Kate Mosse - Labyrinth

Alice finished cutting and pasting the text she wanted into a text document and hit Print. Once it was going, she typed “Cathedral Chartres France” into the search box.

Although there had been some sort of structure on the site as far back as the eighth century, she discovered the current cathedral in Chartres dated from the thirteenth century. Ever since then, esoteric beliefs and theories had attached themselves to the building. There were rumors that within its vaulting roof and elaborate stone pillars was concealed a secret of great significance. Despite the strenuous efforts of the Catholic Church, these legends and myths endured.

No one knew on whose orders the labyrinth had been built or for what purpose.

Alice selected the paragraphs she needed, and then exited.

The last page finished printing and the machine fell silent. All around people were beginning to pack up. The sour-faced receptionist caught her eye and tapped her watch.

Alice nodded and gathered her papers, then joined the line at the counter waiting to check out. The queue moved slowly. Shafts of late-afternoon sunlight fell through the high windows in Jacob’s ladders, making the particles of dust dance in the beams.

The woman in front of Alice had an armful of books to check out and seemed to have a query about each one. She let her mind focus on the worry that had been bugging her all afternoon. Was it likely that in all the hundreds of images she’d looked at, in all the hundreds and thousands of words, there hadn’t been a single exact match for the stone labyrinth at the Re de Soularac?

Possible, but not likely.

The man behind her was standing too close, like someone on a tube train trying to read the newspaper over her shoulder. Alice turned and glared at him. He took a step back. His face was vaguely familiar.

“Oui, merci, ” she said, as she got to the desk and paid for the printing she’d done. Nearly thirty sheets in all.

As she emerged on to the steps of the library the bells of Saint-Etienne were striking seven. She’d been in there longer than she realized.

Keen to be on her way now, Alice hurried back to where she’d parked the car on the far side of the river. She was so caught up in her thoughts that she didn’t notice the man from the queue following her along the river walkway, keeping a safe distance. And she didn’t notice him take a phone from his pocket and make a call as she pulled out into the slow-moving traffic.

Besiers

JULHET 1209

Dusk was falling as Alais reached the plains outside the town of Coursan.

She had made good speed, following the old Roman road through the Minervois toward Capestang, across the sweeping hemp fields, the canabieres, and the emerald seas of barley.

Each day since setting out from Carcassonne, Alai’s had ridden until the sun became too fierce. Then she and Tatou took shelter and rested, before traveling on until dusk when the air was filled with biting insects and the cries of night jays, owls and bats.

The first night she’d found lodgings in the fortified town of Azille with friends of Esclarmonde. As she traveled farther east, she saw fewer people in the fields and villages and those that she did see were suspicious, wariness showing in their dark eyes. She heard rumors of atrocities committed by renegade bands of French soldiers or by routiers, mercenaries, bandits. Each tale was more bloody, more wicked than the last.

Alai’s pulled Tatou to a walk, not sure if she should press on to Coursan or look for shelter close by. The clouds were marching fast across an increasingly angry gray sky and the air was very still. In the distance, there was the occasional rumble of thunder, growling like a bear waking from a winter sleep. Alai’s did not want to risk being caught in the open when the storm hit.

Tatou was nervous. Alai’s could feel her tendons bristling beneath her coat and twice she shied away from sudden movements of hare or fox in hedgerows at the roadside.

Ahead Alai’s could see there was a small copse of oak and ash. It wasn’t dense enough to be the natural summer habitat of larger animals, such as wild boar or lynx. But the trees were tall and generous and the tops of their branches looked to be woven tightly together, like entwined fingers, which would provide good cover. The fact there was a clear path, a winding ribbon of dry earth worn away by countless feet, suggested the wood was a popular local shortcut to the town.

Tatou shifted uneasily beneath her as a flicker of lightning momentarily lit the darkening sky. It helped her make up her mind. She would wait until the storm had passed over.

Whispering encouragement, Alai’s persuaded the mare forward into the dark green embrace of the wood.

The men had lost their quarry some time earlier. Only the threat of a storm prevented them doubling back and returning to camp.

After several weeks of riding, their pale French skin was tanned dark by the fierce southern sun. Their traveling armor and surcoats, bearing the arms of their master, lay hidden in the thicket. They hoped yet to retrieve something from their abortive mission.

A sound. The crack of a dried branch, the rolling gait of a bridled horse, the iron of its hooves striking occasional pieces of stone.

A man with a mouthful of jagged, blackened teeth crawled forward to get a better look. Some way off he could see a figure on a small, chestnut Arab threading its way through the woods. He leered. Perhaps their sortie was not going to be a waste of time after all. The rider’s clothes were plain and worth little, but a horse of that calibre would fetch a good price.

He threw a stone at his companion hidden on the other side of the track.

“ Leve-toi !” “he said, jerking his head toward Alai’s. ” Regarde .“

“Would you look at that,” he muttered. “ Une femme. Et seule .”

“Are you certain she’s alone?”

“I can’t hear any others.”

The two men picked up the ends of the rope that lay across the path, concealed under the leaves, and waited for her to come to them.

Alai’s’ courage ebbed as she rode deeper into the wood.

The topsoil was damp, although the ground beneath was still hard. The leaves at the side of the path rustled beneath Tatou’s feet. Alai’s tried to concentrate on the reassuring sounds of the birds in the trees, but the hairs on her arms and on the back of her neck were standing on end. There was threat in the silence, not peace.

It is but your imagination only.

Tatou sensed it too. Without warning, something flew up out of the ground, with the sound of an arrow from a bow.

A woodcock? A snake?

Tatou reared up on her hind legs, slashing wildly at the air with her hooves and whinnying in terror. Alai’s had no time to react. Her hood flew back off her face and her arms came away from the reins as she was thrown backwards out of her saddle. Pain exploded in her shoulder as she hit the ground hard, knocking the breath clean out of her. Panting, she rolled on to her side and tried to stand. She had to try to hold Tatou before she bolted.

“Tatou, docament” she cried, staggering to her feet. “Tatou!”

Alai’s staggered forward, then stopped. There was a man standing in front of her on the path, blocking her way. He was smiling through blackened teeth. In his hand was a knife, its dull blade discolored brown at the tip.

There was a movement to her right. Alai’s’ eyes darted sideways. A second man, his face disfigured by a jagged scar running from his left eye to the corner of his mouth, was holding Tatou’s bridle and waving a stick.