Requiem: The Fall of the Templars (73 page)

“Is it him?” came an urgent voice.

The voice belonged to Robert. With him were six of the knights who had taken the treasury to Scotland. It took Will a moment to recognize them, as none was wearing his Templar uniform. Robert halted as he spied Will.

“Christ.”

Will took hold of his arm. “Robert, why are you here? Why is David?” He shook his head. “How?”

“We don’t have time to explain, Will.”

Will didn’t relinquish his grip. “Make time,” he said, his tone implacable.

Robert hesitated, then nodded to the knights. “Secure the area. I want to know those soldiers aren’t going to return in a hurry. They were ready for us this time.” He turned to Will as the men moved off, bows primed. “After leaving France we put in around the coast from Aberdeen. While the rest of the men stayed on board with the treasury, I went with Simon to escort Rose to your family in Elgin. It proved to be the best thing we could have done.” His gaze flicked to David. “Your nephew was invaluable in establishing a safe haven for us.”

Will stared at David, struck with pride.

“We stayed in Elgin for a long time, waiting for you,” Robert continued.

“But when you didn’t arrive we feared the worst. In the summer, word reached us that a trial against the Temple had begun in Paris. We came to see if we could aid our brothers in their defense.”

“Philippe is sabotaging it. He’ll do anything to prevent the pope from interfering with his plans. If you are caught you’ll be imprisoned, most likely executed.”

“We know,” said Robert grimly. “But we don’t intend to linger long enough.

Tonight was to be our last attack.”

“Nogaret’s done this before?” asked Will.

“Several times as far as we know. We were hiding in the city, trying to get information on who was imprisoned where and—”

“And hoping we could find you,” interjected David. “But no one knew anything. We’d given up finding you alive until I saw you being led out of that wagon.”

“We discovered the royal guards were taking prisoners out at night to burn 434 robyn

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them,” Robert went on. “We managed to intervene in one of these burnings and saved six men, but lost two of our own in the process.”

Will nodded slowly, the cause of the guards’ tension now clear and the arrow’s appearance not quite as miraculous as he’d imagined. He thought back over Nogaret’s reaction and the readiness of the guards. “My guess is he hoped to catch you if you tried again. He has been instrumental in tracking down Templars who escaped the arrests. He doesn’t want anyone left to defend the order. He wants—” Will stopped short, remembering the minister’s fi nal words, then started across the field to where Robert’s men were making sure the soldiers were all dead. He checked the faces of the dead men, going between the bodies, Robert and David following. “He must have been carried away by one of the soldiers,” said Will, rising quickly. He staggered and almost fell, before Robert steadied him. “We need to fi nd him.”

“No. We need to get you out of here,” replied Robert, gesturing to one of the men, who hastened over. “Help him into the wagon.”

“He knows about the treasury, Robert. He knows it’s in Scotland. He knows Rose is there.”

“He’ll never find it, or her. I promise.”

Will was shaking his head. “He knows my sisters live in Elgin. He knows where to look!”

Robert grasped his shoulders. “They don’t. Not anymore. Will, please.

We’ve got a ship waiting downriver. But we need to go!”

“Clement,” said Will. “He might still help us.”

“I do not think so. While we were here we learned the pope has issued a bull, outlining plans for a holy war. It is rumored Philippe will take the Cross for him. I suspect they have done a deal: the Temple in return for a new Crusade.”

Will was silent. “Nogaret confessed to me in my cell,” he said fi nally. “He admitted he killed Pope Benedict. Perhaps if Clement knew this it might convince him to end his alliance with the king.” He stared at Robert. “It is worth a try, isn’t it?”

After a long pause, Robert nodded. “All right. I will make sure word is sent to Clement before we leave. After that, it is up to him. We can do nothing more.”

With David walking at his other side, Will limped across the grass toward the wagon, leaving the pyres unlit behind him.

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franciscan priory, poitiers, november 24, 1308 ad

Clement stood in the window, staring out over the moon-bathed cloisters.

Behind him, his chamber lay in shadow. Earlier, a servant had offered to bank up the fire and light some candles, but the pope had declined the offer. It seemed somehow appropriate to remain in darkness this evening. In his hand was a piece of parchment, limp and crumpled. He glanced at the words, but his eyesight was poor these days and, anyway, it was too dark to see by. Still, he knew what it said.

There was a knock.

Placing the parchment on the window seat, the pope turned to face the door, feeling acid bubble in his stomach. “Come in.”

When the door opened two figures entered. The first wore a gray hooded robe. He bowed low. “Your Holiness, your guest has arrived.”

Clement inclined his head. “Thank you, Renaud. You may leave us.” As the monk backed out of the chamber, closing the door, the second fi gure remained in the shadows. He was tall and broad, that much Clement could discern from his outline. The pope cleared his throat. “I take it your journey was without incident?”

“Your Holiness, it is late and I have traveled far. Let us dispense with unnecessary pleasantries. Tell me why you have summoned me here.” The native accent behind his French was thick.

Clement nodded, but it was some moments before he could decide how to begin. “Your family has not been treated well by the Church. My predecessor, Pope Boniface, was responsible for your downfall and you have suffered great loses, in terms of persons and property.”

“I do not need a history lesson. I am well aware of the hardships my people have faced.”

“Pope Benedict refused to lift the order of excommunication placed on you by Boniface. You have been a fugitive in France ever since, unable to return to your country or rebuild your life.” Clement paused. “I can lift that order.”

The man’s voice came to him, gruff with suspicion. “Why would you do this?”

“I would consider it payment for services rendered.” Clement looked down at his hands, feeling his stomach churn.

The tall figure came forward, closer to the window. “What services?”

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Clement glanced at the crumpled parchment lifting slightly in the chill draft coming through the windows. He raised his head. “That you end the life of the king’s minister, Guillaume de Nogaret, for his part in the deaths of popes Boniface and Benedict.”

The figure said nothing. Clement just heard his breaths. “Well?” he pressed, discomforted by the heavy silence. “Is this something you would be willing to do?”

Finally the man stepped out of the shadows. Sciarra Colonna’s black eyes glittered in the moonlight.

43

Argyll, the Kingdom of Scotland

december 20, 1308 ad

The horses hung their heads and plowed on, threading their way beneath the dank canopy of trees, hooves splintering through frozen puddles. The sleet wind that had driven at their backs for most of the morning was easing and the company could now hear the distant drag and roar of waves ahead. The dark towers of the mountains that had been their marker for five days were hazy shapes far to the north, ringed with vaporous clouds. The largest peak, Ben Cruachan, squatted like a granite giant over the northern shores of Loch Awe. It was barely mid-afternoon and already evening was drawing in, spinning webs of shadow around them. The loch, which had turned from deep jade to glassy black, was still visible some miles behind them as the track climbed torturously toward the coast.

Will, slumped in his saddle and wrapped in a soggy, fur-trimmed cloak, had forgotten how short the winter days were this far north. On the sea-bitten west coast, they seemed shorter still. This wasn’t a Scotland he knew. This wild kingdom of mountains and water was the realm of his forefathers. His grandfather, Angus Campbell, struck out from these lands and made a life for himself in the tame and fertile east, leaving four generations of Campbells to make their mark. Now a large and powerful family, with many different branches, some of which were highly favored by King Robert, they owned a number of the fall of the templars

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prominent castles in Argyll. Passing them on their journey south, his nephew recounting the history of each fortress and the names of the current lords, Will had begun to feel a strange sense of nostalgia. This was a place of kinship, of loyalties and family. The hostility of the landscape nurtured these things, binding people together in safety and shelter. It was a place where memories were honored and blood ran deep. But the price for those bonds was its isolation.

The way here was not an easy one, especially in winter, and for Will, suffering a year of starvation and torture, it was the hardest journey of his life.

They had left the coast of France in September, Robert’s company conveying Will and the thirteen knights they had saved from Nogaret’s pyres to London, where two Templars were waiting with horses and supplies. Edward II had been slow to react to Pope Clement’s letter insisting he arrest the Templars in his lands, but after growing pressure from the papacy and Philippe, he fi -

nally agreed to allow the inquisitors into his kingdom. The trial against the English Templars was well under way by the time the company docked in the Thames, and it was with the sense of the hunted that they made their way north, plagued by snow on the hills and wolves in the forests. Once they were over the border, the terrain became ever more hazardous and they lost two men during one especially frozen night, but despite these physical hardships, Will found himself secretly eased by Scotland’s impassibility. With every boggy valley they wound their way through, every gray skirt of mountain they inched themselves around, every sea loch that yawed around the next corner, he felt his enemies receding. It could take Nogaret a lifetime to find them here.

“We should be there soon.”

Will glanced around as his nephew maneuvered his horse up alongside him, his face in the failing light ruddy with cold.

David smiled slightly. “You look nervous, Uncle.”

“I’m just weary,” responded Will gruffl y, discomfited by his nephew’s shrewdness. It was true. He was nervous. There were so many things that awaited him at the end of this unfamiliar track, the booming sea growing ever louder, so many hopes, any one of which could be fulfilled or dashed. He looked over his shoulder at the long line of travel-worn men stretching behind. “I pray your mother has a pot big enough. There are a lot of hungry mouths to feed. Her husband’s estate cannot house us all, surely?”

“Not indefinitely, no, but as I told you we’ll find homes for the knights soon enough. I could use a few able men in Elgin and the king would gladly recruit more loyal warriors into his service, I’m certain. He has already accepted into his retinue seven Templars who arrived with Robert last year.”

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Will saw a familiar look in David’s face. It was a look of fierce pride that came over him whenever he was talking about Scotland’s new king. On the journey north, he had heard David tell many stories of Bruce and his band of men, from his battles against Edward’s forces to his ambitious campaign to unite all of Scotland beneath him, quelling the rivals who challenged his claim to the throne. The English might have gone, for now, but the scars of more than a decade of war remained, seeping unrest and the poison of family feuds that had welled up into civil war. Robert Bruce had been faced with a grueling task, but from the respect the Scots in their company showed him, it seemed he was winning.

“But for now,” David continued, “we’ll be able to house most of them in this area. John is close with many families here.”

Will nodded, but said nothing. He was still getting used to all the changes that had taken place in his family and all the unexpected connections, not least the fact that seven men in this doughty company, who had risked their lives to free him, were kin.

At first, he had been scarcely aware of anything, hurt with exhaustion, too numb even to feel relief, but as his strength returned, his curiosity about his rescuers had been stirred. Other than Robert and the six former Templars, there were two spirited young men who were squires of David’s, now the holder of a modest estate in Elgin, come to him through marriage. Will had listened in quiet amazement as his nephew, flushing with pleasure, spoke of his two children, who had stayed with their mother in Elgin, close to Margaret and her young family. Another marriage that had come as a surprise was that of his sister, Ysenda, to a widower named John Campbell, a well-respected knight from a minor branch of the vast family, who owned a large estate in Argyll. They met during King Robert’s campaign in the north and wedded quickly, Ysenda moving south with him early in the summer. Two of John’s youngest sons, rangy and chestnut-haired, were in Robert’s company. But perhaps the greatest shock for Will was the introduction to his nephew, a man named Colin, who was only fifteen years younger than himself and a child of his elder sister, Ede. He had come with his three sons, all of them broad and black-haired, their faces holding echoes of James.

The emotion he felt, coming into this ancient land, surrounded by men of his blood, was overwhelming. He had spent most of the past twelve months thinking his life and everything in it was ended. To be here, now, knowing that in some ways it had only just begun, felt like a gift straight from God, but the fall of the templars

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a fragile gift that he cradled warily, fearful of breaking it. David had told him he would be welcome, but he hadn’t dared ask his nephew how he knew this, and as they wound their way out of the trees and a wide dark sea fi lled the horizon, he felt doubts crowding in on him.