Beloved Pilgrim Page 12

  There were some mishaps that cheer could not make endurable, however, though word of them rarely made it to the armored class riding at the fore. After being trampled by horses, wagons and men, the path froze over again and became quite icy. More than one camp follower slipped and fell. One woman who had her three children tied to her with a length of rope took those children with her as she slipped, slid, and then shot over the edge of a deep ravine. Elisabeth found out about the accident when one of the men-at-arms not far behind where she rode cried out at being given the news. He had lost wife and children in one fell swoop. Those who fell but only broke limbs were at the mercy of their companions' willingness to carry and care for them. How many were left behind to freeze to death was not calculated.

  Near the summit of the highest pass Elisabeth was invited to rest in the guesthouse of a priory as a reward for the luck she seemed to bring with her. She and Albrecht appreciated the warm, dry cells and the hot and hearty food. She felt bad that the three knights who had befriended her were out in the cold. Albrecht did not share his suspicion that they welcomed one night without their shining star. With "Elias" not there to model piety, they would have a chance to go to the lower camp and risk getting the pox.

  Late in the evening Elisabeth was invited to sit in the priory's warming room, a circular space with a large fire in a firepot in the middle. The conical roof allowed the smoke to billow out without letting in much of the cold air except when the wind was especially hard. She was tongue-tied in the exalted company that included the Holy Roman Emperor's Constable, Conrad, and other highborn knights and clerics. She was content to sit and listen and hope no one asked her a question. She thanked her own lucky stars that no one had occasion to bathe, because she had her woman's flux and might have worried about the odor in such a tight press.

  One of the bishops asked the Constable, "Where are we expecting to meet up with the other contingents, my lord?"

  Conrad sat with his head back against the wall and his eyes closed. "We should be coming into Italy near the town of Verona. I believe we will find them camped somewhat south and east, between Verona and Bologna. We will continue along the east coast of Italy to Brindisi."

  An older knight put in his own question, "And whom are they expecting besides Stephen of Blois?"

  Conrad lifted his head and scowled when the name elicited chuckles. "That's quite enough of that. He's making his pledge good." He looked at the knight who had asked him the question. "Also Stephen, Count of Burgundy, and Odo, Duke of Burgundy."

  "Burgundy. Don't they call him Stephen the Rash?" someone asked.

  "Yes, same as his father. His older brother died in the Holy Land, you know."

  "I hope the moniker is not accurate. Rash and a prince, that's all they need. My lord, have you met him?"

  Conrad nodded. "I don't know why they call him that. He's no youngster. He seemed calm enough to me when I saw him last."

  "What about this Odo? I am afraid I have not heard the best about him."

  Conrad crossed his arms over his chest. "Odo the Red? No, not what you'd call a model Christian."

  Leaning to peer around the fire's flames and smoke, another man asked grinning, "Do you know what happened when he tried to rob Anselm of Canterbury?"

  All eyes shot to Conrad. The Constable was smiling. "Yes, but why don't you tell the story?"

  The heads shot back to the bishop as if they had been watching a ball being kicked back and forth.

  "Well, it seems that their noble Duke Odo decided it would be a fine thing to ambush the Archbishop and his train as they traveled through Burgundy on their way to Rome. When they had surrounded the party, Odo went about demanding which of the clerics was Anselm. Anselm came out to him, cheery as you please, and said something like 'Odo, my brother, how glad I am to embrace you!' Odo was so startled he let him. And there and then he pledged himself as Anselm's servant."

  Amid the laughter one man asked, "Is the Archbishop that crafty?"

  The man who told the story raised his eyebrows. "Or is Odo that stupid?"

  Elisabeth inserted, "Maybe he was just embarrassed."

  The response was more laughter but also some considering nods.

  She added, "We call him Odo the Red? Maybe he blushes a lot."

  The laughter increased. Two men sitting near her slapped her on the back. "Rich!" one complimented.

  Conrad, smiling, looked at her. "Laugh now, but don't forget to stop when we get to Verona."

  Bowing her head in humility, she nevertheless asked him a question. "What of Stephen of Blois? I knew he ran away from the Siege of Antioch. But he can't be the only one who did."

  The laughter subsided quickly. No one looked at her or for that matter met each other's eyes.

  "Lord, you said he is fulfilling his pledge . . . ," she went on.

  Conrad sat up and cast his eyes about the room. "Young Elias is right." He relented and looked at her. "We ridicule him because of why he is fulfilling his pledge, though I do not think you should believe all you hear." He paused. "They say his wife threw him out of the castle so ashamed she was of him."

  "Rightly so," a voice muttered.

  "But you can understand that a man like Blois doesn't want people to think he is ruled by his wife. Even if she is the Conqueror's kin."

  Conrad shot another scowl in the direction of a man who interjected, "I think the expression is 'pussy whipped.'"

  One part of going abroad as a man she did not treasure was the nearly perpetual nastiness she heard about wives. She occasionally made a half-hearted attempt to present a more positive interpretation of wifely behavior, but all that earned her was teasing and taunts. "Mama's boy" was one of the polite expressions. This time she essayed more forcefully, "Is it not the role of a wife to inspire and urge her husband to fulfill his holy vows?"

  A few pairs of eyes rolled, a few were cast down while lips smirked, but not a few looked chastened. Conrad's bishop rebuked, "Our young knight reminds us of their duty to serve God the Father. It is not the shame of a man that his wife corrects him, but that he needs must be corrected. If a man wants a silent wife, mayhap he should consider how his conduct will earn her silence."

  Well, it wasn't quite what she had intended, but it was something. As the group filed out of the warming room, she heard a man mutter, "Prig." Maybe it was time to loosen up, she thought.

  At last the slope was more downward than upward, the snow disappeared, and the views south stretched out bare but dry. Olive groves surrounded little villages. The little town of Verona was walled. With the host that camped outside those walls, it looked as if it was under siege.

  A man in rich armor strode up to welcome Conrad as the party from Germany and Austria rode up. "They've closed the gates," his high vexatious voice complained.

  "I am glad to see you as well, Stephen. Why have they closed it?"

  Stephen of Blois frowned. "They say our men cannot be trusted." He waited while the Constable's men helped him lower his weary bones to the ground from where he rode high up on his destrier's saddle.

  "With what?" the German asked.

  Another man cut in, "Much of anything. Wives and daughters mostly." He walked forward. "Hello, Conrad. So you made it over the Alps."

  Conrad took the proffered hand. "Good to see you, Stephen."

  Some distance away Alain leaned to Elisabeth. "The first man is Stephen of Blois. The second is Stephen of Burgundy."

  She nodded. "And I suppose that red-haired man with the red beard is Odo?"

  Odo the Red joined the three leaders where they stood facing one another. "They are right, but so what? Who are they to interfere?"

  Conrad retorted, "With holy pilgrims?"

  Stephen of Blois made a sweeping gesture. "Come on, we don't need to stand out here in the sun quarreling in front of the men." He led the three men over to where his own sizable pavilion stood, and all four ducked inside.

  The combined armies remained near Verona long enough to rest
the German parties' horses and to finish stripping the farms outside Verona bare of all provisions. Elisabeth met many of the Burgundian and Frankish knights when she went with Alain and her other two knightly friends to make the rounds of the established camps.

  "Mes amis, ma foi, what joy to see you again. Michel, have you stopped buggering the little boys on your estate? And you, Olivier, how's that growth on your cock?" The men appeared to take the insults in the lighthearted spirit in which Alain intended them. "Come, meet our new friends. You already know that ugly sod Black Beast. This is Gerhardt. Be sure you stay upwind of him. And this, mes amis, is Elias von Winterkirche. He's still wet behind the ears and too holy for his own good, but he has proved lucky for us."

  Sitting around convivial campfires she learned a lot about the leaders of the armies waiting to pull up stakes and head for the larger, more promising town of Bologna. Stephen of Blois, it seemed, was prone to tantrums. Though more easy-going, Stephen of Burgundy was no peacemaker but washed his hands of the other Stephen's frequent quarrels with the even more quarrelsome Odo. She learned that some of Odo's men were the responsible parties for the shutting of the gates of the town to soldiers.

  "We went on a rampage," explained one of the Burgundians. "We burned down some buildings, including the tavern we were getting drunk in, then broke into the mayor's house and forced him to take in all the now-homeless whores from the tavern."

  "I heard that the abbot of the monastery found one of Blois's men fucking one of his abbey donkeys."

  "Well, it made a nice change from the abbot doing it."

  "Is it true that Odo himself tried to kidnap the mayor's wife?"

  "Oui, he likes them old and fat."

  Alain shared the story of how Elisabeth had gotten a gibe in at Odo that he had heard from someone who had been in the warming room to hear her. She got much the same reaction thanks to the fact that Alain did not include the reprimand her words had inspired from Conrad. As it was, her own face was beet red when the jesting was over.

  Circulating through the many factions encamped there, Elisabeth sought tidings of her father. None seemed to know of him, save by reputation. "Mayhap if he went by way of Milan, he took ship there," one cleric suggested. "Or he went with the later group, the one led by his Grace, the Archbishop. He could already be in the Holy Land, but he came not through the eastern cities of Italia."

  Finally restitution to the town was negotiated, at Conrad's and belatedly Blois's insistence; disputes about who got to ride where in the assemblage were settled to simmering; and the armies, complete with multiply enhanced camp followers, with the addition of several women from Verona, set out for Bologna.

  The streets of Bologna were crowded and festive with the market day press. Elisabeth and Albrecht found that just getting from one side of the street to another required all their brute strength and still took far too long. Elisabeth turned to her squire to suggest they return to the inn they had found, but she could see no sign of him. She stood on the tips of her toes and scanned what she could see of the tops of heads, but nothing looked either like Albrecht's hat or, if it had been knocked off or stolen, his chestnut curls. She was about to step up on a crate when a hand grasped her arm and pulled her away.

  "Elias, my good friend! I owe you for that tavern bill. Come with me and I will make amends."

  It was the leader of the mercenary band, Ranulf. She had occasionally seen him and his ragtag crew on the journey south, but had no reason to speak to him or any of his soldiers. "But . . . my squire?"

  Ranulf pulled her along with him, brooking no objection. "Your squire? You don't need him and his purse. This is on me this time." He grinned sideways at her. "Is he your squire or your nursemaid? Or . . . ," and now he leered, "your leman?" He laughed when she looked affronted. "Never mind. Where I am taking you, you need no lemans anyway."

  Elisabeth was unsure whether to worry more about Albrecht and what he would think of her disappearance or just where this blackguard was taking her. It seemed to be a place the man knew well, for he sailed through the crowd unerringly, down the street, into an alley that was little less crowded than the street, and then down an even narrower alley. Elisabeth felt her shoe sink into something squishy, but it was so dark she could not see her own feet when she looked down. The constant rubbing of bodies against her own made her worry about two things, about the loss of her purse and that someone, maybe even Ranulf, would detect a most unmanly body part under her clothing.

  She was relieved when he propelled her into a covered walkway that was all but empty. Her first action was to check her purse. It was still there. Then she made sure her clothing covered everything that must be.

  "You look wonderful." Ranulf gave her another amused look. "Besides, they don't care how you look."

  "Who doesn't care?" Elisabeth demanded.

  Ranulf did not reply as at that point he pushed open a rough door that seemed to go into an undercroft of a very old, sagging, wooden structure. Passing through a low door with a sign showing seven coins, Elisabeth found herself suddenly in a dark, low-ceiling space that was overly warm and extremely smelly. It was almost more loud than warm or smelly. It was not as packed as the street, but she could hear many voices, some men's, some women's, some raised in song.

  "What is this place?" she protested, but she could not hear her own voice, no less could Ranulf have heard her. He pulled her through the throng to a table in the back. As her eyes adjusted, she recognized the mercenary band. "You!" she exclaimed.

  "Yes, us! Aren't you happy to see us? Welcome to the Settaducati!" Ranulf shouted in her ear. He gestured for Thomas to move over on the bench, and then shoved her next to the silent man. Ranulf slid in next to her, reviving her fears of close body contact. She wished she had worn her gambeson.

  Ruggiero was across from her again. His dark face and beard now sported a smile. It somehow looked more sinister than the man's former scowl. "So you brought the lad, Ranulf. I suppose you thought it was time the little saint got his cherry popped." The Italian raised his cup of wine in salute.

  Elisabeth went pale. "My cherry? What cherry?"

  The Italian laughed. "You know, your virginity."

  "What makes you think I am a virgin?" Her head held high she protested, "I am no virgin!" She caught her breath. Did they know she was a woman? Men don't have cherries.

  "All right, all right, so you are no virgin." Ranulf winked at Ruggiero. "So tonight will be your second time. Or fortieth. What does it matter? I am paying for it."

  Elisabeth stared at him disbelieving. "You are paying for me to sleep with a whore?"

  "Sleep, fuck, play dice with, whatever you want."

  Elisabeth paled. "But I can't!"

  Ruggiero commented, "You just said you had, so you must be able to."

  Elisabeth went scarlet this time. "I mean I pledged my chastity! For the pilgrimage. I must keep myself pure."

  The two men erupted into guffaws, and even Thomas smiled humorously.

  Ranulf shrugged. "Have it your way. That was a damned silly pledge, if you ask me. You are going to the Holy Land to be killed and have your guts fed to the carrion birds and worse. What harm is there in a little fucking beforehand?" He looked up and called, "Giuliana! A cup and wine here!"

  Elisabeth scowled at him.

  "Little prig," Ruggiero muttered.

  Ruggiero jerked as if shoved aside and a woman appeared squeezed in beside him and Ragnar, whose own attention was on a slip of a girl he had on his lap and was tickling, making her scream with laughter. Elisabeth found herself staring at the serving-woman who leaned forward to pour wine from a pitcher. There before her eyes and barely obscured by the woman's tight bodice were two magnificent breasts the like of which Elisabeth had never seen before on anyone other than some old peasant woman and these were taut, full and not hanging to her waist. Her jaw dropped.

  Ranulf laughed. "This is Giuliana and her face is several inches above where you are looking."

&nb
sp; Ragnar finally noticed the newcomer and leaning in front of Giuliana said to Ranulf, "It looks like your suspicion of our fey young friend was groundless, my friend."

  "Indeed," the leader chortled. "In that case, we needs must settle your own guess, my pale-eyed friend."

  Elisabeth could not turn her face away from the delicious prospect, though she had to look up now as the breasts were raised on the standing woman. "What guess?"

  A rich contralto with a musical lilt replied from somewhere above the breasts. "That you have never been with a woman, signore," it smiled, its German heavily accented.

  Elisabeth's eyes went up, traveling from those Alps and their deep valley to a white throat and thence to a pair of lips so red and rich that they could only be matched by the dark, lustrous eyes that sized Elisabeth up.

  Ruggiero spoke to the woman in Italian. She shook her head and replied in a peevish voice.

  Ranulf reached to his belt and fumbled in a drawstring pouch. He produced a gorgeous gold ring with a small but brilliant red stone. "Not even for this?"

  Giuliana's eyes were now as riveted on the gem as Elisabeth's had been on her breasts, where they again rested. "But I do not like to be their first. They come all over you and then they weep. They fall in love and fight the men you take to your bed." Nevertheless she asked, "Is it real?"

  "See for yourself," Ranulf grinned and handed the ring to her.

  The woman examined it, leaning to a candle, and then bit the stone. "Jesu Christe!" she swore.

  "I told you," Ranulf retorted. "Now how about it?"

  Giuliana eyed Elisabeth. "You promise not to get your spunk all over me?"

  Elisabeth nodded dumbly. What little consciousness that remained told her she had no spunk to spill, so it was no lie.

  "And do you promise not to fall in love and think you own me?" the woman persisted.

  In Elisabeth's ears it was an angel chorus, but something seemed to be expected, so she nodded again.