The Sixth Key(52)

‘Which was?’ I asked.

‘To be a guardian . . .’





18


Isobel

‘To that I may reply,’ said Don Quixote,

‘that Dulcinea is the daughter of her own works . . .’

Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote


Montsegur, 1238

The red valley gouged out by giants was already in shadow when Isobel and her mistresses, Rosamunda and Blanche, came to the base of Montsegur. Ahead of them the Templar troubadour, Matteu, led the way – a man already past his prime and yet eternally youthful. She had always felt safe with him and she did so now despite the dangers of this journey. In truth, they had been walking for days in fear of being caught, and despite their exhaustion they would have to climb that steep narrow path to the château before dark.

Yes, Isobel was tired, so tired she could barely feel her feet, and to add to everything else the dark clouds above were scudding across the coppering sky and threatening a downpour. She felt she must soon collapse from the weight of the belongings she carried added to that of the child in her belly. For they had been forced to leave the animals below in the township, since the way to the château could only be scaled on foot and a perilous way it was, with its narrow path and smooth stones. She dared not look down, forcing her eyes to stare ahead to the straight backs of her mistresses who led the way, pausing now and then to lend her a hand.

She had never seen the mistresses tired, nor had she ever seen them afraid. They had made this pilgrimage each year for as long as she could remember and she recalled them walking just as they were doing now, alongside one another, both with their black dresses flapping, each moving one leg after the other in a rhythm that matched the rhythm of their prayers.

Soon, she told herself, they would reach those walls – and safety – but now, through the trees, she could hear the herdsmen gathering the goats before the storm broke. In the distance, bells clanged their discordant resonance and the sky grew closer. Such sounds made her want to hide behind a clump of hazel bushes fearing danger, for she was a child of war.

She couldn’t remember a time without it, nor the fear of the Dominicans or their familiars. She knew the stories back to front. A papal legate had excommunicated the Count of Toulouse for protecting the Cathars and he was, in turn, murdered by one of the count’s officers, causing the pope to call for a Crusade against the heretics. She would not be here if her mother, just a bundle at the time, had not been spirited away from Béziers by the two sisters on the eve of the Feast of Magdalene. They had taken the small child and the treasure that had once belonged to Mary Magdalene herself – the Cathar treasure, which must be handed down from woman to woman. From that time on, the sacred treasure in its pouch had been safely hidden beneath the folds of Rosamunda’s dress, and it was there now.

Isobel looked up to see the clouds gathering in counsel and preparing to drizzle their concerns over the valley floor. A low rumble made the Earth tremble and she pulled the shawl over her shoulders and recalled the stories. After the fall of Béziers in 1209 and the terrible massacre of all its citizens, the world turned over into a hell pit. Siege after siege, battle after battle. Those were terrible years. War in the Corbieres, war in the Minverois and in the Razés, war in Foix and in Toulouse. The land was laid to waste, and villages and towns were destroyed. Who would want to tend crops that would surely be trampled to dust? Who would want to repair a stable door or to fix a leaking roof when at any moment everything might be put to the torch? Insecurity and chaos ruled the land, and the nobles, despoiled of their inheritance, went into hiding, striking out at the Crusaders from their high strongholds. In the meantime a vast network of secret agents, troubadours like Matteu, had brought news of planned attacks, sieges and skirmishes. Her mother had been seventeen and pregnant with Isobel when the young Count Raymond, having returned from exile with an army, took over the city of Toulouse against the foreign enemy. Alongside the other women her mother dug walls, hauled rubble through the streets and worked the siege engines. For three weeks they waited for Simon de Montfort, the leader of the Crusade, to come to rescue his wife from the Château de Nabornnais. Isobel’s mother was among the women recruited to fire the heavy blocks of masonry from a trebuchet and they had been firing at random into a confused mass of soldiers when Simon de Montfort was struck on the head and killed. That same hour her mother collapsed and some time later died giving birth to Isobel.

Isobel could see the walls of the château of Montsegur rising up out of the trees and she paused to catch her breath. She wondered if the good Cathar bishop would be waiting for her with his smiling eyes at the summit.