SAINT-GILLES, PROVENCE-LANGUEDOC BORDER—JANUARY 1208
Lucas Mauléon approached the church from the southern end of the square. He waited in the shadows, observing the low front of the great abbey and its three portico doors. Two cats bounded across the square, one hissing as it chased the other, feral toms fighting over scant scraps. Otherwise, it was quiet. It was only days past the darkest hours of the season, and dawn was slow to come, but soon the church bells would ring for the sunrise service of lauds.
He crossed to the abbey’s central portico, where the dual handles of iron were unchained, and pushed against one half of the door. The polished wood whispered as it glided over worn stone.
Archdeacon Pierre de Castelnau stood before the altar with his back to the entrance, smoothing an embroidered cloth across a low wooden table where the bread and wine of the Eucharist would be arranged. White bursts of air trailed his movements as he chanted.
“Reverend, would you spare a moment for a blessing?”
Castelnau yelped and spun around, the heavy gold chains at his neck clinking. “Goodness, man, you startled me.” He clutched at the ermine borders of the cloak he wore over his black soutane and drew them closed.
“You should be more careful.” Lucas walked toward the altar with a measured pace. “These are uncertain times. You never know who might wander in uninvited.”
The archdeacon sniffed and covered his shock with a smirk. “If I’d known you were coming, I would have arranged for a more gracious reception.” He smoothed his robe and his tone, attempting to regain control. Squinting into the dim light of the nave, he asked, “But why are you wearing Toulouse’s coat of arms? Is it possible that you’ve switched allegiance from the king to a renegade count and I hadn’t heard?”
Letting the question hang in the air, Lucas bent to retrieve a long, slim knife from his boot scabbard. He traced a slow arc in the air, and Castelnau flinched as the silver blade gleamed in the candlelight.
“What is the meaning of this? How dare you brandish that weapon in God’s own house?” Then his eyes bulged, and his mouth opened and closed as he struggled for his voice. “It’s true.” His gasp echoed in every corner of the sanctuary. “I was warned that Plessis would betray me, but I never believed he would condemn me to death.”
Lucas hesitated at this last pronouncement. Only he and his commander, Philippe du Plessis, knew of the mission that brought him south, so close to his boyhood home. Who had betrayed them to the archdeacon? But he could spare no time for reflection. Betrayal wouldn’t change what he’d promised to do or had been promised as a reward. The command had been given, and his hand belonged to those who wielded the most power. Hesitation would mean failure.
His shadow grew as he strode forward, and it vanished as the two bodies met. He clasped Castelnau around the back of the neck, bearing down on the space between muscle and bone, and drew the archdeacon to his chest in a tight embrace. The older man struggled as the knife caught on the thick fabric of his wool robes, but his limbs went rigid when the blade sunk deep into his flesh. Castelnau clutched at Lucas with one hand, babbling in pain. “I have seen the spirit of God,” he wheezed. “They are not heretics. They are the Trinity.”
Lucas withdrew his arm and released his grip on the archdeacon’s neck. He moved away as Castelnau slumped to the ground, unaware of the rectangle of white that dropped from the archdeacon’s hand and slid underneath the altar. He peered into the shadows of the nave, his nostrils flaring.
Then he sank to one knee beside the priest, wiping the red blade on the fur lining of the archdeacon’s cloak. Castelnau’s eyes opened. A bubble formed at his lips, then burst, and a thin trickle of blood ran down his jaw. He blinked once and was still. Lucas bent an ear to the archdeacon’s mouth and held his own breath as he listened.
Satisfied, Lucas replaced the knife in its scabbard and straightened to his full height. His long stride carried him to the door, where he paused, his head cocked. Hearing only the scratches of mice in the straw, he pulled up his hood and opened the door. But he remained in place, allowing the door to close before him. Then he slipped back into the shadows of the nave.
With silent steps, Lucas moved toward the squat figure crouched beside a column to the left of the altar. Approaching from behind, he pressed the blade of his knife against the exposed skin above the cowl of the monk’s robe. The rotund young man froze. The knife’s edge kissed the rolls of fat on the back of his neck, and Lucas imagined the skin parting like a ripe peach. He bent over and encircled the soft chest with one long arm. The monk gave off a rank miasma of fear.
“Whatever you saw and heard, it was enough, wasn’t it?” He spoke in langue d’oc. “There’s no reason to kill you.” The monk wobbled his head. “You’ll wait until dawn. Then you will ring the church bell as for lauds. You’ll ring until the entire village is here to see the slain body of the archdeacon. You will tell them that as you approached the church, you saw a man running away. And that man was wearing the coat of arms of the Count of Toulouse. Speak, so I know you understand.”
“I saw your surcoat. You are Toulouse’s man.” The monk’s voice emerged as a squeak.
“What is your name? You aren’t from the region.”
“J-Jordí Baltasar B-Bonafé,” he stammered. “Of Girona, Catalunya.”
“You will live to bear witness to what happened here today, Jordí Baltasar Bonafé of Girona, Catalunya. I will guarantee your safety if you do as you are told. Do you understand?” Lucas laid a hand on the young man’s shoulder and squeezed, his fingers displacing fat as they ground into the monk’s collarbone.
The monk gasped in pain and nodded rapidly to signal his assent.
The nave carried no sound of Lucas’s thick leather soles crossing the aisle, no sound of the door closing behind him.
• • •
A thin strip of gold lined with rose etched the Luberon range to the northeast. Dawn was near. Lucas strode down the sheep tracks that led from the village walls to the fields beyond.
Achille whinnied at his approach. Lucas caressed the horse’s forehead, and the courser pressed into him, nosing in his cloak for a hidden piece of bread or carrot. He held the great horse by the neck and shuddered.
He’d killed before, of course, but as a Templar knight—a Soldier of Christ—on the battlefields of the Fourth Crusade in Anatolia, far from home. There too he’d seen the faces of those he was about to slay, but they had shown neither fear nor bewilderment. His victims were soldier-warriors, as he had been, merciless in their frenzy to survive and slaughter. The sword blade, the knifepoint, or the ax head could have been turned against him, and his opponent never would have hesitated. On a battlefield, hesitation meant certain death.
Pierre de Castelnau was different. He’d been unarmed, a man of God, and he had not surrendered in silence. I have seen the spirit of God, Castelnau had gibbered in his last moments. They are not heretics. They are the Trinity. Lucas shook his head. The nonsensical moaning of a dying man mattered not.
Achille huffed his restlessness, and his front hooves pawed at the frozen ground; it was time to leave. Lucas removed his cloak and the tunic underneath. He folded the red cloth embroidered with a twelve-point cross into a small bundle, pressing it tightly to his chest to flatten the material before shoving it to the bottom of a saddlebag.
He’d worn the pilfered cloak in anticipation of being seen; Toulouse’s coat of arms would be enough to implicate the count. A witness saying he’d seen a man bearing the symbol of the House of Toulouse leaving the church where Castelnau had been assassinated was a welcome opportunity. And he had a name, a frightened monk known as Jordí Bonafé, who may prove to be useful beyond ringing a church bell in alarm.
The stallion’s ears sprang up as the pealing of bells ripped through the serene meadow. Private triumph rippled through Lucas. He had done as commanded and could claim his reward. The new sénéchal of the Aude and Hérault Valleys, the most powerful keeper of the law in Languedoc, grabbed the pommel of his saddle, stepped into the stirrup, and swung a leg over the horse’s back in one confident uplift of his lean body. Before this new year grew much older, Lucas—who had abandoned his Occitan name, Moisset, to become the French soldier known as Mauléon—would appear in his former Languedoc home, victorious at last.
With a glance at the eastern sky, Lucas pressed his heels into Achille’s side. Man and horse sped toward Paris.
BISTRO LA CAUQUILHA, GRUISSAN—FRIDAY EVENING
Lucas returned to the table a few minutes later, the stray locks of hair that fell across his forehead separated and damp as though he’d splashed his face with water. He regarded Lia calmly but gave no explanation for his abrupt exit.
“Thanks for showing interest in my research,” Lia offered in awkward apology. She’d obviously made some sort of gaffe, but she had groped through their conversation while he was in the bathroom and couldn’t figure out where she’d gone wrong. “It’s not often I find someone willing to let me drone on about dualist theology or Vatican intrigue.”
“It all sounds like the making of a great conspiracy theory,” Lucas replied. The corners of his mouth lifted, but the smile did not reach his eyes.
“Yes, I know.” She sighed dramatically, hoping for levity. “The dark and mysterious Knights Templar make for bestselling novels and blockbuster movies. But behind every cliché, there is an element of truth, isn’t there? Otherwise, the legends wouldn’t work.”
“It was a long time ago,” Lucas said, considering his half-finished meal. His voice was so soft, he seemed to be speaking more to himself than to her. He looked up, and the gold flecks in his irises glinted in the light of the low-hanging pendant lamp. “I should have asked how long you plan on staying in Minerve.”
“I don’t have a time frame,” she replied. “But my dearest friends are close by, and my father’s family is just a few hours’ drive away. My life’s work surrounds me. There doesn’t seem any place I should be but here. I’ll need to sort out somewhere permanent to live, but for now, Minerve is home.”
“I imagine Languedoc is full of distressing memories.”
She cast a glance around the restaurant to avoid the emotion she was certain her eyes betrayed. “Maybe it was wrong to have come back to the place where Gabriel died. But I have to forgive France for his death. Too much of my soul is here. Gabriel’s soul is here.” She stopped, aware she was sharing her most personal longings with a man she hardly knew.
Lucas placed a hand on top of hers, and she froze at the startling intimacy of his warm skin. “The Cathars believed a tragic death could condemn a soul to the hell of rebirth on earth instead of passing to eternal paradise,” he said. “It’s natural to hope to see your husband again.”
Lia sucked in her ire and embarrassment. “Wow. That’s one hell of an assumption. I’m researching a belief in reincarnation, not hanging my heart on a fantasy.”
Behind Lucas, flames roared up from the open kitchen, and the diners around them gasped. A chef shook a pan over the stove and tossed prawns in the flambé. In the moment before the flames died out, Lia pulled away her hand and hoped the low light hid the flush on her face.
“I shouldn’t have pried.” He spoke slowly, breaking the tension. His hand remained on her side of the small table, his tapered fingers reaching toward her. “It was a ridiculous thing to say.” A passing waiter cleared their dinner plates, breaking into his apology. They refused the dessert menu. Instead, Lucas ordered a ristretto, and she asked for a cappuccino.
The hands on the square copper clock behind the bar pointed out the time on its numberless face: almost eleven. It seemed impossible that three hours had passed.
• • •
After dinner, they entered the maze of confined streets that coursed through Gruissan’s medieval center. Lia thought she’d parked in a lot off avenue Général Azibert, but when they crossed the perimeter road, the lot was nowhere to be found.
“I’m certain it’s not far. Really, I can find my way from here.”
But Lucas wouldn’t hear of Lia wandering around Gruissan alone. He was unhurried, but she felt ridiculous. How could she have lost her way? Continuing along rue du Fort, they passed a restaurant overlooking the salt marshes. A few kitchen staff and waiters stood just beyond a side door, shifting their feet in the cold and burning through cigarettes with short, intense drags. Within moments, she and Lucas emerged in an open space familiar to Lia, since she’d driven onto its gravel surface a few hours before.
Several cars filled the lot, but they walked straight to her Peugeot, Lucas’s hand still on her back, a rudder to steer her body. Whether she led the way or he knew the direction, Lia didn’t want to know.
When Lucas took his hand away, an imprint of heat remained on her skin. She pressed the Unlock button on the key fob. The car chirped twice, and the lock released with a click. Lia turned back to Lucas, her arms crossed over her torso, clutching her tiny purse. “Thank you.”
“It was my pleasure,” he replied. A breeze gusted in from the sea and sent dried leaves and scraps of paper scuttling between the cars. “I take your research seriously, Lia. I hope you don’t think I was trying to belittle your work earlier.”
“No, of course not.”
Lucas tucked loose strands of hair behind her ear, and his hand skimmed her cheek before falling away. His touch thrilled her and stirred up longing and loneliness. He reached around her and opened the car door. “Good night. Drive safely.”
In her rearview mirror, she saw him watching, motionless, as she drove away.
• • •
Lia’s dreams that night flickered like an old movie reel. Gabriel flew past on his bike, spinning toward danger. Lucas stood on the other side of the road, silently holding out his hand.
A third man appeared by her side. A scar ran down one cheek, inflamed and red, ugly in the bright light. But his eyes were warm. He opened his mouth, and his lips formed her name, but she couldn’t hear his voice. He too extended a hand to her but looked sharply away. A Mercedes bore down on them, and the sound of screeching tires filled her ears.
She woke with a throbbing head. The sheet was soaked with sweat, and she shivered as her damp skin cooled and the memory of the dream returned. She whispered Gabriel’s name over and over, an incantation of sorrow, until sleep took her away at last.