strength to overcome this illness and…’
‘I am dying, Alan. Let there be truth between us at the last. We have both seen much of death and of dying men, have we not? Let us not deceive ourselves.’
I was weeping openly by this time. The King took my hand in his unnaturally hot, bony grasp, and his glittering blue eyes fell upon a velvet bundle at my feet. ‘You are to practise your music a little more often, Blondel,’ he said mock-sternly. ‘I command it. I have noticed of late that you have been neglecting the vielle; it can be as powerful as the sword in the right hands, you know. You do too much soldiering and not enough singing, in my opinion.’
I smiled at him, through the mist of tears, and offered to play for him for a while. He agreed, but after a verse or two I saw that his eyes had closed and he was asleep, and his household knights behind him were frowning at me and gesturing frantically and silently that I should leave him in peace. And so I tiptoed away. I never saw my King alive again, and even now, many years later, the memory of his well-loved, fine-drawn sleeping face squeezes my throat and makes it hard for me to take a breath.
While the King was dying, Robin occupied himself interrogating the Master: we had rifled his baggage, and gone through the piles of loot, and searched the whole of the castle from the top of the tower to the deepest latrine, and found nothing. Either the Grail was indeed a magical object that could make itself invisible, or it was not in the castle. At first the Master had refused to speak of it at all; then after he had been roughly handled by Little John, who had threatened to roast his balls like chestnuts over a campfire, the Master had admitted that he had once had possession of the Grail, but insisted that he no longer knew where it was.
I dreaded what would come next; I knew Robin would not shrink from the vilest torture to get what he desired. But I did not want to see any man, even one as deserving as the Master, undergo the sort of torments that I knew Robin and Little John could inflict.
Robin strode out of his tent, calling a little too loudly for a brazier, firewood and irons, and I took my chance to speak with the prisoner. He was still bound, with his arms behind him, but his legs had been freed. As he sat there on the ground, his back against a bulky clothes chest, with his skinny white legs protruding from his drab monk’s robe and extended in front of him, it was difficult to remember that this was a man who casually ordered killings, a master of gangs of ruthless French woodland thieves, the head of a secret organization of would-be Templar knights, and someone who called himself the ‘man you cannot refuse’.
I knelt down beside him and looked into his pale, pockmarked face. Slowly, he raised his innocent blue eyes until he was staring into mine. ‘They are even now fetching the instruments,’ I said. He nodded sadly but said nothing.
‘You must die, of course,’ I said, ‘for what you have done to my family and my friends’ — he nodded again, an acknowledgement of his doom — ‘but I can make it quick. And, if you wish, I could use this.’
From the leather sheath at my waist, I plucked the lance-dagger, now cleaned and oiled, that I had recovered from Sir Eustace de la Falaise’s corpse. His eyes fixed upon it and I thought I detected a glow of veneration. He truly believed, I thought, that this was the blade that had pierced Christ’s body. ‘All you have to do is tell me where the Grail is, and swear on your immortal soul that you do not lie, and I will use this on you, swiftly, and you will feel no pain and go to your reward without the red-hot horrors that my lord of Locksley and his men would inflict upon you. Tell me, Brother Michel, where is the Grail? Tell me quickly before they return.’
‘I liked your father,’ he said. ‘Truly I did. And it grieved me that he had to take the blame. But he had to, you know, he was the only one who could.’
I was a little thrown by this change of subject but not so thrown that I could not retort: ‘You may have liked him but you ordered his death without a qualm, did you not? You had Murdac hang him like a felon, didn’t you?’
‘I had a dream, a vision. Our Lady came to me while I slept. She told me that I must take the Grail from that fat, slothful, self-indulgent bishop, a man not worthy of its grace, and use its power to magnify her name. And she came to me again a year later in the plague tents, when I lay dying in that stinking cot, surrounded by all the suffering men and women of Paris; she came to me then, too, and kissed me on the brow, and wiped away my tears, and gave me new life. She told me that I must drink from the Grail — just water, ordinary water made sacred and healing by the grace of the Grail, that wondrous symbol of her holy Christ-giving womb. I rose from my plague cot and left that place of sickness, and I drank from the Grail that very night and that pure draught put the breath and strength back into my feeble, dying body. She told me what I must do to repay her for that second chance; that second life. I saw so clearly what she wanted: a company of knights dedicated to her name, protecting that holy vessel and using its power to spread the love of the Queen of Heaven across the whole world. The cathedral, too, she asked me for that: the greatest church in Christendom devoted to her name. She has been most shamefully neglected: the Mother of Our Lord Jesus Christ, the blessed womb, the font from which God’s love springs — I knew then that it was my duty to devote my whole life to her everlasting glory.’
‘By killing and robbing innocent men and women — that is spreading her love, is it?’
‘Their deaths meant nothing: she told me so herself; all those who fell in her cause would be received into Heaven by her intercession. Those souls who died — including your father, my old friend Henri — have been saved! They are with the Mother of God in Heaven.’
I felt sick. Was he mad, I wondered. And how can one tell with folk who believe themselves touched by God? Or, in his case, the Mother of God. I had taken part in the Great Pilgrimage with thousands of other ordinary folk, and we had crossed Europe to bring war and death to the Holy Land in the name of Christ. Was this any different? Was he truly inspired by the Blessed Virgin Mary? Was she the source of his strange power that had very nearly allowed him to walk calmly from under my sword only a few days ago?
‘Cut my bonds, Alan,’ said the Master. ‘Allow me to go free to serve the Queen of Heaven and her Son. Cut them now: nobody will know but you and I. And you will assure yourself of a place in Heaven by your actions.’
His bright blue eyes compelled me, and my will dissolved; I could feel it melting away like snow on a boot top propped by a hearth; then with a dreamy jolt, I found I was outside my own body, like a ghost, looking across at a young blond knight stretching his left hand forward to grasp the cruel ropes that bound this innocent man of God, this good and holy monk…
No, no, a thousand times, no. With a wrench, I broke our locked gaze, came to my senses and snatched my left hand away as if from a flame. I reminded myself that this slight monk had commanded savage gangs of lawless bandits to do his bidding; he had controlled scores of knights and sent them out to kill at his behest. I had felt the full force of his mind and had nearly been overcome. I had a glimpse of Robin’s mocking face, and I knew that he would find the feebleness of my will entirely risible. He alone, among a dozen Westbury men, had been impervious to the Master’s powers in the round room above the tower: was it his cynicism, his godlessness that had protected him?
I lifted the lance-dagger in my right hand, taking refuge in its implied threat. I was about to make one more appeal to the man before me when I heard movement behind and turned to see roughly dressed, well-armed men pushing Robin’s sentries out of their way and swaggering into the tent: it was Mercadier and half a dozen of his routiers.
‘We have orders from the King,’ said Mercadier. ‘That monk is to be fetched to the royal tent, immediately. Put that ridiculous blade away and stand aside… Sir Knight.’
I stood and sheathed the lance-dagger. ‘He is my prisoner,’ I said. ‘You cannot merely steal him from under my nose in broad daylight.’
‘The King needs him! We have information from another wretch that this monk has in his possession a magical bowl, a relic of some sort, that can cure a man no matter how severe his hurt. So I say once again, Sir Knight, for the last time: stand aside by order of the King!’
I looked down at the Master. His eyes were closed; I heard him whisper: ‘Thank you, Lady, for your mercy!’
I made a final effort: ‘He does not have the magical bowl you seek. I have been trying to persuade him to reveal its hiding place…’
‘We shall persuade him more effectively than you, I think,’ said Mercadier, with a cold smile.
I put my hand on my sword hilt. But Mercadier spoke again: ‘Think carefully, Sir Knight, before you lose your head! You once took a captive monk from me by force — do you remember? Do you think I would flinch from doing the same to you in order for a chance to save the King’s life?’
On either side of Mercadier, two crossbowmen were aiming their weapons at my chest. I took a breath,
