Tostig went outside, took a few deep gulps of air, then dragged John Chard’s body inside the hut to join those of his two sons. After securing the door of the shack against predators, he left the camp. The dog set up a mournful wail as the forester rode off.
Bascot was in the Templar Lincoln Preceptory when one of the castle guard was despatched to apprise him of the forester’s discovery. He had been there since the previous evening, having come to deliver a request from Nicolaa de la Haye for the Order to supply the castle with extra spices, mainly cinnamon, for the king’s visit. D’Arderon, the preceptor, was a man of mature years who had spent almost the whole of his adult life in the Templar Order. He had welcomed Bascot warmly, genuinely pleased to see him. The older Templar knew that Bascot’s imprisonment in the Holy Land had caused doubts about the rightness of the Templar cause in his younger comrade’s mind, and that it had also seriously damaged his trust in God. This lapse had been exacerbated when Bascot had returned to England and found that all of the de Marins family-father, mother, brother-had perished in his absence. But d’Arderon believed it to be only a matter of time before Bascot would, as he put it, “unravel the confusion of his senses” and once more take up his sword and join his comrades in the battle against the Saracens.
It had been time for the evening meal when Bascot had arrived at the preceptory and d’Arderon had invited him to join the company at board. There were three ranks in the Templar Order and their status was denoted by the colour of the surcoats that they wore; knights in white, serjeants and men-at-arms in black or brown, and priests in green. Bascot had taken a place with his fellow knights, enjoying a welcome feeling of ease. Here were men who lived as he had done, scrupulously obeying their vows of poverty, chastity and obedience. The rules were rigorous, but simple. Duty was the prime mandate, to keep oneself fit and able to bear arms in order to protect pilgrims and, if the opportunity arose, to slay the infidel. Templars were not responsible to any earthly magnate, be they monarch or prince, their only obedience outside the Order to the pope in Rome.
Bascot had taken his seat amongst the others, nodding to a few old acquaintances and introducing himself to those he had not met before. The meal was a hearty one, for this was one of the three days of the week when meat was allowed, with good-sized chunks of lamb in a rich brown broth and an assortment of winter vegetables stirred in, followed by plates of cheese and marchpane. Although they were all monks, the usual stricture regarding diet that was laid on nonmilitary religious orders was not applied to the Templars because of the necessity of maintaining their strength for battle. While they ate, silence was mandatory, only a reading of scripture by one of the Templar priests to be heard above the clatter of bowls and eating knives.
Afterwards, Bascot stayed for the recreational hour when the Templars were allowed to gather in the chapter house for general conversation until it was time for the service at Compline. Besides the preceptor, there were only four knights in residence at the moment: two who had just joined the Order and would soon be on their way to Outremer, one recently returned from the Holy Land after fulfilling a vow of atonement that had involved a promise to serve with the Templars for ten years-an arrangement that had been allowed by the Order on receipt of a gift of land from the penitent knight-and one lately arrived from Spain with despatches for d’Arderon. Old battles were refought, former acquaintances remembered and the politics of the struggle against the Saracens discussed, along with the hope of a good response to the call Pope Innocent III had made the year before for Christendom to undertake a new crusade.
Bascot enjoyed the evening and it had not taken much persuasion by d’Arderon to convince him to spend the night in the preceptory dormitory. Since it had been necessary that he and Gianni give up their small chamber in the older of Lincoln’s two keeps to guests that had come for the king’s visit, they were now sleeping in the barracks alongside the men of the garrison. Bascot knew that Ernulf would see Gianni safely in bed for the night and felt able to indulge himself in another cup of wine and more talk with his comrades.
It had been late when he had rolled himself up in his cloak and lain down on one of the hard pallets that lined both sides of the Templar dormitory, dimly lit all night by small oil lamps as commanded by the Order’s rule. Around him the other knights were also preparing for bed; the creak of leather and small clangs of metal the only noise as they took off the outermost of their garments and lay down still almost fully clothed, another rule that was scrupulously obeyed. Soon the large chamber was quiet, only the sounds of regular breathing and the occasional snore disturbing the silence. Bascot lay awake for a time, considering the path that lay before him. He felt pulled in two directions: Gianni and the boy’s welfare on the one hand, his vows to the Order on the other. The boy was dependent on him, had been since the day Bascot had saved him from starvation in Sicily, and Bascot admitted to himself that he would be reluctant to part from the lad, had come to regard him almost as a son. But Gianni was growing older, would soon be of an age to fend for himself, and in the meantime Bascot knew that if he left to rejoin the Templars, Ernulf, without family or child of his own, would care for the boy as well, if not better, than Bascot was able to.
As for the Templar Order, Bascot was beginning to feel a pull to return to its ranks. He had been happy here this evening, had experienced a sense of belonging that he did not feel among the household knights in the Haye retinue, despite his liking and respect for Lady Nicolaa. When he had arrived in Lincoln almost a year ago, he had been angry, at God and at himself. Then he had wished only for solitude, a place to try and forget all that had happened. It was for that reason that the Order had sent him to Lincoln and Nicolaa de la Haye. She had, at the request of the Templar preceptor in London, provided him with shelter and food so that he could have a space of time not only to recover his health and strength, but perhaps also his devotion to God and the Order. Now he wondered if he was, as had been hoped, beginning to do just that.
Or was he merely wishing for an easier path to follow? Staying on in Lincoln would invite responsibilities, not only for Gianni but in the matter of earning his keep. He knew that Nicolaa would be only too happy for him to retire from the Order and take up a post among her household knights, for she had hinted as much. He knew she valued his talents, had already taken to using him as a deputy in the many instances that required not only a man of knight’s rank, but also literacy, a rare commodity among the upper strata of society, and one that he possessed. There was also the matter of his successful apprehension of the alehouse murderer some months before. That he had felt satisfaction at his success and that both Nicolaa and her husband had been grateful to him had been obvious. And now she had once again set him to probing into a matter involving a secret slaying. Could it be that a fear of failing to solve this new riddle of death was the cause of his feeling such a strong pull to return to the Order? Was he experiencing, perhaps, not a return of faith but apprehension about the extent of his own abilities?
He burrowed deeper into the covering of his cloak, murmured a prayer for guidance, and then fell into a deep sleep. It was out of a dark dreamless void that the chaplain’s bell for Tierce woke him. The other Templar knights in the dormitory had already left their pallets to celebrate the earlier religious offices, and Bascot got up from his own bed and went to join them in the round chapel that was the hub of the preceptory, his confusion still unresolved.