Housing had sprung up throughout the island, but it was hidden in most places, carefully concealed from any stranger looking from a distance. The buildings were long and low, their walls and even their roofs made from peat and sod, their floors frequently excavated to provide the building material for the walls, so that although the height of most roofs was less than that of a man, the tallest man could stand easily inside. The first of the longhouses had been designed and built by a brother called Anselm, who had in better times been one of the Order’s most gifted architects and builders, and when Will, surprised by the apparent gracelessness of the construction, had called in the elderly monk to question him, Anselm had looked at him in surprise. Was it not their intent to keep their presence on the island secret, he asked, and was it not also true that they would not be remaining on Arran forever? When Will agreed that it was, the monk had shrugged expressively and spread his hands. That was what he had set out to do, he said: to keep their presence shrouded from strange eyes, and to ensure that they would leave little trace behind when they returned to France. Besides, he said, they had insufficient supplies of wood and lumber to do otherwise. The peat-built buildings could be quickly torn down when the time came to leave, and within a few years their walls would return to the ground from which they were made, leaving no trace of their existence. Will had been unable to argue against the old man’s logic, and so he had given his blessing to the project and decreed that all their impermanent buildings would be made from peat thenceforth.
Now he was tired, but he had completed his work and could speak out loud and clear at the chapter gathering in two days’ time, giving praise and credit confidently where he felt each was due. He called in his earnest, humorless assistant, Brother Fernando, and instructed him in what he wished done with the different piles of documents, and then he sat thinking while the emaciated cleric bustled around him, collecting all the documents.
As soon as the brother had left, carrying a heavy basket full of scrolls, Will bent forward and took a fresh sheet of parchment from the pile at the back of his desk, then picked up his pen again, playing idly with it while he thought of what he would say in the report he had been planning for his superiors in Aix-en-Provence. He had sent three reports already, in February, April, and June, detailing the progress of the works he had set in motion in Arran, and requesting information on the status of the Temple in France. The third of those, in which he had labored long and hard to outline the dilemma he might face in the bleakest of all possible futures and the possibility of releasing the younger brethren from their vow of chastity, thereby permitting them to marry and procreate, had thus far gone unanswered, to his intense chagrin, for he had been hoping for some solid words of guidance. And the two replies he had received to his initial reports had both been terse, lacking in specifics and generally discouraging.
What he had not done, to this point, was set down in writing a description of what he had discovered when he opened the chests committed to his care upon leaving France. He had sent word, in his third report, that the Treasure now lay safely concealed, and had included a map of its location in the underground vault on his father’s lands in Roslin, but he had made no mention of having opened the chests and viewed the contents. Nor had he identified the location shown on the map. That information would be supplied in this next report, once he had confirmation that the map had arrived safely in the hands of the Order in Aix.
Quite simply, as he had long since admitted to himself, much of his failure to describe what he had seen in the chests was based upon fear: his very real fear of betraying the secret by committing anything to writing. Unwritten, the secret was safe in his mind. Written down, it would pose a constant danger of discovery. He knew the contents of the chests were familiar to the highest members of the ancient brotherhood, for it was they, or their forebears from two hundred years before, who had commissioned Hugh de Payens and his small fraternity to find the Treasure, described in minute detail in the Order’s ancient lore. He knew, too, that certain portions of the Treasure had been taken back to France for study, to Aix itself, to furbish truth of their ancient records, but he had no idea at all of why the brotherhood had wished to send the Treasure to safety beyond France.
Certainly it made sense that it should be kept away from King Philip and de Nogaret, but neither one of those depraved souls had the slightest scintilla of suspicion that there was such an entity as the Order of Sion, and no senior member of the Order of Sion had any overt connection with the Order of the Temple, for obvious and necessary reasons. No man could reveal under torture what he did not know, and even if any of the lesser brethren, who served both Temple and Sion, were to reveal something under duress, the secrecy and intricacy of the Order’s structure was such that nothing could be proved or would be found. The major certainty of Sion’s security lay in the fact that the Inquisitors could not possibly conceive of another, far more ancient, secret, and non-Christian structure underlying the Order of the Temple, their sole target. They could not possibly ask questions about something whose existence they did not even suspect.
That knowledge was a more than sufficient reason for Will Sinclair to have grave doubts about committing anything to writing.
Dear God, he thought. How can I write anything of this?
He was interrupted, his pen still undipped, by footsteps in the hall outside, and then came a quiet knock. The door swung open, and young Ewan Sinclair leaned into the room, his hand on the door handle.
“Your pardon, Sir William. My father says can you come at once. There’s a galley coming in, from the north. It’s the admiral.”
“What brings him back so soon? Wait you then, and walk with me.”
He put his pen down by the inkwell and replaced the sheet of parchment, trying not to think about what the new arrival might bring with it. He glanced from side to side of his table desk, making sure that he had left nothing of importance for idle eyes to scan, then stepped away and turned to where Ewan stood waiting. They crossed the empty hall together to the outer door, Will glancing down and sideways to eye the slight limp with which the younger man favored his right leg.
“How is the leg? Does it still bother you as much?”
“No, sir, it’s mending nicely. Brother Anthony seems pleased with it, although he warns me, every time he sees me limping, that I shouldna be so soft on mysel’. The harder I use it, he says, the stronger it will mend.” He grinned, a cheerful, infectious grimace. “Mind you, I fancy it easier to tell others how to act when you’re not the one bearing the pain.”
Will grinned back and resisted the urge to slow his pace. Young Ewan had been warring on the mainland with King Robert, part of the last rotation of fighting men on that duty, and towards the end of his threemonth tour, while riding with the King’s brother, Sir Edward, in Galloway, he had taken a wicked slashing wound above his right knee from a heavy broadsword wielded by a MacDowal warrior. Luckily for him, he had been well tended immediately after the skirmish by one of their own men, a veteran physician who had spent years in Spain tending to wounds sustained by Templar knights in the wars against the Moors.
“What of your father? Does he have ought to say of your progress?”
Again the young man grinned, but this time he answered in his native tongue, so that Will had to listen closely to understand the fast-flowing rattle of his clipped words. “You know my father, Uncle Will. He glowered like an angry bear when I came back and he first set eyes on me … but that was to mask his concern.
He wasna frowning at me. But that was the extent o’ what he’d say. Since then he hasna mentioned anything about it … Hasna even asked me what happened.”
“What did happen?”
“I don’t know … I canna remember. I mean, it was a tulzie … and there were people everywhere, screamin’ and shoutin’ and fightin’ wi’ one another. There was a lot o’ spillin’ blood, I mind, but to tell ye the truth, I didna know who was who, because they a’ looked the same. There
was no way o’ tellin’ Bruce men from MacDowals. So I was sittin’ there on my horse, gowpin’ around and ready to swing at anyone who came at me, but I didna dare swing at anybody else, for fear o’ hitting one o’ our own men. And then I felt this big dunt on my leg, and when I looked down, there was a big sword hangin’ out o’ it. Nobody holdin’ the sword, I mind. Nothing holdin’ it at all, in fact, except the edges o’ the gouge it had made in my leg.” He shrugged. “I must ha’e fell off my horse, for I didna mind anythin’ after that.”
“Passed out. I’m not surprised. Did you kill anyone over there in Scotland?”
“No, Uncle Will, I didna.”
Will looked at him sideways. “Have you ever killed anyone?”
“No, sir. But I will, one o’ these days.”
“Don’t wish it on yourself, lad. It’s not as thrilling as it’s made out to be. Aha, that was quick. De Berenger is wasting no time, so something must have happened.”
The admiral’s huge galley was still approaching the wharf below the hall, but a boat had already been launched from it and was pulling quickly to the shoreline, its thwarts crammed with people, some of them wearing brightly colored clothes that marked them as strangers to Arran. Will recognized Tam Sinclair among the small crowd of men lining the waterside, waiting to pull it up onto the beach, and although he could recognize none of the newcomers from this distance, he felt an urgency that compelled him to rush down the long flights of steps to meet them.
Less than halfway down, however, he hesitated, slowing to a stop in stunned disbelief as he recognized one and then another of the newcomers. The first ashore, being aided onto the firm shingle by Tam himself, was a stooped, elderly man with a shock of silvery white hair. He looked up as Tam released his arm, saw Will on the steps above him, and waved.
“Stay here,” Will said to Ewan, and walked quickly down the remaining steps to the steep pathway that led down to the beach, his mind in a whirl.
Etienne Dutoit, Baron of St. Julien in the province of Aix-en-Provence, was one of the senior and most influential members of the Order of Sion, but he had also been Will’s sponsor on the occasion of Will’s Raising to the brotherhood, and the second man being helped ashore behind him had been Will’s co-sponsor, Simon de Montferrat, seigneur of the distinguished clan that claimed precedence among the federation of ancient bloodlines known as the Friendly Families, whose ancestors had fled Jerusalem before the destruction of the city by the Romans. These two were lineal descendants of the founding fathers of their Order, and the significance of their presence on Arran was so overwhelming that Will was scarcely able to think about what it portended.
He reached them moments later and fell to one knee in front of Etienne Dutoit, but the old man refused his obeisance and seized him by the shoulders, pulling him upright in a flurry of expostulations meant to convey that Will had no need or reason to kneel. Instead, the Baron embraced him closely, murmuring greetings in his ear, then pushed him towards his companion, and de Montferrat greeted Will the same way. Behind them stood two tall, richly dressed young men whose fine weapons and breadth of shoulder pronounced them knights, and whose unmistakable vigilance proclaimed them bodyguards.
Will stepped back from de Montferrat’s embrace and looked from one to the other of his former mentors, shaking his head in bewilderment. But then he remembered who and where he was, and spread his arms, smiling at both of them. “My friends and brothers, you are welcome here … how much, I have no words to express. But how came you here? And why? And aboard a galley from the north? You have much to tell me, it seems, But here is no place for it. Come you up to the hall, where we may be at ease. You will find it a far cry from the comfort of your homes in Provence, but it has comfortable chairs and a sound roof to keep out wind and rain.” He looked now at the two straight-faced young knights. “You gentlemen are welcome, too, since I presume the safety of my guests here is your prime concern.” He held out his hand to each of them. “I am William Sinclair.”
The two knights bowed formally and named themselves, and then Will turned to lead them up to the hall, calling up to Ewan Sinclair, who had remained on the steps above, to run ahead and order food and drink to be prepared for their visitors. Will glanced back at his guests. “You will have baggage, I presume?”
“It’s all here in the boat, Sir William,” Tam Sinclair told him. “I have it in hand. I’ll see it safely up as soon as it’s unloaded.”
“Aye. My thanks, Tam. Take them to the rooms over the hall.” Again he hesitated, glancing at each of the newcomers in turn. None of these men were Templars, but everyone in the press surrounding them on the beach was, and Will knew speculation would be lively afterwards with wonderings of who these people were and why they had come here from France. And so he decided to limit the imaginings of his men from the outset.
“Brethren,” he cried, seeing how every eye present turned towards him. “These knights are very dear to me, friends and mentors of long standing. I cannot say exactly why they come here today, for I do not yet know, but I suspect they bring us tidings of the welfare of our Order in France.” He looked questioningly at Dutoit and de Montferrat, and when both men inclined their heads gravely in acknowledgment, he turned back to his men. “Therefore we will have information we may trust, and as soon as I know of what it consists, I will pass it on to you. Now you may return to your interrupted tasks.”
As the small procession began to climb the stairs, with Will leading, flanked by the two elders, the Baron St. Julien answered the first of Will’s questions, speaking in the same measured tones that Will remembered from years before, his vibrant baritone unchanged by the years that had elapsed since then.
“We sought you first in the north, at Lochranza, only to find you had already returned here. Admiral de Berenger received us—he had just returned himself, he told us—and seeing our chagrin at having missed you, he brought us south in his galley, much faster than our own ship would have. He will join us as soon as he has put his ship to order.”
Will said nothing. De Berenger, too, belonged to the Brotherhood of Sion, and he would be as interested as Will in whatever urgency it was that had brought these two so far from home. But the steps ahead of them were steep for two elderly men, and so he asked no more questions, concentrating instead on assisting his guests to climb the long flights of stairs that had been made for use by men much younger than they were. Time enough for questions and answers once they had refreshed themselves and regained their wind.
FOUR
Aresinous knot exploded loudly in the iron grate, and the burning logs collapsed upon themselves, sending a storm of sparks whirling up to be sucked into the chimney, but ignored by the small group of men who sat ranged around the hearth, staring silently into the roiling flames, each engrossed in his own thoughts. Outside in the cooling night the air was yet warm from the late-August sun, but within the hall the temperature reminded its occupants that they were in Scotland, where the sun’s warmth seldom penetrated walls of stone and timber.
Etienne Dutoit, Baron de St. Julien, rose to his feet and picked up a heavy iron poker from the grate, then used it to break down the burning logs further, stirring them into an inferno before moving to select several logs from the pile in the big iron fuel basket and throw them onto the pyre. He pulled them this way and that with the poker until he was satisfied that they would burn properly. That done, he set the poker down again in its place and turned to face the men now watching him.
“You live in a cold country, my friends,” he said.
Edward de Berenger grunted and sat up straighter. “It’s not so much cold, Baron, as it is damp. Cold you can live with, and you can dress to fight it. But the dampness here is an internal thing … it chills your bones in summer as well as winter. The only way to combat that is from within, with solid, hot food in your belly.”
Dutoit smiled. “Aye, well, none can deny we have had our fill of that tonight. Your cooks are remarkably good.” He drew himself up
to his full height, his back to the fire as he looked at the group facing him in an arc, his eyes shifting from face to face. His traveling companion de Montferrat sat on his far right, combing his fingers idly through his sparse gray beard, and next to him sat Bishop Formadieu, the senior Bishop of the island community. On Formadieu’s right sat Admiral de Berenger, and beside him was de Montrichard, the preceptor. Sir Reynald de Pairaud, the acting preceptor of Lochranza, who had accompanied Will to Brodick for the coming chapter meeting, sat next to the preceptor. Will himself made up the last of the gathering, seated next to Dutoit’s empty chair on the right end of the arc.
“And so to our affairs, the reasons for our presence,” the Baron began. “Neither Sir Simon here nor I myself have any overt association with your Order, so we and our affairs have been largely unaffected by the upheavals in our homeland these past long months. Unaffected, I say, but not unmoved, and I was happy when my dear friend Sir William thought fit to send to me with a request for assistance in gathering information on the status of the continuing investigation into your Order.” He held up a hand, palm outwards, to forestall a protest that did not emerge, and when he heard nothing but silence he quirked an eyebrow and nodded briefly.
“So be it … A request to gather information on the status of the investigation. I will not insult you by offering any opinion on whether or no that investigation is justifiable. I will say only that I myself, along with Sir Simon and many other men of probity and sound mind in France, deplore the actions of our self-righteous King and the creatures with whom he surrounds himself to carry out his bidding. That truth, allied with my long-standing fondness and admiration for Sir William Sinclair and the Order he represents, made it a pleasure rather than a burden to gather all the information available to me and to my friends throughout the land.”