Pagan's Daughter (9 page)

I can’t speak. I want to, but I can’t.

‘I’m sorry,’ he says. ‘This is a hard thing for you.’

‘It’s not hard.’ I’m strong. I’m Toulousain. I can talk, even if my voice
is
squeaky. ‘My mother died a glorious martyr’s death.’ (So there!) ‘She was killed with all the other Perfects after the siege of Lavaur. Simon de Montfort cut her throat.’ Seeing the priest swallow, I drive the point home. ‘That was after he hanged my uncle Aimery, and threw my Aunt Guiraude down a well and stoned her to death.’

The priest says something else in Latin—something abrupt and urgent, like steam hissing from a covered pot. He takes a deep breath.

‘I didn’t know this,’ he says. ‘We didn’t know this, Babylonne. We heard that the French had taken Lavaur, but we hoped—we thought . . .’ He crosses himself, sending a shiver down my back.

When he starts to recite a prayer, I can’t be polite any longer.

‘My mother wouldn’t want your prayers!’

‘Are you sure?’ He doesn’t seem offended. He speaks calmly. ‘You didn’t know her, Babylonne.’

‘And whose fault is that? It’s the fault of the Roman church, which sent French knights here to kill all the Good Christians, and trample the land, and conquer the true lords of Languedoc, all in the name of a false God!’ Suddenly it occurs to me that I’m in a convent, thanks to the priest’s quick glance at the door. I suppose I’d better lower my voice. ‘But we will never submit.’ (Whispering, now.) ‘The Count of Toulouse will never submit—no, nor the Viscount of Carcassonne, nor Olivier de Termes, nor any of the
faidit
lords! They will fight, and I will fight alongside them. The French will never be our masters, even if we have to kill every Frenchman who comes here, and send their heads back to the King their master on the pikes of our armies!’

I might as well be throwing pebbles at a fortress wall. My words just seem to bounce off the priest’s pale, motionless features.

He’s watching me like an owl, without blinking.

‘We’d better go,’ he says after a while. ‘If we leave now, we should reach Braqueville by nightfall. Perhaps even Muret.’

‘
Muret?
’ If we had wings, perhaps. I’m trying to think. Muret? That’s past Portet. ‘It was daybreak when we left Toulouse, and the bells were ringing for terce when we got here. We have to get back to Toulouse, then go around it, and then from Toulouse to Muret it has to be half a day’s walk at
least
—’

‘We’ll be riding, not walking,’ he interrupts, and climbs to his feet. Gazing down at me, he adds, ‘I bought you a horse. From the Abbess.’

Huh?

‘Come.’ He jerks his chin. ‘You can help me to pack.’

CHAPTER EIGHT

What a day it’s been.

First the escape. Then the shock of the priest. Then the nunnery. And now the horse.

I can’t believe that I’m actually sitting on a horse. A living, breathing brown palfrey with a leather saddle on its back.

Not that you could really call it
sitting
. Slipping and sliding, maybe. Bumping and swaying. Holding on for dear life, because I’ve never ridden a horse before. No one’s ever considered me good enough for a horse.

Yet the priest bought me one to ride on. This is what I can’t understand. Why would he do such a thing? It must have cost him at least three livres tournois. Perhaps more. And how much will it cost to feed? And shelter? And—

Whoops!

Almost slipped off sideways.

You see, this is why I haven’t been able to talk. This is why I’ve hardly even noticed where we are. The moment I stop concentrating and start looking around at the scenery—bang!

I find myself dangling off the stirrup like a loose strap.

Perhaps it’s just as well, though. If I’d had my wits about me while we were skirting Toulouse, I would have had a very sweaty time of it. I would have been terrified that someone might start shouting and pointing:
There she is! The thief! The heretic thief! She stole money and scissors and a good pair of fur-lined boots!
Luckily, though, I was so worried about keeping more or less upright that I hardly spared a thought for what might be happening inside the city walls.

And now here we are, past Braqueville already.

I remember this stretch of road. We came this way from Laurac, last year. I remember all the vineyards (so many vineyards!), and the river flats, and the distant, gentle hills, and the river—so
clean
here, upstream from Toulouse, with its ducks and its reeds and a fallen tree that’s damming its flow. (Someone really should clear that away.)

Whoops!

‘You must grip with your
knees
, Babylonne,’ the priest advises, reaching across to steady me. He keeps saying that, but it’s all right for him; he has long legs. My legs are sticking out like roof-beams, because they’re so short and this horse is so wide. How am I supposed to grip with my knees when they’re on top of the horse’s back, instead of hanging down against its flanks?

‘Use your stirrups to help you,’ the priest adds. ‘Remember what I said?’ He speaks kindly, and his expression is calm, but I know that he must be laughing inside. He’s such a good rider, he must scorn anyone who can’t even sit on a horse. Look at the way he moves, as if his bottom half is separate from his top half. Well, he shouldn’t be riding anyway. True pilgrims shouldn’t ride, they should walk. He says that he’s riding because it’s too dangerous to walk across this country at present, but that’s just an excuse. He’s riding because he’s a Roman priest, and Roman priests are greedy and luxurious and always attentive to their own comfort. What true pilgrim, for example, would burden himself with three books on his journey?

If he’s worried about the trip being dangerous, he should have left those books behind. You might as well be wearing an archery target on your back. Even one of those books would buy any passing brigand a perfectly good fortified farm with attached vineyard and fruit trees.

But the priest would never part with his books. Oh no, he says—they were a gift from Father Pagan. Another lame excuse. In fact he’s probably lying. All priests are liars. And fornicators. And murderers. That’s why I have to be so careful with this one. Though he might seem kind, he’s almost certainly pretending.

I can’t afford to relax my guard for an instant.

He’s always watching me, too. I’ve noticed that. I’ll glance at him and he’ll be gazing off at a distant flock of sheep or a toiling serf, but I can tell that he’s only just looked away from me. Perhaps he’s worried that I’m going to fall off my horse. On the other hand, there might be another reason. A more sinister reason.

He’s sitting there now as if he got lost on his way to Heaven—as if he wouldn’t know a sin if it came up and introduced itself in a loud voice. He was right when he said that I should be the one in disguise. No one could mistake him for anything but a priest, even in artisan’s clothes. It’s something about his sombre face. And his quiet voice. And the way he keeps his arms against his sides. It’s something about his hands, which are long and smooth and graceful: a priest’s hands.Only his hair looks out of place. Too boisterous and noisy. Though it’s hidden by his hood, at the moment.

I should have brought a hat with me. It’s awfully hot in this sun.

‘We must buy you a hat,’ says the priest, and my heart almost drops through my belly, I get such a shock. Can he see into my head? Can he read my thoughts? ‘I know what pain the sun can inflict,’ he adds. ‘Even on a Moorish skin like yours.’

What’s that? A
Moorish
skin? ‘What do you mean?’

He raises his eyebrows. ‘Your father was an Arab,’ he explains. ‘Didn’t you know? He came from the Holy Land.’

I don’t understand. ‘You—you mean he went there? To fight the Infidels?’

‘No, no. He was born there. He was a Christian Arab. He fought Saladin before he travelled to Languedoc —oops!’ His hand shoots out, and he grabs my arm. ‘Don’t lose your balance, now.’

‘He fought
Saladin?
’ I don’t believe it. ‘How?’

‘He was squire to a Templar knight. He was born in Bethlehem. Don’t you know this?’

Of course I don’t! How could I, if I never knew my father? I’m waiting, now—waiting for more—but the priest stops speaking. What shall I do? I want to hear more. I want to hear more without asking for more. I don’t want to seem too interested in my fornicating father, who really isn’t worthy of my attention. Even if he
didn’t
rape my mother, he certainly went off and left her. Alone.

Besides, I don’t know what to call this priest. I can’t call him ‘Father’. He’s not my father, and I don’t believe in calling Roman priests ‘Father’, anyway; they don’t deserve that much respect. He says that he’s a Doctor of Canon Law—a teacher from the University of Bologna, north of Rome. So maybe I should call him ‘Doctor’, as his students do.

‘Um . . .’ What should I say? I want to ask about my father without seeming to ask about him. What kind of a priest was he? One of those fighting priests? ‘Um . . . when Simon de Montfort killed my mother, many priests helped him.’ (Priests like my father, perhaps?) ‘There are many Roman priests who would rather fight than pray.’

‘I fear so,’ says the priest, with a sigh. Mmmm. How odd. I didn’t expect him to agree with me.

That’s all he’s going to do, though. Agree with me. He isn’t going to comment, not without a prod.

‘When Simon de Montfort besieged Lavaur, the Bishop of Paris was with him.’ Hint, hint. ‘And the Archdeacon of Paris, who built Simon’s siege machine.’

The priest frowns. ‘How do you know this?’ he asks.

‘I was there.’

‘You were
there
?’

‘I was only a baby. I don’t remember. But I was told about it. The garrison was murdered, and all the Perfects as well, but they let the rest of us go. Riscende de Castanet brought me back to Toulouse, and passed me on to my Grandmother.’ (Sometimes I wonder why she bothered.) ‘It was a great battle, you know. The siege at Lavaur lasted a month. Once the French pushed an armoured tower up to the castle moat, and tried to fill the moat with wood and branches. But my uncle Aimery dug a tunnel that reached almost to the tower, and one night he came and took all the wood and branches back into the castle.’ You have to laugh, when you think about it. ‘He also threw burning flax and fat and other things at the tower, to make it catch fire. But the French put the fire out. They smoked the tunnel. They won, in the end. They cut a hole in the castle wall.’ God curse them and all their offspring for eternity.

‘I am very sorry, Babylonne,’ says the priest.

Hah! If you were really sorry, you would have stayed and fought. Like the rest of us. ‘We had our revenge, though. Don’t think that they weren’t punished, those French.’ Toulouse would never bow to anyone for long— not even Simon de Montfort. ‘Those murderers came into Toulouse, and they took everything of value, and they tore down the walls and knocked the tops off the towers, and they put many citizens in chains. But when I was six, and again when I was seven, the French were massacred in the streets of the city. I remember it well. All the people came out of their houses with mauls and axes and mattocks and sickles. They built barricades out of coffers and planks and rafters from their roofs. They chopped up the French like cabbage, and skewered them like pigs. They dragged them behind horses to the gallows, and strung them up at every street-corner.’ I remember the blood. So much blood that you were stepping in pools of it. Falling over in it. ‘There was a man—he had his chest cut open. I could see everything in there. He stank. They all stank. Their bowels emptied when they died . . .’

He’s staring at me. A fixed, frozen stare. He looks like a ghost.

‘What is it?’ Stop gawping! ‘What have I done?’

‘Nothing, I . . . nothing.’ His gaze drops, and he wipes his hand across his face. ‘Forgive me. Yours has been a hard and bloody life. I am sorry for it, indeed I am.’

‘Salve! Pater!’

Who’s that? Who’s calling? Ah—I see. Over there, on that bank. Sitting under that tree.

Two monks. Two
friars
, in fact. Tonsured Dominicans, in grubby white and black, eating bread and cheese and drinking from a wine-skin. One has a band-age around his head, and a bruised cheek.