I was more than happy to oblige my dying friend. Even though he had no eyes with which to shed tears, his chest heaved and there were sobs in his voice. I held him as tightly as my diminished powers allowed.
‘I have told you how Earl Harold was entrusted with the manuscript containing the exploits of Edgar the Atheling and his loyal brethren. Eleven years before we met at Wolvesey, Earl Harold had decided to repeat what Prince Edgar had done with William of Malmesbury and Roger of Caen. He told me he had been inspired by Edgar’s story and knew it was important that his own story be recorded for posterity – not because it was the story of his life, but because of its importance for our history. Now, I am passing it on to you; it is vital that you become its guardian, because I am the only one who knows it.’
‘But I am no more than a minor English knight of low birth, banished by our King.’
‘You must find a way, Ranulf, for me, for Earl Harold, for those who went before him and for England.’
‘I will try, my friend.’
Alun composed himself again.
‘Earl Harold first met Gilbert Foliot in 1139, when he was Bishop of Gloucester. The Earl had been involved in a violent skirmish at Oxford, during which he was badly wounded. Foliot protected him and saved his life. Nearly fifty years later, the Earl sought out Foliot, who was by then Bishop of London. Foliot was a dying man, but over many days, with the help of his scribes, the story of the Earl’s life was committed to vellum. It was a remarkable story, but one part of it is particularly important and something you must carry with you, for the Lionheart and for England.’
I felt Alun’s hand tighten its grip on my arm as he rested his head on my shoulder; the blood from his eyes started to run down my arm. His head felt heavy and his voice was getting thinner. His end was near.
‘The gossip that Earl Harold was the Empress Matilda’s lover was true, of course. Their affair began at the Earl’s eyrie, St Cirq Lapopie, in the most romantic of circumstances, and they remained close for the rest of their lives; that’s why his home in the Lot was so special to him and is where, I’m sure, he rests in peace.’
Alun gripped my arm more tightly. I sensed a great urgency in his words.
‘Listen, this is the vital truth: all three of the Empress’s children were sired not by her husband, Geoffrey of Anjou, but by Earl Harold. This included Henry Plantagenet, King of England, the Lionheart’s father.’
I peered at where Alun’s eyes should have been; he could not see the amazement on my face, but he knew what I was thinking.
‘Yes, Earl Harold is the Lionheart’s grandfather. Our King has far more English blood than he realizes, blood which includes that of Hereward of Bourne, his paternal great-great-grandfather.’
Suddenly, everything about my mission made sense: why it was so important to Earl Harold and, of course, to England’s legacy. I had often wondered what could have been so important to persuade such a man to devote his life to a recalcitrant duke from Aquitaine. Now I understood; it was the protection of his family’s pedigree that drove him.
‘Alun, I’m not certain of both lineages, but does this not mean that you and the Lionheart must be relatives?’
‘Yes, but not that close. Our great-great-grandparents were brother and sister: Edgar the Atheling on my side and, on the King’s side, Edgar’s sister. She was Queen Margaret of Scotland, the wife of Malcolm Canmore.’
Alun’s grip on my arm tightened once more.
‘Now, remember these important details. Earl Harold’s story was sent to Rome in the autumn of 1187 by Gilbert Foliot. It was sent into the safekeeping of his friend, Thibaud of Vermandois, Cardinal Bishop of Ostia, who deposited it in the secret vaults of the Vatican Library. He also sent a casket, which contained the manuscript of the life of Prince Edgar,
Alun paused for a moment.
‘Foliot is now dead and so is Vermandois, but there is a relic, an amulet I have already described to you, that will give you access to the vaults of the Vatican if you want to retrieve the manuscripts. It is the fabled Talisman of Truth, which is now your responsibility, the responsibility for which you were chosen at Wolvesey.’
The weight of responsibility on my shoulders had suddenly become enormous. I was in the middle of remote Anatolia with a dying friend at my side, my comrades were dead and the new love of my life was lost to me in the hands of ruthless brigands. I felt very alone.
Alun started to feel heavier, and his head slipped further down my shoulder. I looked at his eyes and realized that he was shedding tears, but tears of blood. I nudged him a little and he responded slightly.
‘The amulet is hidden in the soil below the tree where you found me. I managed to hide it without the Armenians seeing me. It was given to me by the Earl Harold, its guardian. Now you must look after it. It is called the Talisman of Truth, but it has also been called the Devil’s Amulet, among other things. Guard it well.’
Alun raised his chin slightly and, with a grimace of pain, managed a final intake of breath.
‘Remember what I have told you; guard the talisman well.’
Only moments later, Alun breathed no more. Blood still trickled down his face, but its life-giving essence had gone. I laid him down by the side of the lake and sat with him for some time.
I started to feel very lethargic, but I knew that I must not succumb to the desire to sleep. I roused myself as much as I could, for had I not done so, I would have joined my friends in death. I got to my feet and lit a large fire. After a prolonged struggle, I managed to remove my hauberk. My stomach wound was deep, as I had feared. But as I was still alive, I assumed the blade had not penetrated any vital internal organs. Even so, I had to cauterize it to stop the bleeding. When the fire was hot enough, I poked my seax deep into its hot ashes and waited until it was ready to do its worst.
Without help to do the deed, I lay on my back and positioned the blade. When I let it go, it fell on to the open wound. It was the most painful thing I have ever had to endure. But I had no choice; I had to bear it, if I was to survive.
After the pain had subsided, I resisted the temptation to sleep. I lay still for over an hour until the wound had cooled, then submerged myself in the lake to cleanse my body. I stripped the leggings off one of the men and used the cloth as a bandage to dress my wound. I drank deeply from the fresh water of the lake and made some traps for fish and rabbit, before finally allowing myself to sleep.
It was a fitful, disturbed sleep; my pain and my conscience gave me no respite, and I woke suddenly in a state of remorse and panic. Fortunately, I had snared a fish in my simple trap and I roasted it on the fire and ate it like a hungry dog.
The pain in my head had lessened and my vision had cleared, so I walked to the tree where Alun had been tortured. I retrieved the relic from its roots; the amulet, tied in a small leather pouch, was just as he had described it.
Hanging from a heavy silver chain was a translucent piece of amber the size of a quail’s egg. It was set in scrolls of silver, each of which was a filigree snake, so finely worked that the oval eyes and forked tongues of the serpents could be seen in detail. At first glance, apart from its size and smoothness, it seemed unremarkable. But when it was held to the light, silhouetted in the baleful yellow glow of its stone was the face of Satan, the horned beast that has haunted men from the beginning of time. Close to the hideous face, trapped in the stone, were a tiny spider and a group of small winged insects, the devil’s familiars
When I examined the talisman, I remembered asking Alun the question prompted by Hereward of Bourne’s colours when they were carried by the Little Quintet during our journey to Angers. Now I truly understood their significance. At that moment I promised myself that, should I survive my current ordeal, I would always wear Hereward’s colours as my own.
Feeling that I was not worthy enough to put it around my neck, I returned the talisman to its pouch and tied it on to my belt. It made me shudder to think that I was now the guardian of this sacred object, but I knew what I had to do, and I knew who the talisman’s next recipient should be. However, I had been dismissed from the service of the man who should wear it with pride; he was several hundred miles away to the south, and I was hardly in a fit state to travel.
I still had to think of a way to discover what had happened to Anna and Theodora, and to their dowry. I
