CHAPTER 3
Lia Maury slowly opened her eyes, luxuriating in the wash of golden light that lapped her sheets. She was floating in a sea of sunlight, idly soaking in the summer’s warmth.
It was going to be hot today.
For a moment she let herself drift in the warm sun, eyes closed, thinking of nothing in particular.
And then her hand crept to her throat, feeling for the fine golden chain –
Yes, it was still there, where he had placed it last night, threading it around her neck, parting the hair at the nape of her neck with gentle fingers.
His betrothal gift.
She stared at it, hardly daring to breathe lest the costly emerald, delicately cut in the form of a leaf, melt away.
‘Berengar.’ She breathed his name into the sunlight – and then fell back on the bed, hugging herself. ‘Berengar. My betrothed.’ Then she began to giggle, for ‘my betrothed’ sounded so ridiculously formal. Hadn’t she known him all her life? In distant childhood days Alissende’s older brother had kept himself aloof, too busy with his companions to bother with little girls. But when he and Jaufré d’Orbiel had returned from the Comte’s campaign to Djihan-Djihar, their friendship had begun anew, and friendship had soon led to a more formal arrangement …
Opening the shutters, she gazed out over the ramparts of the walled city. Doves arose in a flutter of wings from the dovecote in the courtyard garden below and wheeled over whitewashed stone and red-tiled roofs. From the pepper-pot watchtowers along the walls, pigeons flew out to join them, circling overhead. Far away, out in the green plain, she could just glimpse the masts and bright sails of merchant ships on the river Aude, sailing slowly, steadily towards the sea.
‘Safe journey, dear Papa,’ she whispered. He had delayed his argosy for the betrothal ceremony – and then set sail before dawn. He would not be back for two months, maybe three.
She could just see her mother at the far end of the garden, head shaded from the heat of the sun by a broad-brimmed straw hat. Zillaïs could be found tending her beloved garden in all weathers, pruning and weeding, taking cuttings and collecting seeds. As far back in her childhood as Lia could remember, Zillaïs had devoted her time to her herbs and her flowers, making simples and tisanes. Her remedies had gained her a certain reputation in the neighbourhood as a healer but she had always refused payment of any kind.
Lia stared at her mother’s distant figure, inelegantly bent over as she strained to pull out chickweed from amongst the strawberry plants. Lia felt she would never fully understand her mother’s obsession with the garden. Other wealthy bourgeoises of Arcassanne liked to spend their leisure time visiting each other and indulging in gossip; Zillaïs preferred to be alone with her plants.
At least there would still be flowers in plenty for the wedding crowns … though by autumn, the striped roses that now bloomed so profusely, scenting the garden with their clove-sweet musk, would be finished.
One part white wine to five parts thrice-boiled water, left to cool …
Lia placed a square of muslin over the neck of the pitcher and slowly, dreamily, poured in the angelica water.
‘Two handfuls of angelica and three sprigs of borage … or is it the other way round …?’
Bees droned outside in the lavender … the garden drowsed in the sun …
‘Lia! Lia!’
Lia looked up, hearing Alissende’s voice. Setting the pitcher down, she ran to let her and her chaperon in.
‘I’ve just made some angelica water.’
‘How delicious!’ Alissende waved her hand to her chaperon, as though shooing away a troublesome lapdog. ‘Wait in the courtyard. I may be a little while.’
‘Well?’ Lia took her friend’s arm and led her inside. ‘Where’s Berengar? What’s the news?’
‘Haven’t you heard?’
‘Heard what?’
‘They found a body,’ Alissende said in a whisper. ‘A child. In the Tsiyonim quarter.’
Lia felt cold, as if a cloud had covered the sun. She did not want any unpleasant news to spoil her happiness. She looked at her arms and saw they were covered in goosebumps.
‘Jaufré showed Berengar the body. He said it was … horrible.’
‘A Tsiyon child?’
‘No, no, not one of their own. A laundress’s boy from the river quarter. No one knows how he had come to stray so far from home, unless they enticed him with sweetmeats
‘They enticed him?’ Lia’s mother stood in the doorway, carrying a trowel and pruning knife. She was frowning. ‘Are you accusing the Tsiyonim of the murder?’
‘Oh no, Dame Zillaïs.’ Alissende had blushed bright red.
‘That’s how rumours spread. Idle chatter, thoughtless chatter.’ The expression on Zillaïs’s face was cold, forbidding.
‘Well … I’d better be on my way.’ Alissende hurried towards the door. ‘I have other visits to make.’
‘But what about the angelica water? It must be ready to drink.’ Lia followed her friend to the door. Mother’s in one of her moods again, take no notice, she signalled to Alissende. ‘Do stay.’
Alissende shook her head and slipped swiftly out into the courtyard where her chaperon was patiently waiting for her.
Lia glared at her mother. This was not the first time Zillaïs had openly rebuked Alissende; her manner made Lia deeply uncomfortable. She could take offence at the most trivial, inoffensive remark.
‘Alissende is a sweet-natured girl but her head is full of air. Sometimes she talks a great deal of nonsense.’ Zillaïs’s words seemed to make light of the incident, but Lia saw that her expression was still unforgiving.
‘So? What’s the harm?’
‘The harm?’ Her mother’s dark eyes glittered. ‘She is the daughter of one of the oldest families in Arcassanne. She has influence. She should learn to curb her tongue.’
Lia opened her mouth to retort – but her mother turned on her heel and went out of the kitchen before she could speak. Lia went to go after her – and then checked herself. This was an argument she would not win.
‘Well, thank you, Mother, that’s my morning ruined!’
She went over to the jug of steeping angelica water and poured herself a glass of the fragrant liquid. Then she sat in the window seat, kicking her heels rhythmically against the limewashed stone, gazing out over the courtyard garden.
Why was Zillaïs so sensitive? Lia had hoped the news of her betrothal to Berengar would please her mother. Such an auspicious match! Surely most mothers would have been bubbling with excitement at the prospect of making preparations for the wedding?
The morning sun burned down on to the pots of herbs and striped gillyflowers from a cloudless sky; clove perfume spiced the hot air. Lia could see her mother bending down to snip the dry seed-heads from the early-flowering pinks. Maybe it was the fierce summer’s heat that made Zillaïs so ill-tempered?
Lia sipped the angelica water. It was cool and refreshing, infused with the green sweetness of the steeped herbs. But it would have tasted even better if shared with Alissende.
She cast a resentful glance at her mother’s bent figure. She had been looking forward to a delightful morning of self-indulgence; planning clothes for the marriage ceremony with Alissende, gossiping and giggling together over the guest list. It was too bad that her mother had spoiled their plans.
Losing a daughter, gaining a son …
Perhaps Zillaïs did not approve the match? Lia thought, scooping out a candied fragment of angelica from the bottom of the glass and thoughtfully sucking it. Whenever Berengar was visiting, she became reserved, aloof, replying in clipped phrases to his questions. Was she overawed by his lineage, his position in the city? Was she afraid her daughter was not a good enough match?
Bees buzzed amongst the dark-striped gillyflowers; in the acacia tree, a cicada began to whirr.
Or was it Alissende’s story that had upset Zillaïs? The murdered child? Lia felt again the frisson that had chilled her on first hearing the news. Even here, in the safety of the walled garden, it sickened her. Who could have done such a terrible thing?
As the afternoon sun seared the river plain, Lia left the baking heat of the courtyard garden and busied herself helping Emmenza make paste from the tomatoes they had been drying on the roof.
It was too hot to concentrate and her mind kept wandering to other matters … a silly game she and Alissende had been playing the other day, likening their friends to birds and beasts … Plump Emmenza, Lia’s childhood nurse, could be a corn-fed woodpigeon, they decided, with her waddling gait. Jaufré, Lia had declared, was a mountain eagle, with his aristocratic aquiline nose and hooded eyes …
‘Is the Damoiselle at home?’
Lia went to the window, throwing wide the shutters, leaning out.
‘Berengar!’ she called, waving.
Evening sunlight glinted in the dark gold of his hair as he shaded his eyes, gazing up at her.
A lion, Lia thought proudly. Yes, he’s a lion, with his golden mane of hair and his leonine features.
‘Wait! I’m coming down!’ she called, and flew out into the courtyard. She went to fling her arms around him – but stopped on seeing her mother watching from the arbour.
‘Dame Maury.’ Berengar had also seen her; with his customary courtesy, he turned to bow to Zillaïs before greeting Lia.
Zillaïs glanced up from her tapestry.
‘Sieur Berengar.’ She inclined her head in a gesture of acknowledgement; she did not smile nor move forwards to welcome him.
Mother! Lia winced at her mother’s coldness. Even now her attitude could drive Berengar away; who would want to be saddled with such a sour-tempered mother-in-law as Zillaïs?
‘Ouf.’ Berengar tugged open his collar. ‘It’s hot.’
‘Come inside,’ Lia said, drawing him towards the house. ‘It’s much cooler in the solar.’
Zillaïs set her tapestry aside and rose to her feet. She spoke.
‘That’s a magnificent tunic you are wearing, sieur. Is it new?’
‘I – I’m glad you like it, Dame Maury.’ Berengar seemed momentarily caught off-guard. ‘It was made for me by a very skilful tailor. The same tailor I have commissioned to make our wedding clothes.’
Lia smiled warmly up at him.
‘That device.’ Zillaïs came closer, pointing to the embroidered badge. ‘I have seen other young men wearing it around the city. What does it signify?’
To other ears, the question would have sounded innocent enough. But Lia heard an underlying tension colouring her mother’s voice.
‘It’s a hawk, Dame Maury,’ Berengar answered, easily enough. ‘It is the badge of the new evening watch, the Nighthawks. Jaufré d’Orbiel is our Captain.’
‘So you follow Jaufré d’Orbiel?’ Zillaïs said.
Lia began to feel uneasy; there was a distinct edge to her mother’s voice which grated.
‘I am honoured to be one of his company, yes.’
‘And what precisely do you do in this evening watch?’
‘We patrol the streets and keep the peace.’
‘So the city watch do not provide adequate protection for the citizens?’
‘Mother!’ Lia whispered. This was beginning to sound like an interrogation.
‘Many of them are old veteran soldiers, Dame Maury. Comte Aymon was pleased to use younger, more able men – and they were glad to be relieved of their nocturnal duties.’
Zillaïs put her arm around Lia’s shoulders.
‘I have only my daughter’s best interests at heart, you understand. I trust you will not be leaving her on her own every night!’
A sudden hot breath of wind stirred the vines overhead. Lia shivered, looking up at the sky. Her skin felt damp, clammy.
‘Perhaps we shall have a storm?’
‘Not till the harvest is in,’ Berengar said.
‘But it’s stiflingly hot. It would clear the air.’
‘And flatten the ripening corn on my estates. My farms are still recovering from last year’s poor harvest.’
‘So, Sieur Berengar,’ said Zillaïs, ‘to what do we owe the pleasure of this unannounced visit?’
Lia winced; her mother could be so withering at times.
‘There was one thing,’ Berengar cleared his throat, ‘a trivial thing which was overlooked at the betrothal ceremony.’ He seemed suddenly ill at ease.
‘Overlooked?’ Zillaïs repeated.
‘The notary brought it to my attention this morning. It’s only a formality. I would have approached your husband … but as he won’t be back for a while, I have to ask you.’
‘Lia,’ Zillaïs said sharply, ‘You have not offered Sieur Berengar any refreshment. Go inside and get Emmenza to draw some ale from the cellar.’
A formality. Lia looked questioningly at her mother but Zillaïs’s unblinking stare said only, Do as you are bidden. She turned on her heel and flounced into the house.
‘Ale, Emmenza!’ she called loudly.
The voices carried faintly in from the courtyard garden. She crept back to the window, straining to hear what Berengar was saying.
The notary needs further documentation. It’s for the marriage contract, you understand, Dame Zillaïs. When you join a family as old and as eminent as mine –’
‘I thought my husband’s notary had delivered all the necessary papers.’ Her mother’s voice sounded taut, strained.
Berengar hesitated.
‘It appears he has nothing from your side, Dame Zillaïs.’
There was a silence. Lia heard the cicadas start to whirr in the acacia tree.
‘Perhaps you have forgotten,’ Zillaïs said in clipped tones, ‘that I lost everything – family, documents, jewels – in a shipwreck.’
‘There must surely have been some records of your birth in your home city … Tolonada, wasn’t it?’
Emmenza appeared, bearing a full jug of ale, puffing with the exertion of having climbed the steep cellar stair.
Lia, startled from her eavesdropping, jumped back from the window just in time as Zillaïs swept into the kitchen, Berengar following.
‘Emmenza – stay with our two young people, will you? I have matters to attend to.’ She walked straight past Lia without even glancing at her.
Emmenza eased herself into the wooden armchair by the fireside.
Lia picked up the heavy pottery jug and poured ale for Berengar.
He seemed distracted, slowly turning the cup round and round in his hands.
Lia stood watching him awhile. Maybe she had better change the subject.
‘Alissende says the Watch found a child. Dead.’
He nodded.
‘That must have been – horrible.’
He looked up from the cup. His eyes were haunted, reflecting the night-shadows from the darkening garden.
‘Jaufré has a theory he was killed by one of the Tsiyonim.’
The sky outside was growing rapidly darker; it had become almost too dark to see Berengar’s face.
‘Why would the Tsiyonim want to kill a child?’ Lia struck a tinder-flame and lit the candles in the alcove. ‘They’re just different from us. They have different customs, different beliefs –’
‘Different.’ Berengar swallowed down a mouthful of ale. ‘Jaufré claims he has heard of these Tsiyonim practices before. Last time it was across the mountains, in Galicys. About ten years ago.’
‘But there’s never been anything like that in Arcassanne!’
Berengar shrugged.
‘You know how it is with poets … Jaufré reads too much, his head is stuffed full of strange fantasies.’ He drained the last of his ale in one draught.
‘But … in the circumstances … maybe we should cancel the contract with Schimeon for the wedding clothes,’ Lia ventured.
‘Why? Schimeon’s the best tailor in Arcassanne. No one can cut a jacket as well as he can – and if he was good enough for my father, he’s good enough for me.’
Berengar sounded so like his late father that Lia had to stifle a giggle; for a moment she saw him, thirty years on, Lord of his Demesne, holding forth on his favourite topic …
‘I’m damned if I’ll let a few foolish rumours spoil our wedding –’
A distant rumble cut across his words. He looked up. Drops of rain spattered against the shutters.
‘I’d best be getting back.’
‘You could shelter here –’
Berengar opened the door and looked out. Rain was dripping through the curtain of vine leaves. ‘I would not want to put your mother to any inconvenience.’
‘You’re family now!’ Lia moved closer.
He turned up his collar. ‘But we wouldn’t want to cause public censure so close to our wedding, would we?’
‘Oh, wouldn’t we?’ Lia said teasingly, raising her hand to pull up a corner of his collar that he had overlooked, letting her fingers brush against his throat –
Emmenza gave a sudden snore and shifted her bulk in the fireside chair.
Berengar kissed the top of Lia’s head and went out into the rain.
She stood watching him dodge the puddles until he had disappeared into the night.
*
Raindrops began to spatter the dusty street as Jaufré d’Orbiel made his way home from the Tour de la Justice. A thin, warm wind whined fitfully about the rooftops. It set Jaufré’s jangled nerves even more on edge.
Far away, above the mountains, lightning flickered, an eerie corona, pallid against the louring night sky.
He had intended to go straight to his chamber and to bed. But now he found himself taking out the key to the cellar, thrusting it into the lock, turning it, going in …
Jaufré closed the heavy clove-nailed door and leaned back against it, eyes closed. He was tired, achingly tired. He had not slept since – since the catastrophe. He wanted to sleep now, wanted sleep more than anything. So what had driven him back to the cellar? Remorse? It was too late for that now. The boy was dead; remorse would not bring him back.
Eyes still closed, he sensed a sudden stir in the subterranean air, slight, like a sigh –
‘Who’s there?’ He held his lantern high, straining to see beyond the dark-shrouded wine casks.
Jaufré was not easily unnerved. He had stood watch when the camp was stalked by the Snake Warriors of Djihan-Djihar – veiled assassins who crept up on their enemies and stifled them with poison-impregnated scarves. But there was an unwholesome taint to the air in the cellar that made the hairs rise on the back of his neck.
He had scrubbed and scrubbed the dark stains where the child’s blood and the spilt wine had mingled, until the stones were clean … but now it looked as if the stain was still there.
Impossible!
His lantern cast a pool of light on to the flagstoned floor as he set it down to look more closely.
The faint, telltale stain of brown accused him.
He had tampered with unseen forces, he had bared his soul to the dangers of occult influences – and all for nothing.
‘Jaufré …’
He started, almost knocking over the lantern, someone had whispered his name in the darkness, he was certain of it.
‘Who – who’s there?’ His hand slid to the hilt of his sword.
‘Jaufré …’ He felt the breath of a sigh at the back of his neck.
Panicked, he found himself scrambling up the stairs, slamming the door shut, locking it.
Sleep. He was sleep-starved, he was hallucinating, he must rest –
In his turret chamber he fumbled with trembling hands for the phial of Arkendym sleep draught, tipping the last drops of the precious liquid into his mouth.
The cold bitterness of the draught salved his mouth and throat; a creeping calm slowly began to numb his fevered mind, as if the chill of the distant snowfields where the poppies grew were embalming his whole body.
With a sigh he sank down on his bed … and let the poppy’s spell lull him into oblivion …
In his garret, Rahab, half-drowned in sleep, heard the rain drumming on the roof: heavy thunder drops, spattered with hail.
Rain.
He opened one eye – and a cold splash of water fell on to his face. And then another – and another –
‘Why doesn’t Schimeon get someone to mend this leaky roof?’
Grumbling, he rolled out of bed and began to drag his bedding to the other side of the garret. He placed a saucer beneath the leak; a monotonous drip-drip-drip began instantly. Bleary-eyed, he wrapped himself in his blanket and turned on his side to face the wall.
Drip-drip-drip.
Ignore it.
Lightning scored the sky.
He pulled the covers over his head.
Rain battered the shutters; the wind shrieked around the rooftops.
Sheet lightning, blue-white, irradiated Rahab’s garret – and in the shriek of the wind, he heard a shrill, high voice calling, a child’s voice.
It must be Iudith or Thirzah, frightened by the thunder. How could a child be out, alone, in this storm?
A blade of blue light clove the darkness; against the thunder’s crash, Rahab heard the child’s cry again.
Clumsy with sleep, he stumbled to the window, unlatched one shutter. The wind’s force blew it inwards, banging the carved wood against the wall.
Rainspray drenched Rahab’s face as he peered out into the storm.
In the rainswept street below, a young boy gazed up at him, arms raised imploringly.
The street below ran with a torrent of water.
‘Don’t be afraid!’ Rahab called, his voice half-drowned by the tumult of the fast-falling rain. ‘I’m coming down!’
He hurried down the three flights of stairs and unbolted the front door. Rain sprayed inwards from an empty street.
There was no one there.
A faint, high cry pierced Jaufré’s drugged sleep.
He woke to the drumming of thunder.
Another summer storm had boiled up in the sultry air and come rolling down from the mountains.
Lightning flickered around the walls of the turret room; thunder rumbled, loud as the din of Djihari war-drums.
Jaufré turned on his side, trying to block the din of the thunder with his pillow.
‘Jaufré …’
Someone was calling his name in a thin, shrill voice. A child’s voice.
No. He must be imagining it. It must be the wind.
A window blew inwards, one pane of coloured glass smashing to fragments.
‘Jaufré …’
Jaufré forced himself out of bed, staggering across to try to close the banging window.
In the rainswept street below, a young boy gazed up at him, arms raised imploringly.
‘No …’ Jaufré whispered. ‘Not you. You’re …’
The night sky split open.
Riven with lightning, hair crackling with whitefire, the boy rose up into the air. He was naked. Blue wounds scarred his luminous body; from his outstretched fingertips lightning sizzled.
The house shook with thunder.
Jaufré, sight seared by the brightness, turned away, shielding his face with his arm.
When he opened his dazzled eyes again, the street was empty.