Michael Jecks: The Templar, the Queen and Her Lover

Candlemas

In the eighteenth year of the reign of King Edward II 2

Alehouse in Southwark

Sir John de Sapy looked up as the door opened, anticipation lightening a face that had been full of trouble.

The last years had been unspeakable. Christ’s blood, but a man was hard pushed to survive just now. Even friends of the mightiest in the land could be brought to destruction, the realm was so stretched with treachery and mistrust.

He had been a knight in the King’s household until seven years ago, but then, when Lancaster was in the ascendant, he had switched allegiance and joined the Earl. Except the Earl had successfully squandered all his advantages, and ended up being executed by the King his cousin after raising a rebellion.

‘The arse,’ Sapy muttered.

There were few things more surely calculated to irritate Sir John than a man who promised much and then died leaving him in trouble — and he had been in trouble ever since the damned fool had gone and got himself killed. Sir John had been declared an outlaw, had had all his livings stolen from him by the King’s men, and now he was without funds, family or prospects. The only hope he had was that his brother, Sir Robert, who was still in the King’s household, might be able to help him to return to favour.

The door opened again, and for the second time he looked up eagerly, but there were two men hooded and cloaked in the doorway, not one, and he turned bitterly back to his wine. Robert wouldn’t come. He knew it, really. He’d hoped and prayed that his brother would forgive him his foolishness in trusting that churl’s hog, Earl Thomas, but how could he? To forgive John would be to open himself to the accusation of harbouring a traitor. In the years since the battle of Boroughbridge, which saw the final destruction of Earl Thomas’s host, hundreds of knights and barons up and down the kingdom had been taken and summarily executed, many of them for minor offences committed on behalf of the Earl. For a man who supported one of the Earl’s followers, and aided him in hiding, the punishment would be worse.

No, this was pointless. He was wasting his time. His sodding brother could hang himself. John wouldn’t sit here all night like some beggar seeking alms. If his brother wasn’t going to help him, he’d find someone who would. There were barons in France who’d welcome the strong arm and ruthlessness Sir John exhibited.

He was setting his hands on the table to push himself up when a hand fell on his shoulder. ‘Brother, stay there.’

‘Robert?’ Sir John was torn between irritation at the lateness of his brother’s arrival, and immense relief that he had come at last. It made him feel less alone. ‘Who’s this?’

‘This is someone who’s going to assist you, I think,’ Sir Robert said. ‘Meet Father Pierre Clergue. He would like your help.’

‘My help?’

‘Yes, mon sieur. Your help in seeking a heretic!’

Sunday ,

Quinquagesima

3

Château Gaillard, Les Andelys, Normandy

The cell was tiny. Like a coffin. And she was sure that, were she not rescued from this hideous half-life soon, it would become her tomb. A woman of only eight or nine and twenty years, she had already lived long enough. The idea of death was not so dreadful. It would rescue her from this living horror.

Sometimes she dreamed that she had been to visit this fortress before she had fallen from grace; perhaps she had even stayed here once, although not down here in the filth and the cold. No — then she had been installed in a great chamber in a lofty tower that stood high overhead. But if it were true and not some dream that had been sent to torment her, then it was so long ago it might have been a different life. In those days, she dreamed, she had had servants of her own, maids, rich clothing, and an entire household to see to her needs. She had been pampered, beautiful — royal.

As a princess, she had lived in great towers and palaces. There had been wonderful food to eat, jewels to decorate her fingers and throat, carriages drawn by the finest horses. Her clothing was all crimson and velvet lined with fur, shot through with golden threads, and when she retired to her chamber she could fall on to a bed that had been made for her, the sheets smooth and soft, the mattress filled with down, while quilts were settled over her to keep the chill away. All who heard her would submit to her slightest whim. Men desired her; women loved her.

When she fell from grace, Blanche de Burgundy might as well have died.

In many ways she had.

The Cardinal’s Hat, Lombard Street, London

‘Oh, shite!’

Ricard de Bromley ducked as the jug flew past his head and smashed against the lathes behind him. There was a burst of wild laughter from the front room of the tavern, and he glanced at his companions quickly.

‘What now?’

Adam Trumpeter was in no doubt. ‘We get out of here. There’s no point trying to play to them in there. Listen to them!’

Janin, a tall skinny man in his late twenties who wore his long, greasy dark hair in a thin queue tied with a thong, peered round the doorway with his amiable face fixed into a look of nervousness. ‘I don’t think we’d be welcomed.’

‘Welcomed?’ Adam was an older man by fifteen years, barrel-chested and with a belly like a sea-going cog’s massive rounded prow. Under his hood, he scowled, his leathery features lined and wrinkled like an old alaunt’s. ‘They’re likely to rip our arms off and beat us with the soggy ends.’

Ricard set his jaw and sneaked another look. ‘They said they’d pay us twelve pennies each,’ he said mournfully, his moustache drooping as though to signal his disconsolation.

At the mention of money, it was Peter the Waferer who pulled the group together, as usual. He was always the one who kept an eye on the finances and mediated between fights. ‘I’m not giving up on twelve pennies for any number of rowdies,’ he declared. He took up his tabor, settling a small cudgel on his wrist, bound there by a strip of leather. ‘If they want to stop me, they can try.’

He marched in, his arrogance settling the noise inside almost as soon as he pushed in with his tabor in one hand, a recorder in the other. A dexterous man, he could play the two simultaneously. With his tabor, which was one of those smaller ones which a man could carry with ease, he made a daunting figure, standing there blocking the doorway. With the unconcern of a man who knew that his master would be greatly displeased were he to be harmed, Peter strode to the farther side of the room and placed his tabor on the floor so that the royal insignia could be clearly read on his breast. Alone of the band, he was a genuine servant to the King.

The others looked at each other for a moment. Ricard shrugged, then picked up his gittern. ‘Can’t let him get all the money.’

Adam wore a look of resignation on his greying features. ‘Don’t say I didn’t warn you,’ he said as he hefted his trumpet.

Last to make his way in was Janin. He tossed his head and sent his long ponytail over his shoulder. Then he squared his narrow shoulders and followed them inside.

Queen’s chamber, Thorney Island

Queen Isabella rose from her prayers and nodded to Peter, her chaplain, before walking from the chapel and making her way to her chamber.

The weather was foul today. As she glanced out through the tall lancet windows, she could see the rain slashing down into the turgid waters of the Thames, making the river froth and boil. Certainly not the weather to be going abroad today.