Read Chapter 15: The Château of Mirepoix

The château of Mirepoix rose from the dusk like a fist of old stone, its towers blunt against the fading sky. Roland reined in at the edge of the moat and studied the banners snapping above the gatehouse. The baron’s device—a boar’s head, tusked in silver—hung damp in the evening air.

“You know this man?” Aelis asked from behind him, her voice tight with fatigue.

“Baron Geoffroi de Mirepoix,” Roland said. “I bled beside him at the siege of Tripoli. He talks more than a camp whore with a paying customer, but he is not a bad man. And his walls are thick.”

“And you trust him?”

Roland turned in the saddle. Aelis sat her mare with the box wedged before her, wrapped in oilcloth and lashed with rope. She looked thinner than she had in Paris. The last three days had carved something from her face.

“I trust that he will feed us and not knife us in our sleep,” Roland said. “That is more than I can offer most men.”

They crossed the drawbridge. A guard hailed them, and Roland gave his name without hesitation. It felt strange to speak it aloud after weeks of shadows. The guard’s eyes widened—Roland de Vienne was a name that still carried weight in certain halls, even if that weight had turned to lead after Acre.

They were admitted quickly. A stable boy took their horses. A servant led them through a courtyard where hounds dozed by a fire pit, then up a stone stair into a hall bright with torches. The baron came forward with his arms spread wide, a great barrel of a man with a red face and a laugh that seemed to shake the rafters.

“Roland! By the Rood, I thought the Saracens had you, or the hangman, or both.” Geoffroi clapped him on both shoulders, then stepped back to study him. “You look like a man who has been sleeping in ditches.”

“I have been sleeping in worse,” Roland said.

Geoffroi’s gaze moved to Aelis, and his eyebrows rose. “And who is this? You have acquired company of the fairer sort since last we drank together. I hope you have not stolen a nun.”

“Aelis,” Roland said. “A traveling companion. We are bound for Limoges.”

“Is that all?” Geoffroi’s grin was knowing, but he did not press. He gestured to the hall. “Come. Sit. Eat. You look like you could devour a whole boar between the two of you.”

They ate at the baron’s own table, a long oak slab scarred by a century of knives. The food was good—roast partridge, dark bread, a wine that tasted of the hills. Roland ate mechanically, his eyes moving to the doors, the windows, the shadows between the torches. Old habit. The habit that had kept him alive when better men had died.

Geoffroi talked. He talked about his sons, his new hounds, the bad harvest, the worse bishop. And then, refilling Roland’s cup, he lowered his voice.

“You have chosen an interesting moment to travel, my friend.”

“How so?”

“The King has sent envoys across the south.” Geoffroi leaned closer. “They are asking questions. About a box. A reliquary, they say, stolen from a church in Auvergne.” He paused, letting the words settle. “They say it contains the bones of a saint. You would know nothing of that, I suppose.”

Roland kept his face still. “I have been traveling with a woman and a mule. We have seen no reliquaries.”

“I am sure.” Geoffroi’s eyes flicked to the oilcloth bundle that Aelis had set by her chair. “But the King is not the only one with an interest. The fall of the Temple has set every lord in Christendom to counting his silver and checking his locks. There are rumors of debts being called in. Old debts.” He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “Men are nervous. Nervous men do foolish things. And there are riders abroad who are not royal envoys. They pay in gold and ask no names.”

“I will keep that in mind,” Roland said.

They were given a chamber at the top of the east tower. Aelis barred the door behind them and turned to face him, her arms crossed.

“He knows.”

“He suspects,” Roland said. “Geoffroi is an old friend. He will not betray us to the King’s men. But he is right that we cannot stay long.”

“And the box?”

Roland looked at the oilcloth bundle. Somewhere inside it was a copy of the ledger, carefully transcribed by Aelis’s hand across two sleepless days in the print shop. The real ledger was hidden in a cavity he had cut into his saddle, wrapped in waxed linen against the weather.

“We rest tonight,” he said. “Tomorrow we ride before dawn.”

He did not sleep. He lay on the narrow bed with his sword beside him, listening to the sounds of the château settling around them—the creak of timbers, the distant bark of a dog, the wind rattling the shutters. Aelis slept in the other bed, her breathing soft and even. He watched the shape of her in the darkness and wondered again what she truly wanted.

The knock came near midnight.

Roland was on his feet before the sound had finished, his hand closing on the grip of his sword. He crossed the room in three strides and pressed his eye to the crack of the door.

The corridor beyond was lit by a single torch. A man stood there, tall and lean, his face half in shadow. He wore no armor, only a tunic of dark wool. His hair was grey at the temples, but his bearing was that of a soldier still in his prime.

Roland knew him.

The breath stopped in his chest. The years fell away—the dust of Acre, the screams, the treachery. He saw the man’s face in another light, under another sky, and felt the old wound tear open again.

“Roland,” the man said. “I heard you had come. I hoped it was true.”

Roland did not open the door.

“Guy de Nanteuil,” he said, and the name tasted like poison on his tongue.

“Let me in. We need to talk.”

“You are the last man I would let into any room I occupy.”

Guy’s face twisted—pain, or its imitation. “I am not the man I was. None of us are. But I have information that may save your life, if you will hear it.”

Roland’s fingers tightened on the handle of the door. Behind him, he heard Aelis stir, the rustle of blankets.

“You betrayed my company at Acre,” Roland said. “You opened the postern gate and let the Saracens through. Forty men died because of you. Émile was one of them.”

Guy was silent for a long moment. When he spoke, his voice was low.

“It was not the Saracens I let through,” he said. “It was the English. And I did not open the gate for gold. I opened it because I was given information that could not be ignored.” He paused. “Information about a ledger. A ledger of debts. A ledger that could bring down kingdoms.”

The words hung in the air like a noose.

Roland stood frozen. His hand trembled on the latch. The wound of Acre had never healed, but now it bled anew, and the blood was mixed with something he dared not name.

Hope.

Behind him, Aelis had risen. He felt her eyes on his back, waiting. The torchlight flickered through the crack in the door, casting Guy’s shadow long and crooked against the wall.

“Let me in, Roland,” Guy said. “Before it is too late for both of us.”