Labyrinth (19 page)

The hours crawled by. Her mouth was dry and her heart staggered under the influence of the whisky. Not until the pale white dawn crept under the worn edges of the curtains did her mind finally give in.

This time, a different dream.

She was riding a chestnut horse through the snow. Its winter coat was thick and glossy, and its white mane and tail were plaited with red ribbons. She was dressed for hunting in her best cloak with the squirrel-fur
pelisse
and hood and long leather gloves lined with marten fur that went up as high as her elbows.

A man was riding beside her on a gray gelding, a bigger, more powerful animal with a black mane and tail. He pulled repeatedly on the reins to keep it steady. His brown hair was long for a man, skimming his shoulders. His blue velvet cloak streamed behind him as he drove his mount on. Alice saw he wore a dagger at his waist. Around his neck was a silver chain with a single green stone hanging from it, which banged up and down against his chest to the rhythm of the horse.

He kept glancing over at her with a mixture of pride and ownership. The connection between them was strong, intimate. In her sleep, Alice shifted position and smiled.

Some way off, a horn was blowing sharp and shrill in the crisp December air, proclaiming that the hounds were on the trail of a wolf. She knew it was December, a special month. She knew she was happy.

Then, the light changed.

Now she was alone in a part of the forest she did not recognize. The trees were taller and more dense, their bare branches black and twisted against the white, snow-laden sky, like dead men’s fingers. Somewhere behind her, unseen and threatening, the dogs were gaining on her, excited by the promise of blood.

She was no longer the hunter, but the quarry.

The forest reverberated with a thousand thundering hooves, getting closer and closer. She could hear the baying of the huntsmen now. They were shouting to one another in a language she did not understand, but she knew they were looking for her.

Her horse stumbled. Alice was thrown, falling forward out of the saddle and down to the hard, wintry ground. She heard the bone in her shoulder crack, then searing pain. She looked down in horror. A piece of dead wood, frozen solid like the head of an arrow, had pierced her sleeve and impaled her arm.

With numb and desperate fingers, Alice pulled at the fragment until it came loose, closing her eyes against the aching pain. Straight away, the blood started to flow, but she couldn’t let that stop her.

Staunching the bleeding with the hem of her cloak, Alice scrambled to her feet and forced herself on through the naked branches and petrified undergrowth. The brittle twigs snapped under her feet and the ice-cold air pinched her cheeks and made her eyes water.

The ringing in her ears was louder now, more insistent, and she felt faint. As insubstantial as a ghost.

Suddenly, the forest was gone and Alice found herself standing on the edge of a cliff. There was nowhere left to go. At her feet was a sheer drop to a wooded precipice below. In front of her were the mountains, capped with snow, stretching as far as the eye could see. They were so close she felt she could almost reach out and touch them.

In her sleep, Alice shifted uneasily.

Let me wake up. Please.

She struggled to wake up, but she couldn’t. The dream held her too tightly in its coils.

The dogs burst out of the cover of the trees behind her, barking, snarling. Their breath clouded the air as their jaws snapped, drools of spit and blood hanging from their teeth. In the gathering dusk, the tips of the huntsmen’s spears glinted brightly. Their eyes were filled with hate, with excitement. She could hear them whispering, jeering, taunting her.

“
Heretique, heretique
.”

In that split second, the decision was made. If it was her time to die, it would not be at the hands of such men. Alice lifted her arms wide and jumped, commending her body to the air.

Straight away, the world fell silent.

Time ceased to have any meaning as she fell, slowly and gently, her green skirts billowing out around her. Now she realized there was something pinned to her back, a piece of material in the shape of a star. No, not a star but a cross. A yellow cross.
Kouelle.
As the unfamiliar word drifted in and then out of her mind, the cross came loose and floated away from her, like a leaf dropping from a tree in autumn.

The ground came no nearer. Alice was no longer afraid. For even as the dream images started to splinter and break apart, her subconscious mind understood what her conscious mind could not. That it was not her— Alice—who fell, but another.

And this was not a dream, but a memory. A fragment from a life lived a long, long time ago.

CHAPTER 17

Carcassona

JULHE I209

Twigs and leaves cracked as Alais shifted position.

There was a rich smell of moss, lichen and earth in her nose, her mouth. Something sharp pierced the back of her hand, the tiniest jab that immediately began to sting. A mosquito or an ant. She could feel the poison seeping into her blood. Alais moved to brush the insect away. The movement made her retch.

Where am I?

The answer, like an echo.
Defora
. Outside.

She was lying facedown on the ground. Her skin was clammy, slightly chill from the dew. Daybreak or dusk? Her clothes, tangled around her, were damp. Taking it slowly, Alais managed to lever herself into a sitting position, leaning against the trunk of a beech tree to keep herself steady.

Docament
. Softly, carefully.

Through the trees at the top of the slope she could see the sky was white, strengthening to pink on the horizon. Flat clouds floated like ships becalmed. She could make out the black outlines of weeping willows. Behind her were pear and cherry trees, drab and naked of color this late in the season.

Dawn, then. Alais tried to focus on her surroundings. It seemed very bright, blinding, even though there was no sun. She could hear water not far off, shallow and moving lazily over the stones. In the distance, the distinctive
kveck-kveck
of an eagle owl coming back from his night’s hunting.

Alais glanced down at her arms, which were marked with small, angry red bites. She examined the scratches and cuts on her legs too. As well as insect bites, her ankles were ringed with dried blood. She held her hands up close to her face. Her knuckles were bruised and sore. Lines of rust-red streaks between the fingers.

A memory. Of being dragged, arms trailing along the ground.

No, before that.

Walking across the courtyard. Lights in the upper windows.

Fear pricked the back of her neck. Footsteps in the dark, the callused hand across her mouth, then the blow.

Perilhos
. Danger.

She raised her hand to her head and then winced as her fingers connected with the sticky mass of blood and hair behind her ear. She screwed her eyes shut, trying to blot out the memory of the hands crawling over her like rats. Two men. A commonplace smell, of horses, ale and straw.

Did they find the
merel?

Alai’s struggled to stand. She had to tell her father what had happened. He was going to Montpellier, that much she could remember. She had to speak with him first. She tried to get up, but her legs would not hold her. Her head was spinning again and she was falling, falling, slipping back into a weightless sleep. She tried to fight it and stay conscious, but it was no use. Past and present and future were part of an infinite time now, stretching out white before her. Color and sound and light ceased to have any meaning.

CHAPTER 18

With a final, anxious glance back over his shoulder, Bertrand Pelletier rode out of the Eastern Gate at Viscount Trencavel’s side. He could not understand why Alai’s had not come to see them off.

Pelletier rode in silence, lost in his own thoughts, hearing little of the inconsequential chatter going on around him. His spirits were troubled at her absence from the Cour d’Honneur to see them off and wish the expedition well. Surprised, disappointed too, if he could bring himself to admit it. He wished now he had sent Francois to wake her.

Despite the earliness of the hour, the streets were lined with people waving and cheering. Only the finest horses had been chosen. Palfreys whose resilience and stamina could be relied upon, as well as the strongest geldings and mares from the stables of the Chateau Comtal picked for speed and endurance. Raymond-Roger Trencavel rode his favorite bay stallion, a horse he’d trained himself from a colt. Its coat was the color of a fox in winter and on its muzzle was a distinctive white blaze, the exact shape, or so it was said, of the Trencavel lands.

Every shield displayed the Trencavel ensign. The crest was embroidered on every flag and the vest each
chevalier
wore over his traveling armor. The rising sun glanced off the shining helmets, swords and bridles. Even the saddlebags of the pack horses had been polished until the grooms could see their faces reflected in the leather.

It had taken some time to decide how large the
envoi
should be. Too small and Trencavel would seem an unworthy and unimpressive ally and they would be easy pickings on the road. Too large and it would look like a declaration of war.

Finally, sixteen
chevaliers
had been chosen, Guilhem du Mas among them, despite Pelletier’s objections. With their
ecuyers,
a handful of servants and churchmen, Jehan Congost and a smith for working repairs to the horses’ shoes en route, the party numbered some thirty in total.

Their destination was Montpellier, the principal city within the domains of the viscount of Nimes and the birthplace of Raymond-Roger’s wife, Dame Agnes. Like Trencavel, Nimes was a vassal of the king of Aragon, Pedro II, so even though Montpellier was a Catholic city—and Pedro himself a staunch and energetic persecutor of heresy—there was reason to expect they would have safe passage.

They had allowed three days to ride from Carcassonne. It was anybody’s guess as to which of them, Trencavel or the count of Toulouse, would arrive in the city first.

At first they headed east, following the course of the Aude toward the rising sun. At Trebes, they turned northwest into the lands of the Minervois, following the old Roman road that ran through La Redorte, the fortified hill town of Azille, and on to Olonzac.

The best land was given over to the
canabieres,
the hemp fields, which stretched as far as the eye could see. To their right were vines, some pruned, others growing wild and untended at the side of the track behind vigorous hedgerows. To their left was a sea of emerald-green stalks of the barley fields, which would turn to gold by harvest time. Peasants, their wide-brimmed straw hats obscuring their faces, were already hard at work, reaping the last of the season’s wheat. The iron curve of their scythes catching the rising sun from time to time.

Beyond the river bank, lined with oak trees and marsh willow, were the deep and silent forests where the wild eagles flew. Stag, lynx and bear were plentiful, wolves and foxes too in the winter. Towering above the lowland woods and coppice were the dark forests of the Montagne Noire where the wild boar was king.

With the resilience and optimism of youth, Viscount Trencavel was in good spirits, exchanging lighthearted anecdotes and listening to tales of past exploits. He argued with his men about the best hunting dogs, greyhounds or mastiffs, about the price of a good brood bitch these days, gossiped about who had wagered what at darts or dice.

Nobody talked of the purpose of the expedition, nor of what would happen if the viscount failed in his petitions to his uncle.

A raucous shout from the back of the line drew Pelletier’s attention. He glanced over his shoulder. Guilhem du Mas was riding three abreast with Alzeu de Preixan and Thierry Cazanon,
chevaliers
who’d also trained in Carcassonne and been dubbed the same Passiontide.

Aware of the older man’s critical scrutiny, Guilhem raised his head and met his gaze with an insolent stare. For a moment they held each other fixed. Then, the younger man inclined his head slightly, an insincere acknowledgment, and turned away. Pelletier felt his blood grow hot, all the worse for knowing there was nothing he could do.

For hour after hour they rode across the plains. The conversation faltered, then petered out as the excitement that had accompanied their departure from the Cite gave way to apprehension.

The sun climbed ever higher in the sky. The churchmen suffered the most in their black worsted habits. Rivulets of sweat were dripping down the bishop’s forehead and Jehan Congost’s spongy face had turned an unpleasant blotchy red, the color of foxgloves. Bees, crickets and cicadas rattled and hummed in the brown grass. Mosquitoes pricked at their wrists and hands, and flies tormented the horses, causing them to switch their manes and tails in irritation.

Only when the sun was full overheard did Viscount Trencavel lead them off the road to rest awhile. They settled on a glade beside a slow-flowing stream, having established the grazing was safe. The
ecuyers
unsaddled the horses and cooled their coats with willow leaves dipped in the water. Cuts and bites were treated with dock leaves or mustard poultices.

The
chevaliers
removed their traveling armor and boots, washing the dust and sweat from their hands and necks. A small contingent of servants was dispatched to the nearest farm, returning some time later with bread and sausage, white goat’s cheese, olives and strong, local wine.

As the news spread that Viscount Trencavel was camped nearby, a steady stream of farmers and peasants, old men and young women, weavers and brewers started to make their way to their humble camp under the trees, carrying gifts for their
seigneur:
baskets of cherries and newly fallen plums, a goose, salt and fish.

Pelletier was uneasy. It would delay them and use up precious time. They had a great deal of ground to cover before the evening shadows lengthened and they pitched camp for the night. But, like his father and mother before him, Raymond-Roger enjoyed meeting his subjects and would have none turned away.