LASTOURS—THE LAST SATURDAY IN MARCH
“This is one of the loneliest places in all of Languedoc.” Lucas aimed his Nikon lens through the slit of a flèche vitrine—an opening in the side of the tower just wide enough to shoot an arrow through—to capture the raw landscape that punched with rocky fists toward the foothills of the Black Mountain.
“I’m certain this is haunted ground.” Lia leaned into the wind that poured through Château Cabaret’s ruined south end. “But it’s the place where I feel closest to history.”
Lucas joined her at the crumbling wall overlooking Cabaret’s sister castles Régine, Surdespine, and Quertinheux, which stood sentinel on the spine of the ridge.
“I always imagine if I stand here long enough or visit during the full moon, I’ll hear these stones speak.” She dismissed the yearning with a shake of her head. “Not exactly material for my dissertation.”
“Oh, I don’t know, Lia. It sounds just right for the mystical Cathars.” Lucas smiled from behind his camera; the shutter clicked and whirred. He finished and tucked the tripod under his arm. “Thank you for meeting me here.”
As they walked through the ruins, she described the history behind the photos Lucas had framed and shot.
Each castle was comprised of a single tower surrounded by a stone wall. Perched on bedrock high above the Orbiel River and accessible by a crumbling footpath, the lonely ruins rose like four fingers bursting through a rocky grave. They were all that remained of a series of fortresses constructed in the eleventh century by a family that had derived its wealth from nearby iron mines. The castles became a Cathar seat of resistance until their inhabitants succumbed to a brutal siege in 1227.
Eight hundred years later, Lia could hear those lost souls keening through holes rent in the stone by war and the passing of centuries.
Black-green cypress quivered against a beryl sky, and the musk of thyme and the piquant resin of boxwood swelled with the warmth of the sun. The camouflage of silvery-gray garigue blended into the castle stone. They walked in silence down a steep footpath to the medieval village that had huddled at the base of Cabaret hundreds of years before. The waist-high walls zigzagging between oak and cedar trees were remnants of the homes of those who had loved, fought, and shared the lean times and the good.
They entered a bower sheltered from the wind and warmed by the sun’s rays, which beamed between tree branches. Lia brushed russet-colored cedar needles from a level patch of wall and took a seat on the wide ledge. After leaning his tripod against the wall and tucking his camera away in its bag, Lucas sat beside her.
“You said in Gruissan that it would be natural for me to hope to see Gabriel again,” she said. “I know I shut you down. The whole notion of reincarnation seemed almost offensive. I guess you could say I’ve had a change of heart. This agnostic historian now believes the Cathars were right.”
Lucas blinked and frowned but allowed her to continue. Lia looked down at her hands, tightly folded in her lap.
“You remember my friend, the priest Jordí Bonafé, the one we were supposed to meet that day in Carcassonne? He’s been something of a mentor to me, and I think he may be able to help prove that my theory about Castelnau’s murder is right.” Lia inhaled and then forced out her breath in a laugh. “I’ve had some odd experiences recently. You’d think me crazy if I told you what’s happened, but I accept that there are spirits here in Languedoc—spirits from another time whose stories are part of mine. The suspension of disbelief doesn’t seem like such a tall order, surrounded by the ghosts of history,” she said in a weak attempt to sound convincing, sweeping her arm around the mystical space where they sat.
Lucas rose from the wall and leaned against a locust tree a few feet away, crossing his arms over his chest. “This is a powerful place, Lia, full of secrets and legends, but reincarnation?”
“Part of me is waiting for someone to reveal the hidden camera and the joke,” she admitted, punching at the dirt with the heel of her boot. “But, Lucas, the truth is I haven’t felt this clearheaded since before Gabriel was killed. And I feel him beside me, urging me on. Whether it’s to love again or to uncover some truth in this strange history, I don’t know. Maybe a combination of both.”
“To love again?” he asked, an edge of scorn in his voice.
Lia pressed her chilled hands between her thighs and said the rest of what she’d come here to say. “The man I was expecting for dinner the other night saw your car parked in front of the cottage; he saw us kiss after dinner and misunderstood what was happening between us, Lucas. Which is nothing.”
He flinched, and she winced at her lack of tact.
“Not nothing. That’s not what I meant.”
Lucas pushed away from the tree and waved away her words. “I know what you meant. I knew it last week. You can’t blame me for trying.” He flashed a smile that didn’t reach his eyes.
Lia wanted to explain further. She wanted to say how untethered she felt, trying to reconcile her heart with the preposterous tales she should know better than to believe, but she knew more explanation would only humiliate the man before her.
The light had shifted while they’d talked, leaving them in cool shadow. “We should be getting back. They’ll close the gates soon,” she said.
They walked single file toward the visitor’s center. “What does this priest friend of yours know about Castelnau’s death that the rest of the academic world does not?” asked Lucas.
Lia grimaced. She’d said more about Jordí than she should have.
“Oh, I’m not sure he knows anything, really.” She was grateful he couldn’t see her face; she wouldn’t have to hide the lie from her eyes. “It’s just good to have someone else on the case, you know? But he’s out of town indefinitely, so I’m on my own.”
Lia waited for a reply but heard only the crackle of forest debris breaking under their tread. They passed out of the park and descended into Lastours, the still-inhabited hamlet that hugged a stretch of land between the basalt hills and the Orbiel River. Her thoughts turned from Raoul to Jordí and to the pile of documents she’d been working on since yesterday afternoon.
“Militum Xpisti,” she said aloud, stopping so suddenly that Lucas collided with her back. He grabbed her upper arm, steadying them both. She turned, but her eyes looked past him as she searched and remembered. “Militum Xpisti,” she repeated, oblivious to the narrowing of his eyes and ignoring his tightening grip.
“Lia?”
Her lips pursed in a small, secret smile, and she returned her gaze to his face. “Do you mind if we go our separate ways once we get back to the parking lot? There’s something I need to follow up on.”
“I have somewhere I need to be this evening myself. Maybe dinner later in the week?”
Lia nodded absently and turned out of Lucas’s grasp. He let her go, and she missed seeing his hands clenching into fists and releasing as his feet moved forward. Her mind had already left Lastours and Lucas.
Militum Xpisti. The Soldiers of Christ. Knights Templar. Le Temple. Paris.
She knew where to find Jordí.
LIMOUX—THAT EVENING
Dusk seeped over the mountains as Jordí drove through Limoux. He’d feigned the call that ended his lunch with Lia two days before, but a real call—the one he’d been dreading—had come through a few hours before. Just as he’d been making preparations to leave Narbonne, perhaps for good, his past summoned him deeper into Languedoc. The sénéchal, now a photographer known as Lucas Moisset, demanded they meet at last.
Early Friday morning, he’d parked up the road from Lia’s cottage and watched as she left to meet with him at Saint-Just et Saint-Pasteur. He’d had his hand on the car horn, prepared to stop her and tell her everything. But the moment had passed. His nerve had failed. He’d waited a few minutes more, until he was certain she wouldn’t return, before hurrying up the sidewalk to leave the package on her doorstep. Then he’d driven to Lagrasse to see the past for himself.
Logis du Martinet had no tasting room, and the property’s gate was locked, so he waited out the afternoon parked on an unused tractor path until he saw an old Jeep turn from the highway into the winery’s long drive. The Jeep passed, and its driver merely glanced in Jordí’s direction before he placed a hand on the haunches of a quivering greyhound beside him, forcing the dog to sit. But the priest saw the thick scar on the man’s left cheek. Raoul d’Aran.
Jordí’s destination this evening was the home no one knew he owned. Set outside Limoux, it was tucked deep in the woods on an unpaved stretch of Chemin du Rossignol. His blue Renault bumped along a dirt lane before emerging in a shallow meadow. Parked beside the house was a bronze BMW. Jordí’s approach triggered the motion sensors for the front patio lights, but he didn’t need the illumination to fit his key into the lock of his own home; the handle gave easily.
The main room of his L-shaped mas—a traditional farmhouse—was cold as a sepulcher and lit by the dim glow seeping through the windows from the outside lights. Jordí turned toward the sound of liquid glugging from a bottle and splashing into a glass and made out a lean, black shadow silhouetted against the dark blue window. He switched on a lamp near the front door, and Lucas turned, raising a snifter of Armagnac in a toast.
“A 1969 Château de Gaube. You have excellent taste. Can I pour you one?”
Jordí nodded, dropping his leather satchel to the floor. He began to shrug out of his wool coat, but he realized he could see his breath in the cold room.
“I thought I’d find snow in the mountains, not clear skies, but it seems the storm has pushed out to sea. We’ll have a hard frost come morning. Shall I start a fire?” Jordí’s voice carried a faint vibration of fear. He crossed the room as he spoke, rubbing his gloved hands together and taking stock of his surroundings. He hadn’t been to the house in over eighteen months. A fine layer of dust dulled the gleaming wood and stone surfaces, but things looked otherwise untouched.
“A fire would be welcome. This should provide some warmth as well.” Lucas handed him a glass filled halfway with amber liquid.
“Father Jordí Baltasar Bonafé, hiding in plain sight only a few streets from my office,” Lucas said. He leaned against the edge of the antique oak cabinet, looking perfectly at ease in jeans, hiking boots, and a black sweater with a rolled collar. “I’m surprised by so little, but the sight of you catches me off guard. I was expecting a much younger man, one who had aged as little as I. It’s ironic that a man so close to God would get the short end of the stick, don’t you think?”
“Perhaps God showed me the greater kindness by disguising me from the Devil,” Jordí replied.
Lucas ignored the slight. “You’ve remained a man of the cloth all this time?”
“Who can tell about the centuries?” Jordí waved his hand in dismissal and busied himself with the kindling piled at the hearth. “Where you and I come from, there’s no such convenient construct as time.” He touched a long match to the cedar sticks. The dry wood grabbed at the flame and snapped around the logs he’d left stacked in the fireplace nearly two years before. He settled his bulk into a worn damask-covered armchair and wrapped his trembling hands around the snifter of Armagnac.
“Perhaps my prayers that this life is the final one will be answered. What I hope for is to have a heart attack and land facedown in a plate of duck confît.” He snorted and took a large swallow of brandy. “But here we are, wandering souls who have found each other at last. The hapless young monk and the feared Sénéchal Lucas Mauléon, with his unblinking, black eyes, who was, as you say, ‘hiding in plain sight.’”
With one hand, Lucas dusted off a straight-back wooden chair and placed it in front of the priest. He folded his long torso onto the seat, his knees brushing Jordí’s. “I was Lucas Mauléon long ago, Father. Now I am simply Lucas Moisset.”
The tremor in Jordí’s hand revealed itself in the copper shimmer of Armagnac as he brought the glass to his lips. He no more believed Lucas had left behind his identity as the sénéchal than he believed he would be canonized Saint Jordí when, if, he finally passed from this world.
“Why are you encouraging Lia Carrer to pursue her theory that Castelnau’s murder was something other than an act of revenge by Toulouse?” Lucas asked.
“What does it matter?” said Jordí. “History recorded nothing of Lucas Mauléon. Or of poor Lucas Moisset. She has no idea who you are.”
“Who I was, Bonafé. You must know what it’s like, to be suddenly of this world with memories you don’t understand, waiting for shadows to slip into the light.”
“You were the falcon sent to slaughter the dove.”
Lucas fell still, and Jordí thought of a great cat poised to strike. When he finally spoke, his voice was without inflection or emotion, too flat to be trusted. “What are you talking about?”
Jordí’s mind raced. The letter Castelnau dropped in death was the only trump card he had left. Seeking to deflect Lucas’s attention away from Castelnau, he slipped on the scree of his thoughts, scrabbled for purchase, and grasped hold of coincidence.
“Raoul d’Aran’s wife. Paloma Gervais d’Aran. The dove that will haunt us as long as we walk this earth.” Lucas’s recoil was slight, but Jordí felt the electric tension where their legs touched. He readied for an explosion. The fire snapped. The pines whispered.
With studied care, Lucas set his glass on the floor. He considered the dark room beyond for a long moment before gently placing his palms on Jordí’s knees. “What power do you think that name has over me, after all this time?”
Jordí spoke to the hands that spanned his thick legs. “Paloma Gervais and Bertran and Aicelina d’Aran are the reasons why our souls never left this earth.” He looked into the sénéchal’s eyes. “You tried to save Paloma, hoping to recapture her love after d’Aran’s death, but you were too late. Guilt and the search for atonement are the consequences of those unfinished lives.”
Lucas remained silent.
“But you have found her again, in a manner of speaking, haven’t you?” Jordí prodded at the vulnerable spot.
“I’ve found Paloma?” A short, bitter laugh. “You’re mad.”
“Lia Carrer. You were there at the Institute for Cathar Studies just days after her husband’s death. I recognized you immediately, though as you pointed out, time has not been so kind to me. You never once looked in my direction. You had eyes only for Lia. Lia, who so resembles your Paloma. She brings you back to the memory of the woman you adored. You’re in love with her, aren’t you?”
Jordí blinked. The chair before him was empty. Strong hands clamped his shoulders, grinding into the tender space behind his clavicles. Jordí was returned to the cold dawn eight hundred years before, when a soldier stood behind him, pressing a knife blade into the soft flesh at his neck.
“How is it possible that you and I are here when we were never believers?” Lucas growled in his ear. “We never belonged to the heretics’ faith.”
Back in the abbey of Saint-Gilles, a terrified Brother Bonafé had heard the gasps of a dying man floating through the nave: I have seen the spirit of God, the archdeacon had crowed, as his blood ran warm from his chest. They are not heretics. They are the Trinity. Philippe du Plessis had known of Castelnau’s heresy. But he hadn’t understood that truth did not have to be believed to be right.
Lucas’s body shifted, and the grip on Jordí’s flesh tightened. He removed the glass from Jordí’s shaking hand and pressed a photograph into his palm. The priest brought it in front of his face, his eyes straining in the dark. He gasped and tried to pull away. “Where did you get this? How could you know?”
“What were you doing on that very road that day, Father Bonafé?”
The room grew warm, unbearably so, and Jordí began to sweat in the wrap of his wool coat. He didn’t know. He’d never known. Raoul’s own words came to him. “When I woke, I was,” he whispered.
“My memories of this life began that day, not far from where this photograph was taken,” Lucas said. His hold loosened, and he braced his hands against Jordí’s clavicles, uncomfortably close to his neck.
Jordí nodded helplessly. “As did mine.”
“It was, in fact, the first time I saw you. Though as I said, I didn’t recognize you. I caught only a glimpse as you passed in your car. It wasn’t until Lia said your name, the day we were to meet in Carcassonne, that I realized you’ve been here all along. Living with your own secrets.”
“What secrets?” Jordí wheezed, although he knew the answer.
The muscle and bone behind him shifted. “Whatever it is you think you may know about me, remember that Lia has no idea what you’ve done either, Father. Unlike mine, history has recorded enough of your deeds to destroy you.” Lucas’s breath was hot against Jordí’s ear. “Be careful whose truth you reveal. You may come face-to-face with your own.” A blast of cold air pushed into the fire, and Jordí turned to see the front door wide open. Lucas had gone.
Lucas knew his truth. Yet Jordí still had history on his side in the form of a letter, carried through the centuries, to prove why Castelnau had been murdered and why the Cathars had been slaughtered out of existence. The very letter he told Lia had been lost to history.
He sat alone through the long night, wondering if he had the courage to reveal the truth, until the fire died out and he could no longer see the details of the photograph in his hand.
Well before dawn, Jordí drove to Narbonne. He spent several hours in his office at Saint-Just et Saint-Pasteur, sorting his affairs, and in the archives below, gathering the last traces of his past.