Alys Clare: The Joys of My Life

I barely recognize the Church I once loved, the abbess thought sadly. It is no longer a supporting and loving helpmeet; it is a moneymaking giant whose chief aim appears to be the acquisition of land, money and power. As if this devastating quarrel between the Pope and the king was not bad enough — surely, surely two men who had been put on earth to serve their God and their people ought to have been able to do better! — there was now the terrible Crusade against the Cathars. In the south, they said, the towns were burning with the people inside them. The Pope had joined forces with the king of France and, although the excuse was the stamping-out of heresy, everyone knew full well that both Church and State would emerge from the fight immensely the richer.

It was not right.

And here I am, the abbess reflected sadly, trying to fulfil a role set out for me in a world where the old rules no longer apply and everyone seems to have gone mad. Old Queen Eleanor, that great levelling influence and supporter of Hawkenlye, had died peacefully in her sleep at Fontevrault. Sometimes it seemed to the abbess that more than an eighty-two-year life had gone out of the world that April day.

Abruptly she let go of the ends of the parchment and it flew back into its roll. She retied its ribbon and carefully stowed it away in the cupboard let into the wall. Then, squaring her shoulders, she went out to break the news.

In the house in the woods, Josse bent over his spade and, ignoring the vague pain in the small of his back, made up his mind that he would finish the row before Meggie came back. He had promised to dig over the empty area in her herb bed, for she wanted to plant more of her little seedlings this evening. The moon, apparently, was in a condition that favoured vigorous growth.

He smiled as he thought about his beloved daughter. She was seventeen now and in his eyes she was quite beautiful, with abundant, shiny dark hair that had kept its youthful curl and brown eyes that shone with golden lights. She worked too hard, he kept telling her; she was up early hunting for flowers, leaves and roots for her herbal remedies, and she never turned away anyone who came to her for help. In October two years ago, on her sixteenth birthday, she had inherited the powerful heirloom that Josse’s father, Geoffroi, had brought back from Outremer. It was a huge sapphire set in gold and it was known as the Eye of Jerusalem. It held a strange power within its deep blue depths for, in the hand of its rightful owner, it warned of the presence of enemies and, dipped in water, made a febrifuge that possessed the power to stop bleeding. It also detected poison in an apparently innocent drink.

It had come into the family with the sombre prediction that one of Geoffroi’s descendants would one day wield it. A great sorcerer had told Josse that the jewel would in time pass to one possessing the innate psychic power to make it come fully alive and, when that came to pass, for the first time in two thousand years the Eye of Jerusalem would come into its full potential. At the time Josse had not even known of his daughter’s existence, but it was she to whom the sorcerer had referred and now the Eye was hers.

She used it rarely and only at grave need, for its power was extraordinary and she admitted that she had barely begun to comprehend it. In her struggle for understanding she was not alone: the Domina, immeasurably wise, very old now and deeply revered by all her people, was there to help her. Slowly, painfully, Meggie was coming to terms with her extraordinary inheritance. It had already started to change her life, for with the gift came responsibility, and Meggie, true child of both her parents, was not one to turn aside.

Josse dug on and his thoughts moved to his son. Geoffroi, named according to his mother’s wishes after Josse’s father, was ten years old and Josse’s boy through and through. It was likely he had inherited his mother’s strange powers — inevitable, really, since both her other children had done so — but so far he was nothing more than a solid, cheerful, funny little boy who adored his elder sister and half-brother, especially when Meggie let him help her prepare the sweet-smelling herbs and Ninian showed him how to mend a wild animal’s hurt.

Ninian was twenty-four and in love with Little Helewise, daughter of Leofgar Warin and his wife, Rohaise. The girl was not yet sixteen, but she was mature for her years and it was plain to anyone with eyes in their head that she adored Ninian. Time would tell; if they married, Josse would go on his knees all the way to St Edmund’s Chapel to cry out a prayer of thanks.

He and Ninian had never once referred again to the young man’s parentage. His half-brother was busy ruining England, so perhaps it was just as well.

Josse’s former manor, the estate of New Winnowlands, was flourishing, thanks to Dominic’s talents as a landowner. Dominic now concentrated on sheep and he was growing rich. In truth, everything he earned was the result of his own hard work, ably supported and assisted by the many-talented Paradisa, but Dominic had not forgotten that fourteen years ago Josse had given him and his new wife a home at New Winnowlands, and he insisted that a fair share of his profits went to Josse and those who lived with him in the house in the woods. Josse, who lived frugally with his largely self-supporting family and still had most of the gold given to him by the late queen, was quite embarrassed by his own wealth.

He was almost at the end of the row. Hearing voices, he straightened up, a hand to his back, to see who it was. Gussie was striding out towards him, two of his three children running beside him and laughing at something he had just said. He was already holding out a hand for the spade. Josse watched him, smiling. He had filled out from the skinny boy he used to be and now, a man in his prime, he was broad-shouldered and starting to look a little stout. Tilly, his wife, had become an excellent cook.

‘Tilly says you’ve been out here far too long already and you’ll pay for it with a sore back tonight,’ Gussie said, taking the spade from Josse’s hand. ‘Give me that — I’ll finish for you.’

Meekly Josse handed it to him.

‘Horsy, horsy, Josse!’ said the younger child, a little girl.

Josse sat down on the low bank that enclosed Meggie’s herb garden and, drawing up his legs to make a pretend horse’s back, picked up the child and set her on his knees. ‘I had a little pony,’ he sang, and instantly she and her brother joined in: ‘His name was Dapple Grey. I lent him to a lady, to ride a mile away.’

The children yelled the words, their light voices blending with Josse’s deep baritone, and as the song wound up to its inevitable climax, with the pretend horse rearing and shooting its small rider into the soft grass, all three shouted with laughter.

The happy sounds, soaring into the summer sky, echoed beneath the protective circle of trees so that the forest itself seemed to be laughing.

The woman striding along the narrow forest track heard the merriment and smiled in response. Not far now, she thought.

She had been sitting quietly in the chapel when the abbess had come to find her. As the familiar black-clad figure had stood in the open door and beckoned, she had got up and gone outside with her. They stood side by side in the sunshine and the abbess said, ‘It has come.’

A moment of stillness; this moment, so long anticipated, was nevertheless surprisingly disturbing in its power, for this was the final step of a journey begun a very long time ago and her life would never be the same again.

Others had preceded her. She was by no means the first. It helped, a little. This was her choice; she had no more doubts now. As the portent of the abbess’s words sank in and were absorbed, she began to smile.