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  ‘Perverse, perverse. But so are many of his decisions nowadays,’ said the Count.

  ‘Like this crusade?’ asked the King.

  This is going well, thought the Count and continued, ‘He has taken it into his head that I am responsible for the death of his Legate, Pierre of Castelnau.’

  ‘And of course you were not?’ asked the King ironically.

  ‘Of course I did not run his Legate through with my lance,’ smiled Raimon. ‘I admit I was very angry with the man. He was insufferably arrogant and rude. But, no, I did not kill him.’

  The King didn’t enquire if the Count had ordered the death. There were things that nobility and royalty did not ask each other.

  ‘Then it is a pity,’ said the King.

  ‘A pity, Your Majesty?’

  ‘That I have already given my leave for my barons to march south,’ said Philippe-Auguste. ‘I do not want to anger the Pope. I am still hoping for my annulment. So I’m afraid I really can’t withdraw my permission now.’

  .

  CHAPTER NINE

  Amistat

  The Lady Iseut turned out to be just as gracious and beautiful as report had made her. She was now only twenty-three, a presumed widow, though no specific news had ever arrived of Jaufre’s death. Her husband had gone crusading a year after their marriage and she had lost the only baby conceived before he left.

  So she had been ruling her own demesne for six years. She had made it a haven for poets, composers, musicians and artists and a place where her fellow trobairitz were welcome.

  When Lucatz’s troupe arrived at Saint-Jacques, there were already several musicians at court and another trobairitz called Azalais de Tarascon. Iseut invited the whole troupe to dinner, not to perform, but out of good fellowship and in consideration of their weariness after travel.

  ‘Lucatz was right,’ whispered Maria to Elinor. ‘This will be an excellent bastide to winter in.’

  Lady Iseut presided over the table in a dress of light blue satin, which perfectly complemented her fair colouring and her copious and curling hair, so pale it was almost white. Her friend was a perfect foil for her, black-browed and as dark-skinned as Pelegrina the Catalan joglaresa, and dressed in scarlet. But Elinor noticed that a costly diamond brooch pinned a blue feather to her gown, as if to proclaim her part of some society or clan.

  ‘Come, my friends,’ said Lady Iseut. ‘Tell us of your travels. We have had no news from as far west as Sévignan for a long time. Were your last lord and lady well when you left them?’

  ‘They were indeed, lady,’ said the troubadour. ‘And about to celebrate the betrothal of their elder daughter.’

  Elinor felt herself stiffen and prayed she would not blush. She fancied that the Lady’s friend, Azalais, had been looking at her rather intently and she felt seen-through already.

  ‘And we have ourselves taken part in christening celebrations in Montpellier,’ added Lucatz. ‘The Lady Maria’s young son.’

  ‘How delightful,’ said Iseut. ‘So Lady Maria has a son? She is fortunate indeed.’

  ‘Though not in her marriage, I believe,’ said Lucatz.

  Elinor would not have believed Lucatz was such a gossip but he was soon telling the ladies all about Maria de Montpellier’s unfortunate situation. And then about their other encounters in Provensa and the Alps, though not a word of what had happened at Saint-Gilles.

  Iseut and Azalais listened eagerly to all the news. Then the Lady from Tarascon asked, ‘And what of the other events we have heard rumours of? Some say that there is to be some action taken against Raimon of Toulouse?’

  It was Perrin who answered this question.

  ‘We do indeed believe that there might be trouble throughout the south. And not just in Toulouse.’

  ‘You really think the northerners will want to fight our cities?’

  ‘And smaller bastides too,’ added Huguet. ‘Our information is that none will be safe.’

  Elinor could see that the Lady was reluctant to believe that. Her town was well fortified and her lands down in the valley fertile. It was clear from her table that she was rich in grain, meat and cheese.

  Iseut turned to Azalais, with a troubled face.

  ‘Surely we are safe here in Saint-Jacques? Who would attack our walls because of a quarrel with Toulouse?’

  ‘That depends on whether your ladyship is sympathetic to the Believers,’ said Azalais, in a low voice.

  ‘And maybe it will not depend even on that,’ whispered Perrin. ‘The men from the north may march under the banner of a holy war to crush heretics but will actually be more interested in acquiring land – no matter whose it is.’

  Lady Iseut clapped her hands. ‘Enough of war,’ she said. ‘For now, we are safe in Saint-Jacques and can speak of happier matters. As you see, I have a few court musicians but nothing to compare with your company. They will play for us now and perhaps you could tell us about your new songs and poems?’

  The rest of the evening was passed in music and discussion of poetry but Elinor noticed that the Lady of Saint-Jacques now wore a small frown making a line between her fair brows. She was sure that their news of war from the north had deeply disconcerted her.

  From Paris, Raimon of Toulouse travelled to Germany to see Otto of Brunswick, one of the two claimants to be Holy Roman Emperor. The Count was still fuming from his interview with the French King.

  How could Philippe-Auguste have yielded to the Pope so easily? It was understandable that the King’s long-desired release from the wife he found repellent had been held out as a reward for his cooperation with Rome but the Count was certain that the Pope would not give Philippe-Auguste what he wanted once the crusade had been launched.

  But for now Raimon must see what succour he might hope for from Otto IV. The would-be Emperor was an ally through King John of England, who had been the Count’s brother-in-law at one time, and he had always been good at reminding others of alliances. In fact, until this wretched business with the Pope and the heretics, he had enjoyed his position as Count of Toulouse and overlord of such fine cities as Carcassonne, Béziers and Nîmes.

  When he wanted something done, people leapt to obey his command. And when he wanted something not done, whatever it was ceased without question. But everything had changed once Innocent III had been elected Pope. Since then, the Pontiff had been a thorn in his side and, as the Count had told Philippe-Auguste, he suspected there was more to it than a hatred of seeing the Church defied by heretics.

  The court of Otto of Brunswick was even more magnificent than that of the French King. Raimon was kept waiting for a little in an anteroom so gilded and damasked, so mirrored and bedecked with candelabra holding such a wealth of the best beeswax candles, that it would have served as a throne room in any other palace of Europe.

  After a short wait, while he wondered which of these innovations he might employ in the château at Toulouse, Raimon was shown into the royal presence. Otto was as sumptuous in his own person as was his palace. He wore crimson velvet and a cloth of gold cloak, his fingers bejewelled with many rings and an elaborate gold circlet on his head.

  Though the Count had been able to speak French with Philippe-Auguste, the only language he and Otto had in common was Latin.

  ‘Salve, Imperator,’ said the Count, kissing Otto’s hand.

  ‘Ah, not that yet,’ said Otto, all smiles. ‘My rival, Philip, seems to have met an untimely end but now Fredrik von Hohenstaufen claims to have more right to the title than I do.’

  ‘The problems of inheritance,’ said the Count, shaking his head. ‘And even when the title is secure, the problems don’t end there. I have lately come from the King of France. I sought his help in my, ah, difficulties with His Holiness the Pope.’

  ‘Your difficulties?’ said Otto. ‘I thought he had �
�difficulties” enough of his own with Pope Innocent.’

  ‘Indeed, that is what he said,’ acknowledged Raimon ruefully.

  ‘So he refused you?’ said Otto.

  ‘I’m afraid so,’ said the Count. ‘May I tell you what I asked of him?’

  ‘That he would refuse permission for his knights and nobles to take up the Cross against the south?’ said Otto.

  The Count was crestfallen. If Otto knew and had not already offered his help, he was not likely to act on Raimon’s personal entreaty.

  ‘Saving Your Majesty,’ he began hesitantly, ‘and His Holiness, I suspect that it is not simply “the south” that Innocent wants to punish. He is waging a personal vendetta against me – you know he has excommunicated me again?’

  ‘I was not aware that you had been received back into the Church since last time,’ said Otto.

  ‘Indeed, I had not,’ said Raimon, struggling to maintain an expression of sorrow and regret. But his anger soon got the better of him. ‘I say that this Pope has decided that I am his enemy.’

  ‘It is a dangerous thing to have a Pope for an enemy,’ said Otto. ‘Kings and emperors are one thing, but the Pope . . . ! It pits the whole of Christendom against you. I myself have need of Innocent’s support in my claim against Fredrik, particularly since Philippe-Auguste is on Fredrik’s side.’

  He looked at Raimon speculatively for a long moment. Then he held out his beringed hand for him to kiss again.

  ‘Vale, my son,’ he said to the Count, who was nearly twenty years older than him. ‘There is nothing I can do to help you. Quem Papae oderunt nemo audet adiuvare.’

  And Raimon left Brunswick with that farewell ringing in his ears: ‘Whom Popes hate, let no one dare to help.’

  Lady Iseut was as generous a patron as Lucatz could wish for. But as autumn wore on into the colder months, Elinor became aware of the sadness that hung over the bastide of Saint-Jacques.

  Iseut was a good ‘Senhor’ – as good as any man – but, in spite of the competence with which she ran her household, her vassals and her farms, whenever her face was in repose, it wore an expression of deep sorrow.

  From the joglaresas’ gossip with the castle servants, Elinor understood that the Lady was still in mourning for her husband, Jaufre. He had gone off on the crusade to the Holy Land six years before and she had never seen him again. After two years, the survivors had started to straggle back and news had gradually filtered through the Midi of what a disaster it had been.

  But of Lord Jaufre there was no word. For the first two years of his absence, once recovered from the loss of her child, Iseut had enjoyed taking over the reins. But she had always believed that her husband would return from the war and resume the Seigneury.

  It was a whole year after the end of the crusade before Iseut really understood that Jaufre was not coming back. What had helped to convince her was the string of suitors who wanted to pay court to the rich young widow of Saint-Jacques.

  ‘But she wouldn’t have any of them,’ said Maria. ‘Isn’t that romantic?’

  ‘More fool her, then,’ said Pelegrina. ‘I don’t see what’s romantic about living on your own when you could marry again.’

  ‘But she’s not on her own, is she?’ said Bernardina. ‘She has her special friend, the trobairitz.’

  ‘Huh!’ snorted Pelegrina. ‘That wouldn’t make up to me for losing a husband.’

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Bernardina, whose own experience of marriage had left her a less high opinion of men. ‘The lady from Tarascon seems very fond of the Lady here.’

  ‘She’s not like that,’ said Pelegrina. ‘Azalais may be – but not the Lady Iseut. She needs a man.’

  The suitors had eventually given up but Elinor noticed one visitor who was often at the Lady’s court. Berenger de Digne was older than Iseut, around thirty, and reminded Elinor a little of Bertran. He was tall and dark-haired with intense dark brown eyes and he was clearly devoted to the Lady of Saint-Jacques.

  When Elinor asked the joglaresas about him, Maria said that he had wanted to marry Iseut before she chose Jaufre and was now her most loyal friend and local ally.

  The winter months passed and the troupe celebrated Christmas at Saint-Jacques. When Elinor’s jacket started to feel tight on her she thought it was because of the unaccustomed feasting. Then, the night after Epiphany, she woke on the pallet she shared with Huguet feeling a nagging insistent pain tugging at her lower back.

  A moment or two to shake off the fog of sleep and she realised what it must be. Elinor crawled over to where the joglaresas slept and found Bernardina in the dark.

  ‘I’m sorry to wake you,’ she whispered, ‘but the blood has come and I don’t know what to do.’

  Towards the end of the month a group of pilgrims arrived at Saint-Jacques. It was only a short detour off the Pilgrim Way, the Via Domitia that went all the way from the Alps to Compostela. This was a party of Piedmontese on their return journey. They sought hospitality, which Lady Iseut was happy to provide, and they brought news. They had come from Saint-Gilles.

  Even within a year, Pierre of Castelnau had become revered as if he were a saint. On the anniversary of his murder, his body had been exhumed.

  ‘It was unbelievable,’ said the pilgrims’ leader, a priest called Taddeo. ‘His blessed body was completely uncorrupted, the flesh as fair as the day that monster pierced it with his lance.’

  ‘Who dug it up?’ asked Azalais.

  ‘The Cistercians, my lady,’ said Taddeo stiffly. ‘It is already a source of miracles, as well as being one in itself. Why, one of our party was cured of a rheum just by gazing on the sacred corpse!’

  ‘Not by Saint Jacques, on your pilgrimage then?’ asked the lady of Tarascon, who was inclined to be sceptical.

  ‘Alas, no,’ said Taddeo and turned his full attention to Lady Iseut, who seemed to show a more reverent attitude to his tale.

  Elinor was listening closely from the musicians’ place near the dinner table and saw that the joglars were equally attentive. This was that same Pierre whose murder Bertran had witnessed.

  Where the troubadour was now was unknown to all of them; there had been no news since he had separated from them in Saint-Gilles.

  The Lady signalled to Lucatz to begin the entertainment and he nodded to the joglars to start playing. Any further conversation of the pilgrims was lost to Elinor as she played the flute and sang.

  In deference to the pilgrims, their songs were less secular than usual, leaving aside the chansons de gestes and heroic or romantic tales. They sang instead of Our Lady and Our Saviour, ending with the song of the white almond tree.

  .

  ‘White the blossom as the snow,

  Rich the fruits that on it grow,

  Bitter in each twelve is one,

  Rendered sweet by Mary’s son . . .’

  .

  It had been recently written by the Lady Iseut herself and the joglars sang it to honour her. In her role as Esteve, Elinor sang it in her sweet high treble. The Lady was listening intently with her eyes closed but her companion was watching the young joglar closely.

  Elinor had learned the song well but, as she sang it for the pilgrims, she felt as if she understood it for the first time: even at the heart of joy you must expect a bitter note, but through love even that sharp tang could yield sweetness. There was something about this realisation, about the reasons that Iseut had written this song, about finding and losing Bertran and understanding that her future did not lie with him, that made Elinor weep.

  She tried to make her tears seem like those of an overwrought boy, wiping them impatiently away with the back of her hand. But she noticed the lady of Tarascon looking at her oddly. This had been happening a lot since that night a few weeks ago when Bernardina had confirmed to Elinor that she had no
w become a woman.

  Elinor did not want to be a woman. She was appalled by the treachery of her body that could turn her into something against her will.

  ‘Dolcment, donzela,’ Bernardina had said when she shed her first tears. ‘It is the burden you were born for. Without it, you could not bear children.’

  ‘But I don’t want children!’ Elinor had protested. It was true. She was scared of childbirth, which took so many women out of the world and killed so many babies too. Human beings seemed so much worse at it than animals, who only rarely died from reproducing.

  Running away from home was one thing; even getting involved in the dangerous politics of the time through rescuing Bertran had been an adventure to savour. But this most recent event had been a change too far. What would she do once her growing breasts could no longer be confined within Huguet’s old jerkin? Or her hips split the seams of his old breeches?

  So Esteve wept, because he would soon be Esteve no longer. And what he would or could be was a mystery.

  And Azalais of Tarascon watched the young joglar, satisfied that, however unlikely it might seem, she was right about him. The time had come to tell Lady Iseut what she suspected.

  .

  CHAPTER TEN

  Cortesia

  The pilgrims were gone long before the snows came in February and perhaps were already back in their homes in Piedmont.

  Before he left, Taddeo had told Iseut that if ever she needed to leave her bastide, Piedmont was the place to seek sanctuary.

  ‘Leave Saint-Jacques?’ she had exclaimed. ‘Why would I ever do such a thing?’

  The priest looked very serious as he told her that he had heard rumours that no bastide in the Midi would be safe for long.

  ‘They caught one of those ribauts who killed Pierre of Castelnau, at Saint-Gilles,’ he said. ‘But a gang of ruffians tied up the guards and set him free. It will not be long before the Pope wreaks his revenge for the blessed Pierre and then you might have reason to leave.’