inarticulate. He was a boy again, wrestling with his brother. His brother lost and then was furious and accused him of cheating. His father gagged him and sold him, and his first master kept stroking his cheek and telling him how beautiful he was while he forced his penis down Abelard's throat. He tried to fight him off, but he was lamed or chained. His mother was sobbing that he had failed them all. Count Richard had laid siege to their castle, only it was a Saracen city that was under siege and his brother was pouring oil down on him as he tried to scale the walls. He woke shivering with fever, and knew that he had to get himself out of his wet clothes and into something warm. Only when he tried to rise, did he become aware that he was no longer in the mill but up in the castle. His clothes were wet with sweat not rain, and he was being tended by the Jewish doctor from Montfort. The man was measuring liquid into a glass, and only his eyes shifted when he heard Abelard stir. "Lie still and don't talk." He ordered simply, and Abelard did as he was bid. His throat hurt so much he couldn't swallow without acute pain. The doctor bent over and gave him the potion to drink. Abelard lost conscious­ness again.Later Emilie came to visit him. She explained they had sent a page down to fetch him when he didn't appear at dinner. They had found him in the kitchen, covered in mud and feverish. Emilie reproached and queried him with her eyes, but he couldn't explain.         Lord Hughes dropped by later. He urged Abelard to get well soon. They needed him, and incidentally he wanted to take Lady Blanche to the pilgrimage sights, but, of course, had to wait until Abelard was on his feet again. What on earth had he been doing digging ditches in the rain?Abelard hadn't been able to explain. Lord Hughes nodded. Then he laid his hand on his shoulder, told him to get well and left.When he was well enough, he got dressed and went down to dinner. Everyone seemed pleased to see him, even Lady Blanche. He looked over at Claire at the lower table, and she smiled at him somewhat guiltily. As before, he sat next to Blanche and shared her goblet. Out of the corner of his eye he watched her. She had puffy bags under her eyes, and a fine but extended network of wrinkles across her face, marking the borders of her emotions. Despite the silk veils, he could see her chin was sagging, and she had grown thick around the waist. He would no longer be able to enclose it in his two hands ― even if she gave him the opportunity. She was attrac­tive, but she was, as Claire had said, an ageing widow not a maid.The next morning, Hughes and Emilie made ready to take their guest to the major pilgrimage sights: Capernaum, where Christ had fed the multitudes, Cana, Nazareth, Samaria and the tomb of the Baptist, Bethlehem, the site of Christ's baptism on the Jordan, Jerusalemitself. Hughes, of course, would not risk the journey to pilgrim sights in Arab hands, but he would see that his wife and Lady Blanche joined an escorted group of reputable pilgrims and would await their return at the border.        Hughes gave Abelard last minute instructions for the duration of his absence. He planned to visit his father and brother before returning. Maybe they would spend Christmas with his father. Lady Blanche might want to be in Bethlehemat Christmas. There was no reason to return to Montfort before the feast of St. Sebastion ― unless that was what Emilie wished. Yvonne was being left behind.Abelard went across to the tower to take his leave of Emilie. It was pouring rain again, and his cloak was almost soaked through before he reached the entry way. Emilie scolded him at once, saying that after such a recent bout of scarlet fever he should take better care of himself. Then she took him by the arm and led him to the window-seat. "You are all right aren't you, Sir? You gave us such a scare." She looked up into his face, begging mutely for an explanation. But what was he supposed to say? Seeing it was useless, Emilie gave up and released him. She admitted she hoped to talk her father-in-law into coming to Montfort for Christ­mas. She did not like Hughes' brother's wife and would rather not spend Christmas with her.It was still pouring when Abelard reached the landing of the first floor entry and he paused in unconscious dismay. Out of no where, Lady Blanche appeared beside him on the landing. "I've been meaning to give you this." She held his old velvet cloak out to him. "Now, I know why you were so angry about it ― You doneed it in Pales­tine." It was meant as a joke, and she tried to smile. Abelard took the cloak in his hands. The velvet had suffered from the years folded at the bottom of a chest, but the beaver lining was wonderful. The hand holding it was warmer already. Lady Blanche started to turn away. "Wait!" He ordered.She paused, waited tensely."There's something I have to know."She turned back to face him, her face guarded and impassive."Was it my father or my brother, who refused to pay my ransom?"He saw her recoil in shock. Then she looked at him more closely, a slight frown hovered at her brow. "Refused? But - there wasn't any ransom request.""Of course there was! I know. I had to verify the sum! 250 Louis tournais. It was high, but not unmanageable. It was sent to Count Richard before he left Palestine!"  "Ah." She stopped. "You don't know.""Know what?""King Richard was ship-wrecked on his return. He was held hostage for more than a year by the Holy Roman Emperor."Abelard stared at her. Richard a captive?  "But he was released.""Yeeees." She drew the word out. He sought her eyes for the first time since she had come to Palestine, but now she evaded his look. "But not before King Philip had offered the Emperor more than whatever Queen Eleanor could raise. King Philip was in league with Prince, now King, John of England, and they tried to prevent King Richard's release."Abelard felt as if someone had given him a blow to the head. He was reeling slightly. "Richard was held hostage, and King Philip intrigued against him ― of course, my father...."Blanche fussed with her veils. "When King Richard was eventually released, he went straight to England. He had to. His mother had raised most of his ransom there. Eventually his brother submitted to him and was forgiven.""Of course." Abelard only whispered the words, but they were acid nevertheless. He was no longer seeing the rain soaked ward of Montfort in Galilee. Richard would forgive his brother John, his own flesh and blood, but not a vassal, certainly not one who had been disloyal so often before. "King Richard never delivered the ransom request." It wasn't a question any more."Oh, Abelard! We all thought you were dead. There were other crusaders who returned. None of them had seen you alive after the Battle of Jaffa. There was even one who claimed he had seen you go down when your horse was killed. He said no one could have survived under hoof in that fray. He said you were dead.""You were told I was dead? My whole family thought I was dead?""Your mother refused to believe it." Blanche admitted in a frail voice. "We ― we all thought she was a little demented." On her deathbed, Abelard's mother had sent for Blanch. By then, Blanche had been married to Gouzon for almost six years and had borne him two children. But Madame de la Guiltiere had asked Blanche come to her, and Blanche had ridden 60 miles in bitter winter weather to reach her.Madame de la Guiltiere had been ailing for sometime. More than once she had been found wandering around the ward in her night-gown, insisting she wanted to go home. No one could convince her that she was at home. She looked at her son and daughter-in-law and drew back her head in dignified disgust. On other days, her mind was so sharp she could challenge her son about the number of cattle that were being kept in one or the other pasture, and remind her daughter-in-law that they should send a gift to one of their neighbours because it was his 50th birthday.When Blanche arrived she had recognised her at once ― and in the next instant ordered a baffled serving maid to fetch Sir Abelard. "He will want to know Lady Blanche has come at last. He will be glad to see her."Blanche exchanged a look with the serving girl, and the girl had curtsied and disappeared. Blanche tried to gently remind her hostess that Abelard was dead. Madame de la Guiltierre had responded with irritation. "Abelard is not dead! I don't blame you for marrying Gouzon." She added quite rationally. "It was a sensible match. But when Abelard comes home he will need your help. Renaud takes too much after his father. You must help Abelard. He loved you sincerely."The memory of those words brought sudden tears to Blanche's eyes, and she hastily looked away, pretending curiosity about what had made one of the dogs bark by the stables."Thank you." Abelard murmured while she was looking away and when she looked back he had started down the stairs into the rain, still carrying his cloak. Only when he was half way across the ward, did he think to swing it over his shoulders. He did not look back at her once.

Copyright © 2012 Helena P. Schrader

"A Widow's Crusade:" Chapter 7

Montfort, GalileeNovember 1212            When Lord Hughes was in residence with his travelling household of 4 knights and a dozen of squires, Abelard took the opportunity to train with them. The heat of summer dictated training early in the morning before the temperatures were too oppressive and habit kept them to that schedule even as the days turned cool and the first rains came. Rising before dawn and snacking only lightly, the fighting men were generally mounted by the time the sun lifted itself over the horizon and bathed the countryside in its brash glory.           Just a year ago, Abelard had been so shaky in the saddle that he had not dared to join in the collective exercises. He had worked to build up his muscles and skills only secretly, when away from Montfort or when the household was travelling. Then at Christmas, Lord Hughes had presented him with a dapple-grey stallion, Maximus.          Maximus was a big-boned European stallion with knobbly knees and hocks and a "Roman" nose. Ugly but robust and already eight, he had been sold by his previous owner for a flashier, younger horse, but he quickly proved the ideal mount for Abelard. Maximus wanted only to please and, being already schooled in the knightly sports, he understood the quintain and the joust and positively loved the melée. With Maximus, Abelard had a horse capable of performing what was asked of him and desirous of doing so. With Maximus under him, Abelard regained his confidence rapidly, and was finally willing to risk the rough and tumble of training with other fighting men.          Still the spring and summer had been difficult. Once a champion with above average skills in the tiltyard, it was hard to find himself flung adroitly from the saddle even by green youths of 17. Again and again, Abelard recognised what he should or shouldn't do, but his reflexes were not fast enough. His body no longer responded instinctively, anticipating even his brain itself. Maximus did what he could, riding into the lance, anticipat­ing the blow, and stopping instantly if anything went wrong, but he could not aim a lance or parry a sword. Still, with time, Abelard’s skills improved.          It was now chilly in November before dawn, and a mist clung to the valley, particularly along the stream. When Abelard reached the tiltyard, the scattered pounding of hoofs and a solitary clang of weapons could be heard through the mist. Maximus pricked his ears at once, and his nostrils flared in excitement. He broke into a little prancing trot, and Abelard patted him on the shoulder.           As he came nearer, he could see that Hughes himself was already charging the quintain, while two squires of his household fought on foot with their swords. There were only a scattering of other men about, most of them still tightening their girths and binding their coifs as they greeted one another. Everyone, including Lord Hughes himself, wore gambesons over their hauberks and boots rather than mail-leggings.          Bert de Mousseau emerged out of the fog at Abelard's side. Although he was going on 20, he had a round boyish face which he kept clean-shaven, and he was chubby by nature regardless of how much he exercised. "Sir Abelard! I've been meaning to talk to you!" He called, shoving the remains of a bread-roll into his mouth as he signalled for Abelard to halt.          Abelard drew up and waited. Bert was well meaning and had never been one of those who ridiculed or laughed at Abelard, but his perpetual good humour could be tiresome and his chatter could drive a man mad.           Bert brought his bay stallion alongside Maximus. "My mother wrote me a 20 page letter." He made a gesture of disgust and shook his head to indicate most of it had been a waste of time. "She says you knew the Lady Blanche when she was a maiden. Is that true?"          "I knew her." Abelard admitted, already squeezing Maximus to continue.           Bert fell in beside him, insensitive to Abelard's reluctance to talk. "Don't keep me in suspense! She must have been mouth-watering! And an heiress! If I could have found something like that, I sure as hell wouldn't have gone on crusade."          Abelard shrugged. "Will you give me a joust this morning?"          "Sure. Just let me warm up first. Look, if you aren't going to court her, do you have any objections if I do?"          Deeply offended, Abelard jerked Maximus unkindly to a halt and stared at Bert in disbelief. Bert, oblivious to the offence he had caused, was bending to the left to tighten his girth. Bert, though Emilie's nephew, was a younger son of a second marriage. Emilie herself was the first to admit that her family was obscure and insignificant. Furthermore, though Bert was far from stupid, he was unrefined and unmannered. Hughes was constantly trying to teach him better behaviour, but good manners didn't seem to stick. He couldn't be bothered with etiquette. The thought of Bert with Lady Blanche was repellent. "Lady Blanche is old enough to be your mother!" Abelard reminded the youth sharply.          "So? She doesn't look it and she's loadedwith money. As a widow she can't care all that much about my background. And I'll bet she'd welcome a hot lover." He winked at Abelard with a smug self-complacency that was not even intended as bragging. "Her husband's been dead for 7 or 8 years and he was old anyway."          Abelard would have liked to know how Bert knew all that, but he could not lower himself to gossiping about Blanche, not with this callow youth. He made a point of tightening his own girth, and then pulled his coif up and drew the leather band tight at the back of his head to keep it in place. "Ten minutes warm up?"          "Na, fifteen. Dumbo here isn't even awake yet." Bert indicated his somewhat lazy bay stallion.          Abelard let Maximus trot around the edge of the exercise yard, and tried to concentrate on making him move laterally first left and then right. After a bit he tried some circling and then let Maximus pick up a slow, loping canter. His thoughts, however, kept circling back to Bert and Blanche. He couldn't get over the effrontery of a nobody squire thinking he was good enough for Blanche. Bert wasn't even particularly athletic or competent at arms, and he was useless when it came to administration of any sort. He always pleaded a "bad relationship with numbers" and excused himself from any duty that even hinted at counting or calculating. The thought of Bert, who usually took his pleasure with the nurse and was probably father of her child ― though he wouldn't take responsibil­ity for it, making love to Blanche was repulsive.           Hughes had finished at the quintain and so Abelard collected a lance from the stand and started down the narrow lane toward the dummy hanging from a chain. They had placed a captured Saracen helmet on the dummy's head and dressed it in Saracen hauberk with mail sleeves and a broad breastplate that had once been beautifully engraved but was now dented and scratched. The dummy held a round Saracen shield on his left "arm" and a mace and chain at the end of his right. A misplaced lance that sent him spinning, would cause the mace to land a blow on the rider as he swept past. If the mace hit a man on the back of the head it could easily cause a concussion. That was why beginners usually wore a helmet, but Abelard was ashamed to wear a helmet at his age. He lowered the lance and Maximus shot true as an arrow towards the target.          Striking slightly off centre, the mace swung around, but Abelard could duck and ride past unscathed. A boy ran out to re-set the quintain and Abelard trotted around to the starting position while Bert made a run at it. They alternated for another five minutes or so, and then by mutual accord left the quintain to other knights who had arrived later, and took up positions opposite each other.           There were no barriers here, only rough markings in the earth and broad ruts worn by the horses which had run the course before them. They both tightened their girths a final time, tested the stirrups and Bert pulled on leather gloves. Abelard didn't own any. He tossed the lance in the palm of his hand, trying to get a better feel for its balance. For some reason he was more nervous than usual ― or was it just antagonism against Bert because he was so impudent as to think he was good enough for Lady Blanche? Worse, the impertinent puppy seemed to think he would be doing her a favour!           Maximus broke out a fraction too early, responding to the unconscious belligerency of his rider. Abelard was startled only for a fraction of a second. The stallion's tangible eagerness pleased him, and he noted with satisfaction that Bert had to apply the spurs heavily to his lazy mount. Bert had chosen his stallion himself, Abelard remembered, and bragged about his marvellous blood-lines.  Bert's stallion was considerably prettier than Maximus, but he lacked Maximus' heart. Bert didn't understand horses; he had to rely on objective criteria. Bert was altogether much too spoilt and self-satisfied, and it would definitely do him good to eat a little sand.          Maximus kicked up his heels in sheer delight, as if he had personally felt humiliated and depressed by his new owner's singular lack of success up to now. A shout of surprise went up from the side-lines followed by scattered clapping. It was the first time Abelard had unseated anyone since his release from captivity ― and that on a first pass. For an instant his spirits soared and he felt young and strong and victorious. The scattered applause from his fellows reminded him briefly of the cheers that had once roared down at him from the stands at real tournaments. Maybe he could regain his skills? Maybe he could once again enjoy success and the respect that went with it? He looked about for a better opponent ― for what did it really mean to unseat a flabby youth like Bert de Mousseau? ― and noticed that Hughes was dismounted and standing on the perime­ter with a lady. The next instant Abelard realised that Blanche was standing beside him. They waved to him.          Abelard turned Maximus away from them and rode straight back to the castle. The last thing he was going to do was let Blanche see how rusty and clumsy he had become. He was not going to roll in the dust before her eyes.
* * * * *
           A few days later a party of travelling players came to Castle Montfort, offering their wares in exchange for hospitality. They stayed a total of five nights, performing a different play each night to the delight of the entire household. The day after their departure was drizzling and chill. By evening the smoke hung in the hall because the chimneys didn't seem to draw properly yet, and an atmosphere of desultory depression seemed to envelop the entire household from the sculleries playing dice on the floor by the screens to the high table itself.          Hughes remarked that they should think about hiring some musicians for the winter season ahead, and Emilie looked up from her needlework eagerly. "Oh, could we?" Her family had not been able to afford musicians permanently, and the thought delighted her.          "Abelard? What do you think?" Hughes shoved his chair back and stretched out his legs before him as he addressed his sene­schal. "There must be some starving minstrels singing for their supper at disreputable taverns beneath their dignity, who would be willing to come here for the winter. You must know someone who would know."          Abelard nodded, trying to remember where he had recently heard of a young man looking for employment as a minstrel, but before he could answer Bert spoke up cheerfully declaring, "We could make our own music! I’ll bet the Lady Blanche can sing and play an instrument.”          Abelard almost knocked his wine over as he spun around to look at the presumptuous youth. Bert ought to be serving his lord in silence, not taking part in the conversation.          "Oh, I haven't played for at least a year now, and I didn't think the journey would do my harp any good so I gave it to my daughter," Blanche demurred.          "No matter. I've got a cithern. May I go and fetch it, my lord?" Bert asked Lord Hughes eagerly.          "When you finish pouring, yes." Hughes nodded to the pitcher Bert was supposed to be refilling.          Bert grinned, finished pouring and then disappeared. Far too soon he was back and unabashedly sat himself at Blanche's feet. He looked up and asked what she would like to sing. Blanche blushed and looked about a little helplessly. "I'm hardly a trained singer. Lady Emilie?"          Emilie shook her head vigorously and raised a hand as if to ward off something unpleasant. "My voice would spoil anyone's pleasure. Hughes sings well." She looked to her husband.          Hughes shrugged. "It was your idea, Bert." He reminded the youth.          "Well, all right." Bert bent over his instrument, fussed with one string and then next, trying to tune them correctly, a shock of black hair falling into his face as he worked. Abelard watched him with fierce resentment. For all his other short-comings, Bert had a sweet, mellow tenor and could accompany himself quite decently.          Abelard had once had a decent voice himself, though he had never taken particular pride in it. Over the years of his enslavement, however, he had spent too many nights on cold floors, worked to off-load stranded vessels standing up to his knees muddy water, carried litters on windy nights despite running fevers, and so on until his voice was utterly ruined. Even when he spoke, the sounds that came out were raw and scratchy. If he tried to sing, he sounded like a croaking toad.          Bert had chosen a popular love song which he delivered with what Abelard considered to be an excess of pathos, but he noted that both Blanche and Emilie looked pleased. Even Hughes nodded his approval at the end, and suggested another song which Bert readily performed with the same exaggerated mime of a heart-sick lover. Father Claude requested a song to the Virgin, which was lively and better suited to Bert's temperament, and at last Blanche herself ventured to ask for a song, but Bert shook his head with an apologetic shrug.           "May I?" She reached out for the cithern, and Bert handed it over eagerly. Abelard thought he deliberately let his hand brush against hers as he turned the instrument over. Abelard stiffened and glanced at Blanche, but she was too polite to give any indication that she had even noticed.          Blanche hesitated a little, struck a few hesitant chords, and then clearing her throat she started singing the Song of Palestine in a clear alto voice that was warm and pleasant. As she sang, she gained confidence, lifting her head and her voice and her audien­ce was soon the whole hall. Her voice paralysed Abelard, the melody taking him back to the cellar where he had been chained at night and heard the voices of the Christian galley slaves wafting in through the window over his head. At the time, he had not himself yet served on a galley. Now the memories of those voices mixed with images of his own time chained to the oars, and he knew that he would not have had the strength and breath to sing.           When Blanche finished, the applause was genuine. Abelard joined in somewhat belatedly. Her confidence strengthened, Blanche next took up a crusading ballad written by none other than the Lionheart himself. It had, of course, been popular as a result, and Hughes' eyes lit up as he recognised it. He joined her at the chorus and the other knights and squires, who had drifted over as soon as Bert started singing, followed their lord's lead ― for it was a song meant to be sung by men. It was a song Abelard himself had often sung in the months before his departure. He had sung it to Blanche more than once. He could vaguely remember riding together through a woods, their horses sweated and on a long rein, and he had been singing. But she had answered with a foolish song about a knight losing the love of his lady, if he left her behind. They had alternated songs of devotion with songs of fickleness and laughed and sung their way back to Vacour.          Abelard glanced toward Blanche, wondering if she really remembered, or if she had sung the same songs with other lovers, with her husband even. Gouzon was a powerful family, rich and well connected. There had been a Gouzon serving with Count Richard, one of his body squires, but he had been wounded and died of fever early on in the siege of Acre.          The song that followed was one no one seemed to know. Even Blanche seemed less sure of herself and her voice grew fainter, almost fading away at times. Nor did Blanche glance up at her audience as she had during the other songs.  Instead, she concentrat­ed with obvious intensity upon her fingers. Bert, of course, took advantage of her soft singing to lean so close he brushed against her knee. Abelard was too distracted by the impudence of the squire to pay much attention to the words, which seemed at first no more than a standard lament of an abandoned lover.          The chorus, however, he noted begged for God's protection for the pilgrim who had left the singer behind "because the Saracen is treacherous." Abelard cocked his ear and started to actually listen. The singer was regretting her failure to take a kind leave of her lover at his departure. Abelard stiffened. Nights when she was tormented by longing, she wrapt herself in the cloak which he had sent to her ―          Abelard stood so abruptly that his chair clattered over. Everyone looked up at him startled, including Blanche, the words of her song dying on her lips. Abelard avoided meeting her eye, muttered an apology and fled, leaving the others murmuring exclamations behind him.           Hughes was shocked by so much rudeness and apologised to Blanche for his seneschal, promising to have a sharp word with him. But she just shook her head and reached for wine, giving the cithern back to Bert. Bert gladly took the instrument and at once struck up a lively song intended to distract attention from the incident and draw attention to himself.
* * * * *
          The following morning Abelard was hunched over the accounts in his cramped and cluttered office in the gate-house. The rents were still largely paid in kind, and it was Abelard's responsibili­ty to record the payments and to decide what to store and what to sell. He kept the inventory records, the accounts of the prices they attained for their sales, and the accounts of where the money was then spent.           His duties were further complicated by the fact that Lord Hughes’ tenants had become accustomed to a distant absentee lord. They resented the new control introduced by Hughes and employed every conceivable trick to avoid paying their dues in full. Abelard had quickly learned that he could trust no account submitted to him, and that he had to double check both the quantity and quality of goods delivered.           With resignation, Abelard forced himself to concentrate and did not interrupt his calculations when he heard a faint knocking. After a moment the knock came again, and noting the sum he had just added on a chalk board, he called “come-in” impatiently. He expected the kitchen or wardrobe clerk with yet more work for him, and he barely glanced up. The sight of Lady Blanche's waiting woman thoroughly flustered him.          Claire was dressed again in her marigold gown and saffron-stripped surcoat. She wore a fresh white linen wimple. "I wish to speak with you, Monsieur. It won't take long." Her tone was determined and broached no contradiction.          Abelard could remember Claire vaguely from before. Even then she had seemed old and her face had been pock-marked. He had seen her only as a means of communicating with Blanche, and had been relieved to find her co-operative and well-disposed to him. Many a lover had been foiled by a hostile waiting woman, after all.After decades in Egypt, however, he found himself discomfited to be alone in a room with a strange woman ― regardless of her age and looks. It crossed his mind that Claire would have been better off in a society that proscribed that she hide her face. In Egypt no one but her own family would have ever known that she was disfig­ured with pock-marks. She would probably have been married off to an unsuspecting bride-groom, who would have been offended, appalled and disgusted by what he discovered at her unveiling.           Yet Claire was not ashamed to show her face to him, nor ashamed to meet his eye. With a touch of surprise, Abelard discovered that he admired her for that ― for facing him with dignity and self-possession, despite her disfigurement.          "How can I be of service to you, Lady Claire?" He asked politely.          Claire raised her eyebrows. She was not entitled to be called ‘Lady.’ "I won't take up your time, Sir. But there is one thing I want to know: After all you've been through, did it never occur to you that Lady Blanche too might also have changed? That she is not still the spoilt brat, who rejected you 22 years ago?"          Abelard was so astonished by the question and the reproachful tone that he found himself at a loss for words ― and Claire discovered she had a good deal more to say after all.          "All you ever saw of Blanche was the facade she wore in public ― the role she played because it was expected of her and because she hadn't yet learned who she was. But she wasn't ― not even then ― the light-hearted flirt she pretended to be. She noticed every hunting dog that came in with a wounded paw, and ― what is far less common ― every scullery boy with a burnt hand or when a laundress had a cough. Blanche took an interest in everyone in her father's household, and she was quick to intervene on their behalf. Her father was not a cruel man, nor a harsh one, but like most lords he didn't particularly notice if one of his grooms could hardly stand for boils on his feet, much less consider that a page should be allowed to go home just because his mother was sick with milk-fever.           "Blanche has always had a soft heart, and what she felt for you, Sir, was real ― so real it fright­ened her. No, she didn't know how to handle it. How could she? It was all so new to her. But she wasn't lying last night. She did try to seek comfort in the folds of your cloak long after she was married to Gouzon!           "Do you know what Gouzon was like? He was 25 years older than Blance. He was a half-head shorter than her and bow-legged, with crooked, yellow teeth, half of which had broken off or decayed. He squinted whenever he looked at someone and sprayed saliva whenever he spoke. He'd had two previous wives when he took Blanche, and he kept a mistress who shared his chamber every night. In their whole marriage he only slept with Blanche when they were travelling, and the only reason he'd married her was for her land.          "She found herself with three step-sons who were unruly, arrogant and intensely resentful of having a step-mother. They did all they could to make her life miserable ― from childish pranks like putting frogs in her chamber-pot to deliberate cruelties like tying her spaniel by its tail to the back of a cart. They were insolent, disobedient and, as they grew older, they made sure she knew she they intended to rob her blind and put her away in a convent the moment they could. After Gouzon's death, they tried to steal her dower portion.          "No doubt all these woes seem trivial to you, after what you must have been through. But Blanche was very much alone in a hostile world and yet she didn't become self-centred or bitter. Instead, she learned independence and self-reliance and even greater sympathy for those worse off than herself. Do you think it is everyone woman, who would take a half-crazy heretic's child like Simone under her wing? If you knew how many others she helped ― not with cold money but with kindness and comfort and good advice!          "Blanche has a great heart and all her life she has wanted to give it to a good man. The only thing she ever wanted in return was his love. No one re­proached her for what she did to you more than did herself! Isn't it time to forgive? Aren't you man enough to forget the child and look at the woman Blanche has become?"          Throughout her heated lecture, Abelard found himself torn between fascination for this loyal waiting woman and perplexity at what she was saying. An Arab woman who spoke to a strange man was automatically presumed a whore ― and treated as such. Consequently, one was more likely to fuck a strange woman than to have a conversation with one. Abelard had discovered with Emilie how much he craved talking to a woman. But he had come to know Emilie only slowly and diffidently. It was months before they had talked of anything more than his duties. He found it compellingly courageous that this woman ― who knew she would never find favour for her face or flirt her way to success ― would come and confront a strange man and state her opinion so candidly.           With a shock, it finally dawned on him that she reminded him of his own mother. His mother too had been plain and consequently never enjoyed the power that beauty gave to women. But she had been a good wife and mother. She had not only managed their estates frugally, while her husband wasted his income on senseless rebellion, but she had not been afraid to speak her mind against a husband who was often hot-headed and violent.           The memory disturbed a massive wall in his mind, like the first preliminary tremor of an earthquake. Unsettled, Abelard got abruptly to his feet. He did not want to think of his mother ― much less his father.           He forced himself to focus on what Claire had said. That he should forgive Blanche? Whatever for? For what she had done or said as a girl? But he had never blamed her for her temper tantrum.  He knew how easy it was to say something you didn't mean in anger and disappointment. His father―          He cut off the thought sharply. "I don't blame, Lady Blanche." He told Claire, interrupting something she had started to say and he had not even heard. "I never blamed her.  That's why I sent the cloak back, to say I understood that she didn't mean what she'd said. I'd forgotten all about it, until she sang that song last night."          It was Claire's turn to be stunned. She stared at Abelard uncomprehending. Blanche had not slept for crying all night long. She had not wept so miserably in years ― not since the death of her youngest child. Claire had been so furious with Abelard for being the cause of her misery, she had decided to give him a piece of her mind. "But - but if you don't ― then why ― You've treated my lady with contempt! You've avoided her, turned your back on her and last night ― She was only trying to tell you how much she regretted what she'd done. She wrote that song herself, years ago! She used to sing it when she was alone. It took all her courage to sing it out loud in front of everyone ― for you. And the way you interrupted her singing and left, you might as well have spit in her face ― and that in front of Lord Hughes and Lady Emilie and the entire household!"          Abelard stood stalk still, mortified by what he saw in the mirror Claire held up to him. She was right, of course. His behaviour had been churlish and insolent. He had had no right to behave like that ― not to anyone, much less a lady of high rank. Even Bert would have behaved better, and it occurred to him too late that he must have displeased Lord Hughes and Lady Emilie as well.           "Well." Claire had blown herself out. "I've said my piece. You know what I think. I wish to God I could understand you. Not many men get a second chance with a woman as good, loving, wise and fair as Blanche. I used to favour you myself, but not any more." She turned to go, but stopped and looked over her shoulder. "They did more than enslave you, didn't they? They warped your soul. You aren't the man you were before."          "No I'm not!" Abelard retorted hotly. "That's the whole point! I'm not the man I was before, and I never can be. Tell her that! Tell her to forget the youth she fell in love with. He's dead!" The vehemence of his words surprised even Abelard himself. He had not intended to respond like that. He had intended to apologise for his rudeness and promise redress. But Claire’s last remark ignited something inside that so enraged him he had simply exploded.           Claire retreated hastily, closing the door behind her, not a little shaken by the fury she had so unexpectedly provoked. Behind her she heard an inarticulate cry and then something heavy crashed against the door, making her gasp and then scurry away in fright.
Copyright © 2012 Helena P. Schrader

"A Widow's Crusade": Chapter 6

Monfort, GalileeOctober 1212

           Emilie sent word that Abelard had arrived the evening before and would be at dinner. Blanche, who was already dressed, sank down onto the bed paralyzed. Then glancing up an anxious-looking Claire she announced. "I can't go down like this. I must bathe and wash my hair and--"
          "Of course, my lady!" Claire broke into a smile that seemed to obliter­ate all her acne-scars and age-lines.
          Although Emilie had taken Blanche to use the bath built under the mill the day after her arrival at Montfort, Blanche would not risk going down there now. Instead, Claire organised a tub and water, which they had no time to heat. Wincing at the cold but in a hurry, Blanche crouched in the cork lined tub and let Claire pour the water over her and then soap her down with lilac-scented soap brought all the way from France. She washed even her long hair and then Claire poured water over her again to rinse her off.
          Although the days were turning astonishingly cool, Blanche insisted on wearing her best silk. Claire tied her as firmly as possible into her corset and rolled silk stockings up over her knee to be fastened with a leather garter. Claire next slipped the lilac coloured silk gown over her head and shoved the over-long sleeves back up over her wrist and pulled the lacings tight so they were fashionably bunched along her forearm. Over this came a high-waisted purple surcoat with sleeves that fell from the shoulder growing ever wider until the underside peaked at the floor. The revealed lining of the sleeves was a shimmering silver silk, powered with gold stars. A band of golden embroidery stretched across her bodice and ran around the outer cuffs of the sleeves. At her hips, she wore an embroidered band as a belt tied over itself at her left hip. Last but not least, Claire braided Blanche's still damp hair and then fitted a veil made of the same silver silk as lined her sleeves over her head. The veil crossed under her chin then was draped back to the top her head where it was pinned tightly under flat embroidered cap before the ends fell down her back to her waist. The effect was to cover her ageing throat and sagging chin, framing her still youthful face.
          Blanche had given her daughter Jacquette most of the jewellery she had from Gouzon, but she had kept for herself those things she had inherited from her mother. For this purple gown, she had amethyst earrings that fell in three large drops from each ear. She also wore an amethyst ring with a single dark stone set in smaller, lighter stones. She had worn both years ago when she still lived in her father's house.
          Finished at last, she let Claire inspect her critically and apply just a touch of rouge to her cheek-bones and lips.
          "Isn't this ridiculous?" Blanche asked, exasperat­ed with herself. "You'd think I was 15 and about to meet the King."
          "I would much rather be meeting Sir Abelard again than any King," Claire declared with so much feeling that Blanche glanced sharply at her waiting maid. Claire averted her face but she was blushing. With sudden clarity, Blanche remembered that Claire had always cheered for Abelard and taken his part against her other suitors. It was Claire who had kept his cloak all those years ago, and Claire who had encouraged her to seek him out. And despite the dangers and the hardships, Claire had insisted on accompanying her. How could she have been blind before?  Claire had been in love with him too. "Hurry, Claire. You must change too - wear your marigold gown and the saffron stripped surcoat - it suits you well. Here, I'll help."
          "No, my lady, I don't need to look my best --"
          "Of course you do!" Blanche insisted. Claire would never be pretty, but she had the right to feel good about herself.
          Claire collapsed before Blanche's determination and hurried to strip, rinse herself with the still wet wash-cloth and then dress in the stripped surcoat she had purchased in a rare extravagant fling in Acre. She had set her heart so on the cloth that Sergeant Lestelle had bargained with the shop-keeper for a good ten minutes to get the price down to one Claire could afford. As Claire finished dressing and was wrapping her cotton wimple, Blanche took one of her own linen hats with a stiff crown of green-and-orange embroi­dery and fit it over the veils.
          "Oh, I shouldn't!" Claire protested, but she blushed with delight.
          "It suits you much better than it does me." Blanche declared definitively. "Now, the two of us had better go, or we'll be late for dinner."
          Indeed, they were late already. The household was gathered and waiting rather impatiently. Emilie and the almoner, Father Claude, were seated at the high table. But there was no sign of Sir Abelard. Claire and Simone took their places at one of the lower tables with Lady Emilie's waiting woman, and Blanche continued alone to the high table, trying not to show how nervous she was.
          "Forgive me for keeping you waiting. I lost track of the time."
          Emilie could smell the soap and her damp hair and the gown was one she had not seen before. She understood and it distressed her to think that Blanche had gone to such trouble. While she made a conventional reply about not minding the wait, her eyes went toward the entrance to the hall. Abelard had said he would come, but -- given the evident depth of his antipathy -- she couldn't help wondering if he wouldn't change his mind at the last minute.
          Lord Hughes' high backed chair was not used in his absence, but was shoved back from the table out of the way. Emilie sat in the centre with her almoner on her right and Blanche on her left. A chair beyond Blanche was left vacant for Abelard. Emilie glanced nervously toward the magnificent jewelled goblet that was placed strategically to the left of Blanche's setting, ready to be shared by both of them.
          The pages were offering the silver finger bowls, and Blanche washed her hands and dried them on the linen towel. She wanted to ask Emilie where Abelard was, but the words stuck in her throat. And then she saw him. He was advancing up the hall between the lower-tables, and Blanche had to grip the arms of her chair.
          The worst of it was that she recognised him instantly. His features were so familiar, despite the ravages of time, that she fancied she would have recognised him any where and even if she had not been expecting and watching for him. But the cherished features had now been brutally eroded, tearing away any vestige of softness, and they perched above a haggard body far too thin for its length. He wore his hair cropped in a manner totally unfashionable in France, or indeed anywhere, and his short beard was flecked with grey. His shoulders were broad for a man so thin, but his legs were skeletal. He wore a chainmail hauberk over leather hose and soft-leather shoes that came to his ankle. His loose sleeveless surcoat, was belted at the waist with a simple leather belt unadorned with jewels or enamel work or even silver. The surcoat was slit up the front for convenience riding and opened from armpits to waist at the sides as was common, but the skirts hung to mid-calf as had been the fashion in their youth rather than ending just below the knee as knights preferred nowadays. It made him seem even older.
          Blanche's heart was pumping in her chest and she was chilled and sweating both. Abelard kept his eyes directed at Emilie as he advanced. He came around the far end of the table, bowed first to her, kissed the priest's ring and then bowed to Blanche. "Madame. I was astonished to hear you were here in Palestine. Did you have a pleasant journey?"
          How often had he rehearsed those words in his head? He must have said it a thousand times since Emilie warned him Blanche was here. It was a short enough phrase so he could neither forget nor stumble over his own tongue. And yet he was surprised that the words came out as fluently and coolly as he had planned. She was so near in that moment, so strikingly beautiful with her straight black brows, her high cheekbones and the long nose that swept elegantly down to turn up just above moist, parted lips. He could smell lilacs as he bent over her hand, and the jewels on her ears glittered in the light filtering through the windows. The silver silk framing her still lovely face shimmered in the candlelight. She was both more enchanting and more inaccessible than ever.
          He did not meet her eyes. He did not dare. He could not bear to see the shock, disgust or pity in her eyes. He busied himself with taking his seat, and pouring her wine without looking at her.
          Emilie was talking nervously, trying to warm the icy atmo­sphere on her left with her own hot air. Father Claude came eagerly to her assistance, relating the latest reports that had reached them concerning the tragic end to the "Children’s Crusade." There were now confirmed reports of large numbers of Christian children being sold in Alexandria, Cairo and even Damascus. There could be no doubt that the Italians had betrayed them all. Not one ship had put into Palestine.
          "Will you try to take Simone home to her own family when you return to France, Lady Blanche?" Emilie turned to her directly. She couldn't bear to see her new friend paralysed.
          Blanche was so overwhelmed by the intensity and implacability of Abelard's evident hostility, that Emilie's question took her by surprise. She had no time to think of some polite response. She blurted out the truth before she knew what she was saying. "Simone's father was burned for heresy, and her widowed mother cannot support her. Sir Everard asked me to give her a home, which I will do."
          "The girl's father was an Albigensian?" The priest asked in horror with an appalled glance toward Simone.
          "So Sir Everard told me." Blanche managed to get out the words though her whole mind and body was consumed with the realisation that Abelard hated her, resented her and wished her to hell. God, in his infinite wisdom, was rebuking her for her pride, her vanity, and her arrogance. She could not even claim she did not deserve it. Who but a vain woman would travel all the way to Palestine not for the sake of her soul, but to seek an earthly lover she had once rejected? How infinite her arrogance had been to assume that he would want anything to do with her now? She would have laughed had she been alone. The joke was divine.
          "My lord husband rescued a girl whose mother preferred the flames to returning to the Church." Emilie related, trying desperately to think of some way to distract her guest from the unmistakable and merciless rejection that Abelard had delivered. As she glanced over at them, she saw Abelard was wearing his impene­trable mask and Blanche was bright red with shame. For the hundredth time Emilie wished there was something she could do, but there was nothing.

* * * * *
          After that first dinner, Abelard managed to avoid Blanche for the next three days altogether. But then Sir Hughes came home.          A harbinger brought the word to Montfort on a lathered horse. Sir Hughes with his travelling household was just two hours away ― and, as usual, was in a hurry to get home. The household was thrown into a frenzy of preparations. Emilie, usually so calm on the outside, was openly flustered. She started trying to get a meal organised, and then it occurred to her that the stable was over-crowed because of a party of pilgrims who had been given the hospitality of the house, and when Abelard assured her the stable was already cleared, she remembered that she'd promised the Bishop of Tyre to give Hughes a letter "the moment he arrived" and she couldn't even remember where she'd put, but she also had to get changed. Hughes hated to find her wearing simple linen gowns, but they were so practical because it didn't matter if they got dirty in the course of the day, and where in the Name of Abraham was Yvonne?
          The last question was left answered for the trumpets sounded and a shout went up along the ramparts while Emilie was still half naked. By the time she had finished dressing and reached the head of the stairway, she was looking down into a ward in turmoil and at a man bounding up the stairs with a triumphantly squealing child on his shoulders.
          Later, at dinner, Abelard watched his lord and lady through new eyes. Hughes was tanned by the Palestinian sun and his hair was bleached. He wore it to his shoulders as once Abelard had done. Abelard knew that in the two years he campaigned with the Lionheart he had looked much the same ― and he was certain that such a golden knight, vibrating with health and vitality was what Blanche had expected to find.
          A glance at her confirmed his suspicions. She was smiling with open favour upon Lord Hughes as he bounced his daughter on his knee. When Hughes tired of Yvonne's babble, he sent his daughter off to bed without a qualm, and concentrated his attention on his wife and his guest.
          Hughes, Abelard noted, paid particular attention to Blanche, especially her observations about her trip through the Languedoc. Her criticism of the poverty and immorality that de Montfort left in his wake did not offend Hughes de Hebron. He nodded, put pointed questions to Blanche, and readily agreed that de Montfort's war was no longer religious. "Unfortunately, he still has the backing of Innocent the Megalomaniac." Hughes remarked sharply, taking his wife's hand to soothe her prim shock at such impiety. "This ‘Children’s Crusade’ is no less Leo's fault that the sack of Constantinople, and the barbarous war against the cultivated people of the Languedoc. If ever an Anti-Christ wore the tiara it is Leo III!"
          "Hughes! Don't say things like that!" Emilie protested, remembering that Blanche was related by marriage to the Bishop of Clermont-Ferrand.
          "But he is right," Blanche agreed without hesitation.
          Abelard could see the smile that passed between them, and he glanced hastily at Emilie. He could see that she too was aware of the empathy between her husband and his latest guest. Emilie looked wounded, almost as if she had been slapped.
          But Emilie was not capable of jealousy ― not when Blanche was so markedly superior in every way. Emilie was too much of a realist to match herself against a woman as clever and well-bred as Blanche. But it hurt all the same. Blanche was Hughes equal, his match. Emilie looked down at her hand, at the simple gold wedding band that Hughes, back then, had barely been able to afford, while Blanche wore a wedding band of emeralds and diamonds. Still, it wasn't her wealth and breeding that mattered most, it was the way she could parry Hughes teasing provocation, and make him laugh with a quick play on words. And she was beautiful.
          Quite unexpectedly Hughes glanced from Blanche to Emilie, and his face softened as he pulled Emilie into the circle of his arm. "Are you feeling left out, my lady love? I do apologise ― but it is a rare pleasure to meet such a sharp-witted lady as Madame de Gouzon. I hope you have invited her to stay for the winter. You say you are related to my insufferable squire, Bert?"
          "His half-brother is married to my daughter."
          "Ah." Hughes responded uncertainly. The bonds were far too tenuous and distant to warrant such a long and dangerous journey, and so left him wondering what to think.
          Blanche seemed to read his thoughts. "I needed some excuse to escape my daily existence. I was suffocating from boredom, and my step-sons were being particularly distasteful because I'd just won a law suit which confirmed my control over my father's stud farm."
          "And you've left it at their mercy!?"
          "I sold it to the Templars."
          Hughes threw back his head and laughed. "But only after they'd put a galley at your disposal and brought you all the way here. Madame, it is a rare person ― man or woman ― who can strike such a hard bargain with the Temple. My compliments." He raised his glass to her.
          She bowed her head in demur thanks for the compliment, and then glanced for some indescribable reason over her shoulder toward Abelard and caught him looking at her in that instant before he looked away. The hatred in his eyes stabbed her heart.

 * * * * *
          Later, when Hughes retired with Emilie to bed, she ventured to remark on how much he liked Lady Blanche. Hughes had been bending over to release his spurs, but he heard the undertone of jealousy in Emilie's voice and stopped. He sat up and gazed at her. She had her back to him and was fussing with the curtains of the bed. Hughes stood up and, coming up behind her, enclosed her in his arms, his hands on her breasts. She gave a cry of surprise. "Are you jealous, my love?"          "No, of course not. Lady Blanche is ― is everything one would want in a lady."
          "I dare say. But we'd make a poor couple, don't you think?"
          "Why do you say that? She is more your match. She comes from a good family―"
          Hughes cut her words off with a kiss, turning her to face him. He was already aroused and impatient, but he pulled back and held her face in his hands to speak to her. " I don't think Lady Blanche is the kind of woman to take the ‘obedience’ part of the wedding vows very seriously. My bet is that she was spoilt by her father, spoilt by her husband and spoilt by her son. No, Em, you don't have to be afraid of Blanche. I think she's highly entertaining ― and come to think of it she's probably not bad in bed ― " Emilie stiffened and tried to pull away, but Hughes laughed and too late she realised she was only being teased.
          Hughes softened, regretting his little joke. He could never quite get used to the fact that Emilie was so vulnerable, so insecure even now. He covered her face with kisses. "Don't pay any attention to me, Em. I'm here because there is no where else I want to be. You couldn't keep me against my will, you know?"
          "I know." Her voice was so choked with tears, it was almost inaudible.
          "Smile, silly! Don't you see? I'm here and not with Blanche or that wraith like child she brought with her or our buxom nurse Berthe! I love you, Emilie ― and you have to admit that it can't be for the sake of that mortgaged, run-down, provincial back-water you brought as a dowry either!"
          Emilie couldn't keep back the tears any longer. She knew he meant what he was saying ― all the more for the fact that he couldn't be entirely serious. She knew he loved her and it filled her with so much gratitude it hurt. She just didn't understand why, and that frightened her. If it wasn't Blanche today, than it would be someone else tomorrow. And it would kill her. She would never be able to live without him.
          Hughes was kissing away the tears. "I'm sorry, Em. Don't cry, sweetheart. I know you love Betz. I didn't mean it like that. But I do love you for what you are and not what you have."

"A Widow's Crusade": Chapter 5

Montfort, GalileeOctober 1212

          Abelard drew up as he reached the crest of the hill, and paused to look back toward the west. The sun was setting and cast a sheen of gold across the countryside with its walled town surrounded by cultivated fields and vineyards, his lord’s vineyards. Then he turned to glance up at the walls towering above him. Hughes de Hebron was a powerful baron, and a fair one. He had been lucky to find such a good lord. Abelard took the time to say a prayer of thanks before signalling his stallion to proceed.          The stallion needed no urging. He recognised his most frequent stable and was anxious for his oats and his rest. He stretched out his neck and snorted. Abelard bent and patted his neck contentedly. A year ago he would not have been able to handle such a full-blooded horse. From the day of his capture until after his release he had not been allowed to mount a horse and skills that had seemed as much a part of him as walking had withered away. He had to re-learn not only riding but the handling of broad-sword and lance as well. At forty, one no longer had the physical agility and resilience of youth, but over time he managed to regain a level of competence that no longer shamed him.          At the gate, the porter greeted him with a friendly wave. That had not always been so. In the beginning, he had been viewed with open suspicion and ridiculed for his shabby dress, his cheap equipment and his curious behaviour. When the word of his past had spread, some of the men in the garrison had even taken pleasure in hooting orders at him in Arabic - the kind of things they had heard caravan drivers and galley captains shout at their slaves. Only the consistent support of Lord Hughes and Lady Emilie had gradually put an end to such behaviour. "My lady left word you were to report to her at once, sir." The porter called as Abelard rode through the gate.          Abelard nodded, not surprised. Lord Hughes' responsibilities often kept him away at court or visiting his fellow barons. He also had a brother and father here in Outremer. He was sometimes away for weeks on end. In his absence, Lady Emilie had come to rely heavily on Abelard. In the beginning, particularly, Lady Emilie had been helpless in her new, utterly alien surroundings, and Abelard’s familiarity with Arabic and local customs, prices, wages and goods proved invaluable.          In the ward, Abelard jumped down and turned his stallion over to the local youth, a boy of mixed blood from the town of Baram, who served as his squire. The youngster was somewhat sullen, but that suited Abelard better than the garrulous Bert de Mousseau. The latter could drive a man mad with his endless, cheerful chatter. Perhaps he also took a secret pleasure having power over someone of Arab blood, Abelard reflected, but he did not dwell on the thought.  Instead, he glanced toward the semi-circular tower in which Lord Hughes had located his private apartment and noted that light glowed high on the second floor where Lady Emilie had her chamber.          The exterior stairs up to the first floor entry were wooden and newly built by Lord Hughes. In time of siege, the stairs themselves would be set on fire and the landing pulled up like a draw-bridge to act as an extra barrier, wider and taller than the door frame.           The first floor, usually used by the knights and squires of Lord Hughes' household, was dark and still because they were away, travelling with him. The rushes gave off a slightly dusty smell.          Abelard mounted the narrow interior steps, built into the stone, to the floor above. Every three steps a narrow arrow slit enabled defenders to fire onto an enemy below in the yard.          On the landing he paused and knocked, giving his name at the same time. The door opened almost at once, and he found himself in the familiar intimacy of Lady Emilie's private domain. On the floor of above was the bed chamber which she shared with Lord Hughes, but here she had her spinning wheel and loom, her embroi­dery frame, and her books. A writing stand stained with ink attested to the many letters she dictated, and a table laden with household accounts told of her diligence in running her husband's household.          In the beginning, she had been somewhat at a loss, overwhelmed by her husband's sudden power and prosperity. She had been bewildered by the diversity of the crops and the unfamiliar currencies in use. She had confided to Abelard that at home she had only had debts and scarcity to manage. "Hard to imagine that Hughes was once so poor that even my few, mortgaged acres were worth the price of taking me to wife," she remarked one day.          Abelard had been taken off guard. It had never occurred to him that Lord Hughes had married Emilie for her wealth. Lord Hughes had, after all, been the son of the powerful and wealthy Lord of Hebron. To be sure he had been a younger son and Hebron had been lost to Saladin in 1187, but he had served King Philip Augustus as a body-squire, been a comrade-in-arms of the King of Jerusalem (when the later was Constable of France), and been one of Simon de Mont­fort's battle-captains. Lord Hughes' new wealth and prestige fit him like a glove and he wore it with ease. But Emilie, even now, was dressed in an unbleached muslin surcoat decorated with stitching from her own hand, and she rose to her feet as if for an important guest at the sight of Sir Abelard.          If Lord Hughes were not himself such a kind and possessive husband, Abelard knew he might have allowed his feelings for Lady Emilie freer rein. If Lord Hughes had been old and ugly, brutal or indifferent to his wife, or had he been inclined to unfaithfulness, Abelard's affections might have been sparked and fanned to something more dangerous. But fortunately for all concerned, Lord Hughes was openly fond of his wife, despite her social shortcomings and her seniority in years - and Lady Emilie openly adored her vigorous younger husband.           Still, Abelard could not be the recipient of her welcoming smile nor breathe in her delicate perfume and feel the soft warmth of her hand as she greeted him without his heart beating faster. To be sure, part of the excitement was still the after effects of his captivity. In the three years of his imprisonment, he had wasted his youth in a dungeon with 14 other men. They’d had no latrine, not even a chamber pot between them, no opportunity to bathe or even wash their face and hands, and the only fresh air came through a window 18 inches long and four inches wide, set high in the wall high above their heads. They had not laid eyes on a female of any description, race or age throughout that time and so had been reduced to sharing their fantasies about them in ever wilder desperation.          As a slave -- He broke off his thoughts sharply. He did not want to remember.           "Sir, I had to send for you at once-- You aren't too weary are you? Should I send for wine? Benjamin?" Emilie looked about for the son of the Jewish gold-smith, who had been sent to serve as her page. "Go fetch Sir Abelard something hearty to eat and a jug of good wine,” she ordered the boy before adding to her seneschal, “you always look starved, sir." Then she slipped her arm through his and led him toward the window seat. "There is something I must tell you."           A lifetime of disappointments, defeats and humiliations alerted Abelard to danger. He was instantly tense, and Emilie felt it through his arm. She looked up at him with her concerned golden eyes. "Is something wrong?"          "That depends on what you mean to tell me, my lady." He told her tightly, trying to anticipate the worst. Had Sir Hughes found another man he preferred to employ as his seneschal, perhaps?           Emilie caught her breath in dismay as she realised how insecure he was. "I'm not even sure it's bad news," she tried to reassure him, "but I didn't want you to be caught by surprise. Four days ago, a Templar Knight brought a certain lady here. He'd escorted her all the way from Poitou--" the shock that went through Abelard's body was so sharp that it was like a tiny earth quake on her side, but he said nothing and his face was a rigid mask.          Emilie hesitated, unsure if she should proceed circuitously or directly, but Abelard's tension was so brittle she decided it should not be increased further by suspense. "She introduced herself as Madame de Gouzon of Chauvigny, a widow, but her maiden name was Vacour--"          Abelard took a step backward abruptly and violently. Emilie looked questioningly up into his face. It was dead. Unreadable. Even his eyes were veiled. She knew the violence of his emotions by the fact that he no longer seemed the least bit aware of her presence, but the character of his emotions remained hidden.           In the last four days, she had come to know Blanche as witty, generous and competent. She was in many ways everything that Emilie wished she were ― blithely self-confident, gracious, erudite, handsome despite her years, and elegant no matter what she wore or did. But no matter what she found in Blanche now, she knew that it had nothing whatever to do with the role she had played in Abelard's past. She knew only what Blanche had confided in her: that Abelard had paid her court but because he was unsuitable as a husband her father had viewed his attentions as ipso facto dishonourable. Though Blanche insisted that her own feelings had been quite different and that Abelard had known it, Emilie nevertheless imagined that such a rebuff would not be a pleasant memory.          After what seemed like a long time, Abelard managed to ask in his rasping voice: "Why - what brought her here?"          "She is related by marriage to Bert de Mousseau and learned that you were here. She came all this way to see you." Emilie said it gently but deliberately. It seemed a remarkable tribute. She could not imagine anyone travelling such a distance to see her ― much less someone unrelated who had not seen her for nearly two decades.          "There is no one on earth I wish to see less." Abelard answered softly, his face still rigid.          "Oh, Abelard!" Emilie's cry came from the heart. She could feel the intensity of his pain and wished there was something she could do to ease it. But she thought too of Lady Blanche, who had come all this way at no small risk to herself.  She knew Blanche would be hurt by Abelard's vehement rejection. "I'm so sorry!" She exclaimed sincerely.          "You are not to blame. Was there anything else?"          "No, nothing that can't wait. I only wanted to warn you in case...."          "Thank you. Do I have your leave to retire?"          "Of course, but--" She had been about to urge him to join her for a cup of wine, but he was so distant already that she knew it would be futile and unkind to request him to stay. "I can't just send her away." She noted helplessly.          "I know. I will face her tomorrow. Give me tonight."          "Of course."          He backed away, bowed stiffly by the door, and then disappeared. Emilie was left alone in her chamber feeling miserable and helpless.
          Dusk was short at these latitudes and darkness already enveloped the yard. Abelard made for the stables and then past them to a narrow, postern gate that led to a steep, rocky path unsuit­able for horse or wagon. This lead straight down the slope to the mill that straddled the stream below the castle.          The mill was dark. Lord Hughes had lived here until the castle was made habitable. As soon as he and Emilie moved into the renovated castle, Hughes had encouraged Abelard to make use of the vacated mill as his own quarters.         Abelard agreed because it was Lord Hughes’ suggestion, but he did not know what to do with so much space. The long two-storied complex had kitchens, store-rooms, cellars and baths, all of which intimidated him. He was away too often to risk leaving anything of value here, and when in residence at Montfort he always took his meals with the garrison and household up at the castle. The vaulted chambers on the ground floor were empty shells, and the upper story was hardly more utilised. Abelard had only a few possessions, and these were all collected in the corner of one upstairs room.          He had chosen the end room with a view north to the mountains from one double-light window and east to the olive orchard through a smaller single window. The room possessed a fire-place, but Abelard had not used it yet, since he had not moved in until early summer when the heat was already oppressive.          Abelard did not own a bed and he had not slept in one since he had left France. Instead he had a pallet and two sheets, one of gauze and one of linen. A chest for his clothing would have been a superfluous luxury. He kept his braies, hose and shirts in his saddle-bags which he hung from a hook on the wall when at Montfort. His hauberk, two surcoats and cloak had their own hooks. A pair of sandals and a pair of shoes were left, when not in use, in the fire-place. A crude, three-legged stool provided the only place to sit. A box of candles, supplied by Emilie, waited on the floor for use in the single iron candlestick that stood beside the pallet on the floor.           Abelard stood in the doorway and surveyed the scene as if seeing it for the first time. There was nothing in the room that was not the cheapest, simplest, most impersonal item. The only things of value which he now owned were his stallion and his sword - both gifts from Lord Hughes - and his golden spurs, a gift from Emilie. Most of what he had earned as seneschal was still coin, kept in a purse tied inside his belt. He could not have said what he was saving it for specifical­ly, but it was his security against new disasters. The only things he had afforded himself had been a decent hauberk, a good quilted leather gambeson, a pair of boots, and two surcoats of plain silk.          The last time Blanche had seen him, he had been fitted out in glimmering chain mail from head to toe with helm and gauntlets at his velvet-spanned saddle. His silk surcoat had flaunted his arms and his cloak had been velvet lined with the best beaver. Even his stallion, a better-bred horse than he could now ride much less afford today, had had a trapper of silk that reached to his fetlocks and his bridle had been ennobled with bands of engraved silver. Yet even thus, with his inheritance mortgaged to Italian bankers to pay for so much finery, he had been too poor and too insignificant for Blanche.          Christ what a fool he had been! He had been so ludicrously confident that he could over-come the handicap of being born second with nothing  more than his fine figure and athletic competence on the tilt yard. It had never occurred to him that he might fail to win fame and fortune. After all, at 20 he had already become a champion on the tournament circuit and Blanche herself, a coveted heiress, had been in love with him.          Blanche. He tried to picture her, but his memories had grown dim from neglect. From the day of his capture, he had known he had lost her. The truce Count Richard had made with Saladin so shortly after Abelard was taken at Jaffa had eliminated any hope for winning fortune even after his release. Nor had he been so stupid as to think that his ransom would not strain his parents' resources. As the months in prison dragged on, he had forced himself to abandon all his fairy-tales and one of them was Blanche. He had not allowed his thoughts to dwell on her since.          All that he could call to mind now was that she had been dark and the wittiest girl he'd ever encountered. She had had a quickness of mind and a liveliness of tongue that could keep three of four men jumping and her laughter was contagious. He knew she had been counted a beauty, but he could not picture her features. When he thought about it, however, he remembered that she had a slight, almost boyish figure and had been an accomplished hunts­woman, but what stuck in his memory was the jewels glittering from her head-band and encircling her throat as she danced.          He shook his head sharply to clear it of memories, but now they would not go away. He had desired her. There had been an erotic energy between them that had filled the air with static. It had frightened her, young and virgin as she was, and she obsessed him no matter how much he tried to find release with low-born girls. He had wanted her so much that he had imagined the wildest schemes to gain access to her chamber. He had even spent hours reconnoitring the relative position of roofs, windows and chimneys in her father’s castle. He had practised scaling walls under the pretext of training for sieges, when in fact the only goal in his imagination had been her bed. He had even given thought to using violence against her father's watch-dogs, the knights and squires who were always in attendance upon her when they were together. But quite aside from the uncertain outcome of any such tactics, he had shied back from any hint of force against Blanche herself. Even then, he noted with a kind of wonder, the only kind of intercourse he craved was that given freely.          His broadsword rasped from its sheath and he swung it against the stool. The blade bit into the seat and stuck fast. He strug­gled, freed it, swung again and again until the stool had been hacked to pieces and lay splintered at his feet. He stood leaning on the sword to catch his breath, and was forced to admit it had done no good. Nothing, ever, could restore what they had taken away. He thought of the bow-legged, pock-marked sergeant who had been so ugly they had selected him to guard the harem -- after they had castrated him of course. Abelard had come to envy him. He too enjoyed a "privileged" position in the household, and they had occasionally found a few minutes to speak French together. By the time Abelard met him, the sergeant had been in slavery for 5 years already and had come to accept his position. He had even learned to appreciate some of the "secret pleasures" of serving a neglected harem. Certainly he made a good income from selling access to his charges, taking money from both sides.          For Abelard there had been no such compensation. After four years, he still experienced the same revulsion, helpless rage and self-loathing as on the first day when they pinned him down and held a sword under his ear to make him lie still while his master raped him. His hand went automatically to the scar across the back of his neck as he remembered. He had bled so much he had been bed-ridden for nearly a week after­wards. As soon as he could stand, he had been taken back to service the master again.           But they never needed a sword again. He had learned to submit without an outward struggle. But not to accept what they had done to him.          In the beginning, he had been too stunned, weak and well-guarded to think of escape. Later, it was the example of two other slaves that had held him back. They came from one of the heathen tribes east of the Oderand were identical twins sold by their own parents to the German traders. Abelard's master had purchased them when they were still quite young and they were clearly his favourites. But one day they were caught making love to each other and their outraged owner had made everyone watch while he castrated the one and cut the hamstrings of the other. The first was then sold, and the second crawled about the household ever after.           Eventually the deterrent effect of even this example wore thin, and Abelard risked running away. He was caught, returned to his master, flogged and degraded. Whereas previously he had served in the stables, one of the six grooms kept to care for the 20 horses of their owner, after his escape attempt he was employed in more demeaning and exhausting tasks. He was set to carrying casks and sacks into the cellars or out again, hauling water, cleaning out the privies and the like. He was no longer allowed to share the hay-loft with the other grooms, but was chained nights on the naked floor of a damp cellar. Meant as added punishment, he had been relieved to be alone. He was no longer forced to listen to the gossip­ing, bragging and teasing of the others. Never again was he forced to watch them take their turns with a whore and then endure their ridicule when his turn came and he could not perform.           Alone in his cellar, he had been reminded that he was not alone. A window high over his head opened toward the Nile. He could hear the lapping of the waves and the calls of the ferrymen, the dip of oars and the creaking of rigging as ships wended their way up and down the river. Then one night, not long after he had been confined, he was woken by an eerie chorus of voices singing the Song of Pales­tine. At first he had been so disoriented and confused he had thought it could only be a choir of angels. Then he realised that it was coming from a galley, evidently manned by enslaved crusaders. For almost two years thereafter, that ship had passed up and down the river at regular intervals, but gradually the voices grew weaker and fewer and then they ceased to come or ceased to sing.          That ship had been a life-line for him, reminding him that he was not alone, reminding him of the Holy Land and God's Grace. When he heard the others singing, he knew that even if he had been denied communion and confession and forced to commit sodomy, even if he were to die where he was chained, he would be forgiven and find Paradise because he had tried to free Jerusalem.          Coming back to the present, Abelard returned his sword to its scabbard and collected the wreckage of the stool. The latter he carried back down stairs to dump it in the mill stream, eliminating the evidence of his fit of futile fury.           The moon was rising and flooded the orchard with light and shadow and shimmered on the waters of the stream. He paused to take in the beauty of the scene around him and breathe in the fresh clean air. Overhead the stars were brilliantly clear. His master had been a highly respected astronomer who had understood the passage of the stars and comets. His chamber had been filled with charts of the heavens and noting Abelard's interest he had deigned to point things to him, explaining that just as it was possible to navigate a ship by the stars, men who knew how to read the stars could chart their lives by them. Certainly he had done very well for himself, Abelard reflected cynically. He had owned a huge, beautifully furnished house in Alexandria, and kept over 100 slaves.           As someone reputedly able to read the stars, he had entertained a stream of important guests, who came to consult him. While still a groom, Abelard had seen emirs, mullahs, rich merchants and famous scholars come and go. They had been highly cultivated men with manicured hands, oiled and perfumed skin, silken robes and bejewelled turbans. The other grooms had pointed out surgeons, architects and poets with admiration and wonder. Abelard had wondered how these elegant, learned men with their fine manners treated their slaves and their women.          To be fair, his second master had been good to him. He had been sold without warning or reason. He simply found himself turned over to a merchant who expected him to load his caravan camels. Abelard had never had contact with the beasts before and he soon discovered they were as evil tempered as they smelled. Furthermore, they were obstinate, sly and vindictive. The first three days were the sheerest hell he had experienced ― barring the sexual abuse of his old master. By chance, however, he witnessed the way one of the other drivers was cheated when he went to buy some supplies, and his new master was amazed to discover he could calculate. He was at once given charge of the warehouse and it had not taken long before he was given ever greater responsibil­ity, authority and favour.           He was given his master's cast off clothes, new sandals, even a turban. He was allowed to sleep in the office while the other slaves slept in the warehouse. He was tipped now and again and with a wink told to seek a little "paradise" ― he was even given meticulous directions to two different brothels that his master recommended for being "reputable" and "clean."          Cleanliness was considered a great virtue among the Arabs, and it was a custom that had rapidly been adapted by the Christian settlers in Palestine ― no matter what the Church said about cleanliness being vanity. Abelard had taken his master's advice, but despite the blue-glazed tiles, the potted palms, bubbling fountains and clean white sheets, the results had been the same every time. The impotence always over-came him the moment he recognised how much they hated him beneath their impassive faces or their forced smiles. He could not use a whore without remembering how he had been used. Eventually he stopped humiliating himself by even trying.          His new master was a perceptive man. He noted that Abelard no longer made use of his offers to "seek paradise" and offered to buy him a "wife." When Abelard refused, he even offered to buy him a Christian wife. That had only reminded Abelard of the time the grooms had brought a girl up to the loft for their collective entertainment and she had turned out to be French, a captive like himself. When his turn came, he had been able to do nothing for her but hold her in his arms and let her cry until her master came to take her to the next man (or men) he loaned her out to. She said she was lucky, if he remembered to feed her between customers.          Not long afterwards, Abelard had run into an Italian sailor and discovered that Italian merchants traded with Alexandria. He had found the quay they used and eventually made contact with one of the captains. He arranged to go aboard the vessel just as it set sail, but the Italians had betrayed him, knowing that he could never pay for his passage and that his master would reward them more. His master had been so furious that at this betrayal of trust after all the favor he’d been shown that he had sold Abelard to a galley master.          The air was chill now and Abelard shivered as he gazed up at the stars. In the entire seven months he had spent aboard the galley he had not once had a chance to see the stars. He had been chained either to the oars or to a bunk. On watch or off. One lived in the bowels of the ship, hearing the life of the free only as foot-steps or voices over-head. The air the slaves breathed was fetid, putrefied by the run-off from the bilges and the seaweed that clung to the planks beneath their feet, and their own excrement. His health had suffered seriously for the first time since his enslavement. Like the time in prison, his leg muscles wasted away from inactivi­ty. His arms and back, in contrast, were exercised beyond their limit. He was almost 40 and a 4 hour stint of rowing, three times a day, left him nearly crippled with pain.           Toward the end, he had started to have pain in his chest as well, and once he had even collapsed at the oar before the end of his watch. They had beaten him awake again, but it made no difference. He knew he could not go on ― and they probably did too. It was just a matter of using him as long as possible, and when he could no longer pull his weight, they would toss him over-board. That was what they did with galley-slaves that no longer earned their feed. Besides he was an infidel. Not worth any more thought than a mule.          Living as he did, he had no way of knowing where he was. When in port there was no rowing, of course, but the galley slaves were kept locked in the fo'castle where they gambled with straw or pieces of clothing, drank the cheap wine delivered to them and fought among themselves. Abelard had lain on his bunk and ignored the commotion because he did not want to be involved in their brawls. Then someone had shaken him. "Christian!"          He turned over. The man standing over him was the man who wielded the whip. "You're wanted on deck."          He had been pulled as much as rolled out of his bunk, and the key had turned in the lock to free his manacles from the iron rod running the length of the bunk. On deck he had been blinded by the sun and his legs had hardly been able to hold him. Vaguely he had been aware of two men in the fine white robes of wealthy Arabs.           "Christian! Who are you?" One asked.          He must have screwed up his eyes and given them such a wild or blank look that they had hastened to inquire of the driving-master if he were "all right in the head?"           "Of course he is!" Came the answer, accompanied by a blow to his head.          There had been a discussion of whether he understood Arabic but again the driving-master insisted that he could understand, so the question had been put to him again. "Who are you?"          He had stared at them. His eyes were starting to adjust to the sun-light a little and he could make out the men more clearly. They were rich Arab merchants. But he could not bring himself to utter his name. He had not said his name aloud for years. He could not remember the last time he had mouthed it even in silence. His first and second masters had called him "Ibrahim" ― apparently because Abelard had reminded them of Abraham. But on the galley he had not been called even that. Galley slaves had no names. There were too many of them and they didn’t last long.“Don’t you understand?” They asked exasperated. “We want to know your name! Your Christian name!"          Standing there, naked except for a filthy loin-cloth, his wrists and ankles chained, he found it nearly impossible to identify himself with the man he had been 18 years earlier. With difficulty he had formed the words in his brain and then slowly he had felt them in his mouth, but still he could not say them aloud. The merchants were shaking their heads sadly. The one comforting the other, assuring him they would find others. "There must be dozens of Christian knights in Alexandria. Surely we will find one. Come."          "Sir Abelard de la Guiltiere." It came out at last.           They stopped, looked at one another, looked back at him. Stepped closer. Asked his name again. He said it more firmly and suddenly they were embracing each other, congratulating each other, thanking Allah with words of boundless praise.          His chains had been removed, he had been cleaned, his hair trimmed, the nails of his hands and feet had been clipped and filed, and then he had been outfitted in decent cotton robes and worn but serviceable sandals and put aboard a galley ― in a cabin on deck ― along with 19 other former slaves like himself. It turned out that the son of one of the merchants had fallen into Christian hands when his ship went ashore in a storm. The King of Jerusalem had demanded the release of 20 Christian knights and 60 men of lesser rank as part of the ransom.           A week later Abelard had been landed at Ascalon and found himself a free man again ― but one without a penny, a sword, or a horse ― much less property, patronage or position. All the released captives had been in a similar situation and the King of Jerusalem had been forced to provide for them. Most had been in captivity even longer than Abelard and were too old and broken to be of any kind of service. So they had been given pensions or corrodies at one of the monasteries. Abelard had been made a knight of the King's household ― but a knight who had not mounted a horse or used sword or lance in 18 years. He had been pitied and laughed at behind his back. That was why he had sought to find service with someone who did not know what he had been, and he had applied to Lord Hughes, hoping for a new start.           But he could not hide his past. It was written on his back where the marks of his flogging were obvious whenever he removed his shirt. It could be read from the distinctive chain scars on his wrists and ankles. It was betrayed by his uncertain, halting French as he tried to remember a language he had not spoken in years. And of course, one had only to see him ride and or watch him at the quitain to notice he was more inept than a green squire.          Blanche had seen him triumph at a half-dozen tournaments. She had cheered him, sprung to her feet and clapped for all to see when he flung his opponents to the sand with his well-placed lance. He had worn her tokens, and claimed her kisses in victory after victory. And now he couldn't even match the dummy at the end of a quitain, but usually found himself lying flat on his back with a mouth full of sand.          Christ! Why did she ― of all the ghosts of his better past ― have to come to Palestine! Why did he have to face her in his cheap clothes and his battered body and his crippled masculinity? Why?          But God was silent as always. Refusing to answer that question now any more than He had ever answered questions in the past. So Abelard knew he had no choice but to face this humilia­tion just as he had faced all the other humiliations of the last 20 years.    

Copyright Helena P. Schrader 2012   

"A Widow's Crusade:" Chapter 4

PalestineOctober 1212
     The fate of the children hung over Blanche oppressively like an evil omen. As Clair had said, it had been their voices that had jogged her memories of Abelard on the day she learned he was alive. And their example that had inspired her to make the journey to Outremer.  If their crusade could end so ignominiously, than so could hers….     The rescued youth, slow witted and congenial as he was, adjusted rapidly to his new situation; he was flattered to be "adopted" by the Templars as a lay-brother. The girl, Simone, though she seemed to accept the loss of her brother and never spoke of him again, was far from recovered by the time they docked in Acre. Blanche suggested a convent for her, but Simone begged Everard not to turn her over to the nuns. So Blanche saw no alternative but to take her along to Castle Montfort, when she set out on the last and final stage of her journey.     Sergeant Lestelle had served more than two decades in Palestine, and he took over the van of their little party as they left Acreon the eve of St. Edward's. Now that she was so near her goal, Blanche found herself utterly at a loss to under­stand what had possessed her to make this journey. She hardly knew the man she was ostensibly seeking. They had known each other for only two brief years a life-time ago. She was certainly not the girl she had been then, and how could he be unchanged by crusade, imprison­ment and slavery?         Particularly the word slavery had taken on a new reality since the wreck of the Arab slaver. She could not picture the proud, athletic Abelard enslaved. The Abelard she remembered would have preferred death to enslavement. And wasn't it said that only those captives who converted to Islam were spared the sword? Had Abelard abjured his faith for the sake of a life in slavery? She could not imagine it any more than she could not picture the glamorous knight of her youth a man of middle-years ―  yet he too was 22 years older than when they had parted, and that made him 42.      Too soon, given her increasingly confused state of mind, Sergeant Lestelle pointed out a castle crouching upon a barren hill. "Saladin took it after a three month siege in '87." He informed her matter-of-factly. "The Saracen held it for five years and when they withdrew they slighted the towers of the outer-wall and are said to have poisoned the cisterns. King Richard of Englandnegotiated the release of the last lord, Jacques de Armingdale, but Armingdale never returned to Montfort  ― some say because it was a condition of his release and some that he was a broken man. In any case he died in Tyre. The castle then reverted to the crown." Lady Blanche nodded. They proceeded.       At the base of the mountain was a walled town which was predominantly inhabited by native Christians. Passing out of the far gate, they started up the winding road to the castle. The outer wall was, as Sergeant Lestelle had warned, only ruins, but as the road wound around to the back of the castle, it was evident that the inner wall and the roof of the keep had received consider­able repairs of late. Fresh stones, whiter and smoother than those below, filled gaps and topped the walls with neat crenellation       At the gate, the Templars were given immediate admission, and the little party found themselves in a cramped space between a tall keep and a complex of residential buildings. A row of adobe sheds housing animals and workshops backed up against the far wall of the ward. From the gate-house a boy had been sent scampering to inform the lord of the arrival of guests, and Blanche kept looking about herself nervously, thinking that at any minute he might appear. He was the Constable of Montfort's seneschal after all. What would be more natural than that he would come out to welcome unexpected guests?      But the man who hastened down the stairs from the hall as they dismounted and turned their horses over to waiting grooms was a priest. He introduced himself as the chaplain, almoner and "clerk of all trades," and apologized that they had to make do with him. "My lord has not yet returned from Toron and the seneschal has gone to Baram to collect the Michealmas rents. My lady, however, is delighted to receive a French noblewoman, Madame.” He grinned and bowed again to Blanche, “You will be her first female guest since she arrived in Palestine over a year ago." He graciously offered Blanch his arm.     They had not yet reached the top of the external stairs leading up to the hall when they were assaulted by a shrieking child of two. The little girl had a round face with bright red lips, huge button eyes the color of corn-flowers and white blond hair. She grabbed at Blanche's skirts triumphantly and very nearly fell down as she missed her balance on the steps. But that only made her laugh louder ― for her shrieking was in fact laughter.       Blanche stared in disbelief, not at the childish misbehavior but the pure-blond hair. Abelard had the fairest hair she had ever seen. Was this child his? She had never given it a thought, but why shouldn't he have married after his release? Why shouldn't he have started a family? At 40 a woman was considered too old for childbearing, but a man could sire children for another 3 decades. How foolish she would look, if she had come all this way and he was happily settled with another woman!      Panting, a very fat and apparently pregnant nurse-maid waddled out of the entry-way and, seeing her charge behaving so outrageously, shouted angrily: "Yvonne! You brat! Come back here this instant!”      "If you paid attention to your duties, she would not get away from you like that!" The priest admonished with a fierce scowl at the nurse.       Blanche, however, had at last recovered from her shock, and she bent to talk to the child. "What a fuss for such a little girl - and I thought you were too grown up to squall like a baby."      The little girl stopped screaming to proclaim indignantly: "I'm not a baby!"      "Then give me your hand and stop yelping like a skewered piglet."     The little girl happily took the offered hand, her mood instantly restored. "Guests!" She confided proudly to Blanche. "Mama wants guests!"    In the sun-flooded solar behind the hall, Blanche and her escort were greeted by a somewhat flustered lady who hastened forward with apologies at the sight of her daughter clinging to the stranger. "Yvonne! That's no way to behave to guests. Please forgive her, my lady. We have so few guests. And no doubt I have spoilt her - she being our only child and so late in life. Yvonne! That's enough. Berthe! Take Yvonne  to the nursery ― "      "Nooooo!" The child protested, but her mother was insistent, and this time no one came to her rescue. With a grunt, the nurse carried her screaming from the solar.       With the child gone, Blanche had a chance to concentrate upon her hostess and was surprised to find herself facing a woman very much her own age and dressed in a simple, sleeveless, blue gauze surcoat over a pale-blue silk gown ― robes much more suited to a sene­schal's wife than the Lady of Betz, Baram and Montfort. Further­more, she wore only tiny sapphires on her ears and her hands were bare except for her wedding ring and an aquamarine on her right hand. If Lord Hughes was without a wife or if his lady had died, than his seneschal's wife would preside at his castle. The reference to a child so late in life might suggest she had married Sir Abelard before his capture and waited 18 years for his release? She held out her hand to Blanche. "Welcome to Montfort, my lady. I'm sorry my husband, Lord Hughes, is not here. We live simply when he is away." She apologized, but Blanche heard only ‘my husband, Lord Hughes’ and smiled in relief.     "We are grateful to be received so warmly although unexpected." Blanche proceeded to introduce herself and her companions, and then found herself in the awkward situation of having to give some explanation for her extraordinary journey. "Your lord husband is served by Bertram de Mousseau, I believe." She ventured.        Lady Emilie nodded in surprise. "He is the younger brother of my son-in-law." Blanche explained to Lady Emilie's exclamations of surprise. "I have brought him a letter from his mother."     "He will be delighted! But of course he is travelling with my husband.  You must stay until my lord husband returns. It should be any day now, but surely after such a long journey you are in no hurry? You will plan to spend Christmas at Bethlehem, I presume. Are you on your way to Nazarethnow?" Lady Emilie automatically assumed Blanche was in the Holy Land to see the sites, and the delivery of the letter to Bert was just footnote.     Blanche felt the steady, curious gaze of Sir Everard and the more critical look of Sergeant Lestelle. "No." She confessed. "No, I came to find an old ― acquaintance." They all waited expec­tantly. "I believe ― that is Bertam de Mousseau reported ― that you are served by a certain Sir Abelard de la Guiltiere...."     "Yes. He is our Seneschal." Lady Emilie admitted, and then, as understanding dawned, she asked with a look almost of horror. "You knew Sir Abelard in France?!"     "Yes. Did he never mention me?" Blanche was feeling very foolish with them all staring at her ― Sergeant Lestelle with raised eyebrows and Sir Everard with astonishment, while Lady Emilie seemed outright appalled. "He would refer to me by my maiden name, of course, Blanche de Vacour?"     "I'm sorry." Lady Emilie replied stiffly. "He never speaks of his past."      Emilie was remembering the first time she had met Sir Abelard. It had been the same night King John of Jerusalemnamed Hughes Lord of Baram and Constable of Montfort. She and Hughes had been drunk as much with euphoria as the abundant wine of the royal feast. In the midst of their reverie, Sir Abelard had intruded with his raw, rasping voice. "Monsieur." He had waited until they finished kissing, but the kiss had been long enough to make Emilie blush at the thought that anyone had been watching them. She had looked over at the speaker ready to be angry, offended and defensive.     Abelard had stood in the shadows: tall and lank and gaunt. In the torchlight it had been impossible to tell if his cropped hair was blond or gray, but his face was chiseled with lines that ran down his cheeks like desert gullies. His eyes were sunken under a great, square brow, and his nose ranged forward like a mountain.    "Monsieur." He had repeated in his ruined voice, and then with a glance at Emilie he had added almost in a whisper, "Madame."    "Sir?" Hughes had replied frostily. He resented the intrusion on their private celebration after so much doubt, risk and tension just as much as his wife did.     "My name is Sir Abelard de la Guiltiere."     "I'm sorry." Hughes replied impatiently. "The name means nothing to me."    "I didn't expect it to, sir. I ― simply thought it correct to introduce myself." Emilie sensed the uncertainty behind those quietly spoken words and she intuitively recognized a sea of desolation behind his eyes. She sat up straighter and with a gentle touch of her hand conveyed to Hughes that he should be patient.     "Is there some way we can be of service?" Hughes inquired, responding to Emilie's gesture by posing the question without the sharpness he initially intended.      "I was told you arrived from France only this week but have tonight been granted the lordship of Baram and constableship of Montfort."      "It was the King's pleasure." Hughes answered a fraction too defensively, and again Emilie signaled with a touch of her hand for him to go gentle with the stranger.        "For someone new to Palestine, you may find it ― it is not the same as France. Your tenants are Saracens and Jews. You will have to deal with them and to trade with others."         "I know." Hughes told him pointedly.        The man sensed Hughes hostility, but, like someone who has nothing left to lose, he plunged ahead. "I speak Arabic fluently, my lord. I can use the abacus and have experience in administra­tion. I could be of service to you, my lord."       Emilie was startled by his words. He was dressed like a knight and had introduced himself as such, yet the skills he prized were those normally performed by a clerk. Looking more closely, she realized that his short-sleeved hauberk was far from new, and his spurs were gold-plated and already half worn away. He had a sword-belt that was worn and stretched like an old girth and the sword on it had a standard-issue iron hilt such as any armor-smith made by the hundred. His hands were bare of rings, and his surcoat was a rough cotton without coat of arms or other insignia.        As if Hughes had noted the same marks of poverty, Emilie felt her husband swallow back his haughty reply, and say instead. "Sir Abelard, did you say?"          The stranger nodded stiffly.       "Why don't you join us in a drink?" Hughes indicated the space beside him on the bench, and at the same time looked about for Bert. "Bert, bring Sir Abelard a glass of wine." He ordered, when the squire emerged dutifully.        The stranger hesitated a fraction of a second before he clambered over the bench and seated himself. Emilie looked around Hughes toward the stranger, and noticed that he held his hands balled into fists. He looked at them rather than at Hughes.         "Did anyone mention who I am?" Hughes inquired.         "My lord?"         "You were informed of my new titles, but did anyone mention my name?"       A look of alarm came into the stranger’s eyes, and he seemed to draw back as if preparing for something unpleasant. "No, my lord. You were pointed out to me."         This mollified Hughes, who now explained. "It is true that I only arrived in Acre this past week, but it would be more correct to say I returned. I was born and raised in Hebron, third son of Lord Guillaume."       Sir Abelard quickly grasped the significance of the revela­tion. Hughes was  no stranger to Palestine and so he didn’t particularly need the services of a man with local knowledge.  In chagrin Abelard started to rise without waiting for the wine. "Forgive me, my lord. I'm sorry to have disturbed you--"        "Wait." Hughes stopped him as he went to retreat. "Sit down. I may speak some Arabic and understand a thing or two about running an estate here, but I cannot do everything alone. From what King John said, Montfort is in deplorable condition. I will have need for more than one good administrator."           Sir Abelard stood in indecision straddling the bench.          "Please, sit down, sir." Emilie urged. "My husband will indeed need much assistance as I am French and will not be able to support him as a wife should ― until I learn more about the land and people."         Hughes turned to give Emilie a quick kiss to say he did not mind and that he was sure she would manage, while Sir Abelard hesitantly took his seat again.           Hughes turned back to the knight. "De la Guiltierre is not a Palestinian name."           "I come from Poitou. I came out with Count ― King ― Richard."           "And stayed." Hughes concluded.          Sir Abelard swallowed and shrugged one shoulder. "It worked out that way." There was a life-time hidden by those words and both Hughes and Emilie were conscious of it, but the stranger had drawn an impenetrable mask over his face and neither Emilie nor Hughes had risked probing any further at the time.           Later Hughes had grown suspicious of the strange knight for a series of things that seemed inconsistent with his story. Although he took the title of "Sir" he had no squire and owned only a broken down gelding that any real knight would have disdained. Furthermore, he rode very poorly ― something inconceivable for a knight, since they were trained to fight on horseback from boy­hood. Though he claimed to have come to the Holy Land with the Third Crusade twenty years earlier, he did not know Palestine at all.               Hughes' distrust of Sir Abelard had grown so great that he had finally confronted him, demanding an explanation of the apparent contradictions. When the story had come out, Emilie had been so appalled she had wanted to go home to France at once. The realiza­tion that even a knight might be sold into slavery terrified her, and it had been weeks before she had over-come her fear of the Arabs around her.           But perhaps the worst part of the story had been that Abelard's family had refused to pay his ransom. Even the Saracens had treated him with the respect due his rank at first. Immediately after his capture at the battle of Jaffa, his wounds had been tended, and then he had been imprisoned with other knights. He was not sold into slavery until the ransom-demands were not met.          It must have been Sir Abelard's own father or ― so Emilie suspected ― his elder brother who had denied him his freedom. She could not bring herself to believe that a father would abandon a son to his enemies, but an elder brother who had just come into a modest estate might have considered the Saracen ransom demands excessive or even ruinous. Emilie knew all too well what it was to have an indebted, run-down estate that yielded barely enough income to live on.         The lady before her was not, however, a Guiltiere. And even had she been, she would not have been the one who made the decision about Sir Abelard's ransom. It was wrong to blame her. Emilie pulled herself together and smiled at Lady Blanche. "I'm sure Sir Abelard will be delighted to see you, when he returns from Baram ― which should be any day now. Ah! There is the wine I ordered. Come sit with me in the window and tell me of your journey. You will be staying with us, Sir Templar?"        The refreshments and Lady Emilie's questions turned the conversation to their travels, the bitter war still raging in the Languedoc, the tragic Children's Crusade, the betrayal by the Pisans. Eventually it grew late, and since Sir Everard and the other Templars were to leave at dawn to continue on to the Templar fortress of Beaufort, Lady Emilie had pages escort them to their respective quarters for the night.     In the spartanly furnished tower room to which Lady Blanche was apologetically brought, the few belongings with which she had traveled and the goods purchased on arrival in Acre waited for them.  Simone, utterly exhausted, at once lay down and went to sleep fully clothed on the pallet by the bed, but Claire helped Blanche undress and brush out her hair.         "You mustn't be discouraged, my lady." Claire tried to cheer her. "Of course he will be pleased to see you."       Blanche lifted the corners of her lips, but she was not convinced. She had sensed Lady Emilie's hostility far too sharply.         "Come to bed. The air is chill after so much heat," Claire urged.       Blanche let herself be put to bed by Claire as if she was still 16, and then Claire climbed in under the covers beside her. Dear, faithful Claire, Blanche thought. Dowerless and plain, Claire's fate had been one of endless service to a spoilt heiress, rich wife and now mad widow. Blanche reached out and patted Claire's shoulder. "Thank you, Claire."        "What for?"        "For always being there when I've needed you. This time, I'm afraid, I've asked more than was fair ― and I've dragged you so far from home."         "Home?" Claire sat up and looked down at Blanche. "I never felt at home in Gouzon's houses. I always felt we were unwelcome guests, tolerated only for an interval. And before that...." She shrugged. "I was one of 10 children. My second step-mother couldn't even remember my name. I was glad to go to Vaucour to serve you ― I'd never eaten so well in my life ― nor slept in a room with a fire before. Now get some sleep. You want to look fresh and young for Sir Abelard."                  The sun was barely slanting over the ramparts, leaving long ragged carpets of sunlight stretched across the ward when Blanche hastened down to take her leave of Sir Everard. They had known each other only a few short months, but in that time they had shared so much that she felt a greater sense of loss than when she had said good-bye to her own children.       In the ward, the Templar's horses were tacked up and the lay-brothers were hoisting various burdens upon three pack-mules. Seeing Lady Blanche with Simone and Claire in tow, Everard left his stallion and came to bid the ladies good bye.      He no longer worried what Sergeant Lestelle would think if he kissed Blanche's hand. "It was an honor and a pleasure to be of service to you, Madame--"       "Nonsense! I've been a burden and a nuisance, and you have been a saint to tolerate it. I did suggest you be given one of my best stallions as compensation for your labors, but I fear your superiors were not receptive to the idea. Besides we are a long way from Poitou." Then before he could answer, she flung her arms around him and kissed him on both cheeks. "Take care of yourself, Everard. Don't do anything foolish ― not for God or for your Order."       Blushing and moved, Everard tried to find an answer that would do justice to his own feelings. In the end, afraid of being presumptuous, he settled for stammering, "Maybe we'll meet again one day.” Then he stepped back and nodded to Claire and Simone. The sight of the latter made him hesitate. "Take care of Simone, Madame. She can never go home."       "She will always have a home with me."      He bowed his head in adieu one last time and then turned and mounted. Blanche waved to Sergeant Lestelle and the others, all of whom waved back cheerfully.  Then she stood and watched her escort ride away without her and felt a weight on her heart and dryness in her throat. Only as she turned to return inside did she notice that Simone's face was drenched with silent tears. "Ah, child!" She pulled the girl into her arms and, for the first time since her rescue, Simone broke down and sobbed for all she had lost.

"A Widow's Crusade": Chapter 3

This is the third chapter of this novel, set in the start of the 13th century and describing a widow's voyage to the Holy Land on a personal crusade.  I will be publishing a chapter a week until Christmas. I hope you enjoy it -- and keep in mind that the text of the story is copyrighted.


MediterraneanAugust/September 1212

The Templar Commander at Collioure tried hard to dissuade Blanche from her “foolish adventure,” and when he failed, he flatly refused to give her passage on one of his fighting galleys. Instead, he ordered Everard to proceed aboard a smaller, coastal craft, loudly washing his hands of Blanche’s safety as he did so.  The little vessel had to follow the coast, making use of the land breezes as much as possible. Fortunately for the ladies, the Templar captain, an Apulian, proved considerably more gracious and garrulous than the Commander at Collioure, and his officers and crew took their cue from him. During the day, they rigged a canvas awning on the quarter deck so Lady Blanche and Claire could sit in the shade and fresh air rather than sweat with queasy stomachs in their narrow cabin. To keep busy, Blanche offered to mend the clothes of the crew, and later, under the critical eye of the sail-maker, she and Claire were taught the use of the palm and heavy needles so they could do tasks the sail maker entrusted to them. They were favored with fair weather at first, and made good progress upon glistening aquamarine waters around the tip of Corsica and down the Italian coast. After taking on water and supplies in Naples, the captain set a course direct for the straights of Messino, and the vessel was out of sight of land for the first time since the start of the voyage.  At first, Blanche was uneasy about this, but the breeze was fresh and favorable enabling the lay-brothers who manned their oars to come on deck, and the ship herself seemed to rejoice in the wind. With a bone in her teeth, she danced over the waves, her bows sending showers of spray and spume into the air to catch the sunlight and shatter into a thousand prisms. The hiss and gurgle of the water rushing along the keel was more soothing than music when Blanche retired to her bunk that night. It seemed to record her progress toward Palestine.It was a sudden stillness that brought Blanche from her sleep. Registering that they were on an even keel and the sound of progress was absent, she concluded they were becalmed, and turned over to go back to sleep. Then she heard something that sounded like the bellow of a wounded bull, and her hair stood on end. She sat up in her bunk and looked about in inarticulate fear. Claire was sleeping soundly on the bunk below her. Leaning out into the narrow cabin she tried to look out the open port-hole, but she was confronted only by an impenetrable murk instead of the sharp line of the horizon. The unearthly bellow that had put her hair on end came again, but now she could guess its meaning. It was a fog-horn.Blanche's curiosity over-came her unease and she descended the ladder from her bunk, slipped her bare feet into a pair of soft leather shoes and wrapped herself in a light cloak. Then tip-toeing so as not to wake Claire, she let herself out of the cabin and climbed the ladder onto the quarter deck.The fog completely enveloped the ship and the surrounding sea. The long snout of the galley was lost in it, and even the tip of the main-mast was obscured. The damp made Blanche shiver, and she thought how odd that this very natural phenomenon should seem so ominous and pregnant with foreboding. Of course, if they had been nearer to land the danger of inadvertently going aground would have been real enough, but out in the open ocean there was surely no particular danger? Yet she was frightened. She cocked her head and listened. Surely they should be under oar with the wind so still? And where were the officers of the watch?She checked the helm and with relief made out the dark shapes of the two men at the heavy tiller. Then from behind her a muscular hand clasped her forearm in an almost brutal grip.  She spun around and another hand clamped over her mouth to stifle the exclamation in her throat. She was looking up into the face to face of the Captain. He loomed over her, the hood of his mantel well forward, and he leaned toward her to speak so softly she read his lips more than heard his words. "Madame, go below! Show no light and make no sound. Your life depends upon it."Only then did he remove the hand over her mouth, and gesture with it toward the starboard rail. Blanche followed his pointing figure with her eyes, but she could see nothing. She looked back at him blankly, and he cupped his hand beside his ear to suggest she should listen. Holding her breath, she strained to hear something, anything ― and she did: the steady dipping of oars and the low beat of a drum. She looked up at the Captain both astonished and alarmed. It seemed incredible that there could be another ship so near in the midst of so much sea. But since there was, then surely they should make their presence known, howl upon the fog-horn and light every torch to prevent a collision? The Captain answered her unspoken question: he mouthed the words: "Arab-slavers."The chill that ran down her spine made her shudder visibly. She stared in sheer horror at the Captain. He jerked with his head in the direction of the cabin, and Blanche nodded. He released her arm, and she made her way rapidly and silently to the foot of the ladder. Here she paused in the tiny salon to catch her breath and collect her thoughts. What irony if she were to fall into Arab hands while trying to reach Abelard, who was finally free. What had the squire written? That he had been in Arab hands for 18 years? She couldn't grasp it. Eighteen years was a lifetime. She would not survive eighteen years. She probably wouldn't be given the chance. A woman her age was hardly something they would covet for their harems or even their brothels. They would be more likely to kill her at once. Or would they use her first? All the tales of rape and ravishment she had ever heard hung in the damp air under the rafters and blew cold on her spine from the ominous deck over-head. The chatelaine of Lastours had been turned over to the soldiery by Simon de Montfort  because she did not share his faith. The Byzantine Emperor had reported that the Arabs had used the captive noblewomen "like animals" and even Bishops had been forced into sodomy. Blanch was sweating despite the chill, and her chest hurt from holding her breath so long. She let the air out slowly, softly. She would kill herself, she decided, and at once felt calmer. She made her way stiffly to the cabin, pushing the door open gently. Claire still slept soundly, her breath whistling through his half-opened mouth. Blanche went to her chest and tipped up the lid. She had an ivory-handled eating knife. She wasn’t sure it was sharp enough to cut her throat but she had nothing better. She slipped it under her pillow before climbing back up to her bunk.She was awakened by Claire, shaking her for breakfast, and sat up feeling unrefreshed and resentful of the disturbance. But she knew Claire was only doing her duty. Through the port-hole came a murky light and a glance confirmed that the fog was still heavy, though it appeared to be burning off.Everard appeared for breakfast in full armor ― only his helm and gauntlets set aside ― and with dark circles under his eyes. Half-way through breakfast the Captain joined them as well, his beard glistening with beads of fog. He reached hungrily for the bread and cheese. "I'm sorry if I was rude to you last night, ma Dame, but it was for your own safety.""I quite understand, Captain. Are we out of danger now?" Blanche countered.The captain shrugged. "We evaded no less than three of the bastards last night. It’s rare for them to venture this far north ― and in such strength. It’s as if they had word of some prize worth the risks. If I'd had a real fighting galley ― and not been entrusted with your safety, Madame ―" he bowed his head to Blanche before finishing "I would have taken one of them for sure."A shout from on deck prevented any further pursuit of the conversation. The Captain tore off the end of the loaf and stuffed it into his mouth as he clattered up the ladder to the deck. Everard excused himself hastily and followed the captain. Blanche looked at Claire, who stared back at her wide-eyed. "What should we do, Madame?""Pray, I expect ― I'll see if I can find out what has happened now." She slipped out from behind the table and climbed part way up the ladder to poke her head out in the hope of seeing what was going on without getting underfoot. It was evident that the fog was rapidly lifting and becoming patchy, while a chilly breeze was picking up. She heard the orders for the sail and the thud of feet on the deck as the sailors ran for the ratlines. The squeal of pulleys and the rattle of running rigging was answered by a dip and wallow as they changed course. Then the wind caught and the bows bit into the water. With a tremor they started to surge through the water. Blanche let out a sigh of relief and was about to return to her breakfast, when a shout from overhead stopped her.  She looked up again, sensing the danger even before it was confirmed by the furious shouting of the Captain. Men rushed past her toward the stern rail. Beyond she saw close at hand what seemed to be a huge ship riding very high with two tiers of oars. The bow was a long, sharpened battering ram that smashed the waves apart as it cut past their stern. A cascade of unintelligible shouting erupted from the strange ship, as if they too had only just now sighted the Templar vessel.Blanch clung to the railing of the ladder waiting for the ship to veer toward them and ram them with its vicious bow. Along the stern rail, the Templars were lining up with cross-bows and other weapons. Everard had drawn his sword. But the Arab did not even miss a stroke as it swept on leaving the little coastal craft in its wake. They stood to their arms until the Arab was out of sight beyond a horizon that was increasingly distinct as the fog burned off in a hot sun. When at last the danger had truly passed, the Captain himself retired to get some rest, remarking under his breath as has he disappeared into his cabin. "Bloody bastards! They must have been on the scent of something easier to digest."
The days that followed were uneventful until, just west of Crete, they were caught in a vicious Southwest gale that tossed the galley about like a bit of driftwood. Everard tied both Blanche and Claire to their bunks to keep them from being hurt while the wind wailed and the ship groaned. Claire thought the end had come, but Blanche took reassurance from the calm of the Captain, whose voice she could hear over-head. He ordered a sea-anchor out and he kept his vessel bow-to-wind to ride out the storm.A day and a half later, the wind fell off to a manageable level and the rain ceased, so they raised the anchor and continued the voyage while taking stock of the damage. Two men had broken limbs and the rest suffered from less serious bruises and abrasions. The live-stock pen had been washed overboard, and the railing was torn away just aft of the foremast, apparently shattered when the pen was washed away. There were various minor leaks, snarls of running rigging left trailing by the washed away rail, and two of the water barrels were stove in. The Captain nodded, content with the performance of his little vessel, and set course for Crete to replace the lost food and water. The call that land had been sighted brought Blanche on deck at once. The sun was low in the sky behind them, turning golden with the dusk already. They had a good following wind still, the remnants of the storm, and the waves seemed to push them toward their destination as they rushed passed to break upon the island's shore.It was Everard who saw it first. The captain was intent on watching the sails as he swung closer to the wind and started to quarter the swells as he ran north-east. But Everard, like Blanche, was entranced by the landfall, and his eyes were still sharp. "What is all that rubbish at the foot of the cliffs there?" He asked as much to himself as to her. Then he turned and caught the attention of the chief mate. "Brother Guido, look there. At the base of the cliff---""Santa Maria! Capitano!"The Captain turned and his scowl was met with a flood of Italian too fast for either Everard or Blanche to understand. Scowling more darkly still, he stepped to the rail squinting, and then let out a colorful oath. "It is a wreck, isn't it?" Everard inquired.The captain nodded curtly and ordered the helmsman to run down wind again, closer to shore. The word spread rapidly, and the off watch and oarsmen came to line the railing. The captain, however, kept his eyes upon the waves and the wind. Look-outs were sent into the bows and the mizzen was handed to decrease their speed. Slowly they neared the shore. There could be no doubt now. A large ship lay cast up upon the narrow beach along the base of a cliff. One mast lay bent back over the stern, dangling rags of sails over the water, while the mainmast stuck up straight as a tree ― from a deck that sank into the sand at a forty-five degree angle. The stern of the ship still extended out into the water and waves broke over it. As they came still nearer, they could hear the creak and groan of the ship being rammed against the merciless shore with each wave. "She'll break up completely before another day is past." Someone remarked."What is she?" Everard inquired anxiously."Oh, she's Arab." The Mate remarked, apparently surprised that Everard had not recognized this. "Much like that big slaver we saw so uncomfortably close off Sicily. The same double tier of oars, see!" He pointed.Blanche and Everard looked back toward the wreck to note what the sailors had noted at once, while the Captain gave the order to turn up the coast again, anxious to avoid a similar fate. Blanche was about to turn away when something white in the water caught her eye, and she cried out before she could stop herself. Floating very near the ship was a corpse ― face down, a naked back, and long golden hair floating on the surface. She stepped back from the rail feeling ill, but around her the others moved closer pointing, exclaiming. Only gradually did she begin to understand their excitement: the corpse was white. Apparently it hadn't been an Arab after all.After that, things happened too fast for Blanche. They changed coarse yet again, ran down to shore then doubled back upon their previous coarse and then swung sharply up into the wind. Three men jumped over-board and the oars were run-out to hold the vessel in place. As they hauled the corpse aboard, Blanche went below deck and sat numbly at the bench behind the table. She had seen corpses before. She had buried her father and her husband. She had buried a daughter. But the storm had barely receded. They were still riding the swells whipped up by the angry winds. She was acutely aware that that corpse could so easily have been her….Overhead the commotion had not died down. If anything they were shouting more loudly than ever. The foot-falls were heavy and rapid. With a dull scraping they seemed to drag something ― another body ― over her very head. It was Claire's high-pitched voice that startled her. "Madame! Madame! They're children! Little, Christian children!" Claire was shouting down the ladder, half hysterical, and Blanche felt compelled to respond. "Don't shout so, Claire. I'm coming." Reluctantly but steadily she ascended to the deck and was confronted by the repulsive sight of no less than four corpses lined up limply -- all of them white and blue, the water oozing from their mouths, their clothing clinging to their fragile, juvenile bodies, their hair a tangled mess about their heads. And Claire was right. They were white, wearing western clothes and not one of them looked to be more than 14. The smallest couldn't have been more than 7 or 8 -- and her hands were tied.Blanche sank down on her knees beside the little girl in disbelief. With her hands tied she hadn't stood a chance! She looked quickly to the others. All of them had bound wrists. Only then did it finally dawn on her that it had indeed been an Arab ship, and the whites aboard it were all slaves. But how did little children fall into the hands of slavers?  She looked at the little girl with her plump white limbs and her bare feet. She wore a simple linen dress and a white apron, the clothes of a craftsman or merchant's child. Everard sank down on his heels beside her. "Madame, we are going to put ashore and see if there are any survivors."Blanche looked up alarmed. Surely it was madness to take their own vessel any closer to the treacherous shore? Everard seemed to read her thoughts. "We've put out the sea anchor and the oarsmen can keep us off the rocks. We are going ashore in the long boat." He indicated the little row-boat that was lashed keel up at the break of the poop. Sailors were already releasing the little craft from its restraints and dragging it aft. "As the only knight aboard, I will go with them, Madame. Captain Brother Davido will remain aboard and Sergeant Lestrelle will see you safely to Galilee, if something should happen to me."Blanche stood. She felt as if the blood from her head remained in her feet. Strange how his words frightened her, she thought, noting that she had grown fond of him.  Nor could she escape the sense that their fate was bound together for this journey. But Everard had already turned away, was buckling his sword more snugly, and pulling the chain mail coif up over his head, binding it tight with the leather cord at laced through the chain mail at the crown of his head.The longboat was being lowered off the stern. The swells seemed large even for their ship, let alone the little open boat. It bounced wildly, while one after another of the shore-party descended a rope-ladder into it. Everard was accompanied by the Mate, and six other men wearing hauberks and the black surcoats of Templar sergeants. They all had their coifs over their heads and were armed with swords and daggers and two cross-bows.Blanche watched anxiously from the railing as two lay-brothers took the oars and manoeuvred the boat deftly, making for a place on the shore a good hundred yards north of the wreck, where rocks in the water served as a natural break-water and the shore itself was less troubled. They carried the boat above the reach of the waves, and one of the lay brothers remained with it while the others made their way toward the wreck. The Captain came and stood beside Blanche. The landing party moved as a body along the edge of the shore until they neared the wreck. Then they divided into two groups and scrambled up the rocks before climbing back down toward the wreck. A shout reached the galley across the water. They saw something flash and heard a scream. Then they lost sight of the men. Blanche looked anxiously at the Captain."They must have encountered some of the crew and dispatched them." He concluded, without entertaining the possibility that one of his own men might have been killed.They waited what seemed like an interminable time. The Captain started to glance nervously toward the setting sun, obviously anxious to get to a more hospitable anchorage before dark. Blanche could not take her eyes off the wreck and the way the waves were crashing over the stern and hammering it against the rocks. Shattered beams and planks ― and corpses ― were swept away from the wreck with each retreating wave. The corpses were countless. They bobbed among the rubbish and drifted on the currents as far as the eye could see. Blanche tried not to look at them, but she could not tear herself away from the railing either. She strained to see some sign of the landing party.The Captain started muttering under his breath in an incomp­rehensible mixture of Norman-Italian, and he scowled more darkly than ever as he checked the wind. But at last there was movement on the wreck again. Soon they could make out men crawling up the face of the rocks above it. They were carrying something, or rather someone, and there were now 9 of them. Painfully slowly the landing party worked its way back to the longboat, lowered one person into the bottom and then let the other climb aboard, before they carried the boat down to the water's edge and pushed it out into the waves. The oarsmen clambered aboard and started working to keep the boat off the rocks while the fighting men struggled to get aboard the now floating boat. The entire operation looked extremely hazardous to Blanche, but the last man was finally dragged aboard by his fellows and the boat set coarse for the galley.The Captain had meanwhile weighed anchor and set sail, using only his oars to keep the galley head to wind until the landing party and the two survivors of the wreck came up the waiting ladder. No time was wasted bringing the boat aboard, however. Instead it was made fast and towed behind as the vessel started tacking away from the coast using both sail and oars.The landing party and the two survivors dropped onto the quarter deck, soaked through with sea-water. The sail maker brought blankets up on deck to wrap around the drenched men, and the cook passed around a flask of wine, while the landing party reported to their shipmates excitedly. The Mate described in technical detail Blanche could not understand the damage the great Arab galley had suffered, the smashed in bows, the broken back, the toppled masts. Another of the party related how Sir Everard had spotted the three Arabs just in time; two were severely injured and unable to rise, but the third had tried to defend himself. In evident awe, he told how Sir Everard had decapitated him with a single stroke. Blanche glanced at the young knight. He was staring at the deck, pale and shivering, with water oozing up out of his chain mail and dripping from his face, hair and beard. He looked far too young and frail to have just decapitated someone, Blanche thought. "Would that there had been more of them!" Added one of the Templar lay-brothers, who had manned the oars of the longboat. "They had left all their galley slaves chained at their benches. The ship was under sail when she went aground, but the slaves were still chained at their benches!""They always are." The Mate retorted. "There is only room in the forecastle for the off-watch. So the duty-watch is chained to their benches whether they row or not - and the off-watch is chained to their bunks."The sympathy Blanche had been feeling for the Arab crew evaporated."They had not even unlocked the cages holding their captives." Everard said softly, speaking for the first time since his return. Blanche looked over at him. Still he would not look at her. "They were crowded into boxes no higher than 4 feet -- 10 or 15 children to a box -- all with their hands bound." Something about the still, emotionless way Everard spoke made everyone go still.Into the silence, the youth they had rescued spoke. "They hadn't fed us for two days either," he said. He was a beardless boy of 13 or 14, still round-faced and stub-nosed for all that his body was long and his shoulders were starting to fill out. He had ugly bruises all along the side of his face and neck and down across his shoulder and upper arm. Now, wiping his, long wet hair out of his face, he looked at the people clustered around him, trying to make sense of his surroundings. He looked from the sails, bloated now with wind so the splayed, red, Templar cross was clear to see, then looked more intently at Sir Everard’s surcoat and that of the sergeants, and finally to Lady Blanche and Claire. “Aren’t you Templars?”  He asked.“Yes, of course, and this is a Templar ship.” One of the sergeants answered, adding, “Lady Blanche is our passenger.”“Where are you bound?” The boy asked anxiously.“Acre,” someone answered.At once the youth’s eyes lit up. “Acre? In the Holy Land? You’re bound for the Holy Land?”As the men nodded, Blanche was startled by the thin, breathy voice of a girl. Everyone had been so focused on the excited men and youth that no one had noticed the girl they had rescued had come to her senses. Blanche at once sank down on her heels beside the girl. She looked about the same age as the rescued youth, but fairer and frailer. Her skirts had been cut off raggedly above her knees and her naked legs were gashed and cut. Blanche removed her cloak to cover her, but realizing she was starting to tremble from cold and shock, Blanche pulled the girl into her lap and rubbed her arms."We had to cut off her skirt." Everard apologized, his voice soft and flat. "It had caught on something and we were running out of time. The waves were washing over her head as it was. We had to cut off her skirt and drag her out of the hole we smashed in the top of the cage or she would have drowned."Blanche looked up at the distressed young knight standing over her. "God be praised you could save her at all!" She reminded him. "Her legs will heel and I have plenty of spare gowns." She looked back to the girl, and brushed her tangled brown hair out of her face with a trembling hand, as she murmured. “Hush, child,” she murmured. “You’re safe now.”Everard went down on his heels beside her, and he lowered his voice for her alone. "She is from the Languedoc, Madame.” Then he repeated in his own tongue Blanche’s message.The girl turned her face into Blanche’s breast and clung to her wordlessly. “She kept begging me to save her little brother,” Everard confessed to Blanche, “but there was no more time. The wreck was breaking up more and more."“You did what you could, Sir,” Blanche assured him. “You are not to blame for her being locked in cage, or for the wreck. But how was she captured? How did so manyChristian children come into the hands of the Arab slavers? Where are their parents?” Blanche was referring to parents of all the children, but Everard answered only for the girl she held in her arms."Her mother sent her and her brother on crusade to wash away the sin of their father's heresy. Her mother said if they could pray for his soul in Jerusalemthat he might be saved despite his wickedness.""Her mother will have much to answer for on Judgement Day." Blanche concluded angrily. How could a mother send two half-grown children on such a dangerous journey!But Everard countered sharply, "Don't you think rather her mother was trying to save her from ending like the other orphaned girls of my homeland? As a whore to de Montfort’s marauders!" Blanche caught her breath ― as much at Everard’s bitterness as at his words, but their own exchange was drowned out by the excited voice of the rescued youth, who was exclaiming, “I’m a crusader too! We all were. We were going to free Jerusalem! Stephan saw it in a dream and the King blessed us! Stephan said we would not be opposed because we were free of sin." Bedraggled and ragged as he was, the sense of mission and his faith still echoed in his voice. "Stephan said -- Everywhere they -- In Marseilles...." He faltered as the men around him exchanged outraged exclamations.The Mate urged him to continue."In Marseilles, the French merchants demanded the usual fare for pilgrims." The boy sounded astonished, although it sounded perfectly reasonable to Blanche. "Stephan was furious and cursed them for their greed. ‘We are God's Children,’ he told them, ‘and our Father has called us home to Jerusalem. Did St. Christopher ask the Christ-Child to pay for his crossing?’ But they still refused. Fortunately, there were some Pisan captains in the harbour, who agreed to give us passage for free."The explosion of curses that erupted at this remark bewildered the boy. "That's why the slavers were so far north." "No wonder they had no interest in us." "How many were you in Marseilles?" The Mate asked."Oh, we were five thousand or even more," the youth said proudly“Christ weeps! The bastards must have made a fortune!""Who?""The Pisans you fool! Surely you don’t think the Pisans gave you free passage out of piety?! Or that it was pure chance that you were boarded by slavers? Did the Pisan crew die to the last man defending you?" The question was put entirely sarcasti­cally, but the boy answered earnestly, "We didn't see what happened. We were below deck, and then suddenly there were Arabs with huge, curving swords and niggers that bound our hands and tied us together." "The trade of a lifetime!" The Mate exclaimed bitterly. "5000 slaves picked up for free ― not even the expense and risks of going to Prussiato buy them from the heathens! Those Pisan captains will build palazzios from this day's work!""You can't mean Christians sold these Christian children ― crusading Children ― to the Saracen?" Claire was so horrified that her voice was higher than usual and it pierced through the murmur of male conversation."Yes, Claire, that's exactly what he means ― it is exactly what happened." Blanche answered wearily. She could almost envy Claire her naive refusal to believe there was so much evil among them or the boy's apparent simplicity as he scratched his head trying to understand what the Templars had just told him. But the girl in her arms was shivering and her teeth were chattering. "Please, will someone help me get this child below?" She addressed the men standing about her and at once a half-dozen willing hands offered to carry the girl for her. In her cabin, Claire insisted that they lay the girl in her own bunk, and as soon as the men had withdrawn, Blanche and Claire stripped the girl out of her wet clothes, dressed her in the warmest of Blanche’s nightgowns, and settled her into the bunk tucked in with blankets. “Sit with her a moment,” Blanche urged her waiting woman, “I’m just going to see if Sir Everard knows her name.”But when she returned with the information that the girl called herself Simone, she found Claire sitting on the floor beside the bunk sobbing her heart out.“What’s happened!” Blanche asked in horror. “Has she died?” But even as she asked, she heard the gentle sound of the girl breathing in a deep sleep. Blanche eased herself on the floor beside Claire and asked again, more gently this time. “What is, Claire? What’s the matter?”“All those children, Madame,” she gasped out between sobs. “They were the same children we saw in Chauvigny. The children who sang the “Song of Palestine” in the street and made me want to go on crusade! Oh, Madame! I wanted to join them then and there! Don’t you remember? I wanted to join them, but then you told me you were going to sail in search of Sir Abelard, so I ― I decided to go with you instead. But they were crusaders! And look what happened to them! All of them! Betrayed by Christians! How could He let this happen, Madame! And why?”Blanche had no answer, so she pulled her old serving woman into her arms just as she had the rescued child. It was only after she had been sitting like that for several minutes that she realized the Song of Palestine was running through her head and she couldn’t stop it. It was still luring her forward, toward the Holy Land.

A Widow's Crusade: Chapter 2

This is the second chapter of this novel, set in the start of the 13th century and describing a widow's voyage to the Holy Land on a personal crusade.  I will be publishing a chapter a week until Christmas. I hope you enjoy it -- and keep in mind that the text of the story is copyrighted.


CHAPTER TWO
Chauvigny, PoitouMay 1212

The light slanted down from a narrow window high above their heads and Blanche watched the dust particles dance in the sun-light while she listened to the nasal voice of the Templar chaplain reread the document he had composed at her request. She listened very carefully, making minor corrections as necessary, and she noted the way the Treasurer of the Commandery, who sat opposite her, raised his eye-brows once or twice. There were not many women who had such a good command of Latin, he noted dryly as they finished."I was an only child." Blanche replied, as if this explained everything.The chaplain turned the document around and passed it across the table to her. The treasurer shoved the lighted candle and the ceiling wax in her direction. Blanche took her time, skimming the written text to be sure it was identical to what had been read aloud. With this document she bequeathed the bulk of her estate to her son Jean-Pierre, but the precious stud-farm, the jewel of her inheritance, was sold to the Knights Templar for the princely sum of 1000 Louis Tournais. The facts were simple: Jean-Pierre would never be able to hold on to the stud-farm against his powerful and less scrupulous half-broth­ers. She preferred to see the Templars benefit from her father's prize stallions than her step-sons. When she had convinced herself that everything was exactly as she had decreed, she held the ceiling wax in the candle until it started to melt and then let the wax fall heavily upon the base of the document. Removing her signet ring, she pressed it carefully into the wax. The Treasurer was already holding out his hand palm up.Blanche rolled the parchment together and wrapped the red ribbon around the roll, tying it neatly and firmly as she would her embroidery threads. Then with a smile to the Treasurer, she took the document and slipped into her wide, flowing outer sleeve. "I want a receipt for the 100 Louis made out for redemption in Outremer, and I will turn this deed over to a representative of Your Order the day I am safely delivered to the household of Hughes de Hebron at Castle Montfort in Galilee."The Treasurer yanked his hand back and his eyes flashed with irritation. "I don't understand, Madame. If you wish to make a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, than you can be assured of the protection of the Knights Templar from here to any place in Palestine. That has nothing to do with the Testament you have just made." His hand, as if of its own accord, was reaching out again."I'm not going on pilgrimage. I am going to visit an old friend in the Holy Land, and since I am an old, foolish woman, I want a Templar escort from door to door." She smiled her most charming smile.The Treasurer's face was stony. "Madame, my Order is virtually the only bulwark holding back the Saracen hoards. We are involved in a life-and-death struggle every day. Our entire energy and resources are directed toward holding on to the Sacred Soil of our Saviour. The Knights and Sergeants of my Order are not for hire.""Ah." Blanche responded, looking him directly in the eye. "I certainly did not wish to imply that the Templars could be hired. But if my father's stud farm and the wonderful horses it could provide your knights for generations to come are not worth the trouble of escorting an old woman to Castle Montfort, than I suppose I should see if the Hospitallers--""I didn't say that!" The Treasurer interrupted her sharply. His face was harsh, his teeth clamped together, and she could see how much he hated her. But she smiled sweetly and waited for him to continue. "I will be sending dispatches to Acrein a fortnight. If you are ready by then--""But of course, Monsieur." She smiled rising, the deed still tucked neatly inside her sleeve."You will have to ride, Madame. No litter, no wagon. And only one servant.""I will take my waiting woman and a groom, Monsieur." Blanche told him calmly, and the Treasurer swallowed down this retort like bitter beer because he had no choice but to accept it.+  +  +Sir Everard tightened the girth of his fretful stallion with a sharp jerk and with his left hand automatically fended off the snapping teeth. He could not suppress the nervousness in his stomach, nor could he decide if it was an honor or an insult that he had been tasked to escort some old widow to the Holy Land. It was just two years since he had joined the Order, and this was the first time he had been entrusted with a task on his own. Even more awe-inspiring, it was his first opportunity to go to the Holy Land. But escorting an old noblewoman was hardly something a young man could be proud of, and, to complete the ambiguity, they had assigned Sergeant Lestelle to accompany him. Sergeant Lestelle was a grizzled veteran, with almost 40 years service with the Templars behind him. More than half that time had been spent Palestine, but ten years ago he had fallen ill and been sent back to France to recuperate. A strict disciplinarian, Lestelle had been given charge of training the novices, and was soon the most feared of all their training masters. Even now, Everard found himself checking his tack a second time, afraid that Lestelle might discover some flaw. The other two men assigned to the escort were lay-brothers. Brother Conan was a round-faced, balding man who usually tended the Commandery's fowl and seemed completely flustered and disoriented by the questionable honor of being tasked with escort duty. Brother Claude was a young, eager youth, who had not been with the Order very long and could not disguise his excitement at the prospect of travelling to the Holy Land. It seemed an odd assortment of individuals, but Everard reminded himself that the Commander would have had his reasons for selecting them and it was not his place to question them.The bells were ringing Prime and to Everard's surprise the party he was to escort arrived punctually. He hauled himself hurriedly into the saddle and rode over to greet his charges. He had no difficulty distinguishing between the Lady Blanche and her waiting woman, although both were modestly dressed in practical, light-weight dark cloaks and white wimples. Lady Blanche was riding a fine-boned bay mare that flaunted her breeding from every fiber of her well-groomed body. The waiting woman rode a big-boned, long-haired hack that seemed indifferent to its surround­ings. Approaching the Lady Blanche, Everard was careful to keep his eyes averted slightly. He greeted Lady Blanche politely and introduced himself. Lady Blanche at once offered him her hand, and he blushed slightly and looked over his shoulder toward the scowling Lestelle, uncertain if a Templar was allowed to kiss a lady's hand or not. Since he had joined the Order he had not had anything to do with women of any sort, much less ladies. His up-bringing won out over his religious scruples and he took her hand to his lips and bowed his head over it. "I'm perfectly aware that this is an unpleasant duty for you, Monsieur, but Claire and I will do our best not to make it more burdensome than necessary." Startled by her candor and her melodic voice, Everard looked directly into her face, only to be more startled by the discovery that she was handsome woman of middle age rather than the old crone he had imagined.  Remembering his vows, he looked hastily away, and tried to sound appropriately brisk as he said,   "If you are ready, Madame, we will depart at once."When Lady Blanch assured him she was as ready as she ever would be, Everard nodded shortly, and turned away from the women to signal for the others to mount. Five minutes latter the little party trotted out of the gate of the Commandery at Chauvigny bound for the Holy Land.+  +  +There were many good reasons why Blanche had decided on a Templar escort. Obviously the degree of protection one could expect from the best knights in Christendom was one, but another important advantage was the strict rules the Templars had against conversing with women.  Blanche wanted no undue inquiries about the purpose of her travels. It suited her very well to have an escort that kept their eyes on the road and spoke only when necessary.She appreciated too the efficiency of Templar planning, something they were famous for. Sir Everard, as expected, had planned their route carefully to enable them to spend each night at an abbey or priory. Furthermore, when he realized that Blanche was a very good rider and Claire uncomplaining, he adjusted the plan to accommodate longer stages that should have brought them to the their goal, the Templar Mediterranean port of Collioure, sooner. Unfortunately, the war in the Languedocgot in their way.  In Cahors, a city profiting immensely from financing and supplying the army of Simon de Montfort, they were advised to avoid travel through the County of Toulousealtogether. De Montfort, they were told, had taken Penne-d'Agenais from the Count of Toulouse' son-in-law, and laid siege to Moissac.  The latter, it was said, was putting up a fierce resistance, while Montau­ban still held firm for the Count of Toulouse. De Montfort, recognizing he could not conduct two major sieges at once, was meanwhile systematically raising, plundering and terrorizing the territory around and between both cities. Under the circumstances, even the neutral Templars could not hope to find food and lodgings in the area, Everard explained to Blanche, his eyes averted and his voice strangely strained.Blanche agreed to a circuitous route that skirted around the most devastated regions. This meant, however, that they had to travel through territory that had not yet been put to the sword by de Montfort and Everard warned that the area allegedly still harbored heretics.  Blanche was quick to note that many churches were very run-down and several abbeys had been abandoned altogether. On the second day, they passed two men on the road wearing black robes. Hearing horses behind them, the pedestrians had looked over their shoulders and then stepped down into the ditch to let the Templars ride past. Everard nodded his head and lifted his hand in thanks and greeting without thinking, only to be sharply rebuked by Lestelle, who reminded him: “Templars should not greet heretics!” Only then did Blanche realize the men must have been some of the so-called “good men,” the heretical preachers of the Cathars. She twisted in her saddle to try to get a better look at them, but Everard, ashamed of his blunder, increased their pace to put distance between himself and the incident.As they rode deeper into the Languedoc, Blanche noticed that the number of beggars increased significantly. Even more distressing, they could not halt for any reason without a whore sidling up to the party of men. Sergeant Lestelle, who had taken charge of Lady Blanche's groom no less than the two lay-brothers, gave him more than one rough cuff on the ears to keep him from gawking, and chased the girls away with oaths and threats.          Seeing the disgust and disdain on Lady Blanche's face after yet another incident of this sort, Everard approached her.  “Madame,” he did not meet her eye but she could sense how tense he was. “I beg you. Don't judge them too harshly.”Blanche was astonished to find the serious young Templar, who seemed dedicated to his vows of chastity, defending common whores.  But her surprise grew as he continued, “As a man who was raised not more than fifty miles from here, I know they were not born this way, Madame. They are products of the war. They have lost their homes, their brothers, their husbands. They have no one to protect them anymore and no other way to survive. God will forgive, Madam. I’m sure of it ― more easily than the men who made them what they are." Then he turned away quickly to shield his face from her gaze, and they spoke no more about it. 
Shortly thereafter they came upon the first village that had been completely burned. The charred rafters of the better houses lay in heaps upon the cold ashes and blackened earth. Just beyond the town they passed a mound that still stank abominably. Blanche and Clair covered their faces with her veils and looked the other way until the mass grave was long out of sight, while Everard kept muttering a prayer for the dead and crossing himself again and again.In Albi, the Bishop hosted them in luxury for several days and Blanche was grateful for his hospitality. Not only did they have a chance to bathe and wash all their clothes, they were entertained by exceptional musicians at each meal, and even on fast days, although the Bishop was scrupulous to offer only fish, the variety dazzled; porpoise, turtle, salmon, trout, eels, cod and crayfish were all included on the menu.Yet for all his efforts to be a good host, on their last evening the Bishop could not entirely hide his depression. He complained, "The half of the population is ensnared by the wily teachings of these so-called ‘good men’ and the other half is so starved for true salvation that they let their immature children wander off on a bare-foot crusade.""Crusade?" Blanche asked, lifting her head attentively."Have you not heard of it? Some shepherd from the Vendome has been rousing the masses to follow him to the Holy Land. He claims he had a vision and was told to reclaim the Holy Land from the Saracen by love rather than force. Preposterous idea! I should think your Order would be very critical, sir." The Bishop pointedly addressed Everard."My Order is distressed by so much naiveté." Everard answered readily. "It distracts attention from the very real need to defend Outremer.""Defend Outremer." The Bishop humpfed under his breath, smoothing his silken robes across his broad belly. "Half the farms are devoid of young-people, whole herds of sheep have been abandoned, and there isn't a shop in Albi that hasn't lost apprentices ― all run off to free the Holy Land! Mark my words, the peasants will be pleading poverty and the inability to fulfill their feudal duties by fall, and we will have famine by February. All because of some shepherd-boy who can beguile the simple-minded with fairy-tales about defeating the Saracen with love!"But eventually, tired and dusty after yet another long day on the road, Blanche and her two servants with their escort of Templars reached the Mediterranean port of Collioure.  They entered at dusk, just before the gates closed, and after a hot day that had made Claire almost faint and even Blanche feel miserable in her sweat-soaked clothes, a light breeze greeted them with a cool, soft breath off the placid sea. Blanche felt the wind on her face and glanced up as it rustled the long fingers of the palms planted beside the road, and completely forgot the discomforts of the trip. In that instant, she fell completely and permanently victim to the enchantment of the Mediterranean.The Templar Commandery sat on the shore commanding a private harbor, and here Blanche and Claire were given a chamber in the square keep. Windows opened in each wall, giving a view in all directions and providing a cooling draft. On the walls were frescoes depicting St. Christopher, Jonah and the Whale, Christ walking on water and - not entirely thematic - the ascension of the Virgin. Water was brought for bathing along with a light snack. Blanche was assured she would be received by the Commander the next morning after Terce.Although Claire all but fell into bed and started snoring at once, Blanche could not sleep. She pulled a shawl around her shoulders and went to sit in the window facing East.  From here, Blanche could hear the gentle hiss of languid waves upon the beach beside the harbor, and gaze upon the water shimmering under the light of a half-moon. This very same body of water caressed the shores of Palestine, she thought with excitement. “Outremer” meant “Beyond the Sea.” Outremer lay beyond this sea. And Abelard was there.For the first time since the day she had learned of his survival, Blanche surrendered to her feelings, systematically calling to mind each and every memory she had cherished and then neglected. So much was already obscured with time, blurred or lost to her entirely. She was no longer entirely sure where or when they first met. She knew sometime afterward there had been a tournament at which she had been courted by many bachelor knights, and he had been one of them. She had fancied him even then, but made a point of not showing it ― thinking it was clever to make him jealous. Now she despised the girl she had been then ― flirting and teasing and making light of another's feelings. Not that most of her contemporaries were more serious than she. It had been a game to them all ― nothing but a diverting amusement between more important things like meleés, hunts and falconry. The bachelor knights had dallied with her because she was pretty, but they did not take things too far because her father was a respected nobleman. Only with Abelard was it different. She had sensed that from the start, and that had excited and frightened her both. Her intuition told her that Abelard's interest in her was less superficial and more powerful than that of the others, something that was intensely satisfying to her vanity. But she had also heard enough lectures from her priest and warnings from her father to be alert to the danger of adventurers ― men who would not scruple to abduct and rape an heiress for her fortune. Abelard was a younger son, a man without land, and so a man with everything to gain by such tactics. How often had she sat up late into the night ― just like this ― trying to decide if he were a fortune-hunter merely waiting for the opportunity to dishonor her? The problem had robbed her of her sleep many a night because she could not tame her feelings for him. She had hungered for the sight of him, sought every opportunity to see and speak with him ― even if she then wasted the time with him in silly banter. Of course, no one was deceived by her pretended disinterest, and it even reached her father's ears that she was showing marked favor to Sir Abelard. That resulted in a severe scolding; her father sharply admonished her to have more care of his honor and her own.Vexed that Abelard had been the cause of rare parental disapproval, she had accused him of dishonorable inten­tions to his face. Abelard had denied the charges and withdrawn deeply offended. It had been months before they met again ― and by then he had taken the cross.The months apart had taught Blanche the intensity and persistence of her feelings. She had been so glad to see him again, she had dispensed with all falsehoods. She had even apologized to him for doubting his motives. He had replied that he would make himself worthy of her by gaining fame and fortune in the coming crusade.There had followed those three enchanted months in which they had been openly and exclusively in love and she hadn't cared who knew. They had danced only with each other, walked endless miles in the garden, hunted and hawked together. They were never allowed to be alone, of course. Claire shadowed them, and one or another of her father's knights or squires was in constant attendance when they rode out. But her father had tolerated the situation because he knew that the crusader would soon be taken away by his vows. Blanche had simply refused to believe that Abelard would really go away.Blanche sighed as she gazed upon the Mediterranean. With the wisdom of age, it was crystal clear that Abelard would go. That was what had always made him different from the others: he was serious and he took his word seriously. She cringed in retrospect to think how little she had understood him then, and how little she had appreciated his true value. She had been dazzled by his good looks, enthralled by his prowess at arms, and thrilled by his palpable desire for her. His steadiness of purpose, his earnestness and sober plans had meant little to her. But the widow had to give the maiden credit for one thing: she had fallen in love with the best of all the men she had known then or since. The decision she had made two months earlier to seek Abelard out in Palestinehad been motivated as much by boredom and restlessness as longing. Tonight, she felt herself drawn to him across this great peaceful basin of water which beckoned with its whisper­ing waves.
     

A Widow's Crusade: Chapter 1

For the next nine weeks, I will be publishing in installments on this blog a novella a wrote long ago. The novella is set in the start of the 13th century and describes a widow's voyage to Holy Land on a personal crusade. I hope you'll enjoy it -- and keep in mind that the text of the story are copyrighted.
                            CHAPTER ONE Chauvigny, PoitouEaster Week, 1212  The bells were clanging again from all the churches of the town. Blanche stepped up into the window seat to close the casement windows, but paused as she caught sight of the crowds in the narrow street below. This was neither a traditional Easter procession to the shrine of St. Pierrenor one of the guild pageants.  The people pouring down the narrow street like water in a flood wore neither the robes of the guilds nor the habits of the clergy, but they all had some sort of short white cape over their shoulders on which was painted or sewn a black cross. Arrested by memories of an earlier Crusade, Blanche leaned out of the window to get a better look at the crowd.Crusaders wore crosses similar to these, but crusaders were knights and men at arms, while the street below was filled with nothing but beardless youths and children. They were singing in high, breathy, off-key voices a melody that seemed to jar a memory, but the ineptness of their singing and the clanging of the bells obscured it. A gust of wind brought a shower of fine mist through the window, reminding and admonishing Blanche to shut the casement. The sound of the bells at once became fainter and the voices of the children were lost entirely. Instead, as she turned back toward the chamber, she became cognizant of the prattle of her guest. Madame de Mousseau was her daughter Jacquette's mother-in-law, a singularly unintelligent yet obsessively garrulous woman! With a deep sigh, Blanche unwrapped her veils and removed her hat while she tried to gather her patience. What did it matter how long or how pointlessly Madame de Mousseau chattered? As a widow whose children were both settled, Blanche had all the time in the world.  But what was that haunting melody the children had been singing? Not an Easter hymn, Blanch was certain, but an old song. She wondered vaguely why it should make her feel so sad. Her girlhood had been happy.The door opened and her waiting woman Claire entered shaking the rain from her cloak. "You should see what's going on in the street." She an­nounced breathlessly. "There’s a man out there preaching a new crusade!”Now Blanche recognized the melody the children had been running through her head: it was the “Song of Palestine,” a much beloved melody of Crusaders for at least two decades. Now it came to her more clearly, and she remembered dancing a slow carol to it, so long ago in her father's castle. But Claire was continuing in her excited voice. “Only this crusade will be completely different from all that have gone before. The last crusades failed because they did not follow Hisexample.” Claire was so excited she ignored the scandalized look of Madame de Mousseau and the annoyance on the faces of the young men.  “Christ came to earth to preach love, so we cannot regain Jerusalemwith the sword but only with the Holy Word. Anyone who wears a sword is expelled from the crusade!""There will not be many noblemen among this young man’s following then." Blanche remarked dryly."What does he want with noblemen?" Claire countered apparently fully enthalled by the idea, "Christ called for the poor, the sick and the lame - and above all he called for the children - to come to him. This crusade will triumph because of the innocence and purity of its crusaders!”Claire’s apparent conviction brought an outburst of laughter from the young men, Blanch’s son and son-in-law.  They at once started to mock poor Claire, "And what are the Saracens supposed to do?" Robert asked laughing. "Pack up their things and return to the desert just because a rag-tag mob of beggars and run-aways appears before the gates of Jerusalem?” "They aren't just riff-raff." Claire countered with astonishing verve.  Blanche couldn’t remember the last time her waiting woman had been so outspoken, particularly in company. "There were well-dressed youths and modest maidens among them!" She insisted.The young men at once started making lewd remarks about what kind of “modest” maidens took part in a “crusade,” laughing heartily as Claire blushed, more in frustration than shame.  Just as Blanche herself was about to intercede, Madame de Mousseau drew everyone's attention by announcing, "My son Bert is in the Holy Land, you know? He is squire to my sister's husband, one of the great barons of Outremer, Hughes de Hebron. Lord Hughes was named Constable of Montfort in Galilee last fall. I have a letter from Bert here. I brought it especially to read to you.” Before either of the young men could protest, Blanche declared she would be delighted to hear what Bert de Mousseau had to report from the Holy Land, in order to thereby distract attention from Claire. Madame de Mousseau removed the letter, while her audience, more or less reluctantly, settled down to listen.  Blanche sank into the windowseat, but she found it hard to listen to the rambling account of a young squire with no particular gift at expression.  He was rather like his mother, Blanche concluded maliciously, and her mind wandered.Outside in the street, the last stragglers were still passing below her window.  If there were any well-to-do children in this crusade, these were not they. The rear-guard of this curious crusade was made up of children already so lame and barefoot.   They limped and hobbled, dragging themselves along, in what looked like sheer desperation."....Sir Abelard de la Guiltiere. He--""What?!" Blanche’s attention was drawn back to letter being read aloud so abruptly that she knocked over her the embroidery screen set up beside the windowseat and it clattered to the floor. Everyone sprang up to help her set it on its tripod again. Blanche shooed them away, "It's alright! It's fine! Please read what you just read again.""My lord agreed to take him into his household--""Who?""Just some knight that approached him--""No, you read a name." Blanche insisted sharply.Madame de Mousseau stiffened and drew a face to indicate that she did not think Madame de Gouzon had a right to speak to her in such a tone, before she looked down at the letter again. “... a certain Sir Abelard de la Guiltiere. He offered his services to Sir Hughes and my lord agreed to take him into his household."Blanche couldn't breathe. The others seemed infinitely far away, their voices distant, while the melody hammered in her head. “At last my life has purpose, for my sinful eyes have been allowed to see the Land where God took human form....”"You've never seen a mill like this, Mama,” Madame de Mousseau was reading, “with running water to clean out the latrines and the kitchen slops, but to get back to Sir Abelard, it came out that he had been sold into Egyptian slavery--"The embroidery screen went toppling over a second time, and this time Jean-Pierre could not suppress an exasperated, "what's the matter with you, mother?""Excuse me. I'm not well." Blanche did not dare look at him or any of them. She had to get out of the room. She made for the spiral stairs in the corner. They would think she was making for a garderobe. Behind her she could hear their concerned voices, including Robert's practical speculation about which of the feast-day dishes did not sit well upon her stomach. "Too much Lenten fair and then such a feast. Some people such can't handle it." Claire was saying she’d go to the kitchen for butter and saffron to make a stomach poultice. Blanche had gained the stairs and so was shielded from their solicitous eyes. Gratefully she leaned back against the cold stone (there were no tapestries here). She let her head drop back against the wall and closed her eyes. The melodies and words were intermin­gled in confusion and overpowered by slow incessant beat of her heart. He wasn't dead.They had escaped the crowded, over-heated hall, giggling at their escape. Breathless from the dancing, she had stopped to catch her breath. He had loomed over her, taller by a head, and so broad of shoulder that she could not see around him when he leaned over her. For a moment she had been almost frightened to be so near to so much, barely curbed strength. She'd seen what that strength could do: unseat fully armored men with a single well-placed thrust of his lance. But when he bent to kiss her, his lips barely touched hers. They brushed against her so gently that she lifted her head seeking them. And he accepted the invitation gladly, kissing her hotly, breathlessly, until she had become frightened again, and wriggled out from under his arm, giggling.He let her go. Her strength was like that of a fly compared to his, but he did not try to use force. He had simply followed her, smiling a little sheepishly, but playing her silly, girlish games nevertheless.The widow found herself pounding her fists backwards against the wall. Christ! God! He wasn't dead. She'd married another man, taken his name, and raised his children. She'd let him break her maidenhead and plant his seed - and keep his mistress under her roof. She'd borne his children and worn mourning for 5 years for him. And she was trembling and in tears for a man she hadn't seen in 22 years. This was madness. She tried to pull herself together, but she couldn't face the others. She clutched her skirts and continued hastily up the stairs, seeking the privacy of her chamber. She still slept in the same room where Jacques de Gouzon had brought her the day after their wedding. The chamber had been carefully prepared for the new Lady. There were even fresh flowers in a glass vase. Her husband had pointed out to her the ivory jewelry-box and told her all the items in it belonged to her now. He had no daughters. The things he had inherited or which had belonged to his previous wives had been collected here. He seemed to think she would be delight­ed, but she had felt only a hollowness in her stomach. All the things someone else had bought for some other woman....She had waited for him tensely throughout the night, hardly sleeping. She had not been eager, not after the night before, but she’d been raised to think men were ardent lovers and she a beautiful bride. Only later did she learn he slept in his own chamber with a woman who’d shared his bed for a quarter of a century without ever carrying his name or being acknowledged in any way.Outside this chamber she was Madame. She had been given the keys to all the cellars and cupboards, and her husband had ordered his clerks to open their books to her. She had never managed such a large household before, almost 100 servants, and it was a tiring and demanding task that kept her busy all day. But nights she was alone in this well-furnished chamber with the new frescoes and the rich carpets. Alone, and young and full of childish wishes still. It was not her husband she had longed for, dreamed of and fantasized about. Blanche stared at the magnificently carved chest at the foot of her bed. On the lid two knights jousted with each-other, their lances straight and their shoulders hunched against the impact. On the side, under a double arcade, carved figures represented saints, kings and heroes. King Arthur was easily recognized and Roland with his horn to his lips. She went down onto her knees slowly, as if she was afraid of hurting herself. The chest was not locked. She lifted the lid and rested it against the bed behind. A shallow tray was laden with underwear - drawers and stockings and corsets in neat piles, all freshly washed. She lifted the tray out of the chest and set it on the floor next her. Now her summer shifts and gowns came to view.There was a knocking on the door, and Blanche started guiltily."My lady?" It Claire’s worried voice. “Madame? I’ve made a poultice?” "That’s kind of you, Claire, but I don’t need it. There’s nothing wrong with my stomach.”The door banged in the frame as the faithful servant tried to open it. "My lady? What's wrong?""Nothing. I was just - needed some time away from the others. I wish to pray. Go back to your fire and wine.""Are you sure, my lady?" Claire asked one last time. “Yes,” Blanche insisted, and sighed with relief when she heard Claire retreat. Now she could redirect her attention to her chest. Careful not to ruin the careful folding, she started to remove the shifts and gowns. She set the gowns and shifts and surcoats in neat piles around her, digging deeper and deeper until at last her fingers brushed heavy velvet at last. Now, with both hands she shoved aside the remaining clothes and drew a cloak from the very bottom of the chest. Slowly, her feet tingling from cut off circulation she had not even noticed, she drew herself to her feet. As she stood, she held the cloak at arms length, so it tumbled open. It was his cloak. He had sent it back to her from Marseilles, saying he would not need it in the sun-soaked Holy Land.At first she just stared at it in wonder, noting that the velvet was crushed beyond repair from the years at the bottom of her chest. Then she laid it over her left arm and with her right hand she stroked the beaver lining. Abruptly she flung it onto the bed, and started to undress herself. She glanced over her shoulder to be doubly sure that the door was bolted. Her adult mind kept telling her this was ridiculous. Utterly absurd. She was acting like a silly school girl - like that foolish 17 year-old who had made such a scene on the day of his departure.He had come to take his leave of her, and her father had received him more kindly than ever before, sharing a cup of his best wine with him in the great chamber. He had never looked more magnificent, his hair cut short for convenience in coif and helm and his beard trimmed neatly around his thin, strong lips. His chainmail had glittered even in the dim chamber, and his golden spurs had caught the fire-light. He wore a short, loose surcoat with no coat of arms but a blue crusader cross on the right breast over his heart. His left hand had rested on the hilt of a long-sword sheathed in elaborately worked silver. His hands were bare but for his signet ring. But when she had been summoned by her father to take her leave of him, she had lost all control over herself. At first, she had come calmly to stand demurely beside her father, but when she realized that he truly meant to take his leave (not ask for her hand as she had secretly hoped), she had refused to give him a kiss of peace. She had raised a face contorted and ugly with hate and shouted at him in her high-pitched, spoilt voice that she didn't care if he evercame back. The memory of that petulant, spoilt, girlish voice that made her cringe, as she removed her surcoat and hung it carefully upon one of the wall-hooks. Her gown was much more difficult to remove alone. She usually had Claire's assistance. The sleeves had buttons all the way to the elbow and the lacings of the gown went down her back. With increasing frustration that only fired her senseless determination, she struggled until she could worm her way out of the gown, hot and sweating and red in the face. But she could not stop. Her father, who had never liked him, had reproached her sharply for her behavior, sending her away angrily and apologizing to him. She had fled to her chamber, and then watched from the window until she had seen him descend the steps from the hall and mount his great stallion. The stallion too had been decked out in great finery with a trapper that went to his ankles and a saddle studded with brass tacks. She had leaned out of the window and shouted down at him in one last desperate attempt to salvage her dreams. "If you leave me now, don't ever, ever come back! Do you understand? I never want to see you again!"He had glanced up toward her window once, then ridden out of the ward without a backward glance. She had flung herself on her bed screaming and weeping and pounding her pillow until her father sent Claire to tell her if she continued to behave like a five-year-old, he’d treat her like one and she would be locked in her room for week. But he had sent his cloak back to her with a letter. He would not need the cloak in the Holy Land, he told her, but he hoped she would keep it for him until he came back. She had burned his letter in fury at his arrogance. How dare he think she would wait for him?! She had dozens of other suitors! She was an heiress and she was pretty, with a waist he could enclose in his two hands. Why should she wait for him? If the Holy Land was more important to him than she was, than he could stay in Holy Land forever! He would never have her! But when she had raised her hand to fling his cloak after the letter into the fire, her strength had failed her. She had stood with it bunched up over her head, while the cloak felt heavier and heavier, until she had flung it angrily at her chest instead and run, weeping, into the garden. It had been poor faithful Claire, who had carefully folded the expensive cloak and placed it at the bottom of the chest ‘for when Monsieur Abelard comes back.’Blanche worked to free herself of the corset. It laced up the front and held her ever thicker waist firm while supporting her heavy breasts - breasts that had grown round with her pregnancies but now sagged sadly. Tears stood in her eyes, but there was no point stopping now. She removed the corset and her shift and last but not least her drawers. At last, she stood completely naked with her discarded underclothes strewn about her on the floor ― as if a lover had torn them from her in his haste.But what lover would be in haste to have her body as it was now? She could hardly bear to look at what had become of her once elflike figure. It was now so laden with excessive padding that it was all but shapeless. The chill in the unheated chamber made her shiver and she became aware of the hiss of the drizzle against the tiny, circular window-pains in the narrow window. But that only made it easier to reach at last for the musty cloak and pull it around her.The fur was soft - as soft and gentle as his kisses had been. She closed her eyes against the present and felt his warmth, preserved in the folds of his cloak for a quarter century. He wrapped his arms around her in a caress as gentle as it was possessive."Abelard!" She screamed after him, but no sound came out of her mouth. "Abelard." She whimpered as she sank onto the floor, his cloak caressing her nakedness across the sea and across the decades. Her head clunked against the base board of the bed and she wept for all the wasted years, her lost youth, her faded beauty, the husband who had loved only her father's stud farm, and a stupid, selfish, spiteful girl who shouted out her window that he should never come home.

Friday the 13th and the Destruction of the Knights Templar

On the night of Friday, October 13th, 1307, the forces of King Philip IV of France carried out a surprise attack upon all Templar Commanderies across France, breaking in, arresting and seizing the assets of the Knights Templar. In the days to follow, the Knight's Templar were charged with the usual crimes of heresy and sodomy -- allegations that the French crown routinely raised against individuals and institutions that were not completely submissive or had substantial private assets that the French king wanted for his treasury. In the years to follow mock trials, wholesale torture of prisoners, and ultimately the burning alive of hundreds of innocent men followed in what was one of the worst know cases of brutal tyranny in the western world. 

Although some, particularly wealthier, elements in society appear to welcomed the humiliation of a mighty and haughty institution, and some of the poor and ignorant may have believed the ridiculous allegations of sorcery and devil worship, as time passed and the extent of the French king's greed, the refusal of brutally tortured men to "confess" -- even under the threat of being burned alive -- gradually convinced the majority of people that the Knights Templar were largely innocent victims of the French king's greed. 

Gradually, in the popular mind, Friday the 13th (of October 1307) was remembered as day in which forces of evil had pounced upon unsuspecting good Christians, utterly destroying them despite their faith.  As the memory of the actual event faded, the association of Friday the 13th with something unnaturally evil and threatening remained.  This is the origin of the superstition about Friday the 13th right up into the 20th Century -- 700 years after the destruction of the Knights Templar.

Although I'm a week late, I'd like to remind readers of the event with the following short excerpt from The English Templar, which describes that Friday the 13th through the eyes of the novel's hero:

The crash that came from the courtyard made Percy fling off his blankets and grab his aketon. Now he could hear more shouting, the imperative yelling of men giving orders, the thudding of numerous hooves on frozen ground, the pounding of boots on wooden stairs, the clunk of doors being flung open. He pulled the aketon over his head and tightened the laces at his throat.

Men were bursting into the dormitory. By the light of the two candles, Percy could see that they wore round 'kettle' helmets over mail coifs and that they had naked swords in their hands.

Percy dragged his hauberk and surcoat together over his head even as the armed men were roughly kicking the serving brothers awake and herding the startled, bewildered men together.

Sergeant Gautier was on his feet and limping forward in his underwear, calling out, "What is this? Who are you? What do you want?"

"You are all arrested in the name of His Grace King Philip IV of France!"

While some of the serving brothers broke into a jumble of confused exclamations of disbelief, Brother Gautier protested in a raised, somewhat hysterical voice, "Why? On what charge?"

The thought that these simple brothers could have done anything to offend the crown of France was so absurd that Percy instantly dismissed the claim as either a mistake or a ruse. Philip of France could hardly know that Saint Pierre du Temple existed. The Temple was, in any case, not subordinate to any king and owed Philip of France neither taxes nor obedience. Percy knew, however, that he no longer had time for his mail leggings and reached instead for his sword.

There was a shout and the sound of someone running and then someone tackled him from behind. He was flung stomach first on to his pallet, pinned down by the weight of his assailant on his back. Even as he rammed his elbows backwards against his attacker, he saw a foot kick out and send his sword skittering across the flagstone floor out of reach. Another man had joined the first on his back, pressing his knee into Percy's spine. Another had hold of the back of his neck in a powerful, muscular grip and forced his face down into the blankets, nearly suffocating him.  Someone was wrenching his arms behind his back and tying his wrists together. Percy knew when he was defeated since that too was something a good soldier learned to recognize, and he stopped struggling instantly. The pressure on his spine and head eased at once. The men backed off him, pulling him to his feet.

He looked over his shoulder and saw that the men holding him were indeed wearing the livery of the king of France. It was ridiculous! What could they possibly hope to gain by a breach with the pope? Did Philip of France want to start a feud with Clement V to match the one he had had with Boniface VIII? Weak as Clement was said to be, even he would surely not tolerate such a flagrant affront to his authority.

The king's men were already herding the bewildered serving brothers and the priest down the stairs to the courtyard. One old man kept asking his brothers what was happening, while Gaston kept looking anxiously over his shoulder to see what had happened to Percy. Serfs by birth, they had been born to docility and as monks they had vowed obedience. Such men, Percy told himself, could not be expected to distinguish between lawful and unlawful authority.

Brother Gautier alone was protesting to the captain in charge. He insisted that he and his brothers were innocent of all wrongdoing. Not one day in their lives had they ever been anything but loyal subjects of the king, he assured the king's representative in a shaky, strained voice. Terror was written on the aged sergeant's face and Percy felt sorry for him. Evidently, he was so frightened that he had forgotten that the Temple was subordinate to the pope alone.

"It's not for me to judge your guilt or innocence," the royal officer told Brother Gautier matter-of-factly. "I have my orders."

"But who gave you the orders? What is the cause of all this? I don't understand," Brother Gautier insisted, wringing his hands.

"Take it up with the sheriff," the royal officer advised indifferently.

The captain was relieved that his mission had gone so well. The orders to attack a house of the Knights Templar and arrest all those within had made him break out in a cold sweat just six hours ago. He had been raised on the legends of Templars defending their castles against tens of thousands of Saracens, their small bands matching great armies, their rescue of King Louis II from destruction, their heroic defense of Acre to the last man. The captain knew that Templars were not allowed to withdraw unless the enemy had more than three-to-one superiority, and he could not know how many men the Templars had at Saint Pierre -- which was why he'd mustered his entire company of fifty men.  In the event, it was almost ludicrous how easy it had been.

Percy's voice drew the captain's attention: "You can be sure that we will take this up with the sheriff -- and the pope! Someone -- you, your sheriff, or King Philip himself -- has overstepped his authority."

The captain looked over startled at the man held by two of his subordinates.  He took in the chainmail hauberk, the muscular shoulders and thighs, and drew the correct conclusion.  This man was a knight. "Are you the commander, sir?"

"No, I am the commander," Brother Gautier spoke before Percy could get a word out, continuing, "this is just a poor traveler. Here for a single night. Whatever crimes we have been unjustly accused of, they cannot apply to him."

The captain looked from Brother Gautier to Percy somewhat uncertainly.

"I am an Englishman, Sir Percy de Lacy, of the Commandery at Limassol on Cyprus, en route from Poitiers to Limassol," Percy confirmed.  "And you have no business arresting any Templar, since we are subordinate to no one but our own officers and the pope himself."

The arrogance of Percy's tone angered the captain and he took refuge in the certainties of life: "I have my orders and they were to arrest everyone inside this house. I don't give a damn if you are a bloody Englishman or the pope himself!"

And he turned his back on the the two remaining Templars and clattered down the stairs to the ward, his men pushing Percy and Brother Gautier before them as they followed him outside. 

Friday the 13th and the Destruction of the Knights tyranny

On the night of Friday, October 13th, 1307, the forces of King Philip IV of France carried out a surprise attack upon all Templar Commanderies across France, breaking in, arresting and seizing the assets of the Knights Templar. In the days to follow, the Knight's Templar were charged with the usual crimes of heresy and sodomy -- allegations that the French crown routinely raised against individuals and institutions that were not completely submissive or had substantial private assets that the French king wanted for his treasury. In the years to follow mock trials, wholesale torture of prisoners, and ultimately the burning alive of hundreds of innocent men followed in what was one of the worst know cases of brutal tyranny in the western world. 

Although some, particularly wealthier, elements in society appear to welcomed the humiliation of a mighty and haughty institution, and some of the poor and ignorant may have believed the ridiculous allegations of sorcery and devil worship, as time passed and the extent of the French king's greed, the refusal of brutally tortured men to "confess" -- even under the threat of being burned alive -- gradually convinced the majority of people that the Knights Templar were largely innocent victims of the French king's greed. 

Gradually, in the popular mind, Friday the 13th (of October 1307) was remembered as day in which forces of evil had pounced upon unsuspecting good Christians, utterly destroying them despite their faith.  As the memory of the actual event faded, the association of Friday the 13th with something unnaturally evil and threatening remained.  This is the origin of the superstition about Friday the 13th right up into the 20th Century -- 700 years after the destruction of the Knights Templar.

Although I'm a week late, I'd like to remind readers of the event with the following short excerpt from The English Templar, which describes that Friday the 13th through the eyes of the novel's hero:

The crash that came from the courtyard made Percy fling off his blankets and grab his aketon. Now he could hear more shouting, the imperative yelling of men giving orders, the thudding of numerous hooves on frozen ground, the pounding of boots on wooden stairs, the clunk of doors being flung open. He pulled the aketon over his head and tightened the laces at his throat.

Men were bursting into the dormitory. By the light of the two candles, Percy could see that they wore round 'kettle' helmets over mail coifs and that they had naked swords in their hands.

Percy dragged his hauberk and surcoat together over his head even as the armed men were roughly kicking the serving brothers awake and herding the startled, bewildered men together.

Sergeant Gautier was on his feet and limping forward in his underwear, calling out, "What is this? Who are you? What do you want?"

"You are all arrested in the name of His Grace King Philip IV of France!"

While some of the serving brothers broke into a jumble of confused exclamations of disbelief, Brother Gautier protested in a raised, somewhat hysterical voice, "Why? On what charge?"

The thought that these simple brothers could have done anything to offend the crown of France was so absurd that Percy instantly dismissed the claim as either a mistake or a ruse. Philip of France could hardly know that Saint Pierre du Temple existed. The Temple was, in any case, not subordinate to any king and owed Philip of France neither taxes nor obedience. Percy knew, however, that he no longer had time for his mail leggings and reached instead for his sword.

There was a shout and the sound of someone running and then someone tackled him from behind. He was flung stomach first on to his pallet, pinned down by the weight of his assailant on his back. Even as he rammed his elbows backwards against his attacker, he saw a foot kick out and send his sword skittering across the flagstone floor out of reach. Another man had joined the first on his back, pressing his knee into Percy's spine. Another had hold of the back of his neck in a powerful, muscular grip and forced his face down into the blankets, nearly suffocating him.  Someone was wrenching his arms behind his back and tying his wrists together. Percy knew when he was defeated since that too was something a good soldier learned to recognize, and he stopped struggling instantly. The pressure on his spine and head eased at once. The men backed off him, pulling him to his feet.

He looked over his shoulder and saw that the men holding him were indeed wearing the livery of the king of France. It was ridiculous! What could they possibly hope to gain by a breach with the pope? Did Philip of France want to start a feud with Clement V to match the one he had had with Boniface VIII? Weak as Clement was said to be, even he would surely not tolerate such a flagrant affront to his authority.

The king's men were already herding the bewildered serving brothers and the priest down the stairs to the courtyard. One old man kept asking his brothers what was happening, while Gaston kept looking anxiously over his shoulder to see what had happened to Percy. Serfs by birth, they had been born to docility and as monks they had vowed obedience. Such men, Percy told himself, could not be expected to distinguish between lawful and unlawful authority.

Brother Gautier alone was protesting to the captain in charge. He insisted that he and his brothers were innocent of all wrongdoing. Not one day in their lives had they ever been anything but loyal subjects of the king, he assured the king's representative in a shaky, strained voice. Terror was written on the aged sergeant's face and Percy felt sorry for him. Evidently, he was so frightened that he had forgotten that the Temple was subordinate to the pope alone.

"It's not for me to judge your guilt or innocence," the royal officer told Brother Gautier matter-of-factly. "I have my orders."

"But who gave you the orders? What is the cause of all this? I don't understand," Brother Gautier insisted, wringing his hands.

"Take it up with the sheriff," the royal officer advised indifferently.

The captain was relieved that his mission had gone so well. The orders to attack a house of the Knights Templar and arrest all those within had made him break out in a cold sweat just six hours ago. He had been raised on the legends of Templars defending their castles against tens of thousands of Saracens, their small bands matching great armies, their rescue of King Louis II from destruction, their heroic defense of Acre to the last man. The captain knew that Templars were not allowed to withdraw unless the enemy had more than three-to-one superiority, and he could not know how many men the Templars had at Saint Pierre -- which was why he'd mustered his entire company of fifty men.  In the event, it was almost ludicrous how easy it had been.

Percy's voice drew the captain's attention: "You can be sure that we will take this up with the sheriff -- and the pope! Someone -- you, your sheriff, or King Philip himself -- has overstepped his authority."

The captain looked over startled at the man held by two of his subordinates.  He took in the chainmail hauberk, the muscular shoulders and thighs, and drew the correct conclusion.  This man was a knight. "Are you the commander, sir?"

"No, I am the commander," Brother Gautier spoke before Percy could get a word out, continuing, "this is just a poor traveler. Here for a single night. Whatever crimes we have been unjustly accused of, they cannot apply to him."

The captain looked from Brother Gautier to Percy somewhat uncertainly.

"I am an Englishman, Sir Percy de Lacy, of the Commandery at Limassol on Cyprus, en route from Poitiers to Limassol," Percy confirmed.  "And you have no business arresting any Templar, since we are subordinate to no one but our own officers and the pope himself."

The arrogance of Percy's tone angered the captain and he took refuge in the certainties of life: "I have my orders and they were to arrest everyone inside this house. I don't give a damn if you are a bloody Englishman or the pope himself!"

And he turned his back on the the two remaining Templars and clattered down the stairs to the ward, his men pushing Percy and Brother Gautier before them as they followed him outside.