Birth of the Kingdom

Sverre, King of Norway

Harald Øysteinsson, leader of the Norwegian forces

THE SVERKER CLAN

King Sverker Karlsson

Helena Sverkersdotter, his daughter, who marries Sune Folkesson

Archbishop Petter/Petrus

Archbishop Absalon

Archbishop Valerius

Father Guillaume

Brother Guilbert

Brother Joseph d’Anjou

Map (#ulink_1ad7cf31-76fc-56d7-9518-59dc9d1917ff)

ONE (#ulink_808e625a-7b05-54fa-a374-afe7650924e4)

In the year of Grace 1192 just before the mass of Saint Eskil, when the nights turned white and the work of sowing the turnips would soon begin, a mighty storm came over Western Götaland. The storm lasted for three days and three nights, and it transformed the bright, promising season into autumn.

On the third night after the midnight mass, most of the monks at Varnhem cloister were still sleeping soundly, convinced that their prayers were resisting the powers of darkness and that the storm would soon die down. It was then that Brother Pietro out in the receptorium at first thought that he’d been wakened from his sleep by something in his imagination. He awoke and sat up in bed without knowing what he had heard. Outside the walls and the heavy oak door of the receptorium was only the howling of the storm and the lashing of the rain on the roof tiles and the leafy crowns of the tall ash trees.

Then he heard it again. It sounded like an iron fist pounding on the door.

In terror he tumbled out of bed, grabbed his rosary, and started muttering a prayer that he didn’t quite remember but that was supposed to ward off evil spirits. Then he went out to the vaulted entry and listened in the dark. Three heavy blows came again, and Brother Pietro could do nothing but shout through the oaken door for the stranger to make himself known. He shouted in Latin, because that language had the most power against the dark forces and because he was too groggy to say anything in the oddly singing vernacular that was spoken outside those walls.

‘Who comes this night to the Lord’s steps?’ he called, with his mouth close to the door’s lock.

‘A servant of the Lord with pure intentions and a worthy mission,’ replied the stranger in perfect Latin.

This calmed Brother Pietro’s fears, and he struggled with the heavy door handle of black cast-iron before he managed to open the door a crack.

Outside stood a stranger in an ankle-length leather cape with a hood to protect him from the rain. He shoved open the door at once with a strength that Brother Pietro could never have resisted and entered the shelter of the entryway as he pushed the monk before him.

‘God’s peace, a very long journey is now at an end. But let’s not talk in the dark. Fetch your lamp from the receptorium, my unknown brother,’ said the stranger.

Brother Pietro did as he was told, already reassured by the fact that the stranger spoke the language of the church and knew that there was a lamp in the receptorium. The monk fumbled for a moment with the last embers in the heating pan before he managed to light a wick and insert it into an oil lamp. When he returned to the vaulted entry outside the receptorium, both he and the stranger became bathed in the light reflecting off the whitewashed walls. The stranger swept off his leather cape and shook the rain from it. Brother Pietro involuntarily caught his breath when he saw the white surcoat with the red cross. From his time in Rome he knew quite well what that meant. A Templar knight had come to Varnhem.

‘My name is Arn de Gothia and you have nothing to fear from me, brother, for I was raised here in Varnhem, and from here I once rode forth to the Holy Land. But I don’t know you; what is your name, brother?’

‘I am Brother Pietro de Siena, and I have been here only two years.’

‘So you’re new here. That’s why you have to guard the door when no one else wishes to do so. But tell me first, is Father Henri still alive?’

‘No, he died four years ago.’

‘Let us pray for his eternal bliss,’ said the Templar knight, crossing himself and bowing his head for a moment.

‘Is Brother Guilbert alive?’ the knight asked when he looked up.

‘Yes, brother, he’s an old man but he still has much vigour.’

‘That doesn’t surprise me. What is our new abbot called?’

‘His name is Father Guillaume de Bourges, and he came to us three years ago.’

‘Almost two hours remain before matins, but would you please wake him and say that Arn de Gothia has come to Varnhem?’ said the knight, with what looked almost like a jocular gleam in his eyes.

‘I’d rather not, brother. Father Guillaume maintains that sleep is a gift from God which we are duty-bound to administer well,’ replied Brother Pietro uneasily, squirming with displeasure at the thought of waking Father Guillaume for a matter that might not be of sufficient urgency.

‘I understand. Go instead and wake Brother Guilbert and tell him that his apprentice Arn de Gothia is waiting in the receptorium,’ the knight said kindly, although it was still an order.

‘Brother Guilbert might also be cross…I cannot leave my post in the receptorium in the middle of this evil night,’ said Brother Pietro, attempting to wriggle out of obeying the command.

‘Ah!’ said the knight with a laugh. ‘First of all, you may confidently leave the watch to a Templar knight of the Lord; you could have no stronger replacement. Second, I swear that you will be waking that old bear Guilbert with good news. So, go now. I’ll wait here and assume your watch as best I can, I promise you.’

The Templar knight had stated his command in a way that could not be refuted. Brother Pietro nodded and scurried down the arcade towards the little courtyard that was the last open space before entering the monastery proper through another oaken door.

It was not long before the door from the monastery to the receptorium courtyard was thrown open with a bang and a familiar voice echoed down the white arcade. Brother Guilbert came striding down the hallway, holding a tar torch in his hand. He did not seem as huge as before; no longer a giant. When he spied the stranger by the door, he raised his torch to see better. Then he handed the torch to Brother Pietro and went over to embrace the stranger. Neither of them uttered a word for a long time.

‘I thought you had fallen at the battle of Tiberias, my dear Arn,’ Brother Guilbert finally said in Frankish. ‘Father Henri thought so too, and we’ve said many unnecessary prayers for your soul.’

‘Those prayers were not unnecessary, seeing as I can now thank you for them in this life, brother,’ Arn de Gothia said.

Then neither of them seemed able to say anything more, and they both had to wrestle for control so as not to express unseemly emotions. It occurred to Brother Pietro that the two men must have been very close.

‘Have you come to pray at the grave of your mother, Fru Sigrid?’ Brother Guilbert asked at last, in a tone he would use with an ordinary traveller.

‘Yes, of course I want to do that,’ replied the knight in the same tone of voice. ‘But I also have a great many other things to do here at home in Varnhem, and I must first ask your help with a number of small matters that are best done before taking on the larger tasks.’

‘You know that I’ll help you with anything. Just say the word and we’ll get started.’

‘I have twenty men and ten wagons out there in the rain. Many of the men are of an ilk that cannot so easily set foot within these walls. I also have ten heavily loaded wagons, and the first three of them would be best brought into the courtyard.’ The knight spoke rapidly, as if he were talking of commonplace things, although the wagons must be very important if they had to be protected within the cloister walls.

Without a word Brother Guilbert grabbed the torch from the younger monk’s hand and stepped into the rain outside the door of the receptorium. There was indeed a line of ten muddy wagons out there, and they must have had a difficult journey. Hunched over the reins of the oxen sat surly men who did not look to have the heart for any more travelling.

Brother Guilbert laughed when he saw them, shaking his head with a smile. Then he called to Brother Pietro and began barking orders as though he himself were a Templar knight and not a Cistercian monk.

It took less than an hour to arrange accommodations for the visitors. One of the many rules at Varnhem said that anyone who came travelling by night should be accorded the same hospitality as the Lord Himself. It was a rule that Brother Guilbert kept repeating to himself, first half in jest but with ever greater amusement when he heard from the Templar knight that perhaps smoked hams were not the best sort of delicacy to serve the men in welcome. The joke about the unsuitability of smoked hams, however, went straight over Brother Pietro’s head.

But Varnhem’s entire hospitium outside the walls was empty and dark, since few travellers had arrived during the storms of the past few days. Soon the guests were both housed and fed.