Templar Knight, Forbidden Bride

by Lynna Banning

  Count Roger brought his fist down on the table. ‘Out with it, man,’ he demanded.

  De Rodez merely stared at her for another agonising minute. Then his lips drew back in a chilling smile. ‘She is damned to hell for murder.’

  Murder! The floor tilted under her feet. She raised her head. ‘’Tis you who should be accused of murder. This very day I watched you kill that young knight, Jean du Clary. I wonder that you can stand there and accuse another of so foul a deed.’

  De Rodez shrugged. ‘It was in a tourney. Death often happens so.’

  Cries of protest rose.

  ‘Nay!’

  ‘Not so!’

  De Rodez lifted one hand and the hall fell silent as a churchyard.

  ‘Hear me. Then you may judge guilt or innocence.’

  Her limbs turned into blocks of ice. He had some plot up his sleeve, some lie to tell to draw attention away from his own heinous deed. She was sure of it. Across the room she caught a glimpse of Jannet, staring at the Hospitaller, her face pale as milk.

  ‘Speak, then,’ Count Roger shouted. ‘And be done with it, so we can get back to our wine and the troubadour competition.’

  ‘I will speak,’ the burly knight replied, his rough voice low and menacing. ‘This lady, Leonor of Granada, has murdered a child.’

  Leonor gasped.

  The count leaped to his feet. ‘Child? What child?’

  ‘Your son. Galeran.’

  Count Roger reeled backwards. ‘What did you say?’

  ‘Galeran, my lord. Your son. He is dead. Murdered by the hand of this lady.’

  Leonor clenched her fists. ‘That is a lie. Galeran was alive and well when last I saw him at the castle in Moyanne. Indeed, he served me most graciously.’

  De Rodez pointed a thick finger at her. ‘He lives no longer, lady. He was found under a pile of leaves behind his uncle Count Henri’s stables.’

  A fist closed about her heart and began to squeeze. ‘Oh, no. Not Galer—’ Her voice broke. ‘Surely it is some other boy?’

  ‘It is none else, as you well know. You are guilty of his death.’

  ‘Where is your proof of this, then?’

  ‘I need no proof. The word of a Hospitaller is enough.’

  She glanced at Count Roger’s stricken face and stiffened her spine. ‘I am innocent. I swear it before God and this company.’

  Jannet rose and came towards her, but de Rodez blocked her path. ‘She stands accused by a knight of a holy order. According to the law, she must prove her innocence. If she cannot…’ smiling, he smoothed the sword hilt at his waist ‘…perhaps the stake?’

  ‘No!’ Jannet cried. ‘My lord husband—?’

  Count Roger passed one large hand over his eyes as if to erase a vision. ‘Jannet,’ he said, his voice wooden, ‘come here to me.’

  Jannet hesitated, then stepped towards him. ‘My lord, I know you grieve for your son—our son, if you will—but Leonor had naught to do with his death. Do you not remember, she arrived with the Templar some days ago. She could not have…’

  ‘I know,’ the count murmured. ‘I know. But she stands accused. The law is clear in such a case.’

  Jannet gripped both her husband’s hands in her own. ‘Roger, you cannot do this. It is wrong.’

  The count groaned. ‘It is the law. She stands accused until proved innocent.’

  Leonor began to shake uncontrollably. It had taken only one lie by Bernard de Rodez to change her entire life in a heartbeat. With a flick of his wicked tongue, he had condemned her. How could she ever prove her innocence in the face of such evil?

  Dear God, this cannot be happening. None of it is real. Surely she would awaken at any moment to find it was all a terrible dream. Please, God, please! Let me wake from this nightmare.

  ‘Death by fire,’ the Hospitaller shouted.

  ‘By trial of combat,’ a voice spoke.

  All heads swivelled to Baudoin de Beziers. ‘I will stand for the Lady Leonor,’ the tall knight declared. ‘Against anyone…’ he leveled his steady gaze on Bernard de Rodez ‘…who accuses her.’

  Her heart hammered. Bless the gallant man. Never again, she thought irrationally, would she mind anyone slurping his soup. But Baudoin was no longer young, and he had been badly winded in the lists today. What chance would he have against the Hospitaller?

  ‘Done!’ de Rodez snapped. ‘Herald, so record it.’

  The herald, his jaw agape, jerked to his feet, knocking over his wine cup. ‘My lord?’ he addressed Count Roger.

  The count lifted pain-dulled eyes. ‘Yes? What is it?’

  ‘My lord, a trial by combat has been proposed and accepted to establish the innocence or guilt of Lady Leonor in the death of…’ He cast a desperate glance around the hall, then gazed down at the table where the wine puddled next to his overturned cup. ‘Your son Galeran,’ he finished gently. ‘Are you agreed?’

  The count shuddered. ‘I—What was it? Oh, yes. A trial. Yes, I am agreed.’ Clutching Jannet’s arm, he rose and made his way towards the doorway on unsteady legs.

  Leonor wanted to cry out, scream her innocence as the couple moved past her. At the last moment, Jannet met her eyes and gave a barely perceptible nod.

  Relief made her knees weak. They knew. They both knew she had nothing to do with Galeran’s death.

  But someone had. Cold horror swept over her. Who was responsible? De Rodez?

  Proving her innocence would do nothing to uncover the real murderer. Proving it by combat would simply focus attention on her rather than de Rodez. Either way, whether he won the battle or lost it, that snake would go free.

  She was trapped by his guile. She would be sacrificed to cover his own guilt.

  Or was there more to his ploy than this? Did his real motive have to do with Reynaud’s secret mission? With the rivalry between Hospitaller and Templar for supremacy in France and Spain?

  A blade of ice pricked her heart as the realisation dawned. She was the bait to lure Reynaud back to Carcassonne, to be killed.

  Chapter Twenty

  Reynaud drew back on the reins of his destrier and sat motionless, listening. Over the gusty breathing of the horse, he heard a twig snap. Someone was following him.

  Moving very slowly, he dismounted and slapped the horse’s rump. Then he stepped noiselessly behind a tree and held his breath until the hoofbeats faded. It was an old trick he used to play on Leonor when they were children.

  He closed his eyes. Would that this, too, were only a game.

  But it was not. He settled his shoulder against the thick beech trunk and waited. He had circled the château last night, had counted the men positioned as guards along the gated wall. Too many for one man alone. He would not live through this mission.

  He thought of Leonor, her warm mouth opening under his, her eyelids damp with tears. How his body ached at the memory.

  Yet he had his orders. He must get inside the château to deliver the gold to a Brother Templar. He would rather take on a whole troop of Saracen warriors than penetrate to the core of this well-guarded château with just his sword and his wits.

  Still, there must be a way. He listened intently for rustling shrubbery or the thump of a horse’s hooves moving on soft ground. Nothing. Whoever followed him was also adept at the game.

  He would wait until nightfall, when his destrier would circle back to him, then put in motion the only plan that made sense given the situation. And pray to God he would survive.

  He closed his eyes and thought again of Leonor. If he lived through this, he would go to her, carry her off to his bed and do what he had longed to do from the moment he laid eyes on her—bring her to that sweet madness that tortured his body and let himself tumble with her into ecstasy.

  He would give up everything, his Templar vows, his honour—even his sanity—for one night with her. God knew he was a fool.

  But he was a man. And he loved Leonor more than himself, wanted her more than he had ever wanted anything. His body bu
rned with it. He did not want to die now. He wanted to live. To see her again. Touch her.

  Claim her.

  When the moon rose, he heard the soft nicker across the clearing and gave a low whistle. After a moment the horse bumped his shoulder with its nose. He mounted quietly and walked the destrier forwards with slow, careful steps.

  Silhouetted against the moonlit sky, the château rose before him like a huge black confection, all spires and towers, steep slanted roofs and square, smokeless chimneys. Torches burned at the gatehouse, the flames guttering in the soft night breeze. Two guards lounged in the archway, playing at pitch-coin. A dozen or more of their companions marched back and forth along the wall walk, talking in low tones.

  Reynaud drew rein and listened. No sound emerged from the thick beech woods behind him save for the occasional tu-whoo of a night owl. Ahead, the metal coins thudded into the dirt and men laughed. Pigeons gurgled from the dovecote on the roof. He knew its exact location from Brother Pierre’s hasty sketch.

  He dismounted, lifted one bulging saddlebag on to his shoulder and slapped the horse’s hind quarters. The animal jolted away towards the gatehouse, and Reynaud circled to the left, slipping into the shadows at the base of the wall.

  One of the guards shouted, ‘Un cheval!’ Then the sound of running boots, and a score of armed men poured out through the gate. The horse stood still for a moment, then turned and trotted towards the woods.

  The guards hesitated. ‘Vite!’ one man hissed. ‘Look how that bag behind the saddle bulges. There is some treasure there!’

  An argument ensued. While their voices rose, Reynaud stealthily made his way to the secret doorway at the back side of the wall. Ah, there it was, the narrow gate Brother Pierre had described, hidden beneath a rampant heliotrope vine that drooped over it like a leafy curtain.

  He reached out one tentative hand and gave a gentle push. Just as the monk had promised, the latch on the inside had been left unfastened. The plank door creaked open.

  Reynaud winced at the sound, waited thirty full breaths before moving forwards. One more push…There!

  Again the rusty iron hinge groaned, but by now he could hear the receding shouts of the guards. They had not caught up with the horse, nor discovered the river stones that weighted the remaining saddlebag. The destrier would lead them, little by little, away from their post. Another old trick, this one learned from a captured Saracen.

  He stepped through the narrow doorway into a blackness so thick he could not see his outstretched hand. The warm, fetid air smelled sour, and the only sound was the slow drip of water on to stone. Not even the yelling of the guards at the château gate penetrated the unearthly quiet. It was enough to convince him he was entering purgatory.

  Without making a sound he withdrew his sword from the belt at his waist, then edged forwards, lifting his leather boots and planting them soundlessly on the hard surface beneath him. A puff of air brushed his face. He jerked his head up and inhaled.

  Fresh air, cool and sweet. But coming from where? He moved towards it, one slow step at a time.

  The metallic zing of a sword leaving its scabbard cut through the stillness. Without thinking he whirled towards the sound and slashed diagonally upwards from knee to shoulder height.

  He heard the sharp intake of breath, then the scrabble of receding footsteps. He waited until the noise faded, then followed in the same direction.

  The path slanted sharply downwards, then angled to the right. He reached out one hand and his fingers brushed against damp stone. Probing sideways with his sword, he heard the sharp scrape of steel on rock. A narrow underground passage, he surmised from the dank odour. Not much wider than a large man’s body, the ceiling so low his head touched it when he stood upright.

  He took care not to graze his saddlebag or the sleeves of his mail hauberk against the sides of the passage. Only once before had he been in such a place—a Saracen dungeon near Edessa. Seventeen days he had spent fighting off rats and thirst before he devised an escape. To stay alive, he had resorted to trapping the rodents at night and eating them raw. His gorge rose at the memory.

  A faint silvery light shone ahead of him, and he slowed to a crawl. The passage opened abruptly into a walled garden of some sort, overgrown with scraggly rosemary bushes and rampant tangles of mint.

  An instinct made him pause at the tunnel’s end, and in that moment he heard the telltale sound of breathing. Someone waited at the exit to ambush him as he emerged.

  He stepped quietly to his right and angled his body until he felt the moist passage wall at his back. He inched forwards until he stood directly by the watcher, his right shoulder almost exposed. Shifting his sword to his left hand, he lunged upwards and slashed to his right.

  The blade struck home. A figure tumbled off the overhang and sprawled face down and groaning at his feet. One of the guards.

  He waited for the hammering inside his ribcage to subside. How he hated injuring a man, even in battle. But he could ill afford to let the man cry out and warn the other guards.

  At the opposite garden wall, a small arched doorway had been cut into the stone. A carved eight-pointed cross, the insignia of the Templars, was incised into the rock. God be praised, at least he would die among brothers. He tramped across the floor of matted thyme and pushed through the entrance.

  ‘Welcome, my son.’ From the high-backed chair in the centre of the tiny room, Brother Pierre extended a thin hand. ‘You have come swiftly,’ the holy man observed.

  ‘So was I ordered.’ He stared at the man. Brother Pierre? The narrow face was the same, and the dark, gold-flecked eyes, the voice. But the dirty brown robe and worn leather sandals had been replaced by a chasuble of scarlet silk.

  Reynaud scanned the small room. Leaning against the chair was a crosier, the curved head gilded with gold. ‘So, it is not Brother Pierre, but Bishop Pierre?’

  The grey head nodded once. Reynaud studied the unblinking brown eyes of the man seated before him, then let the heavy leather saddlebag slide off his shoulder to the floor at the cleric’s feet. ‘Here is the gold de Blanquefort promised. There is more, safe in our treasury on Cyprus.’

  Bishop Pierre’s eyes shone. ‘How much more?’

  Reynaud hesitated. The treasury contents was privileged information.

  ‘Come, come, Reynaud. Grand Master de Blanquefort and I are old friends. And allies,’ he added, lowering his voice. ‘What does he offer in exchange for a secret Templar base in Languedoc, a repository under the unwitting protection of King Louis himself? Surely that is worth a fortune?’

  Reynaud said nothing. It was not his place to question the dealings of his Grand Master. Or a bishop of the Holy Church. Were they all not united in loyalty to the highest authority of all—Pope Alexander in Rome? And God?

  The older man stared down at the gold and thoughtfully stroked his beard. ‘A fair bargain. Pope Alexander and the Holy Church will control the Templar treasure in France, and right under the nose of Louis of France, too. With this gold, we will drive the Arab from Spain.’

  Nausea cramped his gut.

  Without a word, without a backwards glance at Bishop Pierre or the heavy bag of gold at his feet, Reynaud turned away and started for the door.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  A red-eyed Jannet set the wicker tray of roasted chicken and meat pasties down on the side table in Leonor’s chamber. Leonor had spent the whole day in her chamber, had not been able to stop crying and worrying since de Rodez had accused her of murdering Galeran last night. If only Reynaud were here!

  Jannet turned to her. ‘Mangez, ma petite. It will do you good.’

  ‘I cannot,’ Leonor said in a dull voice. ‘How do you fare?’

  ‘Well enough,’ Jannet murmured. ‘It is Roger who grieves most piteously. I scarcely knew my stepson before he journeyed to Navarre to foster with Roger’s brother, your Uncle Henri.’

  Leonor drew in a careful breath and slowly lifted a meat pie from the tray, then replaced i
t. She had no stomach for food. All she could think of was the Hospitaller de Rodez.

  ‘Tell me of the day’s tourney,’ she begged. ‘Anything to take my mind off tomorrow.’

  Jannet settled herself on the bed and described each event. ‘Bernard de Rodez fought brilliantly, besting every challenger through brute strength and determination.’

  Leonor’s own champion, Baudoin de Beziers, would meet him in single combat to prove her innocence the following afternoon.

  ‘De Beziers, how did he fare today?’

  Jannet’s tremulous smile faded. ‘Well enough. He has much experience, but he grows old. De Rodez, too, is experienced. But Roger says he fights in blood lust, and that can make a man careless.’

  Leonor shuddered. She had seen the Hospitaller’s eyes glitter with malevolence, felt his hostility wrap itself around her spirit. There was something unclean about him.

  She crossed herself quickly. Surely God would protect her? Proclaim her innocence even against the evil, unleashed fury of Bernard de Rodez?

  Jannet embraced her and rose from the bed. ‘Roger would be pleased if you will play your harp tonight. It will ease his heartache.’ She paused and looked deep into Leonor’s eyes. ‘You will come down? Men are loath to ask for succour, even when their spirits are in agony.’

  Leonor smiled at her friend’s earnest entreaty. ‘I will.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Jannet murmured.

  She would go down to the great hall. She wanted to speak with her champion knight, Baudoin de Beziers, to wish him the best in tomorrow’s ordeal. Surely God would not let a good knight like de Beziers die defending her? Yet she did not see how he could overcome so formidable an adversary as the Hospitaller.

  Her chest tightened at the memory of Count Roger’s stricken face, the bleak, dazed expression that came into his dark eyes when he had learned of his son’s death. She pressed her lips together. She must not think on it, must concentrate on the moment at hand and do the only thing she could between now and her trial tomorrow—play her harp.