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CHAPTER FIVE

Joglar

Lord Lanval was not best pleased when Lucatz the troubadour came and asked if the troupe might leave next day. The request for permission was a courtesy; there was nothing the castellan could do to stop them. They had been in Sévignan for months and it was understood that they would move to another bastide in the spring.

But he wanted them to stay to celebrate his daughter’s betrothal. He tried to persuade Lucatz to wait a few days longer but the troubadour was politely firm; the joglars were already packing up their instruments. Lucatz himself had been surprised by the urgency with which Perrin and Huguet had argued the need to move on immediately. But he did not want to stay in the castle without them and risk missing them on the road.

So with April just beginning and the trees all coming into light green leaf the troubadour, the two joglars and three joglaresas and a handful of acrobats, jugglers and dancers wound their way down the hill from the castle. Once the townspeople had gone back into their houses, a slight young boy with a heavy pack slipped out of the bailey and took the same road as the troupe.

It was some time before Elinor was missed. No one had seen the donzela for some hours before her mother started to inquire after her. The Lady Clara was planning another session of explaining to her daughter exactly how desirable it was for her to accept Lord le Viguier. But she was nowhere to be found.

The dark hair that Alys had carefully snipped off with Miqela’s scissors had been burned in the kitchen fire and one of Elinor’s dresses concealed in Alys’s chest for future destruction, so that no one would guess she had left in disguise. Her fur-lined cloak had been rolled into her pack against the next winter. There was nothing to suggest that she was anywhere other than roaming the castle and its environs as she so often did. And nothing to suggest that she was dressed in any way differently from normal. Any search party would be looking for a young girl, not a boy.

It wasn’t till nightfall that her parents were alarmed and by then it was too dark to take the search outside the castle. And when the dawn broke, after a sleepless night for many in Sévignan, Elinor was many miles away.

The troupe had reached Lodève and settled for the night near a tavern, when a young boy on a dappled pony stopped and asked if he might join them.

‘I am Esteve,’ he said in a high, unbroken voice. ‘And I am a joglar like you. I got separated from my troupe.’

Lucatz looked at him dubiously. ‘What troupe? Who is your troubadour?’ He thought the pony looked a little familiar but he did not recognise the boy.

Indeed her own mother would not have recognised Elinor in this slender and hollow-eyed youth. She was riding the pony with a man’s saddle, which had made her sore and awkward. But she had been happy to find Mackerel tethered by the town gate, as arranged with the joglars. He was her own pony and had whickered in recognition as she approached, undeceived by her new appearance. Although it was unusual for a joglar to have his own mount – indeed only Lucatz had a horse and the rest of his troupe walked beside the pack ponies – it would make her adaptation to a rougher life a bit easier.

‘Guilhem Ademar,’ Elinor, who had been coached by Perrin, answered Lucatz’s question. ‘We were at Albi together.’

‘You must have left the court there very early in spring to have come so far by now,’ said Lucatz suspiciously. In truth he was rather jealous that Ademar’s least joglar – for this was just a boy – had his own mount.

The boy said nothing; he had been advised not to elaborate.

‘What do you play?’ asked Lucatz.

‘Flute and tambour,’ said Elinor. ‘And I can sing all the latest cansos.’

‘I say we let him join us,’ said Perrin. ‘Now that Huguet’s voice has broken we could do with another singer to take the high line.’

‘Very well,’ said Lucatz. ‘You may travel with us till you can rejoin Ademar’s troupe. I’ll not have him saying I stole his young joglar.’

‘Thank you, sir,’ said Elinor and then went through introductions to all the people she had already known when she was the donzela.

The joglaresas were the hardest, flirting with him and teasing him about his absence of beard and other aspects of manhood that he lacked.

‘Leave him be, Pelegrina,’ said Perrin in the end, quite harshly. ‘The lad must be tired. Give him something to eat. And then you can bed down with Huguet and me, son. Take no notice of the women – they treat everyone the same.’

Elinor was grateful, though she hoped perhaps the women’s teasing was meant to help keep up her pretence. She ate her bowl of rabbit stew greedily and, after stretching out her bedroll between the two joglars who were already her friends, she fell into a deep and refreshing sleep, better than any night she had passed in the castle for weeks. To lie on the ground, under the stars, was a completely new experience and she would never have guessed how free and at the same time how safe she felt.

In the morning, after some fresh bread and small ale from the tavern, the troupe packed up and returned to the road.

‘Would you ride while a lady walks?’ Bernardina asked the new joglar. ‘That is not true cortesia.’

‘See how he colours up like a girl,’ jeered Pelegrina. ‘Perhaps because he doesn’t think we are ladies?’

Elinor stopped the pony and dismounted, bowing awkwardly to the joglaresas and offering Mackerel to whichever of them would like to ride. But Lucatz had ridden back to see why they had stopped and ordered the boy back up.

‘I don’t want them getting soft,’ he said. ‘How many joglaresas do you know who can ride? But then perhaps in Ademar’s troupe everyone has their own mount?’

‘No, sir,’ said Elinor. ‘I was given the pony by a lord.’ That was true enough.

‘Hmm,’ said Lucatz. ‘We will not enquire into why.’ He glared at the joglaresas, who were cackling with lewd laughter. ‘Now we have delayed long enough. On your way.’

While Lucatz and his troupe travelled slowly east towards Montpellier, Bertran was working his way from court to court in the west. From Narbonne he crossed the River Aude and headed for Minerve, calling at the hill towns in between: Aigne, Aigues-Vives and La Caunette.

After many weeks on horseback he rode unchallenged through the gates in the double curtain wall round the town and over the bridge into Minerve. The River Cesse disappeared into a large natural tunnel, affording a good water supply for the castle. And from here he could see the tall candela, the central tower. From here it looked impregnable, standing on a high spur of rock.

The town was built on the site of an old Roman temple to the goddess Minerva, who had given it her name. In ancient times, the locals would have prayed to the warlike goddess to protect them, but what could save them from the battles to come now that the Midi was Christian but the Church itself was about to take up arms against them? Bertran hoped that the town’s many natural advantages would hold the answer.

He sang his song himself that night at the court of Viscount Guilhem. There were no other troubadours or joglars in the castle so he took his own lute from his saddlebags and sang to all who would listen about the love that was like war, the battles that would be fought and lost or won depending on the readiness of the beloved.

After dinner, he had an interview with the Viscount alone.

‘Where will you go next?’ asked Guilhem.

‘West, to Carcassonne,’ said Bertran. ‘I must talk to Viscount Trencavel.’

‘Do you think he understands the gravity of the situation?’

‘I think not,’ said Bertran. ‘He will see it as a problem only for his uncle in Toulouse. But once the lords of the north take up the Cross against the south, it will not be the Count of Toulouse alone who will suffer.’

‘You really think that an army will invade the Midi?’ asked Guilhem. ‘That the northerners will besiege our castles and bastides?’

‘I do indeed believe that, my lord,’ said the troubadour.

‘But look how we are placed here,’ said Guilhem. ‘We have the outer walls and the tower and enough men to defend them. Even if they come in their tens of thousands, we could withstand them.’

‘Then prepare for that,’ urged Bertran. ‘Build up your stocks of armour, weapons and food. And make sure that the people are loyal to you and willing to defend the Believers.’

Bertran did not know whether the Viscount of Minerve shared his secret religion; he had given no sign. But he did know that if the Church moved against the south, an army hungry for blood and land would not distinguish between heretics and the faithful.

It took the troupe several more days to reach Montpellier and Lucatz was so keen to be in the city in time for Easter that he hired a cart to carry all those without mounts. The three joglaresas sat in the back with their legs dangling over the edge, chatting and laughing and greatly enjoying the treat. After the long winter in Sévignan, they were out of practice in walking the roads. Perrin and Huguet sat next to the carter on either side, playing on a flute and fiddle to keep him entertained on the journey. The jugglers and dancers huddled up together on the straw in the back of the cart improvising raucous and rude lyrics to the joglars’ tunes. Lucatz rode well ahead but Esteve kept the pony alongside the cart.

Elinor was getting used to being Esteve the joglar. She had hardened to riding in a man’s saddle and had not found the change in her life too difficult. It helped that the weather was warm and the nights mild, since the troupe usually slept in the open. Their food was homely and without the refinements that Hugo had applied in the castle kitchen at Sévignan, but Elinor throve on it. Riding in the fresh air and performing at country fairs gave her an appetite much greater than her restricted life in the castle. And now that she was no longer afraid of being made to marry, her heart was light.

She missed Alys, of course, and her brother, but she was not lonely. Perrin and Huguet were as friendly as always and protective too, and the joglaresas, though they kept up a stream of mockery, were not hostile. Lucatz was a bit remote and prickly but he nodded in approval at Esteve’s singing and playing. It was hard work, keeping up with the professional musicians but Elinor was thrilled to find that here was something she could do. She even managed a passable dance when surrounded by the rest of the troupe and her fine leg was commented on by many maidens in the villages they passed through.

Of Bertran, she heard nothing. Perrin went extremely vague when she tried to press him about the troubadour’s movements.

‘He was going east, that’s all I know,’ he said but he seemed uneasy and Elinor was sure he knew of some danger to Bertran that he was keeping from her.

As they approached the walls of Montpellier, Elinor looked up with interest. She had never been in such a great city and the furthest she had travelled away from her home before had been to the market in Béziers. Montpellier had a market too, much larger, and that was where Lucatz was heading.

It was like nothing Elinor had ever seen and Huguet had to nudge her knee to stop her looking like a gaping carp at all the sights.

‘Surely Esteve has seen a market before,’ he whispered. ‘They must have them in Albi.’

She tried to seem less impressed but it was difficult. The central square was filled with more stalls than she had ever seen before. It was Holy Saturday and the city was brimming over with visitors as well as the local population, come to spend their money and go to Mass in the cathedral for Easter Day. Lucatz told the carter to tie up at the edge of the market and look after the horses and signalled to his troupe to follow him on foot.

Montpellier was known as the ‘golden city’ of the Midi because of all its goldsmiths and there were stalls glittering and glinting in the sunshine with all kinds of chains and rings and seals. They sat alongside the wares of glassworkers, parchment-makers, haberdashers and dyers.

In the food part of the market smells of raw fish and eels and game made Elinor’s gorge rise but there were also stalls selling sweet spiced bread and tarts and chestnuts and roast mutton. She had never seen such a range of different kinds of food, not even at one of Hugo’s best feasts in the castle.

At the far end of the market was a raised platform, not much more than a cart frame on barrels instead of wheels, which Lucatz had his eye on. The troupe followed him slowly, threading their way through the many delights being offered on each side. Perrin bought spiced biscuits for the joglars and Elinor thought the mixture of cinnamon, sugar and almonds was the most delicious thing she had ever tasted.

‘This is where we’ll perform on Monday,’ said Lucatz. ‘And I will go to the court and see whether the Lady will give us hospitality.’

‘So we can explore the market now?’ asked Bernardina.

The troubadour frowned. ‘Very well. But I shall expect to see all of you in the cathedral for the Easter Vigil tonight. Then I’ll let you know where we’ll be sleeping. You, Esteve, come with me.’

‘Me?’ asked Elinor, dumbfounded. She was torn between longing to explore the market and curiosity about what the inside of a grander court than her father’s would be like.

‘Yes, don’t dawdle like a halfwit,’ said Lucatz. ‘If you behave like a normal person, I think you might impress the Lady.’

As they walked up to the castle, the troubadour stopped to pick up useful pieces of gossip on the way.

‘So,’ he said, when they had at last left the market and the winding streets around it and were heading up a broader approach to the citadel. ‘It appears we have come at a fortunate time.’

He was unlike his usual self, almost gleeful at the prospect of gain to be had in the golden city.

‘It seems that the Lady has an heir,’ he said. ‘The new little Senhor was born in February. Jacques they call him and he is but two months old. That means the Lady will be recovered from her lying-in and full of joy and, we hope, largesse.’

‘That’s good,’ said Elinor uncertainly. ‘I’m sorry but I know nothing of the Lady of Montpellier. Has she no Senhor?’

‘She is married to King Pedro of Aragon,’ said Lucatz, ‘but is Lady of Montpellier in her own right. She got the title back from her half-brother only four years ago.’ He lowered his voice. ‘But there’s a rumour that Pedro is trying to divorce her and marry someone else. He wants Montpellier for himself but I don’t think the domna will let him have it easily.’

Elinor was amazed. Here was a woman ruling a city in her own name and defying her husband even though he was a powerful king and Elinor’s father’s own suzerain. It made her own attempts at independence seem rather puny.

‘It’s not the first time she has married a scoundrel,’ said Lucatz and Elinor was astonished at the casual way he referred to their sovereign lord. ‘Maria’s first husband married her and gave her two daughters. But the Pope annulled that match because he had two wives alive already!’

By now they had reached the castle, with its silver shield with a red circle on it hanging over the gate. Elinor was a bit disappointed that they were not ushered into the presence of Maria of Montpellier herself. But they were well entertained by her senescal, who was courteous and welcoming. Elinor kept very quiet throughout the interview, saying little except for thanking the man for the sweet wine and biscuits and giving her assumed name.

By the time they left, Lucatz was in a very good humour.

‘Monday morning in the market and in the evening entertaining at the child’s Christening feast,’ he said. ‘What could be better? I didn’t know about the child but I made the right decision leaving Sévignan when we did, even though there was a betrothal feast in the offing.’

Elinor realised with a shock that he was talking about her own possible troth-pledging to old le Viguier. Was it really less than a week ago that she had stood in the solar and heard his proposal?

To cover her confusion, she asked whether the Lady would not have already arranged the entertainment for her son’s important day.

‘We can’t expect to be the only troupe in Montpellier,’ said Lucatz. ‘You must know that from your time at Albi. But we will have the charm of novelty. I’m sure we will be the crown of the evening. I must tell the other joglars to match our songs to the Lady’s circumstances.’

The cathedral was ablaze with light. And in the choir stalls sat all the nuns from a nearby convent. Three of them came down into the main aisle, each carrying a candle, a towel and a box.

‘What are they doing?’ whispered Elinor.

‘They are the three Marys,’ Perrin whispered back. ‘They go to the tomb to anoint the dead body of the Lord.’

The three nuns walked towards the altar, where two choirboys dressed in white stood like guardian angels and warbled in their high voices: ‘Quem queritis?’ – ‘Whom do you seek, O servants of Christ?’

‘Jesus of Nazareth crucified, O inhabitants of heaven,’ sang the nuns.

‘He is not here, he is resurrected as it was foretold.

‘Go and announce that he is raised from the dead.’

It was surprisingly moving. The priest took up the Host and processed round the cathedral with the two ‘angels’ on either side of him and the three ‘Mary’s walking behind.

And then the true Mass began. Perrin and Huguet slipped out and Elinor noticed that two of the joglaresas left quietly too. So they were also heretics, she thought. She knew that those who practised her father’s religion would not receive the Sacrament.

Elinor strained to see the Lady of Montpellier, who sat in her own special stall at the front of the nave. She was tiny, a dignified and indomitable figure with a very straight back and a mass of dark hair. But she was surrounded by ladies-in-waiting and guards, so that there was not much more than a glimpse of her to be seen, in a cloth of gold robe.

Elinor would get a closer view tomorrow.