Daughter of War

by S. J. A. Turney

  The other dead lay elsewhere, of course. The graveyard of a monastery was no place for common bandits and mercenaries, nor, despite Titborga’s protests, the body of Maria, never a true sister, and a proven betrayer and fool. Following the Christian value of charity, of course, the burials of all had been paid for by Rourell, though interred at the village to the south, many in a collective grave and with no headstone, for no one knew their names.

  Ramon had protested at the order’s paying for their burial. Indeed, he protested at such villains and godless animals being buried at all, but the preceptrix had been adamant, pointing to the dire straits into which Arnau and Titborga had been forced by events beyond their control. Perhaps there were mitigating stories behind everybody in that mercenary army. Only God should decide whether they could be redeemed. It was not the place of the preceptory to do so.

  Guillem had returned from Barberà, having officially lodged all the records. His face had been ashen as he took in the evidence of what had happened in his absence, but he had not been given time to brood. The body of Ferrer della Cadeneta had been unceremoniously draped over his own horse and tied there, and Guillem was sent off again to deliver it to the lord’s home and whatever family he might have, to deal with as they saw fit. Rourell would not bury the vile man. Preceptrix Ermengarda’s charity only went so far.

  ‘What happens now?’ Arnau said wearily.

  ‘We rebuild,’ Ramon answered immediately. ‘We repair, replace and replenish. Though what moneys we had in the coffers here were stolen, the order will distribute sufficient coin to return Rourell to its former strength. And with the donations of yourself and the good sister, no coin-pusher from here to the grand master at Acre will argue with us.’

  ‘And the staff?’

  ‘The field hands and millers and so on? It is quite possible they will drift back to Rourell, chastened and apologetic. After all, once the vehemence of their stance wears off, what choice will they have? Some might travel south to Valencia and seek solace among their own, though I think they will find the new Almohad lords there harsher masters than we. Otherwise they will turn to banditry and begging. Many will come back. Not those who committed atrocities, of course, for they will know what awaits them, but forgiveness is in our very nature. And there is always a supply of folk who need homes and work. Replenishing the actual brothers and sisters might be more troublesome, but it will happen. After all, we have two new members already.’ He smiled.

  ‘Will we have a ceremony?’

  ‘Of acceptance?’ Brother Balthesar cut in. ‘Of course. Both you and Sister Titborga, though separately. It is unseemly for a sister and brother to attend a joint ceremony. I feel, though, that we should ask you once more. Your application was accepted in haste and in principle when you were both under a great deal of strain and pressure, with an enemy dogging your heels and threatening your future. He is gone. All is in flux, but should you feel the need to reconsider your path, now is the time. Once the ceremony is held, you will be a sergeant of the Temple and, while it is possible for a full brother or sister to leave the order, it is rare and complicated. Now is when you need to be certain.’

  Arnau nodded. ‘I am certain. I wasn’t until yesterday, but I feel I was given clarity in that fracas, clarity I had lacked before. This is where I should be.’

  He looked across at Titborga, who was in close conference with the preceptrix. She seemed destined to become Ermengarda’s second, filling the place of fallen Catarina.

  ‘Will I be made your squire?’ he asked Brother Ramon.

  ‘Perhaps. Now is not the time to worry over such things.’

  ‘Rourell is going to be unpopular,’ Arnau sighed. ‘Della Cadeneta was right about that one thing. He was committed and sure that we would not risk ruining the high nobles’ plans for creating a strong house out of two lesser ones, but we did just that. His death will not sit well with them and the king. I fear the troubles for the preceptory are only just beginning. Bernat d’Entenza will be irritated that Titborga undid his plans to create a powerful lordship out of their union. Alberto de Castellvell already hates us all, and this will push him further into opposition. The king will be angry.’

  ‘The old king would have taken issue with us,’ Ramon replied calmly. ‘But Pedro the Second is a good man, who fears God above state. He will do nothing precipitous. Indeed, there is talk of a new Crusade against the Almohads to chastise them for the dreadful mess that was Alarcos. If he is planning something big, he will need the support of the Temple. But you are correct in that our strength has waned and we are at a low ebb. Drawing souls to the houses of the order in Iberia has ever been difficult. There is, somewhat regrettably, competition between the houses for those donats who wish to join, and Rourell is rarely the prime choice, unique as we are.’

  ‘I may have an idea about that,’ Balthesar put in, narrow-eyed.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Relics.’

  The other two frowned at the simple suggestion, and the older knight smiled. ‘As a church with a famous reliquary draws worshippers from afar, so might a Templar house achieve a similar draw by the acquisition of such relics. And, let’s face it, the order is known far and wide for the recovery of a number of sacred objects from the site of Our Lord’s crucifixion in Outremer.’

  ‘You propose a brief jaunt to Outremer?’ Ramon rolled his eyes. ‘Jerusalem is in the hands of the Saracen, Balthesar, and the Crusaders disbanded. Acre is our main hold there now.’

  Balthesar levelled a look at his fellow knight. ‘No. Not Outremer, though you must know the time is coming for that. The Holy Roman Emperor has been calling for a fresh Crusade for years, and the new pope is already supporting it. The order will be involved, and even with the situation here, the pious King Pedro will grant whatever the Pope asks.’ He sighed. ‘Be certain that a campaign in the sands of Outremer looms; but no, it is not to the Holy City I look right now. There are relics here in Iberia that languish uncared for and ignored under the control of the Moor. Not an easy proposition, of course, but something to think on.’

  ‘You’re as mad as Lütolf was, you know that?’

  The two men fell silent, and the graveyard became peaceful once more, sizzling in the summer sun, the sound of cicadas, bees and birds a gentle hum all around.

  ‘Come,’ the preceptrix said, of a sudden. ‘It is almost time for nones, and Father Diego will be insufferable if we are late.’

  As the preceptrix, with Sister Titborga at her side, turned and began to make her way back towards the ruined west gate of the preceptory, Ramon smiled. ‘I have to admit that having seen the preceptrix in command yesterday, with that heavy blade hanging at her side, it seems strange now to see her without a sword belt. Against all odds and reason, it sat well upon her.’

  Balthesar laughed. ‘She is a daughter of the church, Ramon.’

  ‘She is a daughter of war, also, Brother, every bit as much as young Sister Titborga.’

  And Arnau, smiling as he fell into step and followed them, pondered on that, and on the fact that the sword had not been returned to the wall of the chapter house. Had the preceptrix not yet put aside her husband’s blade, fearing that there would be further use for it?

  Daughter of war, indeed.

  Brother Arnau chortled as he stumped towards his new home.

  Historical note

  Are we not all fascinated to some extent by the Templars? The Crusades and the Templars interested me long before the idea for this book took shape. I was captivated by the tales even at school, but by adult years my knowledge was so solidly grounded in the Roman world that I had brushed off any idea of ever attempting to write something in this era. The research alone to familiarise myself with the subject was staggering.

  Then Mike at Canelo (the publishers of this tome) asked me, after writing two books for them, whether I had ever considered tackling something medieval. I had, and I said so, but also that I had decided against it. The short story of Daughter of War’s i
nception involves an afternoon of beer and discussion with Mike that ended with me agreeing to do it, and only lamenting my decision on the way home. I thought more about it then. Long. And carefully. I came to a number of conclusions and put my ideas to Canelo, where they were enthusiastically received. I would do Templar tales, but not straight Crusades as they’ve been done so many times and by some very good authors. I would do them, but not the weird secretive Templars with their idols and mysteries. Done too much. But entirely by chance I had found the angle I wanted. I had found a reference to a female preceptor – a preceptrix, in fact – of a Templar house in Spain. Moreover, she was not the only important sister at Rourell, for she had also granted another sister entry to the order.

  Yes, the two main women in this novel are real women. Ermengarda d’Oluja entered the order at Barberà in 1196 with her husband Gombau. They had received the automatic divorce that entry as brother or sister demands. They had brought considerable land and fortune to the order in the region. He had disappeared from the historical record within two years, while Ermengarda went on to be preceptrix of the small house at Rourell. There, in 1198, she admitted to the order one Titborga, daughter of Berenguer de Santa Coloma, as a full sister. This was no nunnery either. This was a Templar house. So I had real characters who truly defied the norm in the world in which they lived. It was too exciting not to explore further. For the record, Bernat d’Entenza and Alberto de Castellvell are also real characters, as is the king, of course. Ferrer della Cadeneta is not. My apologies to the residents of the tiny hamlet of Cadeneta in the Poblet hills. I have driven through the place and it is not horrible at all.

  Suddenly, the whole idea seemed so much more viable. There would need to be plenty of research into the Templars of course, but I suddenly was so much more comfortable with my tale, and the uniqueness of it made the research more focused. I am very familiar with the region, and shall come to that in a moment. For the role of women in the religious and military orders and their place in north-east Iberia in the era I am particularly indebted to two works: Paula Stiles’s Templar Convivencia: Templars and Their Associates in 12th and 13th Century Iberia and Myra Bom’s Women in the Military Orders of the Crusades. Both are excellent works. The latter made me feel comfortable approaching the subject and the former put the perspective of time and location into my mind’s eye beautifully.

  So yes. Titborga and Ermengarda existed. Of course they did. I would never have named a character Titborga by choice. Not unless I was writing comedy, anyway. Their backstories are my creation and not drawn from historical record. Everyone needs a good past, eh? And Ermengarda remains so shrouded in mystery I wanted to try and give her a real tale. Besides, this is historical fiction, not a textbook.

  The castle of Barberà de la Conca is a fragmentary remnant of Templar holdings in Spain. Large pieces of it stand intact in the village, but it is far from the full castles one can see in many places, including another Templar fortress at Miravet. There is some blurring in the region and time as to the form of Templar holdings. Some are clearly focused on the monastic format. Others were once Moorish castles, captured in the Reconquista and given to the Templars, who adapted them to their use. Such was Barberà. For the homes of Titborga and Arnau, I have not used specific locations. They are peripheral to the story at best. There are a number of Santa Colomas, and I have placed on the map one that stands just north of Barcelona. There, the Torre Salvana remains an enigmatic castle ruin, the town and castle both linked to the powerful Cervelló line. The linking of the Santa Coloma tied to the Templars and the family of the Cervelló is my own decision, purely for the book, and should not be taken as historical fact. Ermengarda’s former home at Vallfogona de Riucorb is another fascinating fragmentary ruin to see. As for Rourell itself… well, I’ll come to that shortly.

  The organisation of the Templar order and its ranks are worthy of an entire book on their own. In fact there are treatises devoted to such things. The distinctions between the various levels and groupings within the order are sometimes vague, especially when dealing with such a place as north-eastern Iberia, where strict adherence to the rule seems to have been brushed aside in favour of a blend of Templar rules and geopolitical common sense. Strictly speaking, the squires of a Templar knight are generally to be found drawn from outside the order, while the sergeants are more devoted to warfare and not prayer or everyday careers. Somewhere like Rourell, though, poor by Templar standards and short on manpower as were all orders in this region through the period, cannot have been able to draw a great number of recruits from the surroundings, and their farms and mills, as in the book, would be mostly operated by Moorish slaves or forced converts. There is a distinction between full brothers, who wear the white; sergeants, who wear the black; and various federates, such as confraters, donats and assorted hangers-on. How this all worked is a matter for further investigation. Thus I am somewhat grateful that the period and region in which I have set the book were by necessity vague and unusual, with considerable blurring of lines.

  It might also seem strange to have a religious house containing both sexes, and certainly it would have horrified Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, who originally set down the rules, but there are precedents in history. Indeed, a decade or so before this story takes place, Saint Gilbert of Sempringham died. The order he founded – the Gilbertines – consisted primarily of monasteries specifically designed to contain both monks and nuns, kept apart but within the same complex and sharing a church. A little research will turn up countless other examples, including even Benedictine ones. Still, I have given the sisters and brothers entirely separate quarters and latrines, despite the small scale of the preceptory.

  I have never visited Rourell, sadly, but I have driven past it in two directions and stopped at a connected hermitage nearby, long before I knew the story of Ermengarda. I know the landscape, right up the Francoli valley from the sea to L’Espluga de Francoli and beyond. I only have to close my eyes and I can conjure up the area. I have visited many times, generally in search of the Roman remains in the region.

  Rourell preceptory still sort of exists, though not in the village known as Rourell, which lies a little to the south. The preceptory lay in what is now a hamlet called La Masó, centred around the tiny square in front of the later church and the bell tower. Little remains of Templar Rourell. The lower storeys of the belfry are assumed to be Templar in origin and consequently play a part in my tale. The church there now is much later and must partially overlie the site of the Templar chapel. The building next to the church was likely the Templars’ chapter house. A telltale filled-in arcade suggests its past and also points to the likely position of the church. Other buildings in that small, enclosed area seem to contain features that date back to the era, suggesting the general shape of the preceptory. Below is Fuguet’s map of modern La Masó and its conjectural medieval forerunner (image courtesy of Jbarberà, Wikimedia Commons):

  The problem of the sluicing of the preceptory’s latrines plagued me for some time, given the surrounding ditch. Not washing away the deposits was not an option – imagine the ditch a few years down the line. And Rourell had no running water, though I gave it a fictional well. The ingenious solution of water tank, sluice gate and sloping channels is based on the remains at the abbey of Saint-Hilaire in Provence.

  The mill exists. Just a quarter of a mile east of La Masó lie the ruins of the Moli de la Selva above the banks of the Francoli. Most of the extant structure is in fact a later building, but the lower areas and the vaulted cellars are considered Templar remains.

  The broken bridge across the Francoli is also a true location. A brief mea culpa is due because the bridge (to be found at 41° 15' 45" N, 1° 13' 7" E) which is also an evocative ruin, was actually destroyed by a flood in the nineteenth century and not brigands in the twelfth. Still, the sight of it was enough to trigger my fight scene.

  This story might seem fantastic to some extent, but it should not really. The Templars may seem an im
possibly strong historical force, but just the slightest digging reveals the dissatisfaction that surrounded them and culminated in their fall at the hands of a jealous French king in the early fourteenth century. The tweaks I have made to Rourell’s adherence to the standard Templar Rule of Saint Bernard of Clairvaux (who I always picture in a fur coat with a barrel of brandy around his neck) are all too realistic. The rule might have been more rigidly followed in Outremer or France, but in the lands of Iberia, which were poor in resources and men after three centuries of reconquest, there was certainly a lot of blurring of lines. Stiles’s work (referenced above) goes into this at length and is something of an eye-opener. So I have bent the rules appropriately. After all, the rules say ‘no women’ and the historical record for Rourell shatters that immediately. Saint Bernard may have laid down the rules, but he was not a Templar and did not have to live by them, after all. A fine example of ‘do as I say, and not as I do’. For the record, J. M. Upton-Ward’s translation of the Templar Rule was invaluable during this writing. Without being able to quote it, my characters could not live by it, nor could they ignore and flaunt it where appropriate. It also makes a fascinating read, should you want to spend some six dollars on an ebook. Imagine that, perhaps spending more to see that source material than you spent on this book!

  In my biblical references throughout I have been as careful as I can to keep the period text rather than straying into modern versions. My wording for the Psalms and other extracts comes chiefly from translations of Wycliffe’s Bible (late fourteenth century). So if you’re a psalm lover and you’ve been muttering throughout that I kept getting the words wrong, that’s why.

  As for Titborga’s flight from an arranged marriage? It really is not as far-fetched as you might think. There were medieval women who were far from meek and passive and simply ambled through a controlled and arranged life. Some caused absolute havoc by imposing their wills on an environment not shaped to allow that. Sharon Bennett Connolly recently released her Heroines of the Medieval World and that book might make you think twice about the accepted subservient role of women in the era. In my research I came across astounding tales. One such is the infant daughter of Adam de Cokefield at Bury St Edmunds. As an heiress in much the same way as my Titborga, she was so sought after for her wardship that Bishop Sampson of Bury and Richard Coeur de Lion quarrelled over it. I also read that the bishop won that contest by mollifying the king, though he failed to benefit greatly anyway as the child was subsequently kidnapped by her grandfather. So you see there is plenty of evidence of tales just such as this being real.